Title: Strange Cages
By: writer525
Fandom: CSI: Vegas
Pairing: Gil/Brass
Summary: Post-ep. Spoilers follow.
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: Oh, please.
Feedback: You betcha.
Archive: If you want it. WWOMB, sure.
Author's Notes: Another 24-hour post ep, though this is more of an hour-and-fifteen-minutes post-ep. Finished it at 12:18 AM. Unbetaed, so all mistakes are mine and mine alone. I've decided that the 24-hr post-ep's going to be a bit of a routine for me now, so you'll be seeing a lot more of me. ;) Title by Lee, who has been, is, and forever shall be my title-finding goddess.

There are some demons that you don't want to let out of their cage, Gil mused, sliding a thumb up and down the leather of his steering wheel in one continuous motion. Some parts of the human psyche need to remain hidden. "It keeps humans from hurting themselves," the voice of his Psych professor echoed in his mind. "Keeps them from getting too deep into things. Human beings were never meant to be psychologically intimate. Have sex and move on: that's the psychological and physiological makeup of Homo sapiens.

"Some people are incapable of being psychologically intimate," Professor Stamos went on in his head. Gil opened the car door and slide around sideways, planting his feet on the asphalt, resting his elbows on his knees and his chin in his hands. "They cannot open up enough to let a person know them. Those people," she said, and in his mind's eye Gil saw her behind that massive wooden desk, papers piled up in untidy stacks around her. He pushed himself up and took a step forward, shutting the door gently. "Those people are quite probably the most sane of us all."

A few moments later he was on the stoop of Lady Heather's dominion, fist poised to knock on the heavy wooden door. Before he could lower his hand, the door opened and Lady Heather blinked up at him, a tiny smile on her lips.

"You."

"Me," Gil replied, quirking his head to one side. "May I come in?"

But she'd already stepped back and had started towards the rear of the house. He let out a sigh and closed the door behind him, following her.

She led him into a back room that he hadn't seen before; it was an incongruity to the rest of the manor-like house. A comfortable-looking beige couch was against one wall, a television set on a table in front of it. Two recliners faced each other in the center of the room, and calming, floral paintings graced the walls. Lady Heather sat down in one of the recliners and gestured him into the opposite one. He sat down gingerly, perched on the edge of its cushion. "What can I do for you?"

"You've heard about Chloe, I assume." She inclined her head slightly, and he went on. "My professional relationship with you is over. I haven't got any excuse to be here, and yet..." he lifted his hands in a helpless gesture and let them fall back into his lap. "And yet..."

"You don't belong here, Mr. Grissom," Lady Heather said quietly. "You can't possibly fulfill either of the roles I have available for you. There is nothing for you to do. You--what do they say? You are an enigma. Enigmas have no place in--" She raised a hand and waved it at their surroundings, and Gil heard a sharp scream echo from far above. "In a situation where everything is black and white."

"I'm too complicated for something like this, you mean."

The small smile became slightly larger. "Far too complicated, Mr. Grissom. I've spoken with you quite a few times and yet I still haven't the faintest inkling of whether you would be a submissive or a dominant. I can usually place a person into either category within seconds."

"Maybe I ought to try both, then."

A raised eyebrow this time, instead of that disconcerting smile. "You intend to attempt this for yourself." A statement, not a question. Gil nodded. "I'm afraid that's not possible, Mr. Grissom."

"Why not?"

She stood up and rearranged her skirts, not looking him in the eye. "I'm not at liberty to say."

He got to his feet and put his hand on her shoulder. She still did not look at him. "Lady Heather," he said gently. "I know the magic word."

"I said no, Mr. Grissom." She turned her head quickly and looked him straight in the eye. "That is the magic word."

He let his hand drop from her shoulder and took a step back. The backs of his knees hit the chair and he lost his balance briefly before sitting down. "Tell me why."

She did not sit, did not look at him. "A person must know their limits before attempting...something such as this. I fear that you do not know your own limits. You don't know...you don't know what sort of effect you have on some."

"I'm sorry?" The conversation seemed to have changed track, but Gil couldn't put his finger on where. They weren't on the same wavelength anymore.

"One of your coworkers recently came to visit me. I told him precisely what I told you."

Bizarre. Gil shook his head. This was absolutely bizarre. "That he was too complicated?"

"That he didn't know his limits. He was a simple man, most certainly a submissive, but I was not sure how far he would go. That made him a danger, both to his dominant and to himself."

"So you turned him away."

Lady Heather sat back down and looked straight at him again. "I told him to go and speak with you."

"Who was he?"

She smiled, and for the first time Gil noticed just how much her smile was like a smirk. "Ah. I see that he never did take my advice."

"That depends. Who was he?"

"If he did not choose to reveal his feelings about you, to you, then I am not about to do what he himself could not."

Gil was outwardly calm, though inwardly reeling. "Psychologically," Stamos' voice returned, "a human being can become intimate with perhaps one person in his or her life. Every other relationship is a sham." Someone, a male someone from the sound of it, had...feelings for him?

"I don't understand," he told Lady Heather. "Why would someone come and speak to you if they were having problems with me?"

"It's not a problem," Lady Heather said sharply, "to care for someone. To want to become intimate with them. I think I know what you are now, Mr. Grissom."

"Oh?" He got up from the chair. "And what am I?"

She stood up fluidly, her skirts falling back around her ankles with the motion of a waterfall. "A dominate. Dominates have no desire to open themselves to anyone. You, I believe, would rather cause harm to yourself than allow someone to cause harm to you and see you at your most vulnerable."

He put his hands in his pockets, rocked back and forth from the heel of his foot to the ball. "I don't think that I can argue with that."

"You aren't supposed to." She walked by him, and he turned to follow. Her voice trailed back at him as they made their way to the front of the house. "You ought to speak with Captain Brass sometime, Mr. Grissom. He has some very interesting things to say."

/fin/