A/N: I'd like to take this opportunity again to thank the people who consistently leave a review and encourage me. Writing a story like this takes it out on you and I'm feeling a little burnt-out. I appreciate the support and believe me when I say you're the ones who keep me going. However, it looks like the overall interest for the story is dropping, which tells me that it's time for me to take the short way home.

Jem, many, many happy returns. Have a great day! It's a still little rough around the edges and I've been working on this like mad this morning to get it ready but here it is. I hope you enjoy. Sylvie.

"Mr Grissom?"

Nick smiled and took another step forward. "No, I'm sorry. I'm not Grissom," he said softly, flicking his gaze from Laura to Sara. "My name's Nick Stokes."

Laura dropped Sara's hand and moved toward Nick anxiously. "How did you get in here?" she asked with growing agitation. "You shouldn't be here." She straightened up her body defensively and moved between the bed and Nick as though shielding Sara from this intruder, as if trying to protect her. "There was a security breach earlier," she continued a little uncertainly, "I want you to go."

"Ma'am, listen, you don't understand. I'm a -"

"Please, leave or I'm going to call security." She moved backward toward the nurse call-button.

Nick paused and lifted a conciliatory hand. "I understand," he said, looking at Laura in the eye. His voice was calm and reassuring. "I know about the security breach. But please listen to me; let me explain." Laura stared back at Nick silently but didn't push the call button. Nick smiled. "I'm a friend, a colleague of Sara's. I too work for the crime lab."

Laura eyed him disbelievingly and he unzipped his jacket to show her his CSI ID badge on a chain around his neck. Laura's gaze darted toward the badge and then back to his face, her shoulders sagging suddenly as she visibly relaxed. She turned toward Sara.

"One of the nurses on tonight is a friend of mine and she let me in," Nick explained.

"You're a friend of Sara's?" Laura murmured with disbelief, her gaze firmly on her daughter's face.

Nick's tone was soft and understanding. "I am," he replied. It wasn't that long ago that his own mother had been in a similar position after his incredible rescue. Except that then, once Grissom had hauled him out of his coffin, they knew he would make a full recovery, even if the emotional scars were taking longer to heal. Nick glanced toward Sara, his heart heavy with sorrow and powerlessness, and sighed. "You must be Sara's mother," he stated more out of politeness than anything. The resemblance between mother and daughter was striking.

Laura seemed to startle at his words and she whipped her head round, her watery eyes shining with heartbreaking hope. "S-Sara talked about me?"

Nick let out a sigh, his face twisting into a slight, pained grimace. "I'm afraid not. It's just that…you look like her."

Her disappointment was written all over her face. "Or she looks like me," she stated a little flatly.

Nick didn't reply.

"It's okay, Mr…"

"Stokes. Nick, please."

"It's okay; Sara and I aren't-weren't close…" she let her words trail with a sad shake of the head.

Nick nodded politely and waited for Laura to say more. When she didn't, they lapsed into an awkward silence. Nick checked his watch; he should be back at the lab really but Grissom's picture had been burning a hole in his wallet for the last few hours so he had made a detour on his way back.

"It's okay," Nick said finally, noticing Laura's growing unease. "Don't worry; I can come by later. I understand you want to spend some time alone with Sara, catch up with her."

Laura turned, suddenly looking almost fearful to be left alone with Sara. "No, please, I'd like you to stay." She tried a smile. It was so much like Sara's and so sad that Nick could only nod his head at the request. "Would you please tell me about her…about Sara?"

Nick hid his surprise. He knew Sara and her mother had been estranged and hadn't spoken to each other for some time but the topic had been taboo so Nick never got to learn the details of their fallout. "How do you mean?"

Laura shrugged and tears began to fall down her face. She turned away and took Sara's hand in hers. "Today is the first time I see my daughter in the flesh in seventeen years, Mr Stokes. I'm looking at her. I can see my little girl but I'm looking at a stranger…and it's breaking my heart." She paused and Nick remained silent at a loss as to what to say. "Please, would you tell me about my daughter?" she pleaded again in a choked whisper.

"I wouldn't know where to start," Nick whispered back, his pain audible.

Laura looked at Nick and smiled, her lips curving in a sad downward smile. "At the beginning," she said. Sensing Nick's reluctance, she added a tearful, "Please."

Nick's smile wobbled. He nodded his head and walked round to the other side of the bed, a million and one images of Sara filling his mind: Laughing as she raced him to the finishing line on one of their many runs; joking as they ganged up on Greg with Warrick and mucked about in the break-room; with a twinkle in her eye when she popped her head out from under the hood of a car with the key evidence to solving a case; or simply crying, alone in the locker-room as he had found her on so many occasions, after particular gruelling shifts.

Hers had been the first smile he had seen after Grissom had pulled him out of his makeshift coffin and every day afterwards as she helped him to recovery. He reached over toward her face but didn't make contact. His eyes pooled with tears which slowly began to trickle down his face.

"Have you known Sara long?" Laura then asked, jarring him out of his recollections.

Keeping his eyes on his friend, Nick said in a thick voice, "Ever since she came to Vegas. It's going to be six years this coming fall."

Laura nodded. "I know you've only just met me and I'm going to sound awfully rude but…it seems to me you have feelings for her; did you two ever date?"

Nick burst into a quiet laugh that soon petered out and then shook his head sadly. "She's a good friend – one of my closest one. The best. I have feelings for her – we all do. We all love her very deeply but no, Sara and I never dated." He wiped his tears on the sleeve of his jacket.

"I'm glad she had people who cared for her in her life; that she wasn't without love."

Nick turned his gaze toward Laura in surprise. "Oh, Sara is very much loved," he hastened to say. "She's very much loved." He paused, and redirected his gaze on Sara. "I asked her once," he said with a smile, "Out on a date." He shook his head in disbelief as fresh tears burned in the corner of his eyes. "Only she didn't know it was a date and invited the whole team along." He sighed heavily, lapsing into silence.

"It must be hard on you to see her like this."

Nick closed his eyes, fighting to keep control over his emotion. "It's been hard on all of us. But it's been hardest on Grissom."

"Would you like me to give you some time alone with Sara?" Laura asked.

"No, it's okay. I'll come by later in the morning." He patted Sara's hand affectionately. "It's no trouble."

"Did you see that? Laura whipped her head round toward Nick. "Did you see that just then? When you took her hand? Sara smiled. She smiled; I just saw her."

Nick couldn't hide the pain from his gaze. "Oh, I don't think she did. I don't think she can." He moved closer to Sara's mom and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. "Mrs Sidle, have you been told about the extent of Sara's injuries and the damage they caused?"

Laura nodded her head, her disappointment obvious. She pinched her lips, sniffing. "She's so beautiful as she sleeps. Don't you think?"

Nick swallowed the tightness in his throat, Laura's words so reminiscent of something Grissom had said. "She is," he croaked. "She is the most beautiful person I know."

"Tell me about her, please."

"I'm not the best person to ask if you want to know about Sara; the real Sara," Nick replied. His eyes turned wistful. "She's always kept herself to herself. As a friend, she is generous with her time and her support and her love. She is funny, one of the guys." He laughed. "She 's very protective of the victims we deal with, the living and the dead ones too. She relates to them, we both do but Sara more so than...any of us. She's very protective of us too - her friends and colleagues; her family." Nick didn't notice Laura startle slightly at his words. "We've all found a family in our team. It's a tough job we do and we support each other through it. We know each other in ways that our real parents can never do. With Sara and the team, I don't need to explain; they just get it and they don't judge."

Laura's face shut-off, her jaw set as Nick's words instead of appeasing her seemed to make Laura more uncomfortable.

Unsuspecting, Nick continued. "Sara's fiercely protective of her private life but once she lets you in, you're in. You know what I mean?" Laura nodded vaguely in reply. "She can be guarded and sometimes she gets sad…terribly sad but Sara loves life, Mrs Sidle, and it loves her back." His gaze a million miles away, Nick lapsed into a reminiscing silence, smiling to himself.

"What is it, Mr Stokes?"

Nick turned his head with a frown. "Huh?"

"You were smiling just then. Why?"

Nick shrugged. "I was just thinking that actually I hadn't seen her sad in a long time. She-" Nick paused suddenly, leaving his sentence unfinished.

"Please, I need to know."

"Lately, she's been happy. She's been…alive." The word died on his lips and he turned a watery gaze toward Laura.

"She wouldn't want to live like this, would she?" Laura asked him candidly, turning her eyes toward Sara and the life support machine.

Nick looked at Sara too. He looked at the ventilator pumping air into her lungs through the tube that twisted her mouth out of shape into a sad kind of smile. He looked at her inert body. How still and pale, and lifeless it was. How unlike Sara it was. He looked at his friend and he could only shake his head in reply.

"No, she wouldn't," he said in a small voice. Tears were falling down his face. "She wouldn't want to be kept like this, live like this, unable to feel. This isn't living; this isn't Sara." His voice was barely audible now. "It hurts so much to see her like this. So much."

It wasn't your time to die, echoed painfully in his head. Nick turned away to hide his pain and sorrow, his acceptance of the inevitable, and broke down into quiet sobs.

As he was drying his tears, he heard Laura move behind him and say, "Do you know why she hasn't been sad recently?"

"I'm sorry?"

"It's just…before, you said that Sara could get very sad but not recently. Do you know why?"

Smiling sadly, he slowly nodded his head. "I do. Sara found love. Real love." He shrugged at the banality of his words. "Sounds stupid, doesn't it? But in the last year, despite all the bad things we see every day in our work, all the bad things that have happened to us, all of us, she's been happy. Happier. And until yesterday, I hadn't realised why."

"This Mr Grissom I keep hearing about?" Nick nodded his answer. "I understand he's her boss?"

"That's right. He's the head of our unit."

"Didn't they get on?" she asked a little accusatorily.

Nick's brow creased in surprise at Laura's tone. "They had their ups and downs," he replied defensively. "Why are you asking that?"

"Why isn't he here then?" she countered a little aggressively. "With her, at her bedside. Why has he left her all alone in this hospital room?" She began to cry. "He's left my little girl all alone in this room. I was told he's hardly spent any time with her at all since the accident. Wasn't her love for that man reciprocated?"

Nick looked stunned by the sudden turn the conversation had taken. "That's not true!" he defended heatedly. "This…has shattered Grissom. He's out there risking his life to catch the people who did this to Sara!"

"If as you say they love each other, why hasn't she made him her next-of-kin?"

Nick was looking more and more bewildered by the sudden change of mood. "I can't answer that, Mrs Sidle," he almost shouted. Remembering where he was, he looked at Sara, took a breath and closed his eyes. "I don't understand why you're asking this. I don't know what you've been told but I know for a fact that Grissom cares deeply for your daughter."

Laura turned away. "Please, I'd like you to leave now."

Nick did a double take. "I beg your pardon?"

"I'd like you to leave. I'd like to be alone with my daughter now."

The way Laura said daughter was like a slap in Nick's face, reminding him that he wasn't family and his eyes filled with fresh tears. He looked at Sara and then at Laura before nodding his head wretchedly. He was turning around, headed toward the door when he remembered the original purpose of his visit. Ignoring Laura's resentful glare, he walked back to Sara's side, pulled his wallet out of his pocket and removed the photograph Grissom had lost at the crime scene.

He gently opened up the hand Sara had folded over her chest and placed the photograph in its grasp, carefully closing her fingers over it. He leaned down and kissed her softly on the forehead. "Brass's gone to get him, Sara," he whispered his lips on her skin. "He won't let anything happen to him. You hang in there, sweetie. Do it for him." He closed his eyes, releasing his tears and kissed her on the forehead one more time.

Straightening up, he turned toward Laura but she was looking away. "I'm going to go now," he told her, "but I'll be back in the morning. Please, don't make a decision until Grissom gets back. It would kill him if-" his words caught in his throat and he choked them back. "Take care of her, please."

Nick had his hand on the door handle when Laura asked, "Do you believe in miracles, Mr Stokes?" He paused. "Because I don't."

"I do," the CSI whispered, turning around. "I'm a living proof of them. I'm a miracle. Grissom, Sara and the rest of the team – they saved me."

His words gave Laura pause. "What about Sara?" she asked. "Do you believe this…Grissom is capable of another miracle? Can he make her wake up from her sleep?"

Nick remained silent and looked down to his feet. Grissom was a lot of things but God, he wasn't. "Please, take good care of her until he gets back," he said at last. "That's what Sara would want you to do above everything else."

It took less than an hour between the time Brass woke the sheriff up and frantically explained the urgency of the situation, and the LVPD helicopter transporting Brass and Warrick to Reno taking off. Nick and Greg were out in the field and Catherine had stayed behind to man the lab and field the sheriff's calls. Warrick's land deed search hadn't yielded anything yet but Catherine was going to keep digging. McKay was smart but Catherine was smarter.

The chopper had been in the sky for forty minutes and was about to make its approach in to Reno when it got a call from Reno PD control room.

"Captain Brass, Sir?" crackled through Brass's headset. "This is Reno control room. Do you copy?"

Brass shared a look of surprise with Warrick. "Reno, this is Captain Brass. We copy. Over."

"Highway patrol has just called in a white Ford Thunderbird with a broken taillight. Registration, TUD – 546. Do you still have an APB out on it? Over."

Warrick cheered, shaking his closed fist in delight. "We got them, Jim. We got the bastards!"

Brass closed his eyes, his relief overwhelming. "Affirmative," he said. "We're on our way over to Reno now. Our ETA's…" the pilot turned and mouthed ten minutes to Brass, "…ten minutes. Do not apprehend. I repeat, do not apprehend. The suspects are armed and dangerous and we believe they're holding one of our guys hostage in the trunk of the car."

"It's too late for that, Sir," the dispatcher replied. "The driver refused to pull over for a routine check. A call for urgent back-up's logged in and highway patrol are in hot pursuit of the vehicle. Over."

"Jesus!"

Brass heard Warrick's frantic curse through the radio and he silenced him with a hard stare. "What's their location? Over."

"Northbound on the I- 80, ten miles south of Lovelock, to the east of the Trinity Range. We're setting up a road block two miles south of Lovelock."

Lovelock, Brass mused, shaking his head at the irony of the name. "10-4," he replied. He tapped the helicopter pilot on the shoulder, instructing him to head for Lovelock. The pilot nodded, checked his dials and negotiated a sharp right-hand turn. "Reno, this is Captain Brass. Do you still copy?"

"Go ahead, Captain Brass. Over."

"Tell highway patrol to proceed with caution. I do not want my man harmed in any way. We're headed their way. Captain Brass out."

Brass closed his eyes wearily and ran a shaky hand over his face. It had been a hell of a long day but the end was finally in sight. Soon they could rescue Grissom. The man had been trussed up in the trunk of that car for hours now and God only knew how he fared. Hang in there, buddy, we're coming for you.

After a while Brass felt a quick tap on his shoulder and he looked up. Warrick was pointing through the helicopter window at the flashing lights of three highway patrols up ahead in the distance. Brass scanned his gaze over the dark expanse of straight road until he zoomed in on the speeding white Thunderbird and then a mile further up ahead toward the flashing red and blue lights of the waiting police roadblock.

There was nowhere for McKay to go, sandwiched as they were from all sides. To the east of the I-80, Brass could just about make out the darkened outline of mountains and on the other side there was a small canyon with a river running through it.

The chopper dipped, flying low above the desert ground and soon caught up with the runaway Thunderbird, flying alongside it. Despite the powerful beam of the chopper's outside light, Brass couldn't make out the interior of the vehicle or the number of occupants. The helicopter overshot the Thunderbird and soon afterward the pilot turned toward Brass, pointing toward a spot near the road block safe enough for him to land on.

Brass nodded, craning his neck, looking through the window to follow the Thunderbird's progress with his eyes. This was it, the end of the road for McKay and her accomplice. The Ford appeared to be slowing down as it neared the roadblock. Officers taking cover behind their police cruisers' open door had their guns drawn and pointing toward the runaway car.

"What was that light?" Warrick asked all of a sudden turning wide eyes towards Brass. "Did McKay just open fire?"

Brass could only watch the scene on the ground unfold, powerless to stop it. He gave Warrick a bleak nod of the head. The Thunderbird suddenly accelerated sharply, headed straight for the middle of the road block.

"Son of a bitch," Brass exclaimed. "Where the hell do they think they're going?"

Like a Japanese kamikaze on a suicide mission and despite the officers on the ground returning fire and hitting their target, the Thunderbird didn't slow down. It hit the first cruiser full on, barging its way through the barrage of cars. It looked like they had managed to burst through to the other side when the car unexpectedly took off in the air, spinning and rolling out of control toward the roadside. It landed with a thump on its roof before rolling again and careening off down the ravine.

"Noooo," Warrick yelled.

Brass swallowed the tightness in his throat, bracing himself for the subsequent exploding ball of fire.

Tbc.