A/N: what can i say? here's another chapter! thanks again for the awesome reviews - it is because of those that i decided to rush the update - call it an extra thank you! enjoy:):) (and don't forget to review!lol)

Chapter 9 – Showdown

"Okay, so in case he does check the validity of the transfer, it will show up as being actual money?" Paul asked, uncertain of this new approach. For the third time since the method had been suggested and forcing entry on the house had been decided against, Grissom found himself confirming the question.

"Absolutely. It would be a few days before the computer coding on the cyber-dollars wore down enough for him to be able to see their actual origin," he said, feeling confidant for the first time that day. "This way, we can make him feel safe enough to at least release Greg and Nick without any further incident." The answer came back without hesitance.

"You have my consent." He hung up. Right away Grissom took up Sara's cell phone where Archie was waiting at the other end.

"Archie?"

"We got the go-ahead?"

"Yeah. Do it. Now." Grissom could hear computer keys being pounded mercilessly in the background until Archie's voice finally returned.

"Okay, I've sent the command through, half of the funds will show up in the account in about five minutes, the other half in another five."

"Thanks a lot Archie," Grissom said gratefully.

"No problem. Just call me when our guys are home free." He nodded.

"I promise." He hung up and turned to the team, repeating Archie's last instructions back to them. "I figure after five minutes, we ask him to release one of them, half the hostages for half the ransom, see if we can get Nick out of there before he bleeds out." No one had anything to say on the matter, able only to nod wordlessly as they looked back at the house, wishing that they could know what was going on inside its walls.

When Forman had taken the radio and left the room once more, Greg had returned his attention to Nick who hadn't said a word since his brief conversation with Grissom. The fidgeting had stopped and now he merely sat staring at the ground by his feet, blinking slowly and breathing even slower. Though he didn't say it out loud, Greg kept on asking the same questions in his head, over and over: Was Nick really going to die here? Could he manage without him? Would he even want to try? He hoped against hope that he would be able to hold on for just a little longer... not that it really mattered anyways: this whole mess was guaranteed to be over in less than seven minutes, and if blood-loss and bullet damage didn't do him in, the bomb would certainly take care of that and Greg himself – unless he did something, now.

Looking again at his friend, Greg finalized the plan he had been debating in his head.

"Nick!" he said quietly. Greg's voice sounded far away but he heard him none the less and looked up at him. "I've got a plan that'll finish this thing right now. All you have to do is when I break one of the windows, pretend that I'm escaping and that you're cheering me on, or something. Okay?" Nick looked at him steadily. He knew where he was going with this and didn't like the idea at all; he shouldn't be taking such a risk, not when he could just as easily walk out of there without further injury.

"You know you should try escaping for real," he whispered. At this Greg shook his head.

"Not going to happen," he said with a small smile. "You ready?" Staring at him for a moment longer, Nick finally nodded, carefully curling one leg in so that he was able to remove his running shoe and hand it over to Greg who took it with a confused expression on his face.

"The glass is probably thin enough for this to do the job," he explained. Greg's smile broadened a little.

"Thanks. Wish me luck." And with that he stood and moved beside the wall that housed the kitchen door after pulling the pillow off of the window in the wall across the room from where he stood. Raising his arm, he threw the shoe as hard as he could at the window, shattering the weatherworn glass easily. On cue, Nick started yelling with surprising volume, his tone more than convincing, almost as though he were actually envisioning Greg jumping out the broken window and running towards safety. Had he been Forman, he would have no qualm believing that he was indeed making a run for it.

"Go Greg, go! Get out of here! Run!"

It worked. Forman raced out of the kitchen, gun drawn, heading towards the broken window, and as planned, Greg ran up behind him and drove his shoulder into the dead centre of Forman's back, sending him sprawling forward and the gun skittering away across the floor. Unfortunately, he recovered quickly and was able to dodge Greg's attempt to pin him and get in a hit of his own, square in the CSI's jaw. And yet the adrenaline and anger pumping through Greg's veins allowed him to once again gain the upper hand, landing him kneeling over Forman who was on his back, Greg's hands wrapped tightly around his neck.

This advantage was short-lived, however, and it wasn't long before Forman's struggling hands shot forward, jabbing Greg's broken ribs so that he emitted a scream of agony before falling to the ground, tears of pain begging to fall from his eyes.

Forman didn't hesitate. The second Greg's grip fell away, he shot up, his hands finding and compressing Greg's throat with a lot more strength than had been behind Greg's attack. As such, it took very little time before his struggles slowed and became fewer, black spots dancing in front his eyes as his vision started to blur…

"Let – him – go." Startled, Forman looked up, as did Greg. Somehow, Nick had found the strength to crawl over to where Forman's gun had been tossed and was now aiming it directly at him while slowly trying to stand on weak and shaking legs, his other hand pressed up against his stomach wound. And yet, despite his obvious difficulties, his eyes and face remained hard and uncompromising as he again spoke quietly. "I said let – him go." Haltingly, Forman released his hold and stood, backing slowly away leaving Greg laying gasping and coughing violently on the floor, the extra stress doing nothing for his already throbbing side. Eyes not leaving Forman's Nick staggered towards his friend, kneeling carefully down beside him as he spoke, his voice concerned.

"Greg, Greg how're you doing? Are you all right? Or at least mostly?" Greg managed a smile, one hand still gently massaging his bruising neck while he used the other to push himself up into a sitting position.

"Yeah, mostly," he rasped. "It's nothing a few descent pain killers and a good massage won't be able to handle." Momentarily satisfied, Nick focused his attention back on Forman, the look on his face clearly stating that he was done playing games, and quite ready for this to be over.

"Toss over the radio." An unnerving smile spread across his lips as he reached one hand into his pocket, pulling out and tossing the radio to Nick, his other hand on the done-up zipper of his oddly full-looking jacket.

"Maybe you should know what you're dealing with before you get our buddy Grissom on the line," he spat, and unzipped his jacket, pulling it open to reveal two rows of wired C-4, four blocks in each row. Tucked in the centre of the blocks was a digital timer, its numbers gradually counting down: they had three minutes let before it went off. It was then that Forman reached back into his pocket and pulled out a small trigger button, positioning his thumb over it. "There may be three minutes or so left on that timer, but I can very easily just push this button right here at any time." Great. Just great. With the amount of C-4 in his vest and the fact that there could be an unexpected early detonation, Forman could blow away not only the three of them but probably around half of the cops standing outside.

Before Nick could answer his threat with one of his own, Grissom's voice sounded over the radio.

"Forman? Forman, the transfer of the funds is fifty-percent complete. Maybe as a show of good faith, you could release one of the hostages to us now, and the second when the transfer is completed, perhaps the most injured of the two so that you're not faced with murder," he said simply, releasing the call button and waiting for a response. The attention of every unit was focused on the front door and guns were drawn, in case the man was desperate and came out firing. Grissom glanced down at his watch: they had a little less than three minutes before the bomb went off – he had to try to at least get one of them out of there.

Nick looked back up at Forman, trying to get his eyes to focus properly.

"Well, do you have an answer?" The man was silent for a moment before making up his mind.

"One of you can leave," he said gruffly. "It's your choice who, and you better choose fast." He fingered the button threateningly. Without hesitating, Nick raised the radio to his mouth.

"Griss?" Grissom was a little surprised to hear Nick answer, but chose not to question it for the moment.

"Yeah Nick?"

"Greg's coming out." Grissom shook his head sadly; he had hoped that Forman would release Nick first, particularly after what he had mentioned about murder charges, but knew now that Forman was bound and determined for somebody to die here today, and was trying to make that somebody Nick – and there was nothing he could do; he had to accept the one that he could get right then, and work on recovering the other later. However, before Grissom could acknowledge the decision and let the other officers know, he heard Greg object in the background, and his jaw dropped at the words he spoke.

"Nick, no! You have to get out of here! Give me the gun, I'm staying!" It was a second before he found the voice to demand an explanation.

"Nick, Greg, what gun? What's going on it there? Where's Forman? Is he down?" Catherine, Warrick and Sara looked from him to the house, eyes wide and searching for some sign of what they all hoped to be true before Nick's voice returned, addressing first Grissom then Greg.

"I've got Forman's gun but Forman has his finger on the bomb's trigger, plus the timer. Greg, go now! We don't have time to argue! Go!" Even though there was an underlying weakness in his voice, he sounded overall desperate and pleading. "Please go! I promise I'll be out there soon, just go!" For a moment Greg remained frozen to the spot, staring back pleadingly at his friend and the one who had already saved his life several times that day, more recently while sporting a hole in his stomach.

Nick swayed dangerously and Greg moved to help him, but he shook his head.

"I'm fine. Just go, quick." Grissom and the others stood listening to the exchange, waiting anxiously for the final decision only to hear the silence stretch on. What was going on? Who was coming out? When? Were they coming out at all?

They got their answer when they heard the house's front door bang open and they looked up to see Greg stumbling down the porch stairs, taking a few more steps towards them before collapsing to the ground, falling still.

The last thing he wanted to do right then was move. On second thought, he doubted that he ever wanted to move again. He could live right there, lay right where he was until he collected cobwebs for all he cared – just as long as he didn't have to move.

He only came back to reality when he heard a familiar voice scream his name, and he remembered where he was and what was going on: the bomb… the bomb was going to go off soon… Nick was still inside…

"Greg!" Immediately following her scream, Sara ran out from behind their line of cars, falling to her knees beside Greg and turning him over, because of which he screamed in pain, his hand going to his ribs. Not a second later, the other three were with them, accompanied by two patrolmen. Grissom wanted nothing more than to get him a safe distance away from the house.

"We have to move him! Now!" Grissom yelled. "Careful of his ribs!" Working together, their group managed to lift him bodily off of the ground and hustle him to the ground behind their car, lowering him slowly, carefully back down. Once there, Grissom removed his jacket and bundled it into a makeshift pillow that he placed under Greg's head. The small group couldn't help but wince at the sight of the angry red and brown, hand-shaped bruises on his neck that attested to Forman's attempt to strangle him. Sara however smiled happily through her relief, taking his hand in hers.

"You're safe now. It's going to be okay. The ambulances will be here in a minute," she said, only now beginning to believe it herself: it was finally almost over.

Greg could only shake his head, fighting off the sudden and appealing desire to drift into unconsciousness in order to make himself perfectly clear on a certain matter. He swallowed, trying to wet his dry throat so that he could speak clearly.

"I'm not…going…anywhere…'till Nick gets…out," he said haltingly between stabs of pain.

Before anyone could convince him otherwise, a single shot was fired inside followed immediately by a scream, then silence. Greg's eyes widened as he sat still for a moment, straining to hear another sound, having been unable to tell if the scream had been Nick's. When the silence continued, he decided he couldn't take this anymore, and moreover wasn't going to sit there and take it lying down. Managing to struggle to his feet and push past them, Greg quickly staggered towards a space between the cars.

"Nick!"

Nick let loose a little of the breath that he had been holding when he heard the front door open then close again behind Greg. His promise had been kept – Greg was going to live.

With his relief came a fresh bout of the exhaustion he'd been pushing away that refused to be ignored any longer. Careful to keep the gun-holding hand aimed at Forman, he let himself fall to his knees. Forman laughed.

"Getting a little woozy, are we?" His lack of energy did nothing to take away from the snap of his tone.

"Yeah, getting shot'll do that to you." He paused and for a long moment, there was silence between them, each staring down the other, before Nick finally spoke again. "You don't have to do this," he said softly. "If you turn that thing off right now and walk out of here with me, I promise I'll get your sentence reduced." Forman shook his head.

"I can't do that." He sounded almost regretful.

"Then what do you expect to do?" Nick asked. "There's no way that you can escape this." Forman nodded slowly.

"I know," he said, all regret gone from his voice. "But I look at it this way: when I press this button, at least I'll get to take one of you with me." His thumb moved to the button.

And without even really thinking about it, Nick pulled the trigger firing a single shot, the bullet hitting Forman's hand and obliterating the trigger button. The man screamed and fell to his knees, grasping his hand at the wrist. It was at that moment that Nick noticed the numbers on the bomb's timer – 0:10…0:09…0:08…

Panic seized him and he shot to his feet, tossing away the gun and keeping one hand over his gunshot wound as he tripped and stumbled towards the door – he had to get out. It didn't help that the world seemed to swim before him or that he could hardly feel his legs as he grasped the handle and whipped it open, stepping out into the bright afternoon light and starting towards then down the stairs, painstakingly slowly.

"Nick!" Greg called out again upon seeing him, this time from relief at seeing him alive, and without further hurt, but also out of warning: the bomb; he was too close, much too close… Not being able to run forward because of several pairs of hands holding him back, he called out again. "The bomb! You've got to hurry!" Nick looked up to find Greg looking at him desperately as he made for the second last step. His foot never touched it.

Suddenly, a deafening explosion went off behind him, sending him flying forwards through the air. The force of the landing knocked all of the breath out of his body as debris from the house landed on and around him and his vision went black.

TBC...