Sub Zero
by Layla

In the depths of her unconsciousness she is aware of one thing only – the cold.

Not just cold, coldness can be easily remedied. She's freezing, glacial, her entire body shaking uncontrollably, almost painfully. She curls up in the fetal position but cannot find comfort. She tightens the sheets, covers and comforters around her, but it would be the same if they were not there at all. Her body instinctively seeks his in the darkness – maybe not darkness so much as closed eyes – and she presses her chest to his bare back. He looks comfortable, peaceful, not seeking warmth as her but everywhere she touches him she finds coldness, as if his body has turned into a giant icicle. Touching him burns her, freezing burn, but she finds herself getting closer anyway, sewing her legs to his, seeking warmth, desperately, seeking comfort.

His body turns and he puts his hand to her cheek, his breath releasing puffs of frozen smoke. His fingers caress her skin with tender intention but are unintentionally hard, raspy like stale snow.

"Stella?" he asks, his voice riddled with concern, warmth, but she can't feel it. Why can't she feel it? "What's wrong, baby?"

A low moan escapes her and she opens her eyes, sees nothing but blue, ice, snow.

"Can't get warm," her voice trembles, barely audible even to herself. She's tired, sleepy, her mind lagging and confused, and so cold she can barely feel her extremities.

He wraps his arms around her, strongly, his lips brushing her bare shoulders but every kiss feels like ice cubes callously stabbing her skin. And despite this pain, she presses her face to his chest, wondering if she can somehow infiltrate into his flesh and find the warmth in his core, because she can't find it anywhere else, can't find it in this bed, can't find it in his embrace.

Why is it so cold? Why can't she feel anything but coldness?

"Mac..."

"Shh," he coos, running his hand through her curls. "Go back to sleep."

Her mind offers resistance to his words, but her body doesn't have the energy to obey her mind. So per his orders, her eyes close, blackness taking over for the few seconds it takes her to succumb to nothing.

oooo

Mac Taylor is aware of the chaos around the lab. Maybe not chaos, not necessarily chaos, but a quiet unrest. At least he was aware of it five minutes ago. Not now. Right now his mind is only aware of the phone he held to his ear, the number of rings it takes for her answering machine to activate. The same old message again. Her voice never changes, but somehow it sounds different to him every single time. "Leave your name and phone number and I promise I'll call you back."

Only it's been five hours, and she hasn't called.

"Stella, this is Mac. Please call me as soon as you get this message," he says, stops there, wondering what else to say, wondering if there's anything else to say. There isn't.

He hangs up. Picks it up again. Tries her cell phone again. Slightly different message, but the same gist. The same promise. So he leaves the same message as well, wondering how much longer before he clogs her inbox with the same words, the same monotonous orders. Please call back, call home, call work, call my cell phone. Call Danny. Call Aiden. Call someone, anyone. Please. Just call.

She hasn't.

If she's mad at him he can't figure out why. They were out just the night before, had a cup of coffee for absolutely no reason whatsoever except it has always been hard for both of them to go home to empty apartments. She wasn't unhappy, she didn't seem mad, on the contrary. She was her usual cheerful self, joking around with him, sometimes even at his expense. They talked about meaningless things, avoiding the topic of work because sometimes it's bad enough having to live through their cases during the day, let alone relieve them over a cup of coffee at night. He can't remember how long they sat there. Eventually she began to yawn, so he reached for his wallet and paid for their coffees, received no complaints because it was his turn to pay, otherwise he would have.

She didn't seem mad as they walked outside. She declined his offer to share a cab with him, said something about taking the subway instead. So he said goodbye, watched her go until she disappeared into the New York crowd that never seemed to wane.

He knows she can take care of herself. He knows she's a cop. He knows she has been trained well. He knows she carries a gun but there's always that nagging machismo, that unreasonable and irrational part of him that makes him worry so much. If she knew about it she'd probably give him hell for it, call him a chauvinistic pig, which is probably the reason why he always worries, but he always worries behind her back.

But it wears him out. His mind is tired, tired of trying to come up with a million different explanations, a billion different scenarios. It's only been a few hours, and he already can't deal with it anymore. It's taken all the energy out of his body; it's taken the sanity out of his mind.

"Mac?"

He looks up, expecting to see her there, expecting to see that playful smile on her face as she laughs at him, at her own joke. "Ha ha, Mac, you should've seen your face. Got you good this time. Now what's my assignment?"

Or at least an angry expression, a frustrated sigh as she complains about how bad traffic was that morning, about how her cell phone's battery died and that was the reason why she never showed to work and didn't call.

But she's not there.

No playful expression, no angry expression, no lame excuses. Aiden stands by the door instead, her arms crossed, a very concerned look on her face.

She asks him something Mac never hears, or chooses not to hear, but it doesn't matter. He knows the question, or at least the gist of it. Aiden is worried. Danny is worried. Everyone around the lab is worried and they think it's time for him to do something about it. Because it's very unusual for Stella to be late, let alone miss work, without calling and they all know that. It's very unusual for Stella to miss work without calling and not be home, and not answer her phone, and not answer her cell phone. Everyone around the lab is concerned and they're all waiting for him to do something about it. Anything. At least give them the okay so they can do it themselves.

For some reason, he can't.

And his cop mind tells him he has to, should've done it by now, even though technically they have to wait twenty four hours to file an official report. Those are the rules. But then the non-cop within him complains, because the non-cop doesn't want to admit that there might be a problem, that there might be a problem with Stella. The non-cop reminds him Stella is weird, that she must've overslept, that she must've gotten mad at him some time between that last cup of coffee and now and she's trying to teach him a lesson by making him worry.

His cop mind only has to remind him that the more he waits, the worse it will get. And the non-cop within him finally relents.

"Call Flack," he says, not very loudly but he gets the feeling Aiden was five seconds away from doing it had he given her the order or not. She disappears into the lab, phone to her ear, and he picks up the phone again, his finger halfway to the 'redial' button when he realizes it's futile. It's useless.

His denial disappears.

Stella is not answering her phone. Stella is not home. Stella is not answering her cell phone. Stella never showed up for work and there's no denying it anymore. Something's wrong.

So he puts the phone back in its cradle and picks up his coat. Rushes out of his office and Danny and Aiden want to go with him, but he tells them, or rather orders them, to stay behind in case Stella calls, to start searching for clues, find a lead. They obey without complaining. He waits for Flack outside the station and doesn't give the young cop the opportunity to get out of his car. Mac jumps into the passenger seat as Flack asks him all kinds of questions. What's wrong with Stella? Where is Stella? Where are they going? What's going on?

Stupid questions Mac refuses to answer, instead concentrates on the never-ending New York traffic in front of them as thousands of scenarios flash through his head. When they finally pull up in front of Stella's building he rushes out, Flack right at his heels. They flash their badges at the doorman, who steps behind and lets them do their job. Mac ignores the elevators, takes the stairs instead, two, three steps at a time, so fast Flack is having a hard time keeping up with him, youthful energy and all.

The hallway is empty and they reach apartment 305 quickly. Flack knocks on Stella's door a couple of times but Mac doesn't wait. He knows he has a copy of Stella's keys somewhere in his crowded keychain and when he finally finds the corresponding three he unlocks all three bolts. It doesn't hit him until he looks at Flack that he should draw his gun, too, and he reaches for it hesitantly before he opens the door.

Her apartment is quiet, too quiet to ease his worries, until her cat Brutus jumps in front of him, crying and rubbing himself against Mac's feet. Flack heads towards the kitchen; Mac never decides to check the bedroom but his feet guide him there regardless, Brutus crying and meowing behind him. Her bedroom door is closed and he knocks on it a couple of times, stupid idea, he knows that, but a part of him can't let go of the fact that he probably did something to piss her off and that's why she's hiding.

He opens the door when he never receives a reply, and he can't tell whether the fact that her bedroom is empty is a good thing or a bad thing. Her bed is made; a nondescript book sits on her night table, next to a glass of water. He checks her tiny bathroom and it's empty, too, quiet save for the next door neighbor, who's taking a shower and singing a song Mac likes but he's singing it badly, so he walks out and looks out her window; tries to open it, but it won't bulge. Tries the other window, the one that leads to the fire escape, but that one is locked as well and that makes him feel a little better, scratches the theory that someone broke into her apartment through the window right out of his mind.

He meets Flack in the living room again and the cop is looking at him with an almost haunted expression on his face. He doesn't spend as much time with Stella as Danny or Aiden, but he's worried, too. Brutus runs towards the kitchen, wailing the whole time, and Mac follows him. The tabby cat begins to circle his dish and that's when it hits Mac. The words shift around in his mind like he's trying to put together a really bad puzzle – Stella always feeds Brutus. Stella always feeds Brutus as soon as she comes home. Brutus is very obviously starved.

Stella never came home last night.

It hits him that this is greater than he thought it was. Much worse than he had anticipated. Stella wasn't mad at him, she wasn't playing hide and seek, her train wasn't stuck at somewhere down the tracks between her apartment and the lab. Stella hasn't been missing for five hours.

Stella has been missing for seventeen hours.

For a moment he feels like he has to sit down, because it leaves him breathless, airless, and nauseous. Seventeen. Seventeen hours and no one noticed. Seventeen hours and during those first twelve hours, no one thought to call her, or check up on her, or drop by to make sure she had gotten home safely. No one called just to talk and if they did, no one called back, no one suspected a thing, no one thought to call the cops because it's very unusual for Stella to ignore her phone. She always picks up her phone and someone should have realized something was off. Someone should have done something.

He should have done something.

He should have called her as soon as he got home, just to make sure she arrived safely. He should have shared that cab with her, insisted when she declined. He should have suspected, not after thirteen hours, but immediately after that something was off. It should have been him, not Aiden, to first notice Stella was late for work that morning, and then notice, after an hour, that no one had seen Stella. That first phone call, that first doubt, that first suspicion... it should have been him.

There's a slight possibility, however faint it still crosses his mind, that Stella has been seeing someone. There's a chance she has a boyfriend he doesn't know about, which would explain why she declined his offer to share a cab with her, and she went home to this mystery guy the night before. And it's very possible, the most logical theory at this point, but he knows Stella would never miss work for a man. Stella sleeps with a police scanner on her night table, waiting for an excuse to hop out of bed and go to work; she would never miss work for a man.

Brutus is frantic now, rubbing himself against Mac's legs, crying so loudly Mac wishes he could strangle him just to get him to stop from making that noise, because there's no sound more aggravating in the world than a cat wailing and it's driving him insane. He starts opening cabinets until he finds a bag of cat food. He pours some in the tiny dish and Brutus is so hungry he eats the whole thing dry. How Mac hates this stupid cat, for no other reason except the stupid cat hates him.

"Shelter cats. It takes them a while, Mac, just give him a chance," he hears Stella's voice in his head. But he has given Brutus a chance; he has given Brutus a million chances. It doesn't seem to work. The cat hates him. And he hates the cat. Simple as that.

He hears Flack's voice from the living room, and it's joined by another male voice. Mac walks out and sees Flack taking to Stella's doorman, but it's not the same doorman who's working downstairs. Mac recognizes him as the night doorman, and he's looking nervous and scared.

"I figured she was working late or maybe out with a boyfriend," the doorman was saying, looking somewhat guilty, like it was his job to protect the tenants as well.

"What time does she usually come home?" Flack asks.

"Around eight?" the doorman answers. "Yeah, around eight. She brings me coffee sometimes. I just figured she was working late, I never thought..."

He stops there. The three of them stop there, trying not to look at each other, trying to pretend they don't know where that last sentence was going. Eventually, Mac rubs his eyes and begins to walk out. Going? Who knows. Anywhere but her apartment. Anywhere but a place that reminds him of her, of the fact that she's missing and nobody knows anything and he can't find any answers and he can't think up any theories. Away from her world and away from his world and away from everything he knows to be human, because it's only been a few hours and already he can't deal with this anymore. He just can't. He can't go through this again.

On his way down the stairs, his cell phone rings and he picks it up immediately, anticipating that second when he hears her voice and everything will make sense again. But it's not her. Foolish of him to think it was. Danny's voice greets him instead. The young CSI begins talking about Stella's latest case, about a disgruntled suspect who had been less than cooperative during his interrogation. Mac is skeptic, but Danny gives him the information anyway, and in what seems like a whirlwind of thoughts and emotions, Mac finds himself in front of Jorge Maldonado's building, and it looks dark and unwelcoming, but somehow he can't shake away the feeling that all the answers he's looking for are right in front of him.

To be continued