Title: Sympathy for the Devil
Author: Burked
Disclaimers: CSI is a registered trademark of CBS, Inc.
Rating: R for disturbing content
Summary: SS, CW, and GG work on a case that has them examining their commitments to their ethics.
A/N: We're all grown-ups here, right? We should probably figure that in 15 months of dating, Sara and Hank did the dirty deed at least once. However, for the purposes of this story (and keeping my dinner down), let's pretend it never happened, okay? Just think of it a blatant plot device; that's all Hank ever was.
Thanks to all who have read this and have given me feedback. Special thanks to Mossley and LSI for the close readings and good ideas – you are the best.
"Well, if it isn't Thelma and Louise," Brass chuckled, then threw his hands up in mock-surrender at the death glares being shot at him by Catherine Willows and Sara Sidle.
"Considering our histories with men, you should probably not plant any ideas," Sara shot back.
"Oooo, makes me glad I was never involved with either of you," Brass quipped.
"Not nearly as glad as we are, I bet," Catherine snorted.
"That hurt," Brass whined, holding a hand over his heart.
"Brass, do we have to find the body ourselves, or are you going to give us a hint?" Sara asked, looking up and down the street for the 419 Brass had called in.
"Patience, patience," he said, holding up a hand. "I wanted to talk to you for a second first, before you get to the body. Actually, I was kind of hoping Grissom would come for this one. Maybe bring one of the guys."
"I'm going to try really hard not to take that personally," Catherine said.
"No, no, nothing personal against either of you ladies," Brass backpedaled. "It's just sort of an ... uh ... uncomfortable ... crime scene to share with mixed company."
"Well, deal with it or call in a female detective, because we're here and we'd like to start processing the body before all the evidence is lost ... if that's okay with you," Catherine spat out.
"Follow me," Brass uttered, turning down the alley that intersected the street where they had met. He led them down about fifty feet, just on the far side of a dumpster that was surrounded by mounds of bagged trash.
"I've heard of this before, but I've never actually seen it," Sara said calmly, pulling her camera up to take locator shots of the body lying amongst the black bags. She took out her yellow scale ruler and a case identifier card, looking expectantly at Brass. He rattled off the case number for Sara to write on the card, then stepped back to allow the female CSIs to begin doing their jobs in earnest.
Catherine scanned the area around the body, but found nothing that appeared to relate to the corpse, so she gingerly made her way through the maze of trash to approach the body. "Castrated," she intoned evenly, looking first at Sara, then turning to Brass. Brass looked down at the body and winced, then turned away, bringing involuntary grins to Catherine and Sara.
"The motive for these types of mutilations is usually retribution for cheating," Sara recounted, snapping pictures of the wound.
"You have no idea how tempting it can be," Catherine mumbled, as she scanned the victim's clothing for trace evidence.
"Oh, I think I do," Sara smiled.
"See, this is why I wanted the guys to do this one," Brass complained good-naturedly. "They could identify with the victim instead of the perpetrator."
"You mean to imply that you are all lying, cheating bastards?" Sara asked.
"I'm just going to shut up now before I find myself duct-taped and castrated like this poor guy," Brass conceded.
"Did you find his genitalia anywhere?" Catherine queried, lifting up each sack of trash around him, looking for the rest of the victim.
"Naw. Maybe she kept it as a souvenir," he posited.
"You are assuming a woman did this?" Sara asked Brass.
"I don't know many men who would do this to another man. I mean, it hurts just to think about it," he said, his face pinched in pain.
"This isn't a typical female MO, either," Sara explained. "Most women who castrate do it while the man is sleeping, then leave him wherever she found him. They don't usually dump the body. Most women aren't strong enough to move the body in the first place," Sara rejoined, shaking her head and the already-appearing inconsistencies in this case.
David Phillips backed the van down the alley, stopping a few feet shy of the dumpster, smiling happily to himself when he saw Sara in the rear-view mirror. He pulled the gurney out of the back and dragged it over to the body. Like Brass before him, David winced and suddenly sucked a breath through clenched teeth when he saw what had happened.
The two women fought to maintain their composure. It was not that they thought what happened to the victim was funny – they certainly did not. It was the reaction of the men viewing it that was amusing to them.
"You know, Catherine," Sara said tiredly, "we're going to have to lug all this trash back to the lab. His genitals could be in one of these bags."
"Uh ... I don't think so," David said meekly, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose.
Sara and Catherine looked at him expectantly, eyebrows raised. "What makes you say that?" Sara finally asked.
David took a pair of forceps and gingerly peeled back the duct tape across the victim's mouth and handed the tape to Sara to log as evidence. As soon as the tape released the lips, the ladies nodded to David that they understood what he meant.
"Okay, never mind the trash bags. Looks like our victim's all here, just ... uh ... rearranged," Sara said, eliciting another wince from the two men.
David asked if Sara or Catherine had any special instructions, then bagged and loaded the victim. The CSIs photographed the bags, opening several to see that they obviously originated from the restaurant that backed up to the alley.
"If we're done here, let's follow David in and get a ten-card on this guy. We might get him identified before the autopsy is completed," Catherine suggested, to Sara's nodding agreement.
* * * * *
She sat looking at the printout, hoping the next name would jump out at her. She only had a week to make sure the unlucky bastard still lived at the address printed below his name. She would need to watch him, scout out his weaknesses ... besides his most obvious one.
She had already devoted six months of preparation for her plan. She had gathered all the information she could on the detectives and forensic scientists who worked the night shift at LVPD. She read articles, went to press conferences and even took a tour of the police department. She felt confident that she knew what she needed to know for right now about those she hoped would be more worthy adversaries. She would learn more as the contest progressed.
She never could understand why it had been so hard for the police in the other cities. She felt like she had done everything she could to help them, short of turning herself in with evidence in hand.
As usual, she had done her research and had determined that Las Vegas had a good police department and one of the best forensics labs in the country. Maybe they would be able to do what could not be done in two other cities.
As her highlighter found the next name, she sat back and wondered if she should contact the investigators yet. She always hated the first few weeks, watching them flail around helplessly like fish out of water. She thought of the pettiness of some of the criminal miscreants who delighted in the initial confusion. They stupidly thought that meant that they were smarter than the police. They were rarely right.
But she didn't want the investigators to think that she thought them unworthy. That was yet to be seen. Maybe she would let them work on the first one alone. Then she would contact one of them, to see how well they had progressed. If they needed help, she would help. If not, all the better.
"Mr. Richard Hernandez," she read solemnly. "You have six more days to infect the earth."
* * * * *
David had delivered the evidence bags to Sara. He watched her admiringly as she signed the chain of custody forms for each piece. Occasionally, she would feel him staring at her and she would look up and smile wanly, hoping he would get the hint.
After her own examination, Sara took the clothes to the Trace Lab, finding herself both mortified and relieved that Hodges was on duty. She was sure that in all of her existence she had never met anyone she disliked more than Hodges on a purely visceral level. As far as she could tell, he had only one redeeming value: he was very good at his job. She hated it when talented people were complete assholes; it made it such a challenge to give them the respect they were due.
Sara had already looked over the clothing for trace evidence but found nothing. She wasn't going to waste any more time on it. If there was anything there, Hodges would find it. If he didn't, she could rest assured that there simply wasn't anything there to begin with.
She took the strips of duct tape that had covered the victim's mouth and bound his hands and feet, then put the bags in the freezer. She made a mental note of the time, telling herself to give them an hour to freeze solid.
Sara decided that it would be a good time to eat lunch. The ten-card was with Jacqui, the tox, DNA and blood samples with Greg, trace with Hodges, and the tape in the freezer. Nothing to do now but wait. Sara was very patient when it came to work, but she was very impatient when it came to inactivity.
She combed the halls looking for Catherine, to see if she wanted to grab a bite. Not finding her, she called her on the cell. Catherine told her that she and Brass were canvassing the restaurants in the neighborhood, determining if anyone remembered seeing the victim alive.
Sara told her of her own progress and hung up. Despite the strangeness of the case, she was in a relatively good mood. She had been sleeping a little more lately, more out of boredom than necessity. She found that, not surprisingly, she felt less irritable when she got more than four hours of sleep. But she still couldn't understand why people would voluntarily waste a third of their lives unconscious.
She walked into the break room to find Grissom drinking a cup of coffee and working a crossword puzzle.
"Taking a break?" she asked lightly, walking over to the coffee pot.
"Um hum," he mumbled, eyes and pencil moving across the paper.
"Have you eaten?" she asked.
"Huh?" he asked distractedly.
"I said, have you eaten?" she repeated, a little louder and more clearly enunciated.
"No," he said without looking up.
"You want to go grab some lunch? My treat," she offered evenly.
Grissom looked up briefly, then back down. "No."
"Not like a date lunch, Grissom. You eat with the others all the time. It's just lunch. If you want, I'll go get it, bring it back and we can eat it in here. I'm hungry and I don't want to eat lunch alone."
"Where's Catherine?" he asked.
"She's with Brass. And I have Greg and Jacqui busy on evidence. Nick and Warrick are in the field. Archie is off tonight. David is assisting Dr. Robbins on the autopsy on my victim. See? I already tried everyone else. Hell, I would have gone with Hodges, if I didn't have him looking for trace," she laughed.
"So that means I am the absolute last person you wanted to eat with?" he asked, looking up with an unreadable expression.
"No, it means that you are the absolute last person I thought would say 'yes', and I guess I was right," she said, pouring her coffee in the sink and tossing the cup in the trash. "Sorry to have interrupted your puzzle," she said acidly, as she marched out of the door.
Grissom tossed the paper aside and watched her leave through the glass walls. She had a point: he had often eaten with the other CSIs. In the past, he had eaten with her as well. But ever since she asked him to dinner, he saw every word and action from her as an attempt to further her agenda, and he resisted, even when it was nonsensical. He was taking it too far, and he knew it, but he wasn't sure where the line should be drawn.
He hoped it would become clearer to him soon. His behavior was beginning to unduly influence their working relationship, or what was left of it.
He sat there for a quite a while, trying to decide what, if anything, he could do to normalize his interactions with Sara – even with himself he avoided using the word 'relationship'. He sighed at his failure once again to deduce an answer, and closed his eyes.
He was startled at the sudden thud directly in front of him and opened his eyes to see a white sack, and Sara's quickly receding back as she exited the door. She had evidently dropped the bag on the table. He gingerly peeked inside, and pulled out a chicken sandwich and chips from the deli down the street. In one fell swoop, she had managed to make him feel even worse about himself.
He looked at the sandwich, but felt no hunger anymore. He wrapped it back up and put it in the refrigerator for later. Right now, he knew that the only thing that would make him feel better is work. But he also knew that there was something else he had to do: find Sara and apologize.
* * * * *
"What are you doing here? I didn't call you," Hodges said accusingly when Sara walked in.
"Chill out, David," she said calmly. "I'm not here to rush you. I just came to watch you work. You know, the CSIs are supposed to 'constantly strive to improve their understanding of the technical aspects of the laboratory work'." She reeled it off just like it was written in the handbook.
Hodges was dumbstruck that she had used his given name. No one at the Crime Lab had ever called him by his first name. Ever. And she was tacitly admitting that he had superior trace analysis skills. He decided to let her stay.
"OK. Just don't distract me with a lot of inane questions," he warned.
"Would it be distracting if I asked intelligent questions?" she retorted.
He turned his back to her and exhaled sharply in answer, then bent back over the microscope. Sara watched him look at the victim's shirt a few millimeters at a time.
"How do you keep track of where you've already looked without marking the sample?" she asked.
He stood up, but didn't turn around. In a slightly annoyed voice, he answered, "The weave of the cotton fabric forms it own grid pattern. I follow the lines formed by the threads," he sighed.
"Oh. Simple, yet elegant," she retorted.
"Quite so," he said, looking back at the fabric.
Sara knew there was little knowledge she could gain by sitting here, but she wasn't in a talkative mood, so Hodges was the natural choice to hang around with.
"You weren't kidding, were you?" Grissom asked Sara from the door.
"Oh, hi, boss!" Hodges said with a smile. "What brings you here?" he asked superciliously.
"I was looking for Sara," Grissom answered dismissively. "Can I have a word with you, Sara?" he asked much more politely.
"Sure, why not?" she answered, getting up tiredly from the lab stool.
As they walked down the hall, Grissom was shaking his head. "Things have really gone too far when you feel more comfortable with Hodges than with me."
"He's nicer to me," she said flatly.
"He's nice to you?" Grissom asked incredulously.
"No," she answered simply.
"Oh." After a moment spent regrouping his thoughts, Grissom continued, "Well, I wanted to thank you for the sandwich. I'm really not very hungry right now, but I'll save it for later."
"Whatever you want," she said, following him into his office.
"What made you decide to bring me lunch?" he asked, sitting down behind his desk.
"I went to the deli for my lunch. You said you hadn't eaten, so I brought you a sandwich. I would have done the same thing for anyone else," she said with an undercurrent of indignation in her voice.
"Would you please have a seat?" he asked.
"I'd rather stand," she said stiffly.
"I'd feel more comfortable if you would sit down," he said calmly.
"Well, since it's all about what you're comfortable with ..." she mumbled, pulling the chair out a few feet from the front of the desk before sitting in it woodenly.
"Sara, this needs to stop. It's getting way out of hand," he said beseechingly.
"Hey, I'm the one who offered to buy you lunch. I was very clear that it was strictly platonic. You're the one who was a prick about the whole thing."
Grissom exhaled heavily. "Sara, I don't think name-calling is going to improve the situation."
"I don't know – it makes me feel a whole lot better," she smirked.
"Look. I just don't know where to draw the line with you. I thought maybe we could discuss it rationally. That way, we'd both know what is acceptable," he said unemotionally.
"Grissom, there's a big difference between being decent to someone and flirting. You seem to think that anything this side of emotional abuse is a come-on. If you just treated me half as well as you do anyone else on the team, it would be a welcome relief. And it would still be a long way from 'the line'," she said, drawing quotation marks in the air with her fingers.
"I apologize," he nodded. "You may not believe this, but I'm doing this to try to be fair to you. I don't want you to misconstrue anything I say or do, thinking that I'm leading you on."
"Don't worry about that, Grissom. You have made your lack of interest abundantly clear. I promise not to misconstrue common courtesy as being any more significant than it is. You don't have to avoid me, and you don't have to be rude to me to hammer home your point. I get it. ... I give up," she said with finality, holding both hands aloft in surrender.
His elbows were on the desk, with his arms perpendicular, hands together as if in prayer. Grissom leaned into his hands, resting his chin on his thumbs, the sides of his index fingers against his lips. Hearing her concede defeat should have freed him, but he couldn't seem to enjoy it.
As long as she was pursuing him, even though he was resisting her, it was an involvement – not realized, but at least potential. Now that she gave up, it was over. Just like that. Another in a long line of failures.
It didn't make it any easier to know that this was what he said he wanted, and what he had forced on her. Sara's persistence all these years was disconcerting on the one hand, but strangely comforting on the other. It was something he had grown accustomed to, and he already felt its loss keenly.
He opened his hands and slid them up over his eyes, rubbing his forehead with his fingertips. He kept his eyes hidden behind his hands, not wanting her to see the disappointment that he felt.
The silence hung like a thick blanket between them. Grissom knew she had said all she was going to say on the subject, and was waiting on him. But the only words that would come to mind were betrayals of his cause, pleadings for her to give him just a little more time to work it all out in his mind.
The insistent beeping of Sara's pager shattered the silence. "Jacqui," Sara said succinctly. "Are we done here?" she asked.
Grissom nodded slowly. Apparently they were done – in every sense of the word.
TBC