18. CASE CLOSED
"The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing" - John Powell
It was Monday afternoon. Alexx Woods was in the autopsy lab, and on her table lay the body of Ned Sante. She was tired, with the skipping of a night's sleep, but didn't plan to go home just yet.
She knew Eric, Speed and Calleigh hadn't gone home yet, either. They were frantically working on all the collected evidence, eager to put this whole case behind them.
She walked around the table, and gently stroked the student over his cold arm before looking up as the door to the lab opened.
Her mouth fell open, her eyes wide.
It was Horatio. He was seated in a wheel chair, with one leg-rest raised to keep his leg with the fractured shin and broken toes elevated. A soft blanket over the back-rest provided additional protection for his back covered in abrasions, welts and stitches. Yet, it must be pretty uncomfortable for him to lean back, she figured.
He was dressed casually, a short-sleeved shirt and some dark grey trousers. With his left arm strapped to his body to support the shoulder, he was sagged sideways, leaning with his right arm on the arm-rest. He was pale, and droplets of sweat dotted his forehead as a result of having moved more than he should.
Calleigh was pushing the wheelchair, and responded to Alexx's reaction with a helpless shrug of her shoulders.
"Alexx," Horatio said with a steady but soft voice. "What have you got?"
Deciding now was not a good time to lecture him Alexx stepped aside, providing Calleigh with enough room to push the wheelchair closer to the table. Horatio was leaning forward now, sitting up straighter, and letting his eyes scan the body. Sighing softly, she followed his gaze.
"Multiple welts across his torso, as you can see. His back is covered with them as well. Some are deep, at some spots white of bone shines through," Alexx started. "These bruises and burns," she pointed to the damaged area near the armpits and across the victim's chest, "are caused by the ropes he was hanging from."
She changed her position, and then her gloved hand tenderly ran over Ned's legs. They were badly swollen and bruised, black and blue. "This is obviously from being repeatedly struck with heavy chains. There are no clean breaks, but... most likely there are fractures underneath." She shivered involuntarily. Picking up an arm, she showed the victim's abraded wrist. "These are rope burns. On both wrists, again from being tied up."
Horatio's eyes slowly followed her hands, looking closely, as far as he could see from his position. He gave a slight nod. "What killed him, Alexx?"
Moving back to the upper body, she pressed slightly on the victim's chest. Tiny blue spots indicated something had struck Ned there. "The ribs gave away here. Something heavier than a whip was used here, and based on these blue dots..." she pointed them out.
"The mace," Calleigh interrupted. "Eric and Speed found one in the woods, close to the crime scene."
Alexx looked up at her, nodding. "That's what I'm thinking as well. They struck him with a mace, and at least four ribs must have snapped under the pressure. One or two of them have punctured the lungs, causing him to bleed internally."
Calleigh winced. Horatio appeared to remain unattached.
"The poor boy was bleeding from his mouth when we got him down. He'd bled a lot. That, plus..." again her fingers ran tenderly over the victim's chest, the dark blue stains evident, "plus they pulled the rope around his chest too tight. So my guess is he died from asphyxiation. We were just too late." She stared sadly at the victim's face. "You were already dead when we got to you, weren't you, sugar?"
"Thank you," Horatio said quietly. His gaze was now also directed at the younger man's face. "I'm sorry, Ned. I'm really sorry that you didn't get the chance to do things right. I'm sorry that you didn't get to the part that you called the rest of your life."
With that, he gave a silent nod, indicating to Calleigh that he was finished. Carefully, he leaned back in his chair, grimacing as his back touched the seat. With his head down, he waited, and Calleigh pulled the wheelchair backwards, then turned it around to leave the autopsy lab.
XXX-XXX-XXX
Calleigh had brought Horatio to his office. Detective Tripp came in, two cups of coffee in his hands and placed one within reach of the crime lab Lieutenant.
"H, how are you feeling?"
"Hmm, like I should have stayed in bed this morning," Horatio responded, a faint smile forming at his lips. He stared at the coffee, wondering if his hand could hold up the cup yet.
"Well, let's keep this as short as possible, so you can go back, okay? Are you sure you want to do this?" Frank asked. He'd been to the hospital early that morning and he and Horatio had talked everything through.
"Yes." The red-haired man tilted his head and looked resolutely at Tripp. "Yes, I do."
"All right. I have them all waiting... let's give them a little surprise." Forgetting about the coffee, Frank stepped behind the wheelchair and carefully maneuvered Horatio out of his office, down the hall and stopped next to the door of the interrogation room where eleven students were waiting. Eric Delko and Tim Speedle were also inside, all the evidence sorted out within reach.
Tripp threw the door open and stood still in the doorway. "So, ladies and gentlemen. Let's begin. We're going to discuss your accessory to the disappearance of Lieutenant Caine of this crime lab, followed by the murder of one of your fellow students, Ned Sante."
"I'm sorry, but we've got nothing to do with the disappearance of one of your men," the student called John Waters said.
"That's what you all tried to make us believe," nodded Tripp. "But... I have reasons to think differently." At that moment, he wheeled Horatio in, fully enjoying the nervous shifting in chairs and the deeper intake of breaths. Frank carefully installed his friend on the opposite side of the room, behind the table. After that, he stepped back and, hands shoved into his pockets, leaned with his back against the wall waiting for what he knew was coming.
Horatio slowly lifted his head and his gaze traveled from one student to the other. "Well, hello," he started. "We meet again. Let's go back, shall we?" He paused for a second, as if catching his breath, then continued. "Let's go back to last Tuesday. I was at Cabrerra University and I had a meeting with Dean Hernandez. When we were finished, I came out of the building..."
Horatio let his eyes rest on a now visibly shaking Ginny. "When I came out, you called for me. You wanted to talk to me, Ginny. But there was nothing to talk about, was there? You stunned me with your taser."
Eric, ready to give his boss a breather, placed the taser on the table. "We found it in Jenny's car. It's got your fingerprints on it, Ginny."
"Unfortunately I didn't see which of you attacked me next. Do you want to tell me who they were, Ginny?" Horatio glanced at the girl.
She didn't respond.
"That's okay, Ginny. I don't really need to know. You see," he looked down and shifted a bit. "You see, we have enough evidence to put you all away. Jenny... Jenny, you had my cell phone. We know that, because we found it. You threw it away in a dustbin. What you should have done is turned it off before doing that. But you forgot, didn't you?"
Horatio paused, giving the students time to consider what he'd said. "That night, you were all wearing black robes," he now moved on to the next piece of evidence they had.
"The same ones you had on yesterday night when we caught you," Speed filled in.
"We know they were the same," Horatio continued, "because three of those robes had my blood on them. How do you think that happened?"
Of course, nobody answered.
Speed put three black packages on the table. "These are the robes. They belong to..." he bent forward to read the tags they'd put on them when they had taken the clothing from the students, "John Waters, Mitchell Robins and Mark Homan."
"So..." Horatio unmercifully went on. "That means that you three were the ones handling the chain, whip and mace. Weren't you?"
Eric made room for the next piece of evidence. "What we have here is the whip that you used both on Lieutenant Caine and on Ned Sante," Eric glanced at his friend and when he got an approving nod, he moved on. "You dropped this in the forest last night. John, your prints are on the butt. But we have more. We have traced your order with the Australian company, where you bought this whip. You ordered this through one of the University's computers, and the credit card number on the order is yours."
He paused and pointed at the dark red fall on the whip. "You know what this is? This is called the fall. The fall is to take the force of the blow, in order to protect the tail. Did you know the fall actually breaks at the ends and needs to be replaced after multiple usage? A little piece of this fall, John," Eric looked hard at the student, "was embedded in Lieutenant Caine's back."
"So, John," Horatio again joined in. "You see, John. I don't even have to identify your voice. Although I heard you talking before I came into this room, and it sounded very familiar. Speed?"
Speed needed no encouragement and placed a chain on the table. "You are making it easy for us... Mark, care to explain how your prints got on these chains?"
Mark Homan shifted nervously in his chair.
"The doctor from the hospital has stated that the injuries to Lieutenant Caine's legs are caused by something heavy, like chains. The coroner made a similar statement about the condition of Ned Sante's legs. Mark, we swabbed the chains and guess what we found? DNA. Although your victims were wearing trousers, you must have hit some bare skin around the ankles, because we found DNA on these chains from both the Lieutenant and your fellow student."
"Thank you, Speed," Horatio said. "I think that leaves no room for questions, Mark. Let's get to Mitchell now. Shall we?"
Eric pulled out the mace. "Again, you helped us a lot by letting us catch you. You lost this in the forest, didn't you, Mitch?"
"I've just been down to the autopsy lab to look at Ned Sante's body," Horatio continued, his voice sharper now. "You stroked out hard and unmercifully, Mitchell. Were you angry? Because, you know, Mitchell, your blows with this," he pointed at the dreadful weapon on the table. "Your blows have caused Ned's death. You broke his ribs, and those ribs punctured Ned's lungs. What did Ned do to you, Mitchell, to make you so angry with him?"
"The punctures in the victim's skin are a perfect match with this mace. That, plus the skin tissues we found on the spikes is all we need, Mitchell," Eric proceeded.
"You know what I think?" Horatio continued unmercifully. "I think you were angry with Ned because he stood you up. He refused to play along and you wanted to make sure he wasn't going to talk about the group's activities." Pausing for a second, Horatio cocked his head a bit to look at Speed. "What else have we got? We have footprints, don't we, Speed?"
"Yes," Speed nodded. "I've taken samples of the boots you were wearing last night, ladies and gentlemen. I can assure you most of them matched with prints we got from the Chekika crime scene. And we all know they matched with the scene from last night. That, plus fingerprints from the cabin, and hairs we found at the scene... Not to mention the ropes used on Ned Sante. They matched the ones you used tying up the Lieutenant the other night..." Speed faced Tripp.
Frank removed his hands from his pockets, placed them on the table and leaned forward. "And that will be enough. We already know you had plenty of opportunity to sneak past the guards at the Larry and Thompson campsite. You're all going down for the attempted murder of a police officer and the murder of Ned Sante, ladies and gentlemen."
"I told you," Horatio glared at the stunned group. "I told you no crime remains unpunished in Miami. Didn't I?" With a faint nod, he tiredly dropped his head. "It's a shame. It's a shame that the Professor's death wasn't enough. That you didn't learn from what you did to me. If you had, Ned Sante would still be alive. Get them out of my sight, Frank."
Tripp had already moved, called in for some help and then together with the officers that had arrived, he escorted the students to their cells.
Eric and Speed silently gathered all evidence from the table and took it with them as they left the room, giving their boss the space they figured he needed right now.
Horatio sat alone, lost in his thoughts. He was exhausted, his back and chest were hurting and he was cold. He didn't know how long he'd sat there, but then the door opened and Calleigh came in.
"Hey," she smiled at him. She was carrying a glass of water and had some pills in her other hand. She sat down on a chair, and handed him the pills. "Alexx told me to give you these painkillers," she said. "She also said that refusing them was not an option."
"She did?" he grinned. With a trembling hand, he took the pills and stuffed them into his mouth. He looked doubtfully at the glass Calleigh was holding out for him.
"Here," she said softly, understanding this wasn't easy on him. She put the glass in his hand but didn't remove hers, that way steadying him as he tried to bring it to his mouth.
He swallowed the pills and slowly finished the rest of the water. "Thank you."
"Don't mention it," Calleigh waved him off and placed the glass on the table. "So, what's on your mind?"
Horatio looked up, finding her studying him questioningly and with worry in her eyes. "I was thinking..." he started, "about what drives people. How can one man have this much influence on twelve people? Why, Calleigh," he turned his head and looked away. "Why was Ned the only one able to break the circle?"
"I don't know," she said honestly. "I wish I did, but I really don't know. I guess a factor is their age. They're supposed to be adults, but aren't really. They live and function in groups, so they act that way. Belonging to a group is important at that age, and only those with much self-respect and great inner strength are able to stand above that. The rest just follow the ones with the biggest mouth, the most expensive car or the best looks."
"I don't know, Calleigh," Horatio objected. "Since when does murder fit in there? Wasn't this all about the status of the leaders of the groups? Like you said, cars, brand of shoes or shirts, the most modern haircut..."
"Normally, yes," she agreed. "But what happens when a group like that gets indoctrinated by a mad-man? Who knows what Professor Metzger has been teaching them... those kids have completely lost their grip on reality. And on humanity. They have experienced the effects of fear, power, control and suppression in a way no other human being gets confronted with in a lifetime. They have been taught that these ideas and feelings were natural. Normal. I don't think we can even begin to understand what that would do to a person, especially to people who are still so easily influenced."
"I suppose you need to be a psychiatrist to explain this," he gave in wearily, suddenly too tired to give it another thought.
"Exactly. Our job is to catch the ones who don't play by the rules. Let the shrinks figure out the rest. They sure as hell get paid for that," Calleigh deliberately tried to lighten the mood.
He threw her a faint but thankful smile.
At that moment, Alexx Woods entered the room, clapping her hands. "Okay, it's time to take you back to the hospital."
"I'm out." Horatio turned his head towards her. "I can stay out. Can't I?"
Calleigh chuckled.
Alexx didn't react to that. Instead, she studied him closely. With a frown on her face she stepped closer and grabbed his wrist.
Horatio lowered his eyes and sighed.
"Humor me," Alexx said, then concentrated on counting. Next, she placed the back of her hand against his forehead. "Honey, you're developing a fever."
He didn't answer. Calleigh looked worriedly at him.
"I'm sorry, but we're taking you back," Alexx told him sternly. "They're going to have to find you another mix of antibiotics, this one obviously isn't effective. You also have an appointment for some skin grafts, although I'm afraid that will have to wait until your fever comes down. After that," she smiled encouragingly at him, "we'll talk about getting you home, all right?"
"Well, all right then." This day had worn him out, and keeping up appearances had been difficult and exhausting. Fortunately, it was all over now and he could let go. Carefully he leaned back, closed his eyes and accepted the fact that he was no longer in control.
The two women who were in control at that moment pushed the wheelchair out of the room, out of the building and into the waiting ambulance that would bring him back to the hospital.
XXX-XXX-XXX
Early that evening Calleigh walked through the hallway of the hospital and quietly entered Horatio's room.
He didn't respond to her arrival, obviously deeply asleep.
She studied him for a while. He was still pale, despite the flushed patches on his cheeks. Even asleep and relaxed, he looked exhausted, which, she thought, wasn't a surprise after all that had happened.
He really had no business getting out of bed like he'd done that morning. He really shouldn't have seen Ned Sante's body, bearing gruesome marks similar to his own. Calleigh herself had been shocked at the mutilation, seeing in such close quarters the horrible effects of the torture on Ned, and imagining the terror her own boss and friend must have gone through whilst garnering the same injuries.
On the other hand she understood why he'd done it. Horatio Caine took it as his personal task to make the final accusations, to confront the perps with the facts and then send them away. It was his way of dealing with what they saw on a daily base. It was his way of showing respect to the victims and of offering some salvation to the relatives. Calleigh even suspected that he also did it to protect them, his team. That in case a perpetrator ever came out to seek revenge, he would come after Horatio instead of his team.
Calleigh sat down and grabbed a magazine. She decided she would stay without disturbing him, but she wanted to be there when he woke up. This whole ordeal must have affected him, like it had all of them. Whether he agreed or not, he needed somebody and she was determined to be that person. He hadn't really talked about it yet, and she doubted he ever would but no way on earth was she going to step back and let him deal with it alone.
She wasn't really concentrating on the articles in the magazine, but just glancing through, merely reading the subtitles and looking at the images. She was reaching the last page when Horatio stirred.
Looking up, she studied his face. He wasn't awake, but his eyes were restlessly rolling behind the closed lids. He'd also started to shift and his free arm was flailing around.
Unsure of what to do, Calleigh grabbed his hand, but he pulled free from her grip. Debating whether to wake him or not, she looked up as the door opened.
A nurse came in to check on her patient and she immediately responded to the scene in front of her. She gently placed one hand on the Lieutenant's shoulder and talked softly to him, telling him to calm down and go back to sleep. Her voice had the desired effect as he stilled, leaving her to take his pulse, blood pressure and temperature.
After jotting some values down on her chart, she turned to Calleigh. "He's been having these nightmares. When he does, try to calm him down. It's not doing his back any good if he starts shifting around in the bed. You can attempt to wake him up if he won't settle down, all right?"
Calleigh gave an affirmative nod. "How is he?"
"The doctor will have to tell you the details, I'm not entitled to," the nurse apologized. "But right now, his temp is steadily rising. It'll take a while before the new meds will have the needed effect. I understood you caught the ones who did this to him?"
Nodding again, Calleigh quickly explained. "Just this morning. That's why he came to the station."
"He needed to be there, huh?" the nurse said. "I'm glad that it's all over. I'll be back in an hour or so. Call me if there's anything, all right?"
"Thank you," Calleigh replied and watched her leave the room before turning her attention back to Horatio. He was quiet now.
Calleigh once more grabbed his warm hand. He's been having nightmares, the nurse said. She was glad it was all over, she said. Calleigh sighed, realizing that was not entirely true. The case was closed, yes. The students were arrested and it was all over. But, for Horatio, this was only just the beginning.
THE END
