The ambulance arrives on scene about 10 minutes after Grissom hangs up with the switchboard. Both he and Sara had known they were coming as they could hear the sirens from almost a mile away. In Las Vegas traffic, getting an ambulance to arrive in under 20 minutes was damn near a miracle, unless, of course, they are coming to the aid of one of their own. Sara always thought that the Paramedics should arrive at a scene as quickly as possible regardless of who was injured. Law enforcement officials know the risk they're taking when they get into this line of business – why should they be treated any differently just because they're considered "on of our own." Looking up from Sara's side, after repeatedly refusing to leave her; crime scene be damned, Grissom watches as two paramedics come in with a stretcher, followed closely behind by Jim Brass and the rest of the night shift CSI's carrying their kits.
Moving closer to do their jobs, the medics ask Grissom to please move away from Sara, reassuring him that they are here to take care of her when he looks at them, not moving. With a reassuring squeeze of her hand, he steps back and allows them access to Sara. As he steps back he hears the group behind him take in sudden breaths of air upon seeing the condition Sara's in. He turns to them, immediately switching to supervisor role, hoping to find out as much as he can about who attacked Sara.
"Catherine, I want you to take point on this one. My," he pauses a moment to contemplate his wording, "personal involvement in this case could cause questions as to contamination of evidence or personal interest. Therefore, I'm removing myself from all further aspects of this investigation." Without allowing time for questions he continues on. "I'm here for any questions you may have as I was first on scene, but I can't take part in the actual investigation. As of this moment, I'm part of your investigation process, not part of the physical investigation"
Without question, Catherine steps forward, sets down her kit, and turns to the group; attempting to get things in full swing. "Nick, Greg, it looks like the struggle started at the front door so that's where he probably entered. We know he exited through the window, so I want you to do a full sweep of the apartment from beginning of the fight to the end." The conversation pauses as the stretcher carrying Sara makes its way out of the room. Catherine turns to Grissom. "Go with her. She could probably use the support and you're no use to us here. We'll find you for questioning when we're done here. Hopefully, by then, she'll be available to provide us some more details." Without waiting for a response she turns back to the other CSI's. "Warrick, I want you in the bedroom with me."
Nodding, Grissom understands Catherine's very subtle implications. As first on scene, that makes him their only suspect at the moment. By talking with Sara they can immediately eliminate him from the suspect list. At least, Grissom muses, he really hopes they can. Heading out of the bedroom to join the ambulance, he takes a moment to turn back to Catherine. "You're going to need to pull my prints and DNA from AFIS to rule me out my data compared to anything foreign."
"Is there something I should know about that you're not telling me? Is there something that could cause different variables in my crime scene?" Catherine asks, a questioning look crossing her fair pallor. As far as she has known, there isn't much reason for anyone's DNA to be present in Sara's place but hers. Sure, there might be the errant samples as each of them has been in her place at some time, but as far as Catherine had known there hasn't been anyone since Hank that would be around often enough to cause a large amount of additional data. Therefore, she had been expecting to only rule out Sara's DNA compared to foreign substances.
Grissom outwardly flinches at the mention of Sara's apartment as a crime scene. This was the reason he hadn't wanted to get intimately involved with her. He had always known that a day could come that their relationship could interfere with their work. After Nick's kidnapping he was suddenly aware of the notion that the same could happen to anyone on his team at any time. They both knew the risks though and had decided that every consequence was worth what they can have. He looks over at Catherine "Let's just say you're going to find more DNA of mine than you would expect." And with that, he turns on his heels and races out the door to catch the ambulance before it leaves.
After almost three hours of processing the apartment, Catherine and her team have come up with naught on the perpetrator. There are no errant hairs, no random fingerprints, and nothing more than a boot print that Greg lifted off of the hallway outside of Sara's bedroom. The blood on the scene is most likely all Sara's and the only incriminating evidence that they have found raises eyebrows toward Grissom but has nothing to do with the case. Finally, Greg moves over to the window that served as escape and finds one small black fiber stuck to a jag in the wood of the sill. Pulling the tweezers from his kit he bags the fiber and turns back to the group.
Moving to put his find in the security of his scene kit, Greg sees Warrick lean forward and with a latex gloved hand and pull something out from the base of the bed. "Jackpot!" he exclaims, removing the best evidence they have found yet. Evidence that they know Sara made sure to leave for them. On its way in descent to a plastic evidence bag is none other than the black ski mask, sure to be ripe with hair follicles and epithelials. "You go girl" Warrick remarks to no one in particular.