CHAPTER 4

"So you really don't know who brought it to you?" Flack's voice sounded loud and clear in the overly quiet mailroom, everyone was staring in shock at the yelling detective who had suddenly entered their office. His hands in his side and a dark expression on his face made it very clear that he was not to be messed with, at least not today.

"Well, someone took it in here right? Who?" he snapped at William Blake.

Blake, who had only just returned to his office, was still trying to figure out what caused the CSI's of the sixth floor to act so oddly.

"Well, it just was here.." Blake tried to explain "No one brought it in here, someone suddenly noticed it and notified me."

Flack raised one eyebrow looking at the overweight man who started to sweat slightly.

"At what time was that?" he mumbled under his breath, trying to prevent himself from yelling at the man in front of him again.

"I….don't know detective..something around….er..two PM maybe?" he stammered. Flack rolled his eyes, quickly gave Blake his card and mumbled: "Call me as soon as you remember things a bit better, ok?" Blake got the card and looked at an angry Don Flack exiting the mailroom without saying a word of goodbye.

"Stupid people" Flack muttered when he arrived at the elevator waiting to go up to the sixth floor again to notify Mac. "Who's stupid?" a voice next to him said. Flack looked aside and stared into the deep brown eyes of his colleague Hawkes.

"Aah, it's just me" Flack said to justify his behavior "A little frustrated about the whole situation."

Sheldon nodded looking at the files in his hand, which he had just picked up from the archives. "I heard that there is not much to go on." Don shook his head "No there isn't" he said bitterly "Just some pictures and a newspaper article. I bet Lindsay couldn't find anything on that box and letter, people like that know better than to leave trace behind." Sheldon sighed, knowing that Flack was probably right.

The elevator arrived and they both got in, Flack pressed the button for the sixth floor, waiting for the doors to close.

"You were quite close with Messer weren't you?" Hawkes suddenly asked out of the blue. Flack didn't reply but stared at the door, he nodded quietly.

"I figured, since…"

"Messer's gonna be fine" Flack interrupted "I know him, he's tough, he won't let them mess with 'em."

Sheldon nodded in agreement. Even though he never had one normal conversation with the missing CSI outside of work, he knew perfectly well what kind of guy Messer was. He was the kind of guy that always got into trouble, but surprisingly enough found a way to get out of it. Sheldon smiled at the thought of brave but silly Danny, he knew Danny would be fine, at least as long as he had some control over the situation.

They both kept quiet for the rest of the ride until the elevator reached the sixth floor.

"I'll go check with Lindsay" Hawkes said "See if she needs some help."

Flack smiled "You go do that…"

Hawkes handed the files over to Flack "Would you give these to Mac? Thanks!" he said without waiting for Flack's answer and left for one of the labs.

Flack, a little flabbergasted by Sheldon's assumption that he was willing to be someone's errand-boy, looked at the files in his hands. Why would Mac need old files for this case. Flack, curious as he was, carefully opened one of the files and took a look inside. "Ah.." he said quickly closing the file again, ready to go find Mac Taylor to report he didn't have any new information concerning the box.

CSI – Crime Scene Investigation

Prison. There was something about this place that wasn't natural. The smell was obviously far from natural. Putting over hundred people into one building, with the opportunity of spending only a few hours in the open, would cause weird scents to occur within days. Add to that the average unhealthy and mostly unclean inhabitant of any jail and the mixture will make your nostrils thrill with the uncommon and unnatural smell.

But more than that, detective Mac Taylor hated the crew of the average New York prison, who usually weren't too keen on helping him out with other cases. Today on the other hand was different. A friendly lady had asked Mac what his business was at the prison, and when he told her about the whole case she reacted very understanding and kind, immediately letting him enter the building and arranging a meeting with Sassone.

Mac looked at his hands while waiting for Sassone to appear on the other side of the glass. Next to him was an old and weary looking housewife, still wearing what seemed to be her working clothes covered with stains. She was sobbing, listening to the words the person on the other side of the glass said to her. She held a hanky in one hand when her other hand was trying to hold the heavy phone to her ear. Her whole body was trembling as she cried.

Mac looked to the glass wall in front of him again. He noticed several inmates looking at him in disgust as they passed. Mac smiled on the inside, remembering each of their faces, glad to see them punished for the crimes they committed, to see them excluded from American society.

A dark haired man in an orange suit irritably sat down opposite to Mac Taylor. The two of them stared at each other for a moment. It had been a while since Sonny Sassone and Mac Taylor had met, and it hadn't been a very pleasurable meeting. Mac remembered just a little too well the remarks this man had made, not only concerning the case of Paul Montenassi but also about Danny.

Mac sighed, getting the phone of the hook and looking directly at Sassone, who reluctantly got the phone on the other side of the glass.

"Eh, detective, been a long time.." Sassone started "still hangin' around?"

Mac kept quiet looking at the overly self confident man sitting opposite of him. He leaned forward, staring right into the eyes of Sassone. "You know why I am here. I'm sure they told you." Mac said determined.

Sassone chuckled, "Yeah, somethin' about that Messer. What's that gotta do with me?"

Mac leaned back, reaching for his jacket pocket grabbing the yellowish newspaper article and holding it to the glass for Sassone to read.

"That's why" Mac snapped.

Sonny Sassone leaned forward, a smile appeared on his face. "Ah, my fifteen minutes of fame in the paper. Still don't know why that's gonna connect me with Danny Messer." Sassone said laconic.

"Let me read it out for you, since you like playing dumb" Mac said "Your pals are trying to get us to trade you for Danny."

Sassone smiled and silently started to laugh. "Ah, now I see" he said "Still don't know what you're doin' here, xcept for takin' me out of this hole ofcourse."

Mac narrowed his eyes, silently surveying the man opposite of him, realizing he probably wouldn't get any answers here.

"You know where they are." He said "You know about this, where they keep him, what they did and what they're gonna do."

Sassone smiled evilly at Mac, but kept quiet. Mac leaned back, slowly putting the phone back. The self-complacent Sassone smiled, knowing he had the CSI exactly where he wanted him: frustrated, angry and completely in the dark.

CSI – Crime Scene Investigation

Muffled voices, somewhere far away were the first thing Danny noticed when he slowly woke up again. The cloth which they had held to Danny's face had been drenched in chloroform, causing him to lose consciousness within seconds. Danny had recognized the specific nice scent and the sweet taste of the chemical, immediately realizing he was going down soon. Chloroform was a very commonly used tool to overpower someone. Danny had seen it so many times. When a cloth was held over the mouth of the victim, they would struggle for a few seconds before slumping unconscious. A dangerous method to knock somebody out, the perpetrator usually needed a great amount of Chloroform to knock somebody out in a short period of time. Dangerous because the amount of Chloroform needed was almost as much as an overdoses, which would be lethal to the victim.

Danny breathed heavily feeling his chest rise and fall with every breath he took. He had been very lucky to still be alive. His attackers must have been either panicked by something or they couldn't care less what happened to the young CSI.

Danny, who felt his headache had returned, slowly tried to open his eyes, feeling an aching pain in his stomach, the man had probably caused some minor internal bleedings with his fast hit.

This is probably not my lucky day, Danny thought, getting knocked out twice a day any normal person would have been out for days.

Danny slowly retrieved his strengths, and although his mind was slowly waking up, he had difficulties making his body respond. With great effort he succeeded in slowly opening his eyes. Closing them again, but only for a second, for he realized the blindfold was gone. Although it was dark, he knew he had looked at, what looked like, a concrete ceiling. He had been moved, he was not sitting in a chair anymore, but in fact lying on his back on something that felt like a rug.

Danny moaned feeling rope cutting into the flesh of his wrists. His hands were in front of him, instead of behind his back. The cuffs had been replaced by ropes, which seemed very illogical to Danny, but than again nothing about his situation made any sense. The ropes had been bound tight, making it hard for Danny to move his wrists. The ropes did, however, give him the opportunity, the possibility to try to free his hands.

Danny sighed looking at the blurred ceiling above him, he wasn't wearing his glasses. They probably broke or he had lost them somewhere between getting knocked out and arriving here, anyway it was he didn't have a good look at the things around him, everything was blurry. The one thing Danny noticed immediately was that it had turned dark, it was probably after six PM and the temperatures were dropping rapidly. He tried to sit up, feeling painful aches all over his body when his muscles tightened, trying to move. He moaned in agony and fell back on the rug. He breathed heavily, still coughing raucously. He moved his arms up in order to check his watch. With the light almost gone he could barely read the time, but with much effort he could conclude that it was six thirty PM, meaning that his shift would have been over by now.

Danny sighed, breathing out white clouds. His colleagues had to know he had left by now, although there was a slight chance they thought he might have left for a few days. Danny shook his head lightly, knowing his team, they would have raised the alarm already at noon. But what chance would they have, if he didn't even have a clue where he was, how would his team ever going to find him?

Slowly the memories of the day before returned, Danny had run over that day several times, trying to understand what went wrong.

In the morning he had went to the office just like any other day, nothing special, nothing suspicious. He had taken the eight AM subway to work. Normally the subway was crowded with people, all flocking together to go to work in downtown Manhattan, but yesterday it was abnormally quiet. Danny, who was usually not very early at the subway station, had even managed to find himself a seat.

Danny remembered he had read a newspaper and had watched a girl who sat a few seats away from him. Slightly flirting, making eye-contact and smiling at each other. Could she have anything to do with it? She had looked fairly normal. Long curly hair and a freckled face, a pair of jeans and a blouse, nothing special and definitely nothing that looked criminal. But than again, Danny knew criminals usually looked like everyone else. Assimilating seemed like a second nature for criminals, never afraid to change their looks to blend in.

The rest of the day hadn't been very different from any other workday. Arriving at the office he had discussed some sports game of last weekend with Flack. He and Lindsay had worked on a new case, which had been very interesting, concerning a college student found dead in one of the classrooms. The both of them had gone to the University to check the crime scene, finding several pieces of trace, but nothing special. Lindsay had been very observant, noticing the weird position the feet of the student had. Danny still had to get used to the girl from Montana, finding her a bit intimidating every now and then.

Returning from the crime scene, both Lindsay and him had done some tests before heading home again. Danny had informed Mac on their progress in the case, hoping he would get some kind of compliment, but Mac had only smiled and nodded.

When he had finally left the office, the sky over New York City had turned to dark, and it had started freezing again.

Danny remembered wanting to get home as fast as possible, taking the first cab he could get his hands on. He preferred the warmth of the cab over the cold but cheaper subway.

Danny sighed, his eyes were already adjusted to the dark in his new room. He didn't remember anything what happened after he had gotten in the cab. The only thing he slightly remembered was a hard blow on his head from behind. The headaches he was having now were a living proof of his memory being correct about that.