Aaron
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Chapter Thirty-Six: Riley Revolt
Thanks to my amazing beta, Blythechild!
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It felt like he was strapping himself into the skin of the man he'd used to be. Shirt. Suit jacket. Tie. Weapon, holstered. In the hidden pocket inside his jacket: the folding mirror to look around corners, a switchblade, a pocket flashlight. All small things that had saved his life before and might again soon.
He kissed his son goodbye—so soon since saying goodbye to him the first time—and got into his car. Alone, he drove to the airfield and into a hive of activity.
FBI windbreakers everywhere. Three large SWAT helicopter transports stood waiting, buzzing with airfield personnel running last minute checks on them. There were SWAT logos dotted among the yellow FBI. It was barely dawn, the sun a soft glow on the grey spring sky.
Aaron stood back and watched for a moment until he saw a profile he knew, and then he stepped once more into the shoes of Hotch and walked into the chaos.
Gideon turned to face him, his expression as eagle-eyed and sharp as ever. Rossi, Blake, and Morgan stood to the side, all of their faces tight with tension and ready to board. Morgan and Rossi had been recertified and passed field clearance a month ago. Hotch, two weeks before when both Strauss and media pressure combined to force the issue.
They'd been wrong. His acts hadn't caused war. Instead, there was a social uprising against the therian isolation that had allowed this to happen in the first place. There were protests, bills, scathing newspaper articles. Two of the men accompanying them today wore body-cams—and there was every chance that the footage obtained would be used to further relations between Efisga and the United States to ensure that not only was justice obtained for those who'd been hurt, but also that nothing like this was ever able to happen again.
Born American, Still American, shouted the protestors. Bring them home.
"There is," Gideon began calmly, seemingly unbothered by the thwop thwop of the rotors beginning to turn on the transports behind them, "a new bill being put forward. Enabling free crossing of all therians over the Efisga border, as part of an understanding that any therian born belongs equally to both countries."
"Oh?" said Hotch quietly, well-aware of the law. And who was heading it, with Elizabeth Prentiss's help.
Quinn had wanted to call it Felicity's Law. Emily had gone terribly, terribly silent when the woman had asked permission. Aaron had left the room to avoid seeing Spencer comfort her. Yet another reminder that there was now history between them that was deeper and stronger than anything Aaron and she had ever forged.
He was angry, of course. He was angry that this had happened to them. He was deeply jealous of the way she'd turn to Spencer and not him for comfort, as though the years of companionship before they'd been a pair meant nothing. He was hurt by her shunning of him, despite being cruelly aware he probably deserved it. And he was heartbroken too, because she had been hurt and she was still hurting, and he didn't know how to fix that for her.
But mostly, he was stunned. His feelings, as twisted and chaotic as they were, were nothing compared to the stunned awe of seeing Oliver in her or Spencer's arms. Of seeing the blank, broken look in Spencer's eyes vanish when his son bounded up to him, or seeing Emily's mouth turn into an automatic smile as soon as the pup did something remarkable. He was stunned, but not surprised, by seeing how amazing a mother she was—he'd always known she would be. He was stunned by how much Jack immediately loved the new puppy.
He was stunned by how much he immediately loved him. From the instant he'd picked up the screaming toddler and carried him back to his father in Efisga, he'd known. Oliver was Spencer and Emily's son—that was unmistakable—but he was also absolutely Aaron's pack.
And pack raised their young together. Oliver was his, just as he was Dave's and JJ's and Jessica's. Which meant that the ghostly memory of a black-furred girl, just as sharp and ferocious as Emily herself was, was a part of Aaron as well. An integral, important part of his person.
And that meant that he was going to tear this compound apart, not only because of what it had done to Emily and to Spencer, but also because it still had a member of his pack. No one hurt a member of his pack. And if that meant that he carried the girl from there and once again placed a child that a small, selfish part of him whispered should have been his into Spencer's arms, then that was what he would do.
Then he would bring them all home. Not just Riley and Spencer, but every other taken wolf. And he would spend the rest of his life atoning for that selfish part of himself, and also for the fault he knew lay with him for them being taken in the first place.
"Hotch." Hotch snapped back to attention, turning his head to Dave and noting the raised eyebrow and half-smirk. Apparently, he'd been talking to him for a while with no response. "It's time to board."
So it was. Hotch nodded and turned silently to the helicopter he was taking. He wasn't leading the raid—he was just boots on the ground—but he was leading the wolves of their unit.
One of whom was standing there, his head low and his hand curled by his side as though he was unconsciously still leaning on the support of a hospital-issued steel cane. Hotch approached him, shouting over the noise of the helicopters as their hair whipped around their faces.
"Time to go," he called. Spencer looked up at him, studying him with the now-familiar wolf behind his gaze. Something in Hotch rankled at that look. It wasn't the look of the subservient. It was a look much more at home on Dave or Emily than it was on Spencer Reid.
Some part of him gloried in it. No pack would ever shove Spencer Reid around again. He was, finally, his own wolf. One day, Aaron would know him well enough to tell him that.
"You're leading us in?" Spencer asked quietly, almost too low to be heard. But Hotch's senses were on overdrive; he was vividly aware of not only Spencer's words but also his racing heartbeat and his anxious-wired scent. He could smell Emily on the man's clothes and skin, Emily and Oliver. Coffee on his breath. He could hear the soft crunch of footsteps approaching and see the way Spencer's eyes darted over Hotch's left shoulder and widened slightly.
"No," said Hotch, turning his body to make sure who was walking towards them was who he thought it would be. It was. "You two are, together. I don't know how you work together, and I've never worked with him. But I trust you both. You know the layout. And you know where the children are kept—they're our first priority."
Ethan Reid stopped, a careful distance from them both, lowering his head for a heartbeat.
"You'll be moving against people you've known and called your pack for years," Spencer said, his eyes on Ethan. Nothing brotherly showed on his face—simply calm professionalism. The agent of old, ascertaining whether his team was fit for the task at hand. Profiling. "Can you do that?"
Ethan's head snapped back up, his mouth in a firm line. "You're not the only one with children to save," he replied. "Everything else is irrelevant."
Hotch nodded. Good enough for him. "Welcome to the team, Reid," he said, and turned back to follow Spencer onto the chopper.
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They rested for a night after the eighteen-hour flight at a base camp south of a long ridge of arctic mountains. This far north, it didn't feel as though winter was over. The snow was thick, the air was icy, and every SWAT and FBI logo was quickly covered by layers of lined parkas and hoods.
Three hours before they were due to leave, as the arctic sun scooted oddly around the horizon as though tethered invisibly to the earth by a short leash, Hotch realized Spencer wasn't sitting by his brother. He wasn't in the helicopter. He wasn't pacing by the riverside or standing by the cooking fire.
Hotch found him on a windblown slope, staring at the distant mountains with a strange look on his face. Wary. Distraught.
Wistful.
"They're beautiful," Hotch said quietly, because they were. Miles away, a herd of caribou moved across the icy tundra. White hares watched them from the slope where they fed from the brown grasses unearthed by the wind. "The mountains, I mean."
"They are," Spencer replied. His voice was soft. Hotch stood beside him and they watched the sun rise slowly.
Hotch didn't know how to span the impassable distance between them. They were close enough that the fog from their breath was mixing together, but the years and Spencer's trauma and Emily sat between them. Yet somehow Hotch knew; if he wanted to ever be a part of Emily's life again, or her children's lives, he needed to find a way to reach across.
And that way wasn't through Emily. He couldn't see Spencer just as a facet of his need to reconnect with the woman he loved still—that wasn't fair on either of them.
So he did what he should have done eight years ago, when a wolf with fur like butterscotch had walked into his life and awkwardly shook his hand.
"Tell me about them," he said, looking once more to those distant mountains.
Spencer looked at him, as though trying to spot a trap. He heaved a breath that would have burned with how cold it was. And he began, cautiously, with, "Emily—"
"No," Hotch stopped him. "Not what Emily thought of them, Spencer. You suffered too. This is your story as well."
Spencer stared.
"I don't know what to talk about," he said finally, heavily. His shoulders slumped a little. "It was cold. It was dark. It was both those things, unless I was home in the den I created with Emily. And then it was warm and small and contained and it felt as though my entire heart was beating just for that singular space."
Hotch thought of the people they were going to be bringing home with them and the fight they had ahead of them to ensure that all those people could remain home. And then he thought of those who would never be coming home.
It was risky. It could backfire. He knew Emily refused to speak of it, and Spencer had followed suit.
Here, standing on this slope alone with the other man, as equals, he thought maybe it was time that one of them did talk about it.
"When people ask me how many children I have, I say one," he said. Spencer stiffened, his scent sharpening. "I never held Jack's brothers. There were four, you know. Four apart from Jack. I had them buried with Haley, and none of them have names."
Spencer was silent.
"I don't grieve them as children; I grieve for the potential lives they could have been." Hotch stepped closer. For the first time, Spencer didn't step away, and their breathing was rough with shared pain. "I grieve for Jack, who is going to grow up alone. I grieve for Haley because I lost her. Perhaps if I was the mother, if I'd carried them, their loss would hurt more individually… but it doesn't. And I think of myself as a father of one."
"Emily filled out a form in the hospital," Spencer whispered, almost as though he didn't want to be heard, "and she listed herself as having two children. I did the same. Legally, we have two dependants."
I want to call it Felicity's Law, Quinn had asked, and Aaron had only wondered for a moment who Felicity was before Spencer had made a noise like his heart had shattered irreparably. And he'd remembered—Emily hadn't only carried two.
"I have three children," Spencer said roughly. He was staring at the mountains, but Hotch doubted that was what he was actually seeing. "I am a father of three. And those mountains were her home. I raised her there. I named her there. I was there when she opened her eyes for the first time in a den hidden in a ridge on the mountainside, looking out over a valley of ice. I was there when she walked for the first time, when she spoke for the first time, when she laughed for the first time. And then I took her from those mountains to die."
He turned now, away from the view and back to Aaron, and his eyes were pain. "Those mountains are all I have of her," he finished, closing those hurtful eyes. Something in Hotch's chest twisted, crushed, and he felt again a whisper of the agony he'd felt the day Haley had died. "Those mountains are Felicity. And you'll never know her. Nothing I do can change that."
"I can," Hotch said. He thought of a yellowed letter tucked carefully between the pages of a book. "I can apologise. I was never a pack leader to you. I excluded and isolated you, even if not consciously aware of the damage I was doing. In that, I was no better than the wolves who abducted you. And I was wrong. Because of that distance between us, I wasn't there when you were taken, and I admit, my first thought and concern was of Emily."
"She was your…" Spencer winced. "…mate. Of course you thought of her first."
Hotch wondered just how close they'd gotten, in the long frozen nights of the mountain winters. If they'd huddled close simply for warmth or if they'd found something more in each other. There was nothing sexual in their touches now, no burning need—but there was a deep emotional aspect to the way they held each other, the way they approached each other, that was so much more than he'd ever had with her.
And then he shoved those thoughts away, because they didn't matter. The past was the past. Pack was pack.
Whether or not he ever called himself her mate again, she would always be pack. The rest didn't matter.
"Run with me," he offered cautiously. "I've considered you my pack for some time now, Spencer. You've never run true with a pack. There's so much more to it than what you know."
"I… don't know…" Spencer murmured, averting his gaze. "I've never had a pack that was… well, I had Emily. And the pups."
"You still do," Hotch said firmly, because he refused to let the man believe that he'd lose his family to Hotch—not ever. "I don't need an answer, not right now. But I am asking you to run with me—even if just this once."
"Here?" Spencer's eyebrow rose, his mouth slipping open slightly.
"We have three hours." Hotch began to unbutton his parka, looking about for a tree to stow it in to keep it away from the frozen ground. "It's not the mountains, no, but you can show me what it was to run here." He was naked only a moment before shifting, the air stunningly cold and taking a long second to recover from as he hunched and shifted in his thick coat.
When he looked up again, Spencer was a wolf and he wasn't shivering at all. And he didn't look even slightly small, with the mountains outlined starkly behind him. He stood easily on the snow with his paws spread wide to hold himself up, completely at ease in this world. And suddenly, Aaron fully understood how this man had carried his family so far, alone and without a pack.
Show me Felicity, Aaron said, brushing the strange, clever mind in front of his with a cautious touch designed for an acquaintance and nothing more.
After a slow beat of nothing but breathing, Spencer returned the touch. Just as cautious.
Then he slipped into Aaron's mind, his pack mind, and replied, Follow me.
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It was a split-second movement, but Hotch had built his career around noticing what others found unnoticeable.
"Does anyone have any reservations about the planned entry?" the raid captain asked, and Spencer twitched. His mouth thinned.
And Hotch said, "Agent Reid does."
A split-second movement. And in that moment, if Spencer had been who he'd used to be, he probably wouldn't have said anything. Except he wasn't that man anymore and instead he said, "We can't make this entry. Not like this."
The captain looked at him. Looking him up and down, from his barely-healthy weight to the gaunt look that still lingered in his eyes. Weighing him up.
"Justify your response," he said finally, with a reluctant tone in his voice. And Spencer did, right before outlining a new plan. Hotch listened with grudging respect. When Spencer was done, he backed it. It was a solid plan. Anything to avoid another Waco.
Not one person objected.
It would take them another day to make it to the compound using Spencer's plan. "We have to make a detour," Spencer had said with a thin smile, holding something in his hands. Hotch could see white material, folded carefully, but he didn't know what it was.
"Alright," said Hotch with a calm he was learning to feel. "Lead on."
And here they were. The human body is weakest at four a.m. Spencer had told them. Therians aren't any different, no matter what species. We're fundamentally tied to our circadian rhythm, and that's permanently set to 'homo sapien'. The world around them was silent except for the muffled whisper of wolf paws on snow. They ran in a point—all twelve wolves who'd made the trip with them with Spencer and Ethan leading the way unerringly over a frozen, dark world.
It felt as though they'd left everything else behind. Hotch shivered, his paws skipping a beat. Dave brushed his mind against his, a touch of support, but no one said a word. They were slipping in like ghosts of the compound's victims. Fifteen miles from where the helicopters had dropped them off in order to travel unheard over the snowy wastes. It was a nothing distance for a healthy wolf, even ones laden down with bullet-resistant vests. They ran into a foggy bank that pressed down on them and muffled every sense, but neither Spencer nor his brother faltered.
They pushed on until suddenly, as though they'd sprung out of nothing, they were slipping through a town made of silent, squat housing with windows heavily covered against the bitter chill. No dogs barked. No lights gleamed. It was a silent world made for paws and ice. They stuck to the shadows, of which there were plenty, and any tracks their paws made on the frozen crust of ice covering the roads were quickly covered by the light snow being blown about by a thin breeze.
Ethan led them straight to where they needed to go. Every sense straining, they were a dozen wired wolves sneaking to hunker down in the drifts of snow blown up against a brightly painted building.
Stay here, Ethan said softly, on a private thread to the other wolves. They moved to the sides, ducking into the snow and digging down. It was rudimentary cover, but good enough. In the darkness, no one would see where the snow was dug at or heaped—but dark fur would stand out sorely.
Hotch and Spencer, however, stayed. They followed Ethan into the building as he used his nose to nudge open the unlocked door. Of course it was unlocked. Who out here would wish them harm?
They stepped inside into the almost overwhelming warmth of the hallway after the air of outside. Paintings and murals ran down the walls, garishly bright in the dim light from low lamps set into the brick. The ceiling was low, the floor thickly rugged. Tiny coats and boots lined the hall. Their paws were silent, leaving wet marks on the plush carpeting. And deep into the building they crept. Spencer was almost vibrating with anxiety. Hotch nudged him with his nose.
Breathe, he sent, and Spencer inhaled deeply and nodded, bat-ears perked forward and nostrils flaring red.
Madeline? called a voice, a wolf stepping out from a room. She wasn't looking their way, instead looking down to a sticker-bedecked door across the hall, but they froze anyway. I told you, don't walk around all night, with your clicky claws on the tiles. You'll wake the oth—
She'd turned and seen them. Her mouth slipped open. Hotch tensed his muscles to leap.
Eleanor, said Ethan. It's me.
Ethan? the wolf gasped. But… they said you'd… you're supposed to be dead? You don't look very dead. Are you dead? Wait, does this mean Quinn is dead too? Or… isn't dead too… what's going on?!
Do you trust me? Ethan said roughly, striding forward. Hotch blinked. He'd never heard the mousey Reid ever sounding this forceful, and had figured so many years under the cult's thumb had crushed the fight out of him. El, you need to answer me, now! Do you trust me?
The woman stared at him. Yes, she said finally, her mouth closing. What's going on? Are…are we running? Tonight?
Hotch blinked.
Maybe Ethan was more like Spencer than he'd thought.
Yes, Ethan replied. And we're taking the kids—all of them. Get them ready. Quickly—and quietly!
The woman nodded, bounding into the room across the hall. Go down to the boys' dorm—wake them. They know you, Eth.
Wait! Spencer shoved forward, his eyes wide. Riley Re—Riley. A little girl named Riley, she's twenty-eight months old. Is she here?
The woman stared at him. There's no pup here by that name, she said slowly. Spence? You… you're alive…
Lionel's a lying bastard, Ethan snarled, slipping past to move down the hall. New pups, brought from outside without guardians—are there any of those?
Black fur with a white blaze on her chest, Spencer continued desperately. Hotch winced. He… hadn't realized how much like her mother Riley would look until this moment. When he thought of Emily's children, he pictured tan fur and hazel eyes. Oliver repeated three times over, all cautious eyes and worried tails. You must have seen her! Lionel took her!
There was a little girl, the woman said slowly, her paws shifting on the carpet. Hotch's heart sunk to the floor. In the dim light of the garishly cheerful hallway, he could see Spencer's hackles rising in panic at the woman's tone. She was… ill. Lionel said she was ill, that she was infecting some of the others. He sent her to our sister compound, near Fireside. Her and another he said required treatment.
Spencer was stock-still, his eyes blank. Mouth slipping open just enough that a glint of white was visible. And you let him? he snarled. The woman dropped; tail tucked and belly to the ground, instant submission to a more dominant mind bearing down on her.
Hotch had never seen Spencer truly furious before. He doubted that, before Lionel had taken him, the man had been capable of this kind of cold rage.
Spence, Ethan coaxed desperately, not now. We'll find her—I promise. But we're running out of time to get all the kids out. If this goes to shit, I want them safe! All of them!
Spencer swallowed, and then he turned and padded after Ethan, his shoulders down. Wait here, he said to Hotch, his tone clipped. Hotch didn't take it personally; it wasn't aimed at him. They don't know you. We need to move them out and into the outskirts west of here before the signal comes—and then move due north as fast as possible to make the rendezvous.
Will they come? Hotch asked.
They'll come, Spencer murmured, hate in his voice. We're using their own twisted ideals against them. Their children are taught that every adult has equal dominion over them, that they're the collective possessions of the entire pack. And they're taught absolute obedience to the pack and the greater good—they'll follow us like rats to the Pied Piper.
If he sounded almost vengefully satisfied, Hotch allowed him that satisfaction.
Go, he said, and lowered himself to wait.
The girls were first. Paws, all of you. On paws, the woman—Eleanor—instructed them as they filtered out of the room, blinking sleepily and yawning. Hotch counted as they came. Twelve. Now, shh. We're playing a game, everyone. It's a very important game—do you know it?
It's the sneak game! one of the children at the back said, older and dancing about excitedly on wide paws. We're gonna sneak in the snow, just like you taught us.
Quiet paws! chorused the others. And soft voices!
That's right—now shh. We start now. I have to get your coats. Everyone lay down, bellies flat. The best and flattest gets a prize at the end—older children, help your sisters.
Down they went in a wave of wagging tails and bright fur. Most of them peered curiously at Hotch as Eleanor shifted and went to work, expertly gathering coats and boots and affixing them to puppies one by one. By the time she was done, the boys were joining them, louder and bouncier than the girls had been. Small fights sprung up as the two groups meshed unevenly, shrill voices chattering in Hotch's mind like parrots. He counted; they were up to twenty-three now.
Is that everyone? he asked on a private thread to Spencer as Ethan and Eleanor worked together to get everyone dressed and quiet.
No, murmured Spencer, his ears flat. Riley isn't here, and Arlo is gone too.
Arlo? Hotch asked.
Spencer said nothing, just looked at Ethan and swallowed.
Ah.
Uneasy at the knowledge that two Reid children were among the ones missing from the dorms, Hotch stepped aside as pups lined up—two-by-two—in their motley array of coats and hoods.
I'm thirsty, one whined.
It's cold—my glasses are dirty—where are we going?—is there going to be candy?—who's that man?
Quiet, Ethan said. Enough force that every pup fell silent. As of now, we're hunters, all of us. We're a hunting pack of wolves, and if you make any noise at all, the whole pack goes hungry. We must sneak.
Towards the back, where the older children lined up, Hotch saw chests being thrust out proudly, tails held high. He fought back a smile, aware they were running out of time. Forcibly reminded of Jack the first time he'd caught a rabbit.
Here we go, Spencer said brightly, dancing on his paws. Shh shh, let's go!
Shh shh, let's go! the pups parroted, and they slunk as a wave of paws and fur towards the doors and out into the cold night air. The other FBI wolves closed in around them in a protective circle, and Ethan led the way behind the faculty and into the shadows of a frozen playground.
They moved quickly and with surprising silence for pups. Paws crunched on snow, occasionally there was a muffled sneeze, but all were soft noises that the wind whipped away. Hotch lingered behind the straggling line, keeping a careful eye out for anyone veering away, seeing Spencer doing the same halfway up the line.
There were three clicks in the receiver in Hotch's ear. Three minutes, he sent to Ethan and Spencer. They coaxed the kids on faster, with nips and noses, before they broke out of the shadows and onto a wide flat plain. Behind them, the sleepy town ranged.
Bellies down, Ethan whispered. Here's the surprise, everyone.
Flat in the snow, the children stared at him with fixed focus, all eyes wide and ears perked.
We've made this game even more fun! he continued. Now, some more friends of ours are helping out—they're going to make everything really loud in a second. Do you know why?
Because they're bad, a girl pup answered, popping up out of her flat position to answer. Like Lionel says—bad people come to tell us we're wrong.
They're pretending to be bad, Ethan corrected. So we get practise in what to do when the real bad people come. As soon as you hear the noise, we're going to run! Run as fast as we can, like a pack, towards the sea. Okay?
If we're against the sea, won't the bad people be able to catch us easy? an older pup asked nervously, his tail lowering. And take us to the places where we're not allowed to be pack?
A ripple of worry passed through the pups. One began to cry quietly. Spencer slipped into the lines, nudging her with a gentle touch, cuddling her close until she stopped.
No, because we have friends waiting for us there, Spencer answer, eyes flickering up to the sky where there was a dull thwop thwop beginning to sound out against the cloudy banks pressing down. Fog eddied around them protectively, but Hotch could see lights dancing on the white screen above. And they're going to take you where it's safe. But remember—it's just a game, so don't get scared. You'll be home soon.
The receiver clicked once. Hotch turned. Lights were beginning to flicker on in the settlement as the noise was heard. Voices called out sleepily.
Eth, Spencer said, nervous. More voices. More lights. Hotch winced as someone moved into view, before running towards the sounds and out of sight.
Wait, Ethan said firmly.
More light. The town was coming alive. The helicopters approached. Hotch tensed.
And the warning howls began as the source of the noise was discovered. Moments later: a siren.
The helicopters burst out of the fog, wheeling above.
Run! Ethan cried with a bark, leaping into the air. The pups squealed, spurred by his righteous energy, and rocketed forward into the white wastes.
They were running.
Hotch ran behind them; Spencer to the east; Ethan to the front; Eleanor to the west. They kept pups from straying. He used his nose and his teeth to goad the pups on faster. The wolves around them splintered away, leaving the four of them alone as they circled the settlement to ensure that no compound wolf followed the escaping pups.
A small pup stumbled and fell. The youngest of the pups they'd been able to get access to, the yearlings were tiring fast. Hotch picked her up, slowing to press the other small pups onwards. Any pups born this year were still being nursed in the medical facility, an area that Hotch sorely hoped would avoid any heavy fire—
Gunfire began behind them. Any pretence of a game faded as, at almost the same time, the fog cleared. A yellow moon glinted down on them, lighting up coats and glasses and wide, terrified eyes.
They were painfully visible.
Faster! Ethan urged. Quick, quick!
They ran. Little paws stumbled. Pups were whimpering, crying. Behind them, the gunfire was joined by another sally. Hotch winced. Both sides were engaging.
The sea loomed up suddenly, white caps of ice sparse on the blue surface. They scattered out along the shore, booted paws sinking into the frosty rocks and sand, the air foggy from their mixed breath.
Someone shouted behind them. Wolves howled. Hotch whirled, his hackles up, sensing eyes turning in their direction.
Where is he? Ethan asked wildly, eyes out to sea. Spencer stood next to him, his ears perked forward and his shoulders stiff. He said he'd—
He'll be here, Spencer replied firmly.
How do you know? The guy didn't even speak English. He might not have even—
Look! cried a pup. Hotch turned.
Through the blocks of ice, came the boats. A man sat in one. Hauled invisibly through the water, Hotch could see the ropes pulling the boats along dipping below the waves. He hadn't quite believed Spencer, not completely. Not even when they'd landed where Spencer had directed them and found the lighthouse there. Not even when the man with the shotgun had walked out to meet them, his expression fierce and trigger ready. Not even when Spencer had walked forward and held out the white coat.
But maybe—just maybe—a small part of Hotch had started believing Spencer about the boat and the seals when the man had led them upstairs to a papered room, and he'd found Emily looking back at him from a gorgeously detailed sketch by the man's bed. Two wolves, one black and one tan, facing a wild mountain range. The black wolf looked forward. The tan looked to the black. It was Spencer and Emily, and there was a wildness and a love caught in the sketch that took Hotch's breath away.
Woah, gasped the pups as one, as the seals burst from the water and gambolled around in the shallows to make the children laugh, to take their minds away from the gunfire behind them. Woah! they cried again, as the seals became women who moved swiftly to lift each pup one by one into the waiting boats.
It's okay, it's okay, Ethan told the ones who were frightened. They're our friends. Eleanor—help them. Get in that one.
The third boat, who goes in the third boat? Eleanor was asking. The number of pups on the shore was dwindling. On the boats, the man was showing the pups how to lay flat, to avoid any unlucky falls into the dangerously icy water. They can't go in alone.
Ethan and Spencer looked to each other. There was a long moment.
Find Arlo, Ethan said finally, wading out into the shallows. Please.
I will. Spencer shifted closer to Hotch, watching as the lightning fast changeover was complete and the women turned back to seals, vanishing back into the water. Come back at the signal.
Ethan nodded, in the third boat now with his paws on the helm. The man watched them curiously, his eyes ticking from Ethan to Spencer.
Stay safe, brother, floated back across the waves, and then the fog closed around them and they were gone.
Without a word, the two wolves turned back alone to re-join the fight.
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Their forces had surrounded the town with the compound wolves holed up in one of the centre buildings, a great hall that Spencer and Ethan had warned them would be where the wolves would mount a treacherous defence. They were armed, viciously so, and any of their men who risked entering through the dangerously welcoming open doors would find themselves walking through a gauntlet of fangs and claws and guns.
Hotch and Spencer found Dave examining the building from the north. They know the children are gone, he warned them as they approached. They're not happy. We could have a siege situation here.
Any casualties so far? Hotch asked. Dave nodded.
Injuries on both sides, one casualty on theirs. Male wolf tried to get the jump on Hawkins. Shot from behind. We don't know how many inside the building are non-combatants—there could be plenty of innocents in there for them to twist our arms with.
There are, Spencer answered, his voice distant. Looking back over his shoulder and frowning, ears flicking. You need to let me in there.
Dave blinked.
Hotch blinked.
What? Hotch asked, shocked. No. Absolutely not. You're not walking in there—
He wouldn't have sent Riley away, Spencer snarled, turning on Hotch. He wouldn't have! She wasn't sick. She wasn't contagious. It's too much of a coincidence, Arlo being gone too. Lionel is possessive, controlling. He doesn't like being beaten at his own game, and he doesn't like losing what he perceives as his own. He's vengeful. Sadistic. When I stood against him, he had me isolated for days in pitch black. He did the same to Emily when she refused his cause. He chased us for days to get back what he thought was his—my children. Why would he just send her away after fighting so hard for her?
Hotch considered that for a moment, before nodding slowly. Dave made a slow noise of distress, glancing around to the men ranged in position around them. Why would Eleanor lie about Riley being taken away? he asked carefully, needing to know where Spencer's mind was at before he made a call here.
She wouldn't. She has no reason to. She's always been one of Ethan's—there are those in that building there that are loyal to Ethan as well. He spent the years he was here building trust with the wolves of this pack. If it came down to it, some of them would follow Ethan over Lionel. Without a doubt. If they had a reason.
A reason… Dave murmured. A reason like Lionel turning out to be the snake he truly is?
A reason like Lionel doing the one thing we were indoctrinated into believing was the greatest sin of all, Spencer said firmly. A reason like hurting a child. We live for the children. They are our future, the hope of our species. Aaron, I spent months chanting this drivel. We are God-given the ability to create children and the care of them is our greatest purpose, the truest aspect of Pack. If Lionel has… hurt… Riley, in any way, his wolves will turn on him. He messed up.
He made them loyal to a cause, not to him, Dave finished.
Let me in there. Spencer stood strong and purposeful, his eyes burning and chest heaving under the FBI vest he wore once more. Let me approach them. They won't harm me—even though I ran, they still know me. They know Ethan. And there are those in there who will help me build doubt—if Riley is here, the key to ending this with minimal bloodshed is finding her.
The ambient sounds around them—the chatter of radios and men speaking, the wind, the distant wash of the sea—faded for a moment as Hotch stared at the man he still didn't really know.
He thought of returning home to Emily, without Riley.
He thought of returning home without Riley and with Spencer in a pine box.
He thought of none of them returning home, and instead finding their graves in this arctic night.
And then, finally, he thought of a little girl who was lost and needed them to find her. A girl of his pack. A girl that Lionel was hurting to gain revenge over a mother he'd tortured. Anger came. But it wasn't his anger, not purely. It was the anger of his entire pack.
Okay, he said, and squared his shoulders and hoped he wasn't making the wrong choice. But don't you die, Spencer. We've grieved you enough.
Spencer nodded.
The next twenty minutes passed quickly. Dave shifted back and returned dressed for the cold with a microphone in hand. They obtained permission for Spencer to enter the building alone.
He did. Every step across the empty ground between the ring of his colleagues and the building where they knew there were dozens of sights levelled on him was another beat of Hotch's heart that skipped. Almost without permission, he inched after the tan wolf vanishing through the open door, without backup, without a wire, without his vest...
"Steady on, Aaron," Dave murmured, resting his free hand on Hotch's ruff. "He knows his job. He'll be okay."
They waited. There was silence from within. This was good. This was what they needed. The less casualties the better. There were families of wolves Hotch had led here waiting at Junction for good news, not coffins.
There was a startled ripple from the tense onlookers, and Hotch whirled just in time for Spencer to burst from the doorway, bounding out. Other wolves appeared behind him, slinking nervously and their eyes on the guns ranged at them.
"Stand down!" called Dave quickly.
Lionel isn't here! Spencer howled, panic in his voice. They thought you had him—they thought we'd taken him. He'd be running—cutting his losses. This is his stressor, Aaron, his breaking point! We have to stop him!
Are they surrendering? Hotch asked, confused, as more wolves appeared. Spencer was acting manic, his scent frantic with fear, but the wolves behind him seemed scared and lost, not…
He's got Riley! Spencer snarled, turning on the wolves behind him. He has my daughter and he blames Emily for us being here—he'll hurt her to get back at us!
He wouldn't do that, one of the compound wolves cried out, but the others exchanged glances.
We protect our children! growled another.
He struck her that time… whispered a third. She was only crying. She was scared… she didn't deserve it…
Spencer roared, rage and fury turning his coyote call into a wolfish scream. The humans stared, eyes wide behind goggles and masks. Among themselves, the compound wolves bickered.
Why are we listening to Spencer! He ran from us—we offered them a home, and they stole from us and left! They've proven themselves untrustworthy!
Spencer snarled, teeth bared and hackles up. In that moment, he looked like Emily had the day they'd found her. Mad and wild and ready to spring.
Steady, Hotch coaxed.
"Clear the building of weapons," the raid captain was demanding, SWAT moving forward. "No one leaves this building. Hotchner, get them all shifted. I want every compound therian in human form and in one room. What's going on?"
Hotch turned to his wolves. Spread out, he demanded. Search every building, every outpost, every road out of here—any scent of wolf that's recent, track it. Go! He relayed the same information to Dave moments later as the man shifted to wolf and then back to human again, acting as the go-between for human and therian. Then he turned to Spencer: We'll find her, Spence.
How can you know that? Spencer cried, eyes darting about the foggy buildings around him, like he was trapped in a nightmare. Maybe he was. This was exactly what the man had been running from for years. You don't know what he's like!
I always said there was something wrong with Lionel… one of the compound wolves was saying, his eyes on Spencer. What he did to your mate, that was fucked. That room…
Spencer blinked. The room… he whispered, and then shuddered all over. The room! he cried again, and then ran. Past the loose ring of SWAT still armed and holding the perimeter, past Dave and Hotch who yelled for him. Past Morgan and Blake, and into the fog.
Hotch didn't hesitate. The other wolves were already searching, but he knew a single shout from him would bring them running.
He followed.
.
.
The front door of the squat, grey building Spencer ran unerringly to was locked and barred. Hotch paused, his eyes skimming it. It was a square, imposing structure. Medical, in the kind of way that a hospice was medical. Giving off the same gut-sinking vibe of lost hope.
People had suffered here. The fur along Hotch's back stood on end, his hackles rising.
Spencer darted around the door, his nostrils flaring red and his eyes wild. Scenting frantically. Hotch scented too. There was nothing but ice and salt on the air, to his nose. But Spencer had always been the best of them at tracking.
He didn't even call out, just darted away with his nose to the ground and head already turning in the direction he intended to go before breaking into a sprint. Hotch had to race to catch up with the smaller wolf, startled by the sudden speed.
Spencer— he barked, but the other wolf was gone.
Where are you? came a floating thought from behind them. Dave, leading the other wolves. Hotch touched his mind, leading him towards them, before chasing Spencer down as the other wolf skidded around the corner and began racing full pelt along a high-tension wire fence. Hotch skidded after him, and had a split-second to take in what he was looking at. The thick cabling that rose over their heads in an imposing structure, mounted on a concrete barrier. The warning yellow bars.
Spencer, no! he screamed, seeing Spencer's hindquarters bunch and tighten, ready to spring. It's electri—
Spencer leapt. Hotch screamed out loud, a wolfish, horrified roar, closing his eyes without meaning to as his brain expected to hear the snap-crack of the volts slamming through his agent's body, his nose expecting the acrid scent of burnt fur and flesh.
And then he opened them, to stare as Spencer scrabbled and climbed at the fence, hauling himself over the top and squeezing through the razor-wire strung up there. He left behind fur and blood as he toppled into the inner compound, but he made it.
It's turned off, Spencer threw back over his shoulder, racing towards a door. Hurry!
And he was gone, through the door. Hotch threw himself at the fence, clawing and scrabbling. His claws slipped, his paws tearing on the rough cables. It was too slick, too tightly wound for him to make it. He fell back to the ground. Tried again, falling once more. Spencer! he barked. Reid!
Paws raced up behind him, feet following behind. The other agents. Get in there! Hotch roared at them. Break the door down—or a window—just get in there!
There was a gunshot from within. The sound brought with it silence.
Hotch went cold.
He backed up. He ran. He leapt. His paws slid and slipped and found purchase, muscles screaming as he dragged his own weight up the sheer fence, clawing desperately for the top. A hand shoved at his haunches, boosting him that tiny bit more. "Go!" Morgan shouted, shoving him the final foot he needed, and he was over. Tearing through the thin gap between the razor-wire and the fence with his vest protecting him from the wire above, he tumbled forward and landed heavily, already moving through the pain.
The door hurtled up to him, the shouts of the people behind him growing distant. He slammed it open with his shoulder, already snarling as he lunged through. Spencer was a furious, snarling nightmare of a wolf, back arched and jaws gaping as he screamed with savage fury at the man standing with his back to the door and a gun on the wolf threatening him. Two children cowered behind Spencer, the larger one's arms around the smaller.
The smaller looked to Hotch, her eyes hidden being a curtain of knotted dark hair. Cried, "Mama!" and leapt up, running to him on clumsy toddler legs.
And a gun swept down. In that split second, Hotch met the eyes of the man who'd done this—the cold, blue eyes—and he knew how it was going to end. The man standing there hated the wolf in front of him; his hatred of Spencer was obvious and palatable on the air.
But he hadn't brought Riley to this cold, lonely room because of his hate of Spencer. He'd done it because he despised Emily. Because Emily had been, in some way, the downfall of everything he'd fought for.
And he wasn't going to die without hurting her one last time.
"You would have been a great wolf without that bitch," Lionel said coldly, looking once at Spencer. Hotch's ears popped and rung. He leapt forward into the ringing silence, knocking Riley down underneath his bulk. Her arms came up, wrapped around his neck, her eyes wide with shock as she registered he wasn't who she'd thought he was.
It took a split second. Hotch was pretty sure he'd leapt before the gun fired. Mostly sure.
Absolutely sure, when the side of his head exploded into pain and sound. A cacophony of white noise clamouring for attention along with red-hot pulses of complete disorientation. He slipped to the side and then skated back and then whirled along with the room spinning giddily around him, his balance and senses completely gone. Dimly aware of small hands digging tight into his ruff and dragging him sideways, and smaller hands clinging to his shoulder. Hauled one way and the other as his vison split and splinted and slowly reformed into six worried faces that became two that became six again, all of them wide-open and screaming soundlessly.
And the white-washed walls were red.
Hotch blinked and his vision returned. Almost. Mostly. Three became two and stayed that way, everyone moving around with a fuzzy ghost images of themselves following after. And, beyond the shocked children hanging onto his fur, two Spencers leapt onto two screaming men.
He used his muzzle to grab the girl in front of him gently, pulling her into his chest and covering her with his paws. The boy to his side was already burying his face in Hotch's fur, pressed against the wall and Hotch. Neither could see Spencer killing Lionel.
Hotch watched. He watched until his vision turned red and he became dully aware that he was bleeding and still deaf, still ringing.
He blinked and Lionel was a wolf and Spencer was in danger. Lionel was bigger, not as fast, but twice as strong. Another blink and Spencer was down, pinned below the rugged grey wolf's scarred jaws.
Hotch tried to stand. Tried to snarl. Failed at both. And he was going to watch Spencer die, lose him again.
I'm going to kill you, Spencer said calmly, his voice overloud in the silence of Hotch's deafened perception. Hotch froze. He could see, in between blinks, Lionel staring. But I'm not you. I won't take a life lightly. I'm going to show you why.
Lionel laughed, his teeth inches from Spencer's throat, and Spencer was calm. What? You're beaten, Reid. You've got no—
Hotch felt it before Lionel did. Benefits of being pack.
But Lionel had once run alongside Spencer too. So, when Spencer threw out the memories in a cruel punch to both their minds that sent them reeling, Lionel hurt with them just as much as Hotch did. This wasn't the gentle sharing he and Spencer had exchanged on the mountain. This wasn't pack members rejoicing together. They weren't even the painfilled memories that Emily had shared with him. These memories were tainted and red with hate, and they were everything that Spencer had bottled up and let seethe and fester during their long journey.
Hotch hit the ground with a gasp, barely aware of registering that Spencer was shielding the children from this hate, but it wasn't the room he was seeing with every blink anymore.
It was Felicity dying. Spencer had seen it. He'd watched. Hotch watched too.
It was the wolves who'd killed Felicity dying one by one as Spencer hunted them down with a ruthless intensity.
It was Emily convulsing as paralysis stole through her body, her eyes slitted shut and body wasted.
It was Emily snarled at him as they fought over a dead bird, barely a scrap of meat. The hunger was so fierce, so all-consuming, that Hotch would have killed her for the bird as well had he been in Spencer's paws.
It was a compound wolf finding him dying on the prairies. I could help you, the wolf had taunted, right as Emily's scream tore across the land. But I think they just found your bitch. You'll die like a traitor, Spencer. And it was Spencer using the last of his strength to stagger up and make sure that wolf never reached Emily.
It was death and it was hate and it was all the reasons Lionel had to die.
Stop! screamed Lionel, shocking them both, and suddenly he was gone. Shifted. Hotch was alone, adrift in his mind. He blinked and the room snapped into view, Lionel staggering towards the door. He looked down at Hotch, his eyes huge.
He was crying.
He was crying until Spencer walked up behind him. Walked, not ran, and grabbed his ankle, dragging him down. And Hotch was deaf, so he couldn't hear him beg, but he knew he was. But he wouldn't stop Spencer. Not after what he'd just seen.
So he lay there and watched.
He watched until Lionel stopped kicking, blood bubbling from white lips. But Spencer didn't let go; his eyes were wild and his lips curled back, and he struck again and again and again until those cold eyes weren't looking anymore but instead lost in a mask of red and pink and frothy white. His own hate and Emily's burned in him.
He was a wild wolf and Hotch didn't stop him. Until the door opened and black shapes filtered in through the narrowing lines of Hotch's vision.
He's dead, Spence, Hotch murmured, letting the ground finally pull him down. A red wolf lingered overhead, speaking but saying nothing. He's dead… don't let the kids see… he's dead… And the red wolf became a red man, holding his arms out for the girl to throw herself into, without a care for the blood coating his face and chest. He caught her easily, despite one hand reaching for Hotch.
"Gone!" cried the girl. "The cat is gone, Daddy!"
"Good," Spencer replied, and Hotch lowered his head. Good…
.
.
The bullet had skimmed along the crest of his skull, leaving a long groove of torn skin and fur, and slammed out through the bottom of his ear. The world around him was a muffled mess of skipping moments as chaos reigned around the shattered compound. And there was so much to do, and no one would let him do it.
"You were shot," Blake growled into his good ear, dragging him back to the medical bay they'd set up. Hotch gruffed at her, angry that his tail was betraying him and slinking between his legs. "Sit down and let the rest of us work!"
And he was deposited, unceremoniously, back on the mat where their medical team poked at the thick wad of bandages weighing down one side of his head. Hotch huffed again, just to be sure they knew how grumpy he was, and looked at the other inhabitant of the tent.
Spencer was sitting on a fold-out stretcher, roughly cleaned with his knees drawn up. Wrapped in his embrace, both thickly wound with blankets, Riley was a toddler with her head on his chest and her eyes shut. Fast asleep. Even from here, with her head turned so her ear was pressed against her father's beating heart, Hotch could see the swollen purple shadows under her eyes and the bruises and scabs littering the tiny hand that gripped his shirt. Huddled by his side, the little boy who'd been trapped with her was shallowly napping, snapping awake to stare wide-eyed at every sound. One of Spencer's arms was wrapped loosely around him, and Hotch shivered to see the similarity between the elder Reid and his seven-year-old nephew.
Outside, not a single wolf still fought. Every one of them had lowered their arms at the news of Lionel's death.
Every one of them had lowered their heads in shame and shock as Spencer had walked out into their midst holding the sobbing and battered Riley. She'd been locked up alone with no one but her cousin to care for her in the same room her mother had suffered in; Hotch wished Lionel was still alive so he could kill him again for what he'd done to this family.
And if any fight had remained in the compound wolves, it had faded as soon as Ethan had walked back into town at the signal with every pup unharmed behind him. "It's over," he'd said quietly to the assembled wolves. "What's happened here is over. No more."
Just like that, the wolves bowed their heads to him. Ethan barely noticed, his attention locked on the small, shaking boy plucked from that nightmarish room, but Hotch had seen. Whether he knew it or not, Ethan was followed. The pack looked to him for guidance.
They would be transported first to Junction, where the families of some still waited. From there, they would be taken to Sanctuary, where Efisgan officials would ascertain which of them wished to be returned to the States and which of them wished to stay. DNA tests would be run on the pups to determine parentage.
Ethan would be travelling with them, to both watch over those of the pack he'd walked with for so long, and also to find out which others of the children were his. Spencer just nodded blankly when he was told, exhaustion written all over his features. He was done. Whatever fight he'd had left in him, he'd used it up killing Lionel. He needed to go home to rest and heal.
He needed to go home to Emily.
Hotch understood that now. As much as it hurt, he understood. His place in their lives had changed. But that was okay, because they were all changed as well.
When the time finally came to move the wolves onto the transports and leave that cold, bleak place empty, Hotch walked by Spencer's side with Riley in her dad's arms, rugged up warmly against the cold.
Spencer suddenly stopped, his free hand lifting from Hotch's ruff into a sort of half-wave, half-salute.
Hotch followed his gaze, seeing the man from the boats standing on the outskirts, watching them with pale eyes. Not a wolf. He raised his hand in return and smiled, before vanishing back into the snow. Spencer's eyes lingered before he finally turned away.
Groggy with painkillers, the flight home passed in a hazy wash of sleeping and waking and sleeping and waking again. Hotch woke once to Spencer leaning over to point to something out the window as the helicopter banked, both he and Riley wearing large ear protectors. He thought he caught the word polar bear, but maybe he'd imagined that. He woke a second time to Riley asleep and Spencer staring out the window with the light catching his cheek strangely. He didn't need to ask what the man was looking down upon, because he already knew.
He wasn't awake at Junction. He missed Spencer bidding his brother goodbye. He missed Dave leaning down to check on him and murmuring, it's finally over, and the sheer relief in his voice.
He woke to silence and Dave helping him upright. "We're home," Dave explained, as Hotch looked around wildly. It felt surreal, to step out of the helicopter and find tarmac and city instead of open, wild space and whirling snow. He paused on the cusp of stepping down, shivering despite the thick fur he was trapped in until the doctors gave him the go-ahead to shift without damaging his wound further.
An ambulance stood waiting for him. The others who'd been wounded were already gone. Pilots and flight workers milled about sleepily in the fading dusk. Overhead, a soft spring moon replaced the fading sun, making the airfield hazy and indistinct to his tired eyes.
But it didn't hide what he looked down upon. Spencer, on his knees with his children in his arms, both of them. Oliver and Riley, hugging each other just as much as they were hugging their parents. Oliver was a wolf pup, wiggling and frantic, Riley a human.
Emily held them, one hand on Riley's chin and her cheek pressed to Spencer's. They were crying, all of them. They were together.
As the sun dipped low on the final day of their nightmare, she turned her head and kissed him.
And Hotch limped away, happy to be sad about this moment.