A/N: This chapter was sooooo much harder to write than the last one. Ugh. I apologize. I went over it a few times and restarted until I liked it a bit better. Any comments/polite criticism is welcome, since I'm feeling a bit discouraged with this one. Haha But it's up! Enjoy, until the next one.
Rating: M for language, violence
Spoilers: The Lewis arc, vaguely, but not really anything specific beyond that.
Disclaimer: The characters are not mine! All belongs to Dick Wolf, who clearly prefers his characters tortured over happy.
Talisman: 6
Take the light, and darken everything around me/Call the clowns, and listen closely, I'm lost without you - from Rise Above This by Seether
"Stop! Now!" Hewitt yelled to Stabler. "Or I'll shoot her! I will!"
Olivia felt her captor's grip tense as Elliot continued to advance down the alley. Her eyes flitted back and forth between the two men.
"You're not gonna do that, Hewitt," El told him calmly. "No need to add to all the trouble you're in."
Hewitt sneered with impatience. "Unless you wanna find out what her brains look like, you better stop walking. Now."
Liv's eyes met El's as he came to a stop.
"Who the hell are you?" Hewiit asked breathlessly. "No way you followed her that fast."
"He's my partner," Liv lied, maintaining Elliot's upper hand.
"Was I asking you?" Bruce yanked on Liv's hair with his non-gun hand. She gasped. "Bitch?!"
El's eyes flashed from fire to ice at the sight. "Hewitt, I swear to God -"
"Oh - you don't wanna see her hurt? Then I would advise you to lower your fucking gun!" he hissed.
Elliot did as told, never taking his eyes from the man. "Alright. Tell me what it is you want."
"I'm leaving - with her," Bruce tipped his head toward Liv, "and you're gonna let me. Or," he shrugged, "she dies. Simple."
El squinted - a habit he could never quite shake, when forced to think on the spot. "What do you need her for? Why not just let her go? Gotta be easier than her slowin' ya down."
Hewitt grinned. "Well . . . she's really all I've got going for me, right now, wouldn'tcha say? Gives you, and the other cops, a pretty good reason not to shoot me." The man leered, running the gun down over Olivia's chest. "Emphasis on the pretty."
El's hands twitched and he felt bile rise in his throat. As far as he was concerned, Hewitt was a dead man.
At the sound of sirens, Hewitt started backing up, further into the alley. "We're going," he called. "If I even sense you following us, she's dead."
El watched them retreating, breathing harshly, never taking his eyes off Liv. Hewitt disappeared through a door in one of the buildings at the end of the alley, pushing Olivia ahead of him with the gun pressed to her back.
Elliot watched the door slam shut, and counted to ten. Then he followed them.
ii.
Liv could say with certainty that it was the first time at gunpoint in which her mind wasn't entirely focused on survival. Part of it was focused on wondering how Elliot had shown up where he did - and when he did.
"Keep moving!" Hewitt barked, and shoved the gun into her back harder.
"Look, you should stop making this harder on yourself, Bruce," she said, trying to see her way through the dim. "I mean, we're going down, not up - where do you expect to go?"
"I know these alleys and basements like the back of my hand. Just keep movin'." There was a noise, then, and he pulled Liv into a narrow, empty space, his hand over her mouth. He cocked his head, listening. "Your son of a bitch partner, I imagine," Hewitt whispered. "Looking to get you both killed."
Olivia shut her eyes and prayed that wasn't actually the case. She could hear El now, getting closer; feeling his way through the dark as best he could. They stood, frozen, as Elliot passed within feet and kept creeping forward. Once he judged that Elliot had gone far enough, Hewitt pushed Liv across the shadowy hall - where a door seemed to appear, as if out of nowhere. He pushed Liv inside and shut the door behind them quietly.
The room was large, had probably once been used for storage. It was all concrete, and empty, save for a chair and a dirty single cot.
"This where you like to take your dates?" she asked him, her face a mask of disgust.
"Only the ones I really like," he smirked. Liv merely held his gaze stonily.
Outside the room they'd ducked into, Elliot froze at the sound of muffled voices. His eyes scanned and cursed the dim light. He was starting to think Kathy was right: he was too old for cops and robbers anymore. All he wanted was to get Liv out of there, send Hewitt to a dark hole with bars on it, and sleep.
He caught the shimmer of something metal, up the wall. It turned out to be a grate, that he could just reach on tip-toe. El could see Liv, with Hewitt near the back of the room. Their lips were moving, but he couldn't make out what they were saying.
The spaces between the rungs of the grate weren't large enough for Elliot to take his shot, otherwise Hewitt would already be dead. He wondered, vaguely, where Liv's squad was.
iii.
"Is this the plan, Bruce? Stay here, like sitting ducks, or . . ." Liv spoke again, uncomfortable with Hewitt's long silences.
"If you're in such a rush, I can put you out of your misery now."
Liv sighed as Hewitt focused on listening for the sound of more footsteps or sirens. He heard nothing. Outside, next to the door, Elliot was motionless, barely breathing.
"I think the coast might be clear," Hewitt said. "We need to go deeper. Let's move." He pushed Olivia ahead of him again. "Open the door."
She did as told. Hewitt looked, making sure he couldn't see anyone in the doorway. When he seemed satisfied, he shoved Olivia through the space.
Before she could take a second step forward, she felt a warm hand encircle her wrist and pull her firmly to the side. Then, the narrow, dim space lit up with sudden gunfire. Liv found herself swimming toward concrete in slow motion, wondering if she was dead. Her mind filled with the image of Elliot holding Noah, and how much she had wanted to see that again.
Then . . . then it was like going to sleep, and everything was silence.
iv.
Elliot had never been so grateful to hear the sound of other cops, and to see flashlights flood the dark. Until he saw Olivia on the ground. And blood. He dropped over her, his heart so far up his throat, he was afraid to speak.
"Liv?! Liv! Jesus - can you hear me? Olivia!"
"Hands in the air! Now!"
El looked up to see a long-haired blonde, pointing her gun at him. Dazed, he raised his hands. "Please! Call a bus!" he shouted.
Rollins had already started forward with cuffs, but hesitated. Behind her, Fin radioed for the ambulance.
"Stabler?!" Fin squinted in disbelief. "What the hell?"
"Fin! Thank God!"
"You know this guy?" Rollins asked.
"Used to," Fin replied. "He was Benson's partner for 12 years."
"Fin - it was so dark, and Hewitt had a gun on her . . . I pulled her, I think we both fired . . . fuck."
Fin was on the ground then, as El tried to explain. "Where's she bleedin' from? Rollins - shine your flashlight over here!"
Amanda did as told, her eyes trained on where Elliot was holding Liv's hand and rubbing it, almost possessively.
"Detectives," one of the backup officers interrupted, "your perp is dead."
Elliot was cold with panic, too far gone to feel any sense of satisfaction that Hewitt had gone down. Liv felt cold to the touch, and it was all he could do not to throw up on the concrete floor. Had he shot her? Had Hewitt? He let Fin pull him to his feet when the paramedics arrived, all the noise and commotion swelling, then fading, like radio stations under a passing dial.
El's eyes were riveted to Olivia's face, waiting . . . waiting for her eyes to open again.
v.
After sleeping most of the day away, Elliot was convinced that he'd woken up inside a nightmare. As much as hearing Liv say it had felt like coming home, he wasn't her partner anymore. He wasn't even a cop, anymore - not as far as the state of New York was concerned, anyway. He was an outsider. He hung back, watching Fin, the blonde, another tall SVU detective with a heavy Brooklyn accent, and a dark-haired ADA confer over Olivia's condition. El was jealous of their comraderie. He missed being a part of something larger.
He resisted the urge to scream, squirming in the waiting room chair he was rooted to - his thoughts a run-on mix of prayer, profanity, and questions. It was an eternity before Fin came over to put him out of his misery.
"How's Liv?" El asked, looking up at his old colleague.
"In surgery," Fin told him. "Bullet lodged in her lung. They're doin' what they can."
"Where's Noah?"
Fin raised an eyebrow and paused. He took a seat next to El. "Amanda'll take care'a that . . . she has a daughter that Noah plays with." Fin let go a long breath. "What were you doin' there, Stabler? I gotta be too young to be seein' ghosts."
"Hewitt was my assignment," El said, his chuckle sounding so tired.
"Assigment?" Fin echoed. "P. I. work?"
"Yeah."
"People don't normally hire a P. I. for a rapist."
"I wasn't casing him for rape," Elliot said. "I was . . . hired because the bodega owner wanted to prove Hewitt had been closing up shop early, skipping out on his shifts."
Fin half-rolled his eyes. "Wow. Bruce is just an all-around winnin' guy, huh?"
Elliot snorted and leaned back until he could put his head against the wall.
"Our D. A. - that's Barba - he wants us to get a statement from you. I told him I'd get it; wanted ta give you some time"
"Thanks. I appreciate that." Fin nodded, got up again, to head back to the squad. "Hey. Fin." The two men looked at each other. "You'll let me know?"
"I will."
The two men had had their issues in the past, but Elliot still trusted the man not to deal him out when it came to Olivia. He watched, as Fin crossed to rejoin the SVU squad. Watched them talking in hushed tones, about Liv, about Hewitt, and likely about him, too. El supposed he'd always be a topic of hushed conversation in the NYPD, for one reason or another.
He watched them interacting, cataloguing information to keep his mind off of his own fear. The tall, sandy-haired one was clearly in love with the blonde - who, by her responding body language, seemed unsure if she was in love with anybody. The ADA, Barba, sported a look that Elliot was all-too-familair with, making El wonder how many men who'd worked with Liv over the years had fallen in love, as well. Had he and Liv been so obvious, he wondered - their faces as easy to read?
And, more imprtantly, was he going to get the chance to look at her like that, ever again?
Elliot turned his eyes to the wall clock, and started counting minutes.
vi.
His cell phone roused him from a doze several hours later. The caller ID announced it was Kathy. As he picked up, he looked across the waiting room. Only Fin and the blonde were still there.
"Hey - you weren't here when I got Eli home from soccer, and I couldn't get ahold of you. I was worried," Kathy told him.
"I'm alright," he said quietly.
"How's work?"
"Work . . . got kind of derailed. Turns out my guy was a serial rapist."
"Oh, God!" Kathy groaned.
"Yeah. Well - doesn't matter now. He's dead."
"Dead?! Are you sure you're okay?"
"Yeah. I'm fine. But, look . . . I might not be home for a while."
"Elliot?" Kathy's tone was concern, and suspicion.
"I'm at Mercy," he told her. "Liv . . . Olivia was shot. She's still in the O. R."
There was an interminably long silence on Kathy's end, while he waited to see if she would be able to extend him the same compassion he had been trying to extend her.
"I'm so sorry," her voice came at last. It trembled as she said, "I understand. Let me know . . . if you need anything."
"Thanks, Kathy." He noticed Fin approaching, and his stomach lurched. "I gotta go."
Elliot stood up.
"She's outta surgery," Fin said with a half-smile. "She lost a lotta blood, though - so she's not outta the woods, technically."
"Can I see her?"
"She's not awake yet, but yeah. I'll take you to her. C'mon."
For a man who had spent his own fair share in them, and then some, Elliot hated hospitals. Sterility has a distinct smell, and it sticks to everything, underneath the over-bright lights. The racket created by medical equipment can never quite bounce off the walls and floor, and so mutes, along with the whisper of nurses footsteps, as they go in and out like phantoms.
The blonde detective was on her way out as Fin pointed El to the doorway. "Stabler, this is Amanda Rollins. Rollins - Elliot Stabler."
She shook his hand. "Pleasure," she drawled. "Sorry, 'bout earlier."
"Don't worry about it. I'm just grateful that you showed up when you did."
"C'mon, Rollins," Fin said, "we got a pile'a paperwork to start."
El watched them go, then turned to the doorway, stalling. They had never really had to do this - with her being the one in the bed, because he had always made it a point to put himself in harm's way before her. He had seen it as another part of their partnership, to take bullets, punches, or anything that came between them. Olivia would have just called it ridiculous chauvinism, but it had kept her mostly safe, for 12 years.
But not this time.
He stepped inside.
vii.
She was so pale.
It was his first thought. She wasn't intubated, but it made for no shortage of tubes and machines, beeping away steadily. The gamut of his emotions staggered him. Below the surface of exhaustion, there was guilt, grief, denial, and worse - regret.
El pulled up a chair and cleared his throat softly. He hesitated, and glanced back to the doorway, before he took Liv's hand in both of his. He said a short prayer, and wondered why talking was so much harder when it was one-sided.
"I'm here, Liv," he told her. "I . . . I'm so sorry. I was trying so hard to keep you safe. Guess I'm not as cut out for all this, anymore, as I thought, huh?"
Elliot wanted so much to see her dark eyes that the ache seemed to take up the room. "I just . . . God, I wish we hadn't fought. There are so many things I want to say, and ask."
It occurred to him, suddenly, that this was really the first time he had ever held Liv's hand - when they weren't undercover - instead of just brushing against it at the desk, or in the car. He balked at the realization, and the depth of his own ridiculous cowardice.
There he found himself a cliche - a man in love, willing to bargain all his chips at the door of Another Chance. Elliot let himself drift away, lulled by the rise and fall of Liv's breathing, as his tired mind insisted on trotting out a dozen years worth of memories.
When a hand on his shoulder woke him, bright morning light was burning through the frosted hospital panes. El sat up from where he'd slept, bent at the waist in the chair, with his face buried in the bed next to Liv's hand. His back screamed in agony.
"Time is it?" he asked sheepishly.
"Little after seven," Rollins told him. She passed him a cup of coffee. "It's just black. Figured that'd be safest, til I find out how you like it."
"Thanks." He took the coffee, glanced at Liv. "She's still not awake."
"Yeah. Doc said they're keepin' her under a while, just to be safe." The detective pulled a second chair alongside El's and sat. "But she's doin' well. She's a stubborn one, this gal."
Elliot snorted. "You don't know the half of it."
"You two were partners a long time."
"Yeah. A long . . . long time," he nodded vacantly.
"Fin told me how you ended up in the alley. Good fortune in strange circumstances."
He met Amanda's gaze. "Did CSU go down there? Did they . . . did it turn out I shot her?"
"Hewitt shot her. You two fired within milliseconds of each other," Rollins explained. "He got Liv in the side, and you got him in the head." She watched the man relax, and take a deep breath.
"How's Noah doing?" he asked her.
"Good, for now. He and Jesse keep each other busy."
"Your daughter," El remembered. "How old is she?"
" 'Bout a year and a half," Amanda smiled. "You got kids?"
Elliot chuckled. "Yeah. Five of 'em."
"Five?" she exclaimed, "Lord! How did you work in sex crimes so long?"
"I don't know anymore, sometimes," he admitted. "Their mother carried more than her share. I guess I . . . didn't know how to stop, after a while. The job was everything I knew."
Rollins looked at the wedding band on Elliot's finger, and said nothing.
"They're all grown up now, and gone - save for my youngest. He's ten."
"Mmm - back home in Georgia, we call that a 'Change of Life Baby.'"
El smiled softly. And why not? Her version certainly sounded better than his would. "Georgia," he remarked. "How'd you end up here?"
"That's . . . a story," Rollins said.
He settled back in the chair. "Well. I've got time. Tell me."
So she did.
viii.
Elliot was in the middle of a slow, quiet pace around the room the next day when a nurse came in to tend to Liv. The nurse pulled the hanging curtain around the bed, so El leaned against the wall, arms crossed, to wait.
Lost in his own thoughts, he rolled his head to the side - and realized there was a gap where he could see inside the curtain. His first reaction was to blush furiously, not wanting to seem indelicate. On second glance, he saw that there wasn't anything much being revealed. The nurse was changing the leads for the heart monitor, but most of Liv's chest was still swathed in surgical dressings.
What he could see of her shoulders was enough to set his heart racing. He swallowed hard when he noticed scars there, in the shape of . . . keys, maybe? he thought.
Lewis. Elliot balled his fists and felt his blood begin to rush. Jesus, Liv, what did he do to you? Tears stung at his eyes. I woulda done better than just a shot to the head.
El nodded to the nurse once they finished, sliding the curtain open again. He settled back into the bedside chair that was starting to feel like an extension of his ass. He hadn't eaten, or showered, or even left the room. He had called Eli, to assure him he would be home as soon as he could. Soon, Fin would be trying to get him to leave, at least long enough to give his statement, and they would argue when Elliot tried to explain he wouldn't be going anywhere until Olivia was conscious again.
The pitter-patter of little shoes brought Elliot's attention back to the doorway.
"El!" Noah lit up when he saw Elliot and ran to the chair. El helped him scramble into his lap. As the boy turned arond, he pointed to the bed. "Mama!"
"Yeah, buddy. She's sleepin' right now."
Noah bit his lip. " 'Kay."
Rollins came behind, with Jesse in an umbrella stroller. "Mornin'," she smiled. She dropped a warm, greasy bag into his hands. "You need'ta eat. And since Liv can't make you, you're stuck with me for now."
Elliot chuckled and pulled a breakfast sandwich from the sac, unwrapping it while Noah watched. "Did you make this?" he teased.
"No!" the boy shook his head vehemently.
"Mmm - s'good!" El said, his mouth full. "You wanna bite?" Noah nodded, and El held the sandwich in front of the boy's face so he could chomp down.
"Here - coffee," Amanda announced, and handed El a cup to go with the food.
"Thanks," he said, humbled by her care after having only just met the day before. "Any news?"
"Doctor said Liv is holdin' steady. They'll likely dial back the sedatives soon." Amanda smiled warmly, knowing he was so anxiously awaiting just that.
"That's a relief," he sighed, watching as Noah ate another bite of his breakfast. The tiny blonde in the stroller gurgled and reached for Elliot and Noah. "Hi, Jesse," El acknowledged.
"Jesse is my friend," Noah said proudly.
"So I hear." Elliot ruffled the boy's hair.
"Listen," Rollins said, "would it be alright if you watched Noah for a bit? I promised my sister I'd bring Jesse to do lunch today."
"Yeah. I would be fine with that." Elliot's smile was enormous.
"What do you think, Noah?" Amanda crouched to the boy's level. "You wanna stay here a while, with Elliot and your mama?"
"Yes, please," he said shyly.
"It's settled then." Amanda stood up, searching a pocket for one of her cards. "You can call me, or text, if anything changes - or, if you need a wrangler," she grinned.
El chuckled. "Enjoy your lunch, Amanda."
When there was no more food to keep the boy occupied, he turned in El's lap to look at the man. "When's Mama gonna be awake?"
"I'm not sure," he answered honestly. "Soon, I hope." The boy faced forward again, and leaned back until he was layng against Elliot's chest. "How about, while we wait, I tell you a story?"
"Okay."
Elliot looked down at the top of Noah's head, then across to Liv. "Well . . . once upon a time, I was a police officer, like your mom . . . "
"You were?"
"Sure was. And then, one day, my boss told me . . . your mom was coming to work with me -"
"Wait, wait," Noah said, his voice dead serious. He squirmed around until he could see El's face again. "Is this a real story?"
He looked into the little boy's eyes. "As real as real can be," he confessed.
Satisfied, the boy turned towards the bed again. "Okay. Keep going."
"The first day your mom came to work with me and I met her, I thought she was the most beautiful girl in the whole world. . . ."