"So you still don't remember anything, huh?"

"No, no not really ….." said Olivia, startling Fin by the speed with which she ordered herself a glass of red alongside his beer, "… it's all still pretty blurry."

"That was a pretty big reaction back there for someone who's still blurry about how she feels about Stabler."

"Was it?" she asked, throwing up a wall so high he could barely peek over it. "I don't think so. Not really. I'm fine."

Fin held his silence a moment and took a slow slurp of his beer when their order arrived. Leaning on the bar he turned a beer mat back and forth between his fingers and debated his next move. It was a complicated board, a lot of players, a lot of moves. He knew whichever one he made next could affect a course of events and he wasn't entirely sure he was ready for that responsibility.

"Dani Beck."

"Who?"

"Don't you dare lie to me Benson….." he growled, his eyes snapping up to grab hers. "We've been through too much for you to spin me that BS and you know that. You remember it. You remember all of it, don't you?"

"No, no I…." she stuttered, sliding her gaze off his and bringing it to rest on the bottles racked behind the bar. She took a sip of her wine and swallowed it down slowly. It warmed the back of her throat.

"How long?" he pushed, making no attempts to hide his anger.

He had been there, he had been right there for her from the start and she hadn't been honest with him. There had been endless discussion in the squad room about the impact of the shooting on Olivia, and on Elliot. He had held his tongue, pushed his own reaction down deep inside. It didn't help anyone to show he was hurting too. Not when everyone relied on him to be the constant, the stoic, the unfaltering one. The one thing he could never stand was dishonesty, however, and especially not from her. He held her to a higher standard and he wasn't about to apologise for that.

"Liv how long have you had your memory back?"

"I haven't got it back. Not all of it. Or at least I don't think I do. I wasn't lying when I said it was blurry. Besides, it turns out it isn't enough to just remember everything."

"But you remember a hell of a lot more than you've told anyone, right?" he didn't care for nuance or splitting hairs. "Hey? Look at me? Look me in the eye and…."

"I'm sorry…." she sighed, and this time for the first time in a long time when she turned to look at him he saw Liv looking back.

"Liv…." he mouthed, caught entirely off guard by the strength of emotion he felt at seeing her behind her eyes again. The lights were on, she was home. "My God…."

"I still have gaps. I still forget things today that I remembered yesterday. It isn't linear. That's what Terri says."

"Terri?"

"Wyatt…." she replied, but seeing that didn't clarify anything for him she added, "… therapist."

"So what does this mean? You remember…."

"I don't have the shooting. I have no clue what happened that day. I don't remember reacting to the weapon and I don't remember anything that happened before or after I lost consciousness. I can't even be sure how far in front of it I can remember either. That's what it's like. That's why I haven't said anything. It's not an exact science."

"But you remember Stabler. You remember you and Stabler?"

"I remember that we were partners and then we were something more. I remember us becoming an affair and I feel the weight of that. I remember being the other woman and hating it, but loving him more. I remember not recognising myself because I no longer cared about what was right or fair or good. I only cared about him, about being with him."

"Jesus."

"I don't remember if I knew I was pregnant before the accident. Maybe that's because I didn't know. Like I said: blurry."

"I'm sorry I went for you earlier. I guess no one can know what this is like. I hadn't realised it would get so messy. I just thought you'd remember everything and everything would be just the same as it was…."

"Yeah, yeah me too…" she laughed grimly, shaking her head.

"You remember the job?"

"Like it was something that happened to someone else. I remember what to do, how to do it. I remember procedures and laws and how many million times I've read a perp their Miranda rights but I, oh, I don't know."

"No, no go on…."

"I've lost the 'why'.

"Why you do the job?"

"I remember my mother. I remember that why."

"Can we talk about another 'why' you showed up to work every day?"

"Nothing has changed there."

"Liv you can't not tell him. He's been tearing himself apart these past few months."

"I will, of course I will. But I'll do it myself in my own way, and in my own time. I mean that Fin…."

"It won't help, you know."

"We went for a scan together. I knew I was wrong not to tell him about the last one and he deserved to be there. He deserves to be there more than I do."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Only that I think I've done enough truth telling where Elliot is concerned this week. I tried to explain to him that I can't get my head around having this baby. Not the birth, but afterward. I can't be a mother right now, I don't have it in me. I can't handle it. I'm barely managing to take care of myself."

"Liv are you saying what I think you are?"

"Elliot says he'll raise it on his own if he has to."

"This is five hundred million shades of wrong Liv."

"Maybe."

"You gotta at least talk to him. By God, Olivia, you owe him that. You owe yourself that. Tell him how you feel, tell him why you…."

"You know I think there's some sick part of me that wants him to start something with that new detective."

"Okay now I know for sure we've crossed over. I haven't got a damn clue what planet we're on right now."

"If I didn't know how much I loved him before then seeing him laughing in that squad room….."

"Liv…."

"If she can make him laugh, if she can remind him what normal feels like, hell what happy feels like. Even if it's only for 10 minutes, for a 10 hour shift. I want that for him. She can give him, she can be for him what I can't right now."

"STOP! POLICE!"

Feet thundering in rhythm side by side Detectives Stabler and Mackenzie attempted to outrun their suspect. They had arrived on scene first, interrupting a cash transaction in the alley beside the apartment block between Dwayne Jarvis and new player they weren't familiar with. When Dwayne had immediately recognised Elliot as a cop he had set off at pace. Mackenzie finished checking that their victim wasn't inside the property before setting off in pursuit behind Stabler. It horrified him that she was soon running alongside him without even having broken a sweat.

"DROP THE GUN!"

"DROP IT!" cautioned Mackenzie, reading Elliot's unspoken queues with ease and making her own gestures in response. They caught the suspect in a pincer movement between a chain link fence and a run of garbage cans.

"Give it up Jarvis, game over."

"Fuck you!" came the indifferent response, as Jarvis thrust his weapon down the front of his pants and began to scale the fence.

"Oh Jesus please no…." gasped Elliot, thumping at his chest with his first and gulping air into his lungs in a bid to recharge.

"Come on Grandpa, eyes on…." yelled Mackenzie, stowing her own gun with an expert click on her belt and throwing herself with not unremarkable force at the railing.

Elliot took one last second to catch his breath, watching the muscles of Aubrie's back flex and as she dragged her body weight up the wall with confident arm strength. In a flash of panic he realised that neither of them were wearing a vest.

"Pissing me off is only gonna make this worse for you in the long run, buddy. Give it up. Stop running."

"Fuck off Red!"

"Okay I'm done being delicate about this…." with one crisp, sharp shot Mackenzie grazed a bullet off the suspect's sneaker and caused him to stumble long enough for her to land herself on him with the full force of herself from behind.

"You fucking bitch! You shot me!"

"I barely broke the skin Princess….." said Aubrie with a toss of her eyes, dropping her concentration just long enough for Jarvis to throw back his elbow and catch her heavily in the jaw. She held him fast, still managing to get him in handcuffs while swallowing mouthfuls of her own blood. "Stabler?"

"I…." came the stumbling, stuttering attempt at words from over her shoulder. Dragging her bare arm across her chin to sweep away the worst of the blood pooling there she squinted against the low winter sun and watched her partner.

"You, asshat, sit there and don't move."

"You really think I'm just gonna…." but any reluctance to comply was winded out of Jarvis as Aubrie hurled him, hands cuffed behind his back, against the chain link fence.

"Try to run and I'll take out your other foot." But seeing the way his face was contorting in pain from her earlier shot she trusted he would stay put.

"Stabler? It's me, it's Aubrie….." where her voice had been the perfect acidic sass she now spoke with a rasping velvet, moving slowly toward Elliot with her hands held slightly out from her body. Palms up, wide, open, inviting his trust. "I want you to feel your feet on the ground, okay? Move your toes, feel the concrete under your shoes."

"I couldn't stop her. She just threw herself in front of me, in front of the bullet."

"Focus on something you can smell. One thing you can smell, Elliot."

"She folded in half like a fucking…."

"One thing you can touch…." with one hand resting gently on his shoulder she reached for his hand, trembling at his side, and held it gently, "… now just breathe in, and breathe out, breathe in…."

"I'm really sorry…." he managed, forcing a hoarse rasp and blinking blue eyes repeatedly as the world started to filter slowly back into focus. Turning his head he looked down at Aubrie, whose high cheek bones and wide green eyes stood to attention. He watched face lift slow, steady smile with only a slight wince in acknowledgement of her bleeding mouth.

"That's it, you're back. You're okay."

"I'm okay…." he nodded, feeling his feet on the ground, smelling her perfume, squeezing her hand, "… thank you."

"Just doing my job, partner."

"Mac, my God, your face…." he realised, fully acknowledging reality and instinctively reaching with his free hand to her jaw. Without touching it he held his fingertips millimetres from her skin and felt his pulse quicken once more. "Are you okay? Is it broken? Your jaw?"

"I think I'd know if it was. I'm pretty sure this is more visual drama than lasting damage…." flushing in a rare moment of self-consciousness she lifted the bottom hem of her shirt and used it to blot at her bleeding lip.

"I really hate to break up this precious moment the two of you are having over there but do any of y'all wanna either arrest me or let me the fuck go?"

"How you holding up?"

"I'm pretty sure this is gonna get uglier before it gets better. I bruise like a peach and my porcelain Irish skin isn't very forgiving."

"Get this down you, it'll help…." smiled Elliot, sliding into the bar booth beside her and setting a whiskey down in front of her. The ice clinked against the glass as she lifted it to her face, holding it against her throbbing jaw.

"How much do I owe you?"

"Owe me? Mac you saved my ass more than once today. First by outpacing these old bones at least two to one and second…." he hesitated, long enough to take a long sip from his own glass.

"There's no shame in it you know. The shit we see day in day out. I'd be worried if it didn't get under people's skin. Besides, that was personal. What happened to you and Benson? That was about as personal as it gets. There's no shame in feeling it."

"Maybe."

"Did you talk to anyone?" she asked quietly. "After what happened?"

"I wasn't the one that got shot. I was fine, I am fine."

"Yeah…." she said, and she had meant it to fall from her lips neutral and non-judgemental. In reality it raised a smile from him because they both knew he was anything but, and today had been very real evidence of that.

"I had the mandatory psych checks to clear me to return to duty. I sat down with someone, sure. There just wasn't a lot to say. Liv saved me. She put herself between me and the bullet and I walked away no damage done."

"You didn't walk away from this any more than she did. There was damage done…." she said softly, "… wasn't there?"

"She took a bullet to the shoulder and lost her memory."

"You watched your partner get shot and then lose all recollection of who she is. You left your wife and kids, your home, for a woman who forgot why. Forgot she's in love with you. Don't pretend you didn't lose something too. Don't pretend you didn't lose everything that day Stabler."

"Damn it Mac…." he murmured, finishing his drink and gesturing for the bar tender to refresh their glasses, "…. you get under my skin."

"Like a fungus or…." she smirked, rolling an ice cube around her mouth before crunching down hard on it with a glacial crack of teeth. It must've nudged her swollen jaw and she winced slightly. "I can't even imagine what Benson went through, what she's still going through. I just think it was remiss of people to turn a blind eye to how badly this has all royally fucked you in the ass that's all."

"Aubrie!" chocking on the first mouthful of his second drink Elliot sprayed some of it involuntarily across the table.

"Oh you didn't know?" she grinned, white teeth against red lips and her green eyes twinkling. "I cuss like a sailor on leave after a drink and a half. My mother tells me I'm going straight to hell. I tell her I learned from the pros in the pubs of her homeland."

"You visited Ireland a lot then?"

"A few times, and I'm quick study."

"How's your jaw?" he asked, watching her lift her glass and fail to get the glass to sit against the worst of her bruising. He reached out and moved it slightly to the left, laying his hand over hers so naturally, and then finding himself leaving it there. Needing the sensation of skin on skin, needing to feel the warmth of the back of her hand against his palm.

"You know I think I've probably had enough to drink. I'm a total lightweight. A complete and utter betrayal of my Celtic blood."

Her eyes were magnetised on his, she couldn't blink let alone look away. She wasn't drunk, she was lying brazenly. She was one of the best drinkers she knew. She was always the last to leave and could walk a straight line to the door every time. Elliot Stabler was unlike any man she'd known before. He made them all seem like boys. She had caught herself watching him, always just in time to go unseen. The broad line of his shoulders, the veins that raised through the ink of his tattoo when he flexed his forearms, the way his rare smile lit his blue eyes. It unnerved her that she had become a woman who noticed those details.

"You're not drunk."

"I feel it…." she confessed, her usual rasping bar room Jersey accent a barely audible squeak.

"Me too…." he sighed, taking back his hand and leaning over the table. Elbows braced on the edge, Elliot dropped his head into his hands and rubbed at his face exhaustedly. "You know I'd almost forgotten what it feels like."

"Being drink?" she asked, regaining her composure taking a long steadying sip of whiskey before setting her glass back down on the table.

"No, no that's not what I…. ignore me, I'm rambling."

"You are notoriously a man of many words….." she quipped, and lifting his head from his hands Elliot turned to her and began to smile. The smile spread slowly, crept across his cheeks, touched his eyes, and warmed him from the inside out like hot water hitting ice. It gave off steam.

"Mac I really wanna kiss you right now….." gravel voiced, unapologetically self-destructive Elliot rolled his shoulders, "…. on a scale of one to complete and utter asshole where does that put me?"

"Probably about on a par with how badly I want to let you….." she swallowed, and deliberately didn't make any kind of contact with him. They sat apart, him leaning on the table, her sat upright with her body twisted toward his but very much in her own space. "It is a terrible, terrible idea Stabler and you know it."

"I mean they'd never give me a female partner again."

"Not even close to funny. Elliot think it through….." she sighed, raking a handful of curls off her face and holding them on top of her head, "… with your head that is."

"See, you can be funny too…." he was smiling again. Damn it.

"You really wanna put your job on the line along with the rest of your life? You're already fighting fires at home, with Benson, you really wanna start another one?"

"Yeah, yeah I do…." throwing the rest of his drink down the back of his throat Elliot twisted around, his heart beating twice a second then coming to a total halt as he locked her eyes, "… I wanna run straight into the fucking flames."

"I…." she only managed one syllable before his lips crashed onto mouth, hot, hungry, but at the same time soft and yielding and they melted her lips into parting and tasting his tongue. She slid toward him, felt his arms curl around her waist and pull her body closer to his.

"Mac I'm sorry…." murmured Elliot under his breath, as he peeled himself from her and swallowed the golf ball in his throat down hard.

"Don't apologise…." said Aubrie quickly, running her index finger along lips swollen from more than the earlier elbow she'd taken to the jaw, "…I was on the other end of that. I could've stopped it."

"Now what?" he asked, when all other words and actions failed him. He needed someone else to take the wheel.

"Another round?" she offered after a long silence, her head tilted slightly to the side and her eyes wide and kind. She wasn't angry, she wasn't hurt or horrified. He felt his body relax, his muscles unclench.

"I've got nowhere else to be."

"Oh Stabler you flatter me!" she cried, throwing her eyes to the ceiling as he cringed at his misspeak. "Stop it, I've told you before, don't do that, don't pull that face. Don't make it awkward. We sit, we drink, we talk. Tomorrow we go back to work as normal. There's no fire here…."

She reached for his forearm and gave it a squeeze, he nodded and relaxed to a smile because as wrong as it was: it felt right. In that moment everything about sitting there with Aubrie Mackenzie felt good and for the first time in what felt like a lifetime the world stopped spinning, his heart unclenched, and he felt close to happy. She was wrong though, he knew, as her palm remained on his Eagle, Globe and Anchor. There was a fire.

"I'm sorry I ran out on you at the hospital. I really was late for shift but I should've stayed. We should've talked."

"It's fine Elliot. I dropped another bombshell on you and it was the worst possible timing. Having you sit there watching your child on the ultrasound while I tell you I don't think I can handle raising it with you. That was cruel of me and I'm sorry."

"I'm just glad you're finally being honest with me. I'm just glad we're finally talking, even if it's hard."

"And it is hard, isn't it?" she swallowed, managing a weak smile. He mirrored it, the corners of his mouth twisting sadly.

"I keep thinking it might finally start to get easier and…."

"What was it you said? You're already down? I can stop kicking you now?"

He sighed, heavily, and wondered yet again how things had ever come to this. Sat together in her living room once more, a few inches away from one another on the couch, they continued to swim through the treacle. Folding his hands into his lap he took a moment to compose himself before answering.

"I've said a lot of things I shouldn't have these past few months."

"We both have."

"Yeah, well, with good cause. There's no playbook for any of this. It's a miracle you're still standing after what you've been through. I don't judge you for having doubts. When Kathy was pregnant with Maureen I wanted to run far, run fast and not look back. I was terrified. I wasn't ready to be a father, I didn't even know what that meant. I'd not exactly had the finest example set."

"Is this where you tell me that no one is ever ready to be a parent and that it'll all fall into place when the baby's born?"

"I…."

"It's bigger than that Elliot. It runs deeper. I don't think it can be fixed by tiny fingers and toes and some kind of post-partum epiphany. I'm a lone wolf, I've been alone my whole life..."

"Liv what is it? Tell me?"

"I've been alone my whole life. Sorry I'm whining….."

"You're not. Family's everything."

"Elliot?"

"Sorry, I just….." he stumbled, shaking his head in an attempt to free himself of the memory from another place and time.

"I remember my mother. I remember everything about my mother….." she said, and the hairs at the nape of Elliot's neck prickled, "… and nothing about that makes me want to be one."

"Oh Liv…." he sighed, forgetting himself, forgetting everything that had happened and reverting only to instinct and muscle memory. He reached across the space between them and grabbed her, dragged her into his arms and held her tight.

"Elliot I wish I could do this for you….." she whispered, burying her face in his chest and then bringing her chin to rest on his shoulder. Staring into the distance behind him she blinked back tears. "I'm so sorry for how badly all of this has hurt you. How badly it's still hurting you."

"I'm fine, I'm alright….." he said, his voice warm and genuine as he pulled away from her and held her at arm's length to add, "… don't worry about me!"

"But I do…." she said, deliberately extracting herself from the embrace before she complicated things any further, "… I always have."

"You're remembering, aren't you?" he said, catching her a little off guard. He could leaf through her pages, thumbed and soft, a book he had read a million times and could quote by heart.

"I'm starting to feel a little more myself." She said, being as honest as she possible could with him without fully understanding herself. "And it hurts."

"Talk to me?" he implored, his blue eyes wide. Listening.

"I feel like I'm going to explode. That's not my being dramatic, that isn't hyperbole. I feel like a giant weight is on my chest, crushing me, and sometimes my heart beats so fast it hurts, it physically hurts to keep breathing in and out at the same time. I can hear it in my ears. It makes me dizzy. I don't just remember it all…." sinking the remainder of her wine and gesturing to the bar tender to bring her another Olivia whispered with hoarse misery, "… I'm reliving it."

"Oh Liv…." he breathed, putting his arm back around her, resting his forehead on her shoulder. Her pain was his pain. When she hurt, he hurt. That was how close they were, that was how twisted together, how interlaced their souls had become.

"All the time, every day, every night. It's not just a picture, a video memory it's alive. I smell it, I feel it. All the hurt and pain and joy and whatever the hell else. I've never taken drugs but I can only imagine. A million emotions all flying around at once. I feel like I'm on fire and I want to crawl out of my own skin to just make it stop. Just for five minutes. It is exhausting and my head and my heart are complete wrecks. It's carnage in there, it's ugly and messy and I am drowning. I tried so hard to remember, to get my memories back and now I'm drowning in them."

"I don't know what to say. I don't have any words, Liv."

"I know."

"I'm just gonna….." he began, then gave up and instead took action. He drew her back into his arms and hugged her close, nuzzling his face into the warm, soft skin of her neck and planting kisses there.

"Thank you…." she whispered.

"I'm here, sweetheart….." he didn't call her that, he never called her that that she could remember. It sounded sweet, tender, the word felt precious as it fell from his usually terse lips and danced into her ears. She smiled.

"El I'm so ashamed that I don't feel the way I'm should to about this pregnancy. I'm so sorry that I'm ruining all the joy and excitement…."

"Liv shut up you're not ruining anything. And there's no right or wrong way to feel, there's no supposed to about any of this. Just promise you'll keep talking to me, okay? Just because we're not together doesn't mean we're not together in this. Like I've told you before, I'm here, I'm here for you. There's nothing you can say that will change that. So I wanna hear it, whatever is going on for you. No matter how ugly or scary or impossible it feel you can't scare me off…." lifting the corners of his mouth to a little smile Elliot vowed, "… you're stuck with me, partner. You are not alone."

"She doesn't want to be a mother. She says she doesn't want to raise this baby. But I do: so I will. On my own if I have to."

"And you're okay with that?" asked Fin, clunking open a can of cola with a loud fizz. Elliot sat at the desk opposite him and furrowed his brow.

"What? No, no of course not. I'm not okay with any of this Fin but so far I've had zero choice in any of it. I'm just throwing on band aids and hoping none of us bleed out before all of this mess starts to get better. At this point I'm not even sure it will."

"Is that what you're doing with Mackenzie?" despite Elliot throwing him a warning glower Fin pushed, "She a band aid?"

"She's my partner. She's become a friend, that's all."

"Bullshit."

"You know what? You're an asshole Tutuola."

"I'm not wrong though, am I?" he challenged, and Elliot deliberately kept his eyes fixed on his computer screen. "Look, man, I'm not here to give you grief. It's no business of mine except that I've come to believe lately that you're okay. You're alright Stabler, and I don't wanna see you make a big mistake. I don't want you to screw this up."

"Sure, sure because my life has been so damn great lately I wouldn't wanna mess it up. Wouldn't wanna do anything to jeopardise living alone in an empty apartment, my family barely talking to me, Liv not wanting to be with me, not wanting to raise our kid together. Fin there's nothing left to screw up."

"So that's what this is? You're in self-destruct mode?" scoffed Fin with a toss of his eyes.

"I'm in survival mode and you can judge all you want but I'm doing the best that I can."

"I'm not judging you, man….." sighed Fin, realising that he wasn't entirely sure he would be doing anything so very differently in Elliot's situation. "I'm sorry, okay? I apologise if I came over that way. I only wanna help. You and Liv."

"There's time for her to have second thoughts about the baby. Three months till she's due and a lot can change. Look how much has changed in the last three months, right?"

"Right. And do you think she will? Change her mind?" said Fin, thinking of more than the baby. He wished he could tell Elliot what he knew: that she had already had a change of heart even if it wasn't about the baby.

"Maybe if she feels supported enough. Maybe if I can show her that she's not on her own, that we're in it together. I've done this before and I know it's scary, kids are: they're damn terrifying. I just think sometimes the thought of something, the anticipation of something is worse than the reality."

"And if she doesn't come around to the idea of being a mom?"

"You know Fin lately I've come to realise it doesn't do any good to waste time and energy thinking about what ifs. I've learned that you can't plan ahead further than tomorrow in any of this. So that's all I'm doing. Taking one day at a time, putting one foot in front of the other."

"Survival mode, right. You know Elliot this isn't all on you. I know you think it is. I know you're desperate for Liv to be back the way she was but it's not your job to fix her. You can't take this all on by yourself. We're here too, okay? Cragen is on side, Munch and Casey are here, and I'll do anything I can."

"Thanks, really, I know we've not always seen eye to eye. I appreciate it."

"I'm not judging you Stabler but just be careful, okay? Mackenzie seems like one of the good ones. Just make sure you know what you're doing dragging her into all this."

"Mac doesn't get dragged anywhere she doesn't wanna be Fin. I've been completely honest with her from the start. She knows the score."

"You sleeping with her?"

"No!" cried Elliot indignantly, but his gut twisted slightly in acknowledgement that the temptation had crossed his path.

"You wanna go grab a beer?" asked Fin, feeling that he had done all he could both professionally and personally for one day. "This soda just ain't really cutting it."

"Sure, sure give me five to wrap this up and I'm with you."