Author's Note:

Although this fic is the sixth installment in my "And They All Fell Down" series, this story may be enjoyed separately. To read the previous stories see "Unexpected," "Evidence of Life," "The Truth Will Out," "A Comedy of Errors," and "A Woman's Work."

Takes place between the events of 521 "Committed" and 524 "Grave Danger," circa mid May 2005.


The Best Laid Plans

Time Dilation

Gil Grissom sat in his car, nervously watching the digital clock on his dash count up the minutes until eight o'clock.

He had arrived ten minutes before the hour, just as he had intended, having left home early enough to compensate for any extra traffic or whatever unforeseen delays that might come his way. His perfectly executed plan left him with more than ample time to stare at the clock and wonder if time really did slow down when you watched it.

He considered for a little while how he might go about developing an experiment to test this hypothesis. The exercise distracted him for a few minutes, but not long enough to make any significant improvement on relieving the overwhelming whirl of emotions coursing through him.

Maybe it would have been better just to have been worried about being late.

But no, it would not do to be late tonight of all nights.

This was an evening he had thought about for a long time and he wanted it to be perfect or at least as perfect as he could possibly make it.

At three to eight, he turned off the ignition, collected the small box from its place on the passenger's seat and stepped out of the relative safety and surety of his vehicle and onto the pavement of the parking lot in front of Sara's apartment.

He took the time it took to ascend the stairs to her studio to fully consider that there was no turning back after tonight, at least not for him. Although if he had been honest with himself for the past seven years, he would have realized a long time ago that he had reached that point of no return the first time he had laid eyes on Sara Sidle.

But he was here now and that was what mattered.

He straightened the knot on his tie and took a deep breath to sooth his nerves before he gave Sara's door a gentle rap.

From within, he heard her call, "It's open, Grissom."

He tried the knob, but wasn't entirely pleased to find it turned easily.

As he stepped through the door and into her modest apartment he could not help but say, "Sara, you really shouldn't leave your door unlocked like that. Anyone could have been at the door."

Sara didn't look up from where she was sitting dressed in what appeared at first glance to be her bathrobe, bent over and seeming as though she was having a difficult time with her shoes.

"Good Evening to you to, Gris," she said, shaking her head. She cursed slightly under her breadth.

Grissom suddenly felt sheepish. He had come to take her to dinner and instead of conveying that he was indeed happy to see her and looking forward to the time they were about to spend together, he had started in on yet another lecture and had already succeeded in irritating Sara.

This was certainly not how he had imagined the evening going.

"Look, Sara, I'm sorry..." he began, attempting to swiftly undertake some sort of damage control.

"I'm not mad at you," Sara said, interrupting him before he could really get started. "It's these shoes," she explained.

Grissom smiled in relief and knelt down beside her. "Allow me," he suggested.

She extended her right leg, revealing in the process a lot more skin than he was accustomed to seeing. He took her ankle in his hand and hesitated for a moment, enjoying the way the warmth of her skin bled through her stockings.

"Bombyx mori," he remarked softly as his fingers moved to the strap of her shoe.

"Excuse me?"

He looked up at her and smiled. "Your stockings -- made from the thread of the cocoon of Bombyx mori -- more commonly known as the silkworm. One of the oldest living domesticated animals. Traditionally, the silk threads are harvested by boiling the cocoons with the pupae still enclosed as it helps the silk producers more easily unravel the 3,000 foot long threads."

Sara looked a little discomforted at the idea of anything being boiled alive.

Grissom merely continued as he buckled her other shoe, "You know that in many Asian cultures the pupae are seasoned and eaten. In Korea, they are served as snack food on the street."

"I think I just lost my appetite," Sara whispered, looking and indeed feeling a little green at the thought.

Grissom shook his head. "It's only in Western culture that insect eating is considered taboo. For much of the world, insects have served as important sources of protein for thousands of years. And because of the high food conversion rate exhibited by most insects, insects are actually a more ecologically sound source of meat than any vertebrate."

"Like I said before, I think I'll still pass, thanks."

Grissom laughed and sensing that a change in subject was likely in order said, "Someday, you are going to have to tell me the story behind this tattoo."

Sara's eyes sparkled slightly in apparent mischief when she said, "Perhaps."

Grissom was still in his scientist mode. He smoothed the thin layer of silk that covered the symbol to examine it more closely and asked curiously, "Its not made from Carminic acid is it?"

"You mean from a cochineal?"

"Yeah. How did you...?" Although as quickly as his mind formed around the question, it devised a response, "The entomology textbook."

Sara nodded. "Are you surprised that I actually read it?" She asked.

"I would have been more surprised if you hadn't," he replied.

"Thank you," Sara said softly.

"For what?"

"Helping me with the shoes," she replied, indicating her feet. "I felt just like Cinderella there for a second."

Grissom smiled as he rose, "You don't strike me as the kind of girl who really believed in fairy tales when she was younger."

"Every girl believes in fairy tales, Gris. And sometimes its those who most need them to be true that believe in them the most."

He squeezed her hand, hoping the touch would help the slightly sad look on her face disappear a little faster. "Well, it was my pleasure, dear."

She smiled at the endearment as she allowed him to help her to her feet.

"I do need your assistance with one more thing though and then I'll be ready," she said. "I didn't realize when I bought the dress that I couldn't do up the buttons myself." She turned away from him and slipped off her robe. "Will you?" She asked.

Grissom was infinitely grateful that her back was turned because he was fairly sure that his shock registered on his face.

After he made no move to aid her for several very long moments, Sara peered over her shoulder at him and called his name. He gave her a nervous little smile and set to work on the small pearl-like buttons that ran down along her back. He tried desperately to focus on the task at hand, but his normally nimble fingers fumbled with the buttons. The glimpse of the dark blue slip she wore beneath the dress made it horribly difficult to concentrate.

As he finally slipped the last button into place, he attempted to disguise the fact that just the barely brushing feel beneath his fingertips of the bare skin that lay just above the edge of her slip, made his heart race by saying jocularly, "I was wondering if you were planning to wear that robe out. Or if perhaps the old stereotype was true."

"What stereotype?" Sara asked.

"That a woman is never ready on time."

"Funny," Sara said without laughing as she turned to face him. When she did so, Grissom's eyes went wide. Sara smirked slightly and let him stand there staring until she said with a grin, "You can pick your jaw up from off the floor now, Gris."

He said nothing in reply.

His eyes merely fixed on her as he endeavored to take her all in at once.

Sure, this was still Sara, his Sara, whom he had always regarded as beautiful -- even when she was tousled-haired, dressed in what even he considered to be horrid department issue coveralls, and with streaks of oil on her face from whatever car she had recently been dismantling.

The Sara who stood right before him was equally as alluring, just in a different way.

He noticed her eyes first, because they were so diligently seeking out his own. They were the same deep umber as always, but tonight beneath a thin layer of apprehension, he found that they were warm and welcoming.

She wore the barest hint of makeup on her face, a thin layer that only just masked the light smattering of freckles on her pale skin. There was a slight shimmer to her lips that told him she had put on a different type of lipstick than she usually wore.

Her auburn hair was upswept with only a few loose tendrils curling around her cheeks and neck. Grissom had always been secretly captivated by Sara's curls. He had missed them when she had decided to straighten her hair, but at the time he hadn't been a position to protest their loss.

As his eyes followed the curls past the base of her bare neck, he discovered the cut of her dress to be significantly more revealing than that what he was used to seeing her wear around the lab.

The dress itself, he knew from the near memory of the fabric under his fingertips, was silk, cut in a manner that the garment was fitted in just the right places while still retaining a loose and flowing look.

It was the color, however, that was its most striking feature -- an iridescent shade of sapphire that seemingly captured the light just so when she moved.

It struck him as oddly familiar.

He felt Sara's warm hand on his cheek.

"You disappeared again," she said worriedly. "Where were you?"

"Brazil," he replied. When she gave him a puzzled look, he fingered the thin strap of her dress and explained, "Menelaus."

Still mystified, Sara asked, "Helen of Troy's husband?"

"Actually, she was more like Helen of Sparta, but no. Morpho Menelaus."

"The blue morpho butterfly."

"Yes. Twenty years ago I was working on this field study in the Rio Negro basin, studying the effect of deforestation on beetle populations, when the research team I was with stumbled into a clearing full of blue morphos all sunning themselves. It was as if the sky and earth had changed places -- all dazzling light and color. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen and would see --" He paused, meeting her eyes again.

"Until I met you."

As his words hovered in the small space between them, it was Sara's eyes that went wide. Her lips moved but no words came out.

Probably, the tiny part of her brain still capable of rational thought chimed, because she had just forgotten how to breathe.

So she did the only thing her emotive side could come up with and kissed him, full and hard on the mouth, leaving Grissom breathless as well.

He let himself be carried away for a few moments before he reluctantly withdrew, knowing he had to get the words that were bursting to get out out before all of his newly found resolve deserted him. He drew the warm hand that still rested on his cheek back and pressed his lips into her palm and said softly,

"Sara, every time I see you its like I'm seeing you for the first time and yet -- it is as if I have seen you forever."