Vindication
Chapter
4
Help
"In as far as the evidence at our disposal is concerned, we already have enough to make out a case." – Makhosini Nkosi
Dave sat in his office trying to read through the transcript, but the words didn't reach his mind. He couldn't stop thinking about what he had said to Reid. Was he being over harsh? How would Aaron have handled it?
Aaron had once told him never to second guess himself; make a decision and stick to it. He sighed and put down the papers. He called through to Morgan.
'I'm going home with this transcript. I can't concentrate here.......... Call me on my cell if anything new comes up......... ok.'
He cut the connection and put his cell in his pocket and the transcript in a wallet, and headed to the elevator
If this was the UnSub, Amos Challenger, then they were facing an evil foe. Intelligent and tenacious as a pit bull, Aaron was in the hands of pure evil, evil that should never have got out of prison. He was also rich. The drug money was never recovered. In his world, money could buy anything.
Rossi went to his car and opened the door. He threw the transcript on the seat next to him and drove out of the underground car park.
It was only a short drive home, and Rossi parked out front of his building and leaned across for the transcript. As he did so, he felt cold steel on the back of his neck. He froze.
'Start the car up again and drive.'
'Where? Where do you want me to drive to?'
'Just do it.' The blade pressed harder into the soft flesh of the nape of his neck. Very slowly he sat up straight and switched the engine on again.
'Drive where I say or I will cut your throat out.' the man in the back of his car said. Dave drove where he said. As he drove he felt the man's hand take his gun and ID from his pocket.
'Does this have anything to do with Agent Hotchner?' Dave asked. The blade pressed deeper, and Dave felt blood flow. He got no answer to his question, and they drove out of the city and into an abandoned industrial park. He was ordered to pull up outside an old animal clinic.
'Now get out.' he was told.
Slowly, Dave opened his door and stepped out of the car. The man picked up the wallet from the passenger's seat and got out behind Dave. Now he had Dave's own gun trained on him. It shoved him in the back.
'Don't turn around, just walk.'
Dave was pushed towards the main entrance of the old building. Old torn posters announcing that they love your pets were stuck on the walls, and leaflets were strewn across the floor. Dave realised that it was now or never. He pretended to slip on some papers, and he turned and grabbed for his gun. The movement earned him a crack across the jaw and Dave went down. He crossed his arms in front of his face, pretty sure that he was going to be killed there and then. Instead, the man told him to get up and keep moving.
It was obvious now to Dave that they needed him for something. He got up, rubbing his face and feeling blood.
'Keep moving, and if you try anything again, you're dead meat.' the man said.
Dave walked on, wondering how this was connected with Aaron's abduction. Dave had no connection with the case, and all he could think was that it was because it had been him at the restaurant with Aaron when he was taken.
They passed through a door into what had once been an office of the vet. Two men and a woman stood facing him.
'Check he's not armed.' the older of the men said. The woman stepped forwards and frisked Dave. There was nothing. His gun was already the possession of the UnSub who brought him there.
'Now we have a job for you to do.
Dave was marched out of the office and down a corridor. There was a door at the end, and it was through this door that he was pushed.
'Clean him up. We don't want him dead yet.' the man said, and the door was closed behind him. Dave turned to the door as he heard the lock slide into place. He turned back to the room and what he saw made him want to be sick.
The room was almost silent, except for the hiss of the respirator. He hardly recognised the man lying on the autopsy table as his friend. He went to his side.
Oh my good god, Aaron!
-0-0-0-
Aaron's one method of communication had been denied him. His face was so beaten that his eyes were swollen shut. Dave didn't realise that Aaron was drugged, but he took Aaron's face in his hands and turned his face towards him. Aaron recognised the touch. When Dave spoke, a surge of hope rushed through him; maybe he was going to survive this after all.
'I'm going to help you, Aaron. Can you speak?
Aaron tried so hard to make some kind of sound, but he achieved nothing.
Dave collected some water from a sink and brought it to him. Gently he washed his face and cleaned up the bandage around his neck. Then he pulled back his bloody tee shirt, and gasped – horror struck.
The wound was weeping blood and pus and the wound site was red and inflamed. He carefully sat Aaron up so that he was leaning against him, and pulled off the filthy shirt. It hung wetly from the respirator pipes and dripped blood onto the floor. Dave realised that he wouldn't be able to save him. He was in dire need of a doctor, and Dave knew nothing about medicine.
Aaron's jeans were soaked. He undid the zip and buckle, and drew them off his legs. He saw the catheter and that it had become disconnected, which was why Aaron was wet.
Oh my god oh my god oh my god..........
'I can't put this back, I have no idea how.' he said to Aaron. He called out to the walls, 'I need help with this! Help me do this!'
Dave held onto Aaron, holding him against his chest. 'I can't do this, Aaron. I will get you out of here. I will get you home.'
The sound of the key in the lock, and the woman came in.
'You do it like this.' she said. Holding Aaron with one hand and the tube in the other, she shoved the catheter home, the tube immediately filled with blood. Dave thought he was going to faint.
There was no movement from Aaron except a quickening of his heart beat, and closing his eyes tightly shut against this new humiliation and pain. Dave saw the eye movement.
As soon as the woman was gone and the door was locked, Dave asked Aaron if he could move his eyes.
Aaron moved them in response.
'Have they drugged you Aaron?'
Aaron moved his eyes.
'Did they do this to you here?'
Again Aaron acknowledged yes.
Oh my god....
Dave could not imagine what Aaron was going through as he washed his helpless colleague. He noted the infected pressure burns on his back, and realised that these alone could kill. As he gently cleaned him, he tried to think of how he was going to get him out of there. Hotch was dying, and he was the only one who could save his life. He needed time to come up with a plan, time that Aaron didn't have. He realised that he was crying as he dried him with paper towels. The wound was oozing and Dave was afraid to touch it. When he did, Aaron cried with agony.
Dave thought that he could probably escape, but the thought of doing so and leaving a man behind – this man in particular – left him cold. If he was going to escape, it would be with Aaron, or not at all.
He had every confidence that the team would find them. They knew who the UnSub was; they just needed to track him down.
There was nothing to wrap Aaron in, and he was cold. Dave took off his jacket and carefully slipped it onto him. There were no clean dressings for his wound. And there was no where that he could lay him down other than the floor.
Dave took paper towels and tried to make him more comfortable on the autopsy table, under his heels and shoulder blades and buttocks, but it was only temporary at best. Almost straight away, the towels were wet. Dave gave a shuddering sigh and stepped back. He had done what he could. Now he needed to think.
-0-0-0-
Aaron wasn't alone, and he rejoiced that he had been found – at first anyway. He thought in his distress that he had been rescued, and Dave was going to take care of him. But he had been wrong. They had Dave too, although he wasn't drugged and tortured like he was. He was there simply to clean up the mess.
He wasn't even sure that it was real, that Dave was really there. He knew that there was infection from the colostomy. His lower bowel was open to his peritoneum, and that was fatal without antibiotics and care, neither of which he was getting. He needed food, and although they had told him he would be fed, he couldn't recall this.
But sometimes he couldn't remember his own name, so in his lucid moments, moments that were becoming more infrequent as the infection ravaged him, he tried to make himself remember.
They had taken his body. He couldn't let them take his mind too.
-0-0-0-
The three men came back into the room. The woman wasn't with them.
'Come with us now your work here is done.'
'I would prefer to stay with Agent Hotchner if you don't mind.'
'Oh but we do mind, Agent Rossi.' Challenger said. Then to the other two, 'Take him outside and kill him.'
'You need me alive to clean up your mess.' Dave tried not to sound desperate, but he thought some of his desperation came across in his voice.
One of the men stepped forwards. 'Move.'
Dave didn't move and his reward for non co operation was a punch to the face. Dave stood his ground and attempted to hit back, but he was being held, and Challenger punched him in the stomach. Dave doubled up and groaned in pain. A kick in the groin, and Dave passed out.
'Get him on his feet and out of here. I want him dead. He's done what he was brought here for. I don't want to keep him here. If we need anyone else, we will take him.'
The two men dragged Dave out of the room. Aaron was listening to this and felt terrible fear for his friend.
Please don't kill him...... please.....
Dave was dragged out of the building and out amongst the trees that surrounded the place. He was woken up by a smack around the face. He found himself lying on his back looking up at his murderers.
'You need me to keep Hotchner alive.' he said desperately. He needed to live to save Aaron. He wasn't worried about preserving his own life, but he knew that Aaron was too much loved for him to die in such a dreadful way.
'Kneel.'
Dave struggled to turn onto his front but he wasn't moving fast enough for the two men who began to beat him. Powerlessly Dave curled up trying to protect himself from the assault. Thoughts of what Aaron had endured kept him conscious and determined. Rough hands in his hair pulled him into a kneeling position, and he closed his eyes as he felt the muzzle of his own gun against the side of his head.
He was about to be executed. A tear of absolute rage fell from his eyes as the woodland rang with the sound of a gunshot, the air filled with cordite and Dave fell forwards onto the floor.