42DISCLAIMER: Don't own the characters or some plot lines but I did make this story up!
Ed Tucker sat in his office facing the three psychiatrists he'd called in. All three had a history with SVU, they had all worked with them at one point in time or another but this time they were called in to work for IAB, or more in actual face, for Ed Tucker.
George Huang, Elizabeth Olivet and Rebecca Hendrix already felt uncomfortable and the Lieutenant hadn't even explained to them why they were all sat in the office, whatever it was they knew it couldn't be good and the only connection the three had to them man sitting in front of the was the Special Victims Unit.
"We've brought you in to assess the Special Victims Unit." He said nonchalantly. "The three of you will interview each member of the squad and at the end we here at IAB want a full report so we can understand the psychological connection each of them have with each other and so we can gain understanding whether or not it's time to shake the unit up and send them all their separate ways within the NYPD or whether or not unsolved sex crimes would be on an all-time high if we ever did such a thing."
"You want us to tell you if SVU are too close?" George asked in disbelief.
"That's exactly what I want to know. I need to know exactly what their relationship to one another is, because we don't know how close is too close."
The three psychiatrists shifted uncomfortably in their seats. They knew then and there that the fate of SVU as they knew it was in their hands.
"I want your reports to be separate, I want your individual opinions as individual psychiatrists and not a group report." Ed continued and the three nodded softly to show understanding.
This had been years in the making. The Special Victims Unit where known for being as close as kin could be and no one knew if this made the team better or worse and the fact was that there were rumours about more than work relationships going on, such as Benson and Stabler being closer than married couples with major sexual tension that no one knew whether or not it had been acted upon and the rumour that Benson and Cragen were like father and daughter meeting on a regular basis to hang out as father and daughter would, again, no one knew if these rumours were true but whether or not they were was not the concern it was whether or not it compromised their efficiency.
"Of course we're including the annual psych evals in this report too so evaluate them individually too just as you are being paid to do." Tucker added and again the three murmured their acknowledgement. "And one last thing…" He started getting the full attention of the psychiatrists. "No one at SVU can know anything about the report, only that they're getting their annual psych evals by three different psychiatrists as an experiment to see if the conclusion is the same or not."
The three shrinks sat in the coffee shop together to put some form of plan into place. They had to be at SVU later that afternoon where they would be hanging around gaining some information in between sitting down with the Detectives one on one.
They knew it was going to be difficult. Each shrink had their own individual connection to SVU and they each felt like telling IAB to shove it because SVU was a family and no family should be separated, they each had their own concerns about the welfare of each individual should the family be split up.
"Is it wrong feeling like I'm about to betray my friends?" George asked as he gazed at some of the questions he'd written out to ask the Detectives.
"No." Elizabeth said. "Well, yes, actually because I feel the same but we have no choice here unless we want Ed Tucker to get our asses fired."
"I evaluated Benson and Stabler because Cragen thought they were too close." Rebecca inputted into the conversation. "I did it because I was asked to but I hated every minute of it, what was worse I lied."
"What do you mean you lied?" George gasped.
"I told Cragen they were too close and I said he would lose his two best detectives if he split them, which was the truth but that's not what he asked me to find out, he wanted to know if the fact that they were too close compromised them as Detectives and the answer was yes, in my professional opinion they would always pick each other over the job." Rebecca explained nonchalantly to the two shocked shrinks in front of her.
"It could have cost you your license if something happened and they were re-evalutaed." Elizabeth said.
"I know." Rebecca sighed. "I knew that when I did it but it didn't bother me, the fact they are so close is what makes them good Detectives, they wouldn't be as good if they weren't partners and sex crimes wouldn't be closed half as quick, they work well together and to be honest they need each other."
"Well we can't lie this time around." George said. "Because the truth is, this has been a long time coming."
