The official request form, from the NYPD, had landed on Jennifer Jareau's desk in early March a year earlier. Four deaths over six years. All of the victims were young women, found dead in their beds, a syringe by their bedside, having apparently been injected with a barbiturate solution. It had taken a while for the police to piece together the connections between all the victims. The first victim, Erika Chambers, medical student, had been described by her friends showing signs of depression, so her death had originally been ruled a suicide due to her having access to the necessary drugs. The next victim's was labelled suspicious circumstances, homicide suspected, but no suspects were found and the case went cold. No connection was made between the two deaths; or the next one. The fourth case nearly got missed entirely, but it was ultimately what provided a connection. A hard partying college coed was found in her bed. She'd had history of drug abuse, so until the autopsy confirmed the presence of poison, it was assumed that it was a drug overdose or a suicide. The realization that it was murder did nothing to conjure up suspects; and this case too went cold, and remained that way until the case file accidentally landed in the hands of Detective David Stark, who worked cold cases. Taking a look at the photos of the scene, he spotted something odd about the way the body was posed – with the legs straight and the hands neatly folded, there was little doubt of it having been posed – and something familiar.

File in hand, he ran to his desk and dug through the papers until he found what he was looking for. A case from a year ago. The victim, Lauren Duschene, had been posed in exactly the same way. After some digging it became apparent to the detective that all four deaths were connected, which meant that the city had a serial killer. And so the request was sent to the FBI for a consult, which naturally was placed in the hands of Agent Jareau. Unfortunately, the connections between the four deaths were tenuous to say the least, and method of dispatch unusual – if all the deaths were indeed the work of the same killer. The other unfortunate fact was that the request was ill-timed, arriving together with a request from the Atlanta PD, dealing with a serial rapist who had graduated to murder; and a suspected child killer in Dallas. So the file was set aside. The NYPD never followed up, unsure themselves of Det. Stark's theories, so once again the case went cold.

That is until a year later, when said detective turned up in Quantico, in the early hours of the morning, standing in front JJ's office door. JJ cast a perplexed stare at the tall man leaning against her door frame, as she walked toward her office, briefcase and coffee in hand. She stopped short of the door as the man looked up from the floor to see her coming.

JJ looked at him expectantly, "Can I help you?"

"Agent Jareau?" He asked in a soft voice.

JJ nodded, "And you are?"

"Detective David Stark, NYPD," He extended his hand, "Forgive me for showing up here like this; but after all this time it seemed like the only way to get you to meet with me."

JJ shook his hand, raising an eyebrow, at this unexpected and uninvited guest. It one didn't have to be as smart as Reid to figure out why the man was here. The nation was full of dedicated officers of the law, with plenty of unsolved cases, seeking the FBI's help. Unfortunately, while all of them passed over her desk, only a fraction ever got seen by the BAU. Every now and then, one of the officers whose requests had been rejected would turn up in Quantico to make their case. It would seem that this Stark had taken it upon himself to do the same, as evidenced by the file folders in his hand.

JJ opened her door and walked in. Stark took the lack of a rejection as invitation to follow, and stood in front of her desk waiting for her to face him again. When finally she had set down her case and turned, she was surprised, when he ran his hand through his dark hair and gave her a look bordering on embarrassed.

"I am sorry for the intrusion," he told her, "but I wouldn't be doing my job if I didn't try my hardest." He held out the stack of folders in his hand, "There's something going on in New York; and I could really use the BAU's help."

It was against JJ's better judgment to listen. The BAU was currently flooded with cases, all of them involving unsubs, whose violence was escalating. But in the end, what was one more case file? If it didn't meet the necessary level of urgency then, she would do her job and politely reject the request as she had done entirely. In the meantime, she might as well hear him out.

"Show me."