Disclaimer: I am not Anthony Zuiker. I do not own the characters of CSI: NY. I do own anyone you don't recognize including victims, bad guys and random characters, so don't steal them! I will put the characters back where I found them, unharmed.

AN: Here's the next chapter! Thanks to all who read and reviewed! Please continue to R&R, it helps my muse!

Chapter 5.

Dead Ends

The next day, Danny and Lindsay were back in the lab, processing what little evidence that they had. Lindsay walked over to Adam, who was staring at the computer in confusion. "Adam?" she asked with a question in her voice.

Adam turned around. "Hey, Lindsay. I don't have anything for you. The DNA test on the hair is still processing and Samantha Miller's computer is a dead end."

Lindsay drew her eyebrows together. "What do you mean by a dead end?"

Adam shook his head. "I mean, there is nothing on this that will help us catch the killer, dead end. She wasn't even registered with the fanfiction site."

Lindsay groaned as she rolled her eyes. "And without that, there is no way a judge will get us a warrant."

Adam shrugged his shoulders. "Sorry. Nothing I can do."

Lindsay nodded as she turned to walk out of the room. "I know, Adam. This is just frustrating. Page me when you get the DNA results."

Adam nodded as he went back to trying to trace the IP address of CandiLovesWilliamTheBloody. So far, he was coming up empty. He had a hunch that without the data from the fanfiction website, he wouldn't be able to track down the location of the suspected killer.

A week had passed since the murder of Samantha Miller and the crime lab was frustrated. Unfortunately, the hair had not produced any DNA, there just weren't enough cells on it to pin down a profile and Adam hadn't had any luck in tracking the IP address either.

Flack walked into the break room to find Danny, Adam and Lindsay looking forlorn over their cups of coffee. "Why do you guys look like someone died?" he asked with a raised eyebrow.

Danny looked up at him. "Because we got squat. We have no evidence and not one suspect other than a pen name on a website."

Flack grinned like the Cheshire cat. "I think I might have something to help you out then," he said as he stood to the side and an attractive auburn haired woman walked in. "I'd like to introduce you to Cassie Jones. She just flew in from South America and has offered her help in trying to navigate the fanfiction website."

Cassie looked around at the group of people in the break room, feeling nervous. "Hi, y'all."

Flack smiled down at the overwhelmed woman. "Cassie, this is CSI Danny Messer, CSI Lindsay Monroe and lab tech Adam Ross," he introduced pointing to each of them.

Adam's eyes lit up in interest. "Cassie, I'm glad that you've come to help us. I'll admit, I'm a little out of my depth here."

Cassie smiled, feeling a kinship to Adam. "I'll do everything I can. What do you have so far?"

The group of detectives looked at each other, wondering what they could release to her. Cassie saw the look and correctly interpreted it. "Look, I'm not asking for details, but from my conversation with Detective Flack it looks like y'all think that CandiLovesWilliamTheBloody has something to do with it. Am I correct in assuming that y'all haven't been able to locate her?" Adam looked at her in stunned silence; Cassie laughed as she shook her head. "Look, I write forensic crime as well. It's a logical step."

Flack looked at her with a little more respect. "I'd say that you're right, then."

Cassie nodded. "Have you tried contacting her through the website?"

Adam shook his head. "No. I have no idea how to do that."

Cassie smiled again. "I'm assuming that y'all have a computer somewhere that I can use?"

Adam nodded his head and together the group walked from the break room to the AV lab. Adam sat down at his chair and pulled up the website. Lindsay pulled a chair over for Cassie to sit in and earned a look of gratitude from the woman.

She slid into the seat and looked at the computer screen. "Well, the first thing that you could do is sign up. Membership is free and all it requires in an email address. Now, if you want to post a story, to make yourself look like a legitimate writer, you could do that."

Danny snorted as he began to laugh. "No offense, but I don't think any of us can write."

Lindsay slapped his bicep lightly. "Hey! How do you know that one of us isn't a closet writer?"

Danny looked at her, with a smirk on his face. "Face it Montana, Flack or me wouldn't be able to pass as a serious writer, and unless you and Adam are hiding something, neither could you."

Lindsay rolled her eyes. "I hate it when you're right," she muttered under her breath. "Fine, I'll admit it. I'm not a writer. I was always into science in school."

Adam shrugged. "The last thing I wrote was a paper for college. I was never good at creative writing."

"Not a problem," interjected Cassie. "I can write one for y'all and post it. This website has a two day time frame from the time you sign up until the time you post, so if you sign up today, I can upload it in two days."

"All right," Adam replied. "So how do you log on?"

Cassie settled back in her chair and began to instruct Adam on creating an author page. When they got to choosing a penname, they hit a road block. None of them could agree on what they wanted the penname to be.

Cassie listened to the suggestions being bantered about, namely by Flack, Danny and Adam, while her and Lindsay just rolled there eyes. HotNewYorker, Hot4Buffy, to name a few.

Finally she stuck her hand up in the air. "Okay. Stop it. First of all, what kind of persona do you want this author page to suggest? Because with some of the suggestions that y'all are making are just plain ridiculous! First off, if I'm going to be writing the story, then we need to make the author page a little more…ladylike."

The rest of the group stared at her. "Fine," Danny said. "What do you suggest?"

"Well, we know that Candi writes for Buffy: The Vampire Slayer, so it stands to reason that we should post our story there. So, going for a Buffylike name, is probably our best choice. I'm thinking maybe Dru'sRedemption."

Adam scooted back from the computer and gestured her towards on. "Lead on, oh wise fanfiction author."

Cassie just rolled her eyes at him and situated herself in front of the computer. Within moments, she had signed them up; using an email address created by Adam with the same penname, and was typing out an author profile. Quickly, she made the page look indistinguishable from the other author pages, complete with an avatar.

Danny looked at her in awe with how little ease it took her to set up the page. "So, now what?" he asked.

Flack nodded. "Now, we wait, get a story posted and then review for Candi's story. Hopefully, she'll respond back and we'll be able to trace her IP address."

Everyone looked at each other in silence until Cassie cleared her throat. "In that case, I'm going to head home and write a story that we can post."

Flack nodded to her, but it was Adam that offered to show her to the door. Danny smirked after Adam left. "Ah, nerd flirting! It's great!" he said with a chuckle. Flack and Lindsay began to laugh along.

Two days later, Cassie was back in the crime lab, walking nervously towards the AV lab. She carried a flash drive in her purse, containing a story that she had written to post for the lab. In a way, it was making her feel better about hearing about Monica's death. Granted, they had never met in person, but she felt a close kinship with the younger woman in regards to their mutual passion for writing.

She paused a bit outside of the lab, taking a deep breath as she watched the lab tech, Adam bouncing a bit as he was obviously dancing to his Ipod. She smiled lightly before walking into the room.

Adam was lost in his own world, dancing around to Nickleback, when he felt a hand touch his shoulder. Involuntarily, he flinched before turning around and seeing Cassie standing there. He grinned, a little bit embarrassed as he took the ear bugs out of his ears. "Hey."

Cassie smiled at him, ignoring his flinch. "Hey. I've got the story, if you want to upload it and then we can start to review for Candi's story."

Adam nodded, gesturing her towards the chair in front of the computer. "Mi computer, es tu computer," he joked.

Cassie just rolled her eyes while shaking her head. "Does Detective Flack want to be here for the review?"

Adam shrugged. "I don't know, but I'll page, him, Danny and Lindsay and see what they say. Why don't you ahead and upload the chapter?" he suggested.

Cassie nodded and quickly logged into the site. Within a couple of moments, she had uploaded the chapter and was typing in a disclaimer. Adam watched her as she wrote her disclaimer. "Why are you writing that?"

Cassie glanced up at him. "A disclaimer? I don't want to be sued. I want everyone to know that I am not making any money from this story. You know the drill, CYA." She looked at Adam's confused gaze. "Cover your ass."

"Oh, gotcha," Adam said sheepishly. He continued to watch as her fingers fairly flew over the keyboard and soon, the story was posted on the website. "So what happens from here?"

Cassie sighed. "Well, people will review the story and tell you whether or not they like it. You'll get emails with the reviews, although you can choose to turn that off, if you want. Right now, I need to go and read the latest story from the crappy writer. I haven't read anything by her in about a year and I want to see if she's improved." Cassie rolled her eyes. "Last time I read something by her, I was so mad that I couldn't sleep!"

Adam looked at her, seeing the animation coming to her face; she was obviously very passionate about writing. "Why?" he queried.

Cassie rolled her eyes again as she turned in the chair to face Adam. "She kept calling Willow, Wilma! I mean, come on! Have you even watched the show? She's a major character!" she exclaimed in disgust.

Adam chuckled at her obvious annoyance. "Yikes. That's bad."

"Yeah, and that's the understatement of the century. Top that all off with, when I've left her constructive reviews on what she needs to do to improve her writing, she's very sarcastic in her replies." Cassie sighed heavily. "I'm not looking forward to having to interact with her, but if it helps to find Monica's killer, then it's worth it."

Adam nodded as Flack, Danny and Lindsay walked into the lab.

Flack looked at Cassie. "Thank you for doing this, Cassie. So where are we at with the story?"

Cassie smiled. "Well, I just uploaded our story and I've pulled up Candi's current story that she's posting on. I'm thinking that we can just straight flame her because I am so not into constructive criticism right now. I just wanted to know if y'all wanted some input into the review to maybe make the flame a little more," she paused for a second, "harsh?"

Flack looked at her in confusion. "Why?"

"Well, in my experience with her, the more negative things you say about her story, the angrier she gets. It may be the best way to get her to the breaking point and into a private messaging war."

Lindsay nodded. "That sounds like a good plan. So I guess we all have to read this story?"

Cassie looked at Adam. "Can you put it up on the large screen so we can read it at the same time?"

Adam nodded. "Sure," he said as he bent over the keyboard and punched a few keys. "Here ya go."

Cassie nodded and together they began to read the story.

AN: So, what'd y'all think? There will probably be 2 more chapters after this and then it'll be done!!

Bec0512 - Most people here are really nice, but this story stemmed from a response to a review that I posted, which was fairly critical of the author's story! I was so mad that this just popped into my head! Thanks!

katydid13 - Thanks! This has been somewhat hard for me to write, because I don't normally write the characters in canon! I'm all about my OC!

CSI junkie - Thanks! I was so tired of the very cliched stories that are on the board right now, that I really wanted to do something different! That was the whole reason bodies were burned! I'm sneaky that way!

Aphina - I love having Flack out of his depth! It's fun to write him confused. (:p) I felt so bad that they just missed the killer, but then that would have killed my plot that I've finally worked out!

xdannyx - Thanks and here you go!