Best Face Forward Chapter 1: Craterface, a csi fanfic

DISCLAIMER: I do not own CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, or any of its characters. I just own this story.

Chapter 1: Craterface

7:17 P.M.

Las Vegas Crime Lab

Las Vegas, Nevada

The dayshift was almost over. The lab was almost completely empty, except for a few people catching up on some paperwork. Conrad Ecklie had just finished packing up his briefcase and was ready to go home for the night and the weekend. Before packing up his laptop computer, he decided to check his email (work account, of course).

He looked at his messages. There was only one new one. The name on the email address was not one he recognized. But the suffix was identical to those of all the employees in the lab, so it must be from one of them. It said:

TO: CEcklie

FROM: craterface

SUBJECT: Internal Affair Case File

Hello! I don't intend to worry you, but I thought you might find these photographs interesting. It may change your mind about two certain people whom you know fairly well. And remember: secrets are usually buried very deep in the ground, but always seem to find a way to reach the surface…

There was a picture link at the bottom of the email. Ecklie read the email message rather slowly, and then sat back to think for a moment. Most other people would simply treat something like this as junk mail, but Conrad Ecklie was always a sucker for gossip. Therefore, he double-clicked the link.

As the files opened, a smirk spread across his face. The file contained photographs of Gil Grissom and Sara Sidle. The photos weren't dirty or anything; they were just normal photos of Grissom and Sara. But they were taken in a weird way. For example, a few of the photos were of Grissom and Sara having a close "chat" at Sara's house. The other pics were taken in the lab. They all looked as if they had been shot from a hidden camera.

Ecklie didn't notice that the photos seemed a bit odd, or that the address the email was sent from was the address of a lab employee who used a codename instead of their real name to remain anonymous. No, Ecklie wasn't thinking about any of that. He was just happy to have his hands on some new, juicy, rumors. So, realizing that there was no reason for him to remain at work, he inhaled deeply, shut down his computer, picked up his briefcase, locked the door to his office, and then walked toward the glass double doors of the lab.

Just as he was leaving through the double doors of the laboratory, he came face-to-face with Sara Sidle, who was coming in to work early, as usual. She had planned to walk right by him, but he made a point of coming up in her face.

"Hello, Miss Sidle." Ecklie said, a mischievous grin on his face.

"Hi, Ecklie." Sara said, annoyed, trying to get passed him.

"How are you, Sara?"

"I'm fine."

At this point, she had given up on trying to walk past him. He put his hand on the wall and leaned forward on her in a somewhat threatening way.

"Are you really?" Ecklie said, giving her a suspicious look.

"Yes." Sara replied, giving him a polite smile that covered up her annoyed gaze. She pushed past him and headed toward her office. Ecklie remained behind her. She had absolutely no idea what he was doing.

"How's Grissom? Or rather, how are you and Grissom? What's up with you two, anyway?"

Sara didn't really know why, but this question made her spin around and look Ecklie in the eye. Her stomach turned over as she looked at his satisfied grin.

"What are you talking about?" She asked, trying to keep her cool.

Ecklie laughed.

"I don't know how I could've missed it. All this time I was worried about Grissom and Sofia, but I never realized that leaving Grissom with you would become so problematic."

"Problematic?"

"Yes, problematic. I've always seen Grissom as a bit of an oddity, but I never once viewed him as a crooked old man."

Sara's face instantly became a deep crimson. Her heart started beating a mile a minute. She opened her mouth to speak but at that very moment, Grissom entered the lab. Sara let out a startled scream, and looked back and forth between Ecklie and Grissom.

"Sara, are you all right!" Grissom asked, running toward her and looking at her through worried eyes.

"Yeah, I'm…I'm fine." She replied, breathing deeply. She kept her eyes on Ecklie who was still standing there. Grissom turned his head to look at Ecklie, who stared back.

"Can we help you, Conrad?" said Grissom.

"Actually, I don't think you can." He replied.

"Good evening, Sara. Good evening, Grissom."

Ecklie smiled a sneaky little smile, glanced from Sara to Grissom, then straightened himself out and left. Grissom turned to Sara and gave her a puzzled look.

"What's up with him?" Grissom asked.

"It's Ecklie." Sara replied, shrugging.

"Right."

Sara smiled. There was a brief awkward silence, and then she walked away toward her office.

MEANWHILE…

7:32 P.M.

Catherine Willows unlocked the door to her office, turned on the light, and walked inside. She was near exhausted and was only taking a short break from working. Swing shift starts at 4:00 P.M., and she had already wrapped up one case: a grocery store robbery(a complete waste of time, as no one was hurt and the crooks were just twelve-year-olds stealing Mars bars), and was in the middle of another. She had just finished attending the autopsy of a Jane Doe who was found in the desert. Anyway, Catherine sat down at her desk and turned on her computer. She clicked on the icon for her email inbox. She had only one new email and it was from a user she didn't recognize. But it was from someone in the lab, so she opened it anyway. It said:

TO: CWillows

FROM: craterface

SUBJECT: Internal Affair Case File

This email was completely identical to the one Ecklie had received, link and all. Catherine put a befuddled look on her face and thought for a moment before opening the files. But she clicked on the link anyway. She stared at the photos for a minute or two, thinking why they were sent to her. The photos weren't obscene or abnormal or anything like that. They were just photos. Catherine continued to stare at the computer screen for a few more moments, until someone knocked on her door, forcing her to return to earth. It was Nick Stokes.

"Hey Cath, I got a question for you." Nick said. "Did you recently receive an unknown email in your inbox?"

"Why?" Catherine asked. "From who?"

"I don't know. The name was Craterface and the email was sent from a computer in this building."

"Let me guess, there were pictures attached to the email."

"So you got it too!" Nick asked.

"Yeah" Catherine replied. "I honestly don't see what the big deal is; it's probably just a prank or something."

"Well, I don't know, Cath. I mean a user with a codename sending emails from this building could mean we have a leak in our security. We might even have a clever hacker, but I doubt that because if it were true, then a virus would've most likely already traveled through and wrecked the system."

Catherine began to look uneasy.

"Yeah, but why the email?" She asked. "Why the photos?"

"I don't know" Nick replied. "What I do know is that…"

"Catherine!"

Warrick Brown had just entered Catherine's office, giving her the look he gave people when he just arrived at a break in a case.

"Yeah." Catherine said, stretching her face to relieve the shock of a possible computer hacker and to wake her up.

"I found out who our Jane Doe is. Name is Laura Jenson, age eight, address is 1560 Williams Street. Lived with her grandmother, name Leslie Jenson, retired, who reported Laura missing six weeks ago. Most likely a kidnapping."

There was a brief silence in the room until Catherine replied to Warrick's information with no more than a sarcastic "Great."

"That was all I could find for now." Warrick continued, "But I'll probably find out more after we interview the grandmother."

He started to exit Catherine's office, expecting her to follow him. She didn't.

"Cath, you comin'?" He asked.

"Uh, maybe I'll meet you there" She replied, distracted.

"I can't cover your ass again." Warrick said, a hint of anger in his voice. "I had to do that last week when you couldn't find a sitter for Lindsay. And I don't think Nick wants to cover for you, either."

"Hey, dude, leave me out of this." Nick said, throwing up his hands. "And Cath's just in a weird mood because of the emails."

"Emails?" Warrick asked, looking confused.

"You haven't checked your email, have you?" Catherine asked, a small smile on her face.

Warrick shook his head.

"Take a look at mine." Catherine said, pointing her head toward her computer screen.

Warrick took a look at the photos and said:

"I gotta check up on where this email was sent from." Warrick quickly left the room to do that.

8:04 P.M.

Warrick reentered Catherine's office. She was still there, but Nick had gone with Brass to interview Leslie Jenson. She glanced up at Warrick, who had a puzzled look on his face.

"Did you find out where that email was sent?" She asked.

"Yeah." Warrick replied. "I know this sounds weird, but it came from a computer located in the fourth floor women's bathroom.

"What!" Catherine said, surprised and confused. "How the hell did that happen?"

"I don't know yet."

"What do you mean, 'you don't know yet'?"

"Well, we have to investigate. I know better than to go into a possible crime scene by myself and without a kit. There could be a bomb in there, for all we know."

Catherine sighed.

"I'll get the bomb squad down here A.S.A.P." She said.

8: 21 P.M.

A bomb squad was assembled outside the fourth floor women's bathroom. The fourth floor had been temporarily evacuated, just in case. Usually, the entire building would've been evacuated, but in this case, there was no sign of an actual bomb, so that wasn't done. The man in charge of the bomb squad entered the bathroom with his equipment. He slowly looked in and under the sinks, then started opening each bathroom stall door. The stall farthest to the left had an "out of order" sign on it. The door slowly opened and inside was a large laptop computer connected to a socket on the wall. That was the only odd thing found in the bathroom; there wasn't a bomb in sight.

8:59 P.M.

Catherine and Warrick were assembled in front of the laptop in the fourth floor women's bathroom.

"I'm gonna search the computer for files to give us a clue at least to who's behind these strange emails." Warrick stated, determined.

His eyes were glued to the screen as he searched through ton of case files and emails, not knowing exactly what to look for. This went on for close to an hour, by which time Catherine had completely lost interested and reverted back to her original prank theory. She started to doze off when…

"Cath, you gotta look at this!" Warrick said suddenly.

Catherine opened her eyes and glanced at the computer screen.

"Oh my God…" She said, awing the computer. "Does this mean what I think it means?"

"Yeah." Warrick replied. "It means that whoever was using this computer works for the CIA."