Last chapter; hope you enjoyed. Now to post to DeviantArt and WIN THE CONTEST (maybe) Thanks for all of the error corrections and what not. You all helped me work the bugs out of the finished product, the version that will be posted to DA under my used name of MadreLoca.


The funeral wasn't fancy; Aaron Hotchner wouldn't have wanted anything elaborate. It was the real Aaron Hotchner that they all gathered to remember and honor. Hotch: father, brother, leader, and friend, not the DC Phantom: killer, destroyer, and monster.

Jessica Brookes held little Jack Hotchner, who tried his best to stay strong like he always saw Daddy do, but in the end he sobbed quietly against Jessica's shoulder. The poor child had just lost both parents in one short month.

Reid had not lied to Hotch when he said that he wanted to help him figure something out for Jack. The story that was told to the orphan was simple: Daddy got shot when they went to get the bad guy. It was not a lie, only an omission of a truth so painful that even those who had witnessed the "Phantom's" final minutes on earth still could not quite fathom its possibility, let alone its reality.

One by one, the team laid a rose atop the smooth painter wood of the casket, Reid went first, then Rossi, Prentiss, JJ, and Garcia.

But not Morgan.

Morgan did not even go to the funeral. He couldn't bare cruel irony of mourning over someone whom he had killed, let alone the sight of a heartbroken Jack, or Sean for that matter. He did not want to face the son and brother of the man that he had killed (not to mention the fact that Rossi was still upset with him). He was a coward.

So instead, Derek Morgan stayed home with Clooney and a bottle of Scotch. He had never been fond of hard liquor until he sat up and drank with Hotch one night. Morgan had gotten so drunk and silly that he started to free-style rap, playing off of the fact that "Hotch" rhymes with "Scotch." This was one of the rare times he had seen the former unit chief laugh; not just smile, but fully and whole-heartedly laugh.

Despite his momentary depression, Morgan chuckled slightly at this happy memory. This in turn made him think about his situation from a different angle. Had he really taken away a brother, father and friend, or had he saved what was left of a good man? Had he really killed Hotch, or did he just kill the killer who had already murdered the true Hotch?

Morgan stared at his empty shotglass, as if somewhere in the transparent vessel he might find answers to questions that should never have to be asked. The glass, to Morgan's drunken dismay, held no answers, so he filled it once again with the intoxicating amber fluid.

Before he could raise the glass to his lips there was a knock at the door.

"It's open," He slurred without even looking up. He only faintly heard the door squeak open and closed and latch shut.

"Not you too." Morgan looked up to see Rossi dressed in his Sunday best, minus the tie, no doubt having come straight from the funeral. "Drowning your sorrows in a bottle of Scotch. Reminds me of someone we knew once."

"Yeah, and we both know that you joined him for a shot more often that you'll ever admit. There's another shotglass in the cabinet above the microwave," Morgan said, motioning with his head in the general direction of the kitchen.

"Thanks, but I gave up drinking," Rossi laughed when he saw Morgan's eyebrows shoot up in surprise, Making Morgan laugh as well. "I'll take that invitation."

When Rossi joined Morgan on the couch with the shotglass, Morgan poured the drink and asked, "So, I thought you were still mad at me. What brings you all the way over here?"

"Still mad at you," Rossi said questioningly. "Derek, I was never mad at you."

"You haven' spoken one word to me since…"

"I'm sorry for that. It just took me a while for all of this to really sink in. And do you know what I realized when it finally did?"

"Hm?" Morgan grunted, not entirely enthused about one of David Rossi's famous hidden meaning philosophy sessions.

"I realized that a failure to accept reality can lead to a skewed perspective on our lives," he began. "Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and last but not least, acceptance. We can't deny it, we were there. You seem to have skipped anger, seeing as how you only have two people to be angry with: Hotch and yourself. You have nothing to bargan with, so that leaves you at depression."

"So where do I go from here?" Morgan asked, already knowing the answer, or so he thought.

"We'll the last step is acceptance. Not everyone accepts their reality and it eats them from their core to the surface like a termite in a log. There are three hard truths to accept here. The first is that our friend lead a secret life that ended up killing him. The second is the fact that you pulled the tigger. Last is the not-so-simple fact that Aaron Hotchner is dead."

"I've accepted the fact that Hotch was a killer. I don't justify it but I understand what did it, and not just because I'm a profiler. I get grief, I get loss, and I definatly get anger. The other stuf…" Morgan trailed off.

"What I have done," Rossi continued, "I separated Hotch and the DC Phantom."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that Hotch may have been the DC Phantom, but the DC Phantom wasn't Hotch. The way I look at it is like this: the DC Phantom took Hotch captive and you killed the DC Phantom, freeing Hotch form the grasp of a Monster who had already killed him."

"You know, twisted as it is, I was thinking the same thing before you showed up," Morgan admited.

"If you tell yourself that," Rossi advised, "Then you can more easilly accept the fact that you pulled the trigger and focus on grieving over Hotch, the real one; the one we knew as a leader and a friend. You can focus on being a leader like he would want you to be for his team, because ready or not the burden of Unit Chief has officially fallen to you. If you can remember Hotch as Hotch, not as the DC Phantom, then you can lead by his example and run the team the way he would want it run." Rossi raised his shotglas from which he had yet to take a drink. "To the good times with our friend and leader Aaron Hotchner."

Morgan raised his glass as well. "To Hotch."

Morgan downed his shot and swallowed the liquor along with Rossi's words.

"I remember Rossi," Morgan reminded, "You told me before that I would have to be willing to step up."

Rossi nodded. "Are you?"

Could he step up after everything that had happened? Could he take Hotch's place?

Morgan could accept that Hotch had been the DC Phantom, but he would not dwell on it. That would not be the way he remembered Hotch and that would not be the way he wanted his team to remember Hotch. Morgan would make sure Hotch had a plaque in the hall like any other fallen agent, and he would make sure Jessica and Jack were taken care of.

He could not take Hotch's place, but he could make his own. There was no way that Morgan thought he could ever be the leader Hotch was, but that wasn't going to stop him from trying. If he didn't go back to the BAU and lead his team, his team, his family would be broken up. He couldn't let that happen. Morgan had to step up, and he would do it for Hotch.