In a World They Forgot

A Storm That's Too Much To Bear

"Okay, please tell me that someone has some good news for me." I sighed as I stumbled into the lab at the beginning of the shift, Starbucks already in my hand.

"What's it worth?" Warrick looked up from a microscope sporting a proud smirk.

"Well, if it's good it'll save you from a scalding cup of coffee being poured over your head." I smiled sweetly, but with a daring glint in my eyes. He shook his head at me and stepped away from the microscope, being careful not to knock anything.

"Then you might want to come and take a look at this." He said, waving me over. I put the coffee on the side and squinted into the microscope, altering the focus until things were clear enough to make sense out of it. Two strands of what appeared to be horse hair.

"Horse hair?" I rubbed the side of my head as I looked up to Warrick who was nodding.

"We think that our killer may have been wearing a wig. Both of the victims were natural blondes, no dye present on either head." Warrick handed me a sheet of results.

"Only over half of Vegas own wigs Warrick."

"Yeah. I know it doesn't help much now, but maybe it will come in useful soon." He said with an ever optimistic smile.

"Yeah, maybe." I sat down and massaged my temples softly.

"Hey, are you okay? You don't seem too good tonight." Warrick dragged a stool over and sat down next to me.

"Killer migraine." I mumbled.

"Get them often?"

"Ever since I was sixteen." I told him before gulping down the hot mocha, wincing when it burnt my throat.

"Ever thought it might have something to do with all that caffeine you drink?" Warrick shook the Starbucks cup and earned himself a half-hearted glare from me.

"Then why don't we all suffer from them?"

"Touché my friend."  Warrick patted me on the back.

"Anything come back from Robbins yet?"

"Nope, but his morgue does seem to be throwing a party lately. Chances are he's not got around to those girls yet. What happened to the other case you and Nick had?"

"Handed it to the day shift. They're taking a few of our cases over since the murders are on the rise at night." I explained resting my head on the cold steel table.

"Hey Warrick, you seen Miki?"

I raised my head and waved towards Nick.

"I've been looking all over for you. Why didn't you answer my page?" His accent came through strong with his anger.

"You paged me?"

"Only half a dozen times!"

I sighed and looked down at my waist and noticed that it was missing from my belt loop.

"I must have left it in the locker room when I got here." I shrugged and forced myself to stand.

"Well the mother of the two girls is here. She's waiting for answers in one of the rooms down the hall."

"Okay, go ahead and start without me, I'm going to get my pager before I'm being hunted by the whole team." I told him.

I drained the Starbucks cup and threw it into a bin as I left and went the opposite way to Nick.

I grabbed my pager and turned to my locker, digging around in my pockets for the key.

"Hey."

"Oh, hey Greg." He was leaning on the corner of the lockers, his eyebrows furrowed together as he looked me over, his eyes glazed with worry.