A/N: Apparently, my muse has decided to throw another loop at me. So here you have it.

The next day found Elliot and Olivia at police headquarters, standing outside the building and staring up.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Olivia asked. "You march in there and start accusing IAB of covering something up, it's bound to lead to trouble."

"Yeah, I'm sure," Elliot replied. "I don't care what trouble it leads to if it helps us get somewhere."

"Munch and Fin were going to search Kari Applegate's locker this morning," Olivia remarked. "They're going to call me if they get anything from it."

Elliot shook his head. "How the hell does a cop go missing for almost more than a month and no one bothers to do anything about it until now?"

"Well, none of us have talked to Missing Persons yet, they could have been working on it this whole time, and no one knows it because they haven't said anything."

"That only makes me more convinced that someone's trying to cover the whole thing up. Why wouldn't Missing Persons at least go talk to her husband?"

"That's a good question. You and I will have to head down there and ask them what their reasoning is when we're finished here."

"I couldn't agree more." Elliot looked at his watch and sighed. It was only nine o'clock in the morning, but he was already starting to feel the wear of having only gotten about an hour and a half of sleep the night before.

"Remind me to grab a cup of coffee before we do that," he said, as he started to walk. "I'm gonna fall asleep standing here if we don't keep moving."

"Keys," said Olivia, and he reached into his pocket, drawing out a keyring and handing it to her. "Now we know that we'll both make it across the city alive."

"You sure about that?" Elliot asked, the words escaping him before he could really think about them. She looked over at him with raised eyebrows, and continued on beside him.

"I'm going to chalk that up to you being exhausted and pretend that I didn't hear it," she said. "How's Eli doing?"

"He's fine, but...I don't know, Liv. I think he knows that no one else is there with us, and I think he misses them. He wouldn't sleep last night, so I held him, walked around the house with him until he finally did fall asleep, and even then, it was only for a little while."

"I think babies are perfectly capable of picking up on their surroundings even if they don't completely understand them," said Olivia. "Maybe the reason why Eli can't sleep is because he's noticed you can't."

"That would explain a lot." Elliot trailed off for a long moment, saying nothing as they continued walking. It was only when they'd reached the doors and he'd reached forward to pull one open for his partner that he continued. "It just...It feels strange to me that now that we're finally getting somewhere, it all seems to connect."

"Well, it's got to connect for us to actually have a case," said Olivia, frowning slightly. "You really are tired, aren't you?"

Elliot reached into his pocket again and pulled out the note that Kathleen had left for him. "My kids have got to feel safe enough around these people that they can leave us information now," he said. "And that scares me. I want my kids to feel safe in the world they live in, Liv. I want them to believe that nothing is ever going to hurt them, and for them to feel safe around someone who is hurting them..."

"I get it," Olivia said, quietly, when her partner trailed off again. "Really, I do. Let's just head upstairs and find out what IAB can tell us, if they can tell us anything at all."

Elliot nodded, mutely, and followed her over to the elevators, choosing to remain silent as Olivia pressed the button that would take them up to the fourteenth floor, where they would find the IAB squad room. Halfway there, he spoke again.

"You know, my aunt Erin, she was on that drug war task force back in the 1970's," he said. "It got to the point where all the squads involved had to get a court to seal their department records so that no one could get in and see that they had families. And I always thought that if I became a cop, I wouldn't go that far, but I wouldn't let anyone know that I had a family."

"What happened?" Olivia asked, and he turned his head to look at her, smirking faintly.

"I walked into SVU," he said. "Somehow, it became a way to get people to talk to me, and once I figured that out, well...You get the point."

And she did. The elevator doors opened and as they did, she cast a sideways look at him. "Elliot, this isn't your fault, either. No matter how much you think it is, it's not."

"I keep telling myself that. It worked at first, but now..." Elliot pushed the doors to the IAB squad room open and said nothing more; Olivia knew better than to press him and instead changed the subject.

"So, do we know which of this lot hauled Bennett and Applegate in after they answered the call?" she asked. Elliot pulled a notepad out of his jacket and flipped it open. After a moment, he smirked.

"This should get interesting," he said, and walked down the aisles of desks until he reached the end. The detective sitting there was wearing a pair of glasses that were sliding down her nose, and yet she didn't seem to notice this until Elliot knocked on the desk, startling her into looking up.

"Idiot," she said, by way of greeting. "What do you want?"

"Olivia, this is Detective Jordan Adair," said Elliot, ignoring this. "Jordan, this is my partner, Olivia Benson. You got a minute?"

"Yeah, I've got a minute," said Jordan, frowning as she got to her feet. "What's up? You guys find something?"

"If you count two rookie uniforms, over five calls to dispatch for the same thing, and a note as something," said Elliot. "We need to talk to you about a case you're running."

"Elliot, you know I can't tell you anything," Jordan started, but he cut her off.

"It might have something to do with this, which means, technically, that you can, because we might be looking for the same person."

"Or even at the same person," said Olivia. "Is there someplace quiet where we can talk?"

"Interview rooms are empty," said Jordan, "We'll take the first one."

She picked up the two files she'd been looking over, and turned in the direction of the interview room they'd use. Elliot and Olivia both followed after her, closing the door behind them.

"I'm assuming these two rookie uniforms you're talking about are David Bennett and Kari Applegate," she said. "I've heard it from Bennett's shift commander about two guys from SVU chasing after him. You wouldn't know anything about that, would you?"

"Sergeant Munch and Detective Tutuola had every right to question Officer Bennett concerning this case," said Olivia. "Like we said earlier, our case might coincide with yours."

"Which would mean that you need my help," said Jordan. "I suppose that you want to know why Applegate and Bennett got hauled in right after they got back to the four-nine that night."

"That would be nice," said Elliot. "We're running on empty here, Jordan, we don't have that much and we're running out of time."

"Well, the two of them got hauled in by us because Applegate's a plant," Jordan replied. "Problem is, we don't know where she is. She disappeared a month ago and no one's seen her since."

"You didn't put her undercover, did you?" Elliot asked. Jordan shook her head.

"No," she said, "And neither did anyone else. She was running night shifts two weeks after she answered the call at your place, and then she just didn't go home."

"So Missing Persons did hear from her husband," said Olivia, and Jordan nodded, confirming what John and Fin had said earlier on.

"Yeah, they heard. Can't say they did much about it. At first they told the poor guy she'd probably got hung up on shift, then they tried to tell him that she'd taken on a double shift to cover for someone else, but I don't see how they would have known that."

"Why did you plant Applegate at the four-nine?" Olivia asked. Jordan sighed.

"Because we got an anonymous tip that uniforms in that precinct were shaking down hookers and taking bribes from them," she said. "Kari was straight out of the academy when we pulled her aside, told her that we needed her to tell us what was really going on."

"Did she?"

"Yeah. Bennett was one of the guys she named. He's got a temper on him, doesn't know when to keep his mouth shut, and gets a kick out of insulting everyone who outranks him." Jordan paused for a moment, and then went on, opening one of the files onto the table. "He's been given five-day rips for insubordination and dereliction of duty."

"That's all?" Elliot asked. "What exactly did he do?"

"It's a long story," said Jordan, "But it's all in the file. Sergeant Munch pulled a copy of Bennett's jacket last night when they hauled him into your precinct for questioning."

"You think Bennett might have had something to do with all of this?" Olivia asked.

"We don't know. He won't talk to anyone in IAB without a union lawyer. Your two were lucky he talked to them at all," said Jordan. "All I can tell you about that is that we've been taking a real close look at Bennett ever since Applegate dropped off the map."

"But you haven't found anything," said Elliot. Jordan turned to face him.

"The kid's six months out of the academy," she said. "Besides the two five-day rips, there's nothing. We're still looking."

It was going to have to be enough, whether or not any of them liked it, and none of them did. Jordan pulled a chair out from under the table and sat down, picking up where she'd left off as she did.

"Is there anything else you guys need to know?" she asked.

"The records from dispatch," said Olivia. "We went over there and asked to see them, but there weren't any. Know anything about it?"

"That I can't help you with," said Jordan, looking disturbed. "I heard the twins got hold of their friends and had them start calling."

"They did. We've got the phone records to prove it," said Elliot. "We go to dispatch, they got nothing, but we go to the four-nine, and Lautner's got numbers."

"Which means that at some point in time, the dispatch records did exist," said Olivia. "We need to find out what happened to them."

"I'll see what I can do, but I can't promise you anything," Jordan replied. "I'll let you know if anything turns up. You hear anything from the hierarchy?"

"They're giving up on us. They want us back on rotation," said Elliot. Jordan looked at him with raised eyebrows.

"I'm assuming that this is Flynn and Williamson we're talking about," she said.

"More of Williamson than Flynn," Elliot replied. "Either way, it still means we're running out of time."

"Have you talked to Bryan about it?"

"He's got a department to run. This issue with the Chief of D's is the least of his worries."

"I'm sure he'd beg to differ. You know how he is about family; besides that, he's the only one who can make those other two back off."

"I'm hoping that it's not going to come to that."

"You know it's going to if you don't find any solid leads soon. Promise me you'll talk to him."

Silence. Olivia looked over at her partner, but said nothing. After a minute, Elliot sighed, casting a half-exasperated look in Jordan's direction.

"Fine," he said. "I'll talk to him, but only if I have to. And don't go behind my back to do it, either."

"Wouldn't dream of it," said Jordan. She got to her feet and moved to leave the interview room. "Let me know if you need anything else."

The two partners followed her out of the room, nodding their goodbyes as they made their way out of the squad room. Once she was sure they were out of earshot, Olivia turned to face her partner again.

"What was that all about?" she asked, and then, "How long have you and Detective Adair known each other?"

"Since we were six," said Elliot, "Her father used to work with mine. They were both on that task force I was telling you about earlier."

"And you both know this Bryan that she was talking about."

"Yeah."

"Well, who is he?"

The elevator doors at the end of the hall slid open as the last word left Olivia's mouth; Elliot turned to look at her, a half-amused expression on his face.

"The commissioner," he said, and stepped into the elevators after her, just as the door started to close.

"Kari Applegate's journal starts taking a turn for the worse about two weeks before your family disappeared," John remarked, by way of greeting when Elliot and Olivia came walking into the squad room. "She seemed to think that there was something going on, but she couldn't nail down exactly what it was."

"She was at the four-nine as a plant for Internal Affairs," Elliot replied. "Apparently, they thought something was going down over there, too."

"That precinct's been a mess since that shakedown in the mid-90's," said Fin. "Word has it IAB's usually got a few people in there keeping an eye on things, but no one's supposed to know who they are."

"Say someone found out," said Olivia. "And then this happens, and whoever the plant was threatens to blow the whistle if something wasn't right."

"Kari Applegate's been missing for a month, according to her husband, Missing Persons and Internal Affairs," said Elliot, frowning slightly as he looked over her. "You think someone did something to her?"

"It would explain why no one's seen or heard from her," said John. He glanced down at the journal he was still holding onto and picked up where he'd left off. "Her husband told us that she started acting strangely about a week after she and Officer Bennett answered the call to your place."

"He said she wasn't eating or sleeping, and that she kept walking around their place saying that she should have done something, or that she should have done better," said Fin. "It almost sounds like she knew someone was planning something."

"And now she might very well be dead for it," said Olivia, shaking her head. She sat down at her desk and sighed. "You two get anywhere in finding her?"

"The last time anyone heard from her was about an hour before she was due home," said John. "A waitress in a coffee shop near the four-nine."

"Did you talk her already?" Olivia asked.

"Yeah. According to her, Officer Applegate came in looking like she hadn't slept in weeks, mumbling the same things she'd been saying to her husband, and finally going on a long rant about her partner," said Fin, looking down at the notes he'd taken. "She thought something was off with Bennett, but she couldn't prove anything."

"And Bennett won't talk to IAB without a union lawyer there," said Elliot. "We're almost right back where we started."

"Not necessarily," said John. He walked over to his desk and picked up an envelope that had been left there. "This was here when Fin and I got back. We don't know it's from, but it's addressed to you."

"Anyone see who left it?" Elliot asked, taking it, and sitting down at his own desk. John shook his head.

"We asked, but no one noticed anything," he said. "They were all either out or in the interrogation rooms."

"August and September are hell in this unit," Fin remarked, and reached for the phone on his desk as it started to ring.

Silence fell between the four of them then, as Fin took down a note from the person on the other side of the line, and Olivia got up from her desk to stand with John near the monitors that had the details of their case on display. Elliot opened one of his desk drawers and pulled out a letter opener, before leaning back in his chair and opening the envelope.

Pictures were visible straight off. Frowning, he pulled them out, without really looking at them until they were all spread out across his desk.

"I think we might have something," Olivia said, after a long moment. She turned away from the monitors and walked over to her partner was, but he didn't seem to hear her. "Hey, Elliot...Oh, my God."

For some reason, this exclamation was enough to return Elliot to the present; he blinked, once, then got up and ran out of the squad room.

"What's that about?" John asked, a worried expression crossing his face. Olivia motioned down to her partner's desk and took off after him, not bothering to see if the other two were following.

Fin hung up the phone a split second later. "Where'd they go?" he asked, getting to his feet. "Someone might have seen Kari Applegate, out in the Bronx."

"We've got a bigger problem than that on our hands," said John, looking up from Elliot's desk. "Look what was in that envelope."

Fin got up and walked around; seconds later, he shook his head in disgust, momentarily at a loss for words.

"What the hell do these people think they're playing at?" he asked. "They're only gonna piss him off more, and I gotta tell you, I'm not exactly inclined to stop him doing whatever it is he's gonna do when we find them."

"Neither am I," said John, glaring down at the photos across the desk. "We need to find out where these came from. It looks like some kind of website printout..."

"Damn...If these pictures are all over the internet..." Fin trailed off and shook his head again, without continuing.

"At least now we know the Feds will get off their asses to help us," said John. "You and I need to pay them a visit."