CHAPTER ONE
"Do you have one on your desk?" Benson asked, frantically lifting John's papers from his desk.
"Hey! Hey! That's important stuff!" Munch hissed.
"Fine, let me ask again: do you have one of these?" Benson interrogated slowly, deliberately, and angrily.
"Olivia, stop harassing John. You've all got one. Pack up your desks: you're taking on a case," Cragen spoke, causing Stabler and Fin to look up from their computers.
"What kind of case? Dickie starts t-ball tonight and I need to be there for him," Elliot asked. Cragen nodded.
"Munch will be your captain during this case," Cragen said with a slight smirk as John muttered "This shit again?" under his breath. "Sargent, you're in charge of your own personnel, the decisions that affect them, and filling out their hours forms. This isn't an open/shut case, nor is it an easy one, but I wanted my best on it."
"What kind of case is this?" Fin asked, finding him summons and scanning it. All it mentioned was a warehouse and a lot of unsolved cases.
"A classified one. The FBI recently discovered it, and now they've placed everything they could in a warehouse, along with temporary offices for the detectives who will work through it. They wanted my detectives due to your good track records. Don't screw that up before this even begins," Cragen said sternly. "Now hurry up. The temporary detectives are coming within the hour and will need a place to work."
"How long is this going to last?" John asked, pulling out a large box and tossing his personals into it.
"Until the case is solved or you deem it unsolvable. I imagine it's going to take a while to go through everything, and a long time to get with each witness, analyze each piece of evidence, and determine if those are the only victims."
"Analyzing evidence? We need specialists for that, like Warner, the computer specialists-" Olivia listed, stopping her packing to give Cragen a skeptical look.
"Warner and a temporary lab will be at your disposal, and the rest of your needs can be covered by those that are still here. Listen, detectives: you are all about to take on the hardest case of your lives. Though John will be running things, I'm still calling the shots. You will get to see your son play t-ball, you three can occasionally spend your nights doing whatever it is you do, but work your magic on this case. The nation needs it; the nation needs you."
With that, Cragen returned to his office. His detectives obeyed, but they were all nervous. What kind of hard case needs to be built in a warehouse? What kind of case gets thrown at SVU that affects the entire nation, not just their borough? They were all about to find out, whether they wanted to or not.
