Author's Note: Slow going. No excuse, just lacking motivation. I haven't been writing this for a while, but I'm quite far ahead. A few chapters left before I hit a brick wall. Thanks for your patience.

Chapter Six: Reacquainting

All eyes were on him as he limped into the lab. He tried not to think about it, even though each pair burned holes like cigarettes into his skin. None of them were people he recognized.

The woman at the front desk offered him a timid, "Hi, Greg."

He looked at her blankly for a minute and blinked. But he couldn't remember her name. "Hey," he said.

"Judy," Nick whispered into his ear.

Greg looked at him, then turned to the woman and smiled. "Judy," he said, as if he'd known her all his life. She beamed at him, clearly flattered that he seemed to remember her, even if he was faking.

Nick led him further into the lab, always touching his good arm gently. On either side of them were legions of windows, behind which lab techs paused in their analyses. Greg saw one, Wendy, punch Hodges hard in the arm to make him look up. Hodges seemed the least interested out of everyone and only gave Greg a short, bored glance before returning to his microscope. Greg saw Wendy hit him again, but he ignored her this time. It made him smile.

"Why is Wendy in Hodges' lab?"

"Who knows," Nick sighed. "I don't get those two at all."

They rounded the corner and Nick led him into what Greg deduced was the break room, if the fridge and coffee maker were any indicators. There was a woman there, eating a bagel as she went over some paperwork at the table.

"Have a seat," Nick said quietly to Greg, helping him do just that on the couch.

The woman looked up at Nick's voice and blinked at Greg a few times. Greg recognized her as Sara, who had visited him several times in the hospital at first, and then had suddenly stopped coming. If what Nick had said was true, it was because she had been waiting for him to come to her.

"Hello, Sara," he said, with a small smile.

The corner of her lips twitched and she nodded appreciatively at the greeting. "Hello, Greg. What are you doing here?"

"Well," Greg began, leaning back on the couch. "Someone told me there was a pretty lady waiting for me here."

"Is that so?" Sara said with the tiniest of smirks.

"I came here for you," Greg said, and in mid-smile, he stopped. There was a flash of déjà vu that he was desperate to place, but whatever it was, he knew it was something important. Because whatever ghost of a smile there had been haunting Sara's gaunt features vanished. She rose to her feet and gathered her paperwork, leaving her bagel abandoned on a paper plate.

"I have to go," she said, hastily, all good humor gone.

Greg desperately tried to grasp at the straws of his memory, trying to figure out what it was he had said, and why it had affected her so much. "Sara, please, stay!"

"Greg…" Nick began, nervously. Greg knew Nick wanted to tell him to let it go, but he couldn't. In the meantime, Sara was hastily making her way to the door.

Greg knew he had to convince her to talk to him. "I know I said something just now. I know it means something. Please."

She froze, her back stiff as she stood in the doorway.

Greg sighed, but he was still tense. He didn't want yet another memory to slip through his fingers. Sara was the key. "I know that you know something. Something about what I said. You wouldn't have responded that way if you didn't."

Excruciatingly slowly, she turned and her eyes fell on Nick, imploringly. He took a deep breath. "I'm going to go tell Grissom you're here," the Texan said. He ducked his head as he past Sara in the doorway. Their eyes locked a moment, and he was gone.

Sara entered the room again, each step tentative, as if she were testing the ground she was walking on. Greg could tell from her every movement that she was a cautious person, probably one who didn't trust easily. He could relate to that.

"Tell me what you know," he pleaded as she took a seat to his left on the couch and stared straight ahead. Her spine was rigid, her hands gripped her knees. She refused to look at him. But then, unexpectedly, she smiled.

"You were barely conscious," she whispered. "In fact, mostly, you weren't. Sofia let me in to see you, before the paramedics moved you into the ambulance. I held your head in my lap, and your eyes fluttered open. You saw me. You knew me, at least, then you did. You tried to speak. Most of it didn't make any sense. You pointed at Stanley Tanner and babbled about a few other things. I hushed you. Squeezed your hand. I knew you were talking shop. Worrying about others. You wanted me to collect evidence. So I told you that I hadn't come there for that…"

"You'd come there for me," Greg whispered. Sandalwood and citrus invaded his nostrils and shocked his system. The words, in her voice, echoed in his head.

"I didn't even think you would ever remember that," Sara whispered. "Even without the amnesia. I didn't even know if you were still conscious when I said it. And I've asked the doctors, why, why you knew who I was then, but not after you woke up. They blamed it on hemorrhaging in the brain when they lost you for a minute on the way to the hospital."

As if she had lifted the veil from his brain, Greg could remember it clearly now. And her voice, her words, just like Brass's words, were something that he could hold onto. And he did. He held them tightly to his chest, and he knew that he would never let them go, he would never forget. He reached his right hand out across his lap and curled his fingers around her palm. Finally, she turned to look at him.

"Thank you," he whispered, meaning it more than he could ever say.

A smile was her reply.

There was a tentative knock at the break room door, and they both looked up to greet whoever it was. Catherine stood there, with Warrick lingering close behind her. Catherine looked concerned, like she felt she was intruding. Greg offered her a broad smile to reassure her.

"I wasn't fair to you," he told her. "Back at the hospital. I'm sorry."

She returned his smile, seeming somewhat reassured. "You were right. And we're just happy to see you up and about again."

"Not out of the rocks yet," Greg said. "Still can't remember. Still talk like an idiot."

"You don't talk like an idiot," Catherine said, clearly choosing not to correct something he'd just said. "And besides, some women find lisps attractive."

Greg scoffed. "A lisp. Is that what we're calling it?"

"You don't sound like you used to," Warrick conceded, stepping into the room past Catherine. "But at least your wits came out of this unscathed."

Greg looked at his colleague a long time. "Warrick," he said, as if just recalling his name. "You don't feel we're all that close."

Warrick's eyebrows shot up. Catherine and Sara offered him curious looks. He turned his head, looking at both of them and seeming embarrassed. "That's… who told you that?"

"Nick."

"I didn't mean it in any bad way," Warrick explained. "Greg, we all care about you. However close we were or weren't, it makes no difference. I was as scared for you as anyone else in this room. Nick and I, we processed your crime scene together. I was at that scene for him as much as for you, but when I found some of your hair, it just…"

This was new information to Greg. "You processed my scene?"

Warrick hesitated, as if he wasn't sure if he had been allowed to release that detail. "Yes. I did."

"What did you find?"

"I heard Hodges filled you in on that," Sara interjected, putting a hand on Greg's bad knee. Greg looked down, noting that she was squeezing it tightly, and without any hesitation. She didn't care that it was skinny and frail, and that made him smile again.

"I didn't ask what happened," he said to her, as kindly as he could manage. "I asked what evidence you found. How did you together piece it?"

"Why do you want to know that?" Warrick asked.

"Apparently, I used to be a crime scene investigator," Greg replied. "I'd like to go back to that someday, but first I have to remember what that means. Would you talk at me about it?"

"The rock," Warrick began, "that Demetrius James used to bash your head in. Your blood and hair were all over it, as were his fingerprints. Paint transfer, on your car. Helped us catch one of the gang members, actually. Shattered glass from your windshield, trace from—" He cut himself off. "Trace from your fingernails helped us catch another gang member. You scratched her up pretty good. Together, we used the two punks that we had to lure out the rest, including the gang leader, a guy calling himself Pig Man. He and Demetrius James were our biggest scores that day. We all celebrated afterward, though it was somewhat bittersweet. By then, doctors had reported you'd slipped into a coma."

"And all of that… all those small, insignature pieces, put together, helped you catch the people that did this to me?" Greg breathed.

"Well, uh… yeah," Warrick said.

"They aren't insignificant," Catherine added. "No detail at a crime scene is ever insignificant."

Greg's eyes actually lit up. "That's fascilating!"

Sara chuckled beside him. "There he is."

Greg blinked and looked at her. "What?"

"The Greg we used to know," she explained. "I knew he was in there somewhere."

This actually made his heart fall a little, because while Sara seemed reassured, Greg wasn't so certain that he was the same Greg she used to know.

"Either way," she said, as if sensing his unease. "I like this new Greg all the same."

"Whoever you are now, no matter who you were before, we still love you, Greg," Catherine agreed.

"Seems like the gang's all here," came Nick's voice from the doorway. Warrick and Catherine turned as Greg and Sara looked up from the couch. The Texan was accompanied by Grissom, who was as inscrutable as ever. Greg wondered if that was new, or if that was the way his old boss had always been. He wished he could remember.

"Brass and Sofia send their regards," he said to Greg. "They're both out working cases right now. Ronnie is out sick today… You can meet her later."

For some reason, Greg felt the urge to stand, like a private in the presence of his general. He struggled to his feet, using the arm of the chair to support him, but was immediately aided by Sara.

"What are you getting up for?" Warrick asked, coming to his other side.

"Gotta salute the chief, don't I?" Greg asked, his voice strained from the effort of standing. He smiled at Grissom and, as Sara clung to his bad arm, raised his right hand and gave the most rigid salute he could muster.

The glint in Grissom's eyes behind his glasses and his partially opened mouth gave away how moved he was by Greg's display. But then, he snapped his mouth shut. "You're not in the army, Greg, and I don't need to be saluted."

"I don't know," Greg confessed. "I got this thought that you deserved it somehow."

"Sit," Grissom demanded. "Stop being ridiculous."

"Keep being ridiculous," Nick encouraged with a wink. "It reminds me of the old days."

"Tell me about it," Greg said as he sat back on the couch. They all looked at him strangely. "No. Really. Tell me about it."

And so, for a good hour, all of them sat with Greg in that break room and relayed stories about what he was like seven years ago, five years ago, a year ago. They told him about his days as a lab technician, his transfer to CSI, how that affected his attitude, even his personality. They told him of days spent rocking out to Marilyn Manson, dancing in headdresses, turbans and other headgear, and making bets with and pulling pranks on his fellow lab technicians. They told him about his final exam, how he had failed and then passed it, how proud of him they'd all been. And for the first time, Greg didn't feel bad about not remembering. He became excited to find that person again, and grow into something more.

"We'll continue this at the diner after shift," Grissom assured Greg, looking at his watch. "Ecklie is lenient, considering the circumstances, but we all have work to do."

All of them rose to leave, each flashing Greg a unique, regretful look, as if they all wished they could stay and tell him stories about himself all night.

Sara squeezed his left knee again. "I have tomorrow night off," she told him. "How about I take you out to your favorite restaurant?"

"I have a favorite restaurant?" Greg breathed.

Sara laughed. And to Greg, it was music.

Dinner after shift made Greg feel almost at home. They had taken him to the diner near the crime lab and ordered plates of breakfast food while they explained Greg's entire life to him. Greg learned more about them in the stories about himself than anything else. Each of them told a different story that showed a different aspect that they loved. Sofia recalled a time when Greg had been particularly affected by one of his first crime scenes, a burn victim that had survived with horrible wounds. It had rattled him, but Sofia had encouraged him to hold on to his humor. Nick shared the story of when Greg plastered a purple prose newsletter about Nick all across the lab, much to Nick's chagrin. Catherine spoke of a moment when she had said something shockingly suggestive to Greg that had made him so flustered he dropped his evidence and his face turned red. Sara offered stories of her days as Greg's mentor, including one about an exploding toilet. Brass related an instance where he had taken Greg and Nick to the gun range, and how, though he'd talked a big game, Greg's aim was the worst of the three of them.

"I remember that!" Nick exclaimed. "You confessed later it's because you'd never shot one before in your life!"

"Now, when was this?" Greg asked, his pen poised over a notebook. "I'm trying to establish a time line here."

"Hm, what, 2002, 2003?" Nick asked, looking at Brass for confirmation.

"When you were still a lab rat, for sure," Brass agreed with a nod. "Long before you had a gun of your own."

"I remember when we gave you one," Grissom put in. "You asked me if you could use it to shoot at mockingbirds, or if you were only allowed to target blue jays."

"Atticus Finch!" Greg exclaimed, proud of himself for making the connection. "To Kill A Mockingbird! I read that book when I was twelve and I've never forgotten it! I was making a joke!"

"Yeah, you did that on occasion," Warrick said with a smirk.

Greg could have stayed at that table, writing down these stories all day, but his colleagues were exhausted. After a few hours, they all apologized as they headed off to bed. Even Nick, who lingered for as long as he could, urged Greg to finish his coffee so they could head home together.

"So this is what we did, huh?" Greg asked, looking around the diner. "After shift, we'd all just come here and… whatever?"

"That's what we'd do," Nick confirmed with a tired smile. "C'mon, Greg. Some of us have work in the evening."

Greg continued to stir his coffee, staring into the swirls of it. "I still don't sleep."

"I'd blame the eight cups of coffee you've swigged since we got here," Nick said.

"Not just tonight," Greg clarified, needlessly. "In general. Sleep's not my want right now."

"You tell your doctor about that?"

Greg scoffed. "Which one? I have, like, fifteen of 'em."

"Dr. Amador," Nick clarified. "She's your main one, right?"

Greg grumbled. "No. We haven't talked about not sleeping."

"Well you should." Nick yawned and slid out of the booth. He nodded at the door. "C'mon, Greggo."

Reluctantly, Greg got to his feet and stared at his half-finished coffee. He left the diner unable to stop himself from feeling like he'd left something behind there, somehow.

Greg still had dinner plans with Sara the following night, and he looked forward to it all day. He realized how good it felt to get out of Nick's house and join the ranks of the living. She picked him up and took Greg to a hole-in-the-wall Greek restaurant off the strip. Greg couldn't recall a time in his life when he'd ever eaten Greek food before, but Sara assured him that he loved it.

"Is taste change a side effect of being comafied?" Greg asked, after taking a bite of something Sara said was wrapped in grape leaves and then leaving the rest on his plate.

Sara scrunched up her nose. "OK, maybe the grape leaves weren't your thing. But the schwarma, you always loved that."

"If it's so good, why aren't you eating it?"

"I'm a vegetarian," Sara explained.

"Vege…" Greg took a look at the plastic menu on the table. "How can you find anything to eat here? There's even meat in these grape leaves! I think…"

Sara laughed. "I didn't say this was my favorite restaurant. But I do like the salad here. Something about their feta cheese…"

Greg felt a tinge of warmth, thinking about Sara's choice to take him here when there wasn't much for her to eat. "So…" he began, but he was interrupted by Sara's phone.

"So?" Sara prompted as she reached for it.

"Get your phone," Greg encouraged, shaking his head. "I didn't really have anything to say."

She smiled at him before glancing at the name on the display and answering. Her smile slowly faded and her brow knit together. "What do you mean you have to cancel?" Greg strained his ears to hear the voice on the other line but couldn't make it out. And then, Sara's demeanor changed entirely. "I see. Do you need any help?" More chatter on the other end that Greg couldn't hear. Sara nodded. "No, it's not a problem, I'll be right over." She hung up and looked apologetically at Greg.

"Grissom has a scene," she explained, "over in Green Valley. House full of showgirls, all murdered."

"Ouch…" Greg said, unsure of the appropriate response.

"It's a big, messy scene. They need all hands on deck."

"But I thought this was your night off?" Greg began.

Sara sighed as she took her napkin off her lap and placed it on the table. "Yeah, so did I." She made eye contact with the waiter. "Could we get the check, please?"

"Can I come?" Greg asked.

Sara hesitated, then shook her head. "Greg, that's probably not a good idea."

"Please?"

Sara frowned. "Do you remember that story Sofia told yesterday? About the burn victim? You didn't take that so well. It changed you."

"What's your point?" Greg asked.

"A scene like this… I don't think you're ready for it. Not yet."

"It's not like I've never done this before," Greg said. "I just don't remember doing it before. But, I mean, for God's sake, Sara, I was beaten and put in a coma. And if I ever want to get back to the life I had before, I'm going to have to face scenes like this eventually, aren't I?"

Sara's mouth moved to the left side of her face as she considered Greg's words. She caught the waiter's attention again. "Make the schwarma to go, please?"

Greg had been told to wait in the car. Though he'd protested adamantly, he obeyed and watched the beautiful suburban home from behind the glass of a windshield. Police were swarming all over the property like ants, and the bright yellow of crime scene tape was visible even at this time of night. Greg found the whole dance fascinating as he watched, trying, as usual, to remember something he feared was long gone from him. He fell almost into a trance of waking sleep as he watched the officers do their work. Brass paced back and forth. A couple reporters lingered just beyond the tape, hoping to get a quote. Officers shined flashlights at the house, the sky, the sidewalk, even once directly into Greg's eyes.

And then, there was a scramble of action as several officers swept quickly into the house, followed by a jogging Brass. Greg frowned, trying to guess what was happening. It was several moments later before anything made sense. Brass was escorting Sara out of the house. Even from this distance, Greg could tell that she was shaken. He wondered if the crime scene had gotten to her, like she'd been worried it could get to him. He doubted that even veteran CSIs were immune to such things all of the time. Brass took off his crime scene coat and draped it over Sara's shivering shoulders. They huddled in hushed conversation. Greg's concern and curiosity piqued, he opened the door. It took him a moment to manage to kick his bad leg out of the car, but he did, and seized his cane in the process before making his way across the street. Somehow, somewhere in the space between his car and the sidewalk, he became someone else. His actions became automatic. He ducked under the crime scene tape like it was no big deal and began to make his way toward Sara and Brass. An officer placed his palm on his chest.

"Excuse me, but this is a crime scene,"

"Check the vest," Greg snapped instinctively, "I'm CSI, I'm here to process the scene."

The officer blinked. "What vest, sir?"

Greg looked down. He was wearing a white button-down shirt with blue lattice lines and a pair of jeans. No vest. No badge. No gun. He came back to himself and suddenly wasn't so self-assured.

"I-I'm sorry," he stammered. "I don't know why I said that."

"Can you tell me who you are, sir?" the officer asked, sounding at once both concerned and demanding.

"He's Greg Sanders," came Jim Brass's gruff voice.

The officer turned and looked at the detective, then back to Greg. Slowly, recognition crept into his eyes. "The guy that was…"

"Yeah," Brass interrupted, pushing the officer aside. He looked coldly at Greg. "What are you doing here, Greg?"

"Sara brought me," Greg explained. "I wanted to come." He looked past Brass's shoulder at his friend, who had pulled the jacket tighter around her and stood watching him by the door to the house. "Is she OK?"

Brass followed his gaze. Sara stared stonily at both of them. "She'll survive. There was a victim still alive on the scene. She reached out to Sara from under the bed, scratched her cheek."

Greg's eyebrows shot up. "So there's a survivor?"

Brass's expression was grim. "Not anymore."

Greg's eyebrows fell with his mood. "Oh. Can I talk to her?"

"Sara?" Brass clarified. He stepped out of the way. "Be my guest."

Greg made his way over to his old friend, who had a glimmer in her eyes. It took Greg a minute to place it before he realized it was tears.

"You OK?" he asked, feeling guiltily relieved to be the one asking the question instead of the one hearing it.

Instead of a verbal reply, she simply nodded.

"Brass told me what happened. I can't imagine what that must have been like."

"You have your own nightmares," Sara said, with a sad smile.

"That I do," Greg conceded. "But at least I don't remember mine."

"She died in my arms," Sara said. "Did Brass tell you that?"

"No, he did not," Greg said. "Sara… it's not your fault."

"I know," she said, mustering her stoic expression and using a smile to reinforce it. "And it'll be better when we get the bastard that did this to her and her friends. I have to go back and finish processing the scene. Do you… wanna come?"

Greg was intrigued. "I thought I was regulated to the car?"

"Relegated," Sara corrected, without even flinching. "And you were. But you're here, now. Past the tape. Might as well go all the way."

"I bet the old me would have killed to hear you say that," said Greg with a smirk.

"Yeah," Sara returned. "He would have."

She took him around the house and into the backyard. She dusted for prints on a chair that had been lodged under a doorknob. If Greg had known how to do any of this before, it had all vanished. Sara showed him how to leave a fine coat of dust and how to collect the print ("The particles stick to the oils left behind by the skin."). She made a comment about how there was new technology coming out where all they'd have to do was scan it like a price gun, but Las Vegas had yet to upgrade. In the meantime, she explained, she kept things fun by using different colored print dust. She commented on the type of print, how it was calloused, which was unusual.

As she was explaining the different kinds of print one might find, she paused a moment, then laughed.

"What is it?" Greg asked.

"Nothing," she explained. "It's just… déjà vu, is all. Reminds me of my first day training you."

"For me, this is my first day training under you."

"Yeah," Sara said, with a thoughtful smile. "I guess it is."