Disclaimer: I obviously do not own CSI: NY. I just own my car, my laptop and my crazy muse who seems to want to write 4 different stories at a time. I also do own any characters that you do not recognize. You can borrow them if you ask permission first!

A/N: Okay. Thanks to everyone that read and reviewed! Here's the next chapter!!! Many thanks to Aphina and Axellia for the beta. I don't own the chapter title either. That belongs to Apocalyptica. Okay, I'm actually going to put a rare second disclaimer in here. The case that begins in this chapter is based on a real case that happened in New Orleans in the 1800's. While I allude to the gruesomeness in this chapter, I do get more graphic, so I wanted to prepare y'all for that. I will tell you what case inspired it after I fully reveal the crime scene (which happens in chapter 24), but Virtual Cookies to anyone who figures it out before then!!!

Chapter 22.

I Don't Care

When Danny awoke the following day, he was surprised to see that Cory's side of the bed was still empty. Puzzled, he grabbed his glasses and cell phone and quickly called her number. She picked up in a matter of moments.

"Hello," she said with a sheepish sound to her voice.

"Okay, bella, it's nine a.m. and you didn't come home last night? Please tell me you got sleep."

Cory mentally hit herself upside the head for forgetting to inform him that she was leaving the country. "Um, actually yeah. I got plenty of sleep, but...um…I'm in London."

"You're what?!!" Danny exclaimed, not believing that he had heard her correctly.

"I'm in London," Cory sighed. "I'm sorry. I was so upset yesterday when Alistair hung up on me that I just forgot. So I decided to come here so that I could confront him to his face. God, I'm such a bad fiancée."

Danny shook his head, upset with her lack of thought. "Look, Cory. I get that you're obsessed with catching Etienne and why you're pissed off at Alistair, but you can't let this rule your life. This is not like you. You are not one to drop everything and just fly off somewhere."

Cory bristled at the disappointment in his voice. "Actually, it is. Remember me. The girl who moved to New York to catch Ortiz. This is part of me and if you're just going to have to deal with it," she shot back.

"No, I don't have to just deal with this, Cory. There are two people in this relationship and you're being selfish right now."

Cory grew silent for a moment before shrugging. "Look. I can't deal with this right now. I'm trying to get into InterPol to see if I can convince Alistair to come clean. We'll talk when I get home," she finally said before hanging up.

Danny resisted the urge to throw the phone across the room. Just barely. Only the thought that he needed the phone for work kept him from doing that. He finally climbed out of the bed, still pissed off and knowing that he still had half the day to go before he was supposed to be in a work. Sighing, he decided to go to the gym, to see if he could work out some of his feelings.

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Six hours later, he was feeling much calmer as he walked into the lab. He knew that he had probably overreacted to Cory's lack of thinking, but he still didn't think he was wrong. When he got into the lab, he immediately went back to processing the clothes from the shooters, hoping to find something, anything to connect Etienne to them. He knew that the likelihood of that happening was slim to none, but until he got a new case, that's all he was going to be spending his time doing.

As he walked past Mac's office, he noticed the Stella and Mac engaged in a lively conversation and wondered what it meant.

Mac was smiling at Stella. "You're completely right. We haven't been out of the house recently and we need to rectify that."

"I know. We need to do something, have dinner and a movie, you know. A real date. Like regular couples," she said teasingly.

"Since when were we normal, Stel?" Mac quipped back.

Stella opened her mouth to respond, but Mac's phone interrupted her.

"Taylor," he answered in his usual brisk manner.

"Detective Taylor, I'm Lieutenant Michael Lafferty of the Hamptons Bay Police Department. I need your assistance," the man on the other end of the line said somberly.

"How can I help you?" Mac answered.

"I have a crime scene," Lieutenant Lafferty paused, groping for words. "To be honest with you detective, it's the scene out of my worst nightmare. My people are not capable of working it. Can you help me?"

"What are the details?" Mac questioned, his curiosity peaked.

"It's best that you find out for yourself detective. Let's just say that it has massive casualties, so you need to bring as many people as possible," the man responded vaguely.

Mac furrowed his brow, sensing that the man was withholding valuable information that he thought might dissuade him from helping him. "Why won't you tell me anything else," he persisted.

The man sighed. "I've had seasoned veterans—veterans that were there when the towers fell and that aftermath—who became violently ill upon seeing this scene. Please, Detective. I need help," he pleaded.

Mac swallowed hard and then acquiesced. "All right, let me get my team together and we can be there in three to four hours," he agreed, thinking of the distance that they would have to drive. "Keep everyone out of the crime scene," he cautioned.

Lieutenant Lafferty forced a laugh. "Trust me. That will not be a problem," he assured Mac.

Stella looked at Mac, sensing that something major had happened. "What's wrong?" she asked, worry etching her voice.

Mac sighed gustily. "Hamptons Bay PD is asking for assistance on what he is alluding to a gruesome scene with massive casualties."

Stella raised her eyebrows in surprise. "Really. Okay, so I take it that he's requesting a team?"

Mac nodded. "Are you up for a trip to the Hamptons?"

Stella smirked. "Of course. I'll grab Danny and Hawkes. They are working the swing shift today."

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Four hours later, Mac, Stella, Danny and Hawkes were driving up to the imposing ruins of a multimillion dollar mansion; it's burnt out remains starkly illuminated by the full moon.

Danny suppressed a shiver at the sight and silently wondered what could have been so bad that the local police could not deal with it—not even to give them a warning of what they were walking into. They grabbed their cases and began to walk towards the building, the smell of smoke and the unmistakable sweet smell of burned flesh lingering in the air.

As they got closer to the desecrated mansion, the team noticed the grim faces of the guards standing around; in fact, a lot of the guards seem to be holding back waves of nausea in the green tint to there complexions was any indication.

When they arrived at what used to be the front door, they saw a heavy set man waiting for them, his face unreadable. When the team got close enough, he stepped forward and extended his hand. "I'm Lieutenant Lafferty," he introduced himself.

Mac met him and shook his hand. "I'm Detective Taylor," Mac started as he began the introductions to the team. Once finished, he looked the man in the eyes. "Okay, now that the pleasantries are out of the way, please tell me what you were dancing around on the phone about. What didn't you want to say?"

The Lieutenant shifted uncomfortably before motioning for them to walk towards the parked cars. Looking at each other, the team followed and when the reached them, Lieutenant Lafferty leaned against one of the SUV's. Sighing, he rubbed his hands over his face, tiredly. "You know, this is a quiet community," he muttered, shaking his head. "You'd never suspect something like this happening here."

Intrigued, Mac looked at the man, who was clearly shaken. "What happened," he asked quietly.

"I don't know. That's the problem," he responded, clearly frustrated. "All I know is that at three a.m. the security monitoring company contacted the fire department about a fire in the house. When they arrived, the place was in flames. Totally engulfed. They fought the fire for four hours before getting it under control."

"Do you know what caused the fire?" Danny asked.

Lieutenant Lafferty shook his head. "Other than we know it was arson, no. The fire investigators are trying to determine the point of origin, but it's going to take a while to get the results from them."

Stella shook her head. "So far, it seems all pretty routine."

The lieutenant nodded. "Yeah, it wasn't until we were allowed inside that the case turned." He visibly steeled himself for what he was about to reveal. "We began the recovery process since we had been unable to locate the owners. We assumed that they had been in the house."

"Were they?" Hawkes interjected.

The man sighed. "Honestly, I don't know. We never made it past the first floor due to the horror of what we did find." He looked straight at Mac. "In the dining room we found approximately twenty burned and desecrated bodies. That's why I called you, Detective."

Mac nodded. "Do you have any idea of the identity of the victims?"

Lafferty shook his head. "No. This house belonged to an elderly couple." He consulted his notes. "Mikhail and Nadezhda Pasternak. Damn, that's a mouthful. They moved in about twenty years ago and pretty much kept to themselves." He thought for a moment. "Actually, I don't think I ever saw him. She was seen shopping around town and was a kind soul. She was always concerned with making sure that the homeless had a place to live." He smiled wryly. "It was a joke around here that the only way to see the inside of the house was if you were homeless. They didn't entertain."

Mac nodded again. "So could the bodies be of those homeless people?"

"Some of them possibly," he confirmed. "But, we don't really have a homeless problem here, so there should only be a couple of people besides them." He gazed at the house, the ill feeling rising in his stomach again. "I wanted to tell you this in person and I hope that it helps your investigation," he concluded before walking away.

Mac turned to his team. "Stella, call Adam and see if he can run a background check on the owners and also get us pictures. Maybe we can get an ID on them." Stella nodded and quickly pulled out her phone. "Hawkes, when Stella is done, I want you and her to take the first floor. Danny and I will start with the second floor and work our way up." Hawkes nodded as Danny bent over to pick up his kit.

"I don't have a good feeling about this boss," Danny said as they began to walk back to the house.

Mac nodded. "Neither do I, Danny. Neither do I."

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When Danny and Mac entered the house, both tried to ignore the smell of burned flesh. Danny glanced to the right and saw what must have been a formal living room, covered in soot and ash. Then he glanced to the left and suppressed a shudder of horror. That room must have been the dining room that the Lieutenant had referred to, as he could see a multitude of burned bodies lying on the floor. He focused ahead and gazed at the grand staircase, which looked unscathed other than the black soot of the fire resting on it.

The entry hall itself must have been twenty feet wide, with the staircase dominating it. He glanced up at the twenty foot ceiling and saw a glass chandelier suspended above the stairs. Wow, he thought to himself and tried to imagine the place free of soot and how imposing that it must have been for visitors.

Both Mac and he made their way to the staircase cautiously, stepping lightly on the first step, just in case the heat and water had compromised it, but they were in luck. The staircase was made from marble, so it was still sound enough to bear their weight. Silently they proceeded up the staircase, both unsure of what horrors lay in wait for them. Once at the top, he looked at Mac. "I'll go left, you go right?" he questioned.

Mac nodded. "Yes, but be very careful; I don't want you falling through the floor."

Danny nodded in consent and turned to his left, staring at the destroyed paintings on the wall. He proceeded with caution, making sure of each step before placing his full weight on the floor and was surprised by the solidity of his footing. Huh, I guess the fire wasn't so bad after all. That doesn't make sense, though. Lafferty mentioned that the house was totally engulfed in flames when the fire department got here. Maybe it was just contained to part of the house.

He opened the first door on his right and found what looked like an office. A mahogany desk sat in the middle of the room, the computer on its surface looked to be completely ruined. He looked at the ceiling to see a sprinkler head gleaming in the middle of the room. Carefully, he sat down his case and extracted his camera, photographing it. I guess the sprinkler system worked, he reasoned. Water was still in puddles on the floor, warping the once fine wood that graced the room.

He looked at the computer, wondering if they might be able to salvage anything from it, but decided that it took a backseat at the moment, knowing that if anyone could salvage it, Adam would. Seeing nothing out of the ordinary in the room, he walked back into the hall and made his way down to the next room, wondering what this house would say if it could talk.

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Mac was making a similar journey on the other side of the hallway, except he was finding what obviously were guest rooms. He took a glance in the closet of the first room, finding nothing but hangers in it and reasoned that the room was not in use. The second was the same, but in the third, he found some men's clothes. He carefully withdrew them from the closet after photographing them and studied them carefully. He determined that the man in question was approximately six feet tall and wore a size 38 slack. He looked carefully around the night table, trying to see if he could find some ID, but didn't find anything that could be use to determine who the mystery man was, or if he was one of the victims in the dining room. Dispassionately, he bagged the clothes, hoping that they might be able to pull some hair or DNA from it to make a match.

Pausing for a second, he glanced out the window, taking into account the ornamental bars that cut into the view, shaking his head; he knew without a shadow of a doubt that if anyone had been in this room at the time of the fire, they would not have been able to escape. Shaking his head, he walked back out of the room, to continue his exploration.

AN: Okay, so here's the next chapter. I am so excite to finally get to this storyline. I've had the majority of this and the next 3 chapters written for the last 6 months, so I'm jumping up and down that it's started. I will tell you that this will be a fairly long and involved case because I can see it extending for at least another 3-6 chapters, depending on my muse. On a side note, voting is now closed for the poll about Flack and Lindsay's baby. Final score: Girl - 14, Boy - 10. I promise that the revel is coming up soon, so y'all won't have to wait long to see who was right! On a second note, I have posted a new poll. I want to see who y'all want Lydia to end up with. :D Finally, only 2 reviews for last chapter? Was it really that bad?

Soccer - No worries! I know that you read it!

Aphina - Welcome back and I'm glad your PC is fixed!!! I'll jump on those chapters tomorrow when you send them to me (I totally wish that I could have read them today). I'm with you. I wanted to slap him upside the head, but he does have a good reason for doing what he was doing, so that'll come soon with that. I love seeing both sides to the case, how they are having to deal with it differently and I really wanted to bring some humanity back to Cory. I want people to know that this kind of thing takes an emotional toll on anyone that is having to deal with it and while she is pretty strong, somethings got to give eventually. Her friendship with Lydia has grown a lot. She trusts her (she has to since she is second in command for her), but I almost see it similar to the relationship that Mac and Stella have on the show. They know each other very well and can almost read each other's minds!! Oh, I agree that it was way to easy and that doesn't bode well for the future. Etienne is definitely a different sort of criminal and as of right now, he has no redeeming qualities--Unlike both Ortiz and Montoya (may he rest in peace). By the end of ATTH and DV, I was really sad about what I had done with both of them, but I don't think I'm going to have that sort of problem here!!