A/N: All characters, cases, and locations belong to Bruno Heller, CBS, and affiliates. Please review.

On her first day at the CBI, Grace Van Pelt felt overly nervous. She couldn't sleep the night before, proceeded to spill coffee down her skirt before getting in the car, then got lost on the way to the CBI office.

By the time she finally got to Minelli's office, she felt like the butterflies in her stomach were trying to eat themselves out of her stomach.

"You must be Grace Van Pelt. Welcome to the CBI," the man said, rising behind the desk. He was balding with brown eyes that looked her over once as he walked towards her.

"Can you walk and listen? Good." She opened her mouth to reply, but closed it as the man walked down the stairs with her hastening to follow.

He wore a black suit and scuffed shoes. He was dressed in a white undershirt that had small crinkles in it front sitting behind the desk. He also had a shiny gold badge strapped onto the waistband of his belt.

"The press are all over us for the mess up regarding the screwed over double homicide in narcotics. We're drowning with paperwork and complaints. I reviewed your transcript. Impressive for someone right out of training. I've put you on Lisbon's team with Serious Crimes. I don't normally put rookies on a higher up team, but Lisbon will look after you until you find your feet."

They reached the end of the staircase and the boss was swarmed by a woman in high heels and a head full of curly hair. She had a pad of paper on her arm, her phone in between two fingers, and a blue tooth stuck in her ear.

"Virgil. The press are outside and they won't leave without a statement. Bosco, Lisbon, and Harger already railroaded me. You're up in three minutes."

The man opened his mouth and his eyes darted over to the red head next to him. He sighed and turned back to the woman.

"Hold on Brenda, I need to hand the rookie over to Lisbon bef—"

"No time," the woman cut off, not even looking over at Van Pelt. "We need to go over the facts before the cameras roll. The CBI cannot afford another media mess on this front."

"I—fine. Hicks, Hicks!" he called over to the tall, dark skinned man standing near the coffee machine with another man. Both were well dressed and discussing something in whispers, when they turned towards Minelli.

"Sir?"

"You and Dyson, take Van Pelt here to Lisbon and tell Bosco I want an update on his capital case by lunch while I go play monkey for the presses."

"Of course, boss."

The other man, Dyson, was taller than Hicks and sported scruffle across his cheek. His hazel eyes looked her up and down before holding a hand out, gesturing down the hallway.

"Shall we?"

Van Pelt managed a smile and adjusted her laptop bag on her shoulder before following them. She focused hard on not tripping in her new leather shoes she chose for her first day as a 'real' detective.

"So Lisbon's team huh?"

"Uh, yes," she said with a nervous smile. "Are you part of the Serious Crimes Team, Agent Hicks?"

Both men snorted.

"Thank god, no," Hicks said, shoving a hand into pockets as they walked. Van Pelt gave them a confused glance. He suddenly looked less professional than she had originally realized looking at him from across the way.

"I'm sorry?" she questioned, hesitantly.

Dyson smirked at his partner and began to explain.

"Lisbon's team is going downhill. They're all a real mess, a bunch of misfit that Minelli threw together."

"How so?"

She really hated office gossip. It was one of the reason she left her small town home in Iowa for the big city and the CBI.

"Cho's an ex-gang member and violent. No one would work with him because he had a record, so Lisbon took him. Rigsby's a big oaf, that's going nowhere but down in his career. Their old member, Hanagan, couldn't keep his hands off a bottle to save his life. Almost got Lisbon shot his last week on the job after showing up drunk, again.

"Lisbon's bad ass. A great agent, no doubt. She was going somewhere big. But Jane, their consultant, causes more trouble than he's worth."

"A consultant?" Grace questioned, trying to keep her face emotionless as they walked down the hallway filled with labeled doors and large open bull pens.

"He used to make his living pretending to be a psychic until Red John killed his family. Been with the CBI ever since. He closes cases. That's the only reason the boss puts up with his crap. He's dragging the team down with him. They couldn't get any other team to keep him so Minelli threw him on Lisbon's squad. She's the only one that can control him."

Her eyebrows wrinkled in confusion. Control him? Just what team had Minelli put her on?

"Rumor has it they're having a hot, wild affair, secretly engaged, or he's going to sacrifice her to Red John to finally catch the SOB. I think it's the first. There's no way she could get him to behave any other way," Hicks continued, "speaking of disaster squad, here comes Bert now."

A large man, maybe in his early thirties stopped in front of the group from a large bullpen. He was tall and muscular wearing an office suit minus the jacket. His light brown hair was short, but caught the light making it look light than it actually was.

"What are you doing here, Hicks? Dyson?" the man growled, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Just delivering this pretty little one to Saint Lisbon for Minelli," Dyson said stiffly.

"Right, I can take it from here."

Grace bit her lip as the two agents stalked off the way they came and the man, Rigsby, turned to her and smiled. His frightening and anger filled façade faded and it was replaced with a polite and kind face.

"Sorry about them. They're always looking for trouble with somebody. I'm Wayne. Wayne Rigsby."

She smiled and shook his outstretched hand.

"Grace Van Pelt."

"Welcome to the CBI, Agent Van Pelt. Lisbon's office is right this way."