Please follow, favorite, and review if you support me in continuing with this fanfic. Since I'm not able to reply to guest reviews, I figured I'd make a habit of responding to reviews here:

EyesOfTheSoul: Here's the next update! Hope it lives up to expectations.

Guest: Glad you liked it.

Guest: Thanks, I paid special attention to the length last time, and will continue to do so.

Guest: Have no fear, Liv will be fine. I love Liv and would never kill her off or anything like that. I once read writers always put characters they love the most through the emotional wringer. That's definitely true for me. It's angst, right?

Chapter 4: Called Away

Olivia was back at the beach house in Yaphank, with her hands cuffed to the iron frame of the bed and her knees duct taped together, begging Lewis to let her live as he stuffed her own gun into her mouth.

There was a knock on the door.

"Help!" she screamed.

"Miss Linda is that you. I can't find the key."

"Shut up!" Lewis hissed as he held the cold metal of the gun to her temple. "I'm going to get rid of them."

Relief, as he left, relief for just a moment, and then a massive rush of adrenaline. She had to get free, had to get out of there, had to tell the poor unsuspecting soul at the front door that the needed to run for their lives.

She struggled and squirmed, managing to twist her body around enough to plant her bound feet on the floor. She arched her back trying to lift herself off the mattress enough for the handcuffs to have a little give.

"I'm riding along," Alex announced, as the gurney carrying an unconscious Olivia was hoisted into the back of an ambulance. It was more of a statement than a request for permission. The young paramedic shrugged, allowing the blonde attorney to climb into the back as he moved to the driver's side door.

"Should I strap her down Frank," asked his partner in the back, a female paramedic whose makeup looked like she had planned to spend the evening anywhere other than seeing patients.

"No!" Alex made a beeline for Olivia and practically not the restraint out of the woman's hand. "No, you most certainly should not"

"Look, lady, that's standard procedure until I know what she's on."

"What she's on?"

"Yeah, she's obviously hallucinating. Probably strung out on something,"

Olivia was indeed fighting with must've seemed like invisible foes, but Alex knew the nightmare was all too real. Taking Olivia's hand in her own, and stroking it soothingly with her thumb, Alex addressed the paramedic in a voice more than worthy of her old 1-6 nickname "The Ice Queen":

"Assuming you've worked in a major metropolitan area like New York for more than, say, six months, I'm going to assume that you're not dealing with your first sexual assault victim. So let me tell you my standard procedure: continue acting unprofessionally and I will sue you for all your worth, have your ass handed to me on a silver platter and mount on the wall in my apartment like a fucking trophy! Do you understand me?"

The woman looked positively alarmed, her eyes becoming as big as dinner plates. I…um… I didn't know she had been raped

"Clearly," Alex huffed, turning her attention to calming the distressed detective. "Shhh, Liv, it's only me, only Alex. Lewis is rotting away in a cell, which is exactly what he deserves. He won't hurt you anymore."

"So help me God," Alex added to herself, as she watched the Manhattan city lights in an attempt to calm her returning rage.

Alex sat in a visitor's chair in the emerge Bellevue Hospital listening to the beeping of the machines that monitored the sleeping Olivia's vitals.

"Olivia Benson, concussion?"

Alex nodded, inclining her head in Olivia's direction. "Should I wake her?"

"No, new medical research indicates what your mother told you about falling asleep with a concussion is nothing but an old wives' tale. I'm Dr. McDoughal, the on-call neurologist. I'll be back when she's awake and can consent to some tests."

"Tests?"

"Just to determine the grade of her concussion. I see the paramedics gave her a sedative."

"She had an adverse reaction in the ambulance."

"To the drugs?"

"No, more like a…flashback."

"I see, buzz the nurses' station when she wakes up."

When Dr. McDoughal was gone, Alex got down to the business of calling the office to ask her secretary to clear her schedule and inform the DA that she would be at Olivia's side for the rest of the day. There was no way she would leave Olivia alone in the hospital which could very well be a hotbed for more traumatic flashbacks.

"DA's office, ADA Casey Novak speaking."

Alex jumped. "Casey, since when do you play receptionist?"

"You're lucky it was me and not him. He's left two messages on your phone."

"I had my phone off. I've been in group all afternoon."

"Oh." Casey, who had finally gotten her long-held wish of prosecuting straight homicide after Connie Rubirosa's replacement couldn't quite cut it, knew all about Alex's volunteering at the community center. "Well, you better get down here. Remember the jewel thief who got the appallingly low bail?"

"Yeah." It was the case Alex had been working when she'd found out about Olivia's abduction. "What about him."

"He's in for it this time. Couldn't help himself, only this time he shot the jeweler at point-blank range. Anyway, looks like you and I are partners again."

"I'll be right there." Alex hung up and gently shook Olivia awake.

"Whassamatter?"

"You're in the hospital, sleepyhead. The doctor will be glad you're awake, he should be here in a few minutes."

"But you've got to go," said Olivia understandingly.

"If I could blow this off I would…"

"I know." Olivia smiled. "But Alex?"

"Hmmm."

"I'll take that hug before you go."

"You've got it."