Welcome back everyone. Thanks for the nice response to this new story. So much appreciated. Now lets head back to the park and see what we find.


Derek sat up with a yawn then stretched, hearing his back crack in a good way. The flight and the hike to and from the crime scenes had worn him out. After a nice dinner with the team, he had headed back to his hotel room with every intention of relaxing in bed and watching a movie. But the second his head touched the pillow, he was out like a light and had slept soundly until his alarm had gone off.

He rolled out of bed and shuffled off to the bathroom to take a quick shower before heading down to the restaurant for breakfast. Derek got dressed, threw open the door and tripped over a box lying just outside of it. Instantly on alert, he scanned both ends of the hallway, hoping to catch a glimpse of whoever had dropped it off. Seeing no one, he cautiously bent down to examine the neatly printed note on top of the box.

Derek smiled, recognizing the handwriting. It was Emily's. She only printed when she wanted to make sure that her message got across. Otherwise, her handwriting was barely legible that not even the brilliant Dr. Reid could decipher it. Many in the BAU thought she was writing in one of the obscure languages she spoke fluently.

He picked up the box, carried it back into his room and sat on the bed. With the box resting in his lap, he read the note. Emily had kept it short but sweet. 'Your feet will thank me later' it said and was signed, 'Tree Hugger'.

Chuckling, Derek set the note to one side and opened the box. Inside was a brand new pair of Merrill mid-cut hiking boots; they were similar to Emily's with the thick lugged outsole and heel and toe bumpers. While hers were suede and mesh, his was all leather. She had also included two pairs of mid weight hiking socks. He took off his socks and combat boots and slid his feet into the new ones. Derek then stomped around his hotel room, amazed at how comfortable they were and that they were a perfect fit. Also, they looked damn fine on his feet.

Wearing his new boots, Derek left his room for the second time. While he waited for the elevator to arrive, he wondered how the hell Emily knew what his shoe size was.


Emily was the only member of the team in the hotel's restaurant when he arrived. She was seated at a table by the window, working the crossword from the morning paper. In front of her was a half eaten egg, cheese and bacon biscuit and a tall glass of orange juice. He took a quick detour to the buffet and helped himself to a heaping pile of scrambled eggs, a couple sausage links, wheat toast and a cup of coffee.

"Morning," he said as he settled in across from her.

Emily looked up from the puzzle and smiled, "Morning. Sleep well?"

"Like a rock," he answered, unwrapping the utensils and tucking into his eggs. He stopped in mid bite when he felt her eyes were still on him. "What?" he asked her in confusion.

Emily cocked her head to one side. "Well, lets see them."

"See what?"

Her eyebrows shot up. "Do I really need to say?"

"Oh, right!" he exclaimed, his face lighting up. "The boots." Derek stood up and moved back from the table so that she could see.

Emily nodded in approval. "I knew they would look good on you. How is the fit?"

Derek grinned as he sat back down. "Great. How did you know what size shoe I wear?"

Emily picked up her glass of orange juice and peered at him over its rim. "Lets say I know shoes." She took a long drink.

He chuckled as he speared a half link of sausage with his fork. "With everything going on yesterday, when did you have time to go shopping?"

She put the glass down and gave him a secretive smile. "A girl can always find time to go shoe shopping."

This time he laughed and reached for his wallet. "How much do I owe you?"

Emily waved him off. "Nothing. Consider them an early birthday or Christmas gift. You're choice."

Derek paused. "You sure? They had to be expensive."

"Positive," she said, picking up her breakfast sandwich. "I got a good deal on them."

"Thank you, Tree Hugger," he said sincerely, putting his wallet away.

"You're welcome, City Boy."


At nine sharp everyone had assembled in the conference room at the ranger station. Hotch passed out the reports he had copied earlier. "As you can see we have the findings from both the crime scene techs and the Coroner."

Emily flipped through the pages. "Both skulls were female and they have started the process of identifying them through dental records."

"But they are still trying to match up the bones with the skulls," Reid commented. "That's going to take some time."

"And with our luck they could find a third victim intermingled among the others," Dave said.

"That's a strong possibility," Hotch agreed.

Derek thumbed through the report from the crime scene techs. "They found absolutely nothing. No personal effects, no scraps of clothing. He must have stripped the bodies before he dismembered them."

"Definitely didn't want them to be found," Dave muttered.

"So we can eliminate the reports for the missing men?" JJ asked.

Hotch nodded. "For now, but keep them close by in case we have to return to the theory that he targets people based on convenience and not gender."

They spent the next several minutes shifting through the files, pulling the ones they didn't need while Reid removed from his map the names of the men. When he was done, he did a quick mental tally. "That leaves us with forty-one potential victims," he announced.

"Slowly getting smaller," Derek said with a sigh.

"Maybe we should break them down into smaller categories," Emily suggested. "Physical attributes, where they went missing, when it happened, where they are from and marital status. See what trends might develop."

"Good idea."

Everybody fortified themselves with fresh cups of coffee before getting down to the task at hand.


After four hours of paper shifting and list compiling, Hotch calls a halt to the proceedings. He suggested it was a good time to break for lunch and to meet back here in an hour. He didn't get any argument from his team; they were all tired from staring at reams of paper.

Derek and Emily left the ranger station and headed down the street to the small café they had spotted yesterday when they had driven in. The place was hopping when they got there and managed to snag the last two seats at the counter. They looked over the single, laminated menu and quickly made their choices while they waited for one of the harried waitresses to come over.

When she finally arrived with the coffee pot, Emily held her hand over her mug indicating that she did not want any. Instead she ordered a Coke.

Derek cocked an amused eyebrow at her. "You do know soda has caffeine in it?"

"I do," Emily said as she idly rearranged the condiments. "It also has sugar so I can be hyper and jittery at the same time."

He chuckled and while they waited for his turkey club and her BLT, the agents reviewed the case. They kept their voices low so as not to be overheard by any of the patrons. When their sandwiches arrived, the two friends switched to safer subjects: their love of Kurt Vonnegut's books, what they could tease Reid about next and how anal-retentive Rossi was.

Halfway through their lunch Emily's cell phone began to ring and skitter across the counter. She scooped it up and checked the screen. "It's Hotch," she told her partner and put it to her ear. "Prentiss."

Derek continued to munch on his sandwich as he listened to the one sided conversation. Emily kept repeating 'okay' and 'uh huh' and then she frowned. She pulled a napkin from the dispenser and made a writing motion with her free hand. He dropped his sandwich and patted his pockets for a pen. When he couldn't find one, Derek resorted to borrowing one from a passing waitress.

"Could you repeat that, Hotch?" she asked when he handed her the pen.

Emily shifted the phone to her other ear and propped it up with her shoulder so that she could hold the napkin while she wrote. She quickly jotted down the information Hotch was giving her in her indecipherable handwriting. "We'll get right on it," she said and hung up.

"Well?" he asked.

"Hotch had an idea," she said, consulting the napkin, "which means he is working through lunch. He had Garcia search the park records for the recovery of complete remains over the past ten years."

"I take it Baby Girl found some?"

"Our computer whiz found three. All men, no signs of cut marks and cause of death was a blow to the head," she replied.

"Intentional?"

"Undetermined. They could have been hit in the head or it could have been caused by a fall. Anyway, Hotch basically wants us to scout out the locations to see if there is any similarity in terrain between the scenes, that our guy possibly likes secluded glens or clearings. He'll have the files waiting for us."

"Sounds like fun," he quipped.

Emily smiled and glanced at his feet. "Looks like you are going to have a chance to test out your new boots."

Derek chuckled and they spent the next few minutes discussing the order they would visit the locations. They decided to check the two closest ones first and save the distant one for last, especially since it was in the opposite direction. If they didn't make it there today, they would go first thing in the morning. That settled, Derek paid the bill and they headed back to the station and their transportation.

Halfway back, Emily was almost knocked off her feet when a small child blundered into her legs. She grunted from the impact and Derek's hand in the small of her back kept her upright. Her concern immediately went to the little girl staring up at her.

Emily knelt to get on the same level with the girl and rested a hand on her shoulder. "Are you alright, sweetie?" she gently asked.

The girl blinked and then, much to the agents dismay, burst into tears. Emily pulled her into a hug. "Are you lost?" she asked, rubbing circles on the girl's back.

The little girl nodded into Emily's chest. "Y…y…yes," she hiccupped.

"That's okay, sweetie," she said softly. "We'll help you find your mommy. Do you know which direction you came from?"

She removed one arm from around Emily's neck and pointed a shaky finger back down the street. "That way," she sniffed.

"Okay," Emily said with a nod. "Lets go find your mommy. Can I pick you up?"

The little girl nodded. Emily grunted when she lifted the child; she was a lot heavier than she looked. With Derek at her side, they walked slowly down the street, eyes on alert for a frantic parent. If they didn't find her soon, they would take the girl back to the ranger station with them and let the people there handle it.

"My name is Emily. What's yours?" she asked, trying to distract the child.

She sniffed. "Mag…" she began.

"MAGGIE!" a panicked voice shouted. The two agents looked up to see a frantic woman running up the sidewalk. Derek flipped open his credentials and held it up so that the mother would know that they weren't kidnapping her daughter.

"Mommy!" Maggie squealed, squirming in Emily's arms, wanting to be put down. The second Emily set the girl's feet on the pavement; Maggie was off in a shot and was wrapped in her mother's comforting embrace.

The mother looked at them over her daughter's shoulder. "Thank you," she said with a tearful smile.

"You're welcome," Emily said with a smile. "My partner and I are just glad that we were able to help."

The thankful mother scooped up Maggie and slowly walked away, repeating over and over to her daughter how much she loved her. The agents knew that when both parties calmed down, there was going to be a discussion about wandering away. Both knew from experience how quickly a child could disappear and they were thankful that this one had ended on a happy note.

Derek casually slung an arm across Emily's shoulders. "That's our good deed for today," he said with a grin.

Emily returned it. "I'll take them whenever I can get one." She patted his stomach. "Come on. We have work to do."

He sighed dramatically. "I know. We have mountains to scale," he said, eliciting a laugh from Emily and with a chuckle of his own, followed his partner to the car.


"This is certainly off the beaten path," Emily observed as she and Derek climbed out of the SUV at the third location.

"There is absolutely nothing out here," Derek said as he stopped in front of the place where a piece of fluttering crime scene tape remained and stared down at the dirt. He turned back to his partner. "How the hell did they find this spot?"

Emily consulted the file she was carrying. "Two months ago a family was camping out a mile north of here." She slowly turned in a circle to get her bearings. She stopped and pointed to the left of the dumpsite. "That way. They had their dog with them. When the dog brought back a bone they didn't think much about it. But when he brought the lower jaw…"

"They panicked and call the park rangers?"

"Yes. And while they were waiting the dog took off. The husband followed and ended up here."

Derek knelt and poked the leaves under the piece of tape. "Did they find any other bones beside the original remains?"

Emily shook her head. "No, only the male hiker. He was missing part of his lower right leg and one arm that the wildlife must have dragged off."

"So no bones were found that could be connected to our victims," he stated, standing up and dusting off his hands.

"Yup," Emily agreed. She went back to the SUV and tossed the file through the open window. "So what do you want to do next? The same thing we did at the last two scenes?" she asked, leaning against the fender with her thumbs hooked on her jeans pockets.

Derek gazed around. "Yes. Lets split up this time. We'll be able to cover more ground and still get back to Rochester before dark."

Emily pushed off the car. "Okay. I'll head west. You?"

He shrugged and pointed to his right. "I'll go that way."

"East," she said with a smile and a shake of her head. "Men and their directions."

Derek frowned and wagged a finger at her. "Don't go to far. You can easily get lost in woods like these." Laughing, the two friends parted and began their search.


Emily made her way cautiously through the woods. Carefully she examined the trunks of the trees as she walked by. She was looking for any sign that their killer might have left: a piece of cloth snagged in the bark, slashes marring the wood from an ax, symbols carved into the surface indicating a path or where something or someone was buried. So far she had found nothing of interest. Their killer had left no trace of his passing, which meant he knew the national forest intimately.

She paused to catch her breath. With hands on her knees, Emily sucked in deep breaths of clean, fresh mountain air. Turning around she could see that she had been steadily walking uphill, explaining why she was winded. From where she stood, she could see nothing but trees and a scattering of rocks. She saw no sign of the car or Derek.

BEEP! BEEP!

Emily glanced down and pulled out her phone. She had set the alarm for fifteen minutes so that she wouldn't wander too far away from the crime scene. If they weren't so busy hunting a serial killer, she would sit down and enjoy the open sky, the happy babbling of the creek and the peace and quiet. She sighed at the opportunity lost and headed back phone still in hand, wanting to return before Derek started to worry unnecessarily.

She had managed to take a few steps before something strong snaked around her chest and jerked her backwards. With a startled cry, she dropped the phone. As her hands shot up to grab at what was holding her, Emily's back smashed into a hard and unyielding object. Before she could fully understand what was happening, she felt a sharp prick at the base of her neck. Immediately, the forest began to spin and her knees went weak, threatening to buckle at any moment. In her last second of true clarity, before the drug overwhelmed her system, Emily sent an elbow flying into her assailant's ribs. The grunt of pain from the well-aimed blow was the last thing Emily heard before her world faded into darkness.


Hmmm...seems that Emily is in a spot of trouble. Do come back next week and see if Emily can get out of this sticky stituation. But before you go, let me know what you think. Until then.