The stab wound was infected.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

In a second, Olivia was on her feet in front of her partner and grabbed onto his shoulders to stop him from falling to the floor.

"Elliot!" She tried to shake him, but in vain; only his limp body swayed in her grip. Some sort of muffled grunt could be heard in the darkness, but she couldn't make contact with him beyond that. "El, Goddamnit! Why do you always have to be such a stubborn idiot?!"

The rising worry raised waves of anger inside her, but at the same time, tears welled up in her eyes as fear began to spread through her every cell. After trying to wake up her partner for a while, she carefully lowered him on the ground, and in the pitch darkness, began to take groping steps blindly towards the door. On her way, she almost stumbled upon a person lying on the ground, who groaned irritably.

"What are you doing?!" He snapped as Olivia carefully stepped over him and continued walking. "Go to sleep!"

But she didn't listen, a squeezing worry commanded her legs moving forward, and finally her outstretched hands hit a solid surface. The wooden door under her hands felt cold as she took a deep breath and began pounding on it with her fists.

"HEY! We need help!"

Like the night before, there was no sound from the door, but this time she wasn't going to give up. On the contrary, not reacting only made her bang on the door harder.

"I know you assholes can hear me! We need a doctor!"

And then, sooner than she would have expected, the door was suddenly flung open, and the bright light flooding in made her squint. There was an armed man standing in the doorway, looking at her angrily.

"What the hell is wrong with you?! Shut up and go to sleep!" He snapped and poked at her with his weapon, but fear for her partner only made her take a step back before she clenched her fists and replied:

"There's nothing wrong with me, but my p-… Elliot needs help."

"This is just a trick."

"No it's not!" Olivia exclaimed, turning to Elliot, who was still lying on the ground, eyes half open, looking sicker than ever before. A lump rose in her throat, but she turned her head toward the guard, her eyes pleading. "Please, help him. He has a stab wound on his back which is infected, and he has a high fever. I…" She had to bite the inside of her cheek to keep the tears from welling up in her eyes. "I'll do anything as long as you help him."

"Liv…" Elliot's voice was weak behind her, but she didn't turn to look at him. She couldn't.

"Shut up, El."

"No, I'm not going to let you…"

"I said shut up!" She exclaimed, her voice sharp, final, and she bored her gaze into the guard. "Please…"

And finally he slowly moved his gaze from her to Elliot, looked at him appraisingly for a moment, then gave a tentative nod.

"Very well. Hold on a second, I'll call for backup."

He stepped out of the door, and without even glancing at her partner, Olivia followed with her gaze the guard who was calling out to the others for help. She could feel Elliot's gaze on her back, but his silence reinforced the fact that he needed help as soon as possible, as she knew he would have protested much more violently if he had had the strength to do so. Soon, running footsteps began to be heard, which finally stopped at the door, and the guard explained briefly:

"One of the Chosen ones has a fever and apparently has a wound that has become infected. Take him to the doctor."

And then two men, also armed, entered the room and started to approach Elliot, who sounded like he was coming to life as he suddenly began to protest. However, he couldn't resist the two large men who grabbed him and began to drag him towards the door.

"No, no, let go of me! Liv, please, listen to me!"

"I'm not going to let you die, El," her voice broke, and he tried one last time to yank himself free from the men's grip, but in vain."

"No Liv!"

But then the men pushed him out of the door, the door slammed shut, and complete, suffocating darkness filled the room again. Tears began to roll down her cheeks as she sat down, pulled her knees to her chest and wrapped her arms around her legs. Quiet whispers were heard around her, but she didn't care, because only one single thought had filled her every cell:

Please, please help him.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Olivia wasn't sure how long she had been sitting there, sleepless despite her previous fatigue, when the door opened again. Frustrated protests were heard around her as the light once again filled the dark room, but she immediately raised her head from her knees and turned her gaze towards the light, expecting to see her partner. But instead, there was only a guard standing at the door, staring at her unkindly, and she felt her stomach drop.

"Is Elliot okay?"

"I don't know," the guard grunted and made Olivia stand up. Her sudden movement made him raise his weapon, but it didn't make her back down.

"Where is he?"

"It's not your problem."

"Actually it is!" Her voice began to rise as her worry began to defy the barrel of the gun pointed at her. "He's my partner, and I need to know if he's okay!"

The guard eyed her for a moment, but then sighed.

"We took him to the doctor, but now this is not about him. Father wants to see you."

Even though Olivia didn't look around, she could almost feel the heads of the others in the room pop up almost simultaneously, and judging by their reaction, meeting the head boss himself was not ordinary at all. She felt her pulse begin to quicken as her cop instincts began to rear their heads.

"Why?"

However, the guard just snorted. "We had a deal. So move!"

"I'll do anything as long as you help him."

And Olivia had no choice but to force her resisting legs to move and follow him.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The guard had led Olivia through the entire long and winding corridor, and finally he opened one door at the end of it, pushed her in, and closed the door behind her. The brightness of the room made Olivia blink, and the size of it made her feel confused for a moment.

She was in a large, surprisingly high room, which looked more like a hall than a room. At the end of the room, directly across from her, was a fireplace with flames crackling merrily, the room was furnished with various armchairs and a wooden table, and she took a few cautious steps closer to the inviting warmth of the fire. It attracted her so that she startled violently when she heard a man's voice:

"Hello, Detective Benson."

She quickly turned around, and there, in one of the armchairs, was sitting a slender man, about her age, with his hands resting in his lap. His demeanor was carefree, he had a slight smile on his lips, and he was looking at her with a curious twinkle in his eyes.

"So, you are the great "Father" they all talk about," Olivia crossed her arms defiantly. "The one who has saw the future."

The man chuckled, got up, and walked over to the table, on which were two water glasses and a frosty bottle full of bubbling cold water. Automatically, she licked her dry lips, and the man poured water into another glass after glancing at her. Then he handed it to her, and without a second thought she raised it to her lips and drank greedily.

"I clearly have to tell my boys to give you more water," the man looked at her appraisingly and took a sip from his own glass. Then he sat back down, motioned for her to sit as well but she shook her head.

"No," she straightened her back again. The water had made her thoughts clear a little. "So, Father, it would be very nice to hear why the hell we are here?"

The man watched her for a moment and ran his fingers along his glass, but then he let out a light sigh.

"I have seen a vision."

"Don't try to feed me that bullshit," Olivia snapped and put her own drinking glass back on the table. "Actually, I should have asked, why are we here?"

The man looked at her in silence for a moment again, but then he stood up again, put his hands behind his back, and began to pace around the room.

"So, you figured out my plan so quickly. Impressive, good girl," something about the tone of his voice made the hair on the back of Olivia's neck stand up. "My plan has been more profitable and easier than I would have thought."

"You and your henchmen are going to end up behind bars for the rest of your life."

"Yeah, I know, if we get caught," the man grinned. "And so we get to why you are here."

He walked back to the water bottle and poured himself another glass of water. Olivia looked at him, the confusion had momentarily taken away her ability to form sensible sentences, so she just waited for him to continue.

"Children, those miracles of God that make people do unexpected things. I have learned that the innate human need to have and care for offspring makes some childless people so desperate that they are willing to pay huge sums of money to have their own screaming creature in their arms. I saw a niche, but who could give me children proved to be a problem until I met a man with schizophrenia. He was sure the government wanted to kill him, and he was willing to do anything to stay alive. And that's how I got the idea."

"To feed drugs the people you kidnap so they think what you're saying is true," Olivia stated, and the man turned to look at her slightly surprised.

"Exactly. You really live up to your reputation," some inexplicable emotion flashed in his eyes, but his voice remained calm. "It was actually surprisingly easy. I selected people who seemed to me to be fertile, and I began to execute my plan. Everything went smoothly until we encountered a rather large setback."

"Which was?"

"Annabel Simons."

And then the pieces fell into place in Olivia's head, and she couldn't understand how she hadn't realized it sooner. Annabel Simons, a woman who had been found wandering the street wearing only a thin dress. But it hadn't been a dress, it had been a gown similar to hers.

"So she was…"

"She managed to escape, and our whole plan was about to go wrong. I know she hasn't spoken to you, but you and your partner got too close to the case, and I had to intervene."

Olivia was starting to feel dizzy, but she shook her head to keep her thoughts clear.

"So you kidnapped us so you wouldn't get caught? But why did you bring us here? Wouldn't it have been easier to just kill us right away?"

"It would have been, and that was my original plan," the man answered, and the floor swayed again under Olivia's feet. She tried to force herself to breathe deeply and calmly. "But then I thought: why waste good genes? I know Detective Stabler has a whole bunch of kids, so his little buddies must be active, if you know what I mean. And you…" His eyes flashed behind his water glass, and the floor began to rock even more violently in Olivia's eyes.

There is something wrong here.

"At first I thought I would deviate from the rules and use my own sperm on you, but then I had second thoughts. This is business after all, and I wouldn't have the heart to sell my own child," he sighed and put the glass down. The ground swayed violently under her feet, causing her to stagger. Her eyes landed on her water glass that she had placed on the table, and that's when she realized.

There hadn't been just water in the glass.

Oh no… No no no no no…

"I've been following you and your partner for a while now, and since you seem like a perfect match, I thought... This might be the jackpot."

Olivia staggered again, and she had to take support from the nearest armchair.

"Where's… Elliot?" Her thoughts began to blur, and the man stood up, walked over to her and brushed her hair behind her ear, making her flinch. "Don't touch me!"

"It's okay, sweetheart, you don't have to worry. Your partner is receiving medical treatment, but we already have everything we need."

"How?" The world was spinning in Olivia's eyes, but panic prevented her from losing consciousness yet.

"We were effective while removing the knife. Electricity is a very useful tool for many things, isn't it?"

She wanted to throw up, but her eyes began to darken, and the world began to sound distant to her ears. From somewhere in the distance, she heard the door open, someone enter the room, and she tried to turn her head, but she collapsed to her knees, her body no longer obeying her commands. And before she lost consciousness, she heard the man's voice from somewhere near her:

"Take her to the doctor. It is her time to fulfill her purpose."