"Catherine Willows, Dr. Kira Tyler." Grissom says.

"We met. Another Ph. D.?" Catherine asks, as we shake hands.

"Not exactly. I used to be a trauma surgeon." I say.

"What prompted the switch?" Warrick asks.

"One incredibly bad incident accompanied by a slip of my temper." I say, hopefully making it clear that I don't want to talk of it.

"So where did you learn Greek?" Catherine asks.

"In Greece. My dad had work there when I was little and my mom thought it was a bad idea to go anywhere when you don't know the language at all, so since it was going to be a long job, we all learned Greek."

"`All`?" Grissom asks.

"Five brothers, five sisters." I say.

"Whoa." Warrick says, failing to hide his amazement.

"Big family." Catherine says, hiding her surprise a bit better, but still badly compared to Grissom, who simply raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah. Anyhow, your food is supposed to be here in about an hour and a half." I say

"Oh. Thanks." Warrick says.

"No big." I say simply, shrugging a little. "Would rather like to get to work, though."

"Right. Well, there's not much to do right now, so why don't you just walk around, get you bearings, and someone will come and find you when there's something to do." Catherine says, as I notice a look Warrick and Grissom share, as if Catherine does this all the time.

"Right, can't blame me if I get lost then." I say, optimistically.

"Yeah." Catherine says slowly, as I walk a bit slowly out of the room.

"Dr. Tyler?" Grissom calls softly, as I'm halfway down the hall.

"Yes?" I say, stopping and turning towards him. "Oh, it's Kira, please."

"I was just wondering, would you mind accompanying me for a little while?" Grissom asks, approaching me slowly.

"Wouldn't mind at all." I say, reading him like an open book for approximately the seventh time today - and hiding it well. "Where to?"

"DNA Lab, this way." Grissom says, leading me further down the hall. I give Grissom a very covert second look as we head down to the lab and I can't help thinking that I could really.

"Got your sample, waiting on the results now. Who's this?" A guy - younger and a bit taller than Grissom - says, snapping my attention back to reality.

"Kira Tyler, transfer from L.A." I say, trying my best to be social to the guy who interrupted a rather entertaining daydream.

"Greg Saunders, nice to meet you." He says, offering me his left hand to shake.

"Likewise." I say as we shake hands.

"Interesting accent. Where are you from?" Greg asks.

"Australia, near the reefs." I say.

"Oh, I would've guessed Manchester." Greg says, as Grissom looks over his lab results.

"Really? Oh well." I say a bit amused.

"Where's my chemical analysis?" Grissom asks.

"Charlotte commandeered your samples." Greg says.

"Oh." Grissom says thoughtfully. "Kira, would you mind Greg showing you around for a while?"

"Not at all." I say, reminding myself that this is my first day and that I should treat minor things - such as being passed back and forth like a trading card - as precisely that - minor.

"Find me if you have any problems." Grissom says, walking out of the room.

"So, ah." Greg says a moment later, "what have you seen so far?"

"Well, the lobby, Trace Lab, Brass's office, Security, and another office."

"Oh. So how 'bout I show you to the Layout Room and then the Ballistics Lab?"

"Sounds good."

"After you." Greg says, gesturing to the door. "So how long have you been over here?"

"About sixteen years. My family moved from Australia to Greece, from Greece to Italy, and from Italy to New York City." I say.

"That must've been fun." Greg says sarcastically.

"Yeah, once I learned the languages life got quite a lot easier." I say cheerfully.

"How many languages do you speak?" Greg asks, apparently amused.

"Seven, why?"

"Curiosity. Can you list them all?"

"Sure. Fluently it's Maori, Greek, Italian, Latin, French, Dutch, and Spanish."

"You're kidding, right?" Greg asks, nearly laughing out loud.

"Not at all." I say, amused. "Why?"

"No reason." He says, regaining control of himself. "Why Latin?"

"My mom called it a teenage obsession. I heard a bit somewhere, it interested me, and so I learned it. I was fourteen and it kept me out of trouble, so my parents didn't bother me about it."

"No other languages?"

"A few, but I tend to use what I'm most fluent in. Why, what languages do you speak?"

"Nothing too popular. My grandfather was Norwegian and didn't speak much English."

"Oh? I worked up in Oslo for a little while."

"Really?"

"Yeah. My mom and I were there for about six months, so she made me learn a little Norwegian."

"So what does your mum do?" Greg asks, I giggle a bit before I can catch myself. "What?" He asks, smiling nervously.

"I'm sorry, it's just that I haven't heard `mum` when referring to a mother in years. I just didn't expect to hear it." I say, sincerely apologetic.

"What about when you talk to your own?" Greg asks, apparently quite relieved and amused.

"She's mom, or ma. Whichever I feel like saying at the time." I say, with a slight shrug as we come to a stop outside a door.

"Oh, well, we're here."

"She's a linguist, by the way." I say, as we go into the Layout Room.

"Oh, your mom? That must have been."

"Certainly unique."

"Really. Well this is Layout."

"Not bad. Reminds me of my father's living room, really." I say, admiring the large table with the lit surface absentmindedly.

"What does your father do?"

"Special effects and stunt work, mostly for movies." I say, noticing Grissom walking by out of the corner of my eye.

"Whoa." Greg says. "So you're already used to cleaning up after supposedly dead things."

"For the most part. I'm also used to the weird in general." I say, as Grissom comes into the room and walks up to stand - silently - right behind Greg.

"You'll need that working with Grissom. I mean, he may be a genius, but he is really"

"Really what?" Grissom asks suddenly, startling Greg.

"Really, uh. creative." Greg says, recovering quickly from the shock.

"Or strange, take your pick." I say mischievously.

"Oh. All right, uh. I don't have a car yet." I say, uncertainly.

"Oh." Grissom says. "A call just came in, I'd like you with me on this one, Kira."

"I thought so. Come on, I'll drive."

"Okay. Nice meeting you, Greg." I say, as Grissom and I start to leave the room.

"Likewise." Greg says, before I actually leave the room.

"So what are we heading into, or won't we know until we get there?" I ask, as we hurry down the corridor.

"Report said dead body in a bath tub."

"Oh. Well, that's a change of pace for me." I say, as the warm Las Vegas air hits us as we walk out of the building. "Plain ol' dead body instead of a shootout."

"How are they different?"

"I used to always get called in with the paramedics, which I didn't really have a problem with unless the shooting wasn't done yet."

"That's not going to happen here."

"Obviously."

"Should I take that as an insult or a compliment?" Grissom asks sarcastically.

"I just meant that it seems like the crime lab and the police department have a much better understanding here." I say, smiling as he opens a passenger side door to a dark blue Ford Explorer.

"This is from hearsay?" Grissom asks, after I get in, he closes the door, walks over to the driver's side very thoughtfully, and gets in.

"More the fact that you don't seem to have cops and D.A.s breathing down your collective necks all day and night." I say, as he starts up the car and pulls out.

"Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?"

"Grissom, I grew up with four older brothers, and my older sister is still a tomboy. I'm quite sure you can't offend me with a question." I say, smiling a bit crookedly.

"Oh. Well, it occurs to me that you're, uh. you are, umm."

"Really short, entirely too young, completely batty, what?" I ask, trying to be as polite as possible when interrupting just to screw with his head.

"Young. I was just curious as to how you did all that you claim to have done?"

"Oh, I suppose it's no great secret. I skipped through quite a lot of school, before collage."

"So why have I never heard of you if you're such a prodigy?"

"I've never been too fond of the press. What can I say, I get it from my mom."

"So in what area are you such a prodigy?"

"General sciences and languages."

"No higher math?"

"It wasn't my favorite subject, but I got past it."

"So did MENSA ever try to recruit you?"

"Not that I'm aware of." I say, uncertainly. "Do you mind if I ask your opinion on something, Grissom?" I ask, my curiosity shaking off my uncertainty quickly.

"Uh," Grissom says softly, hesitantly. "Not at all."

"I know that I'm. very unique, and I've come to accept it, but do I present myself as that"

"Out of place? No. You seem to be very. confident."

"Huh. Well I'm glad someone sees that, but I wasn't really going there. I was going to say peculiar."

"Oh. Yeah."

"Really? Hm. Thanks." I say, as we stop at a red light he looks over at me confused. "Always better to know these things."

"I see." He says thoughtfully. "When did you see your first dead body?"

"You are going to think I am the most screwed up girl because of my father."

"Why? What did he do?" Grissom asks, his voice taking on a dark tone. I glance doubtfully at him, a look he catches as he makes a right-hand turn. "Try me."

"I remember flying to New Zealand with my father and my brother to visit a morgue because my uncle needed new pictures to base his prosthetics on."

"So your father wasn't into that aspect of special effects just yet?"

"No, my uncle was working for my dad, but my uncle was the only one to think the photos were necessary."

"That doesn't sound so strange."

"I was five and my dad gave me a camera."

"That's insane!" Grissom cries, looking over at me suddenly.

"Grissom, road!" I say, as we begin to drift.

"Sorry." He says, jerking us back into our own lane.

"No big. I never said it wasn't insane. It didn't bother me in the least, but my mom still gave him hell when we got home."

"What rule allows a person in New Zealand to just walk into a morgue and start taking photographs?"

"Unclaimed body."

"Who gives a five-year-old a camera - genius or not?"

"My father?" I ask jokingly, he glances at me incredulously. "Hey, don't look at me like that. He had taught me how to shoot a camera before that."

"What gave him that bright idea?"

"I'm not sure, my memory doesn't go back that far, but knowing my father I probably swiped his camera once and just started playing with it."

"So he taught you how to use it. That makes sense."

"Which is strange because my family doesn't usually make any sense to other people."

"It must seem to most people a miracle that you survived your childhood."

"It's a distinct possibility." I say, as Pink Floyd starts to play on the radio. "Could I switch the song, please?"

"You don't like Pink Floyd?"

"Actually, I do, but this song just seems to be fairly bad luck for me."

"How so?"

"Well, the first time I heard it my dog was hit by a mail truck."

"And the last time?"

"I was in a car wreck. Both of the driver's legs were broken from just above the knee along with one hip, and I had a penetrating fracture to my right arm."

"You can't tell." Grissom says, flipping the radio station and glancing at my arm. "How long ago was that?"

"About a year ago. I've been avoiding that song like the plague ever since."

"So you're fairly superstitious."

"Well, sort of. I believe in the proven ones, anyway."

"Which means?"

"Hmmm?"

"What superstitions are true?"

"Oh. A candle in a window is bad luck, people have tampered with Halloween candy, every one has a pre-ordained lucky number, things like that."

"Wait, what makes that last one true?"

"I've never lost a bet when I've bet on multiples of six, and my friends have always won on their numbers, too."

"So what's my number?"

"What's your birth date?"

"August seventeenth, fifty six."

"Hmmm." I say, thinking on it a bit. "Try one or ten next time."

"This is the address." He says, pulling into a broad driveway of a rather large, run-down house with white and gray peeling paint.