Author's Note: "Resident Evil" is a very popular and well-made video game series that was transformed into a very bad movie series about zombies and parasites. That's your pop culture reference of the day. If you want to learn more, google it. The title of this chapter is exceedingly random, yet relevant at the same time. Woohoo for me! Keep reviewing. It's a little slow right now, I know, but I promise it picks up.
Chapter Seven: Zombies and a Curling Iron
"Warrick!" Catherine called as she saw the man in question making his way swiftly past the trace lab. He did not respond. Bidding a curt goodbye to Hodges she took off after him at a brisk pace and called his name again.
He stopped, but seemed frustrated. "Not now, Catherine, I have to find Nick. Have you seen him?"
"No," she said. "But have you seen Greg?"
"Greg is the reason Nick ran out," Warrick replied.
"Did you see his limp?" Catherine pressed.
"What limp?" Warrick asked, his brow furrowing.
She smiled. "One time I told Lindsey to stop climbing a sycamore outside of our house because I was afraid she'd fall. Well she didn't listen to me and when she finally did fall, she earned herself a solid gash on her left leg. She thought she could hide it from me by wearing long pants but she hadn't cleaned or dressed the wound properly so it got infected—"
"Does this anecdote have a point?" Warrick snapped impatiently.
She looked taken aback. "I just meant that I know a limp when I see one, even if the person is trying to hide it. And Greg's is only visible when he's walking fast."
Warrick looked tired as he buried his face in his hands and rubbed at his eyes. "I'm sorry, Catherine, but Grissom's out with that new homicide and it's got me a little on edge, not to mention this thing with Greg, and it's got Nick wound tighter than a… see, I can't even think of a proper metaphor, I'm so distracted."
"What new homicide?" Catherine asked, intrigued.
"Same M.O as Bonnie Hunter's killer. Which makes me think that…" He trailed off, his eyes moving elsewhere but he shook his head. "Never mind. My head is all foggy from lack of sleep. Ecklie pulled me in for swing shift because they were short, so this is my second shift today. My mind's playing tricks on me. Like waking nightmares. It ain't pretty."
She smiled sweetly, reassuringly as she rubbed his arm, acting like a mother might towards her child after he awoke from a particularly bad dream. "You're tough, you'll make it through shift," she said. "You've worked doubles, triples even, on less sleep."
"It's not the lack of sleep that's getting to me, it's all this antipathy that's hanging in the air," Warrick said. "Since Greg was attack, it's like a storm cloud came and settled permanently over the lab. Sara and Grissom are acting like they work for the CIA. Do you know I haven't even spoken to Sara since we were at Bonnie Hunter's crime scene? And the only time I ever talk to Grissom is for case related issues. And Nick hates everyone because no one's talking, and since I keep trying to reason with him he keeps biting my head off… And Greg is never around… How long exactly does it take to recover from a wound to the throat? If the hospital discharged him, shouldn't he be OK to work? My God, Catherine, it's just… you seem to be the only one going on like everything is normal. A regular ray of sunshine in this dismal hellhole."
Her smile turned into a grin and she almost blushed, but she was too proud for that. "I have faith that as soon as this case is over things will start going back to normal."
"How do you know that?" Warrick asked.
"It's just a feeling I have," she replied. "I mean after they've caught the guy… what's there to hide?"
"You think it's confidential because telling us will hurt the case?" Warrick asked.
"I can't think of a better reason Grissom would keep something form us," Catherine returned.
"I can…" Warrick mumbled and he looked away from her.
She touched his chin and made him look at her again. "I trust Grissom," she said.
Warrick wanted to say that he trusted Grissom too, but he couldn't find the words. "I just can't shake the feeling that there's something… uncanny about this case. Something wrong. Something poisonous. And it's like it's infected Grissom and Sara and it killed them and now they're just… zombies. Hosts to some parasite and they're just doing its bidding and adding fuel to the fire."
"Don't go all Resident Evil on me," Catherine said. "I know Gil, and Sara's not much different. They may be dismal, but they're focused, and they're sharp. They're just working the case. Don't talk to me about zombies and parasites."
Warrick looked surprised. "Resident Evil?"
She rolled her eyes. "Lindsey—"
"Say no more."
She laughed lightly and it even made him smile for the first time in days.
And then, they both heard a bang coming from the locker room. They looked towards it and then back to each other, echoing each other's thoughts.
"Nick."
They both ran off just as Sara rounded the corner and stopped as she looked after them, then looked in at Hodges, who was busy working on the evidence Catherine had left him. Sara turned into the trace lab and sat down on the other side of the counter, watching him until he became so irritated by her scrutiny he would look up and tell her to stop it.
But he never did.
He went on as if she wasn't there, and it took Sara a full minute and a half to finally decide to admit defeat and be the first to speak. "What are you working on?"
"Catherine has some trace for her homicide off of Mason Avenue," he replied absently, focusing the microscope. "Hm. Cotton."
"Do you remember the hair I found on Greg's vest?" Sara asked.
He seemed to flinch ever so slightly at her mention of it, but other than that he seemed unfazed. "Sure," he said, straightening up to look at her across the table. He was as Hodges-like as ever, and typically unpredictable. Try as she may, Sara could never read him.
"What color was it?" she asked.
"Dark blonde," he replied. "I would say it could be Greg's, but then it showed no signs of chemical damage. It was a natural blonde."
Sara recalled Harold's sandy hair. "About how long was it?"
"A little under six inches," he replied.
Sara nodded. "Anything unusual?"
"Not really," he replied. "Fine, thin hair. Broken medulla. Hard to get a precise match. A lot of people could have hair like that."
She sighed and closed her eyes, feeling as though they had reached a dead end. "Hopefully Grissom will have more when he gets back."
Hodges bit his lip. He looked like he was bursting to ask her something. And then, he went for it. "Is Greg…" But as soon as he had started, he stopped again, and fidgeted, before turning around and going back to his work.
She smiled warmly at him, though he could not see her as he was once again engrossed in his work. She found that being busy was the best way he could find of avoiding people. And it was the perfect excuse to ignore him. After all, he was paid to process evidence, not sit around and chit chat. He had told her that once when she had insistently interrupted him in testing a poison to ask him to verify a rumor that Wendy had turned him down for a date.
"He's doing OK, considering," Sara replied, guessing that was what Hodges was going to ask.
He didn't respond, nor did he even make any move to show that he had heard her at all. He was back to ignoring her again. She didn't mind. He always did this when he didn't want to show that he cared.
And then her heart leapt into her throat as Grissom appeared in the doorway, looking solemn, but holding an evidence bag which he sat on the table before nodding at Sara in hello. She beamed at him, but he did not return it, and her smile faded.
Hodges looked up, sensing a second presence, and walked over to the counter where Grissom had laid his evidence. "Should I put this before Catherine's?" he asked. "I don't think she'll like that."
"I think she'll understand," Grissom replied, his voice low and calm. But Sara was experienced enough to know that Grissom was a vast lake, and his still waters ran very deep indeed. And she could detect a hint of disquiet under his placid surface, his own Loch Ness Monster stirring up trouble in his darkest depths.
He turned his gaze back to her and blinked at her. She tried to bring a smile to his lips by flashing him her own, playful smirk, along with a wink. The corners of his lips twitched before turning into a full-blown smile, albeit a strangely tragic one. He opened his mouth as if to say something to her, then seemed to remember himself as he snapped it shut and looked at Hodges. He had forgotten they weren't alone.
"So am I on DNA duty tonight too?" Hodges asked, looking at a swab of blood.
"You know this case is confidential," Grissom said. "And you know why."
Slowly, he nodded. He looked about to complain, but he was biting his tongue. Sara had thought that Hodges would be excited to have been taken into Grissom's confidence, but he had only greeted the extra workload this case was giving him with begrudging indifference. She knew that he didn't appreciate all the extra work, but he would dutifully do it if Grissom told him to. David Hodges wasn't the biggest fan of Greg Sanders, but he wasn't as big of a misanthrope as he would have others to believe either. Beneath their bickering and caustic remarks, Hodges and Greg had always seen each other as worthy opponents. On some level, Sara knew that Hodges probably liked Greg, or at least appreciated him, enough that now that Greg was in trouble, Hodges was rising to the occasion to help him anyway he could. Though he would probably never admit it.
"What did you find?" Sara asked, turning her attention to Grissom.
He looked at her impassively. "A dead body."
It was his grim attempt at humor. "I mean evidence. What happened?"
"She was naked… raped… decapitated… African American… So now it's not only gender, it's race that he doesn't seem to care about. He doesn't have a type at all. Makes the profile a little harder."
"We'll let Brass worry about that," Sara said.
"Brass?" Grissom allowed a hint of curiosity to leak into his voice.
"Mm," Sara said. "He's… been quite helpful." He narrowed his eyes but didn't inquire further. Still, under his scrutiny, she knew she had to explain herself. "He figured it out. It had nothing to do with me. It's not exactly the hardest thing to put together you know."
"Hodges," Grissom said suddenly, an idea striking him. "Do a tox screen."
"A what?" Sara asked.
"There was a dirty wine glass that had tipped over on her bed," Grissom explained. "I collected a sample of the wine and swabbed the rim in hopes of getting maybe some DNA. If it was her wine and it was drugged then she may have been more easily manipulated. There were no ligature marks, not like Bonnie Hunter at least, so she was unbound. How did she sound on the tape?"
"Hysterical," Sara replied. "She didn't sound drugged, but I suppose she could have been."
"It deviates from his pattern…" Grissom whispered. "Are we sure it's not a—"
"Copycat?" Sara finished. "Damn sure. Grissom, she said Greg's name."
"Which the copycat could have gotten off of the news. He may have been confused, thought Greg's name was a suspect… Or thought you'd think the killer was messing with you."
"The phone calls to 911?" Sara said. "That wasn't released to the press."
Grissom pursed his lips. "OK," he said at last.
"What else did you get from the scene?" Sara asked.
"She was clean," Grissom said, shaking his head. "Impossibly so, it was…" He sighed. "No prints. Nothing. Just… things I thought that maybe… The wine glass, for instance… It could have…" He looked away, deep in thought. Sara knew he was at the point where his wheels were turning and he stopped completing sentences out loud and finished them in his head. He became oblivious to the world in these instances, often blurting out things he didn't mean to say, thoughts that suddenly came to him that left those who happened to hear him baffled. He chewed on his lip as he mentally catalogued all the evidence he'd collected before sighing. He looked at Sara and then at Hodges, who had stopped what he was doing to watch Grissom. "I don't know. Be creative, Hodges. You might get something out of this evidence I didn't."
"We have…" Hodges said, looking at the evidence on his desk. "A knife, a wine glass, and her clothes, which aren't torn…"
"I processed them for hairs," Grissom said. "I found one, but again there's no tag." He nodded at another evidence bag.
"Right," Hodges said. "Her clothes, a hair, and…" He frowned, looking at the last bag. "A bloody curling iron? But I thought…" Sara looked disgusted and Hodges seemed to realize what was going on and stopped talking. He blanched. "Oh… damn…"
"He's raping these women—" Grissom stopped to think. "—These people… with objects that are associated with them. Curling iron, broom handle… gun… Our vic, Lauren, worked at a hair salon. Bonnie Hunter was obsessive compulsive about the upkeep of her apartment, and Greg…"
And then, suddenly, Brass appeared in the doorway. "You'll never believe what I just found out from her roommate," he panted. All three of them looked up at Brass curiously, Grissom's musings temporarily forgotten. "Lauren Johnson had a date that night with a man she'd met at a bar two days ago. Lauren had told her roommate that he said his name was Harold."
Sara grinned and leaped to her feet, throwing her arms around Brass's neck. "You are by far my favorite person right now," she said, pulling away from him so she could beam at him.
"Well, hold on," Brass said. "This is all circumstantial. Harold isn't exactly an uncommon name. And just because she was meeting him doesn't mean she ever did. The roommate had left for the evening upon Lauren's request, and that's the last time they spoke. All she knew was that they were supposed to meet at a club. But you're right. This is a very big lead. Providing we get more from your evidence…"
"We won't," Grissom said, dismally. "He left none of his DNA behind."
"Fingernail scrapings?" Sara asked hopefully.
"Her hands were cleaned," Grissom said. "How he has time to do all that between the time he kills her and the time the police arrive…"
"He didn't linger this time," Brass deduced.
"If he did, the dozen officers you sent over with me definitely scared him away," Grissom said with the hint of a smile.
Sara looked from Brass to Grissom. "But we still have enough to hold him, don't we?"
"We'll see…" Brass said. "You said it yourself, he seemed a little jittery for murder, didn't he? His lawyer will probably point that out… I think we need more. But I'll definitely pull him in. Play everything casual. He'll break eventually."
Sara was still grinning. "I'm going to go tell Greg," she said, her previous quarrel with him forgotten, and with that she darted out of the room to find him.
