Dick owns 'em.

It's a longish one. Hope you enjoy.

Alex and Casey arrived at Olivia and Elliot's for the dinner party promptly at 7:30. Dinner – Mexican takeout – was already on the table and the charades game was in the living room. Everyone wa ready to drink lots of wine and let loose with the game.

They piled the food onto their plates and went out into the living room. "I get Alex tonight," Olivia said quickly, grabbing Alex's arm and dragging her to the couch.

"You stealing my girlfriend?"

Olivia laughed. "Yep. You get her all the time, Casey. I get her tonight." She squeezed Alex's arm and stole a bite of her enchilada. "You're stuck with my husband."

"Fine. So long as I get to bring her home tonight."

"I make no promises."

Alex couldn't believe how good it felt to have her two best friends pretending to fight over her. It was obvious they were faking it, but that somehow made it even better. "Sorry, Case. Olivia's mine tonight."

Casey turned to Elliot and sat down on the floor, patting the spot next to her. "Think you can get down here or are your knees too old?" She gave him a playful grin and returned to her dinner.

"And everyone's saying you're stuck with me," Elliot said, taking a seat next to her. "Looks like I'm the one stuck with you."

The game of charades was quickly under way. Alex and Olivia took the lead almost from the start, and they only seemed to get better after each sip of wine they drank. "We're getting killed here," Elliot told Casey after he failed to guess flying saucer. "Your girlfriend is too good at this."

Casey glared at Alex. "No. they just keep getting easy ones like teacher and telescope. And you suck at guessing."

"You were spinning around in a circle with your arms over your head. How the hell was I supposed to guess flying saucer?"

"I got it in ten seconds," Alex informed him. "You really are a bad guesser."

"Well Cabot, next time you're on my team. You're he guesser in this bunch and that's what I'm going to need. You up for it?"

Alex pretended to think about it while she laced her arm in with Olivia's. "Well it'll be up to Olivia here. She'll have to give us the okay."

"Don't I get a say?" Casey asked. "What if I want her?"

"No," Alex said. "Despite my telling Elliot that Olivia would have to give the okay, I'm the only one who actually gives the okay. And considering Olivia's helping me kick your asses, I think I'm going to stick with her."

Olivia grinned and wrapped her arm around Alex. "Back off, everyone. Cabot's mine."

Alex smiled. Casey was ecstatic to see it. Alex had been so upset the day before, trying to find herself between who she was four years ago, the various aliases she had, and who she was now. Everyone had moved on during those three years she was in witness protection, but Alexandra Cabot hadn't. Alexandra Cabot had lost three years of her life, and for the past year she had been desperately trying to catch up. Casey smiled when she met Alex's eyes. "I love you," she mouthed.

"I love you, too," Alex mouthed in return. She almost hadn't come tonight. As good as it felt to be around her old friends, it was also difficult. They had moved on. They had solved cases without her. Hell, they had even gotten married. And she had missed all of it. It had felt like they all expected her to just be the same Alex she was before, but she wasn't. She had changed. She'd been dealing pretty well with it, but it was getting harder rather than easier. Talking to Casey last night had been a turning point for her. And playing charades with everyone made her realize that Elliot and Olivia had no expectations. They didn't expect her to be anyone other than herself, whoever that might be at this time. And they seemed to just want to hang out with her. Now that the game was over, she walked over and sat down next to Casey. "Thanks for making me come tonight," she whispered.

Casey nodded and leaned against her. Her plan had worked. The dinner had been planned for a couple of weeks now, but getting Alex on someone else's team for the game, setting up the fight over her, had only happened because of a quick phone call she'd made that morning. Olivia had told her that she'd also noticed Alex struggling a bit and she was only too happy to help.

Olivia walked them to the door and gave Casey a quick hug before pulling Alex into a tight one. "It's so good to have you back. I feel like I don't say that enough. It's good to have you back, Alex." She leaned over and rested her chin on Alex's shoulder. "And I'll take whichever Alex I can get," she whispered. "Alex from four years ago, Alex mixed in with Emily and Meredith and whoever else you happened to be. The Alex I've currently got my arms around is one hell of a great friend. And a damn good charades player."

"Only when you're on my team."

"Good. Then you'll be on my team next time?"

Alex followed Casey outside and smiled. "Wouldn't have it any other way." The cab they had called earlier was just pulling up and they climbed in. "You called her, didn't you?"

"No," Casey answered, way too quickly, as she buckled her seat belt.

Alex reached over and gave Casey's hand a gentle squeeze. "Thank you."

Olivia and Elliot were sitting at their desks filling out paperwork when Cragen stormed out of his office. He walked over to them and frowned. "The patrol watching Parker Zimmerman lost him forty-five minutes ago. I need the two of you to get the hell over to his ex-wife's house and make sure she and their four kids are okay."

"They lost him?" Olivia yelled. "He rapes four women, gets off on a technicality even though he threatened to kill his wife and kids in the courtroom, and they LOST him?"

"Get to the family now, ask questions later."

Olivia followed Elliot out of the precinct and climbed into the car. They drove as quickly as they could to the house. Pulling into the driveway, everything seemed normal. They got out of the car and crept up to the front door, keeping a hand on their guns as they did so. As soon as they reached the front door, they drew their guns. It was kicked in. They nodded at each other and slowly entered the house. Nothing could have prepared them for what they found inside.

There was blood everywhere. It was on the floor, the walls, the ceiling, the furniture. It took several seconds for them to realize that there were four bodies in the living room, each of them hacked to pieces. Elliot and Olivia looked around the room for a minute before deciding that Parker wasn't in there anymore.

"Elliot?"

"What, Liv?"

"There are four bodies in here, including Ms. Zimmon."

"Your point?"

"They had four kids. Where's the youngest? Where's Steven?"

Elliot noticed movement to his left and his gun was immediately in the air. "Freeze! NYPD!" his eyes widened slightly when he saw Parker stop suddenly in the kitchen. He was holding his four-year-old son at knife point. "Put him down, Parker."

"No! Get out of my house! Get the hell out of my hose!" Parker pressed the knife into Steven's neck, but didn't press hard enough to cut him. Not yet anyway.

Elliot kept his focus on Parker and tried to keep him talking while Olivia moved to the right to get a better angle. "Parker, your son is scared. You can let him go. He doesn't have to die, too. Let him go." He realized Parker was thinking about it and nodded. "That's it, Parker. Put him down."

As soon as Steven's feet were on the ground, Olivia dropped her gun and knelt down, holding out both of her hands. "That's it, sweetie. Come over here." Before the boy had taken three steps towards her, she felt an intense pain in her side, and then another in her back. "Ahh!" she moaned, falling to the floor before everything went black.

Elliot was distracted for a second when he heard Olivia cry out in pain. He snapped his head towards her and saw her crumple to the floor. A man stood over her, hands raised with a knife, about to stab her again. A single shot from Elliot's gun left the man with a bullet between his eyes. He saw Parker reach for Steven and fired the exact same shot again, dropping the man where he stood. Steven was screaming, and Olivia was lying on the floor motionless. He had to make a decision. "Okay, Steven, it's okay. It's going to be okay." He froze when he realized how pale Olivia looked. She was losing a lot of blood. He motioned for Steven to come over to him while he placed his hands over Olivia's wounds. "Come on, honey. Stay with me. Stay with me, Olivia!" He grabbed his radio and called for an ambulance, then returned to his injured wife. "Come on, Liv. You've gotta stay with me. You can't leave me now. I need you."

Casey sat on the couch, only half listening to CNN on the television. She was nursing a glass of wine and trying to figure out what Alex was cooking. It was a little nerve-wracking, knowing Alex's history in the kitchen, but Alex seemed determined to make this dish tonight. And the fire extinguisher is at my feet, should anything go wrong. She set her glass down on the coffee table and turned around on the couch. "You're really not going to tell me, are you?"

"Not a chance," Alex yelled from the kitchen. "Just watch the news and be ready to tell me what's going on in the world."

Casey pouted and rested her feet on the coffee table. She knew that was one of Alex's pet peeves, and she wanted to see how long she could get away with it. Since their argument, she'd taken to cleaning up after herself a bit more and Alex was trying not to let small messes get to her so much. They both had their moments, but they were getting better. Casey figured that the occasional fight over who cleaned this mess or who made that one was well worth it in the end.

"Feet off the table!"

Casey looked at her watch and laughed. "Wow, five whole minutes. I think that's a new record."

"Shut up and get out here. Dinner's ready."

"Finally," Casey said with a smile. Her eyes widened when she saw the dish on the table. "That looks like chicken and gravy. Alex, did you make chicken and gravy?"

Alex smiled proudly. "The dish I perfected while I was Meredith Axley."

"They let you cook while you were in the program?"

"Haha," Alex joked. "The only place that delivered there was this horrible Chinese takeout place. Now, you know I love Chinese, but after about the fifth round of food poisoning, I decided to call it quits. I was supposed to be from Kentucky, and my handler suggested I try some good ol' country cooking."

Casey laughed at Alex's obviously faked southern accent. "Did you explain to them how you set fire to your stove when you try to cook?"

"I did. But they were insistent I learn to fend for myself. The grocery store was forty minutes away, and I didn't want to have to live on prepared foods all the time. So I learned how to make something."

"Makes sense. In a terrifying sort of way."

"Oh just try it."

Casey stabbed a piece of chicken and put it on her plate. She stared at Alex for a minute and pretended to be afraid as she took a bite. "Wow," she said, chewing her food slowly. "This is actually really good."

"I know. It's the gravy."

"I'm rather fond of the fried chicken."

"It was my comfort food in Montana. I'd...never been lonelier, never had to be someone so not me. This was the one dish I could actually really cook, even if it was Meredith's dish instead of mine."

Casey smiled. "Well now you're going to have to make it once a week again, you know. No way you can cook something this delicious and then leave me hanging." She noticed the brief flash of hesitation on Alex's face. It disappeared as quickly as it appeared. Still, Casey had a feeling she knew where it came from. She finished her chicken and swallowed nervously. "I know you're not Meredith Axley. You're Alex Cabot. But Meredith Axley is a part of you, even if that part is a country fried chicken cook."

"You really like it?"

"Alex, I love it. I can tell why it was your comfort food. It's delicious."

"Good, because I actually really enjoyed cooking it for you."

Before Casey could answer, she heard her phone buzzing on the coffee table. "Damn phone. Alays rings at the most inopportune time." She walked over and flipped open her phone. "Novak."

Alex watched her girlfriend's face pale when she answered the phone. She was about to ask what wsas wrong when she heard her own phone ring. "Hello?"

"Hey, Alex, it's Fin."

His voice was too low, too quiet, too...sad. "What's wrong?"

"It's Olivia. There was an accident."

"What kind of accident?"

"She was, um, she was stabbed."

"What!"

"They took her to Mercy."

Alex bit her lower lip. "How bad is it?"

Fin didn't answer right away, and he knew that his silence was only furthering Alex's worry. "You guys should meet us at the hospital."

The line went dead and Alex sat her phone down on the table. She looked over to see Casey staring blankly at her phone. Tears were running down her cheeks. She walked over and hugged her.

"That was Munch," Casey said blankly. "Olivia was stabbed."

"I know. Fin told me."

Casey pulled out of the hug and leaned her forehead against Alex's. She wiped away a few of Alex's tears and smiled sadly when she felt Alex doing the same for her. She held her breath for a moment and shook her head. "We have to get to the hospital. We can cry later. Right now, we just have to get to the hospital."

"Yeah," Alex said gently. "Yeah you're right. I'll call us a cab."

Casey nodded and went to pull away, but then realized she didn't want to lose the contact. She kept an arm around Alex while Alex made the phone call. When Alex's arm snaked around her, she offered a small smile. "She'll be okay. Olivia's going to be okay."

Alex squeezed her gently. She was so grateful to have Casey's arm around her. "Of course she is. She's too stubborn to let a little stabbing get in the way of her life."

"Yeah, I know." They made their way downstairs and waited in the lobby for the cab. "You know, she um, she really got me through a lot when I first got here. She's...she's gotten me through a lot, Alex."

"I know. She got me through a lot, too."

"Guess it's time for us to get her through this."

Alex nodded. "We well. Together, we'll get her through this.