Title: "Tears For The Dead"

Author: Miss Capitaine/deliciouslycrzy

Rating: T

Genre: Romance/Angst/Tragedy

Pairings:Ross/Rodgers

Summary: Liz Rodgers didn't cry.

Warnings: Major Character Death. Prepare the tissues.

Spoilers: Season 9, "Loyalty Pt. 1".

Note: This is the story I started writing the Thursday after Loyalty aired.

Disclaimer: If I owned L&O CI, Danny and Liz would have gotten more screen time and Danny wouldn't be dead, he would be in Witness Protection.

Liz Rodgers didn't cry.

She was an M.E of a large, sprawling city.

She saw atrocities daily: Women raped and brutally beaten to death, children shot, execution style, to the back of the head, the hundreds of John and Jane Doe's that crossed her examination table yearly, never being identified, never allowing the unknown families the closure of knowing what had happened to their loved ones.

She had seen everything that could possibly be done to the human body, and because of that very fact, Rodgers was able to be calm and collected even when seeing some of the most barbaric and immoral aspects of human nature brought to light. It was also the reason she could put up with the more eccentric detectives on the NYPD poking around her bodies (She didn't like it, but she was used to it.) She prided herself on her ability to be completely unflappable, by exposure if not choice.

But this case was different, and Rodgers couldn't help but be completely and utterly flapped.

It was simple, or at least became so, when the victim was anonymous, because there was no connection, no way to somehow connect the dead body to the person it was before its untimely demise. But when it was someone you knew, someone you had a personal relationship with, the game changed.

She'd caught the case completely on accident. Having just returned a body to the city morgue, she had been just heading out to her car when the call from dispatch came in.

Rodgers considered ignoring the call and letting her assistants deal with it. She had a bottle of French Bordeaux waiting patiently for her (and her usual company.) Rodgers honestly didn't know what the difference between wines were, but the one currently chilling in her wine cooler had tasted delicious the last time she had tried it. Also, it was the only thing that was always Danny's responsibility when they got together. 'What he lacks in cooking and cleaning skills he makes up for with his excellent taste in wine.' Rodgers turned around with a resigned sigh; the wine would have to wait. Danny, hopefully, wouldn't mind.

It was part of their usual mid-week routine; they would meet for dinner (At Rodger's place, usually. As previously stated, Danny's cooking skills left something to be desired), share a bottle of wine, and just spend some well deserved time together. They were both busy during the week, and more often than not their nights together usually just ended with the both of them falling asleep on the couch to the sound of Rodgers' favorite Opera. It wasn't ideal, but Rodgers was usually too tired to care much about it. Just being able to sleep with another human being was luxury she hadn't enjoyed since before Lennie had gotten sick, so she didn't usually complain. Danny always tried to make it up to her, in one way or another.

This week however, had been more hectic than usual, what with the piracy case, and Danny had visited that morning, delivering both the wine and some bad news while Rodgers was still in the shower.

She hadn't expected that knock on the shower door, and was, to say the least, pleasantly surprised when she saw that it was him.

That happy feeling disappeared when she noticed the apologetic look on his tired face.

'I'm going to be late this evening.' He had said, obvious regret evident in eyes; there was something else there, too, something that Liz only recognized once Danny finished his sentence. "I thought I would... try and and make it up to you."

Needless to say, they had both been late to work, and Rodger's hair had still been drying off when she cut into her first body of the day.

The day had been slow, or as slow as the day of a medical examiner could be in a large, violent city like New York. There had been relatively few bodies that day, and Liz had been fully expecting to be able to go home early, maybe enjoy a glass of one of the many bottles of wine that Danny had brought over in the past year. (The wine chiller had been a gift from him as well.) She had put his latest gift in the wine chiller in the hopes that they would be able to share it later.

Now, as she looked back on it, Liz wished that she had replaced that bottle of fine wine with something a little bit stronger.

~/~/~/~/~/~/~/~/~

Liz accepted the phone from the receptionist, leaning against the woman's desk casually. "Rodgers." She greeted curtly, ignoring the squawk of protest from said receptionist.

"Liz, it's Martin." Liz didn't smile, but the slight light in her eyes would have alerted anyone who knew her (eg. Danny) that the person on the other end of the phone was a friend. In fact, Liz had known Martin for years. He was a paramedic, and the two had met years ago on the job, of course. "Martin, this is a surprise. How have you been?"

"I've been good." Martin answered, and Liz noticed an off tone in his unusually gruff tone. "Liz, uh... There's something you need to see."

Liz's lips twitched into what could be called a frown. She didn't think she liked where this was going. "Martin, what's going on?"

"It's not something I should talk about on the phone." Martin paused, and Liz could hear another voice in the background, saying something indistinct. "Look, Liz, I wouldn't be calling if it wasn't important. It's... Captain Ross."

Liz felt a sudden feeling of dread in the pit of her stomach. " Where?"

It would have usually taken Liz twenty minutes to get to the construction site that Martin had directed her to, but she was able to make it in ten.

It was just outside city limits, somewhere with very little foot traffic. This fact alone made her rush as she scrambled out of her car. The situation left a bad taste in her mouth, and she couldn't help but feel chilled as she walked through the nearly deserted construction site. She pulled the collar of her jacket up around her neck, trying to ward off the cold.

She could see flashing lights, not dissimilar to the ones of an ambulance, so she turned in that direction. From what she could see, there were two men standing over a chillingly still body. She couldn't see who it was, but the feeling in the pit of her stomach, fear, grew stronger.

One of the men looked up, and Liz realized that it was Martin. She moved to get closer, but he held up his hand, an unusually somber look on his face. "Wait, Liz, I've got to talk to you first." He said, placing a hand on Liz's shoulder. He gently led her away, behind the ambulance. From here, she couldn't see what was going on with the other two men. She could hear murmuring voices, but that was it. Liz sighed and put her hands on her hips, glaring subtly at the older paramedic.

"Well, Martin, what is it?" She asked, her voice collected despite the feeling she couldn't quite shake. She noted that the older man seemed quite shaken.

For a moment, he looked as if he was struggling with what to say. "Liz... Rey and I got the call earlier from dispatch, said that a Caucasian guy had two gunshot wounds to the chest. He'd been found by a couple of kids, cutting through the site." Martin paused, running a sweaty hand through his thinning hair. "They didn't know who he was. We got here and..." His voice trailed off. Liz's eyes widened, her lips set into a hard line; The fears were getting harder to ignore now, since it was as though they were clawing on her insides, making it hard for her to think straight. "He's septic. He wouldn't survive the 'bus ride to the hospital. He asked us to call you."

Liz Rodgers didn't cry.

But when she saw the man she had fallen in love with over the past year, lying beaten and broken on a tattered, blood-stained bed sheet, she couldn't help the tears that burned at her eyes.

The sound of sirens was familiar, but most certainly not comforting. The ambulance, which was supposed to be something that could help save lives, was sitting idle, while Martin and his partner quietly buzzed around, trying to make their 'patient' comfortable.

"Oh god." Liz's vision blurred, a fresh batch of tears welling in her eyes. Her throat felt tight, and for a moment she didn't think she could speak.

Danny was laid out on the ground, partially wrapped in an old blue sheet, something that looked as though it had been sitting, forgotten in the back of an ambulance for years. There was a dark stain on it, one that seemed to grow before Liz's eyes.

Danny's breathing was short and ragged; the sound of him struggling to breathe almost broke Liz's heart. He didn't have much time left, she realized. Liz grabbed his hand gently, but firmly, and squeezed lightly.

His eyelids flickered; His pale eyes were glazed, but he quickly locked his gaze on her. "Liz." He whispered, his voice weaker than she had ever heard it. He looked more confused than anything, and this fact made Liz cry even harder.

"I'm here, Danny." She muttered. She managed a weak and teary smile, just for him.

"You're crying." He observed, his eyebrows knitting together weakly. "It must be serious." He added, his lips twisting into a wry half-smile. When he saw the look on Liz's face, however, the smile quickly faded. "I really screwed up."

Liz shook her head, gently taking Danny's hand and placing it on his chest. She laid her hands over his, lightly, so as not to hurt him. "Just a bit."

Danny's eyes narrowed. "I was... working-" His chest heaved, and he coughed. All Liz could do was watch helplessly as he was wracked with coughs, each one seemingly more painful than the last. It took Danny a few minutes to allow for the coughing to subside. " It was a RICO case." He continued, his voice noticeably weaker than before. "I was undercover."

Liz didn't question this; instead, she placed her free hand on his cheek, and suddenly had forgotten what she had wanted to say. "I was really looked forward to that bottle of wine, too." She finished lamely, her voice cracking. Danny smiled weakly at the banality of her comment.

They sat in silence for awhile longer, as Danny's breathing continued to grow more ragged and force. Liz continued to hold his hand, her thumb massaging along his palm. Her other hand was entangled in his dark curls, her fingers resting against his almost too cool skin. She couldn't help it; she felt hot tears prickling at her eyes again, and her breath hitched.

" Hey, don't cry Liz." He whispered, and slowly raised a hand to wipe her tears away. "Do you really want my last memory to be of you crying over a dying man?"

Liz sniffed, smiling slightly in spite of her tears. "You should be honored. I don't just cry over anyone, you know."

Danny made a noise; Liz belatedly realized it was a sort of a choking laugh, and she felt even more grief at the pain he was in. "I'm going to miss you, Elizabeth." Her heart broke. Liz's eyes fluttered close to hide the tears, and suddenly, she felt his thumb tracing a pattern over her jawline. For a moment she entertained the thought that this was like any other day, and when she opened her eyes they would be home, and this whole, painful place would just be a distant nightmare. She held onto this thought for only a moment, before letting it fly away. She felt her throat tighten as the full realization of what had happened hit her.

"I'm going to miss you too, Danny."

She kissed him, pressing her lips to his as gently as possible.

It wasn't the beginning of something, as it had been so many times in the past. There would be no happy ending for them, as Liz had envisioned once or twice. There would be no white picket fences, 2.5 kids or small dogs named Spot. Their short-lived romance would end here, on a hard dirt ground, leaving only one of them alive to grieve for what could have been.

Liz knew that it was over, that there would be so riding off into the sunset together for them, so she tried as hard as she could to stave off the impending shock, just long enough to say goodbye.

She pulled away from him, her eyes stinging. "I love you." Liz whispered hoarsely, and Danny nodded.

"Liz, will you..." he coughed again. " Tell my kids-" He took a shuddering breath. He opened his mouth as if to speak, but Liz silenced him by pressing a finger to his lips.

"Of course." Her attempts to keep from crying had become a losing battle, and Liz moved to wipe the tears away angrily when Danny grabbed her hand.

"It will be okay." He said, and then with what he had left, pushed himself up and kissed her one last time. Liz relished the feel of his lips against hers, the light brushing of his fingers against her cheek as he pulled away, and the look in his eyes as he spoke his last words.

"I love you too."

By the time the F.B.I had arrived, Danny was gone. She didn't want to leave him, that was the last thing she would ever choose to do willingly, if she were in her right mind, but of course, she wasn't. So Liz stood up when one of the agents, a woman, came up behind her and told her that she would have to leave. She was composed, at first. For maybe the first thirty seconds.

And then she began to run, and she didn't stop until she had reached the yellow crime scene tape.

That episode killed me. Danny's death, Liz's reaction to it... I had to give them a goodbye. Please review!