AN: HELLO THERE! HAPPY NEW YEAR TO EVERYONE! I'M GLAD TO BRING YOU A NEW CHAPTER TO THIS STORY. THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING IT! AND SPECIAL THANKS TO THE ONES THAT TAKE A MINUTE TO LEAVE A REVIEW! I LOVE YOU!
AN2: THIS CHAPTER WAS INSPIRED BY BRUNO MARS' SONG TALKING TO THE MOON WHICH WOULD BE A GOOD IDEA TO LISTEN WHILE READING! :)
D: LAW AND ORDER SVU ARE NOT MINE NOR ARE ITS CHARACTERS.
CH29 Let the moon lead you back home.
The attacker of Elliot's daughter hasn't survived so the case has become a much less complicated for the detectives because there is no family that worries about the man and the district attorney finds not useful to pursue the case rather than to help close above cases. It is stated that Kathleen acted in self-defense and the drunkenness of the man was the cause of the lethal fall. So, Elliot and his family returned to the city as soon as he was discharged from the hospital. Katherine took the opportunity to ensure that Elliot didn't get back to his confinement and took him home with their children wanting him not to be absent for Christmas.
"We should go for a Christmas tree before the best ones are taken." Elizabeth complains while pulling out a juice from the refrigerator.
"Oh no what a tragedy!" Richard teases his twin. "Santa won't come over if there is not a Christmas tree!" Earning a glare from Liz.
"Richard!" Katherine decides to intervene. "It's actually not a bad idea. You should go with your father to buy the pine like in the old times." She dares to propose looking at Elliot who is washing a few dishes in the sink.
"Yes! Daddy lets get a pine!" Elizabeth reacts excitedly rushing to take Elliot's arm. He turns to see his daughter and felt real joy to see the enthusiasm of the young girl in her huge and bright eyes. "Shall we?" Elizabeth insists.
"Okay, lets get the pine." Elliot accepts shaking off the excess of water from his hands.
"I'll finish with that." Katherine is quick to say so her children and their father could leave soon.
Once in the Kathy's van Elliot drives towards a huge vacant lot in Queens that each year is filled with pines to sell them; the Christmas forest near home is how Elizabeth named it when she was four years old.
"We must choose a huge pine tree!" Elizabeth shouts loudly trying to be heard over the music that co-pilot-Richard has put on. "Turn down the volume a bit Ricardo!" She yells at his brother with the Latin nickname that she loves to call him when something is bothering her. Elliot handles to lower the music wanting to prevent a further fighting.
"Hey! I'm the music manager!" Richard complains.
"That is correct but you are not the get-father-deft manager." Elliot replied with a twisted smile making both twins laugh.
"It's good to see you again dad." Richard says.
"Yes. Lately each of us is so into our lives that we hardly see each other." Elizabeth supports the words of her brother.
"It's part of growing up." Elliot answers them trying to avoid a deeper conversation.
"That you lock yourself in an apartment for months it's not a part of growing." But Elizabeth doesn't allow him to evade the issue. "What I mean is that you have been totally absent not even a call to see how your princess is doing in college. It is understood that things were horrible but do not forget your children." She complains.
"Hey Liz, I know and I'm sorry indeed. I don't..."
"No explanation or apology is necessary, just don't do that again." Richard intervenes assuming it is not an easy way for his father to speak about it; about Olivia. "You are not alone." He assures him.
"Exactly." Elizabeth agrees with her brother. "Although, Richard has actually taken advantage of your apartment in your absence."
"How come?" Elliot questions immediately turning off the radio completely.
"Argh, thank you Elizabeth." The young man complains. "Ahm, lets say that I have been paying your rent and watching your place." He tries to explain without saying much.
"And bringing girls to it" Elizabeth continues her talking. "such as his sister's best friend."
"What?" Elliot can't help but ask for more information.
"Elizabeth please nothing happened!" Richard starts arguing with his sister.
"Certainly not! She told me she found another ladies' underwear!" Elizabeth replies hard and hassle.
"I don't know to whom it belonged!" Richard responds in self-defense. "They were already there when I arrived!" And then the car is completely silent. Elliot is soon to understand which clothing his children are talking about; Olivia left her clothes in his shower the day before her disappearance. And his children are afraid to ask more about it.
"Richard you were not supposed to go to my apartment." Elliot finally speaks. "The man who kidnapped Olivia knows where I lived." The name of Olivia goes with sadness but it hides behind the seriousness and concern with which Elliot speaks to repress his children.
"That man is now in jail; and if I didn't pay the rent they would had thrown your things to the street." Richard replies angrily to his father.
"It is not that I don't thank you for that Richard, I'm grateful. But this man is dangerous even in jail and it would be best to stop living in that apartment." Elliot explains to his son while concentrating on parking the van nearby the pine tree market. "Thank You." He says once he can see Richard eye to eye. "And stop messing with your sister's friend."
"Please!" Elizabeth expresses immediately making his brother roll his eyes.
With that they decide to go down in search of their Christmas trees. Elizabeth moves between all the pines not accepting some options that Richard and Elliot proposed and it is not until she finds a really huge pine that she shouts "This is it! This is it!" and soon the pine is strapped to the roof of the van.
Elliot drives back to his family home listening to a couple of anecdotes that the twins decide to tell about last Christmas; Christmas when they were still kids. Soon they find themselves at home; Elliot and Richard strive to load the huge and heavy pine to take it into the house where the others are already waiting with all the ornaments ready to be placed. So they spend the afternoon decorating the huge pine and ensuring that everyone has a sock with their names hanging in the living room. Elliot really enjoys the evening with his family but at nightfall he can't help but turn to see the huge moon glowing in the sky and let out a sigh thinking of past Christmas.
Each December he used to go and buy the pine with his children making sure to pay for a second one which the next day he would take to his partner's apartment: 'the Grinchlivia cave' as it has been named by himself; forcing her to get the Christmas spirit. They spent an entire afternoon decorating the pine, trying to think of the right gift for the office secret-Santa exchange and recalling past years, until the night reached them. It was the only time that Olivia would say to him that cheesy phrase: 'let the moon guide you back home'; phrase that a six year old Olivia had invented thinking that the moon lived on top of her house, wishing her mother did find her way back home at night; hoping not to spend Christmas Eve alone. She stopped saying this phrase when her mother did come back home but drunk and aggressive. And it was not until the first December as Elliot's partner- when Elliot first forced her to decorate her apartment- that Olivia said that phrase again; one night, once a year for more than a decade.
Elliot observes the moon and nostalgia attacks him as he realizes that the next day he will not be decorating a pine with her. But the memory of what happened in Adirondacks' is present and latent so he looks up at the moon and whispers: "Let the moon guide you back home."
/ ETERNITY /
Once Olivia had told the essentials of her life the extra questions took place and she decided to answer them with sincerity owed to the three vampires. After all they had demonstrated their full confidence and support to her over the months.
"It's good to have information about your human life." Stephen says with a warm smile trying that she doesn't feel uncomfortable. "It will be very useful to help you get back." He explains.
"That and it's always good to know that we haven't turned into a vamp a crazy psychopath." Megane dares to joke around making everyone laugh.
"You've heard all my background and still don't consider me a psycho?!" Olivia says following the joke. "Perfect!"
"I can say that your background actually helps me understand a little, just a little, that super self-control of yours." Mario says. "And Stephen is right. We have to think how you are going to come back from the dead."
"We must consider that they had made a pretty big search for you or your body and all they found were your broken clothes." Megane reminds the facts occurred when the possibility of returning was completely nonexistent.
"I've already thought of some potential stories. They are a bit unlikely but they can work if we properly assemble the whole acting." Stephen lets them know that during Olivia's narration of her life he has been joining several stories to get her back without any suspicious.
"Good but I think first things first." Olivia stops that discussion. "We have to make sure I can return; that I will be able to control with more than five persons." She says letting them know that, despite her self-control, there is still a part of her that still doubts she can do it. Mario and Stephen let out an incredulous laugh as they are confident that she will achieve self control with no problems. However, Megane remains serious and gets up to walk around the room.
"I think you're ready to go with more than five humans." Mario tells trying to infect her with his confident. "You could control against hundreds." Olivia gives him an incredulous look but her eyes suddenly turn to his background to see how Megane takes one of the few decorations in the room to throw it hard against the mirror wall. Olivia reflexes act immediately and in less than a second she already is on the other side of the room catching the vase in the air just before it crashes into the huge mirror.
"What the hell?" Olivia complains dedicating an expression full of doubt to the blonde who looks at her from the other side of the middle-rock.
"I think the self control is not the greatest of our problems." Megane says smiling intently watching the vase in the vampire's hand, drawing the attention of everyone. Without thinking twice she takes the table where the vase was and throws it again this time straight to Olivia, who swiftly stops it with her free hand without doing any damage to the wood. "I think you've forgotten how to be human." Megane announces implying the reason for her actions. "That vase must be broken to pieces together with the mirror and that table should have knocked you down." All but Olivia begin to laugh at what happened.
"I think we should teach you how to be human again." Stephen laughs even more at the expression on Olivia's face; she leaves the table and vase back on the ground before turning back to find herself in the mirror. The same mirror in which she first saw herself after waking as a vampire in the forest; the mirror in where she couldn't recognized her own face until inquired carefully into her expressions; the same mirror where she saw her eyes shining with that intense red, she thanks that now they have a soft golden color.
"Fuck." She leaves out the word with obvious anger. "I will never go back." She says angrily thinking that if she hadn't been able to recognize herself then her friends will not be able to see at her without knowing that something very strange had changed in her. "This plan of yours involves a plastic surgery?" Olivia asks Stephen seeing him through the mirror's reflection. "I mean ... how will I explain my perfect figure and my perfect face carved in stone? And my eyes?!" Her voice is clear with the panic beginning to be present so Stephen is soon to be at her side.
"Not to worry Olivia." He tries to calm her down.
"Not to worry? Look at me! I can't even remember how to move to a humanly acceptable speed; and I used to have at least ten wrinkles on my now-perfectly-smooth face!" She says pointing to her reflection. "I'm supposed to be forty, not thirty!"
"Olivia calm down!" Megane decides to interfere trying not to laugh. "First of all, humans' eyes are weak and will not notice any changes as accurate as yours, and secondly, there is nothing that makeup can't fix ... Or unfix." She says with secure in her words.
"And contacts with your original eye color." Mario seconds his girl.
"And we will teach you to control your speed and your strength and your reflexes as well." Stephen assures. "You will return to be the same Olivia Benson, only maybe less fragile."
"No need to pretend plastic surgery." Mario says laughing.
"So there is a lot to teach you." Megane encourages pulling her arm to drag her to her huge closet.
"I'm not missing this." Stephen tells Mario making him laugh.
"Another change of clothes?" Olivia complains.
"We will choose our outfit to go to a hotel to pretend we're human." Olivia rolls her eyes. "Hey! You will choose your own clothes this time but you will have to do it acting and thinking as a human."
"Says the one who dragged me here with super vampire speed." Olivia continues complaining.
"Don't get difficult!" Megane scolds. "Now, walk slowly and naturally human toward the clothes and choose one considering the weather."
"Don't forget to breathe or appear to breathe." Mario adds.
"And blink." Stephen dares to tell.
Olivia let out a big sigh, but she doesn't complain and decides to do what she was ordered. She takes a deep breath and prepares to give a step as slowly as she imagines she should. She walks to the winter garments thinking that it should be an intense cold though she doesn't feel one bit of coldness on her skin. She raises her hands in slow motion to take a huge jacket. She ends up looking like a badly programmed robot trying to move at human speed, breathe, blink and struggling to seem calm at the same time.
Stephen strong laughter fills the room making the others to not contain any more their own laughter. Olivia turns to him with fury in her eyes and without thinking twice she throws him the snow boots she has taken a second before.
"With mocking I will not accomplish anything!" She complains seeing the boots crash to his face and he grimaces in pain.
"Ouch!" He complains and then continues laughing. "That's how it's done." He explains letting her know the obvious; the boots beat him because he allowed them and of course they didn't cause any pain but he perfectly pretended that they did. And another glare leaves her golden eyes.
So they spent two full days training Olivia to pretend to be an ordinary human. Starting with the basics; walking pretending common errors such as tripping or slipping; the breathing without forgetting it due to the lack of the need for air in her lungs and perhaps how to fake a hiccups attack; the occasionally blinking without appearing to have a strange tic in her eyes and pretend that she has an speck that bothers her; how to control the use of force and the correct timing of her hands; tiredness and how to pretend to sleep; even decided to also help her control the use of her gift reminding her not to answer questions or comments that hadn't been made aloud.
At the end of the two days, Olivia could pretend to be a human without much trouble and it was time for the final test. Adequate preparations were made to take her to one of the nearby hotels. They will pretend to be a group of friends who decided to spend a weekend skiing in the mountains. Mario took care of getting a van while the others were packing false suitcases and disguised themselves as humans. As they approached the chosen hotel Olivia start to put her learning in practice. She listened, sniffed and soon observed the humans who were there. She concentrates on the walking, breathing, blinking and the generals to appear to be a human while the self control is not as easy; so she decides to use her gift to start looking around the human's thoughts. Upon entering the hotel things got a bit more complicated because the smell and warmth is much more intense than outside as most humans take shelter from the cold night in there. Megane is responsible for telling her a fake gossip story to help her with the appearances noting that she begins to look tense.
"I'll go check in." Mario announces seeming perfectly human.
'Is everything fine?' Stephen decides to use the voice in his mind to communicate with her while pretending to read a brochure. Olivia immediately identifies his voice among the others and it helps her calm down. She nods knowing he can observe her but seeming to be nodding at Megane's conversation.
"Good night." Mario comes to the reception where a man is focused on a monitor screen. "I would have two rooms please." He tells trying to get his attention.
"Sorry we are full." The man says without even turning to see him.
"Yes, I see that there are a lot of persons this weekend." Mario tries to make conversation. "But, don't you have even a room?" He tries again.
"Sorry." The man finally turns to see him. "The only room available is for two, not four." The man let him know while directing his gaze to the other three vampires. Mario let out a sigh trying that the man's attitude doesn't bother him. He looks at him and he realizes that the man has not separated his look from Olivia. Immediately Mario leads his own eyes towards the vampire hoping not find evidence but she looks like a common human. So Mario returns his gaze to the man at the desk and ensures to place himself between his gaze and Olivia.
"Are you a hundred percent you have no other room?" Mario asks trying to win his attention back but the man just nods while directing his gaze to the wall that is on his right side. Mario notices this so he puts his gift on in order to search in his memories what is on that wall. Soon he gets to see in his mind a corkboard with different papers stuck to it and one in particular catches his eye: A photo of Olivia hangs in there with the words 'missing' in it. "Oh, okay we'll look elsewhere." Mario tells him pretending to be calm but inside he is nervous realizing that perhaps the man has recognized Olivia.
"Everything is full this season." The man announced still trying to get a look of Olivia.
"We'll try." Mario tells his back as he walks to his friends making sure to cover Olivia with his body. "We must return to the road." He announces with false deception in his voice.
'On the wall there is a picture of you and I think the clerk recognized you.' Mario is quick to explain to Olivia using her gift. She flips looking for her photo and soon finds it.
"There is no room here either?" Megane plays along with her boyfriend. "Damn." She complains pretending nuisance.
"We should continue looking." Olivia says turning to prevent the receptionist to see her. Suddenly the self control and the throat burning don't seem as important as not to be recognized without even having a plan of how to explain her disappearance. "Let's go." She says making everyone else to follow her out of the place. They hurry as much as they can, still pretending to be humans, to return to the safety of the van where Stephen and Megane requires an explanation.
"You think he recognized her?" Megane asks Mario with evident fear in her voice.
"I don't know." He answers truthfully. "But he suspected."
"I'll find out." Olivia says lowering the car again. She walks to one of the hotel's windows in search of the man and once she locates him she focuses on him and him alone to read his mind. Indeed, the man has found the resemblance between Olivia and woman in the photo -which pleases Olivia cause that means that she is not as changed as she though- but he was unable to observe her clearly and now he begins to forget about it. Olivia decides to take a look at the other minds but none seems to have noticed the photo. She lets out a sigh and decides to return to the van making sure not to be seen.
"And?" Stephen is the first to ask.
"We are out of danger." She says settling into her seat. All let out a sigh of relief.
"It was very stupid from us bringing her here. These flyers will be throughout the area." Mario complains. "We were lucky."
"Yes, and you're a great actress." Stephen tells her letting her know she had passed the test. "You even went back there and didn't lose control one bit." Olivia smiles satisfactorily.
"I even think you can come with us to leave the car on the other house." Mario tells her starting the engine. They drive for four hours until they arrive to their house in Long Island, not so far from the city but far from common residential areas. They show the house to Olivia: it is much larger than the small cabin in the woods but there are no close neighbors either and it has a garden big enough for four more houses. Olivia enjoys the tour of the two levels of the house doing a couple of questions about the property.
"This will be your room." Megane tells her letting her enter one of the back rooms. It is about the size of her little tree house, has its own bathroom, a big closet like Megane's one and its own balcony. "You will decorate it as you like. No bed means more space."
"I will not need this room." Olivia says. "It's not that I don't thank you but ... I'll go back to live in my own apartment, remember?" Megane's smile disappears along with her enthusiasm.
"True." She says without much encouragement walking towards the balcony.
"Not that I do not appreciate it but I'm supposed to be back to my old life." Olivia tries to explain not wanting to seem ungrateful.
"I know." Megane says while watching the moon. Olivia walks to her side. "Will you pretend you never met us?" She asks with fear in her voice.
"No." Olivia replies immediately. "Megane, you rescued me; you will be part of my returning." She ensures her trying to look into her eyes happy to see her smile again.
"So this is your room although you are not living with us." Megane says making Olivia laugh.
Soon Mario joins them to explain the plan that he and Stephen have already made; both agree that the plan seems quite believable and they are sure they can address any issues that may arise with respect to it.
"Where is Stephen?" Olivia asks Mario thinking he should be there with them.
"Preparing to begin with the plan tomorrow morning." Stephen answers from the garden showing a huge sack he's chosen for his human disguise. Olivia looks at him and gives him a huge smile and then looks back up at the moon and said almost inaudibly: "Guide me back home"
TO BE CONTINUE...
AN: HOPE YOU ENJOY THIS ONE! LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK AND WHAT YOU EXPECT TO HAPPEN NEXT...
NEXT CHAPTER THE PLAN WILL BEGIN.
