DISCLAIMER: I don't own CSI. Don't think I'd want to own it, anyway. Too much stress.
WARNINGS: Character...undeath?
SUMMARY: There's a vampire loose in the crime lab, and Archie wishes to hell that he'd gone home early. (slight crossover with BtVS)
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Okay, I've decided to continue this as a series of one-shots that I can wander back into whenever I get the urge, so each part is not necessarily in sequence with the previous ones. "Wishing" obviously occurs before "Unbeating", for example. And each one shot will be from one character's point of view; their thoughts, etc.
That said, I apologise in advance for my botched nerdspeak. Feel free to flame me for it.
Wishing
Archie gasped as he shot out of his chair, heart leaping into his throat and hammering out a new home for itself there as he backed away from the naked figure in the doorway.
The creature was humanoid. He had short dark brown hair and a vaguely familiar square face. He was lean, just this side of thin. The healing beginnings of what looked like a Y incision marred his muscular chest. Elongated canines curved around snarling lips, glistening with saliva and blood. His bumpy forehead, lit by the glow of the big screen and light from the deserted hallway, cast shadows over fevered, jaundiced eyes.
The trekkie in him wondered if this was what it would look like if Worf and Quark somehow had a love child.
The rest of his brain fragmented in fear as the creature leered predatorily at him from the open doorway.
He suddenly regretted ever staying late at work just to avoid Hannah in one of her moods. He wished he wasn't stranded in a ghost town of a lab between shifts, that he'd just gone home on time and faced whatever argument awaited him.
He wished that he'd actually paid attention in that karate…judo…whatever class it was that his brother had dragged him to years ago, wished he hadn't insisted that even considering the classes was perpetuating a stereotype and quit a week later. Right now, all he could remember was how to punch somebody without breaking his thumb, and judging from the look in the creature's eyes, that wasn't going to help him at all.
Most of all, he wished he hadn't questioned Hannah's ramblings about vampires and Slayers. That he hadn't just written off her sudden increase in strength as a by-product of her diligence at the gym. He wished he'd just believed in her, believed that she wasn't crazy.
Because she wasn't crazy.
Because if she was, then he was even more so, since he was pretty sure that standing before him was an honest-to-god, bona fide vampire.
He wished he was home right now, so he could tell her he was sorry.
But all this wishing was getting him nowhere when he was pressed up against a desk with a naked, bloody, hungry predator closing in on him, and he really needed a plan now, but his mind was still racing, and...
Mentally, he pushed the defrag button in his brain.
'Okay,' he thought, and wasn't it funny that his mental voice was just as breathless as he was, and sounded even more scared? 'Ballistics! Bobby's still here! Bobby has guns! Guns make things stop!'
Ah, and apparently his brain was in 'Safe Mode' as well, interesting…
Eyeing the vampire warily, Archie felt around on the desk behind him frantically for a weapon.
A screwdriver? No, Hannah had mentioned something about wood. His screwdrivers were too tiny to do much damage, anyway.
A laptop? Surely Grissom wouldn't mind him smashing evidence to save his life?
A bagged minidisk…a pair of cans…an evidence log sheet…He wished he was more disorganised than this. Where was a stray light sabre when you needed one? He wished he'd taken up ballistics instead of electronics…
The Vulcan Deathgrip? Maybe if he moved suddenly enough he could reach before…No. He mentally suppressed his inner trekkie. Funny how it became that much stronger when he was this close to wetting his pants in terror.
'Okay, deep breath, Arch,' he thought to himself as he wrapped his fingers around the laptop.
The vampire lunged.
Archie swung the laptop in a wide arc, slamming its edge into the vampire's temple, then kicked his foot out, nailing him in the scrotum with the toe of his right boot. That second of distraction was all he needed to skirt past the monster and sprint through the open doorway, carelessly slamming the thick glass door shut behind him before making a mad dash for the ballistics lab.
"Bobby!" he screamed, praying to God that he didn't fall flat on his face before he reached safety, and that Bobby hadn't left yet, and that if Bobby had already left, he'd at least conveniently left a loaded weapon on a counter somewhere. "Help! Anybody!" Because at that point, he could hear the vampire's footfalls behind him above the pounding of his heart, and he could practically feel him breathing down his neck. Did vampires breathe?
Relief flooded his system as he saw a head of curly brown hair pop out of the ballistics lab door, saw eyes widening and saw an arm throw the door open for him, hands frantically motioning him forward.
Archie pushed himself for an extra burst of speed as he felt fingers ghost against the nape of his neck. The vampire was too close.
Bobby stepped back from the doorway, reaching for something on the table behind the door, as Archie dove for sanctuary…
...The exact same moment fingers grasped the back of his collar and yanked him backwards. Archie wheezed, arms reaching for the safety of the ballistics lab which was so close.
Greg appeared at the door, grabbing his hands and pulling him towards him as the vampires bent to sink his teeth into his neck. Archie could feel the sharp edges of the vampire's canines scrape against the skin of his neck as Greg gave one final heave and miraculously pulled him out of his grasp.
Archie flew forward, landing halfway over the threshold of the ballistics lab on top of Greg.
Archie scrambled off of Greg's lap, backing away from the advancing vampire in fear while Greg just sat there with wide eyes.
"Nick?" he heard Greg say in disbelief.
Archie's eyes widened. So that was why the vampire had looked so familiar.
Nick stopped in his tracks, blinking at Greg in confusion.
Before their eyes, Nick's forehead smoothed out and his eyes faded back to their normal colour.
"G…"
Suddenly, Nick hissed, his face slipping back into its vampiric form as his back arched in pain. The sickening scent of burning flesh and some kind of strong chemical filtered into Archie's nose as Nick spun around and ran away.
And Hodges stood there, an empty beaker in hand, staring at them with as much concern as he could muster while still holding on to his smug façade. "You can thank me and hydrochloric acid later," he said with a smirk, walking back to his lab.
Greg slowly got to his feet, staring blankly in the direction Nick had run in. It would take him to one of the emergency fire exits, Archie knew, and into an alley on the dark side of the crime lab. After that, who knew where Nick would go.
Archie brought a hand up to his neck feeling the blood trickling out of the scratches there, the reality of how close he had been to death finally hitting him hard.
"We've gotta get that checked," Bobby was saying to him, putting a comforting hand on his shoulder.
Archie panted from his spot on the floor, still reeling from the attack, still feeling his heart pounding.
It was too much.
He fainted.