Near the end of the shift, only an hour remaining, Skye and I were done with all the things.

I could only do DNA and some trace, but that left still a lot of other things, which Skye did alone. She was a quick worker, music helping her work faster and better.

We stopped talking while we worked, and just as I was finishing up, I heard a sigh.

"Finallllly! I'm done." Skye announced, pushing against the desk to roll the chair across the room to the computer and printer.

I turned as she rolled past me, her long black hair down and flowing down her shoulders like black oil, only without the mess. "Hey, careful you don't hit anything as you roll around."

She abruptly stopped right at the printer, grabbed the sheet of paper and rolled in my direction. I thought she was gonna roll past me again, but she grabbed my chair and my chair moved along with hers to the middle of the lab. "Don't worry, Sanders. I won't hit anything." She gave me a toothy grin and her blue eyes sparkled.

With her foot she pushed me back to the microscope and she rolled back to her desk, grabbing a file and putting the paper in it.

"You're seriously done?" I asked.

She nodded, and put the file on a pile of other files. I could see 10 of them, plus evidence packets neatly next to them.

"Wow. You're fast." I said, going back to the microscope, hoping to finish up fast.

"Thanks. Patience and taking things slow are not strong suits of mine."

Since you don't like to take things slow, how bout we skip the getting-to-know-each-other thing and just go out? I thought.

Skye laughed suddenly and I immediately blushed. "Did I say that out loud?!"

She looked at me, and shook her head. "No, it was something funny I remembered. Sorry." She apologized and then saw my heated cheeks. "What were you thinking? Your face is red, must've been something funny. Or embarrassing. Or…"

"Nothing, it was nothing." I returned my heated face to the eye lens of the compound light microscope I was using.

"Sure it was nothing." She started and I felt her eyes on me, then nothing.

It got quiet, minus the radio playing.

"Skye?" I looked at her.

"Yeah, Ryan? Uh, Greg, I meant. Greg." She said, looking at me calling me Ryan and she blushed, stammering.

I smiled a little. "That's my name."

"Sorry. You just look like Ryan, a bit. And sound like him too." The pretty young labrat admitted.

"So he's devastatingly good-looking and has a dreamy voice if we sound and look alike." I said slyly.

Skye laughed. "Sure, Greg. Let's say that. Not far off from that, though."

I laughed too and finished up with the DNA. "All right then. Can you just go over and get the DNA results?"

Getting up from the chair, she went to the printer and read the results, then gave them to me. "Unknown male."

"Uh." I read it.

"What do you do now?"

"Not my problem now. It's the CSI's."

Skye took the paper and waved it infront of my face. "Well, aren't you a CSI now, Mr. Sanders?"

"CSI wannabe." A familiar Texan accent said from the door.

We looked up to see Nick Stokes stand there with my sister.

"Nicky!" Skye grinned.

"Hey Skye. How was it? Did you behave?"

"She behaved quite well. She was rowdy at times but I settled her down." I smirked.

Nick gave a look, identical to the ones I give him when he looks at Erica like the Casanova he is.

Skye saw and gave me a look, confused and questioning. I simply smiled nicely at her, and she returned it, turning to Nick.

"Did Greg behave, Skye?" Nick asked.

She looked at me then back to Nick. "We were just fine, Nicky. Don't worry. See look, I didn't hurt myself, Greg, or anyone else. The lab's still intact."

The Texan looked at his younger cousin. "Ok."

"Hey bro. Hi Skye!" Erica said cheerfully.

"Hey Erica." The two of us said together.

Erica laughed as Nick sort of scowled.

"So Skye, where's those fibers I gave you?" Nick said.

Skye went to the pile and dug through the files til she found the one she was looking for. "It's a polyester fiber. The other one was cotton. A polyester/cotton blend, that'd be almost any shirt, bedspread, etc. Good luck." She said, handing it to him.

"I thought you were the best in the lab. You just gave me…almost nothing to work off of."

"White fibers, look for a white shirt, bed sheet, curtain. Sorry. All I could get. Why don't you give me more to work on next time?" Skye said with a grin.

He gave her a look.

"Don't you give me that look, Nick." She warned easily. Nick handed the file back to her and gave her a evidence packet. "Try this. Scrap of cloth. It's stiff--"

"Like it was ironed and sprayed with something?" Skye took it.

Nick nodded.

"Ok, thanks." Skye put it on the table and took off her lab coat.

"Hey, what'cha doin'?" Nick questioned.

Skye pointed to the clock on the wall. "Shift's over. I ain't doing anything else. I'm outta here. Tired, in need of food, and sleep."

I saw how tired she looked, she was getting circles under her tired eyes.

"No way, it'll be quick."

"It'll take awhile, you know that." Skye said. "Come on, Nicky."

"No." He said stubbornly.

I smiled when I saw the Nick was blocking the door and when Skye moved to step around him, Nick stepped too and blocked the way out.

I laughed when Skye stomped her converse clad foot and whined, "Niiiicccck!"

Erica laughed and said, "Come on, Nick."

"No way, I need to know." he insisted.

"I'll tell you tomorrow!" Skye tried pushing him out of the way, but Nick planted his feet firmly on the ground and didn't budge.

After a 5 second stare-down with her older cousin, Skye backed down. "Fine. Ok? Fine, Nick. Come on and get me some gloves." She sighed, turning her back on him and took a few steps towards the table. Nick went to fetch the gloves and as soon as he did, Skye turned and made a run for the door.

I laughed with Erica as Nick turned and saw through the glass wall that Skye was out and gone.

"Oh no she didn't." Nick huffed but his brown eyes showed a hint of laughter.

"Oh yeah she did." Erica smiled. "Greggo's girlfriend just ran off. Sorry Nick."

Nick was startled to hear that and looked at me. "What?! Girlfriend?"

"No." I said. "She had a boyfriend and it's not me, geez." I said, my good mood gone.

"Ok, I was bout to go off. It's only been one day. Not even a day, hours!"

"Did you check out her DNA?" Erica questioned teasingly.

I blushed. "No."

"Ask her out?"

"No."

"Get her number?"

"No." I huffed, getting rather irritated by Erica's questions.

"Good, cuz I don't want her to be hurt." Nick said.

"Skye would be hurt less with a guy like me than with a Casanova womanizer like you." I stated, boldly.

Erica and Nick were both surprised, I was surprised myself.

After an awkward silence and a staring contest between me and the strong Texan who could do serious damage if he wanted to, Erica continued.

"So do you like her?"

Taking off my lab coat and putting it on the chair, I left. "I'll see you at home, Erica."

Hurrying out of the lab, I laughed to myself; almost seeing her reaction in my head.

Happy because she's alone to make out with Nick, then realizing that I was her only ride home.

I paused for a second, just at a corner of the lab.

"Greg, wait! You're my only ride!" Erica's voice carried down the lab.

I burst into laughter and then hurried away.

[*]

"Really, I oughta get a map for this place." I heard a frustrated Southern accented female voice echoing down the hallway.

The lights flickered off down the hallway, they always did, but Skye sure didn't know that.

I heard a thud and a "Owww! My face!"

I couldn't help but laugh.

"Who's there? Greg?" The girl asked, then I heard footsteps, another thud, a groan and a irritated voice. "I hate this place."

"Yeah, it's Greg. Just chill, the lights always do that." I said in her direction.

She emerged from the darkness, looking sort of hilarious. Her eyes were wide, and she looked around, taking in her surroundings and she was biting her lip. She saw me and smiled. "I don't know where I am."

"Locker rooms." I said, opening mine.

"Should've figured that one out faster." She said, looking at the lockers.

I grabbed my jacket. "Yeah, but I don't blame you. You're new here. The lights do that often, don't worry bout it. You ok? Sounded like you ran into something."

"Ran into a open locker door, then into the bench. So my shins hurt and my nose hurts." Skye said. "But I can see now, I'm good. Can you show me how to get outta here?"

"Sure, I'm leaving too." I said.

Leading the way out of the locker room, we passed Grissom who stopped.

"Hello, Miss Stokes. Greg."

"Skye, please."

"I didn't do anything, I swear!"

Grissom looked alarmed and looked at me.

"Greg didn't do anything bad, Grissom. He showed me around and helped me do some work in the lab. Really backed up for awhile, huh?"

The supervisor nodded. "Yeah, did you finish it all?"

"Greg helped me out, we both finished it all."

"I didn't expect it to be done today, it would've been fine if it was finished tomorrow. Wow, Skye." Grissom was impressed.

"Like I said, Greg helped too."

I grinned. "She did 3/4ths of the work, I didn't do as much compared to her."

He nodded. "Well, how was your first day?"

"It went fine, better than I expected." Skye said.

"Glad you enjoyed it. I got all your paperwork in and filed, you'll officially be part of the crime lab tomorrow. You'll get your id transferred from the Miami-Dade crime lab and with a few adjustments, it'll be your id for here."

"Thank you." Skye smiled and looked at me. "Officially working tomorrow. Awesome."

I smiled back. "Welcome to the LVPD."

Her eyes lit and Grissom smiled. "Glad you're with us, Skye. Go home and sleep off that jet lag in your eyes, and come back tomorrow."

"Thank you, Grissom. Bye!" She said as we left again.

Grissom went into his office and we walked away.

"Tomorrow's your official first day here." I said.

"Yeah. I hope it'll be just as good as today was."

"But I have to go into the field tomorrow. So you won't have me with you."

She pouted playfully. "Aw, you're leaving me for a dead body, Greg?"

I chuckled. "Can you make it sound any more weird?"

"Yeah, I can actually. 'You're not going to spend time with me, so you go hang with a dead body?' "

Laughing, I said, "Yeah, I am. Don't worry, I'll pop in on occasion and see how you're doing."

Her eyes danced. "Ok. Oh and Greg?"

"Yeah?"

"Wanna go out?"

"Me? Like a date? Sure, of course I'd like to. Even though I just met you, you know."

"Yeah, but I felt a connection with you that I cant deny."

"Same here. So, where you wanna go?"

"Earth to Greg!" Skye waved her hand infront of my face.

I snapped out of my fantasy conversation with fantasy Skye and looked at the pretty labrat.

Her eyes were laughing at me, she had a smile on her face and looked just amused.

"Sorry. I wasn't paying attention."

"Thanks for sharing, Captain Obvious." She said playfully, and grabbed my arm; stopping us in the middle of the hallway. "So, I was asking, is making out in labs on a table allowed here?"

My heart pounded and I could almost see my fantasy coming real. "If you want it to." I grinned.

Skye laughed and shook her head. "No seriously, Greg. Is that allowed?"

"No, it's not."

"Oh. Well, then. Nick and Erica better quit it if that's not allowed." Skye said, looking past me.

I turned to see us standing outside of Erica's lab where my little sister was sitting on a table, and was trading spit with Skye's cousin.

"Oh, this is disgusting." I made a face and rolled my eyes.

Skye burst out laughing. She stuck her face in the lab and I wondered what she was gonna do.

"EWWWWWWWW! GET A ROOM THAT'S NOT MADE OF GLASS!" Skye yelled and as they broke apart, Nick saw her and started to let go of Erica to grab Skye by the throat or something.

Skye grabbed my hand and pulled me away. Laughing, we ran down the hall into an elevator and I pressed the button to the lobby. The doors closed and panting from the rib-cracking laughter, I looked at Skye.

"Wow, that was funny. Nick looked like he wanted to kill you."

She just grinned, and when the doors opened we got out. "He always looks like that."

"He gives me that look too. I wouldn't worry."

"Yeah." We left the building and it was dark, but the dawn was coming just over the horizon.

"So you stayin with Nick or do you already have your own place?"

"I'm gonna start looking for a new place soon." Skye said, as she walked with me to the parking lot.

"Cool. So…how are you going to get to Nick's? Do you have the car keys or something?"

Like Erica, she realized her only ride home was by their family.

"I'm such an idiot. I didn't grab the car keys when he was sucking face with your sister." Skye sighed, but reached in her pocket and took out a key. "Nick's house key. He gave me the spare so I can get in. But my stuff is in his car, and I want to get my bag." Skye said, and headed to Nick's car.

Crossing her fingers, she pulled on the door; but Nick had locked it.

"Well, this sucks. Stuck in Vegas without money, a ride, any sense of direction, and I'm jet lagged and hungry." Skye groaned, resting her head on the window. "Oh lovely SUV, please let the back be unlocked." She said to herself as she went around and tried the back without success.

"I give up, gonna hang and wait for Nicky."

"You don't have to." I said. "You can come with me, I'll drop you off."

"Really? I shouldn't, Erica is kinda relying on you for a ride."

"She'd rather go with Nick, believe me." I smiled. "Come on. I wont bite or anything."

Skye smiled but hesitated. "I don't know…"

"Please, I'd rather not hang and wait for Erica to come and start babbling about Nick like a love struck puppy."

"Ok." Skye relented and walked with me to my car.

[*]