*NEW NOTE – OLD STORY*

Hi everyone! For some of you, if you're still here in CM, long time no speak! If you used to follow me here in the H/P fandom, I'm sorry I went away, but it wasn't by choice. It just was the way it was. And any of you who did know me from before, I can tell you that you all know this story here already. Universe V! It ended up being left incomplete about four years back when my CM muses flew the coop for what I thought, was a permanent basis. But, for reasons I explained in much more detail over on my Tumblr (sienna27 is my blog if you're interested), shockingly, due to an unexpected series of events outlined there, my Girl muses have returned! So I am taking a shot at ATTEMPTING to finish up this story. If I can get it done (as in the muse really sticks around) that would be amazing, and if I think I can keep the momentum going (and find another Girl universe which feels inviting) I will then take a crack at reposting/finalizing another of the Girl universes that were left undone. But please, do keep your expectations low on that latter point. I am "hopeful" about being able to wrap this one up, but absolutely, one thing at a time. And please know, new readers, that I stopped watching the show YEARS ago! Like three U.S. presidents ago. So, the version of the team that you will find in my stories, are the original version from way, way back when Prentiss first showed up at the BAU. And my Girl universes became their own self-sustaining little ecosystems that really had nothing to do with canon after probably season four. So, yeah, if you're a current canon viewer, and would like to read this story, please wipe the last decade of events from your brains :)

But to the repost, I did a bit of spot cleaning on these chapters just catching missing punctuation or whatnot from the first time around, but otherwise, I thought they seemed fine so these early chapters are going up pretty much as they were originally. And I am going to leave most of my original A/Ns on them too, because well, they're all still relevant for the plot points, so why delete them? Right? Right :) And I am genuinely happy to be back here again and I hope that maybe some of you from before are still out there and might be happy to see ME again. I missed you guys :) So yeah, here we go… again!

Author's Note (Original Posting):

This is Universe V. And yes, we are skipping ahead a few letters there, and not as teased to the Z is for Zombie, but instead to V as in VAMPIRE! Yes, we're doing a vampire story! And it is a crossover with a book, and no it is NOT Twilight :) This is a throwback to literally the very first bonus that Kavi and I wrote for our prompts community, a crossover with Stephen King's, Salem's Lot. So obviously WAY darker undead world. There are no sparkles here :) If you don't know the story (though it's highly recommended reading) essentially vampires take over a small, secluded, town in Maine.

If you choose to jump into this one, you need to know that it's again a Girl spinoff because that is my base, and you should read Chapters 1 to 36 of Falling in Love With a Girl before you start this one. Also being familiar with the holiday stories Making Spirits Bright and A Kick, A Kiss and Bag of Chips, would be helpful because those also lay down the foundation for the Hotch/Prentiss relationship found herein.

For the Girl'verse "connoisseurs" this would be in January just after events in the bathroom. For general recap, Hotch is long separated, but still a month from signing the divorce papers. And JJ has just found out she's pregnant, but nobody else knows that yet. In Girl, her pregnancy isn't generally known until May, and again, this is January.

And FYI, I make no promises here for the health, safety or welfare, for any members of the team. It's an M for language and violence. Shit's gonna get messy!


Bonus Challenge #1 - Vampires

Author: Stephen King

Title Challenge: Salem's Lot


The Storm

"Hotch, are you sure you know where we are, man?"

Morgan's sharp tone cut through the tense silence that had been filling the SUV for the last half hour. And the response to that bizarre question from the back seat . . . where Emily, JJ, and Reid were crammed together, huddling for warmth . . . was a confused furrowing of brows, and shaking of heads. Then Emily shot Derek a scowl that he couldn't see.

What the hell was he talking about?! Of course Hotch didn't KNOW where they were. NOBODY knew where they were! That was the whole FUCKING problem!

They were lost!

And Emily could see, from her vantage point behind the passenger's seat, that though he was attempting to maneuver around a blowing snow drift that was blocking half the roadway, still, Hotch took a split second to shoot Derek a nasty look across the front seat.

Though it was dark outside, his face was clearly visible in the dashboard lights.

"No, Derek," Hotch bit out tightly as his eyes snapped back to the blinding white snow splattering over the front windshield, "I do NOT know where we are. Do you?! Because if you do, NOW, or perhaps forty-five FUCKING minutes ago, would have been the time to share that INFORMATION!"

Hotch's last words were a straight up growl, punctuated by a smack to the steering wheel. Both actions combined, caused Derek's mouth to snap shut, and for Emily and JJ to exchange a quick, worried, look.

Because okay, that was bad!

Yes, under the circumstances, Derek's question was obnoxious, but still, Hotch almost never lost his temper! So it really wasn't good news for ANYONE stuck in that vehicle, if he was losing it right now. Because right now . . . Emily's anxious gaze shifted back out her side window . . . they were already SERIOUSLY screwed!

The day had started out pretty normally though.

At the morning briefing, JJ said they'd been asked to assist with a series of missing children cases happening around East Millinocket, Maine. The two most recent were just last week, but apparently the disappearances had been happening off and on for some years. Until now though, the investigations had always just been handled internally. Which was a bit odd given the scope of missing person's reports in the file they were sent . . . almost forty . . . but the team was chalking that one up to old fashioned Yankee pride. After all, they were talking about the backwoods of Maine. Which, regardless of the year on the calendar, still wasn't a part of the country likely to ask for help from outsiders.

Yankees took care of themselves.

So what had changed this week? Well, now they had a new sheriff. One who had just moved to the area after retiring from twenty-five years working homicide on the Boston P.D. And when those two little boys hadn't arrived home from school last week, after immediately raising a region-wide Amber alert (which the previous sheriffs had never done), the new sheriff started flipping through the old case files. That's when he'd realized that those two boys were just the latest in a long line of young children who'd disappeared over the last twenty years.

More than thirty of them were just in the last ten.

Immediately seeing the horrifying pattern that he couldn't understand how his predecessors had missed, he'd called down to his old homicide buddies on the BPD. One of them had referred him to the BAU. So last night JJ had received an email from Sheriff Dixon asking if their team wouldn't mind coming up to take a look around, because he was pretty sure that he had a serial killer working in the area. And after reviewing the paperwork he'd forwarded to them that morning, the team was pretty sure he did too.

So they had all, minus Dave (who was attending a funeral in New York) grabbed their bags and headed out to the jet. They'd landed in Bangor a little after four with snow in the forecast, but none falling at that point. And because it was just the five of them for now . . . Dave would be joining them tomorrow . . . Hotch had decided to take just take the one Suburban rather than the usual two.

Dave would pick up the other one when he arrived.

So they'd set out for East Millinocket in bitterly cold, but essentially clear, weather. It was supposed to be about a two hour drive, a straight shot going north. The flurries started after the first half hour. And then there was a detour on the road. A downed tree.

That was where things had started to go wrong.

Though there had been a state highway man there to give alternate directions, their team seemed to be the only people who had taken the road suggested. The road that was supposed to take them northwest for approximately forty minutes, before they took a left hand turn onto Rural Route 14, for another thirty.

They were supposed to end up right in the center of East Millinocket.

But it wasn't ten minutes after they'd taken the turn to go west, that the storm had whipped up out of nowhere. It had become a complete whiteout within maybe twenty minutes, and then they'd totally lost their bearings. And that had happened to have been right at the point where they were supposed to make the turn back to the east. Hence their current situation.

Totally fucking lost.

Ordinarily of course, any one of them could have just whipped out a smart phone and gotten a GPS reading or called for help. But they'd lost both the GPS, and all cell service, about an hour ago.

That was when they hit the forest.

Yeah, that was the other thing. They weren't just lost in a snowstorm in one of the least populous counties, of the least populous states in the country, they were also lost in a God damn FOREST! Like Hansel and Freaking Gretel! That is if Hansel and Gretel were five well trained federal agents carrying enough fire power in their vehicle to take over a very small country.

Which, based on the stories Emily had read, they were not.

But either way, at the moment their weapons didn't matter. Again, nor did their phones. Because now that the sun had completely set, everything visible in the headlights, was completely white.

White road, white ground, white trees.

They hadn't seen another vehicle, or even so much as a sign post, or a side road, in over an hour. Again, just after they'd made the detour. And peering over Hotch's shoulder, Emily could see that for the sake of their dwindling gas rations, they REALLY needed to find some kind of shelter, very soon. Because with the wind buffering the SUV, she knew that it was probably a good ten below zero outside. So it was going to suck BIG TIME, if they ran out of gas out there.

They'd freeze to death before morning.

And she could now hear Derek making that point to Hotch as well. The 'we need to find shelter before we run out of gas,' one. And seeing Hotch's fists clench around the steering wheel, Emily decided to step in and handle Derek's idiocy herself.

It was the only useful thing she'd been able to do in an hour.

"Hey, Captain Obvious!" She yelled from the backseat. "Would you happen to have any useful suggestions that we could undertake right now? Or are you just feeling good busting Hotch's balls about crap he can't control?"

For a moment there was stunned silence in the cab, and then Emily heard Morgan suck in a breath, right before he whipped his head around.

"Excuse me, girl?!"

"Excuse nothing, Derek," she scowled, "you're being a dick. We all know what our problems are. If you don't have any solutions on how to resolve said problems, shut up!"

"Don't tell me to shut up!" He shot back. To which she poked her finger in his back.

"I'll tell you to shut up if I NEED to tell you to shut up! So, why don't you take your big, fat fu . . ."

Before Emily could get out the rest of it . . . though admittedly the rest of the sentence was going to be mostly expletives that you would not use in front of your mother . . . Hotch cut her off with a sharp, "PRENTISS!" which she knew meant that he had already guessed how the rest of her sentence was going to turn out.

And when her eyes snapped up to his in the rearview mirror, she saw him giving her a head shake, so she slumped back against the seat.

"That would have been a good one too," she mumbled. Then in the dash light, she saw Hotch's mouth quiver for the briefest of seconds, so hers did too. Because she knew then that at least she'd been able to lighten his mood a bit.

Good.

Because she knew that he was blaming himself for this mess that they were in. Even though the mess they were in wasn't his fault at all. The route had seemed clear, and the storm had blown in before anybody had even realized it was a storm and not just a squall. At that point it had been too late to turn back, or to get shelter.

They were already in the middle of nowhere.

And she could see him now taking a breath, and then slowly letting it out. And though she would have liked to have asked him how he was doing, and to reassure him that nobody blamed him for this cluster, but she would never engage in conversation like that in front of the others. The recent shift in their relationship, the one that now allowed personal conversations whereas in the past they would have been completely verboten, was just that.

Personal.

And even as she felt JJ and Reid squirming next to her, she could hear Hotch clearing his throat. It seemed he had decided it was time for a 'rah, rah, pull together,' speech. And it probably was. Because if Derek opened his mouth and said something stupid again, she was probably going to club him with the butt of her pistol.

And that was going to make a mess.

"I know everyone is a bit on edge," she heard Hotch state quietly, "myself included. But as Prentiss has already so succinctly pointed out, as only she can," seeing him shoot her a look in the mirror, her eyes crinkled slightly, "we are all already aware of our issues at the moment, and I'm presuming that if any of you had any fresh ideas on how to resolve those issues, that you would have shared them by now. But," his gaze flickered briefly down to the gas gauge . . . Emily could see they had less than a half tank left, "by my estimation we only have maybe another hour or so left on this tank. And if we haven't found shelter by the time the tank runs dry, that is obviously going to be a serious problem."

"So JJ," Hotch tipped his head as he briefly met her eyes in the mirror, "you're in charge of finding us some extra layers. Fortunately we do have the ready bags with us, but I want you to look in the way back. Get the vests, any blankets, hell, even the evidence bags," he looked back to the road, "people could line their boots with them to help keep their feet dry. Just anything you think might have some dual use. Because," his gaze snapped down to the time and temperature reading, "the air temperature is twelve," he looked back out the windshield, "and with the way it's blowing out there, the wind chill is probably negative twelve. So worst case, whether it's walking, or hunkering down, we're still going to need every layer we can get."

At their current speed, fifteen to twenty miles per hour, it could easily take them hours to find a town. But with the way the snow was piling up . . . a good two inches on the ground now, and it was heavy and wet hitting the windows . . . he didn't want to risk a spin out by going any faster. The bottom layer on the road was probably ice by now.

It would be suicide to gun it.

JJ was already unbuckling her seat belt, before Hotch had even finished talking. And when he did, she gave him a swift nod, "right, right, I got it," she murmured while turning to climb over the seat into the back row.

Reid gave her a boost.

Once she was situated in the third row and pulling their bags over from the way back so she could see what else was in there, Hotch snapped on the middle dome light. It illuminated the whole latter half of the vehicle.

Then his attention shifted to Emily.

"Prentiss," their eyes caught for a second in the mirror, "you're in charge of food and water."

He called back to JJ.

"JJ, yell out what you find for supplies, Prentiss will make an inventory in case we need to figure out rations later."

Hopefully they wouldn't end up needed to ration anything. But under the circumstances, it was best to prepare for the worst. Mostly though, he was having them make these lists now, because it was something to keep them occupied.

It would lower their stress levels to stay busy.

"Yep," Emily nodded as she started pulling off her gloves so she could get the pen and interview pad from her inner pocket, "I'll take care of it."

As she unzipped her parka to get her writing utensils, she heard Hotch giving Morgan orders to tally up their weapons, ammunition, flashlights and batteries. Again, JJ was instructed to yell out what she found in the back.

Seeing Morgan then start patting the pockets of his puffy coat for a pen, and knowing he wouldn't have one in there . . . he'd never worn that coat before, it was new . . . Emily felt a little twinge of guilt for yelling at him. Yes, he had been annoying with his questions, but he'd only been asking them because he was getting antsy. And when he got antsy he needed to talk things through.

And she knew that.

So she decided that this was a good opportunity to make peace, because it was never good to let things fester. Not in their line of work.

Too many bad things could happen.

"Here," she tapped his shoulder with the blue gel pen in her hand, "take this one. I've got a spare." When he turned in his seat, reaching back to take the instrument out of her hand, Emily gave him a little smile.

"Still friends?" she whispered hopefully, and his eyes crinkled.

"Of course we're still friends," he answered in the same quiet tone she'd spoken in, "it's not the first time you've called me a dick."

"And it won't be the last," she immediately shot back with a smirk. And even though Derek laughed at that, hearing Hotch clear his throat, Emily's attention shifted over to see him giving her a look in the rearview mirror.

She winked at him.

Then she looked back at Derek.

"Here," she tore off a page from her notebook, "I've got extra paper too."

His lip quirked up.

"Thanks."

Then he turned back around, now fully armed with list making supplies, to start making his own list.

As she was digging out her other pen, Emily heard Reid clear his throat.

"Um, Hotch. Don't you have anything for me to do?"

"Ah right, Spencer," Hotch nodded, "yes, I do have a job for you. Presuming we do run out of gas, I need you, quietly to yourself, figure out our best options from there. Basically how long can we survive walking, versus how long we can survive inside here."

That was about as complicated a nonsense task, as he could think for him.

"But Hotch," Reid's brow wrinkled, "there are so many variables there that would affect the answers for each of us individually."

"That's fine Reid." Hotch nodded as he turned up the windshield wipers a notch, "just write it down, and if the time comes that might help make our decisions on staying or going."

Though Emily was pretending like she wasn't paying attention to their conversation, at Hotch's words, still her mouth twisted in a faint, wistful smile. Because she was quite sure that their boss had already decided if the time came, who would be walking for help, and who would be sheltering in place.

Basically he and Derek would be going, and the rest of them would be staying.

But he also knew that Spencer needed something to do too. And these were varied calculations for five different people of different heights and weight and ages. He would figure all the numbers out perfectly.

And that math that would keep his brain busy for a few minutes.

Because sure enough, as soon as Hotch stopped speaking, Reid immediately got down to business using the calculator on his otherwise useless phone.

Emily quietly passed him a piece of paper to write down his results. Then she patted his knee, and went back to her own list.

She'd already written down all of the supplies she had with her:

Two bottles of water, a half empty bottle of Diet Coke leftover from the plane, four chewy chocolate granola bars, three mini boxes of raisins, one snack bag of pizza flavored Combos (just picked up at the airport because they sounded like a good idea at the time), pack of Ring Dings (also just picked up at the airport because F it, they were Ring Dings and when do you see Ring Dings at the airport) and then lastly, two cellophaned, squished nearly flat, Hostess cupcakes that she kept forgetting to take out of the side pocket of her bag.

Hmph . . . she tipped her head while reading it all over again . . . that was actually a pretty good haul. And those were just her supplies! Granted, they needed a hell of a lot more liquids to get by for any length of time, but even what she had alone was enough food to last the five of them until tomorrow. So basically she was thinking they should be in good shape if everyone else had a comparable amount of stuff with them.

And they all should.

Given that they never knew what kind of facilities they'd end up with from town to town, everyone generally carried a few of their own personal favorite snacks, everywhere they went. Basically they packed like old timey boxcar hobos.

Thank God.

And it was just at that point where she'd finished writing down her own supplies, that JJ interrupted her train of thought.

"You guys ready for me to start rattling stuff off from back here?"

"Yep," Emily nodded, "I'm good, but I already know what I have for food, and Morgan," she turned slightly to direct her comments to the front seat, "I've got my Sig, you know it's a P226, and I'm carrying two clips, plus I have four extra in my bag."

Morgan nodded while jotting down her ammo.

"Six clips," he mumbled, "got it."

"Actually," Hotch cut in, "make that thirteen clips total for the P226. I also have two on me, plus five in my bag. And I've got two spares for the Glock 23."

Then JJ yelled out from the back.

"I've got five more Glock clips."

"All right," Morgan scribbled down the updated number, "then counting what's in my bag, that brings the count up to thirteen." Then he turned slightly.

"Reid?"

Spencer lifted his head up to state distractedly, "one box of .38 cal. It's three quarters full."

Then he went back to his numbers.

"K," Morgan projected his voice, "anything else Jayje?"

"Yeah," she tapped the case under her feet, "three unloaded, standard issue, Remington 870 shotguns, and four boxes of shells. That's the last of the weapons. But we also have," she leaned over to look into the way back again, "six large Mag lights, no extra batteries, three pairs of night vision binoculars, two pairs of regular binoculars, pack of flex-cuffs, box of evidence bags, box of rubber gloves, pack of Lysol wipes, eight bullet proof vests, basic first aid kit, unopened, a box of flares, a set of walkie talkies, a bottle of anti-freeze, an ice scraper, a tire iron, and," she turned back around, "one spare tire. That's it for you Derek. Want me to repeat anything?"

It was a crap load of stuff to list off at once, but . . . they were trained to remember a crap load of stuff at once. So JJ was figuring he was probably fine. And sure enough, though she could still see him bent over his list, writing, he called back, "no, no, I'm good."

So she turned her attention to Emily.

"Ready Em?" She asked fairly rhetorically, given that she could clearly see her friend had pen and paper in hand. And sure enough, Emily tipped her head.

"Shoot."

"All right, for what's in the SUV itself, they gave us a half a case of Aquafina water, which equals seven sixteen ounce bottles. They're cold, but not frozen."

She looked up.

"And that's it," she shrugged, "unless there's some gum in the glove compartment."

"Hmph," Emily mumbled, "okay. But that's just as well because we needed the water, so at least they gave us some." Then she looked up and around at her teammates.

"Do you guys know what you have for food?" She asked them generally, "and if not, do you mind JJ digging into your bags to find out?"

It turned out that nobody cared about JJ rifling through their stuff, because nobody knew exactly what was left in their bags, except for Hotch because he'd just re-packed his. And he had quote, "four peanut butter protein bars, two snack packages of mixed nuts, one mini bag of chocolate covered pretzels, two bottles of water, and two bottles of Gatorade."

Emily's eyes crinkled slightly when Hotch mentioned the pretzels.

She'd bought them for him at the airport.

And with him and her done, from there it was JJ rattling off what was left in the last three bags.

Hers: Two unopened sleeves of saltines, large bag of Hershey kisses, large bag of craisins, three strawberry Soy Joy bars, one chocolate almond Clif bar, two bottles of water, and a six pack of mini-ginger ales.

Morgan's: Six chocolate protein bars, a half empty jar of peanut butter, a roll of Ritz crackers, two Monster energy drinks, and one bottle of water.

And finally, Spencer's: Two packages of Red Vines, a large bag of off brand Oatmeal raisin cookies, a quart sized ziplock filled with double stuffed Oreos, and three bottles of Cherry Coke.

It didn't surprise Emily in the slightest, that Reid had packed nothing but pure sugar. But this wasn't the time for commentary. She'd speak to him about the dangers of rotting out his teeth, when they got home.

For now, as she tucked the list into her inside pocket before pulling her gloves back on, she was just feeling pretty good about them having this inventory done. Her gaze shifted to the man in the front seat.

Hotch was right. Better to get organized now for a worst case scenario, and then cross their fingers that they wouldn't need to go into survival mode. After all, as she bit down a shiver, she knew it was possible that at any time, they could suddenly spot a sign for a town or even just a side road leading up to somebody's farm.

Or a hunting cabin.

Really, just because they were in the back woods, it didn't mean that there was nobody out here. After all, SOMEBODY paved this road that they were driving on! And also, in America in the twenty-first century, provided you stayed on a paved road . . . which they were . . . it was actually VERY hard, to get lost and STAY lost, for any true length of time. Right now they were definitely lost, but that was because of the weather.

It was just the snow screwing them up.

But even the worst of snowstorms blew out within a day. So the snow should end by tonight, if not then definitely by sometime tomorrow morning. Yeah . . . she nodded to herself as Hotch flipped off the dome light . . . even if they did get stranded for a bit, by morning, they'd be able to get their bearings no problem.

She was sure of it.

And she was about to share her 'Susie Sunshine' thoughts on this matter with the rest of the team . . . everyone could use a bit of cheering up, especially Hotch, the least 'sunshiny' of them all . . . when suddenly she saw a flash of light in the rearview mirror.

It was coming up fast.

So fast in fact, that it took her a second to process what the light meant. But then her brain caught up, and her eyes popped in astonishment.

Headlights!

Holy crap! Those were freaking headlights!

That was civilization back there!

And she was definitely not the only one seeing them. Because suddenly everyone was talking at once and, aside from Hotch, shifting around, trying to see who was behind them. Maybe if they were INCREDIBLY lucky, it would be a State Trooper or some other law enforcement!

And she was just about to say something to Hotch about possibly pulling over, when she realized that the headlights that had appeared perhaps five seconds earlier, were getting brighter and brighter in the rearview mirror. That vehicle . . . whatever it was, she still couldn't see . . . was going ENTIRELY too fast!

OH SHIT!

They were about to have a major collision!

Just as she was yelling out, "HOTCH, BREAK LEFT!" he was simultaneously yelling for everyone to, "HOLD ON!"

Apparently they'd seen the same thing at the same time.

All she had time to do was grab the overhead strap before Hotch took a sharp swerve to the left. He was trying to get them out of the way, but it was only a four lane road . . . two running in each direction. And they were surrounded by the forest.

There wasn't much maneuverability.

Still though, Hotch was about the best offensive (and defensive) driver, Emily had ever known. And she could feel him tapping the brakes, trying to keep control of the vehicle even as they moved from the center, towards the shoulder. The shoulder itself was almost non-existent, but there was at least some place to go.

And it looked like they were about to going to make it . . . he was slowing them down, pulling off the far lane . . . when suddenly something happened. Emily couldn't quite figure out what it was. It was like they were . . . shoved.

If that was even possible.

She wouldn't have thought that it was. But whatever happened, suddenly they were shooting back across three lanes of slippery . . . snow covered . . . road. From his cursing, it was clear that Hotch couldn't get control that time. Then Emily's heart shot up into her throat.

Because were spinning.

Around . . . and around.

And around.

JJ screamed. So did Reid.

She might have too. It was hard to say, it was all happening so God damned fast. But then those lights that had been coming up behind them . . . they were directly out her side window. It was a big black car.

And they were about to get T-boned.

"CAR!" She screeched just before impact.

And then there was the smashing of steel against steel . . . and they were spinning even faster. She was knocked into Reid, smacking her head against his . . . though by some miracle she wasn't crushed by the other vehicle. The impact must have been just behind her.

JJ!

The thought flew into Emily's brain . . . the impact would have been where JJ was sitting . . . but she had no time to catch it. Because things were still moving too fast! They'd finally spun off the road. And now once again her window was filling with a new picture. This time it was trees.

Nothing but trees.

OH JESUS!

She threw her arms over her face a split second before the glass exploded into it. Along with it came sharp branches, and snow covered pine needles.

The SUV had finally stopped moving.

And the wind that had been blowing outside, was now blowing inside too. She could also hear someone screaming.

It sounded like they were in agony.

And with her whole side aching, and her head pounding, she tentatively dropped her arms down from her face.

Still though, all around her, everything was still spinning . . . though really she knew they were standing still. She blinked, trying to clear the fog in her brain from that crack to her skull. Because she could still hear the screaming, and someone else was sobbing. And she needed to help them.

But she just couldn't focus.

Then she heard Hotch calling her name. He was telling her to undo her belt. To hurry.

To hurry up and come help him.

She blinked again even as her gloved hands fumbled for the silver latch at her waist. Because head spinning or not, she was ingrained to follow orders.

Especially Hotch's.

As the belt snapped back, a blast of frigid wind and snow simultaneously hit her face. With it though came some clarity, because it was the equivalent of someone throwing a cup of water at her.

That time when she looked up, she could see Hotch was already out of his belt and up on his knees in his seat.

He was leaning over the console, with one hand on Morgan's arm and the other on his knee. He was murmuring softly to him, telling him it would be okay. It was then that Emily realized . . . that was where the screaming had been coming from.

Derek.

Tentatively, and with a rising sense of horror and dread, she pushed herself up and leaned forward. She looked over into the front seat.

What she saw almost made her throw up.

The branch that had crashed through the glass, breaking the window, it had also crashed into Morgan. It had gone right through his left eye.

And that's why he couldn't stop screaming.


A/N 2 (again, original): Aaaah Morgan! And gross! Eyeballs! But I told you going in, made no promises about health and safety :) And what would be the point of going into the supernatural realm, if we didn't hit the ground running?!

So why is there a new story? Short answer, I have some occasional "anger issues" :) And I've found that writing horror stories is a WONDERFUL way to vent out the darkness that occasionally boils up. Truly, if you can, it's highly recommended. That's how we've gotten all of the ugly stories I've written to date . . . my messed up brain needed an outlet. And I've had no outlet for this stuff for a while, so I just started scribbling one day when I needed to work in a darker palette, then the world started to form in my head, and here we are.

To this story, for their supplies, it is important to know what exactly they have at their disposal while entering this environment. And I was going to just do a quick narrative on that, but then I was thinking about what each of them would actually bring, and how that played into the characterizations themselves, so I thought it would be good to bullet it out. Derek with his muscle man stuff, Reid with a ridiculous sweet tooth. Pregnant JJ with her healthy snacks and her first trimester morning sickness crackers and ginger ale. I thought it added in extra layers to them as people, so I left in the nitty gritty.

And I was going to send them to Derry for the missing kids, because, duh. But, it was in the wrong part of the state. I actually found Stephen King's 'map of Maine' on his website, and it shows Derry down by Bangor and it would have been VERY hard to get turned around and end up in Salem's Lot, which it shows as being much further north. Again, by his map. And they're his towns, so :)