Chapter Title: Dying

Author: Sam

Story: Speed Trap: 01 of 23

Series: SpeedBurn: 09

Characters: OC: Joe Avery

Rating: M: violence, language

Summary: When Miami, Dade loses one of its own, it effects more than just Horatio's team. The repercussions can be felt as far away as even New York City.

Spoiler: Yeah, season 1 of CSI: New York and seasons 1 – 3 of CSI: Miami. Specific episodes: "Officer Blue", "Night Mother", and "Tanglewood" from CSI: New York; "Dispo Day", "Freaks and Tweaks", "Big Brother", "Lost Son", "Under the Influence", and "From the Grave" from CSI: Miami; "MIA to NYC: Non-Stop" crossover for CSI: New York and CSI: Miami. Specifically, the entire episode: "Lost Son" from CSI: Miami.

Category: Crime-related; Drama; Science; AU

Setting: AU: SpeedBurn: Saturday, December 4, 2004 to Friday, September 23, 2005: Maine, New York City, and Miami.

Disclaimer: CSI: Miami was created by Ann Donahue, Carol Mendelsohn, and Anthony E. Zuiker and produced by Alliance Atlantis Communications (2002-2007), The American Travelers, CBS Paramount Network Television (2006-2009), CBS Productions (2002-2006), CBS Television Studios (2009-2012), Jerry Bruckheimer Television, and Touchstone Television (pilot only). CSI: NY was created by Ann Donahue, Carol Mendelsohn, and Anthony E. Zuiker and produced by Alliance Atlantis Communications (2004-2007), Alliance Atlantis Motion Picture Production (2004-2007), Alliance Atlantis Productions (2004-2007), CBS Paramount Network Television (2006-2009), CBS Productions (2004-2006), CBS Television Studios (2009-present), Clayton Entertainment, and Jerry Bruckheimer Television. I am in no way connected with these people, and I do not claim ownership of these characters, lands, or names. I have borrowed them to share a story, and most likely not a story any of them would have written, had they had the time or no. I am making no money from this and it is just for my entertainment and that of free entertainment to a select group. Thank you.

Distribution: Please ask first?

Note: In the SpeedBurn timeline series significant changes occur in various episodes, marking differences in each series. The initial drastically changed episodes are in chronological order: "Bait" (Without a Trace), "Reveille" (NCIS), "Lost Son" (CSI: Miami), "Bodies in Motion" (Crime Scene Investigation), "Summer in the City" (CSI: NY), and "In Name and Blood (In Birth and Death)" (Criminal Minds). Many episodes after those changed are also different. This story is number 9 in the grand scheme. Thank you. This story is a cross-over between CSI: NY and CSI: Miami.

Second Note: False Identification mentions Calleigh's rape, when written.

Feedback: Yes, please, especially constructive.

xxx

Setting: Saturday, December 4, 2004: Old Harbour, Maine:

Groaning, the thirty-something man shifted restlessly on the hard wooden floorboards of the nearly bare apartment. Only a sleeping bag lay between him and the cold surface, doubled over for cushioning instead of on top of the man for warmth. He shivered as a draft crossed his thinly clad body, T-shirt and old jeans not enough protection in the cold December air of a late New England fall.

He shifted again and felt an intense, sharp tug of pain in his chest, and his hand went defensively to cover the ragged wound dubiously protected by old, none-too-clean bandaging. The sudden attack left him panting and weak. He didn't know how he could live like this much longer.

The program was supposed to help him, not bring him back from the edge of the abyss to desert him, freezing and weak and alone. He wondered just how many other screw-ups had left people without money or help at the possibly worst time in their lives. If something didn't change soon, if the program didn't figure out why he was there and how to get him out of it, they might as well just bury him, because the young brunet couldn't stand another night of this wretched existence that had become his life.

Distraction: he needed distraction.

With a soft sigh, feeling the sharpness easing in his wound, the man opened chocolate-colored eyes. He moved his shaking hand up, over his damp face and into shaggy, unkempt brown-black curls. Rather than dwelling on the lack of furniture, medical care, and even soap, in his current life, he concentrated on the little things.

"My name is Joe Avery," he told himself, the suddenly hoarse admission cutting through the cold night air. "Joe Avery . . . the nobody." A derisive, humorless snort followed that statement, cut short by a gasp at the renewed sharp pain. Damn! If the program didn't come through soon, he wouldn't need medical care anymore; he'd be dead already.

Joe let his pain-filled eyes close once more, willing the intense pain to ease, to disappear completely. As it obeyed, this time, the man further willed himself to relax. The pungent scents of human sweat and unwashed body and clothes surrounded him, but he'd actually started to get used to the sickening odor. Life was a far cry from the way it used to be, before he'd made mistakes, before he'd wound up in the program and just this side shy of homeless and derelict. Hell, in a couple more days, he'd be out of the food he'd been grudgingly provided by the bitter woman who'd dumped him in this unfurnished, unheated studio apartment. Then he would have to go begging, something the once proud man had never done in his life. In fact, this was the first time in his life he'd actually not had enough to eat, had the threat of starvation hanging over his broken body.

"I live at 44 Donner Street in Old Harbour, Maine." Live? Yeah, right! As if anyone could call this living. It was more like a limbo existence, somewhere between hoping against hope to be rescued and waiting to die in obscurity. He might as well have taken his chances in the shelters and churches; they'd undoubtedly have helped him more than the program.

Hell . . . that was what the program should really have been called.

God, he needed a fix: just something to take the edge off, really. A bitter chuckle escaped the thin man, followed by a gasp of pain as his chest once more reminded him of its recent trauma. Once upon a time, when he'd lived a different life, a fix would have meant something nefarious and disgusting . . . would have meant coke or heroin or meth. Now, it simply meant 'something, anything to get rid of this soul-eating pain.' If he had money, he might have even been tempted to try one of those forbidden false self-medications . . . then again, if he had money, he'd have checked himself into a hospital, no identification be damned.

Ironic how hard the paramedics had tried to save him, had even used electricity to bring him back from the dead. They'd pushed so much blood into him; his DNA could have changed, if that had been possible. With all the tubes, wires, and monitors, for two months Joe had looked more like Frankenstein's creature than a real human being. And for two months, his precarious life, shattered by a single bullet, had balanced on the thin knife's edge of hope. Science nearly gave up on him, medicine wailed in despair that he would ever regain that ephemeral state called life, and religion hovered just out of reach, waiting to claim him in that final, all consuming darkness each person comes to dread or resignedly accept. Somehow, someway, life had won and the man known as Joe Avery had been reborn. Had been reborn merely to find himself neglected, forgotten, two and a half months later, lying on a cold hard floor in an out of the way place, dying once more . . . this time more slowly and painfully than the initial shooting had done.

Perhaps, just perhaps, he should give in, waste the efforts of that heroic medical team and let the cold darkness claim him. Perhaps the doctors had been wrong to defy God and pull him back into life. Perhaps Joe Avery was never meant to exist, the man he had been was meant to die in that shooting so very long ago, two and a half months and a lifetime in the past.

Joe closed his dark brown eyes once more, and this time, he didn't even bother to gasp as the pain shot through his heart and radiated over his chest. This time, he even stopped trying to will it away.

Perhaps it was time Joe Avery accepted death after all.

xxx

To Be Continued in Chapter Two: Rescued

xxx

This is being attached to all first chapters of my CSI: Miami stories as it is imperative for the timeline!

On someone's recommendation I just watched Season 8, Episode 1 of CSI: Miami. I was horrified to see the discrepancies as compared to the original season and character biographies released in 2002. These discrepancies mainly revolve around Speed and when everyone came to or left the CSI lab. Thus, here is the original timeline as released in 2002 between Season 1, the biographies by the network, and Rory Cochrane's personal website, incorporating what I can of Season 8:

1991: Speed's best friend from high school (unnamed) receives a severe spinal injury during the senior class trip. Speed goes to medical college as a result (to try to heal him).

1993: Speed's best friend dies in surgery while Speed is in the second year of medical college with a double major (meaning four years of classes in two years). Speed drops out and disappears right after the funeral. He is not seen or found for a year.

1994: Speed turns up in Miami, living with the uncle of his deceased best friend. The uncle is a CSI from Miami's crime lab, under the supervision of Megan (Donner – no mention if she is actually married at this time). While bored, Speed visits the crime lab with his host and falls in love with the work. He applies for a job. Megan tells him to finish college and she'll hire him as a tech. He goes back to college.

1995: Speed graduates with a double major (meaning he finished four years of college in one year). He applies and is hired. In six months (supposed to be the quickest of any tech in Miami), he is made an investigator. This is without becoming a police officer at all. Horatio leaves the bomb squad and transfers to the Crime Lab. He is working under Megan. Rick Stetler also joins the crime lab (from homicide?). Both are trained by Speed as CSI's.

*September 1996: (My additions) Megan takes a temporary academy teaching position, leaving the Lab in the hands of her team: Speed, Horatio, Stetler, and various non-science related officers like John Sullivan. Speed goes to the St. Petersburg Police Academy (6 months, then a 6 month stint in St. Petersburg on the beat for experience). Shortly after these two leave, Jessie Cordoza arrives for a one year assignment before going to California.

September 1997: Flashbacks of "Out of Time" (CSI: Miami, Season 8, Episode 1) occur.

*September 1997: (My additions) Calleigh transfers from Louisiana to cover for Cordoza while they find a replacement. Within a few months, she is replaced so goes back to Louisiana. Speed returns from St. Petersburg.

*October 1997: (My additions): Megan returns from teaching and takes over the lab supervision once more.

2002: David Caruso states he is pleased that the CSI characters 'working for him' are all police officers (thus my addition of when Speed may have gone to the academy).

March 2002: Megan's husband Shawn Donner is killed in the line of duty. Megan is offered two weeks bereavement leave. She takes six months instead. The supervisor job opens, but Speed refuses to apply for it, content at his own rank. Horatio and Rick compete for the job and Horatio gets it. Rick transfers from the lab to IAB in order to get a promotion, but remains angry and resentful of Horatio. Horatio immediately hires Eric Delko and Calleigh Duquesne, handpicked CSI's. (Delko nearly made it to the Olympics as a swimmer and Calleigh was known as Bullet Girl in Louisiana at the time.)

May 9, 2002: "Cross Jurisdictions" (CSI: Miami and CSI crossover episode).

September 23, 2002: "Golden Parachute" (CSI: Miami pilot episode). Megan returns to the team as assistant supervisor. Eric expresses his anger for her attitude and Speed explains the loss of Megan's husband. (This denotes Eric did not know Megan or her history.) Also note that Megan relies heavily on Speed out of habit and unfamiliarity with Delko and Calleigh. She gives Speed double and triple amounts of work, which Horatio at times counters.

September 19, 2004: "Lost Son" (CSI: Miami episode). Speed is given full honors during the funeral, including an American flag and gun salute (denoting he is a cop).

Megan is only present for the first ten episodes. She leaves the series by the 11th episode. The character is said to have retired due to Post Traumatic Stress related to her husband's death. The actress is said to have left due to professional differences with David Caruso. My opinion differs about this for the following reason:

Speed and Megan are said to be very close friends, however the only voluntary contact Speed makes with her is during "Golden Parachute" when he sympathizes with her loss of Shawn. After that, he will not come physically close to her: stepping away if she approaches, hugging himself in an unconscious self-protective gesture, and moving so that at least one person or piece of equipment is between them whenever he is able. I think the professional differences were between Rory Cochrane and Kim Delaney.

Season 8, Episode 1 discrepancies: 1997: Calleigh transfers to Miami Crime Lab, which is "a closet". Horatio encourages Eric to become a cop then join the lab. Jesse Cordoza recommends "Speedle, a great guy up in St. Pete's (St. Petersburg, Florida, implying Speed is a cop.)". Horatio is also made head of the new crime lab, and Megan is mentioned as being in the field, but implied to be working for Horatio.

As you can see, these are major changes. My stories, especially in the SpeedBurn timeline are based on the original information released and not on the discrepancies in Season 8, though I have made adjustments which incorporate almost all Season 8 changes. Merrianna follows my lead on this, as well.

Thank you,

Sam