Alrighty, a few notes before everyone reads this:

None of the characters on SVU are mine. I might wish I owned Elliot, would be fun, but I don't.

The story depicted is fiction. Any relation to actual stories in the papers or names being real people is purely coincidental.

I'm not a hardcore fan. I've only seen season 2, season 5, season 6, and of course what's been shown on the latest. So anything I don't know, perhaps a character tidbit (age, birth date, name ex, Dr. Warner or Hendrix's first name) will be made up by assumptions made by the episodes I've already seen. I don't have the Internet at home, so all this has to be done at school, and I don't have a ton of time to research properly, so you'll have to pardon my ignorance. (And if you correct me, please be nice about it. I hate nasty comments; they just bring me down and make me not want to write.)

I'm Canadian. I don't know a ton about the US, so I won't exactly be able to write down say the addresses of locations. In the beginning there's the mentioning of a school project on past wars, I write what I know. 'Nuff said.

To do with this chapter: I saw the episode where Elliot tells Hendrix about his father beating him. I couldn't remember the exact details (damn me for not taping an episode like that!) so I used my creative license. I also used the same for Elliot's family (names, etc) because I don't know them. If they ever were mentioned, I never saw those episodes. So again, if you correct me, please be nice and I'll change it.

(Oh boy, am I done yet?)

Yeah, I am. lol.

Prolouge

November 25th, 1978

"C'mon bro, we've gotta get walking, or we'll miss the bus!" my brother Jack said as he shoved his feet into his boots, his diorama under his arm.

We were in grade five, and our History teacher Mr. Rooney told us to make a diorama of a famous war. Jack did the War of 1812 for the project. He was always doing stuff to make Mr. Rooney mad, and Mr. Rooney doesn't like Canada very much, and according to Jack's research Canada won that war. I don't know why he doesn't like Canada; he calls them a bunch of pacifist rednecks. Dad threatened Rooney though, if he didn't pass Jack's diorama because of prejudice he'd get him fired.

"Yeah, yeah," I said as I pulled on my jacket. My own carefully crafted diorama sat on the little boot room bench by the door of our condo. I'd done the Civil War. It was really nice, dad even helped me with it, the first nice thing that he's done since the year before when Jack let it slip about an incident that happened in the schoolyard in grade four.

Jack and Jessica slipped out the door. I could see my friend Borden waiting by the gate, who waved at Jack. Jess was a year behind and didn't have a project, but she had a bunch of cookies she'd baked for her class, as it was her best friend's birthday.

"C'mon!" Borden yelled at me.

"Hold up a minute!" I yelled back, putting on my boots.

I wandered outside and as I was walking down the steps I stumbled and heard a snap. I lifted the top to my project and looked inside and frowned. A tree had snapped in two. I pulled it out and looked at it, then decided to just put it in the house.

I turned and I was jogged back up, yelling at Jack, Jessica and my friend Borden that I'd catch up. I went inside and was about to put the tree in the garbage when I stumbled again and dropped the project. It hit the ground and one or two other pieces broke. It was still fixable, I knew that, but when I looked at the clock and saw that it was ten after eight, that the school bus was gone, my lower lip trembled. Now I had to walk, and my project was busted up.

"What are you still doing here?" A voice snarled from behind me.

I jumped and whirled around. It was my dad, and he looked angry with me. He'd been drinking, I could see that much. He had a five o' clock shadow and deep bags under his eyes, which were looking mean. My dad was a cop, and he'd just got off from working three days straight. I looked back at my project and sniffed. "It broke, and I…"

"You what?"

"I came in, to get rid of the tree, and I dropped it, an'… and the bus left, an' now I'm stuck…"

"So I gotta drive you?" he barked.

I didn't want him to drive me. "I can still fix it, I'll walk…" I said hastily, wiping at my face. I couldn't cry. Whenever I did he seemed to get mad and cuff me behind my ears.

"Are you crying?"

The words came out harsh and accusing. I jumped up at once and gathered up my project, ready to run for the door. Maybe I was crying a little, but he couldn't see, I couldn't let him. It wasn't fair, he never touched my sisters, or Jack. Sometimes Michael, but mostly me.

"Git back here," he said, grabbing me by the collar as I rushed by. My project flew from my hands and managed to land on the table. I choked as he threw me back and I hit the ground. I cowered at his feet, covering the back of my neck with my hands. If I wasn't crying a second before, I was crying then. I was sobbing like a baby.

He sneered. "Take off your Jacket."

"N-no," I said, "I gotta go to school."

"TAKE IT OFF!" He grabbed me and hauled me up by my collar again and I choked, coughing hard, wishing mom were home to make him stop.

I was shuddering as I took off my winter jacket and hung it on a chair. He took off his belt and pulled it taut in his hands, then began to wrap it around his right. I wondered what he wanted, I wondered if it would be like what happened to Jack, where his teacher hurt him in the bad way and went to jail. Having your dad hurt you in the bad way would be worse than any teacher.

He whipped it suddenly and hit me across the face. I twisted around as he whipped me again, and again, and again across my back. "You're weak!" he bellowed, hitting me harder whenever I yelled louder.

"DAD STOP IT!" I screamed.

"No son of mine should be weak! Look at Jack, look what he endured, and he's not weak!" He hit me as hard as he could, still yelling. I guess he didn't realize then who Jack would become later. My head was spinning and my back aching. I tried to crawl away, but he stood over top of me and wouldn't let me move.

"Dad…"

He lashed once more time across my exposed neck and I screamed in agony. He laughed. "WeakCan't even take it like a man, you're weak." I slumped down, sobbing, trying to turn off my tears so he'd stop, but I couldn't. I couldn't be weak, but I couldn't stop.

Inside of me I felt the seething hatred which would haunt me from then until I was nearing my forties. I want to kill my own father, I wanted to whip him, I wanted to strangle him with my own hands and watch the light behind his eyes go out. I didn't care if I burned in Hell; I'd endure it because he'd be holding the door for me when I arrived. It was the first time I'd ever wanted to really kill someone, and it planted a seed of anger and hate inside of me, which began to send up razor sharp blades over the years which turned me into the man I became.

"You're pathetic. You won't be strong; you won't be a man. You'll grow up a sinner, a faggot," he spat, throwing down the belt beside me and walking to the alcohol cupboard, the forbidden cupboard, where he shuffled inside until he found what he wanted.

A fag? I was pretty sure that was a gay person. I knew what they were, sort of. I knew the church said if you were one you go to Hell. I knew in some pieced together way from whispered words and rumors about the schoolyard that it wasn't a man going out with a woman, but a man with another man. I couldn't be that, I couldn't, and he thought I was.

He left me lying in the kitchen and went to go watch TV. He had another bottle in his hand, I didn't know if it was beer or a whole 26, and I didn't give a fuck. I got up after about fifteen minutes of self-pity, the tears turned off, and pulled on my jacket. I took the project with me. Dad didn't even grunt good-bye. 'Spose it was best that way, I might have just gotten madder.

Outside on the way to school I threw it on the ground, envisioning it to be my father. Each piece was his face. I screamed as I stomped on it and destroyed it, and no one noticed. No one ever noticed anything in New York City; no one ever cared about anything except what was happening to him or her there and then. The Bronx especially was no exception. I felt the same; I didn't care about anything except what was happening to me. I left it there in the snow along with my weakness. I was bound and determined not to be weak, not to get hit ever again.

I made it to school and missed my first classes and got several lectures from the teachers and vice principal. I lipped them off and got several detentions and a whipping for my lateness and cheek, but I didn't care. I headed for third period, history, where I told Mr. Rooney I didn't have a project and I didn't give a lick about it. I got a whipping on my hands for it, but I bore it silently. Jack thought I was nuts, I'd always been the good kid and it was the first time in school ever that I'd gotten whipped. I made a kid eat pavement in the school yard at lunch because he called me a nasty name and went home with a busted lip and a letter from the principal about my behavior that day, requesting a meeting over what may have caused it.

Dad said nothing, just looked at me long and hard with the eyes I'd inherited from him while mom read the note aloud, her voice wavering occasionally on details of the fight and how, if I'd continued, I may have seriously injured him. I could read his look; he was daring me to tell about what happened that morning. But I saw something else. Approval, perhaps.

"You sent him home with a bloody nose and a black eye?" she said, mouth dropped, staring at me. "Elliot Richard, what has gotten into you?"

"He insulted me, and I wasn't going to take his crap," I said.

She just goggled at me, unable to speak. Then, "Rick, deal with your son, he needs an attitude adjustment. Then we'll talk about what made you do it, Elliot."

"I did it, just me. Nothing made me. I was angry, and I just did it. I wasn't about to be a baby and walk away. No one calls me a b-"

"Shut up, Elliot!" my mother scolded, "if I hear that word from you I'm putting a bar of soap in your mouth!" she turned on my father next, looking accusing. He stared back with a blank cop look, like he was on purpose not registering a word she said. "Rick, what's gotten into him? What's wrong with him?"

My dad shrugged and sipped his beer.

"Leave me alone, I don't want to talk about it. I gave him what he had coming, that was all. I was in a bad mood today. I missed the bus and busted up my project, and I was mad."

I turned and stomped to the bedroom I shared with Michael and Jack. As I turned the corner from the kitchen where mom had been cooking dinner I could hear dad's voice.

"Jesus, leave the kid alone Linda. Something must've pissed him off and he's venting. Leave him alone, he'll be fine."

Fine? I spent the next twenty-seven years going downhill because of one moment. Just one. And it was your fault.