Toni was brought in to see the tape; she, Elliot and Munch watched it in a room shut away from everyone else at the precinct. Toni sat at the table and watched the tape, Elliot alternated between looking at the tape and then back at Toni. Munch on the other hand was strictly watching her because he'd already seen the tape, and he noted that Toni looked mildly uncomfortable, but not as she should've, instead she looked like she was standing in line waiting to get the score back on her written test for a driver's license.

On the TV screen, somebody turned on the cold water tap and a stream of water washed over her face and poured into her mouth and still she didn't move. After a few more minutes, she started coughing the water up and turning her head from side to side. It took her a few tries to get her eyes open and she tried to sit up in the tub, at which point the other teenagers helped her up, and it was at that point that the tape cut off. Munch turned off the TV and said to Toni, "Off the record, Toni, I took a lot of stuff in the 60s and even I never had a reaction like that, so what the hell were they passing out at the party that night?"

"I don't know," she replied, "I think I was just drinking a lot back then."

"Must've been grain alcohol to have that effect," Munch said, "We know you have an unusually high tolerance to booze."

"Toni," Elliot said firmly, and pointed at the screen, "What the hell was going on that night?"

"Nothing out of the ordinary," she nonchalantly replied, "Just your average late night orgy. Everybody had gotten together for some big blast, yeah some of them brought pills, stuff to make them so high they'd forget where they were, and just feel everything…"

"Sounds like crystal meth," Munch said, "Keeps them high for hours during which time they have long sessions of sex without needing to rest in between."

"Yeah, maybe," Toni replied as she looked to the side.

"And you?" Munch asked.

She shook her head, "I never went for that stuff…I was more the voyeur of the group…I had no place to go while that was happening so I mainly just stood around and watched…after a while things just started to blur, like on one of those damn rides at Coney Island…and the next thing I knew I was in a tub full of cold water with everybody standing over me."

"Why were you naked?" Elliot asked.

"I don't know, alright?" Toni asked, "That's actually one part of my life I've chosen not to try and remember. Look, I don't get what any of this from back then has to do with me now."

"This tape was in the guy's apartment we arrested," Elliot said, "Them and a dozen others."

"Fine, then prosecute him for the others," Toni said, "But leave me out of it."

"Toni."

"Elliot!" she replied, and pointed to the TV, "That tape was made 5 years ago, statute of limitations has run out for me anyway."

"It's not a rape," Elliot said.

"She's still right, partially," Munch said, and both turned to look at him as he explained, "Manufacturing child pornography is a felony and all felonies short of murder have five year statutes of limitations in this state…however," he added as he turned to Toni, "This tape was made in April, this is only March, so there'd still be a month left if you want to take your case to court."

"What case? I have no case," Toni said, "And I don't want one. Look Elliot, the guy that made this tape, has he put it on the internet? Has he made copies and sold it to people?"

"So far as we know, he never made copies and he only kept them in his own private viewing collection," Munch answered.

"Then I don't care…find the victims whose time hasn't run out, and see if they give a damn about it, I don't, and I'm not going to be put through the hellhole that is your judicial system again, having every personal detail about my private life dredged up for everybody to hear about."

On that note, she got up and stormed out of the room, Elliot started after her but Munch pulled him back and said, "I'll go after her, you stay here incase she starts throwing things."

Munch stayed a few steps behind so she wouldn't catch onto him following her immediately, and he saw her disappear into the restroom and went in after her, he found her over by one of the sinks, pounding it with her fists.

"Try harder," Munch suggested, "I don't think it learned its lesson yet."

Toni slowly raised her head and saw his reflection in the mirror and said, "This is the ladies' room."

"I won't tell if you won't, besides, I have an honorary member's card," Munch said as he cautiously headed over to her, "Look, I'm sorry you had to be put through this."

"It's just the way Elliot is," Toni replied, "Too damn overprotective."

"If it makes you feel any better, in a way I know what you're going through," Munch said, "Did I ever tell you that back in Baltimore, one of my ex-girlfriends who worked at a museum, took a picture of me from my flower child days," he sashayed his boney body from one side to the other as he added, "Au natural, had it blown up and stuck it on the wall for everybody in Baltimore to see?"

Toni started to laugh, "Are you kidding?"

"That wasn't the worst part, everybody in the homicide unit found out about it before I did," Munch said, "And that damn picture is probably still hanging up in that place, except she finally did me a little justice and stuck one of their promotional flyers up in an…appropriate place."

Toni laughed harder and about fell on the floor before sobering up and said, "I need to get back to the house, Kathy's home, she kept the kids out of school today, and she's about to go nuts with Elliot not being there."

"I'll run you back," he offered.

"Don't bother," Toni replied, "Just get back to work on catching this guy."

"We've got about 130 cases of manufactured child pornography against this guy," Elliot said three days later when all the tapes had been gone through and most victims had been identified, "He cut a deal with the D.A. and told us where his brother is."

"And?" Olivia asked.

"That's the problem, he's already left New York," Cragen added.

"I know, Angel gave him a change of clothes and some money and his truck, but he wouldn't say why Arnold shot those kids or went to the school, I guess he doesn't know himself…we didn't see Arnold leave the building because he went out through the fire exit on the rear side where we couldn't see it from the streets," Elliot said.

"It gets worse," Cragen told them, "We got a call earlier from Baltimore." As soon as Munch opened his mouth, Donald replied, "I know, I know, you're never going back there…seems that Arnold Kramer is establishing a serial pattern for himself…three more teenagers shot dead in one place on the exact hour. Have we determined a connection between Arnold Kramer and Mark Leonard?"

"Well Arnold was a student at that high school about 15 years ago," Munch said, "Maybe he just hated the place, Mark certainly did."

"But the two went into this together, so there's got to be more than that," Olivia said.

"Yeah well ol' Markie isn't giving up anything on this guy," Fin told them, "When the cops canvassed the school, they found his gun but not Kramer's..."

"He ditched his clothes but took his gun with him?" Elliot said, "None of this is making any sense."

"Whether it does or not, he's our perp first," Cragen said, "Elliot, I'm assigning you and Fin to work with the Baltimore police and any other jurisdiction this M.O. pops up in, to catch this bastard and extradite him back here for the murders of Lindsey Vogel, Tommy Giraldi and Lenny Camonte. Their families want justice and the press will have a field day with us if we fail to deliver."

"Will do, Captain," Elliot said, knowing that he'd be getting it from all sides when his family heard about this.

"You're going away?" Kathy asked.

"This guy's already left the state but we need to bring him back to stand trial for the murders," Elliot said, "Fin and I are going to follow the path he's led so far and see if we can catch him before he gets to…Mexico or wherever he's heading ultimately."

Toni had overheard the conversation as she headed into the room and said to Kathy, "This shouldn't be anything new for you, he's been gone before, undercover, this will be about the same thing except the bastard won't know that Elliot's coming, it'll be easier to catch him that way without anybody getting shot."

"Toni, can I see you for a minute?" Elliot asked her.

"Sure."

She followed Elliot upstairs to his bedroom while he grabbed a few quick things, "I know that Kathy's worried and I can't blame her. I don't know if we're going to be able to catch this guy…"

"Or if you're even coming back," Toni added.

Elliot started to respond but stopped and looked at her. They didn't exchange words on the matter but it was obvious that had been on his mind as well.

"Don't worry, Elliot, I'll hold down the fort here until you come back," Toni said, "Don't worry about it, I'm not about to let anything happen to your family."

"I really appreciate it, Toni, this wasn't exactly part of the plan when you came here," Elliot told her.

"Things change, just go and bring that bastard back here for trial," she said, "Or a hanging, either one will be fine with me."

Elliot turned and headed back downstairs where he hugged all his kids and told them he'd be back in a few days, and tried the same thing with Kathy, but she was in a mood that didn't want him even touching her.

"I'll be back, Kathy," Elliot told her.

"I hope so," was her only reply.

Elliot returned to SVU where he and Fin were going over the game plan with Cragen one last time before they shipped out. Before they left, Elliot stopped by Olivia's desk and asked her for a favor.

"What is it?" she asked.

"I don't know how long we're going to be gone so when you punch out at night, could you swing by my house and make sure everybody's okay there?" he asked her.

"Sure," Olivia answered.

"Alright, let's go," Fin said.

"Hey Elliot," Munch called after them, "If you run into Kaye Howard, give her my regards."

"I'm sure she'll appreciate them as much as a hernia," Elliot replied.

"So, where are we now?" Olivia asked.

"Well we still have Mark Leonard to deal with," Munch said, "One of these days he's gotta wake up and when he does, we'll be there and hammer him about what he knows about this guy."

"Think he'll talk?" Olivia asked.

"Well he hasn't had mommy and daddy taking care of all his problems his whole life for him but he's still bound to lawyer up, but there's always the slim chance he'll be terrified of the charges Casey can throw at him and tell us what he knows about Kramer."

"Never a dull moment," Olivia said as the phone on her desk started to ring, "Special Victims Unit."

It was the first night without Elliot coming home and everybody seemed to be taking it fairly well. Dickie and Elizabeth were staying the night with friends and Kathleen was out on a date, so it was just Toni and Kathy left at the house now; Kathy on a couch and Toni in a chair in the living room, each of them keeping to themselves and neither saying a word, especially not to the other.

"Well this has been kind of fun," Toni finally said, breaking the silence, "Now, are you going to tell me why you're going off on Elliot lately?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Kathy replied.

"I heard you two fighting the other day, and I know it's not the first time," Toni said, "You two were going at it months before too, weren't you?"

"Every couple has arguments," Kathy insisted.

"Yeah, but the man usually doesn't walk out of the room crying," Toni said as she stood up, "I don't know what you said to him, Kathy, but whether you think he listens to you or not, he does."

Kathy was starting to lose her hospitable attitude towards Toni, now when she spoke her voice was harder, colder. She wouldn't turn to look at Toni, instead she dropped her gaze to the living room floor and said, "His family needs him."

"And he needs his family, but you know what he is," Toni said, "He's a cop, and you've always known him as a cop."

"He wasn't a cop when we got married," Kathy said, "He had just gotten out of the marines."

"Okay but you knew he wanted to be a cop, you had to have known what that would mean…it's not a regular 9-5 job, Kathy, you can't just punch out and hang your job at the door when you go home for the night."

"His job means more to him than we do," Kathy said, "His kids need a father and I need my husband."

"Kathy, you're not getting it," Toni said, "Elliot is as devoted to his job as he is, because he has a family. He sees you, he sees his kids, he sees his kids in those kids, he saw his daughters in me, he doesn't want what he has to put up with every day, to happen to you guys and the only way he knows to keep that from happening is to put these guys away, and he can't do that staying at the house." She took a step over to Kathy, who still refused to look up at her, "Elliot always says how you're threatening to change the locks on him, take the kids and leave him…would you really do that to him?"

Now Kathy looked up at her. The look in her eyes was not the usual 'what business do you have telling me about my husband?', it was something else. "It isn't just that he's always gone, when he is here, he never talks, he never tells me anything."

"Yeah, and there's a reason for that, he's protecting you, and your kids," Toni said, "What do you expect him to do? Over dinner tell you about how he's looking for a guy that gets his kicks off of locking little girls in a room with him and refusing to let them out until they perform oral sex on him? Or while you're all sitting around watching TV for him to tell you about the teenaged boy whose father has been raping him since he was 8 years old and invited his friends over for a go at the boy too? Why do you think he doesn't talk to you?"

"And how is it," Kathy's voice was starting to break now but she continued, "How is it you know so much more about my husband than I do?"

"Because I'm there every day, I see the same things he does, I have lived through the things he's investigated…Elliot's a good man, Kathy, maybe not the best father or the most attentive husband, but he does the best he can…" Toni was starting to cool down now, and added as she sat back down, "And you better start to appreciate it…if you two were divorced right now, I don't know that there'd be anything stopping me from taking him away from you permanently."

Kathy looked over at her, a look on her face somewhere between unbelieving and humored, "You can't be serious."

"Oh I don't know," Toni said as she stretched her arms behind her head and put up her feet, "Nicely built man in his 40s with plenty of life experience, a tour in the marines, and a cop, and a damn good cop, and you can tell he's devoted to his work, devoted to ridding the world of the rapists and pedophiles and he's not too much above killing them himself…in my book that sounds like a nice catch. Think about it, he's well into his adult years so it's not like some stupid high school crush between classmates, he's been in the real world and he seems to have made a solid place for himself in it, he's physically fit, very passionate, and we know he's damn well fertile, there's got to be some kicks in all that somewhere. Now if I were the marrying type and didn't give a damn about breaking up families, I think I'd steal him right away from you to the best of my abilities…it wouldn't make any difference to me if he comes home every night, just so long as he came home."

Having gotten out of her system her little speech solely intended to hurt Kathy and wake her up, Toni returned to her usual demeanor and said, "Think about it, Kathy, you have four kids, three you still have to raise…you'd never be able to make it on your own, and neither would they. Elliot may not be around much but he's still here, that's what makes all the difference. Take it from me…I had my mother die on me, and then my father was hauled off to Rikers…I spent 8 years without him, and just about all of those days I would've preferred killing myself to what I actually did…but I held on, hoping against all hope that I'd see him again…and now he's out, and now life's worth something again to me." She glanced over at Kathy through one eye and added, "You see, I used to have two parents, then I only had one, and then for a long time I didn't have any…these three knuckleheads here still have the original two, you don't want to start that domino effect."

"Late night, huh?" Munch asked as he found Olivia still at her desk, looking about half asleep.

"Don't you ever go home?" Olivia asked.

"Do you?" he returned, "I thought Elliot asked you to check on Toni and his family."

"He did, but I don't think he meant tonight, he's only been gone a few hours," she replied.

"That's still long enough for Toni to torch the place," Munch said.

Olivia looked over at him, "Why do you always expect the worst of her?"

"It saves time," Munch answered, "Besides, she can take it, she doesn't go off the handle every time somebody has something unflattering to say about her, unlike some people."

Olivia closed her eyes for a second and stretched her arms out, grimacing momentarily when she felt a muscle in her back jerk. She picked up the day's paper that somebody had discarded on her desk and briefly looked over the front page. As she read the cover story, a sound emanated from her throat that got John's attention.

"What is it?" he asked.

"Rikers prison has been evacuated," Olivia said, "They moved all the prisoners out."

"Why?" John asked as he reached for the paper.

Olivia tried to find the reason in the article before he snatched it away, "Some suspicious looking boxes were found in the mail room, they were opened up and it looked like packages of anthrax or something so they're moving all the prisoners to other institutions until the place can be declared safe again."

John made a face, "It's prison, when do people care if it's safe?" He read the article over, "Just great, 14,000 murderers and rapists brought out of their cages….all of them shackled and put on busses to take to other prisons until this whole thing's cleared up, and just where the hell do they think they're going to put them when there's not enough room for everybody as it is?" He didn't wait for her to answer, "They should just hope none of them escape."

"How could they escape?" Olivia asked.

The next day, Kathy had spent most of the morning thinking about what Toni had said about Elliot. The kids had come back from their friends' homes and were just lounging around the house doing nothing in particular. Kathy was doing the laundry when she heard somebody at the front door. She looked and saw the silhouette of a man at the door, and the man's overall shape looked like Elliot's. How could he be back already? she wondered. He had figured this assignment would take him out of New York for several days.

"Elliot?" Kathy called.

The door opened and she saw the man starting in. She put the clothes down and decided to try and mend things with her husband; as she headed to the door she put on a little smile and tried to sound pleasant. "Elliot, I'm glad that you're back, I was starting to think that we shouldn't…" Kathy's sentence was cut off as she stopped dead in her tracks, and screamed.

It wasn't Elliot who had come in the house.