Warning: Future Cath/Sara femslash I reread this and did some changes. I plan on posting the second chapter by tonight or tomorrow.
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Chapter 1: Suspicious Circs.
When Gil entered the conference room he wasn't surprised to find that Nick, Warrick, Catherine, and Greg were already there. For a second he wondered where Sara was, but then he remembered that she had requested the week off. When she had requested it, he had been surprised but also somewhat pleased. For the past three months Sara had done nothing but work. Even on her days off, she had found some reason to come into the lab. So, of course, he had given her the time off, knowing that his team could handle the week's cases without her. That wasn't to imply that the lab didn't need Sara, in fact, Grissom couldn't imagine not having her on the team.
"So, what have you got for us this week?" Catherine turned from the coffee maker to ask.
"Nick, I want you and Warrick to take the db on the strip. Greg, you and I have a missing persons, and you, Catherine have a suspicious circs. Any questions?"
"Yeah, where's Sara? I haven't seen her yet."
"Really? Usually you're following her around like a puppy dog by now." Smirking, Catherine glanced over at Greg and watched his face turn red at her comment.
"I don't follow her like a puppy dog."
"Actually, Sara has requested the week off. Now, let's get out in the field."
Before anyone could ask why, Grissom had left the room. Greg jumped up and practically ran after him. Saying goodbye to Catherine, Nick and Warrick also left. Instead of following the others out, Catherine stood at the counter wondering about Sara. It was so out of character for Sara to ask for one day off, let alone seven. By no means were her and Sara close, but she was still worried about her. Looking down at the case Grissom had given her, Catherine decided that she would worry about Sara after she had dealt with her suspicious circs. She would call Sara after work to check on her.
With her case file in hand, Catherine hurried down the halls of the lab and out to the parking lot. After she had gotten into the Tahoe and had started on her way to the crime scene, her mind drifted to the case. Suspicious circs. could be anything from a peeping Tom to murder. Until she actually got to the crime scene and looked at the evidence, all she could do was guess. Years of working with Grissom had taught her that she should never guess on a case, but how was she supposed to tell her imagination that.
The crime scene ended up being an alley behind a bar. When she got out of the Tahoe and grabbed her case from the back of the vehicle, Brass waved her over to the crime scene tape. Pulling out her identification, Catherine showed it to the officer standing at the crime scene tape. With a curt nod he held the tape up for her to duck under. A young blonde was standing next to Brass, who had out his notepad taking notes. Apparently, this woman was a witness to the crime that Catherine still knew nothing about.
"Catherine, this is Ms. Innes. She's the one who called the cops. Ms. Innes, this is Catherine Willows from the Las Vegas crime lab. She's going to ask you about what you saw." Politely, Catherine shook the woman's hand.
"What happened that made you call the cops?"
"I came out here to smoke and I head someone yell. So, I ran back here and saw this man pinning a woman to the wall by her wrists. She kept struggling and telling him to get off her and then he hit her and she fell. I ran inside to get help and called the cops, but when we came back out here, they were gone."
"We?"
"The bouncer and me."
Frowning, Catherine pictured the event in her mind. More than once she had seen the same thing happen in the strip club that she had worked in. Some creep would follow one of the girls out and make a move on them. When they turned the guy down, he would force himself on them, and unless one of the security guards got out there, the creep would end up hitting the woman. Most of the time the creeps were stopped before they could get to the woman. Apparently, no one had been able to help her victim in time. She had probably gone to the bar alone and left alone.
"Can you describe the man and woman to me?"
"I didn't get a good look at the guy, but the woman had brown hair about shoulder length. She was tall and skinny too. It was dark, though so I can't really tell you much more than that."
"Did you see a car leaving when you came back out?"
"No, sorry."
"Where, exactly, did you see this taking place?"
"About halfway down the alley." Catherine turned to look at where the witness was pointing somewhere around a pile of garbage.
"Do you remember anything else that might be helpful?"
For a second the woman thought about it, then shook her head. "No, sorry."
"Alright. Thank you for your time. If you will, give Detective Brass here your contact information in case we have anymore questions."
"Sure."
"Brass, can you see if any of the video cameras from any of the shops around here saw anything that could help? See if the bar had one out back, too."
After she had pulled on her gloves and grabbed her case, Catherine started down the alley to where the witness had pointed. The farther down the alley she got, the stronger it smelled of stale beer and urine. Processing this scene, by herself, would take at least three hours. There was too much garbage here possibly concealing important evidence. If she was lucky, there wouldn't be too much contamination to the evidence. Reluctantly, Catherine grabbed her camera and began taking pictures of anything that she felt would be important to her investigation. She stopped when she noticed a broken bottle with what appeared to be blood on it.
After she took a picture of the bottle, Catherine swabbed the bottle to check for blood. Frowning, she watched as the swab turned pink, indicating that the red substance on the bottle was, in fact, blood. She bagged the bottle to send to trace and continued processing the scene. Other than a few blood drops, there was nothing else to suggest that there had been a struggle in that alley. Well, not any that would stand out in the garbage cluttered alley.
By the time Catherine was finished with the crime scene, she had been there for almost three hours. Once her gear was packed, Catherine hopped back into the Tahoe and headed to the crime lab. The sooner she got trace checking out the blood, the sooner she could really get started on the case. In cases like this one, time was against her. The longer it took for her to find the victim, the more time she spent not knowing if the woman was alive or dead.
In less that thirty minutes, Catherine was back at the lab. Upon arrival she had taken the broken bottle to trace, and not long after that, Brass had showed up with the security camera tapes from the surrounding stores. Not sure of how long it would take for them to watch all of the tapes, Catherine and Brass both grabbed a cup of coffee before they settled down in one of the empty labs to watch the tapes. Normally they would have been in the lab with Archie, but he was out of town for a few days, which meant that they were on their own. They were halfway through their third tape when Greg came into the lab carrying a envelope.
"Hey, I was just down by trace. They wanted me to give you this. They found a match for the blood you found on that broken bottle,"
"Good, maybe we have something to go on, now."
Catherine glanced over the report not expecting to find what she found. The blood on the broken bottle belonged to someone that all three of them knew personally. Sara. Catherine felt the blood drain from her face and felt the report slip from her hand. She didn't bother to try and pick it up. Her concern for Sara at the beginning of the shift, now returned. Only this time she had a logical explanation for being concerned.
"Catherine? Hey, are you okay?" While Greg tried to get Catherine to respond, Brass picked up the report and read over it.
"Greg. Go get Grissom."
Greg was about to ask why, when Catherine jumped up and started pacing the room. The two men watched her for a minute as she paced and thought. Turning to Brass, she grabbed the report and then turned to the T.V. monitor. They hadn't seen anything on the tapes indicating that Sara had been there. The blood could just be circumstantial.
"No. No, we don't know for sure that the woman attacked was her!"
"Cath-" Brass attempted to interrupt her, but she held up a hand stopping him.
"No. We'll call Sara and ask her why her blood is on that bottle."
"Wait! You found a broken bottle with Sara's blood on it?"
By the time Greg had finished asking the question, Catherine had already dialed Sara's cell and was waiting impatiently for Sara to pick up, while Brass filled Greg in on the case. Sara would explain how her blood got in the alley and they could all breath easier. At least that's what Catherine told herself. When the phone switched over to voicemail, Catherine hung up and dialed Sara's home phone. She ended up getting the same results as she had, had with the cell. Frustrated and worried, Catherine slammed her own cell down on the table. They still had the security tapes.
"That-that doesn't mean anything. She could be out and her cell is just dead. Let's, um, let's finish watching the tapes, and we'll keep trying to call her. Yeah." All of this was said more to herself, than to Greg and Brass.