natabrains - Cory will be around a little while longer - there's still some things that need to be wrapped up! Yes, she is on a date - cookies if you can guess who with!

BlueEyedGunSlinger - Hey! Thanks for sticking it out - 5 days?! I'm glad you're enjoying it!!

yellowpea - how about you and your not-so-subtle friends take a hike now? This is old.

Bmangaka - Hmm, I thought I had linked that directly, but FF doesn't seem to like that idea! If you go to DJs & shows - Chris Moyles breakfast show - at the bottom there's a section called 'the best bits' and 'to Hull and Back. In there there's a picture of a girl on a mic - not me... I'm the person stood behind her! Righto, Riley's babysitting! You must have had your results by now - I hope you did well!

demolished-soul - We will see more of her! LOL, I'm in complete denial about that episode too!!

TVjunkie323 - I need to write more with those... again! (But I'll keep sending you new chapters when I have them written!!) I think you're right about the secret agent thing

Trizzy - He will not be going crazy! I shall find the story (work permitting, today!) - and happy dance, the new season is out now!!! Yummy! I couldn't handle the circus, so there's no need to worry about that!

sparkyCSI - Hey stranger - I hope life's calming down for you - sorry for going ahead and posting this, but for once I had some time on my hands!! I am DJing a wedding on Sat night, so I may be sparsely available then?

Maraena - Thank you - and I'm sorry to keep you waiting!

meadow567 - I did make you wait - I'm sorry! I'll try harder for the next update!!

ambercsiny - I hope it comes back to you soon too! I like the parrot too - it gives me an excuse to attempt to being funny!

Spoilers... 4x18: Admissions. And I was going to wait for my beta but I had to be in work 2 hours earlier than normal to let someone in the building (I'm still waiting!!) so I got bored. Basically, all mistakes are mine!

What The Eyes Can't See

Chapter 225: We Don't Need No Education

Nathanson Academy was a six story building located just a block away from the south end of Central Park. Even from the outside it screamed money. Inside, with its state of the art equipment and marble floors, that fact was evident.

Taylor spun on the spot, inhaling deeply. The place even smelt of money. 'Wow. We could never afford to send Riley here,' she muttered regrettably.

'Don't give up just yet,' Flack told her. 'A murdered teacher is likely to drop tuition fees. I mean, who would want to send their kids here now?'

'And that is precisely why we want to keep the information of this incident to a minimum,' a crisp voice informed him. Taylor turned to meet a short stocky woman wearing an elegant grey suit, glaring up at them, her hands on her hips.

'Of course,' Flack agreed, smoothly. 'Now what can you tell us about the victim,' he asked, getting straight to business.

Taylor gave him a smile and nodded her head in the other direction, mouthing, 'Catch you in a while.'

Flack returned the comment with a wink as he scribbled notes from what the woman was saying.

---

Flack looked up as Taylor entered the crime scene a while later with Mac. 'Hi Mac. Our vic is Robert Greggs. He's a guidance councilor. Divorced, no kids. He also chaperoned the dance and played key master.'

Mac nodded and walked over. 'Who discovered the body?' he asked as he crouched down beside it to peer at the skin damage on the victim's face.

Flack frowned. 'An unfortunate student came in looking for his keys and boom!'

Mac looked up at the detective with an eyebrow arched in amusement. 'Boom? You and Danny have been working together too long,' he smiled as Flack smirked at him. His face turned somber as he returned his attention to the body, half buried in a destroyed refrigeration unit. 'This guy took a hell of a beating. Witnesses?'

'No one's come forward yet,' Flack informed him, shaking his head. 'But we have a gym full of potential suspects right next door.'

Mac rose to his feet and looked in the direction Flack was indicating. Silently, he walked out of the room and into the centre of the chaotic gym where, despite the fact their prom had come to an abrupt end, few students had ceased in their partying. 'Behold. The future,' he said, gesturing with his hands.

Taylor rolled her eyes. 'Future suspects, more like,' she muttered.

Mac looked over and frowned. 'I know it's only been a week, but you're going to make progress with Riley, you know. You've just got to realize that you're not going to get results overnight.'

'Oh, I know that,' Taylor sighed. 'But it doesn't give you much hope, does it?'

'What's that?' Flack asked.

Taylor shrugged. 'Well, look at us. We are stood in one of the top five private schools in Manhattan and lying on the ground in front of us is a guy, a teacher no less, who's missing half his face, was beaten before he died, and the prime suspects are kids.'

'It doesn't happen in every school, Taylor,' Mac pointed out. 'Besides, we have no evidence yet to say that it wasn't a child. It could just have easily have been another teacher. Or a complete stranger. We can't jump to conclusions just yet.'

Taylor nodded. 'I know.'

'Right,' said Mac, looking around at the glammed-up teens. 'Do you want a hand interviewing?' he asked Flack.

Flack nodded. 'That would be great.'

Mac glanced over at Taylor. 'And you...'

'Stay out of mischief?' Taylor offered.

Mac nodded and walked off, leaving Flack giving Taylor a confused look. 'How the hell did you just do that?'

Taylor shrugged. 'I don't know, but I'm not going to push it. I'll go see if Sheldon's here. We need to have words.'

---

She found Hawkes and Danny with the body, pulling the fridge and shelves off him. 'Clue of the day: we're looking for a them.'

Danny looked up from the bunch of keys in his hand. 'And do these them have any names?'

'Dude, do you have any idea how grammatically incorrect that was?' Taylor laughed. 'It's a good job we're stood in a school. Maybe we can get you to attend a few classes while you're here.'

'Drew,' Danny said, rolling his eyes.

'Phosphoric acid, sulphuric acid, hydrochloric acid,' Hawkes listed as he read the labels on the bottle.

'And they couldn't have kept the keys in the English room?' Taylor smiled. 'And then there'd be a dictionary to hand for Danny.'

'So I could launch it at you, smart ass,' he retorted, although he was grinning.

'So which one of those delightful acids melted this guy's face off?' Taylor asked.

Hawkes held up a fourth bottle. 'Hydrofluoric acid. Trace amounts of this on the skin can eat away at it without you even noticing it. Half a bottle of this spills on your face..." Hawkes trailed off, pulling a face.

Taylor frowned. 'Why would you even put something that dangerous in a high school lab?'

'Perhaps,' Hawkes suggested, holding up a piece of the destroyed refrigerator. 'Its ability to dissolve glass.'

'It's commonly used in glass etching,' Danny explained.

Hawkes walked over to the whiteboard and picked up the dry erase marker. 'Silicon oxide, plus four molecules of hydrofluoric acid produces...'

Taylor stared at the board, frowning, whilst Danny stuck his hand in the air. 'Oh! Me, me, me!' he cried, like a small schoolboy. 'Pick me!'

Hawkes grinned and held out the pen, smiling proudly. The smile slowly vanished as he read what Danny had written.

SiO2 + 4HF - N(e)R(d)

'That's cold, man,' he told him.

Danny grinned at him and walked back over to the body, winking at Taylor, who was smiling. Hawkes rolled his eyes and continued collecting trace.

Taylor looked at the problem, frowning. Whilst the other two were preoccupied, she picked up the pen. Using the side of her fist, she rubbed out Danny's "attempts" and filled it in with her own. SiF4 + H2O. Silently, she put the pen down and headed for the door. 'I'm going to find Don. I'll catch you later.' She paused and glanced back at Hawkes. 'Oh, and stop putting ideas into Riley's head, or you'll be answering to me,' she informed him as she disappeared.

'See you,' Hawkes called out to her retreating back, frowning slightly. He looked up, glancing at the board, and his frown disappeared into a smile. 'Hey, Danny.'

Danny looked up and found Hawkes pointing at the whiteboard over his shoulder. He turned, expecting a smart ass comment to be written on it, but instead found the solution to the problem. With a grin, he turned back to Hawkes. 'She's learning.'

Hawkes nodded. 'That she is.'

---

Taylor headed back to the decorated gym. The students were still milling around, looking more put out that their event had come to an early end, rather than looking upset at the fact one of their teachers had met an untimely and gruesome end. The balloons on the ground floated out of her way as she walked across the floor to where Flack was interviewing a student.

'Mr Greggs was an inspiring mentor,' the student was saying. 'The kind of man I'd like to be in twenty years, only making fifty times more money.' Taylor caught Flack's eye as she stepped up beside him. He was trying desperately not to roll his eyes at the kid. 'It is sad when such a young life is taken from us before-'

'Stop,' said Flack, finally unable to hold back on the eye rolling. 'Just stop.'

The kid sighed, looking put out, but turned and walked away.

'Are these kids for real?' Flack asked, turning to Taylor, still rolling his eyes.

Taylor shrugged. 'At least he's not calling you "dude",' she pointed out.

Flack shuddered. 'That's true.' He looked up as Mac and Lindsay joined them.

'What do you know?' Mac asked.

'I think we're looking at a fairly short window of opportunity,' Flack told him. 'Most of the kids remember the vic introducing the class president.'

Lindsay nodded. 'At one point during her speech, she referenced Mr Greggs. He wasn't in the gym.' She held up an iPhone. 'One student snapped this photo at exactly 22:18.' She handed the phone over to Mac to show him the picture.

"Alive at ten eighteen,' Mac looked up at Flack. 'At what time was the body found.'

'Approximately ten thirty,' he replied.

'A twelve minute window,' Mac frowned. 'It's possible he left the gym with someone during that twelve minute period.'

Taylor nodded. 'I think you're definitely looking for a "someone else".'

There was a moment of silence before Lindsay held the phone up. 'I'm going to collect these. It's possible that if the students didn't see anything, that their cell phones did.' She disappeared as Mac's phone began to ring.

'Excuse me,' Mac muttered, also walking away to take the call.

Taylor yawned, stretching her neck out. 'You look tired,' Flack told her

'I am,' she admitted. 'Guilt.'

Flack sighed and led her to one side. 'You and your guilt complex,' he sighed. 'What are you feeling guilty over this time?'

'That there's a serial killer on the loose, and his victims have been hanging around the house. They keep quoting something at me and I have no idea what it is.'

'Tay, firstly, it's my job, not your job to catch the killer. Secondly, have you tried Googling this thing they're quoting.'

Taylor's mouth flapped open. 'No,' she realised. 'Actually, no I haven't.'

Flack grinned. 'Sometimes I'm too smart for my own good,' he announced.

Taylor swiped at his arm and was about to make a wise-ass remark in return, but was distracted by Mac bursting through the door by the side of them, shouting into his phone. Taylor shared a look with Flack as Mac ended the call with a vicious stab to the button.

'Sinclair?' Flack asked.

Mac nodded, face as black as thunder. 'Every five minutes it's someone else. Half the brass wants me working the cab driver serial.'

'But, unfortunately, you've got a murder at an elite prep school whose alumni contribute half the Mayor's campaign funds?' Flack offered.

'And then there's the fact that Deputy Inspector Gerrard's daughter is a student here,' Taylor added sympathetically.

'And until we catch this cab driver, my phone's not going to stop ringing,' Mac frowned.

Flack held his hands up. 'It's just a matter of time,' he said reassuringly. 'I've got uniforms conducting taxi check points throughout the five boroughs, flyers distributed to dispatchers, on footbridges and overpasses in case he decides to dump another victim.'

'And you've got me,' Taylor added, hoping that google would produce an answer. Mac looked positively exhausted.

Mac nodded thoughtfully. 'Maybe we need to use the media,' he said, clearly reading Taylor's offer of help differently to what she was trying to imply. 'The public already know we're looking for a cab rigged to allow the flow of carbon monoxide to pump into the passenger compartment.' He looked at Taylor thoughtfully. 'Tell them about the disabled rear door locks and the torn passenger Bill of Rights sticker. But don't mention the marks he leaves on the back of the victim's necks.'

Taylor nodded. 'What about the tarps he wraps the victims in. Any leads on that yet?'

Mac gave her a look. 'You're gonna start riding my ass now?'

Taylor held her hands up. 'I'm not starting anything,' she told him. 'Other than the journey to the Daily, because I should have enough time to make the first edition.' She stood on her toes to kiss Flack. 'I'll see you at some point tomorrow,' she sighed.

---

Taylor walked up to her office, rubbing her eyes. It was well past midnight and she was exhausted. She'd called Marty on the way there, who coincidentally wasn't impressed that she'd woken him, but he did offer to take Riley to school in the morning before he had to be in for work. She sat down at her desk and opened a fresh document.

'What are you doing here?' a heavily accented voice broke the silence. 'Do you have an exclusive?'

Taylor looked up finding Nancy there, her appearance immaculate as always. 'You're still here?' she asked in surprise. The building was far from deserted. It remained permanently unlocked because writers were coming and going at all hours. However, Alex, when he had been editor, had never stayed later than eight on a Saturday night, although they also never used to produce a Sunday edition.

'When the news sleeps, so will I,' Nancy informed her, strolling in.

Taylor eyed her suspiciously. Somehow, she didn't think that was too far from the truth. 'Actually, I do have an exclusive,' she told her boss, filling her in on the information Mac had given her.

Nancy gave her an approving smile. 'It's good to see that some freedom in the crime lab is productive. Keep it up. And give Reed a call. This should be on the web A-SAP.'

Taylor waited for the woman to leave the room before rooting her iPhone out of her pocket and dialling Reed's number.