"What bugs you most?"
A CSI fan-fic story, started May 2003; WIP (and somewhat AU).
The usual disclaimers: none of the CBS or CSI characters belong to me, and I make no money doing this kind of thing. I am not affiliated with CBS or CSI in any way.
Spoilers: this is set sometime between Seasons 4 and 5 (so lots of water under the bridge since I started this fic). Greg Sanders is still in the lab.
Rating: T for adult themes and language in later chapters.
Pairings: Jim/Catherine; Bobby/OFC.
Chapter 11/??
"A lesson in Trading Spaces"
Grissom pulled up to the curb and saw Captain Brass, notepad out, speaking to a slender, well-dressed young man. The young man was gesturing toward the building and his body language plainly showed that he was upset. Gil parked the Tahoe and brought his gunmetal gray field kit with him, wondering what to expect. Two uniformed officers stood more or less attentively at the front door of the house. It was clearly identified as a "model home". A model for what? Gil thought. Nearby he could see six or seven other homes in varying stages of completion.
"Thanks, Mr. Merrifield," Brass was saying as Grissom approached. "We'll take it from here." He put his notepad back into his inner coat pocket and sighed as Merrifield moved off to one side. The man looked utterly defeated as he slumped into a wrought iron patio chair, shaking his head.
"What have we got, Jim?" Gil asked quietly, removing his sunglasses.
Brass cast a weary look toward the impending sunrise. "Inside. You're gonna to love this one." Jim's face gave him no further clues, so he shrugged and followed the detective in.
The sight that greeted them was right out of a horror film: it looked like blood was seeping from every wall and from the ceiling as well.
"Matthew Merrifield is the interior designer for Pathways homes. He came in early today to begin setting up the model," Brass began, clearing his throat against the strong ammonia-like smell. "Furniture guys are supposed to be here by nine. He opened up shop, saw this, and called us. I don't think he'll be showing the model home today."
Gil had squatted down in the tiled foyer, not yet stepping onto the carpeted area. He looked at the carpet and saw only a few footprints among the days-old vacuum cleaner tracks. "Interesting color scheme he's working with. I'm not sure it does anything for me," said Grissom sardonically. "Anybody walk in here besides our Mr. Merrifield?" He pulled on a pair of latex gloves and was shining his flashlight across the taupe carpeting.
"Just me and the place is clear: no bodies, no sign of a struggle, vandalism, B&E, nothing, nada." Jim paused to loosen his top shirt button and tie against the heat and humidity inside the house. "I saw this in a movie once."
Grissom opened his field kit and pulled a sterile swab from its packet, then dabbed it carefully in the red material on the wall nearest them. "Really? Which one was that?" He removed a small plastic bottle from the kit and added several drops of phenolphthalein to the end of the swab: no color change.
"Amityville Horror."
"Hmm. Pheno negative," he said, showing Jim the swab. "It's not blood. I'm partial to Hitchcock films myself."
Brass smiled slightly. "Yeah, he's okay too. So you don't think it could be our Nosebleed boy-wonder working on his sequel?" Jim was referring to a case they had worked in which a young man deliberately expirated blood from his nostrils on every wall of his apartment to get back at a negligent apartment complex manager. It turned out that the manager was the one with a criminal secret to hide: his missing wife's body in a water softener's brine tank down in the building's basement.
Grissom shook his head, stood and pulled a small digital camera from his windbreaker pocket. He also slipped out of the jacket and left it draped over his field kit. Jim nodded to himself since it looked like a good idea. He transferred his LVMPD shield to his shirt pocket and left his coat with the field kit as well. Both of them were starting to perspire in their shirtsleeves; it felt like the climate control in the place was non-existent.
"Shall we?" Gil asked, gesturing into the room with the camera.
"Ready when you are, Mr. DeMille."
The model home was a "family starter" at two thousand square feet: three bedrooms, one and a half bath, with a kitchen and combined living room/dining room. From every wall and ceiling, a reddish material seeped from the drywall, making a sharp contrast to the fresh white paint. Surprisingly enough, the red material did not seem to drip down onto the carpeted floor in any of the rooms. Grissom was beginning to agree with Jim's cinematographic assessment of the scene as he collected digital photos and several more swabs of the material; there was no overt evidence of a crime anywhere in the house.
Opening one walk-in closet door, they were met with a fresh wave of the pungent ammonia-like odor. Jim's eyes watered. "Whoof! What is that smell?"
Gil's eyes were watering slightly too. "Urine maybe? Almost, but not quite; I don't know. Did Merrifield indicate that the A/C was off all weekend?" Jim grunted an affirmative from his side of the room. He stopped and turned in a full circle where he was standing in the living room, then sighed. "Let's get some air."
Brass immediately agreed and they made their way back to the front walkway. Matt Merrifield met them at the sidewalk.
"Captain Brass? What do I tell my boss?" He looked and sounded worried.
Jim held up one hand and spoke calmly. "Nothing yet, Mr. Merrifield. We're still working on it." He came to stand by Grissom who had discreetly waved him over.
"Jim, I want to call in a microbiologist on this one," he said cautiously, as if he was expecting an argument.
Brass remained expressionless, his analytical brain processing what he'd just seen inside. "You have a theory?"
Grissom smirked. "I don't work theories, I work evidence."
Brass gave him a look, and then he chuckled. "Yeah, right. Gimme a break, Cousin."
"I think it might be a microbe, Jim, unfortunately it's not my field of expertise. We've got the samples taken and the photos, but Mickey should see this in situ to give us a better idea of what we're looking at," Gil went on, checking his watch: it was nearly seven. "You said yourself that we have absolutely no evidence of a crime at this point. And you're here just in case there's trouble, right?"
"Okay, so you call the other Bug Doctor, and I'll get O'Riley to drive her out here. Vega's on vacation." Jim chuckled again, and shook his head at the friendly reminder of his reaction to the last time Mickey was in the field on a case with the CSIs. They both pulled out their cell phones and were dialing.
"Five bucks says Dr. Kaye can name that bug in ten seconds," Grissom said, winking mischievously.
Brass snorted. "No way in hell I'm taking that bet. This is my golf-sharking niece we're talking about here." He paused to listen as O'Riley picked up on the second ring. "And it'll be five seconds or less, Professor. Ray, it's Jim. I need you to meet up with Dr. Kaye in the lab or the CSI break room and run her out here to the Pathways development. Yeah, I know what time it is. Don't rush. Yeah, thanks."
About a half-hour later, Mickey and Detective O'Riley were walking up the driveway of the model home; they hadn't really rushed and had made a convenience store stop on the way. The sergeant had tossed their two empty plastic orange juice bottles into the nearby flat dumpster on the way to where Grissom and Brass were waiting. All four wore sunglasses against the bright Las Vegas morning.
"Dr. Gil, you said you had something interesting for me to see?" she greeted. "Hi, Uncle Jim. What's up?"
Mickey had acquired a thin neck chain for her forensics lab identification badge, and if he didn't know better, looked like she had been doing CSI work for years. O'Riley followed one or two paces behind her, his large frame looming like a bodyguard with a buzz-cut. Grissom and Brass exchanged a quick glance as if they both had thought the same thing.
Brass smiled faintly in welcome, raising his eyebrows well above the rims of his sunglasses. "Take a look inside, Mouse." The uniformed officers stepped aside as all four passed them; their curiosity now piqued at the arrival of a second detective and a second scientist.
Grissom held the door for Mickey to go in first. The ammonia-like odor hit them again, but he and Brass were now almost used to it. O'Riley drew in a quick breath and stifled a curse. Mickey didn't react to the smell at all, or so it seemed.
"Welcome to Amityville, boys and girls," exclaimed Mickey softly, pulling on a pair of latex gloves from her slacks pocket. "That's an awful lot of Serratia, Dr. Grissom." She removed her sunglasses and gave a low whistle. "Damn..."
Gil turned to Brass who had just stepped into the foyer in time to hear the diagnosis. "About three seconds, Jim," he said pointedly, the look on his face amused. Brass just shook his head. "Is that definitive, Mickey?"
She faced him and nodded. "Yes, sir. Odor and pigmentation are both very definitive for Serratia marcescens. Just a really weird place to find it is all, like we should use this in a journal publication kind of weird." Mickey indicated his field kit under the two jackets. "May I?"
Grissom grabbed his windbreaker and handed Jim his suit coat. "Be my guest." He watched with interest as she pulled out his digital thermometer and placed it carefully on the open-air kitchen counter, and then turned back to scanning the walls, a look of disbelief on her face.
"Have you seen this bug before, Mick?" Jim asked, retrieving his notepad from the coat pocket to scribble a few more notes.
"Sure. I use Serratia in my microbiology courses for teaching several different types of labs, however not nearly this much of it." She paused to check the readout on the thermometer when it beeped for attention. "Thirty-nine C. Mighty hot for this bug to be red."
"How so?" Grissom inquired. He took the thermometer from her and returned it to his field kit.
"Usually it goes red or pink at 25 degrees C incubation. It's environmental in origin, most of the time," she shrugged, stifling a yawn. "Excuse me. We use it in teaching labs because the pigmentation is genetically controlled, and easily manipulated; UV light, chemical mutagens, what have you. And it's generally not considered to be a frank pathogen, which is good for students to use. I can check it out better for you back at the lab."
Gil nodded, bending down to collect his field kit. "The samples and photos will be on your bench by the start of tonight's shift; it'll keep. Get some rest today and then look at it with fresh eyes. Jim, I'll leave you to talk to Mr. Merrifield. No blood, no foul, my friend."
Brass smirked at him. "Thanks. Ray, go ahead and book off from here if you don't have anything else going on."
O'Riley grinned and shucked off his enormous jacket. He was absolutely drenched with perspiration but smiling broadly at the prospect of being off shift. "I'll do that, Captain."
"Thanks for the ride, Sarge," Mickey told him.
"Yeah, Doc. See you later," he said cheerfully and was gone.
Jim shook his head and chuckled, watching as both Grissom and O'Riley pulled away in their vehicles. "Give me a few minutes, Mouse. Paperwork then pancakes, how's that?"
Mickey slipped off the latex gloves to throw away and put her sunglasses back on, grinning. "Sounds great. And I taped the Red Sox-Tampa Bay game last night. Pedro was pitching at Tropicana Field; very cool."
"Alright, Mouse," said Uncle Jim. "Way to go, kiddo."
TBC
A/N thank you for reading this far! Feedback, comments and critiques are most welcome ;-)