Title: A Night in the Life Of
Author: Clockstopper
Pairing: Nick/Greg
Rating: PG
Summary: So I decided that while Nick Stokes Lab Rat Extraordinaire is totally finished, it's not totally finished. That story is finished, but I feel there should be little drabbles that delve into that universe every once in awhile. Hey fanfic writers do it all the time why can't I. This is an attempted at one of those little drabbles.
Spoilers/Warnings: Some season four references such as Invisible Evidence, Eleven Angry Jurors and Paper or Plastic? as well as Play With Fire. But then again folks this is the Lab Rat universe so it's a bit tweaked.
A/N: Summary kind of says it all. Written for wordclaim50 the fluff prompt. It's pretty fluffy.

"Long shift?"

Greg looked up to see Nick lounging comfortably on their couch. He'd gone home sometime earlier, his involvement in their case done with after his second shift.

"Way long. Five dead bodies for a robbery and it turns out that one of the victims had a hand in orchestrating it. You know I'd be happy if we didn't have as many cases like this as we've had." Greg said as he shrugged off his coat.

Nick hummed and scooted around on the couch to allow Greg to plop down. Greg smiled and plopped down on the space that Nick cleared for him. He moved on to his side, Nick's arm immediately being thrown over his waist.

"The thing is… I get it. I really do. I understand why she did it. She was desperate. People do really stupid things when they're desperate. She wasn't planning on anyone getting hurt. She thought she could trust those guys and she was wrong. She was running out of options and that made her naïve." Greg said.

Nick placed a kiss on the back of Greg's neck. They'd been going through this ritual for a couple of months now. For the first two months that they'd been dating, Nick had been recovering from the explosion. Greg had tried to keep the tough cases to himself, but there'd been a few that Greg just couldn't keep to himself.

It was the first time that Greg decided to forget a tough case by going out on a drinking binge that convinced Nick that they needed to find another way to deal with the tough cases. Greg had been a brooding messy drunk, which would have been okay if he hadn't insisted on throwing things. It had taken some patience on Nick's side before he got him to go to sleep.

When he walk up, Nick demanded to know what the hell was wrong with Greg for doing something that stupid. Greg had explained that he and Sara had gone out to talk out the case and had gotten drunk. Nick had asked why he just hadn't come home and when Greg said that he wasn't sure, Nick knew that it was because he didn't want Nick to worry about him.

"Or maybe it just made her forget. Made her forget that she wasn't supposed to be involved with guys like that. I don't know. I just… I don't get people."

"David said he stopped trying to understand people years ago." Nick whispered into Greg's ear.

Nick felt Greg tense a bit.

"Could you please not quote Hodges when we're alone together."

"Greg."

"Look, for you I have gone out to dinner with the guy and it was, and I will kill you if you ever repeat this to anyone I don't care how much I love you, okay. Doesn't mean I want to hear his theories on life."

"It's the way he deals with going home alone every night after seeing the kinds of things we see."

"Not to sound mean, but you guys are lab techs. You don't see as much as we do."

"I know, but we piece it together, Greg. Trust me, the lab rats see some pretty weird shit too."

"Yeah weird shit or no you've never had to look at someone in the face, someone you've known has killed someone or helped killed someone and wonder why."

"Ours is not the question why." Nick murmured.

"And no Grissom quotes either."

"I know it's hard, baby. I know that you don't always like seeing the things that you've seen, but it's… I think the way you are about it all… it's refreshing."

"Refreshing?" Greg said in a skeptical tone.

"Yeah, I mean just look at the way you handled that Faye Minden case a couple of weeks back. And that time that CSI was trying to make heads or tails of the Rachel Lyford case. Just because you sympathize doesn't mean anything. You're good at what you do Greg." Nick said.

"Yeah, I know, but people… I don't wanna be like Sara or Grissom. I don't wanna get to that point where people don't really matter."

"Greg."

"I mean I'm not saying Sara and Grissom are cold hearted. I love Sara. She's my best friend, but she's totally cut off from the world."

"You don't have to be like that."

"I wanna ask Catherine how she does it. How she stays grounded."

"She's got people that care about her. You've got people that care about you. I think that's her big secret Greg."

Greg turned in Nick's arms so he was facing him. He kissed Nick's nose and sighed.

"How'd I get so lucky?"

"Almost a year of dating and you're still going strong on the smooth talker routine. Seriously Greg, enough is enough." Nick said teasingly.

"It's really almost been a year? Feels like it was just yesterday I was talking you into going to breakfast with me. Funny how time does that."

"Does what?"

"Flies when you're living the best life anyone has ever lived."

Nick just smiled.

FIN