Wow, this took forever. I'm sorry. I must have changed this a billion tiems already and I know it's confusing, I just want it to be perfect. So, not to be confused, the chapter first reflects on how Seth recognized Reid, in the prison he just seemed cute and sort of familiar.

"You had better be quiet now, or I'll have to come back out here."

With that, Seth quickly got up and walked away, then slammed the bedroom door shut behind him, cursing under his breath as he shrugged out of his suit jacket. What a mess…

Richard was sitting on the bed, looking up at him somewhat skeptically as he let himself fall onto the bed exhaustedly. For a moment he looked like he was going to say something, then though he merely focused on the TV again.

Seth was grateful for it. He was done for the day, all he wanted to do was sleep so he could stop thinking. He felt drawn from the day's stressful events and having to deal with both his brother and those fucking monsters tailing them all at once. At least they hadn't caught up with them yet –but now he had the police searching for them with renewed efforts after what had happened in the bank.

Seth stared at the ceiling blankly. He still didn't know what had possessed him taking that FBI agent along.

Well, he did know, he just couldn't believe the mess he was suddenly in. He never allowed emotions to guide his actions because it was deadly in their world, and he was usually so good at it. Today he had screwed up.

In a way, he was surprised Richard hadn't started asking him questions yet, seeing as his actions earlier had been completely out of character. They had a number of unspoken rules they lived by, rules that were there mostly to keep Richard from going berserk -but today he had broken them for a change.

Normally, both FBI agents would have ended up dead next to the security guard, simple as that. He'd been well in the process of getting that done, too -but then he'd made the mistake of looking into the younger man's face before shooting and it had been him.

The young man from the prison.

Seeing him again, despite having known he was affiliated with the FBI, had been completely unexpected, and it had momentarily thrown him off his game. He usually was rather good at shutting off his emotions during kills, to distance himself from the person or see them as deserving death. Naturally, thinking like that of civilians, of women and children was nearly impossible and it was part of the rules he'd set for himself to not harm those groups and to try, however seldom successful, to keep Richard from harming them, too.

In this case neither was involved and yet is hands had gone inexplicably weak, his focus being drawn to frightened hazel eyes and for a moment he had been sure he wouldn't be able to pull the trigger. If only the kid had looked more like a cop, more like he could actually defend himself…if only Seth hadn't spent the three nights prior thinking about…

Angry at himself, he'd tried to ignore those thoughts, focusing on the fact that he was a cop, an enemy. It had worked to a certain extent…until…

Until the boy said something, his voice the last puzzle piece needed for realization to hit him, paralyze him.

It was him.

All those years ago…the boy at the sanatorium...

That was why he had seemed familiar. Fucking hell…

He had thought it was his mind playing tricks on him at first, but with every second he kept staring at the young man's face it had become more and more obvious to him that he had to be right. It had been 14 years...but the age fit, the appearance, the peculiar way of speaking...and the eyes.

Those eyes. Either he was losing it now, his mind playing tricks on him, or those were the same eyes.

After that, it was like his body had acted on autopilot, completely ignoring his brain which was too busy with the onslaught of repressed memories and emotions it was suddenly subjected to anyway. Suddenly, he'd been unable to see anything but that little boy's face from his past when he looked at the agent, unable to help being reminded of everything that had happened that day, of how he had felt, of who he had been. There was a reason he usually repressed those memories: His hesitation to kill had suddenly turned into outright reluctance, a feeling he could neither rationalize nor shake off. It had felt like he was sixteen all over again, the gun suddenly heavy in his hand.

Problem was, Richard had had no clue what had happened; he had still been expecting him to kill their enemy and the situation had demanded it, too.

So, too conflicted to make a permanent decision, he had done the only other thing he could think of: He had taken the kid hostage as well, buying himself time to think.

Consequently, he now was in a world of trouble.

"Why don't we just kill him, Seth?"

Richard's voice suddenly broke through his thoughts, interrupting Seth's train of thought rather abruptly. His head snapped around to find his brother at looking him with the same expression of barley concealed skepticism as before. Richard shrugged, "I mean, we already have money and his team will work over time to find him, right? If we just kill them now, we'll be rid of the problem."

For a moment, Seth considered it. Let Richard take care of the problem without even bringing up the fact that he couldn't. Kill the kid and be over with it. The mental image of letting Richard walk out there and do just that in his usual violent, creative manner turned his stomach.

Careful to keep a blank face, Seth slowly turned his head away again. "No," his tone left no room for discussion, "No, were not gonna do that."

He was almost afraid his thoughts would show and prayed that Richie would just stop talking, go back to his usual indifferent passiveness and let Seth make the decisions for both of them without questioning them.

"Why not?"

Seth ground his teeth inaudibly. Apparently today wasn't his lucky day.

He sighed heavily, trying to remember how he had justified his insane decision to himself and then convert that into an argument that would work on his brother.

There was no way that he would tell him the real reason for his screw up, whatever it was, nostalgia or misplaced attraction or a mix of both. Because Richie, being Richie, was usually unstable even on the best of days and that naturally only got worse when Seth gave him the smallest bit of leeway, or failed to give him strict orders and guidance. And that was how people around them usually ended up mutilated or dead or both. No, he was the leader here, the strong one, he couldn't allow himself to be seen wavering.

No, the kid was alive for now and until he had figured out the truth, found out where he stood, what he would be capable of doing, he would pretend that everything was normal and act like he always did -because it was the only way of knowing for sure that his brother would react the way he always did.

"Think about it," he finally improvised, "with the money we'll get for him we won't ever have to look back. We can stay in Mexico for the rest of our lives. Plus," he grinned, adding an afterthought that he knew would help win Richard over, "if we pull this off just right, those fucking agents will never forget who outsmarted them."

He glanced sideways just in time to see Richie mirror his expression, his a little darker and less sane maybe.

"That does sound good, Seth," he mused, his eyes suddenly gleaming, "We should let them know that the fed is suffering more every minute they don't pay us. Then, when they can't look on any more and give us the money, we'll let them find his dead body."

Seth felt his mask slip a little at that mental image and hastily replaced his expression with a familiar frown that said, 'no-nonsense'.

"No. They won't give us the money unless he's alive."

Richard frowned, but gave in when Seth's expression grew irritated, "Huh, you're probably right. Doesn't mean we can't hurt him though, right?"

The last part he said in a tone that was sickeningly familiar and this time Seth couldn't help but openly glare, hoping Richard would interpret it as general anger about the suggestion.

"Richie, you know that's not how we do things. If you want us being back together to work out, you'll stick to my rules. We do what we have to in order to survive and be free. Nothing more. I keep fucking telling you: This isn't some game!"

At least for him it wasn't. Richard, as usual, didn't even seem to grasp what he was getting at, merely rolling his eyes in annoyance.

"Uhg, you and your moral code. I would have thought you'd gotten past that in prison. Fine, 'no unnecessary deaths, no mindless torture of innocents, blah, blah, blah'" He said it like it was a ridiculous imposition, only to immediately follow it with, "So ok, the girl may be innocent, but he is a cop. Your rules don't suddenly apply to cops now, do they?"

He looked at his older brother expectantly, almost hungrily and for a few seconds Seth just stared back, mind blank. No, they didn't apply to cops.

"He's not a real cop, you heard him," he finally said, trying to shrug the matter off, "He's just a kid, he's not gonna give us any trouble."

That should do for a reason, it was partially true and it fit into what Richie was used from him. For now, it would have to do –maybe in the morning he'd be able to sort this out.

In his mind, that was the end of the discussion, so he was almost surprised to hear Richard keep talking.

"But if he does?"

Clearly, he really didn't want to let this go. His brother was eyeing him without blinking, so obviously out for blood that for a moment Seth let himself feel some of his pent up anger and frustration. God damnit, they had only been reunited for three days and already he was starting to lose sight of his brother in the image of a bloodthirsty monster in front of him.

"Then we'll deal with it," he said decidedly, leaving no more room for discussion, "Let me handle him, Richie. Let me handle all of this. I'll get us into Mexico and away from all this shit. That's all that matters, everything else is just gravy."

He made himself smile, in the way he often had when they were younger and seldom did these days, in the way that said he would take care of their little family and that Richie needn't worry.

Thankfully, it worked.

Richard finally relented; he nodded slowly and then didn't ask any more questions about Reid. They briefly spoke about the vampires following them, but Seth also shot that conversation down in its roots, tired of talking.

He lay awake for a long time after Richard had finally turned off the TV and gone to sleep.

His thoughts were in turmoil, his chest full of emotions he usually kept well under wraps. He hadn't felt like himself for hours, but now in the silence it was getting worse.

He couldn't help but think about how he had acted towards the agent this evening, how for some reason he had wanted to try and be calmer, less aggressive than he ususally would have been, because the kid looked so distressed already. He knew he couldn't be doing that, under no circumstances, because this agent, no matter how little he looked like it was a trained agent of some sort -and he would try to work against him and get himself and the girl to safety for sure, just like he ahd already tried by denying any knowledge of their case.

Seth remembered how angry he had suddenly become, having been almost too caught up in frightened doe eyes to see the intention behind them. In retrospect, he might have overreacted a little to compensate for his mistake after that, going slightly overboard with the whole tooth-pick-finger-nail-thing. Still, better to be overly feared than giving the guy hope of manipulating his way out of this. now that he thought about it, he probably should have punched him or something the second he tried to play him, just to make their positions clear.

It was what he usually would have done. Problem was this...this situation was so confusing, upsetting...he didn't much feel like himself. He wanted to be himself, do what he always did…but he simply couldn't seem to in this situation and he was unwilling to ponder why that might be.

And to make things worse, memory flashes he had suppressed for over a decade had been hitting him full force all day, brought back by seeing this boy again. How he had felt back then, angry and scared and disgusted and powerless…almost ready to start hurting back a world that had done nothing but to him for 16 years, but not depraved enough yet to actually do it...

He had almost forgotten what it was like to feel anything other than anger, frustration and contempt.

Seth shook his head, angry at himself. The last thing he needed was to be reminded of how he had felt as a sixteen year old and to let any weakness shimmer through. Considering where they were at now, that could only lead into a catastrophe.

Luckily, he had always been good at compartmentalizing.

So he had met Spencer Reid once before. It had been in a different life, plus, he didn't actually know him. The memory that he had been holding on to for all these years wasn't that of the person he'd met, it was of how he had felt back then -it was just a symbol. He didn't matter anymore than any other hostage they'd ever had, he was just mixing up his emotions.

Yes, it had made him hesitate when he was supposed to kill him, and that had been fucking stupid -but what was done was done, he had to see this rationally.

He would do what he had to. Come morning he would have pulled himself together. He would handle this like any other time they'd taken hostages. Demanding ransom had initially just been his excuse to Richard, but the idea wasn't all bad, really. Why not? They could use the money.

Yes, they would try that way first -not because he couldn't kill the kid -just because it wasn't rational. And if later on it turned out he would have to kill him anyway -he would. Because he didn't care, because it didn't matter, because he wasn't weak.

He just had to internalize that so he wouldn't let his feelings screw with him again the next time he was faced with those big hazel eyes. And once he had, he would have to make sure the agent realized his position as well.

Yes, if he did it that way it would all work out.

Just like it always did.

xxx

Night had long fallen over Mexico but the BAU team wasn't sleeping and they all knew they weren't going to get any sleep in the next few days either.

They had gotten the shock of their lives that morning when the local police had informed them that there had been a bank robbery in which Morgan and Reid had been compromised. They had raced to the hospital, expecting the worst.

Initially, they had been relieved when they had been informed that neither agent had arrived there dead -but that relief had faded quickly faced with the prospect of Morgan being in critical condition and Reid not being there at all.

Now they were back at their temporary station, working like crazy and getting nowhere. There was no security camera footage, no trace of Reid or that female bank teller. He was just gone and not knowing was wearing all of the down.

"What if he's already dead?" Elle muttered, distraught, as she stared blankly at their profile, "Remember the hatred Gecko had for us? They would have shot him as soon as they didn't need him anymore."

Hotch shook his head, squeezing her shoulder, "We can't think like that. As long as we don't hear anything we have to keep searching."

He and Gideon exchanged a grim look over her shoulder. In truth, there was no way of not thinking the worst. After all, they knew who they were up against.

Who knew how much time they had before Reid would be beyond saving?

So yeah, a little more insight.

Does it feel more like Seth spared Reid b/c there was an attraction b/w them or that he unconsciously already knew they'd met before? I hope it's the former. I want their past to just be the rice corn that tips the scale so to speak, a reason for Seth to feel again -but him liking Reid is not supposed to be directly related to that.

I hope it'll go fast from now on, hopefully I'll be through before x-mas so I can start fresh in the new year. Thanks for reading everybody and please don't hesitate to share your impressions, good or bad^^