So here we are, another chapter. In my defense (this time…HA!) I would like to note that I was overtaken by TWO…count 'em, TWO plot bunnies…pernicious little bastards. One is an ongoing House M.D. fic and the other is a Firefly fic that appears to be writing itself…Of course, more stories is a VERY BAD THING…

I debated whether or not to stop this chapter where I did. Certainly, the point I did stop is a natural ending, however, I was also well aware that if I had continued I could well have gone on for another two-three thousand words, and frankly, I wouldn't put anyone through more of my alleged wit than absolutely necessary…

As usual, my thanks to 'tasha, the invisible beta, and to those authors of fan fiction who have inspired me of late...

Please read and review: shower me in love…

Detection is, or ought to be, an exact science, and should be
treated in the same cold and unemotional manner. You have attempted to
tinge it with romanticism, which produces much the same effect as if you worked a love-story or
an elopement into the fifth proposition of Euclid.
—Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

It is an error to believe that the Roman Pontiff can and ought to reconcile
himself to, and agree with, progress, liberalism, and contemporary civilization.
—Pius IX

The most persistent sound which reverberates through man's history is
the beating of war drums.
—Arthur Koestler

SHAKESPEARE KILLER BROUGHT TO JUSTICE!

"What do you think, Grissom? An appropriate headline?"

Gil Grissom looked dubious; mind you, he also looked shattered after just having finished an eighteen-hour shift examining forensic evidence to do with the entire Shakespeare Killer file up to, and including, the evidence collected from the orphanage, the latest scene from whence their suspect had been collected. "Well, a person who was responsible for an attack on an orphanage has been detained in police custody," he noted mildly

"Semantics. Mere semantics. This is the media, we're not after accuracy; anyway," and Agatha Babylon smiled impishly, he eyes alight with something akin to mischief "we couldn't possibly fit what you just said onto a headline."

Acknowledging that fact, Grissom asked a more pointed question. "What then, are you actually after?"

"After? As in what do I hope to achieve from such a headline?"

"Something like that."

"Well, I'd like peace in our time and a chance to travel and meet people. I believe the children are our future…"

Despite himself, Grissom grinned, "Nice acceptance speech, now, would you mind answering the question?"

"You're not going to believe me if I said that I believed that such a headline would fill people with hope and make them feel secure in their city once again."

"No."

"Damn, didn't think so. Alright then, seriously, sales." Catching Grissom's pointed look, Babylon raised her hands in acknowledgement of his view of such a mechanistic approach to the world. "Yes Grissom, so much for journalistic integrity, but if your paper doesn't sell then you don't actually have anything to pay for the care and feeding of your integrity; anyway, if I read the mood of the city correctly, they want blood, not some amorphous concept of justice. By telling the great unwashed that the killer has been brought to justice I just might grind off some of the sharper edges from the more feral members of society who, as we speak, are probably preparing to rip your suspect's throat out with their teeth."

"…and where is the justice in that?" He held up a hand to forestall Babylon, who was about to interrupt "it's like you've already convicted the guy before anything's been proven."

"Don't be naïve, Grissom, the public aren't interested in reality and due process, they want tidy conclusions and safely controlled intrigue," she shrugged, "how else would you explain reality television? Anyhow, irrespective of the actual process, if we perpetuate the idea that we're going light up like a Christmas tree anyone who even vaguely looks like they might be the killer then the majority of the population will consider that justice is being pursued and then they'll shut up and let you get on with it."

"…And what if this person, whom we happen to have in custody, happens not to be the Shakespeare Killer? Or, if they are this person, what if their mental capacity is diminished through illness? You're well aware, Agatha, that we have been examining the connection between the substitution of a placebo for the Pax Romana drug and the timing of the killing surges; we need time to investigate this, which rabble-rousing headlines like the one you propose don't give us."

"…But you have to give the people something, so you may as well give them what they think they want to hear…"

"Like what, Bread and circuses? Hell, let's go all the way and have a witch burning, you can bring the marshmallows and I'll bring my knitting; we'll even find someone to bring a violin and they can play as our justice system crashes own around our heads."

"Isn't that slightly overdramatic, Grissom, you know the world isn't black and white so why try and perpetuate a notion you don't believe in." Babylon shivered as a slight chill from her darkening thoughts wound its way down her spine "Sometimes the straight and narrow path doesn't necessarily lead to redemption and it ill behoves us to try and create such a path out of an environment that isn't fit for it. Also," she gestured at the screen before them, "this isn't about truth or justice. What are you going to do, dress up as Captain America and save us from ourselves? I think not. Look at you," she gestured at the weary man, "you can barely keep your head up and your eyes open and you're trying to debate the moral relativity of journalism - with me no less. If I didn't know you were so intelligent I'd assume you were an idiot, a brave idiot, but an idiot nonetheless."

Grissom, tired as he was, wasn't completely incapable of intelligent commentary, "That's all well and good, Agatha, but some of us have to draw a line somewhere, otherwise, why bother? Remember," he added sententiously "we define ourselves by our actions."

Agatha Babylon sighed heavily, certainly, she knew Grissom had a point, but a point her well-honed cynicism wasn't prepared to accept at anything more than face value. She was coming to hate it when her journalistic – tabloid if she was in the mood for a little self-flagellation - instincts came into conflict with her newly reawakened conscience. It wasn't so much a battle of the titans as it was a skirmish between two snakes in the grass; not, of course, that it was really appropriate to assign her conscience a reptilian caste, except for the minor fact that the damn thing had developed a propensity for slithering up and biting her on the backside when her halo started to slip.

"Dammit, Grissom, can't you let me write my story in peace."

"Is that what you really want? I mean, I do have other things I have to do; for example, I'm sure the lab could use some additional help processing what is bound to be an absolute wealth of new forensic evidence," his tone held the promise of something more than simple editorial commentary.

While Babylon might have scowled in annoyance, this didn't stop her libido stretching languorously much in the manner of an entirely over-satiated feline. Who would have thought that the apparently, extremely proper scientist, was so talented; maybe that also explained why she wasn't able to concentrate and thereby marshal her arguments sufficiently.

"I thought you were tired," She noted suspiciously, "you look tired…" (Bah, who was she kidding? Until Grissom had come along she had been laid less that thirty year old carpet, he could have looked dead and she would have been interested.) She was, after all, very tired herself; not that she was complaining mind, but if last night was to become a regular occurrence, then she'd better renew her gym membership, or take up running. Marathons. Lots of them.

The reporter in her blood threw up its hands in disgust and stormed off to a quiet part of her subconscious to sulk as she acceded to the mental prodding of her libido. "No, Grissom, I don't want you to go; and yes, you're right, it's probably better if I report events with some measure of regards towards accuracy; no matter how much I may hate myself for it later."

Grissom nodded understandingly, he knew that it would take the reborn sense of journalistic conscience now inhabiting his friend some small measure of time to take root; thus he cajoled, not pushed, and encouraged instead of demanded; of course, if he was being honest with himself he would have admitted that his interest in the woman extended beyond a concern for her scribal integrity. "Let's see if we can make you feel better about things shall we?"

Eight hours is never enough sleep, thought Grissom tiredly, as he slowly worked his way through the mountain of evidence that had turned one of the workrooms into something that more closely resembled a bureaucrat's nightmare (or wet dream) than it did a repository or organised, scientific method. Of course, Grissom's sub-conscious sardonically noted, if you'd actually got eight hours sleep then you wouldn't be so tired would you? While quietly acknowledging that his inner voice was indeed correct, he noted that he could do without the commentary and that if the voice didn't like it, then he could recommend a perfectly good lake for it to go and drown itself in.

Shaking himself mentally, much like a dog emerging from the sea, Grissom took a brief moment to ponder the strangeness that was his relationship with Agatha Babylon, before shrugging it off as a pleasant behavioural aberration that he would examine more closely at his leisure; not, of course, that he expected to get anything resembling leisure in the foreseeable future if this damn Shakespeare Killer case kept dragging on. Manfully, he ignored his sub-conscious' snide, sotto voce comment that calling what he was doing with Babylon 'work' was the apex of mendacious hypocrisy, and he returned his attention to paper mountain.

Of course it was at this point that he was interrupted.

"Evening Grissom. How goes it?"

Turning in his chair, Grissom found himself face-to face with Greg, who was looking far too rested, relaxed and enthusiastic to one as fatigued a state as Grissom. With a sarcastic wave of his hand, which indicated the scale of the paperwork strewn about the room, the older man was clearly, if mutely, responded 'how the hell did it look like he was doing?'

To say that Greg was taken aback would have overstated the matter but he couldn't ignore the concern he felt looking at the older man. Certainly, it wasn't unusual to see Grissom push himself to the point of normal human endurance, but this seemed different; where previously, tiredness had always warred with an unquenchable intellectual fire, this time it was the fires of frustration that backlit the man's expression.

"Where are the others? Surely the importance of this case would demand some degree of resource prioritisation?"

Grissom shrugged, "Unfortunately, the rest of the criminal fraternity didn't decide to take a day off to celebrate our capture of the alleged Shakespeare Killer, in fact it would seem they feel some deep-seated need to make up for his absence." He took a moment to catalogue where the various members of the nightshift were. "Catherine and Nick have a triple homicide at the School for Performing Arts, something to do with Hamlet going horribly wrong if I remember correctly. Warrick's dealing with a multiple hit and run."

"How can you have a multiple hit and run?" Greg queried.

"Apparently, and this is only going by what was reported from the scene, there was a standard hit and run and then the people who stopped to help, three separate people I might add, were themselves hit and…err…run…over" he finished lamely, "Warrick's trying to determine if it was the original hit and run driver coming back to finish the job or, and I quote, 'there's a convention in town'."

Greg smiled grimly, "Sounds a bit like a comic I read once, where there was a serial killer convention…"

"…Sandman: A Doll's House…" Grissom interrupted.

"I didn't know you read comics, Grissom."

"I don't, Sandman is literature," the tone was the Grissom of old, that is, addressing Greg as if he was an ignorant, unlettered savage, and for all that it was mildly annoying to be, once again, reduced to peasant status, Greg felt some measure of relief that the historical Grissom was, in some measure, still present.

"What about Sara?"

"Something about some spiked punch at a school ball."

"That's not that unusual."

"There's a fairly substantial difference between brandy and what appears to be, at least judging from eye witness accounts, some form of hallucinogenic."

"Joy."

"Oh yes; blood samples from over two hundred students, Sara was ecstatic."

"Casualties?"

"Not as far as I am aware, although the report, when it came in, suggested that several students appeared to be under the misapprehension that they could fly, so I guess we'll just have to see whether or not any of them took the opportunity to test their belief from a suitably elevated position."

"Four of them," came the wry answer from the doorway. "It would appear they were going for distance."

"Any dead?"

"Fortunately, no – although we had two near drownings, from the pair who dived into the school pool, one minor impaling and a set of parents who will eternally grateful to the headmaster's anglophilic eccentricities."

"How do you mean?"

"The last of our pseudo-Icari landed on the privet hedge that marks the border of the school maze; the kid's a bit scratched, but otherwise unhurt."

"What about the hedge?"

"It's expected to make a full recovery."

Grissom nodded, satisfied that there hadn't been any resultant horticultural damage. "Thanks Sara. Could I trouble you to go and see if Brass needs any help?"

"What's up?"

"He didn't say, he was muttering something about nuns and minibuses though, so you might want to proceed with caution."

Sara didn't bother to answer as she left, although Greg noticed the bemused look that crossed her features. She seemed more relaxed, he noted, which could only be a good thing. While, due to his association with Rilie, he had become a little more tolerant and understanding of the female psyche, there was still, to his mind anyway, a huge difference between grumpiness due to permanent caffeine deprivation and what came across as ongoing case of acute PMS; his subconscious shrugged: must be a girl thing – or a boy-not-understanding-a-girl thing...or something…it was far too complicated for his simple male brain and he gave up and decided to follow the easier option of solving serial killer crimes.

"So Grissom, how far have you actually got?"

"Not very, really; especially since our international man of butchery isn't talking. Frankly, he's barely present. In fact, he's taken disassociation to a whole new level; I'd be impressed if it wasn't so aggravating."

"What about the Pax Romana link? Or the medical records?"

Grissom sighed. "We're still waiting on the Italian Government to release the full documentation relating to Pax Romana and SPQR. The subsidiary in South Carolina is now nothing more than an empty warehouse and as for the medical records, we need consent, and I believe I mentioned that our friend isn't in any state to give us consent. Actually, if he doesn't eat soon he won't be in a state to do much anything."

"I assume then that we haven't even been able to take a DNA sample."

Somehow, Grissom managed to look even more distressed; informed consent was indeed a double-edged sword. Forcibly changing his focus of attention, Grissom's gaze came on rest of the small package Greg held in one of his hands.

"What's that?" he asked, pointing.

"This? This is the toy bear we recovered from the apartment where the officer was stabbed."

"…And what are you doing with it?"

Greg looked everywhere except at Grissom.

"Greg…?"

"Ummm I took it home and now I'm bringing it back."

"You took it where?" The shift head's voice went up an octave.

"Home… well, not really home," he clarified, "Rilie's apartme…not helping huh?"

"You took evidence out of the building; are you insane?" Grissom took a moment to recompose himself; then decided it wasn't worth it. "Why? And I repeat, are you insane?"

"I'd already finished testing it, Grissom. Anyway, he looked lonely."

Grissom shook his head in disbelief. "He…looked…lonely. Greg, it's a fucking bear, it can't look lonely."

"I'll remind you of that next time I catch you talking to that pig foetus of yours."

"Not the point; the pig isn't evidence in a major criminal investigation, the bear is."

"How? It's not like he's," Greg paused and corrected himself "sorry it's, a witness…"

"The evidence is always a witness Greg, you should know that by now."

"…and I didn't…" Greg continued over the top of Grissom's interruption, "I didn't take the bear with me until after I had completely processed it…"

"That's not the point and you know it. At the very least it's tampering and, dependant on how the case turns out you could be charged, especially if the case fails and the police department needs a scapegoat."

"It's a shame the mayor doesn't work here then, the police have been using him as a scapegoat for years."

"Again," replied Grissom, teeth gritted in an attempt to retain some measure of patience, "not the point. We're talking about you and your actions, not the potential actions of someone who doesn't even work here; and…" he held his hand up to forestall the inevitable interjection, "I don't want to hear anything even remotely resembling commentary to the effect that the mayor doesn't work in his office either."

"You know me too well," Greg demurred with a wry smile.

"I do, God help me; I'm starting to think that I'm cursed." Grissom sighed, "Okay, irrespective of any potential consequences, just tell me why you did it."

Greg did a remarkable job of looking everywhere except at his boss.

"That's right," Grissom recalled, "it was lonely. Tell me, Greg, is this going to become a common occurrence? Are other pieces of evidence going to call out to you on long winter nights? Will they too be taken home, perhaps given a mug of hot cocoa before you tuck them in?"

"No," Greg muttered, "I'm not that far gone; the bear was special; don't ask me why, I couldn't tell you. Look, even Rilie wanted to know why I'd brought it with me."

"Well it's nice to know that one of you retains some small measure of sanity." For a moment propriety reasserted itself, "and may I ask, how is Rilie, it's been a while since I've seen her."

"She's well thanks Grissom, although I think I may have to stage an intervention with regards to her coffee intake; arabica isn't supposed to be a blood type."

"Maybe she needs it in order to put up with you; if it were me I'd be taking something a damn sight stronger than coffee."

"Like that bottle of whiskey Brass thinks he's hiding in his drawer?"

If the comment was supposed to faze Grissom, it failed. "Something like that; although you should know by now not to underestimate Brass, the whiskey is the drawer is a decoy, the good stuff is somewhere else; maybe you two should get together and compare notes as I imagine Jim takes as much care with hiding his whiskey as you do hiding that coffee of yours."

Greg's expression assumed a look of mock-horror, "Hush your mouth, no one shall ever learn my secrets."

"Not even Rilie?"

"Every relationship should retain some measure of mystery, Grissom, if you know all of your partner's secrets then what is left?"

"That may well be true, Greg, but if Rilie catches you hiding coffee from her your life will be measured in seconds."

"She'd have to catch me first."

"I'll have that written on your headstone."

"Isn't that a tad prosaic? I would have thought you capable of something far more profound."

"You assume you're worthy of profound."

Greg's eyes narrowed suspiciously "What are trying to suggest?"

"Well, I always thought Ogden Nash far more appropriate."

"Who?"

"Ogden Nash, a poet; amongst other things."

"I have the feeling that I'm going to regret asking, but what did you have in mind for my epitaph?"

Grissom grinned, his first real smile of the evening, "How about this:

The ant has made himself illustrious
Through constant industry industrious.
So what?
Would you be calm and placid
If you were full of formic acid?

"What are you trying to say, Grissom?"

"It's just as well Lewis Carroll didn't get hold of you" came a wry comment from the doorway, "or maybe Shelley: My name is Sanders, king of kings, look on my works ye mighty and try not to laugh too hard."

"What is this, a poetry reading? Anyway, Brass, aren't you supposed to be chasing nuns?"

"I was on my way back out, with Sara, when I heard Grissom bringing your parentage into question, so I thought I'd pay a visit."

"Joy."

"…And I thought you loved me, Greg."

Greg smirked "It's a love sorta like the love that dare not speak its name, except there's no love and I'm spelling it out."

"You're having problems with your analogies again, aren't you; I thought you were going to have that looked at."

"That was my allergies, idiot."

Brass grinned somewhat maniacally, "You mean there's a difference?"

"You know, Brass, I'm starting to think your nun obsession has nothing to do with crime, you've been sniffing their robes and the camphor from the mothballs has destroyed your mind."

Grissom, who had been watching the byplay with a degree of scarcely veiled amusement, interrupted "He might have a point, Jim, you've been acting awfully strange lately."

"How can you tell?" asked Greg, trying for all his worth to imitate the innocence intrinsic to his brief tenure as an alter boy.

"There is that," acceded Grissom, "However, based on my long experience with the subject…"

"Right here you know…" for all that he tried to look aggrieved, Brass failed miserably, grinning he turned his attention to his friend's mountain of paper. "Having fun are we?"

"More than you could possibly imagine."

"I can imagine quite a bit."

"On a policeman's salary imagining is all you'd be doing."

Brass shrugged, "True enough. You making any progress?"

"It would depend on how you define progress, if you determine progress by sheer weight of paper moved from point A to point B, then yes, however, if you are asking if I have anything substantive to add to the case, then no."

"Can I help?"

"That would depend on how quickly you leave and how far away you go."

"Charming. I think you hurt my feeling."

"Because as we both know," Brass joined in the recitation "you only have one." How is your feeling anyway?"

"I wouldn't know, it's chained to the steering wheel of my car, I thought I'd check on it later. What about him" Brass indicated Greg with a jerk of his thumb, "is he helping?"

"After a fashion." Grissom cast a sly glance at his young lab tech, "Greg was just discussing the state of some evidence with me."

Greg winced.

The wily old detective didn't miss the young man's reaction but decided to cut him a bit of slack; everyone in the department was under enough stress as it was without him compounding it with one of his 'observations'.

"Alright, I'd better go, I have to go and soothe the ruffled feathers of our local bishop who wants, and I quote, 'to know why the local constabulary are permanently engaged in a series of nefarious activities synonymous with the concept of harassment'; this from the folks who brought us the Spanish Inquisition."

"How many accidents have those nuns in the minibus caused since they've been in town?"

"They're fairly close to setting a new record; it's only the fact that they haven't managed to kill anyone that sets them back."

"Has this been explained to the Bishop?"

"Of course, his response was to ask why police stabbed the nun at the orphanage?"

"I'd love to have heard that explanation"

"Fortunately, I didn't have to, the bishop's secretary showed him, with an impressive degree of urgency I might add, the affidavit from the good, non-dead, sister who said the perpetrator wasn't wearing a uniform."

"Just wait," noted Grissom, "he'll probably decide that it was a plain clothes detective."

Brass shrugged, "Frankly Grissom, with the good bishop's known predilection for the sacramental wine, I wouldn't be at all surprised if he nominated the gentleman we have in custody for beatification."

"Well, with the speed with things are moving here, I wouldn't be surprised if he's beatified before we bring the case to trial."

"True enough, and knowing my luck, highly probable. All right gentlemen, have a good evening." As Brass exited the room they heard him pause and exchange a few quiet words with someone before the sound of his retreating footfalls echoed down the corridor.

"It sounds like you've developed a cynical streak, Grissom" Came a voice from the doorway, probably, both men surmised, the person to whom Brass had briefly spoken. The voice was familiar, but it hovered just outside the range of immediate recognition. Stepping out of the shadows cast by the doorway stood a presence long removed from the hallowed CSI halls, "Nice to see I'm fondly remembered," noted Conrad Ecklie wryly, with an expression that held equal parts of mockery and self- deprecating humour.

Greg was the first to recover "Ecklie!"

Ecklie spared Greg a pitying glance "He's very quick, Grissom; training to be a CSI, is he?"

Grissom's smirk in return was adroitly covered by the light censure his tone held "Now now, Conrad, I'm just as surprised to see you as Greg is; his reaction is hardly unwarranted."

"So what's new?"

Grissom's eyes rolled. By his count he'd recited his lack of success no less than three times in the last forty minutes. If he had been at all religious he would have started to think that he had, in some way, offended the gods, and that this was their punishment; for him to sit and achieve nothing, whilst beset on all sides by a rancorous chorus of harpies cheering him on in his Sisyphean endeavours, thus he limited his answer to simply asking if Ecklie had read the newspapers.

Apparently, Ecklie's time in hospital had done nothing to diminish his somewhat jaundiced view of the professional world, "By newspapers, do you mean the excrement that's posing as alleged journalism, or what I get from reading between the lines?" He cast a sly glace at his colleague, "although I have to admit that, of late, the inimitable Ms Babylon has been demonstrating a degree of restraint I previously thought well beyond her capabilities; you wouldn't have anything to do with that would you, Grissom?"

Grissom looked pained. Never one to mix his personal and private lives, Ecklie's question had caught him somewhat unprepared; admittedly, not to the extent that falling into a relationship with Babylon had, thus he went with avoidance as his opening gambit.

'I'm not entirely sure what you're referring to Conrad."

Ecklie grinned, "You'll have to excuse my wheeling out an old and exceptionally bad pun, Grissom, but denial is not just a river in Egypt..."

Greg continued, "You were aware that your relationship is the talk of the lab don't you, Grissom?" The young man glanced sideways at Ecklie is a fashion that was clearly intended to be theatrical, "how stands the betting pool?"

Ecklie's response was as ingenuous as a girl in a red cape visiting her grandmother, "How could I possibly know that, Sanders? I've been sick. In hospital, no less; I haven't had the slightest opportunity to find out the odds let alone place any money down."

"Do you two mind?"

"Not at all, Grissom, you stay right there and I'll be with you in a moment."

Grissom's eyes narrowed dangerously, and, although his tone was one of sweet reason his face assumed a calculating mien, "Tell me, Conrad, how is it that you, hospitalised and all, are aware of the existence of a betting pool?"

"I couldn't possibly comment"

"Greg, would you care to provide some measure of enlightenment?"

"Not particularly…"

"…And might I ask why?"

Greg managed to look both sheepish and smug simultaneously, "Would you believe I have too much riding on the outcome?"

"…And precisely what, pray, is this 'outcome'?" Two pristine chips of frigid ice framed the stress on the word 'outcome'.

Ecklie came to Greg's rescue, "Leave the boy alone Gil, you know he can't possibly tell you."

"Why would that be?"

The day shift supervisor grinned with shark-like glee, "Obviously, because if he told you the potential outcome might be influenced thereby rendering the pool invalid; that would be ethically unsound."

"So what you're telling me," Grissom clarified, "is that it is morally acceptable to wager on the outcome of my personal relationships, but that it is not acceptable to inform me of the criteria surrounding said wager on the basis that that is immoral."

Ecklie and Sanders regarded each other as they mentally worked through the permutations inherent in Grissom's thesis; then as one, they replied.

"Yes."

Grissom shrugged, he'd known the answer was a foregone conclusion but he'd required an answer from them for reasons of his own. "Just for that, you can both sit down and help me, after all…" he paused for dramatic effect, "it would be the moral

thing to do."