Finally

Disclaimer: Oh hadn't you heard? I recently won the lottery and bought CSI, from now on it's going to be a GSR fan fair!!!

Little Depressing Comment: Did anyone watch the fourth promo on YouTube? If you haven't, go, do it, NOW!!! In fact, watch all four of them but make sure you're not eating or drinking anything near the computer, I give you fair warning.

A/N: Ok, this idea hit me like a train in the wee hours of the morning, so I'm writing it, rather than jotting it down somewhere and forgetting it. I have the most incredible case of writers block with "A Week To Remember" but I promise not to leave it hanging, I swear it'll get finished. For all those who are waiting on "Misconceptions", again, I promise to finish it once AWTR is done and dusted and then I'll finally get cracking on the sequel to "Anniversary". I'd just like to take the time to thank all the people who are still waiting around for the sequel after months of me saying I'll get it done, but it's going to happen, I already have the first three chapters on paper but I don't want to start until I've gotten at least AWTR finished. Final thing before the A/N turns into the actual fic, you may all hate me in the first chapter but I swear to you, I know what I'm doing!

Sara Sidle strode purposefully through the corridors of the lab, noting the busy people going about their jobs in a never ending fight against "The Bad Guys" of Las Vegas. She walked past the break room, seeing Warrick and Catherine sat close together, possibly debating something in a case file or magazine, or maybe they were just using it as an excuse to sit so close. 'Man, they need to get a room' Sara thought, smiling to herself and shaking her head. Next, she passed the AV Lab where Nick was going over some footage of a parking lot that had recently been the proud host of a hit and run with a burglary chaser. She stopped in the doorway and watched the handsome Texan stare avidly at the screen, as he had been doing for the past three hours, trying to find some clue as to who the criminal was. She watched him for a few more minutes before Greg burst through the doors that led to the DNA Lab.

"Nick! We got something from the door handle!" Greg said, breathlessly. Nick jumped from his seat and ran over to the doors and into the Lab.

Sara sighed. Although she loved all the members of the Lab like her own family, not that she could remember that very well, she would perhaps miss Greg the most. He had always been the one who could cheer her up in an instant, no matter the reason for her being down. Greg had that quality of a person you just couldn't help loving, but only to the extent of older sister to younger brother. It had always flattered Sara that Greg wanted to be more than friends, but she had just never wanted to cross that line. Not with Greg anyway. Nick would have been the most logical choice. He was closest to her age, dashingly handsome, always reliable, but Sara had never felt that spark with him. He was the older brother she never had. And Warrick? Well, everyone knew that Warrick and Catherine needed to 'get it on' before someone locked them in a small room together, and Sara felt quite smug to be privy of the knowledge that they had already done so. Been there, done that and most definitely got the T-Shirt (she had the proof in the form of an "I Love NYC" T-Shirt that they had gotten for her on their first holiday together last year, Sara being the reason they were together in the first place, but that was a story for another time) so no, Warrick was most definitely out of the question and frankly, not Sara's type. She would even be sad to say good-bye to Catherine, even though they had not gotten off to the best of starts, and there had been that period of uncomfortable tension after Eddie had been murdered, they had become comfortable friends. She sighed and moved on from the AV Lab to her final destination. She turned the last corner and was glad to see his door was open; it would give her a better chance to do her task with less pain, just get straight to the point. From what she could see of him, he was doing paper work, his most favourite of tasks, but he looked up, apparently using his "Sara Sense" to foresee her coming and laid his pen down as she stepped over the threshold of Gil Grissom's office.

"Hey, you going home?" he asked before she could open her mouth.

"Uh, yeah, you got a second?" Sara asked, trying her best to smile without making it look too fake, a fete she had near enough mastered over the years of working with the man before her.

Grissom sighed dramatically. "Well, as you can see, I have piles of paper work that I would love to keep going with, but if distraction calls, who am I to ignore it?" Sara's smile lightened a little. True, their "relationship" had gotten better over the weeks, but a few dozen days was not enough for years of disappointment and sadness. She stepped forwards to his desk and dropped a white envelope onto the file he had been working on before her entrance. Grissom followed the envelope as gravity brought it floating down to take up more space on his desk.

"It's my letter of resignation." Sara answered the unasked question she could see forming on his face. "I don't want you to make a big fuss out of it and ask millions of questions about it, just accept it, sign it and hand it in to Ecklie, please." She inwardly applauded herself that she had managed to say all that without her voice or her tear ducts failing her. She stood, head held high, waiting for the bomb to drop and the inquisition to start, despite her requests, but it didn't come. Grissom just looked into her eyes, with what could have been tears in his own.

"Why?" Grissom croaked, so quietly Sara barely heard him. She had prepared for this question, knowing that someone was bound to ask.

"I want to move back to Frisco, maybe give lectures, get my PhD. I just…I just need a different work environment. Please Grissom," she whispered before he could speak again. "this is hard enough as it is without you questioning it." Her eyes had begun to burn, but she stood her ground, waiting for him to open the envelope. Grissom looked like he wanted to say more, but he thought twice about it and lowered his head, playing with the un-stuck flap of the document on his desk.

"Fine." He said, dejectedly. "I'll hand it over to Ecklie before I go home. When are you going?"

Sara managed to wipe her eyes without him looking up before answering. "Two weeks tomorrow, it's all in the letter." He nodded and she turned away to the door. She'd barely taken two steps before he spoke again.

"This isn't because Sofia and I are together is it?"

Sara looked over her shoulder at him. He was still staring at the envelope. Sara sighed again. "Grissom, believe it or not, not everything I do is because of you."

The next day, Ecklie called Sara into his office as soon as she arrived at the lab to try and persuade her to stay. He tried every angle conceivable, a raise, promotion, shift change, everything. After the fifth time of Sara saying she was definitely leaving, he got the message and, in a strange character shift, wished her luck with her life and conceded that she was one of the best CSI's he had ever worked with.

"Well…gosh, thanks Ecklie. I don't know what to say." 'God please tell me I'm not blushing!'

"How about 'I was only joking, I'll stay'? No? Well, I can see there'll be no changing your mind. Good luck Sidle." He offered her his hand to shake, which she accepted and hurried back out of his office to the break room where Grissom was in the middle of giving out assignments.

"…stabbed to death by his wife, Nick, take Greg with you. Cath, you have a shoot out in The Bellagio, attempted robbery, the security guard shot him. Finally, Warrick, you and I have a kidnapping in Henderson with Sara, when she gets here."

"Sorry Griss, Ecklie wanted to talk to me about something." Sara said, remaining standing as everyone else was rising from their seats.

"Oh, you're here." Grissom said, seemingly surprised. "I thought you might have left already. I'll meet you at the car." He got up and walked out of the room, leaving Sara to four sets of eyes staring at her.

"What did he mean he thought you might have left?" Catherine asked, always the quickest on the uptake.

"Yeah," piped up Greg. "And what did Ecklie want? He didn't fire you did he?"

"No! No Greg." Sara sighed and sat down in the chair Grissom had vacated. Everyone else took the hint and sat too. "He didn't fire me, I resigned."

"You what?" Nick hissed unbelievingly.

"I resigned. I'm moving back to San Francisco in two weeks. I'm going to start lecturing." She looked at the stunned faces. "And before you ask, there's nothing you can do that will convince me to stay, Ecklie already tried, lots of times. I'm definitely going."

"What about Grissom?" Warrick asked. Mumbles of agreement met his words.

"What about him?" Sara said, crossing her arms over her chest defensively.

"Well surely he must have said something, attempted to get you to stay?" Catherine interjected.

"Why would he? Look, I don't want a big fuss made out of this so I just asked him to sign the letter and give it to Ecklie." She looked pleadingly at Catherine to drop the subject because she knew it would be harder to say goodbye if they all bombarded her with questions.

"So you're moving back to San Fran?"

"Yep."

"And there's nothing any of us can do to make you stay?"

"Nope."

"Well then," Catherine said, rising from her chair. "I guess we'd better make it the damn best leaving party you'll ever have!" she walked out of the room, the boys in tow, leaving Sara mumbling excuses to an empty room.

TBC

Well, it's 2:45 am so I think I'll turn in for the night…morning…whatever. I've already set up the fences around me for the rotten fruit and vegetables you're all going to throw because of Grissom and (shudders) Spork, but I promise you that it will all pan out in the end. The rotten fruit doesn't bother me, it's the pointy objects that you need to put down!!!

A/N 2: OMG nearly forgot, the hugeness of this news: GCSE RESULTS ARE IN!!!!! I got 5 C's in Spanish, English Language (poetry shudders), Maths (I was an hour late for the second paper so...), ICT (computing) and Science (stupid physics grrrr!!!!!) and 2 B's in BTEC (sportish stuff) and English Literature (a book called "Heroes") and I was incredibly shocked by the English B because I was certain I was going to get the second B in Spanish and fail English completely, oh and I got a level 2 in Religious Studies which is an A - C grade, but they're awkward so they grade us using levels instead of letters. So what this means is I am enrolling in College and they'll tell me when I start and I'm going to study Law, Biology, Sociology and Psychology...writing that last sentence gave me RSI!!!