Infinity

By LMR

Disclaimer: I own this universe of CI. I have the documents. I'd show them to you, but in this universe, all legal documents are invisible. Tough noogies! ;P

Thank you for all the reviews. You guys are the best. As for Alex's pocket...You'll find out in this chappie...maybe. And thanks for the font votes. Unfortunately, I don't think I have a choice in it. seems to be shrinking my font on its own. If anybody knows how to change this please tell me as 10 seems to be preferred.

Chapter 5: Puzzle it Out

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Alex was woken with a resounding fwump on her gut. "It's Christmas, wake up! Wake up! Wake up! Wakeup-wakeupwkup!"

"Merry Christmas to you, too, Nathan." She managed to make her voice relatively cheerful despite the fact that she would really rather bang her head against the floor in aggravation (which she probably would, the way he was bouncing.) than act chipper. Did I actually have this guy inside me?!

His eyes were resolutely closed, but Bobby was wide awake and smirking.

This did not spare him.

"Way-ake uh-up!" Nathan insisted, grabbing his cheeks and shaking. Bobby snatched the kid and lifted him up.

"Gotcha!" The little boy squealed happily. Nathan got Merry Christmas kisses from the entire clan before settling back into Alex's lap.

The gift giving was organizationally shuffled. Everybody got one gift and as soon as one was "delivered" to the last person, the tearing began.

"Do I even want to know?" Alex wondered nodding her head toward Nathan's gift from Bobby. He looked away innocently, pretending he hadn't heard the question.

"Cool!" The paper had been ripped away with gusto, revealing a radio-controlled robot hammerhead. It was supposed to be an educational toy, something from the Discovery Channel store, actually, but every child in the world, Bobby included, knew perfectly well no child ever learned anything from a robotic animal other than:

Robots are cool.

"It dives and everything! It's eyes light up! Neat!"

If it had been any other man in the world, Alex would have thought he was trying to buy the child's affection. Not Bobby: He wanted to help Nathan play with it. "I thought it was cool," he explained.

Nathan hurried over to hug him. "I love you, Bobby."

Bobby gladly returned the hug, doing nothing for just a moment but enjoying being loved by a child. He glanced up at Danielle for permission. Parents don't like kids to get too attached to the boyfriends in the family. Not until there was more. Bobby shook the thought.

Alex poked her sister and whispered something at her. Bobby couldn't pick up too much of it. "...wants...no...kayta...ell...lah...sim."

Glad for the translation , Danielle nodded. "I love you, too, Nathan." He checked John's face, and to his surprise, he was almost smiling. Accepting Bobby was one thing, but to be okay with inviting him into the child's life so intimately...he was shocked that John seemed happy with that while they were still only lovers.

"Gat-ah open yours," Nathan said with determination, handing him the package.

Alex tried not to laugh as she watched Bobby carefully take off each piece of duct tape, trying not to rip the packaging. After having watched him rip into every package before it with abandon, he was opening this one slowly to the point of ridiculous, taking an inordinate amount of time with each piece of tape. It occurred to Alex that this was likely the first present from a child he had opened in some time, maybe since he was one himself. Fumbling absently with an intricate wooden puzzle box from Andrea to both of them, Alex was relishing Bobby's present-unveiling almost as much as he clearly was. He lovingly tore the paper away from the label and stowed that away in his pocket for safekeeping.

The touching gesture was lost on Nathan, who was huffing at Bobby's patience. Giving in, he tore the final seam.

It would have looked, to most adult eyes, like a lump of clay somewhat indecisive on the topic of what, precisely, it was supposed to be. But to Bobby, the imprint of a glass in the middle, something that the clay had been formed around, gave it away. He couldn't be sure, but he took a gamble.

"This is a beautiful coaster, Nathan." And he meant it. The little 'N' on the bottom with the date made it no less precious to Bobby than platinum, even if the rest of it was rather nondescript.

Nathan beamed. "I made it," he said unnecessarily.

"It's perfect. Thank you." Bobby kissed him on top of the head. He set his coffee on it, trying to ignore the way it was tipping just slightly to the left.

Alex gestured to the one remaining package, the one Andrea had been nosing around. She was sitting, legs curled in front of her toying with the puzzle box. Distracted from his remaining present, Bobby rearranged himself so he was sitting around her, reaching over her in an attempt to "help."

Alex shrugged her shoulders, moving Bobby's hand off the puzzle. "Stop that," she said, sounding a little too much like Nathan.

"The tag said it was for both of us," he pointed out, reaching over her shoulders again.

"Yeah, and if I don't get to it first, you finish it in five minutes and I'll see how you do it, and it'll be spoiled for me. Shoo." He smiled a little at the admonishment, but didn't stop. "Don't make me squish you," she warned. A few seconds passed. "I mean it." A few more. "I warned you." She pushed off with her feet and sent them both tumbling backwards onto the sofa, landing with her back square on his chest.

"Ow!" he yelled, wincing.

Her expression changed immediately and she rolled herself gracefully off him and onto the floor. "Baby, are you al-"

"Ha!" he cried triumphantly, snatching up the puzzle.

"Ratfink! You still have one left to open. Gimme that and open your present. It's from me," she added, tapping him with her foot.

He shrugged and picked up the last package, shaking it first, just to tease. He opened it, and it definitely wasn't what he'd been expecting. "A mystery puzzle?"

"Wondered how you'd do with a killer you couldn't creep out," she teased. "Have to do this the old-fashioned way."

He grinned. "There's something..." He put his head down near the box and sniffed. Alex smiled. She'd been wondering how long it would take him to notice that it had been tampered with. That there was something very different about it.

"I had it personalized," she explained, looking smug.

He removed the lid carefully, pulling out the bubble wrap that had been disguising the sound, and pulled out a piece. He could see that it didn't have the usual sheen of a puzzle piece. It was matte on top, and he made out, with the light just right, a slightly rough coating on it. He held it up to his nose. It smelled woody, with a little fresh soil mixed in. He rubbed the rough texture a little. The smell grew stronger. The picture was a series of little green strokes. and bits of brown. Leaves.

"Got a friend in a sticker factory," Alex said, obviously very pleased with herself. Had to twist his arm and call in an old favor, but I got it."

"You mean, it's..."

"Scratch and sniff," she confirmed. He laughed out loud and grabbed her up in a bear hug, kissing her fiercely.

"I can't believe you sometimes." She raised an eyebrow. "Oh, yes, I do mean that in a good way. Nobody else would ever think of that. That's so...you. So us."

She kissed him again, looked at him appraisingly as they separated. The best way to get him to do what she needed him to... "Bet you can't solve it before New Year's Eve," she challenged, swinging her feet whimsically over the edge of the fancy sofa.

"Who says I have to do it now?" he said, playing. He had every intention of diving into it as soon as he felt he had thanked her properly.

"I do, do it now."

"You bet, huh? What's the stakes?"

"If I win, no renting those subtitled movies you like to make me watch for... a month. If you win... well, can't talk about that in front of our nephew," she said casually under her breath.

That sealed it.

Naturally, he'd jumped to the obvious explanation for her side of the deal. I have fooled the most knowledgeable detective in the history of the NYPD, she thought, relishing the moment.

"You're on." Getting a nod of permission from Danielle to commandeer the coffee table, he started to lay out the edge pieces.

"Back in a bit," Alex said simply, kissing him on the cheek before following Andrea toward the kitchen with Nathan and shark close on her heels.

"Where are you going?"

"To help Andrea clean up."

"I thought you wanted me to do the puzzle."

"Yeah, get goin'." She tapped his thigh and walked out of the room.

"I can't solve a case without you," he said plaintively.

"Bobby," she said gently, leaning in the doorway. "It's not a case. It's a jigsaw puzzle with a clue in it and a fifth-grade, Encyclopedia Brown/Nancy Drew level mystery booklet attached. I think you can manage without me."

"Okay, I know, I just mean I can't have any fun solving a case unless you're there."

She smiled, touched, and glad to know his confidence level wasn't quite that disastrous. "Bobby," she said pointedly. "This puzzle was personalized for you. Just. For. You." He was pouting. "You work on it on your own for a while, then I'll come help you with it," she conceded.

"When?"

She rolled her eyes. "Do it on your own until you've had some sort of brilliant revelation, let me know what you think," she paused, "Then we'll do it together, 'k?" She was smiling slyly, apparently delighting in his grouchiness at her absence. She turned and headed back into the kitchen. "Just let me know when you figure something out," she tossed back over her shoulder.

"Why's he have to do it now?" Andrea wondered out of his earshot.

Alex grinned slyly. "You'll hear before too long." She squatted down to Nathan's level. "Wanna do me a really big favor?" Nathan nodded dutifully. "Go tell Uncle Bobby that it's good to start puzzles with the letter pieces." She made sure to speak slowly. "Can you remember that?" He nodded again. "And don't tell him I told you." She put her finger to her lips conspiratorially.

"Uncle Bobby?" (After more times than he'd kept count of, he still grinned like an idiot every time he heard those words.) "Aunt Alex said something about letters first, 'K?" he reported. Out of sight, Alex rolled her eyes. "Did I do it right?" he asked loudly, running back to his aunts.

"Close enough, little man," she praised, picking him up for a kiss.

Bobby laughed. Way to be sneaky, Al. Actually, it was exactly what he had been doing. Words were always easiest to match when there was no picture to reference, which there never was in a mystery puzzle, a good one, anyway. He'd found the word pieces. Only a few. But there was something strange about them. The writing was painted on top in shiny red... nail polish? The letters were well disguised: Only tiny fractions of letters on each piece. The pieces were irregular and not completely interlocking, which didn't help, but he liked it that way. More challenging. The words were on a banner, also painted on.

A lowercase 'a'. That's a lowercase 'y' there with a space after it.

It couldn't be.

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Ooooh, how dramatic of me!

BTW: I lied about the pocket thing. I get to torture you a little longer. (As if you don't already know.)