"We heard the call as we were pulling up." Olivia Benson entered the kitchen. She was breathless as if she had sprinted inside. Her partner Elliot Stabler was close behind her. Bobby was surprised to see them in his kitchen, in his house. Though, he noted Mike Logan did not seem surprised. Just something else that had transpired in his personal life that he felt somewhat clueless about. But, he didn't ponder that long, the chatter on the radio picked up again, with Brian Murphy still coming in and out. Apparently, two officers were down – both Matt Walker and Alex Eames were injured in some capacity.
"Murphy, this is Goren, identify the injuries." Bobby snatched up the radio and interrupted the conversation. He was the senior office in charge of Murphy and Walker.
"Walker is down, out of sight, injuries unknown, shots fired." Murphy supplied. Bobby could hear that he was out of breath, as if he was running. They could hear the sound of sirens broadcast over the frequency, and then there was a loud rush of white noise.
"I need…" Bobby started his voice just barely a croak, and then he cleared his throat. "I need to get to that scene." Mike Logan started across the kitchen his keys in hand, clearly he was planning on driving to the scene. "Lucy is with Addie…" Bobby started to say to Olivia, who was nodding, indicating she would take care of everything at home.
Bobby slid into the passenger seat beside Logan, his mind racing through everything that was happening. He didn't get the status on Eames, he barely got anything on Walker, hell he didn't even know who was firing the shots. Benson and Stabler had magically appeared in his house to relieve Logan, and he was just about to ask that about that when Logan cut him off.
"Lucy called Benson this morning." Logan offered as he sped toward the scene. Bobby felt as if everyone was reading his mind, which strangely irritated him. Usually he was the one mentally ahead of the game. However, he recognized that it did make sense that Lucy should call Olivia Benson. Over the past year or so they had become friends. What had at first started out as a professional relationship had slowly eeked into a personal friendship. So then Benson had probably called on Stabler. Therefore Bobby figured Stabler's presence was kind of transitive, with perhaps no direct connection to either Lucy or Bobby.
"Who fired the shots?" Bobby asked. Logan was shaking his head indicating he didn't get that information. Logan was concentrating hard on getting to the scene as quickly as possible, so Bobby didn't press him for further information. Bobby jumped at the sound of his cell phone ringing in his pocket. He recognized Murphy's exchange and answered the call on speaker. "Goren." Bobby said in way of hello.
"Holy shit, no one was here, then there were all of these shots being fired – from a distance." Murphy just jumped into details.
"Identify the injuries." Bobby commanded.
"Walker was shot twice, once in the shoulder, once in the leg. He's lost a lot of blood, the bullet in the leg took out something major." Murphy started with Walker again, which was reasonable for Murphy, who was close and partnered with Walker. Bobby of course wanted the 411 on Eames.
"Eames dislocated her shoulder ducking for cover, but she wasn't hit." Murphy supplied. Bobby realized that he breathed for the first time in a long time. Well, he almost breathed, his ribs were killing him. Though adrenaline was a little like a powerful narcotic in terms of temporarily pushing pain aside. However, as soon as Bobby understood that Eames was Ok, he could feel a bit of his adrenaline abate, hence the pain in his chest. "We have not apprehended the shooter. Or, maybe shooters. It really was out of no where." Murphy was still out of breath. Bobby could see they were getting close to the scene, he could see the swarm of NYPD vehicles and ambulances in front of him.
"Listen Murphy, I'm pulling up." Goren replied. "I'll see you in one minute." Goren clicked the phone closed.
"He called you on your cell." Logan observed as he screeched to a skidding halt.
"More reliable than those damn NYPD radios sometimes." Goren moved to get out of the car, his eyes scanning the scene. He was trying to take in as much as possible, but mainly he was searching out Eames. About a second later, Eames walked up, her shoulder and arm taped to her body. She had found Bobby first, and he looked at her for a long moment before responding, taking in the fact that she was Ok.
"Walker's in the bus." She, like Logan, and for that matter like practically everyone else the past 24 hours seemed to be reading his every thought. Matt Walker was his primary suspect in terms of moving task force information to the Fernandez brothers, in terms of flat out giving away his personal information or perhaps even simply just putting the Fernandez brother's on the path of obtaining his personal information. "He's unconscious. It does not look good for Walker." Eames offered, following Bobby to the ambulance where they were loading Walker.
"Wait." Bobby commanded as they were about to shut the door.
"There is no wait." The EMT bit back, clearly annoyed at NYPD for attempting to delay transport. "You can catch us at the ER." The EMT slammed the doors and Bobby watched the bus peel away.
"This was a set-up." Eames murmured as Brian Murphy walked over. Bobby wanted to question Eames a bit further but couldn't do it with Murphy standing there.
"You can get to the hospital. We'll be right behind you." Bobby offered, encouraging Murphy to follow Walker.
"Sure thing." Murphy replied, excellent at following orders, but also clearly concerned about his partner.
"Set-up." Bobby turned to Eames once they were alone again.
"The shooter, likely from one of those rooftops." She gestured to some buildings across the way. "The shooter was just waiting for us to move on this house." Eames offered.
"Who was the target?" Bobby asked, but he already knew the answer.
"My guess, Matt Walker." Eames offered, which was another strong indicator that Walker was the leak. Walker had served his purpose and the Fernandez brother's were probably attempting to eliminate him. "We should get to the hospital." She looked over at Logan, who seemed to be the newly designated driver.
"A set-up." Bobby paused, not rushing back to the car to in pursuit of questioning Walker. He had been reacting all morning, he needed to take a moment to try to get ahead of what was happening. "Did you see the shooters?" Bobby looked at Eames, who had to stop midstride from dashing to the car. She turned to look at Bobby.
"No." She offered, following Bobby's gaze, watching him look around.
"A set-up." He mumbled to himself, thinking about the tip… how Eames was supposed to respond with Murphy and Walker.. how Eames had picked him up at the hospital… how he had wanted to go with Eames to respond to the tip... how Eames had talked him out of it. So, if someone were setting something up, then (and rightly so) that someone would've guessed that Bobby would have responded to the tip as well. If someone knew Bobby, they would know that his injuries from yesterday would not keep him in the hospital and that he would be even more determined to chase down each and every lead related to this case.
"What?" Eames asked, wondering what Bobby was thinking. And for the first time everyone around him was not in mentally in front of him, he was moving back in front.
"This was the set-up." Bobby turned and frantically signaled for Mike. The realization hit him in the chest harder than the shotgun blast from yesterday. "But the set-up was to get everyone here. The set-up was to get at Lucy. The same set-up as yesterday. Theo Fernandez didn't take me, he didn't want me, he wants Lucy. She is still the target." Bobby called to Eames who was now quite a few steps behind him. He jumped into the passenger side of the car, which Logan already had in motion. As they peeled away from the scene, Bobby could see Eames on her radio, and hear her voice on the radio in Logan's car, she was calling in for back-up to Bobby's house. Bobby had his cell phone open, his brain momentarily split between calling his home line and calling Benson.
Author's Note: Still reading? Should I still be writing...? I love to hear from you and I tend to use your reviews in my writing.