Chapter Two

He refused to admit that this case was getting to him. He positively refused to admit that this case made him think more about David Schroeder than he had in the past eighteen years. Spencer Reid knew David would tell him to quit being an idiot and to just admit that he was bothered by the case. David would probably smack him upside the head, too, but David wasn't here.

"Reid, you with us man?" Reid looked up at Morgan.

"Huh?" He asked. Hotch smiled slightly in amusement.

"Reid, why don't you take a break, okay?" He suggested. Reid nodded and left the room. He was glad to get away from them for a bit, glad to grab some time alone.

"David, I really need your help right now." He sighed as he exited the precinct. "You were always really good at doing that."

"He was, wasn't he?" Reid nearly jumped out of his skin. He turned and scrutinized the young, ginger haired female officer in front of him.

"Let me guess. Abigail Andrews." He replied. Abby grinned.

"Yep. How do you like being back in Vegas?" She asked. Reid shrugged. The truth was, it was bringing back all sorts of memories. He could tell Abby that, she'd always been quite nice to him, but he decided not to tell her. Honestly, he wouldn't have told David either.

"It's fine." Reid replied. Abby raised an eyebrow, clearly not believing him. "Okay, so I'm not fine. I mean, it isn't fine. Being back isn't fine. I'm fine, but being back isn't." Abby had to laugh.

"So, in short, you aren't okay and being reminded so much of GG is screwing with your head. You're an open book, Spence." She said. Reid smiled slightly.

"You're right. Can I have a hug?" Anyone in the BAU may have thought it was strange of him to ask, but Abby had been friends with Spencer since the second grade and was used to such requests from him. They hugged each other tightly for a minute before breaking apart.

"How've you been?" She asked. Reid shrugged.

"I've been okay. How about you?" He replied.

"Great until this case came up." Abby replied. She sighed heavily and folded her arms over her chest. "If we find this bastard, I'll kill him."

"I won't stop you." Reid told her. "Truthfully, I'd like a piece of the unsub, too." Abby knew Spencer was a gentle person, but she also knew that when it came to his friends, Spencer was rough and unstoppable.

"Whoever it is, he better hope we aren't around when he's caught." Abby commented. Spencer smiled.

"Agreed." He replied.

X-0-X-0-X

It was incredibly late. They'd been working hard all day, trying to find clues, a slip-up on the unsub's part, but, so far, they'd found absolutely nothing. JJ, Emily, and Rossi had talked to the victims' families earlier, but the parents hadn't revealed much. What Reid found strange was that they were all straight "A" students, played football, looked a lot like David, and all went to Riverside. Next to that, every one of the victims' fathers were lawyers, and their mothers were out of the picture. It was all too familiar to Reid. He was having a hard time with this.

"Reid, go get some sleep." Hotch said when Reid gave a yawn that nearly split his face in two.

"No. I have to keep working on this." Reid replied as he ran a hand through his hair.

"David wouldn't want you exhausting yourself, Reid." Emily said in a gentle, but coaxing voice.

"David hardly got what he wanted when it came to me." Reid sighed. "Besides, he wouldn't want me to leave this alone. I'm staying." Emily and Hotch exchanged exasperated looks, but said nothing else. They were all silent for a while before Hotch spoke.

"Reid, how'd David break his arm?" He asked.

"David never broke a bone in his body." Reid replied. "Why?"

"Because autopsy reports say David broke his arm about two years before he died." Hotch said. Reid frowned.

"I met David two years before he died. He never broke his arm." He told Hotch.

"Is it possible that David isn't really David?" Emily asked.

"Could be." Reid muttered. His mind was racing. Could he be alive? Could he still be out there? If he was, why hadn't he come back?

Maybe he can't. Reid reasoned. Maybe he's incapacitated or something. But for eighteen years? Surely he would have found a way out by now? Deep down, Reid felt betrayed. David was a fighter! He always fought his way out! Why hadn't he done that this time? He was probably dead. No matter the cost, David would have come back by now.

"Reid. Earth to Reid." Reid jolted out of his reverie.

"Huh? What?" He asked.

"Would you be alright with going by Mr. Schroeder's and getting his permission to exhume his son's body?" Hotch asked. Reid went rigid. They wanted to disturb David's peace? They wanted to disturb his body? No way.

"You do it." Reid snapped. "I'm not having any part in that." Before anyone could say anything else, Reid was out of the room and leaving the precinct. Hotch sighed. He wondered if he should pull Reid from the case. You didn't have to be a profiler to see that Reid was having a rough time handling this.

Reid angrily climbed into the SUV and slammed the car door shut. Let them do whatever the hell they wanted; he would have no part in it. There was no way in hell he was going to help dig up his best friend. He lay his head back against the seat and closed his eyes. In the silence, he could almost hear David telling him to take it easy…

*September 13th, 1992*

"Take it easy, man. I'm nearly done."

"Ow! David, please!"

"Almost done. Just one more." The young boy buried his face in his hands as the older boy extracted the last shard of glass from his side.

"Yikes." David muttered. "That's a big one." Spencer groaned. David pressed the wad of toilet paper to Spencer's side, careful not to press too hard. He wasn't happy, but he was a bit calmer than he had been when he'd first found Spencer sitting on the cold, leaf strewn ground, clutching his bleeding side, trying hard not to cry.

"How'd this happen, again?" David asked. Spencer just shook his head. "Come on, Spence. You can tell me." Reid shook his head again.

"I promise I won't kill anyone." David promised.

No response.

"I'll remain calm and handle it accordingly."

No response.

"I'll talk to the principal about it instead of handling it myself."

"The principal doesn't care." Spencer muttered. David sighed almost inaudibly in relief. Finally, he'd gotten an answer, but not the answer he was looking for.

"Then I'll talk to their parents. What happened and who was it?" The older boy replied.

"They pushed me and I fell. No one knew there was glass under those leaves." Spencer muttered as he began to stand. David gently pushed him back down onto the toilet seat.

"You're staying here until the medics come. Now, who pushed you?" David told him, but not unkindly.

"It was an accident." Spencer pressed. "Just an accident."

"And I suppose they left you there by accident?" David muttered as he grabbed another wad of toilet paper and threw the bloody wad away.

"Yes, because they're scared of you." Spencer sighed.

"They wouldn't be scared of me if they were actually nice to you." David replied. They could hear the sirens now. "Can you make it outside?" Spencer nodded and wiped his eyes.

"Yes, but you'll have to help me." He replied. David smiled as he help his friend stand.

"Don't I always?" He asked good-naturedly. Spencer grinned. It had been a silly request. He knew David would always be there to help him. They exited the bathroom and stepped out into the chilly, leaf strewn park. "They really should get a clean-up crew out here." David muttered as they sat down against the wall.

"Yeah, no kidding." Spencer sighed sullenly.

Reid angrily wiped the tears from his eyes and took a deep breath. He needed sleep. He needed David. Reid stuck the keys in the ignition and started the car. He waited a few moments before driving back to the hotel. It really sucked, how much the case was affecting him. Why was he so out of whack? Was it because he couldn't stand being reminded of David? He wiped his eyes again and tried to focus on the road. He probably shouldn't be driving if he couldn't focus.

X-0-X-0-X

Reid didn't get any sleep that night. He went back to the precinct around 7:00 the next morning, exhausted. If anyone noticed something wrong, they didn't comment on it.

"Exhume him yet?" Reid asked Hotch. Hotch shook his head.

"We haven't asked yet. Emily's going, if you want to go with her." The older agent replied.

"I already said no." Reid retorted as he flipped through Jason Grant's file.

"I think you should be there." Hotch commented. Reid snapped the file shut and glared daggers at Hotch.

"Hear me out, Hotchner. David was my best friend. If you think for one second that I am going to take part in digging him up and disturbing his peace, then you haven't got much of a-" Reid stopped mid-sentence, knowing he would be in for it if he finished it. Hotch folded his arms over his chest and fixed Reid with a look that the younger agent assumed was supposed to let him know that he was treading on thin ice.

"Have much of a what?" Hotch demanded. Reid hesitated.

"Nothing. I just… lost my train of thought, that's all." The younger agent muttered.

"Reid." Hotch said in a dangerous tone. "If I have to yank you off this case and send you home, then I will. Regardless of how well you knew the first victim. Am I understood?" Reid nodded, feeling like a chastised child who'd been caught stealing from the cookie jar.

"Get to work on the geological profile, please." Hotch sighed, his tone a bit less harsh than before. Reid silently did as he was told. If David had been here…

"Shut up, Spencer. He isn't here." Reid muttered as he started to look over the geographical profile. "No sense in thinking what he would've done if he was here." Emily walked over to him and hugged him.

"Listen, I know this is hard. But if he's alive, this is the only way to figure out if the body you found eighteen years ago is his or not." She told him. Reid nodded and hugged her back. He felt tears well up in his eyes, but made no attempt to wipe them away.

"I miss him so much." He whispered. "Maybe Hotch should take me off the case." They broke apart and Reid angrily wiped his eyes on his sleeve.

"We need you on this case, Reid. Don't give him a reason to yank you off the case. Are you going to come with me?" Emily asked. Reid thought for a moment. Mr. Schroeder might feel more comfortable if he was there. David's father knew Reid would have David's best interests at heart, but he wouldn't know if Emily did.

"Yeah." He replied. "Yeah, I'll go."

"Great. Need help on that profile?" Emily asked.

"Nah, I'll be fine. Thanks, though." Reid said. Emily nodded and patted his shoulder.

"I'll come get you before I leave." She told him. Reid watched her join Rossi, Morgan, and Abby before turning back to the profile. He was almost finished with it.

"Okay." He muttered. "Let's get to work, Spencer."

It seemed like five minutes before Emily came and got him, but it was really an hour. They were silent for most of the ride to the house, and Reid was surprised that he remembered the way.

"There's the park." Reid commented as they passed it. "David and I used to go through there when we walked home from school. He picked a lot of fights there, too."

"Do you think one of the bullies could have killed him?" Emily inquired as they pulled into David's old neighborhood.

"It's possible. They were scared of him, because he kicked their asses so hard, but sometimes he made them so angry they wanted to kill him." Reid replied.

"He had a lot of enemies, didn't he?" Emily asked, though she wondered if it wasn't more of a statement.

"Yeah. All because of me." Reid sighed. His stomach lurched when David's house came into view. It was still light blue. "If he hadn't tried so damn hard to protect me, maybe he wouldn't be dead." They pulled into the driveway and got out of the car.

"You alright?" Emily asked.

"Yeah." Reid replied as he looked the house over. "Yeah, I'm fine." He followed Emily up the pathway to the front door. Reid noticed that the flower beds were just as clean as they had been the last time he had been there, eighteen years ago. He wondered if David's geraniums still came up in the spring. Emily knocked on the door and Reid noticed that the paint was still blue and was peeling off, revealing the white paint underneath.

"He might be sleeping." Reid muttered. "It's Saturday."

"Too late now." Emily commented. She went to knock again, but before she could the door opened. The man had a cane and his hair was gradually thinning, but Reid could still see the middle-aged, eccentric, protective lawyer who played football just as well as his son.

"Mr. Schroeder?" Emily asked.

"Yes." The man replied. Emily and Reid took out their credentials.

"I'm agent Prentiss with the FBI, and this is agent Reid. I think you two know each other." Emily said. The man smiled and nodded.

"Only know one Reid. 'Cept my client, but he's seventy." He replied. Reid smiled. For a moment the lonely, twelve year old boy shone through. "Well, come in. What's this about?"

"It's about David." Reid replied as he and Emily entered the house. He closed the door behind him. Mr. Schroeder's face fell. "We think he might still be alive."

"How's that?" Mr. Schroeder asked.

"We were looking over his autopsy report." Reid explained. "And I noticed it said David broke his arm two years before he died. That would have been eighth grade, but he never broke his arm then."

"He never broke any bone in his body, 'cept his ankle, when he was seven." Mr. Schroeder replied. "You want to exhume him, don't you?" Reid took a deep breath.

"It's the only chance to find out if he's dead or not." Reid told Mr. Schroeder. The older man nodded.

"Okay." He sighed.