Going Wodwo
a/n: This story was inspired by the Round 3 fic prompts on the Chit Chat on the Author's Corner forums. I was assigned Morgan/Prentiss as my characters, and my objects are a camera, a tent, and marshmallows.
The story is AU, obviously, and the title is a direct reference (or rip off, however you prefer) of a Neil Gaiman poem in his anthology Fragile Things. As he says in the introduction, "A wodwo, or wodwose, was a wild man of the woods."
This story is rated M for harsh language. You'll notice it right off the bat, and it doesn't get much better as it goes along. Also, this isn't necessarily an M/P 'ship story; they're just the main characters here.
Thanks to chiroho for his always insightful beta'ing skills, though I probably didn't keep as many of the changes to this chapter as he would like. :) Also, I love reviews. That's just a plea to the general reading public.
Disclaimers: Criminal Minds and the characters, situations, and plot lines pertaining thereto don't belong to me. Nothing else I reference belongs to me, either. Just the computer I'm typing on and the actual words that come out of it, I guess. :) So, in other words, don't bother suing me.
Chapter 1: The Detectives
kindly and thoroughly beta'd by chiroho
I'm a creeping and intangible sense of loss;
I'm a memory you can't get out your head.
If I leave you now,
You'll wish you were somewhere else instead.
-David Gray, "Nemesis"
"'A year later their footage was found.'" Emily Prentiss dropped the newspaper she'd been reading from with a dismissive snort and pinned her partner with a glare. "That's the plot of the fuckin' Blair Witch Project, Morgan."
"I know, I know," Derek Morgan said, waving his hands as though to ward off the death rays emanating from her dark eyes. "But there's a difference, Prentiss: The Blair Witch Project was just a movie; the whole 'missing filmmakers' thing was a marketing ploy. This is real." He waved the file under her nose, and she raised a skeptical brow.
"This is a joke, right? You're messing with me? Haha, good one! You almost had me going. Now, can we do some real work before I have to sell myself on the street so we can make rent?" She ignored the thin file he was brandishing and turned back to her own desk. "I was thinking of talking to Mrs. Wakowski again—"
"Em. I'm not kidding. You should read the file." His voice was calm, and it cut through her work-related chatter like a cleaver. He took the two short steps across their tiny office and dropped the file in front of her. "Just humor me, ok?"
She looked up at him for several long, tense heartbeats, but at last she let out a frustrated breath. "Fine. If it's that important to you, fine." She opened the anorexic file and began flipping through the scant contents. "There's hardly anything here, Morgan. Just a couple missing persons and some pictures."
"Apparently the locals aren't taking it real serious."
Prentiss caught him with a brief glare. "I can't imagine why," she said, her voice droll. "These are our missings? David Rossi, Penelope Garcia, and Spencer Reid. Oh, pardon, Doctor Spencer Reid. Unlikely looking group." She studied each picture carefully, memorizing the faces. David Rossi was older, probably in his late 50s or early 60s, with dark, penetrating eyes and a thinking man's face. Penelope Garcia had bottle blond hair and cat's eye glasses; her makeup glittered and her smile was at least a thousand watts. Spencer Reid was young, skinny, and geeky, but good-looking in a pretty, almost androgynous way. Calvin Klein would love him.
"A college professor, a professional grad student, and a computer geek head into the woods…no wonder they never came out again," Prentiss remarked.
Morgan let out an impatient sigh. "These people are missing, Prentiss, and the locals don't seem to care. The families are desperate, and they want us to look into it."
"Morgan, this happened in Tennessee."
"Yeah. They were investigating some old Appalachian folktales. They were up in the mountains and—"
"Morgan! That's 500 miles away! We can't travel 500 miles to investigate the plot of a bad movie."
He sighed and ran a hand back and forth over the smooth dome of his skull. "I know it sounds crazy, but listen. David Rossi was one of my professors back at Northwestern. I hadn't even really thought about him in years, and then suddenly the call comes in from his daughter. It's gotta mean something, Prentiss."
She eyed him. He'd been on a spiritual kick lately, ever since…well, just ever since…and Prentiss was growing weary of his constant search for signs and miracles and hints from the universe at large. "Maybe he'd talked about you, Morgan," she said, keeping her voice gentle. "Maybe she remembered your name and thought you'd be willing to do what the local cops aren't, despite the fact that they don't have to travel 500 miles to do it." She'd lost the thread during the course of that sentence, and the initial care she'd been taking to spare his feelings had evaporated somewhere along the way.
"I know it sounds crazy, and I know I'm asking a lot, but I think we need to do this."
Prentiss recognized that tone, and it had her closing her eyes and shaking her head in weary resignation. She would cave, she knew, and it was almost better to get it over with and spare herself the headache. "Rossi was a professor at Northwestern, you said?"
Morgan cleared his throat. "Well. I mean. He was, when I was there."
"But…?"
"But he left sometime in the late 90s. He had some…theories…that were unpopular."
"So he was a raving nutjob."
He shifted, discomfort written in every line of his broad-shouldered frame. "Nooo, I didn't say that. He just wasn't exactly mainstream."
"Oh God," she groaned, rolling her eyes. "Mulder, Scully, and Eddie Haskell go camping."
"Hey, that's not fair. He looks like a nice kid."
"So did Eddie Haskell. Look, it says here he had three Ph.D.s by the time he was 24. What were you doing when you were 24, Morgan?"
She'd meant it as a joke, but she could tell by the faraway look on his face that he took her seriously. "I'd just met Elizabeth," he said. "I was doing every damn thing I could to get her to look at me, and I was fuckin' it all up."
"A woman who wouldn't look at you? I didn't know such a creature existed in nature."
"Yeah," he said, voice wistful, "she's one of a kind."
Prentiss allowed the moment to linger for only a few seconds more before she cleared her throat. "Right. Well, when I was 24 I was getting the shit beat outta me every night by Timmy Lawson, until one night I got sick of it and kicked him so hard he still has to piss sitting down." She smirked, and he shook his head, face lighting in a quick, amazed grin.
"Emily Prentiss, ball busting bitch. You are one bad motha—"
"Shut your mouth," she interrupted dutifully. She closed the file and drummed her fingers against it in a thoughtful rhythm. "We can't afford a trip to Tennessee, Morgan."
"They're paying all expenses, plus covering for the work we'd be missing. Emily, look, we can hash this out all day, or you can just say yes now and save a lot of time. Which's it gonna be?"
"I have to make a good show of it."
"You want a good show?" He held up a small plastic case, and Prentiss could see it held a memory card like you'd use in a digital camera. "I got you a show right here."
She glared at the little bit of plastic, but the expression held more curiosity than irritation. At last she relented. "Let's hear it, Sam."
He booted up his laptop and slid the card into it. A few clicks later and the shaky footage began. Prentiss squinted; leaned closer to the screen. It didn't last long, and at the end of it she sat back in the squeaky desk chair and blew dark bangs off her forehead with a long puff of air. "Of all the detective agencies in all the world, why did David Rossi's daughter have to walk into ours?"
Hey, so, do us both a favor and review me! They keep me writing. :)