A Christmas Carol
Some characters seem to be very out of character. I'm sorry. That's only because they needed to fit the characters in the real story…Oh, yes, true indeed: sometimes it's very, VERY old British English. Sorry for that!
I hope we all remember Judge Cohen. He was that sneaky bastard of a Judge that tried to get Warrick do some bets for him. Well, in this story, he's dead. Hooray?
This is the CSI version of a Christmas Carol. There might be many mistakes and unreality in it, but in the end: it's all about the thought. Well a very joyful Christmas!
Chapter One
The Ghost of Judge Cohen
Once upon a time – of all good days in the year on Christmas Eve – 'old' and bald Ecklie sat busy in his office. Outside it was cold and bleak for Vegas. It was quite dark already, but that was about time after 8 pm.
He was watching his clerk, Judy, doing his paperwork while he was making some phone calls. The air-conditioning in his office was nearly on, making the temperatures almost unbearable.
'Ah, a merry Christmas, Mr. Ecklie! May there be less crimes,' It was the voice of Gil Grissom, who came upon him so fast, that it was almost unnoticed.
'Merry Christmas, humbug,' Ecklie said as he continued looking up some numbers.
'Christmas a humbug, Conrad? You don't mean any of that, I am sure.' Grissom said, sounding pretty amused.
'I do, Gil, I do. There is no reason to be merry. All the crimes rates keep growing. You'll be busy enough with Christmas.'
'On the contrary, what reason you have to be dismal? What reason do you have to complain? All you do is sitting in your office.' Grissom raised his eyebrow.
'Humbug,' Ecklie said as he putted down the book he had in his hands.
'Is humbug your new complaining word? Don't be so cross, Conrad.'
'What do you expect me to say instead? Crime rates? I'll say that from now on,' Ecklie's voice was rather calm, 'What else can I be then cross if I live in a world of fools as this? Merry Christmas! Out on a Merry Christmas. What's Christmas time for you when the crime rates go up? A time for finding yourself a year older, but the rates will not go down. Who goes about with 'Merry Christmas' on his lips in this lab should get suspended without paid leave!'
'Conrad.'
'Gil, keep Christmas in your own way with your bugs and Miss Sidle, and let me keep it in mine…'
'Keep it? But you don't.'
'Then let me leave it alone. Every year it's the same. Much good may all deaths do you. What good has it ever done you?'
'There are many things from which I might have gotten something good, but by which I have not profited, I dare say. But still. Christmas among the rest. God bless it.'
'What a strong words for someone who does not believe in a religion.'
'I think you should know me better. I believe there is something.' Grissom paused, 'Come. Dine with my team, be a person for once.'
'Crime rates, Gil. I hardly think there is any time.'
'I am sorry for you that you have to be this way, Conrad. Good day.'
'Good day, Gil.'
As Grissom left, he did stop to greet Judy who apparently was in the Christmas mood already with her woolen Christmas sweater.
As the shift ended, Ecklie got on his way too home. He was just on his way to the parking lot, as he slipped. He fell, and noticed everything got blurry, really fast…
There he was. Walking down the old Vegas ala London style streets. People greeted him with a Merry Christmas, but he just blankly ignored them. 'Nothing merry about Crime rates at all,' he thought.
He walked towards the chambers he lived in. It had belonged to the former Assistant Lab Director, who had died of an sad, sad accident. Murder had been overruled. The chambers were a gloomy suite of rooms in a lowering pile of building up a yard, dreary enough, for nobody lived in it but Conrad Ecklie; the other rooms being all let out as offices.
The yard was so dark that even Ecklie, who knew it's every stone, was fain to grope with his hands. Now, it is a fact, that there was nothing at all particular about the knocker on the door, expect that it was very large. It is also a fact that Ecklie had even less fantasy then a purple mouse could have. And those don't exist, so do the calculation.
But even he found it strange to see a face appear on the knocker.
'What?! Judge Cohen!'
It indeed was Judge Cohen's face that had appeared. It was not angry of ferocious, but looked at Ecklie as Judge Cohen used to look with ghostly spectacles turned upon it's ghostly forehead. The hair was curiously stirred as if by breath or hot air… and though the eyes were wide open, they were perfectly motionless.
'Judge Cohen?'
Ecklie looked fixedly at this phenomenon. It was a knocker again.
'Humbug… Ehr, crime rates…'
He thought of the incident as he got inside and walked to his kitchen. He made an melancholy dinner and ate it all alone while reading the newspaper. The lights in his home were pretty dimmed, but he liked it that way and it was less expensive. He thought about what Gil had said, and then got up as he lay away the newspaper and got to his room. He putted on his striped PJ's and wanted to lay down, when he heard an noise.
Every bell in the house started to ring. The bells ceased as they had begun. Then… Ecklie rememberd to have heard that ghosts in haunted houses were described as dragging chains. The cellar door flew open and then…
Ecklie yelled, 'Crime rates!'
The same face, the very same face, appeared. Judge Cohen in his prison clothing. The chain he drew was clasped about his middle. It was long and wound about him like a tail and it was made, for Ecklie observed it closely, of cash boxes, keys, padlocks, ledgers, deeds and heavy purses wrought in steel. His body was transparent.
'Now, now what do you want with me?' Ecklie asked, eyes widened as he saw this before him. He must be dreaming.
'So much, Conrad Ecklie, and so less time!' Judge Cohen responded.
'Who are you?' Ecklie asked, trying the phantom in front of him out.
'Ask me who I was,'
'Who were you then, you are particular for a shade,' Ecklie said, actually sounding pretty sarcastic.
'In my life, I was some kind of your partner. Judge Cohen.' The ghost answered so calmly back that Ecklie shivered.
'Can you sit down?' he hesitated asking that, but still he did.
'I can.'
'Do it then.' You could hear the firm in his voice.
'You don't believe me?'
'I don't.'
'Why do you doubt your senses, Ecklie?'
Ecklie had to think a little bit, but when he responded the sentences were clear, as if he had practiced saying them in his head. 'Because a little thing affects them, a slight disorder of the stomach makes them cheat. You may be an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an underdone potato. There is more of gravy than of grave about you, whatever you are! Crime rates, I tell you, crime rates!'
'Ah, still mocking about the crime rates, aren't you?'
'Yes. Give me a reason, not why. Why do you trouble me?'
'Do you believe in me, or not?'
'I do, I must. Why do you come to me?'
'Because after all these years you're still mocking about the crime rates instead of doing what I told you. To have a merry Christmas indeed. You still don't get that the crime lab only works better if you stop being an ass that kisses other people's asses?'
'But it worked for you,'
'Oh has it? Look how I ended up! You will end the same if you don't change! I am here tonight to warn you that you have yet a chance and hope of escaping my fate. A chance and hope of my procuring, Conrad.'
'Don't try to spook me.'
'You will be haunted by three spirits.'
'I'd rather not.'
'Without their visits you cannot hope to shun the path I tread. I always believed in crime rates also and I never knew fun. All I did was ass kissing and I ended up adding my own part to the crime rates. Expect the first tomorrow when the first bell tolls one!'
'What are you saying? You did kill the officer? I always kept believing you didn't. Couldn't I take all them phantoms at once, and have it over, Judge Cohen?'
'Expect the second on the next night at the same hour. The third upon the next night when the last stroke of twelve has ceased to vibrate.'
'Crime rates!'
'Look to see me no more,'
'Crime rates, Judge Cohen, I'm way too busy to meet your phantoms! Crime rates!'
The spectre walked backwards from him, saying no more, and at every step it took, the window raised itself a little, so that when the spectre reached it, it was wide open. It wanted to let itself fly out gently, but instead it tripped over shoe and it fell hardly out of the window leaving a hard smacking sound… When Ecklie found this more weird, he suddenly heard voices and names.
'Greg!' it was the voice of Sara Sidle.
'Whát? I didn't mean to let the box with samples of Grissom's bugs experiments fall on the ground…' he said, but he mumbled the last part, 'thát hard…'
Grissom just looked at the both of them and raised his eyebrow. Then he looked back at Ecklie. 'I think he's waking up.'
'That was about time,' Catherine said.
'Grrumble, Humbug…,' Ecklie muttered. Ecklie tried to sit up straight immediately but noticed he hurt his head by doing so as a head ache increased. He looked around in search for a ghost, while the others just looked at him as if he had turned insane.
'Lost something, Conrad?' Grissom asked, sounding amused.
'Yes.' Ecklie snapped, 'My mind!' he got up and did an attempt to walk away, which, lucky for him, worked out immediately.
Grissom just smirked.
'Are you just letting him go?' Sara asked, obviously wondered.
'Yes.'
'Why? Is he going to be fine?' Greg now asked.
'More than fine. I think he will have some nice dreams tonight, waking up with a total different perspective.'
And as the two CSI-ers looked surprised at their supervisor, he just smirked.
--------- Anyways. This is probably going to have three more chapters (three phantoms!), maybe four. If you're going to read them all, I shall wish you good luck. Reviews are more than welcome! - SzmandaEads
Do tell me, how to ruin a perfect Christmas story? This ís a bit different then how I wanted it to turn out, actually. But I still pretty much like it.
