CSI: A New Beginning

Chapter 4: The Plan

Elizabeth ~ September 2011

Since I'd started working at the crime lab, I solved at least 20 or so cases. It had been about a year now and I was pretty sure I could remember everyone's names, unless we had someone new that I didn't know about. I'd grown close to a lot of people, Sara and Nick especially. We ended up on a lot of cases together and we even laughed when things were grim. Nick and I would crack a joke that would leave everyone else laughing. Sometimes I even came up with quotes from books I'd read or a movie or play I'd seen that had  to do with a case we were working on, and they'd just look at me in awe. I tried not to do that as often as I'd like. I'm still not used to the looks they give me, even though it happens all the time. Sometimes I just can't help myself by asking why.

"How is it I'm the only person that gets weird looks from everyone, all the time?" I asked Nick one day. "I mean I can't be that strange, can I?"

He just laughed and said, "No, you're not strange, you're just... familiar."

"Familiar?" I asked, bewildered. "You keep saying that. How am I familiar?"

"I don't know, it's like I've seen you before. Everyone else thinks so too. Catherine, Sara, Greg... Basically everyone."

"I'm pretty sure I've never met you before, not until I came here. Do I look like someone you know or something?" I inquired. I heard them say something about a Grissom on my first day, but I was still too nervous to ask about it. Maybe he knew my so-called father and that was why I looked so familiar.

"I don't know. I don't think so. I mean, unless you would happen to be... But that's impossible," he muttered. He looked around as if someone had called his name and I looked too, but no one did. Yet, he got up and acted as if someone had.

"Hey, I just remembered that Brass wanted to talk to me about the case we're working on, I'm gonna go talk to him real quick. You just hang tight, right here," he told me and walked out of the room before I had a chance to object. Jim Brass was our detective, and sometimes he actually did need to talk to us to get updates, but I seriously doubted Nick would suddenly remember right in the middle of our conversation.

I thought about our exchange while he was gone. Unless I were... Who? What was so impossible? Did he think I was Gil Grissom's daughter? How could that be impossible? It was over thirty years ago and it was an accident. Yes, I admit, I was an accident. He had to be hiding something. He hadn't done that to me since I first came here, when he was basically gossiping about me right in front of my face. But what could it be?

Nick

I walked out of the room in haste. It probably gave me away but I didn't care. I almost blew it back there. It was the first time that she'd asked me that question in the year she'd been here. I mean, what was I suppose to do? Lie to her? That was out of the question; I couldn't do that. I'd grown too attached to her to tell her anything but the truth. Now I had to find Sara and Catherine. We needed to get this all out in the open real fast or I was gonna end up asking her myself.

"Hey, Catherine, where's Sara? I need to talk to you guys quick. It's about Elizabeth," I said the last part under my breath. This was a secret we kept from the entire lab. Who knew what Ecklie would say. He was basically in charge of the whole lab.

"I think she's with the coroner, why?" she interrogated as she walked us into to her office. Grissom's old office. She still had the jar with the fetal pig in it that he gave her before he left. I knew it was a little weird, but that was just Grissom. Weird.

"She asked me why she looked so familiar to us. Well, not exactly but that's pretty much it. I don't think I can take it much longer, Catherine. It's killing me not to ask her," I buzzed.