Disclaimer: I don't own anything from the CSI franchise. I play with the characters but unfortunately I can't keep them. Otherwise, I'd have a few of them chained to a bed in my non-existent basement.

A/N: I'm writing this chappie in the last minute. I'm a bad lazy ass fanfic writer XD but part of the reason was that my muse was eluding me and it's still not home to inspire me or at least kick me in the ass to be more productive. The other part is that studying sucks away my creativity and I have a pair of very very very hard exams next week.

Did you like the reveal that the child victim wasn't the daughter of the man they were interrogating? Talking about last chapter, I hope you are enjoying the case because there's still quite a bit of it left. I've tried to keep it interesting but I'm certainly no part of the CSI writing crew so bear with me. I'm trying to make the relationship between the characters develop as organically as possible with a side dish of drama but I think it's going as smoothly as a rock to the face. Thank you to my new and old reviewers and all the people who've decided to follow or favourite my fanfic. You are the best. Well, have a nice day sweeties!


Morgan's POV

David had managed to piss her off royally. It seemed it was the result of all their interactions lately and she didn't like that but... how could he shut her out and then approach her like this in the middle of this nightmarish case. She was tired of this hot and cold game and she told him off. She didn't know what she wanted anymore but this wasn't it.

It all became irrelevant when her pager went off and it was like a ton of bricks had fallen on top of her. Their victim wasn't who they thought he was and now not only they would have to tell another family they had lost a child but there was a little girl missing, probably kidnapped. Another child lonely and scared in who knows what god forsaken place. Why did it have to be a case like this? She was still a bit troubled by the memories of her own kidnapping and she didn't feel strong enough. Still, the present required her right now, she didn't have time to dawdle in the past, and she had to tell Hodges and everybody else about this before going to the Morgue to find out more.

She just showed the message to him who seemed just as taken aback as she was and left the Lab with a promise to return later to learn more about the results and a curt farewell. She didn't turn her head because she didn't want to see him looking at her all worried. It would make her feel bad for telling him off.


It was a short walk to the Morgue. She spent it calling Larry Mitchell and Finn. The latter told her that Henry had confirmed that all the DNA samples belonged to only two people, the victims. The conversation with the former was a bit more complicated:

-"Hi, this is CSI Brody".

-"Hey. Do you have something new on the case?"- he inquired- "We still haven't gotten anything conclusive from our interviews and the bank has sent us the tapes of the surveillance of all week except for last night. They say it was a problem of miscommunication and that they'll sent us the tapes soon".

-"I have some bad news. The victim was a boy. It's probably one of the soccer teammates of Jennifer. You should call their coach. He might know who was friends with the girl or even who went with them that afternoon and that way you won't have to unnecessarily alarm the other parents" -it brought more questions without answer -"The problem is, where's Jennifer? Was she taken by the attacker?"- she tried to fill him in about everything she had learnt- "Also, there seems to be a connection to a small zone of dessert. It might be nothing but you should contact David Hodges from the Traces Lab".

-"What the f...?"- the line went silent for little more than a second- "Okay, I'm calling an A.M.B.E.R. Alert. We are going to put road block controls in all major arteries of the city but it's been about nine hours since she was abducted so who knows how far she can be if the criminal decided to flee. On the other hand, if the father was implicated as I believe, they probably haven't left the city. The wife seemed about to divorce him. He might have decided to escape with the girl. Moreover there hasn't been any ransom notice although I'll put someone on the phones just in case".

-"But why torture and kill the other child?"- she had a lot of doubts - "And why did he even come to the interview?"

-"I think that guy is a sociopath and the fact that his wife kicked him out again was the stressor that broke the camel's back. Not only his reactions were weird but there's something fishy about this man's life from the house he couldn't have afforded to pay to the fact that we couldn't find anything about his life previous to his marriage"- he stated the facts with confidence-"He wanted to kill them in this gruesome matter and he wanted to have the chance to look at our faces after we had seen his handiwork".

-"I just hope the girl is okay".

-"Me too"-his voice sounded heavy through the telephone-"As soon as I hang up, I'll have my men summon Mr Clegane to the Station again. We are going to find her".


Al Robbins was labelling some samples behind his desk as Dave finished cleaning of blood the tiny body of the boy. When Dr Robbins saw her, he picked up his cane and got up in one swift movement as experience had converted the walking aide in just one more part of his body. Dave shut off the water and turned too, greeting her with a nod.

-"Hey Morgan. We were expecting you"- said Robbins smiling at her- "Have you guys managed to identify our John Doe?"

-"Not yet. What can you tell me about me about Vanessa Clegane and the child?"

-"We've just finished with Mrs Clegane. Cause of death was a shot to the back of the head. Time of death is 5-8 PM"- Dave gave her the results of his work- "The decapitation was postmortem but the blows to the face, neck and back of the head and the defensive wounds on torso and arms are all antemortem. We'll get a mould of the stab marks. Still the kid got the worst of it. The rest of the information will be on your desk soon".

-"We have barely started the autopsy on the boy. We won't be able to tell you much until we're done" -Robbins informed her"- I've finished labelling the samples taken from the nails of the mother. You can take them to DNA".

-"I'll take them after the autopsy".

-"Are you sure you want to stay?" -Dave tried to convince her to opt out- "It gets pretty tough for me and I'm used to it".

-"Nobody so young should be on our table David, but I'm sure if Miss Brody has decided to stay, she is capable of handling it" -Robbins reassured her and the discussion was over.

The external examination and vitality tests determined that the multiple cuts, gashes and bruises on his face and upper body were made with him alive as they feared. They had extracted the vitreous humour of the other eye to get the very best margin on time of death and it matched the findings they had gotten with Vanessa. There weren't any visible signs of sexual assault and, for that at least, they could be grateful. The poor kid's face was totally disfigured and his deep lifeless eyes seemed to be staring at her angrily. She shook her head, closed her eyes and wished to stop seeing what wasn't there. When she opened them, the illusion had vanished.

When they started with the Y shaped incision, she realised there probably wasn't much more she was going to learn and, after saying her goodbyes, she took off to continue her work.


Hodges' POV

He seriously considered beating his head against the wall. He knew he had just blown up the chance Finn had provided him but he hoped he could fix it when she came back for the rest of the results... if she did come instead of sending someone else for them. Right now 'though, his objective was to analyse the heck out of the traces he had to help find that girl and catch the killer.

It was true that elevated levels of those chemical compounds could only be found in the 25 square miles surrounding Alkary's Factory at the start of the desert zone south-west of Las Vegas but there were about a thousand people working in that factory and the surrounding ones so even just running background checks on all of them was going to be a monumental task and it was going to take time the girl may not have. He told Officer Mitchell as much when he called him half an hour later.

Most of the stuff he found was too common to pinpoint any area or particular occupation and he was down to the last soil sample the CSIs had collected. The Mass Spectrometer had already done its thing and he was looking at it with a microscope. There seemed to be some spores and at first glance he couldn't recognise them what could be a great sign since he was sure he knew the shape of all the common spores in the metropolitan zone. It was time to compare it to try to find what specie it was from. He might have stricken gold.


Morgan's POV

-"Morgan"-Finn didn't even say hello before telling her what she had discovered- "We need to go to the scene again. I'm practically sure there were two people involved in the crime".

-"Then let's go"- she wasn't going to let that kid down.

This time the ride was tense and silent after Finn had explained that there was a hole in the blood pattern that could only match with a second suspect but that she needed to see it in person. It was dispersed by the sound of Finn's cell phone.

-"Uhm aha, okay... wow... will do"- were her half of the conversation.

-"It seems that the patrolmen that went to fetch Clegane committed the mistake of telling him it wasn't his daughter that had died and he bolted. They didn't know he was a suspect so they thought he should know his daughter wasn't dead as soon as possible. They are right now being chewed out by Mitch not only because they told him but because they let him give them the slip. He wants us to get his prints from something in the house and send him the results immediately".

-"Damn".

Once they got there, Finn started reconstructing the scene with red laser pointers and mannequins. It was going to be a long job. Meanwhile Morgan started searching for prints in places where they hadn't looked before in the master bedroom and in what was obviously the father's stuff.


Hodges' POV

Arghhh, he couldn't find the damn type of spore. Moreover Nick and Sara were pestering him about their stuff and it was only time before Sanders got impatient too. If they thought this job was so easy, they could just do it themselves and see how well it went.

He took a break from finding the spore to advance the analysis of the other samples hoping to catch up and that the pause would clear his mind up and help him.

He had a lucky break or two in Nick and Sara's case but still couldn't find the species and was two images away from hitting something.

He closed his eyes to relax and sighed loudly and when he opened them he found a half amused half vexed Conrad Ecklie.

-"Do you know where's my daughter?"- he asked politely. They had gotten on better as they had gotten to know each other a bit after Olivia and him started dating and he realised he wasn't actually doing the same with his child.

-"She was working on her case but I don't know where she is right now"- he hoped Ecklie couldn't notice the guilt he felt for how things had gone down in their last encounters.

-"It's just that I asked her on Friday if she wouldn't mind spending her break with me. She is been so busy lately that we haven't been able to meet barely at all these last few weeks and I'm a bit worried. I even bought chicken from our favourite place"- he confessed to him and it made him feel even worse because he didn't deserve the confidence and because he should have noticed that something was off with Morgan... he was such a pathetic self-centred sorry excuse for a friend.

-"I imagine you've already tried her cell phone, how about sending her a pager?"- he suggested.


Morgan had finished collecting all the fingerprints. Taking out the child sized ones and the partial ones that were only barely usable, there were still a good dozen or so. Finn was still in the middle of setting everything up and was so concentrated that she barely nodded when Morgan told her she was going to the portable laboratory they had in the back of the car to discard the prints from the wife and see if the husband's were in AFIS.

She got there and in very few minutes they were introduced. Luckily there seemed to have been a clear fingerprint that wasn't the wife's on a historical novel inside his bedside table. Even if he was on the database 'though, this would take some time. She was still waiting when she heard a small commotion to her right and saw him.

Clegane was fighting with another man 30 yards down the street. It was a tall man with dark brown or black hair, difficult to say as there wasn't much light. He was wearing dark pants, a clear sleeveless t-shirt and some sporty shoes. He was muscular and had tattoos but she couldn't make them out clearly.

She took out her phone but it had died because of lack of battery. She pulled out her gun and flashlight and advanced towards them.

As soon as they made her, she run towards them yelling for them to stop but they took running in opposite directions. She decided to follow the dark haired man but he was very fast. She increased her pace but just when she was reducing the distance he jumped onto a bulky Harley Davidson motorbike. She tried to make out the license plate number but the license plate was intentionally muddled and she could barely make out a 3 and the letter F. He burnt up the road getting out of there in seconds while she tried to get something more from the license plate.

In that moment her pager went off and she saw she had received a message from her father (damn! she had forgotten about their lunch break date). She started reading it as she turned around to return when she received a heavy blow to the back of her head. She fell to the floor face first and before she lost consciousness she heard someone over her say:

-"You've fucked everything up".


A/N: Morgan doesn't know what the expression self-care means and that's not good, not good at all. If you don't take care of your psyche and emotional health, you are never going to heal completely and in her job, she really needs it although what she really needed this time was a BIG helmet XD Well, what have you thought about this chapter? What should Hodges have done different? Is Morgan right about being angry? What do you think it's going to happen next? Please tell me in a review. There's a bit less interaction between the protagonists in this chapter but I needed the time to develop the case a bit further. Lots of cyber hugs for my favourite readers! See ya next Thursday!

P.S.: FF ate this chapter so this is version 2.0 Raaaarghhhh! That will teach me to take better precautions! Also, this is my longer chapter to date. Unfortunately, it's probably not going to be the norm so don't get used to it. Sorry