The poet John Donne wrote: "No man is an island, entire of itself...any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee."

It had been bugging him for a while now, but he still wasn't sure why.

Things had been changing for him and for the team since J.J. had been forced to take a new position at the Defense Department, prompting Hotch to promote Garcia to take on her job.

David Rossi caught himself because he almost said, take her place. But even as the last member of the team to come in, he understood rather quickly that no one could take J.J.'s place.

Now with Emily gone, there was an emptiness with his colleagues that her death had left and couldn't be filled. Seaver was doing a good job, being a quick learner and having an inquisitive mind, but she wasn't part of the working family that he, Hotch, Morgan, Emily, Reid and J.J. had become.

It was inevitable because they spent so much time together, traveling to consult with police departments across the country. The demands of his job were in part why he'd never been able to make any of his three marriages work, why Hotch lost Haley even before her death, and why Morgan, Emily and Reid never seemed to have anyone special in their lives.

Their jobs just weren't conducive to a personal life.

J.J. was the only one who'd been able to make it work. From what little he knew of them, she and Will seemed to be quite happy together because they'd been able to find the balance between work and home. They were truly a team; raising Henry together.

And now with her new job, she was going to be home a lot more.

But with Emily's death, their close-knit team had suffered a second blow that they were still trying to come to grips with. The first had been Haley's; effecting them deeply because it had been so senseless.

George Foyet had taken the love of Aaron Hotchner's life and killed her for no other reason than to break him. He'd already had to suffer the absence of Haley and Jack when they'd been taken into federal custody to protect them because he'd refused to give up the hunt for the elusive 'Boston Reaper' and Foyet had retaliated.

And if Dave had thought Hotch had been stoic before, he seemed to double down with the loss of her.

But with Emily, it was almost as if-

Hotch had never been an easy guy to read and that was what made him the perfect choice for Unit Chief. But Rossi couldn't help but sense that he'd been carrying a heavy load on his shoulders since the night Emily died.

He thought back to the night they'd all sat in the waiting room together, waiting for word on how their friend and colleague was doing; waiting to hear from the doctor that Prentiss had come through her ordeal and that she was going to be all right. What they'd gotten instead was J.J. breaking the news to them that Emily hadn't made it out of surgery.

As Dave sat in his chair late one night, looking at the photo on his desk of him and his brother, he finally realized something and found himself questioning how good a profiler he really was. He missed it at the time because he'd been sitting among grieving friends, but it suddenly dawned on him that the news of Emily's death hadn't come from the surgeon who'd worked on her, but from J.J.

The further he pondered on that night, he remembered that she hadn't sat with them during the long hours of waiting and once she'd finished trying to comfort Reid, she'd left the kid with Garcia and met Hotch in the adjacent corridor outside the waiting room.

Ever since then, his friend wasn't able to look him in the eye for very long when the subject of Prentiss would come up. Classic avoidance technique, his years of experience profiling unsubs told him.

That wasn't like Hotch.

One of the things that made him so good during interviews was that he had the singular ability to stare down suspects and get them to spill their guts; to make them flinch without his blinking an eye.

Classic Alpha Male; and Dave was becoming more certain that he was hiding something.

He knew Aaron would be in his office because even with Morgan continuing to write up the case reports for him, he still put in too many hours. So he pushed himself away from his desk and stood up, wondering how he was going to broach the subject.

The bullpen was dark, except for Morgan's desk, where a light was on and several file folders lay open. He wasn't there, but Rossi heard movement coming from the break room and figured he was probably refueling. It was just as well because he didn't want the younger man getting wind of what he was about to do.

Derek had taken Emily's death particularly hard. Dave had gotten the sense in the aftermath that they'd been closer than either had wanted to admit because they'd been teamed up together more than they had with any of the others.

It had always been interesting to see them work because their paths of logic often ran along the same lines, so it was a particular blow to Morgan when the whole thing about Lauren Reynolds and Ian Doyle came to light.

But as much as he may have felt betrayed in the beginning, he was the one who was with Emily after she'd been impaled with a broken table leg and stayed with her until she'd been wheeled into surgery. He'd begged her to stay with him, reassuring her that he understood why she did what she did and telling her that he had her back; that he'd always have her back.

When the rest of the team had regrouped at the hospital, Dave went looking for Morgan and had found him sitting on the floor just outside of surgery. Tears were falling unchecked down his face as he stared at his hands. Emily's blood had dried on his palms and it had taken some doing to talk him into the bathroom to wash them off.

'Come on, kid.' He'd put one hand on his shoulder and with the other, turned on the taps to one of the sinks. 'You don't want them to see this.'

'She's one of the strongest women I know.' Derek's voice had been low and rough. 'Cyrus beat the crap out of her and she took it because she was protecting Reid. And even after getting a concussion when she and Bunting were forced off that road, she insisted she was fine and wanted to go after the guy who killed him. But this-' He'd taken a deep breath. 'This is different.'

'Morgan, she's a fighter.' Rossi had tried to sound like he really meant it, but there had been so much blood left behind when the paramedics had rolled her out of the warehouse. 'And she knows how much we need her on the team.'

'She's my partner, Rossi.' He'd taken another deep breath and lifted his hands to look at the crimson color on them again. 'She's my friend and I don't know if I ever told her that.'

'You can tell her when she comes out of surgery.' Dave had answered and then tried to lighten the mood just a little. 'And then you can tell her the next time she pulls a stunt like this, you'll handcuff her to her desk and throw away the damn key.'

He wouldn't have put it past the younger agent to do it, if he'd been given the chance.

Rossi took the last few steps to Hotch's office and rapped lightly on the door.

"Come in." The brusque voice sounded tired and he couldn't help but wonder the last time the overworked Unit Chief had gotten more than a few hours sleep. He looked up for a moment and then promptly looked down.

Avoidance.

"What can I do for you, Dave?"

"You have a minute?"

"Of course, what is it?" He glanced up again and then back down at his paper work, pen in his left hand. If Rossi didn't know better, he would have thought Hotch knew what was coming because he could see the pen tremble slightly.

"Something's been bugging me lately and I think you can help." He leaned against the doorjamb, hands shoved in the front pockets of his jeans. "It's about the night Emily died. Some things just don't fit."

A look of resignation flashed across Hotch's face for a moment, but then just as quickly it was gone. To an untrained eye it would have been missed. But for an old hand at profiling, it was a glaring tell.

It was an admission.

"Dave, this has been a difficult situation for all of us." He looked up and sighed quietly. "What happened with Prentiss wasn't a choice any of us wanted to make."

It wasn't a choice-

Rossi stood rooted to the spot because unless he'd completely misread it, Hotch had just confirmed what he had begun to suspect. Emily Prentiss was still alive and she was either in protective custody or living under an assumed identity somewhere. With Doyle on the loose, it had to be that way.

And with that knowledge he knew that as much as he wanted concrete answers, Hotch couldn't give them to him. Prentiss' life was in his hands and it would explain the sense Dave had gotten of Aaron carrying an extra burden.

It's because he was.

"I suppose you're right." He boosted himself off the doorjamb and walked into the office. "So what do you say to a nightcap before we hit the road?"

Hotch nodded to the idea and got up from his desk. "Have a seat."

Rossi sat down and a few moments later, a tumbler of scotch was placed in his hand. Hotch walked around to his desk, set down a tumbler of his own before taking a seat across from him. "It's been a hell of a year."

"That it has." Dave nodded in agreement as each man took a sip from their glasses, knowing how true it really was. "That it has."

And just like that, his friend's burden had been lightened a little because now they were silently carrying it together.

Life is a hell of a thing, to happen to a person - David Rossi