CSI this week seemed to have eerie timing, especially since the case this week involved a deadly viral outbreak.
When the episode began, we saw an image of a man prophesying in the street set against the backdrop of the lighting of Las Vegas. The next scene we see is Sara and Greg arriving at a crime scene. There is blood all over the room and the victim appears to have a gun shot wound to the neck. As Greg begins to look around, Sara looks at the victim’s eyes and realizes he was very sick.
Greg takes a look as well, admitting to her that he’s seen photos like this in biology books. Sara immediately calls the CDC to tell them of a possible case of hemorrhagic fever and that one is dead while two others have been exposed, meaning her and Greg. They both look at one another in fear.
After the credits, Cooper arrives at the scene where Detective Emmett is ordering individuals as they enter the area in Hazmat suits. David arrives with Cooper, feeling guilty for not being there sooner. Detective Emmett tells Cooper the evidence can’t leave the house and that they need to disinfect the area, which will likely destroy the evidence but Cooper is more worried about Sara and Greg. They eventually come out wearing white protective suits, both looking stoic as they speak to Cooper, telling him they can still get their crime scene photos from their drive.
Greg and Sara are taken to an area to be quarantined as the men in Hazmat suits carefully remove the victim’s body from the home. Ecklie and Cooper talk about what is going on with the case and with Sara and Greg while Morgan and Nick look at the photos Greg and Sara were able to get to them before evidence in the house was destroyed.
Heather Lanning, from a place called RyneLab, comes to offer her services, as they deal with biological organisms and she could possibly identify what the man had. She goes to autopsy with Cooper and watches as Doc Robbins performs the autopsy. They see that his organs are mushy, but still do not identify the victim.
Cooper calls Finlay to tell her what is going on. She wishes she could help, but he tells her to focus on the Gig Harbor twins. Tests are being run to determine whether Greg and Sara contracted the virus.
Nick and Morgan go through the photos in order to see if they can figure out how to identify the victim. They eventually realize that he had a library book in his possession and they decide they can get his name through library records.
Sara and Greg are in isolation when Lanning comes to see them to let them know about RyneLab’s assistance. She informs them of what the virus is as we also see Cooper, Ecklie and Nick discussing the virus. It is called Ibare and it has an 80% fatality rate, which makes Greg and Sara go speechless. There are no effective treatments for this type of virus and the only prior outbreaks occurred in South American countries.
Morgan, Nick, and Cooper focus on working the case since they can’t do much for Sara and Greg. Meanwhile, we see an image of Greg walking in the house and stepping in blood. He is apparently imagining that he made a mistake at the scene, but Sara balks. She knows they were both careful and did not make any mistakes. She tries to help him stay positive, bringing up the time they had to take a shower after being exposed to mold in the wall of a victim’s house many years earlier.
Sara’s on the computer when they get a video call from Nick. He informs them they identified the victim as Jack Weaver, who was a medical doctor who studied organisms during his travels. However, he hadn’t been working much in the past eight years. They discover via a photo that he worked with Lanning, who failed to identify the victim earlier in autopsy.
Cooper interrogates Lanning, who has her attorney, Rudy Adela, with her. She tries to explain away that she hadn’t seen Weaver in so long and hardly recognized him. Cooper is unsure, but takes her statement as she claims not to have spoken to Weaver in a long time.
Ecklie and Nick are talking, where Ecklie informs Nick that RyneLab has specimens of all types of organisms enough that are deemed as bio-defense. Meanwhile, Morgan comes to tell Nick that a report was found that earlier in the week, Weaver had been seen in the streets of Las Vegas, prophesying about a plague.
While looking at the crime scene photos again, they notice that there is a void in the blood spatter, much like a briefcase, as though someone had taken something with them. Nick and Morgan decide they need to go to the house and figure it might be safe now that the house has been decontaminated.
Arriving at the house, they decide that since the autopsy found that the bullet that killed Weaver had ricocheted out of his neck, then the bullet would be somewhere nearby. Weaver was laying down when he was shot and based on skip marks found, Nick finds the bullet lodged in the couch.
Meanwhile, Greg and Sara are playing a chess game on the computer to pass the time. Sara begins pondering the fact that you never know that today could be your last day. Greg, who is trying to stay positive, talks about doing something like taking a vacation you planned. He gets on the computer and begins typing. We then hear a woman’s voice and Greg says hi to his grandmother. Sara watches silently as Greg talks to her, telling her he’d love to visit.
The team finds out that the bullet that killed Weaver matched to a robbery report. The suspect was a man named Shawn Steubens. Nick goes to the man’s house along with cops, but when no one answers the door, he goes to the side to look out the window. It is there he sees Steubens lying on the floor, his face covered in blood. He has been infected.
Inside the quarantine unit, Nick talks to Shawn, telling him that his friends, who he cares very much about, could be sick as well. Shawn admits that he saw someone in a Hazmat suit going into the house and he thought it was a meth house. He took his gun so he could go raid the place. However, when he saw Weaver on the ground covered in blood, he panicked and shot him. He saw the briefcase lying near him and took it, but was unable to open it. The briefcase might have contained a stolen vial of the Ibare virus.
The news is on a television while Greg and Sara are watching. Sara is standing and looks pale as Greg comments on the lady calling them veterans. When Sara doesn’t respond, Greg asks if she’s okay. Then, Sara collapses and Greg immediately begins shouting for help, calling her name, as he can’t physically go to her.
Luckily, Sara is okay and just had a 100.4-degree fever most likely caused by stress. Cooper is glad to see his CSIs are doing okay. They still have negative results on their tests. Greg and Sara want to be put to work, despite being stuck in quarantine. Cooper tells them the briefcase found at Steubens’ house only had a drive with files belonging to Weaver. He puts them to work on looking over the files.
Sara and Greg find that Lanning and Weaver had been in correspondence, despite Lanning saying otherwise, and that Weaver was obsessed with the Ibare virus. He seemed to be focused on a particular outbreak in a village in Bolivia eight years earlier.
Then, Rudy Adela comes in and gives Cooper a recording he had done with his client, where she said something about keeping things quiet. He also had found out the missing vial of the virus had about 10 cc’s in it, which was enough to cause a lot of deaths.
Cooper interrogates Lanning, accusing her of killing Weaver. However, she balks at his statements, even as he informs her he knows that Weaver was the one who wanted to meet, even though she claimed that she invited him. Cooper begins to believe Weaver may have stolen the virus and perhaps Lanning went to retrieve it. Lanning is not happy and asks for a lawyer.
Ecklie and Nick are discussing the case, where Nick believes it’s possible that Weaver committed suicide by injecting himself with the vial so he could expose RyneLab for hiding what happened in Bolivia. They need to prove it and Ecklie tells him to be careful when investigating RyneLab.
Morgan and Nick are working, with Morgan going through items found in Lanning’s office. She discovers a letter hidden behind a photo frame. The letter details what really happened at the village in Bolivia. While it was reported that 17 people died and 20 survived, what actually happened was Lanning and Weaver lied to family members of the victims, telling them it was simply a fever. All of the families went inside the clinic, ignoring the doctors’ pleas not to go in. Morgan and Nick realize they need to prove that Weaver broke into the facility.
Morgan and Henry go to RyneLab, where they have to wear Hazmat suits. Realizing that whoever stole the vials didn’t wear a suit and that the area is totally free of cells from other human beings, then they decide to try microbial analysis to discover a DNA profile.
Henry takes a swab from the door where the virus was kept and Morgan works on extracting a profile. As they are working, Nick calls Morgan with jaw dropping information.
Cooper is in interrogation with Rudy Adela. His photo appeared in one of the photos found of the village in Bolivia. His entire family had died and RyneLab had given him a place to go to school and he got to be a lawyer. Then, he discovered the truth of what happened to his family and wanted revenge. He took the vial and injected Weaver with the syringe. Next, he recorded Lanning in an effort to shut RyneLab down for their work in trying to cover up what happened.
Meanwhile, Greg wakes up and doesn’t see Sara across from him behind the plastic curtain. He sits up in a daze, unsure of where she is before he sees a figure walk toward him. Sara pulls back the curtain to let Greg know they are in the clear and that it was found that the virus was gone within two hours of being exposed to air, well before they would have arrived onto the scene. Greg is relieved, taking gasping breaths as he stands up. They apologize to one another and then suggest coffee.
As they walk out, David comes in, smiling happily at them. When they offer for him to come for breakfast, he reveals he’s working. They realize Shawn Steubens is dead. David tells them he is extremely glad they are okay, unable to hold back his smile as he leaves. Greg turns to Sara and repeats David’s earlier words, ‘Goes without saying’ before pulling his friend and co-worker in for a hug.
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