As promised the next chapter, I hope I haven't kept too many people waiting :)

I have no color prejudices nor cast prejudices nor creed prejudices.

All I care to know is that a man is a human being, and that is enough for me;

he can't be any worse.

Mark Twain

Time was clearly defined for him.

The man came in twice a day to torture him. The unfamiliar man, with whom he was too familiar with now, took great pleasure in announcing the exact time and date. Keeping track of his grunts and groans of pain, logging how much time passed between the start and finish of a session, of each individual electrical burst of the cattle prod against his skin. Seeing how long he could remain quiet under the influence of the cattle prod searing heat into his skin. Sometimes the man fluttered the prod close to the skin, but not directly on it, causing him to imagine a flame was being brought close to his skin and then taken away again. Other times, when he had been particularly susceptible to the pain, the man congratulated him on his sounds of protest, on the moans that escaped due to his hot flesh inflaming.

This man was sadistic.

Hotch knew it had been a couple of days since the abduction. He also had vague ideas about the progress of the team. He knew, for instance, that on the third day of their disappearance Morgan had visited Emily's apartment, and broken through her door when she hadn't answered. It sounded so like Derek that Hotch knew the UnSub wasn't lying. The man had taken an immense amount of satisfaction in relaying what he thought about Morgan and Emily's involvement. That was about the time Hotch realised the UnSub thought he and Emily were partners…in a romantic sense.

The man also gave updates on the exact condition of Emily's apartment.

The man had identified himself as The Observer.

The Observer was strict in the protocols of their interactions.

Hotch was to answer any and all questions without pause.

The UnSub liked to use the cattle prod during their 'interview' sessions. When an answer didn't satisfy him the cattle prod would venture closer to sensitive regions of Hotch's body. When an answer did satisfy him, the cattle prod remained stationary on his torso. So no matter how quickly Hotch answered a question, he would always be on the receiving end of the cattle prod. It was especially hard not to hesitate when The Observer started asking personal questions about Emily, questions that Hotch had no idea how to answer.

Hotch however, became indignant at these questions, he figured if he was supposed to be her partner, her lover, he might as well start acting like it and pretend to be affronted and outraged rather than try to make something up. The Observer seemed uncharacteristically thrilled when Hotch refused to answer those types of questions. The questions were never-ending and repetitive, Hotch had to concentrate all the time to remember his answers to some of the more unusual questions. It would be horrific if he accidentally gave two antonymous answers to the same question. The Observer was extremely thorough. So he spent down time reminding himself of this life he had created for Emily and himself. He only hoped that if The Observer was asking these questions of Emily as well, that she could play along too.

Hotch had spent a great deal of time examining the room he was confined in. It was a non-descript room. White/beige walls were all around, same for the ceiling. No windows, and a bright glaring light that was never turned off. Thankfully, Hotch had learned early in life to sleep whenever and wherever possible. Lights, noises, movements, they didn't bother him, not that there were a whole lot of noise or movement, other than when The Observer arrived and departed. There was no door. But there was a man-hole in the ceiling. It was disturbing to see your torturer enter and exit through the roof, with a ladder that could only be accessed from the outside. Even if Hotch was strong enough to somehow find a way up to the ceiling, he probably wouldn't be able to pull himself out. That's if the UnSub didn't put some kind of weight on top of it to prevent such a thing from happening.

When he was alone, and his mind was going over the life he had imagined, he was restricted to lying on the floor or leaning against one of the walls. He was routinely tied up by The Observer with ropes around his ankles and wrists after the 'sessions' were concluded. This limited his movement extensively. He couldn't stand up with the way his legs were crossed and the painful manner in which his arms were locked.

He strained against the coarse ropes for the ump-hundredth time. His wrists and ankles all bore the marks of rope burn. They were red and swollen with persistence. Once in a while, his abductor, gave him a reprieve from the ropes. But that's when the real pain began again. What worried him more than the ropes, or the prod, was that the abductor had Emily holed away somewhere else. He didn't know how she was faring, or what condition her room was in. He wasn't even sure that she had actually been abducted, as he had not seen her since lying her down on her lounge room couch.

What was also distressing was the way The Observer seemed to get off on recounting torture of Emily. The Observer took great delight in reliving those tortures with Hotch, asking him if he could imagine the look on Emily's face when he pressed the prod into her lower back, while electricity would span out from that very place on his own lower back. This happened multiple times, after the 'sessions' would get stuck in circles, or when he refused to be explicit in the perceived sexual relationship he and Emily were supposed to have shared, to be sharing.

The Observer would comment on the sounds he would make and compare them to sounds Emily made under the same type of stress. Hotch didn't know which was worse, that Emily had to undergo this type of torture too, or that The Observer was probably telling her about his torture as well. Thereby doubling her sense of pain, Emily was a very empathetic person. It was a talent that connected her with the victims and the families. It was also disturbing when she managed to do it with UnSubs and make their pathologies seem wonderful and beautiful instead of despicable and horrid. Perhaps that was merely his impressions of Emily Prentiss and the manner in which she worked, not any kind of wonderfulness inherent in the UnSubs.

It was obvious that The Observer was more interested in Emily than he was in Hotch. Every conversation revolved around her.

The only thing Hotch couldn't figure out was where this man got the idea that he and Emily were lovers. He had thought about asking but realised that the man's process seemed connected to the idea that he and Emily were a couple. He didn't want to create more problems by introducing the notion of deceit into their, already dangerous, association.

What did you think?

This was so hard to write...it took me a few goes and countless edits but I got there!

Arc