Thanks for the reviews!
"Miss Duquesne, you're needed in interrogation now."
Rick Stetler basically loomed over Calleigh as she remained seated. He wore his signature black suit and tie with an accompanying sneer on his wrinkling face. They knew he was going for an 'intimidating' look but it never worked on them. Natalia and Eric stood behind their colleague in defense with stone cold expressions.
"She hasn't even had a chance to finish her lunch yet," Eric retorted.
"Yeah, what's the rush?" Natalia joined in crossing her arms.
"A CSI almost dies, in your own lab and you wonder what's the rush?" Rick accused with hands on his hips.
"Let's go," Calleigh responded before Eric could get any angrier. The bantering was just too much. She stood slowly and sighed.
"Don't worry, we'll clean up," Natalia offered in a soothing voice.
"Here," Eric gave her the soda.
Calleigh nodded and left the room with a blank face. Stetler gave the others a look that showed how much he disparaged them before following her.
"Is she even okay to do this interview?" Natalia worried.
"I'm not sure," he sighed, "I hope so."
"Walk me through what happened," Rick began.
The two were in the interrogation room with the most windows at the front of the department. She watched the prying glances of the passers-by through the corner of her eyes. Rick obviously wanted to put on a show. It was so embarrassing. A slightly withdrawn Calleigh sat looking up at him as he stood on the opposite side of the table.
"Well," she shifted her gaze to the closed laptop in front of her, "I had just reassembled the gun from the crime scene. I loaded two bullets in order to do test shots. I fired one and -"
Stetler leaned over the table, "And?" His eyes threatened to bulge out of their sockets.
"Then I passed out. I was told the second round was accidentally discharged…"
"Yes and your co-worker, CSI Wolfe, was shot."
"It was a freak accident, Rick," she clarified.
"Except for the fact that it could have been prevented."
Rick strolled over to her side of the table. She watched him in pure confusion as he opened the laptop and hit the play button. The sense of guilt she had was rising in her chest. But she couldn't look away.
The video showed what she explained. Calleigh witnessed herself stumble a bit when she stood from her chair. A few seconds later she took the gun and was making her way to fire. Rick paused the video.
"You saw that, right there…"
"Rick, that was nothing," she argued.
"Negligence."
Horatio had now entered the room. His CSI was fighting back tears and refused to face him.
"Rick," he warned in a stern but calm voice.
"Horatio, there's clear evidence of negligence in the video."
"Calleigh," he gave her permission to leave. She faced him momentarily with watery eyes before rushing out.
Eric and Natalia, who were working and conversing in the DNA lab, saw her walking pass. Natalia stopped what she was doing, quickly took off her gloves and hung her lab coat on the rack.
"I'll check on her."
Calleigh barged through the door and was relieved to notice the room was empty. She entered the middle stall as Natalia entered the room behind her.
"Calleigh," she heard her sobs, "Are you okay? What happened?"
She sat fully clothed on the toilet and sobbed into her hands. After a minute or two she calmed down.
"Rick's right: I was negligent," her voice strained.
"Negligent about what?" She leaned against the stall.
"I felt faint before it happened but I went and shot the gun anyway."
She began to sob again which made her speech louder. Someone entered the room and Natalia rushed into the stall. She couldn't allow anyone to hear Calleigh admit to anything.
"Okay, sh, stop," Natalia grabbed her shoulders and whispered, "it's not your fault, you had no idea what would have happened today. Has this ever happened to you before?"
"No," she muttered.
"Exactly, see you couldn't have known and it is not your fault. Stetler can't do anything."
"Okay," Calleigh sighed.
Her friend grabbed a handful of tissue and handed it to her.
"Thanks," she gazed at the tissues before bursting into tears again.
"What?" Natalia asked incredulously.
This behavior from Calleigh was very odd to say the least. Natalia had never seen her colleague cry or even act this hormonal. An idea sprung into her head immediately.
"Calleigh, I'm gonna ask you a question, but don't take this the wrong way."
"Okay," she responded as she wiped her face.
"When was your last period?"
For a moment the blonde stopped weeping and thought carefully. Natalia saw her face fall apart once more and tears reappeared.
"I don't know," she sobbed.
"Wow, deja-vu…"
"What?"
"Oh nothing." Natalia recalled the time she had a scare similar to this with Eric. "I will go and get you a test. In the meantime, you try and cool off and -"
"Is there a bathroom party I don't know about?" Maxine joked as she overheard Natalia's voice.
Natalia peeked her head out the stall, "Maxine, please stay with her until I get back."
"But, I-"
The lab technician was dumbfounded as Natalia rushed out of the ladies' room leaving her with a clearly upset Calleigh.
This situation was extremely awkward for Natalia. She tried very hard to slip pass the lab but to no avail. The modern layout of glass doors and windows had Eric glaring at her as she neared the elevator. She had ignored him constantly calling her name.
"C'mon, c'mon, c'mon. Deja-vu, deja-vu," Natalia whispered in the empty elevator. Her finger jammed on the buttons repetitively. As the doors closed she could see Eric's upset face. Luckily he was stuck on the case and couldn't run after her.
"Mr. Wolfe have a seat," Stetler welcomed, "How are you feeling?"
"I'm fine," Ryan answered begrudgingly.
He tried to avoid wincing as he took a seat across from Rick. They were in the same room Calleigh had her interrogation. Rick stared sympathetically at Ryan's bandaged left forearm.
"I'm sorry this happened to you," he apologized.
"Let's just get this over with," Ryan replied angrily.
"Okay," he shrugged off how curt he responded, "tell me what happened."
"We were investigating the case. I went to see if Calleigh had already processed the bullets from the scene. And - I got shot…"
"By Miss Duquesne…"
"Yes, accidentally!"
"You say that as if it's okay to have an accident like that occur in the lab," he scrutinized.
"Don't do that," he warned, "you're not gonna twist my words. It was clearly a mishap; a freak accident, and my coworker, my friend, shouldn't be blamed for what happened."
"You could have died."
"Yeah, well I'm still here," Ryan stood up and left the interrogation on that note.
As he walked down the hallway he could feel the stares from people all around. Delko appeared at the entrance of the trace lab.
"Hey man, you okay?"
"I'm good, Delko, thanks."
The two shook hands. At the end of the hallway he spotted Calleigh and Valera exiting the restroom. Their dear friend's face was pale and frightened as she caught them looking. Ryan went directly up to her and Calleigh's eyes searched his in suspense.
Teehee, the suspense.
