IN NAME AND BLOOD
We were so out of our depth here in Milwaukee. Three people working the case and none of us knowing what exactly was going on with Hotch, or Prentiss. Strauss is not making things easy, she shouldn't be in the field, and her attitude is not helping. The only thing we can do is try and work this case. I've phoned Hotch a few times, not to force him to come back, but because we're lost. I think if it weren't for the actual case and something to think about, losing ourselves in the actual job, we'd all have gone crazy. Thank God Hotch and Prentiss showed up! There was an immediate shift, a balance returning.
I think there's also the problem with Gideon leaving. I understand the job getting to him, and what Frank did, but disappearing like that? Abandoning us? I can see Reid struggling to figure it out, and I admit I'm having a hard time of it. This case has been like trying to survive the loss of our parents, not knowing where to turn or what to do next. I thought Gideon would always be there, and then the uncertainty of whether Hotch would be there - I'm so exhausted by the time we get back to the hotel at night that I don't know what I'm doing. I think Hotch realized my panic when I asked him if it was true, that he wasn't leaving us. I know this job is taking its toll on him, what's this decision going to do to his family?
I looked up to Gideon. I know he was more of a mentor/father figure to Reid, but he was also a mentor to me. I learned so much from him, and he let me discover things about myself along the way. I don't know how to feel about his abandonment. It was an abandonment, nothing else. I think I could have understood it more if he told us he was leaving, rather than just didn't show up for work, I don't know. It's like I lost my father all over again, and, honestly, that surprised me. He knew things about me, just like Hotch did, and he still respected me. That meant a lot to me, and that helped me more than I thought it would.
Our unsub used his son to capture women and torture them. What legacy was he leaving his son? From what we understood, the unsub was dying and would soon leave his son, and this is the image he leaves him with? How's that for abandonment issues?
The night we returned from catching Smith, I had nightmares. I was the victim, cuffed, blindfolded, hanging from the rafters, feeling Smith's hands all over my body, feeling the heat of his anger. Feeling helpless, like Carl made me feel.