A parody by QueequegEvie
§ Disclaimer: Characters of CSI and
Without A Trace do not belong to me. (in my dreams, duh!) Other characters are
often derived from actual individuals; if they behave anyway like their
real-life identity, it must be a coincidence.
Also,
any discriminating acts will be conducted by the character that derived from
myself.
(First published on 2003/3/17; revised on 2004/3/13)
Agent Samantha Spade stepped out of the closet. Smoothing her pink blouse, she
walked back to her desk, while the phone in Jack Malone's office rang. Sam
rushed in the office and picked up the phone.
"FBI New York Field Office Missing Person's Unit. How may I help
you?"
A frantic voice from the other end of the phone answered, almost screamed.
"GeekLove is gone! GeekLove is GONE!"
"Wait…" Samantha was confused. "Calm down, Miss..... Take a deep
breath. First, where are you?"
The voice on the phone hesitated. "Las… Las Vegas. You guys will handle
the case if we stay in ‘New York, New York’ right?"
"I can transfer you to our Nevada office if you don't mind..."
"Please," the girl on the phone begged. "Please, you are one of
the best people we can think of. Besides, we have reason to believe the missing
people are in New York."
Jack walked into his office. He and Sam had a silent agreement that she would
walk out of the closet three minutes earlier than him, just to avoid suspicion.
Jack gave Sam a look signaling her that she could continue the conversation.
Sam staaaared at him, and smiled. Someone else
on the other end had taken the phone when Sam concentrated back to the
conversation.
"I am sorry, Agent Spade. Evie is a little bit hysterical in stressed
situation. My name is Devanie Maxwell."
Sam was surprised. "How do you know my name?"
"We’ve been admiring the work you and your team had done for a
while."
"Thank you. I need the basic information on the missing people. Can you
give me that?" Sam hit the speaker phone button so Jack could hear the
conversation.
"Oh, yes!" Devanie said. "Gil Grissom and Sara Sidle are
missing. They are LVPD's criminalists. Supposedly we should have a seminar from
them more than three months ago, but they never showed up. Together, I
mean."
Sam scribbled down the information. "What kind of seminar?"
"Geeklove seminar... uh, actually, the official name of the course was
'UST between boss and subordinate..."
"UST?" hearing this on the phone, Sam and Jack exchanged a meaningful
glance. Was this what they had in mind?
"Unresolved Sexual Tension."
"Oh." Sam smiled at Jack, who offered her a cup of coffee and a
shoulder touch. "Where and when was the last time you and your classmates
had seen Mr. Grissom and Miss Sidle together? "
"At a crime scene analyzing blood drops. They walked around the entire
block. It was two weeks before the seminar. It was the last Thursday of
December."
"When was the last time you've seen them individually?"
"Sara... she walked out of the door of Police Department and never came
back. Grissom parked outside Lady Heather's mansion at night about three weeks
before Sara was missing. Just last week, Lady Heather closed her *dominion* and
moved to New York."
"Thank you, Miss Maxwell. We will send agents to speak with you shortly.
You are staying in New York, New York, right?"
"Yes. Thank you, Agent Spade. Please help us find them."
"We will."
Sam hang up the phone. Jack staaaaared at Sam.
His uneven hair looked depressed with the serious expression on his face. Sam
looked at him. "Jack, this sounds like a case of character abuse and
cruelty from the writers. "
Jack nodded. "We have to find them before the Season Finale." He
said.
~~ 30 Minutes Later ~~
Vivian tapped in the government computer network and printing out Grissom and
Sara's files. Sam quickly downloaded Grissom and Sara's pictures from
GrissomandSara[dot]com and updated the team with Grissom and Sara's un-romance
history. Jack set up the timeline on the white board, noting their last
appearances with black lines.
"Danny and Martin, you will go to Las Vegas and interview the witnesses.
Vivian, talk to the heads at CBS and see what you can find. Sam, we will check
out this Lady Heather." Jack commanded. "Okay, lets move!"
(First published on 2003/3/18; revised on 2004/3/12)
(2003/3/18
on LiveJournal:
**
I realized that I vent too much. Since I really can't work out the MatLab code,
I would rather just make something fun.
Maybe
when I am done I will think of the code.
**
The world is such a depressing and nervous place recently.)
~*Missing 2320.5 hours*~
Danny and Martin headed straight towards Chris Carter's School of Dramatic Arts after their plane arrived at Las Vegas. After all the PSVs in the crowded economic class seats (The FBI must be cutting down budgets), both of them finally got some air in the rented car. The car, with a big Lariat Rental at the back, cruised over the Strip. Martin studied the glamour of the city through the window. Danny was amused by Martin's expressions when he saw the *clubs*.
"Hun," Danny coughed slightly behind the wheels. Martin turned over and look at him.
"What kind of academy let students live in New York, New York?" Danny asked.
"I don't know," said Martin. "Maybe in the world of parody and fan fictions."
"Well, that's good enough for me." Danny shrugged. "We will know more when we get there."
~*Missing 2321 hours*~
"... I respect your opinion, but I DO think online fandom is a microcosm of the entire fandom...." a heated argument between the instructor and a student was interrupted when Danny poked his head in the conference room door. The instructor excused the students and talked to Danny. In a minute, he was back and dismissed the class. Martin walked into the classroom and showed his badge.
"We are from the FBI. May I speak to Devanie Maxwell?"
A red-headed girl in the back put up her hand. "That will be me. You must be the agents from New York."
Other girls in the classroom quickly gathered together. One of them handed Danny a timeline, similar to what they had back on the white board in the New York office.
"Hi, they call me Red Creeper. This is the timeline we have after we gathering all our information."
Danny studied the timeline, finding some new leads he did not have from his colleagues. Martin sat down next to him and tried to read the piece of paper in Danny's hands.
"'Since I met you', interesting..." Danny said, and exchanged a meaningful staaaaare with Martin. Martin nodded. "It was very beautiful...."
Before Martin could finish the sentence, a strange little girl with dark hair showed up next to him and started poking him with her fingers.
"Are you sure you are not an alien?"
(First published on 2003/3/20; revised on 2004/3/12)
Before Martin revealed this true identity, Danny came to rescue. "No, not in this show. Try the Sci-Fi channel."
"But I swear I saw an extra-terrestrial creature in the room too, when I was not looking at it." another dark-haired student said.
"Folie a deux," Evie shook her head and sighed. "Lac, what do you think? Optical tricks or Space-Time discontinuum?"
"Folie a deux, times two. Lets go to the fan-art class."
"Okay." two girls walked outside the classroom together, as Danny continued interviewing RC and Dev.
"Grissom said he was on a date, but we were not sure who or what he was with," RC said. "How could it be a person other than Sara when he and Sara were so shippy to each other the night after? "
"...And then Sara called Hank "baby". How could that happen? There is no logic behind this, Agents." Dev said.
"Not to mention the 90 minutes of Lady Heather." Molly pointed out, joined by VIgirl. "I am sure he doesn’t love Lady Heather. It was the shortest Sweep Relationship I've ever seen."
"Although it generated the biggest male 18-49 demo." Molly added, handing Danny a pile of her research papers with statistics.
"I've heard that in The Guardian. Apparently the writers were not sure about the shipping. It happens all the time." Martin continued. "Especially those people from the daytime like General Hospital and Days of Our Lives. Their behaviors are the most difficult to predict."
"I don't know you watch daytime soaps," Danny was amused. "How do you find the time?"
"I, I , eh, TIVO-ed them," Martin paused briefly, and explained himself. "For research purposes only."
RC and Dev quickly exchanged a glance. RC pointed at her quiz problems from last class. It said: "Is It Shippy?" Dev nodded.
Danny continued. "Where was the last time you've seen them individually?"
"I saw Grissom's car parked outside Lady Heather's mansion last week, before she moved to New York." one of the girls who had been quiet the entire time, finally spoke with slight German accent. "Hi, I am Eve. My main expertise is surveillance." She gave the agents a folder of photos.
"This is Grissom's car parked outside the mansion last Thursday night. I've seen it before, so I took the photos." Eve continued. "When Lac, Dev and I saw it was still parked outside the mansion on Saturday night, we realized something was wrong, so we brought the photo and Captain Brass along...."
Martin and Danny were intrigued. "And?"
"When we got there, everybody in the mansion was gone." Dev said. "Lac did some asking around. People said Lady Heather dismissed the girls and packed for New York that morning. She didn't even take her whips with her."
Martin took out his cell phone and called the New York office.
"Hey, Jack, It's me, Martin. I've got some new leads on Lady Heather, you.... are you there, Jack?"
"Bad signals?" Molly asked.
"Yeah. Probably THEY stuck in an elevator." Danny added. "It would not be the first time."
Molly offered to bring everybody coffee when Marin continued.
"What about Sara? Where was she?"
"Evie... oh, she isn't here now, but she'd told us everything." Dev said. "Sara broke up with Hank last Thursday and she was very distraught. Evie saw her walked out of the door, got into Catherine's car, and never came back."
"Who is Catherine?"
"One of the criminalists just like Grissom and Sara, except that she is the star instructor of 'RST' seminar and the model of 'Dress Revealing' class."
"What is RST?" Danny asked.
"Resolved Sexual Tension." Martin said.
Molly brought coffee back for everybody, and she gave a cup of hot tea to Danny.
"I don’t drink tea," Danny protested.
"Yes, you do. We are shippers. We notice everything." RC said.
"But I really don't drink tea." Danny insisted.
Martin smiled, and passed him the honey.
PART FOUR
(First published on 2003/3/29; revised on 2004/3/12)
~*Missing 2325 hours*~
After routing his phone call through Vivian, Martin finally sent the confirmation to Jack that Lady Heather was indeed in New York.
Vivian worked out the New York address of Lady Heather's; Jack and Sam jumped at the chance to interview Lady Heather.
~*Missing 2326 hours*~
A woman with two big black-circled eyes and black outfits opened the door. Sam and Jack flashed their badges in a synchronized motion. "FBI. We are looking for a Heather Playhippo." Sam asked.
"Lady Heather" paused. It seemed like three hundred years ago that somebody called her real name, after she was sired to be a vampire ...ooops, wait, wrong show. "That is me, but I prefer the name 'Lady Heather', if you don't mind, agents."
Jack and Sam nodded. Following Lady Heather, they stepped into the house and sat in the living room. Lady Heather brought them tea in exclusive, Victorian style cups. Jack and Sam showed reluctances in the offering because they just had their coffee together in a shop close to the office. Sam noticed that all windows were shut and covered with black curtains.
"I understand that you have moved here from Las Vegas, Lady Heather," Jack said. "May I ask why? I assume that your business should have worked well in the Vegas setting. Besides, it's difficult to leave all the old customers behind, isn't it?"
"Change of environment." Lady Heather said. "Refreshment of live is an essential element of being. My girls can take care of the old customers."
"So you plan to start a new business here, is that right?" Jack said.
"Yes."
"I don't see any equipments or..." Sam noted. "I understand that you use whips, balls, and chains..."
"I am waiting for the workers to re-decorate the house." Lady Heather said. "My instruments are left at the mansion."
"Do you use closet?" Jack asked. Sam was surprised, and gave Jack a joking stare.
"No. Closets?" Lady Heather was confused. Jack and Sam smiled at each other.
Ignoring Lady Heather’s confusion, Sam continued. "What is your relationship with Gil Grissom?"
"We are simply acquaintance, through business," Lady Heather replied, trying to make no expression over her usual expressionless exterior.
"What kind of business? Was he one of your customers?"
"No," Lady Heather gave a forced, uncomfortable smile, trying to be mysterious. "He was investigating murders of my employees and customers."
"Miss Playhippo, Gil Grissom is missing. Is it possible that you've seen him before you left Las Vegas? "
Lady Heather was not too fond of the use of her real name, but she concentrated on answering the question with her artificial poise. She paused, formulating her thought. "No. What are you accusing me of? That I had kidnapped him? You know in your hearts I would never do such a thing."
"Thank you for your cooperation, Miss Play-hippo." Samantha stood up. "We should get back to the office."
Lady Heather gave Sam a death stare, although it was really difficult to tell from her artificially calm face.
----
"She is lying." Jack said in the car. "The shut windows, the dark rooms... do you think she hold Grissom in captive?"
"We don't have a warrant." Sam said. "She is lying. I can tell that too. Grissom was at her mansion before she moved here."
Jack sighed.
"I can't even believe she doesn't have a closet. It's not usual to miss the most important ... " Jack paused. "Maybe she isn't the person she claims to be."
"I can tell from the tea set." Samantha said, sarcastically.
"I still prefer coffee." Jack exchanged a meaningful glance with Sam.
PART FIVE
(Finished on 2004/3/12)
~*Missing 2327 hours*~
“Yes, Jack, we’ll stay here some more days to dig up the details on Gil Grissom. Say hello to Samantha for me.”
Martin hung up the phone, and consciously ignored the accusing look from Danny.
They were at the entrance of New York, New York. The statues of masculine New York firemen at the entrance somehow made them miss the old and busy city. You could recreate the city down to the pretzel stand, but it was still not NYC.
Danny spotted the same group of girls walking out of the CBS store. Still complaining for the expensive CBS merchandises without Sara on them, the girls seemed angry and would just explode on, practically, anything.
Danny walked up to the girls. Dev and Molly nodded at him, and asked simultaneously. “What did you find?”
“Well, we found Lady Heather in New York.” Martin, who was one step behind Danny, answered.
All of the girls gasped, and then sighed happily.
“Did you find Grissom?” Sheep (Formally known as…you know) asked.
“Unfortunately, we didn’t have enough evidence for a warrant to search her … dwelling …”
As Danny spoke, Marin noticed Evie greeted a girl and they started chatting in an alien-like conversation.
“Dd dd, dd-dd?”
“D-d! DDDdDDd?”
“DDDDdD?”
“DDDDDD,DDDD”
“DDDDDd!”
“Dd, DDDD,DDDDDD!”
“DDddd,ddddDDd!”
Evie then bid farewell to the girl.
Martin tried to understand their language. It sounded like Morse code, but it did not combine to any known language. It was not alien language, at least not the kind he spoke. What was it?
“Miss Evie, I had a few questions for you earlier. May we speak in private?
“Sure, just because you may be the hottest alien ever around, doesn’t mean I should avoid you.”
“What was the language you were speaking?”
“Oh, it was DD-ish; it’s a code between Anne and me, sorta a tribute to David Duchovny. We speak to each other in DD-ish just for fun.”
“Would you mind tell me what you were saying to each other?” asked Martin.
“Oh, it’s just some greetings, you know, the weather and stuffs. Nothing special.”
Martin, in his sharp alien sense, could tell that Evie was hiding something, but since Evie’s concentration span could last no more than 3 seconds, he did not want to continue digging her brain. Who could resist Alien John ( his true identity) anyway? He took back his mind-reading ability and tried to ask in human language --- English, in this case.
“Please, Evie, just bear with me.”
“Sure.”
“Your classmates mentioned that you saw Sara Sidle leaving the police department. Can you tell me more details about your sighting? Was there anything suspicious?”
“Well, she got into Catherine’s SUV.”
“Do you know where did they go? Anybody following them?”
Evie shook her head, but soon she stopped and said, “ Well, now you’ve mentioned it, I did saw somebody around.”
“Walking or driving?”
“Driving. The person was driving a white Corolla.”
“Plate?”
“Not really. It started with a B though.”
“Do you remember the driver?”
“Eh…. Women, brown hair, in her forty’s, looked hysterical, kept talking to herself, ‘I’m not an UGLI, I’m not an UGLI’.”
Martin pulled out his wallet and showed Evie a picture. It was not known why he would carry the photo of his supervisor’s wife. He just did.
“Yeah! That’s her! I am 101 percent sure!”
“Have you seen her before? Maybe sneaking around here?”
“Isn’t this Marie Maria Malone? Oh My God, I did not realize that was her!”
Marie. Maria. Malone.
Evie’s scream attracted other girls’ attention. As they gathered, they formed a little circle, centering the photo in Marin’s wallet. All of them had this fearful expression that made Alien John thought it was his own doing. Apparently the wife of his boss had a power way more powerful than his.
Evie started sobbing. “I am so sorry, I didn’t know she existed back then. I didn’t get a good look of her in Hank’s lecture either… I was too busy staring at him, and the way I felt about the UGLIs, you know… I just didn’t…”
“It’s alright, it’s not your fault,” other girls tried to calm her down. “This is way too strange,” said Dev.
“Strange,” Martin pulled up his sunglasses and made a David Caruso pose (although it was at night). “Strange, indeed.”
Danny looked at Martin and felt the bliss of sands on a Miami beach.
PART SIX
(2004/03/17)
~*Missing 2329 hours*~
Back in the New York Field Office.
“Jack, you have to pull yourself from the case now that Marie is involved.” Vivian argued. “I am afraid you might make any wrong decisions.”
Samantha was quiet, but she kept sending Jack meaningful glances. Jack was less than reluctant to pull himself out of the case despite Vivian’s protest. He and Samantha simply could not let the UGLI’s win the fight --- not even one self-denying UGLI who happened to be his legally wedded wife.
“It’s my job,” Jack said with a more-than-delightful Aussie accent,” not a responsible FBI agent would pull himself from this, Viv. If I pull off now, it’s you who will be getting the out-of-character love interest in next season. Try and tell me that’s what you want.”
“Alright, “ Viv said. “ Van Doren said as long as you stay in New York, she won’t push you further. Danny and Martin will look into Marie’s involvement. I’m checking with the trace, if you need me just call Agent Miller.” Vivian then walked out of the office.
Jack looked back at the computer screen and sighed. His distress was not relieved at all. Samantha came in from behind, handed him a cup of coffee, and patted him on the shoulder.
“It’s just like pulling the moth away from the fame.” He said.
“It gets everybody.” She said.
“I’m still not used to this.” He said.
“If you do,” Samantha sighed. “it’s time to get back to your wife.”
Danny was worried that this group of young women in their twenties and thirties would eat him alive. They were hungry for both the food and the truth since the hotel did not allow outside food inside the room, and the truth was still out there. Warrick walked into the conference room. “Ladies,” ignoring Danny’s protest, he continued. “A white Corolla was found abandoned on the Industrial Road. We found prints in the car that belong to a Marie Maria Malone. She’s your boss’ UGLI wife, am I correct?”
Martin and Danny nodded.
“So Evie’s words are checked out. Is the car registered to Marie?” asked Danny.
“That’s the strange part,” Warrick said with a calm voice, much like the kind he used in the CSI computer game.” It’s registered to a ‘Q’, male, age ‘infinity’, residence is in ‘a galaxy far away from here… or just about anywhere’.”
Some girls, headed by Heidi and Kirstin, burst into hysterical laughter. “You sure you didn’t find the car in Trek Experience?”
“A prank from some Trekkies, maybe?” Andi speculated.
Suddenly something hit Kirstin. “Well, suppose a Q really needs a car --- or some kind of manifestation of their form of vehicle or transportation maybe, why a white Corolla?”
“Why not use a Stargate? It’s faster and shippy-er.” asked Sheep. Some girls murmured and agreed with the Stargate theory; after all, the Iris is a much faster gateway for ordinary earth beings.
“Yet there are no Iris on earth that’s anywhere near Las Vegas or New York,” Andi explained. “Maybe a white Corolla is a metaphor to a slower, older form of transportation to the Q. Since they could overcome the speed of light, a Corolla could be a slip stream, warm hole, or even something we don’t know.”
Metaphor. The girls heard the word and were in awe. Metaphor must be good.
Martin looked serious this time. He knew about the Q’s, and he certainly knew what their kind could do. “In the beginning, we thought a group of UGLI’s were not happy about the ‘ship, but now Sara Sidle and Gil Grissom could be some billion light years away.”
PART SEVEN
“You see anything?” Jack hang up the phone and stared at Sam, who sat next to him on the driver’s seat.
“You know, you’re supposed to look at our target,” Samantha replied in a tone, filled with tease, without taking her eyes off Heather Playhippo’s door. “What did Viv say?”
Jack sighed. “It’s now on a cosmic scale.”
Samantha was taken aback. Surely she had heard about the basement office in the FBI head quarter, but she always thought the FBI’s do not really engaged in… cosmic matters. It did not mean that she had not conducted private researches though, especially when she worked under Jack Malone, who seldom worked by the book. She knew what she had studied may come in handy someday.
“What’s everything and everywhere?” Jack said seriously.
“A Q?” Samantha was surprised. Of course, she had studied it, but she was expecting something like a flukeman or a baby that held mythical power to save mankind instead of some extraterrestrial being from The Federation.
“Well, apparently we are dealing with one. At least one of them, I think.”
“First Heather Playhippo, then your wife, and now we have a Q? Can you feel what’s going on, Jack? It’s a mix of UGLI’s and science fiction characters, hilarious yet devastating.” Samantha complained, and then said sarcastically. “What’s next, Wolfram and Hart?”
“Like I’ve never dealt with them before.” Jack murmured. Samantha turned and through him a surprise look.
“Wolfram and Hart had shared ownership with Maria’s law firm. They handled our pre-nup.” Jack sighed. “Thus the never-ending separation. Some spell or binding, I think.”
“So this is a Wolfram and Hart conspiracy. But it’s… I can’t believe it… what about …” Before Samantha could finish her sentence, Jack sighed again. Heavily. It must be the heavy and gray New York air that were brought by the CSI:NY crew that made him depressed.
“Sam, don’t call it too early. We live in this fantasy world of a wacked parody writer. Maybe we’ll see a hobbit skipping down the street next moment if she likes. We got to talk to her in person if she likes. We can call our own creator of the show if she likes. She can also let us ride off to Mexico in sunset if she had too much of that Chocolate Martini. Last time I checked, she liked whatever written by Joss Whedon a lot, so remember everything you’ve known about Whedon-verse, because we are in on a crazy ride.”
Samantha was about to ask Jack what’s in that Wolfram and Hart pre-nup agreement that might mythically punish her as a mistress, but then she saw something. Heather Playhippo slowly opened her door. She was leaving.
Heather Playhippo was in black. Swiftly she closed the door. A white corolla drove in the ally and picked her up.
“Follow her, now!” Jack ordered. Sam already had her feet on the gas petal.
The two agents tailed the car off the streets. The corolla, whose plate read “UGLIZ” disappeared --- faded, and then vanished in the thin air, right in front of the agents.
“Oh, for cryin’ out loud, STEINBERG!” Jack groaned. “We don’t need another missing person, or thing, case!”
(TBC)
(the parody writer’s note: Y’all know what the (white) chocolate martini was about.)