"What do we have here?" Rachel slid the sunglasses off her face to get a better look at the body. She could see the sunlight streaming through the alienated locker room. It made her long to feel the breeze and the sunshine. After her last long shift, all she'd been able to feel is the inside of her eyelids and a bad case of heartburn from the leftover Chinese that was still sitting in the fridge.

Kurt craned his neck to look up at Rachel, examining the sun print dress briefly over the light tan coat. Beyond Rachel, he could see the glimmer of moving sprinklers over the country club golf course.

"Well, as best as I can tell from the scene, cutie over here...."

"Why don't we give the corpse a little more respect, huh?" Noah Puckerman sauntered in, the heavy scent of spearmint gum almost masking the bourbon on his breath. He was hour thirteen into his twenty hour shift and was probably feeling it. That was the only reason Rachel didn't nitpick at interrupting Kurt or the fact that his greasy black tie was on the verge of looking unprofessional and lazy.

Kurt continued, unabated, moving the camera around in his hands as he spoke with the click and flash of each shutter of film. "I just call'em like I see them. As I was saying, cutie here was found in the sauna by one of the attendants. Cops say he brought him out into the open floor and tried giving him cpr."

Puck growled under his breath. "Damn it. That ruins the validity of the crime scene."

Rachel shook her head. "Do we have any information on the deceased?"

Kurt nodded, motioning to one of the beat cops that was taking a statement by someone who had seen the man come into the locker room. "Wallet in his locker gave him the name of Finn Hudson. Money was still there, as were credit cards."

Rachel tucked her fingers under her chin as she thought. "We can rule out robbery then. Did we find a murder weapon?"

Puck had moved over closer to the sauna itself. "Nope, no weapon. Just a lot of water on the floor!"

Kurt merely shrugged. "Could have been electrocution then. That's a dry sauna."

Rachel nodded. "Lets hope its that simple. Lets finish up here and send the body into process. Contain the room and we'll meet back at the lab."

Kurt rose, knees aching from being on the tile floor long enough. "Sounds like a plan. Had breakfast yet? Dad sent me some muffins for my birthday."

"What kind?"

Puck was already headed out the door of the locker room, the scent of chlorine from the pool wafting into the room. "I can't believe you two can think of food at a time like this."

Kurt merely blinked as Puck walked away. "But they're blueberry."

Rachel had to walk quickly to keep up with Puck. He was nearly to the car in the parking lot when Rachel caught up. "Hey! You think you're in line to lecture me about being appropriate at crime scenes when you smell like a distillery three days a week?"

Puck turned, leaning on the car for support and folding his arms. "One, my drinking never affects my work. Two, the guy just died and his wife probably doesn't even know. And three, and this is a big three, you are just jealous that I was hired and promoted. So get off my case!"

Rachel walked around Puck, blocking him from the driver's side door. "Jealous? I do the best work in the city and you know it. I'll have you know that I'm not impressed. You think you can just blow in from New York and everything should bend to your will? It's not likely, not from this girl. Now you, Mr. Puckerman, are going to stay behind with the body because I am not going to be in the same car with someone who smells like booze!"

Rachel got in the car, slammed the door, and started up the engine before Puck could object. Puck reentered as Kurt was taking pictures of the fingerprints left by the attendant. "I thought you were headed back to the lab with Rachel? You two have another fight?"

"She's just coming around. She wants me. You know what thats like, having a girl trying to resist her natural urges."

Kurt merely rolled his eyes in response and continued on, moving from the body to the contents of the late Finn Hudson's locker.

It was only a few hours later that the first table meeting was called. Kurt's photos lined the lit, glass top table and witness statements filled the small tables in the small room where nobody had enough room for a chair.

Will Schuester called the meeting to order after Puck entered, smelling strongly of black coffee and with a new dark blue tie tied neatly into a half Windsor, which left Rachel fuming at his inability to get caught laxing off. "Okay, people. Figgins has asked us to make this priority. The media hasn't gotten wind yet, but they'll be looking for blood."

Kurt piped in, palms leaning on the edge of the table. "Seems natural to me. The guy was the only son of the first female senator in the state. Are we assuming foul play?"

Will shook his head. "We can't assume it was related to his lineage or a botched attempt at kidnapping. What evidence do we have thus far?"

Noah spoke. "A possible tampering of the crime scene, since the victim was moved from the sauna and out into the center of locker room."

"The place was cordoned off, though, was it not?"

Rachel nodded. "Kurt spoke to the entrance attendant of the country club, who saw Hudson check in. He had the room cordoned off as soon as the attendant, a Mike Chang, informed him of the body."

Kurt bounced off of Rachel's statement. "My hypothesis hasn't changed from earlier. Since nothing was missing from the locker, I think we can also rule out botched burglary."

Will breathed in. "Okay, it's the start of the case and we've got some good leads, but I think we can narrow this down more. Keep me informed of your progress."

Rachel looked at her beeper. "I'm just waiting on Artie."

Will picked up one of the pictures to take a closer look. "Okay, why don't you head down and see if you can lend him an assist. Kurt, we're gonna stay here and talk about your intuition on the photos, specifically the tod fingerprints I'm picking up here. Puck, go ahead and witness the mother. Its early in the game, but perhaps she can think of someone desperate enough to attack her son. Eventually, we'll need to confirm a dateline of how much time it took to cordon off the locker room from attendant to front door staff as well."

Rachel left, walking down the opposite end of the hallway as Noah. She could already here him in her mind, flirting with Santana as that poor girl tried to deliver messages and keep the responsible yet friendly face of their CSI office afloat. She pitied the poor girl.

Artie was hard at work on Finn's corpse when Rachel walked in. The room was cold and she could tell the doctor was wearing at least a sweater beneath his scrubs. His hands, however, were deft and moved skillfully with his assortment of tools.

"What have you found, Artie?"

His long eyelashes flipped up to meet her gaze from his wheelchair. Even slightly handicapped, Artie was still the most professional and dare she say it, closest to genius, in the CSI morgue for three states. His disability hadn't kept him from succeeding. In one hand he was holding a jigsaw while using his dentistry lever to move the table to the perfect adjustable height for his work. Hidden in the above lights, a camera was flashing every ten seconds that motion occurred in the room.

"I just finished cutting the y section to take a look at the wound. I suspect the fingerprints on the chest, neck, and wrists are from the locker attendant. You can see the bruising from where they occurred postmortem."

Rachel wrinkled her nose. "Can we at least pinpoint a time of death?"

Artie merely shrugged as he traded the jigsaw for another stainless steel object. "Hard to say, especially the way that the body reacts to a dry sauna. Changes the skin cells nearly in the same way cold would. I can give you a broad range of about four hours, but that could put him anywhere between eight in the morning and twelve noon."

Rachel shrugged, unsatisfied but suspecting that this would not be a cut and dried case. Big stakes were involved. "That's not much help. Could we at least narrow down what killed him?"

Artie smiled. "Sure. Grab a glove and I'll raise up the height a bit for you."

Rachel was no longer perturbed when she looked into the chasm of Finn's chest. Desensitized to most forms of gore except for her field partner that referred to himself as Puck with all the charm of a mohawked weasel, Rachel moved along the major arteries of the body with her slender metal probe. "I'm not sure what I'm looking for."

Artie watched the probe move. "You'll get it. Just a bit higher. Do you see it?"

Rachel nodded slowly. "Blackness in the left ventricle. I can see the veins branching off. Problem is that we didn't find a stab wound."

Artie pointed with his free index finger. "But wait, there's more. I took film from the victim's back and found an opening three inches in diameter that's perfectly circular. I bet that you'll find he lost most of his blood from the back."

Rachel sighed, putting the probe back on the tray and her unsullied gloves on her hips. "The crime scene is a mess. Water and blood mingled everywhere, stress marks on the sauna door and a corpse moved. The question then is what killed him? The water in the lungs that drowned him or the stabbing? And further, what was he stabbed by?"

"All very good questions, Ms. Berry. I suggest you leave the rest to me and I'll have a full report done. They're rushing the kit through Britney at tox, so you might want to get back up there and check it out. Let me know what you find, although I'm not sure you'll find much. Finn looked like too much of an athlete to indulge."

Rachel thanked Artie. "I agree. I'd best get going. Oh, Parcheesi at my house on Wednesday after morning shift."

Artie saluted with a gloved hand in the air. "Wouldn't miss it."

Rachel could have sworn that Noah was stalking her. He was walking with that cockier than thou attitude coming back down that same hallway where they had parted less than an hour earlier. In his hand was a pre-printed list, no doubt from Hudson's mother's private bureau of investigations. She made a mental note to see the list before too long.

"How's the body?"

Rachel blinked, titling her head confidently into Puck's eyes. "He's fine. Resting comfortably. We've got a three-inch diameter of a cutting weapon at a crime scene with no weapon at all. Not sure he was killed by the water in the sauna."

Puck nodded. "Good. Press release from the governor's secret service. Gonna check this out, see if we recognize anyone from the camera work."

"I can get started on that right away then."

Puck lifted the papers into the air. "No can do chica. I am gonna take care of this one while you babysit the body until mom comes to identify it. She didn't seem to take to me very well."

Rachel let her nostrils flare in Puck's direction. "I didn't think she would. A woman with that kind of class or breeding would hardly mingle with your type of chauvinistic...."

"A-hem." Kurt inflected loudly from the doorway as he watched the tiresome exchange which he saw play out in their sexual tension way too many times. "If you two lovers are done squabbling, we have results from the tox screening. Our lovely Brit pulled a miracle."

Britney waved as Rachel grabbed for the file and smiled in her direction. "Thanks Britney, Kurt. We owe you guys."

Kurt nodded. "Big time. I haven't even had time to reapply base today after getting back from that humid locker room. Its hell on my skin care regiment."

Puck shook his head. "Dude, just a locker room."

Kurt rolled his eyes, ignoring Puck for the umpteenth time. "Okay, Rach, the tox screen was negative. Our cutie jock was not doping any type, not even alcohol, which is surprising considering its complimentary on every eighth hole of the state famous course that club has got. Most of the lifted prints were pretty trashed and there's no hair to run through screen that doesn't match someone whose using the communal area. Basically, the guy had all his wits about him and nothing to suggest electrocution either."

Rachel grimaced. "Well, its a start at least. We can rule out splinters of wood as a weapon since there was no trace in the hole and we can rule out pneumonia as the cause of the death since the water didn't have much time to seep through."

Puck shook his head. "Shoe prints are going to be hell for this, if any can be found. Think our killer's too smart for that."

Kurt folded his arms and looked intriguingly at Puck. "Whom are you suspecting of foul play?"

Puck grinned. "Everybody."