Good Afternoon One and All! New fic time. This one has been niggling at the back of my mind for some time now and I've finally gotten into it.
To briefly summarise, I had this idea a while ago, and whilst I do still see Erin Strauss growing up in a city like New York, I thought to myself, what if she was small town? and then this fic kinda happened. The first chapter is a little slow I will admit, but I just needed an introduction, for want of a better phrase, but I implore all you lovely readers to stick with it! Its gonna get fun!
And for all you Strauss/Rossi shippers out there...stay tuned for fluff alert in later chapters!
So...let's go find out what happens when the BAU collides with a small town and the family Strauss!
Home Advantage: Chapter One
The Case.
Erin tapped her pen relentlessly on the desk, a nervous action that she could never seem to control no matter how much she wanted to. 8.30 am and already she was on edge. That could not be a good sign, the day had barely started and yet she knew it wasn't going to get much better. In fact it had the potential to get significantly worse.
"I'm not making any promises Rob. Yes I have the file right here and yes I've read it! What? Of course I've read it! Why would I say that I'd read it if I hadn't read it! Jesus give me some goddamn credit!"
She sighed, raising a hand to her temple, her fingertips making a vain attempt to quell the throbbing headache that threatened. It had threatened for twelve hours, since she'd gotten the first phone call. This one wasn't making matters any easier.
"I can't make you any promises until I've spoken to whichever unit chief I give the case to! They'll decide whether or not its a viable case Rob, we can't just fly out to anywhere and set up camp it has to be validated and justified and costed in!"
Erin's attention was distracted briefly as she registered the knock on her office door. She called out a 'come in' without breaking stride from her phone conversation.
"You call me a bureaucrat one more time Robert and you can forget getting any help from me!"
Aaron Hotchner raised one eyebrow as he stepped into his boss's office, he didn't appreciate being summoned here anyway, he certainly didn't harbour any desire to bear witness to whatever debate the Section Chief was currently involved in.
Erin cut him a look and Aaron straightened up, his expression returning to one of indifference. He knew that look very well, it was the 'do not mess with me' look, and Hotch had no intention of doing just that. True every once in a while he would test the boundaries, every time he'd been shot down within seconds. Today he was not about to push her.
"Robert, I told you I would look into it, I will do what I can, you know that I will. Right now I have to go I'm about to present your case. I'll call you when I know anything."
At the mention of a case Hotch had tuned in completely, he was beginning to see why he'd been unceremoniously summoned to her majesty's lair this morning. If it was a case then he could relax, for a brief moment he had considered that he was being brought here for an ass kicking or a new budget outline. He wasn't in the mood for that crap, he rarely was, he just dealt with it. Exceptionally well in fact, but whilst his team might believe he relished the protocol and paperwork, Aaron preferred being out in the field.
"Ma'am?" Aaron narrowed his eyes, taking a step forward.
Erin removed her glasses and sighed again. Her fifth this morning and handed the Unit Chief a file.
"This case came directly to me, the Director signed off on it providing your team are satisfied that there is in fact a case to investigate."
"Directly to you, Ma'am?" Hotch held her gaze for a long moment as Erin appeared to be mentally arguing with herself as she sat in her desk chair, eventually deciding to just be honest.
"I have a personal connection to the Woodland Park Police Department, Agent Hotchner. They have asked for my help and I told them I would do what I can, I made no promises."
"You don't sound convinced Ma'am." Hotch saw no reason to question her personal connection to the case, he knew from experience that with Chief Strauss, knowledge was on a strictly need to know basis, especially if that knowledge had a bearing upon her personal life.
"I'm not. But then I'm not a profiler. I believe there is a case that much is obvious, my concern is that the local PD can handle it. I'm not about to waste valuable resources Agent Hotchner."
"No Ma'am." Hotch replied stoically as always, his eyes were already scanning the pages of the file, his brow furrowed in concentration. "The locals obviously don't believe they have a handle on it or they wouldn't have asked for our help."
"Touche." Erin conceded with a slight nod. "So what do you think?"
"I think that Woodland Park Colorado has a serial killer and they need our help."
She sighed again and Aaron narrowed his eyes in response. Erin should have known better than to act like this in front of him. The profiler could tell she was anxious, she employed a forced detachment that he couldn't quite work out the source of.
In truth Erin did have mixed feelings about this whole thing. On the one hand she couldn't have denied that she wanted to help The Woodland Park PD, even if it was for personal reasons. Those personal reasons were what was holding her back. This case could reopen parts of her life that she wasn't entirely sure that she wanted to revisist. It wasn't that they were bad times, time was just a funny thing, too much of it had gone by and Erin had no idea how that would have changed her, changed what she used to know so well.
"Then we had better gather the team Agent Hotchner." Erin sighed again, catching herself she realised she was going to have to stop that, not only was it telling, it was irritating, even to her.
"We? Ma'am?"
"Yes we." Erin got to her feet and picked up her cell from the desk. "If you're going to Woodland Park then I'm coming with you."
"Two girls, aged 22 and 25, found strangled and beaten in Pike National Forest, just outside of Woodland Park, Colorado."
Hotch passed out the files, glancing to Garcia as she controlled the tv monitor's bringing up the images that made the Section Chief's stomach turn.
David noticed Erin flinch from his position seated across the table from her, he sat back in his chair, a sly smile tugging at his lips. "Woodland Park, sounds familiar."
He knew what reaction he would get, he knew full well why it sounded familiar to him. But damn he just liked to tease her.
"David." Erin cut him a look, and to his credit he backed down, for now, both of them returning their attention to Hotch. She knew she'd have to come clean sooner or later but right now was not the time. She would tell them on the jet...probably.
"The locals made extensive enquiries but so far they've came up blank. Both girls went missing at least two weeks before they were found, although the timing isn't confirmed yet, no sign of sexual assault. Medical Examiner's report indicated both were strangled by hand but the beatings were consistent with differing methods."
"Sounds straight forward to me." Morgan shrugged. "Classic unsub, thrives off the power, he obviously feels weak and unnoticed in his ordinary life and now he wants the world to know who he is."
"I agree. Local PD are concerned by the prolonged time between abduction and the kill. The town is in the middle of a massive national park. The Chief liased with other PD's from surrounding towns and came up with a possible 27 more missing girls that fit the victim type."
Until that point the general feeling had been that the team could deliver a profile without leaving this room. They all knew the implications here, a small town area with the possibility of widespread panic, it was a dangerous scenario for all concerned.
"Then I guess we're going to Woodland Park Colorado." JJ voiced what everyone else had been thinking, her gaze moving from Hotch to land on Chief Strauss.
Agent Jareau hadn't been a full time profiler for very long, but she didn't have to be. She'd been around Erin Strauss for long enough to know the woman's tells. The section Chief may have liked to believe she was in control, an unpentratable stone wall, but this team knew her very well. Something was bugging her.
"I'll be coming with you." Erin didn't look up from her file as she spoke. "I requested to join the team if you accepted this case. The Director also cleared Ms Garcia to come too."
"Me? Why?" Penelope looked between Hotch and Erin, resembling a deer in the headlights for a moment.
"Because Woodland Park is like a black hole. They get internet sure but its practically stoneage, they'll need your abilities on site."
Garcia remained stood there, like everyone else in the room she was shocked to hear the Section Chief refer to internet as stoneage...half of them had been sure that she didn't even know what internet was she was so old school.
"You should know."
Erin raised her eyes to David, his words continued to irk her, he looked so smug as he sat opposite her, watching her unblinking with that smile on his face. Part of her hated that smile, sometimes she wanted to just wipe it right from his face. Other times it made her weak at the knees, but she only allowed that to happen outside of work hours.
They'd had a thing together for some time now. They hadn't defined it, it was just there from time to time. It was casual, no commitments, no attachments. But they prided themselves on maintaining a playfull hatred of each other inside the bureau, nobody could see through the cutting remarks and icy looks to what was really going on.
"Woodland Park is your home town right Strauss?"
The silence resonated for the second time in only the last few minutes.
Everything began to make sense to Aaron as he stood at the head of the table, his eyes trained on his boss. In his mind he was already conducting the risk assessment, questioning the Section Chief's objectivity in this case. For now he would give her the benefit of the doubt, if nothing else her knowledge of the area could prove beneficial in some way.
"Wheels up in an hour." Hotch spoke to the room, diffusing the atmosphere instantly.
Still Erin remained where she sat, she didn't feel the need to respond to David's words, the team would find out eventually, still her gaze was fixed on Rossi as he too remained seated.
"Couldn't help yourself could you Dave?" Erin shook her head slowly, watching as his smile widened to an even more insufferable level.
"Where would be the fun in that?" Dave winked teasingly at her as he finally got to his feet. "See you on the jet, Strauss!"
Erin took a deep breath and picked up her cell. She waited until she was alone on the corridor back in the direction of her office before she made the call. She was only just holding it all together today. A part of her life that she had closed off was about to be invaded by her colleagues, and she still wasn't sure how she felt about that.
But if the BAU was going to rip through her home town, learn things about their leader that she never wanted them to know, then she was damn sure she was going to be there when they did. No way in hell was she going to let it all happen behind her back.
There were two sides to every story afterall. She needed to be able to tell her's.
Erin reminded herself for the third time today that this wasn't about her, not really, it was about two dead girls and a serial killer. She had to focus on helping the team to put a stop to it. If she didn't then she knew for sure that she would face the wrath of someone far more scary than the Director himself.
Drop a review if you have the time, I really do love to know what you think. Part 2 To follow in the next couple of days!