This is just a little fluff and fun I thought we'd enjoy.

Dick Wolf is allowed to use this if he wants, they're his characters after all.

A Room full of Feathers

The ad promised enough feathers to make any mattress soft as a cloud. Bobby was trying to make something special for Alex who was sore after her battle with a perp and her muscles were giving her trouble. He specially ordered the feathers and was busily stuffing them into a couple of blankets he'd hired to be sewn together when the call came in that they had a call. He dropped what he was doing and headed out for the crime scene.

Alex picked him up in the department SUV and filled him in on the way to the scene. Not for the first time did it occur to Bobby that more murders were committed during the nighttime than the day. Didn't these people sleep?

The victim had been killed with a single blow to the head and just left to lay there for whoever to find. He hadn't been disturbed, robbed or mutilated in the least. It looked like a business man who'd wandered out from a bar. He still had his expensive suit on, Italian shoes and a warm overcoat. However the one side of his face was caved in from a heavy object and there was blood everywhere.

Bobby found the mans watch laying a few feet down the alley from the body. It looked like someone wanted the watch for the engraving on the back. He sent it to the lab to be analyzed and turned to his partner who was standing beside the body looking stiff and miserable.

"I think we can wait somewhere warmer now until they're done with the autopsy. Want to go get some breakfast?"

"I just want to lay down somewhere." She groaned.

"Come back to my place. I'll let you use up all the hot water and stretch out on my new mattress."

One of the CSU techs gave him a surprised look. "Sore muscles from wrestling alligators." Alex snapped at the man. He had the presence of mind to find something to do in a hurry in another location. "You know this is going to get all over the precinct now."

"Sorry. I'm just concerned about you." Bobby shrugged.

Alex sighed. "It sounds heavenly. My hot water is usually gone by this time of day."

"Then let me take care of you. You've done so much for me."

"Alright. Just this once. I'll even let you drive."

She really had to have been hurting. He took the keys from her and escorted her back to the SUV, trying not to hover. He was careful how he drove so she wouldn't tense up. She was stiff and even sort of comical when he escorted her up to his apartment. "Sit down, I'll start the water." He said.

"I can get it, Bobby, I'm not an invalid." She said crossly.

"I know. I just want to do this for you."

"Fine, but you're not helping me get undressed."

"Whatever you say." He hastily got that image out of his mind. He hurried into his bathroom and turned the water on and then moved the bag of feathers around the other side of the bed and straightened the covers so it couldn't be seen. With any luck she'd be in the bath so long he'd be able to finish stuffing the bed with feathers.

He put some aromatic bath crystals in the water and tested it with his arm. It was just right. Alex was moving stiffly around the kitchen when he got back. "What are you doing?" he asked.

"Making some tea. I'm thirsty and cold." She informed him crisply.

"Go get in the tub. I'll make you some tea and it'll be ready when you're done."

Alex gave him a suspicious look. "Are you up to something?"

"I-I'm just trying to take care of my partner." He protested trying to look angelic.

Alex looked at him for a few long seconds and sighed. "Okay. I'll let you know when I'm ready to get out. Don't come in."

"I won't." he promised.

She went into the bedroom and he sighed. He put the tea kettle on and tracked her movements by the sounds she was making. The closing of the bathroom door, sounds of more water running in the tub, and her gentle sighs and the smell of the bath crystals as she stirred up the water.

When he was certain she was safely in the tub and he wasn't going to see something she wasn't offering he crept into his bedroom and started stuffing feathers again as fast as he could. Feathers are not known for being stuffed in a hurry and neatly.

He could hear her splashing around in the tub. He hurried as fast as possible but the tea started to whistle and she called. "Pour me some, I'm getting out of the tub."

He flew to the kitchen to do that. He poured it and let it steep while he got out the sugar and creamer she liked. "Don't come in for a minute. I'm going to stretch out on the bed."

"Okay." He called back. He set the cream and sugar on a tray, reached for a spoon when an awful thought hit him. "Alex, wait….." he cried and bolted for the door.

He flung it open and gazed upon his wet, nearly naked partner stretched out on top of a deflated bag of feathers while a cloud of them floated on the air currents in the room. He wasn't sure to laugh or cry, try to apologize or run like hell. He wondered where her gun was.

She struggled to sit up and glared at him. "What happened?" she demanded.

"I, um, was trying to surprise you with." He had to stop and blow feathers away from his mouth so he could breath, "A soft as a cloud bed and I didn't get to finish" more feathers in his face "filling up the bag or sewing it shut."

The feathers were attaching themselves to Alexs wet hair and damp body. She was starting to look like a huge chicken. Her glare didn't help anything. Bobby tried not to laugh, but it was just too funny. "You-You have feathers in your hair." He barely got out around the laughter.

Then Alex looked down at the mess in the room and on her legs and towel and she started to laugh as well. "I better watch out for Colonel Sanders." She said with a grimace.

The two ended up rolling on the bed laughing with all the feathers on it and spent the rest of the day picking them off each other. Who would have thought how much fun it would be to have a room full of feathers?

TBC