The lab was quiet as the CSI's collected in the break room waiting for Grissom to hand out the assignments. No one wanted to break the sad and heavy silence between them, all lost in memories hoping that they would wake up and that nothing would have ever happened and the team would be whole again. All but one had no clue why they were suddenly missing a team member, the only reminder that she had ever been there, a single note left on the table saying she was gone and not to follow her.
None of the lab techs dared say a word that wasn't case related to the CSI's all evening. They watched them come and go, working just as diligently as they always did but with an air of sadness and some bitterness as they wondered why she had to leave them behind and not even say goodbye. The lab techs had all heard about and read the note for themselves and they missed her like the CSI's did but they had never been as close to her as they had. They had worked alongside her for years and formed strong bonds with her and now she was gone.
The morgue was even quieter than normal; no one felt the need to say anything as they all thought back on the time that they had spent with her. She may not have always been the cheeriest person around but she was a damn good CSI and they had liked her. They just wished they knew why she had felt she needed to leave them.
There were cases as normal, a homicide and a break in at a jewellery store, and the CSI's worked professionally in silence at both scenes, collecting evidence methodically. Brass only spoke the necessary to brief them as he too wondered where in the world she was now and why she had left them. He had liked her and had always felt at ease with her, she was like a daughter to him and he wanted to protect her and hurt whoever had hurt her enough to make her leave.
She had looked happier a couple of months before she had left and that had carried on until two weeks before her departure. She had seemed upset and angry then but a week and a few days later those emotions had just intensified and she pulled away from all of them, barely speaking to any of the rest of the team. The day before she left Brass had seen her at a scene and caught her staring at him with a sad smile on her face. She had turned away so quickly that he thought that he had imagined it but he was sure now that it had been there.
She had known she was leaving and that sad smile gave Brass hope that maybe she hadn't wanted to leave them and that she would miss them as much as they would miss her and that was what kept him going through the days and months to follow. Others had also been given a sad wistful smile and had been just as confused as Brass but now she was gone it felt like everything to them, it was hope, the hope that she hadn't wanted to leave them, the hope that she missed them.
The team had gotten further apart since her departure, no one had wanted to talk about it and conversations had become stilted and hard to carry out. They all feared saying the wrong thing and bringing her up. The only conversations they had had about her had left with anger coming out and accusations being thrown around. They seemed to all throw themselves into their work as though it could bring them closer to her.
As time went on they came to terms slightly more with the loss of a friend, a member of their family, but they were still split. With no clue as to why she left they all blamed themselves and each other in a hope that they would feel better and get the answers that they so craved but nothing came of it.
They wanted to work longer to take their minds off it, the same day each year they all worked for as long as possible so that when they went home they had no time to wallow in sadness and just fell into a restless sleep, but this year there was not enough cases to keep them occupied and they soon found themselves going home alone to drown in their sadness and wish things had turned out differently.
It was five years to the day since Sara Sidle left the Las Vegas Crime Lab.