Issues by SLynn

Disclaimer: I own only the thoughts in my head and the characters you don't recognize.

Chapter 13: Notes

At work that same night Warrick had been surprised to find the note Greg had left for him. He knew immediately who it was from despite it only containing two case file numbers. Greg's handwriting was distinctive. Neat, compact and always printed in capital letters. For years Warrick had marveled at how different the man was from his own handwriting. Tonight he wasn't just marveled, he was amazed.

Warrick pulled up the two case files and looked through them before Catherine had arrived. By the time she had, he'd already begun to think along with Greg that these two were related. The first case listed was a year and a half old, the second just under a year. That would make five total, over the course of two years, all roughly six months apart.

"What are you looking at?" Catherine asked as Warrick had displayed the first new victim onto the overhead.

"Look familiar?"

"Very."

Warrick read the case history to her. It was similar. The first was of an older Hispanic woman, a nurse. Like Dr. Sanchez, she'd been strangled in her home. Like Dr. Sanchez's home, there had been no signs of forced entry. The victim, Juanita Juarez was also found partially stripped on her bed in a near perfect inverted cross position. She'd also had her underwear stuffed into her mouth like Dr. Sanchez. No prints or DNA at the scene, but three unidentified natural fibers were found on the body.

"So how'd we miss this?" Catherine asked.

"There were a lot of cases to go through. No telling."

"What else?" she asked, seeing the second file sitting nearby.

Warrick switched the photographs, this time the victim was much younger. Still a kid almost. He read off the file again to Catherine. Sixteen year old Jaime Taylor found in north Vegas near where it looks like the first victim, the Jane Doe prostitute had been found.

"Runaway?" Catherine asked.

"No, but pregnant. Six weeks. Parents identified her; she'd gone missing from school one day, dead the next."

Catherine looked at the crime scene photos. Again, no DNA recovered. She looked like she'd struggled, strangled but more bruised then they'd seen before. Interestingly enough, her shoes were missing.

"What's this?" Cath asked, indicating a post-it note stuck onto one of the pictures.

"Don't know," Warrick said, "Haven't gotten there yet."

The post it only had two words on it, 'what's that', with an arrow indicating a wall near by the body where it looked as if graffiti had been scrawled. It wasn't readable, but written in large block letters.

"You haven't gotten there yet. Didn't you dig these up?" she asked before really looking at the note.

Warrick shrugged.

"This is Greg's handwriting. Did he find these?"

She hadn't sounded angry.

"He might have done some independent research."

Catherine nodded and put the photo onto the overhead so they could get a better look. It wasn't a good shot, but there was something written near the body. If they were lucky, whatever had been written near the body was still intact.

"Well," Catherine said closing the files. "Care to take a drive?"

Amy, in the lab, was still upset. She'd gone home that day angry about Greg's attitude, but that wasn't what was upsetting her now. He'd done it again. Completely rearranged the lab while she was gone. The first time she'd thought it was cute, like a joke and had undone it all to play along. She hadn't expected him to do it again.

Mumbling and riffling through boxes was how Nick found here when he arrived on duty. Found wasn't exactly right. He'd only heard her as he stepped into the lab.

"Amy?" he asked, a bit confused at where she could be. The place wasn't that big. But as Greg could only manage to get part of the way into the cabinets, Amy practically fit inside.

"What?" she called out, her voice muffled. "Just leave it on the counter and I'll get to it in a minute."

Nick walked around to the other side of the counter, squatting down and smiling at her protruding feet.

"Are you hiding?"

"Ha, ha," she said dryly, still rummaging about.

"Okay, so not hiding," he replied, "What are you doing then?"

"Restocking."

"Looks full to me."

"It is," she said, crawling out backwards and kneeling down still in front of the cabinets, "just not correctly. Damn him. I really think he's serious."

"I'm not following you."

"Greg," she said flatly and in a way that marked she still hadn't gotten over their argument. "He keeps rearranging things on his shift. It's driving me crazy. It took months to get things like I like them."

Nick laughed.

"It's not funny."

"Yes, it is."

"No. I need things to be where I left them. It took me half an hour to find the Petri dishes today. He had them on the top shelf. I can't even reach the top shelf."

Nick was positively rolling now.

"It's not funny," she said, hitting him lightly in the arm.

"Is that why my results aren't done?" he asked, still laughing. "Because you're short."

"I am not short."

"Excuse me," someone else had said from above them.

The new voice surprised them both. Looking up, there was Grissom, leaning over the counter looking down at the both of them.

Nick, no longer laughing, got to his feet quickly before giving Amy a hand up.

"I'll come back for those results later," Nick said, making a very quick exit.

Amy shot him a look as he left, imploring him to stay, to which he smirked at her from the other side of the glass. She was on her own now.

"You're probably here for that DNA comparison," Amy said recovering herself, and stepping over several boxes to get to the print out.

"Here," she said handing it off to him. "They matched. It's your girl or her evil identical twin. 99.9875 percent certain."

Grissom hardly looked at the print out, was instead surveying the room. Just like he'd seen before with Greg, boxes were everywhere. Supplies of all types were strewn about.

"I'm doing some cleaning," Amy said as an explanation.

"Give me a minute," Grissom said quickly leaving the room. Amy watched him go with interest. She thought he might be coming back with her pink slip, considering she'd single handedly wrecked the lab and was found giggling on the floor moments earlier, she wouldn't have been at all surprised.

But he didn't.

He came back quickly and set a box down in front of her.

"It's a label maker," she said looking it over, waiting for something more.

"Exactly."

The next morning Greg made it to his appointment on time. Sara dropped him off to do the grocery shopping and promised to be back in under an hour. She never went into his appointments with him. It felt like an evasion of his privacy.

The tap itself was moderately painless. They gave him a local and took the marrow from his hip. It made him sore for a day or two, but nothing too bad. Lumbar punctures were much worse. Greg was glad he wasn't getting one today.

After they'd gotten the marrow he waited for Dr. Tracey in her office. He hadn't seen her since the day of his review and she was anxious to ask him how it had gone. Disappointed he'd temporarily lost his position at work she was otherwise pleased with his general health.

As expected, she wanted him to begin therapy again.

It hadn't been easy for her to talk about. Dr. Sanchez was a good friend of hers, but she was concerned for Greg's well being. Dr. Tracey was a good physician. She knew that it wasn't just about the physical well being, but the mental too.

She recommended Dr. Fenton to him.

Dr. Fenton had been a colleague of Dr. Sanchez's. They'd known each other for years and he had agreed to take on some of her clients. He'd specifically requested Greg's and having no objections of his own, Greg agreed to meet with him.

Dr. Tracey set up the initial session for Friday afternoon at three o'clock.

Before he left she promised him his results on Monday. She wished him luck and felt that there was a good probability that he'd gotten through the worst of it. Instinct lead her to believe that he was in remission, science just needed to prove it.

Sara and Greg had a quick lunch before he went into work. It was just after noon when he arrived. Stopping first at his locker he was surprised to find a note fall out of it. It contained one line in Catherine's handwriting.

'Come in tonight with Sara.'

Greg tucked in into his pocket and headed to the lab.

Relieving the temp who'd filled in for him, the first thing Greg did was look at the cabinets and wonder if he had time to redo everything he knew Amy had undone in his absence.

Today he didn't have too.

Smiling, he ran his hand across the table counter. There had always been three large cabinets under the table top. Now there were three large labeled cabinets under the table. Sanders, Thompsen and Chen. Days, swings and mids.

Greg opened his and found it just as he'd left it with one exception.

On the inside of his door was an additional label with one word on it. A question really. 'Truce'

Chuckling at Amy's unique problem solving skills, Greg looked for the label maker she'd used. Finding it nearby on the desk, he broke it out to make his response.