Title: Bright Lights; Dig City Author: Jayke Manners

Category: Drama / Angst

Spoilers: Only received up to end Season 4 in Aussie – so pretty much anything up to there…

Disclaimer: I do not own CSI or it's Characters. If I did Mr Will would be at the mercy of mine. (Bring the handcuffs CSI man)

Summary: Casefile / Angst / GS

Firstly, I AM SO SORRY for the amazingly looong delay in the posting of this chapter. Real life and the unfortunate return of SLEEP (actually I was really glad about the latter) put a damn quick halt to my fanfic fun. Thanks so much for bearing with me… this is kinda short but I promise to continue soon. Let me know what you're thinkin and if you need anything you aren't getting…

Big thanks to my reviewers and especially K.C.-Clark for the kick in the pootooty! Oh by the way y'all – I'm female. I know, the name is ambiguous…

THIRTY FOUR

The initial pages Grissom flicked through without much investigation. Page three revealed a photograph of a smaller, wide eyed Sara. She was standing in pig-tails and cut-offs, hands balled at her sides into fists of anger while her face pulled into a toothless grin. It was a similar smile to the one she had perfected through the years, only her hands no longer bunched into fists, they crossed in front of her protectively - the fight now burning within and secretly hidden from prying eyes. It was more than Grissom needed, or wanted to know. That part of her was simply none of his business, not unless he was invited into it. The fact that it took him another seventeen pages before the juvenile record was complete, he pushed into the back of his mind.

He flipped through the official records, the ones he had seen many times and knew as well as his own. Graduated first in almost every class, university honours, readily accepted by the Crime Lab and moving through her training and Levels swiftly. He couldn't help but notice a plateau in her progression once she'd entered the Las Vegas Lab and he winced at the knowledge that it was not entirely Sara's fault – and now… There were insubordination reports, but Grissom believed that any great law officer without a few insubordinations was either very good at talking in circles or simply corrupt.

The page that altered Grissom's reality was numbered forty-three.

It was a photograph. He only recognised it as Sara by the gap in her teeth, the rest of her face was so bloodied and battered that, if her mouth had been closed when the picture was taken, Grissom might not have accepted it. Her left eye was swollen shut – her hair matted and streaked with red and dirt. She hadn't been cleaned up at all, the dried blood caking on her mouth, on her cheekbone, down her neck. It still flowed in places, little streams of crimson that crossed like cobwebs across her ashen skin. Her shoulders were hunched, an arm cradled against her stomach, wrapped crudely in a bandage that looked as if it were fashioned from a ripped portion of her CSI jacket. The clock on the wall declared it was nearly three in the morning.

He turned the page, it was the kind of report he'd read a hundred times over. Assault. Battery. Rape.

Grissom swallowed the word along with the bile that rose in his throat. The image of Sara was already seared into his consciousness, now words leapt out at him, sentences branding his memory forever…

Struck from behind… dragged into concealed area… severe contusions, abrasions, laceration of face and abdomen… fractures of occipital bones… positive for semen traces… multiple DNA results… no matches… ligature marks on wrist … distinctive thumb print below left eye resulting in pressure fractures… witness encountered victim 2245… multiple assailants escaped west down Whitecliffe… victim incoherent and disoriented upon arrival…

There were more photographs, a rape kit, Sara's statements - thorough descriptions considering her state and their disguises, DNA summaries, possible matches, the witness account. She had fought back – of course she had, but there were two and she was attacked from behind. No, she couldn't identify anyone, they wore masks. They knew where she lived. Victim again requests that further investigations be restricted within the department, refer all enquiries Detective Jim Brass…

All of it went flying across the room, followed quickly by the coffee table, a commemorative plaque and the part of Gil Grissom that believed in the goodness of mankind.

THIRTY FIVE

The room was no longer a safe place to be. Corbett stiffened slightly in his chair, his body suddenly injected with adrenaline, like he had just walked through a spider's web in the middle of the night. Sara wasn't pacing, wasn't talking, wasn't even glancing in his direction – but he had seen that look in her eyes before. It meant danger for them both.

"Sara, whatever it is you're thinking…"

Corbett hardly got the sentence out before Sara laughed slightly, her eyes flicking toward him from an angle, "You know, Corbett… I'm making decisions in my head right now…" her hand raised from it's odd tapping motion in the air and sort of pointed toward him, "it's a really good idea for you to just shut the fuck up ok?"

He swallowed and fell quiet.

Suddenly, Sara was animated. In one swift movement she was across the room and seated in front of him, leaning forward on her elbows, hair falling in wisps before her eyes. "Why?" she asked. "Why do you do it?" Her hands clasped, her knuckles turning white with the pressure. "I just… I can't understand it. What do you get from it? What do you…" For the first time her eyes lifted and penetrated his own, "Can you even tell me? Do you… do you know?"

For a moment, Corbett considered continuing his charade, debated stringing her along and seeing if he could pluck at the threads of her sanity until they finally snapped. But there was so little to play with, perhaps the truth would actually provide more amusement for once. He smiled softly, as if the memories were some sweet boyhood recollection, "Of course I know," he answered.

He watched as Sara's brow furrowed, as the soft trembling in her hands flowed through to the rest of her body and he offered her a sympathetic grin. "I know you want to hear differently Miss Sidle. I know you want there to be some terrible event or trauma that lead me down this path. Perhaps if I were the victim of abuse, or my Mother abandoned me, or even a nice chemical imbalance…" He sat back, almost casually as his eyes wandered around the room, "But the simple truth is, I've come to enjoy it."

Corbett glanced at the boards which surrounded them, drinking in the images that were plastered on each and drawing from his mind his own monstrous recollections. "Not Jessica," he said. For a moment his face darkened in what could have once been remorse, "that was a mistake, I… I want you to know that. I never meant to hurt Jessica. But… things happen."

He turned once again to the photographs, eyes roving. "The others," he continued, "they were revenge, Sara. Revenge against all the girls just like you. The girls who drift thorough life with their pretty hair and their pretty faces, and their dirty little thoughts all wrapped up into such sweet little packages." He looked at her, words patronising. "Such a sad little lot you are. Nothing ever touches you does it? No hairs on your silly heads fall out of place. Not until someone like me comes around, someone to remind you that life isn't all roses and candy." Corbett lifted a hand and reached for the other pile of photographs, the after shots. "Life is cruel," he told her, "looks are… fleeting."

He shrugged and with that single motion, all regret was gone, in its place was an earnest curiosity. He too leaned forward, his eagerness causing Sara to shirk backwards – but only slightly. Corbett ignored the reaction, "Do you believe in fate, Sara?" he demanded. "That in all the great movement and jumbling in this world, there's one path that's been selected for you from the very beginning? Before you were even born?"

When Sara didn't answer, he continued. "I do. There's no other explanation for it." His hand snaked toward her, imploring. "Think of it Sara. One day, I'm just an ordinary guy, the teacher that no one really notices, the science geek. Then, in one tiny moment, with one push of my hand – the whole world is changed. All things. Turned on their axis.

She just… fell. It was like watching an angel… And then I realised, I had the power to change things. To change people. You have no idea how much clarity that kind of moment brings to a human being Sara. Watching someone, the moment they realise that they are going to die. It's a strange and wonderful thing."

Sara seemed unable to speak. Corbett couldn't decide if it was fear or rage keeping her plastered to her seat, her eyes fixed on his with such intensity they seemed to blaze.

It was amusing, really. He'd enjoyed including her in his little jigsaw of girls - letting her know, in his own way, that she was indeed simply a piece of his puzzle. Of course he realised hers wasn't an entirely similar case. She can't have been worshiped during her school years, long and gangly, probably too skinny to be considered beautiful, not to mention those teeth – and nowadays… Well after tracking her movements for a few months and watching through windows, listening through open doorways, Corbett realised that life for Sara was… different.

He smiled at her, wondering just how long it would be before her supervisor came crashing through the door. Perhaps he was already watching behind that long window – either way, he planned to have his last bit of fun before the game was finally over. He was getting bored with life anyways, why prolong the inevitable? He sniffed, "It wasn't your fault, Sara."