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 Shinedown.

Chapter 25.

Never Too Late

By the time that Lindsay and Flack arrived at the hospital, her euphoria had disappeared and her body was aching. She watched tiredly as the doctors carefully checked over Ryan, with Flack hovering protectively over them.

Finally the doctor smiled. "Well, we've weighed him and he comes in at a good five pounds, ten ounces. Is he really three weeks early?" At Lindsay's nod, he continued, "Well, he is in good health and it just looks like he was ready to meet the world. We'll keep both of you here for a couple of days, to make sure that there weren't any complications, but barring that, I'd say you'll be home by the weekend."

Lindsay smiled again as she smothered a yawn. "Lord, I'm tired," she muttered as she fought to keep her eyes open.

The doctor nodded. "That's to be expected. Your body has been through a traumatic ordeal and you need your rest. Were you planning on breast feeding?"

"Yeah, I think it's best since he still get some immunity protection from my milk," she answered as she watched Flack cradle the baby. He was a natural.

"Good. Then let's get you settled in a room, so you can get a few hours sleep before he needs to feed. The nurses will bring him in to you," he said looked at Flack. "That is if your husband lets him out of his arms."

Flack flushed at his words, he had been so totally engrossed in staring at the most perfect little boy in the world that he had completely ignored the doctor and the nurse who was standing by with a bassinet. Reluctantly, he placed his son in the plastic bed before returning his attention to the doctor, who was asking for Lindsay's insurance information so he could check her in. He looked at her and realized that she was not following the doctor's words at all and withdrew his wallet. Quickly, he extracted their insurance card and the doctor nodded gratefully before instructing the nurse to take her up to the maternity ward. Flack followed, his heart bursting with pride at the unexpected turn of events.

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Cory awoke around six a.m. London time and immediately checked her phone, her heart dropping when she realized that Danny had not returned her call. She bit her lip, wanting to call him again, but her pride wouldn't permit her to do that. Fine, if he's going to ignore me, two can play that game, she thought. She quickly jumped in the shower and got dressed. She hoped that if she got to InterPol early enough, the Iron Maiden wouldn't be the receptionist and she could actually get in to see Alistair. She decided to keep an optimistic view and quickly was walking out of the hotel, hoping to grab a cup of coffee before she began her long wait.

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Alistair was walking into InterPol at the same time as Cory was waking up. His mind was heavy with thoughts about his reaction to Cory. He was ashamed of himself for ignoring her, but breaking his silence would reduce his pride and that was one thing that he was not willing to do.

When he found out that she had shown up basically on his doorstep, he had decided that he needed to refresh his mind on Etienne. So he had locked himself in his office the previous day, with instructions that he was not to be bothered unless the world was coming to an end, and then only if he could do something to stop it.

As he had reread the case file, he relived the mistakes that he had made fifteen years before with grim determination. He had no idea what has caused Cory to fly to London, but he knew by her actions that it must have been important.

Sighing, he sat down at his desk, determined to do some more research before finally letting himself meet with her, for what he knew was going to be an uncomfortable conversation for him.

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Stella and Hawkes made their way from the dining room to the kitchen, their minds still reeling over the discovery of the woman, so they were unprepared when they walked into the kitchen. It looked as if it had born the brunt of the fire; the walls black with soot and water still in puddles on the floor. But, that was not what surprised them.

What shocked them was the sight of a burned body, almost a skeleton, which had been chained to the island in the center of the room. Stella looked at Hawkes, disgust showing in both of their eyes at the sight. "Why would someone do this, Sheldon?"

Hawkes shook his head. "I don't know. It's like they were all slaves, trapped in this house and destined to die here." He looked around the room, not even able to focus on what he was seeing as his mind tried to come to terms with the worst that humanity had ever thrown at him.

Stella nodded thoughtfully. "You know, they said that this was arson, could it be that one of these people started the fire to end their pain?" She chewed on her bottom lip slightly. "I know that if I were chained in here, I'd do anything in my power to try to escape that pain, whether it is a physical or spiritual escape."

Hawkes looked at her, obviously thinking hard about it. "At this point, I think anything is possible." He sighed heavily. "I don't know about you, but I think I need some fresh air. We also need to arrange for some sort of transportation to get these bodies to Sid."

Stella nodded her agreement. "I also need to check in to see what Adam has found out," she said as she turned around to exit the house. When she got to the door, she saw Danny practically running down the stairs, revulsion and queasiness evident on his face. Mac was following after him, his normally tanned complexion, ashen in the moonlight. She felt her stomach drop in fear. "Oh god, what did you find?" she asked, not really wanting to know the answer to her question.

Mac just shook his head, indicating that he didn't want to talk about it yet, so they just followed him to the parked crime lab SUV's. Stella watched in shock as Danny proceeded to throw up, his nausea overwhelming. When he finally had emptied his stomach, he laid his head upon his knees in an obvious attempt get himself back under control.

Mac leaned against the car. "What did you find?" he asked the pair.

Stella told him as quickly and precisely what they had discovered, but she was confused when Mac didn't seem fazed. "Mac? This doesn't surprise you?" she asked in bewilderment.

"Not in the least after what Danny and I discovered. It could only be described as a torture chamber and actually, if you're up to it Hawkes, I'd like to get your medical take on it." He looked at the doctor gravely. "I will warn you; it is truly gruesome. Take your worst nightmare and multiply by a million and that's what we found up there."

Hawkes looked at him in surprise. "Really?"

Danny groaned from the ground. "Trust me, it's going to haunt me until the day I die," he muttered into his knees, not looking up.

Hawkes sighed. "All right, but I don't know what I'll be able to do?"

"Any insight you can possibly give, will be much appreciated," Mac reassured him before turning to Stella. "We need to arrange for transportation to the morgue, but I think that the fewer people that see these bodies, the better. From the quick glance that I took upstairs, we're looking at around fifteen to twenty bodies there."

"Plus the twenty to twenty-five downstairs, we pretty much need something the size of a semi." She pursed her lips. "All right. I'll work on that and see what Adam has dug up for us now. You two go examine the room that you found and if God is with us, we can leave this place by afternoon."

Hawkes just nodded as him and Mac began to walk back towards the house of horrors.

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When Adam awoke from his nap, he found an email waiting for him from Stella. It contained two sets of fingerprints that she wanted him to run. Glancing at the computer running the facial recognition, he saw that it was still running (six hours later) and sighed. He quickly scanned the fingerprints into the system and began to search for them.

Within moments, he had hits on both sets of prints, but when he tried to access the records, he found that his security clearance wasn't high enough. Shaking his head, he called Mac.

"Taylor," Mac answered, his voice sounding grim.

"Hey Mac. Those fingerprints that Stella had me run? I don't have the security clearance to access the records," Adam informed him.

Mac's eyebrows shot up. "Really. Isn't that interesting?" He paused for a moment before continuing, "Okay. Let me give you my code, but Adam? You are to forget this once you type it in."

Adam nodded to himself. "Whatever you say. I didn't hear anything, didn't type in anything," he reassured Mac. Once Mac had given him the code, he entered it immediately and then looked at the screen in shock. "Um, boss? You don't have high enough security clearance either."

"What?!" Mac exclaimed.

"Seriously, it says access denied." Adam chewed on his lip. "What about Cory? Do you think that she might have the access?"

"At this point, I couldn't tell you that, Adam. But why don't you try. If not, we'll find someone who does and clear up what happened here." Mac sighed tiredly. He hadn't slept in close to twenty-four hours, but he knew that he was going to get a chance on the drive back, since he had made both Stella and Danny take naps in the cars so they could make the long drive back. Both he and Hawkes were still too disturbed by the scene to be able rest. In fact, when they had gone back up to what they were referring to as the torture chamber, they had studied the bodies of all the victims and the atrocities that had been committed sickened both of them.

"All right," Adam returned. "I'll give her a call now. She should be awake, I hope."

"Let me know what you find," Mac instructed before hanging up the phone and running a weary hand down his face.

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Cory was surprised when around noon the Iron Maiden gave her the okay to go up to Alistair's office. She exhaled slowly as the rode the elevator upstairs, chanting a mantra in her head to stay calm. The last thing that she needed was to unload all of her frustration and anger onto him; however much he deserved it. She didn't want to alienate him, since she knew that she needed his help to figure out exactly what Etienne was planning and why it was tied to her.

As she came to a stop outside of his office, she drew a deep breath before knocking. When he called for her to come in, she did and stood in front of his desk.

"Corrine? To what do I owe this pleasure," Alistair spoke with a smile that didn't reach his eyes.

Cory's eyebrows rose at his statement and her temper snapped. "Gee, I don't know. Maybe because you hung up on me?" she seethed. "Why the hell did you withhold information about Etienne on me?"

Alistair looked at her. "What did I withhold, Corinne? I know nothing more about his whereabouts than you do," he reasoned calmly, knowing that he was speaking the truth. He had no idea where the man was. If he did, he'd been in custody.

Cory stared at him, flabbergasted at his thinking. "You didn't think that I needed to know the name of the man who was responsible for almost killing my mother?" she shot back. "The fact that he's a rogue InterPol agent? Really, you didn't think that was important?"

Alistair looked at her. "Important to you? No, it wasn't. Etienne is my problem, not yours, Corrine."

"Why the hell is he only your problem? He's responsible for the deaths of fifty children and the Lord only knows what he is planning next! Get off your high horse Alistair and give me the damn information I need to stop him," Cory exploded.

"What makes you think that you can stop him?" he returned angrily as he rose from his chair. "God knows that I've been trying to do that same thing for the last fifteen years and look how well that went. He's now one of the world's most sought after assassins. It's my job to catch him and bring him to justice."

Cory took a step back, recognizing the tone in his voice and understanding for a moment what Danny had been trying to tell her. "You've gotten personally involved," she stated, her anger washing away. "Trust me Alistair, I understand, but you can't let your anger towards him overcome your logic," she reasoned.

"I'm not," he returned waspishly.

Cory just looked at him before settling in a chair. "What did he do?" she asked lowly.

Alistair stared at her, seeing the understanding and compassion in her eyes. He sighed as he sank into his chair tiredly. He knew that he would have to admit his sins to her. "To understand that, I'll have to start at the beginning."

Cory nodded. "Okay, I get it."

Alistair settled back, an uneasy look on his face. "Twenty years ago, when the Iron Curtain began to fall, I was a fairly young agent. Idealistic. Actually, you remind me a lot of myself during that time," he said thoughtfully. "Anyway, when the Curtain actually fell, I made the suggestion to try to recruit some of the former KGB agents. So, I got with the field agents that were assigned to the Soviet Union to see if any of the agents that they were observing fit the profile we were looking for. One of them, Andrew Middleton suggested that we interview an agent by the name of Boleslav Kladivo."

Cory sucked in a breath, recognizing the birth name of Etienne from the dossier that her unknown informant had given her. "Also known as Etienne Martel," she said baldly.

"You are correct, although I knew next to nothing of him at the moment. I was careful, though. I had Andrew get me a complete background on him. Within a month, I knew everything about him. From how he grew up in Prague and experienced the Soviet invasion of the Czech Republic in '68 when he was seven to the Soviet orphanage that he was placed in after his parents were killed a few years later. I thought I had my man. An in into the KGB, someone that could give me the knowledge that we needed to prevent any harm from coming to us when everyone was scrambling to survive after the fall."

Cory leaned forward, drawn into the story. "So, what happened?"

"After three months of an intensive background investigation, I gave Andrew the okay to approach him. After several meets, Andrew brought him to London, for a formal meeting with me. I went over the background and when he was here, he was subjected to several psychological exams. Everything came back perfect, so I made a formal offer." Alistair leaned back, closing his eyes briefly.

Cory bit her lip, sensing that the next part of the story was going to be crucial to understanding what had caused the man to become a thorn in Alistair's side. She stayed silent, letting Alistair take his time.

"A couple of years later, we sent him and three agents back to a hotspot in Russia, where the Russian Mob was becoming a project. They were to infiltrate the Mob in hopes of bringing down a weapons smuggling ring. Three months later, the situation exploded. Literally. A bomb ripped through the safe house that the agents were staying. Two were killed instantly, the third made it to the hospital. He survived long enough to tell the handler that Boleslav was the one who caused it."

"Do you know what he did?" Cory probed.

"No, only that he went rogue. Sided with the Mob and sold out his partners." He looked at Cory, emotion cracking his normal cool exterior. "The three agents that died, they were good people. Good friends and I had to break the news to their families. I swore on each of their graves that I would catch him."

Cory nodded as she leaned back. "Look, I get it. I reacted the same way after James was murdered, but by withholding that kind of knowledge from me, it's made my job harder. He is gunning for me for some unknown reason. The only thing I know is that from what my mom told me, he believes that I am the key to bringing down America. As much as I understand your situation, you can't do this alone. I think that if we work together, then we can bring him down. You with me?"

Alistair stared at her, realizing the truth of her words, but just as he was about to respond, her cell phone rang.

Cory jumped, her hopes rising as she pulled out the phone with an apologetic look. "Sorry, give me a moment," she said as she flipped answered the phone. "Reid."

"Hi Cory. It's Adam. Did I wake you?" Adam's cheerful voice asked her.

Cory looked at her phone in confusion until she remembered the five hour time difference between London and New York. "Um, Adam, I'm in London."

"What? No one told me. So I guess I can't get you to see if the FBI can ID these fingerprints."

Cory smiled. "It was a spur of the moment trip, Adam. Why can't you ID the fingerprints?"

Adam sighed. "I don't have high enough security clearance. Neither does Mac," the young man admitted.

Cory's eyebrows shot up as she took in what he had told her. "Well, that is interesting. Tell you what, email me the prints and I'll see what I can do for you. Deal?"

"Deal. I'll email you some basic details of the case as well. It's been a frustrating time. Thanks, Cory."

"You're welcome, Adam. I'll get back to you as soon as I find something out," she promised as she looked at Alistair and hung up her phone. "You up for solving a mystery? A set of fingerprints that are so top secret that the head of the New York crime lab doesn't have the security clearance to view."

Alistair smiled. "Sounds intriguing," he said before moving the topic back to their previous conversation. "You are right. I think it's going to take both of use to catch Boleslav, so I will stop withholding information. Together, we'll catch him."

AN: Okay. So now you know what Alistair was hiding! Now, who can guess why Mac can't access the records? :p Another mystery to clear up!

Soccer - Thanks!

Maddy - I can't believe that you haven't used any of them! They are such fodder for some really icky cases. I hadn't heard of the Chicken Man until you reviewed, but I did look it up online and that's just cool. Hopefully, he'll stick around and keep protecting the city. :p

Nienna - Thanks! I knew that I had to through that disclaimer in there, considering that I got nauseous when I reread what I had written! Thanks. I hope that I can keep your interest. :p

Axellia - It has taken forever! I am so glad to have little Ryan here. Hopefully, I can have some good interaction with all of the characters and him. I think Danny may freak out a little. It is a nice relief, since this story is so drama filled. I need some more fluff in here. :p So, when you do move here, you totally have to do the tours! They are fab. There is nothing wrong with the fact that you love this twisted little plot. It is so very creepy and it still give me the wiggins. Is it wrong that it worries that I have something like this in my head??? lol. :D