a/n: so I wrote this story as my entry in the livejournal eoficathon and it was much fun. So basically, I have very little claim to this. The main characters are not mine (Damn you Dick Wolf and NBC, damn you) and the story idea was given to me by marikatz over livejournal obviously, which means that only what I chose to do with it can I claim as mine. But I like to think that's something significant. I was going to post this to my livejournal first, but of course me being me my short stories turn into Novellas before I blink my eyes, so it was too big for a livejournal entry. LAME. I know. Not my fault. Anyway, enough babbling. Please enjoy! Thanks to everyone who participated in the eoficathon. I had sssooo much fun and I can't wait to read everyone else's stories!

TangoSVU

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Wounding Embrace

by TangoSVU

for marikatz

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"Go around!"

"I'll take the back!"

Simultaneous shouted whispers. Guns are drawn, all the pieces are in place and the stage has been set. Everything that happened has led them here, to this very spot, and there's no way to avoid how the cards have been dealt. They have to play the hand out until the end.

He breaks the front door at the same time he hears her do the same to the back door. Even when apart, they act together.

"Stephanie, don't do this."

"My name is Olivia!" she corrects angrily and Elliot heads toward the sound of their voices, keeping an eye out for other people. "And when you've seen the things I've seen, you wouldn't hesitate either."

"You have no idea who I am," he says.

"You don't know me, either." She replies immediately.

Something in this cabin is making the voices echo more than they should. There are too many rooms. Elliot is having a hard time figuring out where they are. He needs to be there, have his partner's back.

"You don't understand what's at stake here,"

"No, that's where you're wrong. Every step I take, the ground is obliterated by the souls that people like you have ruined."

He's already been in this room. He's all turned around. Where the heck are they?

"You're really willing to give it all up for a fight you'll never win?"

"Stopping people like you is worth it."

He sighs, almost laughs. "So naïve,"

And then there's a shot.

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Five Days Prior

"Benson, Stabler, my office." Cragen gathers his two lead detectives into the room behind him.

"What's up?" Olivia questions as the door closes, both her and her partner watching their Captain expectantly.

In response, he passes them a manila folder that is so full it is literally spilling its innards. They both take a side and begin flipping page after page of monstrosity. Everywhere they look there are pictures of children objectified, victimized, abused. Each child has old eyes, ones full of horrors, ones that shine only the emptiness they feel instead of a soul. A tear threatens to slip out of the corner of Olivia's eye but she funnels head-first into her anger instead and releases her part of the folder to Elliot. "What's the plan?" If she goes straight into action, there's a chance of making it all okay again. There has to be.

"This is a top priority case." Cragen starts. "This website is home to over fifty different child victims with anywhere between one thousand and three thousand hits from paying members a day. They have been tracked for nearly two years over thirty different precincts across the U.S. but nobody's been able to catch them."

Elliot interrupts briefly. "Them?"

"A husband and wife tag-team" Pages flip, searching for information that isn't there. "There's no names, no pictures, no details besides that website. Look," they turn away from the evidence in the folder. "The brass is putting a lot of heat on this. We need to stop them now. We've just gotten reports of their whereabouts, it's seems they're operating from a camp in the mountains upstate, so I'm sending the two of you in as part of a married couple's wilderness retreat."

"Wait, couple's?" Olivia and Elliot give each other a sideways glance.

Cragen releases the tension in his jaw slightly. "You think I'd send Munch and Fin?"

It creates quite an amusing picture, but no one laughs. Their slice of the world has always been too grim.

"I'm trusting you guys with this. Here're your cover stories." More folders with more information to be processed. "Go. Do what you have to do, and get your asses back here in one piece. I don't have the time, the money or the energy to replace you."

Tucking the mass of papers beneath their arms, they nod in unison. "Got it, Cap." Elliot assures him, and then glances at Olivia before following her out.

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Three Days Later

He's been driving slowly for the last hour – not because he cannot maneuver the windy roads but because neither one of them really knows where they're going – but finally he pulls into a driveway and stops completely.

Elliot places his hand on the armrest between them, his palm outstretched and waiting for hers. "You ready, Stephanie?" The name feels strange inside his mouth.

They've poured over the folders for hours, memorized all the details of their persona, this new life they must lead. They've been married for ten years. She, a thirty-nine year old business woman who runs a corporate office. He, a forty-one year old banker whose time-filler is playing golf at a renowned club. They're both affluent citizens from well-to-do families and have never had children themselves. It's a life that many people have; it just isn't theirs. But it is now.

There's a moment of hesitation as she watches him, and then she rests her palm inside his and allows him to grasp it. "Ready, Marshall." And they take a step towards the cabin buried in the trees. They can do this. They can do it together. They will. They have to.

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Later that Night

The day had been quite uneventful. It was a really small group. Only four couples: Ethan and Margaret (Maggie), Brennan and Elizabeth, Thomas and LeAnna, and them, Marshall and Stephanie. Everyone kept to themselves at dinner but the respective sexes began mingling at the evening get-together. It was supposed to be a weekend of heart-to-hearts, rediscovering your passion and recommitting to your spouse, but thankfully the first evening was mostly a "figure out how to share this space" sort of thing.

Even then, Elliot and Olivia don't have time to talk about their observations until everyone split off to their cabins. They make sure all the doors and windows are locked and then meet up in the bedroom, which is where they suddenly pause.

The awkwardness and insecurity of it all fills the room, but what makes them suffocate is that both of them want something they think the other one doesn't. He's seen her in her bra before and she's seen him in his boxers, but somehow this just feels new and almost wrong. She flips the light switch off with the side of her hand to try to make things easier and he suddenly speaks. "I can sleep on the floor,"

"No," she stops him with her abrupt whisper. "We don't know who's watching. We can't risk it." She climbs into her side of the bed then and delicately places herself beneath the sheets.

He waits for her to settle before doing the same. There must be a foot of space between them. He wants to touch her so badly he thinks he can actually feel her heat transfer to him through the sheets. It's insufferable, but they can't talk about it. "So who do you like?" she says, trying to reign his thoughts back in.

"Thomas seems a little strange…"

"But I'm not getting anything from LeAnna," she refutes. "What do you think about Ethan?"

"I don't know. It's hard to tell, especially without a background check on any of the couples." He turns on his side towards her. "Besides, shouldn't we be focusing more on the leaders? I don't see why anyone would lug all their equipment out here with them just for a weekend."

She disagrees. "Cragen said they were running their operation from here though. Elizabeth was telling me that it's easy to rent one of the cabins for an extended vacation. Who would look for a child porn business up here? Maybe they're just participating in the couples' thing to keep up appearances."

"Then I guess we'll just have to stake out the other cabins tomorrow and go from there."

She nods even though he can't see her and faces him as well. "It'll be easiest if we split them up. I'll take Brennan and Elizabeth's, you take Ethan and Maggie's and whoever's done first can get the other one."

Suddenly a window bangs open, hurled by the wind. Elliot flings back the covers to reclose it and by the time he gets back into bed, the atmosphere has dropped several degrees and Olivia is shivering. Instinctively, Elliot reaches for her to pull her closer but Olivia freezes. "El," she whispers and he puts a finger on her lips.

"Ssshhh, Stephanie." It's meant to comfort, but also a gentle reminder that they're not who they think they are, and maybe that makes everything ok. "You were the one who mentioned keeping up appearances." He continues.

She has a desperate want to kiss him: the way the moonlight is twinkling in his eyes and the shadows fall across his muscled arms as he waits for her. She sighs, then rolls over and scoots back until she can feel the bare skin of his chest and his arms curl his warmth around her body.

She knows she shouldn't; she knows she can't. But they're not themselves tonight, so maybe, just maybe, this little cross over the boundary won't matter. Maybe this little act will be enough for a lifetime. And they sleep content in each other's arms.

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The Next Morning

"Alright, let's continue with this topic. Stephanie, Marshall, you don't have any children. How has that affected your relationship?"

"I love kids." Elliot jumps in. She knows she has to pick it up; play the part like it's just another time to sweat out a perp inside the bullpen, so she does. She always does her job.

"And you think I don't?" Instantly on the defensive.

"Well you're never home,"

"Like you are?" She twists in the unyielding chair beneath her. "Seems like I'm always calling when you're at the golf course with your buddies."

He looks to the mediator. "She always mentions that. She just hates that I have friends I can hang out with and she doesn't."

Olivia scoffs but the mediator steps in before anything else can be said. "Hang on a minute; let's not start attacking each other. Remember, this is an exercise in listening honestly to the other person and trying to resolve conflicts with compromise." Elliot and Olivia both let out a sigh and look away. "Now, Stephanie, what is it that you're hearing right now from Marshall?"

"He thinks that I don't care. He thinks I'm punishing him by not being home."

"Are you?"

She pauses, looks at him with sincerity in her eyes. "No. But my job is really important to me and he doesn't seem to understand that."

"I do understand how much it means to you," He responds and then grabs her hands inside his own. "But is your job more important than a child? More important than us?"

It's a persona, an assignment, a play that they are acting in. Whatever it is, it is not reality. Even still, there's something in their words that hits too close to home. He's staring at her with those solid blue eyes; begging for her to give him the answer but she can't. She doesn't have the answer.

Instead, she yanks herself from his grasp and only once she's reached the door does she turn back slightly. "It's not that simple," she whispers. And then she's gone.

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Elliot doesn't even need confirmation from the mediator to run after her, but Olivia's nowhere to be seen. He wants to think that she planned this as the perfect chance to do their scouting missions, but on the way to the first cabin he still knows that there was more truth to that conversation than either of them had meant to face. And there's more that he needs to tell her, there's more that has to be said, but he'll wait for her. He has to wait for her. Then he's at a cabin and he forces his thoughts into the task at hand. That's always worked before. The job saves them at the same time it condemns them.

There's nothing in Ethan and Maggie's cabin. No folders, no cameras or suspicious photos and no computer. It's even set up the same way that their cabin is: small, plain and boring. He gets out of there before anybody spots him and makes his way to Thomas and LeAnna's cabin. He has his hand on the doorknob when suddenly a voice halts his advance. "Looking for someone?"

Elliot rotates quickly to meet the scowl aimed directly at him. "Huh? Oh, Thomas. Hey, I'm just looking for my wife."

"In my cabin?"

"Your cabin?" He turns back and pretends to study the building for a moment before taking his hand off the doorknob and moving a few steps backward. "Sorry man, I get so turned around up here. They all look the same, you know? Shit, I don't know how anybody finds anything without a GPS nowadays." He laughs, but Thomas just replaces the scowl with a skeptic expression and gives a slight nod before disappearing inside the cabin.

Elliot waves innocently and figures it probably is time to head back to his own cabin anyway. He can smell the remains of the noon meal emanating from the cafeteria but he's not hungry. Something is going on here and they don't have much time to stop it. He needs to find his partner. That's right. That's it. He just needs to find Olivia.

---------------------------------------------

She's in the cabin already when he closes the door behind him. She's just sitting there, her body turned away from him, as if she's done nothing except plan for this moment when she is no longer waiting on him and it stirs something within him that he cannot describe. "What was that about?" He shouts, instantly angry as he closes the distance between them.

"What was what, Marshall?" She spits the name at him antagonistically, as if signifying that he can't do a thing about it. They push each other; that's the way it's always been, but not like this. This is different.

"That!" He swallows, tensing his muscles and pulling his fingers together into a fist. He wants to strike at something. This was supposed to be a simple assignment. Easy in, a little investigating, easy out. They've done undercover stints before, hell, they've even been a married couple before, so what was making this so hard? What was going on? What had turned so sour between them?

"It's just a job, remember? Simple. Easy." And she's always been able to do that, pull words from his mind and speak them and for some reason this time it pisses him off even more. He's about to yell at her again when she tilts her face behind her so that he can see her smile. But that's not what he focuses on. All of the sudden he gets lost in her eyes, and her words may be angry but there's something else entirely behind her eyes. And that's when he realizes that, for some reason, she wants him angry. She'd rather deal with him angry than, than what?

He softens, takes a few steps towards her. "But the job is important to you." Olivia closes her eyes so that she doesn't have to look at him anymore but he can't stop now. "You can't bear to lose it, even if it means gaining the only thing you want."

She's trying to hold onto the anger because she thinks the anger keeps her strong. He brushes his fingers across her forehead to move her bangs out of her eyes as a single tear slips down her cheek and it only burns in him as further proof that it's her humanity and her soul that makes her strong. It's what keeps her beautiful when the world tries to drown her in muck. It's what keeps him from giving into the darkness himself. It's what keeps him strong, to keep her strong; a never-ending cycle, a continuous circle. He wants that. He needs that. He needs it now.

He kisses her.

But that sounds so simple, so effortless. It is a kiss but it is so much more than that. Marshall and Stephanie are gone. Detective Benson and Detective Stabler are gone. They are left just El and just Liv.

The tear has reached her lips and he takes it with him. He takes her sorrow and he uses it to fuel the bridging of this gap that has come between them. Some of the gap is their fault, so what, but most of it is not. It's every perp that they've ever crossed paths with. It's Richard White and Gitano. It's Picard and Harris. It's the Brass and IAB. It's Kathy and Kurt. It's Dani and Cooper. It's his mother and her mother. It's everyone and everything and that's not the way it's supposed to be. There's not supposed to be anything between them and he won't have it anymore. He pushes the obstacles out of his way so that he can reach her soul, the place he has always belonged. He uses their sorrow, their pain, their rage, their fears and their hopes and their desires and he joins with her. He kisses her hard and he kisses her tenderly. He takes everything from her and he gives her everything he's got. He kisses her and she kisses him.

They're on the bed and he doesn't know how they got there but he doesn't care because he knows this is right. He is just kissing her and holding her in his arms and all thoughts are gone. She's grabbing at his shirt and tearing at his skin and he breathes for her because he cannot let her go.

Except that's the exact moment when she makes him let her go. "I can't do this right now!"

It's a scream and yet it's a whisper but either way it is a cry. And this time when she leaves him she doesn't look back.

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I can't do this right now!

It echoes through the whole house, even in her memories. She can still feel the heat of his words but that is nothing compared to the heat radiating from the skin of his fingertips brushing her bangs out of her face. The feel of his lips against her own, the desperate want for everything to end up alright. That's how she ended up here: outside the cabin, outside the boundaries of that claustrophobic little couple's wilderness retreat campground, outside the reach of Elliot, of her partner, of her other half.

It wasn't supposed to be this way. This wasn't supposed to happen like this. This never happened to anybody else in the police force, so why did it keep happening to them? Why the hell did it have to be them?

She wonders if this is some cruel joke fate is playing on them as it toys with their lives. As if rubbing their noses in the fact that it can never be truth, no matter how much either of them want it, no matter how much both of them can see it and expect it to happen. They are not meant to be together and she knows it and it kills her. It's killing them. Elliot Stabler and Olivia Benson. They are two separate things. They are not meant to be one. But ever since they met, she feels like they have belonged to the other person. How are you supposed to fight that? The lines have been blurred and crossed too many times to make sense of this knot now. There is nothing left for her to do.

"Trouble in paradise?" the voice startles her from her reverie and she looks up. It's not Elliot, thank God. She doesn't think she could handle seeing or talking to him right now. It'd be too much.

"No, Ethan, I—"

"Don't try to say everything's fine because I know that's a lie. Come on," he sits on the log beside her, a comfortable distance away. "Maggie's off on one of those 'girl time' things. The wilderness often brings out the best and worst of relationships. So what's going on between you and Marshall?"

Even though they've been working with these disguises for a while, it still takes her a second to remember that Marshall, for all intents and purposes, is Elliot. "Same old, same old." She sighs. "We both want something we can't have."

It's the truth but it doesn't satisfy him. She takes the time to fully notice Ethan's jet black hair and green eyes before he speaks. He looks a little bit like Simon, at least in his face. "Why's that?" He asks. Why is that, indeed.

When she doesn't answer, he simply stands up and reaches a hand out to her. "Come on," he says. "I wanna show you something." And she takes it and follows him even though he is not who she wants and she doesn't want to go anywhere. But she always has to do things that she doesn't want to do, so what's new?

He takes her back to the campground but by a way she hadn't gone before. They circle a lake and the sun has set before they reach the cabins even though it is not yet night. He takes her inside his cabin although she thinks it probably isn't appropriate and he hands her a book. "You remind me of me," he speaks softly. "Read this with Marshall. Start talking. Don't think, just be honest. Try to listen to each other. I think you'll find it makes all the difference in the world. You guys will work it out. I believe it."

It's a sweet gesture, but she's already pushed the trauma of the afternoon behind her because internet cords should not come inside through an outside wall and light should not come from the bottom and top of the same wall and beyond that, at a couple's wilderness retreat with all childless couples she should not hear the faint cry of a child behind that wall either.

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BANG!

A shot rings out before Olivia can respond, and Elliot suddenly realizes where they are. "Olivia!" he screams, breaking through the mirror of a door that had been hidden from him when he'd been in here earlier that day.

Something, or rather someone, smacks into his chest. Female, but not the female he's striving for. It's Maggie. Where's Ethan? There's a gun in her hand. His reaction time is so quick she's still shifting her weight off of him when he head butts her and kicks her legs out from beneath her. He hears the gun scatter across the floor. She's unconscious but he takes the precious time to cuff her to the desk anyway.

When he stands up, there's Ethan, typing wildly at the computer. Ethan must've shot first, because Olivia should've had him by now. Where is she? He needs to get to her, now. He has to find her.

Ethan looks up at the same moment that Elliot's gun goes off. He does not have time to yell. The cluster hits him smack in the chest and he flies back into the wall of the cabin.

Beside him, in the corner, is Olivia: eyes closed, blood pulsing from a wound below her ribs. "Olivia!" Elliot screams again, pulling her into his arms. "Open your eyes, Liv." She's been hurt before, she's bled before. But this, this is too much. This isn't right. This wasn't supposed to be in the cards. He won't let it end here.

"Liv, talk to me." Elliot lets her head rest against his knee as he rips his shirt over his head and presses it tight against the giant hole in Olivia's gut before any more of her blood can escape. Suddenly he notices that there's already a small pool of it beneath them. It's on his hands and he's getting it in her hair but he doesn't care. In fact, he barely even notices.

"El…" She breathes finally, blinking slowly.

"Liv, I'm here. It's okay. A bus is on the way. Just hang on."

His shirt isn't stopping the blood flow. There's too much. He should've been the one to take this bullet. It was his job to protect her, to have her back and where was he? Why had he failed her the one time she truly needed him? "I'm sorry," he says, trying not to panic for her sake.

"I'm, fine, El…" she stutters. It's an echo of the last time he'd held her bleeding form. Go, Elliot, go. I'm fine. Go! Go! He hesitated to believe her then when she had been fine, and it had cost another life. This time he knows she's lying but no matter what he does the cost is still a life.

"I'm not leaving you," he assures her.

Labouringly, she lays a hand atop his own. "You don't have to," and closes her eyes.

What the hell does that mean? Shit. Her body has gone limp. Not good, not good. He shakes her gently. "Liv, look at me. Open your eyes. Olivia!"

Then he hears the sirens and the next thing he knows, Elliot's hoisting her up in the width of his arms against his body. His feet are beneath him and he's carrying her outside to the ambulance himself. I won't fail you, Liv. Not this time. I won't let you fall.

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She's in surgery for over three hours. He spends the entire time not pacing as some might expect but sitting very still in the hospital's small and minimalist chapel, simply wringing his hands in front of him. If there was ever a time for God, it would be now.

The last time he was in a hospital waiting like this, his wife and son had been in a car accident. Olivia had been driving. Three of the most important people in his life in such danger. But now, Kathy's basically nonexistent and so are his kids. He won't even dare to think what his life would be like without Olivia. He can't bear it.

He hasn't carried a Rosary since he was a child, but someone has left one in this chapel and he unconsciously counts the beads, trying to remember a prayer appropriate for this moment. Nothing he thinks of can even attempt to compare though, so he gets stuck on the only two he can remember.

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with Thee: blessed art Thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of Thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen

He struggles a bit, but makes it through. He doesn't like that death part at the end. It hits too close to home. He won't let that happen. It can't.

O my Jesus, forgive us our sins; save us from the fires of hell; lead all souls to Heaven, especially those most in need.

That's a little better. Not as blunt. Olivia doesn't understand his Catholic faith and he knows it. He remembers a college priest they met once during a case. "That's in the Eye of the Beholder, isn't it?" The priest had said. She'd gotten into his face. "No Father, that's in the Eye of the District Attorney." And he wasn't even one of the ones who had harmed the children himself; he was just one of the many who didn't stop it from happening. She'd told Elliot some time ago that "I can admit that most priests and pastors and rabbis and whatever the hell else you wanted to call them, are sincere and – pardon the pun – honest-to-god good people who really believe that what they feel they'd been 'given' to share with the world will actually help people. It's not that I don't want to believe in what they're offering, the problem is just that for every good one you show me, I've had personal dealings with three more who aren't. And those odds just aren't in anyone's favor." He hadn't known how to argue that, but something inside him just won't let go of it. It's a habit he can't afford to break. So he just twists a Rosary bead between his fingers, lost in his thoughts until something else breaks through.

"Elliot Stabler?"

He jumps up with a start to face the doctor and finds the Rosary broken in his hands. In embarrassment, he thrusts the pieces into his pocket while replying, "How is she?"

The doctor – impossibly young – smiles. "She's lucky. There was a lot of internal damage, but as long as there's no infection she should come out just find. She's a strong girl."

That she is. Elliot agrees. "I need to see her." He doesn't ask if he can, because there's no way they'd be able to stop him. He has to see her. As long as he's with her he can protect her. As long as he's with her everything will be all right.

The man leads him into a recovery room and he nearly falls to his knees and cries when she blinks up at him with those sepia eyes, all clear and piercing. Immediately he pulls up a chair beside the bed and grabs her hand. He has to touch her. He has to know. He has to be sure that she's okay, that she hasn't left him. He gives her a little smile and wraps his other hand around hers too.

"Did they,"

He doesn't let her finish. "Ethan's dead. Maggie's in jail. They didn't have a chance to delete their contacts. We've found most of the kids already and we've got dispatches out on all the perps."

She thinks for a moment. "We did it." She says this slowly but he's not sure if it's a byproduct of the massive surgery she's just come out of or because she doesn't quite believe it's true. "Wait, what happened to Ethan?"

"Olivia, he nearly killed you! What do you think happened to him?"

"Elliot," she breathes, rushing the words out even though he knows it must take some effort. "There was another door into the room. Maggie had a clean shot and I couldn't even see her. Ethan wasn't the one who shot me."

He's glad he's sitting down because the room gets so still and heavy with weight that he doesn't think he'd be able to stay standing. Ethan wasn't the one who shot me. He misinterpreted the situation. He'd heard them talking and just assumed… He shot the wrong perp. They both deserved to die for their crimes and their sins, but…

"I thought I saw a gun," he says in his defense, but did he? He tries to think back and there's nothing. Just reaction. Just a fire burning in his veins and clouding his eyes, leading him to her side.

He reaches up and gently moves her bangs out of her eyes. She sighs sadly. "Olivia,"

"Elliot, don't." She stops him, pulls out of his grasp and struggles to adjust her position on the bed with a soft grunt. Then she looks back at him. Her eyes are so intense, so full of emotion that he can read plain as day and he knows what she's going to say, feels it break his heart. "What happened, we, we can't,"

"I know." He tries to save her from saying it, knowing she isn't talking about who shot who. Her eyelids flutter, so delicate. She's exhausted, and with good reason. "Sleep." He tells her. "I'll always be here."

She squeezes his hand once more and offers him a little knowing smirk. He waits until her breathing has deepened, and then plants a kiss on her hand that he's wrapped inside his own again. "I love you, Olivia."

He doesn't know it, but she dreams of him, of them, of what they both know can never be. She dreams of him and her body heals.