Author's note: Okay, so I'm a lier. I need one more chapter after this to finish this story. It turns out that everything I want to add is just too much. This was a hard chapter to write, I'm sorry it took so long, but it was going to be totally different with Munch sleeping through the whole process, but then I felt that was unfair to him. In my defense, the last chapter should be jam packed up cameos and suspense. So I hope you enjoy this chapter and if its not that exciting, just wait...
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He could have sworn his head had just hit the pillow when his phone rang. Bleary eyed, he grabbed his glasses and searched through the pile of clothes he had left on the floor for the phone in his jacket pocket.
"Munch."
"John, it's Olivia. Sorry to wake you up early," Benson's voice rang over the phone.
"Early? How long has it been?" questioned Munch as he scanned his bedroom, looking for the clock.
"Only two hours since we left you, but something's come up and Cragen wants you back. Fin should be there in 5 min. so grab clothes for 72 hours and whatever you need, it looks like you'll be bunking at the station house."
"What? Olivia, what's going on? You're not telling me everything,"
"I'm sorry, there's no time, just get your stuff together, Fin will explain more when he gets there, I've gotta go."
Munch cursed under his breath. Why couldn't anything be easy? He hoped that Fin would be able to answer his questions, but he had a sneaking suspicion that his partner was about to be as closed lipped as Benson had just been. Deep down the cop in him knew it was because they couldn't tell the victim anything until the suspect had been confirmed, but the selfish part of him felt like they were treating him like a child, and he hated that.
Gathering things up along the way, John headed towards the bathroom. He splashed a little cold water on his face to get the sleep out of his eyes and then walked to his closet. He didn't have enough time to dress properly, assuming that Fin would be there any minute, and he didn't want to answer the door half dressed, so Munch pulled on a black long sleeve shirt and some gray dress pants and packed a couple suits and ties to change later. If they were really in such a hurry, the dress code would have to forgive him this time.
Seconds later the doorbell rang, and he pushed the button to let Fin in. But as Munch suspected, Fin was full of insults and not information. As the drove towards the station Munch felt his frustration rising at a situation he seemed helpless to change. What exactly was going on? And why did he have to evacuate his apartment? Did they have a suspect? The more Munch thought, the more questions came to his mind and he grew impatient to get back to the squad room and demand answers from Cragen.
The matter at hand didn't get any better when John entered the squad room only to find the place practically empty and Cragen having a "closed door" meeting with someone in his office. It also appeared that his partner was nowhere to be found. John glanced hopelessly from Cragen's door to his desk and back again. Satisfied that no one was going to clue him in anytime soon, he gave up for the time being. "I'll just make myself comfortable then!" he said to no one in particular as he picked up his bag and headed towards the bunkroom.
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After about 30 min. Stabler and Benson had bounded out of Cragen's office and out the door, stopping briefly only to say hello and good-bye to the confused detective. Munch had been sitting at his desk, reorganizing files that he had spent the night going through. The mix of exhaustion and frustration was starting to really upset him, so there was some slight relief when Cragen called him into the office.
"Will you PLEASE tell me what's going on now?" Munch started in.
"John, calm down and I'll explain what I can," Cragen walked around and sat on the corner of his desk, motioning John to take a seat. "Now, you should know a few things…"
"No, I want to know everything!" John interrupted. The determination on his face caused Cragen to let out a sigh.
"Fine, but I don't want you to do anything stupid. Actually I don't want you to do anything at all just yet. First off I should tell you that we have a suspect and Stabler and Benson are off searching his place as we speak."
"Who…" started John but Cragen cut him off.
"I'm not going there yet, not until we're absolutely sure. They're searching his place, but he hasn't been caught yet. But we have caught his cohort in Baltimore."
John took a moment to let it all sink in. "So what you're telling me is some guy working here in New York has been sending these letters to Baltimore where some other guy has been sending them back to me, kinda a complicated way to send a letter isn't it?"
There was a moment of silence as John rolled this information around in his brain. When Benson and Stabler took him home everyone still was clueless, and today they had a suspect, an accompliss and they were searching the guy's home. What had changed in the last couple of hours? Munch played back the events of the morning in his mind. They had taken him home, he had gotten his mail, they walked upstairs, and then it hit him.
"Its my neighbor, isn't it?" Munch asked.
"What?" Cragen asked out of surprise.
"This morning, my neighbor came downstairs as Benson and Stabler were taking me home, and when he bumped into Benson, he dropped a large envelope. That's how you found they guy in Baltimore, isn't it? That's why you got me back out of my apartment. You suspect him."
"How the hell did you figure that out?" asked an astonished Cragen.
"Hey I've been a detective for over 25 years. I used my amazing deductive skills and figured it out!" said Munch.
"Okay, fine, yes. But we don't know the why. Nor do we have any hard proof or evidence, nor do we know where the guy is, he hasn't come back home, and he didn't go into work today."
"I'm going to go help," started Munch, but Cragen cut him off.
"No, you are going to sit here, having you out there is a danger to yourself and the others right now. The Baltimore PD is sending they're suspect up here for questioning, I sent Fin to pick them up. I want you to sit in here and listen in and see if you can't use the deductive reasoning to pick up why this was going on."
Sitting around waiting was not Munch's ideal job while everyone else was out searching for the guy that had shot him, but he had to admit, he was a bit curious about if he knew this accompliss from Baltimore. He was still in Cragen's office, peeping through the closed blinds when Fin led the suspect into one of the questioning rooms.
There were a few suprising things about the person Fin had in custody. First, it was a woman, a petite woman, with short curly blond hair. Second, and most shocking was the fact that Munch knew this woman, as in the biblical sense of "knew."
"Talk about bad family reunions…" exclaimed Munch.
"What do you mean?" asked Cragen.
"That's the fourth ex-missus Munch!"
