Title: Demons of the Present
By: Heather Exume
Summary: Grissom has decided but is it too late?
Series: Alterna ‘Verse
Webpage: www.angelfire.com/weird2/butterflywings
Rating: R
Warnings: child molestation mentioned

It had been three weeks since Gil had seen Nick. He called, e-mailed visited Nick’s apartment, nothing. Nick had literally vanished off the face of the planet and he would stay vanished until his job undercover was finished. Trouble was Gil didn’t want to wait three months or six months. Truth to be told (and Grissom tried to always tell the truth) he didn’t even want to wait one more day. Gil had always prided himself on his patience but couldn’t seem to find it in regards to Nick. Gil had never been in a serious relationship before and now that he felt ready to commit in some form there was no one to commit too. In the end what he really missed was Nick. Catherine had noticed right away the change that had come over him, but Grissom hadn’t felt up to talking about it. He was desperate to fall back into that place where the crimes didn’t matter. All that mattered was the science, where the outside world was just one big experiment, where he didn’t feel anything but satisfaction for figuring out a puzzle, where his life was empty but he didn’t realize it. Damn you Nick! Damn you for making me want this! Grissom thought to himself. I just hope the next case is perplexing enough to take my mind off Nick for a night. Grissom pulled up next to Warrick’s Tahoe. “What’s going on?”

“Man Gris, you aren’t going to believe it!”

“What?”

“That prostitute that we questioned a couple of months ago?”

Grissom’s heart began to race, “yeah?”

“He changed jobs to stripper. Ladies were throwing a bacorelette party and the husband came home to find the stripper raping their seven year old. God the things people will do it’s terrible.”

Warrick continued talking about the evils of the world but all Gil could hear was a roaring sound. For a second he couldn’t focus, the idea of Nick, doing something like that was incomprehensible. What if he really had done it? What if he…Grissom shook himself. You can’t think like that, gather the evidence, is there proof that Nick did that? Better question where is Nick?

“Warrick where’s N-the prostitute now?”

“Back of the squad car. Chief wanted us to take samples before he got shipped off. Wants to process this as fast as possible.”

“Well c’mon.”

Grissom approached the squad car, Nick was leaning against the glass with his eyes closed. He looked terrible. Grissom knocked in the glass and Nick pulled away startled and left a bloody mark behind. Grissom starred in shock. “He’s injured why isn’t he being taken to the hospital?”

The cop next to the car sneered, “we asked if he wanted to go and he didn’t say anything, damn pervert.”

Grissom squatted down in front of Nick, “Nick are you okay?” He asked gently. Nick shook his head no. “Do you need to go to the hospital?” Nick nodded yes. “Can you speak?” Nick shook his head slowly no. “Okay I’ll get an ambulance. One more question,” Gil could see the weariness and pain in Nick’s eyes, “did you rape that little girl?” Nick shook his head no. “Sorry I know I said one more question, but did you see who did?” Nick shook his head yes, “was it the father?” The cop and Warrick hissed in surprise, as Nick shook his head yes. “Okay thanks Nick. I’ll contact somebody to let them know what’s going on.” Nick latched onto Gil’s sleeve and shook his head vehemently no. Gil was shocked, “you can’t expect to stay? You’re cover’s been broken.” Nick slumped down into the seat, defeated. Grissom wanted to caress that bruised face, or at least wipe away Nick’s few tears but was afraid to touch Nick’s bruises, lest he hurt him more, not to mention Grissom suspected a broken or dislocated jaw to be the cause of Nick’s inability to speak. “You’ll be okay Nick.”

Grissom closed the door again and pulled a passing cop aside, “call an ambulance down here.”

Warrick rounded on Grissom, “What the hell was that?”

“That was me talking to an undercover cop.”

“Undercover cop?”

“Yeah. Nicky’s not really a stripper or a whore. He’s an undercover cop. We’ve been dating for a couple of months now and he just went undercover recently. I trust Nick so unless the evidence tells a different story then I’m going to believe what he told me. Unfortunately I have to be removed from the case, too personal.” Grissom eyed Warrick and Warrick squirmed, “I hope you manage to look at all the people involved objectively.” The ambulance pulled in and screeched to a halt. Nick was loaded into the back and Grissom followed behind, he didn’t ever glance back.

Warrick watched as a man he had respected for as long as he had know him took Nick’s hand and smiled down on him, tears in eyes, but still smiling in a way that Warrick had never seen before.

Gil was oblivious to the people around him. It felt like he was in a plastic bubble, he sensed movement and heard the low murmur of voices but he paid them no heed. The only person, the only *thing* important to him right now was Nick. He stared down into Nick’s frightened eyes and held his hand, muttering soothing syllables. Gil was unaware of the looks he and Nick were receiving but if he had known he wouldn’t have cared. The ambulance pulled into the ER and Gil was forced away from the gurney and Nick, the doctor pulled him aside before Gil could enter the emergency room. "Are you family?"

"No, we’re partners."

"Cops?" the doctor questioned.

"Yes, but no." The doctor shook his head in confusion but he didn’t have the time to mess with those questions now.

"Can you tell me what happened?"

"He’s been accused of raping a little girl, but he says the father did it. So please try and persevere all the evidence that you can. He was beaten by the father and possibly the police on the scene as well. I believe his jaw is dislocated and that’s why he can’t talk."

The doctor listened with half an ear to what Gil was saying but it was clear that the doctor was focusing on the first part of Gil’s statement with a disgusted look on his face. "Please go to the waiting room, call any family that you know of and we’ll let you know his condition as soon as possible." The doctor headed into the emergency room containing Nick who was already hooked up to monitors and surrounded by nurses. Gil stood in the hallway for a few moments gazing sadly into Nick’s room, before he turned away his eyes met Nick’s and he tried to convey with them how much he trusted Nick and that he wasn’t alone.

Gil hadn’t been in the waiting room for more than 20 minutes when Brass showed up. "Gil! What the crap do you think you’re doing! You don’t take yourself off a case! I take you off a case!"

"Jim, calm down I got off the case because I’m prejudced. The man accused, I know him, we’re" Gil hesitated if he said it to Jim then he couldn’t take it back, but all he had to do is think about Nick’s bloody face to realize that he didn’t really care, "dating. We’ve been seeing each other for a couple of months. It happened after that case where the ex-boyfriend killed his lover. Nick was an undercover cop, he was the prostitute that told us the boyfriend was abusive. He came to me after his assignment was up and asked me on a date, I said yes." Gil look up at the gaping cop, and for the perverse pleasure of it decided to tell him one more thing, "and I think I love him."

Brass took a few moments to compose himself before he spoke, "yes, well, it’sagoodthingyou’reoffthecase." Grissom smirked at smeared together sentence, but didn’t press the issue. "What can you tell me about the suspect."

"I can tell you I don’t think he did it and unless you have more then eye-witness testimony I’m not going to change my mind. Right now what I think happened was: Nick was undercover as a stripper and dancing at the house for the party, whether it was part of his assignment or an honest mistake he went into the little girl’s room and caught the father raping her, he was startled enough to allow the man to hit him, and stun him. The father then proceeded to systematically beat Nick so that Nick couldn’t talk or communicate easily with his hands. Then he called the cops and reported that Nick raped that girl." Brass looked skeptical.

"That’s pretty far-fetched. It’s a lot simpler to believe the father’s story."

"Well even if there wasn’t any evidence either way I would still believe Nick’s story over that man. Jim the guy’s a vegetarian because he doesn’t believe in killing animals. There was one time after a really heavy rain, and there were earthworms all up and down the sidewalk and he carefully picked up each one and placed them on the grass."

"Earthworms?"

"Yes, see earthworms breath through their skin so when the rain is really heavy they have to leave the soil and climb onto the sidewalk to gain some access to air, but once it stops raining the worms are stuck on the sidewalk, and as they try to crawl to the soil they scratch and scrape their underside. I remember when I asked him why he was doing that he asked me if I believed in karma. Then he told me that he did and that maybe if he saved enough worms it would balance out the people he had killed on the job. His eyes were so haunted Jim. There’s no way that was the face of a man that could do that. I just don’t see how it’s in him."

Jim studied Gil silently deciding that Gil wouldn’t budge on this unless there was evidence. So maybe that’s all Gil needed. "Look you can have the night off do what you need to do, but I except you into work on time tomorrow, mean while I’m going to check out the record on your friend, Mr. Nick..."

"Stokes, Jim his last name is Stokes." Jim could hear the finality in Grissom’s voice so he left without even a word of goodbye.

It was two hours later before he heard any news on Nick. Nick’s injuries included a broken jaw, dislocated wrist, concussion, and bruised ribs. He would have to be in hospital for at least two days and after that only allowed to leave if someone watched him. Since Gil didn’t know the phone number or address of any of Nick’s relatives it would fall to Grissom for the time being to be Nick’s decision maker. Gil, for his part, welcomed the responsibility because it meant he could visit Nick while in the ICU, normally only family was allowed in.

Gil had been sitting there for a couple of hours when Nick woke up. Gil immediately shushed him, afraid he would hurt himself.

"Carful, they had to wire your jaw for the time being so it can heal you can’t really speak." Gil listed Nick’s injuries and what the treatments were for them. "The doctor is planning on letting you out of the hospital in few days if everything stays in the green and you can stay with someone," Gil hesitated to bring it up, they had left things so open-ended but as they say in for a penny in for a pound. "I’d love to have you stay at my place. Oh and is there anyone I can call for you?"

Nick blinked yes. "Okay just blink the number and I’ll write it down and call." Nick slowly blinked out the number to his parents place, sure that they would contact anyone that needed to know. Gil could see how tired Nick looked so he decided visiting time was over, "Nick you’re hurt and you still have anesthesia in your system, so why don’t you get some sleep? I’m going to contact this person, and" Grissom sighed, "get back to work soon, but don’t worry I’ll be here right after with an update on your case. Nick blinked yes and held up his left hand in the classic sign of ‘I love you’. "Ditto."

Gil approached work as he always did, focused and sure, but in the back of his mind he was still thinking of Nick lying in that hospital bed, alone. Gil had been true to his word and had called the number Nick had given him. It had been an ....interesting conversation. The phone number turned out to be Nick’s mom. Once he had explained that he knew Nick she had guessed that he was Gil, it was pretty obvious that Nick was out to his family and they knew all about him and Gil, and had for some time. For the first time in a long while Gil had felt decidedly ass-like. To have accused Nick of not being interested in a long term relationship, of him being embarrassed of their relationship when it was clear now that Nick had planned all their activities so that Gil still had an out, it was times like this that Gil knew he wasn’t quite as smart as he thought he was. Of course the story of him and the hooker was all over work and he had to have a long talk with Catherine which fortunately ended with Catherine on his, but for the most part he ignored it. His shift was over now and he only had one thing left to do before he headed to the hospital to visit Nick.

“Warrick.” Warrick Brown froze in the hall, he had been trying to sneak past Grissom. He wasn’t sure what Grissom wanted with him, but he didn’t want to disobey Brass’s orders to not talk to Grissom about the case involving Nick.

“I just wanted to know what the latest is on the rape case.” Warrick turned and saw the genuine concern and nothing else in Grissom’s eyes and caved.

“It’s not looking too good for Nick, we can’t find any evidence to substantiate Nick’s story. That and the little girl is sticking to the father’s story and not budging.” Warrick respected Grissom like no other. If it hadn’t been for Grissom when his gambling addiction had come out, he probably would have been fired, but Grissom had pled his case and all but threatened to transfer if Brass didn’t find a better solution then firing him. Brass knew *he’d* be out of a job if Grissom left because was the one that had increased the efficiency of the lab and workers and also increased their solve rate. So Brass and Warrick worked something out and Warrick knew he had Grissom to thank for it. He didn’t know if he had it in him to accuse Grissom’s point of happiness. Even Holly had picked up on Grissom’s feeling for Nick, and she could be pretty unobservative for a CSI. “Grissom,” Warrick asked in a soft voice, “have you considered the possibility that Nick’s guilty?”

Grissom looked stricken for a moment with his face slack and his eyes too bright from no sleep, “yes actually, but until you have concrete proof...look you’ve been trying to prove Nick’s story right? Well the guy had time to clean up and get everyone’s story straight, why not go the other way?”

Warrick cocked his head to the side and squinted, “what do you mean?”

“Well Nick hasn’t been bathed at the hospital, I made sure for better or for worse that the evidence, or lack there of will be there. Grissom looked at Warrick intently, “maybe you would like to accompany me to the hospital.”

Warrick could give Grissom that at least. “Sure man, let’s go.”

Gil was visiting Nick in the hospital a few days later, telling Nick about a case he had worked a year ago where a man had been blowing blood on the walls. “So we thought that as it until we found silphid beetle and I knew that a crime had been committed. Turns out the super killed his wife and put her in the water filtration tank. Said she nagged him.” Grissom shook his head in disgust, he had also watched as Nick reached for the pad of paper at the bedside before stopping in mid-motion. He had been doing that the entire time Gil was visiting and Gil suspected that there was something Nick needed to say. “Nick do you need something?” Gil handed him the pad of paper. Nick slowly took the paper and began to write, Gil moved his chair so that he was no longer facing Nick but shoulder to shoulder with him and watching as he wrote. Gil was startled by what he saw but waited for Nick to finish writing. When Nick finished his message read ‘thinking of transferring, don’t think I can go back undercover, scared, burned out lonely’ and Gil understood immediately all the things that Nick hadn’t said and all that was implied in his statements. “Where are you thinking?” Nick drew a question mark on the page. Gil nodded thoughtfully. “Well if you’re interested in being a CSI I can talk to Brass. I’m sure there’s plenty of places available on other units of the police force too, I think that you should do whatever you think is the right move for you. Whatever you decide, stay, go you have plenty of time too, still one more day in the hospital and weeks before you can really go to work. Speaking of work I have to be going but I’ll come by and see you after work, we can talk about this more then if you want and maybe the doctor will be ready to release you.” Gil leaned down and kissed Nick on the lips, he was about to pull away when Nick’s hand threaded around back and kept Gil’s head close not so that were kissing but cheek and cheek. Eventually nick let him up and Gil smiled down upon Nick, “I’ll miss you too.”

Grissom was pleased to find out that Nick had been cleared when he got into work. Nick had shown no evidence of abusing the girl and the foreign male material on the girl didn’t match Nick’s but it did have a 50% match to the girl’s own DNA indicating a family relation’s DNA, with Nick’s testimony and evidence of unenvolvement in the crime it was enough to get a DNA sample from the father and Greg was running it when Grissom came into work. Time passed quickly after that. Nick slowly recuperated at Grissom’s house and they talked about Nick’s transfer and finally decided together that Nick should try being a CSI. Gil assured Nick that even if he hadn’t known Gil he still could have transferred in, after all Nick did have an undergrad in criminology. Life certainly wasn’t perfect but it was a lot better for both of them than it had been in awhile.

The End

Next story in series - Demons of the Present.