"You know, Mike," Munch said to his former partner when Kellerman had explained his idea to the older man early the next morning, "I know you've been on the wagon for a few years and recently fell off to a roaring stop within in the past few days, but I think all that drinking's finally fried your brain cells, this is nuts."
"John," Mike said to him, "I have a vague memory of being in the motel room, but I don't know what motel. I'm going to have to go back and check every motel between the diner I ate at, and the highway I ran into Toni's car on, and I need somebody to go with me."
"It's a wild goose chase, Mike, even if we do find the place, it's not going to prove anything," Munch said.
"Maybe whoever works there would remember seeing the woman and could describe her," Kellerman pointed out.
"And maybe she got eaten by the Abominable Snow thing too," John sarcastically remarked, "It's a million to one shot, Mike."
"Come on, John, what've we got to lose besides the gas for the trip?" Mike asked, "It might just clear Toni."
"It might," Munch agreed, "But I'm still waiting to see what it is Olivia and Elliot found out about those unis. They already didn't have a leg to stand on…"
"But it sure developed a leg real quick when that fourth 'victim' came forth," Mike responded.
"…True," Munch sighed, "Alright…well…there are two ways we can go about this. Either you and I go check the motels out, and Fin stays here and sits on Toni until we get back…"
"Or all four of us go and make a road trip of it, I know," Mike told him, "Actually I'm more in favor of the latter because maybe we'll be able to find something out. If it turns out Toni had never been at that motel before, it would help to find out, wouldn't it?"
"A lawyer's not going to take her at her word," Munch said.
"John," Mike said, "What the hell are we in this business for if we can't figure out how to read people? Can't you gauge by how she answers if she's telling the truth or not?"
"Alright, alright," Munch concurred, "Let's go get Fin and Toni and we'll circle our way back to Queens to start, but we'll make sure to avoid Manhattan on the way out there. As long as this manhunt's on I don't want Toni within spitting distance of any Manhattan cops."
"Right. Oh, should you call your partners at SVU and tell them?"
"No way," Munch said, "By now the Rat Squad's probably on the warpath, their cells might be compromised, I'm not giving any of them a chance to get on our tail. If the cops or the judge or IAB wants us, they're going to have to come hunting for us themselves."
"I never really had you pegged as the go down with the ship kind of guy," Mike commented.
"Dying on your feet's better than living on your knees, you take a stand in this world and eventually somebody's going to blow you away," Munch told him, "The trick is in acknowledging that early on to prepare for it, when it comes down to it, I'm ready."
"If any of these places was the crime scene we'd never know it," Fin observed as he glanced around the room, "I don't even like standing on the carpet in here."
"Most of the motels in this city are no tell motels, they definitely look the part," Munch responded as he picked up the items on the nightstand one by one as if checking them for something.
"You pay cheap you get exactly what you deserve," Fin noted.
"That's a myth," Munch said as he took the shade off the lamp and then replaced it, "You take a black light into any four star hotel you'll find the exact same amounts of blood, urine and semen traces as in any of these $26 a night dumps."
"That's disgusting," Fin said.
"That's business," Munch replied.
"It's still disgusting, and so's that."
Munch turned to see what his partner was complaining about now and saw Fin was referring to Mike laying down on the bed in the motel room, on top of the covers but it didn't seem to make much difference in the gross factor.
"What do you say, Mike? Is this the place or not?" Munch asked.
Mike shifted around on top of the covers like he was trying to get comfortable and said, "I'm not sure…can somebody dim the lights?"
"The lights were dim?" Fin inquired.
"I think so, yeah," Mike said.
"Don't look at me," Toni sneered.
The curtains were drawn to emulate it being night time, Fin turned the lights down gradually until Mike declared it was just right. Then he repositioned himself on the bed several times, never really settling on any specific side.
"Will you stop flopping around like a barracuda out of water?" Munch asked, "What the hell are you even doing?"
"I'm trying to figure out what position I was in when I was assaulted," Mike answered, "I don't remember, if I was on my back," he tried that, "Or if I was…" he turned over onto his stomach to see if that sparked any memories.
"Don't get up," Fin said dryly.
"If you don't like the view, then move," Toni told him.
"Mike," Munch went over to the man twisting around on the bed and asked him, "Do you remember where your attacker was? Was she on top of you or behind you, or what?"
"I'm not sure," Mike answered. He tried laying on his back again but said, "No, I don't remember seeing the ceiling." He turned over again and said, "I remember looking to the walls…the lights were so low…"
"Like this, almost pitch dark?" Munch asked.
"No…there was something else," Mike said, "Like…ah…."
"Like there were candles lit?" Toni suggested.
"Could be," Mike slowly nodded as he pushed up on his knees, "It's foggy but I remember the whole place looked like a jack-o-lantern glowing."
"Oh that's a big help," Munch sarcastically noted.
Fin turned to Toni and asked her, "How 'bout it?"
She shook her head, "No way, candles make more light, exactly the last thing I want."
"Well it doesn't smell like any have burnt here recently," John commented, "So either this isn't the place or housekeeping's that good with the air freshener."
"Just a thought," Toni said, "If his attacker did light candles in here, would she have left them here or taken them with her? Because there aren't any here."
"Maybe they just burnt down," Munch supposed, "There'd be no reason to keep them here then, they'd go out with the trash." He hit on another school of thought and said to her, "Okay Toni, let's just say for argument's sake that you do go for this vulgar stuff," he went over to Mike and shoved him back down on the bed and said to Toni, "Here's your unwilling and unresponsive victim. Which approach would you take with him?"
She folded her arms against her chest and eyed him skeptically and asked him, "Are you seriously asking me that?"
"Yes," Munch answered, "You said it yourself you know the mind of this assailant, how she thinks, so if you were the one doing this stuff to these guys, how would you do it? I want you to give us a little PG demonstration if you will."
"You can't be serious," Toni said.
Mike rolled over to look at her and said, "It's alright, Toni…" he looked to Munch and added, "This is going to go towards proving your innocence."
Toni glared at Munch and told him, "I don't like this."
"I know you don't, but do it anyway," he said.
With a murderous scowl on her face, Toni got out a large huff and went over to the bed and climbed on it beside Mike, who lay there patiently, waiting to see what she would do. Toni looked at him and grabbed him, forcibly turning him over onto his stomach, pressed him facedown into the bedcovers, then she positioned herself behind him and grabbed his thighs to force them apart.
"Okay, just a minute," Munch said, "Mike, can you feel that?"
"Yeah."
"Think that's hard enough to leave some bruises?"
"Bruises?" Mike choked a laugh into the covers, "That would leave fingerprints."
Munch leaned over to Fin and murmured, "Mike had some bruises from the collision but nothing that would even be suspected of being handprints."
"Doesn't prove anything," Fin remarked, "It wouldn't be anything for her to change her M.O. with us here to watch."
"Yeah well I think we ought to wait until the end of the performance to determine anything," Munch replied, "Alright, Toni, you've got him right where you want him, now what?"
Toni looked at him like he was nuts and she asked him as much, "Are you crazy?"
"Just do it," Munch told her.
Reluctantly, Toni climbed on Mike and planted her knees on top of the backs of his knees where he lay flat against the mattress. After that she paused long in hesitance, and the two detectives watching noticed that she started to breathe harder and looked like she was going to either hyperventilate or throw up before she grumbled something and got off of Mike and said to the sergeant, "You're sick, Munch, you know that?"
"And just as I suspected, you couldn't go through with it," he pointed out.
"It still doesn't prove anything, and you know it," Toni told him as she got off the bed.
"How about it, Mike?" Munch asked.
Kellerman pushed up on his hands and turned over and commented, "Not entirely unpleasant, but it was the wrong view. I was pushed facedown here, I couldn't see the walls, not up anyway, just the light against them, and…the bedding, the pillows."
"And did they look like these?" Munch asked.
Mike gave everything a look and shook his head, "No…they were almost black, some kind of purplish black…I think."
"He thinks," Fin groaned under his breath.
"Alright," Munch said, "I'm going to check with the maids and see if they have any different colored bedding for when they change the sheets, which I'm sure is quite frequently around here." He started for the door and stopped and turned back and said, "Oh but one more thing before I go."
"Here we go," Fin rolled his eyes.
"Alright, Toni, I asked you how you would do this, but you think you know this other woman's mind and how it works…that said, based on what Mike's told us, how would you say she did it?"
"You've really lost it, Munch, you know that?" Toni asked.
"Humor me," he replied.
"No!" she told him, "I refuse."
"Why?" Fin asked skeptically.
"You realize what you're asking me to do?" she asked.
"Mike does, and he has no objections," Munch pointed out, "And if anybody should…"
"It's sick," Toni said.
"It's called reenacting the crime," Munch said, "A close proximity is all we need."
"What's it going to prove?" Toni asked him.
"I don't know…show us," he persisted.
Toni looked to Mike and said nothing, but looked like right about now she'd rather be having her teeth ripped out one by one without the benefit of anesthesia than do this. But Mike complied and rolled back over onto his stomach and lay flat against the mattress, hers for the manipulating, so to speak. Toni got on the bed beside him and positioned him so he was slightly on his side, and as such his head was to the side, but still pressed his face into the covers so his view was low from the bed. Her hands started at his neck and worked their way down his body, a little light groping along the way to the final destination. Again, she positioned herself behind Kellerman but this time didn't grab his legs and jerk them apart, instead this time she just lightly pushed them open; Mike complied given he was supposed to be more or less knocked out when this was going on and therefore wouldn't have been able to resist. This time Toni didn't put her own weight on his legs and wasn't so rigid to stay directly behind him where he couldn't see her.
"Alright, Toni, what's going through her mind during this whole thing?" Munch asked.
Climbing over Mike and getting off the bed, Toni told him, "Her thinking is he's drugged so he can't do anything unless she makes it happen, if she wants to hurt him she can because he can't stop her, and if she doesn't want to, she'll do whatever else comes to mind, because she's got the means, opportunity, and she knows all the time she has before the drugs wear off and he comes to."
"Right, but back to the question why does she want to hurt him?" Munch asked.
Toni half looked to Mike and said to Munch, "Well just look at him, he's got that look that in the right circumstances he'd be very easy to mess with. Subdued he'd be the perfect…"
"Victim," Munch said.
"Exactly."
"Why? What drives her?" Munch asked.
"What drives any rapist?" Toni asked, "The need for power, to dominate, to feel powerful, sometimes all the struggling and pleading is not necessary for them to get that feeling of power. In this instance it doesn't matter that Mike himself is not feeling powerless during the assault, it's merely having a convenient live body that's indisposed and can't fight back, can't make her stop, can't interfere with her plans, that's all she's after."
"And when she's done with them she gets them dressed, hauls them out to her car and drops them out in front of the hospital," Fin said, "That's a lot of upper body strength for one woman."
"Well," Toni said slowly, "She's not working with a partner, whoever she is."
"How do you know?" Munch asked.
"What's a partner going to get out of it? You have any idea what the odds are of two women with this mindset finding each other, let alone deciding to work together?" Toni asked, "Besides, partnering up only increases a chance of something going wrong, getting caught, add to the fact I don't believe this chick believes in sharing her bounty, she's like a hunter, she picks her targets specifically, makes sure the attacks go off without a hitch, never lets herself be detected, covers her tracks, and goes straight for the kill. And then when the thrill of the hunt is over and she's gotten the use out of him she's going to, she discards him like a carcass picked clean."
"And whoever she is, she's out on the prowl right now for another victim," Fin said, "Odds are she didn't bring all the guys back to the same motel room to rape them."
"Meaning she has no comfort zone," Munch said, "She's not from around here."
"But that's not going to help you find her either," Toni told them.
"I'm going to go talk to the maids," Munch said as he headed for the door.
"I'll go with you," Fin said.
"This is a mess," Toni said as she flopped down on the edge of the bed.
Mike sat down beside her and started to say something, but Toni raised a hand to his mouth and shushed him, and said lowly, "Fin's not gone, he's just waiting outside to see if we try making a break for it."
"How do you know?" he asked.
"Because I know them, and I know that they don't trust me," Toni said, "After everything else a person can possibly go through, when there's absolutely nothing else left, still the worst thing that can ever happen is the day everybody stops believing you."
"Munch believes you."
"Maybe, but he's the only one, and even he can turn," Toni told him.
Mike put his arms around her and pulled her against him and assured her, "Nothing can turn Munch, if he believes in your innocence he'll take it to the mat for you. And I believe you."
"That's supposed to be the only thing that matters," Toni said, "I don't know if it is or not, but it'll have to do for now."
Munch came back with the news that the motel only used one variety of color sheets, so the goose chase was on again, 3 more no tell motels later, they found one that did use dark purple sheets on their beds that almost bordered on black. Once again Mike resumed the position as best as he could remember and tried to get some perspective on the situation.
"Well Mike, what's the verdict?" Munch asked.
"This might be the place," Mike said as he rolled over and looked to the ceiling.
"More 'might be's," Fin huffed, "This isn't getting us anywhere."
"You never know," Munch said, "Get up, Mike, we're going to go see if by some off chance, the guy running this dump saw you here before."
"What do we do?" Toni asked.
"Just stay here and look pretty," Munch said, and as he and his former partner headed out the door, he added to his current partner, "You too."
"Ha-ha," Fin dryly remarked.
"Fin?" Toni said to him, "If this is the place, what do you think the odds are that she'd come back here with another guy?"
He thought about the question and shook his head, "Anybody's guess I suppose."
"Then maybe we ought to stay here tonight," Toni said, "And keep watch. We don't have anything better to go on, all we know is that she needs privacy to work, she's not going to get a guy unconscious and do him in an alley or in a car." She looked to the cop and told him point blank, "Fin, I didn't do this."
"I know you didn't," he told her.
Toni scoffed and replied, "You sure could've fooled me."
"I've been doing this a long time, Toni," Fin said, "I've been on both sides of thinking you know somebody and swear they couldn't possibly do something."
"And you're worried about winding up with egg on your face," Toni said, "And finding out I'm a rapist. Because I might have some insight as to how this woman thinks, how she works, and because somebody got a shill to come in and personally say I attacked him. Do you know me at all, Fin?"
There were times he wondered if anyone truly did.