It was a busy day for the crime lab. Sara Sidle was relaxing in one of the lounge chairs in the break room. This particular shift had been a hectic one. The entire team had been running around the country attending to a variety of calls. Prank calls, murder, domestic violence, shootouts- you name it, they had it. Officially it was the first of April otherwise known as April Fools Day and every since shift started, the practical jokes were on.
Right now things were quiet in the labs, considering the number of 'real' cases that had up. Earlier in the evening, it was a war zone of people trying to get their revenge for the jokes cruelly played upon them by members of the crime lab and the CSI's themselves.
When shift had started, she had been the unlucky one to get a hole punched in her cup resulting in a nice brown patch on her pretty white blouse. She had shrieked at the boys and vowed to get her revenge, leaving the break room in a haste to get changed. When she got back, she was delighted to have witnessed Greg go down in the act, with the classic 'whoopee cushion'.
The assignments that night were relatively easy. Most of them turned out to be prank calls. There were a few cases like her 419 in Henderson and Nick and Greg's 420 in Summerville. Catherine had scored a case in Riverhigh County, which was a two hour drive from Vegas, leaving her to run the lab tonight. Ray had a variety to himself.
She had just gotten back from her case and was taking a breather while her evidence was being processed by Hodges. Henry had popped in a few minutes earlier with her reports. He was sporting a big black ring around his eyes; this suggested that someone had painted the microscope eyepiece with shoe polish. Seeing Sara's amused face, he quickly excused himself.
"Who put shoe polish on the microscope? Hodges! Is this one of your juvenile pranks?" he could be heard saying.
Nick had just entered the break room to get himself a cup of coffee. He had left Greg to sort out the evidence among the labs. As soon as he turned the sink on to rinse his cup, he was rewarded with a dousing of water as the hand sprayer hosed him down. Sara laughed as he tried to turn off the water. He finally got it shut off and looked closer at the sprayer. A piece of black electrical tape held the handle down so when the water was turned on, it automatically started spraying.
"Alright, who's the wise guy?" retorted Nick, turning towards Sara.
"Hey, it wasn't me" replied Sara, raising her hands in surrender. "Somebody's up to no good around here."
Just then, Jim Brass walked into the room carrying a paper clip chain. They all looked at him funny. "You were saying?" He held up the chain. They couldn't help but snicker.
"Okay, now that we've had our fun, I'd thought you'd like to know your results" said Hodges, coming into the room with Greg.
"I'm coming" said Sara to Hodges' retreating back. Just then Greg went to sit down in his chair only to find himself on the floor when the chair gave way. Everyone laughed. Greg looked up at them from the floor.
"You were saying?" inquired Greg.
Brass' phone went off.
"Huh, I'll be right there" said Brass, shutting off his phone.
"I just don't know how much more of this I can handle"
He patted Greg on the shoulder and turned and left. They all held in their snickers when they spoiled a sign on Jim's back that said 'Frisk me'. As if that wasn't funny enough, as Hodges turned to leave, they saw the sign on his back that read 'Grissom's pet'. They all bust out laughing when Hodges gave them a funny look, oblivious to the source of their amusement.
As soon as Sara entered the lab, she could feel something wet trickle down her back. A moment later she could feel it trickling down her face. She found herself covered in green slime just as another whoopee cushion sounded through the lab.
"I've had just about enough of this! It was funny at first, now it's getting old."
Ray was in the AV lab with Archie processing footage from a robbery heist he was sent to, when he found Sara storming down the hall, covered in green slime and looking very angry.
Nick and Greg were in the hall when they saw her coming. "Uh oh, it looks like somebody has fallen victim to the serial joker once again."
Greg tried not to laugh, and failed miserably.
"That is it! Who the hell thought it would be funny to drop goo all over me? Its getting annoying. Wait till I get my hands on you…"
Laughter could be heard from the DNA lab and Sara looked to see Catherine, Wendy and Hodges doubled over in hysterics.
"Who did it? I'm NOT amused!"
Nick and Greg ran down the hall laughing, in fear that Sara would kill them right there with her bare hands. Not only that, but from fear that her husband would appear right about now to kill them, hide the bodies and probably get away with it.
As shift came to an end, the pranks began to continue. Some were with good results.
Ecklie kicked shut the door to his office and plonked himself down on the chair. He'd made it! With the amount of cases on hand, he just couldn't take another practical joke.
Just then his phone rang.
"Ecklie" he answered immediately as he picked up the phone.
" Hey"
" Hello?"
" I'm just fine sugar daddy; now tell me...what are you wearing?"
" Uh...? Who is this?"
"This is someone you've met before, Mr. Gay."
"I'm not gay! Leave me alone!"
Ecklie slams the phone down. It rings again. "What? Oh, sorry about that. Yeah I'll be right there"
Placing his hands on the desk he pushed himself up out of his chair and was rather surprised to find the chair coming with him.
"What the hell…?"
He pushed down on the chair arms. The chair pulled against the back of his shirt and pants, but refused to let go. He twisted his head round to stare down his back. The chair was stuck to his shirt! He could feel the weight of the chair dragging at the seat of his pants, so odds were; it was stuck there as well.
He (and the chair) sat back down. Ecklie shook his head in disbelief. He'd been got. He'd been well and truly got. Damn. How was he supposed to get out of this?
He twisted, trying to rip the fabric of his shirt and pants from the chair back. He unbuttoned his shirt and taking hold of the sleeve end with his hand, tugged his left arm out. He slipped his right arm out of the other sleeve and leaned forward. Then he pulled himself out of his pants. Hah, success!
Ecklie was half naked and by the sounds of laughter that could be heard within the lab, someone was going to pay for this. Big time…
Elsewhere in the lab, Wendy was sulky because someone had sewed the arms of her lab coat shut.
Doc Roberts was perhaps the angriest person in the hallway, accusing anyone who crossed his path of taking his tools. Someone had taken all of his surgical instruments and replaced them with everything from forks , plastic utensils, and straws.
And the jokes kept on going…
Things quieted down for a while . Hodges still walked around with no idea of the sign on his back and somehow during the night, Brass' sign had changed to 'I'm now drunk that I could kiss your ass'. The rest of the CSI's and lab techs kept busy with their work.
Everyone started to let their guard down when nothing happened for a while. It was actually fairly quiet in the building when Ray let out a loud yell.
Sara and Catherine were in the garage processing a car. They looked at each other.
"Oh no, not again" Sara groaned.
They walked into the hall just in time to see Ray emerge from a lab covered in white foam. He did not look happy.
"I've had enough of this! It's getting dangerous in here. I think I'm going to go home sick. It's safer there."
Catherine walked over and picked up a manila envelope from the floor. "The old shaving cream bomb."
Sara gave her a puzzled look.
"You fill the envelope with shaving cream, put the open end under the edge of the door and stomp. You see the results."
Ray raised his eyebrows at her. "So, you know how to set this up huh?"
"Hey! I was in the garage with Sara; there is no way I could have done this."
After Ray had gone home ('Finally', thought Catherine as the man himself was as bad as Grissom- hardworking and very devoted to his work), the team gathered in the breakroom sans Greg.
They were all tired but couldn't help it when Greg walked into the room, with a bump on his head.
"What happened to you, man?" asked Nick.
"Oh nothing. Someone thought it would be funny to turn off the bathroom light and douse me with water. To add to it I tripped and hit my head on the sink. This has gone too far".
Just then, Sara spewed her coffee all over the place.
"What the hell?" Nick said.
"Ugh! That is so nasty! Who the hell replaced the coffee with soy sauce? That is just so wrong."
And Ray was livid, as he entered. "I can't get it why someone would remove the battery of my car. I can't take it anymore. I calling in a taxi" he said as he grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge and left.
A page went off for Sara to come to the reception.
While everyone was discussing about the prankster and who it might be they heard laughter coming from the hall.
"What's so funny?" asked Greg from the doorway.
Sara, who the phone call had been for, responded. "I've just won an isolated, month-long camping trip to Antarctica."
Their pagers went off and they all gathered back into the break room just as Robbins came up to them with a letter.
'Dear Graveyard Shift,
I hope you all have had a fun day; I sure did.
Now everyone turn and look at the door.'
They all turned and there was Grissom standing in the doorway with a huge smile on his face.
"Gil!" said Sara in mock anger, unable to keep the smile off her face.
"Yes honey, I missed you too. But you guys are just too gullible." He hosed them down with the super soaker that he had been holding before running down the hall and out the front door.
"Hey Conrad!" he yelled patting Ecklie on the back before jumping in his SUV and sped off.
The others came out the door as Gil was tearing out of the parking lot. They all started laughing as Ecklie gave them a look. There was Ecklie half-naked in boxers with finger prints on them. It spelt -
"CSI RULZ"