A/N: Cowritten with my bashful but brilliant beta, Esperanta, she who keeps my prose typo-free and boasts an imagination more twisted than my own. The only things we created were this creepy little world and a few OCs.

Solitary 5.0

Chapter One

Justice Starts Here

The man who called himself Warden peered through a light spatter of rain on his windshield. Like his prey, he was a meticulous man, intelligent, observant, and orderly. Prepared for any contingency. No wild streak of impulsivity darkened his mental makeup.

But—also, like his prey—he could seem impulsive when his preparation met unparalleled opportunity and his powerful intellect recognized potential. Like his prey, he had the courage it took to break free of his own patterns and seize victory when it presented itself.

Like now, when the lawyer whom he'd been tracking so carefully, so meticulously, suddenly emerged from his garage into the light late-afternoon rain of a Friday in early May. He wore khakis, a light blue knit shirt, a plain navy nylon windbreaker, and a billed cap with the FBI insignia. He carried a tarpaulin and a folded nylon tent in his arms. Behind him, the garage door remained raised, rolled to its fullest height.

The lawyer was a cautious man, a meticulous man. The open door meant he would be back within just a few minutes. He was at home here, safe, in his quiet yard, on his quiet street, but he was also vigilant. Rigorously careful. He would not leave the door rolled up for more than a minute or two.

The man bent on destroying him did not hesitate for even an instant. Because he was always prepared, he didn't have to waste so much as a heartbeat regretting that he had not brought this item or that one, or to wish this had happened at a more convenient time. Luck is what happens when opportunity meets preparation.

It won't go down at the car wash in June after all.

He pulled to the curb, turned off the engine, and exited his surveillance vehicle. Walking with a relaxed and confident gait, the stride of a man who belongs here, who fits in, he made his way up the driveway of the adjoining house, which was almost a mirror image of his prey's own. It now stood vacant. Warden stepped across the narrow strip of grass that separated the two properties, and slipped into his prey's open garage.

~ o ~

Incomprehensible pain.

Christ, it's a heart attack, maybe a stroke, I can't die now. We just got settled. Jack's due here in an hour, shit, damn Dad and his fucking Type-A personality genes, I can't die early, too, I need to get help, call 911, and as he struggled with suddenly nerveless fingers to reach for his cell phone he tumbled forward, barely saving himself from falling smack on his face on the floor of the garage.

That I haven't swept since we moved in, God, it's filthy….

"Arms out," an unfamiliar voice said—and where the hell did that come from, anyway? Male. Middle-aged. Not so much authoritative as, as—

Ow!

Oh, Jesus, worse than a stroke….

"Arms out," the voice repeated. "All the way out and away from your sides, or I'll turn up the power on my little Enforcer next time."

As the owner of the confident voice—and the Taser, or the Taser-like device, that was now pressed against the back of his neck—straddled his torso, he obediently extended his arms, arms that were sluggish, slow to respond. No, not a Taser. A cattle prod; he could tell by the contacts. And he has named it. Probably the kind of guy who names his penis, too ...

Somebody has to see this. Some passing car. Some neighbor in search of the evening paper.

In a suspense novel, the hero would find something useful conveniently at his fingertips as he lay cruciform on his garage floor on a rainy spring evening. Real life was a bitch: His right hand touched nothing but dusty poured concrete. His left hand rested beside the right front wheel of his van. So—filthy, but uncluttered.

A little clutter would be useful about now. A wrench, hammer, piece of pipe. Almost anything.

"It's like this," his assailant said as he swiftly and expertly searched Aaron, confiscating his cell phone and removing the battery, which he pitched across the garage floor. Calm. Matter of fact. "I'm not strong enough to knock you out and then wrestle you into my truck. So in order to move you from point A to point B, I'll have to harness your own kinetic and potential energy."

Kinetic and potential energy? This guy sounds like Reid's evil twin…or maybe my junior high science teacher.

His attacker went on. "You have two motivators. The first is my device. If need be, I can turn it up so it immobilizes you completely—but then again, there I am trying to wrestle you into my truck. So my fallback position is this: If I have to immobilize you and drag you over to the truck, it will take more time, and you don't have time to spare. There is an explosive device set to go off in eleven minutes at 113 Aspenwood Circle. I believe that you're familiar with the neighborhood?"

"Yes," he whispered, horrified. Can't show him fear.

The pain of the cattle prod was nothing to the pain that pierced his heart at the mention of Jessica Brooks's address, where his son at this moment was probably shoving toys and treats into his backpack, getting ready to head home to his father in her minivan.

"In eleven—well, ten, now, ten minutes the device will go off if I don't drive by and disarm it. I can do it remotely." The man who now straddled his back began rapidly, enthusiastically, to describe the precise makeup and placement of the device. Hotchner knew just enough about bombs to recognize that the guy knew his stuff. Worse, the man referred confidently to the layout of Jessica's property, the make and model of her minivan. He knew that stuff, too. "So do I have your undivided attention now?" he concluded.

"Yes." He wasn't even trying to keep the apprehension out of his voice anymore.

"So time is of the essence. When I bring the truck up the drive, I will come back in to get you. You will stand up and walk to the truck. You will not attempt to call out or otherwise attract attention. You will do this because if you disobey me, I will hurt you, and then we will run late and you will hurt your family. I may not be strong, but I am organized and I am determined."

Wow. And you're profiling yourself for me.

If Jess and Jack were not in danger, too, Aaron might actually have found that amusing in a twisted kind of way.

"All right, now put your hands behind you."

"What do you want?" Aaron asked.

The business end of the cattle prod slid along the back of his neck. "Don't make me shock you again; it'll just take time, and you don't have time. You may speak only when spoken to. Now shut up and put your hands behind you."

He complied with a sigh.

"Don't worry. I don't want to hurt any innocents," the man holding him down said. "The only reason I would do that would be to punish you, so—as long as you behave, your loved ones are safe."

Weirdly, Hotch believed him. That gave him courage.

Cords were wound around his wrists, then the man climbed off him and attached his hands to his ankles. The son of a bitch was hog-tying him! How in the hell was he supposed to get to the truck, wiggle?

"I'll be right back," the man said, and after a moment added smugly, "Don't go anywhere."

When he got to his feet and left the garage, Hotch twisted his head around and peered over his shoulder to steal his first look at his personal UNSUB: maybe five-eight, mid- to late forties, build thin but tough, fairly athletic. Light brown hair, possibly going gray, worn in untidy bangs practically to his eyebrows. Black-rimmed glasses. A terrific crop of muttonchop whiskers. Nothing even remotely familiar about him. He jogged through the evening mist in his jeans and corduroy shirt and climbed into an older model dark blue truck with a camper cap. The vehicle started with an unhealthy cough and moved into the driveway of the vacant house adjacent to his own.

No plate on the front bumper, which eliminated a lot of states right there—unless, of course, he'd removed the rear plates too, but then that would bring him to the attention of any police car that spotted him.

The man left the truck's engine running as he got out. Producing what indeed proved to be a long antique cattle prod from his right-hand back pocket, he beamed down at Hotchner. "Ready to come on board?"

"You don't need to do this," Aaron said.

The man crouched down. "Actually, I do," he said, conversationally. "And you were not given permission to speak." He adjusted something on the awkward-looking metal device, and bent down. "This will make movement difficult."

"No," Hotchner managed to gasp before the current hit him. His synapses scrambled, all of his muscles spasmed and contracted, and the pain made him dizzy and confused. He felt the cords falling away from his limbs, and then a calm voice directed him to stand up slowly and carefully.

He had been operating on the assumption that once the bonds were removed he might be able to resist his would-be captor, to drag him down and wrest the remote from his person, to tear off wildly for Jessica's house, but the most recent jolt of electricity had left him weak and uncoordinated. It was all he could do to drag himself upright, clinging to the side of his van.

"Now," the voice said, "to the truck, quietly and steadily. No quick movements. Your family's well-being is contingent on your obedience."

Hotchner doubted that he even had the capacity for quick movement at the moment. He could barely stand, and the world kept lurching around him. Hurry, he kept telling himself. We're down to eight minutes and it's a five-minute drive. One foot in front of the other.

He would have given almost anything for a gun.

~ o ~

Warden leaned over. With his left hand he pulled the seatbelt across his wobbly prize and snapped it firmly into place, his right hand holding the prod tightly against the lawyer's side to discourage any attempt at resistance.

Once he had the man securely belted in, he laid the prod on the dash, within easy reach, then fished around under his seat for the little bag with the drug and the needle he'd previously stashed there. Carefully filling the hypodermic, he even tapped it for air bubbles, something he had never seen a real nurse do, though he had seen it often on TV. "Give me your left arm," he directed.

The lawyer looked at the needle warily. "You don't need to do that," he said, his voice low and controlled. "If you don't trust me, you can tie me up again, if you want."

"You don't listen very well, do you?" Warden sighed. "But you never did, did you? You don't have permission to talk. And you don't have permission to have opinions. About anything." He touched the cattle prod against his prisoner's ribs, eliciting a smothered cry and a return to enfeebled lack of coordination. "Much better," he said. He replaced the device on the dash and turned in his seat. "This will actually feel rather pleasant, or so I'm told," he said. He shoved the sleeve of the lawyer's nylon jacket upward and slid the needle into his unresisting arm.

The lawyer watched the injection with mournful eyes. "My family," he breathed. "Hurry."

Warden beamed. "There is no device," he assured his captive. "Not unless you've pissed off someone who's a lot less civilized than I am." He rolled his eyes. "Bombing innocent people? Little old moi? I mean, really." He watched the last of the liquid drain from the hypodermic, then withdrew it carefully.

The lawyer stared at him mutely with eyes already beginning to lose focus. "I know," Warden said with a light chortle. "And you thought you were such a great interrogator, could spot a lie-on-the-fly from fifty paces. I guess you can chalk this one up as a learning experience."

The lawyer started to wrestle weakly with his seatbelt.

"Do we really need another teachable moment here?" Warden asked, reaching out toward the shock device on the dashboard. The lawyer ignored him. Warden touched it lightly against the man's forearm. The prisoner jerked and shuddered and slid sideways with a faint protest.

Warden watched him with a mixture of disappointment and contempt. You'd think an FBI goon would be sharper than that, tougher than that, but, hell, in the end a lawyer's just a lawyer.