CSI and everything attached to it belong to someone that isn't me- just
playing, don't sue- it really wouldn't be worth it!
Timeline- first season, early, au AN- This is a repost of the first three chapters, as for some reason, the formatting changed when I uploaded last time- hope this comes out a little better!
The brunt of the fall was taken out by a pile of old newspapers, stacked up waiting for someone to take pity on them. By that time, however, it hardly mattered. The flames had all but burned themselves out, leaving behind the occasional flicker, but mostly just smoldering ashes of the cotton t-shirt and jogging bottoms.
The horrified screams of pain, long since silenced, seemed to echo in the still night air, pulling people from their apartments above the alley, rising above the regular sounds of whatever happened to be on the box at that moment. Someone dialled 911, while others looked on, helpless to act, helpless to do anything except watch and hear over and over that haunting screaming. A feeling akin to relief when at last the sound died, taken over by the crackling flames, and that pungent smell of burnt flesh. More that one of them threw up as the smell got in their noses, stuck to the back of their throats, making them gag. The wall of flames had died, but it had certainly left a mark.
'A human torch.' Captain Jim Brass said, looking over at the CSI by his side, to see how she was taking it.
'Any ID?' Her face was carefully blank, emotion pushed firmly to the background. If the smell that was making him nauseous was getting too her, she was far too professional to show it.
'Negative. Visual's impossible, everything else is burned. It'll have to be on dental records, if there's even that left. My guess?' He looked over at her to see if she was interested in hearing his opinion. She looked sideways at him. 'Male- tall to be female.'
She looked back at the scene before her, fighting the urge to vomit up her insides. The smell was indescribable, and even though it wasn't her first death by burning, it was the first time the smell had been this pungent. She began to list everything that she would need to do as Brass asked a question. She looked up at him, the look on her face telling him she hadn't been listening.
'I asked where the rest of the team are?' He repeated.
'Busy.' She answered. 'You should know Brass, the other cases are from your team.'
'Oh right, sure. You can do this alone?' Sara Sidle ignored the question, looking back at the scene, the look on her face showing that she didn't like her professionalism being challenged.
She had lucked out on this one. Nick and Catherine were still knee deep in a fatal robbery on the strip, and Warrick and Grissom were investigating a double murder in the Pines. Which left her, when this had come through. Finally, a chance to prove that she was more than capable.
'Ok, well, we've got a few eyewitness statements to take, so I'll leave you to it.' He said, in a rushed voice, feeling uncomfortable. He knew if someone had questioned his ability, he'd be a little pissed as well.
Sara barely acknowledged his leaving, her mind already back on listing all the things she had to do. Knowing she could ask a uniform to do it, she hoisted the camera and started to shoot. She preferred to work the scene alone.
Shots of the scene in general at first, then close ups of the body, the charred limbs, the barely recognisable head, the hair completely burned, the face so badly mangled that it was impossible to say whether Brass's guess of the body being male was right or not.
She bagged and tagged a few things of interest; ash to test for an accelerant, some litter off the streets which could, or could not be useful. A single piece of paper that had been folded into a little square, which lay about three feet from the head of the body. She didn't try and unfold it then, wanting to test for fingerprints first off of the two outer surfaces.
Her cellphone suddenly vibrating in her jacket pocket made her jump and almost drop a few strands of hair that she had found. Annoyed, she snapped down the casing, barking her name into the handset.
'Sara? It's Nick.'
'Hi.' Her voice was still curt, her mind too on the scene before her to think of manners as well.
'Yeah.hi. Just saw Grissom, he said you had a charred body out in Buntingford.' Sara looked over at the body. She wouldn't call the body that was barely just above ash, charred.
'Yeah.'
'Do you need a hand? Me and Catherine have just finished collecting'
'No.' She interrupted quickly. 'No, Nick, it's fine, all in hand.'
'You sure? I know we're stretched, but there's no need to take on all that work.'
'Nicky, it's all under control, nothing I can't handle.'
'Okay.' Nick answered, sounding uncertain. 'Well, Grissom said that whichever of us finishes processing first can help you with the case.'
'Whatever, bye Nicky.' And with that she snapped closed the lid and threw the phone into the box of instruments next to her. She looked at the two intertwined strands of hair that were dangling from the tweezers she held in her left hand, moving them a little so they could catch a glint of the dim streetlight above, the conversation already far from her mind.
Nick Stokes looked at the cellphone in his hand, still a little surprised by the curt cut off. He had thought that in the last few months she had started to warm to their friendship a little. They had started to occasionally see each other outside of their (hardly) normal work duties. And, ok, a little part of him had been hoping that some day, in the future, that it might even go a little further. But if that phone call was anything to go by, he had a long way to go.
'Hey Nick, did you drop off the guns in Ballistics?' Catherine startled him as she entered the break room.
'Uh yeah, all done. But, there, um, a little jammed, so they said it could take a while.'
'Are you ok? You seem a little preoccupied.'
'Oh, it's nothing. I just phoned Sara to see if she needed a hand, and she, well, she.'
'Cut you off?' Catherine guessed.
'well.kinda. Yeah.' Nick answered, looking up at her.
'Don't worry bout it Nicky- she's at a crime scene, and it's the first time she's been assigned alone. She's just involved and forgetting herself.' Catherine told him confidently.
Nick raised an eyebrow slightly in thought.
'You probably rang just as she'd found something. Come on, we've got clothing to check for evidence.' Catherine told him, pulling him up by his sleeve, and out the door.
The coroner had arrived and gone through the formality of pronouncing, and the body had been removed to the morgue, leaving Sara to comb the entire area inch by inch. She found one more strand of hair, and a few short strands of some fibre that she couldn't identify by sight. She bagged and tagged, and began to pack up her equipment, signalling to a near-by uniform that she was going.
Brass saw, and moved towards her. The newest member of the CSI team was growing on him, he had to admit. Maybe a bit too much of Grissom's influence in her, but hopefully, the more she was with the rest of the team the more she would be well rounded by them, blunting the early influence of Grissom.
'Finished?'
She shrugged. 'Done all I can here. Anything from them?' She asked, nodding towards a few stragglers that the younger detectives were just finishing questioning.
'All of them were roused by screaming. All saw a ball of flames, but didn't have time to do anything. No one saw it begin, no one saw anything identifiable of the body.'
'Shame. Well, I'd better get back, start processing. Try and identify.him?'
'Yeah. I'll get in touch if I find out anything.'
'Ditto.' They parted ways, Sara heading to her Tahoe. She dumped her stuff on the back seat, and hopped in the front, switching on the engine at the same time as flicking on the radio, already tuned to a local rock station.
Her sanctuary, aka the CSI labs, were fairly quiet, as it was coming up to one in the morning. She made the stop at Greg's lab to drop off the ash, asking if he could process it for an accelerant. He pointed at two separate sets of bags stacked on his desk.
'Bit busy here.' He told her.
'Think of the overtime.' She told him, walking out before he could reply.
She stopped at the locker room to strip off her jacket and slip into her lab coat before going off to start logging in the rest of the small pieces of what might turn out to be evidence. It was long and tedious, but necessary, the part of the investigation that really benefited from having more than one person working on it. She worked through it though, hoping that the time would be enough for the prelim report from the coroner to be ready.
Timeline- first season, early, au AN- This is a repost of the first three chapters, as for some reason, the formatting changed when I uploaded last time- hope this comes out a little better!
The brunt of the fall was taken out by a pile of old newspapers, stacked up waiting for someone to take pity on them. By that time, however, it hardly mattered. The flames had all but burned themselves out, leaving behind the occasional flicker, but mostly just smoldering ashes of the cotton t-shirt and jogging bottoms.
The horrified screams of pain, long since silenced, seemed to echo in the still night air, pulling people from their apartments above the alley, rising above the regular sounds of whatever happened to be on the box at that moment. Someone dialled 911, while others looked on, helpless to act, helpless to do anything except watch and hear over and over that haunting screaming. A feeling akin to relief when at last the sound died, taken over by the crackling flames, and that pungent smell of burnt flesh. More that one of them threw up as the smell got in their noses, stuck to the back of their throats, making them gag. The wall of flames had died, but it had certainly left a mark.
'A human torch.' Captain Jim Brass said, looking over at the CSI by his side, to see how she was taking it.
'Any ID?' Her face was carefully blank, emotion pushed firmly to the background. If the smell that was making him nauseous was getting too her, she was far too professional to show it.
'Negative. Visual's impossible, everything else is burned. It'll have to be on dental records, if there's even that left. My guess?' He looked over at her to see if she was interested in hearing his opinion. She looked sideways at him. 'Male- tall to be female.'
She looked back at the scene before her, fighting the urge to vomit up her insides. The smell was indescribable, and even though it wasn't her first death by burning, it was the first time the smell had been this pungent. She began to list everything that she would need to do as Brass asked a question. She looked up at him, the look on her face telling him she hadn't been listening.
'I asked where the rest of the team are?' He repeated.
'Busy.' She answered. 'You should know Brass, the other cases are from your team.'
'Oh right, sure. You can do this alone?' Sara Sidle ignored the question, looking back at the scene, the look on her face showing that she didn't like her professionalism being challenged.
She had lucked out on this one. Nick and Catherine were still knee deep in a fatal robbery on the strip, and Warrick and Grissom were investigating a double murder in the Pines. Which left her, when this had come through. Finally, a chance to prove that she was more than capable.
'Ok, well, we've got a few eyewitness statements to take, so I'll leave you to it.' He said, in a rushed voice, feeling uncomfortable. He knew if someone had questioned his ability, he'd be a little pissed as well.
Sara barely acknowledged his leaving, her mind already back on listing all the things she had to do. Knowing she could ask a uniform to do it, she hoisted the camera and started to shoot. She preferred to work the scene alone.
Shots of the scene in general at first, then close ups of the body, the charred limbs, the barely recognisable head, the hair completely burned, the face so badly mangled that it was impossible to say whether Brass's guess of the body being male was right or not.
She bagged and tagged a few things of interest; ash to test for an accelerant, some litter off the streets which could, or could not be useful. A single piece of paper that had been folded into a little square, which lay about three feet from the head of the body. She didn't try and unfold it then, wanting to test for fingerprints first off of the two outer surfaces.
Her cellphone suddenly vibrating in her jacket pocket made her jump and almost drop a few strands of hair that she had found. Annoyed, she snapped down the casing, barking her name into the handset.
'Sara? It's Nick.'
'Hi.' Her voice was still curt, her mind too on the scene before her to think of manners as well.
'Yeah.hi. Just saw Grissom, he said you had a charred body out in Buntingford.' Sara looked over at the body. She wouldn't call the body that was barely just above ash, charred.
'Yeah.'
'Do you need a hand? Me and Catherine have just finished collecting'
'No.' She interrupted quickly. 'No, Nick, it's fine, all in hand.'
'You sure? I know we're stretched, but there's no need to take on all that work.'
'Nicky, it's all under control, nothing I can't handle.'
'Okay.' Nick answered, sounding uncertain. 'Well, Grissom said that whichever of us finishes processing first can help you with the case.'
'Whatever, bye Nicky.' And with that she snapped closed the lid and threw the phone into the box of instruments next to her. She looked at the two intertwined strands of hair that were dangling from the tweezers she held in her left hand, moving them a little so they could catch a glint of the dim streetlight above, the conversation already far from her mind.
Nick Stokes looked at the cellphone in his hand, still a little surprised by the curt cut off. He had thought that in the last few months she had started to warm to their friendship a little. They had started to occasionally see each other outside of their (hardly) normal work duties. And, ok, a little part of him had been hoping that some day, in the future, that it might even go a little further. But if that phone call was anything to go by, he had a long way to go.
'Hey Nick, did you drop off the guns in Ballistics?' Catherine startled him as she entered the break room.
'Uh yeah, all done. But, there, um, a little jammed, so they said it could take a while.'
'Are you ok? You seem a little preoccupied.'
'Oh, it's nothing. I just phoned Sara to see if she needed a hand, and she, well, she.'
'Cut you off?' Catherine guessed.
'well.kinda. Yeah.' Nick answered, looking up at her.
'Don't worry bout it Nicky- she's at a crime scene, and it's the first time she's been assigned alone. She's just involved and forgetting herself.' Catherine told him confidently.
Nick raised an eyebrow slightly in thought.
'You probably rang just as she'd found something. Come on, we've got clothing to check for evidence.' Catherine told him, pulling him up by his sleeve, and out the door.
The coroner had arrived and gone through the formality of pronouncing, and the body had been removed to the morgue, leaving Sara to comb the entire area inch by inch. She found one more strand of hair, and a few short strands of some fibre that she couldn't identify by sight. She bagged and tagged, and began to pack up her equipment, signalling to a near-by uniform that she was going.
Brass saw, and moved towards her. The newest member of the CSI team was growing on him, he had to admit. Maybe a bit too much of Grissom's influence in her, but hopefully, the more she was with the rest of the team the more she would be well rounded by them, blunting the early influence of Grissom.
'Finished?'
She shrugged. 'Done all I can here. Anything from them?' She asked, nodding towards a few stragglers that the younger detectives were just finishing questioning.
'All of them were roused by screaming. All saw a ball of flames, but didn't have time to do anything. No one saw it begin, no one saw anything identifiable of the body.'
'Shame. Well, I'd better get back, start processing. Try and identify.him?'
'Yeah. I'll get in touch if I find out anything.'
'Ditto.' They parted ways, Sara heading to her Tahoe. She dumped her stuff on the back seat, and hopped in the front, switching on the engine at the same time as flicking on the radio, already tuned to a local rock station.
Her sanctuary, aka the CSI labs, were fairly quiet, as it was coming up to one in the morning. She made the stop at Greg's lab to drop off the ash, asking if he could process it for an accelerant. He pointed at two separate sets of bags stacked on his desk.
'Bit busy here.' He told her.
'Think of the overtime.' She told him, walking out before he could reply.
She stopped at the locker room to strip off her jacket and slip into her lab coat before going off to start logging in the rest of the small pieces of what might turn out to be evidence. It was long and tedious, but necessary, the part of the investigation that really benefited from having more than one person working on it. She worked through it though, hoping that the time would be enough for the prelim report from the coroner to be ready.