It was business as usual for the Las Vegas Crime Lab, the night shift had just started and the Night shift CSI staff where beginning to fill in, so far only Gil Grissom, a man in his early fifties with short grey hair and a matching beard and the coroners had arrived for work but he knew that the other staff members would show up soon.
And of course, the two new arrivals would be here soon enough.
Two new CSIS would be joining the team that night, one male and one female, they were young and inexperienced but had shown great promise during their training.
Of course, we'll have to see how they perform in the field. Gil thought as he looked over the cases, one was an apparent suicide of a young woman in Henderson, the other was a rather grizzly murder at the Tangiers hotel and the third was a hit and run.
As he decided who to assign the cases to there was a knock at the door, Gil looked up seeing the chief Coroner, Dr. Albert "Al" Robbins, a balding man in his sixties with grey hair and a beard standing at the door clenching his cane in one hand and holding the door with the other.
"Sorry for the interruption Gil, but this young man got lost on the way to your office." Al explained as the man he mentioned stepped in, the noticeably embarrassed man was in is early 20s with long light brown hair tied into a ponytail and blue eyes, he was tall and pretty well built, he sat down in front of the desk as he thanked Al for the help.
"Evan Mitchell is presume?" Gil asked though he already knew the answer.
"That's me, sir." Evan answered shifting uncomfortably in his seat.
"Call me Gil; we are going to be friends after all." Gil reassured the young man and he seemed to relax a bit. "Did you see a young woman on your way in?" Gil asked and Evan shook his head.
"Aside from Al the only other person I've seen since I got here is the receptionist." Evan answered and Gil nodded.
"You showed some exceptional skills for someone who hasn't worked in the field before." Gil said showing him the file on him. "But do you think you're ready for the field?"
"Not to sure to be perfectly honest but we'll have to wait and see." Before Grissom could continue there was another knock at the door, it was Al again this time accompanied by a young woman.
"Gil, as you have probably guessed by now this young lady got lost on the way to your lab and, like Evan; she ended up in the morgue by accident." Al explained as the young woman stepped forward, she was petite with long, dark brown hair and green eyes.
"Thanks Al, don't worry, these two are the only newcomers tonight." Al nodded and held the door open for the young woman and she entered, she sat down next to Evan and Gil smiled.
"Sophie Danielson, correct?" Gil asked and she nodded, before he could continue the sound of the rest of the night shift CSIS approaching filled the area.
"Well, guess it's time you two met your co-workers." Gil said, the two rookies stood up unsure what to expect, the CSIS entered the office surprised to see the unfamiliar faces.
"Everyone, I'd like you to meet Sophie Danielson and Evan Mitchell, they are joining the staff as of tonight." Gil said motioning to the rookies as he mentioned their names, they said nothing and Gil continued. "Now onto business, Nick, Warrick, you are on a suicide in Henderson, Evan will accompany you on the case." The two CSIS approached the young man and took there assignment, "Catherine, your with Sophie, murder at the Tangiers, all I can say is be ready for a bloody crime scene." Gil said handing the assignment to Sophie. The four CSIS left the room just in time to here Greg get the hit and run case.
"So you're new here, huh?" Nick asked Evan as they walked down the hallway.
"Yeah, I got similar job offers from the crime labs in Miami and New York but I chose this one because it's closer to home." Evan said scratching the back of his neck nervously.
"You nervous kid?" Warrick, the only African American on the team and the only one sporting an afro for that matter, asked him.
"Let's see, it's my first day on the job, I somehow ended up in the morgue whilst looking for Grissom's office and I got a suicide case for my first case, I don't see why I'd be nervous." Evan said jokingly getting a laugh out of the more experienced CSIS.
"Happens to everyone man, don't worry about it." Nick assured him as they hopped in the car. "Just so you know, you're shadowing us on the case, meaning that you can't collect evidence but it'll be a good learning experience for you." Nick added as they entered the car, Warrick hopped in the driver's seat and Nick got in alongside him, the drive to the crime was uneventful, well apart from Evan getting a call from his girlfriend as they neared Henderson but that was just a quick check up.
Soon they arrived at the apartment complex where the victim lived, it was a small complex and had a comfy feel to it, the three CSIS went under the crime scene tape and where greeted by a young man with blonde hair in a police uniform and Captain James "Jim" Brass.
"OK people, the coroner is in the apartment where the body is, Scott Michaels here was the first officer on the scene." James said motioning to Scott who nodded politely. "The media is all over this due to the death's nature so play your cards close to your chest."
"Any other information?" Evan asked.
"And you are?" James replied.
"Evan Mitchell sir, it's my first night on the job." Evan introduced himself.
"James Brass, Homicide, welcome aboard." James replied. "The tenant is listed as Kara Stevenson, 17 years old; the landlord's already confirmed that Kara and the victim are one in the same." James said pointing to a portly man speaking with another officer.
"Thanks Jim, we'll take it from here." Nick said as he went up the stairs to the crime scene, they stopped at apartment number 20, the crime scene, and entered.
The apartment was small, just small enough to satisfy a woman the victim's age, the victim was lying face up on the bed, her eyes were still open revealing them to be blue, she had shoulder length light brown hair and she was wearing a black tanktop and a matching skirt, but the thing that was most notable was that she was surrounded by drugs. Nick shook his head sadly.
"I hate cases like this." Nick said with a sigh as he and the other CSIS put their gloves on, the assistant coroner looked up from examining the body.
"Hey guys." Dave "Super Dave" Phillips greeted as he took the liver temperature. "Body's just entered Rigor Mortis, that and her liver temp suggest that she's been dead around 26 hours." Dave said standing up. "I'll be waiting outside until you guys tell me to move the body to the morgue." Dave said walking out of the apartment.
"OK, Evan, you and me will have a closer look at the body and the bed, Warrick, you up for processing the apartment?" Warrick nodded and grabbed his kit and Nick lead the younger CSI over.
"So what are we looking for here?" Evan asked looking over the bed.
"Fibres, anything to confirm if it's a suicide or a homicide, seaman, those kinds of things." Nick replied as he took a picture of the body, it was then that Evan noticed wounds on Kara's arms.
"Hey Nick, these look like defensive wounds to you?" Evan asked pointing to the wounds on the victim's arms, Nick saw them and nodded.
"They do actually; I think we can rule out suicide." Nick replied as he took pictures of the wounds.
"We've got blood over here, small amount and it doesn't look like blood spatter to me." Warrick said taking a sample for DNA. As he stood up he spotted a picture on the coffee table featuring her, an Asian woman and a slightly younger woman, obviously friends of the victim.
"Look's like she was pretty popular." Warrick mused eyeing the photo.
"Could they be our first suspects?" Evan asked noticing the photo, before he could answer they herd shouting outside, curious Evan looked outside and saw the women from the photo trying to get past the line.
"At least we didn't have to track them down." Evan muttered as Nick and Warrick looked as well.
"We'll interview them and the landlord once we're done processing here, Evan would you mind hitting the lights?" Evan turned of the lights in the apartment and Nick turned on the UV light to check for seaman on the bed, finding none Evan turned on the lights, Nick spotted a fingerprint on the bedside table and dusted it, finding only a partial print he lifted it and bagged it.
"That's all the evidence I can see, we'll get the coroner to move the body and we'll interview the landlord and the two girls from the photo." Nick said as they walked out of the apartment, Warrick told Dave that he was good to go as far as the body was concerned and Dave motioned to the coroner team to bring the stretcher in, the three CSIS walked up to the suspects Warrick interviewing the landlord and Evan and Nick interviewing the women.
"Excuse me; can we talk to you for a minute?" Nick asked the women, the Asian woman raised an eyebrow at them and the younger one shrugged.
"Sure I guess." Answered the younger woman.
"OK, we're going to need your names first." Nick said taking out his notepad.
"Hold on, I want to see some ID first." The younger woman said folding her arms across her chest, Nick and Evan showed them their badges and she sighed.
"I'm Christine Nyoko; she's Emily Swan, happy now?" The Asian woman asked agitated.
"Very, do you know Kara Stevenson?" Evan asked
"Yeah, we're friends, why is something wrong with her?" Emily asked starting to get worried; the sight of the stretcher being moved into the coroner's van didn't exactly help either.
"Christine, Emily, there's no easy way to say this....."
Evan could tell from their facial expressions that they where starting to catch on to what had happened to their friend, taking a deep breath Evan continued.
"Kara's dead, I can't really say anymore as it's an ongoing investigation."
"Your....you're lying!" Emily said in desperation but Evan simply shook his head.
"I'm sorry for your loss; did Kara have any depression issues in the past?" Nick asked giving the two women Kleenex tissues so they could wipe their eyes.
"Depression? Err, yeah a couple of years back, nothing serious ever came out of it though." Christine said after thinking for a few minutes. "She takes....took meds to help her with her with that though." She added. "You'll have to excuse me; I have a lot to sort out."
"What she said." Emily added.
"Sure, but if you think of anything that could help with the investigation give us a call, OK?" Nick asked handing them his card.
"Will do." Christine said walking off, Emily soon followed her and Nick and Evan walked over to Warrick who had just started interviewing the landlord.
"Mr. Sabewlsky? Warrick Brown I'm with the Las Vegas Crime Lab, can I ask you a few questions?"
"I've already told your colleague all I know Mr. Brown, but if it helps I'll tell you to." The Landlord replied.
"OK, first can you tell me what happened?" Warrick said getting ready to jot down some notes.
"It was a typical Thursday evening for me, I was going through some paperwork when I noticed Kara hadn't been paying her rent, I went up to her apartment to remind her and when she didn't answer the door I got worried, I used my master key to get in and that was when I saw her, god it seems so meaningless now, the whole rent thing, I'm going to miss her, she was a good kid."
"It worried you that she didn't reply?"
"She typically didn't take long to answer the door usually around five minutes at the most, and I knew she couldn't be asleep because she was a night owl." The landlord explained with a sigh.
"Did she have any enemies?"
"No, like I said she was a good kid. Got on well with her neighbours, we even organised an intervention for one of her friends with her." This caught Warrick's attention.
"For whom and for what?"
"It was one of the girls I saw your colleagues talking to a few minutes ago, the younger one....Emily I think her name is, as for what, well she had a bad drug addiction, I mean REALLY bad, it was a good thing we intervened before the drugs did permanent damage, I think she was doing Coke if it helps."
"Very much so, I'm going to need your DNA and fingerprints." The landlord blinked.
"Why? I've done nothing wrong."
"Never said you did, its protocol." The landlord didn't need much convincing once Warrick said that and happily gave his DNA and fingerprints, Warrick gave him his card and turned to Evan and Nick.
"We'll have to confirm that Kara died of an overdose and find out if Coke was the drug she overdosed on to see if Emily's past drug use has an effect on her status as a suspect." Warrick said.
"And the only way to find that out is to wait for the Autopsy results." Evan said. "So what will we do in the meantime?"
"Go back to the lab and process the evidence we already have." Nick replied opening up the van's trunk, the CSIS loaded the evidence into the back and entered the car.