LAS VEGAS : PRESENT
Horatio and Eric followed Grissom into the emergency room. Grissom's he rounded the corner of the nurses station asking, "Ryan Wolfe was just brought in. What room is he in?"
"Exam B," the nurse answered.
Grissom headed through the doors to exam room B. Calleigh stood outside. In the room Nick was dodging the three doctors and four nurses, trying to collect evidence while they worked.
"How is he?" Eric asked.
"Not good," Calleigh said.
A doctor Grissom knew saw him and motioned him to give him five minutes. Grissom nodded. It was ten before he left.
"Gil," the doctor said.
"Hello Ian. How is he?"
He looked at the Miami CSI.
"They're his friends," Grissom explained. "How is he, Ian?"
"He's suffering from malnutrition – I don't think he's eaten in a week or more. He has heat exhaustion, dehydration, and was stung by a scorpion. There's four broken ribs, a fractured hip, and cuts on his wrists and ankles that are infected. Was he a drug user?"
"No," Calleigh and Eric answered.
"Why do you ask?" Horatio asked.
"He has needle marks on his neck."
"Ryan was kidnapped a little less than four weeks ago," Horatio told him. "We don't know what happened to him while he was kidnapped, but we do know he was not using drugs before he was kidnapped."
"Alright. I'll order a full panel then."
"We need his clothes," Grissom told him.
"Your CSI already bagged them."
A nurse opened the door. "Doctor Spencer, we're ready to move him."
"Be right there," he told her. He told the CSI, "We're moving him to room 12 in ICU."
"Thank you," Grissom told him
Ian went back into the room. A few minutes later a nurse pushed the bed out of the room, passing them. Ryan was a mix of bandages, sun burned skin, and bruises. His face was swollen and he had a cast on his left leg from his groin to foot.
"I'm going up to ICU," Eric said, following them.
Calleigh didn't say anything as she followed.
"You will call me if you find anything?" Horatio asked Grissom.
He turned to Horatio. "Yes."
Horatio followed his CSI, leaving Grissom. Grissom entered the room.
"You'll have the room for a while," Grissom told Nick.
"Okay. Ian said he'd ask the nurses to let me finish documenting the injuries when they change the bandages in an hour, so I'll need to stay for a while."
"Hurry back. We need to find Chrissie."
"I have his clothes." Nick grabbed the bags by the door and handed them to Grissom. "Hey, Grissom, uhm… You know, that guy is in really bad shape. He's hanging on by a thread. I heard what Ian said to you guys, but in here, he didn't have a real good prognosis for Ryan."
Grissom smiled at a memory and quietly told Nick, "So was Sara, but she survived. Why can't this young man?"
Nick stared at him. Grissom took the bags and left.
Nick entered Ryan's room, smiling at the Miami CSI as he passed. A nurse followed him in with a tray of bandages. She grabbed a pair of gloves from the dispenser and sat the tray down on a table. Nick stood close as she cut the bandages from one wrist. The nurse gently unfolded one hand and held it flat for Nick to photograph Ryan's wrist.
"Other side," Nick told her.
She carefully turned Ryan's wrist, flattening out his hand. Nick focused in time to see Ryan's fingers curl. He looked at her.
"It's him," she softly said. "He's coming around."
Nick glanced at Ryan's face. One eye was almost completely swollen shut; the other was puffed up under it where the snake had bitten his cheek. If it hadn't been for the swelling, his face would have looked gaunt. Sunburned skin hid how pallid he was. Nick looked back down, gently uncurling Ryan's fingers and then snapped photos.
"Help," Ryan whispered.
Nick looked up at his face again. Calleigh moved up the bed, laying her hand on Ryan's shoulder.
"Ryan?" she softly asked.
"Calleigh?"
"Yeah. You're safe. You're in the hospital."
"Who's that?"
Nick looked up. Ryan's eyes were opened, but only slits.
"Nick Stokes. You're in Las Vegas and he's with a CSI."
"You need my statement," Ryan told Nick.
"Naw. That can wait," Nick answered.
"She's leaving for Russia."
Nick glanced at Horatio and Eric as they moved closer to the bed.
Nick looked back at him. "Chrissie is leaving for Russia?"
"Yes."
"When? Do you know what day?"
"No."
"Okay. Is she going to fly on a commercial airplane?"
"Yes. They're smuggling drugs in cadavers in coffins."
Nick smiled. "You know what I like about you Miami CSI, Ryan?"
"What?"
"You guys don't know how to give up. I gotta finish documenting your injuries then I'll get word to my supervisor."
"I've got that," Horatio said as he started dialing.
"H?" Ryan asked.
"I'll be right back, Ryan," Horatio said. Horatio stepped outside the room.
Nick and the nurse moved to the foot of the bed and Eric came around to stand on Ryan's other side.
"You are a mess, know that?" Eric joked.
Ryan didn't smile or even attempt to.
"Nick?" Ryan said.
"I'm still here. What's up?"
"When you catch her, you tell her the fire and crash didn't kill me."
Nick lowered his camera, looking up at Ryan.
"I'll be sure she knows."
Ryan slowly nodded. Nick lifted his camera, snapping his photographs. He wasn't going to tell Ryan, or anyone else, but if he saw Chrissie Mandias, his hope was she'd give him a reason to shoot to kill.
Chrissie and Jerry pulled up to the gates in a new hearse. Both looked like a business couple. Inside an FBI agent and Greg were dressed as security guards. Greg grabbed a clipboard and stepped outside the guard house.
"Can I help you?"
"We're supposed to deliver this corpse to Continental flight 418."
"Paperwork," Greg said.
Jerry handed him the papers and he looked them over. He handed them back.
"It's at terminal B, gate 17. And hurry, they were expecting you twenty minutes ago."
"I thought the flight left at seven-thirty."
"Maybe you should call the airport before you come next time," Greg told Jerry as he stepped back in the shack.
Jerry heard Chrissie move and reached over, laying his hand on her's before she could pull the gun concealed in her purse. He looked in her eyes, shaking his head very slightly. The gate rolled open and Jerry pulled through.
In the guardhouse Greg and the FBI agent watched them pull away, and when they were gone, the FBI agent lifted his radio.
"They're headed your way," he said.
"Affirmative," Brass answered.
Jerry drove along the roads to the terminal and pulled up to the luggage conveyor. The baggage handlers – one a policeman, the other Nick Stokes – were leaning against a baggage cart.
"Is this the dead guy?" Nick asked.
"Yes. This is the deceased," Jerry told them.
"Your dead guy almost missed his flight."
Chrissie got out of the car.
"Hi," Nick said, faking a flirty smile.
She smiled back as she walked around. She handed him the keys to the hearse with a rolled up hundred dollar bill.
"We're to accompany the body," she told him. "Someone from the mortuary will be picking up the car. You don't mind parking it, do you?"
"Not at all," Nick lied, letting her drop the keys into the palm of his work glove.
He dropped the items into his uniform pocket.
"Come on, Nick," the officer said, smacking his shoulder. "I'm not moving some dead guy alone."
Nick followed the officer around to the back and they loaded the coffin onto the conveyer.
"Hey, where's the tag?" Nick called.
"Oh!" Chrissie walked over. "There isn't one?"
"No. You know we can't take this without that tag. They got all these rules and regulations."
"Is there any way to convince you of overlooking that?" she asked as she produced another hundred.
"Me, yeah, but this new guy I'm working with might be a little harder to convince." He nodded behind her.
She turned, staring at the gun Horatio had trained on her. The police officer had Jerry pinned against the hearse with his gun shoved into Jerry's back. She turned as she pulled her gun from her purse, and found Nick staring down the barrel of his own gun.
Brass, police officer and FBI agents came from under the plane, surrounding them.
Chrissie turned, looking for an escape.
"Chrissie," Nick said.
She turned to him, still aiming her gun at him.
"Ryan sent a message. The fire and the crash didn't kill him," Nick snarled.
Chrissie's face was easy to read. She knew she had lost. She knew she'd made a mistake in not killing Ryan. She knew that she would never go to jail; she'd be put back into a psychiatric hospital again. Her thumb brushed against the trigger, pulling it back.
It was instinct for Nick and Horatio to respond to the threat. In unison two guns fired. One bullet hit her between the eyes. The second cut into her chest, tearing her heart apart. She fell back on the tarmac, getting her last wish in life fulfilled. She'd never see the inside of another psychiatric hospital again.
Nick stared at her body. Horatio walked around the hearse, also staring at it.
"Good shot, Horatio," he told him.
"And the same to you, Nick."
They didn't need to tell the other that they'd hoped for her to do something like she had. The individual bullets had said that clearly.