The Incomprehensible Corruption of Innocence

They followed the clues to the absolute best of their ability and talents, which was quite considerable indeed. They started with the bank, and tested just about everything they found, up to and including a blue fiber that obviously came from one of the robber’s jackets, but that led to a dead end. The bullets that came from the weapons – two different kinds – were followed to two different manufacturers, one of whom was an ex-con, who made a point of hiring ex-juveniles to teach them a trade and some serious life lessons. The manufacturer was a dead end as well. They followed the paint scrapes to a 1986 Taurus, steel-grey . . . that had been reported stolen three weeks previous, and was still missing. The license plate led to a woman in St. Petersburg who’d had her license plate stolen, and who had reported it, the week before the robbery. Eye witness reports were all gone over with a magnifying glass, including Delko and Horatio’s, but that yielded nothing they hadn’t already known.

Three weeks later, the case had gone completely cold, and everyone in the crime lab knew that the chances of Ryan still being alive were slim to absolute zero.

“This sucks! Without the damned car, we’ve got nothing!” Delko fairly screamed, as he threw a beer bottle against the wall, and watched it shatter. He placed his head in his hands and flopped down on the couch. Horatio watched the whole scene, seemingly implacable, from the kitchen, as he set the table for two.

Almost automaton-like, he took a dish towel and cleaned up the glass, threw the entire thing in the garbage can, and went back to the kitchen. He got Eric another beer, poured it into a plastic glass, and set that before the distraught man. “I can’t believe it,” Eric’s voice was low. “We were just getting back on track, man as friends. This sucks.”

“Yes, it does,” H obviously tried to control his voice, to bring the control he was so incredibly famous for into play, but he was exhausted, not only from doing his regular job day by day, but he’d also shouldered all the emotions of his crew . . . everything from holding Calleigh while she’d cried out her regrets, to listening to Alexx tell and retell Ryan stories as if she could hold onto him and keep him from slipping away simply through the force of her considerable will, to supporting Eric through his hot-blooded, rollercoaster-like Latino emotions, both in and out of the bedroom.

He turned away and faced the sink. He gripped the edge until his knuckles were white, and fought to keep from revealing exactly how deeply he was affected by the loss of his youngest CSI . . . the CSI he’d hand-picked to fit in after Speedle had been killed . . . the CSI he’d had to teach a lesson in being part of a team . . . the CSI he’d reinstated after that lesson had been learned . . . the CSI whom he and Eric had sometimes talked about maybe bringing into their lives to protect him from not only himself, but the world at large.

And now that world had ripped him out of their lives before he’d even had a chance to bring him in.

He had seen the look in the psycho’s eyes as he’d glared at Ryan. His gaze had been full of venomous hatred and anger, but his eyes had raked over Ryan’s form, and H had seen the ‘appreciation’, if that was the right word, of Ryan’s obvious attributes. However, it wasn’t just the physical Ryan the psycho was drooling over; in fact, it probably wasn’t the physical Ryan he had seen at all . . . that was just a fringe benefit.

No, what Horatio knew the psycho had seen, was that damnable air of unconscious innocence that he wore like a second skin. Even when he’d been at his worst, trying to lie to H about his gambling, that ridiculous openness surrounded him, and H could read every emotion and practically every thought Ryan had.

And he knew that the psycho had also read Ryan, and he’d known, beyond any shadow of any doubt, that if Ryan were still alive, the last three weeks had been the worst of his life. H, all too experienced in the manner of all kinds of crimes, could imagine what Ryan had gone through, and probably some things he couldn’t picture due to the absolute incomprehensibility, even in his oh-so-experienced mind, of it all.

“H?” Eric’s soft, questioning voice broke through his dark thoughts, and tender hands were laid on his tight shoulders, but he couldn’t bring himself to turn around. While he’d been thinking, at some point, tears had formed in his eyes, and he tried to force them not to fall. “Damn, H, I’m sorry,” Eric said, and Horatio blinked, though it didn’t do much to clear his vision. “Here we’ve been so wrapped up in ourselves, in what we’re feeling, that we’ve all but forgotten that he’s special to you too.”

“Eric . . . I . . .” H’s voice trembled, and he swallowed, unable to deny the validity of Eric’s words.

“It’s okay, H,” Eric smiled gently, and turned the older man around, though H bent his head sideways and tried to avoid Eric’s eyes. “I know you love me . . .” Eric smiled, and ran a hand down the side of H’s exhausted face – an exhausted face he was seeing clearly for the first time in three weeks. “And I love you, but Ryan’s . . . special, and we both know it. You and I have talked for a while now about letting him in, seeing if he’d want to be with us.

“Do you think I didn’t notice that you smile differently when you talk about him? Do you think I didn’t notice that you watch him like a hawk? I know, unlike some people,” he smiled gently. “That you don’t keep an eye on him, waiting for him to make another mistake, you watch him to keep him from making a mistake.

“And yeah, Ryan’s made a lot of mistakes, and he has a definite potential to self-destruct, but damn, H, he’s one of the few people that actually cares. He cares about the people, he cares about the job, and he cares about the victims . . . almost as much as Alexx does . . . or you. And he needs people like you,” he sighed. “And people like me, to make sure he doesn’t self-destruct.”

“I waited too long, Eric,” H whispered, and finally, the tears spilled down his pale cheeks. Eric pulled Horatio close to him, and held onto him.

“We both did,” Eric whispered, and closed his eyes as Horatio cried silently, his body held stiffly against Eric’s, though his hands gripped the Latino’s arms tightly, and Eric knew there would be bruises, but he didn’t care. Horatio was another person who had the potential to self-destruct, though like most, it wasn’t overt or quick, but it was a slow introverted implosion, and it was usually when it was too late for anyone to be able to do anything about it.

At least now, H had someone else to rely on, and to trust his feelings with, especially those feelings that dealt with Ryan, and particularly his disappearance. As Eric held his rigid, eerily silent, lamenting partner and boss, he realized that Horatio had been weeping without sound for their friend for the last three weeks, though he never made any kind of emotional indication to that effect. And now that he had, Eric hoped that that night, H would be able to sleep for longer than two or three hours.

“We’re going to find him, Eric,” H finally said as he separated himself from his lover, and Eric didn’t know whether he was trying to convince himself or Eric.

“I know we will,” Eric nodded. “Ryan’s tougher than most people give him credit for. He’s a survivor,” the dark-haired man answered, and whether it was to convince himself or H, well, he didn’t know that either.