Title: Magic 8
By: kennedy
Pairing: Nick/Greg
Rating: PG
Summary: Greg needs some advice about his love life, and obtains it from an unlikely source...

***

Greg Sanders tapped his pen against his lips and then chewed it savagely.

His attention was firmly divided between two objects.

One was the Magic 8 Ball that sat next to his mousepad.

The other was his co-worker, Nick Stokes, who sat in the lab across the hall from his own. Nick was currently hunched over a laptop, completely unaware that he was being stared at as he worked on a pile of overdue reports.

Completely clueless sniffed Greg, unaware that ink was starting to dribble between the cracks of the half-masticated pen barrel and was slowly turning his lower lip blue.

Nick's t-shirt strained over the muscles of his shoulders and upper-back as he reached into the desk drawer for a pen. Greg smiled goofily, admiring him from afar.

It was a slow night in the lab. Greg really had nothing to do but run tests, wait for them to end, and then slot the next tests in. He did a complete whirl on his chair, watching the room spin around him. He paused when he came back to his starting point, and once again studied the Magic 8 Ball.

Magic 8. Purveyor of secrets. All-seeing prognosticator.

"Do you know?" Greg whispered, leaning in close, looking around him. The last thing he needed was someone to walk in and wonder why he was talking to a toy that could be bought in any cheap gift shop.

Of course, the Magic 8 didn't answer. It had to be held by the supplicant in order to give an answer.

Greg cocked an eyebrow, to let it know that he wasn't an easy mark. He wasn't like some kid that would be conned at a carnival by a faux gypsy with a spray-painted bowling ball and some incense. He was in control.

He looked over at Nick through lowered eyebrows. He was still blissfully unaware of the inner turmoil of the lab rat a mere fifteen feet away from him.

Greg spun around on his chair once more, swooped up the Magic 8, and embarked upon one more rotation. Flushed and slightly dizzy, he now felt crazy enough to do what he wanted.

"Magic 8," he said with a grave tone that he hoped was obsequious enough, "Should I tell Nick?"

He shook the ball vigorously. The liquid within the centre bubbled and frothed as if it was in a spin-cycle. Greg thumped the ball on the table, and waited for the answer to be revealed.

Most definitely.

Greg's heart seemed to stop beating, and sweat stood out in pin-pricks upon his forehead. "Maybe I wasn't being clear enough."

Two more circuits on the chair, his brain seeming to ricochet off the walls of his skull.

"Magic 8, should I tell Nick that I value his friendship more than he thinks?"

Froth and bubble and slam.

All signs point to Yes.

Greg sighed. Why had he even started this?

Time to spin---

On his first circuit, he saw someone appear in the doorway.

"Greg? What are you doing?"

Greg threw out an arm to balance himself, but caught the edge of the desk and this threw him off. As he tumbled to the floor, the shadow raced over to him.

"Are you okay?"

It was Sara, scented like patchouli and trying not to laugh.

"Fine – I'm fine!"

She helped him up, and he staggered back onto his chair.

"Are you that bored, Greg?" A slight smile tugged at her lips.

"Not at all. Just waiting for some tests to run."

"Are mine done?"

He glanced at his computer screen. "No, they'll probably be about another twenty minutes."

"Page me when they're finished? Oh, and Nick is waiting for you."

Greg's head jerked up, and his ears began to burn. "Wha--- huh?"

"To get back to him about some tests."

"Oh – yeah."

"Don't strain yourself, Greg." Sara grinned, deciding not to tell him that his lips were bright blue, and took her leave.

Nick still had his back to him, but he seemed to be staring off into space, stretching his arms above his head as he yawned. Beautiful, beautiful Nick – the one person Greg felt genuinely happy and comfortable around, but also made him unbearably sad because he wanted more than the status of friendship. And these feelings were not lessening with time.

"Come on, give me an answer I can deal with." Greg muttered. "Magic 8, should I tell Nick I…" he fumbled with the word, "love him?"

Churn, churn, churn – both ball and heart.

The taunting piece of plastic surfaced.

All signs point to Yes.

"Stupid Magic 8 ball!" Greg hissed. "What do you know?"

Like a ball could know about the difficulty of truth! It was easy for it to make judgment calls, because it wouldn't have to deal with the consequences! It could just vomit its answer and go back to being a kitschy paperweight, either unaware or just not caring about how it would make the user feel!

Greg scooped the offending psychic up and stormed over to his bunsen burner. He set the flame to blue and extreme, closing his eyes briefly and letting the sound of the flame's fire soothe him.

"Last chance." Greg told his nemesis. "I'll lay all the cards on the table. Should I tell Nick I love him, that I can't get through an hour without thinking of him, that I lie in bed at night thinking of schmoopy things like holding hands in a movie with him? That I wonder what his hair looks like when he first wakes up in the morning? Should I tell him all this, and risk destroying the best friendship I have possibly ever had to chase a vague dream?"

In slow motion, the triangle swam lazily through the churning blue waters, twisting and turning, taking its time to think over its answer, agonizing Greg with each passing second.

Like a figure from a nightmare dreamed by HP Lovecraft, the answer emerged.

All signs point to Yes.

With a muffled cry of vengeance and frustration, Greg brandished a large pair of tongs like a weapon, and submitted the Magic 8 ball to the flame of the burner. The plastic began to shrivel, peeling back as if it was screaming. Greg began to laugh as it twisted beneath the tongs, the central unit of liquid becoming exposed. He pulled it away just as it exploded, sending dye over his lab-coat. The answer cube fell into the flame, then back out, where it came to rest, smouldering even still.

All signs point to Yes.

Still provoking him.

Greg swept the corpse of the psychic into his waste-basket with a deranged cackle. Satisfied, he turned around to once more look at the object of his affections.

Nick was watching him through the window of the lab in which he was working. He gave Greg a quizzical look that asked Are you okay?

Hoping that his own expression didn't give him away, Greg gave him a wide smile and a thumbs-up. Nick's brows knitted together, but he turned back to his laptop and sat down once more.

His heart thudding uncontrollably, Greg sat back at his desk and sighed heavily. The Magic 8 might be telling him what he should do, but it couldn't make him.

The pinging sound from his computer alerted him to the fact that a batch of tests had completed running. All signs pointed to yes, but his heart screamed not yet, and Nick was never off his mind.

***

It was the second week of December, and three days since Greg Sanders had annihilated his Magic 8 ball for telling him something he didn't really want to accept.

Well, that wasn't exactly true. Greg wanted it, but he couldn't bring himself to try and imagine the reality of what would happen if he fed into his own fantasies. The most devastating thing for him would be if Nick started avoiding him – having Nick in his life strictly on a platonic level was better than on no level at all, no matter how much it could hurt in the long run. He just couldn't imagine not having Nick standing across from him in his lab, grinning at him as Greg forced him into playing one of his stupid guessing games before he eventually showed off and gave him the answer. Plus, he just didn't want to see the look on Nick's face if he took it badly – he never wanted to have Nick think badly of him, even if the truth would be that it reflected badly on Nick's character rather than Greg's if he was to take it in such a way.

So to stop Nick from avoiding him, Greg began avoiding Nick. It made sense. Slightly.

His paranoid fantasies about how it could all fuck up roiled against the sweet dreams he imagined if it all went as he hoped it could, often becoming one gooey mess of images that set him on edge whenever Nick appeared in the peripheries of his vision. And it didn't help that it was Christmas, the season that even managed to top Valentine's Day as the loneliest time of year for the single person. The morgue was steadily filling up with suicides, some which were macabrely inventive in ways to hasten their exit from the world, a fact that was grimly recognised by Greg as he found himself trying to brighten up their surrounds (and himself) by volunteering to be in charge of office decorations. Luckily Mia had needed no arm-twisting to join him on the task.

"We need mistletoe." she had said mischievously. "There will be plenty of alcohol at the Christmas party, and who knows what will happen? And when it does, I'm going to make sure I'm there with a camera to record it all."

She had managed to get a smile out of Greg at that one, and for that she was happy. "Cheer up, Greg. ‘Tis the season to not be miserable, and all that."

"So the cards keep telling me." he had replied, pretending to chuck some empty vials in the medical waste bin as Nick passed by the lab – managing to drop entirely out of the other man's line of sight.

This was an action that was not lost on Mia. Nick gave her a small wave, but she could see his eyes were looking past her, looking to see if her lab-rat partner in crime was present. He moved on, his jaw set in the profile of one who was not happy.

Not much was lost on Mia.

--------------------

So, here they were now – balancing on step ladders, fumbling with staple guns and masking-tape between running tests; crying out occasional curses as their co-workers unknowingly slammed into them while running between offices and labs, and almost sending them flying. Hodges managed to do it three times, before Greg threatened him with ritual disembowelment.

"Merry Christmas to you, too, Sanders." Hodges had replied, his mouth stretching into what Greg claimed was a smile, but Mia dismissed as the thought of a happy Hodges was too scary for her to deal with.

But all in all, it was fun, and a distraction. For the first time in over a month Greg felt relatively light-hearted. Mia was at the bottom of his ladder, handing up various decorations. She stood back for a moment. "Hey, that's the perfect place for a sprig of mistletoe."

Greg shrugged. "It's a doorway. So obviously, yes, it is."

She handed a bunch up to him. "I wonder who will be the first victim beneath it."

"Well, it's not going to be me." Greg scoffed, applying the staple gun a tad savagely.

"Oh, look, here comes Nick." Mia sang out.

Greg did a double-take, which quickly disintegrated into the expression of a rabbit confronted by car headlights coming over a hill towards it.

True enough, his head stuck in a manila folder, here came Nick Stokes. Before anything untoward, and knowing Mia – embarrassing – could happen, Greg jumped from the ladder in one agile move and was across the hall and bunking down in his lab before Nick could even notice his presence.

"Hey, Nick." Mia greeted him.

He looked up, and grinned at the plant hanging above their heads. "Mia, you aren't trying to trap me there, are you?"

"Would that be so bad?" she teased.

"I plead the fifth."

Back in his lab, Greg rolled his eyes, and mimicked him under his breath. "I plead the fifth, Mia. Ooh, look at me. I am Nick Stokes, God of Flirty."

But his eyes narrowed with barely-restrained jealousy to see what Nick would do.

Nick snapped his folder shut. "Isn't G meant to be helping you?"

"Funny that." Mia said pointedly. "He just disappeared on me."

Nick snorted. "Good luck finding him again. I always seem to miss him at the moment." He walked off, shaking his head.

Mia glanced across the hall, and her eyes met Greg's. She strolled across, and closed the door behind her. "Okay, what's up?"

Greg pretended to be busy with the vials on his desk. "I don't know what you mean."

"So you just Superman-ned across the lab for no reason?"

He ignored the question.

"Greg, I can only guess at what you're doing, but let me tell you this. If you are trying to avoid him to stop suspicion about something, the way you're acting at the moment is only going to draw attention to it."

Greg sighed. "It's the only way I can deal with it at the moment."

It was the closest thing to an admission he had ever made.

Mia smiled. "Greg, surely you have watched enough bad Christmas movies to know that this is a time of miracles."

Greg winced, and finally looked up at her. "And that's why they're movies, Mia. Because they're not documentaries."

Mia sighed. "I hate Christmas."

"No, you don't."

"Okay, I don't. I just hate what it does to people."

"Well, we just have to deal so we don't end up like the people on our slab." Greg stood up, and rubbed her on the shoulder.

She grasped his hand and swung it affectionately. "On that cheery note, let's finish decorating the lab." As they headed back out the door, she whispered, "He did say he was missing you."

"Drop it." Greg growled.

***

Carollers were telling the staff of the Las Vegas crime lab to have themselves a merry little Christmas through the speakers that Greg and Mia had set up. Catherine had forced Hodges to dance rather drunkenly and sloppily with her, and they were the centre of attention to all the revellers. Greg kept hanging around the outskirts of the party, drifting lazily in an effort to remain inconspicuous, and just happening to go in the opposite direction of wherever Nick was gravitating.

"You're doing it again." Mia hissed as she floated past with a tray of Cheetos. "What did I tell you about avoiding him?"

"It's working well so far." Greg said, childishly.

"He knows something is up." Mia smiled at Brass as he scooped a handful of snacks on his way past them.

"Not my problem!" Greg chose that moment to escape, and a handful of Cheetos struck his back.

He smiled to himself, surveyed the room, and saw Nick and Sara sitting close together on a sofa, their backs to him. His interest piqued, and his jealousy levels rising, he inched closer to them, straining to eavesdrop upon their conversation amidst the strained cheeriness of the Christmas album.

"---don't know." Nick was saying.

"Well, I have no idea what goes on in his head." Sara replied. "The boy is a mystery."

Greg dared to move in a little more. They were unaware of his presence.

"He's avoiding me for some reason. I don't know what I've done to him."

"It's Sanders, Nicky. Who knows why he does anything he does?" Sara laughed. "Do you want a beer?"

Greg jumped up and moved away before they could discover him, his pulse racing. He was caught out, Nick was on to him. He may not know why, but he knew that he was hiding from him.

The music suddenly faded out, and Catherine called for attention. "Okay, everyone! It's present time!"

The more drunken of the staff cheered as Catherine started handing out presents. The office tradition of Secret Santa had led to Greg being assigned Bobby Dawson. He had bought the ballistics expert an extreme Super Soaker, and when he had shared his discovery with Mia she had laughed and said that the point of Secret Santa was that they were to remain secret. And that everybody would know the only person likely to buy a gigantic water cannon for somebody would be Greg.

"Greg!" Catherine yelled out.

He shuffled forward. Catherine gave him a dazzling smile, and handed over a small, exquisitely wrapped box. Greg returned her smile, then turned back. His eyes fell upon Nick, who was standing across the room and watching him. Involuntarily, the smile left Greg's lips, and he looked at the ground as he sought refuge near Mia and Hodges.

"Aren't you going to open that?" Mia asked.

Greg peeked around her shoulder. Nick was still looking at him. Flushed, he mumbled to Mia, "Yeah, sure."

The wrapping was really too pretty to destroy, and Greg felt a momentary sense of guilt as he ripped it away.

He paled as the box was revealed.

Magic 8 Ball! Knows all your secrets! Tells you your future!

Greg almost dropped the package, but managed to hold on to it.

Mia wrinkled her nose. "That's a pretty lame present."

Greg managed to find his voice. "That's Secret Santa for you."

"Mia!" Catherine called out. Mia clapped her hands together excitedly, and raced forward. Greg took this as his opportunity to slip away from the noise of the party, and seat himself in his lab. He breathed slowly, trying to make the dizziness in his head slow down.

He stared at the box. Who the hell was his Secret Santa? It had to be mere coincidence, but it was a creepy coincidence. He opened the box slowly, and pulled out the offending object. It wasn't a cheap and nasty one, like his old one had been. This was the crème de la crème of Magic 8 Balls.

"This has gone on long enough." came a voice from the doorway.

A soft, Texan drawl. Greg groaned internally, and swung around to see Nick slouched against the door frame.

"Nick." Greg said, simply.

"Aah! He remembers who I am!" Nick smiled down into his chest, and then stared at the lab rat. "So, what's going on, G?"

"Nothing." Greg croaked.

"Oh, nothing." Nick moved away from the door, and pulled a chair to sit on the opposite side of Greg's desk. He straddled it, resting his arms upon the chair's back. "So it's nothing that's been causing you to avoid me for the past week?"

"I haven't been avoiding you!" Greg protested weakly. "I've been… busy."

"Yeah, busy avoiding me!" Nick stared at him, refusing to look away. "It kinda hurts my feelings, man."

Greg couldn't resist looking deeply into those brown eyes, framed by the encroaching crow's feet that gave him character rather than aged him. The eyes didn't flinch away from the intensity of the moment, and Greg felt his pulse race again.

"Sorry… I, I didn't mean to hurt your----"

Nick reached across and grabbed the Magic 8 Ball. "Cool present."

Realisation dawned on Greg. "You! You were my Secret Santa!"

Nick grinned. "See, you will make CSI one day."

"But---"

"I had to swap with Warrick in order to get you. He had no idea what you would like. I said I would give him Hodges. Strangely enough, he thought Hodges would be easier to buy for."

"What, a copy of How to Win Friends and Influence People?"

"See, there's the Greggo I've missed."

Greg could feel a flush spreading across his face, and he was glad he had dimmed the lights while entering the lab. "But why a Magic 8 Ball?"

Nick began tossing the Magic 8 from hand to hand. "Because I watched you destroy your last one."

"So what made you think I would want another?"

"I just thought maybe this one would give you answers you would like."

Greg swallowed around a lump in his throat. "Maybe it was the answers the last one gave me that made me destroy it."

"What answers could it possibly give you to make you kill it?"

Greg couldn't answer him.

"Poor Magic 8 Ball." Nick smiled at the one in his hand. "Maybe this one will make you happy."

"I doubt that." Greg said bitterly. He was just about to ask Nick why he was really there, when Nick leaned over the ball.

"Magic 8 Ball," he asked in a serious tone, "what will it take to finally make Greg Sanders kiss me?"

A thousand emotions exploded throughout Greg's body. Mainly fear, love and desire, but there were nine hundred and ninety seven distinct other emotions as well. But of course the patented Greg Sanders talk-before-you-think routine kicked in. "Why is it up to me to make the first move?"

And there were the dreaded words, an admission, hanging in the air between them and unable to ever be taken back.

Nick smiled. "Finally." He began shaking the Magic 8 Ball.

Greg reached over and snatched it away. "Magic 8 Ball, is Nick Stokes fucking with my head?"

He watched hurt settle in Nick's eyes.

Oh my God, he is being serious.

Trying desperately to salvage the situation, Greg began to shake the ball again. "Magic 8 Ball, is Greg Sanders a moron?"

"You don't have to wait for the ball to give you an answer to that one." Nick muttered.

Greg continued shaking. "Magic 8 Ball, will Nick Stokes allow me to kiss him, even though I've been a moron?"

His hands were getting slick with nervous sweat, and his grip loosened enough to let the ball fly out of his grasp and go thudding along the lab floor.

"Well, I guess we'll never know---" Nick smirked, but was interrupted by Greg reaching across, grabbing him by the collar of his leather jacket and laying his lips upon his own.

Nick tasted sweeter than Greg imagined, although his breath was slightly tinged by alcohol. Hungry, years of fantasy compelling him, he ran his hand over the back of Nick's hair and brought him in even closer. Nick's mouth was working against his, his lips parting---

A flash made both their eyes spring open, and they drew apart to see Mia standing in the doorway, pulling a Polaroid out of the front of the camera and waving it dry.

"Whoah!" she laughed. "I told you this party would go off, Greg, and I would be here to document it!"

Stunned and flushed, Nick and Greg stood frozen in the afterglow of the kiss and the camera bulb.

Nick suddenly sprang into action. "Give me that!"

Mia laughed, and twisted away from his outstretched arm. She took off down the hallway, screaming with delight, Nick hot on her heels.

It felt like all the blood that had rushed to Greg's head had come from his knees, because he had to sit down. He leaned over the desk as much as he could, and noticed Nick and Mia struggling down the other end of the hallway. Their fight had drawn some interested onlookers from the party.

He could hear Nick give a triumphant whoop, and Mia yell, "I'll get you for this, Stokes!"

Thumps in the hallway alerted him to Nick's presence back in the lab. Sweating slightly, he waved the Polaroid at Greg. "Success!" he crowed.

He paused, unsure of why Greg was glaring at him. "G?"

"Getting rid of the evidence?" Greg asked coldly.

"What?"

"Did you have to go after that photo so nobody would know?"

It was Nick's turn to go cold. "Maybe you should ask that Magic 8 Ball if you're being a moron again."

"Am I? You tell me."

"Okay, I will. All signs point to Uh Huh, Yes and Damn Straight." The shiny, happy Nick was gone, and replaced with a stern, hiding-his-hurt model.

"I just wonder---"

"What? Jesus, Greg, how can you say that? How many times have I had to touch you when it wasn't necessary, just in order to get some sort of reaction out of you. Or played along with your games in the lab? If anything, I thought I was the one imagining there was something between us." Nick stared at his feet. "And I'm glad I've had a few beers so I could finally get that out."

Greg was now wearing his shame face. "I just thought that was the Texan way of being friendly."

"Oh, yeah? Have you ever seen me touch Warrick the way I touch you?"

Greg had to admit to himself that he had not. That there had always been a closeness and a touchy-feeliness between him and Nick that wasn't shared with anybody else.

"I just wanted the photo." Nick said softly. "It's proof that we may have finally got our act together."

Greg rubbed his hand through his hair, feeling like the world's biggest asshole. After everything he wished for, here it was being handed to him and he was totally screwing it up.

Nick knelt down and picked up the Magic 8 ball from where it had fallen.

"Last chance, Magic 8 Ball, for you to tell Greg what he needs to hear."

Greg gave him a small smile. "Come on, Nicky, don't…"

Nick laughed. "Magic 8 Ball, is Greg going to allow himself to love me like I love him?"

At those words, Greg froze.

As if in slow motion, Nick began to shake the ball.

Greg reached out, and grasped Nick's arm. He closed his other hand over the ball and pulled it out of Nick's hand.

For a moment, Nick looked worried. "What are you doing, G?"

"I don't need the Magic 8 ball to tell me the answer. I already know it."

They watched as Greg dropped the gift into his bin.

"Hey, that was your present!"

Greg took Nick's hand in his own and slowly rubbed his thumb over the back of Nick's hand. "I already got all I wanted."

"So what's your answer?" Nick moved in closer, so that their chests met and they could almost feel each other's hearts beat frantically through their clothes.

"Uh huh, Yes and Damn Straight."

They both began to laugh. Nick reached up to cup Greg's chin with his free hand, and they kissed once more.

There was another flash from the doorway, and Mia brandished the Polaroid like a weapon. "Don't even think about it, Stokes. This one's for the noticeboard."

Nick shrugged. "I already got my photo. I'm fine with that."

She smiled. "Okay, I'm going to find more victims. Greg, I take it you will be a lot happier come Monday morning?"

Greg wrapped his arms around Nick's waist. "Merry Christmas, Mia."

"And God bless us, everyone!" she yelled, making her way back to the party.

Greg leaned into Nick, surprised at how easily their bodies seemed to fit together already. Silence was between them, but it was a comfortable one as they basked in the glow that can only come with a shared realisation and unabashed happiness as Nick's fingers interlaced with his own.

In the waste basket, the Magic 8 Ball read All Signs Point to Yes.

***