Replay 1/1 [GSR, CWR, Nick, Greg.]
Nov. 15th, 2007 01:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
misscamReplay
(or Five Things That Happened in the 1980s - and One They Led to in 2007)
by Camilla Sandman
Summary: The more things change, the more they remain the same. The more things remain the same, the more they change. [GSR, CWR, Nick, Greg.]
Rating: Teen. Some language and adult activities.
Disclaimer: The characters are CBS's. I merely borrow for a profit-less spin.
Author's Note: Spoilers up to early season eight. References to back story partially revealed in previous seasons - and some totally invented on my part. For the 'I love 80s!' ficathon at![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
geekfiction. Many gracious thanks to ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lyricalviolet for beta.
II
Plus ca change, plus c'est la même chose.
Plus c'est la même chose, plus ca change.
(The more things change, the more they remain the same.
The more things remain the same, the more they change.)
- Agatha Christie
II
1981
It's another dead body.
Gil Grissom is used to them by now, it's not that. You can't be a coroner and not be. Young, old, middle-aged, thin, thick, tall, short, big feet, small hands, blonde, brunette, grey-haired - he's seen most variations.
Simple components make such startling variety, he observes and learns.
Another Saturday, another body. Another variation in death.
"I can't believe you can kill someone with a beta mack," Officer Jones says, but Grissom doesn't bother answering that. Jones doesn't believe a lot of things. "What a way to go, with a loser down your throat."
"It's been inserted after death," Grissom corrects, pulling out a piece of plastic and regarding it quizzically. "Someone was making a point."
"What was the cause?"
"Gun. Times change. Some classics don't. I'll extract the bullet for you."
"You know how to charm a girl," Jones says, her smile a little trying.
"No," Grissom says simply. She looks at him a little strangely. "What?"
"Don't you ever think about doing something else Saturdays?"
"Watching Voyager 2 pass Saturn?"
"That's probably your idea of a date too," Jones says, her voice odd and a little flat. "Right. Have a good Saturday."
He nods at her, attention already on the mess crunched into Alan George's mouth and throat.
"Oh, and Grissom?"
"Hmmm?"
"Look at the living sometimes too. Or people will start thinking you're a ghost."
She leaves, he remains in the silence. But that's all right.
He's started a life on it.
II
1983
Nick runs.
His mother always remarks they must have bred an athlete; his father only smiles. Perhaps he doesn't believe that's Nick's path, or perhaps he just finds it something to smile of. Nick's never asked.
He's a little afraid to. He loves dad and he loves mum, but he can't ask them. He's afraid he'll never run out of question.
He runs instead.
Jack invites him to come play Space Invaders; Nick runs. Jessie invites him to the arcade; Nick runs. Tessie asks him to play Pac-Man and smiles at him with red lips and Nick runs hardest of all.
He thinks there's something wrong with him. There must be. She wouldn't have done it otherwise, wouldn't have touched him, wouldn't have... It must be.
If he can just run long enough, maybe he can leave it behind.
He just doesn't understand what he did wrong. He's good at school. He helps with the dishes. He's proud of his father. He stands up for his sisters. He can't have done anything wrong.
Can he?
Nick runs, but he can't leave himself behind.
II
1984
Blood drops on a walkman.
The brain has filters, Sara knows. Like an engine, or a plant. It's a needed function to stop something bad from coming into the system. It's better to live without grit.
The brain knows it too.
So all she can see when she closes her eyes is blood on a walkman. Hers - walkman, that is. Not blood. Father's blood.
But even when she tries to remember, she can't envision the murder. She saw it happen. She still can't see it now. It was a perception, but the brain hasn't allowed it to be filtered to memory. It is as if it thinks she shouldn't have to live with that grit - her mother killed her father.
Deep down, she knows it won't work. Not being able to remember doesn't mean it didn't happen. It did. There's enough police around that she knows it did. There's enough other memories in her head to know why it did.
Slaps. Punches. Bruises. Screaming. Scars. Apologies. Gifts. A walkman.
She had always wanted one, he knew. All her friends had. And the music played loud enough could drown out everything else. But not Thriller. Never play Thriller. She got enough of that live.
It's ruined now, she knows. All of it.
"Sara? I'm Jenny. It's time to go now."
Blood drops on a walkman, she remembers.
It makes a strangely symmetric pattern.
II
1987
Greg is getting used to his father yelling at him. It's not abusive - he never really feels afraid. These days, it's almost a compliment.
It means he's succeeded at his experiment. Like now, taking a fax machine apart.
"Work paid for this machine," his father says, sounding about ready to have a minor stroke. "Greg, why... Just, why?"
"I wanted to see how it worked," Greg says, which is true. He always does. De Loreans. Video recorders. Rubic cubes. Atari consoles. Gold fish. Lawnmowers. Mouse traps. Radioactivity.
It was too bad his mother caught him before he could buy that ticket to Chernobyl.
"Greg... Science is for geeks," his father says firmly. He always does. "You want to make your father proud, don't you? Stock market, there's your ticket. Good career. How about it, son?"
"No," says Greg Sanders.
It's going to take his father at least another decade to realise his son is a geek.
II
1989
Catherine isn't sure if she hates answering machines or not. On one hand, if she hadn't made Eddie get one, she would still be a fool. On the other hand, if she hadn't, she wouldn't feel one.
He's cheating. Or thinking of it, if giving his number out to tramps who leave messages like that. She's played it over and over again, and now the message is stuck in her head like a bad tune.
She wants to kill him. She isn't going to. Detective Tadero has taught her enough about crime and solving it that she knows why it's a very bad idea.
And there's that other thing. That other very important little thing.
So, she's not murdering Eddie with a rusty fork and instead gets even the only way she knows how.
She's fucking a teenager in his car, just a little under the influence of a little something-something.
She should feel ashamed, she knows. He's barely legal and acting shy enough she knows this means more to him than her. But Las Vegas has a way of killing scruples. She wants a one-night quickie, to feel sexy and wanted and Catherine.
He kisses her, fingers already up her skirt in a way someone must have taught him is sexy. His shoulders is so tensed she knows if she touches him, he might come then and there.
So she leans back instead, watching his eyes close as he thrusts into her and makes a noise at the back of her throat. In the dark of the car, his skin almost makes him blend in. There is something about him that tells her one day, one day he's going to be really, really worth sleeping with just on his own.
Maybe it's the shine in his eyes, visible even with Las Vegas sparkling as the only light.
"Hey," she whispers as his teeth scrapes her collarbone. "What's your name?"
"Warrick," he manages. "Warrick Brown. I'm... Oh, fuck."
Warrick Brown makes Catherine feel Catherine again, and neither has any idea the future will be doing a replay of its own.
II
2007
Some things don't change.
It's another dead body. It's another murder. It's another murderer caught. It's another Saturday morning and five CSIs are having breakfast.
"Remind me never to get killed on a 1980s retro party," Nick says, and Greg nods with enthusiastically with eggs in his mouth.
"Didn't like the 80s, Nick?" Catherine asks, winking at him. "I bet you were at your cutest then."
"I'm at my cutest now," he replies firmly. "Lost the Miami Vice look."
Warrick laughs a little, drinking his coffee almost lazily. "That would not be becoming on you, man."
"Some things change, luckily."
"Until they become retro," Greg points out. "Why is that? We decide things were horribly out of fashion until it's in fashion to remember how out of fashion it was?"
"The illusion things change," Grissom says, still keeping his eyes on the outside. Sara's late, his watch has been telling him for fifteen minutes straight and he worries.
"Things do change," Nick corrects him. "Man, what were we thinking with that hair?"
"Height of fashion," Catherine corrects him, "to look like you had a hairdresser that was high."
"You'd look hot in anything," Warrick says, tone a little too casual. She smiles at him, Nick and Greg a little too occupied arguing over who ate the sausage and should pay for it to notice. Grissom isn't... Grissom isn't there at all.
"Gil," Catherine tries, and he looks at her a little distractedly. "She'll be here. Unless you gave her the wrong address."
"Sara settling in at swing?" Greg asks, but Grissom doesn't answer, simply getting up and walking out. "What did I say?"
"It's more what Grissom didn't want to say," Warrick says. "You know Gris."
"I know Greg's trying to weasel out of paying his share," Nick says good-naturedly as he gets up too, feeling strangely energized. "But only if he can get to the counter faster than me. School sprint champion, Sanders. You're doomed."
"No one ever told you science is for geeks, not athletes?" Greg calls after him, not even trying to make a matching run for it. Getting up lazily, he gives Catherine and Warrick a little wave and leave them there.
They sit in silence, but it's a comfortable one, feet under the table just touching.
"Lyndsey's out," she finally says. "Left a message on my cell. House is all empty."
It's not going to be for long, she knows when she sees his eyes shimmer in the filtered sunlight from outside.
Outside, it's snowing dust, twirled up by autumn winds. Another summer ended. Another year changing.
Sara's watching the particles in the air, leaning against her car as Grissom walks up.
"Do you know dirt falls in patterns?" she asks him as a way of greeting.
"You never come in anymore," he says as his way of greeting. "Sara?"
I'm not sure my filter works anymore, she doesn't tell him. I'm afraid, she doesn't say. I think they would tell, she doesn't confess.
"I know," she says instead, leaning into his kiss when he gives it, tasting desert on his lips. She can feel him smile as he pulls away slightly and he looks almost happy.
"What do you see, Gil?"
"I see you. What do you see?"
"Symmetry," she says, kissing him again.
Some things don't change. Nick's still running. Greg's still into the how. Grissom's still a ghost. Catherine's still getting even and still getting Warrick. Sara's still living with filtered grit.
Some things do. Nick asks questions. Greg doesn't ruin fax machines and wonders about the whys too. Catherine feels like Catherine, but a willingly changed one. Warrick's kicked a habit and gained confidence. Grissom looks at least one living. Sara's starting to remember a murder after all.
Change, not change, retro and now. It does makes a strangely symmetric pattern if you look. Another year the same. Another year changing.
Play it again, time.
FIN
(or Five Things That Happened in the 1980s - and One They Led to in 2007)
by Camilla Sandman
Summary: The more things change, the more they remain the same. The more things remain the same, the more they change. [GSR, CWR, Nick, Greg.]
Rating: Teen. Some language and adult activities.
Disclaimer: The characters are CBS's. I merely borrow for a profit-less spin.
Author's Note: Spoilers up to early season eight. References to back story partially revealed in previous seasons - and some totally invented on my part. For the 'I love 80s!' ficathon at
geekfiction. Many gracious thanks to lyricalviolet for beta. II
Plus ca change, plus c'est la même chose.
Plus c'est la même chose, plus ca change.
(The more things change, the more they remain the same.
The more things remain the same, the more they change.)
- Agatha Christie
II
1981
It's another dead body.
Gil Grissom is used to them by now, it's not that. You can't be a coroner and not be. Young, old, middle-aged, thin, thick, tall, short, big feet, small hands, blonde, brunette, grey-haired - he's seen most variations.
Simple components make such startling variety, he observes and learns.
Another Saturday, another body. Another variation in death.
"I can't believe you can kill someone with a beta mack," Officer Jones says, but Grissom doesn't bother answering that. Jones doesn't believe a lot of things. "What a way to go, with a loser down your throat."
"It's been inserted after death," Grissom corrects, pulling out a piece of plastic and regarding it quizzically. "Someone was making a point."
"What was the cause?"
"Gun. Times change. Some classics don't. I'll extract the bullet for you."
"You know how to charm a girl," Jones says, her smile a little trying.
"No," Grissom says simply. She looks at him a little strangely. "What?"
"Don't you ever think about doing something else Saturdays?"
"Watching Voyager 2 pass Saturn?"
"That's probably your idea of a date too," Jones says, her voice odd and a little flat. "Right. Have a good Saturday."
He nods at her, attention already on the mess crunched into Alan George's mouth and throat.
"Oh, and Grissom?"
"Hmmm?"
"Look at the living sometimes too. Or people will start thinking you're a ghost."
She leaves, he remains in the silence. But that's all right.
He's started a life on it.
II
1983
Nick runs.
His mother always remarks they must have bred an athlete; his father only smiles. Perhaps he doesn't believe that's Nick's path, or perhaps he just finds it something to smile of. Nick's never asked.
He's a little afraid to. He loves dad and he loves mum, but he can't ask them. He's afraid he'll never run out of question.
He runs instead.
Jack invites him to come play Space Invaders; Nick runs. Jessie invites him to the arcade; Nick runs. Tessie asks him to play Pac-Man and smiles at him with red lips and Nick runs hardest of all.
He thinks there's something wrong with him. There must be. She wouldn't have done it otherwise, wouldn't have touched him, wouldn't have... It must be.
If he can just run long enough, maybe he can leave it behind.
He just doesn't understand what he did wrong. He's good at school. He helps with the dishes. He's proud of his father. He stands up for his sisters. He can't have done anything wrong.
Can he?
Nick runs, but he can't leave himself behind.
II
1984
Blood drops on a walkman.
The brain has filters, Sara knows. Like an engine, or a plant. It's a needed function to stop something bad from coming into the system. It's better to live without grit.
The brain knows it too.
So all she can see when she closes her eyes is blood on a walkman. Hers - walkman, that is. Not blood. Father's blood.
But even when she tries to remember, she can't envision the murder. She saw it happen. She still can't see it now. It was a perception, but the brain hasn't allowed it to be filtered to memory. It is as if it thinks she shouldn't have to live with that grit - her mother killed her father.
Deep down, she knows it won't work. Not being able to remember doesn't mean it didn't happen. It did. There's enough police around that she knows it did. There's enough other memories in her head to know why it did.
Slaps. Punches. Bruises. Screaming. Scars. Apologies. Gifts. A walkman.
She had always wanted one, he knew. All her friends had. And the music played loud enough could drown out everything else. But not Thriller. Never play Thriller. She got enough of that live.
It's ruined now, she knows. All of it.
"Sara? I'm Jenny. It's time to go now."
Blood drops on a walkman, she remembers.
It makes a strangely symmetric pattern.
II
1987
Greg is getting used to his father yelling at him. It's not abusive - he never really feels afraid. These days, it's almost a compliment.
It means he's succeeded at his experiment. Like now, taking a fax machine apart.
"Work paid for this machine," his father says, sounding about ready to have a minor stroke. "Greg, why... Just, why?"
"I wanted to see how it worked," Greg says, which is true. He always does. De Loreans. Video recorders. Rubic cubes. Atari consoles. Gold fish. Lawnmowers. Mouse traps. Radioactivity.
It was too bad his mother caught him before he could buy that ticket to Chernobyl.
"Greg... Science is for geeks," his father says firmly. He always does. "You want to make your father proud, don't you? Stock market, there's your ticket. Good career. How about it, son?"
"No," says Greg Sanders.
It's going to take his father at least another decade to realise his son is a geek.
II
1989
Catherine isn't sure if she hates answering machines or not. On one hand, if she hadn't made Eddie get one, she would still be a fool. On the other hand, if she hadn't, she wouldn't feel one.
He's cheating. Or thinking of it, if giving his number out to tramps who leave messages like that. She's played it over and over again, and now the message is stuck in her head like a bad tune.
She wants to kill him. She isn't going to. Detective Tadero has taught her enough about crime and solving it that she knows why it's a very bad idea.
And there's that other thing. That other very important little thing.
So, she's not murdering Eddie with a rusty fork and instead gets even the only way she knows how.
She's fucking a teenager in his car, just a little under the influence of a little something-something.
She should feel ashamed, she knows. He's barely legal and acting shy enough she knows this means more to him than her. But Las Vegas has a way of killing scruples. She wants a one-night quickie, to feel sexy and wanted and Catherine.
He kisses her, fingers already up her skirt in a way someone must have taught him is sexy. His shoulders is so tensed she knows if she touches him, he might come then and there.
So she leans back instead, watching his eyes close as he thrusts into her and makes a noise at the back of her throat. In the dark of the car, his skin almost makes him blend in. There is something about him that tells her one day, one day he's going to be really, really worth sleeping with just on his own.
Maybe it's the shine in his eyes, visible even with Las Vegas sparkling as the only light.
"Hey," she whispers as his teeth scrapes her collarbone. "What's your name?"
"Warrick," he manages. "Warrick Brown. I'm... Oh, fuck."
Warrick Brown makes Catherine feel Catherine again, and neither has any idea the future will be doing a replay of its own.
II
2007
Some things don't change.
It's another dead body. It's another murder. It's another murderer caught. It's another Saturday morning and five CSIs are having breakfast.
"Remind me never to get killed on a 1980s retro party," Nick says, and Greg nods with enthusiastically with eggs in his mouth.
"Didn't like the 80s, Nick?" Catherine asks, winking at him. "I bet you were at your cutest then."
"I'm at my cutest now," he replies firmly. "Lost the Miami Vice look."
Warrick laughs a little, drinking his coffee almost lazily. "That would not be becoming on you, man."
"Some things change, luckily."
"Until they become retro," Greg points out. "Why is that? We decide things were horribly out of fashion until it's in fashion to remember how out of fashion it was?"
"The illusion things change," Grissom says, still keeping his eyes on the outside. Sara's late, his watch has been telling him for fifteen minutes straight and he worries.
"Things do change," Nick corrects him. "Man, what were we thinking with that hair?"
"Height of fashion," Catherine corrects him, "to look like you had a hairdresser that was high."
"You'd look hot in anything," Warrick says, tone a little too casual. She smiles at him, Nick and Greg a little too occupied arguing over who ate the sausage and should pay for it to notice. Grissom isn't... Grissom isn't there at all.
"Gil," Catherine tries, and he looks at her a little distractedly. "She'll be here. Unless you gave her the wrong address."
"Sara settling in at swing?" Greg asks, but Grissom doesn't answer, simply getting up and walking out. "What did I say?"
"It's more what Grissom didn't want to say," Warrick says. "You know Gris."
"I know Greg's trying to weasel out of paying his share," Nick says good-naturedly as he gets up too, feeling strangely energized. "But only if he can get to the counter faster than me. School sprint champion, Sanders. You're doomed."
"No one ever told you science is for geeks, not athletes?" Greg calls after him, not even trying to make a matching run for it. Getting up lazily, he gives Catherine and Warrick a little wave and leave them there.
They sit in silence, but it's a comfortable one, feet under the table just touching.
"Lyndsey's out," she finally says. "Left a message on my cell. House is all empty."
It's not going to be for long, she knows when she sees his eyes shimmer in the filtered sunlight from outside.
Outside, it's snowing dust, twirled up by autumn winds. Another summer ended. Another year changing.
Sara's watching the particles in the air, leaning against her car as Grissom walks up.
"Do you know dirt falls in patterns?" she asks him as a way of greeting.
"You never come in anymore," he says as his way of greeting. "Sara?"
I'm not sure my filter works anymore, she doesn't tell him. I'm afraid, she doesn't say. I think they would tell, she doesn't confess.
"I know," she says instead, leaning into his kiss when he gives it, tasting desert on his lips. She can feel him smile as he pulls away slightly and he looks almost happy.
"What do you see, Gil?"
"I see you. What do you see?"
"Symmetry," she says, kissing him again.
Some things don't change. Nick's still running. Greg's still into the how. Grissom's still a ghost. Catherine's still getting even and still getting Warrick. Sara's still living with filtered grit.
Some things do. Nick asks questions. Greg doesn't ruin fax machines and wonders about the whys too. Catherine feels like Catherine, but a willingly changed one. Warrick's kicked a habit and gained confidence. Grissom looks at least one living. Sara's starting to remember a murder after all.
Change, not change, retro and now. It does makes a strangely symmetric pattern if you look. Another year the same. Another year changing.
Play it again, time.
FIN
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2007-11-15 07:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-15 09:01 pm (UTC)Great job!