Hi, I am so sorry this update took so long. I had been super busy with finals, graduation, along with touring stress etc. I am not promising that life won't get the better of me again but here is an update.

Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I do not own in any way, shape or form Grimm, any of its characters or dialogue (excluding my own original characters).

Entering the bullpen Nick stalked over to his desk and collapsed in his seat, instinctively resting his right elbow atop the wooden desk and mashing his closed fist against his mouth and under his nose.

His entrance hadn't gone unnoticed; the air in the room had noticeably thickened seconds before he entered and seemed to only intensify the closer he came to his desk. All eyes watched as the detective collapsed at his desk chair and transformed into the literal representation of deeply troubled.

They were wise though and declined from approaching the man.

One man though was not as inclined. Captain Sean Renard.

Like his officers he had also noticed the coming presence of Nick, but unlike them he could tell who the aura belonged to before having visual. It was an aura that Sean had first ingrained into his memory when the younger man had first entered his precinct. Even before Nick had discovered his Grimm heritage he had known and felt the power of the Grimm that was lurking deep inside the man, a power that enraged his zauberbiest side but intrigued the other part of him that was Regnant.

He hadn't run into a Grimm in a good three years at that time, the last one having been 'taken care of' when he had entered his protectorate and had gone on a killing spree of any and all wesen he came across.

His whereabouts to the public and precinct were still unknown.

He had purposely given Detective Burkhardt and his partner Detective Hank Griffin their current case, having seen earlier pictures that had been sent to him by CSU. If they really were dealing with an Endezeichen Grimm, then the wesen population in Portland was in serious danger of being exterminated.

Looking out his window he watched as Nick sat at his desk, his computer off and still in the same pose that had fueled Sean's concern for the younger man. Something was deeply troubling the detective, and common sense told him that it had something to do with the case.

~GRIMM~

Lowering his hand he finally turned on his computer and opened up the pictures that contained the message. There had to be a meaning behind them, otherwise why leave them behind?

When he had told Hank that he was going to try and decipher the message he had mainly said it as an excuse for leaving but now with the actual task at hand he found that his mind was all over the place and bouncing from the gruesome images at the crime scene to the pulsing emotions that were skittering around his mind and shocking his insides in want to attention.

Shaking his head once in an attempt to kick down the wall in his mind he did the only thing he could do at this point, run the message through the internet and see what results he got. As expected he didn't get any specific results but there were plenty of documents that came up that had similar letters to it. Clicking on one of the links he was brought to a long document that went on for five pages, all in a foreign language.

Suddenly a bar dropped down on the screen and it was there that he saw the page was written in Romanian. Finally having something to go on he picked up a pen and wrote out Romanian on a pad of paper then dropped the pen and went back to his computer.

He spent the next fifteen minutes going through various translation websites until he found one that translated Romanian into English but when he did find one he had to go through several others just to make sure that it was accurate.

By the end he had finally managed to get a rough translation of the message:

"All is not what it may seem, for deep inside there is a beast."

Sitting back in his seat he ran the words over in his head, trying to figure out if there was any special meaning behind the words. He didn't recognize it from any literature but just to be sure he also ran the phrase through the network but came back with nothing.

Fatigue starting to set in, he picked up his cup of coffee but was dismayed to find that it was empty. Sighing he rose from his chair and walked over to the coffee machine. Normally anyone with some sense of mind would avoid the dirt flavored station coffee but he needed the caffeine now and he didn't feel like waiting around for the next coffee run.

Setting the empty cup in the sink he chose a clean mug from the shelf and lifted the coffee holder up off the hot plate and filled his mug. Setting the holder down, he turned and was startled by the sudden figure of his captain standing behind him, his eyes unreadable as always. As a result his hand had jerked and most of his coffee had gone sloshing over the rim and onto his hand and clothes, burning him and causing him to blurt out obscenities.

"Son of a bitch!" he muttered at the end, setting the mug down and shaking the remaining drops of coffee off his hand then reaching over and swiping a few sheets of paper towels and patting the remaining coffee off his hand and clothing.

The whole time Sean had remained silent, not saying anything, only observing and taking note of the obvious bags under the detective's eyes and too pale features. He looked like he could keel over at any moment.

"How many hours of sleep have you gotten?" he inquired, concern for the younger man flowing through him.

Nick looked guiltily at his still burning hand, refusing to answer like a petulant child who didn't want to admit to having done wrong.

"Nick?" he persisted, wanting an answer.

"Maybe 3" he admitted, his eyes finally meeting Sean's.

Shaking his head Sean reached out and took the mug of coffee from Nick's grasp, his hand brushing against Nick's and for a moment a spark of power went through them but vanished in a blink, going by so fast that both were quick to shake it off as nothing more than static shock. Setting the coffee aside he addressed him,

"I'm sending you home. I can't have one of my best detectives dead on his feet. You can come back in tomorrow after you've gotten some rest, and the same goes for your partner" he ordered, the command not one that was given regularly and when it did come it was usually a sign that overtime was not agreeing with you.

Nick shook his head, "I'll be fine captain, just need to get some caffeine in me and I'll be alert. I just started making a dent in this case and if I leave now it could pass me by. I can't just leave now because of lack of sleep" he added at the end.

"I heard about your case, look I understand your need to spend every hour of everyday on tracking this individual down, I myself am very concerned about what this could mean, but you're running yourself ragged and that means your mind is not at its best. So, I'm ordering you to go home and get some sleep. The case will still be here when you get back" he persisted, his tone leaving no room for argument.

Before he could bite his tongue Nick found himself responding, "is that an order?"

Sean's left eyebrow rose in a challenging manner but his frown remained, "it is. Now go home, I don't want to see you back here until tomorrow"

Turning on his heel Sean strode back into his office and pointedly closed his office door behind him, and stood watching Nick from his window to make sure that he would follow his order.

Growling in frustration Nick stalked back over to his desk and collected his jacket while logging off his computer. Before leaving though he grabbed the rough translation of the message along with a quick printout of the actual picture of the scene then walked out, keeping his head down in order to avoid meeting the eyes of his fellow officers.

He felt like a kid who had been sentenced to the bench during the big game.

Once Nick had left Sean returned to his desk and sat down in his plush chair, the phone almost crawling into his hand as he speed dialed a familiar number.

Waiting for the phone to ring he brought up the crime scene pictures and on hearing the click spoke,

"I need you to look into something."

~GRIMM~

Going home was the last thing on Nick's mind. Something was driving him in this case, something primal and all consuming. He didn't have time to sleep, not when he still had so much work to do.

Pulling up to the side of the trailer he got out of his car and walked over to the door, the key already in his hand. Unlocking the trailer he stepped in and quickly closed the door behind him, not wanting to risk anyone seeing what was inside.

Going over to the desk he shrugged out of his jacket and draped it over the seat before sitting down and pulling a random book over to himself.

There had to be a reference to the message somewhere, obviously the words meant something to the person or persons committing these crimes but all he was seeing right now was a shadowy foreboding of his rapidly darkening future.

Grimacing he put that thought aside and set his mind on scanning the pages before him, on the lookout for any reference to the Endezeichen Grimm.

Getting to the last page of the book he was in he closed the book and moved on to another thick volume that was a faded brown leather that was starting to fall apart from years, maybe even centuries of use.

He could already tell by the time he reached the center of the book that his search wasn't going to be easy.

~GRIMM~

~Four hours later~

He was currently rifling through what felt to be his 1,000th book, but he was sure was much less having lost count, when his cellphone suddenly shrilled startling him so badly that he almost fell out of his chair.

Shaking his head in exasperation with himself he reached into his jacket pocket and took out the shrilling device and saw that it was Juliet.

Before answering he cleared his throat then accepted the call.

"Hey honey" he greeted, resting his elbow on the old mahogany desk.

"Nick where are you? We're supposed to have dinner tonight with Beth and Andy, remember?" she inquired, standing in their living room in an elegant green dress that hugged her curves in all the right places.

Shit! He had completely forgotten about that. With the case going on and his darkening thoughts it had completely slipped his mind. They had planned this dinner weeks ago when Juliet learned that her cousin was going to be in town for a brief time with his fiancée. She had really been looking forward to this and had made him promise that he would do his best to be there.

"Right the dinner, um look I'm heading home right now I was just visiting with Monroe and time got away from us but I promise you I will be there on time" he rose from the chair and as he continued speaking slipped into his jacket and grabbed his car keys off the desk but as he was about to head to the door his eyes grazed over the current open book in front of him and he finally found a section on the Endezeichen Grimm.

He found himself sitting back down and his eyes roaming over the words that a member of his family had written, but this wasn't just any family member. He recognized this handwriting almost as well as he knew his own.

It was his Aunt Marie's.

This was the first time he had come across anything that had been written by her and it was like a punch to the gut that the first entry he would find was on such a personal subject: their own origins.

Unable to help himself he traced her distinctive cursive with his fingertip. Conjuring up a picture of what his aunt may have looked like as she wrote this entry.

He was so absorbed with his thoughts that he completely forgot that he was still on the phone with Juliet who by now had grown greatly concerned by his lack of response.

"Nick? Nick! Are you there? What's going on?"

The sound of her panicked voice brought him back to himself and he forced his gaze away from the book, making an effort to keep all his attention on soothing Juliet's concerns.

"Sorry, sorry about that, I was just thinking about a case that I'm working and my mind went elsewhere. Everything's fine, I promise" he assured her, feeling like such a jerk for having caused her such concern.

Juliet breathed a sigh of relief at his words, though she was still concerned about him. She knew that he was holding back on her, a trait that she had been trying to break him of but was having minimal success.

"Are you sure you're to okay to drive? Maybe you should call a cab or better yet I could just come pick up?" she suggested, not liking the thought of him driving in the possible state that he was in.

"I'm fine Juliet, all I had was one beer. I'll be home soon and then you and I will have a nice dinner with your cousin and his fiancée, just like we planned" he assured her, taking a moment he picked up a loose piece of paper and placed it in the corner of the spine that the entry was located at then closed the book.

"Okay, I'll see you in a little while. I love you" she added, turning to head back up-stairs to finish getting ready.

"Love you too, bye"

"Bye"

Moving quickly he exited and locked the trailer and hurried over and into his car. Starting the car up he made a U-Turn then drove out of the trailer/storage area.

~GRIMM~

Sitting around the bonfire the leader of the clan was sharpening an antique knife, her eyes drinking in the beauty at how the knife glowed in the moonlight as the blade sharpened.

It wouldn't do to have a dull knife; that would require more digging than she wanted. For the task it was destined for she wanted the blade to be able to sink into the skin in one single thrust.

Setting the whetstone down she brought the tip to her finger and was easily able to push the very tip of the blade into her thumb. She smiled in satisfaction, the pain nothing more than a bee sting as she brought the bleeding joint to her mouth and sucked the blood up, not stopping until the flow slowed down.

Rising from the log she walked over to an older man who was stirring the contents in a steel pot that was stationed over the fire.

"Is it almost ready?" she questioned, leaning over to take a look into the greenish blue sludge that was bubbling from the heat.

Without stopping his stirring the man responded, "we still need two more not to mention the final ingredient" his voice was thick with a Romanian accent that would have been hard for a person who was not familiar with the accent.

Turning his head he revealed his face. His white hair was thinning and clinging together in strips that were mattered to his sweaty head from the heat of the fire. The wrinkles that dominated his features were jagged and deeply grooved but his most defining and startling characteristic was his milky left eye that had once been a chocolate brown but had been irreparably damaged due to a blow to the head in a long ago fight.

She nodded in understanding and stepped back, giving him the space he needed to continue his task.

"Just make sure that it's ready in time, we can't afford to miss it" she ordered, his mind consumed with what could happen if they failed.

"Don't worry, it shall be ready in time. Have I ever failed you before?" he questioned, meeting her gaze.

A huge part of her wanted to snarl yes but she held back, now wasn't the time to open old wounds. Things would be righted soon enough.

Gritting her teeth, her eyes dark with dark intent she hissed,

"Get it done" stalking off, her hold on the knife in her hand tightening in internal rage that was boiling and steaming beneath her tightly locked mind.

A/N: I know that this chapter isn't as long as the others (something I plan on remedying in the next chapter) but please review, I always notice that the number of views and the number of reviews all stories get are drastically different and this makes me question my story and chapter so please review, it really helps with my self-esteem.