Chapter Fourteen
Greg's face was anxious as he knelt down by Catherine's side, blurting out whatever comforting words came to mind.
"It won't be crooked when it heals! They'll fix it! I'm sure it's not that bloody or anything and you won't have any scars and it probably hurts way less than you think it does!"
But Catherine didn't seem to be listening to him as she sat in the sand with her hands clamped tightly over her face, her eyes scrunched tight.
"Is she okay?" Ecklie asked, his hands still sitting on his hips.
"Are you okay?" Greg repeated.
Catherine grudgingly replied through her hands, "Do!"
"Let me take a look at it," Greg prompted, reaching for Catherine's hands, but she refused to pull her them down. "Oh come on Catherine…I promise I won't laugh at it for being big and purple and bloody or maybe crooked."
One of her eyes opened and she glared out at Greg.
"Say dat agaid…"
"Cut it out."
Catherine rolled her eyes, then slowly lowered her hands from her face. Her mouth and lower nose were covered in blood; faint half-moon purple circles were beginning to form beneath her eyes. The bridge of her nose was slowly increasing, though it didn't look crooked.
"Well…it's not…that…bloody."
"Is id dat bad?" Catherine asked, leaning over and spitting out a glob of bloody spit.
"Naw…it's…it's just…bloody and…swollen…and…you've got black eyes starting…"
Catherine let out a heated sigh, "Dat b—"
"Uh-uh Cath, kids!"
Matt and Lauren had been standing next to each other, seeming unsure of what else to do.
Catherine huffed as best she could and put her hands back up to her face.
"I cad beliebe he did dat. I hobe he kills hibself."
"No you don't, you're just saying that because you're in pain and aren't thinking clearly." Greg said smugly, squatting down next to Catherine, still looking her face at different angles. "Sara might have found something in the airplane to take care of that for you. And hopefully our hands too…that was probably one of my worse ideas…"
Catherine glared at him.
Sara strode across the sand, a faint satisfied smile on her face. The foaming waves casting up on shore seemed so much more pleasant now, rather than the bars of a jail cell holding them all in. The loud calling of the seabirds sounded more thought-provoking and less obnoxious now that she knew they were going to be rescued soon. She reached the gently turning corner of the island, her stomach turning in excitement upon telling the rest of them the news. They would celebrate when they got back home. Who knew how just yet, but there was definitely going to be a celebration upon returning to civilization.
She took in a deep breath in an attempt to calm her squirming stomach. But something was beginning to feel different. A strange sixth sense feeling. But it was a thought of nonsense…probably a voice in the back of her head repeating one of Murphy's laws—anything that can go wrong, will go wrong.
"Is Sawa back yet?" Lauren asked exasperatedly, sitting in Greg's lap and fiddling with the soft white sand on the beach.
"She should be…" Greg said. "She might have got distracted or something."
A stupid thing to say and he knew it as he said it. She had concentration skills that almost rivaled Grissom's. Almost.
"Greg…what could she hab gotted distracted by? Dere's barely adytid out here…"
"Well what do you propose?" Greg said raising his eyebrows. "Wait here while she's off stuck in quicksand or getting attacked by seagulls or being eaten by some jaguar or—"
"Will you cut that out?" Ecklie said. "That's not something we need to be thinking about…"
Greg responded with anxious silence.
The strange prickling on the back of Sara's neck was beginning to bother her. She was almost at the turn as she walked across the shoreline. What was wrong with her? She jogged a couple of steps, hoping to get rid of the feeling but it remained.
"This is ridiculous," she said aloud. She turned around, scoping the landscape behind her. "There's nothing there." She threw her hands up exasperatedly, letting out a scoff. "Stop fooling yourself."
"You're not fooling yourself."
The prickling feeling returned in all extreme intensity and Sara spun back around. Standing there, with a vine in his hand, was Dan, his face filled with an overload of some sort of rage or fear.
"I think we need to go find her…" Greg stated after fifteen more minutes had passed.
"I was just thinking the same thing myself." Ecklie said quietly. "That guy is still out there, you know."
"That's what I'm worried about…"
"Well then we should start—" Ecklie began, but he was interrupted by Matt shouting.
"Look! Lookit! An airplane! Look!" He was bouncing up and down, jabbing his little finger into the air. "Look at it! It's coming! It's going to save us!"
"Oh tank God…" Catherine breathed, a sort of rising feeling of elation filling her stomach.
"She must have managed to radio in!" Greg cried, beaming. "But…but then why isn't she back yet?"
The airplane was nearing them, a big silver body of metal zooming closer and closer. But it wouldn't be landing on the side shoreline where they were.
"Come on, it's landing in the front of the island." Greg stated. "They'll be able to help us find Sara…"
"Am I going to see my mommy and daddy now?" Lauren asked Greg as he stood and picked her up.
"Umm…Lauren, you'll find out." Greg mumbled, trying to divert her questions as he began to hike through the sand. Catherine took Matt's hand with one of her bloody ones, the other still clamped across her face. Ecklie trailed alone after them.
"Holy—" Sara began, gaping at Dan as he leered at her.
"Quiet!" he interrupted. He took a step forward and she took a step back, her palms beginning to sweat and her grip tightening on the cooler. "Did you radio in?" he asked in earnest.
Sara opened and closed her mouth, making no more sound than a couple of breathless croaks. She was telling her legs to run, but they wouldn't. They were planted. Dan reached out and grabbed her shoulders, causing her to drop the cooler into the sand.
"Did you radio in?" he asked, even more fervently.
"I-I…"
"Did you?" he asked, shouting now. He shook her shoulders, trying to shake an answer out of her.
"Get off!" she shouted, lifting a leg and shoving him roughly away with her foot. She turned to run as he stumbled backwards but he threw himself forward and hooked her around the ankles. She came down roughly, getting a mouthful of sand in the meantime. She sputtered, trying to clear out her mouth of the stuff, but as she did so, she felt her hands being brought together and tied.
"Greg Sanders?" Brass called loudly. He was standing on the white sands of the beach, the bonfire before him emitting a thin, steady stream of gray smoke. "Catherine?"
About three or four other rescuers were walking around as well, peering into the woods, walking along the shoreline.
"Sara?" Brass shouted, cupping his hands to his mouth. Then suddenly he heard a faint noise to his left. He looked over, his stomach turning. His face was unshaved; his hair disheveled as if he hadn't bothered to comb or even shower in several days.
"Hey!" he shouted, taking a few more steps toward the left end of the island.
A faint call answered him, "Brass!" He could barely make it out.
"I found them!" he shouted to the other rescuers. "They're over here!"
He jogged through the sand, nearing a turn, and just when he was close to reaching it, Greg, Catherine, Ecklie, and two kids whose pictures he had only seen on the news and in the examination of the flight in the case.
He choked, though he didn't show it. Everyone back at the lab had been hit hard by this, all of them fearing the worst, and now they were here, safe and sound and appearing to be better off than they could have been.
When he reached them, they stood there for a few moments, before Brass said, "Are…are you all alright?"
"Do." Catherine muttered into her hand. "By dose is broked."
"We'll get that taken care of. There're a couple of helicopters out there that were helping us look around." He paused and gulped. It wasn't like him to be emotional.
"We're all righd Brass…" Catherine assured him, reaching out and giving him a one-armed hug. He returned it and then released her. Contact. Official proof that they were all right there…except for one…
"Where's Sara? She radioed in!"
"She hasn't come back yet." Greg said, putting Lauren down on the ground when she started to squirm. "We're worried, this isn't a big island. We were about to go look for her when Matt saw you guys coming."
Brass looked nervous. "Grissom and them were looking into this Dan what's-his-face…he's some bad man. Killed his brother's girlfriend and let his brother take the blame. Kind of a psychopath…"
"We realized…" Catherine mumbled. "He dearly drowded. Laured by droppid her off a cliff…"
"We need to find Sara." Brass said firmly, solemnly. He brushed past Greg and Catherine, waving for the other rescuers to follow. As he turned the corner, he pulled out his gun.
"Do not run. I need to know." Dan lifted Sara up from the ground by her bound wrists. He turned her around and placed his hands on her shoulders once again. "Did you, or did you not radio in?"
Sara remained silent.
"Tell me!" he shouted.
"Why do you even want to know?" Sara answered. Her stomach was still twisting but this time it was out of fear.
"What do you mean? Of course it matters! If you people get saved, I'm going to jail, damnit! I won't last in there, I'll go crazy!"
Sara refrained from informing him he already was.
"You haven't answered me! Did you or did you not?" he cried, giving her another rough shake.
Again, she didn't answer. What good was it going to do if she did? There was no telling what he would do if she responded in the way he didn't want her to.
His eyes were crazed and his breathing came in giant heaves that raised his shoulders as he took them.
"Uggh!" he cried in enragement, "That's it! I'll make you tell me!" He dragged her sideways, towards the curling ocean waves.
"What are you doing?" Sara asked, starting to struggle against his force.
"I'm going to make you talk."
Sara stared ahead at the water, glistening and beautiful. There was pretty much only one thing he could be planning to do.
"All…all right…I radioed in. I talked to a rescue plane; they're coming to get us."
Dan spun his face to hers.
"You what?"
"I radioed! They're coming!"
Dan's eyes widened and he frowned, still breathing heavily.
"They're…they're…coming?"
Sara nodded.
Dan looked as if he was scrounging the last of his brain, trying to come up with some sort of way to get out of his situation.
"No…can't…I can't…but…" he muttered crazily, still gripping Sara's bonds. "There can't be…no…no…murderer…no crime…no witnesses…no…all right…" He turned to Sara again. "No witnesses, no murderer, no crime." And he began to shove Sara forward, towards the glistening water.
"W-wait…you…you don't have to…you…" She began to struggle harder now, trying to back up as he pushed and pulled her forward. Her fingers were working on prying the vines apart but they were done too tightly.
"There's no way I'm going to jail." Dan said heatedly, shoving her forward a couple of feet.
"But…but maybe you won't! Maybe you can plead insanity!" Sara offered.
They were standing in the water now, ankle deep in it. He turned his face to look into her eyes again, firmly, authoritatively.
He then uttered, saying each syllable firmly and with emphasis.
"I am not crazy."
Dan then pushed her roughly downwards, causing Sara's knees to buckle into the water, and then he pushed forward, shoving her entire face into the water. She kicked, fighting it, trying to force her head back out for air. He pushed her harder, holding onto her hands with one hand and the other keeping her head under. The more she struggled the more he tightened his grip.
She screamed underwater, nothing coming out but a bubble of air. She kicked, but he stepped across the backs of her legs. Sara stopped screaming, a headache beginning to form, stabbing her forehead. Her lungs were burning angrily, screaming as she had been. The fight was gone, but the feeling of his large sausage fingers on the back of her head kept her aware of where she was. She coughed out a bubble of carbon dioxide and reflexively she took in a gasping breath of nothing but water. She choked…her sight went hazy…her lungs burned unbearably…
"Sara?" Brass yelled, jogging along the eastern side of the island. "Sara!" The others followed him through the sand. Brass was inwardly cursing. Where could she be? Why has she taken so long? She had said she would be there at the fire but she hadn't been and nobody else had been, meaning she hadn't gotten to them to tell them what she had found out. He was following a set of footprints in the sand, no doubt Sara's.
They neared a right turn, and Brass continued at his brisk pace, his gun at the ready.
"Sara!" he called. No response. His stomach was in knots, very nervous knots. He reached the corner, and caught sight of a rather chubby man's back, several yards along the beach, standing ankle deep in the water, bent over slightly as if he were looking at something…or…
"Sara!" Greg shouted, catching sight of Dan, and floating dark hair on the surface of the water.
Dan's head swiveled toward them and his eyes widened; like a deer in the headlights of a car, only this time it was in the path of a Brass's gun barrel.
"Let go!" Brass ordered, his face twisted in anger.
Dan turned his head back to Sara, floating motionlessly in the waves, and turned back around.
"Put your hands up!" Brass ordered, still aiming his gun at him.
He paused for a couple of seconds, still looking dumbfounded, but then Dan left his hands down, putting one into his pocket, smiling broadly.
And Brass fired.
A/N: I'm alive:D Be happy! Sorry it took me more than a month to update. All in favor of hating school, say I! I! All right, well I updated. And there is officially one chappie-ter left. HUGS for all the over150 readers of my most popular story:D I originally had a less climactic version of this chapter left where Sara comes back and is all happy with everybody else and then they go to the bonfire to get rescuedand Oh noes! Dan has thrown himself in the fire and is dead. Well, I decided to go with a slightly more action-packed version, so...yeah...