Hey! So, it's been a while since I've updated this series but I'm back now! This is a canon divergence of sorts for the season 4 episode "Minimal Loss" with Reid taking Emily's place and Moreid. As usual, I own nothing to do with Criminal Minds. I hope you enjoy!

"Now, the three child service workers…" Rossi began, his voice betraying none of the fear he felt for the answer.

Morgan held his breath, heart pounding and terror pumping through his veins. Everyone was waiting for the answer Benjamin Cyrus would provide with bated breath, but for Morgan the answer the cult leader would provide could quite literally ruin his life. While he hoped they were all okay, he prayed to whatever God there was that Reid was most of all. Reid had to be okay. He didn't know what he would do if the genius wasn't.

"One of them is dead. It wasn't us," Cyrus' voice finally came through the other line. Morgan felt his heart plummet and the cold clutches of dread and despair take hold around his very being. Not Reid, not Reid, please dear God not Reid, not Reid…

Rossi still as calm as ever, said, "I need a name to inform the family."

"Her name was Nancy Lunde." Morgan didn't hear anything else that he said. All he heard was a name that wasn't Reid's. While these thoughts made him feel guilty, because a poor woman had just died and all he cared about was that it wasn't Reid, he would mourn and berate himself later. For now, he was content in feeling the weight of the earth being lifted from his shoulders with the confirmation, even if it was only for a few moments.

Morgan only became aware of what was happening around him again when Rossi stood and began to gather supplies into a box. It didn't exactly take a profiler to figure out what the elder agent was doing, even with having zoned out for the last half of the conversation.

"Let me come with you," he offered immediately. He just wanted to see with his own eyes that Reid, and Emily were okay. He wasn't keen on taking a cult leader's word for the state of one of his closest friends and his boyfriend.

Rossi searched his face, no doubt profiling it despite their "no profiling members on the team" policy. The Italian's eyes softened as they found what they'd apparently been searching for. "It's better if I go alone. We need to build up their trust if we're going to get as many people out of there alive as we can." Rossi squeezed his shoulder in a comforting gesture, leaning down as he went past to whisper, "I'll make sure he's okay." With a final pat on the back, Rossi left the trailer and headed for a truck parked outside.

Derek could only watch him go, worry eating away at his soul.

0000

Morgan jumped from the chair he had been forced into by JJ after he had made his thirtieth nervous loop around the trailer when Rossi finally came back. It took all of Morgan's self-control to not immediately run up and grab Rossi, demanding to know if they were alright.

"Reid and Prentiss are okay," Rossi said looking pointedly at Morgan who visibly relaxed. After this was all over, he was fairly certain he was going to need some sort of heart medication.

Morgan barely had time to try and shut away his worry and get back to getting Reid and Prentiss the hell out of there before JJ was storming towards them, laptop in hand.

"Guys, we have a problem."

The worry Morgan had hastily been trying to box away of course came back with a roaring vengeance as he, Hotch, and Rossi all crowded around JJ's screen where a reporter was talking about a tip off they had. A tip off that just so happened to tell them there was an undercover FBI agent within the compound as they spoke.

Morgan felt his world crashing down around him.

This couldn't be happening.

They were making progress. They were working on a way to get as many people out of there alive as they could, including both agents. Now, thanks to the freaking news reporters and some snitch (if Morgan ever found out who had told, he couldn't be held responsible for his actions) everything was jeopardized, including the lives of both Emily and Spencer.

Morgan ran a hand over his shaven head, taking a step back and covering his mouth to keep all his emotions in check. He was still a trained FBI agent above all else, after all.

Rossi fiddled with some controls on the sound panel they had been using to listen in on the activities within the compound, handing headphones out to everyone present. With shaking hands, Morgan took his, not sure if he wanted to hear what was about to go down, but not daring to miss a thing either.

"Which one of you is it?" came Cyrus' voice over the line, anger leaking into his voice.

There was a noise on the other end, the rustling of fabric and something that sounded like the quiet creaks of a revolver being handled. Morgan's heart promptly froze in his chest.

"Which one of you is the FBI agent?" Cyrus, again, demanded, this time anger masking any other emotions he had the first time he asked.

"Why do you think one of us is an FBI agent?" Reid. Morgan held his breath. Spencer was an excellent actor when it came to situations like this. Plus, he had the whole innocent nerd thing going for him. As much as Morgan loved his pretty boy, the kid wasn't exactly the threatening FBI agent type.

"God will forgive me for what I must do."

"I-I don't know what you're talking about," came Emily's voice, wavering with what Morgan could tell was false fear. She was playing the part just as well as Reid.

"One of you does. Who is it?" The sudden coldness in Cyrus' voice caused an involuntary shiver to pulse down Morgan's spine. Something told him this wasn't going to end well. The sound of a hammer being pulled back echoed through the headphones, seeming much louder than it probably was.

"Me. It's me." Reid, voice full of desperation, yet a solid determination. If it had been any other situation, Morgan would have been grinning from ear to ear at his lover's voice. It wasn't often someone heard Reid's voice that solid, that set-in stone with his decision, and nine times out of ten when you did hear it, there was going to be hell to pay.

But this was not any other situation. This was Reid, having just admitted to being an undercover fed to a clearly psychotic cult leader who had not hesitated to fake poison his congregation to test their loyalty only an hour before. Frankly, this was one of the most terrifying situations Morgan had ever been in and he wasn't even directly involved. But Reid was. And it was so much different when Reid was involved.

There was a pain filled grunt on the other end that sounded suspiciously like Reid. God, Morgan wasn't sure if he wanted to see what was going on or remain with only the audio, either way, he felt like he was going to be sick. From the look on his companion's faces, he wasn't the only one.

Another grunt and the sound of flesh connecting with flesh. They heard a body hit the ground with a thud. "I told you not to put me in this position!" That was Cyrus, snarling with rage.

Another hit and Morgan couldn't stay quiet anymore. His boyfriend was quite literally getting beat to death. While Morgan knew the genius was hiding some surprising muscles under those cardigans and sweater vests, he was by no means big and beefy. There wasn't much keeping Cyrus' fists from Reid's fragile bones.

"We gotta go in!" Morgan cried. There was another hit and another pained grunt, this time followed by a wheeze that had panic gripping tight to Morgan.

Hotch stood up and looked Morgan firmly in the eyes. "We'd be risking the lives of everyone in there." If Morgan didn't know Hotch he would have almost missed the pitying look of understanding Hotch was giving him.

"Get up!" Cyrus growled. Not a moment later came the sound of glass shattering and a sharp cry from Reid quickly followed by the solid thump of another punch finding its target.

More panting and pained gasps from Reid filtered through the audio, but soon his voice joined the mix, "I can take it."

"Oh, you can take it?" Cyrus snarled, quietly before he was no doubt roughly throwing Reid to the wall or the floor once again.

Morgan was beginning to panic. At this rate, Cyrus would kill Reid. Morgan could already feel the dread and despair coiling in his stomach. He was just about to tear the headphones off, fed up with listening to his boyfriend getting beat and not being able to do a single thing about it when Rossi held up his hand for everyone to calm down.

"He's not talking to him," the Italian said suddenly.

"He's talking to us. He's telling us not to come in," Hotch said, realization dawning on his face. Morgan swallowed down the bile he could feel rising in his throat. He knew Reid was tough, way tougher than most people gave him credit for, but this was too much. They were asking him to just stand there and listen to the love of his life get beat to hell!

Suddenly Morgan could feel eyes on him. He drew his awareness back to his fellow agents and saw all three of them watching him closely, matching expressions of pity written on their features. However, it was Hotch who spoke up.

"Morgan, I know you're worried about him, we all are, but we can't jeopardize the lives of everyone in there. Reid's strong; he can handle this. As much as I would love to bust in there right now and put an end to this all, that would have horrible consequences. None of us like listening to him bring hurt, but there's nothing we can do right now. I know it must be hard separating your feelings for him from your professional self in this situation, but I have to ask you to try. It's what's best for him."

Despite the sudden irritation he felt at Hotch for his little speech, the profiler in Morgan knew he was right and managed to overrule the worry-stricken boyfriend part of him. He nodded resignedly and wisely kept his mouth shut.

Morgan sighed with relief when Cyrus finally seemed to have enough, and the beating came to an end. This horror show wasn't over, but at least Reid was once again out of harm's way, at least for the moment.

0000

Hours later, after they had infiltrated the compound and managed to get as many people as possible out before Jessica blew the whole place to bits, Morgan was sitting beside Reid in the back of an ambulance as a paramedic worked to patch up all his injuries and give him a once over to make sure he was well enough to stay away from the hospital. Morgan had tried to convince the genius to go to at least get checked out, but the kid was too stubborn for his own good. Well, Morgan could be stubborn too. He refused to leave until Reid was at least checked out by a paramedic.

Both men were silent, lost in their own thoughts. Finally, Morgan cleared his throat.

"Reid-"

"I'm sorry," Reid cut him off. Morgan had to strain to hear him. When he did, he was left with his mouth hanging open like some sort of dog.

"Wh-what..I…what are you sorry for?!" he spluttered. Why was he apologizing? Spencer was the one who got beat nearly half to death.

"For making you worry like that," Reid murmured, gazing at his lap, "I know it was stupid and risky to give myself up like that. But he had a gun at Emily's head, and he was going to shoot her if someone didn't admit to being the FBI agent. I couldn't let that happen! I figured I had a better chance giving myself up than Emily. At that point he probably would have just shot her on spot."

Morgan sighed and put his arm around the younger agent. Reid pulled the blanket someone had given him tighter around his shoulders and leaned into Morgan.

"I know you were just trying to protect Emily. I get it, I really do, but I need you to start thinking about yourself sometimes. You're not alone anymore; you have people who care about you and people who would be devastated if anything happened to you. It's bad enough you got hurt and I couldn't protect you," he trailed off, the guilt already returning full force. Not that it had ever really left.

Reid lifted his hand and brushed Morgan's shoulder. "It's not your fault. I made that choice myself, and I don't regret it."

Morgan narrowed his eyes at his boyfriend. "Yeah? What if this had gone way wrong, Reid? What if Cyrus had killed you on site for exposing yourself like that?"

"He didn't though. I'm still here, even if I'm a little worse for wear. I'm right here still, Der."

Derek swallowed hard around the lump forming in his throat and shoved down the emotions he had been holding all day. He'd let them out once he was safely at home and could process things in private because he absolutely refused to cry in the back of an ambulance surrounded by news cameras.

"I-" he turned away and coughed to keep from choking up, "I can't lose you, Spencer," he finally whispered.

Reid laid his head on Morgan's shoulder and the man in turn wrapped both arms around the doctor. "You won't lose me," he whispered back, voice slightly muffled by Derek's shirt, "I'll be more careful from now on, I promise. I'm just sorry you had to hear all that. I can imagine how I would have felt if it were you getting hurt. It must have been awful."

"It was. But right now, all I care about is you're alive and breathing." Morgan leaned down and kissed his hair, then his forehead. "Come on pretty boy, let's go home."

All done! I hope you enjoyed!