4by Ted Sadler
Copyright © 2004
Disclaimer: neither CSI nor The Simpsons belong to me and I am not doing this for profit. Some of you may ask why I am doing it at all. You are the sane ones.
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"Who did you say called us in on this case?" Catherine asked her boss as they drew into the strangely-coloured town.
"Chief Wiggum." said Grissom tersely. "He said their own experts were baffled and they needed better-looking CSI's to go over the place."
"And that would be us, right?" she continued, staring at the hordes of bright yellow people in the streets.
"Apparently so." the ageing-yet-mysteriously-sexy chief replied. "They have a different system here in Springfield. Like, for a start, my counterpart in the Police Department is called 'the scriptwriter' and he single- handedly solves the crimes."
"So why are we here, then, if he or she's so good?"
"He's been struck down with an illness called *scriptus interruptus*. It's a disease normally only found in writers. Someone shot the boss of the local power plant and he doesn't know how to resolve the plot."
"Wow! That's a biggie." exclaimed Catherine. She studied his face and saw the beginnings of the confused expression that marked one of his regular periods of temporary hearing loss. "I love you, Gil." she whispered.
"I heard that." he said, looking sharply at her. "You're supposed to wait until the background sound goes distorted before whispering things like that, so that I don't pick up on them. I also use this facial expression when I'm just temporarily overwhelmed by the evidence, you know. We're not supposed to get it together until the ratings start to drop and I've resolved Sara's secret desire for me."
"Sorry." said Catherine. "But don't wait too long, or they'll transfer me to Miami to make out with Horatio."
"He's too old for you." Grissom retorted.
"He's four years younger than you!" she responded. "Anyway, he reminds me too much of a guy from the NYPD I used to date when I was an exotic dancer."
"Well, just remember you're an exotic CSI now." he said as they pulled up at the crime scene. "Flaunt yourself occasionally, like we do in LV."
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"Estimated time of death, Dr. Hibbert?" asked Grissom.
"Well, see that's a difficult one." replied the evasive medical man. "Some time before the opening credits, so difficult to actually say."
Grissom looked up into the sky in exasperation, as if searching for the scriptwriter himself. "Oh come on! Give us a break!" he called in anguish.
"At two thirty five and ten seconds." Hibbert immediately responded.
"How can you be so sure?" asked Grissom, wrinkling his forehead in the way that melted Catherine every time.
"Well, you started it." replied the doctor.
Catherine looked up from her examination of the body. "According to the documentation in his wallet, Mr. Burns is approximately one hundred and twenty-two years old, and is despised by everyone in Springfield, except for his assistant Smithers."
"How can you be so sure?" asked Grissom, again wrinkling his forehead in the way that melted Catherine...
"Stop doing that!" she hissed at him. "Use your enigmatic 'I've worked it out but the evidence doesn't agree' look. I can live with that until we get back in the car." She unfolded a number of news clippings taken from the wallet.
'Burns must die!' screamed the first headline from The Springfield Post.
'We hate you, Burns!' shouted the second from The Springfield Clarion.
'Burns allegedly reported to be slightly unpopular amongst certain sections of society. Share price suffers a little at close.' hinted the Wall Street Journal, sotto voce.
'I think you are wonderful, Sir.' whispered Smithers' hand-written note.
Grissom's musings were interrupted by a loud voice from the other side of the Crime Scene yellow tape (guaranteed to keep out intruders). "Admit it, Grissom; you're out of your depth here! It may have to run to a two- parter!" cried Homer.
"Simpson!" Grissom cursed under his breath. Looking up, he stared with hostility at the overweight symbol of modern American man. Catherine mistook it for his wrinkled forehead look and started towards him but stopped when she realised what was happening.
"I thought when we ran you out of Vegas that I'd never have to see your ugly face again! Catherine! Take his DNA."
"No! You can't have it!" shouted Homer, as he was seized by the local cops. "I'd be nobody without it! Let me go!"
"Wait a minute." said Catherine, getting the swab ready. "I'll just drop some phenolphthalein on the stick first before taking a sample from his mouth."
"Good thinking, Catherine." said Grissom. "Testing for blood at the same time as sampling the DNA."
"Actually, no." she replied. "I couldn't resist the old chemistry lab trick of getting someone to ingest some so that their pee turns bright blue!" (Kids, don't try this at home. Phenolphthalein is poisonous and the victims always have their revenge when you least expect it.)
"Take his fingerprints, then." Grissom responded.
"You can't have those either!" cried Homer, his tantrum continuing.
"And why not?" asked Grissom, wrinkling his..
"For crying out loud, Gil!" hissed Catherine, her hormones in overdrive.
"Got you!" shouted Homer in delight. "Springfield residents don't have any! Na-na-na-na-na!"
A sudden crack of thunder caused everyone to look up momentarily as the scriptwriter's image flashed across the sky. Homer looked down at the strange new lines on the tips of his three fingers.
"D'oh!"
A subliminal image of Hawaiian canoes flitted through Grissom's mind. "Book him, Danno!" he said, using the smooth but gritty voice that signalled the approach of the final scene.
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Back in the car, Catherine took the cue of distorted background sounds to express her innermost desires. "Gil, my darling! Make love to me now, right here before the closing credits! Gil! GIL! Oh, for goodness sake!"
""What?" he said, looking round at her suddenly as his hearing returned.
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