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The rain pounded down onto the pavement, drenching Reid instantly. He had barely walked out of the subway station before water was gathering in rivulets that streamed down the creases of his clothes. Nobody took notice of Reid as he walked slowly down the street, for it was the middle of the night, and nobody was around. He walked slowly, his feet dragging with every step. The case hadn't been particularly difficult; in fact, they had solved it in only three days. However, Hotch had insisted on leaving at midnight in order to be home for Jack, and nobody had objected to the late flight.

Reid rubbed at his eyes wearily; the short nap on the plane had only served to make him more tired. As the street light above him flickered, Reid looked up, frowning. It had been doing that for months, and frankly, it was a safety hazard. He made a mental note to call the electric company to have them come fix it.

He turned the corner, wiping a sopping strand of hair from his eyes. He was beginning to feel the cold in his bones. He would have to change as soon as he got home, or he could catch a cold or pneumonia. Reid mentally scanned everything he knew about contracting diseases from prolonged exposure to moisture. He concluded that he would most likely be okay, based on his current body temperature and the length of time it would take him to reach the house and change into a new set of clothing.

Reid slowly tromped up the steps of his porch, fumbling in his pockets for the keys. He managed to draw them out of his pocket, before dropping them, picking them up, and then dropping them again. Reid picked the keys up a second time, then fumbled to get the keys in the hole; his fingers were too cold to function properly. The lock clicked open, the door creaking on its rusty hinges. Reid made a second mental note to grease that in the morning.

He paused in the doorway. Something was off. Not only did the familiar beep of the alarm not go off as the door opened, but his unopened mail sat on the coffee table instead of below the letter slot. He took a step forward, fumbling for the light switch as he did so. As the lights flickered on, a rustle came from the left. He walked over, slowly drawing his gun, trying to be as silent as possible. As Reid rounded the corner towards the bedroom, someone knocked him on the head. His grip on the gun was momentarily loosed from shock, and the intruder soon began wrestling control of the weapon away from Reid.

Reid blinked the stars away, before firing two shots into the floor, more to attract attention to the house than to harm the other man. The gun fell to the ground, and both men dove for it. The intruder landed on top of Reid, wrapping his hands around Reid's torso. Reid desperately kicked out, struggling to get free.

Several of the kicks landed on the stranger, who grunted and loosened his grip. Reid wriggled free and fled back towards the door. The man pursued. Reid looked around desperately for a weapon. A vase J.J. had given him the previous Christmas sat on the coffee table. He hesitated for a moment, before grabbing it and throwing it towards the stranger. J.J. would understand why he had to break it. Not only did he want to stop this man, whatever his intentions, but also if his place was in disarray and furniture broken, there was no way the intruder could make his disappearance look like an accident.

The vase missed, smashing into the wall behind him. Reid picked up a bowl that was also on the table. It hit the man on the side of his head. He stopped. Blood was flowing down the side of his head, only serving to make the man look more menacing. His head was shaven, and he wore a tight black t-shirt that accentuated both his muscles and his tattoos. Reid picked up The Encyclopedia of Birds and Their Mating Grounds in North and South America and heaved it at the man. It missed, and he charged forward, grunting. Glancing around frantically, Reid grabbed the coffee table and held it in front of him like a shield. The intruder charged through the wood and snapped it in half, before throwing broken pieces everywhere.

The man picked Reid up as if he were a ragdoll and threw him into the mirror, which shattered on impact. Reid let out a strangled scream, before fading into blissful blackness.

Reid woke briefly while in the back of a van, only getting a bleary look at his surroundings before he fell unconscious again. His next conscious thought was not until hours later. The world was blurred, vaguely reminiscent of coming down from a high.

He licked his lips, wondering why he was so cold. And then he remembered. The man in his house, the struggle, and then, nothing. He never had time to change out of his wet clothes. I hope the man packed me some, he thought bitterly. He snorted. As if. With the recollection of the attack, he began to look around. The room was white, no windows, only one door, and a bare light bulb hanging from the ceiling.

His hands were tied roughly behind his back, using some sort of thick rope. Looking down, he realized he was lying on a small cot that was shoved into the corner of the room, but there was no other furniture. And other than the pounding in his head, the rest of his body was relatively pain free. Judging by the fuzziness of the room, Reid guessed he was slightly concussed.

The door swung open. There was no handle on the inside, and thus no possible way he could use the door as a means of escape. Reid's attacker walked in, a bandage around his head.

"Ya got me good, ya little bastard. You'll pay for that." His voice was deep and rough. His eyes were hard and angry.

Judging by the distance between his nose and his lips, along with the slant of his eyes, Reid guessed that he was from an Eastern European country, possibly Yugoslavia. More worryingly, the man was showing his face to Reid. If the man wasn't scared that Reid would remember his face, the man had no intention of ever letting him go. His hearted thudded with this realization.

"Don't worry. I'm not gonna kill ya." He paused, licking his lips savagely. "Yet."

Reid closed his eyes, trying to suppress the panic welling up inside him. When he opened them, the man was still there, staring.

"What do you want with me? I'm just . . . I'm just . . . I have no money, I'm not famous, and I have no rich friends. But if you let me go now, I swear I'll forget this ever happened."

"See, Dr. Reid, I have a plan. You may not remember me, but I remember you. You arrested my brother, and soon he will die if I don't save him. So what we have here is what your good friends at the FBI like to call a 'hostage situation.' And you will get me my brother back."

Reid racked his brains for a case where the unsub was about to receive the death penalty. The number of unsubs he had caught who were to be executed within the next year was surprisingly high- twenty-three. Quickly eliminating the ones whom he had not directly arrested, Reid was left with only seven. He then eliminated all of the women unsubs and those who were not Caucasian, and was left with only two. Riley Giles was sentenced for the rape and murder of thirteen women. Giles, however, was 70.

Reid finally spoke: "Is your brother Michael Aremovic?"

The man looked surprised that Reid was able to deduct who the man was that quickly. He sneered slightly, revealing crooked, rotten teeth. Reid allowed himself to be smug for a moment, before delving into his memories of the case. It had been particularly gruesome; Aremovic kidnapped eight children for five days each, demanding five million dollars from each family. When they couldn't pay, he would slowly kill each one. They finally caught the man after the ninth child, when Reid was able to deduce his location using a formula he had created based on the probability of each child being chosen.

"You're right. My brother is Michael. I don't think we have ever met personally though. I am Jeremy." He held out a hand as if to shake one of Reid's, before grinning nastily and retracting it.

"Listen," Reid began. "We can work something out. Let me call my boss, Hotchner, and we can just find a solution. You know, there are approximately 1,000 innocent people imprisoned each year- your brother could be one of them! We can just hire him a really good lawyer to work his case- I know one from Project Innocence, I am sure he would be happy to help!" Reid was rambling, tripping over his words and talking fast, like he did whenever he was excited or nervous. He knew Michael was guilty- the team had found him holding a knife to a little girl's throat- but he would say whatever it took to get free.

"You're right- I am going to let you call your boss. But you are going to say exactly what I tell you, and only what I tell you. Stray at all, and I will shoot you. Capiche?"

Jeremy stepped closer to Reid, drawing a gun from the waistband of his pants and a sheet of paper from his pocket. He pressed the gun to Reid's temple, flipping open a cell phone with the other hand.

"Dial."

"I can't. My hands are tied."

Jeremy pressed the weapon harder into Reid's head, aggravating his injury from the mirror. Pain shot through his body, intensifying beneath his eyes.

"Give me the number. I'll dial."

"555-403-1222."

Jeremy pressed the numbers slowly, as if he was having trouble making out the symbols. Reid observed his hesitancy, noting that he might be barely literate. The phone started ringing, with Jeremy holding the phone between the two men. He counted the number of rings, worried Hotch might not pick up if he did not recognize the number. After all, it was probably still early. He frowned; he didn't actually know how long he had been out for, and Jeremy had removed his watch.

"Agent Hotchner."

Cliffhanger! (ish). There really can't be much of a cliffhanger if the story has just started!