It was a terrible thing, watching a man crumble.

Especially a man you respected and even loved. Especially one as self-contained as Aaron Hotchner. Cringing in on himself, the Unit Chief couldn't stop saying the one word that was the sum total of his identity and his world now that his fear had been exposed…now that everyone would know what he was really made of.

"Coward…coward…coward…coward…coward…"

He might have continued chanting the ugly sobriquet forever. Until weariness took him. Until his voice failed. Until the end of time. But as much as Hotch felt he deserved it, Rossi and Reid refused to see their leader in the false light staged by Peter Lewis.

"Aaron, STOP IT!" Rossi grabbed the man's hunched shoulders with savage force. "STOP IT! Right this minute…STOP IT!"

Hotch subsided into shuddering silence, but his haunted eyes and rough respiration told his teammates he was still chanting the word to himself. It had been planted by an expert. A genius.

"Reid, you know any tricks? Any quick fix? He's fighting, but this is about the most unfair battle I've ever seen. What did that bastard do to him?"

Spencer shook his head in slow disbelief. "I'm not sure. But if Hotch's trying to work his way past what Lewis did, then I have to think he'd be willing to let us help. He just doesn't know what he needs."

"Neither do we, kid."

"Lemme think…lemme think…" Reid chewed on his lips, running equations and scenarios in his mind. Discarding each one as nonviable.

Think! The standard way to work out someone's mental problems would involve years of psychotherapy. But that's for problems that have been years in the making. This was shot into Hotch in drug form augmented with words. So…so… Visions of classmates he'd known who'd experimented with recreational drugs sped through Spencer's brain. He saw their buddies walking them up and down the dorm halls, trying to work off the effects. He'd had his doubts about the usefulness of such treatment at the time, but…

So the equivalent of walking the brain up and down would be getting Hotch to…what?... follow a trail? Logic? Maybe if we can get him to focus on a series of steps leading to a logical conclusion…? OR…maybe if we can follow the trail Lewis did. There has to be a starting point. I thought it was Texas, but that was just a stepping stone. So Hotch thinks he's a coward. Is that the starting point? Can't be, or having brought it to light would have been a relief.

Reid watched as Rossi wrapped his arms around the Unit Chief's shoulders, pulling him close, trying to soothe soul-deep wounds with surface comfort.

It was half-baked at best, but it was all Reid could come up with on the spur of the moment. The more he thought about it…which took microseconds…the more he thought reasoning with Hotch and hearing his responses would point them toward something like a light switch that the unsub had installed.

"Rossi, we have to talk to him. Or, rather, get him to talk."

Dave gave a small, frustrated huff. "That's what I've been trying to do all night. But you see what it's like…Like pulling teeth just to get him to tell us what happened."

"That's it, though. None of that stuff he told us really happened. Dr. Regan didn't kill herself in front of him. Lewis set that up to hit at Hotch, to weaken his defenses so he could go deeper into worse fears."

Rossi rested his chin on top of Aaron's bent head as he snugged him even closer. "My personal opinion is that Dr. Regan doing that so close and his not being able to stop her…to save her…is one of Hotch's worst fears. 'You can't save everyone…'" He murmured the last almost to himself.

"Okay, okay." Reid's brows knit in fierce concentration. "So then he accessed more than one fear in Hotch. And he wove them all together into what looks like an impenetrable tapestry. So…we know he's afraid of losing us, his team. And…" He glanced at Rossi. "…he's afraid of not being able to save everyone. And he's afraid of being shot the way I was…But…" The young genius shook his head.

"What? What are you thinking, Reid?"

"There's something else. Something that ties it all together…which means it has to be something really deep. Primal…which would mean it was something we all share…all mankind, I would think…" His voice went distant as he followed his own thoughts; trying to give words to the leaps and bounds his mind could make by assembling and interpreting millions of scattered bits of knowledge acquired over his lifetime.

Rossi knew when the moment of revelation came. Saw Reid's features slacken, his eyes focus on some distant point. Dave pulled Hotch closer yet and held his breath, waiting for this remarkable thinking machine to finish its journey and solve a human riddle.

XXXXXXXXXXXX

Reid's brain stopped looking outward, plunging instead into his own experiences. A primal fear so basic we all have it…linked to my getting shot…to getting shot oneself…

And then he knew. Once again the pieces fell with a rattle, forming into a solid solution.

Reid felt the bullet once again. Felt his body lose tension; his muscles falling slack. Felt the hot gush of liquid flowing from the wound. Saw the world greying, fading, growing fuzzy. It had happened so fast he hadn't had time to dread; only time to experience the difference between vital life and approaching death. It hadn't been so bad. I thought getting shot would be worse. But it wasn't as bad as…as being held captive by Tobias Hankel! Because that had hurt! Hitting the soles of my feet had hurt much more than being shot! With a wound that grievous, the body's own defensive mechanisms click in. The pain is muted by shock. Death isn't what's scary...It's the process of dying...the pain of it that we all dread.

"Rossi, it's not fear of death. It's fear of pain!" Bending low, he tipped Hotch's chin up with gentle fingers; locked gazes with his leader's tormented eyes. "That's it, isn't it? That's why you force yourself to experience pain even when it's not necessary, because you're always proving to yourself that you can take it. When you hit your head in a car chase that time, you wouldn't even take an aspirin. You allowed the pain so you could tell yourself you were beating it. You're not masochistic. You're trying to defeat your biggest fear by exposing yourself to it. Is that it, Hotch? It's a biological directive, programmed into us to avoid pain, to be afraid of it. Is that it? You're scared of pain?"

It was like watching a balloon deflate. The sorrow and stress and struggle went out of Hotch. Something loosened inside, freeing him.

"Y-yes. Yes. Yes."

Aaron gasped out the words, feeling something dark and heavy...lift and leave. He let himself collapse within Rossi's embrace. The older agent held his friend, turning an expression of relief and gratitude on Reid.

But Spencer couldn't share it. He had a feeling the battle wasn't over…