Okay, this is a repost, and although I liked the idea of simultaneous scenes, the other version was a bit disjointed. So, after a re-shape, this hopefully brings things up to date, with the events mentioned below having their own chapters coming soon.

Warning: this is a fantasy AU and a crossover between csi ny/miami and will soon be crossing with csi lv and navy ncis.

Nothing below is mine, all CBS's I'm sure, and I get nothing for this but the airing of my brain and writer's cramp.


Chapter 6

In the span of twenty-four hours a lot can happen.

For instance, a mere twenty minutes after Danny Messer's apartment was attacked, Horatio Caine and his team found themselves on a plane; in need of sleep, heart weary and exhausted, they sped towards New York with the hopes that their questions could be answered. Half way to their goal, Horatio finally succumbed, and dreamed.

Forty-five minutes after the attack found Fiona Donnell being roused from her bed by an approaching presence, the warning tingle of her protective wards awakening her from a sound sleep to instant alertness in seconds. It wasn't odd for her to have visitors at all hours; as far as she knew, she was the only medicine woman that catered to all manner of races with prejudice, save that they would never use her skills to harm another living creature. She knew that this was different; her wards were snapping under her visitor's power. She left her bed and moved to her door, opening it to two vague forms, one leaning heavily on the other.

"Sanctuary," The woman asked, and Fiona was struck by the use of her ancestor's mother tongue.

"Sanctuary freely given. You are invited into my home," Fiona answered back in old Irish.

As soon as they entered her wards doubled in strength.

In Las Vegas, almost fully five hours after the attack, Nick Stokes was just getting off shift and checking his phone messages while walking to his truck. Upon hearing them he froze, and after checking the perimeter, he moved swiftly back into the lab to take emergency leave.

He is unaware of being watched.

At the same time one Tony DiNozzo is just returning to D.C. after expediting a suspect suspected for terrorism back from Canada, wired from too much coffee, baiting McGee, and an uneasy feeling that he always acquaints with being followed. Already on edge, he is fully prepared for the sudden attack. He has the fleeting thought that, maybe, he should have warned McGee first. Then he has to laugh at the look on McGee's face as the roof of the car is peeled away.

Even though he just knows that Gibbs is going to make him pay for Probie's therapy bills.

Still worth it though.

It is after the twenty-four that hope begins to die.

Detective Don Flack fell first, exhausted from pushing himself without rest or food, hunting down any possible leads on Danny Messer, growing more anxious and angry whenever they went nowhere. Finally he sat on the lab's break room couch and five minutes later he slept.

Next to him on the couch was Aiden Burn, curled into his body, even in sleep carefully cradling Danny's glasses to her chest. On her face were the track s of tears she wouldn't cry while awake, but that escaped when she was unaware.

Stella Bonasera was bent forward at the table, head pillowed on her arms and crime scene photos before her (not Danny's, no, crime happened even when one of their was missing, gone, maybe even), with Sheldon Hawkes coat over her shoulders.

The ME himself was across form her, arms crossed before him and half-slouched. He had stayed beyond shift, running small errands, picking up food, anything to help. In his hand he clutched his cell phone, open to speed dial, the number reading D. Messer.

Mac Taylor waits at his desk for anything new, eyes gritty with stress, and he rubs them wearily every five minutes.

He won't accept this.

He can't.

He reviews Danny's cases, open and recently closed. He looks into Danny's past, as much that he can, but there is nothing to raise red flags. His body has reached its limit but his mind wails in protest; one of his own is missing, he won't rest, he won't, not until Danny is found.

A good seventy-three hours after the attack finds Mac Taylor slumped over his desk, a witness statement still clutched in his hand.

And he dreamt.


He knew that he was dreaming.

He was sitting on the beach, enjoying the feel of the warmth of sand beneath his feet, watching the tide slowly come in. A light breeze ruffled his hair as he sat, enjoying the peace of the moment; the silence that was so rare in Miami, the sun reflecting the wet flame of the water, and the rhythmic breath of salt air on his skin. His head tilted as he hear approaching footsteps and relaxed slightly as they neared; he would know those steps anywhere.

"You could have told us," He said, not turning his head away from the scene before him. There was a soft sigh and then Tim sat down next to him, pulling his knees to chest, and reminding Horatio of an errant, pouting child. He had never looked so good.

Turning toward the water he was unsurprised to see his friend in the flesh next to him and a woman reflected in the water. When Speed raised a brow in question he merely grunted, and Speed smiled in response.

He saw Speed reach a hand out, cupping sand, and watched as it spiral around his palm like a small tornado.

"No, I couldn't have."

He nodded, not in agreement, but just to show that he understood.

"You didn't have to do it that way."

Hesitation. "It seemed the best way. If I had simply ran then you would have followed."

"You're right," Horatio agreed. "But it hurt us."

"What would have hurt more, that I couldn't stay, or that I wouldn't? There is no correct answer, H. Not with this."

"What's going on?" He turned to fully face his friend, his student and son. There was age in the face before him, and sorrow, and he wanted to erase the look from Speed's features.

"I can't tell you."

"Why?"

"Because I don't want you to know."

"Why?" He pressed.

There was a pause.

"Because death follows me. Because you wouldn't have let me go and if I stayed, it would have been you lying on the ground, bleeding out. Because I always make the wrongs choices." The voice had risen as the words spilled out, and the strain of unshed tears could be heard.

Then Speed whispered, "Because it was time to do the right thing."

Horatio stared at him.

"We run, we always run, but it still follows. We bury it and it unearths itself." Speed's appearance shifted and the female version stared at him, begging him to understand. When Horatio reached out, Speed shook her head, and pulled away from him.

"I had to leave, don't you understand? There's something I have to do. See?" She pointed to the horizon and they watched the gathering weather, the angry black clouds that were swelling as if they were a monstrous beating heart, and they watched it head in their direction. "It's coming."

Speed turned back to him. "I moved on for you, so it would be easier."

"In what way?" Horatio demanded.

"In that you wouldn't have to see me fail."

Horatio stood and reached out again. "You don't have to do this. We want to stand with you. We want to protect you."

"You still don't understand, H. It is not you who will protect me." Speed turned and ran, the wind picking up around her, picking up sand and blocking him as he struggled after her.

"It is I who will protect you."

"We'll find you, Speed! I'll find you! I promise!"

With a quiet cry Horatio Caine awoke. Wiping his hand over his face, he couldn't help but think that he had just had his own warning, and wondered why it couldn't have come before. He didn't believe in premonitions but this was merely reinforcing what he had known all along.

Speed was alive.

And he would find him.


He was dreaming.

He knew because he was standing in the center of Ground Zero, beyond the fences, watching the shadows of people pass him by.

He was inside looking out and it bothered him.

He turned him to see Aiden, Stella, Don, and Sheldon standing to his right. He turned to his left to see Horatio and that, he assumed, was his team standing with him.

Everything was so still that Mac jumps when one of Horatio's men steps forward, a young man with fair skin and hair, and turns to Mac.

"This isn't real, you know. This world, the world you know, wouldn't exist without you. You keep it this way and so, it is your reality."

The boy-man gestures at the barren hole in which they stand, at the bleak and gray New York, and the faceless people. Mac sees it all and then turns back to him when a hand is placed on his arm, turned to face behind him.

"But that is real."

A figure is coming towards him and at first he thinks that it is Claire, but as it steadily approaches Mac can see that he was wrong; Claire had never looked so inhuman.

The skin is as pale as the other's but where they're melded in with the background tones, hers shines brightly.

Her body is petite yet muscled, a fighter's body, and she walks with measured steps; Mac recognizes her manner, and knows that he has seen it before. Her eyes flare out at him with radiant blue, cold blue, which is in direct contrast with the fiery ginger of her hair, which swings behind her in braided ringlets. She is dressed in a simple sheath, white and gold adorning her, and when she stops in front of him he can count the scars that cover her arms and hands.

She is what he has been waiting for, he realizes, and looks at his team and knows that the one who was missing is found.

"Come home," He says.

"Where is home?" She replies.

"Home is with us." He answers.

"I have no home."

Dread begins to fill him as she turns from him, starting to walk away. Already she is fading and he knows that he'll never see her again. There are shadows moving in around her and he knows what they are hungry for.

"She is going to die." The boy-man tells him.

"No." He begs. "She can't."

"Why?"

She continues walking.

"We need her."

She stops but doesn't turn back.

Mac closes the distance between them and his team follows.

"I need her."

She turns back to him, looking even more unearthly as she glows softly, the golden light warming him. The boy-man has followed him.

"You have to choose."

"Choose what?"

"What you want her to be."

"I want her to be who she is, and whoever that turns out to be, I will accept. I swear it."

He finally reaches out to touch her, and their fingers entwine.

"Will you wield me, Mac?" She asks.

"I will wield you, Danny."

"Then bring me home."

With a gasp, Mac Taylor woke. He was a man of science, not fancy, but even as he shook off the effects of the dream, he knew that something had changed.

He just didn't know what it meant.


I am feeling better about this one, and even though it set me up for MAJOR writing, I feel no regret.