Present day. Miami:
He was disturbed from his thoughts by a soft knock at the door; he gave Calleigh a small smile as she entered the room and sat down next to him.
"I made coffee and bagels for breakfast, you interested?" she teased as she placed a hand on his thigh.
He kept his head bent down but twisted his neck to look at her and shyly smile.
"Sounds good," he replied, trying to inject an enthusiasm into his voice that he didn't feel.
She could sense his hesitation, leaning over; she placed a light kiss on his temple.
"Are you sure you're ready for this?"
Returning his gaze to the floor, he nodded.
They both sat in the bedroom for a number of minutes, neither speaking until the silence was broken.
"Kyle called this morning, he wanted to wish me luck for today," Horatio said quietly as he got up from the bed, grabbing his jacket as he left the room.
She watched him go, seeing the slump of his shoulders as he walked away, a sight that had become all too familiar recently.
It had been four weeks since Kyle had left for his new posting at Camp Blanding; he had been reluctant to leave his father while he was still recovering but had used up all of his personal leave in the weeks previous.
At least the posting was State-side and not back out in Afghanistan, it seemed to help Horatio to know that his son would not be in immediate danger although it was clear to see that the events of his time at the hands of the Malucci's had served to make the redhead much more cautious and wary when it came to his son's safety.
The first few days after Kyle had left had been the worst, she thought back on the nights when Horatio would wake up screaming after having yet another nightmare about his son being killed in front of him. He had retreated in on himself during those dark few days, refusing to eat or talk to anyone, spending most of his time sleeping or screaming the house down.
As with everything, eventually the pain and the nightmares lessened as Horatio became used to not seeing Kyle every day. It made Calleigh smile to think of how the young man had doted on and cared for his father with such gentleness in the first few weeks after his rescue. The mannerisms reminded her so much of Horatio, Kyle was most definitely his father's son.
Flashback. Miami 14 weeks ago:
Kyle sat by his father's bedside and watched him sleep, only moving out of the way when a nurse came in to reposition the sleeping man's pillows and instructing him to cough. He could hear the wet sounds of fluid in his father's lungs as he breathed noisily.
He'd got up early this morning and made his own way to the hospital, he left Calleigh a note to tell her where he would be so that she wouldn't panic and send another search party out after him.
He'd met Eric in the waiting area and frowned as he took in the Cuban's haggard appearance. It shocked him when Eric told him what had happened to his father, how could the thugs that took him sink so low as to make him believe that he was dead?
And so he had sent Eric home, commanding him to go home and rest, assuring him that he would stay with his father and do whatever it took to convince the other man that he was still alive.
He watched as his father began groaning, his eyelids fluttering as he tried to lift the hand that was being held.
"Easy, Dad. You're ok," he said gently as he squeezed his hand.
The blue eyes opened and struggled to focus in the dimly lit room before the eventually found the young man sitting by the bed.
He couldn't believe what he was seeing, Kyle was dead, he was sure of it. He squeezed his eyes shut as he willed the image haunting him to go away, thinking that surely he must have died and gone to Hell.
"No," he whispered as he shook his head from side to side, letting out a low moan of pain.
Kyle gripped his father's hand tighter as he leant closer to him.
"It's me, Kyle. Open your eyes, Dad."
He could hear the sound of the boy's voice yet refused to believe that the image he was being hounded with was nothing more than a ghostly apparition, sent to show him how he'd failed the ones he loved, yet again.
"Not….real," the redhead ground out as he kept his eyes firmly shut.
"I am, I promise you," Kyle responded as he felt hot tears prick at his own eyes.
"Please, Dad. Just open your eyes and look at me."
He felt his resolve weaken, thinking that he'd never hear the voice or see his sweet boy ever again. Surely it wouldn't hurt to take one last look at Kyle, even if he weren't real.
He opened his eyes slowly and let out a sob. His son was just the way he remembered him and not some ghoulish corpse sent to haunt him. This was the way he wanted to remember Kyle.
He called out to his son in a breathy whisper, trying to commit to memory his face before it disappeared along with all of the other people he had loved and lost along the way.
He could have stayed in that moment forever, looking at the young boy who was slowly growing into a man. Something nagged at the back of his mind, telling him that this moment wasn't real.
He shook his head again and spoke aloud to himself.
"It's not real."
Kyle was at a loss for what else to do, how could he make his father see that he was still alive and as real as anyone else?
He pushed the call button, giving the nurse a small smile as she entered the room.
"What can I do for you, Hun?"
"Is Dr Woods still here?"
"Sure, I'll page her and see if she'll pop by."
He returned his attention to his father as the nurse left the room, his heart sunk as he noticed that his father was still talking to himself. It took him by surprise when the blue eyes opened once more and stared straight at him.
"Kyle, I let you down. This is all my fault." The words were choppy as the redhead struggled to catch his breath, the fluid in his lungs causing him to cough between words.
"You have nothing to be sorry for," he told his father as he stroked the back of his hand with his thumb.
"I should have saved you; I should have given them what they wanted."
His father sounded so sad, desperate, even.
"They killed you because I couldn't remember. Why couldn't I remember?"
He watched as his father began to get even more distressed, the monitors above the bed signalling how worked up he was getting.
He was glad to see Alexx enter the room a few moments later. He looked up at her with panicked eyes.
"What's the matter, sugar?" she asked as she placed a hand on the young man's shoulder.
He ran a hand over his face as he attempted to gather his composure.
"Dad seems to think that I'm not real, he's convinced that I'm dead and haunting him. He shouldn't be acting like this, should he?"
The doctor made her way over to the monitors and pressed a few buttons, nodding her head slightly at the readings before turning her attention back to Kyle.
"Your father's been through a terrible ordeal and he's still very unwell. We've got him on a cocktail of different drugs just to keep his vitals stable which is probably making him quite dazed and confused at the moment."
She pulled out her stethoscope and listened to the redhead's chest as he looked at her with panicked eyes. The wet sounds coming from Horatio's lungs confirmed what she had already suspected.
"It sounds as if the fluid has come back, we'll give him a strong course of antibiotics and hope that it kicks the pneumonia before it gets too bad."
She stopped when she saw the crestfallen look on Kyle's face and gave him what she hoped was an encouraging smile.
She was about to say something when Horatio croaked her name, she leant closer to his face to hear what he was saying.
"Am I dead?"
Had she not been so worried about her dear friend, she might have laughed at his question. She placed a gentle kiss on his forehead and frowned at the heat radiating from it.
"No, sugar, you're not. Kyle's alive and he's sitting right next to you."
The dazed blue eyes focused on her.
"You can see him too?" he asked as he began wheezing between words.
"Sure can," she smiled at him.
"Are you sure that I'm not in Hell?"
"Of course I am, sugar. You wouldn't expect to see me in Hell, would you?"
He was struggling to think logically at all at the moment, everything seemed in a jumbled mess. The more he thought about Alexx's statement, the more sense it began to make. Maybe he wasn't imagining that Kyle was with him, maybe the boy was real.
"He's real?" he asked, fearing that Alexx too would disappear into an ethereal mist and leave him on his own once more.
"That's right, baby. He's right here with you."
She stroked his head tenderly as she watched the redhead's eyes begin to droop until they finally closed, his head falling slowly to one side.
She motioned Kyle to follow her outside the room a few moments later.
With one final look, she closed the door and regarded the young man in front of her, knowing that she had to be honest with him.
"Kyle, you need to be prepared," she began. "We don't know half of what your father has been through but whatever it is, it's likely to have affected him deeply on an emotional level."
"He's very ill at the moment and that's probably why he's acting so out of sorts but you need to be aware that these changes in him might be permanent."
"You don't think he'll recover?"
"I really hope he does, believe me. Even after we've healed the physical injuries, he's going to need a lot of time and support to deal with things on a psychological level. He might not be the man you remember anymore."
"I don't care," he said firmly, causing Alexx's eyes to register her shock. "I don't care if he's changed. He's my father and I love him, nothing's going to change that."
He felt himself being pulled into a fierce hug, slowly wrapping his arms around the doctor who was so close to his father.
She pulled back and regarded him with a watery smile.
"He's going to need your love and care to get through this, Kyle."
The thought of seeing his father in such pain and misery felt like something was clawing at his own heart. Never had he felt so scared, so afraid, not even on the frontline in Afghanistan had he ever felt this unsure and nervous.
The one thing that he did know was that his father needed him. Their relationship had always been the other way around, him leaning on his father and looking for his support. He was growing from a boy into a man now, his father needed him to be strong and carry him for once.
He promised himself, and his father, that he would do whatever it took to help him recover.