(Obviously I don't own "Criminal Minds" or any of the characters or have anything to do with it, other than being a fan. I'm just entertaining myself, and hopefully maybe a few others…)

And Still We Smile…

By: TutorGirlml

Chapter One

"We wear the mask that grins and lies,

It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes –

This debt we pay to human guile;

With torn and bleeding hearts we smile."

- Paul Laurence Dunbar

Reid stood again, shakily, feeling almost dazed, both from suddenly being freed and back with his team, and from the throbbing, near-crippling pain in his left foot and ankle. Crossing his arms protectively over his lanky torso, he started to move away from Hankel's body and nearly feel when the majority of his body weight shifted to the injured extremity.

Wincing, he regained his balance and took a more tentative step, gritting his teeth against the pain. Suddenly, he realized how isolated and helpless he felt. He might be safe, but he was alone with the knowledge of all that had happened to him with Tobias, and all that had gone on in his mind. He didn't know if he'd ever be able to share it with any of them, and he desperately wanted to let the horror out, even as he forced himself to bury it.

Almost without thinking, he patted the two vials he'd slipped into his pocket moments before, already wondering when he could escape again. For the first time since he'd been eighteen, reality he'd let himself forget was pressing back in with a weight too heavy for him to bear. Not only was he hurt, traumatized, and shot full of drugs, but after the flashbacks of his mother and what he'd done, a small part of him whispered that he'd deserved to be punished, just as Raphael had decreed.

'Get moving,' he told himself, willing his feet to take another step.

It was then that Morgan appeared at his side; tall and solid, reaching out as Reid felt himself teeter painfully again. "Reid, you okay?" Morgan asked, putting a bracing arm around his waist and giving Reid no choice but to put one of his arms over the larger man's shoulders and let him help him forward.

Reid looked at his friend, finding words a complete impossibility. He had no answer for a question that was usually so simple. 'Was he okay?' Honestly, it was touch and go at the moment. Instead of responding he opted to just concentrate of leaning on Derek and taking the next couple of steps forward.

"Did he take something from you?" Morgan asked bluntly after a minute, breaking into the flurry of thoughts rocketing around in Reid's head.

"What?" Reid asked, completely taken aback.

"Well, I saw you get something from Hankel's pocket, just before I came up up to you. I thought maybe he'd taken something of yours."

"Oh," Reid nodded, his brain kicking back into gear to cover his tracks. "Yeah, he did, but I've got it back."

Morgan let it drop, but something in his dark eyes still looked concerned; gauging, wondering. Reid knew then that he was going to have a hard time keeping this from people who practically read minds for a living. Did he really want to anyway? Well, yes, because he had to. Right at this moment, there didn't seem to be any other choice. He was going to hold onto the Dilaudid, if only as a reassuring sort of security blanket, and he couldn't bear to deal with their disappointment or hurt if they knew.

"It's good to have you back," Morgan said, his voice serious – almost hesitant – in an unfamiliar, more emotional tone than Reid was used to hearing from him. "Don't know what we'd have done…Well, it's just good to see your face again," he finished awkwardly.

Reid gave him a small smile of acknowledgement, not knowing what to say. The nightmare of the last twenty-four hours had had him preparing himself to never see any of the BAU team – his family – again. He'd known he was digging his own grave and about to die. Tobias could have shot him at any second. If Hotch hadn't understood that one clue he'd been able to drop… A shudder ran through his body inspite of his resolve to hold himself together.

"What's wrong?" Morgan asked quickly, feeling the tremor.

"It's nothing," Reid tried to hedge, seeing that they were finally nearing the others, and the ambulance that they must have called ahead of time.

Morgan studied him again, "Reid…"

"I just wasn't sure I'd be seeing any of you again," Reid finally admitted. "I almost resigned myself to it…and then I saw those flashlight beams…"

Morgan, as uncharacteristic as it was, couldn't seem to stop himself from suddenly pulling Reid into a tight, desperate hug. Pain shot through Reid's many injuries at the squeezing contact, yet he sunk into the comfort of it for several seconds, grateful.

As he pulled away, Morgan murmured, his deep voice raspy but emphatic, "We would never have left you. You know that right? No way in hell we would have rested until we got you back."

There wasn't really a fitting answer to this either, not one to reassure Morgan's sudden show of guilty emotion. Reid knew they hadn't deserted him, that they'd been looking for him franticly, come as fast as they could – yet he had still been terrifyingly and completely alone with a psychotic killer. His mind had been forced to places he'd never allowed it to wander on its own. And that wouldn't disappear simply because he was free again. "I do know that," Reid finally said as they reached the ambulance and Morgan stepped back to let EMTs look at his young colleague.

Their eyes met solemnly for just a moment, and Reid found the best words he had. Swallowing hard, he said, "Thanks for coming after me."

Morgan merely nodded, his eyes warm and caring. As Reid let himself be loaded into the ambulance, Morgan could only be glad that they really did have him back, and hope that there hadn't been too much damage done.