Chapter Four

"I had a student approach me after class once. A bright young man. He told me he'd seen devils fly out of the clock during lecture. I never saw him again."

(Author's former professor)


As his friend, Jennifer Jareau was required by unwritten law to tousle Dr. Spencer Reid's hair as she passed behind his chair at the pizzeria. The young doctor had barely smoothed the wayward tufts when Olivia followed JJ and repeated the latter's affectionate gesture. This earned Olivia a glare from her brother as she took the open chair to Spencer's right. Of course, the scene provided endless amusement for Derek Morgan in the agonizingly slow minutes between ordering their food and receiving it. Aaron Hotchner and David Rossi exchanged an exasperatedly bemused glance, each relishing in that rare moment of emotional levity a little more stoically.

"Lombardi's in New York is America's first pizzeria," Spencer was saying as the server brought two large pizzas to the table. "It was licensed by the City in 1905."

"Is that so, Pretty Boy?" Morgan asked distractedly as his empty glass of Sprite was replaced.

"Is that the one with Mona Lisa painted on the front?" Olivia asked, sliding a slice onto her plate.

Spencer nodded as his phone buzzed. He looked at the screen and the siblings shared a look before Spencer excused himself from the table, Olivia following a short pace behind him. Their concerned friends and colleagues could only stare after their retreating forms.

Morgan backed away from the table and followed after them before anyone could stop him. He left the warmth of the restaurant to find the Reids standing on the sidewalk. Seeing his approach, Olivia met him halfway. "Did something happen with your mom?" Derek asked, unabashed.

Olivia sighed. She wasn't going to lie to her friend. "Last week," she started slowly, "another patient told my mom that he overheard the doctors say my father had called the hospital to inform them that Spencer and I had been killed on the job. The patient told her the doctors were plotting to hide this from her."

Derek drew in a sharp, angry hiss of air and shook his head. "There's more," he said, looking into his friend's sad, worried emerald gaze.

Olivia looked back at Spencer, but he had his back to them. "The meds she's been on for the last two years have slowly decreased in effectiveness since the end of August. Had the other patient told her this in, say, June…well, it would have been a different reaction. It would have been better."

"She didn't try to—" Derek started, but he couldn't say it.

"I got a call at eight that evening," Olivia told him. "She had an episode, a complete breakdown, and they had to sedate her because she was hitting herself, pounding on the windows, and smashing her head against the wall. They tried to tell her we were alright, that the other patient had lied and I was on the phone waiting to speak with her, but mom was telling them life meant nothing without her children and that the doctors should just kill her." She had to look away from Derek's horrified face. Her hands trembled, so she stuffed them in her coat pockets. "When I talked to her, it was only for a second. She was drugged. She said, 'I'll be there soon, baby,' before she was asleep." Olivia didn't tell him that she'd spent the next four hours on the bathroom floor, emptying her stomach and sobbing.

Spencer approached them then. "Everything is alright," he told his sister.

"Can I do anything to help?" Derek asked them, though he couldn't see how. "I could talk to Hotch."

"No," Olivia told him, "the only thing we can do is take a flight out when this case is over." She looked at Spencer. "We don't even have to go back to Quantico. But let's go back inside. I'm freezing."

But Morgan didn't move. Olivia was looking at him, borderline desperate to escape the biting chill, one hand on the door. When he didn't tease her about being from warm Nevada, Olivia knew something was off. "Two o'clock," Derek said, trying to look casual. "Dark blue car."

The least threatening of the three, Olivia nodded and began to walk away, loudly proclaiming she'd forgotten something. She put on a convincing show and walked a roundabout route to where a middle-aged man was sitting in his car, pretending he hadn't been spying. Derek and Spencer took a more direct approach, but the man decided it was time to leave, as the agents had anticipated, and began to drive away.

He didn't get far.

It all happened relatively fast then. There was no time to process the sequence of events as they unfolded in rapid-fire succession. Hotch, Rossi, JJ, and Prentiss had cautiously moved outside. In the time it took them to exit the pizzeria, Olivia had somehow managed to coax their unidentified stalker into rolling down the driver's side window. Now, instead of talking to the man, Olivia was almost completely inside of the vehicle, fighting for control of a gun the man had produced upon the agent's approach.

The man pressed the gas pedal with varying degrees of applied pressure as the struggle continued. Olivia's horrified colleagues ran after the swerving car, shouting at the unsteadily retreating vehicle.

There was a moment when time seemed to be suspended. There was nothing except the sounds of a lurching car, shouts, and the pounding of feet against the cracked pavement.

Time caught up with them in a blinding, disorienting rush.

The sedan had a driver but was not exactly being driven. As physics would have it, the all but unmanned vehicle slammed into the side of a parked van, nearly ejecting Olivia into the street. But the agent continued to struggle, valiantly deciding physics would have to wait until she'd subdued this mystery man. At the moment, she didn't have time for the laws of nature.

Aaron Hotchner was the first to arrive. He was maybe a foot away from being able to touch the sedan when the resounding crack of a gunshot echoed through the main street.

A bloodied Olivia fell to the pavement. Her head connected with the ground, fracturing her jaw-clip into several jagged pieces. The other agents were still shouting her name as they flooded onto the scene.

Olivia blinked. "I'm fine," she told them, reaching out a hand. Hotch helped his subordinate to her feet, where she swayed a little too unsteadily for his liking.

As Hotch and Rossi examined the deceased driver, the others alternated between staring at the bloody scene and fussing over a winded Olivia Reid—except Spencer, who directed his sister to lean against the car's bumper and didn't spare a second glance at the unidentified driver. "You might have a concussion," he told her. "The car was traveling at approximately thirty miles per hour before the collision. Did you hit your head more than once? The effects of a concussion could take hours to appear, so when the ambulance gets here, you should probably go to the hospital just to be safe."

He felt the base of his sister's skull for a bump, laceration, or any tender spots, but Olivia swatted his hand away. "I'm fine," she reminded him.

"You keep saying that," Spencer countered, "but like I said, you might not know for hours."

"No hospitals," she grouched. Olivia wiped away some of the foreign blood from her face and neck with the back of her hand. She shuddered upon noticing the fragments of hair and brain matter. "I was just about to complain about not getting any pizza," she said, "but…never mind."

Spencer and Hotch made eye contact across the way. Hotch's gaze clearly read: we need to know what happened here.

"You need a cognitive from me," Olivia said a heartbeat later, without looking back at her superior. Spencer nodded. "There isn't much to say. He pulled a gun and I reacted."

"You aren't wearing your gun," Spencer observed, worried at that implication.

"Neither is Morgan," Olivia said. "Hotch was holding our guns while we did the custodial with Sutherland. Everything was pretty crazy when we got back to the precinct; I guess it slipped my mind."

"Why did you struggle with him for the gun instead of running? He was driving away."

"The gun wasn't aimed at me," Olivia told him.

Derek joined them then. "What do you mean?"

"He put the gun to his temple."

Spencer blinked. "This was a suicide?" He exchanged a look with Derek.

"I tried to stop him," Olivia told them. "We fought for the gun and he still got what he wanted in the end." She turned to face Hotch and Rossi as emergency vehicles began arriving to the scene. "Did you find an ID on him?"

"Carl Luther," Hotch affirmed. "Fifty-two."

Prentiss was holding the wallet with one gloved hand. "He's not from town. Did I hear right? This was a suicide?"

Olivia nodded. She was starting to feel more emotional about the situation as the adrenaline and shock wore off. She didn't want to talk about it anymore. Of course, the choice wasn't hers. Two separate officers and a paramedic still needed to know what happened, and she related the story grudgingly. Spencer tried to convince her, once again, to be examined at the hospital, but she declined. "Honestly, I just want to go back to the motel and take a really long shower," she told him. The paramedic had cleaned her up the best he could, but Olivia knew there was probably foreign matter in her hair. Scalding-hot water and lots of shampoo were the only things that would placate her at this point.

"Go," Hotch said, approaching so quietly that Olivia jumped. "Have Morgan drive you back to the motel, then meet us at the precinct. Take your time."

She had never been so glad to leave a crime scene.


Author's note: I'm not entirely happy with this chapter; I have family on the East Coast being affected by the hurricane, and I can't help but worry. Anyways, this chapter is just a filler, sort of a setup for the action. Seriously, everything is about to go south, really fast.

ForTheLoveOfSeto: I lied! Unintentionally, but gahhh, sorry! MGG has been posting about the episode he's directing "in October" and I missed one of his FB updates saying it was for 8x10. So, I don't think Halloween's episode was directed by him. Nevertheless, it looks superb! Thanks for being my faithful reviewer! I look forward to more It's Not Too Late updates! (: