Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Grissom/Sara
Genre: Suspense, Romance, Angst
Author's Notes: The Mind Palace was borrowed from Thomas Harris's Hannibal Lecter, who I actually think would have quite a pleasant time poking around in Grissom's head. The information on Midsummer came largely from Wikipedia, The Summer Solstice by Ellen Jackson, and personal knowledge. There's also a mention of 'What Sarah Said' by Death Cab For Cutie. As for timeline... it takes someplace post-Butterfly and pre-finale, if that makes sense. Written for the Geekfiction Summer Sizzler Ficathon on Livejournal, with the prompt 'solstice'.

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Good morning, Las Vegas! Today is June 21, looks like another sunny day here in Nevada...

Grissom looked at the calendar, and noted the date with a thoughtful smile. June twenty-first, the longest day of the year. He carefully searched his stores of knowledge (an extensive thing, indeed) for information on the solstice. He enjoyed this - testing himself and his memory on an array of subjects. There was a technique to it... the Mind Palace method in which one created a set of rooms, and in each room added objects. Attached to each object was a piece of information, so when he wanted it, it was as easy as reaching out in his mind to touch the glass vase embossed with tiny suns. He leaned back in his chair and locked his hands over his stomach, mentally walking through the lavish rooms of his mind.

The pagans of medieval Europe had called the day 'Midsummer'. It was a festival celebrating life and fertility, during the season when the entire continent burst into lusty growth. In some cultures, the gods were considered to walk the earth, and chose their favorite mortal women for nights of (and here a faint blush tinged the bashful Grissom's cheeks) inexplicable pleasure. The children born of these couplings were called merrybegots, and were said to be gifted with certain supernatural gifts. Grissom wasn't sure about all of that, and preferred to stay to the facts and the simple, earnest traditions of the commoners.

At night bonfires - known as Bale Fires - were lit to chase away bad spirits and ensure luck and a fruitful harvest. The couples of the town, arm and arm during the height of the night, leaped over the flames to ensure love, prosperity and happiness in their relationship. It was seen also as a method of purification, to cleanse the worries or misdeeds of the past and start anew. This supposed cleansing property of fire could be found in cultures and civilizations across the world and centuries apart. In ancient Rome, for example -

Sara stuck her head through the office door. "Um... do we have anywhere to be?" Grissom was shaken out of his palace (and thoughts). He looked up at the clock and realized the shift had started ten minutes ago, and no one had bothered to come find him.

"Yes, but where are the others?"

She ticked off the members of the team on her fingers as she spoke. "Nick and Catherine are reassembling the car from the Hawthorne assault, Warrick's out stomping around in the fields trying to look for the missing cattle, and apparently DNA is insanely swamped, so Greg's helping with backlog.

Grissom nodded, shuffling through a pile of papers. "All right, m'dear, looks like it's just you and me tonight..." He caught her amused look and bit back any more overtly affectionate chatter. Instead, he handed her the assignment slip. Silently, she read it and nodded.

Her head lifted - he could see that sheen in her eyes, the one that glimmered when she wanted his approval. And, as he always did, Grissom consciously kept his face blank in spite of her - so hopeful, so earnest, so well meaning. As usual, her face flattened. It was a gentle, gradual thing. But her eyes... it was her eyes that gave her away. The light crumpled, it flickered and guttered. Grissom looked away. He couldn't bear to see the pain in those eyes, or even more horribly, know that he was its cause.

Then why do you do it? he asked himself against his will. And - no surprise here - he had no answer. He sighed inwardly and looked back to Sara, whose face was now carefully neutral. He offered her a kindly look. "Come on. That murder's not going to solve itself." He grabbed his kit and headed to the parking lot. She followed wordlessly, sullenly. The air between them was thick with silence, heavy with all of the words left unspoken. Grissom held his breath, fearing a confrontation with each new step. But one never came. They reached the SUV without incident.

As was their habit, Grissom took the driver's seat and Sara the back row of seats. He would drive to the scene and she would catch a few more minutes of rest. On the way back, she would drive, and he would sit in the passenger's seat to keep her company (or keep her awake, depending on how one saw it - after working big scenes, they were always both exhausted). More often than not Grissom would stay awake with her for ten minutes or so before dozing against the window in spite of himself.

She would stop for coffee and order a double mocha latte for herself and a straight coffee - two creams, one sugar - for him, as well as a cinnamon roll apiece. The warm, homey aromas would rise him from his slumber, and over caffeine and sugar they would chat for the rest of the drive about the evidence they had collected, unusual persons present, possible motives, and the like.

It was funny, he mused while watching Sara attempt to fold herself into the backseat (she wouldn't be successful - she never was, but nevertheless she would spend a good five minutes shifting around back there). It was funny that, for two people who were as far from a normal relationship as was humanly possible, they already had a routine, a schedule, like an old married couple.

Grissom pulled out and surreptitiously snuck glimpses of Sara's long, somehow beautifully awkward form in the rear-view, trying to find comfort in a hard, uncompromising place. A soft sadness fluttered over him, but he said nothing; he drove on in silence, saying a soundless prayer of thanks that this was the shortest night of the year. He did it not for his own sake - he had abandoned religion long ago - but for Sara's. He wanted to murmur to her in the velvety dark of the car, the shadows occasionally pierced by lights that illuminated it momentarily, like neon stars, like false gods. Don't worry, Sara, he wanted to say. Soon the sun will rise. You'll be all right. It'll be over soon. Gil parted his lips...

In the back seat, she stirred. Grissom bit back the words on the tip of his tongue. He gripped the steering wheel and stared at the road. Once again, fear and silence stole his words.

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Sara rolled out of the car, drowsy, tousled and utterly beautiful (to Grissom's eyes, at least). He had told her once that she was beautiful. He had run from her then, too.

Hoisting his kit onto his hip, Grissom entered the restaurant.

It was an upscale place, the walls covered in a smooth champagne-colored paper. The carpet underfoot was sea-green, like the crests on the tops of the waves back in Santa Monica. Glass lamps lit the dark room, tiny candles behind blue-tinted glass. Nevertheless, it was still a crime scene. Grissom caught his first glimpse of the victim, sprawled on the plush carpet in a corner, and slipped on the rubber gloves.

There was no room here for regrets or wishes, no room for him to contemplate the delicate arch of Sara's cheekbones or the soft curl of hair that hid just behind her ear. There was room only for work, and that was comforting to him. He gladly embraced the task at hand, pushing all distractions to the back of his mind.

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Two Hours Later
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Grissom's brow furrowed in sudden thought. "D'you smell that?" Sara lifted her head and sniffed the air.

"Smoke?"

They slowly stood and surveyed the main room. It was aglow candlelight, but nothing was burning outside of the tiny glass hurricane lamps. Sara turned and looked at Grissom, then tilted her head towards the kitchen.

They entered and fanned across the room, Grissom to the left and Sara to the right. Carefully, they moved through the expansive modern kitchen, checking the stoves, burners, and ovens. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. At the very back of the room, Sara and Grissom met again, having found nothing burning. She looked at him and shrugged, but the serious expression he wore didn't pass. "I still smell..."

It was as they turned back to the kitchen exit that they saw the flames licking innocently across the threshold they had just moments before passed through. Sara's eyes widened. Grissom froze. "It must have been in the walls behind the paper. I'm sure the glue made for a nice accelerant..." He heard her gulp beside him, and then, crazily, she began walking toward it.

"Sara, what are you doing?" He reached out and snagged the sleeve of her shirt.

"We have to get out somehow."

If she had sprouted three heads and started tap dancing on the counter to 'Two for Tea', Grissom's expression would have been largely similar. He gestured behind him to the fire exit, slightly worried about her mental well-being if she had overlooked the glaring red letters that red ESCAPE. "This way." He tugged on her sleeve, pulling her towards the door. All of a sudden, he felt her plant her feet. He looked back at her. "What are you doing? Let's go before this whole place goes up in flames." He was starting to panic now - he could hear the sharp edge that crept into his voice when he was afraid.

"My kit..."

"Forget the kit, we can replace it." He pulled again. Again, she didn't budge.

"All of our evidence is out there. You know the cops won't save it."

Grissom shook his head. "That's a chance we'll have to take - this case isn't worth dying for!"

"Look, the glue probably burns at around three hundred degrees... but the tiles won't ignite till it reaches five hundred. We still have time to go back..."

Grissom felt nauseous as he watched the flames sear the walls. He tried to peer out into the main room, to signal the officers there to get the evidence, get out, and call the fire department. But the hallway took a sharp turn and they were blocked from view.

"Grissom?" His attention snapped back to her face. It was pale and fearful in this treacherous light, but her tone was as strong as ever.

"No, Sara." He was surprised by the force in his voice, so much more sure than he felt. "It's too dangerous." He released her sleeve and instead gripped her arm. He would get her out of here safely, even if he had to drag her out of the fire exit kicking and screaming. He turned back to the second door...

But bundles of towels on the floor near it burst into flame just as he started towards it. As he watched, the smolder grew into a wall of fire. Chaos filled Grissom's mind, terror swept through him.

There is no way out. I can't... we're trapped. The principled palace of his mind fell to pieces. Images flashed before him in rapid succession, played out against the flickering orange curtain: Sara's windbreaker catching, the flames devouring her as he stood, helpless. He could almost smell the burning flesh, almost hear her screams. He saw his horrified face, illuminated starkly by the fire's glow as he watched her burn. He reached out for her, and in a moment of release he wrapped his arms around her, screamed with her, for her, because of her. He heard so many things in that ragged cry - pain, fear, loss, guilt, regret... love. He screamed his love for her as the flames consumed them both. The sound echoed in his ears, leaving him senseless.

But...

Sara wasn't gone. Not yet, at least. She shook him from his reverie. "There's no other choice, we have to go out the front." Gil stared at her, unseeing. The words she said didn't permeate his brain. They were eclipsed by the silent shrieks he thought he heard. He saw her lips move, but all he heard was...

"Grissom!" This broke through the empty, endless cries. She really was yelling now, and shaking him harder than she had before. "We have to go before it's too late!"

Right. Right. Only one exit... tiles ignite at five hundred degrees...

He shook his head to clear the horrible sounds from it. His logic was returning, he was beginning to regain his grasp on the situation.

Shit. There's not much time. It's now or never. Jump or listen to the screams for real.

And of course, there was only one choice.

Grissom looked to Sara, noting relief flood into her features - relief that he had come back from whatever terrifying reverie had swallowed him. "Are you ready?"

She nodded. "We'll have to jump."

Gil mentally calculated the height of the flames scurrying across the floor. "We'll need a running start." And this time when he looked at her, he really looked at her. He saw how scared she was, he saw how hard she was fighting to maintain her composure. He knew what she was thinking.

What if this is the end?

Not yet, he wanted to tell her. Not yet. He raised a hand to her cheek and held her face for a moment to bolster her. Her eyes slipped shut. She took a deep, deep breath to prepare herself. And when her eyes opened again, he read the empowerment in their honey-brown depths. Against his hand, she nodded again. He offered her a smile, and although he knew that it was a horrible excuse for one, he knew that under the circumstances, it would do just fine. She noted it, and looked back to the doorway.

"Here goes everything."

Grissom's hands trembled, but he knew that he needed to be strong. "On the count of three. One. Two. Three!" At the same time, they began to run towards the door. The steel surfaces of the kitchen flashed by in the corners of Grissom's eyes - freezer, sink, counter, oven - but his eyes were riveted on the flames before him. He felt Sara running beside him in long, clean strides, could almost hear her heart pounding, feel her blood rushing through her veins in time with his own. Nearer and nearer they came to the fire, and then, when they were three feet away, they leaped.

Grissom's heart flew into his throat and lodged there. His hand unconsciously went out Sara's back. Just like I would if I were helping her through a door, Grissom thought irrationally. Or at least one not flaming. Time stuttered, and then slowed to a crawl. He turned his head to the right and saw that Sara was looking at him, too. There was so much fear in her eyes. Are we going to make it?

And there was so much danger in this one moment, this one fragment of time that should have been insignificant, but God, she was beautiful. Her legs were stretched out, graceful as a dancer's, and her hair flew behind her in a shadowy curtain of silk. Her face was, at last, devoid of all the awkward tension of the human world, the slowly encroaching laugh lines at the corners of her eyes and mouth smoothed by the fire's glow. She was a goddess, leaping over the flames - he saw them reflected in her eyes, felt the heat from them, knew that the same energy pulsed beneath her skin.

And for just a moment, Grissom thought that he saw the fire behind her drop away into an impossibly green field, around which ruddy-faced men and women danced and cheered and yelled out in joy because they were alive. They thanked the earth and sky that had given them life, and they rejoiced that, for another year, at least, they still danced. They prayed for luck, for love, for happiness. And as Grissom sailed over the fire, he did the same. For one breathless, timeless moment, he was in line with the universe.

But then they were through the door, and landing roughly on the other side. Grissom tumbled to his knees, breathing hard all of a sudden. Beside him, Sara gasped for breath. Once again, their eyes met. And this time, he didn't hold back. He wrapped his arms around her in a strong hug, making her give a soft cry of surprise. But after a moment, she hugged him back.

We're alive, the embrace said. I didn't know if we would be, but we are, we did it. We made it. And Grissom murmured into her hair, where he knew she could never hear over the roar of the flames behind her, "I was so afraid I would lose you."

They stayed there for a second, just holding each other in relief. When Sara pulled back, he could see faint tear tracks through the grime on her face. The tears shed in relief, that held no pain for her, and so caused him no pain. They looked back at the fire in the kitchen, and then the reality of the situation hit them. They were sitting there on the floor holding each other while the entire room was about to burst into flames.

They staggered to their feet and ran through the hallway as fast as they could. It was an unsteady, stumbling run, but a run all the same. They had just barely turned the corner into the main room when they heard a furious crack from behind them, reminding them that they weren't out of danger yet.

"The tiles are exploding!" Sara screamed at him over the noise of the fire. Grissom grabbed her windbreaker - he wasn't really sure which part - and pulled her behind him as fast as he possibly could, knowing that although she had more stamina than him, she had been shaken far more severely. They sprinted through the front room, stooping to rescue their kits and what they could of the evidence, but not stopping. As Sara would later tell Catherine, the other stuff wasn't important anymore... getting out alive was.

They burst through the door in a cloud of smoke, sweat, and heat. Both of them were covered with ashes and grime, but when they reached the sidewalk, they were numb. They stood there, looking out at the uniforms and other crime scene personnel, attempting to minimize the blaze and clear a path for the fire truck that Grissom could hear screeching towards them. Brass yelled for the paramedics to go to them and they obeyed, pulling the pair away from the building which was now definitely burning in earnest.

They were hustled to a nearby ambulance and checked for burns. Grissom had been scorched across the bottom of his calf by a metal table leg, and a shard of burning wood had struck Sara across the arm, but other than that, they were fine. The paramedics cleaned the wounds and dressed them with burn salve and white gauze bandages. They gave them the typical test for shock, which they passed, to the mild surprise of the medical crew. CSIs dealt with incredibly high levels of stress every day, but escaping from a near-death experience typically left people ranting in fear. Although both were extremely unsettled, they were medically fine. They were released with orders to drink fluids, stay away from other respiratory irritants, and tend to their burns.

Sara and Grissom trudged back to the SUV, the kits and evidence in their hands hanging like afterthoughts that they were barely aware of. They had spoken little to each other since the escape, but as they unlocked the car and heaved themselves in, Sara turned to Grissom. "Do you mind if I don't finish the shift? I don't think I can handle working anymore tonight. I can drop you off at the lab, if you'd like."

Grissom shook his head. "I'm not particularly keen on going back either. Under the circumstances, I'm sure they'll understand."

Sara made a wordless sound of agreement and started the car. As they pulled out of the parking lot, Gil looked back into the building that had almost claimed their lives. Inexplicably, he found himself thinking, What doesn't kill us... He settled back into the seat and didn't look back again.

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The radio clock had just flashed midnight when the newscaster's cheery voice in the speakers filled the car in a sharp contrast from the classical music that had recently been in its place.

"Good morning, Las Vegas! It's 12:01 am, and you know what that means. Today is June 22, and the National Weather - "

Sara cut in before the man had a chance to tell them that it was going to be hot (they were in the desert; it was always hot).

"Today's the twenty-second?"

"Yes."

"Which means that yesterday - or tonight, I guess - was the twenty-first."

"That's usually the way it works." Sara shot him a look at the dry humor in his tone, but the next words out of her mouth were unrelated.

"The summer solstice." Thoughtfully, she ran her hands over the steering wheel. Hours after he had first confronted the topic, Grissom did so again, taking care to replace the shattered objects in his Mind Palace and mentally smooth the walls back to their previous luster. Midsummer, when the gods walked the earth, and people celebrated life, and...

Lit bonfires. Grissom straightened in his chair. Cleansing flames. Prayers for happiness. People jumping over fires, but not just any people, it was always...

Lovers. Grissom's gaze jerked to Sara, and realized that she was already looking at him. And he could tell from the amused glimmer in her eyes that she knew. Of course she knew. She was just as studied as he - she was one of the only people who could follow his bizarre trains of thought, based on obscure knowledge and outdated customs.

She said nothing, though, just turned back to the road. She couldn't help the tiny, indescribable smile that quirked the corners of her mouth.

But then... neither could he. And he found, for once, that he didn't mind quite so much if she knew, didn't mind the implications. He found that he might not be afraid anymore - because honestly, he had seen worse. And for the rest of the drive, he didn't try to hide the glances that she took from him, nor the affection that was finally, finally starting to make its way to the surface. He soaked up the image of her, the chestnut waves of hair and pale, cream-colored skin. He traced the contours of her face in his mind's eye, and he committed the dimple in her cheek to memory. He memorized the sound of her breathing, and drank in the dangerous, sultry scent of smoke and ash on her. He held her with his eyes, and this time he didn't look away or pretend he hadn't.

He remembered Sara once saying that love was watching someone die. And suddenly, inexplicably, he knew that that was false. Love wasn't watching someone die.

It was watching someone live.