Summary: Grissom struggles with his emotions as the CSIs search desperately for a piece of evidence that could lead them to her. Spoilers for the season 7 finale, Living Doll. This story focuses mainly on Grissom and some support from Catherine. Sorry, but the other characters don't appear much, except of course for Sara.
Disclaimer: Okay, if I owned CSI, the finale would not have ended like that!
A/N: I, like many of you, was unhappy with how the season finale ended and decided to tackle my own version of how things could turn out. A fair warning, there is a bit of swearing in this story, but the characters are feeling intense emotions. This first part of the story in italics is obviously a flashback, I hope you enjoy.
Chapter One
"Hi honey," Grissom greeted Sara as he climbed into bed.
"Don't you 'hi honey' me," she glared at him.
He sighed, "You're still mad that I was with Heather last night?"
"Yes! You could've told me where you were," she snapped, "it was your night off. What if I had come home to see you on a break? I wouldn't have known where you were. In fact, I called your cell a couple times. What were you doing with Heather that was so important you had to turn your phone off?"
"Sara, you're being ridiculous," Grissom told her.
"I'm being ridiculous?!" she practically shouted.
He looked up to the ceiling in exasperation, "Heather doesn't exactly have a lot of friends and she trusts me. She was in a dire situation and I just wanted to help out a friend. You can't tell me that I can't have female friends. Are you going to get jealous if I work a case with Catherine?"
Sara snorted, "That's different. I know and trust Catherine. Lady Heather doesn't exactly instill trust in me. From the past cases and what I've heard from Brass, she's into you as more than a friend."
"I know that in the past she was very interested in me, but I never slept with her. Look, it's not any of your business and I shouldn't tell you this, but the attempted murder was…well Heather solicited the guy for suicide. He paid a substantial amount of money for her to let him kill her. She wanted the money for her granddaughter and I was just afraid that last night she might try to go through with the suicide again," he admitted.
"Oh," was all she could manage, "I…I didn't know it was that bad."
"I didn't want to tell anyone, but then when Catherine showed up and I was with her…well that pretty much screwed the plan up. I was going to be home before you and I didn't feel like it was fair to spread her private issues around," he explained.
Sara let out a short sigh, "You still could have told me where you were."
"I didn't think of you, I am still new at this," Grissom shook his head.
"That's no excuse," she said, "you're in a relationship and you have to think about the other person. You keep using 'I'm new at this' as a reason for the things you do. You have to start trying or I'm not sure this will work out."
"Sara, I love you more than I have ever loved anyone in my life. I have never had a meaningful relationship with a woman before and my social skills are, uh lacking shall we say? That doesn't mean that I don't love you and you have to be patient with me. I don't think about your feelings and I promise you I will work on it," he assured her.
Her face softened at his words, "I love you too. I'm sorry I got so worked up, but it bothers me that you can be so self-centered sometimes. I just think it would be nice to know where you are. What if something happens? What if I was hurt at work and they called here and you weren't home? I just worry about you, that's all. You must now how I feel. If I had gone to say Nick's place after work and stayed the night because we were working on a case, wouldn't you worry?"
"I guess I never thought of it that way. Just be patient with me, haven't you ever heard that it's hard to teach an old dog new tricks?" he joked.
She couldn't help but laugh, "Yeah and you are old."
"Ouch," he smiled.
As if on cue, their dog came bounding into the bedroom and jumped up on the bed.
"Oof," Sara's breath was knocked out of her for a second as the dog landed on her.
The dog licked her face a couple times in apology, all the while beating Grissom's face with his flying tail. Sara laughed when she realized that Grissom had gotten the short end of the stick and convinced the pup to lie down between them.
"He's getting big," she commented.
"I know," he nodded.
"He's a big, loveable goof though," she scratched behind his ears.
With every passing minute that Sara was missing, Grissom's heart broke a little more. He tried to remain composed and strong for his team as they always depended on him, but for once in his life he realized that Sara was a lot more important than his job. He was initially torn between Sara and remaining professional and he decided what the hell did his job matter if the woman he loved was killed?
Catherine watched her supervisor with worry. She was sitting behind his desk, awaiting word from any of the other CSIs who had gone out in the field for more evidence. Grissom was pacing back and forth in front of his desk, practically unaware that she was even there. It was clear by the pain etched on his face that he was very worried about Sara. They were all concerned for the brunette CSI, but no one was as upset as Grissom.
"Cath, where the hell do we even go from here?" he asked suddenly.
"I don't know, Gil," she shook her head, "somebody has go to find some kind of clue. Sara's a fighter though; she will be okay when we get to her."
"Yeah," he nodded absently, clearly not comforted by Catherine's words.
"I know you love her, and we're all going to our best to get her back to you," she offered.
Grissom sat down across from her with a sigh, "What if our best isn't good enough this time?"
"We found Nick with equally shitty odds. At least Natalie is still alive," she pointed out.
"Yeah, a psychotic bitch who won't do anything sing that damned song," he spat, "at least Walter Gordon's madness was somewhat logical."
Catherine was taken aback by his angry words. She had never heard her supervisor speak that way before. Although given Brass's account of how Grissom had angrily shaken Natalie in the interrogation room, it was not a total shock. His emotions were obviously getting the better of him, not that he could be blamed. It seemed he'd finally acted on his feelings for the troubled woman and now she was being taken away from him and dangled like a doll; her life now depending on a yet to be found clue or a delusional serial killer.
Grissom let out a short humorless laugh, "It's stupid now that I think of it."
"What?" Catherine felt one step behind.
"Sara and I were hiding our relationship from you," he shrugged, "what the hell was the point of it? You guys are CSIs, you would have picked up the clues eventually."
"I've got one good reason for you: Ecklie. He would raise hell if a supervisor was dating an employee, especially if it's you dating Sara. He has it in for both of you all the time," she said.
"Very true, but still in the grand scheme of things now, what's the big loss? I can't believe I actually thought my job was more important than the woman I love," he shook his head miserably.
"Everyone's priorities get skewed sometimes. It just usually doesn't take something like this to make you straighten them out," Catherine spoke knowledgeably about poor romantic decisions. She'd made more than her fair share of them, the biggest one being Eddie Willows.
"I hope she knows how much I love her," Grissom finally broke his staring contest with his shoes.
Catherine stared into his eyes, "Gil, she knows. I've seen you two exchange looks and now that I think about it, it's quite obvious that you're both madly in love."
He smiled sadly, "Yeah."
The two sat in silence for a moment before the look on his face went darker, "This is all my fault."
"Grissom, you can't do this," she started.
"No," he cut her off sharply, "it is. If I didn't love Sara, Natalie wouldn't have decided to kill her."
"She's not dead yet," Catherine reminded him.
"How do you know?" he narrowed his eyes, "for all we know she lied when she told me that she didn't kill Sara. Just to torture me with false hope and so that I'd feel even guiltier when we find her dead."
Catherine got up and moved around the desk, "Gil Grissom, you stop talking like that. That is so unlike you. You are always the voice of wisdom and you always keep us grounded in reality. You have to believe that she's still alive and we're just a step away from finding the clue to send us to her. If you think the worst, it will come true, so you have to be positive or you'll go nuts."
"Oh fuck being positive," he grabbed the miniature sitting on his desk, "I hate this stupid thing!"
With tears in her eyes Catherine grabbed his arm, "Gil, stop it."
He spun around and for a second Catherine thought he might actually strike her. Instead of rage in his eyes though, she saw crushing despair. He crumpled to the floor and sobbed harder than he ever had before. Catherine dropped to her knees and put a comforting arm around him. She was upset about Sara too, but more than that she was terrified at the way Grissom had been acting. It was so out of character for him to be so violently emotional.
Her eyes caught the smashed miniature on the floor. When it hit the floor the motor had stopped moving and now the mini-Sara was motionless. She hoped that this was not an ominous sign of what they would find when they actually got to Sara. Hodges had taken samples from the miniature to analyze and left the thing sitting on Grissom's desk. Ultimately she supposed it didn't matter if it was intact or not, but seeing the now lifeless doll made her heartbeat speed up a little.
Grissom rolled over in bed to find Sara's warm sleeping form next to him in the bed. At first he was confused because he hadn't been expecting her to be there. For some reason his mind couldn't quite grasp, he had expected her side of the bed to be empty. He put his arm across her protectively, feeling for some reason like he was going to lose her.
Sara was apparently awake, "Why are you suddenly so clingy tonight?"
"I don't know, I just had this awful nightmare that we found the miniature killer and then you went missing," he shuddered, remembering why he had felt so confused by her presence.
"That sounds awful," she turned to face him, "it was just a dream though, I'm right here and I'm not going anywhere."
Sara's reassuring smile relaxed him and he was able to fall back to sleep with her lying safely in his arms.
He was awoken suddenly by the sharp tone of his phone ringing. It took a second for him to realize that he had dozed off in his office at work. The smashed miniature on the floor assured him that Sara was in fact missing and this was not some awful nightmare.
"Grissom," he answered his phone curtly.
"It's Warrick," came the reply, "we pinpointed the location to a fairly small stretch of desert east of the city."
"Where?!" Grissom jumped up to his feet.
"Meet Catherine in the parking lot, I already gave her directions," Warrick explained, "I'm calling Greg, Nick and Brass and we're all rolling out with a search party."
"Thanks," Grissom hung up and practically ran outside the crime lab. He practically plowed into Catherine just outside in the parking lot.
"Whoa," she breathed, "slow down."
Together they ran across the parking lot to avoid getting soaked by the torrential downpour. It had occurred to Catherine that there was probably significant flash-flooding in the desert, but she wasn't about to say anything in case Grissom hadn't thought of that yet. She pulled her Yukon out into traffic and put on her flashing lights. If Sara's life on the line was not an emergency and excuse to speed, she didn't know what was.
The drive had felt like an eternity to Grissom and he was out of the car before it fully came to a stop. Catherine put it in park and grabbed her flashlight and First-Aid kit before running to catch Grissom. The rain had not yet let up and the only thing that illuminated the immediate area was red and blue flashing police lights and headlights. She caught up to him just as he reached the apparent search leader.
"Has anyone found her yet?" he demanded.
"Sir, we just got here, we're trying to get organized to search in a grid pattern," one person explained.
"I don't have the patience for this," Grissom seethed, "why isn't there a helicopter searching by air. We'd find her a hell of a lot faster."
"The storm is creating strong winds in the atmosphere and it's not safe to fly right now. As soon as it's safe, I assure you they're going to come out. I take it you're her supervisor," the leader eyed Grissom.
"Yes, this is Gil Grissom," Catherine introduced him before he could piss these people off, "and I'm Catherine Willows. We both work with Miss Sidle."
"Well Mr. Grissom, Miss Willows, you are both welcome to join one of our search groups if you feel that would be the most productive use of your time," the man offered.
"Thank you, we'll do just that," Catherine knew Grissom would want to be out there himself searching for Sara.
"Us too," Nick put in, walking up behind Grissom and Catherine.
Grissom turned to see Nick, Warrick, Greg and Jim standing behind them. They all said a brief greeting and then joined a team that was heading out along the side of the road. The CSIs were all soaking wet within minutes, but none of them seemed to mind too much. For the time being their biggest priority was finding Sara and that took precedence over their own comfort.
"I SEE IT!" someone shouted.
Grissom's head snapped up and he saw the familiar red car, looking exactly like its' miniaturized version. His heart skipped a beat and though he was much older than their trained search and rescue counterparts, he outran them all and dropped to his knees in the mud. He reached out and grabbed her hand, hoping against hope that she was still alive. Her hand was very cold and he was positive that they were too late.
Tears were already streaming down his face when he felt her squeeze back. He dropped down on his stomach and looked into the darkness under the car. Suddenly the car was illuminated and he glanced up to see Catherine with her flashlight beside him.
Sara's face was muddy and her brown hair was strewn across her face. He reached in carefully and brushed it aside. At this gentle contact, she opened her eyes to finally see Grissom. She had been praying for him to come and though she didn't really believe in God, she knew this was real. He was actually here with her.
"Sara," he said at a complete loss for words.
"Grissom," she half smiled at him and tried to shift her body. The attempted movement was a horrible idea as she was wracked with pain and she coughed hard.
"Help is here," Catherine said to both of them.
"I'm not moving," Grissom didn't break his eye contact with Sara. Now that she was actually here in front of him, he was not letting her out of his sight again.
Grissom was aware of movement around him and the whole area was suddenly lit up. There were firefighters and paramedics who convinced him to move aside for just a moment so they could get a read on Sara's vital signs. As he sat up momentarily, he noted the heavy flow of water going underneath the car. The flow went just in front of where Sara was trapped and he was struck by how close she likely come to drowning.
When the paramedics stood back, Grissom slid back into place and took her hand again, "Sara, they're going to free you now. There are firefighters and tons of people to get this car off you. You just hold on a little while longer and you'll be free."
"Good," she coughed again and Grissom was horrified to see in the better light that blood was coming out of her mouth. The paramedics hadn't said anything to him when they checked her out. They must have seen the blood though; now that he looked he realized there was quite a bit of it splattered over the ground in front of her face.
"Please don't die," he whispered.
"I love you," she choked out.
"No Sara! You can't leave me," he began to panic.
She smiled sadly at him and he knew that she knew she was close to death. It hit him that she had probably held on only long enough to see him one last time. He recalled with a sense of irony their conversation one night about how he wanted to die slowly. She had said that she was not ready to say goodbye and now the tables were turned. She was actually dying and he was the one unprepared to say goodbye.
"Sara! Don't leave me! I love you. You can't leave me. I don't know what to do without you. I love you too much," he was now crying hard.
"Tell the others I love them too," she said, her voice growing weaker.
"I will, but if you just wait a minute, you can tell them yourself," he said.
"I've always loved you, ever since San Francisco," she started, interrupting herself with another bout of coughing, "take good care of Bruno."
He couldn't believe she was thinking of their dog at a moment like this. His mind was racing and there were a million things he wanted to tell her.
"Don't talk like that, you'll be home in a few days to take him for a walk. You can't leave him with me, I'm not good with dogs," he sobbed.
"Love you," she told him once more for good measure.
"God, Sara, I love you more than anything. You can't just die and leave me alone," he pleaded one last time, "I need you."
"Sir," a voice said from above him, "we're about to lift the car, you're going to have to move."
Grissom ignored this and continued to squeeze Sara's hand. Her grip on his hand loosened and she coughed violently one last time, spraying him with her blood. He didn't even notice as she choked. She was making horrible strangling sounds and there was not a damn thing he could do for her.
"Sir, you're going to have to move back so we can free her," the impatient voice said.
Grissom finally slid back from the car, and his face told the whole story for his friends, "It doesn't matter. She's gone."
The even tone of his voice belied the pain he was feeling. For a moment, it felt like his own heart would stop beating with the immense pain. He couldn't even stand up, but he wanted to run. He just wanted to get the hell out of here. Instead he was stuck sitting in the mud, just a few feet away from the love of his life. As his friends cautiously approached, he turned his head and threw up violently.
As if it was some sort of joke, the rain chose that exact moment to let up. Now that it didn't matter, Sara wouldn't drown if she wasn't breathing. Grissom was shaking when Nick and Warrick helped drag him to his feet. With their assistance he made it to a stretcher where he sat down heavily and a blanket was wrapped around him. The blank stare he was giving frightened all of his friends.
"Sara's dead," he told them, figuring they hadn't heard when he told the firefighter before.
"I know," Catherine's voice cracked.
"She can't be," Greg was breathing heavily, clearly on the verge of breakdown.
"How could this happen?" Warrick asked.
"We get here and she's alive and then our hopes are dashed. It's a cruel twist of fate," Nick agreed.
"It's not fair," Brass put in.
"She's dead, damn it! There's nothing more to it. We couldn't have done anything, so just shut up!" Grissom lashed out.
Greg actually stumbled backwards at the angry words, looking incredibly hurt. Catherine stepped over and hugged the youngest member of their team as her own tears spilled over. Even Jim Brass, the tough veteran cop was crying as the harsh reality struck them. Sara Sidle was dead and that was the plain and simple truth. They had been just barely too late to save her. Grissom was the only one who was not crying, instead just sitting there, and staring straight ahead once more.
As Sara's closest friends and the ones who loved her stood in the middle of the desert crying, the sun began to rise. The sunrise that morning was almost obscenely colorful as the clouds from the night's thunderstorm were just breaking up. They sat in silence beside Grissom and they all watched the sunrise together.
Grissom finally broke the silence, "Sara would have loved this sunrise," and with that his voice cracked as he began to cry again.
A/N: I almost made myself cry with this one. I hope this is not how the show starts next season. How depressing would that be? I wrote this story in the hopes that the writers of CSI will go in the complete opposite direction. I know Grissom is way out of character, but he's distraught. Reviews are always welcome, the story is complete.