Note: I really hate having to leave you guys with no updates for such a long time and then returning with something that's... this short. However, I wasn't really sure what to do with a de-aging fic any more. But I think this is a nice conclusion to the baby arc before starting to age him up.
Garcia pushed the door shut behind her with her foot. Spencer was asleep in her arms.
Morgan stood at the doorway. He didn't come any further into the apartment.
"Listen," he ran a hand over his head, keeping his voice quiet, "I'm not gonna be able to stay here tonight. I've got Clooney and…"
"I get it. It's okay, Derek." She smiled at him, a little half smile still counted as a smile. "You've got to take care of your own life too."
"I just don't like leaving you and the kid."
"We'll be fine, Derek."
"I know." He grasped her upper arms, almost as if he were… afraid. He gave her a wry little smile. "Just… don't shoot a guy for worrying, okay?"
She returned his smile with an utterly sincere grin of her own. "Never."
His smile turned tender. "That's what I like to hear." He pressed a soft kiss to her forehead. "Stay safe for me, Baby Girl."
"Always."
He smiled and shut the door for her when he left. It was easy enough for her to lock the door after him.
Her apartment complex was reasonably safe, but there was no way she would ever leave that door unlocked.
Not with the kind of things she saw in her line of work.
And she didn't even have to face the bad guys.
No, she just had to see the pictures of the victims, see their smiling faces and know that that light had been snuffed out, that someone had been evil enough to… to do that to them.
Her lips twisted down in a frown and she forcefully directed her thoughts somewhere else.
She had a sleeping child in her arms and he was the most precious thing she had ever laid eyes on. It didn't matter how weird that sounded to her, since he had technically been one of her closest friends before… before this. It didn't matter how weird it was that he was growing up at a rate practically unheard of for children.
Or at least she thought it was. She had never heard of anything like this before, but it wasn't like she had ever done a google search for anomalies or anything of that sort.
Nope. Not going to think about that.
She was going to cherish this.
