~Archie's A/V lab~
Archie was going over the recovered video footages from the security cameras when he came across something that made him want to smack himself silly. He picked up his cell phone and forwarded an urgent message for Grissom, Warrick, Sara and Catherine; to come to the A/V lab immediately.
A few minutes later the requested people huddled into the A/V lab and waited for Archie to show them what he'd found.
"I went over the hospital footage again, when I suddenly remembered that we've only been checking the footage inside the hospital not around because we all assumed Greg escaped by himself, but we were wrong. Check this out." Archie turned to his keyboard and tapped away at his keys and when he found the video he was looking for, he started talking again.
"This is the video footage taken from a security camera positioned on the roof above Greg's room, around 7:17 PM. I'm going to close up on Greg's window and well…it explains itself." Archie zoomed in on Greg's window and started the video.
The nightshift watched as the window was opened and an unknown man appeared in the window seeming to look down at something, before something caught his attention inside because he clearly nodded his head at someone or something inside then moved away from the window.
"I kept the video playing to see if anyone else came to the window and soon Greg appears next to our guy, who then proceeds to lock the window and pull the window up." Archie explained.
They watched the rest of the scene unfold. The unknown man walked away from the window and another unknown man walked up beside Greg and appeared to laugh at the expression on Greg's face. The man patted Greg on the back.
The footage ended when the man who had patted Greg on the back jumped out of the window. Archie stopped the tape and turned to the CSI's behind him, who were gaping open mouthed at the footage they just watched.
"I'll keep trying to see if there is any more footage like this one, but I'm afraid to say that this is the best picture you're going to get. The camera that recorded this isn't exactly up to date on technology and when I tried getting sound, all I got was static." Archie explained.
"Good work Archie." Grissom turned to the remaining members of the nightshift crew and started handing out assignments. "Warrick, Sara-I want you to go back to the hospital and talk to the staff again, see if they remember seeing these two men entering Greg's room." as if Archie had read his mind he was already printing out two close-ups of the two men's faces from the footage. The pictures were kind of blurry, but they were still clear enough for someone to possibly remember seeing them. Archie handed the photos over to Sara and Warrick. "And I also want you to get the results from Dr. Fellows on the analysis of the drug found in Greg's pocket, along with his DNA sample." Grissom finished.
Sara and Warrick walked out of the lab with their assignments.
Grissom turned to Catherine. "Catherine, I need you to keep working on the Lothspeich case." Catherine was about to protest but he cut her off. "I know you want to help Greg, but with Nick gone we are going to need to work twice as hard to solve these cases and I really don't want to have to hand them over to Ecklie because he thinks we're too emotionally involved. So I need you to go through all the evidence we currently have on her case and call me if you find anything."
"And what will you be doing?" She asked, before she turned for the door.
"I'm going over to Greg's apartment, see if I can find any evidence that can help us find him." Grissom walked out of the lab and headed for the parking garage.
Catherine turned to Archie about to say something but Archie beat her to it.
"I'll tell you if I find anything new." He assured her with a smile. Catherine thanked him and headed out of the lab for the evidence room.
~Briefing room of the Sanctum~
After Greg's injuries had been attended to by Korey she told him to meet Sean in the briefing room that was on the left of his father's office. He was at first a little lost when he was walking through the warehouse, but soon found his way when he came across the shooting range. Not really liking the sound of guns going off and bullets making impact into the targets, he hurried away from the noises and quickly escaped over to the staircase and ascended the stairs.
He walked past his father's office and paused outside the briefing room hearing a conversation going on that raised a lot of red flags. That voice belonged to none of other than Sean and from what he had heard so far, whomever Sean was talking to sounded like another boss.
"I told you I would take care of it and I did…no they don't suspect anything. George still thinks he's taken care of the problem…yes sir, I'm going to get rid of the rest of the evidence tonight…understood sir." The conversation seemed to have ended, but just in case he delayed his entrance for a few more minutes and glad because what heard next shed some more light onto the situation.
"Tina just couldn't keep her mouth shut!"
Greg stood rooted to the spot, shocked at what he had just heard. The pieces were slowly starting to come together. He was still a little confused of course, but now he could see that Sean was the reason Tina was dead and he suspected that Tina either hadn't been the only rat or she wasn't the rat to begin with, but in reality it was Sean. He needed to look more into this.
Knowing that Sean would come looking for him if he didn't go in soon, he grasped the handle and turned.
~A few hours earlier outside Nick's apartment~
Nick parked his truck in his building's parking lot and turned the ignition off. Instead of immediately getting out he sat in his truck staring out through the windshield with a faraway glazed look in his eyes.
All he could think about since leaving the Crime Lab building was how he was going to find Greg, even if he was technically 'off the case'. He could weasel information out of Warrick and investigate any leads they might have, but he didn't want his friend to get in trouble and there was also the possibility of him doing more harm than good.
He knew that he was too emotionally involved to be working Greg's case and yes Grissom had even assured him that he would still be in the loop, should anything important come up, but somehow that still wasn't comforting. He wanted to be a part of the action. He wanted to be the one who brought Greg home.
After a few more minutes of self-moping he finally got out of the car and headed for his apartment building. Unbeknownst to Nick he was being watched.
A man in a familiar black van was stationed a little ways across the street with a camera aimed directly at him and his apartment building. The man zoomed in on Nick as he got out of his truck and took some close up pictures of him walking towards his apartment building and for the final money shot he zoomed in on his face when it was in the right angle and took the shot.
The man smiled and turned to his companion who had a smile of his own.
"Did you get the other shots?" He asked him.
His companion nodded and retrieved the photos from a manila envelope. The pictures were of the inside of Nick's apartment and there was even one of Nick sleeping on his couch.
"Oh yeah, he's going to love these." The man commended.
~Back at the sanctum~
Hearing the door open Sean turned around and saw Greg standing in the door. "Glad you could finally join me Greg, I trust Korey tended to you injuries?" Sean asked conversationally.
"Yeah, she did. No matter how many times I told her that I could take care of them myself." Greg looked around the room and saw a metal table that seated six and a blown up picture of the Crime Lab pinned up on the wall. But he also noted that no one else was in the room.
"Where's everyone else?"
Sean walked towards Greg then sat down on the edge of the table in front of him.
"The rest of the guys are down in the locker room getting suited up. They've all ready been briefed. Toby isn't going to be joining us tonight though, because he's currently lying unconscious in his bed. I got to say man I'm impressed, not too many people have been able to hurt him that bad." Sean praised.
Greg didn't know if he should be pleased or unnerved at hearing that. He made Toby sound like some kind of fighting machine and if you saw him you would agree.
"That power you have is pretty powerful and could be used for a lot things…like tonight." Sean said.
"What? I can't control it yet Sean! I could seriously hurt someone if I'm not careful." From the glint in Sean's eye Greg knew that that was his intention. "I'm not going to hurt anyone and I'm especially not going to stand by and let you." Greg exclaimed.
Sean stood up from the table and in a flash lashed out, yanked Greg up by his throat, whipped around and slammed him down on the table. Greg cried out in pain from the abuse to his injuries.
"You know I'm getting real tired of you not following orders, so I've come up with a little presentation that is sure to make you see things my way. I know you've heard this threat before, but I figured it was time for some visual aid." Sean reached into his back pocket and took out some folded up papers. He unfolded one by one, showing them to Greg. Greg's eyes widened as he scanned across the pictures of Nick, ranging from getting out of his truck to entering his apartment, but what really freaked Greg out was the picture of Nick asleep on his couch.
"I am fully capable of killing your precious Nick and I will do so without hesitation if you don't start doing as you are told. I swear to god I will personally be the one to take the life out Nicholas Stokes." Sean released his grip on Greg and turned away from him while Greg gasped in precious air that had previously been denied to him. When his breathing was under control, he rose up from the table and leant against it, staring down at the photos.
For a few minutes nothing was said. All that could be heard in the room was the humming of the air vents, chatter from downstairs and their own breathing.
After a few choppy breaths, Greg finally spoke up. "You said you wanted to brief me on tonight's plan, so start briefing." Sean turned to face Greg and his expression became serious.
"Sit down; we have a lot to discuss before you're ready for tonight."
~Crime Lab Briefing Room~
Most of nightshift sat around the table waiting for Grissom to arrive to discuss what they had found on Greg's case. Catherine had also joined them to discuss some of the evidence she had discovered from her own case.
Grissom finally walked through the door, carrying a paper bag while closing the door behind him. He walked over to the head of the table and through his facial expressions he told them that he was ready to hear what they had found.
"Sara and I went down to the hospital and talked to a few of the staff members again and when we showed them the photos, they said that they did remember seeing them enter Greg's room, but thought that it wasn't relevant to the case, so they didn't say anything. But what's really important is that many of the staff remembers seeing identical tattoos on the two men's forearms, so I had a sketch artist come down and they all described the same tattoo." Warrick opened a manila envelope and produced a sketching of the tattoo.
"That's the same tattoo that we found on Tina Lothspeich." Catherine pointed out, remembering the photo she had seen in her own evidence.
"Yep, when we showed the tattoo to Dr. Fellows he said that he remembered seeing that exact tattoo on Greg's forearm, so somehow these two men and Greg could possibly be connected with Tina." Sara finished.
Grissom sighed and planted his hands on the table, holding all his weight up with his arms. He turned to Catherine and she took out the pieces of evidence she had found.
"After going through Tina's phone records I discovered that she had been talking with someone quite frequently for the past three months, almost all of the phone records are to this same person, who she called and received calls from at least three times a day. I'm having Archie track down the owner of this number as we speak, so hopefully we might get a lead out of this. Other than that, that's all I have." Catherine said tiredly.
Grissom noticed the tired expressions on all his CSI's faces and came to a decision.
"I went to Greg's apartment and looked through his things and I found this." he placed the bag on the table and pulled out a shot that was filled to the brim with a clear fluid.
"The hospital faxed over the results and it turns out that what we thought was a drug, is actually antibodies, but for what we don't know, but whatever the reason Greg seems to be taking a lot of it because this entire bag is filled with them." He dumped the bag out and the shots skittered across the table. "I've already gone over each of these shots and I couldn't find a single good fingerprint, it's almost like the people who made these shots were wearing extra thick gloves." Grissom added.
"So we still have nothing?" Sara summed up with a disappointed frown on her face.
"Not quite, we have a definite description of the men who helped Greg escape and a possible tie with the Lothspeich case." Grissom looked at the people in front of him and saw that they were all fighting to keep their eyes open, which was becoming a losing battle with the way they had to hold their heads up with the hands.
"Okay everyone you did a good job, but I think its time that we all head home and get some sleep." No one truly wanted to go home while Greg was still out there along with the new developments in the case, but they were dead on their feet and they knew they were no good to anyone if they were zombies, they could miss vital evidence, so they relented and stood up from the table, collecting their evidence, before returning to their beds for much needed rest.
~An hour later~
A black van parked a little ways away from the Crime Lab so as to not be seen by the many security cameras in the parking garage and in front of the building.
Six men exited the van and stealthily crept towards the building. When they reached the building, one by one they shifted through the wall and reappeared in the locker room of the Crime Lab.
"Where's the evidence room Greg?" Sean asked looking round at the rows of lockers around them.
"It's this way." Greg led the men towards the wall on the other side of the room. One by one the men passed through the room and before the camera was able to record their presence, they quickly steered around the view of the lens and made it across the room and into the next.
They continued this process for two more rooms before they made it to the evidence room.
Sean looked at Greg expectantly and Greg knew what he was thinking. "I don't know exactly where they're keeping the evidence for Tina's case, so we're just going to have to look." Greg informed him. But unbeknownst to the five men, excluding Greg of course, one of the newer security cameras that was hidden very well along the wall was recording the men's every move.
"Ha ha, jackpot! Hey guys I found it!" Exclaimed one of the men. Everyone gathered around the box and with double-layered latex gloves on to prevent leaving fingerprints, the box was carried over to a table and set the box down.
"We don't need to sort through it guys, lets just get out of here and dispose of it." Sean ordered, anxious to get out of there as fast as he could.
Greg and the four other men walked over to the wall and shifted through it, but a surprise waited for them on the other side and this unforeseen surprise went by the name of Hodges.
Hodges was startled by the sudden intrusion and dropped his cup of coffee. The shards of china scattered in front of him and he didn't even notice the burning of the coffee that had seeped through his pant leg. He looked at the men in front of him in shock, much like they were looking at him in surprise, before his eyes stopped on Greg.
"Sanders?" He questioned in shock.
Sean recovered first from the surprise and reached for the gun hidden in his coat. The other men, excluding Greg coped his movements. Greg knew what was about to happen and quickly shot forward to push Hodges down on the floor and out of the way just as the bullets started flying.
He managed to dodge most of them, but one stray bullet managed to lodge itself in his shoulder. Not having time to fuss over his wound he quickly crawled to the floor over to where Hodges was on his stomach, covering his ears with his hands.
"Get out of here!" Greg shouted.
Not having to be told twice Hodges shot up from the floor and escaped through the door, narrowly avoiding a bullet meant for his head. The initial fire of bullets had stopped when Greg had been shot, but Sean had continued shooting, mainly aiming to scare Hodges into making a dumb move and get shot, but he stopped shooting once Hodges was out of eyeshot.
Sean lowered his gun and angrily walked over to Greg, yanking him up from the floor by the scruff of his hair, ratting his injuries as well as the injuries he had sustained earlier.
"What did I tell you about following orders?" He spat in Greg's face.
"Your orders didn't include killing! And I told you that if you tried to hurt anyone I cared about, especially Nick, I would kill you!" Greg retorted.
Sean carelessly dropped Greg to the floor, which caused a grunt of pain on impact.
Sean turned to his men and smiled, relaying the next order. "Kill Nicholas Stokes!"
Upon hearing this Greg eased himself up from the floor and limped over to the wall. Before he shifted through he was stopped by Sean's voice.
"You're going to have to hurry Greg; I have more men out there who can easily finish the job!" Sean laughed as Greg shifted through wall after wall until he reached outside.
Greg limped his way over the van, getting in the driver's side. The keys were of course gone, but after spending a few weeks with his older cousin when he was a kid, he had learned all kinds of juvenile delinquent things, like for instance; hotwiring a car.
Greg quickly went through the procedure of hotwiring a car and when the van sputtered to life he had to resist himself from shouting out in joy. He put the car in drive and pulled out of the parking lot and onto the surprisingly deserted streets of Las Vegas.
~Nick's apartment building~
After going out and showing pictures of Greg around Nick trudged back into his apartment building and dug through his pockets, before producing his key and stopping in front of his door.
He slid the key into the lock and turned. Before he entered the room he reached around the door and flipped the light switch on, covering the room in light.
Nick walked inside and closed the door behind him, being careful to relock all three of the locks on his door. After making sure the door was properly locked he turned back around and immediately felt that something was off.
He looked around the room cautiously, when his eyes landed on the open window, explaining the unusual smell of dessert and the slight breeze drifting into his room. A feeling of dread and unease filled him as he would never leave a window open.
Nick pulled his gun out, clicking the safety off then holding the weapon out in front of him ready to fire. His eyes traveled across the entire room, watching out for any unwanted visitors.
He walked around the room and stopped abruptly when he heard a soft moan of pain coming from behind his couch. With his gun now trained at the couch he slowly crept towards it and peered over the edge. He saw a figure lying on the floor behind it, practically bleeding to death, making his heart skip a beat.
"Greg?" He just managed to choke out.
A/N: I'm sorry it took so long to update this story but I have been extremely busy. Please review if you want more because it really motivates me to write more! Also I have to give an extreme thank you to my BETA Holly, thanks for helping me!