A/N: This is my first attempt at a fanfic. I've read a lot of good stories on here and I started getting a few ideas stuck in my idea. My main plan is to stick with the show, but with a slight AU.I've not decided where i want the story to start but I do think it will be after JJ and Will have Henry. I might even make him a little bit older. I'm probably aiming for late S4 or S5 for my starting point.
And as for a disclaimer: I do not own Criminal Minds, or any of the characters... even though i might secretly wish for a couple.(after reading a few stories it wont be too much of a secret) Please read and review, any and all feedback will be appreciated. So without more mindless babble, on with the story :)
Chapter One
It had been a long day. Sitting there in the hospital, trying to figure out just how everything went wrong to cause her to end up shot, hit in the head with a baseball bat, and now a coma. The doctors decided to medically induce a coma to try to help with the swelling. She's been in the coma now for 12 hours, about 10 hours of that in surgery while the rest of the team is sitting in the waiting room, seeing if she will come out of the coma the same person she was before. The doctors ended up having to go back in a few hours ago because there was still some internal bleeding from the gunshot wound she took getting hit when the unsub fired though the door. She has only been back for about a half hour, and already having a better response that the first time out of surgery.
The doctor walks in at that time, with the clipboard in her hand and JJ jumps up, hits mute on the remote control shutting up the TV, and starts firing questions left and right at her without pausing for breath or waiting for answers. She notices the gun on the woman's hip as she stood up and figures she was with the rest of the agents standing just down the hall in the waiting room. She also recognizes her as the agent that was on the news earlier that afternoon addressing the public about the guy they were trying to help the local an amused grin on her face as JJ stops and looks at her reaction, she says "Hi, I'm Dr White. And you are..."she lets it fall knowing she will fill in the name, since she wasn't able to catch her name from the news since she's been going non stop herself.
JJ shakes her head as if she is trying to calms herself down."My apologies for the way I went off Dr. White. I'm Agent Jennifer Jareau, but you can call me JJ."
"Not a problem JJ. I've dealt with more than a few law enforcement officers in my time as a doctor. I understand how close-knit officers are with their partners." Dr. White says. "Now as for Agent Prentiss. Everything looks better this go around. All her vitals are better, and the brain swelling from the baseball bat is virtually gone, so I'm here to go ahead and stop the anesthesia. She could start waking up withing the next hour or two, but if she does, it probably will not before very long. So I would ask that we make sure somebody is here with her to show her some support. It would go a long way to helping her heal to have friends and family here with her."
"There's no chance of her waking up without me being here." JJ states. Doctor White nods knowingly. "On top of that, the rest of the team is in the hall and I'm sure nobody is leaving until we actually talk to her and see she is alright."
"Alright then, do you have any questions for me?" JJ shakes her head no, since the doctor had answered them all. "Then with that, I will leave you here to head down the hall and explain to the rest of the agents as to the situation. If you have further questions of me, just have one the nurses get me. Or if you need anything else, don't hesitate to ask." Dr. White says as she turns and heads towards the door.
"Thanks Doc." JJ says. As she goes out the door, JJ reaches back down, grabs the remote to unmute the tv but turns the volume down to where it's not a major distraction, and goes back to her seat where she has pulled the chair in the room beside Emily's bed and sits back down. She pull as close the bed as she can. With the steady beeping of the heart monitor going, add in the amount of the stress from the case and waiting in the hospital, exhaustion starts to set in "I'm so sorry Em." JJ whispers. "It's all my fault" she says as she falls asleep with her head on the side of the bed holding Emily's hand.
Meanwhile, out in the waiting room, the rest of the team sits and waits. Everyone has been on edge since the end of the case. Morgan constantly pacing, waiting for his partner to wake up. Rossi and Hotch sitting in solemn silence. Reid, the ever flowing river of facts about how good her chances are of coming out of the coma. And Garcia, wondering how her girl and best friend are going to be if Emily doesn't come out of this OK. Dr White walks out of the room and heads towards them, and everyone gathers to receive the information. "Agent Prentiss is doing just fine. The swelling of the brain has gone down and all her vitals are almost within range of normal, so I've gone ahead and taken her off the anesthesia. I've also asked Agent Jareau that somebody stay with her over the next couple hours so she has a friendly face to wake up too. So if that's all the information you need..." she looks around at all the faces of relief and hears a few sighs, "If you have further questions of me, just have one the nurses get me, i should still be around for some time before the end of my shift." Reid and Garcia go back to where they were at before the doctor showed up. As Garcia sits down, she starts going over all the information she has and as far as she can tell, she was, and still is the only person on the team that knows the way JJ and Emily feel about each other. She just prays that after something like this, they will find a way to actually tell each other how they feel.
Garcia is pulled back to the present by the raised voice of her best friend and gets back up to head over there. "Look Hotch, she's my partner. I'm tired of sitting out here waiting to see her. Now that I know she is alright, I'm going in there." Morgan says.
"I understand that she's your partner and you want to be with her. And it doesn't take a profiler to see you're trying to blame yourself for Prentiss getting shot because you were somewhere else and not with her. I made the call to send Prentiss and JJ to the witness' house. How were any of us suppose to know the unsub was in that house at the time? Her and JJ were just suppose to be re-interviewing a witness about the latest change in the profile to see if it matched him. How were they suppose to know the unsub went there when he hasn't been there in over five years?"
"I don't give a damn Hotch, I'm going in there." Morgan says.
Just then, Garcia walks up and tries to help Hotch out, while secretly helping JJ out knowing nobody else knows about the growing feelings between the 2 agents currently in the room. "Hey Sugarplum, why don't you come sit with me a bit?"
"Look Baby Girl, as much as I would like to continue pacing out here, I need to be in there." Morgan says. "Humor me." She retorts.
They go a short ways away and take a seat and start talking. As they leave, Rossi and Hotch watch them go, and Rossi turns back and asks "You think she can calm him down?"
"You know what the one thing about that girl I've learned over the years?" Hotch asks him.
"Whats that?" Rossi replies.
Hotch says "Never, ever underestimate Penelope Garcia."
"Hehe. Ya, maybe your right. She does seem to pull the biggest damn rabbits out of that CPU of hers at the time we've needed it the most. And even when she doesn't find anything, it still seems to help us narrow down our suspect pools or refine our profiles." Rossi states admirably.
While that conversation was going on Morgan turns to Garcia after taking a sit "So whats the reason you wanted to talk to me?" he asks her.
"Look Derek, I know you want to go in there and sit with Emily, but put yourself in JJ's place. You would want to be the first person Emily sees because you would be blaming yourself. You would need her to wake up and tell you it's not you fault. Give Jayje the opportunity to get that comfort from her. How was anyone to know the unsub was going to start shooting at the door the first time someone started knocking? And who could have guessed he would use the little bit of ammo in the first seconds of the confrontation, and switch to a baseball bat? It could just as well be Jayje in the bed instead of Emily. Jayje could have gone right instead of left. Look, they didn't have the time to wait for backup because of the potential hostage inside. The couldn't have known the unsub already killed her. Alright, I'm not saying you can't see her, just please give her time to wake up so those two can talk it out a bit." Penelope says.
She can see he still wants to still go in there to sit with his partner until she come around. And he can see that she is starting to pick a few things from spending so much time with profilers, and while he thinks about mentioning it to her, he knows how she hates it being brought up. So instead, he just sighs and says "Your right Baby Girl. They need to work through this themselves and I would want the chance to talk to her first if it were me." She smiles all knowingly. "And I hate when you go all profiler and logical goddess on me." he mutters loud enough even Reid glances over knowing the outcome of that statement.
"Oh, you watch your mouth." she replies playfully, laughing as she slaps him on the arm. Morgan starts to laugh and he glances at Reid to see him laughing at the exchange between the two.
Down the hall Rossi and Hotch see the end of the conversation, and when they see Morgan lean back in the chair and Penelope leans into him, resting her head on his shoulder, "Should have known." Rossi says. Hotch just nods. "So the doctor said she should be coming out of the drug induced coma soon if everything keeps going the way it is." Rossi says.
They start to make their way over by Reid and take seat to try to rest a bit while they continue waiting. "Ya, when she does wake up we should wait a while and give Prentiss and JJ some time to talk about what happened." Hotch states. "Give them a chance to work the issues we know are not there but one or the other might try to place there."
"Look, why don't we all just try to get some rest. It's already 4 in the morning, and if all's well with Prentiss tomorrow, we should be able to leave early tomorrow afternoon. Well everyone but Prentiss. She wont be flying for at while, and depending on how good her condition is, she hopefully will be able to drive out as soon as the weekend. It will only be about a four to four and a half hour drive back to Quantico. I say we let Morgan fight it out with JJ to see who gets to drive Prentiss back." Rossi says, not quite keeping the smile from reaching his eyes.
Morgan looks over at Rossi and says "I'm not scared of Blondie in there."
Everyone laughs and starts to relax a bit and tries to get settled in for what will continue to be a long morning.