Sorry it took forever to get a second chapter done, but my school banned from the school computers, so i could never upload. Newayz, i finally got a computer of my own, so here it is...lol...as always, disclaimers apply...yadda yadda yadda...u got it.


Lost-Chapter Two

The crime scene wasn't hard for Stella to find, with the crowds of people on their way to work stopping by to gawk, and the flashing lights atop police cars that surrounded it. It had the textbook look of all crime scenes Stella had been to-bystanders, cops, lights, and body-it was definatly nothing special. Except for the fact that the main subject would never see another sunrise. That was a fact that had never left Stella's mind whenever she was on a case, whether the victim was yound or old, alive or dead. Most of the time, their life was over, taken by whatever monster had gotten them. They would never have another birthday, never see their kids or families ever again.

CSIs weren't supposed to let their personal feelings get in the way of investigating a crime scene; it was a job that somebody had to do, and they had to do it well. If they were too busy fighting their emotions when they got there, it effected their work, and that was something they couldn't let happen. But it was a human weakness, one that every CSI had to hide. Stella tried to hide it, but sometimes it would get the best of her. Mac always called those lapses being 'overly emotional'.

"Our job isn't to sit here and cry over them," he had once told her. "It's to get them justice. Feeling sorry for them isn't a crime; it's human; but finding their killer is more important."

At the moment, though, that seemed to be the last thing on Mac Taylor's mind. He hadn't spoken a word since their last exchange when they passed Ground Zero; just stared out the window.

He really needs to be on leave, Stella thought again. Not here.

Stella parked her car next to one of the closer police cars, and reached for her CSI case. Mac awoke from his trance, and made his way out towards the caution tape that surrounded the body. Stella followed him close behind.

Ducking under the police tape, Stella came face to face with Don Flack, one of the officers on the scene.

"Hey Don," she said. "What have we got here?" Don flashed her a half smile.

"Hey Stella. It's yet another Jane Doe," he replied, waving his hand at the body behind him.

"Hopefully not another one for the collection at the morgue," Stella thought aloud. "Who found her?"

Flack pulled his notebook out of the pocket of his coat and read aloud.

"Guy named Jerry Gardner, 40. Says he was on his way to work when he car broke down a little down the road. He'd been walking for about 20 minutes, looking for a phone. Apparently, his cell wasn't charged and the pay phone nearest was out of order. And then he found the vic," Flack grinned, his eyebrows raising over his blue eyes. "I'd say he's having a pretty crappy morning."

Stella looked over her shoulder at the body laying on the pavement, half of which was coated in blood from an abrasion on the forehead, and looked back at the Dectective.

"Well i'd say that girl's having a worse one." Flack nodded in agreement, then caught sight of Mac, who had gone straight to the body, and was now examining the fingernails of the victim.

"What's he doing here?" he asked Stella, confusion on his face. Stella gave him a puzzled glance.

"Doing his job," she replied. Don rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, yeah i know that...but isn't he supposed to get a few days off? I mean, his wife just died, didn't she? In the towers?"

Stella heaved a sigh, and turned back to look at the other CSI. He was focused intently on the body before him, paying no attention to the two of them standing a few feet away.

"Yeah, she did. We've been trying to get him a few weeks off, but he won't take it. Just keeps asking for more cases," Stella said in a low voice. Flack raised a quizzical eyebrow in Mac's direction.

"You sure he's alright to keep working? That's kind of unhealthy, jumping back into work so soon, don't you think?"

"People deal in different ways i guess," Stella remarked. "But he'll be alright."

Stella could only hope she wasn't lying.


Why did it have to be a woman?

The body that lay before Mac was cold, he could feel that through his CSI gloves easily. It had obviously been there awhile, and from the amount of blood at the scene, this is were she had bled out and lived her last moments. Alone, probably. Disoriented, too-the first blow to the head didn't seem like enough to knock her out, but just leave her dazed. But not the second one. The second one, in the back of the head, was meant to kill. It was were most of the blood had come from, and it wasn't likely that she had even lived long enough to call for help.

Claire called for help...she must've. But no one could hear her...

Mac shook his head violently, trying to purge the thought from his mind. No, he thought to himself. Not now, please not now. He was on a case now, and he needed to focus. Focus...

The woman had light brown hair that framed a thin face, with brown eyes staring aimlessly at the early morning September sky. Most of her hair was sticky with blood now from the two blows to the head, and some of it had stained her face. The killing blow had come from behind based on it's location, and it had a lot of force to it-part of the skull had been broken away to reveal soft tissues underneath; it was ultimately what killed her.

Mac reached out a hand and brushed some of the hair off the woman's forehead, to get a better view of the cut on her forehead. As he did so, he caught glance of her eyes. He couldn't help but notice that they were the same color as Claire's, with the same speckles that he had seen in his wife's eyes on the many times he had stared into them. Times that Claire would never have again...times that he would never see again.

At that moment, Mac felt sick. A defenseless woman had been attacked and killed; it wasn't the first had seen, and it wouldn't be the last. But he couldn't handle it. The blood that he had earlier just seen as evidence in a crime, now turned his stomach. The stained hair and open, sightless eyes no longer belonged to the name less victim laying forgotten in a parking lot.

They belonged to Claire.

Mac stood up, walking quickly away from the crime scene, as fast as he could manage, and almost ran into Stella.

"Mac?" But Mac pushed past her, ducked under the police tape, and almost ran down the side walk. With shaking hands he pulled off his latex CSI gloves, unconsciously dropping them on the sidewalk. Something told him that he needed to keep them, for the case, but he kept walking. It wasn't long until he came to a dark alley, empty except for a faded green City of New York dumpster, and quickly turned into it out of sight.

Chest heaving, Mac collapsed against a wall, closing his eyes and tried to forget what he had just seen. For a moment, instead of a nameless victim, it had been Claire. Alone, without anybody to claim her. Dead, while onlookers looked on from behind yellow police tape and police cars. Gone.

Claire was gone. And there was nothing he could do.

Mac walked over to the dumpster, leaned over the edge, and threw up.


Stella pushed past the crowd of bystanders surrounding the crime scene, searching for Mac amongst them. He had left the crime scene so briskly, and the look one his face wasn't right. Stella knew something had to be wrong-Mac had never behaved that way at a crime scene before, or anywhere else, as long as she knew him.

Leaving Flack to continue guarding the crime scene, Stella began to walk down the sidewalk near the scene. Besides a few cars that drove by, there was absolutely no life on the street.

She was just about ready to walk down the other direction when she heard a sound, like somebody was banging something against metal. A trash can, maybe, or a dumpster.

"Mac?" she called, but no one answered her. Stella walked a little further down the sidewalk. "Mac?" The open mouth of an alleyway caught her attention, and she made her way towards it. Before she could get to the opening, Mac came walking out . His appearence shocked her.

Mac's face was pale, a sharp contrast to his short, dark hair that was now disheveled and out of place. Red, bloodshot eyes had replaced his brown ones, and they appeared to be wet. He looks bad enough to be Sheldon Hawk's table, Stella thought.

"Mac...?" She said cautiously. Mac blinked, and seemed surprised to see her for a moment, but quickly covered it up.

"Stella," he muttered, dragging his sleeve across his lips, and began to walk past her. Stella caught his arm before he could get far.

"Mac, are you alright? You look terrible." Mac shot her a look, and pulled his arm free of her grasp.

"Nothing...I'm fine," he said brusquely, and kept walking back towards the crime scene. What the hell...? Stella thought. He was obviously lying-Mac had never been a good actor. Stella quickly caught up to him.

"Hey, hold on a second." Stella grabbed her colleague's arm again, and this time he stopped, and slowly turned to face her.

"Stella, i'm fine, you've got nothing to worry about, and I have a crime scene to process," he snapped. Shaking her hand free again, he kept walking, stopping briefly to pick up a pair of discarded latex gloves, and then continued on. Stella didn't follow him, but instead put her face in her hands and sighed.

Mac Taylor wasn't as invincible as he pretended,Stella knew.He was hurting, more than anyone would ever know. And he couldn't hide it forever.


Mac packed up the last of the evidence, snapping the lid of the CSI case tighly closed. Inside, he had enough evidence to trace the blood he had found underneath the vic's fingernails to her attacker, along with several other pieces of evidence that he knew would help the case along. He hadn't found the murder weapon, but he could guess that it was some type of heavy, blunt object, maybe even a bat.

The thought of someone bashing in the woman's skull with a bat made him sick again, but he managed to hold it in this time. He didn't need to be tipping off Stella again by running away from the crime scene.

Mac didn't know what had come over him. Playing out how murders occured was almost second nature to him now-he didn't get a perverted sense of enjoyment from it, but it was his job. He had never been physically sickened by it. He knew what had caused it, though. It had been Claire, or the thought of her...trapped in those towers...he had seen her face in the dead woman's, and it had set him off.

CSIs were taught not to let their emotions control their cases. How often did he have to tell Stella and the rest of his CSIs that? But now, even he couldn't do it. Solving cases had been his only chance, and now even that wasn't working.

Mac shook his head again, and rubbed his hands over his eyes. Stella had caught him at a weak moment twice that day-he didn't need her seeing him in another one again.

Straightening up, case in hand, he walked back towards Stella's car, leaving the body of the woman behind him for the moment.

For the second time that day, Stella and Flack watched from a distance as Mac went about his processing of the crime scene, and then made his way to her car.

"You sure he's okay?" he asked again. "I've never seen him like this before."

"None of us have," she replied. "Then again..." Stella looked in the direction of where the Twin Towers had once stood.

"...nothing like this has ever happened before." Flack followed her gaze to the skyline, then looked back at the CSI.

"Yeah...are you sure you can't get him to take some time off? He looks like he could really use it."

"He won't take it. He's trying to bury himself in his work..." Stella trailed off, and shrugged.

Flack looked at Mac, then back at Stella.

"Well, it sure doesn't look like its working out too well, does it?"