A/N: I just want it to be known that all those who wish to give me "constructive" criticism should do so face to face instead of hiding behind anonymity. Also, that those who do hide behind anonymity only make me laugh, as well as your weak and utterly harmless flames. If they could be called that.

For the rest of you are enjoying this, continue doing so. I only hope that I can meet your expectations for this story.

Right before I graduated high school... I was a mess. I was scared shitless that when I turned eighteen that August I would be drafted. My buddy and me, we figured out this plan to get conscientious objector status. Write letters to our draft board, all of that. They weren't as harsh then with the draft as they would soon come to be. I got it, but he didn't. Three months later, I was going off to see the world and we was getting ready to step into a jungle. A month after that he came home. In a pine box draped with a flag. I never felt right about that. I should have done something for him, anything, just something. Helped him get to Canada. Something.

I spent forever trying to get my head together, not using the most legal of methods either. In fact, I probably screwed my head up even more. I didn't know what to do and this feeling of guilt remained settled deep in my stomach.

I went to the Wall in Washington, D.C. around the time of the Gulf War. I found his name and I cried, not just for him, but for all the boys my age who had been sent there for no reason and died. That's something I've never told anyone because it's mine. Mine in a sense that it's so close to my heart that I can't possibly share it.

"Joann, did Zack or Robert tell you anything last week? Did anything odd happen maybe?"

"I went to pick them up on... Monday... no, Tuesday. Zack was waiting with Robbie and Mrs Ludmer was with them. The boys waited out on the steps and Mrs Ludmer told me that she had found Robbie crying alone in one of the classrooms. Do you think..."

"We're not sure. Did Robbie tell you what had happened?"

"N- no. He and Zach didn't say a word the whole way home."

"Have either of the boys ever mentioned having any trouble with someone at school?"

"You don't think..."

"We have to cover everything, and school is the logical place to start seeing as they spend most of their time there," I explained gently.

"I... I don't remember." She buried her face in her hands.

I rubbed her back. "Joann, this is not your fault. It's perfectly normal not to remember. It's all right."

A muffled sob came from her.

"It's all right. Shh. We'll find them. I promise."

In the car fifteen minutes later, I was driving and I caught Olivia looking at me. "Don't say that I should take myself off this case. Don't even think about it."

"Did I say anything?"

I looked at her for a moment, then back at the road. "Fin call yet with anything from the school?"

"Not yet. Look, John-"

"I know, I can't promise her. I'm too close. Yadda, yadda, yadda." I paused. "I have to find them. Maybe it's better that I'm too close."

She put her hand on my shoulder. "All right, John."

Her phone rang. "Thanks," I mouthed.

She nodded. "Benson."

I attempted to pay attention to the road and the conversation, but only succeeded in hearing snippets that gave me no information at all. "So?" I asked as soon as she closed her phone.

"Fin said the gym teacher seemed a little off. Other than that... everyone else was all right. They're running everyone's names and prints through the system just to make sure."

"What's the gym teacher's name?"

"Kyle Brigham."

"Anything specific that Fin mentioned about him?"

"No, just said both he and Elliot got a bad vibe off the guy."

"Good enough for me. They bring him in or what?"

"Cap said to wait."

"He wants Robert and Zack to wait in some place they don't know, scared out of their minds without their mother. And who the hell knows what this pervert is doing to them while we wait to maybe get some more info on a guy that could tell us what he knows now. I see."

"I'll call him."

I had the distinct urge to slam my fist against the horn, but I had always detested those who succumbed to "road rage."

Five minutes later, after a semi-heated discussion with the captain, Olivia closed her phone and told me, "He said take it easy."

That was all I needed to hear.

"You heard about Robert and Zach Hontas. Two detectives came and asked you some questions earlier today, correct?"

"Yeah, they did."

"Do you know anything about that?"

"All I know is that some bastard took them and for some reason you guys think I did it."

"I don't remember saying that. Do you, Detective Benson?"

"No, I don't think we ever said anything like that."

"So whatever gave you that idea, Mr. Brigham?"

The middle aged gym teacher glanced at both of us, first at me, then to Olivia at the other end of the table.

"Well? We're waiting."

"I told you, I don't know anything."

"They're nice boys, aren't they?" I slid over a picture of each of them. Right in front of him. "Aren't they? You enjoy watching them run around, don't you?"

"You're sick!" He pushed himself away from the table, the back of his hand coming to his mouth.

"Now see, Mr. Brigham, I always defined sick as the bastards who harm children, who rape defenseless women. Wouldn't you agree?" His eyes are glued to the pictures of Robbie and Zack. "You like them, don't you? If only you could spend some time with them... alone. Maybe showing them how to really hit a ball out of the park. A private lesson when no one else is around. You'd like that, wouldn't you?" No answer. "Wouldn't you?" I yelled and slammed my fist on the table.

"No! No, you're sick!" But his eyes are scared.

"We've been through this, Mr Brigham. You're the sick one. Picturing these little boys," I picked up the photos and shoved them in his face, "in their skivvies. Or maybe less. That's sick. I know it and you know it."

"I wouldn't... no... I don't think of them like that." His eyes darted to Olivia. "I don't think like that."

"Mr Brigham, we can get you help. Counseling, whatever it is you need. But you have to tell us where they are."

"I don't know. I didn't take them, I swear."

"We'll get you help if you tell us."

"I don't know! I... that's not..."

"What is it, Kyle? What do you want to tell us?"

"I never touched them but... I've..." He took a shuddering breath. "Jackie Warning. I... I touched him."

I got up without another word and left, slamming the door behind me. Cragen is standing by the glass.

"Good call, John."

"Yeah." Good call when it came to the student population as a whole, but not when it came to the Hontas boys. Not when it came to Joann.

The first time you fire your weapon at someone is something you never forget. Your gun is always cold after that. Before it was warm because you could fool yourself into believing that it was only there to threaten, never to actually kill. Afterwards... you can't fool yourself anymore and that gun is cold as ice. It's like losing your innocence for a second time, or maybe a third. Seeing your first dead body, and I mean murdered dead body, not what my brother deals with. Real death, that's another one.

The first two times you lose your innocence are interchangeable I suppose. One is when you realize there is evil in the world. The other is the traditional loss of innocence, your virginity. Then, as a police officer, comes two more that are interchangeable. Firing your weapon at a human being and seeing your first stiff.

After that, there's really not much left. There's not much left to take. When you've gone through those four things, there can't possibly be innocence left within your cold heart. There can't possibly be anything left at all.