#( we’re here to stand with you and stand with you i always will; ayanna bell / speciallyhenious )

[captbenscn]

Gotta love seeing Elliot’s daughter, wife and boss all together!! 💙 They are absolutely beautiful. All of them Queens.

[abfa-fics]

Running out of time

Read here or on AO3. @febuwhump day two prompt (failed rescue attempt)

‘Tick tock, Elliot,’ Richard’s voice purrs down the phone. ‘You’re running out of time…Detective Benson is running out of time. I’ve gotten so bored waiting for you to find us, that I’ll make you a deal. I’ll send you the coordinates to where the lovely Olivia, Angela and I are all waiting, and in return you promise to come alone, hmm? We would be so disappointed if you brought the entire team. Would end the fun before it had even begun, and then where would we be?’

Elliot knows exactly what he is implying: come alone, or Olivia dies.

‘Fuck you, Wheatley,’ he bites out, bile rising in his throat. She’s been missing for three hours already, and he can only hope that the Wheatleys didn’t want to do anything violent towards her without him as a witness. He’s barely able to resist crushing the phone with his bare hand as he listens to the man gloating at the other end of the call.

‘Now, that’s not very polite,’ Richard tuts. ‘You’re on speaker phone here. You don’t want the love of your life to be offended by your crassness now, do you?’

‘Let me talk to her,’ Elliot says immediately. ‘Let me talk to her, and I’ll go wherever you want me to go. Alone.’

There’s a brief pause as Wheatley mulls it over, and then he hears a muffled ‘mmf’ as Olivia’s mouth is freed from whatever was keeping her silent.

‘El,’ he hears her voice rasp. ‘Don’t do anything stupid.’

He knows what she is afraid of - that he will turn rogue and indeed race after the Wheatleys alone in the hopes of protecting her, yet risking getting himself killed in the process. But as Fin and Ayanna crowd around him, listening closely to Richard’s demands, he knows not only do both units have his back, everyone desperate to find Liv and rescue her, but Fin will murder him if he goes off unprepared.

‘That’s a hard request to give our mutual friend,’ Richard jumps back in cheerily, and there is the sound of a slight skirmish as he clearly tries to gag Olivia again. Elliot’s knuckles are white as he clenches his fist. ‘Detective Stabler just loves to run straight into situations without thinking of the consequences first.’

‘Send me those coordinates,’ he manages to keep his voice calmer than anticipated, attempting to sound in control. ‘This is between you and me, Wheatley. Let’s leave Olivia and Angela out of this.’

Richard chuckles darkly, without an ounce of true mirth in his voice.

‘That’s where you’re wrong, Elliot,’ he says. ‘It’s always been about more than just us.’

There’s a loud beep as Wheatley hangs up the call. A couple of seconds later, his phone vibrates, a message coming through from a blocked number.

‘Where is it?’ he demands, thrusting the coordinates under Jet’s nose and watching her fingers dance quickly across the keyboard.

‘Looks like an abandoned power plant,’ she says, pulling up satellite imagery. ‘Can’t trace the phone though, so who knows if that’s where they actually are, or if it’s just a trap.’

‘He’ll be there,’ Elliot promises, understanding exactly how Wheatley operates. ‘He wants the satisfaction of a showdown against me, with Liv caught in the middle.’

‘And he’s getting impatient,’ Fin interjects, shaking his head. ‘Which makes him more dangerous right now.’

‘Vest up,’ Bell orders, pointing at her own team and Special Victims, Rollins and Velasco standing to attention at Fin’s shoulders. ‘Jet, find us a way to approach the plant without being seen easily. I’m calling in SWAT.’

‘I need to appear if I’m arriving unaccompanied,’ Elliot points out, already marching quickly towards the exit without waiting to see if everyone else is following him. ‘I’m not risking him hurting Liv because he sees an entire parade of law enforcement following me, and you know he’ll do it, just to make me suffer.’

‘That’s why you’ll go in ahead,’ Bell agrees, as they move towards their respective SUVs. ‘Get your earpiece in so we can hear you. I’ll let you know when we’re in position.’

Elliot drives faster than he has ever dared to do before, lights and sirens blaring to clear his route until he finds himself in a more industrial-looking area of the city, slowing slightly as he follows the coordinates Jet had programmed remotely into his satnav. As the power plant looms in the distance, he switches off any noise and lights, not wanting to give Wheatley the satisfaction or power of seeing how panicked he is in arriving.

He knows the rest of the team won’t be far behind, so he pulls up in front of the prominent plant entrance, attempting to pull all attention to himself instead of whatever vehicles would be approaching from another angle.

The figure waiting for him is not who he is expecting to see, however.

‘Liv?’ he calls, stumbling out of the car so fast that he doesn’t even turn off the engine. She’s huddled on the steps leading up to the power plant, arms wrapped around herself, and as he hurriedly approaches, his breath catches as he sees how much blood is covering the left side of her face.

‘Shit shit shit,’ he says, and there are people asking questions over his earpiece, but he ignores them all as he sprints over, dropping his knees heavily onto a cement step directly in front of her, hands hovering over her body in frantic desperation. He wants to check her, see where she is injured, but he fears making her hurt worse if he touches her in the wrong place.

The whole set up could be a trap - Wheatley and Angela could be watching them right now, guns trained at their heads - but he can’t bring himself to care when he sees the blank stare Olivia has as she hunches over.

‘Liv, where are you hurt?’ he asks, voice catching slightly. He remembers the rest of the team listening in. ‘I need a bus, someone call a bus!’

He lets himself touch her then, fingers holding gently onto her chin as he scans her face and head for injuries. There is so much blood matted in her hair, it’s impossible to see where it comes from, and he feels sick at the thought that she may have sustained a serious brain injury.

‘It’s not mine, El,’ her voice is hoarse, as if she is trying not to cry, but he can’t help but feel relief at hearing her finally speak. He leans back slightly, ducking his head so he can catch her eyes, while his hand gently cups the other side of her face.

‘Are you hurt, Liv?’ he asks again softly, prioritising his questions. She hesitates for a moment, then shakes her head slightly.

‘It’s Wheatley’s,’ she says, clearing her throat, and then stops talking. He wants to ask her what happened, but now he knows she’s not physically injured, he’s content to let her go at her own speed, instead sliding his hands down to rest on her thighs as he continues to kneel in front of her. He waits patiently as she slowly relaxes her shoulders.

‘He ungagged me,’ she begins, fingers still gripping her own sides tightly. ‘I think he just wanted to monologue…try to get me to rise to the bait. But I targeted Angela instead, kept speaking to her until she got angry. At me, at you…But mostly at him. I made her distrustful.’

Elliot rubs his thumbs back and forth on her legs, trying to bring her comfort. He can feel her body trembling slightly under his hands, and he isn’t sure how much is from the cold of the late afternoon air and the cement steps, and how much is from the shock running through her body.

‘She turned her gun on him,’ she continues quietly. ‘So he tried to use me as a human shield.’

He makes a considerable effort not to accidentally dig his fingers into her skin in reaction to hearing that, instead taking a deep breath and nodding at her in support. There’s a confusing cacophony of noise over his earpiece, so he tugs it out to rest it against his chest, and gives her his full attention.

‘She shot him directly in the head,’ she confesses, finally unwrapping her arms to gesture at the side of her face. ‘Hence…all of this. And then I grabbed his gun as he went down, and-and shot her.’

Her hands come up suddenly, grasping at his shoulders as she makes proper eye contact for the first time.

‘I had to, El,’ she says. ‘I had to, I’m sorry.’

He isn’t sure why she’s apologizing, especially not about saving her own life, and if anything, he should be the one apologizing to her for getting her involved in all this Wheatley mess. He’s the reason why she was in danger in the first place, and there is a horrible mix of emotions within him at the thought of Kathy’s killers being gone, but that Olivia had to go through pain for it.

Under different circumstances, he would have been relieved by their deaths; he would have been wanting to see them zipped up in body bags as definitive proof that the nightmare was over, and his family would be safe at last.

Olivia is in front of him however, pale-faced and blood-drenched, and his only focus right now is her comfort. He leans forward slowly until their foreheads touch, uncaring about the blood that still feels tacky against his skin.

‘It’s alright,’ he says gently. ‘I’m sorry.’

There’s a siren in the distance that gets louder and louder - the ambulance he had demanded someone call. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Fin sprinting around the side of the building towards them, followed closely by Rollins and Bell, and he can tell that Olivia has caught sight of them too by the way she stiffens in his hold, shifting as if to pull away.

‘It’s fine, El,’ she whispers, turning her face to the side to hide the blood from their approaching colleagues. ‘I’m fine.’

‘Like hell you are,’ he tells her, and then he is pulling her against him tightly, feeling her arms wrap around his shoulders. She begins to sob quietly into the crook of his neck.

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O.Benson posted:

The heat may be getting to me, just a little. No, but really, I’m not lying when I say this man brightens my day. So many smiles. So much laughter. So much… chaos, is it?

In this photo: @irasciblesoul @speciallyheinous (Ayanna)

#Don’tTakeMyFanEl #HeActuallyTookyMyFan #HappinessFound #HappinessKept #ThankYouForTheVideoAyanna #AndSorryForTheChaos #AndForElliot😜