Late to say it, but I hope not too late: THANK YOU to all who read, review and add this to favourite and alert lists, I'm so happy every time I get one of these automatically written mails…hope you keep on reading and enjoying it!
They were too late. Emily knew it from the second they arrived at the parking lot, together with four police cars. They all were too late. "No", Morgan hissed, suddenly seeming overburdened by the simple task of parking, "no, no, no, this can't be true!" He killed the engine right where they stood and left the car. Emily stayed in her seat, shocked. "Morgan!" "What?" The agent shot her a glance that made her shiver. For a second, she found herself being afraid of her colleague, and then the FBI-instinct took over: "If you leave this car where it is, you're blocking the damn street for any back-up! Do you really think you can play the hero now, saving Reid on your own? We almost couldn't save him altogether then!" "So what are we supposed to do, Prentiss, waiting for help and watching him die? I've seen Reid breaking down, more often than anyone else of this team. No matter what he does, he never thinks he's good enough! When we found him, back in Hankel's garden, he was surprised. Not that Hotch found him, but that he looked for him! I swore I never would let the kid feeling alone and worthless like that, Prentiss" Morgan's voice had become quiet, but it shivered slightly from passion. "I will not let Reid down, never again. I swore it to myself, and I swore it to his mother. So if you wanna stay here and wait, it's okay for me. But I'll go in and save him!"
Both were very quiet after the outburst. Emily was the first to find her voice again. "I'll go with you, Derek, no matter what. But please – take your time to drive at least to that empty space over there, so Hotch and the others can come after us!" Morgan looked at the car as if he hadn't seen it before. "Oh…" "Yeah", Emily smiled, trying to give her voice a playful tone she didn't feel, "oh. Now give me the keys, and let's save our genius!"
Reid quickly passed the reception. Of course he knew where to find his mother. And he definitely wasn't in the mood to talk to Dr. Bradford. Yes, the doctor had supported him concerning his mother, but more because of the money than because of his oath. Bradford's greed, however, had only grown when Reid had been incautious enough to mention his own fear of getting schizophrenic one day. For years now he tried to convince Reid to take a room in the clinic, "just in case". This way busy of avoiding the clinic staff, Reid didn't notice the young blonde man standing at the elevators, and, as Reid approached, getting into one of them.
Reid's thoughts were circling around another problem now: what he was going to say to his mother. He didn't want to tell her about the splitting of the team. Would she even believe the truth? Diane Reid still was a professor, and though she wasn't working anymore, she knew how people had treated her once. Reid's stomach seemed to shrink into a fuzzy, hot ball somewhere in his guts. His mother said that she understood, that she was grateful for the decision the young Spencer had made. But deep down in his heart he was sure she despised him for being that weak.
Exhausted by his work and his thoughts, Reid stepped into an elevator, not yet pushing the button to go up. Maybe he shouldn't do it. Maybe he should just go back to the others. Even if the case now tore them apart – the BAU was his world. There he could do something against the evil he saw every day. The BAU was his home; the team was his family.
Reid gulped, trying to calm down again as he thought about his colleagues. He had fallen into a deep moral hole after Gideon had left, into the emptiness the exit of his mentor had left in his heart. Even without an eidetic memory, he would be able now to recite the letter the old man had written to him. He had read it hundreds of times; searching for solace in the words, for explanations, for the security that Gideon was happy now. Secretly, Reid still feared that one day, people would find Gideon's bones in the woods. Though – he was pretty sure Garcia checked the man's credit cards once in a while to see if he was still alive. She would tell them. In the brass mirror, Reid saw himself smiling as he now pushed the button to go up. As he thought about the rest of the team, his smile widened. They all had suffered from Gideon's leave. Still, nobody had begged him to read the letter. They had trusted him, and they had accepted that their mentor had wanted to justify himself only to one person. Reid still didn't know though why he had been that person.
"Because he admired you most, Reid. Because he saw all the potential in you – apart from you super-brain. You never gave up, not as a kid, not as a student, not even as the eternal genius of the BAU. Gideon was the first to accept that brainwork is as important as instincts and experience in this job. Many of the first profilers were afraid of being replaced by theoreticians. Gideon took a big risk in supporting you, kid, and you never disappointed him. Honestly, I think…if it hadn't been for you, Gideon would have left the BAU much sooner. Maybe right after Boston. You taught him to believe in our work again. And in mankind."
Now as then, these words sounded ridiculous – wrong maybe, he couldn't tell. If JJ or Garcia or Emily had said that, he would have seen it as the nice blandishment his female colleagues use to make when they thought he felt not like a part of the team. But hearing those words from Derek Morgan was quite different. Reid knew how Morgan had longed for acknowledgement by Gideon – he had seen the joy in the other's eyes when he'd told him about Gideon's words. Thousands of years ago, when they had taken down a bomber in Seattle. Morgan had – in his typical cruel self-destroying way – refused to leave a possible victim alone.
Thousands of years ago, before Tobias Hankel had shown up. Reid closed his eyes. No matter how much time had passed: still he woke up sometimes at night, twice, five, eight, twelve times – woken by his own cry because he thought about how Tobias, no, Raphael, was forcing him to choose again who should live or die. Or how he was injecting him the dilaudid. Or how he hit him…
Reid took a deep breath and tried to get his thoughts back to the moment when he had smiled. The BAU. His family. Rossi, who managed to take Gideon's place without trying to be him – yeah, somehow he already belonged to this family. Emily, Garcia – fairy godmother of Henry as much as of the whole team -, Morgan… While he left the elevator, Reid noticed that his smile was returning, wider than before. Hankel yes or no, he was lucky enough to live in a world where people like Rossi and Garcia and Emily and Morgan were, and more still – he was lucky enough to live in a world where there was Jason Gideon, Jennifer Jareau and Aaron Hotchner. Yes, he had been in love with JJ once, but that was long ago. What he felt today was something deeper, stronger. Reid loved the blonde agent with all his heart; and he would die for her as much as for his godson. But he had stopped getting nervous when he saw her. Far from it, JJ had become a saf harbor for him. One of the two people he spoke to without thinking much. One of the two people whose mockery he never feared.
The other one, of course, was Hotch. Aaron Hotchner was the greatest leader Reid had ever seen. He was two hundred percent loyal; to the FBI, but even more to his team. Hotch had, as much as Reid, as much as maybe Rossi, found his absolute appointment in fighting the evil. Seen from now, Reid knew that Haley had had to go one day. Hotch had abandoned himself to his job; disclaiming any private life was a sacrifice he made without much thinking. Of course, he had loved Haley with all his heart, of course there was nothing more important to him now than Jack – but Reid knew that Hotch would also die for him, for everyone of the team. Maybe he would even die for Chief Strauss, just because she was a woman and part of the BAU.
He stood right at the door. Reid sighed. He was not ready yet. Like a black shadow over his sunny memories lay the fact that Hotch had divided the team. Why? What had happened that they couldn't even talk to the others?
The genius closed his eyes. It would do no good thinking about it now. Hotch had given them an order and Reid would never ignore his words. Still… lost in thoughts, he went over to the fire escape. A quick glance onto his watch showed 4:42 pm. Almost one and half an hour to visit his mother. He had time. And confused like that he couldn't show up at his mother, anyway. Reid entered the staircase and sat down.
"Would you please let me drive, sir? FBI!" Rossi took over the cab, not because he was sure to drive faster than the original driver but to have anything to do. He hated it when colleagues – friends – were in trouble because of the good they had done. "Penelope, where do we have to go?" "59 straight ahead till Hillside, then 18. You should be there in fifteen minutes." The tech analyst sounded quite calm, but her makeup was a mess. She was lucky the others didn't see her like that. Stupid, cheap, water-dissolving stuff! "Not that this is really important now", she murmured rather to herself. "What?" JJ leaned forward to understand her friend through the loudspeaker. "Nothing, all's well…yeah…just go. I already called the clinic, I gave them your number, Hotch, and Derek's number, too. But he doesn't pick up, and neither does Emily, I…" "I guess they're already in the building by now, Garcia. The break is miserable there. Calm down!" At least Hotch had found his calmness again. Right now he could do nothing but trust Reid to survive and Rossi to drive fast enough. He had decided to do both.
Tobias had recognized Reid, had called for him like a child and pointed his fingers onto him as if he would get some sweets for it. Rapahel smiled. Maybe there would be sweets later, now he had to find the sinner. Unfortunately the clinic restored the information about their patients really safe, and he didn't know yet where the woman was living, but he knew her son would guide him to her. The last battle had begun: the sinner himself would guide the archangel to the prize, the last untouched, innocent soul in the whole city.
Quietly he ran down, ran down the fire escape.