Hey everyone! I haven't written any fanfics in a while, but as I was reading someone else's lovely work, I got inspired to write again, so here I am :) This fic contains no pairings (I think...)

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the Criminal Minds characters (ha. I wish...)

Enjoy! :D

The sound of his heart beating in his chest drowned out anything else as Morgan followed the two members of the SWAT team down the dimly lit corridors of the abandoned building. One of them turned to the left to clear out another room while Morgan followed the other man down some stairs and into the basement.

It had all happened so fast. They had been called in on a case in Springfield, Massachusetts. Three bodies had been found. All male, their ages ranging from twenty to thirty five. They suspected that the unsub followed his targets before taking them once they were alone, leaving no witnesses and barely, if any, evidence behind.

The first victim, Ethan Young, had been kept for a week. There were bruises on each of the victims' ankles and wrists from where their restraints had been and there were puncture marks on their backs. Although his throat had been slit, the coroner suspected that Young wouldn't have survived long regardless. The tissue around the twenty-four year old medical student's spine had been severely inflamed to the point that his nerves were badly damaged. This caused local paralysis and, if untreated, could have made it impossible for Ethan to breathe on his own.

Will Dawson, the second victim, had been discovered ten days after he got taken from his own apartment. Like Ethan, Dawson's spine was badly inflamed and his nerves were showing increasing amounts of damage. His throat had been slit in a similar way, after which his body was left near the pond in Chicopee Memorial State Park.

Finally, their third victim had been found sixteen days after he had been reported missing. Like each victim, Marcus Hope, a young lawyer, had been dumped at a secluded location with his throat slit. His mother had reported Marcus' as missing after he failed to show up for her birthday dinner. She had heard about the previous murders on the news, Dawson's body having been found not even twenty-four hours before her son had failed to show, and got worried when Marcus didn't answer his phone.

Toxicology reports revealed that the victims had been injected with an unknown substance. Forensic scientists had tried to discover what it was for, but they reluctantly admitted that they had failed to identify the contents of the drug. They had however discovered trace amounts of stem cells, and oddly enough the third victim's scapulae had begun to create small lumps of bone due to the injection of these stem cells.

Having read of a similar case a couple of months ago, Reid had discovered a connection between these murders and four other killings in Belmont, New Hampshire and three more in Portland, Maine. They had been about to deliver the profile when the unexpected had happened.

Reid had volunteered to go and get them their lunch, having easily memorized the map of Springfield as he had been working on the geographical profile. When he still hadn't returned an hour later, Morgan and JJ had gone to the restaurant they had ordered their lunch from, finding the SUV Reid had left in in the parking lot behind the restaurant. It didn't take them long after that to find two bags containing their food abandoned in a small alleyway, but finding Reid's badge, gun and phone in one of those bags had been the reason for them to call in the rest of the team.

With the added pressure of Reid's disappearance, they had delivered the profile, although they bitterly had to admit that it was rather thin. They suspected the unsub to be male, aged forty to fifty. Taking the fact that he had acquired stem cells into consideration made them believe that he worked in a scientific field. They suspected that he used his victims for some sort of experiment and deduced that the man was a narcissist and felt underappreciated in his workplace. He wouldn't hesitate to voice this injustice, which would have likely caused some trouble with his colleagues or superiors.

Despite the incomplete profile, it had taken them another nine agonizing long days before they had come across their suspected unsub Matthew Miles. Matthew was a forty-six year old researcher at Pioneer Valley Institute. According to his colleagues, Miles had started working there only three months ago, when he moved to Springfield. He had apparently complained when one of his superiors had none too friendly rejected one of Miles' theories about the ability to evolve the human body with stem cells and cross species engineering, which had resulted in an argument that threatened to turn physical.

Another colleague of Miles had voiced his concern about the man to one of his superiors once he'd has a discussion with Matthew about the use of human trials. They had strongly disagreed on this subject, with Miles claiming that it was a necessary evil to subject humans to trial drugs. He claimed that these human subjects should be honored, as their sacrifice would allow them to develop their research further.

The thought of Miles using these men as lab rats had made Morgan sick, not to mention furious. This man had taken Reid, had most likely used him for whatever experiment he was working on, and he felt that it was a 'necessary evil'.

Garcia had provided them with Miles' current address. Hotch and JJ had gone there, being closer to the location than Morgan and Rossi were, as they were still on their way back from the clinic. When Hotch contacted them twenty minutes later with the news that neither Miles nor Reid was there, Morgan had stopped the SUV and hurriedly climbed out. Rossi had let him cool down as he rang up Garcia, who desperately tried to find another property owned by their unsub.

Somehow suspecting Miles to be smarter than that, he requested Garcia to widen her search and had her look for any old clinics or buildings that used to be owned by scientific organizations. Garcia finally found an old clinic that was due for demolition in two months on Granby Road. Thanking Garcia and instructing her to let Hotch and JJ know where they were heading, Rossi called out to Morgan, who looked up immediately when he sensed the urgency in Rossi's tone.

It had taken them fifteen minutes to get to the abandoned building on Granby Road. The clinic was larger than they'd suspected, but looked like it was about to fall apart. Rossi had spend ten minutes of their drive convincing Morgan not to run in blindly, but instead wait for the SWAT team that he'd called to arrive on site, and his team mate had reluctantly obliged.

Now that the SWAT team was there, however, Morgan was impatiently tapping his foot, ready to get their missing team member back. As Rossi and Morgan finally positioned themselves at the two entrances, each accompanied by three SWAT team members, time seemed to stop around them.

Morgan nodded at one of the men with him and watched as he picked the lock on the back door. Uncertain if Miles was with Reid or not, they had decided not to alert the man of their arrival yet. They quietly made their way through the corridor, one of them turning right into an old examination room.

Morgan could hear the quiet 'clear' over the radio, followed by Rossi's instructions to check the ground floor and basement while he would cover the top two floors. Morgan continued to follow the remaining two members of his SWAT team, nodding for one of them to turn into the next room while he continued down the hall and towards the basement.

As they were descending the stairs, Morgan could hear Rossi's voice over the radio once more, along with an unfamiliar voice in the background. ''We've got Miles, no sign of Reid yet.'' Aware of his own rage, Morgan was somewhat relieved that he hadn't been the one to find Miles, as he didn't trust himself to act rationally if he had. Hearing the man cursing and demanding his release made his blood boil, but for now all Morgan wanted to do was get Reid back.

Replying a quick 'copy that' to Rossi and having been joined again by the two men of the SWAT team that had cleared out the rooms on the ground floor, he continued down the stairs, wary that Miles might have set traps for unwanted visitors. Not much longer, Morgan found himself facing a surprisingly clean and new metal door with a large lock on it. He bit the inside of his cheek as he nodded at the man in front of him to break the door with the battering ram, his grip on his gun getting tighter.

With one final blow the door swung open to reveal a dark room with a white tiled floor. The three SWAT team members entered the room once they turned on their flashlights, one of the lights stopping on a still figure in the middle of the room. Morgan's heart was in his throat, but he reached out for a light switch and flicked it on regardless.

The lights above them flickered on to reveal a white, sterile room. There was a metal table to the right with medical tools on it, including syringes with a strange substance stocked in small vials standing next to them. On the other side of the room was a gurney, which hadn't been cleaned properly as traces of blood were still evident.

Morgan didn't take in any of it. His eyes were focused on the motionless figure in the middle of the room. His arms were pulled above his head and secured to the ceiling with chains. His shirt, shoes and socks had been removed, leaving him in his black trousers. Despite the man being over 6 foot tall, he was barely touching the floor with his toes, his ankles shackled to the ground. His brown curls were obstructing his eyes from where Morgan was standing, but it was obvious from the way his head was hanging motionlessly that he was unconscious.

They'd found Reid. After ten days, they had finally caught up with the man who had taken one of their own, yet Morgan was frozen in place. He noticed the drops of blood on the ground below Reid, making him wonder if they were too late. Slowly, he took a step into Reid's direction, then another one, until he found himself reaching up in search for a pulse.

Morgan let out a breath he didn't realise he'd been holding when he felt a pulse underneath his fingertips, although the heat that he felt coming from his friend's skin caused his worry to increase again.

''Reid, can you hear me?'' He asked, receiving no reply. He gently placed a hand on his friend's cheek, for the first time noticing the pained look etched onto Reid's face even though he appeared to be unconscious. Morgan spoke softly, hoping to reassure Reid in case he could hear him. ''We're getting you out of here, kid. You're safe now.''

He noticed that one of the SWAT members was working on getting Reid's arms free. Morgan gently wrapped his arms around Reid's bare torso, only stopping when he felt something odd on Reid's back and noticed his friend's soft whimper.

Pulling his hand away he discovered blood on his fingertips, but that wasn't the only thing he had felt. It was as if something had been attached to Reid's back. Somewhat afraid of what he would find, Morgan slowly walked around Reid to look at his back, but what he found was beyond anything he could have imagined.

So that's it! The first chapter's done :) I hope you enjoyed reading this and please review, I'd love to get some feedback! Xx