Chapter 16 - Munch
Geez, you guys need no pushing to review! Again, you just blow me away! Thank you so muchfor the reviews nem, Lady Padfoot II, Katydidit, qt-angel, asjkid, Sadie13, Southrn Bell, LivElRocks a lot, boredsvunut, LawandorderSVUfan, Shellster, Howdy yall, stablerchic14, volleylover, and christopher-meloni-freak.
There's just a few reviews I want to respond to. First, nem, you are so welcome for the titles. I wouldn't even be writing this if it weren't for all the reviews I get, so any suggestion or questions are always welcome! I just love reading them!
And to boredsvunut, I'm sorry you don't think Casey was in character. I guess I see what you mean. I'm not all that familiar with Casey yet. I watch SVU mainly on USA and they were showing episodes from the seasons with Alex in it latelyand I suppose I know more about her. I'm just trying to keep everyone in character, both with the show and the plot of this story. So thanks for the feedback and I'll keep that in mind.
While I'm thinking about that, I just want to let everyone know that in this chapter and chaper 18, Olivia will probably seem like, really out of character, but she'll be back to normal further along the story.
Oh, and just in case you didn't catch that, I am going to post three more chapters, but I think this is going to be the last triple post I do for a while. I have to start catching up on my writing so that I can still update once a day like I've been doing. Well, here's Munch (And the moment of truth...), Tutuola, and Cragen.
Lyrics by Simple Plan - Thank You
I thought that I could always count on you
I thought that nothing could come between us two
We said as long as we would stick together
We'd be alright
We'd be okay
But I was stupid
And you broke me down
I'll never be the same again
So thank you for showing me
That best friends cannot be trusted
And thank you for lying to me
Your friendship, the good times we had
You can have them back
I wonder why it always has to hurt
For every lesson that you have to learn
I won't forget what you did to me
How you showed me things I wish I'd never see
But I was stupid
And you broke me down
I'll never be the same again
So thank you for showing me
That best friends cannot be trusted
And thank you for lying to me
Your friendship, the good times we had
You can have them back
So thank you - For lying to me
So thank you - For all the times you let me down
So thank you - For lying to me
So thank you - Your friendship you can have it back
Munch
"Hey John." Fin stepped out of Cragen's office and slowly crept towards me.
"I'm not a ticking time bomb or anything," I pointed out to him. "I won't blow up on you."
"That's yet to be seen..." He muttered under his breath, still keeping his distance from me.
"What is it?" I was becoming impatient with his hesitance.
"Warner got the results from Elliot's DNA and the rape kit."
"And..?"
He paused for a moment. "And they didn't match. It wasn't Elliot."
I just sat there, like a deer in the headlights, not fully understanding what I'd just heard. Once the reality of everything sat in, my mind began racing. Of course, the first thing to pop into my head was that the results had been tampered with, or that Fin was lying, any crazy idea that would mean I didn't have to believe that Olivia had lied to me. But, that couldn't be true either.
Olivia would never lie about being raped. But, then again, would she lie about who? She couldn't. She wouldn't. Even if she did lie on purpose, why would she blame Elliot? They were best friends. Sometimes I'd even wondered if they were more. Maybe her rapist scared her into blaming Elliot? No, no one could scare Olivia into anything, especially wrongfully accusing her partner of rape. There had to be some sort of explanation... But what..?
"Oh no..." Fin's voice brought me back to the present.
"What?" I turned around and watched as Olivia walked through the squad room doors. "Olivia? What are you doing here?" She was wearing a pair of jeans and a t-shirt that fit her a lot better than the clothes I had given her.
She shrugged as her hands slipped into her pockets. "I needed to get out. This is where I come to get away from things."
"How about we go out somewhere and talk?" I suggested, trying to get her out of the station as quickly as I could.
She opened her mouth to answer, but Olivia was cut off by the sound of a door creaking open. The three of us turned to see Cragen walking out of a questioning room. I froze my gaze on Olivia as I realized who would be following.
Cragen noticed all eyes on him and he immediately turned to Olivia, startled by her presence. What happened next played out as if in slow motion.
Cragen paused and, a moment too late, turned around to stop Elliot from leaving the room.
Olivia noticed everyone's reactions right away and her eyes traveled to the door as well. Her slight confusion instantaneously changed once she caught sight of the battered Elliot. A fleeting look of fear passed over her face before her features quickly hardened into pure anger, fury, and hatred.
Elliot's swollen eyes nervously surveyed the surrounding scene, an unidentifiable look on his face once he had noticed Olivia.
"What are you doing?" Though her eyes were boring into Elliot, like she was looking right through him, I wasn't sure to whom her cold, whispering voice was aimed.
Again, Elliot's eyes scanned through the office, showing fear at the sound of Olivia's voice. I decided that I should say something.
"Liv," I whispered in a soothing tone, "we did DNA tests. It wasn't Elliot." I took a cautionary step towards her.
Her eyes glossed over as she clenched her teeth together. By the lack of changes in her appearance, I doubted if she'd even heard what I had just told her.
Taking Olivia's temporary paralysis as a chance to prevent anything from escalating and blowing up, Cragen put his hand on Elliot's back and began ushering him towards a back door.
"You sonofabitch!" In a flash, Olivia took a running lunge at Elliot, pinning him on his stomach. I quickly jumped after her. Before she could throw any punches or cause any more damage to the limp figure underneath her, I wrapped my arms around Olivia, yanking her away. She was screaming and struggling as I dragged her over to an interrogation room, striving to keep my arm lock on her.
I gently shoved her into the room, still screaming and fighting. Shutting the door behind me, I caught a glance of Elliot. He was lying on the ground, unmoving. A puddle of blood was forming around his face. Cragen and Fin were on their knees, trying to help him as best they could.
"Sonofabitch!" I yanked the door closed the rest of the way and ducked as a folder containing a bunch of loose-leaf papers was hurled at my head.
"Olivia! Stop!" I put my arms in front of my face as I ducked through the onslaught of papers and folders Olivia was hurling at me. It took a minute, but eventually I managed to get to her. I grabbed her wrists and twisted them behind her back, like I was going to handcuff her. "Calm down!" I hugged her to my chest, squeezing her tighter as she continued fighting.
Slowly, I practically felt the anger seep away from her until she was almost limp in my arms. She was panting and a sheen of sweat was forming on her forehead.
"Are you okay now?" I picked my arms up, gingerly moving them a few inches off of her, but still close enough to grab her again if she went off.
"Yeah." She pushed away from me, wiping her forehead with her sleeve. Standing in the corner of the room, amidst the whirlwind of papers scattered everywhere, she had a blank stare on her face, lost in thought.
Though I was worried about Liv, I couldn't get Elliot out of my head long enough to reassure her. Leaving her in the blank daze she was in, I maneuvered through the litter on the ground to get back to the door. As I was opening it, I heard the sirens coming towards the station.
Oh my God, they called a bus for Elliot. I shoved the door open and looked at the scene in horror.
The puddle of blood around Elliot's face had only grown, so much so that even I knew it was too great an amount for a human body to handle losing. Cragen and Fin were standing off to the side as the paramedics went over to Elliot. They both had fearful looks on their faces as they watched on. It was only minutes, but felt hours, before they had put him on a stretcher. As they wheeled him out, a voice broke the silence.
"Can you go with him?" It was Cragen. He was nudging Fin to go with the paramedics to the hospital.
"Yeah." Still dazed, he managed to stumble after them.
Cragen was drenched in dark red blood. His knees from where he'd been kneeling next to Elliot, his chest, and his hands were all covered. The blood on the ground was starting to seep into the crevices of the tiles and spread like cracks in a windshield.
I heard a shuffling behind me and saw Olivia staring at everything. I could see the reality of what she'd done sinking in. She backed away from Cragen and mine's stares, a mix of confusion and guilt on her face as her eyes began watering.
"B-But why..? Let him go…" She managed to stutter a few words out. I knew exactly what she was asking.
"It wasn't him Liv." I took small steps towards Olivia as she was backing away. It seemed like every time I took a step forward, she took two backwards. "Your rape kit was positive, but it didn't match his DNA. He had an alibi Liv. It wasn't him."
Olivia looked at me like an animal cornered, bewilderment covering every inch of her. Her eyes turned to the pool of red liquid only a few feet away from her. "W-What did I do..?"
