Title: To Protect, and Ultimately Love (1/4)

Author: Quantara

Email: quantara@nzoomail.com

Disclaimer: The usual, Third Watch and Gargs don't belong to me, they belong to their respective owners (Disney/Warner Bros/NBC/Buena Vista, etc,.)

Rating: R - for violence, language and content

Thanks to everyone on the 55David message board for all their feedback! Thanks guys! Here's the second part...more will be following VERY shortly! I wasn't going to post this part until I had finished the last 3, but thought I would!
All feedback is welcome, good or bad! Mail me: quantara@nzoomail.com

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CHAPTER ONE
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Same Night - 11.47pm

The cool winds of the midnight air got caught between Elisa's jacket collar and her neck, harshly brushing against her bare skin and sending a shiver down her spine as she instinctively wrapped her arms around herself. Across the road from her she could see a couple walking hand-in-hand in the opposite direction she was headed. The woman was carrying a red balloon on a string made of ribbon, there was a wide smile on her face as she talked with her boyfriend, fiancé, hell, maybe it was her husband. It hurt too much watching them for her to really care.

Sighing and letting out a long breath as she continued walking, Elisa wondered how she and Matt had got so caught up in the 'relationship' they had. Yes, she knew grief brought them closer together. Her own grief at losing Goliath. And Matt's because of the car accident he was in eight and a half months ago that had stopped him from working for not quite seven of those moments. She wished, that instead of taking the heroin with him, she'd helped him get treatment to get over his addiction. But it had all gone terribly wrong when she sat there, watching as he injected the shit into his arm and her mind instantly flickered to the idea of how great it might feel to escape from the sorrow she was feeling day in and day out. And that's how her addiction to it had begun. Something though, had they ever been caught, would cost them their jobs.

Shaking her head slightly, Elisa sniffed back the tears that had decided to come back in full 'flooding' mode and she hated it. Not the tears. But the idea of taking drugs. Her parents had always brought her up to stay away from it. She knew they'd taken it as youngsters, whose parents hadn't? But taking in mind the fullness of her actions, the consequences, she wished she'd listened to their advice. All these years saying 'no', how could she have just abandoned everything she ever believed in just to ease the pain she felt? The pain that came from every break up. Every break up... she thought, pain stinging her eyes as she wished all those years in a non 'intimate' relationship with Goliath that they hadn't just let what they had slip out from underneath them. She loved him, painfully so, wished that they had been as intimate as she'd have liked. But they were two different species and they'd agreed it would be too dangerous if they were to ever have sex. They didn't know what would happen if they had of, the risk was too high.

But all of that...she shook her head again, a tear rolling down her cheek as her mind trailed over to Matt. To what they had. Beyond the drugs, beyond the sex. They did have something special, they always had. All those years with Goliath, she hadn't even noticed he had never once been involved with a woman. The thought passed her mind that maybe he was gay or something, but no. She soon learnt, from a drug induced conversation he didn't remember the next day, that he had always been in love with her. In love with her fiery personality, the way she said what she wanted and to who she wanted. And how he'd let himself be available, just in case. A dream he had, to be the one she'd turned to if what she had with Goliath would ever end. And as everything changed in her relationship with Goliath and then ended, she did turn to Matt. And now she was pregnant with his child.

"How did I let my life get so screwed up?" she asked herself aloud, a tone of mourning in her voice, of dissapointment, and that's when she heard a noise that was only too familiar and she instantly froze in her steps. Her heart surged in her chest at what felt like a thousand beats per second. "Please, don't do this..." she breathed out, her voice a mere whisper, knowing he was there, gun pointed at her head. Knowing there was murderous intent in the way he was breathing. Slowly, she inhaled, and turned around to see him standing there. He wore a beanie atop his head, his eyes were as dark as they always were and blood covered the white T-shirt he wore. She knew he'd done something terribly wrong. "What'd you do, Michael?" she asked, her voice shaken.

The stainless steel magnum pointed at her, he swallowed hard. "Just shut up," he warned her, his voice as deep and full of contempt as it was the last time she saw him.

"You have to tell me what you did."

He squeezed the gun tighter in his hands, his teeth clenching as he looked back at her. "I said shut up!" he roared, causing her to flinch at his tone. "It was you, wasn't it, Maza? It was you that made that bitch sister of yours keep my son from me! Wasn't it!?"

She gasped in that moment when he stopped screaming at her, finally able to catch the breath she didn't know she was desperate for. "No!" she said back, but he only shoved the gun closer to her. "I swear it wasn't me, Michael!"

His breath still clenched, his left hand squeezing then releasing at his side. "You're lying to me! I know it was you! You had to put the blame on someone...who better than me!"

"No...no...we didn't do that...Grayson was the one who took over your case..."

He eyed her angrily, "It's not like you tried to stop him though, is it!?"

"How could I!?" she screamed back, tears streaming down her face now.

"By not lying to them when they asked if I came to your place and spend the night with Beth! That's how!" he shouted, his left hand clenching tightly at his side.

Elisa closed her eyes momentarily as she shook her head. "I'm sorry," she whispered, her eyes slowly opening to meet his.

"No you're not," Michael shook his head, "You and that bitch sister of yours betrayed me. I was innocent!"

"If you were guilty, then why'd you plead guilty to the other two auto theft charges? Huh, Michael?" she asked.

"I never did the on you fucking cops arrested me for!" he shouted again, this time his tone of pleading and Elisa could feel her chest tightening.

"You still did the other two. And now? Now you're out on parole eighteen months later. You've gotten off virtually scott free. So why don't you take the gun out of my face, unless of course you want charges against you...and you don't want that, Michael..." she said, her voice soft as she tried to reason with him.

He stared at her for a long moment, then shook his head. "No...I should just kill you for what you did, Maza...that's poetic justice, don't you think?" he asked, taking a step back as he stretched his arm out straight, hand tightly clutching onto the gun as he waited for her answer.

Elisa swallowed hard, "You don't want to go inside for murder..."

Silence again as he stared back at her. "Too late for that...this blood?" he asked, grabbing the front of his T-shirt with his left hand and pulled it away from his stomach before releasing it. She cringed as she heard it slap against his skin, feeling deathly sick to the stomach. "It's from your sister, and your mom..."

"N-no..." she gasped, all too slow to react as his arm swung out and he clocked her in the head with the butt of the magnum. She was out instantly, everything swirling to nothing as she fell to the ground.

* * *

Same Time

Pain flooded over her as Faith tried to open her eyes. Her left eye opened only so far before it wouldn't open any further. She swallowed hard as she winced from the pain that shot through her eye and she let it close, keeping her right eye open as she tried to figure out where in hell she was. The last thing she could remember was Fred cornering her in the bathroom, him hitting her across the face then as he shook her by her hair. Another shard of pain shooting through every point of unbelievable pain on her body. A flash in her mind as he shoved her hard against the wall, then the most painful memory of all, feeling his hands as they ripped her shirt open and trailed down to the belt on her jeans. Oh God, no... she thought, her mouth opening slightly as she took in a breath and tried not to cry.

As the reality of what happened settled on her surroundings grew eerily familiar. She was in their bedroom, blankets on top of her where she lay on her left side, facing the door to the room. Behind her was a warmth that sent a shiver up her spine, the sound of breathing slowly faded into her world and tears flooded both her eyes, however painful it was. Every part of her wanted it to be just a dream, that every punch he'd laid on her was just an awful nightmare that wasn't real. But it was, the pain in her stomach as she breathed in was proof of that. And so came even more proof as she moved one of her legs, as if testing to see if she wasn't really lying there, living this nightmare, but then a thought and a prayer of hope came over her that he hadn't done what she thought he had. But the memory of his hands trailing down her stomach reappeared and she knew he'd raped her. Her husband, the love of her life.

Pain as she pushed the blankets back and silently sat up on the edge of the bed. There were bruises on her inner thighs as she looked down at her legs, her stomach aching painfully as she pulled the shirt she wore away from her skin. His shirt. The same one he was wearing when he came after her. Her gaze fell on the clock beside the bed and she winced, it wasn't quite an hour ago now since he'd...she closed her eyes, swallowing hard as more tears came flooding over her. It's all my fault, all of this...taking in a breath, her good eye opened and she looked over at the pile of clean clothing sitting on the chair just to the right side of the wardrobe. A prayer of thanks filled her mind as she rose to her feet, her back and legs aching painfully as she walked over and gathered the articles she needed before she turned around, her gaze falling on Fred. She watched as his bare chest rose and fell easily, his breathing like nothing had happened, and that's when an unmistakable hatred fell over her. Hatred that she had every right to feel for what he'd done to her.

Swallowing hard, she clutched the clothing to her chest and made her way out of the room, she had to be away from him, the sooner the better. She had just gone into the bathroom and quietly closed the door behind her when her chest went tight and she felt the tears come to her, faster this time as she looked at the far end of the room where it had all happened. Where he'd knocked her unconscious and violated her. Closing her eyes tight, she let out a shuddered breath and walked over to the hand basin, avoiding looking at the floor as her gaze fell on her own reflection. Her cheek left cheek was red and swollen, and had started to bruise. Slowly, she lifted her hand to touch the graze from where his fist had impacted against her, she winced, knowing the swelling and bruising would only get worse as the hours passed on if she didn't apply ice or something to it.

After getting dressed, Faith dumped the shirt, the only article of clothing she had been wearing, onto the floor and headed out of the bathroom, along the hallway to the living area when she heard an unmistakeably familiar noise from back along the hall, where her and Fred's bedroom was. She froze where she was, turning around, her bare feet making the linoleum floor squeek beneath her as she did so, her heart racing fast. A part of her wishing beyond wish that she hadn't woken him up. But the doorway to the room grew dark as he stumbled out of the room, eyes locked intently on her as he pulled up the right side of his boxers.

"No..." Faith cried as he begun staggering toward her, hands balling into fists at his sides. Swallowing hard as he got closer, she did the only thing she could, and rushed over to the door and fumbled with the safety chain. Her heart pounding deeply in her chest, beating painfully the closer Fred got, when she finally had the chain free. She looked over her shoulder at him once more, tears flooding her eyes as he grabbed hold of her by the upper arm of her left arm. "No! Leave me alone!" she screamed, yanking her arm free of his grip before punching him hard in the face with her right fist. She wasn't going to let him hit her again. She'd put up with it too long. Enough was enough, she thought as she watched him fall to the ground, holding onto his nose as he fell flat on his ass. Her chest heaved painfully again as she turned back to the door, feeling every beat of her heart thumping through out every part of her body and she pulled it open, running down the hallway as fast as she could. She didn't stop, just kept running until she reached the staircase before running down them. So afraid that he was coming after her, or that if she stopped for even a moment it would all be over. But she wouldn't let him get to her again, wouldn't let him beat her one more time. But most of all she wouldn't let him think he had any God given right to rape her.

And as she reached the base of the stairs and made her way out of the building and onto the streets all she could do was let out a loud cry of relief, taking in every breath she could before running again, this time away from the apartment building headed anywhere but where she was.