Okay, then. This chapter is seriously... informative, I guess? It's LONG. There's a LOT of Horatio in this chapter. A LOT OF IT.

Spoilers for CSI: Miami in general.

Thanks for the kind reviews Alysandra Martin, Hordak's Pupil, Silver Shadowbreeze, Miriam1, princess moon shadow, Le Pecore Nere, Plushiemon, cabot007, ImmortalPhantom22

14. Invasion of Privacy

Seven-thirty AM, Miami-Dade Crime Lab, locker room.

Danny had insisted on staying at the lab while Sam and Tucker were being treated for their wounds and cuts and broken hands. In the process, he had managed to fall asleep somewhere around the tim of nine-thirty in the lobby. Eric had taken it upon himself to move the boy to the locker room and make sure he was comfortable enough to sleep for the night. The metal bench wasn't exactly the ideal bed that he had dreamed of, but it suited his purpose for sticking around and making sure his friends were going to be all right.

He blinked blearily, swinging his feet over the edge of the bench and stretched, cringing. He remembered he didn't have an extra pair of clothing with him. After being in the lab all day, it never occurred to him that he was going to be sleeping in a crime lab. Chances were more than likely that he was by himself and Sam and Tucker were sticking around somewhere more comfortable than where he was now. He stumbled out of the room and blinked, the sunlight shining in his eyes. "Good morning, Miami," he muttered.

"Danny."

He blinked again, turning around and noticing Horatio behind him. The redhead smiled at him, fingering that pair of sunglasses he had always carried around with him. The raven haired teenager and the lieutenant stared at each other for a couple long moments before Danny yawned and gave him a wave. "'Morning, lieutenant," he replied, finally returning the smile.

Horatio cocked his head. "I was wondering if I could talk to you for a few minutes before you go and see your friends."

Danny shrugged. "Sure."

The man gestured him over to him near the window and waited, contemplating every so quietly. His thoughts drifted to memories of his wife, dying next to him in the ambulance and being stopped by the gang members. His hand unconsciously went to his glock on his side. The teenager blinked and swallowed slightly at the haunted look in the lieutenant's eyes. "Are you okay, Horatio?"

Horatio laughed bitterly and shook his head. "Far from it, actually. I just had a horrible revelation to me last night by our residential Internal Affairs agent, Sergeant Stetler."

"Is there anything I can do to help you?"

"You can listen to me for perhaps a little bit. Do you have some time to hear out a man's secrets before you run off to be with your friends?"

Danny nodded. "You helped me in getting them back... kind of."

Horatio turned towards Danny. It occurred to the teenager that he never fully faced a person ever since he had got here. His body was constantly turned at a fifty degree angle, and he would always talk downwards towards the floor and not look at people in the eye unless he meant something. Danny didn't understand the reasoning behind this at all, but he felt it was rude to pry into such matters. He looked away slightly and tried to count the floor tiles in his head while speaking aloud. "So... um, what did you wanna talk to me about?"

"Have you ever loved someone, Danny?"

It was a startling question, to be sure. He looked at the redhead, surprised by the start of the conversation. "Yeah. I've had a crush on a girl I really like, but I haven't... love-loved someone before."

Horatio ducked his head and grinned. "Like Samantha Manson?"

"Um, maybe..."

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to pry into that part of your life."

Danny shook his head. "Whatever. What's Sam and love have to do with you?"

"Well, I loved someone once too. A woman I met through my coworker Eric Delko, who got you into the evidence locker last night for your sleeping purposes. This woman was Eric's sister, Marisol." Horatio swallowed slightly. "I met her, and I found out that Eric was buying drugs off the street for her. As in, cocaine and crack."

The teen frowned. "One of your CSIs was buying drugs for her?"

The redhead nodded. "Yes. Marisol, you see, had leukemia. She was fighting off the pain with smoking crack and was going to chemotherapy on a weekly basis. I fell in love with her during this time, and we began meeting each other often. Now, mind you, Eric was very protective of his older sibling. Yes, I said older. But that didn't stop us from going out to lunch together for some time and getting to know each other better.

"Time passed, and eventually, I asked her to marry me. Some people have told me it was much too soon for the two of us since we were going out for approximately six months, but I felt it was time. I really loved Marisol. And when May of 2006 rolled around, I was ready to marry her. We had a nice wedding together- some of our colleagues attended, but not many. It was all right, though. We loved each other, and that was all that mattered."

Danny sensed a snag. "But something bad happened."

Horatio didn't nod or shake his head. He merely stared out the window for a moment before looking back at Danny, a certain darkness in his eyes. "Something bad did happen.

"Over the year, I had gained some enemies through the local gang, the Mala Noche. I had locked up a couple of their members, and they were still upset with me about it. They decided to target some of my loved ones, and the one they knew was closest to me was Marisol." He closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. "It happened less than twenty fours hours after we were married."

The teen blinked. "What happened?"

Horatio gave him a look over for a moment before finally looking at him straight in the eyes.

Danny saw nothing but a storm of emotional turmoil that made him want to reach out to the lieutenant. He had never seen anyone so brokenhearted in his life. He broke away, his mind swimming in a pool of emotions before finally whispering out again, "What happened to Marisol?"

"She was shot."

It was so blunt, so blank. The teen had a gut-wrenching feeling he was reliving his worst moment in his life. And for some reason, the boy could feel the pain as well. It was hard to say how it felt- kind of sad, kind of heartbroken, kind of infuriated. The eyes said the same thing- darkness, longing, love. Danny found the courage to speak again. "Shot?"

Horatio could only nod. "The Mala Noche ordered a hit on my wife and myself. They got my wife, but they didn't get me. I ended up killing some of the gang members in an ambush on the way to the hospital. But the real killer, who had ordered the hit, was still out there, escaping from authorities." He shook his head again. "I was enraged, to say the least."

"I see you as calm, frankly," Danny admitted. "No emotion whatsoever."

The redhead smiled. "That's what everyone thinks about me. Contrary to popular belief, I'm very human. In which, it comes to the thing I really wanted to talk to you about. You can't tell anyone about this- Calleigh, Natalia, anyone. Only you, Yelina, Stetler, and I- as well as Eric- know what happened in Brazil.

"The federal agents of the country ended up finding Marisol's killer alongside us- a drug dealer and leader of the Mala Noche in Brazil, Antonio Riaz. Since he wasn't a citizen of the United States, they had him extradited to Brazil for murder. Things seemed to be moving along very well for a while... until we got a call one day from the chief of the police force in Brazil."

Danny bit his lip and shifted his stance. This didn't sound good. Judging by the tone of Horatio's voice and the look in his eyes growing darker, his figured this wasn't going to end well.

Horatio sighed. "The evidence was sabotaged. Riaz was going to become a free man because some of the witnesses went into witness protection- or so they say. So, Eric and I decided to do what the Brazil police failed to do- get Riaz."

"But he was already free, like you said," Danny pointed out.

"Yes, he was out. And he was still running around in Rio de Janeiro. I had no idea were to start looking, so I decided to go to an old friend of mine- or sister-in-law."

The teen's eyes widened. "Yelina was in Brazil?"

The lieutenant nodded, glancing down at his watch. Seven-fifty. He had been going on for twenty minutes. This was taking longer than he thought. He gave Danny another look. "You know, you can stop me whenever you want."

"No, I'm fine. How much longer is this going to take, though?"

Horatio chuckled. "Maybe another five to ten minutes."

"All right. Go on, then. Then I'm going to go and see Sam and Tucker."

His friend cocked his head and gave Danny a strange look. The raven haired hero could figure out if it was sadness or a distorted... fury? All the same, he shook himself out of his gaze and continued speaking. "Yelina and my brother were married, and my brother had been undercover with drugs before. I figured he'd know something about Riaz, so I went to go and see them, but... he wasn't there. In fact he was busy..." He walked towards the window and stared out at the international waterway outside the lab. "He was busy dying. Riaz had him killed because he was my brother. The last of my biological family, Raymond Caine, Sr... he ended up dying when I was beside him. He kind of died in my arms, as well."

Danny couldn't help but feel tears stinging his eyes. "Your family is all... gone?"

"Yes. My life hasn't exactly been the happiest, to say the least. Now, Eric and I ran off to find Riaz after having Ray's body arranged to be shipped back to the States. Eric found him first, and I snuck up behind him when they were in the middle of a fight. Riaz had a knife in his hand, I had a discarded knife in my hand. It kind of didn't work out for him because... Eric had evaded a knife and tossed it away. I grabbed it. Riaz ran for me after my repeated attempts to subdue him calmly. Nothing worked."

A feeling in his stomach rose, and Danny hated it. He thought he was going to throw up.

"Riaz ran for me, and..." Horatio looked dark and angry and sickened. "I stabbed him."

The raven haired male put a hand over his mouth, feeling his stomach suddenly whirl like a washing machine. "You killed him?!"

Horatio turned away. "He was running at me with a knife. What was I supposed to do?"

"I don't know! Anything but kill the guy!" Danny held his head and doubled over on the ground. His head was spinning. "Why did you kill him?!"

The lieutenant's eyes darkened even more. "It was self-defense. He killed my wife and my brother and was about to kill me. I can't help it if a drug lord and killer is going to kill me with a knife and I have my own knife... god, I... what would you have done?"

"I don't know! I'm only a half ghost that has to deal with a psychotic fruit loop who just so happened to take your CSI! I have to put up with him almost every single day because he's the mayor of the city where I live! Horatio, I'm not a fifty-something year old guy who's wife has been killed!" He looked furious. "Why are you telling me all of this, anyways?! I'm a fifteen year old kid!"

Horatio stared out the window. "It's because you've faced so much more than anyone could have ever dreamed of, myself included. Honestly, having to put Vlad every day is a lot better than killing people who..."

"Is that why Stetler is having such a fit right now?" Danny interrupted, still feeling slightly sick.

The redhead didn't reply. "You've heard enough. Go and see Sam and Tucker. Give them my best."

Frankly, Danny felt sick to his stomach. As he walked to the morgue, he felt like he was getting colder and colder- literally. He began to shiver as he rushed to see if his friends were okay. Something seemed wrong. He was feeling cold, a blue stream was coming out of his mouth... wait.

Blue stream?

A loud cackle suddenly echoed through the hall as a ghost rode down the hallway on a flaming horse, pointing his weapon at Danny. He groaned, narrowing his eyes in the ghost's direction. "Let me guess- Vlad sent you."

"Perhaps," the Fright Knight intoned, stopping in front of him, his horse rearing. "But it makes no difference. I'm not here for you- I'm here for the redhead."

Danny clenched his fists and morphed into Phantom. "What's Horatio got to do with anything?"

The ghost seemed to smile. "So he is around here." He motioned with his hand onward. "He's here! Find him and bring him to me!"

Suddenly, a weather-like ghost appeared, as did a hunting ghost. "His pelt will hang on my wall for good luck! I will be able to show him off to my allies!"

"Stay focused on the ta-"

BAM. Phantom suddenly landed a punch right to the Fright Knight's armor. The ghost went flying back with his horse, and screams suddenly erupted through the hall. The hybrid did a face-palm and floated in mid-air, watching Natalia and Alexx bolt towards the scene. "What are you-?"

Natalia rolled her eyes. "We're here to help you."

"How?!"

Alexx shrugged. "You expect us to know? Just tell us what we can do and we'll do anything we can."

Phantom opened his mouth, but Natalia winked in his direction. He sighed. "All right. It's simple. I need someone to come with me to Amity Park for a couple of hours. We need to grab some things to take these guys. Meanwhile, you all can distract the ghosts with something, and the CSI and I would be right back."

"We can find Eric and ask him," Alexx suggested. "He'd be good for the job."

The boy bit his lip. "All right. I need Eric, a distraction, and some food. I haven't eaten since last afternoon, and I'm getting kind of hungry..."

God, that was a long chapter. This explain the whole Brazil thing. I know- probably not that exciting, but I'm trying to explain something for later. As for Ryan and Vlad, they're coming in next chapter, as is more of Eric. Thanks for reading, and feel free to review.