A/N: and here it is… I don't think this ones evil…mwaha – thanks to all who are reviewing, its awesome to hear your thoughts – thankyou!
Catherine found Brass in the break room raiding the fridge. He turned as he heard her approach and rolled his eyes at her, "When are you guys gonna get some food in this joint? I swear it wasn't like this when I was the boss…"
"Have you heard anything from Grissom lately?" Catherine interrupted his moaning, her serious and slightly anxious tone not lost on him.
"No, last I saw him we were down at this mornings crime scene – you know that Hunter guy struck again… why, what's wrong?"
Catherine sighed, "I don't know, I got a call from Sara's cell but it was Griss, it was a bad line but I thought I heard him say something about your voice mail? He just sounded really… weird – and then the line went dead all of a sudden."
"Did you try calling him back?"
Catherine glared at him, "What do you think I am? Stupid? Of course I tried, I called Sara's phone and it was dead and I called his phone but it rang out – he never has the damn thing on him," she grumbled.
"The guy likes his beeper!" Brass tried to lighten Catherine's mood but sighed when the worry didn't dissipate from her face, "Okay – look, I'll go and check my voice mail, my phones in my office."
Catherine nodded, "I'll come with you."
~~
"Ow! Grissom! Ow! Slow down, I can't…" Sara panted as she stumbled after Grissom. They ran, bounded together, over fallen trees and piles of rocks, through the muddy puddles and under the lower canopy.
"Yes you can! Don't say that Sara, come on – I can still hear him behind us," Grissom struggled to talk as he ran as fast as his legs could go – pulling Sara along after him. Sara swallowed hard and urged herself on – the screams of Henderson were becoming slightly fainter, but they still rang through her, chilling her to her core.
"You are going to have to run faster than that my friends!" Henderson's shrieks seemed to echo off the trees surrounding them. He had given them a ten-minute head start – not much of an advantage when both Sara and Grissom were unfamiliar with this area of bush land and were still bound together by the cuffs he had used on them.
Sara ran on, moving in front of Grissom and taking the lead. Occasionally they would both turn in the opposite direction – jarring their wrists, causing them to choke out smothered cries.
~~
"Whoa whoa whoa – kidnapped? Grissom and Sara? Are you serious?" Nick sat in the break room with the rest of his colleagues. After Brass had checked his voice mail, he and Catherine had called the team together to let them know what was going on.
"But I just saw them a couple hours ago at a diner down the strip!" He continued.
Brass nodded, "I've just sent a couple of uniforms down there to ask around, see if anyone saw anything – I also did a quick background check and this guy, Henderson, is linked to at least two of the victims in the case Grissom and Sara were working on – no doubt they realized this too and the guy went after them before they could get anything linking him to the murders."
"Well how are we supposed to find them? Even if the psycho is taking them out to the bush to play his game with them, how do we even know where to start?" Warrick asked.
"We start with the guy's car – all road crews are on alert for the car Grissom described – unfortunately he didn't give the plate number but the car is the same type that Henderson has registered so if we're lucky then he's stupid enough to use his own car," Catherine went into boss-mode.
Warrick raised his eyebrows at her, "But we still don't know where to look?"
"We'll go back to the original crime scenes – there's only so much bush land in Nevada – sooner or later he's going to have to start doubling up…"
"Lets hope it's sooner…" Warrick murmured to Nick who nodded, still in shock.
"Nick, go back to the listed crime scenes – try and see if you can work out any sort of pattern this guy's been following - or any bush land that stands out that he hasn't already been to – Warrick, you're with me," Catherine ordered.
"And where are we going?"
"Henderson residence."
~~
Their sprint had slowed to a slight stumble, and as they neared the next fallen tree Grissom tripped and fell – bringing Sara crashing to her knees. They had stopped hearing Henderson's screams about an hour ago, but both did not have the guts to hope that he had stopped looking. Grissom lay there on the damp ground, his eyes closed, trying to catch his breath. Sara rested on her knees. She looked at Grissom; shirt out and dirty, hair looking like it hadn't been cleaned in weeks – she suddenly understood exactly what Henderson's victims had gone through before they were killed. The sheer hopelessness of their situation hit her and as she struggled to catch her own breath she felt the tears build up in her eyes. She tried to breathe deeply, to stop them from falling but she couldn't. She looked at Grissom, who was now looking up at her from where he lay, just as the first tear streaked down her face. Grissom knew how she felt – all he wanted to do was lie in the dirt, curl up into a little ball and cry himself to sleep. Instead, he sat up and mimicked Sara's kneeling position. He took her left hand in his right, and her right in his left.
"We are going to get out of this Sara," he said, still breathing deeply, "we're going to make it – we have to."
Sara breathed out half a laugh, "Of course we are, yeah I completely believe that."
"Sara…" Grissom tried to sound authoritative; hoping to snap her back into her usual strong willed self. Sara simply averted her eyes from his gaze, trying furiously to blink away the tears that still threatened to run rampant.
He studied her; trying to work out if she had any injuries she wasn't telling him about. The small gash on her neck had dried up, her wrist was badly beaten – though no more so than his own – but apart from being utterly exhausted she seemed fine.
Finally, Sara looked into Grissom's eyes. He gave her a weak smile and squeezed her hands. They stayed that way for a couple of minutes, still trying to control their heavy breathing, and as the sun finally slipped over the horizon the sound of thunder, and a flash of lighting, filled the newly darkened sky.