An Unfair Act of Vengeance

Notes: This chapter took me a while too, but I think it was worth the time... Hope you all enjoy it.

Summary: Nick tries to find help from his friends, but things continue to get worse. Greg finds Grissom, and they use Greg's phone to contact Catherine who informs them that the situation is getting worse and worse. Nick's family finds it hard to cope with Nick's situation, and Sara and Warrick process the shooting in front of the CSI Headquarters.

Nick waited quietly in the dark for his friend to finally head up to his door. He tried as best as he could to hide the fear in his face, but he had the distinct feeling that he was failing miserably.

Jack Windle cheerfully hopped out of his truck, and headed up to his house. He had just gotten a call from his boss, and it looked like that promotion was his. Not to mention that things were going really well with the girl he was seeing. He had barely slipped his keys into the lock when he heard something off to his right.

"Psst…" Nick hissed between his teeth, and he moved a few small steps closer to Jack.

Jack turned, and nearly jumped out of his skin when he saw his friend crouching behind his hedge. His mind flashed back to the news reports he had heard about his friend, and seeing him now, and bleeding, wasn't exactly something he had planned on…

"Look, man, I need your help…"

"N-no, no way, man… I s-s-saw w-what you did on t-the n-news… J-just t-take whatever, a-and g-g-go…" Jack barely managed to get the words out. His fearful eyes were not comforted by the other man's own nervous state, and he didn't know what to do. For God's sake, I went to college with the man! No. You saw what he did to those people… Just get inside and call the cops, and make sure to get a restraining order tomorrow… I just need to get inside… Nick watched as his friend nervously fumbled to unlock his door, and with a dejected look, he began to back away slowly. Once his friend turned to look at the door for a brief moment he took off running once more…

Warrick looked at the two very angry men standing in front of them. Catherine and Sara were off to his side, but he was too focused on the Texans' grim faces before him, and the sickening look of pain etched into the face of Nick's mother.

"What in the hell has been going on around here?" Nick's brother began furiously. His eyes shifted between the three uncomfortable people that his younger brother had said were his closest friends, and though Nicky had never told his parents he had often confided in himabout how they were something of a second family for him. That thought calmed him down, a bit, at least it gave him the comfort of knowing that they were doing their best to help his brother…

"I-I honestly don't even know where to start…" Warrick said quietly.

"Then why don't you try from the beginning?" the Judge demanded forcefully, but he felt a sudden pang of guilt when he saw the hurt look on the other man's face. "I-I'm sorry, but we need to know how Nick is, and w-what's going on."

"Ok, a few weeks ago, Nick was processing a scene, but it turned out that the killer never actually left. We believe he managed to hide under a conference table, and he killed an officer while Nick was busy processing, then he startled Nick and stabbed him. Afterwards the evidence made it appear is if though Nick had stabbed himself… Unfortunately, we didn't take enough care about the situation, and he began seeing someone following him. And, once again we were too stupid to actually believe him. Then the guy pulled a gun on him, and forced him to knock me out, just before forcing your son to tie himself up and crawl into a small access space beneath one of the morgue's counters… And then we came to our sense, but unfortunately our director didn't, and he and a DA decided to pursue Nick as a lead. As of about an hour ago someone shot both of them while they were confronting him. Whoever did it used Nick's gun, so he is the top suspect that the police have…" Catherine could barely hear her own words as she focused on Jillian Stokes.

"My son wouldn't… h-he c-couldn't do that!"

"I never said that he was our primary suspect…" Catherine tried to continue. And, slowly led Nick's family from the room, in order to take them to the break room.

Sara looked over at Warrick, and both could tell that they had a new job to do.

"It doesn't make sense Warrick," Sara began once they were outside looking at the pools of blood, "Why didn't they at least have an officer with them? They didn't follow protocol."

"Maybe they didn't think Nick was a threat… or maybe they did have an officer with them, and he was involved…"

"This scene looks all wrong. Was Dr. Alberts wearing gloves?"

"Not when we got there, but he could've taken them off before, and unfortunately he knows about GSR, because with his version of what happened it'd explain how it got on his arms…"

"Yeah, but what about distinct patterns, I mean we should be able to tell…"

"I wouldn't be so sure. We don't know how his clothes were positioned on him, and he had blood on his hands from checking their pulses. I bet you more than anything they let him wash his hands. Which could also theoretically contaminate our findings."

"This guy had to have missed something… I mean there is no such thing as a perfect crime. Whatever it is we need to find it."

"We've been looking, and I wouldn't hold my breath if I were you..."

"Ok, so we can't rely on any gunshot residue, and we've got no witnesses. Both Ecklie and the DA, Harold Rogers, are still at the hospital, and it isn't looking good for either of them…"

"And, we have all the prints we could lift from Nick's gun, they're running them through AFIS now, but I'm seriously doubting that we're going to get any prints besides Nick's."

"That's it Warrick, where are the gloves? I don't see where he could have even possibly hid them. There are a few cars around here, but he couldn't have run to one, hid the gloves, run back, and checked their pulses. Besides, if Nick had done this wouldn't he have made sure there were no other witnesses? I know I wouldn't hesitate to shoot him, and I definitely wouldn't have dropped my gun…"

"So, you're thinking we just need to grant Nick some reasonable doubt, and then he just magically won't get arrested?" Warrick asked sarcastically.

"Look, I'm saying that we need to find some reasonable doubt on this doctor. If we can even cause some doubt here, then it could call into question all his findings on Nick's sanity. That done, we could safely bring Nick in, without being arrested, and from there we could start building a case against this creep."

"Yeah, except that we aren't finding anything Sara. I've checked all the cars in the lot, and there aren't any gloves, or any other evidence that suggests that he could've even been involved."

Sara's cell phone went off, and she looked at it, the confusion showing clearly on her face. "What is it Hodges?"

Warrick looked surprised that he would be calling Sara now.

"What test results?" Sara asked confused, "What? No I didn't forget about the first body, but wouldn't it take a lot of that to kill someone? You're sure, ok, I'll let Warrick know."

"What was that all about?"

"Hodges said that the poison in our first victim was Pyridine. It usually only causes nausea, headaches, coughing, or even laryngitis, but apparently our victim had some sort of reaction to it that killed him. Which, could mean that he wasn't supposed to die when he did…"

"So then maybe he rushed something; I mean wouldn't he have to?"

"Wherever, he wasrushed, there is a mistake, and it's waiting for us to find it."

Greg rushed into the overcrowded lobby. He pushed people out of his way, not caring about the glares that followed him… Right now he only needed to see one face, but he couldn't find it anywhere. He passed into another larger room, filled with even more people. He hurried around displays, and charts that showed various crime scene investigating tips, and procedures. This was getting him nowhere, he needed to find his boos, and fast.

"GRISSOM!" He yelled as loud as he could, and found that the room had gone dead quiet. All eyes were on him, and then a moment later he saw his supervisor pushing his way towards him, clearly concerned.

Nick was beginning to shake from the cold night air. He couldn't go to his home, and he didn't even have his cell phone on him. The cut on his head was starting to bleed again, and he wasn't entirely sure that it was as shallow as he had believed. Then it hit him; he didn't have much choice, and he doubted anyone would look for him there, not while they saw him investigating the case.

This time it was Warrick who picked up his phone. "Warrick. Hey Brass, tell me you've got some good news… Damn, when did this guy see him? Yeah, ok, see if he can come here, I'd like to talk to this guy. Well, Sara and I are still busy processing. No… Look Brass, what is he going to tell us that we don't already know? Ok, I'll get there as soon as I can." He looked up at Sara regretfully.

"Hey, if whoever saw Nick can help us out, then go, I can finish this scene easily enough." Sara tried to flash her colleague a comforting smile, but could tell that she hadn't been successful.

Tina Brown opened her front door, and her jaw dropped as she saw her husband's best friend standing there, bleeding. Her mind flashed to the news she had just been watching. She worried so much about Warrick, and how much this case was affecting him. She hadn't even been able to talk to him about it, but she had heard that the man now standing in her doorway was their only suspect…

I've got the feeling that I'm going to regret this, but I can't turn him out… No. I'll help… Her mind was made up, and she quickly helped Nick inside, hiding any possible sighting of him from any prying eyes of neighbors. She helped Nicklean against the heavy wood door, and quickly went about shutting all the blinds and curtains, before moving the bleeding man into the kitchen. Nick tried to protest, but she gave him a stern look and began to study the cut on his forehead.

"Well, it definitely doesn't need stitches, but I am going to have to clean it up a bit. And you're freezing, I'll go grab a sweatshirt of Warrick's…" She walked down the hall and into their bedroom to grab a sweatshirt before heading into the bathroom to grab some first aid supplies that she always kept around the house in case of emergency.

Nick eyed the gloves that his best friend's wife had put on, but his attention was suddenly drawn back to his forehead, as she quickly and efficiently worked at cleaning the cut. Once she had cleaned it she used several gauze pads tosoak upthe water and mild soap. Finally, she gently placed a bandage over the cut, and gave the man a brief smile before helping him put on the sweatshirt.

"You want to talk about this?"

Nick looked up at her; she had actually helped him, and something in him felt like this woman couldn't be deceived. Warrick was certainly a lucky guy… "I'm not sure…" he answered after noting the somewhat awkward silence that had fallen over the room.

Grissom had stopped dead in his tracks when he heard Greg yell out his name. He had immediately made his way to the youngest CSI on his team, and he knew that his presence meant something bad had happened to Nick. His suspicions had only been confirmed when Greg had barely managed to tell him what had happened to Nick since Grissom had left, and he had simply asked the man for his cell phone which he now had out and was waiting for an answer.

"Catherine. Oh my God, Grissom… Is Greg there with you? Thank goodness, look we need you both back here and fast. The whole situation has gone to hell."

Grissom listened with shock as Catherine told him everything that had happened, including the fact that Ecklie and a DA had been shot and neither was expected to recover.

"Ok Catherine, we're going to be on the first flight back to Vegas, we'll see you soon, until I get back it looks like you're in charge. Be careful, and do everything you can to keep Nick out of jail."

Dr. Carl Alberts sat back in his temporary home and smiled as he listened to their worried voices. It had been so easy bugging all their phones, and his henchmen were still doing there jobs wonderfully, they had even taken his gloves from him after he had shot Ecklie and that dimwitted DA. He knew exactly where Nick would go, and that the nurse would never let him be… Of course he also knew that Grissom would be back soon, and he thought he'd give the two one more chance to see each other before he finally went into the final stages of his plan, and brought Mr. Stokes into the final stage of his life.

To Be Continued…

Next Chapter: Warrick finds that Tina helped Nick, and gets mad that his friend put his wife in possible danger with not only his stalker, but could've gotten her arrested as well. Grissom returns, but they can't get any evidence to use against Dr. Alberts. Grissom searches Nick's home for clues, but only finds painful memories. When he finally goes to his home he finds Nick waiting for him, butthey are sooninterrupted by Dr. Alberts...