Note: This was co-authored with the amazingly awesome terriblycontrite!

Notes:

Please note! As this fanfiction is cross posted on Archiveofourown it was formatted to fit there and simply transplanted here. This chapter loos SO much better over there. I created actual journal pages (images) that I am unable to use here.

All of the parts when JJ and Kate are reading that are in italics and/or in the middle of the page are part of the journal.

~CC~

Chapter 24

Unavailable

"I saw her," Dennis Andersen, the P.E teacher declares after no more than a glance at their photo of Amelia. "He called her Annie. She used to pick him up after practices. Not like she was friendly, never spoke to her, just caught a glimpse here and there."

"But you're certain it was the same woman from the picture?" Kate asks, eyes following as Dennis makes his way around the gymnasium picking up stray basketballs.

"Oh I'm sure." He confirms, tossing the ball in his hand toward a bin in the corner. "She wasn't from here. I'd know if she was. Pretty lady, not sure what she was doing with Ryan."

"Why do you say that?" JJ asks, standing on the sidelines with her hands tucked in her coat pockets. It is cold in the gym, this man is annoying, and she finds herself looking forward to returning to their warm suite at the Wood Buffalo Inn, so she and Kate can read through Ryan's journals.

"Ryan was a nice kid, don't get me wrong." Mr. Andersen qualifies, "but this was a woman, not a girl, and I'd never even seen Ryan with a girl. He was quiet, real introvert. Didn't have a lot of friends."

JJ considers that as she watches the man tidy the gym, resetting it for the next class to come in. "Do you think Annie was really his girlfriend?"

"He didn't talk to me about it, but I saw them kiss." The coach pauses, smirking. "Before that I thought she might be a friend of his moms. I mean, understand this was a woman I'd have given my right arm to date."

Kate suppresses an eye roll at that. "Ryan was seventeen. You didn't think to mention the relationship to his parents? To the principal? Or to even talk to him about it?"

"Hey, I didn't ask for her ID. I just knew she looked older." Andersen looks offended but motions them to follow him and his bin of balls into the equipment room anyway. "You're talking eight years ago…I had just finished college and taken this job. Guess I didn't think it through, I was practically one of the kids still."

"Great." Kate mutters, taking in the cluttered racks of sports equipment crowding the small room, that smelled pungently of sweat. She didn't want to be here anymore; this guy was getting on her nerves, and it felt like they were getting nowhere. Amelia just seemed to be able to move from place to place, undetected, with an ease that bordered on supernatural.

"I had never seen Ryan excited about anything before." The P.E teacher shrugs. "It was cool, and he wasn't far off eighteen either. I didn't figure he was doing anything that he didn't want to. Him, and any other seventeen year old boy."

"Anything else you can tell us?" JJ interjects, before Kate can say anything that won't help their cause. "A last name for Annie? An address? Did you ever see her around town? What about after Ryan died?"

"Why would I have her address?" Dennis scoffs, but does appear to give some thought to the rest of the question. "No last name, and now you mention it, no I can't remember ever running into her in town. Not once, before or after Ryan passed."

"And what about the snowmobile accident that killed Ethan Curtis, Thomas Watts and Eli Curley?" JJ presses on, her voice taking a cooler tone. They did their research, and she knows Dennis Andersen aimed to play in the NHL. "They were all into sports, avid hockey players from what we've heard…you coach them?"

The man stiffens, turning his back to shove some mesh bags filled with soccer balls out of his way. "I knew them from P.E class but I didn't coach them outside of here. Hockey isn't my game anymore. Why?"

"We heard they spent a lot of time harassing Ryan, that's all." JJ doesn't mind provoking Mr. Andersen if it will get them the information they need. She isn't a fan of his attitude, or of any teacher who turns a blind eye to bullying.

Facing them again after stuffing the bin of basketballs in place between the soccer balls, and a sorry assortment of gymnastics equipment, Dennis gives a hard done by sigh. "Yes, I guess they did. Ryan was…well some kids just seem to get picked on. I don't think it's right, but there it is. Ryan was moody, not half bad at basketball and soccer, decent at track, but he didn't love it, and maybe it seemed like he thought he was…above it?"

JJ gives him a pinched smile, finished with the conversation, before handing over her card. "If you think of anything else, call us."

She and Kate turn to make a quick exit, but she turns back thinking of one more thing the man might be able to help with. "Before we go, any chance you noticed her vehicle?"

Tucking the card in his pocket, he dips his head toward them in a dismissive way. "It was an old pick up, pretty sure it was a Chevy. Never saw the plate." His face turns suspicious, as if he's finally woken up and started thinking. "Mind me asking what you're after? Ryan's gone, been gone a long time. What are hoping to fix?"

Kate gives him a hard look. "Its Annie we're looking for. We would like to interview her regarding an open investigation."

Mr. Andersen takes a second, then laughs loudly. "Two FBI agents fly out on a private jet from Washington to question a nameless suspect? And to bug some teachers about a near ten year old suicide? I'd bet there's more to it than that. This might not be the big city, but we weren't all born stupid ladies."

Kate grits her teeth, JJ rubs at her forehead, and his laughter follows them all the way down the hall as they leave the gym.

"Ryan was remarkable, absolutely." Mr. Byron Atkinson, an English teacher's name if JJ had ever heard one. A wistful look crosses the middle aged mans face, from where he sits across the desk from them.

"His poetry was mature beyond his years, as is usually the case with talented youth. He favoured free verse, though he sometimes took a metered approach. He made little effort toward rhyming, said he found it too limiting." Byron waxes on, "he did some narratives for class that were superb, but a bit dark in subject matter. He did well with sonnets, even if he resented the need for structure, so perhaps he was in love."

"Would a person need to be in love to write a sonnet?" Kate asks, tilting her head in thought.

Byron chuckles and offers Kate a somewhat patronizing smile. "It certainly helps, though being scorned may be arguably just as effective. The iambic parameter, the structure, and the subject of love are what denote a sonnet, which, of course, Shakespeare was famous for, and that's what an English teacher is hired to teach. For the most part."

JJ gives a half smile at that. She can remember being inundated with Shakespeare's works in school. "I'm wondering, did Ryan confide in you at all? His mother said he mentioned you and thought he may have."

"Confide?" The man repeats, folding his hands on top of his large oak monstrosity of a desk. "Yes, we had a few conversations. He never told me he wanted to die though if that's what you're getting at." Byron eyes them defensively.

"You knew he was unhappy, that he was being bullied though? What did you do about that?" Kate's voice is hard, and JJ keeps her eyes on Mr. Atkinson to gage his reaction. "Kids spend more of their awake hours in school than at home, so parents need to know they're being supervised, protected. Was Ryan? Being protected, that is?"

Byron's glares at the affront, hands clenching. He takes his time to formulate his response. "Ryan might have been at this school for 6 hours a day, but those hours weren't all spent with me, in my class, agent. He told me that he hated it here, he dreamed of moving to a big city, like most kids. I told him his talent would take him there one day, I helped him enter contests, get published in newspapers. I tried to open doors, steer him toward script and playwriting, or journalism. Something he could make a career of. The point is, I tried, agents."

Kate sneers, leaning forward stiffly. "You told a sensitive boy, living in a perpetual state of despair, his emotional pain a daily torture, that someday, someday, it might get better?" There's a tense pause, pregnant with animosity, before Kate sits back again, crossing her arms. "Good for you, sir. Did he say anything else?"

Byron draws in a short, sharp breath, and while JJ thinks Kate was harsh, the man does seem suitably ashamed. Moving his hands to his lap, he looks down at them. "He told me about Ethan Curtis, the harassment, that he wasn't sure how much more he could take. I advised him to talk to his parents, and I went to the principal. Very little was done, but I told myself Ryan was a teenager and teenagers go through rough patches. I hoped things would get better." He brings his head up and JJ can see the guilt now, etched across a face that appears to have aged in the time since they walked into the classroom.

"You come north to places like this, where they need teachers desperately, because you think you're going to do some good." Byron keeps on, and JJ isn't without sympathy. After all, that's what the BAU is about too, trying to do some good in a world that fights you on it. "Then you meet kids like Ryan, and you realize it takes more than moving here to make a difference. I thought I did what I could, I know now it wasn't enough, that I should have done more."

Kate opens her mouth, but JJ shakes her head and gives her a pointed stare. She let's the teachers last words sink in before she speaks again.

"Did you know Ryan was dating someone?" JJ turns back to the practical. "Right before he died?"

He inclines his head once. "I did, he mentioned it. She didn't go to this school and I never met her, but it did seem to make him happy for a time."

"For a time?" JJ prods, curious about this man's take on the ghost of a relationship that seemed to represent Ryan's only light in the dark.

"Yes," he answers slowly. "It was a brief reprieve. After that awful accident that killed Ethan and those other boys, Ryan got worse again. The whole school was in mourning, I assumed he got caught up in it even if the boys weren't friends. Hard not to, all that sadness. I tried to talk to him as he was leaving school on the Thursday before he died, but he brushed me off. He was absent on the Friday and by Monday…well you know the rest."

JJ does know and it makes her cringe. This man conceivably missed his chance to save Ryan, and she wasn't sure if she should be mad at him for giving up so easily, or sorry for him because he will likely never forgiven himself. "I know it was a long time ago, but is there anything else you remember that might be helpful? Anything at all?" JJ coughs to clear the lump in her throat and moves on with the interview.

"I'm afraid not, but if I think of anything else, I'll be sure to let you know." Byron stands to see them out, coming around the desk and offering his hand to shake, eager for them to go.

JJ and Kate are out the classroom door and down the hall before he calls to them.

"Annie Little!" He shouts. "It's the name he would doodle in the margins of his notebooks. Could be the name of his mystery woman."

Dave had found it hard to stop working the previous night, but he is not as young as he used to be, and he eventually gave in to the call of decent scotch and a warm bed. Sleep didn't come easy though and returning to his office late the next morning he feels entirely wary of the continuing search for the ever-elusive Amelia Porter, and the mountain of paperwork related to it that remains heaped on his desk.

Tossing his phone down, he slumps into his chair, wondering why Hotch hasn't checked in again and what he's doing this morning. He had debated calling him last night after Kate and JJ called to say they landed safely and were heading for their hotel, but it had been late, and he didn't want to disturb the other men if they had managed to find some peace. Maybe they even slept in this morning, he thinks, though it hardly stops him from worrying. It's unlike Hotch to be so distant, and the last, and only time, Dave can recall him checking out like this was when Foyet was plaguing them and Hotch was losing faith. He didn't trust the team to help then, and it's beginning to seem like he doesn't now.

Dave leans back further, engaging in an internal debate, trying to sort out what's been happening to the team since this case went south, and what he should do about it. So far, Hotch hasn't been willing to confide in him, but Dave isn't clueless. There is only one thing that makes a man as rigid as Hotch toss rationality aside, and that's love. Back when Foyet was doing his worst, it was Hotch's love of his wife and son that made him vulnerable; now, near as Dave can figure, it's his feelings for Spencer Reid and that could spell trouble. This is not the time for Hotch to be letting down his guard and making rash decisions.

Deep into his thoughts on averting disaster, Dave fails to notice the clack of high heels approaching and is uncharacteristically caught off guard when an entirely too perky Garcia pops up in his open doorway. Sitting upright too quickly, his knee connects with the desk and he curses under his breath, before plastering a smile on his face to greet the intrepid technical analyst.

"Oops! Sorry, sir." She chirps, sounding anything but. "Didn't mean to startle you. I heard you come in, and I am hoping to share my newest findings with a warm body."

She doesn't wait for an invite before bustling in and seating herself in the only other chair, shoving Dave's own paperwork aside, to make space to offload everything she is carrying onto the desk. He watches fondly as she sets herself up, knowing that intervening would be like trying to stop a boulder rolling downhill.

"Think nothing of it, mio tessoro." Dave pours the accent on thick. "Now, I am always pleased to see your lovely face, but might I inquire as to where Morgan is this morning? He is generally your first choice of warm bodies."

She gives him an indulgent grin, taking a break from the papers she's been shuffling through, just long enough to give a flirty flip of her hair and a wink. "Well of course he is, but you, mio amato, are an excellent substitute since he has gone home to catch some z's. We are dividing to conquer."

"Ah, well second choice isn't so bad for an old man like me." He digresses, folding his hands on the desk top, studying his companion carefully. "What about you sweetheart? Did you get any sleep?" Penelope has a relationship with coffee and sugar that makes her appear wide awake with disturbingly little actual rest in Dave's opinion.

"Oh sure!" She promises, bobbing her head, without any real attention to his words. "I went home, took a shower, and had a long, luxurious cat nap. Very refreshing! Now I am back before you, better than ever, working at dangerous speeds, to bring you this!" She triumphantly produces a folder from the pile she brought along, pushing it across the desk into Dave's hands. "That," she tells him, "is everything in a nutshell, that Derek and I have found since we started trying to connect Amelia to Green, and Green to the cartel, and then Amelia to the cartel through Green…or something like that…anyway, read it over! There is some eye-opening stuff there that I really think changes our perception of Ms. Porter."

Relaxing back in her seat, Penelope appears content to watch him read, which he tries to do at top speed, though he can't hold a candle to Reid in that department. He can feel his eyebrows drawing together as he follows the trail that Garcia has marked for him, and while he can't begin to fathom how she managed to put it all together, in the end, his heart sinks because it really is a trail to nowhere.

He clears his throat, glancing up to meet her earnest gaze, which is trained on him awaiting his reaction. "Wow, this is…" he trails off choosing his next words carefully, "well it certainly is fascinating, Penelope. I honestly am not sure what to make of it all." That was the truth. "Lucas Olson inherited the Porters entire estate, but we don't even know how he knew them? Or if he knew Amelia at all."

Penelope shifts, her face hardening slightly. She was ready to defend her work, Dave knew she would be, and if he were writing a novel this stuff would be gold. As the basis for an investigation, it left him more lost than ever.

"No, not yet." Penelope qualifies reluctantly. "I do know that they were both drafted to the Vietnam war at the same time. They could have met that way. Serving together forms lasting bonds, you would know that."

"Fair." He responds, scrutinizing the file again. "How does Green connect with Lucas Olson?"

"Well, he doesn't so far." Penelope admits. "But they both connect to Amelia. That's the point."

Dave nods, wondering how much more mystery they can take on before they start solving some of it. "And how does the cartel factor into this?"

Penelope lets her breath out in an agitated sigh, reaching over to direct him to a different page. "Not sure, yet, but look! I haven't even shown this to Derek yet, I found it after he left. University records are entirely too easy to access if you ask me. Figuratively speaking, they put them in a locking file cabinet and then never bothered to lock it."

Dave is fairly sure that it's more complicated than that. More like they did not anticipate master hackers being interested in their files, so they failed to properly secure them, but that's a topic for later.

"So, legally obtained then?" He asks of the information he's holding.

Penelope scoffs. "Legal enough. I mean if you let me in the room, you can't expect me not to snoop."

Dave tsks but lets it go. "Oh my, so our friend Green really is a bit unsavory. Derek will feel vindicated anyway…wait, this is his original connection to Amelia? An affair when she was only 17?!"

What Dave is holding is a personnel file on Zelen Green, stretching back to when he first received tenure at age 32, documenting a disturbing number of misconduct complaints for a man still gainfully employed.

Garcia smiles excitedly, glad to have his full attention. "Uh huh, so it seems. He was quite the Casanova with his students, which the university frowns upon but isn't technically illegal. Amelia was the only under age girl he had relations with, and by the time it was reported Amelia was only days from turning 18. That's how it got swept under the proverbial dirty rug."

Dave can't deny that he's invested in the story now.

"Knowing Amelia enrolled in University at age 17, of course she must have graduated high school early, so I checked out her alma mater." Garcia keeps the conversation moving, eager to maintain his interest. "Now, if Universities are terrible at keeping secrets, imagine how bad high schools are! Ridiculous, but since it is to my benefit in this case we will talk no more about it."

Dave suppresses an eye roll. He's glad it will be Cruz that fields the paranoid call if someone becomes curious as to why they were hacked by the FBI.

"Anyhow, back to things that were swept under the aforementioned filthy rug!" Penelope exclaims. "Turns out Amelia only opted to graduate early after an 'incident', that should have ended in criminal charges, or at least expulsion, but instead was hushed up and glossed over in a big way. A student, Thomas Fuller, running back for the football team, was badly beaten outside the gym after practice." Garcia directs him to the police report amongst the papers he was given. "It's all laid out in there, and it is gruesome…severe nasal fracture, zygomatic fracture, 3 broken ribs…, bruising, lacerations, there was a chunk missing from his lip," Garcia makes a face and grimaces, "and believe it or not, a ruptured testicle."

Dave crosses his legs, wincing at the damage. "Amelia did all that? It seems hardly likely. This took some serious strength, not to mention anger. And how were there no charges?"

"Well, that's the thing." Garcia tilts her head, waving a hand at the report in Dave's hand. "There were witnesses who said Thomas started it, and with significant bruising on Amelia's throat, Thomas could easily have been charged too I would think, and Amelia could have claimed self-defense. Instead, everyone seemed to agree Amelia would leave school and no one would ever speak of the 'incident' again.

"Who were these witnesses?" Dave asks, absorbing that logic.

"Two friends of Thomas' and the gym coach. It was the coach who broke up the fight."

"We should talk to this Coach. He would be the most reliable." Dave thinks out loud.

"The last page you have there is his contact info." Garcia supplies, helpfully. "I also sent it all to your tablet, so you can access it there too. His name is Sean Adams and he's retired but still lives in Salt Lake City."

"As always you are magic, Ms. Garcia." Dave smiles widely at her.

"Oh, don't I know it! Poof, information where there was none before. I really should have a cape." Garcia replies with humor, but no modesty. "Wait though, you should know that according to school records Amelia could have graduated sooner, in fact it's debatable whether she needed to go to high school at all. Her grades were off the charts in all subjects, freshman year she scored 186 on the standard IQ test, and Spring of her junior year she scored a perfect 1600 on the SATs!"

Dave whistles through his teeth at that. "So, we are talking Spencer Reid smart?"

"It would seem so." Garcia confirms. "Though SAT scores on their own are not indicative, combined with her grades and IQ score, I would say she is, another verifiable genius, albeit a possibly evil one."

Dave quirks an eyebrow at her. "Possibly?"

Garcia looks over her shoulder as if she wants to ensure their privacy before she answers, which Dave thinks is a little strange, then says in a conspiratorial tone. "There's one more thing that I found, that might be something, or maybe nothing…I'm telling you first because Derek is definitely on board the 'Amelia is a crazed psychopath train' and I can't seem to convince him that-"

Dave holds up a hand to stop her there, suppressing a smile. "Penelope, how about you just go ahead and tell me, and I promise to keep an open mind."

Penelope bites at the corner of her mouth, glancing behind her again, deciding how best to present what she learned. "It's about Lucas Olson's murder." She blurts, then continues with her usual enthusiasm. "It remains unsolved, but the locals did have a suspect at the time, or rather three suspects, college kids from the University in Salt Lake City with an impressive history of trouble making."

Dave motions for her to keep going, not wanting to interrupt until he was sure he understood where she was going with this. Penelope takes a deep breath and Dave can tell she's as excited about what she found, as she is apprehensive about sharing with him.

"Lucas Olson was known to hire out his tracking and hunting skills privately on occasion, and these three suspects, Jaxson Caddell, Karson Lowe, and Landon Hart were the last people to hire him, just days before he was murdered. They told police they met him at his cabin, and he took them moose hunting, but that they had no idea what happened to him after that. I'm not a police detective, but in my mind their alibies were shoddy at best. They came from their frat brothers who swore they were hosting a party that day and well into the night. All the details have been sent to your tablet, and they are on paper in the file you're holding, so short version, they were never arrested or even questioned further, to spite the fact that blood matching Jaxson Caddell's DNA was found at the scene, as well as footprints that were size matches for Jaxson Caddell and Landon Hart."

"I'm surprised that they were willing to give DNA samples," Dave comments, trying not to judge the police work.

"Oh, they didn't, Jaxson Caddell was a suspect in a rape during his freshman year at the University." Penelope says. "He was cleared of that, but he and his friends had been a constant worry for campus authorities since then, the subject of multiple noise complaints, drunken disturbances, fights, and more seriously, distributing marijuana."

"Nice kids," Dave notes sarcastically.

"Anyway, that is just the lead up to what I really want to tell you," Garcia claps her hands together. "They are rich kids who just might have gotten away with murder only to have karma catch up with them, and I take no glee in this because they're kids, unless they killed Lucas and then I might a little…wait, no I don't because that would make me as bad as they are, but maybe-"

"Penelope!" Dave cuts her off, loudly. "Circle back to what you were going to say. I'm not judging you, just listening."

Penelope pauses to catch her breath, nodding. "Of course, sir. So, the thing is Jaxson Caddell and Landon Hart were both found beaten and stabbed, in an alley behind a pretty shady strip club, about 6 weeks after Lucas' death. The police came up with no plausible suspects, and no one has ever been arrested for their murders."

It takes Dave a moment to process that and come around to what Garcia might be getting at. "Wait, so you think what exactly?" He asks turning in his chair to fully face her.

"What am I-?" Garcia repeats haughtily, then quickly adjusts her tone to a more respectful one. "I think that Lucas Olson gave Amelia a farm, that he was a family friend and a loyal one at that, and that Amelia cared about him, sociopath or not. I think that Jaxson and Landon killed Lucas for some reason, to gain access to his marijuana garden possibly, and that Amelia killed them when the law failed to bring them to justice."

Dave chews on that, faintly amused by Garcia's irritation with him. She feels strongly about what she's saying it seems, but it still feels like an awfully big jump to him. Afterall, these kids were found outside a dive bar, in a bad part of town, so the more likely conclusion is that it was a mugging or drug deal gone wrong. And even if it were Amelia acting as a vigilante, hell bent on revenge, it is unlikely they can prove it, or that it would point them to her current location. Again, it is good plot filler, but functionally lacking for their current purpose.

"I'm impressed, as usual, and I am going to go over everything you've found and see what I can make of it. Sound good?" Dave says instead of voicing his concerns.

"All I can ask," Garcia chirps, grateful for the moment. "I'm going to get back to work. Derek will be back soon, and we are going to work on the organized crime angle. Spencer says only an accurate profile will catch this lady, and we are not going to let him down." She stands now, tapping the files she brought with her. "Remember, all of this is neatly available on your tablet as well."

He chuckles, waving as she heads for the door, then thinks of something. "Penelope, wait!" He calls before she heads out the door. "Have you spoken to Hotch today?"

"Early this morning, yes. I gave him the information on Lucas Olson, and what I had on George Porter, the cousin interviewed by police after Miriam's death. Why?"

"Just curious, he didn't answer when I called on my way in here. He should be making himself available." Dave worries, wondering if an interview with George Porter might have gone badly. He will try calling again as soon as Garcia leaves. "Do you have any idea what's going on with them?"

Garcia cocks her head, giving him a searching look. "In Salt Lake City, you mean?"

Dave resists sighing. He probably shouldn't have said anything, but he can't take it back now. Not with Penelope in super sleuth mode.

"I mean in general." Dave ventures, choosing his words carefully. "They've become thick as thieves. Is there something I missed?"

Now Garcia looks like she's questioning his mental health. "Unsure what you mean, sir. Hotch became the new Gideon in Spencer's life a long time ago. He's protective. I know our boy genius stays late to talk. Hotch listens to him. They're good for each other. I'm not sure Spencer opens up to the rest of us." Penelope lists, while eyeing him up.

"Sure, of course. I know Hotch mentors him." Dave tries to expand without upsetting the apple cart, so to speak. "But he has been in Salt Lake City away from his son for weeks now, and the team is leaderless. I just wondered if something was affecting Hotch's judgement." Too far, Dave thinks, wincing as soon as he says it.

Penelope turns her full focus on him, eyes boring into his accusingly. "Due respect, sir, but he couldn't leave Spencer alone after what he went through. That's a terrible thought." Garcia's indignation is bordering on anger at the suggestion.

"No, but did you know I offered to stay?" Dave can tell from her reaction that she didn't. "I didn't have a 9-year-old son waiting at home, and I am not the chief either. For that matter, you could have stayed. You can do your magic from anywhere, correct? My offer was declined in no uncertain terms, as I've no doubt yours would have been."

Garcia is scrutinizing him now in a way that tells Dave without a doubt he has tipped his hand; and it's a hand she hadn't considered, which is interesting. Maybe he is entirely off base.

"Are you…" she starts but thinks better of it. Treating him to another indulgent smile, she finishes. "They are friends and Spencer needs Hotch right now. It's a good thing that the boss man is showing some heart and we can all manage in the meantime."

For a tense few seconds they stare each other down, a silent showdown, ending in an equally silent agreement to move on.

"Anyway, I have work to…well work on, and you have a lot of reading to do." She gestures to his desk with a genuine look of amusement. "I will check in later, but you know where to find me if you need me!"

Watching her go Dave knows he just opened a can of worms and can't decide whether to congratulate or kick himself.

By the time they get back to their room at the Inn, JJ finds herself more than ready to soak up some warmth and comfort from the cozy surroundings. Eating from take out containers, wrapped in quilts, they each take one of the journals and try to wrap their heads around the scrawled writings, poems, and briskly sketched drawings, that hint at deeply hidden meanings, but aren't providing quite the insight that they had hoped.

"Listen to this, JJ." Kate props the book in her lap and reads ruefully aloud. "Stuck in the crazy north and surrounded by robots infused with the idea of human emotions. They don't feel anything so they cannot interpret the suffering of others. They taunt and torture without any hint of how morally reprehensible they all are. Anyone who wishes to escape them needs to go deep in order to avoid contact. But then it isn't fair, because we all wind up dwelling in the deepest of dark."

"Intense but if we were expecting something we could use as evidence, I don't think this is it."

JJ's lips twist into a grim smile of acknowledgement. Her book is no different, some of the entries aren't even dated, there are sentences that makes sense, but they meld into longer writings that are not at all straightforward.

New school year and everything is the same as last year. I am going to do track and field again because it stops Dad from complaining and for some reason I care what he thinks.
Cross country isn't bad. Basketball means being stuck in a gym with a bunch of screaming morons. Someone should lock the gym doors and just leave them all in there. They would be happy for the rest of their lives if someone threw them food and they would only bother each other.

You don't have to cull your herd if you separate out the defective early enough.

"What do you think of that? Are we looking at someone who is schizophrenic, psychotic, or just a teenager going through a rough time?" JJ asks Kate, wishing that Spencer were here with his combined background in psychology, sociology, and philosophy. He would be better able to analyze what they were reading, and separate angst from mental illness.

Kate snorts. "Don't we always say that teens profile as sociopaths?"

"Yes, but does that read as a real threat? It's not quite a plan, but it sounds like hurting someone at least crossed his mind." JJ insists, not liking the overall negative feel of Ryan's writing, the impression that it's building toward something bad.

Kate considers it, shifting to see the writing over JJ's shoulder. "Honestly, I don't think so. I'm not a handwriting expert but sometimes he writes like he's lying-in bed just thinking, and other times he's pressing his pen practically through the page, like he's desperate and has to get the words out but wants the feelings to go with them, even in written form you know? It reads like a desire for things to get better, not like he's given up hope."

Again, JJ wishes Spencer were here to decide. "Most of it is so random, its not like he has it all neatly labeled and dated. You're right, we may not get what we need from this, Kate."

"I don't know, hang on, what is the date on the entry you just read me?" Kate sits up crossing her legs in front of her, reaching for the third journal.

"The gym thing? Um…September 9, 2003. So, right after the school year started probably."

"Ok, look here!" Kate pushes the second book toward JJ. "This book starts in August 2004 and the last dated entry is May of 2005. Now, my book picks up in 2005 where that one ends, still in May. Every page is filled and it's last entry is dated December 11, 2006. Ryan committed suicide on January 7, 2007. Why didn't he start a new book? He had never gone that many days without writing before."

"Maybe he had already made his decision and he wasn't driven to write anymore?" JJ offers, though it was obviously how Ryan expressed himself, how he processed emotions, pouring out his thoughts out on paper, trying to make sense of them. He spoke to the diary like a therapist, she would expect him to 'talk' out his decision to end his life the same way. A sort of private suicide note.

Kate sits up straighter, facing JJ. "Or Charlotte didn't give us the last journal, and if she didn't, why not?"

JJ slumps back against the rustic wood headboard behind her to mull that over. Charlotte had seemed eager to share Ryan's story with them, to direct some attention to his plight, which had been overshadowed by the accidental deaths of the snowmobilers. She had been left all alone a long time with her grief, and JJ had surmised that giving them the journals was a way of sharing that grief finally, lessening the burden. She thought the woman had been honest with them, but maybe it was just too painful to let go of her son's last words.

Kate is leafing through the journal in her hands with purpose again, pulling post its from the pad beside her to mark pages. "Ok, the first time Ryan mentions a woman is in March of 2006 as far as I can tell. He goes on to write poems that center around love, there are sketches of a lady with dark hair…happy love talk peaks in the summer, then goes on a downward spiral." She plops the book in JJ's lap. "You take a look and see what you think. The post its are the entries where he actually mentions a woman he is in love with."

JJ opens to the first neon pink post it and reads:

Falling in love was not a possibility for me. At school the girls want the guys who play hockey and football. It's a popularity contests. Is that love? My parents say the words, but I know they could live without each other. My Dad is away so much, and my Mom is so into her work. What difference would it make if he never came back? She knows how to live without him. I guess I believed that love is the label people put on not being lonely.
Then I met someone. At the gas station, nothing romantic or special. She was driving a rusty truck and she didn't even acknowledge me. So I stared at her. She was so pretty and so different. I could tell she wasn't there to be looked at, not like the girls at school who always want attention. Her jeans had holes and she was wearing a flannel shirt with no coat. But she didn't look cold. She finally looked at me and her eyes were so BLUE I couldn't look away so I kept staring and I must have looked totally STUPID.
All I could think was she doesn't notice the cold, but she notices ME
It felt like something. She asked me where McDougal road was and I think I told her because she asked if I wanted to show her.
Who says yes to getting in a strangers truck?
I did because I loved the sound of her voice and the way she looked at me like she could actually SEE who I am.

I'm going to see her again.

"Kate! This is something. What's on McDougal Road? We need to find out." JJ rereads the entry wondering if this really was Amelia, what was going through her head when she picked Ryan up. If it was an entirely random meeting, like it seemed, did she actually just need directions? JJ doesn't think there is much chance that a survivalist, who could elude an entire police force and the FBI, couldn't read a map.

Kate waves a hand at the journal. "Keep reading. I'm not sure the McDougal Road thing will help us, but we can check it out later."

JJ flips to the next post it marked page:

I used to hate poems about celebrating love, but I find myself thinking about Shakespeare's sonnet 18, only I wouldn't compare her to a summer's day. More like the most beautiful day in winter, when the sun is shining its brightest but it can only reflect the brilliant white of the snow, because the cold is so deep it can't hope to melt it. She is that cold, but she smells like Spring. She is strength and promise, and she won't be injured, not even by the sun. She will not disappear until she chooses to.

"Wow," JJ says, shaking her head. "That's pretty deep for a teenage boy. He makes her sound otherworldly."

Kate laughs at that. "Well, a teenage boy having sex with a mysterious older woman might actually believe she was. I had a fling with a professor in college. I was certainly awed by him."

"Did you think the sun couldn't melt him?" JJ responds doubtfully, and Kate laughs again.

"Not exactly, but I definitely failed to notice he had been divorced 3 times, and that the number of students he had been smitten with before me was in the double digits."

JJ grins, recalling some of her infatuations. It was easy to get carried away seeing yourself through someone else's eyes, the way people tend to do when they fall in love.

Kate produces the few photos they have of Amelia and reaches to turn some pages in the journal that JJ is still holding. "Take a look at the sketch here," she points. "Does that not look like our Amelia?"

It is only a rough pencil sketch, but the resemblance is uncanny. The shape of the woman's face is perfect match, cheekbones prominent, chin tapering to a pleasant V, eyes perfectly oval and slightly hooded, hair shaded darkly. Visually she is stunning, but the poem on the next page indicates that there was more than looks to Ryan's attraction.

If beauty were the only essential,
You would walk in freedom unfathomed,
Instead you are duty bound to this earth,
Held by longing and sustained by purpose,
And because of this I gaze upon you,
Knowing what love is.

JJ lets out her breath in a long sigh, trying to imagine Amelia the way Ryan saw her. Passionate, free spirited, uninhibited, all the things he longed to be himself. Her looks would seduce him, but it would be her confidence that would intrigue him. She would appear like someone who couldn't be bullied, and her strength would entice an inexperienced boy who hadn't found his place in the world. Amelia would know it, and she would use it, reeling him in, feeding off of him until she got what she wanted, and then discarding him. It could be what brought Ryan so low that he took his own life. That sort of intensity leaves a mark long after it burns out.

"Ok, JJ listen, I had a thought." Kate pats the bed between them excitedly. "The snowmobile accident Charlotte talked about happened on December 3, 2006 right? There are random journal entries, mostly poems, that have no date, but they were made between December 2 and December 10, so it was certainly after the accident. Then, December 11 is really disturbing. Check it out." She finds and points out the page to JJ.

I can hear my heart in my chest,
I know it is broken.

I can feel the sting in my eyes,
I know there will be tears.

I can feel your grip lossening,
I know it will be gone.

I can hear your footsteps fading,
I know you are a dream.

I can recall when I'm alone,
I know you were true love.

Come live with me and be my love,
We will all the pleasures prove,
Burning passion that consumes,
Take it all and leave me none.

The words of promise burn through the truth leaving me nothing but the emptiness I had before, when I knew nothing but lies.

I thought I had lots of regrets in my life but none of them compare to this. I have wished people dead before and of course it never happened. When it does you don't know how to feel. I want to be happy or vindicated at least because otherwise I'm a hypocrite. There is nothing to cry about when people get what they DESERVE. Or that's what I thought until now. Because all I wish is that I hadn't been there in the woods.
I AM BETRAYED.

Cut through the veins and the soul will bleed!
The flesh is only a prison for the soul. Be set free!

"Kate, that's awful…" JJ trails off as she takes in what she's read. "The soul bleeds, and what he did…his mother read this. It must have broken her heart."

"Yes, there is no limit to the ways human beings can hurt each other with love." Kate frowns, but shakes it off to make her point. "But JJ, we need to find out exactly what happened with this snowmobile accident, because what if Ryan had something to do with it? He said he wished he wasn't there in the woods, and I'm pretty sure that's where it happened. What if Amelia helped him, put him up to it maybe, or just encouraged him? His journal reads like he was madly in love with her at first, then not so much by the end when he starts talking about letting go, and then betrayal…if they did something awful together the guilt could have torn them apart, made him desperate enough to commit suicide, right?"

"God, I don't know Kate. It's a bit of a leap. How would they make an accident like that happen? Tamper with the snowmobiles?" JJ considers it for another moment. "It's a bit farfetched…we thought she might have pushed Ryan into suicide…but could she be acting as some sort of vigilante, helping the weak? Benton said she made him feel good about himself, she could have helped him kill Miriam because she left and stopped protecting Benton from their father…"

"It's a different perspective on what we know, for sure." Kate responds thoughtfully. "First things first, we need the report from the snowmobile accident, and I think we should ask Charlotte for the last journal. Oh, and call Hotch and bring him up to speed too right?"

"We should, but I tried him when we got in, while we were waiting for lunch." JJ shares, with a worried crease to her brow at the reminder. "Both his and Spence's phone's went to voicemail. It's pretty rare that they are unavailable on a case. I'll try Dave, I haven't spoken to him since last night, and you see what you can get from the locals on the snowmobilers."

Notes:

You can't always get what you want
You can't always get what you want
You can't always get what you want
But if you try sometimes, well, you might find
You get what you need

Haha! Just be glad you don't have to actually hear me singing that. Lots of dialogue and stuff to add to the profile and some really great information in this chapter! ...but no, you don't get to know what's become of the boys in the greenhouse just yet! But the team is starting to wonder where they are too! TC and I wouldn't want Garcia hacking our computers, so we'll be sure to let everyone know where Hotch and Spence are and more importantly how they are in the next chapter.

I've been told that I have to let you all know that I actually did some writing in this chapter! Go me! To be fair I didn't write any of it with the intention of it being in a fanfiction... But some of the poetry in this chapter was taken from my angsty teenage years. (to clarify, my teenage years were over 15 years ago...)

Let us know what you think of Amelia now that we've had some insight into her upbringing and a few of those missing years after Miriam's murder. Remember, reviews feed our addiction!

If you're really anxious to know where the boys are, follow/fav to be notified when we update. I promise that they are in the next chapter, how they are... well you'll have to read to find out, I make no promises.

~CC~