Author's Note: Because I will be leaving the country on Friday and won't have much access to internet, this will be the last posting of this story until around New Year's Day. I hope everyone has a great holiday! Thanks!

Flight to Knoxville, Tennessee

The jet engines roared to life, nearly causing Hotch to twitch in a nervous response. He sat near a window seat next to Prentiss, both across from Reid and Rossi. Morgan, JJ, and Allison sat behind Rossi and Reid while the other agents were circled around Camen near the front of the jet. Hotch hadn't expected to be nervous, but he felt scared of meeting his demons again. Regardless of all the work he had done within the past six months to get better, a part of him felt like he was going to fail.

"Aaron?" Rossi said lightly as the jet began to taxi down the runway. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah, I'm-"he spotted Camen glaring at him. "The last time I was on this plane-"

"That's in the past. Let's focus on now; once we level, we can start. You ready to address the pain-in-the-ass and the "yes, man" squad?"

"Yeah, I'm ready, but there is something I wanted to say," he lowered his voice, "Thank you all for the last five months. I wouldn't be able to come if you hadn't supported me."

"Hey, we're family," Rossi chimed as the jet leveled and the seatbelt sign turned off. "Guess it's go time."

"During the course of seventeen months starting from 1990 and ending mid 1991, there was a series of kidnappings and murders that rocked the Knoxville area. Women of all different background were disappearing- Knoxville had twelve women missing by the time Agent Gideon, Agent Hanes, and myself were called in. Two days after we had arrived, we found a burial site in an abandoned housing development wooded area filled with the graves of ten women," Hotch stated. He stood in front of the entire group of agents and actually felt like he had some form of control. Minus Camen and Agent Peter Ho, all of the agents were listening to every word he said.

Hotch paused to take a breath, but was cut off by a small agent, sitting behind Camen.

"What happened to Agent Gideon?" she asked. Reid flinched at the comment and received a friendly squeeze from JJ. Hotch shot a glare at the agent and retorted, "He couldn't handle the job anymore so he quit."

"So like you?" Agent Ho answered, the agent who had been making snide remarks about Hotch for the past few months. Morgan almost sprung at him, but Rossi once again stopped him before he could.

"He burned out." And I attempted suicide

"Basically what I just said. So tell me, Mr. Hotchner, why should we trust you? You ended up in the psych ward."

Hotch narrowed eyes before answering in a calm yet angered filled voice. "Because I'm the only person that can help you capture this killer."

"You couldn't do it the first time. What makes now so different?"

"Because at the time I was your age and was inexperienced and arrogant."

Ho opened his mouth before closing it again, speechless. Unfortunately as if an imaginary baton was passed from Ho to his mentor, Camen stepped into the fight. "He's only pointing out what he sees: a very poorly trained, unqualified team of agents."

"My team should not have been punished for my actions regarding my dealings with Foyet," Hotch retorted.

"You should have been more responsible. A leader knows that."

"Well, the situation is done and I believe that we need to focus back on the case."

"Fine- I do believe a team's qualities mirror the one's of their leader."

"Which is why I ran the A team and you ran the B team," Hotch answered, not even looking up from the file. Morgan bit his lip, fighting hard not to laugh. Good to see him back with some snark in him.It's really good to see life in him again.

Knoxville Police Station

As soon as the teams arrived at the police station, Camen turned and faced the A squad. Hotch stood next to Allison, confused over the fact that the B squad was setting up and the A squad looked like they were children about to be reprimanded.

"A squad, you know the rules. You stay here, do your jobs, and try not to screw things up. My team and I will be back soon." Once his agents dropped their stuff of in a small conference room, Camen and his B squad walked out of the police station.

"What-why aren't you guys going with them to the scene?" Hotch asked in confusion. He knew his team: Prentiss and Morgan would have argued with Camen until they found themselves suspended, Rossi would have found some sneaky way around it, and JJ and Reid would; do as they were actually doing right now-riding it out the best that they could.

He felt like he was in the twilight zone.

JJ spread the files out onto the desk, "We don't actually get to go out in the field. Camen and his squad do the fun stuff and we get to sit here and twiddle our thumbs after he buries us in paperwork. So you can work an aspect with one of us in our assigned jobs or just be a general guide."

Assigned Jobs? My team is better than being treated like children! Hotch suddenly muttered, "That's it."

Rossi tapped his shoulder in worry. "I'm sorry?"

"I'm sick of the stares and the complaining and the….because peoples' lives are on the line, we aren't going to treat this like a game of power," he stood up and glared at his team, "I had hoped to believe that if I'd ever left the team that you all would be able to handle yourselves, but I'd never expect you to let an agent with piss poor FBI skills to knock you down!"

Reid, Prentiss, Morgan, Garcia and JJ exchanged guilt ridden looks amongst themselves. Hotch lowered his voice and continued, "I know that I'm here as a guide and I'm not in charge, but- but I'm taking back my role of authority while we are here. You find anything pertinent to the case; you report it to me first. That's the point of a team; we all have to work together." Morgan shifted uncomfortably in his seat at the last statement.

Hotch quickly glanced towards him and thought, Hope he understood that. "If there are any problems with Camen, tell him that he can come to speak to me about it. Do I make myself clear?"

The chorus of six, "Yes, sir," added a bit of excitement to Hotch's mood; Rossi only stood back and watched the ex Agent be himself. "Prentiss and Reid, go back to the old dumpsites. See if you can find anything surrounding the dumpsite that may differ than the new ones. That can tell us for sure if we are dealing with a copycat. JJ, we had initially thought that he could be in construction or forestry since both dumpsites where in areas marked to be developed for new housing. I need you to look at any companies in the area that would have any employees pushing 60. Garcia, you work with JJ on that; I also want to know if there were any similarities in anything in the lives of all the women-all of them, including the first thirty and the new five. Dave, you and-you and Morgan go to the coroner's office and take a look at the bodies. Ok?"

His team members instantly scattered throughout the rooms to their jobs; all had grins about getting into action. Rossi passed by Hotch and whispered, "Welcome back."

Farragut Coroner's Office- 20 miles from Knoxville Police Station

"Why are we so far away from the city?" Morgan asked, stepping into the building.

"7 car pileup and these bodies from a 20 year old case? Knoxville's coroner is being overrun with bodies right now. Farragut, Tennessee decided to lend out a helping hand."

Morgan bent under the low railing and asked Rossi, "So Hotch is still livid with me?"

"I don't know if livid is the right word, Morgan. Beyond pissed kind of sums it up a little better."

Morgan pushed open the coroner's door and flashed a badge to the secretary. "I understand."

"Hey, he gave you eye contact and said your name. I call that progress from the last five months."

Suddenly, the coroner stepped out and disposed of his gloves in a trash can. "Oh," he said, with sudden surprise, "You guys must be the FBI guys…again. I thought two agents already came by?"

Morgan smirked as Rossi said, "We're the more attractive, smarter version of those two agents. We'd like to get our own look, if you wouldn't mind?"

"Of course, not. Follow me."

The coroner stepped next to two bodies and pulled the sheets off of both. "Both died from very high levels of the toxins that black widow venom in their systems. One bite from a black widow in a person probably won't kill them, but the levels in these bodies and I assume the ones that I haven't got to yet had six times the normal level. I was just about to call you guys," the coroner lifted one of the bodies and pointed to a small part of the back, "because I found that what was first assumed as a single bite mark was actually post mortem."

Morgan bent down to get a closer look, slightly taken aback. "What do you mean?"

"Well, if there were repeated bite marks, which is one of the only ways to get that much venom into the system, there would be signs of it. When I look closely and analyzed the bite mark, I found a needle injection site that probably healed over time."

"So he injects them and has them bitten after death to throw us off. This guy's smart. Thanks Doc." Rossi started towards the entrance and asked, "What are you thinking?"

"Someone with training in entomology, forestry, or even botany. It explains how he works with the bugs so well and how he finds these dump sites. Why wasn't this caught before?"

"Because they weren't looking for it."

Knoxville Police station conference room-1 hour later

"Ok, so Morgan just called to say that they are on their way back with some news about the COD. Prentiss and Reid should be back any moment now," JJ told Garcia who was halfway through digging through the victim's lives.

"Si, madam. I have to say, it feels so good to have the whole squad back together, even if it's only temporary."

JJ chuckled and looked up in time to see Reid and Prentiss sprinting into the room and closing the door. Both were out of breath and were grinning.

"You two ok?" JJ asked.

"Where's Hotch?" Reid asked. Prentiss turned around and peeked through the blinds.

"He went on a break an hour ago. He should be back with Allison- did something happen?"

Reid peeked through the blinds with Prentiss. "We received a call from Camen that he and his squad are on the way back and he's livid."

"What your-oh…" JJ spotted Hotch and Allison walking towards them, both totally unaware that Camen and his team had just walked through the door. Although they couldn't hear the chatter through the main room, they could hear Camen yell, "Hotchner! A word!"

"Oh, this is bad-"

"Yes!" Garcia exclaimed, "Think this is the final round?"

"Of course, not," Prentiss laughed right as Camen nearly dragged Hotch into the conference room. He barked, "Out! All of you- Now!"

After being ushered out the room, Camen slammed the door shut in their faces. The A squad huddled together as near to the conference room as they could get without Camen or Hotch spotting them watching. The B squad only stood dumbfound behind Allison, who was watching the A squad giggle in glee once Hotch and Camen began arguing. Unexpectedly, Prentiss turned around and exclaimed, "Allison, you alright?"

"I've-I got to say. This is a much more dynamic, family oriented team than the one I met in January."

"Aww, that's so nice."

Rossi glanced to his teammates and directed, "We need to get back to the case."

Morgan answered, "Most of the evidence files- pretty much everything we have on the case is in that room."

"So what do we do?" Reid asked.

"We wait until the battle of the titans ends."