I have a feeling this is another chapter you all have been waiting for! Enjoy! I'm starting to wrap this story up, and I am working out the final five chapters but don't worry, I have more stories coming for you! Let me know what you think. Love Ya'll!


Tris wakes up feeling completely satisfied and warm and she smiles and remembers she was in bed with Tobias. She felt more content than she thought she ever had. She turns her head to see him sleeping, looking handsome as ever, his hair a mess from her running her hands through it. She leaned up and looked at the clock next to the bed. It was dinner time and she wanted to make dinner for him, but she probably needed to see what he wanted first and what things he had to actually make a meal.

"Tobias…" she whispers playfully and then leans down giving him a kiss on the cheek.

"Tobias" she calls a little louder, her heart racing and the concern evident in her voice.

"Tobias, wake up" she chokes as she nudges his shoulder, and he doesn't move.

Panic rises in her as she shakes him again harder, and he doesn't move or respond. She wraps the sheet around her chest moving her hand to check his pulse. Just as she feels his neck Tobias quickly grabs her wrist and starts laughing.

"Estupdio!" Tris shrieks as she hits Tobias across the chest and then continues to laugh as Tobias tickles her.

"You scared me half to death, you are a horrible person," she scolds him as he laughs and pulls her close.

"But you love me" he chuckles as they settle back down, and Tris lets her heartbeat go back to normal.

She looks at him narrowing her eyes as he winces a little.

"See you are still hurt, I told you we should have taken it easy last night," Tris whines running her hands over the scar on his abdomen.

"Just a little sore and don't worry, I like feeling the pain, it reminds me that I'm still here," Tobias says softly pulling her to lay back down with him. Being so close to dying when they were trapped, it hadn't been like other times. He could admit this time had shaken him to his core because he had really been ready to let go. Tobias runs his hand through Tris' hair massaging her scalp. He places a kiss on her forehead enjoying the comfortable silence. Tris lays against his chest and plays with his other hand, they press their palms together. Tris shifts so she can sit up and look at him.

"Are you happy?" She asks him, noticing there was a soft smile on his lips.

"Very happy" he confirms.

"I'm sorry, for running away about how I felt about you, I promise I'm going to show you how much I want this, us,"

"Hey, we're here now. That's what matters. I just want you to know that I'm not letting you go again," Tobias promises. Tris leans up to give him a kiss on the lips.

"I'm not letting you go either" she promises.

"Can I say though I can't believe you showed up here in nothing but a trench coat…You never cease to amaze me Prior"

Tris drops her head to his chest as she starts to giggle while he wraps his arms around her. She really couldn't believe she had been that bold either.

"Ummm Tris, we didn't use a condom" Tobias groans as he relaxes his hug and falls back onto the mattress. He had been so wrapped up in her, being connected and making love to her, he didn't once think about a condom.

Tris bites her lip as she thinks about it. "I should probably make an appointment to get on birth control because feeling you inside me like that, I want that every time"

"You are going to be the death of me" Tobias lets out another groan which causes Tris to laugh and throws her leg over him and snuggle closer.

"Don't worry, I'll go get a Plan B tomorrow just to be safe"

Tobias breathes a little sigh of relief. They didn't need to worry about a baby right now.

"Thank you for trusting me, I know I don't deserve it," she says after a minute turning somber her fingers idly playing with his necklace.

"I had made up my mind that I was going to fight for you, get you to see we belonged together before the explosion. I just hadn't figured out how I was going to do it yet"

Tris smiles at his admission. For her, it was a sign everything was going to be okay because they were finally on the same page.


Christina lets out a high-pitched moan as she feels her body clench as Uriah pushes deep inside her. She clutches his back at the hard thrusts and closes her eyes tight as her orgasm rolls through her. He normally wasn't rough with her, but the hard pace he set was still driving her wild.

"Fuck" he groans as he shudders releasing himself as she continues to come down.

He rolls to the side not looking at her, and Christina sits up to look at him.

"That was fun" she whispers and gives him a kiss and her monetary happiness fades away when he still doesn't look at her. Sex was the only way they connected now but as soon as they were done, Uriah withdrew again.

"Yeah, I'm going to shower," he tells her pulling away.

Christina lets out a huff of frustration as he climbs out of the bed. It had been weeks since the bombing and she could tell Uriah was growing more distant. Their days together had been filled with awkward silent dinners, or Uriah going for runs alone with his headphones when he wasn't at the hospital. The most they did was make love and Uriah pulled away immediately every time. It was hardly making love anymore though, there was no tenderness, no connection. They barely talked outside of idle chit-chat. Whenever Christina brought up him finding a support group or going to the VA about the flashbacks and dreams he was still having he shut down and snapped at her that he could handle it. She wipes away a tear from her eye as she hears the shower running. She knew what she had to do, but it was breaking her heart thinking about it.

Uriah lets the hot water beat down on his shoulders as he leans his head against the cool tile. He steps back and wipes his face shaking his head underneath the spray. Bedtime was the hardest right now. He hadn't felt this way since he first came home from Afghanistan. The quiet moments at night had been robbed from him. He was tired from not sleeping well. Staying busy at the hospital and losing himself with Christina were the only things that helped right now. He realizes that he'd zoned out in the shower, and he turns off the water and grabs his towel. He stops dead in his tracks when he walks back into the bedroom to find Christina standing there dressed in yoga pants and her CFD hoodie pulling her overnight bag over her shoulder.

"What's going on Chris?" Uriah asks, his heart beating wildly.

"You know what's going on" Christina chokes out wiping tears from her cheeks. "You are going down a dark hole and I don't know how to help you. You have to want to save yourself, Uriah. And I can't do this to myself again"

"Come on Chris, this isn't the same thing…" Uriah runs his hand over his hair in frustration. Why did she have to push him so damn hard?

"But it is, self-destruction is self-destruction, even if you aren't using drugs" She tosses the VA support group pamphlet on the bed and walks out of the bedroom.

Uriah slams his fist against the wall and sits down on the edge of the bed when he hears the front door slam.

Christina had never given Tris her key back when she moved out, Tris insisted she keep it for emergencies. That night she was glad she still had it. She sent Tris a text to let her know she was there. She continued to sniffle as she grabbed a blanket and went into her old bedroom. She curls up on the bed and cries into the pillow. She loved Uriah, more than anything but she could take watching him implode.


"Are we sure the bombing at Chicago Med wasn't Phelps?" Eric asks as the Intelligence team sits in the bullpen looking at their whiteboard full of information.

All eyes had been focused on the bombing at Chicago Med and Jack and his team had done everything to link it to Phelps, but they hit dead end after dead end. Everyone had been frustrated but Jack could feel that the bombing wasn't Phelps. He was into starting fires and watching them burn, not blowing up buildings.

"It didn't feel like him…that's not his style…Yes, we've been pressuring him, but he wants to show us how smart he is" Jack tells his team.

"But he's still out there, what do we do now?" Susan asks her

"We follow his every move, don't let him out of your sight," Jack tells everyone.

Caleb had a feeling in the pit of his stomach, Phelps wanted to prove how smart he was to them, show them that. He knew Jack was right, he was going to show himself, but Caleb felt like there was a piece of the puzzle missing.


Eric and Bobby sit in their unmarked car. They had been trailing Adrian Phelps for the past two weeks since the bombing at Chicago Med and everyone was frustrated because he'd done nothing out of the ordinary yet.

"Hardware store?" Eric murmurs.

"Should we follow him?" Bobby asks looking out the window of the car not taking his eyes off the hardware store.

"Yeah, if he's buying supplies to start a fire. This could be it"

Eric and Bobby make their way into the store and find Adrian thoughtfully looking at propane tanks. Eric stays a few feet behind him and continues to tail him as he chooses another aisle. This time Eric approaches from one end of the aisle and Bobby from the other. Adrian holds his shopping basket in his arm, picking up things to place inside it.

"Do you know why arson is so hard to prove?" Adrian asks them without making eye contact as he puts several boxes of matches in the basket.

"Why don't you tell us?" Eric pushes. This guy gave him the chills.

"Fire eats itself, destroying all the evidence, it would be as if after you shoot a gun, it would then disintegrate"

Adrina adds several containers of lighter fluid to his basket as he talks while Eric and Bobby watch.

"Why don't you tell us about the fires you start, get it out in the open? You know you want to" Eric taunts him stepping closer. Adrian smiles a crooked smile, not flinching. He turns and walks past Bobby to register where there is a line to check out. He waits patiently for his turn with the cashier.

"How are you doing today?" he asks her while placing his basket on the counter. Her long black hair hung down past her shoulders and it covered most of her face. She was a young girl, probably only 18 or 19.

"I'm okay today," she tells him with a half smile.

Eric and Bobby watch as she moves her hair, revealing that she had scars on the left side of her face that had to be from a fire when she pulls her hair back.

"I hope you don't mind me asking, oh where did you get those scars?"

Adrian rolls up the sleeve of his shirt displaying that his entire left arm was covered in similar scars.

"A fire?", He asks pointing to her scars.

She smiles a little and nods her head as she rings up his items, feeling less intimidated knowing he had been burned in a fire too.

"Yeah, I was trapped in one, in my old school. I don't remember much about it" she tells him with a shrug. "I'm lucky to be alive, is what the doctors said."

Eric squints his eyes as he listens and watches.

"Was it the fire 8 or 9 years ago at Dearborn Elementary?"

"Yeah, it was" she confirms, as she reaches into the basket to continue ringing up the items.

"I remember that one, I'm glad you made it out alive, that was a bad one"

"Me too" She offers him a smile. "Your total is $86.47"

"You know what, I decided I don't need any of this," he tells her and turns around to walk closer to Bobby and Eric.

"I'm going to the grocery store next if you want to come"

"We're gonna take you up on that" Eric tells him.

He knew exactly what he was doing, showing off his handy work. He understood now why Jack said the bombing wasn't Phelps. Eric was tired of this guy playing games and Eric felt sick to his stomach knowing that Adrian was watching this young girl, admiring how he had almost killed her.

Adrian pushes open the door to the hardware store and puts his hand in his pocket with a lopsided smile as he walks out while Eric and Bobby hang back.


Caleb, Susan, and Jack sit in the bullpen of the Intelligence Unit looking at the evidence board and listening to what Eric and Bobby witnessed in the hardware store. As soon as Jack hangs up the phone, they try to strategize their next move.

"He has burn scars on his arm" Susan starts running over details in her mind.

"And we know he changed identities at least twice going back 20 years" Caleb adds sitting down on the edge of his desk.

"And what do we know about psychopaths?"

"They work up to their first kill and are usually sloppy in the beginning"

"So, either he burned himself or he suffered an inciting incident and that's what set him off" Susan reasons, looking at the evidence board as she processes all the information.

"Exactly!" Jack tells them excitedly, feeling like they were finally putting the pieces of the puzzle together. "In the interview room, Phelps mentioned men who kill their own families. Let's look at some of the earlier fires around the area that surrounds 51 where the families died except for one little boy"

Susan nods and goes back to her desk to go through the stacks of evidence she had on Phelps and all the fires from CPD and OFI.

Two hours later, Caleb and Susan are eating Chinese takeout while reading when Susan calls out "We got one"

"Fire in Bridgeport. 1984" Susan reads.

"Killed a mom, father, brother, sister, and there was one surviving son aged 7 named Peter Hayes" Caleb finishes reading over her shoulder.

"Got an address?" Jack asks.

"3424 South Green St." Caleb reads off the file.

"Let's hit it," Jack tells them. Everyone grabs their keys and radios hustling out the door.

Twenty minutes later they pull up to the address and find a vacant lot between two houses. They all stared at the lot not sure if there was anything to look for. A man emerges from the home to the right of the vacant lot to rake the leaves in front of his house. He was an older gentleman who looked to be in his late 50s.

"Excuse me, have you lived here long?" Jack asks him as he, Susan, and Caleb walk closer.

"Just my whole life" The man shrugs as he continues his lawn work.

"Were you here when this place burned down?" Jack probes.

"Yeah, the Hayes Family? I was here," he tells them.

"How come no one ever rebuilt?" Jack asks him.

"The son who survived, he still owns the property. Peter, umm Peter Hayes" The man nods as he starts raking again recalling the name.

"Do you ever have any contact with him?" Caleb asks hoping that this would lead them somewhere.

"Yeah, all the time. He lives right there" The man tells him and nods his head to the home on the other side of the vacant lot.

"What?!" Jack asks as they all turn to look at the home.

"Yeah, he never left the area" The man shrugs. "I saw him last week. Comes and goes at all different times and is nothing but nice.

"Is this him?" Caleb asks, pulling out his phone to show the picture they had been using.

"Yep, that's him, Peter Hayes" The man nods looking at the picture.

"Vest up," Jack tells all of them indicating they needed to put on their bulletproof vest. They were going to nail this son of a bitch.

Caleb puts on his vest quickly and then grabs the battering ram. Susan draws her gun as Caleb swings the ram to knock down the door.

They search the house, room by room, looking to make sure there is no one in the house.

"Clear!" Susan calls as she moves through the living room while Caleb and Jack clear the upstairs.

"Hey, in here" Susan calls to them from a desk that was set up near the kitchen. It was covered in photos and newspaper articles and a computer sat there. Caleb gets a chill as he sees there are pictures of his fiancée all over the table.

"Shit, Mar…." Pictures of Marlene are everywhere. Surveillance-style photos of her walking into 51, in the park, getting out of her car at Dauntless. There were even photos of Truck 81 on the scenes of fires. He'd been watching her - she was his next target.

Caleb pulls out his phone quickly and dials Eric.

"Hey, you got eyes on Phelps?"

"Yeah, he just went into a grocery store," Eric tells him as they watch Phelps walk up to the door.

Adrian turns and looks at them giving that sick smile as he enters the store.

"Snatch him up Eric, he's going after Marlene" Caleb yells into the phone.

"Move to arrest," Eric tells Bobby as they take off running toward the entrance of the store.

Susan looks at the computer screen and then back up at Caleb.

"He's sending out false texts, this one is from Shauna Preston telling Marlene to meet at this address. 625 Loomis St. Suite A."

"When?" Caleb asks, his heart pounding. He had to get to her as quickly as he could. His mind ran over where she could be. She was off shift today, she wanted to go look at wedding dresses and go to the gym today"

"Now" Susan confirms.


Eric and Bobby both draw their guns as they run into the grocery store. Their eyes searching for Phelps. A young man sweeping up in the front of the store puts his hands up and his eyes go wide, and he drops his broom when he sees Eric with his gun drawn.

"You see a guy come in here, dark hair, red jacket?"

The young man nods and points toward the back of the store.

"Out of the store, out of the store" Bobby tells all the people he sees in the aisle. He looks up when he smells smoke, and he waves everyone running now from the direction of the back of the store.

Eric and Bobby meet up at the back of the store and find a display of lighter fluid and kerosene in a blaze.

"Go," Bobby tells Eric as he pulls off his jacket trying to beat the flames out.

Eric runs through the door leading to the stockroom with his gun drawn. He moves slowly crouched down looking. He searches through the stock room and sees an exit to the back alley. Phelps was nowhere in sight when he opened the door. His phone buzzes and he picks it up seeing it was Caleb.

"Please tell me you got him?" Caleb asks as Jack drives, speeding through traffic with the lights and sirens on his vehicle.

"No, he's in the wind" Eric sighs.

"Meet us at 625 Loomis St. Suite A."

Caleb doesn't give Eric a chance to respond as he hangs up and dials Marlene. He would never forgive himself if anything happened to her.


Marlene walks down the street looking at her phone to see the address that Shauna sent her. She'd been surprised that Shauna sent her the info about a wedding photographer that she thought would be great especially since she hadn't mentioned it the day before on shift, but it was in the area, and she had time to swing by before meeting Caleb for dinner.

Marlene pushes the button on the elevator, and just as it dings and opens, she sees Caleb call her.

"Hey Mi Amor, I'm getting in an elevator" The signal is choppy so she can't hear him well.

"Mar, I need you to get out of there now" He yells frantically.

"Caleb, I can't hear you; I'll call you back" She looks down at her phone and shakes her head and leans over to push the button for the 6th floor.

"Mar, listen to me, get out of there! Now! " Caleb yells into his phone.

She ends the call, as she feels the elevator start to ascend. When it reaches the third floor it jerks and suddenly comes to a stop. Marlene holds out her hands to steady herself as she looks around. She pushes the buttons trying to see if it will start moving again, but nothing happens.

She presses the emergency button and a voice answers.

"Hello" A voice calls to her.

"Yes, I'm stuck in the elevator" She calls back

"Okay, I'll send someone out to take a look".

Marlene sighs and looks down at her watch. She was supposed to meet Shauna in 5 minutes, it didn't look like she was getting out of the elevator anytime soon.

She hears a noise as one of the ceiling panels moves and someone removes it.

"Hey, need a little help down here" she calls up.

"Do you need help?"

Marlene gasps as Adrian Phelps looks down on her from the elevator shaft. She feels her heart race as he stares back at her, and she backs up a few steps looking up at him.

"I warned everyone, and no one would listen" He rattles off. He sits back and grabs a gas can and quickly unscrews the top.

"Do you know what the police called me?" He asks her as he begins to pour the gas into the elevator car. Marlene gasps as she steps back again.

"God's mistake, that's what they called me," he tells her with a dead look in his eye. "But I'm not from God"

Marlene coughs, feeling herself start to choke from the fumes of the gasoline as he pours more in, emptying the contents of the container.

"Stop, listen to me, Stop" Marlene yells forcefully.

Adrian reaches into his pocket and pulls out a lighter, waving it with a sick twisted smile.

"You don't want to do this" Marlene says softer this time, panicking now.

"All I want to do is watch you burn" he holds out the lighter.

"Why?" she asks her stomach in knots.

"Firehouse 51 let my entire family burn; I want everyone including you to burn too"

Marlene backs up against the wall, tears forming in her eyes. There was nowhere for her to go, she was trapped.

"Look Adrian, you poured too much gasoline. You know this. If you light up the car, you're going up too" Marlene tries to reason with him hoping she could stall for time.

"I don't care" He shrugs.

"You got away with it for so long. You don't want to end it this way, they are going to say you made a mistake and the cops didn't underestimate you. You will have ruined your legacy you worked so hard for" She pleads with him trying to think quickly of anything that would stop him based on what she knew Caleb had said.

He stares at her for a minute, his hand still firmly clutching the lighter. Holding it open -he just needs to strike it.

"This finishes my legacy," he tells her firmly. "I was destined for it, to be consumed in the chaos of fire"

"Don't do it, please" Marlene whimpers as a tear falls from her eyes, fear finally consuming her. She was about to go up in flames with this lunatic. She would never see Caleb or her parents again. She ran into burning buildings every day to save others, but this isn't how she wanted to die.

"Do you know the story of the phoenix? It's a beautiful bird who settles itself in a nest of fire and a new bird is born from the ashes." He continues to wave the lighter and Marlene feels more tears fall down her cheek.

"I will rise again, stronger, better," Peter tells her as he ignites the lighter and looks down at Marlene with a laugh as she trembles.


Jack stomps on the breaks, his SVU skidding to a halt in front of the building. Caleb hops out grabbing his AR 15 from the backseat and he takes off running into the building with Jack right behind him.

Caleb moves to the elevators, and he sees a man with dark hair and a maintenance uniform standing in front of the elevators.

"Hands up, right now" Caleb barks.

"Hey, I just work here, I got a call the elevator was stuck," The maintenance man tells him as he turns around with his arms up in the air.

"You smell that?" Jack asks, turning to Caleb.

"Yes…It's gasoline" Caleb tells him recognizing the smell.

"What floor is stuck on" Jack yells at the maintenance worker.

"Ummmm between three and four," he stammers still confused about what was happening as Caleb holds his hands out for the keys to open the panel.

Caleb makes a mad dash for the stairs and races up to the fourth floor, taking the stairs two at a time. When he gets to the fourth floor, he points his gun again looking for any sign of Peter Hayes. He uses the key to open the elevator door quickly. Prying them open with his fingers.

He grabs his weapon and positions himself at the opening of the elevator shaft, looking down through the scope of the rifle at Peter who was holding the lighter as Marlene looked up terrified. Hearing noise above him, Peter turns his head and looks upward to see Caleb aiming at him with his assault rifle.

Caleb doesn't hesitate to pull the trigger. The shot goes straight through Peter's glasses and into his eye. When the bullet pierces Peter's skull, killing him instantly, the lighter falls from his hands and Marlene dives for it. She gasps as it lands in the palm of her hands, and she quickly closes it to extinguish the flame. Her palms were sweaty, and her heart felt like it was going to jump out of her chest.

"Mar" Caleb yells down, as he gasped for breath.

"I'm okay" she calls back with a shaky voice.

"Ya voy bebé (I'm coming, Baby) He calls to her. He races back down the stairs and uses the key to open the elevator door on the third floor.

As soon as he pries open the door, Marlene launches herself into his arms. Still gasping for air from the gasoline fumes. Caleb holds her as tight as he can when he wraps his arms around her.

"Estás bien (Are you okay)?" he asks her gasping for air unable to control his breathing as he pulls back to look at her, his heart pounding so hard he thought it would jump out of his chest.

"Si, estoy bien, estoy bien (Yes, I'm okay, I'm okay)" She nods with her voice shaky and tears running down her face as she still clutched the lighter, afraid to let it go.

Jack pokes his head in the elevator and sees Peter Hayes' dead body half laying in the open ceiling panel with blood dripping down.

Marlene grabs Caleb by the face and kisses him, both still breathing hard. They had to call in the crime scene and Caleb insists on calling an ambulance even though Marlene said she was fine.

They give her some oxygen because of the fumes she inhaled, and she sits in the back of the ambulance with Caleb. He wasn't about to let her out of his sight. She looks down and sees his hands trembling. She takes off the oxygen mask, intertwines their arms, laces their fingers together, and leans her head against his shoulder.


Susan, Eric, and Bobby walk into Dauntless to grab a beer to celebrate taking down Peter Hayes. There was always a level of satisfaction when taking down a perp but this one felt good after all the chaos he had caused.

"How do you feel knowing this guy is dead?" Susan asks Chief Boden.

"Well, I'm for one happy, that son of a bitch is dead" Eric scoffs taking a swig of his bear.

"The devil in the white city," Max says, seeming deep in thought.

"Gone back to hell where he came from" Susan adds taking a swig of her own drink.

Zeke comes over from behind the bar to talk to Boden wanting to hear it for himself that the man responsible for his father's death was dead.

"So, is it really over?" He asks and looks over at Max who nods.

"Yeah, they got him. He's dead, shot down by Caleb Prior," Max confirms.

Zeke pulls Max into a celebratory hug before leaving to call his mother. This ugly chapter of all their lives could finally be closed.

Tris and Tobias come in hand in hand and Zeke looks up and smiles from behind the bar at the two of them. Caleb had called her to tell her to meet them at Dauntless to celebrate.

"I see we got another reason to celebrate tonight" Zeke yells and Tris covers her face.

"Shut up Pedrad" Tris yells with a laugh as Tobias squeezes her hand.

"Where's Chris?" Tris asks when she grabs a seat at the bar. She had called her when she and Tobias came up for air after she saw the message, she was going to spend the night at the apartment. She told Chris she would catch up with her at Dauntless after hearing everyone was gathering to celebrate that evening. Tris and Tobias had stopped by her place for Tris to get some clothes and Christina wasn't there. Tris figured she had already left for the bar.

"Called in, said she wasn't feeling well" Zeke shrugs.

"Ah shit" Tris groans.

"What's wrong?" Tobias asks as Zeke sets a beer in front of him.

"She and Uriah got into some kind of argument. She spent the night at my place, but I still haven't talked to her." Tris sighs.

Zeke blows out a breath. He knew Uriah had been moody since the bombing, Hana had noticed it too, and Christina was trying to figure out how to get him to see someone at the VA. Things must have gotten rough for her to leave.

Before Zeke can say anything, the bar erupts into cheers as Caleb and Marlene walk through the door. Tris hops off her bar stool and pulls Marlene into a tight hug.

"I'm so glad you're okay," Tris tells her after she lets go.

"This man right here is the only reason I'm alive," Marlene says looking up at Caleb and leaning her head on his shoulder.

"Baby…" Caleb says. He didn't want all the attention. He was just glad his fiancée was safe, and the son of a bitch Hayes was dead.

"You did it, we're all fine thanks to you," Marlene tells him, pulling him into a hug.

"Next round on me" Jack Kang announces as he walks through the door. He pats Caleb on the back and gives him a smile and the bar erupts in cheers again.