Spoilers: No Humans Involved

Disclaimer: They are not mine, but they were just sitting there on the doorstep alone with nobody telling me I couldn't play with them.

Thanks for the feedback. As always it is the nectar that inspires further chapters.

Sheila

Ghosts Chapter 2

Greg walked to the back of the house alone. He should have waited, but the detective kept pressuring him. It was a guy out of Narcotics, and Greg wasn't familiar with him. He kept asking Greg when CSI was going to show even though Greg assured him that he was qualified. In truth, he wasn't sure he felt all that confident about his abilities. Each new case horrified him more than the last. He felt like he was never able to do much more than stand around waiting for someone else to tackle the hard stuff.

The detective told him that there was a dead girl in the back bedroom, young, maybe 10, maybe 13. Said that they found her doing a drug bust on the house. Told him that they found her bound and gagged, bruises on her face. The detective's description alone was almost enough to make Greg's stomach turn.

Paint peeled off the walls as he walked to the back. There was a deep sour smell, but it was not yet of the body. It was the smell of bodily functions and bad hygiene. Greg heard that they pulled almost 20 people out of the small house, half of them too high to even register the arrest.

At the door, the smell changed. It was hard and foul. Greg winced. The smell of dead body was not something that he was ever going to get used to. The room was trashed. A mattress flung in the corner. Fast food wrappers littered the floor. An ugly red spatter hung on one wall. The girl was in the closet. Dead probably three days. He imagined that they probably closed her in there, and then went out to score more heroin. He stepped around the closet door to look inside.

"Hey!"

Greg jumped back against the wall. Sara was standing in front of him.

"Sorry. Didn't mean to scare you. Thought I would back you up."

Greg relaxed against the wall.

"Never did a first on the scene before, have you? Has Grissom cleared you for this?" Sara carefully set her kit down, and began unpacking it.

"Where is he? You guys took forever." Greg felt his legs stop shaking.

"Yeah, I was at a hit and run with Grissom and Sofia. He sent me on ahead."

"By yourself?"

"Yup."

"It's a dead girl."

"I know."

"You just had a dead boy."

"I know that too."

"Maybe we should wait for Grissom."

Sara took a breath before responding. "Greg, I understand that Nick and Warrick have been in your ear about taking care of me. They are not subtle about it. But you were on the other case too. My…difficulties are not your burden to carry."

"This is another tough one."

"Well, then I imagine she deserves the best we have to offer. Now let me do what I do, okay?"

Greg let her take the lead. Over her shoulder, he could see the child curled up in the corner. Her face strained against the closet wall, arms pulled behind her back. Sara knelt and just looked at her for a moment. Then she looked over her shoulder.

"They really took their time on her."

"I imagine those bruises extend under her clothes."

"Hand me that. I am going to start dusting her."

"Sara--"

"I know, Greg, but technically you probably shouldn't have even come in alone. She's mine now. I'm going to work it. I need you to go to the police station, and do a trace and DNA on everyone of those bastards, okay?"

"What about the house?"

"Close it off. Grissom or Sofia should be here in a couple of hours. They can take the rooms."

"You're going to be in here alone with her?"

"Bye Greg." Sara had already turned her attention back to the small body. Greg watched for a moment, unsure if he should continue fighting with her about this. She picked up a sheet of tape and carefully laid it on the girl's shoulder. She pressed it down and then pulled it off. With the flashlight on the girl, she meticulously studied her for another spot to print. She was methodical and focused, seemingly unaware that he was still in the room. Greg quietly backed out of the room Abused in life, he knew the child was being cared for in death.

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Brass looked around the room. Some were listless. Others were agitated. They were all in desperate need of a shower. Two people were trying to reason with the officer guarding them, and another was banging his head against a wall. Brass could tell he was going to have a hard time organizing this particular group. To his left, Greg stood, his eyes wide. Brass reached over and shook him a little. Then he gestured toward a chair. Greg grabbed a chair and put it in front of Brass. Brass climbed up and stood, surveying the room.

"Okay!" He shouted and started clapping his hands. All right! Listen up, people! This is how we are going to get this done. We are taking you one at a time. We will be taking a DNA sample from you, and trace evidence from your clothing. We will also be interviewing you. Does everyone understand this so far?"

A rush of indignant voices erupted.

"Good! Good! Glad to have your cooperation. How many of you want to be out of here by the morning?"

Twenty people began talking at the same time.

Brass held up his hand. "Okay! That's what I thought. If you are forthcoming in your interview, you will be out of here in next 4-6 hours. Just in time to score a little powder for breakfast. How does that sound?" Brass didn't wait for a response. "Now, we are not interested in anything less than full cooperation. If we find stories that begin to match up and give us useful information, great! You are on your way. But! You try to hand us a piece of fiction, and I'm going to charge you with conspiracy to murder and throw you in a cell. You can do detox the hard way!"

The room got quiet for the first time.

"Perfect! I think this is going well, don't you? Who is our first witness? Greg, grab your kit. Let's get this show on the road."

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Grissom stood in the doorway to the bedroom. David had just finished moving the child from the closet 15 minutes earlier. David's sensitivity was a blessing in situations like this. He took his time, and was gentle throughout the transfer. Now the bedroom was empty save for Sara who sat cross legged at the closet door staring in. Her kit was packed up, but still she sat. Grissom was reluctant to disturb her. He knew that she needed space to gather herself. Her head turned and she saw him. Her eyes were blinking hard.

"Sofia and I will finish up here if you want to get to the lab."

She nodded. "I want to be there when Doc starts."

He stopped her at the door. "Sara, I…"

"It's okay. I'm okay." She patted his shoulder and moved on down the hall.

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"He had an accent." The man was sweating profusely, beads of moisture dotting his bald head.

"Good start. What kind of accent?"

"I don't know. Portuguese, maybe?"

"Portuguese! Did you hear that Greg? Portuguese!" Brass turned to his young colleague. "What does that make it?"

Greg thought for a moment. "Four, I think. Russian, French, 2 votes for Italian, and now Portuguese."

Brass returned to his witness. "What makes you say Portuguese?"

The man shrugged. "He was foreign sounding."

"Oh, so immediately one would think, hmmm, he must be Portuguese."

"Yeah, I don't know. What do you want from me?"

Brass slammed the table. The man nearly fell off his chair. Leaning in more closely, Brass said, "A child was found tortured and killed in the closet of the home where you were. I want a lot from you, Buddy."

"I wasn't involved!"

"Talk to me now 'cause it's four in the morning and I got twelve more of you idiots. Tell me something interesting now or you're going down to lock-up."

"I don't kno---"

Brass hit the table again. "Get him out of here. Send in the next clown."

"Wait!" The man yelled as a deputy put hands on his shoulders. "I overheard stuff. No direct conversations. Understand?"

"Talk to me."

"I heard she was collateral. Her mom is a runner. Lost some blow. A lot of blow. Foreign guy says he took the girl as collateral."

Brass stared at him for a moment. "What was the point?"

"He says he gave Mom a week to make up the difference. He said she took off, and now he had this kid who was nothing but trouble."

"You saw him bring her over?"

"She was already messed up. Tied up. Walked funny. He took her in the back bedroom with him. A few hours later, he left, alone. People didn't want to know. We closed the bedroom door. Told people it was off limits."

"Wow!" Greg exclaimed.

Brass looked at him, startled.

"Just closed the door on her." Greg continued, shaking his head. "Amazing!"

"In my world, you don't ask questions." said the man.

"You don't have kids?"

"Got 4 or 5. Depends on what their mothers say."

"She was somebody's kid. While you were high, a drug dealer brings in a kid, and kills her in the back room, and you probably heard the whole thing." Greg continued as if he was alone in the room with the man.

"He's got guns, money, and blow. All I got is an itch. It's not survival of the fittest. It's survival of the most invisible."

"Okay, big guy. We want you to sit down with our artist. I want on a face on foreign guy before you go anywhere." Brass took control again.

"Can I get some cigarettes?"

"Oh, shut up."

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Ecklie looked up as the receptionist brought in a package. He smiled at her as he did with all office support workers. He knew how important it was to be pleasant with his underlings. He was surprised to see how thick it was. It was in an overnight delivery envelope. And it was addressed to Conrad Ecklie from the Department of Children's Services, Encino, California. Ecklie prided himself on being able to manipulate any and all bureaucracies. Without ceremony, he tore open the package and began to read.

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In another part of the building, Grissom staring at his computer screen. It had the Google search engine with Sara's name and Westlaw typed in. Over the course of the last two days, he had pulled up this screen five, maybe six times. He suspected that she had told him that much information so that he could do just this. He reasoned that she might see this as an easier way to tell him. But he couldn't bring himself to hit search. He had told her he was going to wait until she was ready, and so, as he had already done several times, he hit close.

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TBC