An Apology: I want to apologize in advance for the completely uncalled for abundance of medical drama in this chapter. A few years ago, I was really into ER (back when there was still a sizable number of the original cast, at least). Anyways, writing this was kind of a throwback to those days, and I just couldn't resist putting them through one last leg of torture. Also keep in mind that their injuries were intense, and everything that happens to them are actual complications that can happen with these types of injuries.

There will be a brief epilogue after this chapter (taking place two months later), and then it will be finished. After that, I'll be working on a new story which is currently tentatively titled "Bloody Sunday" which contains more action/adventure plus a twist of mystery for Greg (for some reason I can't get enough of Greg angst) with supporting roles given to the rest of our favorite CSIs. Very possibly a Sandle. Summary: "Greg thought it was a bad day when he woke up in the middle of the desert covered in blood. But he knew for sure when he called work and found out he's been missing for three days straight."

And I want to apologize for that SHAMELESS self-promotion, and this next one. If you like my writing, visit Fiction Press .Com (under the name ancientsands) and check out my full length play. I really am shameless when it comes to plugs. The best thing about it though is you can completely ignore them.

That said, enjoy this very long chapter (which I also apologize for its length)


Everything was white. When she opened her eyes, it was all so sharp and bright she just wanted to close them again. There was a moment when she just floated there, staring up at the florescent strip as it buzzed loudly in her ears. She didn't know where she was. She forgot what she was supposed to be doing. Her first thought was that she was late for work. She tried to turn over and look at the alarm clock but she couldn't move. But she had to get to work. What time was it? What day was it?

She became aware of the warmth in her right hand and the comforting pressure. Someone had interlaced their fingers with hers. She blinked and looked down at Grissom, who raised his head up off of the arm of his chair as he felt her fingers squeeze him back.

It was slow, and ever so subtle, but a small smile began at his lips and ended up in his eyes. When he spoke, his voice sounded as tired as she felt. "Hey, sweetie."

With his words, the events of the day came flooding back to her and Sara really wished they hadn't. She closed her eyes and stretched her neck. "What time is it?"

" Nine o'clock."

"Grissom, didn't your shift start at—"

"In the morning," Grissom added. He put his other hand over hers, sandwiching it between his grip. She welcomed its warmth. "My shift, if I'd gone to work today, would be over by now."

"You never miss work unless you're deathly sick enough to be sent against your will to the hospital," Sara said with a playful smile.

"Or someone I love is," Grissom said.

Sara opened her mouth to reply when the full impact of Grissom's words snapped it shut again. She stared at him with a mixture of shock and respect as an insane warmth bubbling up inside of her. "Grissom…"

"Sara," Grissom interrupted, his hand moving up to stroke her hair. "I know I'm not perfect. I know I drive you crazy. And when I'm around you, you make me feel completely at a loss for anything to do or say… But I realized something yesterday. When Brass called me and told me that you and Greg were missing, I felt utterly lost without you. And… it wasn't like when Nick was kidnapped, when that happened I was just… furious and focused. I was determined, I was driven… But Sara, the first thing I did when I heard you were gone was I tried to work your case and I couldn't. I just couldn't think about it at all. I froze up. That has never happened to me before. Not even with Nick."

Sara yawned. "Well, you were missing two of us this time…"

"It wasn't that," Grissom said sharply. "I was worried sick about Greg. But I couldn't even think about you without wanting to hurt something."

Sara reached out and caressed Grissom's unshaven cheek. "Oh Grissom…" she said, her eyelids growing almost too heavy to fight, "you are absolutely perfect."

With a weary smile, she closed her eyes and her hand fell away from Grissom's face. Her deep, steady breaths were the sweetest sounds Grissom had ever heard. He took her fallen hand and placed it next to her on the bed. He stood up and kissed her forehead as he leaned in to whisper in her ear.

"Sweet dreams."

He crossed the hall into Greg's room, where he saw Nick snoring in the chair. He chuckled a little at the sight, which made Greg turn his head. Grissom was surprised that he was awake. Greg grinned at him.

"Yeah," he whispered. "I thought it was kinda funny too."

"I never thought I'd say this, Greg," said Grissom, pulling up a chair. "But it's good to see that stupid smile again."

"Thank you, Grissom," Greg said, perking up.

"You sound wide awake," Grissom said. "Considering what you went through…"

The smile quickly faded from Greg's face and Grissom regretted having said anything at all. He was the king at saying the wrong thing. "Greg, I'm—"

"When I was laying on that table," Greg interrupted, staring at a spot on the wall with a furrowed brow, "and he was… I don't know… with the lighter, or the water or the knife or the lye… I pretended I was at the dentist's. I kept telling myself, 'OK, it hurts now, but at the end of it, I'll have the best damn teeth you've ever seen.' I know, it doesn't make sense, it didn't even make sense at the time, at least not at first… I just had to grin and bear it. But after a while, I just broke. I lost all perspective. I was wondering what happens to people when they go insane. I saw myself through his eyes… I can't explain it."

Grissom felt he should say something, but he didn't know what it was. So he decided he would just stay quiet.

But Greg didn't need him to say anything. "Then, I lost my mind completely. I bit off his ear. He punched me in the nose. I set him off. He went after Sara. And then, all of a sudden, I was back, I was in my mind again and I forgot all about the pain and all I could think about was what that bastard was going to do to her, and because of me. Because I pissed him off." He turned to look at Grissom, his eyes desperate. "Grissom, what happened to her, I am so sorry I couldn't stop it. I'm so sorry that I couldn't protect her. You have to understand that. Watching him hurt her like that, the way he…" All of a sudden, Greg began to choke up. "I'm just so tired, and so sick of everything, and I promised her, I promised her that he would never…" He sniffed and swallowed as he looked up at the ceiling. Grissom saw the tears slide out of his eyes. He closed them and shook his head. "It's just not fair." He laughed and looked back at Grissom. He gestured at his face. "I'm sorry about all of this. I know you're no good with emotions."

Grissom smiled and closed his eyes. "Greg, you didn't do anything wrong. In fact, you did pretty well under the circumstances."

Greg looked down at his sheets and shrugged in an uncharacteristic show of humility. "I did OK," he said. "Doing well would have been keeping my promise."

Grissom's eyes also wandered to other points in the room until he fell on Nick. It was at that point that he realized the snoring had stopped, and it had stopped a long time ago. "It's oddly quiet in here, Greg, don't you think?"

Greg gave him a funny look. "How do you mean?"

Grissom nodded at Nick's silent form and Greg looked his way. Greg looked back to Grissom and grinned again. It was a strange sight to see, the grin with the tear steaks down his cheeks still.

"Hey Grissom," Greg said. "If Warrick and Nick got in a fight, who would you put money on?"

"Oh Warrick," Grissom said. "Definitely, I mean Nick has really let himself go."

"A guy puts on a few pounds and suddenly he's no competition for his buddy in a fight?" Nick's mouth moved, but his eyes remained closed. He opened them and gave Greg and Grissom a lopsided grin. "So what gave me away?"

"You snore," Greg and Grissom said together.

"It's impolite to eavesdrop," Greg pointed out.

"Sorry, Greggo," Nick replied. "But you and Grissom were having a moment and I didn't want to interrupt that." He winked.

"You shot him," Greg said, flatly.

"I'm sorry?" said Nick.

"You shot him," Greg repeated. "You shot Woodward. I wanted to do that."

"I think we all wanted to do that," Grissom pointed out. "Frankly, I kinda wanted to run him over with my car."

"Yeah…" said Greg, sounding far away. "I wanted to submerge his body in lye."

"Yeah," Nick said. "What can I say? I promised him I'd shoot him if I got the chance, and I did."

No one spoke for a long time as the three friends sat there with their own silent thoughts. On multiple occasions, all three men thought of voicing their thoughts, but they all ended up biting their tongue in the end. They were content to sit in the comfortable silence of camaraderie. They didn't have to speak. They were just glad to be together.

"Hey," Nick said at last. "You got a TV, Greg. Wanna watch the game?"

Greg was about to enthusiastically reply when the breath caught in his throat. He found himself suddenly unable to breathe or move. Nick's voice sounded like an echo in the fog of a murky swamp.

"Greg!"

Why was he saying his name like that? Like his was falling off a cliff? Greg began to see spots. Someone was shaking his shoulders. He faintly heard Grissom screaming for a doctor and the sound of a shrill droning whine.

Greg's head felt very heavy. Other people were running into the room.

"Come on, Greggo, don't do this to me kid."

But Greg wasn't sure what he was doing that would make Nick's voice sound like that.

And then, the hospital dissolved around him and he wasn't laying in a hospital bed but on that damn metal table. Everything was sharp and gray and painful. He hurt everywhere. His hands and feet were screaming. There were open wounds on his chest. His gunshot wound hurt most of all. It twisted and ravaged his shoulder as though it were a live animal, destroying him from the inside out. He felt the bullet slipping deeper into the wound…

Woodward's face hovered over him as he mashed the glass in his mortar. He poured the glass over Greg's chest as though they were sprinkles on an ice cream sundae and pressed down. The tears streaked down Greg's face.

"You aren't out of the woods yet," said Woodward. "All that talk about being home safe, everyone was OK, and your sweet Sara was safe and sound. It cracked me up."

Sara!!!

"Sara…" He sobbed the name, too weak to voice any of his horrible thoughts. Where was she?

Woodward was laughing hysterically. Greg heard crying and turned his head enough to see Sara, crying uncontrollably in the corner of her cell. Her clothes were in shreds and she was bruised all over. She was madly trying to cover herself up with the shreds of clothing left. She had a black eye and bite marks all over her neck. They bled freely like the marks a vampire leaves behind.

A deep-seated rage swelled in his belly and bled through his wounds as he grit his teeth and screamed louder than he'd ever screamed before.


Catherine banged the machine after it ate her money.

"Need coffee that badly?"

She closed her eyes as she turned to meet Warrick. "I hate these machines, they always—" she cut herself off when she noticed Warrick held two Styrofoam cups filled with a warm brown liquid. He offered her one and she took it gratefully. "You're a saint."

"Nah," said Warrick. "They just make these better in the cafeteria. I already drank mine, this is for Nick."

"I should get some for Grissom…" Catherine thought aloud.

"No," Warrick said. "I asked, he said he doesn't need any."

Catherine sighed as she looked at the white, bland surroundings. "How did we get here? I mean, how did we even let it get this far?"

Warrick took Catherine's hand. "They're safe," he whispered. "Wasn't that our goal?"

"Sure," said Catherine. "They're safe now. But look at the shape they're in…"

"That's to be expected," Warrick said quickly. "They endured the wrath of a psychopath. You're bound to come out looking a little scratched up."

"Sara's shirt was torn," Catherine said. "Her sleeve was destroyed on one side."

"And Greg's shirt was ripped to shreds," Warrick countered, knowing what she was implying and refusing to even consider it.

"Her bruises…" Catherine said. "They're not as gory as Greg's, but they were well-placed."

Warrick sighed. "Grissom wants to wait for Sara's statement before we jump to conclusions. We have no idea what happened in there, Catherine, and the less we speculate, the less we worry."

"You're right," Catherine said. "I'm sorry. It just pisses me off a little, not knowing."

"You and me both," Warrick said with a sympathetic smile.

"You know…" Catherine said, a faraway look in her eyes, "I remember this one time, it was one of Greg's first times out in the field… He tagged along with Sara and me. A scuffle in the red light district had ended up killing three people. We divided and conquered, and Sara decided to give Greg the hooker while we processed the two men who were killed. Greg started talking about what a shame it was for pretty women like that to have to sell themselves for cash. He was convinced this hooker could have gotten a better job somewhere else. Sara and I ignored him, you know, but I saw a smile tugging at Sara's face. I wasn't sure why at the time, but the more he talked about how he actually respected the hooker, the more she tried to hold in her laughter. You should have heard the way Greg yelped when he realized that the hooker had a few extra parts."

"You're joking," Warrick said, chuckling.

"I think Sara knew from the start," Catherine said, "and she was just waiting for Greg to figure it out."

"That sounds like Sara alright," Warrick said, still laughing. "God, what a pair."

"Really!" Catherine said, quite amused herself. As their laughter died down, neither one spoke at first. When Catherine did break the quiet, her voice was very soft. "I asked if Greg wanted to talk about what happened. He told me about all the things we could already figure from his injuries, and very matter-of-factly, like he was telling me what happened to a corpse he'd just processed. He was shot, he was tortured, hands burned in lye, feet frozen in ice water… And then, he began to talk about Sara and he just stopped mid-sentence. He just froze, his mouth half-open as he stared at me. And then, all of a sudden he completely changed the subject, started talking about sports and then said he was really tired."

Warrick wrapped his arms around Catherine and she rested her head against his chest.

"I'm sorry," she said in his embrace. "I know you told me not to speculate."

"Sh," Warrick said. "Sometimes your mind can't help wandering."

"Yeah…" She paused. "Warrick, I've been thinking a lot. Bad things happen more often than we like to admit, and we think it'll never happen to us, but hell, look at Greg and Sara, look at Nick, I mean… if I was ever in a situation like that, there would be so many things that I'd regret not doing." She pulled away from him just enough so their eyes were inches apart. "Warrick, I know everything, but I just need to tell you…"

All of a sudden, Warrick's phone began to ring. They broke apart and he laughed, only sounding minimally awkward as he saw the name. "It's Grissom," he said. "Must have changed his mind about the coffee. Hello?"

Catherine could hear Grissom's voice coming through the receiver. "Warrick? I'll have that coffee after all. And could you make it an Irish?"

Warrick frowned. "What happened?"

"Just… get up here now."


Catherine and Warrick jogged down the hall to see Nick and Grissom standing outside the door to Greg's room.

"What's going on?" Catherine asked.

"Greg," Nick said simply, before Grissom could reply. Nick was pale and his eyes seemed darker somehow in contrast. Warrick handed Nick and Grissom their coffee. Grissom tried to sip his slowly.

"Does Sara know?" Catherine asked.

"She's sleeping," Grissom said, looking into her room. "I don't want to wake her up and worry her. She's been through enough already."

Greg's parents came running down the hall. Greg's mother looked a little more than frazzled, her frizzy hair flying everywhere, while his gaunt father followed close behind. "What's happening?" asked Mrs. Sanders. "What's wrong with my son?"

"We're not sure," Grissom replied. "All I heard them say was there was complications with Greg's bullet wound."

"Is it his heart?" Mrs. Sanders asked, clutching at her own. "Our family has a history of weak hearts."

"Mrs. Sanders, I don't know what to say…" Grissom began.

"Lillian, calm down," Mr. Sanders said soothingly to his wife as he put his arm around her. "These people don't know any more than we do."

"Might I say, ma'am," Nick put in, "that it's been my experience that Greg has a very strong heart indeed."

Mrs. Sanders smiled a strong smile through her tears at him. "Thank you," she said.

The doctors began wheeling Greg out of the room on a gurney. At the sight of him, Mrs. Sanders fainted into Mr. Sanders arms. Nick and Mr. Sanders exchanged looks.

"Go check on my boy," Mr. Sanders said. "I'll stay here with Lillian."

Nick nodded and ran along side the gurney. "Where are you taking him, what's going on?"

"I'm sorry, sir, we can only disclose that to immediate family," said a doctor.

"I'm his brother," Nick lied, a little too easily. "Please."

The doctor glanced at him fleetingly, as though surprised, but he didn't press the matter. "When Greg was in surgery," he explained, "they couldn't remove the bullet in his shoulder because it would have required more extensive surgery into the muscle tissue. At the time, we thought the bullet was stagnant, but it's moved closer towards the heart."

"Will he be alright?" Nick asked.

"If we get him up there fast," the doctor said, "his chances are better."


"This is all wrong…" Greg muttered. "You're dead…"

"Am I dead?" Woodward asked. "Or are you?"

There was a flash as bright as a camera in Greg's eyes and the table was immediately vertical and facing the wall. Greg couldn't find the energy to scream as he watched what Woodward had done to Sara repeat over and over again before his eyes. He felt so tired. It all seemed so surreal.

There was a flash again and Greg was horizontal once more as Woodward took a knife and dug it deep into his left shoulder in his bullet wound. Greg screamed.

"You think that hurts," Woodward hissed in his ear. "But just wait for this."

Woodward slowly pulled out his gun and aimed at Sara in the corner. There was a bang and then another flash.

Greg was kneeling in front of Sara. "Sh," he said, "It's all OK. You're safe now."

Her words were completely unintelligible as continued to sob, madly trying to do any menial task to distract herself. She was completely shattered and nothing Greg could say would fix her.

"Please," he begged her. "Please, Sara, just stop crying. I'm here. It's all OK."

But all she could do was cry.

There was the bang again. Greg felt the bullet strip through him and hit Sara square between the eyes. They stared up at him, glazed over, and she looked vaguely like a porcelain doll, her gaze forever frozen in an expression of horror.

There was a final flash and Greg was blinded by it. But he heard the voices.

"Come on, Greg. Can you hear me?"

Greg blinked. Everything was moving very fast. He looked up at the doctor who was speaking to him. "Wha…?"

"Greggo." Greg blinked again and saw Nick was running alongside the gurney.

"We're taking you into surgery," said the doctor. "Do you understand?"

Greg nodded. "Nick?"

"I'm here, Greg," Nick said.

"Sir, we're going up into surgery now, you'll have to stay here," said the doctor as they entered the elevator.

Greg was scared. "Nick?" he said again, this time more worried.

"He'll be there when you get out of surgery," the doctor said to him.

Greg was too tired to worry and he closed his eyes.


Nick jogged back down the hall to see the same crowd he left assembled outside of Sara's room. Grissom was being pushed outside by a nurse.

"Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to wait outside," said a nurse.

"No!" Grissom said, suddenly understanding the irritation of people at the crime scenes of loved ones. "I'm from the Crime Lab, I can…" But that excuse couldn't help him here and he knew it even as he said it.

"I'm sorry sir," said the nurse. "But please, just wait outside." She pushed him out the door and turned to go back in, but Grissom caught her shoulder.

"Is she going to be alright?" he asked her. "What happened?"

"Please just wait outside," said the nurse, before closing the door. Grissom put his hands on the door frame and banged his head on the door.

"What's going on?" Grissom turned around to see Nick, his eyes desperate.

For once, Grissom didn't have an answer. "I don't know."

"Something just… happened," Warrick said, stunned.

"But—she was fine," Nick said. "She was fine a minute ago, wasn't she?"

"She woke up…" Grissom said, confused. "She talked to me. She asked me the time, why I wasn't at work… We had a conversation."

Catherine wrapped her arms around Grissom, but he couldn't bring himself to return the hug. He just stood there, completely lost all over again.

"First Greg…" Grissom muttered. "Now Sara..."

"No," said Nick, resolutely. "We're not losing either one of them."


When Greg opened his eyes again, he was in a sparkling white hospital room. Sara was sitting by his bed.

"Hey, hot shot," she said softly.

"Sara…" Greg said. "Are you OK?"

"At this moment, I'm better than you are," she said. "I'm not in surgery."

"I've been seeing things…" Greg said. "Terrible things. I'm not sure what actually happened and what's part of my dreams."

"Sh," Sara whispered. "It's all OK. You're safe now."

Greg nodded to the group outside the hall. "What about them?"

Sara looked over her shoulder at them. "They'll do alright."

"I'm tired, Sara."

"So am I."

"So what are we gonna do?"

Sara was quiet. "Grissom said don't give up."

"So…" Greg said. "Whose dream is this? Yours or mine?"

"I'm not sure," said Sara with a wry grin. "Does it really matter?"

"I guess not," Greg said.

"I won't give up if you don't," Sara said.

"I just wanted to be sure you were safe," said Greg. "And now, I feel so tired."

Sara placed her hand on his. "Come on," she said. "I'm not letting you go so easily."

"Sara," said Greg, not looking down. "I can't feel you."

"I'm right here, Greg," Sara said.

"No," Greg insisted, shaking his head. He pulled his hand away and waved it at her. "I mean I can't feel you." He looked at his hands sadly, which were heavily bandaged up to his forearm to let the burns heal. "I'm pretty much crippled thanks to that bastard."

"But not permanently," Sara said. "I mean, sure, you can't walk, and your hands are busted up, and you can't really move your left arm, but all that will heal."

"What are you really doing here?" Greg asked. He noticed her shirt was stained a dark crimson. "You don't look too good yourself."

"I'll be fine," Sara said. "You spend so much time worrying about me, you stop thinking about yourself."

"Thinking about you is the only thing that kept me alive," Greg said. "So long as I was focused on making sure you were safe, I could block out the pain."

"You're sweet," said Sara. "All I could think about was how you shouldn't have been there in the first place."

"I love you." The words tumbled out of his mouth like uncontrollable drool, but somehow he didn't care.

"It's a shame you'll never have the guts to say that to my face," Sara replied.

"Ah," said Greg. "So this is my dream after all."

"Don't be too sure of that, hot shot," Sara said with a wink.

"There. You never call me that," Greg said.

Sara stood and Greg saw her waist. The crimson was dripping down her jeans as she walked closer to Greg and stroked his hair. She slowly morphed into his mother, who kneeled down next to him on the bed.

"Please come back, baby," she said, her eyes bright with tears. "Momma misses you."

"Hey, Mom," said Greg. "It's good to see you."

"You should listen to your mother," came a voice from the other side of the bed and Greg looked up to see his beaming father. "You should have told us you were promoted."

"You know how Mom gets," Greg said, smiling at his mother. "I get a paper cut and she wants to send me to the emergency room like I'm anemic."

His mother pouted. "Well, human beings are fragile, you know, Greg, your Grandpa Olaf narrowly escaped death himself in the war."

"But he survived," Greg said. "And so did I."

"So far," said his father.

"Greg, sweetie…" his mother came in, stroking his hair compulsively. "If you leave me, I won't know what I will do. I'll be a wreck."

"You're already a wreck, Mom," Greg said with a light laugh. "You've been a wreck ever since I was born."

"It's only because you drive her crazy," said his father with a smile. "Son, I'm proud of you. I hope you know that." He looked as though he wanted to pat him on the shoulder, or shake his hand, but Greg's injuries made that impossible. So instead, he kept his arms neatly folded.

"I know that, Dad," Greg said.

The images disappeared, but his mother's words echoed in the room. "We'll keep you safe, Gregory."

And Greg was left alone. The scene faded in and out. He wasn't so sure of what was going on.

The sight of Sara flashed before his eyes. "It's time to wake up now, hot shot."


They all waited in the hall between Greg and Sara's room, not sure of what to do. Greg had gone to surgery, but no one was telling them what was wrong with Sara. Soon enough, a nurse came out to speak with them.

"Are you Miss Sidle's family?" she asked.

"Yes," Grissom said, quickly.

"Alright," said the nurse. She was smiling. "Well, we're sorry if we caused you worry, but she threw a clot and we had no time to waste. It was just a little scare is all. She's stabilized now, though, and she told me to tell someone named Grissom that she's sorry she's not perfect either." The nurse smiled at Grissom, as though she could tell it was him. "Would you like to see her now?"

"Hell yes," Warrick said, and the four CSIs filed into the room. Nick was last and he hesitated as he noticed that the Sanders remained, shaken and wan standing in the hallway. He stood there awkwardly a moment as they looked at them before approaching them.

"Mrs. Sanders," he said. "I meant what I said about you're son. He's survived one hell of a lot already. It's not in his nature to give up now."

"It's good to see that Greg has such noble colleagues," Mr. Sanders said. "I'll be he's learned a lot from you."

"It's like Grissom said," Nick said, turning towards the door. "He's our family too."

With a smile from Mrs. Sanders, Nick entered the room. Sara tried to look over at him and a grin lit up Nick's face. It was all he could do to not run over there and scoop her up in his arms, he was so happy to see her awake again. He wanted to say so many things, but she seemed to say them all in two simple words.

"Hey, Nick." She then addressed them all collectively, her eyes filled with concern. "How's Greg? Is he OK?"

She tried to sit up and winced. Grissom gently pushed her back down. "Greg is in surgery, sweetie," he said, his voice soft as though Sara were a delicate child.

Her brow furrowed in confusion. "He'll be alright." It wasn't a question, but the others still didn't know how to respond.

"You're right," Nick said bravely.

"Nick," Sara said with a knowing smile. "Always have faith."

"Always," Nick echoed.

"We're all just glad that you're both safe," Warrick said.

Sara closed her eyes and tried to stretch out her neck again. "I think I have whiplash or something. My neck is killing me."

Her friends exchanged looks. Catherine licked her lips and took the chair by Sara's bed. "Honey, do you want to tell us what happened in the warehouse?"

Sara looked confused. "But I thought Greg would have told you everything by now…"

Catherine looked at the others before continuing. "Well, he did, but he wasn't so clear on what happened to you. We know he was tortured and we know you guys tried to escape a few times but…" She trailed off as she noticed Sara was staring at the far corner of the room. "If you want us to leave, we can," she said.

For a long time, Sara didn't speak, and Warrick even moved towards the door.

"Wait," Sara said, still staring at the wall. "I don't remember everything that happened. I tried to block out a lot of it. But I can tell you what didn't happen." She turned and looked Catherine in the eye. "He didn't rape me. I know it's his MO, and God knows he tried, and once he got really, really close, but…" she trailed off again, and though she was still looking at Catherine, her eyes became very distant. She shook it off and smiled at all of them. "Well, one way or another, he always got distracted, whether it was Greg coming at him with a hacksaw or Nick calling him on the phone."

"What?" Nick said, surprised.

"And Grissom," Sara said. "You should have seen the look on his face when you called, it was priceless."

There was a knock at the door and it slowly opened. It was Greg's doctor.

"Mr. Sanders?"

The others looked at each other in confusion, before Nick jumped at some internal realization and stepped forward. "Yeah?"

"Your brother's out of surgery," the doctor said. "You all can see him now."

The doctor left and Sara cocked an eyebrow and gave Nick a lopsided grin. "Brother, huh?"

"They'd only tell me what was going on if I said I was family," Nick replied. "I lied, so sue me."

"Nah," said Sara. "I don't think you did."

"Are you feeling OK?" Grissom asked. "I bet we could get a wheel chair."

"Bah," said Sara, waving her hand dismissively. "I just spent the whole day with Greg I can see him later."

"We'll be back," said Warrick.

Sara shrugged. "I'm not going anywhere."

Grissom lingered. "Are you sure you're alright?"

She smiled at him, but put her hand on her stomach under the sheets. "I feel fantastic."

Satisfied, he left and Sara exhaled a sigh of relief as she looked at the ceiling. As much as she was glad to see them all, she was glad to be left alone with her thoughts.


Greg opened his eyes and saw the faces of his friends and family staring back at him. "You see," he said to them, his voice hoarse, "this is what a guy needs to wake up to every morning."

His mother made a sound as though she was stifling a sob. She looked as though she really wanted to hug him, but was afraid he would break. His father was holding onto her tightly. Nick, Grissom, Catherine and Warrick were all there. He really wanted to see Sara.

"How's Sara?"

"It's kind of cute, you know," Catherine said. "How one of the first things either of you say is an inquiry about the other."

"That's not an answer," Greg said.

"She's fine," Grissom replied. "Awake."

"Can I see her?" Greg asked.

"Oh sweetheart," said his mother. "The doctors said you shouldn't move right now."

Greg ignored his mother and looked at his friends. "Guys?"

"If that's what the doctors said, I'm not helping you break any rules," said Nick.

"You can see her after you're both feeling a little better," Warrick said.

"It's probably better that way," Greg said, feeling his eyes getting heavy. "I think they drugged me so I could sleep."

"Well then we better let you," Grissom said. "We should get some sleep ourselves."

"Yeah, you guys go home," Greg said, waving at them to leave.

Catherine seemed to flinch at the sight of his bandaged hand, but all she said was, "Get rest and get better."

As they left him in peace, Greg closed his eyes, and resolved to not open them again for a very long time.