Ten for a Bird You Must Not Miss

All he could think as he ran was that he couldn't believe that this day had finally come. He was not so naïve to believe that it never would, but if he was honest with himself, and he so tried to be, he didn't think that it would be today.

Today, when the evil they were chasing was just a troubled kid.

He had known that it would most likely be one of the four of them – Garcia rarely traveled and Reid and JJ didn't go into the field very often – and he had pictured a truly sadistic unsub, one with a high body count and an endgame that had been carefully scripted and executed. He had envisioned a day that was dark to match the realities of what had happened; maybe a shootout, an explosion. A blaze of glory, if you will.

But he hadn't pictured this.

Not this boy who, for all that he had done, hadn't killed anyone yet.

Not this day, this beautiful October day, with its vivid blue sky and bright fluffy clouds, the gentle waves of the mountain lake softly kissing the shoreline, the autumn leaves just falling to the forest floor, blanketing the ground in splashes of oranges and reds.

And while he had known that it would be one of them, it truly hadn't occurred to him that it would be this one.

But Morgan hadn't seen what he had, and Dave hadn't had the words to reach him, and he, well, he hadn't been fast enough.

He looked slightly to the right and fired two quick shots, the way his target crumbled to the ground, felled by a double-tap perfectly placed in the heart, going unnoticed by him. He had turned just long enough to pull the trigger, then his attention was immediately returned to her.

Her.

Emily.

Emily, who was trying to save a child.

Emily, who was shot by the fifteen-year-old she was trying to reach.

Emily, who now lay bleeding on the leaf-covered forest floor.

His Emily.

Oh God.

They could've been happy. Really happy. The sort of happy that people write books and movies and songs about.

Instead, he had failed her.

Failed her in life, and failed her in love.

He didn't bother to wipe at the tears already tumbling down his cheeks as he fell to his knees next to her. It wouldn't be of any use, anyways, they were coming faster than he could brush them away. The dry leaves crackled under him as he shifted her into his arms, the blood flowing from the perfectly round hole in her chest soaking him immediately.

He knew he wouldn't be able to scrub its touch from his skin.

She opened her mouth and tried to speak, but only a wheeze sounded. He brushed the loose tendrils of hair that had fallen from her ponytail off of her sweaty forehead.

It was as soft as he remembered.

"Shh, sweetheart. It's alright. I'm right here."

He pressed a tender kiss to her forehead and held her hand as she struggled to bring air into her lungs, the wet rattling he could hear in her chest telling him that it wouldn't be long now, the muddy ground drinking her spilled blood greedily and the cool wind cruelly stealing the last of her strength. He could hear Morgan yelling frantically for the medics, but he knew that they wouldn't get there in time.

Suddenly, a hundred things that he had never gotten to tell her crossed his mind. How he only liked cookies when they were still warm from the oven, how he had made Reid take his Halloween costume off last year because the mask freaked him out, how he was driven to do this work, their work, because of his fear of turning into his father, how he worried about pushing Morgan too hard, or not challenging Reid enough, or forgetting to tell JJ or Garcia how appreciated they were.

How he loved her.

She shivered and then lied still, and floating into the blue autumn sky with the last wisp of breath to ever cross her lips were the final pieces of his battered heart, now never to be whole again.

And somewhere in the distance, the cry of a loon.