Title: All That's Left You
Author: Ally
Pairing: Olivia/Alex
Summary: When the body of an unidentified woman is discovered, Alex finds herself thrown back into a familiar world. But can anyone really go home again?
Disclaimer: None of the characters belong to me etc. etc. They are the creation of Dick Wolf and Co. and I use them without permission for entertainment purposes only. Please don't sue.
Spoilers: If you're aware of events up until the advent of "Conviction", you'll be fine.
A/N: I once swore I'd never attempt another WIP/case-file, but hey. And yes, this is another "Alex returns" fic, but with a little plot thrown in for good measure. Apologies in advance for any factual inaccuracies in terms of geography and other technicalities; I research what I can, but am largely reliant on t'internet, which I acknowledge is not always one hundred percent accurate. On most of the 'legal' aspects I'm claiming "artistic license", but if there's anything really glaring, feel free to point and mock. A slightly different style from my first attempt back in the writing game, but once again, all feedback is welcomed and gratefully received. Thanks for reading.
Status: On-going
All That's Left You
"Long ago, it must be, I have a photograph
Preserve your memories; they're all that's left you."
Chapter 1
Monday 3rd July 2006, Battery Park, Manhattan
"Your victim is white female, early forties. Definite signs of sexual assault, but I won't know C.O.D. 'til I open her up."
At this statement, Dr. Melinda Warner looked up at the SVU detective at whom her clinical assessment was aimed. As she met the other woman's eyes, she sighed sadly, conveying the contained emotion behind her otherwise stoical words.
Meeting her gaze, the detective in question shifted her weight to her other foot and subconsciously rubbed a hand over the back of her neck, the only outward sign that she was at all affected by the grisly scene before her.
Pulling her light-weight T-shirt away from her body, Detective Olivia Benson silently cursed the ungodly soaring summer temperatures that had cursed the city for the last month. She did this not only for the sake of the loved ones who, after a likely seventy-two hours in the heat of a city park filled with scavengers of every description, would be stripped of the opportunity to give any form of visual identification to the city's most recent victim; but also because although only 3am, the sheen of perspiration which already coated her body would be nothing compared to the heat she could expect for the next sixteen hours or so, during which time the chance of her finding ten minutes to grab a shower and a change of clothes down in the crib could be accurately assessed as slim-to-none.
"Liv!"
Grateful for the distraction, she looked up to see her partner signalling to her from his prone position in the dry dirt a few feet from their victim. His shirt sleeves rolled up, and his face already damp, he looked as happy to have been dragged away from his wife and kids, as she herself had been to be interrupted from what she realised was rapidly becoming her new nightly routine.
"What is it, El?"
Skirting briskly past a young uni, she gently positioned herself on the ground next to her partner who was gingerly holding a near decimated square of paper in a gloved hand. Despite the arid climate, it had clearly been exposed to liquid in at some point in its recent history. Taking advantage of the streetlight above them, she leaned in for a closer look.
"Bus ticket?" she peered curiously. "Think it belonged to the vic?"
Elliot Stabler shifted the angle of the remnant for a better view before shrugging wearily.
"I'll get it to the lab. See what they can do."
Seeing that the body was finally ready to be loaded into the waiting ME's van, Dr. Warner hovering alongside, the two detectives pulled themselves sluggishly to their feet.
"Why don't you go home and grab a couple of hours sleep, El?"
Olivia slapped her partner affectionately on the shoulder as she spoke. "Besides, I'm pretty sure you could use a shower before I have to spend the next fourteen hours with you."
Her partner smiled at the jibe before turning toward her, the expression on his face shifting to guarded concern.
"And what are you going to be doing until daylight, Liv?"
Olivia smirked briefly, the expression not quite reaching her eyes.
"Oh, you know, the usual."
With that she turned round, and after issuing stern orders to the uniformed officers around them to finish clearing the scene, disappeared into the darkness of the park and her awaiting Sedan.
xxx
Monday 3rd July 2006, Manhattan District Attorney's Office.
"What do you want now, Jim?"
"Now Alexandra, is that anyway to greet your boss?"
Bureau Chief Alexandra Cabot looked up from the pile of papers scattered across her antique oak desk, at the dulcet southern tone of District Attorney Arthur Branch whose bulky form now filled the doorframe of her office.
If she felt any sense of embarrassment at her initial greeting, there was no outward sign of it. Her features schooled automatically into a picture of practised cordiality and she smiled wryly.
"Checking up on me already, Arthur? I thought I was entitled to at least a month to get my feet under the desk before I was afforded that honour. And besides, aren't you meant to be in the Hamptons right about now?"
The DA smiled knowingly, skilfully avoiding the younger lawyer's question, but his eyes held a momentary flicker of concern.
"How are you doing, Alexandra?"
For a brief second, Arthur Branch thought he saw an expression he had, in his recollection, never before witnessed in arguably his sharpest, and most openly ambitious A.D.A. – uncertainty. But as quickly as it had appeared, it seemed to vanish, leaving him to ponder whether it was something his politically exhausted mind had conjured up to make the woman sitting before him somehow less intimidating. There was no doubt in his mind that Alexandra Cabot was different from the majority of the cookie-cutter young attorneys with whom he had crossed paths over the years. Not that she was by any means the only politically ambitious, fresh out of the Ivy League, counsellor he had come face-to-face with in his career. But she was, in his memory, the only one who had made absolutely no pretence of hiding their motivations. It was ironic, he considered, that where as pretty much every other fresh-faced A.D.A. in his long tenure with the District Attorney's office, who had entered into the domain of the sex crimes unit, had gone from naïve defender of justice to burnt out cynic before the detectives at One Police Plaza bothered to learn their names, Alex Cabot had entered that bureau for purely political gain, and somehow discovered her ideals. The whole notion had been faintly amusing to the D.A. – that is until she'd gone and gotten herself killed.
Even now, after three weeks of her being back in her newly promoted role, and after over six months with the knowledge that news of her death almost three years previously had, for want of a better expression, been greatly exaggerated, staring at the re-incarnation of Alex Cabot was still somewhat unnerving.
The first couple of days after her return, both simultaneously to New York City, and her former place of employment, he had genuinely felt as if he were looking at a ghost. But now, after the initial novelty had worn off, that feeling had yet to fade, and he was left with a disconcerting suspicion that he was becoming poetic in his old age. He had no delusions that her drive was still there. She'd already managed to scare the hell out of all the young A.D.A.'s in her charge, not to mention her bureau deputy. But there was still something in her countenance that caused him a measure of concern. He didn't have to be a shrink to surmise that after spending three years, alone, and with as many identities, looking constantly over her shoulder for the first sign of discovery, the woman had earned the right to be a little jumpy. But she was home now. And although no-one, in this life at least, would ever have described Alexandra Cabot as 'warm and fuzzy', there now appeared to be a new level of guardedness, hidden behind the perfectly controlled smile he was currently on the receiving end of. And it was this thought which prompted his closing remark.
"Well, you know where I am if you need anything."
On hearing the door close in her boss' wake, Alex let the smile drop from her face, her expression again blank as she turned her attention back to the papers in front of her. With her free hand she subconsciously pinched the bridge of her nose. It was definitely going to be a long day.
TBC