Title: Not Quite Myself
Author: Roxanne Kowalchuk
Feedback: roxettemts.net
Category: Romance/Humor
Pairing: S/G (Sara/Grissom)
Disclaimer: I don't owe anyone.
Spoilers: IE. Just the Job.
Summary: Sara is having a bad day.
Notes: I gotta stop writing while on a sugar rush. Gotta love Hallowe'en
candy. :)
An Extra Big Thank You: To Kelly, my beta reader.
Archived: Yes, please!
Feedback is welcomed.
...................

Eventually he had gotten away from Nick. They were almost to the front doors when the opportunity presented itself. A large group of doctors and nurses separated him from Nick. Greg took that as a chance to back track and hunt down the first available nurse or doctor he could find and ask about the condition of the deputy.

"There was a deputy brought in some time ago. He had a shotgun blast," Greg explained to a nurse who reminded him of his grandmother. "He had his vest on. Saved a woman's life."

Nodding her head, the nurse remembered. "Yes, he's in good condition. We're keeping him in for observation. The woman, is also doing good."

"Ya I know," Greg told her. "She asked if I'd ask about the deputy. He saved
her life."

"Friend?"

"And co-worker," Greg explained. "Apparently I'm the only one she'll talk to
right now."

There had been some buzz about a patient not letting some people in. "Next
time you see her, tell her he's doing fine."

"I will, thank you," Greg said, as he knew he had to get going before Nick
asked the security guards to lock down the hospital. Wandering away from the nurse, Greg knew he could play it two ways. One was to tell Nick that he searched and searched for him, but just couldn't find him or just wander out
of the hospital with not a care in the world. He took number two.

.........

"Hey Gris," Warrick greeted at the doorway to the house.

"Warrick," Grissom said as he surveyed the house. "How's it going?"

"I've searched every square inch of the house, now all I have left to do is
go back to the lab and go through everything that I have gathered" Warrick
explained.

"All right," Grissom said. "I'll come with you."

"Where's Brass?" Warrick asked as he picked up his field kit, closed the
door and headed towards his Tahoe.

"Dropped me off."

"Oh, okay," Warrick said as he loaded the Tahoe then jumped in.
..........

Greg wasn't impressed with anyone at the moment. He was so completely bogged down by work, it was almost as if they had put 365 days worth of work on him and told him to get it done within two hours tops. Which, to honest was never going to happen, especially since his mind kept on wandering to thoughts of Sara.

"Greg!"

Lifting his head, Greg slowly turned his head towards the door. "Yes
Catherine," he said in his most cheery, icy voice he could muster up.

"Are my results back yet?"

He knew she'd ask and he knew he'd have an answer for her. "Hey look, I'm a human being not a machine. I just got back here about half an hour ago, so
will you just chill out. I will page you when and if I feel like getting results for you. Got it!"

Catherine didn't say a word. Instead she backed out of the lab and into the
hallway where she bumped into Nick.

"Catherine, what are you doing?"

"Sorry Nick, I think Greg is having a bad day."

Walking with her, he asked. "Why?"

"Because he just snapped at me."

"Could be because of me," Nick admitted. "I had to take him to the hospital
a while back. I broke up what looked like to me was him trying to pick up an
intern."

"Oh?" Catherine inquired. "Nope isn't that, I don't think." Catherine
replied as she spotted both Grissom and Warrick. "Hey Warrick, Grissom.
How's Sara?"

Looking over at Nick, Grissom spoke. "Nick didn't tell you."

"Tell me what?" Catherine replied.

Looking away from Grissom, Nick answered. "Sara won't talk to anyone but
Greg."

"Greg?" she repeated.

"Yes," Grissom replied. "I don't know what she's trying to pull but I will
figure it out. But for now, let's figure out what exactly this case that
Sara was working on is all about."

"Sure, Gris," Warrick said as he parted from the group and headed towards
Greg's lab.

Catherine never said a word. Nor did Nick.
..........

He was swamped. He felt like he was sinking to the bottom of Lake Mead. He had no life jacket on and no one was about to throw him one.
Rubbing his eyes, Greg turned around and watched as a single piece of paper
slowly slipped out of the printer. Grabbing hold of it, he turned around and
placed it on an already growing pile of printouts. He could have paged some
one to get them, but he knew they asked for the results of the next piece of
evidence.

"Greg."

Turning from the pile, Greg saw Grissom threw blood shot eyes. He was
exhausted. Greg was, not Grissom. "Yes Grissom."

"Have any results?"

Looking back to the pile beside him, Greg picked it up and handed it to
Grissom. "Here."

Eyeing the pile that he took from Greg, Grissom questioned his lab tech.
"Weren't planning on giving us any of these very important results?"

"I was then I knew you'd ask for the rest," Greg said as he turned around
and pulled one last sheet out of the printer and handed it to Grissom.
"That's all of them."

For now he'd let his lab tech go. "Since this is a very important case, I'll
let what you've done go. But after this is all over, we talk." And with
that, he was gone.

Greg didn't care. His shift was almost over and he was going to leave. Oh
wait, it was over. He was on overtime. Overtime he didn't want. Getting up,
he walked out.
..........

"That's all the results? For every piece of evidence we gave him?" Warrick
asked in a state of surprise.

"Yes," Grissom answered. "And yes I'm as surprised as you at what Greg has done."

Walking into the lunchroom, Catherine took a seat beside Warrick. "And
speaking of Greg, anyone know where he is?"

Also walking into the room, Nick, who had been down in the morgue, answered. "Saw him walking out the door."

This statement peaked Grissom's interest. "Who? Greg?"

"Ya," Nick answered as he handed out copies of a report to everyone.
"Technically he's on overtime."

"Yes but, technically I didn't tell him he could go," Grissom explained.

"Then I don't know Gris," Nick replied. "Any ways, I was done at the
morgue."

"And? Those two bodies?" Warrick questioned.

"They were the suspect's parents, Doc Robbins said they were in their late
70's. Said they were hit with a blunt object at the base of their skulls,"
Nick explained to everyone as they all read their own reports. "Because they were so old, they had no clue what hit them. He's doing more tests."

"So this guy kills his own parents. But this can't be why Sara had the
case," Warrick pointed out.

Pulling a file out, Catherine spoke. "Sara is going to be pissed at me but I
had to do it."

"Do what?" Grissom asked.

"Break into her locker. I couldn't find the file anywhere else," Catherine
said as she handed it to Grissom across the table.

Opening the file, Grissom read it but then decided to let Catherine explain
it. Handing it back, he spoke. "Go ahead, Catherine."

"Okay," Catherine replied. "She was sent to investigate an B&E on a garage."

Grissom didn't say a word.

Nor did anyone else.

"The neighbour of the suspect owned the garage. Several things were missing, Sara went there to check out things. From her notes, she indicated she found blood. Eww..."

"What Catherine?" Warrick asked first.

"A small dog was mutilated. Owner of the garage said that his neighbour
didn't like him and that he was strange."

"There goes the saying love thy neighbour," Nick said as Grissom glared over at him. "Sorry Gris. So anything else?"

"Ran the neighbour, found out he hasn't been a saint," Catherine continued
as she closed the file. "Next thing we know, she's serving a warrant for
either his arrest or to have a snoop around his house."

"And he answers the door with a shotgun," Warrick said.

"The blood from the garage doesn't match the victims in the house. Although, the single print she found, matches with the prints on the front door."

"So he is our suspect," Catherine reaffirmed. They all knew that.

"Anyone get Sara's story yet?" Warrick asked.

"Brass is gone to do that," Grissom informed them.

This question was bugging her for sometime now since Nick told her that Sara wanted to see Greg. "So she doesn't want to see any of us?"

"Apparently not," Grissom replied. "Although, This may have been coming from her drug induced state, hopefully when they start to wear off she'll change her mind."
Somehow deep inside of him, Warrick knew it wasn't. He had snapped at her. This was revenge.

"All right people, let's head home. Get some sleep and continue working on
this tonight," Grissom announced as he got up from the table and left before
anyone could question him. He was tired and didn't feel like talking anymore
or for that matter to anyone, except for Sara and she didn't want to talk to
him.
..........

"You look like hell, Greg."

"I feel like I had a nice lovely vacation there and just got back," Greg
commented as he sank down in the chair beside her.

Watching him rub his face, Sara continued on. "You know, you can go home."

"Ya I know, but I rather be here."

"Hiding, huh?"

Looking over at her, Greg saw a small smile on her face. "Feeling better,
huh?"

Actually she was. "Yes I am. If I'm a good little girl, I'll be allowed out
in a week."

Greg couldn't help but chuckle. But he stopped laughing when some one
entered her room. "Grissom?"

"Oh I hope not," the person answered as he approached the bed.

As Greg realized that it was Brass he sheepishly offered an apology. "Sorry,
Brass."

"That's okay," Brass said as he looked at Sara. "How you feeling?"

"Better," Sara answered. "What can I do for you?"

"I need to know what happened from your point of view. From the start."

"Maybe I should go," Greg piped up.

"No, stay Greg," Brass told him.

"Okay," Greg said as he slumped down in the chair. "Sara."

"When you say from the start? Where do you mean exactly?"

"The lab," Brass answered. He wanted to know a few other things that weren't really a necessity to the case. He just wanted to know if he was right or not.

"Well, after I got back from the garage, I started the process of processing
my evidence. I told Greg to do my stuff when he had a chance. Ran a few
things on the computer and since I had time to wait, I decided to have
lunch," Sara started. "Never ate it. Grissom put a stop to that. Made my way
back to the lab, got my head bit off by Nick, then Catherine and Warrick
before I left the lab. I left with Billy, err Deputy Jones to serve the
warrant.
He knew it. She had been having a bad night at the lab. "Then what?"

"Well..." she started but stopped when she looked over at Greg. He was
asleep. "Leave him be, Brass. He's had it rough too."

"No problem," Brass agreed.

"Billy for some reason, stood in front of me at the door. He wouldn't let me
stand beside him. He told me to humor him, so I did. Good thing I did."

"It's a very good thing," Brass agreed, again. "So what did you do? Knock on the door, announce yourselves?"

"Basically, yes. Billy said LVPD and we have a warrant," Sara explained.
"Everything was routine. Well not the shotgun, but everything else was."

"Were you armed?"

"Yes."

"Well I'm going to find this guy and ask him as politely as I can, why he
drew a shotgun on the two of you," Brass said as he dropped the cop
toughness and went soft. "Seriously, how are you doing?"

"Sore, tired but good."

"If you need anything call."

"Actually I need something," Sara told him.

"Which is?"

"Bring him home, please." Brass chuckled. "Sure. Not a problem."
......................

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