Jay wakes up the next morning with Casper laying across his stomach. "Casper," Jay calls as he scratches the dog's ear.
Casper looks over to Jay and starts wagging his tail when he sees his human awake.
"Do you want to go out?" Jay asks the dog.
Casper cocks his head to the side before walking in circles a couple of times on Jay's bed before finally jumping down.
"Is that a yes?"
Casper barks before going to the door leading out for the bedroom and turning around as if looking for Jay to follow.
"Okay, okay. I'm coming," Jay tells the dog as he finds a hoodie to throw on along with his sneakers.
Once ready, Jay hooks the leash onto Casper's collar and leads him outside. Jay takes Casper for a short walk around the block before going back into his apartment where he makes sure Casper has fresh water. The next thing that Jay does is get Casper's food before taking a shower and getting his own breakfast to go.
Before Jay leaves for work, he makes sure that Casper will be okay until he can come back and check on him later in the day.
Arriving at work, Jay notices that Kim and Kevin are the only ones who are not yet in. "What do we have?" Jay asks Hailey as he walks towards their desks.
"Nothing, that's the weird thing."
"How is that weird?"
"Because we've been going over everything and other than what you found, there is nothing that they have in common."
"Vanessa and I have been going through CCTV footage of the places in the last week of each victim and we can't find one person in common in any of them, not even someone completely random," Adam adds.
"How does this case make sense, but not make sense at the same time?" Kim questions as she enters the bullpen with Kevin behind her.
"Could we be looking for a woman?" Vanessa asks. "Their guard would be down then."
"But she wouldn't be able to subdue them without help. The ME reports say that they fought hard and there were no drugs in their systems," Kevin adds.
"We need something. I feel like we're missing key information and once we have it, we'll be able to tap in better," Hailey mutter worried that her partner could be next.
Before anyone else could make a comment, Voight comes out of his office to give them their assignment for the case. "Kevin and Adam keep going through the footage, Kim and Vanessa go and re-interview the family and close friends of the first two victims; Hailey and Jay do the same for the third and fourth victims."
The pairs go off in the direction of where their assignment is.
Getting into Jay's truck, Hailey asks, "You are being careful, right?"
"I always am."
"Okay," Hailey responds trusting her partner and his gut instinct.
"Do you think we're going to find anything useful?"
"I don't know. The connection that we have isn't that strong but we don't have anything else."
"As a military person, what do you think? I mean, from experience to service member run with people from different branches or do they mostly stay with their own?" Hailey asks
"Not generally," Jay answers. "I mean, don't get me wrong, there is a brotherhood that extends past the branch you're in, but there's still a rivalry between the different branches- we just respect each other for serving."
"Do you have any theories?"
"No, but with these guys, they're the best of the best in their respective branches," Jay answers with the second part being more to himself than answering her question.
The rest of the ride is pretty quiet, as Hailey knows that Jay isn't too open about his time in the military and it seems like they are getting to close to that for his comfort.
Back at the district, Kevin and Adam are going through the footage to see if there is anything that was missed the first time.
"This has to be the strangest case that Intelligence has had," Adam comments.
"It's probably one of the most important cases," Kevin tells his friend. "I mean they survive wherever they're stationed only to be killed on US soil."
"You really think that it was that bad where they were?"
"Why do you think Jay never talks about it? And remember what Mouse was like when he first started working here?"
"Jay's not that talkative, to begin with, and Mouse always just seemed like he was wired up on too much coffee," Adam answers while getting a look of disbelief back in response.
After finishing their extensive interviews, and a pitstop at Jay's for the detective to let out Casper, both pairs sent out return to the district to share what they found which wasn't much.
"How can we have so much information, but nothing at all?" Kim questions frustrated after they compare all of their notes.
"I swear once we find it, it's going to be one of those things that was staring at us all along," Hailey mutters.
The team works from the bullpen until Voight sends them home at nine-thirty, telling them to be ready in the morning with fresh eyes.
When Jay arrives home, the first thing he does is put his gun and badge away and then he grabs Casper's leash to take him on his walk.
Casper happily walks alongside his human. Jay decides to take Casper on an extra-long walk, since he has spent so much time on their current case and because soon it will be too cold to go for long walks.
About fifteen blocks from their apartment complex, the hairs on the back of Jay's neck stand. He cautiously looks around to find nothing out of the ordinary of the empty street. With this strange feeling, Jay decides it is a good time to turn around and head home.
He gently pulls on Casper's leash to guide him in the direction of their home. The two walk for a few blocks before Jay gets the same strange feeling of something not being right.
Jay pulls Casper closer to him as he doesn't want him hurt. As they walk past an ally, someone pops out and goes to grab Jay before he can think. Before Jay has a chance to fight back, three more comes out to help subdue him.
"T get the dog," Jay hears the first guy order.
Hearing this Jay drops the leash, "Casper, run!" he orders as he attempts to fight his attackers off.
Casper starts to leave until he realizes that his human is not with him. Jay sees Casper slow down and order him to go again once he sees "T" going after his dog. "Casper, go!" He yells as he continues to fight the three attackers.
The three attackers continue to hit Jay blow-by-blow, with the fourth one casing Casper. Jay is giving it everything he has, but he can't do much against three guys who are a bit bigger than him and Jay is slowly starting to lose consciousness.
After a few minutes, the fourth man comes back. "Did you get the mutt?" the leader asks.
"No, I lost it after a few blocks. I wouldn't worry about it; it looks young and taken care of. No way it lasts in the streets."
Hearing that Casper managed to get away, Jay allows his body scum to the pain and goes unconscious.
When his attackers realize that he is unconscious, they drag him into the ally that they came out of and put him in the back of their van where they tie his hands and feet together and tape his mouth shut before driving off.
Casper looks around after running away from his human. Not knowing where he is, he tries to find his way back home before getting scared and finding himself alone in a park where he hides in the bushes, hoping that his human comes to look for him.
A/N: Whoo! Only two weeks this time and not close to three months. WOW! I feel evil leaving you all with that ending.
For all of you who have said missed Casper, I missed him too and I missed writing him. I don't know how it is possible to miss a dog that doesn't exist, but I did.
So, I don't think that there's anything in this chapter that I need to explain, but if you have questions leave a comment and I will answer it in the next chapter.
Okay, so I mentioned this in my other story, but there is an author on this site who is plagiarizing other people's stories. That's not cool, if you see it, please report it. It is easy to tell because their writing level from the Title and chapter summary does not match the content of the story. So, please report these people for plagiarism, it is not far to the authors affected. The accounts that I am almost certain that are from the same person are sweetbutpsychogirl16, Onechicagofamily. suv, PdUpstead, and most recently Shanyah Cole. I believe that this same person is also pulling the same stunt on AO3. ***Take away the spaces with the first two. sweetbutpsychogirl16 was formally Chicagopd . svu.
The first time I mentioned it, another author who I will not name, just because I don't know if they want me to name them, gave me a list of the plagiarizer's AO3 names: Rileyrollins_1, Pdupstead, Riley_Rollins2, Shanya_ Cole, and Chicagopd_svu ***If there is a space in the AO3 name, there is an underscore, it is just not visible because I underlined the name.***
The account sweetbutpsychgirl16 is also a beta on this site. I encourage you to not use her as a beta. I see no good of using a beta who plagiarized, I also, personally, don't think she would be a good beta as far as English grammar goes. I personally don't use a beta, but I have nothing against them, as long as they are an honest writer.
Sorry for the rant, but in other news. I joined AO3 about a month ago and am slowly in the process of adding my stories over there as well as them being here. FF is still my go to site, but I am editing these stories and adding them over there.