Part 4: The Battle

Law and Order: SVU is the intellectual property of Dick Wolf. The use of the characters, settings, and plotlines is not malicious. This is a work of fiction.

Amanda Rollins sat in her rolling chair, leaning back, tossing a rubber ball into the air and catching it repeatedly. "So, why are they in there," she began speaking to her partner, "And we're out here?"

Nick Amaro laughed. "Because they're in charge." He shrugged. "Fin is asking all the questions, Elliot's running point because Goren is still involved in this, somehow, and Olivia is watching them, through the glass, with that hot-shit ADA."

"Who?" Rollins narrowed her eyes. "How do you know she's not in the interrogation..."

"I was in there," he interrupted her, looking at her funny. "Not even five minutes ago. Barba walked in and I walked out. You...you saw it happen! Where is your head lately?"

She rolled her shoulders and tossed the pink ball to him. He didn't even try to catch it, and it sailed over his head, bouncing out into the hallway. She raised an eyebrow, shaking her head, and then finally answered the question. "It's been a revolving door, here," she said snidely. "You think it's my fault?"

"What?" he asked, squinting at her. "What in blazes are you talking about?"

Rollins sat up a bit straighter and folded her arms. "From what I was told, when I took this job, this unit had been rock-solid. The same team, the same captain at the helm, for over a decade. That's not normal for Special Victims." She bit her lip and eyed Amaro cautiously. "I walk in, and suddenly people who've been on the job for longer than I've been alive just up and quit? Two people, good cops, great men, retire. One of the best detectives in the entire department gets handed the command post..." she let her teeth scrape over her bottom lip and a lost look filled her eyes. "It doesn't make sense, and I think..."

"You don't know?" Amaro cut her off. "Before...before either of us volunteered for this, uh, there was a...an incident." He looked over his shoulder. "People...people died. Right here, in this room." He slid off the edge of the metal table and moved quickly, sitting in the chair in front of Rollins' desk. "A young girl, a kid really, opened fire. Stabler, he...well, the girl aimed at Olivia, is how I was told this story, and Stabler shot her."

"He killed a kid?" Rollins asked, stunned. "Holy shit."

Amaro nodded. "He was a wreck afterward. He left the unit...and it affected everyone, especially Benson." He sighed and folded his hands on the desk. "Seeing something like that...you never get over it. So that's why Munch retired, and Cragen quit. The job...after so long...became too fucking much."

Rollins nodded, understanding. "I didn't know." She looked at Amaro. "Why her, though? Why did they give Olivia the job, knowing she..."

"Something you need to understand about Olivia Benson," Amaro said, a small smile on his face, "Is that she will never work with anyone else the way she worked with Stabler. You saw it, briefly, when he came back to the unit. They were unstoppable. Then Tucker retired, his first...and only...recommendation was Stabler. I guess the higher-ups knew that Olivia wouldn't handle losing him twice, so when Cragen took leave, they handed her the control."

"Makes sense," Rollins said with a slightly pensive frown. "Did you know...they're married? I didn't they could be..."

"There's no rules against it," he said, his lips curling into a smirk. "No law, guideline, nothing...nothing at all against partners...being more than partners." His tone had shifted and he knew it affected her, seeing the expression on her face change. "They got married a few months after the shooting. Guess they realized they had too much to lose, if they ever really lost each other. Fin said it was a long time coming, and from what he told me, everyone in the NYPD expected it."

"They did," Olivia said, stepping closer to them. She was walking a few steps in front of a man in a three-piece suit, who looked annoyed. "My ears were ringing."

Amaro looked at her and smiled. "Hey, Cap'n," he joked. "Just filling in the blanks for Rollins over here. She, uh, clearly was left out a few loops."

"Well, I hope you reached a point of clarity," Olivia said, putting her hands on her hips. "You two have to go out to Queens, pick up a new person-of-interest in the Bramson case."

"Who?" Rollins asked, standing.

Olivia handed her a white piece of paper. "His names Victor Ramirez," she said, "Sarah Bramson, after about thirty minutes of hysterical crying and whining, told us that he is Valerie's biological father. According to her, he had a pretty huge reason to want Valerie...out of the way."

Nick shook his head as he rose to his feet. "There is never a good reason to want your child out of the way," he said sadly, thinking about his own children. "Nothing...nothing could ever make me..."

"I know, Nick," Olivia interrupted. "Don't...don't do that. The second you start letting cases get personal, that's when the shit becomes too deep to clear away." She looked at Rollins. "Bring him back here, and the first thing you do is get a swab."

"You don't think he's her father?" Rollins asked, tilting her head.

Olivia rubbed her forehead, feeling a headache coming on. "Sarah's done nothing but lie to us since the moment we found her daughter in that alley," she spat. "I'm not taking her word for it. I want a test done, ASAP."

"Good call," Amaro said, exhaling sharply. He looked at Rollins. "Ready?"

Rollins nodded, giving him a half-smile. She kept her eyes on Nick's as she pulled on her jacket, nodded once to Olivia, and stepped in time with her partner.

"Twenty bucks says they're playing hide the sausage," Barba said, folding his arms.

Olivia laughed. "Please," she said, shaking her head. "I know the signs. Nothing's going on between them." She raised an eyebrow and smirked at the attorney. "Yet."

"Is that how it started? With you and Stabler?" Barba asked, plopping into Rollins' empty chair.

Olivia leaned against the desk and crossed her arms. "I don't think we were ever that transparent," she said with a crooked grin.

Barba started rearranging all of Rollins' pens, and the corners of his lips turned up as he asked, "Anniversary's coming up, huh?"

"Two years," she said with a smile. "Falls right in line with Rollins and Amaro being here...wow, it's been a year already." She exhaled and there was a moment of silence. "You don't think I can do this job, either, do you?"

He stopped doodling on Rollins' desk blotter and shot her a look, seemingly frozen. "How did you...what part of anything I said made you...what?"

She laughed and licked her lips. "In the observation room, you...you said, you weren't sure how I could separate my personal feelings for my husband from my job. I assumed you meant..."

"I meant...that it must really hard for you to control yourself when you're watching him interrogate someone," Barba said, flattening his hands on Rollins' desk. "I saw it in your eyes, the more pissed off he got, the more you wanted to tear his clothes off." He tilted his head. "How many times has he bent you over your desk since you got the job?"

Her eyes were wide and her jaw hung open. "Oh, my God," she spat with a surprised laugh. She watched the man grin and wink, and then she asked him, "What are you going to charge her with?"

"For starters, I'm gonna make sure the three separate fraud charges stick," he told her. "And then...she'll be indicted on aggravated interference with health care services, bribery, coercion, criminal sale of a controlled substance on or near school grounds, possession of drugs with intent to sell, the countless obstruction charges we..."

"I think a better question would be what aren't you charging her with?" Olivia chided, flabbergasted at the list that Barba had just rattled off.

Barba put his hands in his pockets and gave her a smug grin. "Murder," he shrugged. "But, that may change, depending on what Romeo and Juliet find out from Ramirez."

"What about me and Liv?" Elliot questioned with a grin, coming into the squad room with Fin right behind him.

Barba flattened his expression. "Not you," he said snidely. "If you're finished with her, I'll schedule arraignment for Bramson."

"Yeah," Elliot said, nodding. He was pulling down his sleeves and refastening his cuff-buttons when he looked over at Fin. "You got the..."

Fin held up a notebook and cut Elliot off. "Right here," he said, handing the pad to Olivia. "She wrote it all down. I think, uh, you're not gonna wanna hear this, but I think she needs a Seven-Thirty."

"What?" Olivia asked, annoyed. "Why?"

Fin looked her in the eyes. "That girl is bat-shit crazy," he said, heading over to his desk.

Barba pulled the notebook out of Olivia's hands and read the first three lines of writing. "I'll schedule one of those, too. Make me a copy of this?" He handed the yellow pad back to her. "I'll be back in about an hour." He looked around. "She's still in there? With her lawyer?"

Elliot nodded. "Discussing the offer we put on the table."

"What offer?" Barba snapped. "I didn't agree to making her an offer."

Elliot held up his hands. "Easy," he said. "It's dropping the conspiracy charge in exchange for..."

"Conspiracy charge?" Barba yelled, interrupting. "I left you alone in there for two minutes, and it's like I know nothing about the case anymore!"

Olivia looked at Elliot, concerned, and just as irritated as Barba. "What conspiracy charge?"

"Read her confession, Liv," Elliot said. He sighed, rubbed a hand down his face, and looked up at the ceiling, trying to figure out how to tell Olivia something he knew would piss her off, more than anything. "Liv, she...she knows who killed her daughter." He looked at her, almost apologetically, and he reached for her hands, an attempt to keep her calm. "She was gonna pay him to do it."

Olivia's eyes narrowed. "Wh...what? How could...she was her...mother, I..."

"Yeah, I know," he said, a softer tone. "That's why she...she changed her mind, she backed out of the deal." He held her gaze and said, "She took out a pretty hefty life insurance policy on her daughter, but...when all of those medical claims started hitting, the company cancelled the policy, so she called off the hit."

"Guy got pissed, killed her anyway, but raped her for added revenge," Olivia supposed. She swallowed the urge to throw up, yell, and hit things. She looked at Elliot and unconsciously ran her thumbs along the sides of his hands. "Who was it?"

"That's why we offered her that deal," Fin said, and then he looked at Barba. "The other seventy-six things you want to hang her for are still in the basket, Barba, but this...we need the guy's name."

Barba nodded. "For once, I agree with you." He looked at Olivia. "Like I said, I'll be back in an hour, and I'm not backing down on anything else, I have...:"

"Excuse me?" another lawyer called from the doorway leading into the observation room. "My client...she's going to take the deal."

Olivia pulled her hands out of Elliot's, took two steps toward the man, and gave him a sour smile. "Who was it, Langan?"

"Benson, back up," Trevor Langan said, slightly scared. "She didn't tell me. She wants to talk to Fin and Elliot, and she wants to make sure that charge is dropped. She...she doesn't want to go down for trying to have her own daughter killed."

Olivia looked at Elliot. "Go," she said, nodding. She watched her husband and Fin follow Trevor back through the door. She sighed and looked at Barba. "If the name she gives us doesn't pan out..."

"Then I will add a conspiracy charge to her laundry list," Barba finished. "You, uh...you and Elliot...wanna grab a couple drinks when this is over? I think we're all gonna need it."

Olivia gave the attorney a smile. He reminded her of someone, but she couldn't put her finger on it. "Sure," she said, nodding at him.

He smiled. "Oh," he said, "And Olivia? You asked me how I felt about you being captain of this ship. I don't think you can do it." He watched her eyes fall closed and the smile fade from her lips. But then, he took a few steps closer to her, rested a hand on her shoulder, and said, "I know you can. You can, and you will. But I'm not the one that has to believe it, am I?"

She gave him a wide-eyed expression, a mix of gratitude and respect, and she said, "I'm getting there."

Barba squeezed her shoulder and turned, walking away from her.

Olivia folded her arms again, looked around her empty squad room, and felt herself stand a little taller. "I can do this," she said softly to herself. The moment of revelation was interrupted when something hit her, very hard, in the shoulder. "Ow! What the..." she turned and saw a pink, rubber ball bouncing across the floor. She rolled her eyes. "Barba!" she yelled. "Grow up!" She laughed and headed into the observation room, walking with a longer stride and new sense of purpose. She stepped up to the glass wall, peering through it, watching her husband and Trevor Langan talking in a corner while Fin made Sarah Bramson write down the name and contact information of a man who may or may not be Valerie's killer.

She took a deep breath and relaxed as she exhaled. "This is gonna involve so much fucking paperwork," she said, rolling tension out of her neck.

"You can handle it," a low voice from behind her confirmed.

She turned around and her eyes widened. "Chief Muldrew!" She stood up a little straighter. "I wasn't expecting...wait, do we have a meeting? Did I miss..."

"Calm down," the chief chuckled. "I just dropped by to, uh...well, there's something that you and Sergeant Stabler need to be made aware of, and you're both here, now, so...two birds, one stone, as they say."

Olivia furrowed her brow. "Are we in some kind of trouble?"

"Trouble? No," Muldrew said, shaking his head. "Danger."

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Jo

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