A/N sorry for the delay in posting, but I'm a week away from my exams and literally every teacher of mine is trying to wrap up all the lessons before exam time, plus there's studying in there too. I've got one tomorrow (which I should be studying for, but I wanted to finish this chap first) and then the rest are next week, so I probably won't be updating for at least a week until this is all over. But, the good news is that after that I have the whole summer to write!
-Nightshade
I don't own Criminal Minds or any of the characters affiliated with the show!
Get Through
Chapter Thirty-Eight
"Five murders in Amarillo, Texas, all Caucasian males, heavily-built, bodies dumped in the middle of local parking lots overnight. The bodies of Anthony DiCosta, Evan Willoughby, Daniel Kramer, Cortland Zimmerman, and Craig Hollenbeck were found a week apart each, with evidence of torture, wrists bound in packaging ties, and the bodies wrapped in plastic." Hotch briefed the team on our next case while we were hurtling through the skies on our jet. Everyone stared at him intently, so focused that you could practically hear the gears whirring in everyone's mind.
"Five murders and we're only just being notified?" Morgan asked, flipping through the photos of the victims, noting that they all had a similar appearance. Thick, muscular neck and strong shoulders, firm jawline, dark, deep-set eyes, close-cropped brown hair. Ruggedly handsome, as some may say. They all seemed quite strong and would have easily put up a fight if they had to. I wonder how they're being restrained…
"I was told that they didn't believe that they were connected. The local Sherriff's office sounded pretty shaken up by it all though. I'm guessing they were hoping it wasn't as serious as it is." Hotch explained plainly, still flipping through police reports.
"Great, this could have been solved a lot quicker if they'd just stopped hoping and realized they had a problem." Morgan grumbled frustratedly. Hotch shot him a warning glance, causing the man's hardened demeanor to soften slightly. We all knew the feeling, there were always cases where we felt they could be handled better, but we all knew criticizing others wouldn't do any help. We all have to be human sometimes.
"Guys, I think our unsub might be a woman." Reid murmured, sketching something on a notepad of his as his brow furrowed in concentration.
"Why?" Rossi asked. He seemed to know the answer, after all he is a master profiler, but our boy genius looked as if he'd explode if he didn't finish his thought.
"Well, the torture aside, these dump sites are incredibly clean, with the plastic wrap and all. Plus male unsubs tend to kill their victims with guns or knives, or bludgeoning them to death, violent, messy kills. These seem very clean, perhaps they were smothered or poisoned." He speculated, shaking his head as he gesticulated wildly, as if he was pointing to an invisible whiteboard somewhere in the jet. At that moment, the screen of the lone laptop out on the desk chirped happily, and Garcia and Tegan appeared in place of the FBI logo.
"Office of Brilliance, Mistress of Knowledge and the All-Seeing-Sidekick here!" the perky blonde chirped happily as she waved some sort of feathered-pen-thing about.
"Whaddya got for us Hot Mama." Morgan drawled his reply, picking up their easy flirty banter.
"I've got toxicology reports from the Amarillo Sherriff's office on all five vics," she called, scooting on her wheelie-chair across the room, crashing into Tegan's and causing the young woman to squeal in surprise before wheeling around Pen, jostling her chair occasionally like a game of dodgems. Finally, when the giggling blonde made her way over to a screen on the far side of the room, she was back 'on the job'.
"Oookay, victim number one, Mr. DiCosta's toxicology report was essentially useless because the body was sitting out for almost a week in the hot Texan sun before it was discovered. But every other one pinged for a drug called Fentanyl." She read out, manicured nails tapping furiously against the keyboard as she spoke, almost drowning out the sound of her exuberant voice.
"Fentanyl?" Reid asked confusedly, flipping through his mental file folders for the correct one.
"Uhm." Tegan cleared her throat slightly, shuffling a little closer to the camera.
"It's a painkiller, opioid. About 100 times more powerful than morphine. It's supposed to act like heroin, except fewer hallucinations and more of a sedative effect. It causes some problems on the street because of how easy it is to OD on." She avoided looking directly into the camera, shifting about guiltily. It took me a second to realize why she was uncomfortable. The reference to her old life. The drugs. I suddenly wished I was there with her so I could comfort her, because she suddenly seemed so afraid of judgement.
"So it can be purchased without a paper trail?" Morgan twirled a pencil in his fingers while thinking.
"Uhm, yeah…" she muttered softly.
"Thanks Hon, that's actually a lot of help!" I added in, trying to cheer her up. Her raven and silver-tipped head whipped upwards in surprise.
"Really?" she asked, shocked. I could swear that the hint of a smile upon her face was pride.
"Sure thing Mini-Prentiss! Knowing the drug and its uses gives us just one more thing for my Babygirl here to look up and track! If it's illegal our unsub could have a record, and if it's OTC then there's a record of it somewhere!" Morgan joined in, causing Tegan to blush.
"W-well I'm glad to be of service." She nodded slightly before wheeling offscreen. Penelope signed off with her usual flourish, as well as a promise to type fentanyl into her computers and see if anything pinged. I hesitated for a moment, fretting over my daughter's reaction when Derek flashed me a quick glance.
"It's not easy to get over." He murmured, placing his hand on his knee before moving off into a separate corner of the jet to review the paperwork. JJ had remained silent the whole time, instead scribbling notes upon a pad of paper as to what she should include in a preliminary press briefing. I gently jostled her shoulder, jolting her out of her reverie before moving her over to the couch, upholstered a warm cream color like the rest of the jet, to take a seat. She sighed heavily, sitting across from me with her feet curled up at my thighs and her head leaning against the wall of the plane.
"Em?" she inquired breathily. Her eyes seemed to stare right past me, their usually clear depths curdled and milky with a worry that was as obvious to me as a smack in the face.
"Yeah Jayje?" I replied, reaching over to grasp her hand in mine, intertwining our fingers as if she'd disappear if I didn't.
"Do you ever get a feeling that this case isn't going to be easy?" Her voice seemed detached from her mind, as if she was speaking without putting any thought in it whatsoever, just her deepest thoughts and the outside world, no middleman. I struggled with how I should respond, not wanting to worry her but not exactly able to deny the own foreboding feeling tingling within my chest.
"Every time we get into this jet." I murmured, squeezing our interlaced hands. The team continued to toss out ideas along those lines, Reid scribbling something on an imaginary white-board while Rossi wove a little gold chain, the meaning of which was untold as of yet, through his fingertips. I simply sat with JJ in my lap, both of my arms snuggling her around the waist while reading an ME's report over her shoulder. We knew that as soon as the plane hit tarmac we'd be in business-mode, so it was nice to soak up what few moments of intimacy we could. Within the hour we were unlacing our hands as the BAU parted the red sea of reporters outside of the small sheriff's office. A broad-shouldered man with tired eyes, major 5'o clock shadow, and a beige state police uniform greeted us at the door with firm handshakes.
"Hey y'all, I'm Deputy Carson Welles, we're all real glad to have you guys here." He murmured, desperation inching slightly into his voice.
"Sheriff Delmonte's off on a call right now, people 'round here are pretty freaked out, but I can get y'all anything you need?" he led us through the lobby, crowded with more media personnel swinging microphones like clubs, and into an equally hectic office space, with phones ringing shrilly and interns and young officers calling across the room, just as shrilly.
'Okay, we need a room and some boards to start putting information up on. As well, we need you to open all your files for our analyst in Quantico." Hotch efficiently fired back, while the Deputy murmured something about getting that all in order for him. In about ten minutes, we had our own port in the storm so to say, a little back room with all the information we needed, and a direct line to Penelope.
"I've got a bad feeling about this one Hotch." Morgan muttered, watching Reid scribble arrows and compass grids and concentric circles all over a map of the area, trying to discern god-knows-what. Before the suited man could reply, Reid interjected perkily, pushing an irksome lock of his long brown hair behind his ear with his long, bony fingers.
"Actually, from the obvious 'type' that this unsub has, their apparent knowledge of medication, and the tight location in which the men were taken from, as well as the local dumpsites actually makes it fairly easy to narrow down a profile. As it was mentioned on the jet earlier, the clean, almost careful disposal of the bodies implies that the unsub is a woman. She could perhaps seduce our victim, get them alone, and then subdue them with a dose of fentanyl. The dumpsite makes it fairly easy to simply toss a body from the back of a car, so she wouldn't need to be particularly physically strong, plus the few sites that the victims were last seen at also had easy automobile access. So she's mobile, fairly well educated, and has some sort of personal connection to a man who looks like these victims." He finished breathlessly, picking the hair from his face once again before harrumphing in defeat and turning back to his board. JJ murmured 'haircut' under her breath amusedly before excusing herself to go deal with the massive horde of reporters that were seemingly duplicating before our eyes. Did the media just have extras on standby or were these people being flown in from neighbouring counties? Hotch didn't even feel the need to comment, just gave Derek a look that said get back to work before dipping out of the room to talk to the deputy who'd greeted us earlier.
"Greetings all you lovely people in the land of Tay-haas! It's the ever-popular Penny G Network, where calling in will nab you a creepy-creeper in one week or less! My satisfaction rate is through the roof…" An oh-so familiar voice crackled through the little Bluetooth phone-speaker-type thing that all police stations seemed to have.
"Hey Babygirl, can you get me something?" Derek leaned over to talk into the speaker, a sly smirk appearing on his face as they slipped into their repertoire of casual flirting.
"Oh, anything for you Sweet Thang. Hit me!" I took a seat at the table while Reid muttered something to the darker-skinned man.
"Can you use your little face-matching-magic software to see if there are any similarities between our vics and anything past recorded? And cross check any names you get with arrests or incidents involving fentanyl." Reid pointed to a wide blue circle on the map before interjecting.
"Plus look for names that are in a five-mile radius of any of the abduction or dumpsites. This unsub likes staying local." He added helpfully.
"Mmkay, Fentanyl, five miles, and a little dash of my microprocessor magic, coming right up! I'll hit you back with the results!" she chirped happily, fingers already whirring against the keyboard at a speed too rapid for me to comprehend.
"You'd better!" Morgan added, chuckling a bit before hanging the phone up, just as JJ whirled in, looking about as haggard as she did the night after the Hankel case. And it had only been a few minutes.
"I've done my best, but the press is sensationalizing the heck out of this. Without a preliminary profile I won't be able to hold them off much longer, they're already coming up with nicknames for the killer." JJ murmured, tucking into my side comfortingly as she talked.
"Well we're pretty damn close to a preliminary profile-" Morgan was about to say as Hotch re-entered the room brusquely.
"We'll have to deliver it later, they've found another body." He interjected tensely, already re-buttoning his suit jacket and gesturing for the rest of us to follow. I had a feeling that this case wasn't going to be an open-shut one, and I worried about leaving Tegan for too long. I know that she was healing well and she was fairly independent and I probably sound crazy and overbearing just by simply thinking it, but I worried. I would always worry. JJ squeezed my hand soothingly, reading me so well that I was almost worried I'd been speaking out loud without knowing it.
"Call her on the way to the scene, just to check in. If anything it'll calm your nerves." She murmured secretively, eyes darting back then forth before pressing a quick kiss to my cheek, with the promise of more lingering for later.
"I've got to stay behind and wrangle the media, stay safe Sweets." She reminded, flashing a tense smile before whirling around to confront the vultures. The two of us didn't quite have the whole romance-at-work dynamic down pat, so it was a little awkward, but we were working on it. We got through so much, this won't stop us at all. I did as she urged, dialling Pen's number and asking her to put my daughter on the line.
"Hey Hon." I murmured a greeting as I heard a sleepy yawn on the other end of the line. I had momentarily forgotten that firstly, we were on different time zones, and secondly, my daughter naps like a little cat. I find she's always a little more tired when I'm away on a case, and I can only suppose it's due to stress.
"Hi Mom, what's up? Is something wrong? Is JJ okay?" she asked in rapid-fire succession, suddenly sounding much more awake than she'd been seconds ago. A crash resounded on her end of the line and it sounded as if she'd knocked something over in her panicked flurry.
"Everyone's fine Tegan, just worried that this case is going to run a little long and I missed your voice." I soothed, jumping in the back of a waiting SUV and ignoring the few questioning looks I was given as they saw me on the phone.
"Oh, okay. Actually I kinda wanted to talk to you about something." Her voice was nervous and awkward and tentative, as if she worried I'd react poorly. On the other hand, I was curiously wracking my mind as to what this talk might be about.
"Okay, what's up Buttercup?" I mentally smirked at the rhyme, something that the old me would scoff at. I noticed Rossi signalling that we were almost at the scene, and I mentally cursed the fact that everything in a small town was ten minutes from each other.
"Umm…" she trailed off uncomfortably, causing my stomach to drop nervously. Was this bad news? What could be so unnerving that she's this hesitant? I thought we were surmounting the trust issues?
"I can't tell you right now. I want to talk to you in person if that's okay? When you're back from this case? Like, I don't want to ask this over the phone." She murmured quietly, almost ashamedly, while I brightened a little.
"Of course Sweetie. It'll be the first thing I do when I get back, okay?" I added, listening to her sigh from relief on the other end of the line. A few more breaths passed, but I was just content to listen to her gather herself for a few seconds. Every little thing she did was amazing to me, and not exactly in the cliché-keeps-every-art-project-the-child's-made-si nce-Kindergarten-and-acts-like-their-macaroni-scul pture-is-a-museum-worthy-piece, but in the way where I think where she came from, how she started. I remember that raspy, skeletal, jaundiced pile of bones with the sharp tongue whom I'd met in the hospital bed almost a year ago, and she doesn't even compare to the daughter I have now. Sure, she's still occasionally guarded and dodgy about her past, but she dances and makes waffles and smiles and laughs and has joy in her life.
"Okay Mom, love you, bye." She murmured before hanging up, hardly giving me the time to say goodbye. I shrugged it off, reminding myself that she got a bit peculiar when she was stressed, and that we'd be saying 'hello' again soon enough that it really didn't matter too much. I slipped the phone back into its holster on my belt and settled into my seat in the car. I barely had a second or two of silence before Hotch turned around in his seat to face me.
"Are you two doing okay?" he asked, a hint of concern shining within his cold eyes. I knew he had a right to concern, he was already struggling with the super-dad angle of his, balancing work and family, and from my understanding it had sparked a couple fights between him and Haley.
"I think so." I murmured softly, not really talking to anyone in particular, simply voicing the thoughts I hoped were true.
A/N what do you guys think Tegan wants to tell Emily? What's got her so nervous? And what's the feedback on the case? I don't write a lot of cases, so I truly hope it turns out properly!