Arc Two: Chapter Four to Six

Chapter Four: Bad Blood

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The briefing on the jet was long and tense. Gideon was as unflappable as always; Emily suspected he was just as awkward with humans as he was with wolves, so she didn't take his reticence personally.

Morgan was an asshole, also nothing new. She resisted the urge to get under his skin and smiled instead at Blake, the only human member of the team who actively bothered to treat them like agents instead of the hired help.

The wolves sat one side, the humans the other, and when the briefing was over that divide grew.

Almost.

Emily stood and walked over to the one silent head. It was bowed over a casefile that was eight times as thick as theirs, and she thumped into the empty seat beside him and leaned into his personal space to peer down at the photos looking back up. Reid winced away, and she couldn't help but scent the realized proximity of a male wolf outside of her direct circles. He smelled like Reid. Books and coffee and underneath it all, the barest whisper of the hot-baked scent of sun on fur. Nothing dangerous. Nothing thrilling. Just Reid, and hints of the suppressants he was on.

"Light reading for the trip?" she teased, and he shoved his glasses up his nose and frowned distractedly. Emily could feel eyes burning the back of her neck. And the front. Basically, everyone was staring.

Let them stare. He was a weird wolf, but she kind of liked that about him. Mediocre sucked.

"Missing persons reports," he answered, and flipped through them rapidly. "Look at this map. If we discount any who have made contact with packs or family since their report, or any with children, there's a pattern. Slightly concealed by outlying cases, but it's so obvious." He ran his fingers across the map he was hurrying to unfold, spreading it across both their laps like it was no biggie she was there. "Emily, how did we miss this? Look—it begins in Nevada almost twelve years ago, and works down from there, hitting almost every regional pack zone."

Twelve years? Emily stared, shock thudding into her chest. Impossible.

But then again, who questioned a wolf leaving for the wild? It was in the nature of every wolf to go rogue at least once. Emily had, for eight wonderful months when she was a teenager. Sometimes, city life just got too… small. Tight and enclosed and the only escape was swapping skin for fur and taking to the woods. Her memories of that time were hazed and wild and glorious.

It was no secret that Hotch had done the same, before he'd joined the Bureau. Not that anyone would think it by looking at him. She glanced up. He stared back, expression impenetrable, but if he'd had hackles, they'd have been bristling. No leader liked a packless wolf sidling in, not even one as harmlessly transient as Reid.

"Have you shown Gideon?" she asked instead, sweeping her eyes down the neat patterns of dots and lines he'd drawn on the map.

Reid nodded, eyes worried. He looked up at her, so despondently hopeful that her heart twinged a little. "He wasn't convinced that the authorities could have missed this for twelve years, or that kidnappers could have been active this long without making a mistake, but he's willing to allow me to investigate." His mouth thinned, curling up into a smile that wasn't a smile. The only hint of the wolf that hid under his neat sweater vest and crooked tie in the inhuman expression of irritation. "Within his stated parameters, of course."

Can't have his pet wolf going off leash, some snarky part of Emily wanted to say, but that was cruel. And it completely downplayed Reid's importance within his team. It may have also been a little bit because she was jealous of that importance and how easily his gifts had allowed them to see past his species and place him within the actual BAU and not the shameful offshoot, but that was another thing she'd never admit.

"I'll talk to Hotch," she said, instead of any of that, and tried not to look too invested in the thankful smile he beamed in her direction. "Surely one of us can help you with that." Me, that statement said, because none of the others except maybe JJ would agree to it, but that was fine. If it meant not having to deal with Derek fucking Morgan, she'd do whatever Reid asked of her.

Maybe some of that showed on her face. Reid winced, lowering his voice. "You'll have to work with him again someday," he murmured, leaning closer. Emily felt rather than saw Hotch twitch with concern at their closeness. Male brain, she scoffed silently. "Your animosity is unfounded."

"He prioritizes humans over wolves," she retorted, voice a hiss. "We were in more danger that day, Reid, and he got the humans out first. We could have been killed." You could have been killed, she wanted to snap, because that bothered her more than her own life did. As though the rush of anger that surged at the memory brought with it remembered scents, her nose burned with smoke, coppery blood, the heat-baked stone of the cult they'd been trapped inside. She closed her eyes to compartmentalize for a moment and saw Reid's tawny body laid out broken on the sandy ground.

And Morgan had taken point into the building, saving the humans first. In that dank basement where Emily and Reid were trapped as wolves, their pack disallowed entry because of procedure, Reid had bled and bled and bled while Morgan not only rescued the innocents, but the bastards who'd put them down there as well. And the building had burned above them.

Reid shifted uncomfortably. "He thought we were able to remove ourselves from the situation," he protested, because he'd never blame a teammate for leaving him to die. "He thought we were… abler than the humans. You know this. It's not his fault we were hurt." His hand brushed his shirt collar nervously and her anger flickered again at the nervous tic.

Under that collar, there was a burn that marked how close they'd come.

"And if it wasn't for Gideon realizing we were still inside, we'd be more than hurt," she said coolly, pushing the papers aside and standing. "And if it wasn't for Hotch breaking every rule to get us out…" She left that there and walked away, back to her silent team. They'd never agree on Morgan, never. And yet, Reid still chose them over the wolves who'd actually been there for him.

Reid wasn't capable of holding a grudge, and she wasn't capable of forgiveness.

"You're upset," Hotch murmured, moving his briefcase to make room for her. JJ inched closer, hands curled in her lap and mouth thin.

"Nope," she replied curtly. Slumping into that seat, she kneaded her knuckles into her eyes and cursed the temper that the suppressants tended to leave her with. Not to mention, they all stunk of it; the acrid ozone scent of the pills was noxious to her nose. Not really optional to forgo them when flying into another pack's territory, even for those who weren't bothered by the season's whims. "Reid thinks this is definitely serial, going back twelve years. I want to help him investigate his theory. He's found patterns of abductions that seriously suggest he's right, Hotch."

"Kid usually is," Rossi said passively, without committing to backing her on this. Pity. Rossi was a powerful ally when Hotch was moody.

"Is his evidence sound?" Hotch didn't look pleased. That wasn't a new look on him, so she wasn't overly concerned. Ever since Haley… well, overprotectiveness wasn't new on him either. "I'd prefer you were in the field with me or Dave, rather than staying in the precinct. You're the sharpest out of us at tracking, and in a New York alleyway exposed to several hours' foot traffic… we'll need that strength." He was pointedly not mentioning that the best tracker in DC was sitting metres away, reading a casual twenty-thousand words a minute like it was nothing.

Emily moved uncomfortably. Reaching for her water bottle, she dry swallowed three pills with a swig of water and willed away the exhaustion. Hotch eyed the pills, but said nothing. "You know it's sound, his evidence always is, and JJ isn't a profiler," she replied calmly. "And Rossi and Reid always end up fighting over crap when you put them in the same room together."

"Hey," protested Rossi, bristling. "He starts it—"

"He's an unfamiliar wolf—" Hotch began.

"You don't like that Gideon plucked him from your team when he first got shoved all knock-kneed and new through the front door," she retorted. "And Rossi's got weird old-fashioned thoughts about things, although he'd never admit to them."

Rossi huffed, folding his arms and sulking as Hotch shot him a glare that was immediately recognisable as shut up.

"Packs are not an old-fashioned concept," Hotch said, his eyes narrowing. She watched his chest move as he breathed in deeply, letting it out in a slow exhale. "His acceptance into Gideon's unit didn't require him to remove himself from pack life."

"The laws do though," she pointed out, but that was bull. They all knew it. They worked as a unit, they ran as a pack, and fuck the zoning regulations. Reid wouldn't have been turned away. He hadn't been turned away. He'd left by choice. "He's not an interloper. He's been here for years now, Aaron. If he was going to challenge our ways, he'd have done it." She paused, wondering how far he'd let her take this, and then deciding to plunge ahead anyway as JJ made a noise that suggested she agreed. "And you've got funny old-fashioned thoughts as well."

Now he looked at her, blinking. She'd surprised him. Not pissed him off, and that was hopeful. "If this is about us," he said awkwardly, as thrown as she'd ever seen him, "that has no bearing on my behaviour around him. I can separate my private life from the workplace, Prentiss." His tone suggested she was bordering on insubordination.

She looked past him, out of the window to avoid the faintest glint of dismay in his eyes that she'd brought it up. "Is this why you're being so anxious about Reid? Really, Aaron?"

Silence.

"My vote is with the kid," Rossi said bluntly, finally taking a side. In a heartbeat, the tension dissipated. "He's a clever shit, Jason's no idiot himself. If they think this is worthwhile to follow up on, I can get behind that. Besides, I don't know about you guys, but if this turns out to be more than just a hunch… I want paws in on that investigation. Twelve years of missing wolves? Fuck. That. And, her pain in the ass manner aside, Prentiss is right. She does work best with him."

Hotch looked at her before nodding, deferring to Rossi. And this was what humans never seemed to get. They got all hooked up on the alpha/omega bullshit… but that wasn't what packs were. They weren't blindly following some alpha personality to whatever end. They were a partnership, and whoever was best to lead at any one time, led at that time. There had been cases where Emily had taken command. Even ones where JJ had.

On the way out of the jet, stepping down on the blistering cold of the New York airfield, Hotch caught her arm. Over the whistling wind, his voice was still strong enough to carry.

"Em?" he called, face already ruddy from the cold. Behind him, the humans were bundling up to brace the wind that the wolves were already fearlessly facing. "Be careful, okay?"

She smirked. "Hotch, I'm going to be pushing papers," she replied, shaking his arm off. She felt cranky, overwarm, numb inside. The effects of the suppressants. She'd probably break out by tomorrow as well. "Only thing I have to worry about is papercuts."

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The room they'd been tucked away in was stifling. Emily propped the door open with a box of files, and joined Reid in the middle of the floor with her own box to work through. Occasionally, the clerk would arrive with another delivery of freshly faxed reports, adding them to the teetering stacks. They worked in silence, except for the occasional comment about a certain file. Each case went into one of three piles: possible, unlikely, impossible.

The possible pile was worryingly large.

"Want coffee?" she said finally, and slipped away to the breakroom as he nodded and kept flicking through the densest of the data they'd been given. The trip for coffee was an exercise in not meeting people's eyes, aware of the presence of several wolves among the humans dressed in blue around the squad room.

One of them caught her in the breakroom, sidling in and closing the door tight behind her. Senses up, she smiled and tried not to look too cornered. He didn't look untrustworthy, just… nervous. Short cropped hair and grey-green eyes, he kept a respectful distance as she wiped spilled coffee from her hands.

"I've been sticking my head in on Sarge's case," he blurted out suddenly, eyes huge. "This is really looking big, isn't it? Like, dozens of wolves taken big? Sarge has us pulling up every missing wolf over the past ten years…"

"We really don't know enough to say," she said gently, but he stunk of sweat. "This could be an isolated incident. Do you suspect otherwise?"

"No, but…" He stopped and swallowed. "My sister… went rogue, five years back. Me and Ma and the other girls just figured she'd gotten sick of the rat race here. It feels wrong, sometimes, limiting who we run with op… limiting who we run with. But…"

"But?" Emily coaxed, heart hammering with anticipation at some kind of break, any kind of break.

"She wanted pups," the cop continued, hands tightly clenched. "Her and her partner, they were going to try for pups that season. We were scared shitless, you know? Having a litter, that's dangerous and we told her to just have a couple of humans, no one would judge her these days. Without packs, it's a stupid risk, but she was determined and… then she vanished. And I thought she'd just left to raise the pups somewhere more suited to being us, but maybe she didn't have a choice after all and I'm a cop, ma'am. I'm a fucking cop. What if I missed that someone took her?" The pain in his eyes was visible even if the misery pouring out of him wasn't burning her nose and mouth.

"Would you like us to review her case?" she asked. When he agreed, she promised to do so and pelted back to the room where Reid was sorting the piles into further smaller piles, the meanings of which were lost to her. As she burst in, he shoved a file under the others, hand hovering protectively over it.

"One more," she declared, deciding to ignore that odd behaviour and tossing it down to him. He opened it with a wary glance, reading the contents in a heartbeat. "If you were going to have a litter, would you go north to do it?"

Reid didn't answer right away. Instead, he finished reading the file and then lowered it slowly.

"No," he said, voice quiet. "That would be suicide for my mate. Labour complications are increased by sixty-eight percent when birthing therianthropic young, and that's with twenty-first century medical care. She vanished in March—if she was allowing herself to go through a season with the intention of having pups, she'd have been pregnant by then. There's no way she'd have left her family unit, and she'd have been trapped in wolf form…"

"And out of every pair we have in the 'possible' pile, when were they taken?" Emily asked, feeling giddy on the cusp of working something out and sick with the knowledge that this probably wasn't getting them any closer to actually finding the wolves. She looked at the piles again. Any of the dozens of them.

"The dates are varied, but they almost all avoid the mating months," Reid said, shuffling through to find a carefully scrawled out sheet of data he'd been keeping. "How many of these other pairs were waiting for a season to have a litter rather than raise human young? Could the kidnappers have been aware of this? They may have been aiming to take those without dependants to deliberately obscure their tracks."

Emily shrugged helplessly. "How could we possibly find that out?" she retorted, frustrated. "Garcia perhaps, if they were putting affairs in order that may have left a data trail…"

Reid nodded, already burying himself back down in a mad shuffle of paperwork. Emily watched him, realizing she'd forgotten his coffee in her rush to bring the casefile to him. She stepped back, oddly reluctant to break his concentration, and murmured, "I'll be back in a moment." He didn't respond, just inched forward a little more to reach the furthest pile, his knee knocking the mass in front of him to slide onto the ground.

"Wait, Emily," he called, jerking his head up and staggering to his feet. His eyes were wild, his scent stressed, and she couldn't help but step closer to him in an automatic response to alleviate that strain with her nearness. "I… the earliest. If family members are placing missing person reports, they're likely not convinced their family went rogue—or at least willing to consider that foul play occurred. And for some of these wolves to have never returned home… I think we need to talk to the families."

"Well, okay," she agreed, scanning the piles. It was a reasonable thought. The families could give them more links between vics. "But that may be difficult. They're spread all over the states."

"They are," Reid said. Feet shuffling on the carpet, he did a strange half turn with a single file in his hand and gestured down to the largest of the mini-stacks. "But… the largest congregation is in… Nevada. Uh. Not… not missing reports. They're the lowest, for actually filing reports but… I looked up stats on wolves absconding and Nevada is an outlier, with a marked increase in werewolf defections over the past decade compared to other states of a similar cultural context."

Oh.

"Someone is going to have to go there," she pointed out, reaching for her phone. Hotch was not going to like this.

Reid's mouth narrowed. "Yeah," he muttered. "Yeah…"

That wasn't a promising start. She pushed a little harder. "Spence…" His eyes darted up to her. "You're from Nevada. That's your state pack. They'll send you."

A wary nod was his reply, fingers tight enough around the file he was clutching that it crinkled in his grip.

Well. In for a penny. "Do you want me to come?" she asked. A valid request. She was the only wolf on the team without pack ties to any other state, and she doubted the Nevada wolves would be open to talking to human feds. They made Hotch and Rossi look positively progressive with their views on wolf life.

And Reid nodded "Please," he said. There was sweat around his collar, his skin reddening. The chemically tang of the suppressants was weakening. Due for another dose. "Bathroom… uh… I'll be back." He slid past, positively oozing anxiety, and she stepped back to give him space. She'd have to call Hotch while he was gone, explain their…

The file in his hand caught the light as he passed, the name on the front barely unobscured by his fingers. Clear enough in the stark black type that she unconsciously processed what it said even if the words didn't slam home until the door had already closed behind him.

"Fuck," she said out loud to the empty room as she realized how complicated things had probably just gotten.

Missing: Ethan J. Reid.