DATE UNKNOWN | LOCATION UNKNOWN
He hadn't remembered falling asleep after he'd been reintubated.
Yet, there was now a nudging sensation at his shoulder that awoke him. Weak, fatigued, languid, and disoriented, he was pulled up to sit, and his body tipped before a hand stopped him. With a soft groan, he tried to bring up his hand to wipe the drool pouring out his mouth. It still smarted, and his hands were tender, but the pain was diminishing. He was half dragged to the toilet, stumbling forward, and couldn't sit upright.
It was strange, being made to urinate and defecate when he was coming off of the drug. He had to be held up so he wouldn't fall over, and he couldn't clean or wipe himself so it was done for him. His hands shook from any kind of jostling. He was too tired to feel any certain way about it, or how the woman brushed his teeth for him as he teetered over the sink.
He was taken to the bed in the same manner, and when he reached it, exhaustion enveloped him. There went that citrus and lavender.
He slumped onto the bed and before long he was being urged to sit up again.
He gave a short, high whimper when his hands were manipulated after receiving a tap-tap.
"You will keep your eyes closed," was the order, given by the man.
His eyes were already covered; though such a directive was redundant, the demand was clear.
One large hand held him up, and the other worked:
Everything that encased him in darkness was removed—the buds, the cured molding, the cups, the brace, the blindfold. Even though it was only the heavy hum of the whuffling fan, it was an assault on his ears. Each sound was more boisterous, and he blamed it on the lingering drugs. He covered his ears, wincing and folding over. He kept his eyes clenched as he had been directed. The sensation of light beyond his closed lids was so soft that it was as if the blindfold—which had not been removed for over a week now—remained.
His temptation to open them was eclipsed by the fear of punishment.
The buds were replaced, as were the molding and cups, and he sighed. The cuffs at his wrists fell away, tugged and shimmied despite his curled form. His shirts were tugged, though, and he sat up and began to remove them in obedience, breath hitching as his hands stung at the movements.
After folding his clothes, he felt that clap on his shoulder. His hands were tap-tapped, and he brought them up. "I will give you something for you to hold over your eyes. Your hands won't fall. Understand?"
Spencer nodded, clenching his eyes ever tighter. His hand flickered up. "I understand."
A hand clapped at his shoulder. The non-padded restraints, weighed down with a length of chain between them, were attached to his wrists. Then, a simple and small, thick, folded piece of fabric—the texture of which was the same as that which had been used to hood him when he first woke up in captivity—was slipped into his hands. He put it to his eyes and shook. They trusted that he wouldn't remove it, and they were not wrong.
Today was supposed to be a bath day, he was sure, but he wasn't being given a bath.
It was all wrong. This was all too new. He didn't know what it all was, but the last newness had gotten his tooth pulled out. The directive for him not to complain was enough for him to accept whatever this was.
From a distance, was the scent of heavy chemicals; nearby, that of—of coconut.
He didn't understand what was happening at all. When the man's hand brushed into his wiry hair, his breaths puffed out, and he whimpered. That strong coconut scent was on the man's hands, and it was rubbed into his hair and scalp. He tried to keep still. It was oil.
Some kind of . . . of anointing? The profile flashed in his mind again, and that religious aspect jumped out at him.
He was held upright, that strong, chemical scent drew nearer to him, and he began to tilt his body away in apprehension, fighting back the urge to plead with his captors for clemency. He couldn't. His hands were being used to keep his eyes covered, which would only leave a vocal plea as the alternative, and he knew that he couldn't do that without reprimand. Instead, the man put an overbearing hand on the crook of his neck and shoulder and pulled him back to sitting straight. He drew up his shoulders when his hair was lathered in a cold, creamy substance. The man pulled his hands down a little so it could be spread on his eyebrows.
Oh. I'm being . . .
His features were being changed.
His chin was grasped by the large, callous hand, and his head was tilted as it had been days ago: up and down, left and right. His breath hitched and he tried not to draw his head down.
It was dehumanizing; he was but a specimen. And he was further stripped of himself as the chemicals on his eyebrows began to burn away parts of who he was. He could do nothing but sit, wait.
The bleaching solution, as he was sure that was what it was, was wiped away from his eyebrows after a few minutes with a damp towel, but it stayed in his hair.
Spencer Reid. His mind blanked but for the two words, which seemed to circulate around him in flashes, in binary code, in hexadecimal code, in a cypher, buzzing around him like a swarm of agitated bees. He began a listless rubbing of the pads of his feet atop each other, unable to quell the desire to do so because he couldn't rub his eyes or thighs, and soon realized that the humming wasn't in his mind but was in his head. His throat was vibrating with the petering sound of his grave distress.
They could have done this while he was insensate. They chose to do it while he was conscious.
He winced when the rest of his hair, down to its roots, was lathered in the thick cream. His knee began to bob, and his body began to tip forward and backward and again.
Many minutes later, his shoulder was clapped, and he was pulled up to stand as the cuff on his ankle was removed. He teetered. His pants and underwear were tugged down together, and he had to suppress a moan of grave discomfort at the removal of them by another.
They stopped at his ankles, which were then tapped. He stepped out of the clothing, trying to maintain his balance, and curled his body forward, wishing to cover his groin but unable to do so without moving his hands. A hand—the calloused hand of the man—urged him forward to walk with a tap tap before it curled over his shoulder to guide him forward. And then it forced him down until he was kneeling. The hand moved to his back to thrust his chest forward and down until he was leaning over the lip of the tub.
This was happening. It was real. This was real. Was it weakness to have the urge to cry?
A spray of water began to rinse out the chemicals from his hair, the woman's smaller, gloved hand massaging it out of his scalp. Lather, rinse; lather, rinse. And then to his eyebrows a similar but shorter treatment.
His fingers twitched and he held his breath.
Spencer Reid.
While his wet tresses dripped on and clung to his face as he was pulled to kneel upright, citrus and lavender calmed him. In a few short minutes, the tub was cleaned, and he was being made to stand before his leg touched its lip again. He stepped in, was lowered to sitting, the cuff went around his ankle, the length of chain hanging between his wrists was locked, and he was then washed.
Days ago, he had wondered if they killed their victims soon after changing their visages, if any of the victims weren't blond already.
Such was not the case.
There was far too much ritual and care involved with this current act to dispose of him soon after. They were further entrenching him into the identity of their son.
But he was someone else's son. He had a mother, Diana Reid, and he would acknowledge that had an estranged father, William Reid.
Spencer Reid.
The woman took one of his hands and she massaged it, palm and cramping digits. The hand still upon his face shook as he palmed it over both eyes and the fabric with great diligence. She kneaded at his tender hand, rubbed at it in careful, soothing motions.
And then her lips fall upon the digits.
His eyes pricked and his hands curled as she continued her ministrations. She let go, and he returned it to his eyes before she took hold of the other and which she gave the same treatment and which she, too, kissed before releasing.
The danger lights and horn flashed and blared again, and he swallowed. He hated this. He didn't want to comply to this. He didn't want to survive like this. And yet, he leaned back as he was palmed beneath his chin and the hand tugged, and he was shaved while the woman continued to wash him.
When they finished, the chain was loosened from its tether, his leg was uncuffed, and he was ushered out of the tub. His body was dried, and he was helped into his underwear and sweatpants before his left ankle was cuffed. A t-shirt was put over his head, and one arm was made to feed through the sleeve at a time.
And then his hair was cut.
It was combed and stretched, and wisps of small clippings fell upon his face and over his fingers.
Spencer Reid.
Again—citrus and lavender as the tub was cleaned a second time.
Comb, stretch, wisp. Comb, stretch, wisp.
With each flutter of hair that brushed against his skin, more of him was being whittled away. He had resolved days ago that he wouldn't allow this. He knew who and what he was—
Spencer Reid.
—he knew his objective—
Survive.
—he would remember who his family and friends were—
Maeve, Diana, Jennifer, Henry, Derek, Penelope, Emily, Alex, Aaron, Jack, David, Will.
—he would remember that there were some among those people who were looking for him. And he would hold on to Maeve.
But now he had to become someone else, and he didn't know how his behavior would hinge on his survival from here on out. It was an immense weight.
When all was done, the woman slipped her hand through his hair and then gave his face a gentle squeeze with her dampened fingers. The heat of a hair dryer blew in his hair and face while her hand ruffled through the shorn locks.
When she was done, she tugged his fingers away from his face and his hands shook as she also removed the fabric from before his eyes. He sucked a breath inward, kept them closed, and flinched from the sudden clap on his arm from the man, who had drawn near him again.
Good job, it conveyed. Quite so. He hadn't opened his eyes when the opportunity had presented itself. He wouldn't dare.
Something new was fitted and shimmied over his head. He thought, as it was manipulated, that this might have been why the man had inspected his face a few days ago, and why he had done it again earlier. The man had been taking in his features and he was doing it again now, admiring his handiwork no doubt.
The woman patted his arm before she kissed his head for the first time, above the temple, in his hairline. Though slight, he pulled away, but not too far for fear of being seen as obstinate and that action being a silent complaint.
"Good boy," she said after she tapped his hands. This time, she added, "My —-— boy."
He didn't know the words she'd used between my and boy, and in the ensuing days and months, he never found out.
Spencer Reid.
—
Many hours later, Spencer's fingers tugged at the ends of his new hair before tracing over this new brace in distress.
It had modular, hollow contours over the eyes and ears to seal in the darkness. Whatever touched his skin was lined with the softest suede while its outer layer was composed of thick, layered full-grain leather. It fit over his eyes and ears to such perfection that it was clear to him that this had been tailored to fit his face. Along with the cuffs which he was told not to destroy, he wondered if the man was himself a skilled leather and metalworker, for this was a simple and secure design that did what these people wanted it to do: it occluded his vision and hearing with multiple locks that would only be undone with a single K-300 key.
Artisanship was in the preliminary profile. Wherever a strap crossed over another, there were metal rivets and thick threads sewn in to maintain the structure and keep it from falling apart. Despite its many straps, it chafed less.
Of artisan craftsmanship, of quality material, and he must be the perfect specimen for any fetishist.
He should have listened to Aaron. On Monday, April 29th, around 1:17pm, Aaron had pulled him outside of the Sussex County Sheriff's station and tried to convince him to take the rest of the day off and go back to the hotel. Spencer had refused.
He'd begun mulling over this the other day. He wouldn't be in this current situation if he hadn't been so damned myopic and maudlin. Everyone was just trying to help him, and he had been so fixated on himself. Idiot. What an idiot.
He had no one—literally no one—to blame for being here but himself. His inability to voice himself, his relying on something that became foreign to him for years—he painted his own target upon his back. And he was now locked further in these unsub's fantasies.
Because of his foolishness, because he spurned Aaron's offer, he was sure that the team was coming under scrutiny. The director might move to have them divided again, as had been done after they came under review following Emily's faked death at Ian Doyle's hand. They hadn't even had a review yet since Maeve had been murdered. Twice in just a matter of months was—
Oh, no.
If that happened—if they weren't working together, if they were demoted or if they were—
He hadn't thought about it before. But if they were relieved of their duty to the law, what chance did he have? They were the best equipped people to find him.
Before the despair could bury him, he refused. No. Despair—sentiment—was what had made him end up here in the first place. He hadn't been vigilant. He hadn't paid attention. He'd been focused on himself.
He couldn't think about himself in this situation. Aaron would blame himself. He knew he would. But he wasn't to blame. He had offered Spencer a way out; it was he who hadn't taken it.
The team was going to fall apart because of him. And far too many things were his fault.
He thought often to himself that Maeve died because he hadn't been smart enough to outwit Diane, because she had detected his lie through the failure of a kiss. This was a placating lie. Before this, he could have done more despite Maeve's insistence in wanting him to be safe. Instead, he guarded his relationship with her for no other reason that she was his and his alone, his piece of peace, something untouched and unruined by anyone or anything, something that had no painful lies attached to it, and something that at its arm's length couldn't be taken away from him. Except that length shortened with each passing day.
He would have shared her with everyone. He would have. She expressed an ever-growing desire to know them all when she found true safety. It had been selfish of him to keep her to himself. Penelope would have helped. They found Diane in hours. What he and Maeve held off for months was solved in mere hours once the imminent danger Maeve was in was apparent. The Replicator obviously found who she was just by spying on Spencer, and his interference, that message of Zugzwang, had been the only thing that indicated that Maeve was in any danger at all. It was a nudge. It must have been. For what grand purpose, Spencer didn't know, but somehow, even Maeve had gotten caught in that web.
Had he . . . had The Replicator discovered who Maeve's stalker was and so contacted Diane as a cryptic voice over the phone? Given her breadcrumbs? Clues? How had he known that Spencer was calling Maeve? The payphones—could he have hacked them? Had he listened to his and Maeve's conversations? How much, and for how long?
In retrospect, it would have made sense. But his comfort had cost Maeve her own life. Well and truly, she might have been better off without having known him at all. He'd damned her.
With Emily, he had detected that she was disturbed about something just days before she had abandoned the team to protect them. He had known, and he hadn't helped in the capacity that he should have been able to help her.
It was the same years ago in a hotel room during a case they were working on that affected Elle, whom he had suspected still wasn't able to deal with the events of Randall Garner and her near death experience. He hadn't helped as much as he could have, had brushed off her turmoil and trauma, and she left the team just days after having killed their prime suspect in what she claimed was self-defense. If he'd done more, done better, perhaps she wouldn't have felt shunted as she was.
Jason left because he couldn't take things anymore, and it had confused, hurt, then angered Spencer. He knew that his abduction and subsequent drug addiction had worn on his mentor, aside from the many other things—Frank Breitkopf and Jane Hanratty, the murder of his new love, Sarah Jacobs. Spencer hadn't been able to prevent him from leaving. He hadn't been enough.
He hadn't been enough for his father, or for even his mother.
He really wasn't any good to anyone, was he? Least of all himself, he supposed.
WASHINGTON, DC
When SSA Derek Morgan had been forced by SSA Jason Gideon—then Unit Chief of the Behavioral Analysis Unit—to assist rookie cadets at the FBI academy who needed an extra something, he'd been irritated.
"You're too hot-headed, Morgan," Jason admonished. "You could have gotten Agent Baylor—your own team member—killed because you're too damn stubborn to listen. You don't trust your teammates, and you want to handle things yourself. That's not how this works. I know you went deep undercover for two years in your previous post, but you need to relearn the value that you—are not—an island."
Derek hated every bit of it. The first cadet he helped train was an alpha male who acted like he knew far too much to be going through such mundane training and who didn't care to take any of Derek's direction without arguing. He was sure that this was what Jason wanted him to assist with—garnering a compatible and humble attitude with fellow cadets—because the cadet in himself was not lacking in physical skills. He had lasted a mere 250 hours into the program, though, and was discharged from it for belligerence and unsuitability. Derek didn't know how he had passed the screening in the first place.
But Jason had viewed it as a failure on Derek's part. That cadet had been his responsibility. Derek didn't care how Jason felt about it. He wasn't the type of person to try to justify his actions if he knew them to be right. He did what he did, and there was no regret. He knew the cadet better than Jason did over the weeks, and he knew that that man was not fit to uphold justice.
This was the second year in a row that he had been given the assignment, and he was already over it before it even began.
"This cadet needs all the help he can get in physical training," Jason declared in exasperation. "But his potential is unparalleled. He's a little wet, though, so—" He gave a shrug in that laissez-faire you'll-see-for-yourself manner and left it at that.
It was before dawn when the mornings would still chill down to the bone and the breaths puffed out in white clouds. He wore a baseball cap and his hoodie over his head to protect himself from the sting of the cold. He was to meet the cadet at the bleachers, where he had just walked through. He looked at the seats. No one was there. He peered back into the entryway, no one was walking through, either.
Of course not. Another cadet that spurned the work. Unacceptable. What was his name again? Cadet Reid? In forty-five more seconds, he would receive a demerit for tardiness—in Derek's book, a minute late was inexcusable. He was on time; this cadet should be, too. The cadet should have been waiting for him, in fact.
"This is bull," he murmured, looking at his watch. Ten, nine, eight . . .
The tap-tap-tap of shoes on the track thumping in his direction caused him to kick his head to his left. Peering for a better view of the source of the sound, he saw what he hadn't initially seen, and almost outright laughed at the sight coming towards him.
A young man—a very young man—reached Derek the moment that his watch beeped twice to indicate the turn of the five o'clock morning hour.
"Cadet Reid?"
The young man—face covered in sweat, patchy and red, wheezing and placing his hands on his knees—nodded. "I'm—yes—Cadet Reid." There was barely a voice behind the statement.
Derek couldn't understand what he was looking at. The cadet was wearing a pair of low Chuck Taylors, mismatched long socks that weren't even the same length, a pair of shorts that were just a little too short, arm bands, a color-block hoodie that he drowned in, horn-rimmed glasses that were ready to slip off his face, and a headband in his mangy hair. These must be his own personal clothes, and he would be changing into a clean uniform later, when his actual mandated physical training would begin. No one was foolish enough to wear non-regulated clothes otherwise.
He looked like he didn't even break twenty—frail-looking enough that a soft wind could knock him over. Derek wasn't one to judge, but in this, he felt that the standards were lowering. For the hundreds of thousands of like-minded people who vied for the position to even be selected to train as a cadet, how did this little dweeb manage to squeeze his skinny white ass here?
Ugh. Must have some parents with deep pockets that let him have his fifteen minutes of fun whenever he wants. Won't last long.
Despite his irritation, he would give him the benefit of the doubt. Jason had asserted that he had unparalleled potential. Whatever the hell that meant. Either way, nothing could be worse than last year.
So thinking that he would break the ice, Derek gave a chuckle. "Kid, the eighties called, and they want . . ." He trailed off and then pointed an open hand at the outfit, " Whatever this is back."
It fell flat. The cadet blinked at him, and something crossed his features before he steeled them.
"Mm. I'm Agent Derek Morgan."
"Yes."
"Stand at attention."
"Sir."
The cadet did as told; Derek lowered his jowls. The last one had rolled his eyes with an undulating swagger, but this one straightened right up.
"You got here early, then."
"I calculated my mile so that if I ran each lap consistently at three minutes and forty-five seconds, then I would reach the entrance at five o'clock, and I was advised to be here promptly at five o'clock."
Was he showing off? Okay, yes, I'm impressed that he calculated things down to the last second, but nope. "I hope you're not fishin' for compliments. That's a fifteen-minute mile. Almost twice as long as the requirement, kid."
The cadet paused and blinked multiple times, jaw clenching. "It's to the best of my abilities, sir." He then corrected himself. "Agent Morgan." And then he continued. "I expect that your training should reflect a better result in time, just as you expect that I should improve. Sir." He corrected himself again. "Agent Morgan."
Excuse me? Derek wanted to needle him, see how far it would take for the cadet to show his true colors. Right now, he was merely showing contrived deference.
"Nah. Ain't here to hold your hand, kid. I'm not into that Bagger Vance nonsense. Is this what they're lettin' into the Academy now? Mm-mm. Standards are damn low."
Ah, there it is. Something alighted in Derek's eye as he watched: the cadet flushed, his eye twitched, and his hands—flat at his sides before—tightened into fists. But the cadet spoke and said something he didn't expect in the least.
"I'm an adult."
"What?"
"Sir," he added. And then he corrected himself: "Agent Morgan."
"Yeah, good, but what?"
The voice was soft, but it was firm. "You've referred to me as kid three times, Agent Morgan. I'm an adult, and respectfully insist that you not use that moniker for me. Cadet Reid will suffice."
Derek didn't respond and had to refrain from balking.
"Sir," Cadet Reid finished. "Agent Morgan."
Derek kicked his head back and rolled his eyes. Great. A wiseass.
He met with the cadet three times a week, and the two of them didn't quite see eye to eye those first few times. He had to admit: the cadet wasn't like the previous one. The first one had downright repulsed him.
Cadet Reid, though, was an irritating pain in Derek's ass.
He didn't fish for compliments—he spoke facts. He always seemed to have something to say, but only ever in response to comments or jabs thrown at him. He never initiated things. He was a little all over the place, too. He was smart—damn smart—but oftentimes, the cadet would take things he said too literally. He didn't refrain from correcting him, either. He didn't understand some of his references to modern shows or music, and he didn't always understand the point of his jokes and his light-hearted jeers.
One day—and still within the first month of their acquaintance—the cadet arrived at their pre-arranged meetings late, sporting a busted lip and a bruised eye that would, in the days to come, become a black eye.
Derek railed against him for being late. "You probably deserved that shiner, too, 'cause of that smartass mouth."
Despite the words, though, the cadet's lack of response and his blanketed expression didn't sit well with Derek, and it wasn't until he had left that he realized that the cadet hadn't spoken a word—he had done as told. Yes, it didn't sit well with him at all.
He had to give it to Cadet Reid, though. He was persistent, and he didn't give up. What he lacked in strength, he made up for in speed; what he lacked in social graces, he made up for with his intelligence; what he lacked in stamina, he made up for with grit. Derek reluctantly acknowledged these things. The twerp damn well demanded his respect.
Somewhere along the lines, he began to look forward to their sessions for reasons he couldn't understand.
And one day they had a harmless conversation—strangely humorous, insightful, suddenly sobering, and formative. The little punk reeled him in, and the ties of their strange bond thickened as the weeks passed.
Derek enjoyed needling him until his nose would flare and he'd straighten his lips before he would break into an unsure, puckered grin. He liked jabbing him until—on one occasion—he barked out in laughter. The tension and quailing from the hair ruffling lessened. The flinching at a cuff to his arm lessened. He was like Clooney, his rescue dog. Until he was more than Clooney.
Derek mulled over the fond memories in relish. If he didn't latch on to them, then he was left imagining what Spencer was enduring.
It wasn't like the times when he would drop Spencer off at the airport to take a flight west to visit his mother or to give a guest lecture somewhere faraway or visit criminals with fractured minds like Amanda Jackson or, lately, Ben Foster. There was an unspoken promise of return on those occasions. In those times, Spencer would send Derek a funny text message of something that occurred while away, or he responded to one of Derek's texts with multiple paragraphs to correct him or did-you-know him or to how-would-you him.
He missed him. He had half a mind to send a text. The phone was still unable to be traced.
Mere weeks had passed, but he missed Spencer. It was a pang as sharp as a constant, twisting dagger in his soul. He didn't know how long it might take before this feeling passed or before the blade would withdraw from his chest. How could it? His heart was tied to Spencer in ways he couldn't explain and hadn't known until he wasn't here and there was no promise of return .
—
Alex put her incentive spirometer away after seeing the numbers, breathing a sigh. "Ugh. This is taking way too long." She knew she couldn't rush the healing process. It didn't stop the irritation.
The dreams—the nightmares—were the worst to adjust to and kept her up often. For a few nights, she awoke gasping and aching as she slapped her hand over her chest to fight the punches—the stabs—that lanced through her or reliving the body wrenching pain of the crash. Within a few days, though, the horror ebbed, replaced by new ones.
When she was distressed in the past, she used to dream of her son in the hospital with wires protruding from patches, with his chocolate hair shaved to the skull, with deep blotches of a taupe-grey under his eyes, and pale and chapped lips.
Now, the horror turned into Spencer on a morgue table: polka dotted in bruises that bled through his pale skin in dusty blues, plum purples, and lime greens, ochre yellows; covered in welts from belts and wire that spanned his chest to his legs; sliding abrasions where he was dragged; freckles of red petechiae from his jaws to his forehead along with whispery bruises where hands had wrapped around his neck; the gore of his exposed flesh decaying where his hands were cut off. Bruised knees as a visual indication of sexual assault, which would be confirmed empirically upon a more thorough examination. Lights would flicker and hum above him.
It was horrific and it continued to manifest the emotions she had toward Spencer.
The word teammate was far too distant. She knew this with a sharp reality now. And the others didn't just view him or each other as mere colleagues. She was still new to their team, but their dynamic with each other was profound.
She had been grafted into a family, and it was Spencer who had insisted she become a part of it. It was a startling concept, considering how shunted she was by this very same institution many years ago. She was hesitant and careful to expose any of herself to these people who might no sooner betray her and hid that behind a wall of general aloofness. It had been no further from the truth.
When she spoke with David and Aaron the morning she woke up from her surgery, she'd made a correlation with Spencer, saw a definite string, and realized that her feelings for him went far deeper than she had wanted to admit.
He wasn't Ethan. He wasn't her son. But she could view him as such. The fondness she often felt toward him, the worry she often had over him, the need she had to make sure that he was well, the desire she had to care for him when he had his debilitating migraines, when she stayed with him one night and smoothed his brow—he filled something in her that she thought had become an empty space. She couldn't deny it—she loved Spencer as if he were her own son.
That kind of love could be blinding. It could be dangerous.
Alex first met Spencer about two years ago now, in the late summer of 2011. He had taken a two-month sabbatical in June and July, and when he returned, he took up his reassignment to a different unit. She would later come to know that it all had to do with the then-supposed death of ex-Agent Emily Prentiss, even his excursions to the firing range whenever possible.
Although the debacle took place earlier in the spring, the team had come under review near the end of May, and there were transfers and reassignments as a result—of Spencer to the Research, Strategy, and Instruction Unit of the NCAVC, and of Aaron to an investigative task force. The reassignments were supposed to be permanent. Spencer didn't know about everyone else's continued investigations on Declan Doyle until late during the summer. These latter details were revealed to Alex as her and Spencer's relationship budded.
Alex had, at that time, been looking for a guest lecturer for her fall forensics linguistics course and stumbled upon Spencer's FBI profile. After having a brief, pleasant conversation over the phone with him in early August, she invited him to guest-lecture in the beginning of the fall semester, which he did. Within just another few weeks, though, it seemed that his position as a behavioral analyst was restored, and over the course of the next year she had him guest lecture in the same course again—at the end of the fall semester, and at the beginning and end of the spring semester.
She enjoyed his company before and after the lectures, and they often engaged in academic conversations other times and therefore developed a secular familiarity. It was Spencer who encouraged her to resume working in Quantico instead of flying to the Seattle field office whenever she was needed. She was hesitant—there was history in Quantico she didn't want to revisit—yet didn't oppose the prospect.
It was a shock to learn from him that in mid-September of 2011, he was suspicious that Erin Strauss had advocated for his and Aaron's rank to be reinstated to that specific unit for the express reason that they become a cohesive unit again. The other shock was learning that ex-Agent Emily Prentiss was, in fact, alive. The ex-agent had also made the same advocacy, and hers was the most convincing. But when there was an opening in the unit due to Agent Prentiss' departure to London less than a year later, Spencer had taken it upon himself to recommend Alex to Aaron and David.
What started as a more academic relationship developed into something more within the mere months that they worked within the same unit.
She missed him.
Yo-Yo Ma's rendition of Bach's Cello Suite No. 1 in G Major played on her radio, and she returned her eyes to the book she was reading. It was another one of the books Spencer had bought while he was in New Jersey.
It was how she passed the time. Sometimes someone from the team would send her a text, but they didn't burden her, though she told them to call or text her without reserve. Her father and even her younger brother had stayed for a few days to help her until the arguing. She sent them away to recover without any added levels of irritation.
It was just as well.
Her phone rang, though, and she reached for it with her right hand, hoping that it was someone from the team to distract her. It wasn't. It was her husband, who she hadn't spoken to in weeks, and it was a welcome distraction.
"Hey, you!" Alex exclaimed.
"Hey. Next time I decide if I want to keep working at Doctors Without Borders, please shoot me."
"What country are you in right now?"
"Right now, all I see is sand. So, South . . . Sandistan, I think."
Alex laughed. She was usually glad to know that despite his profession, her husband's humor was intact. And he wasn't the overly-doting type; he was a man who let her breathe. But she missed him, too. She sighed. "When are you gonna get home?"
"Yeah, well they kept me out here for ten months. Who knows?"
She was unable to respond. People needed her husband. He was good at what he did.
The bell rang.
"Do you need to get that?"
"Mm-mm. No, not right now." But it rang again.
"You sure? Maybe you have to sign for something."
He's being awfully insistent for me to—oh! Her heart thrummed in understanding. Putting her phone down too eagerly, she winced before she clambered up and walked to her front door. Her mouth fell open and her eyes pricked when she opened it.
"Special delivery." Her husband still held the phone to his ear.
He didn't know how much she needed to see him, if just to ground her a little. She needed it. She drew herself to him and let out an Agh of discomfort as she reached her right arm around him, and he put his arms around her.
"Hey, now . . ." he cajoled when he pulled her trembling form from himself.
As he stepped in, Alex went to the kitchen to make him a coffee. He insisted that he could make it, that she shouldn't strain herself, but she told him to sit at the couch and let her feel a little useful. While the coffee brewed, she looked at her phone when it vibrated and beeped with a message from Penelope.
» Hey, Ms Owl
» How ya feelin?
» I made a batch of
oatmeal cookies.
Way too many left
over.
» What o what to do?
Alex smiled at the text.
« TY, Pen
« Feeling ok. Bored.
« Yum yum! I have a
feeling ur itching to
send them my way.
» Gasp. You didn't get
into the FBI at 24 for
nothin lololol
» I shall drop them
off this evening after
work!
« And I shall await ur
dropoff. Do u guys
have a case?
» Yepyep, everyone's
in Motor City. Icky
stuff.
« LMK if u need me to
help with anything.
« My fingers are
twiddling.
» That would be a nope.
» You need your rest!
» I'll see you tonight!
The coffee finished brewing and she poured some in her mug and then turned gingerly. "This is a treat, James," she declared as she walked out the kitchen. "You never surprise me at home. How'd you get the time . . ." Her words trailed off as she came upon her husband sleeping. Or pretending to. "James?" She looked at his leg. "You can stop faking. When you're really asleep, you do that leg twitch thing."
James, eyes still closed and hands folded over his belly, murmured, "No I don't."
The nerve. She bit at her lip and bent a little to give his leg a tap. He pulled it toward his body, opening his eyes, and she sank into the couch. Reaching her hand toward him, he let out a soft groan before reaching for her fingers.
"What's going on, James?" She tilted her head. "'Cause there's something."
"Why does there have to be something?" he asked in a reasoning tone, his face morphing from the pleasant softness to something more hardened and concerned. "Can't I just want to visit my wife? You were nearly killed, Alex."
Alex straightened her lips and squeezed his hand as her eyes glistened. She could have been killed, yes, but she was alive, and she would be fine. Spencer, however—
"Alex, someone stabbed you multiple times after sabotaging the car you were driving and crashing into you," he added.
"I'm fine. And there's something else. I can tell."
Avoiding the latter statement, James argued, "Telling me that you're fine? Definitely tells me that you're not fine, honey. No one should be after what you've gone through. Honey, they had to perform an emergency hysterectomy."
Alex blinked something out of her eyes.
"Agent Rossi told me that another agent went missing. That Dr Reid you're fond of. Has he been recovered yet?"
Her eyes welled, and she had to draw her gaze away from him, shaking her head.
"Oh, babe," he began.
She hated this. She hated showing weakness to people. It wasn't her. She wasn't a person so easily overcome by her emotions.
Shaking her head, Alex pulled her hand away. "You quit Doctors Without Borders, didn't you?"
"I did not," James objected without conviction.
"Don't lie to me, James; just say it," she insisted. "Did you quit because of me? You know I don't want a thing like that."
"I did not quit," James insisted.
"Well, then what?" Her husband was silent, and she thinned her eyes at him. "The worst thing you can do to a linguist is not communicate."
"Alex—"
"You knew that when we got engaged."
"Alex, they offered me the position at Harvard."
She pulled back. "They did?"
"Yeah." He nodded. "Decent hours. Better pay."
This was—this was good. He would be closer to home. And he'd been going for that position for years.
She couldn't suppress a smile. "What did you tell them?"
He quirked his eyebrow. "I told them that I would only consider it if they gave you a position in the linguistics department once you're doing better, and they said Okay."
"They did." It was uttered in disbelief. She didn't know how to feel about this. A professorship at Harvard was not something to scoff at. But she didn't appreciate people making decisions for her, and such decisions were life-altering.
"They did." James laughed with raised eyebrows. "Can you believe it? We can celebrate this thing together. This good thing."
"It is," she exhaled. "It's a very good thing. It's just . . ."
She needed to stay at the BAU. Especially now. She was pacing herself in her recuperation, but she wanted nothing more than to help the team. But that position was . . .
"Not what you want," James finished for her.
"No. Not right now. It's taken me 10 years to get here. Not just to get to the BAU, but to restore my reputation inside the Bureau. And James. What happened in Jersey . . ."
"I know."
"And the job comes first for both of us. That was the deal."
For many years, when they dated and when they got married, part of their attraction was that they were both obsessed with their own work. She preferred it.
"Yeah, well, the deal also came with veto power. Remember? One of us could always say, I want to be a couple again. Alex . . ." His eyes bore into hers. "I wanna be a couple again. And your job is dangerous. It's nearly killed you." His face reddened, and the next words came out choked. "I could have lost you; do you realize that? We already lost Ethan."
What she and James had was special. Spencer's life was the BAU, and it wounded him when he had a mere taste of this. She owed it to Spencer to get him back to safety, or at the least to assist in bringing his captors to justice if he was no longer alive.
Her eyes welled again, and she shook her head.
"I don't appreciate you making any kinds of decisions for me, James. That's not how this works. That's not how we work. And I feel like you're holding this over me."
James sighed. "That's not what this is, Alex."
The irritation on Alex's face was gossamer thin. "That's exactly what this is, James. If you want to take up the position in Harvard, I'm not one to hold you back at all. I've never been. Don't pretend otherwise."
James leaned forward. "So are you going to tell me that you wouldn't want this position?"
Alex stuttered before she shook her head, feeling her control slipping from her. "No, James, that's not what I'm telling you. You know I would want this position. I'd be a fool not to take it up. I just—" She blinked, and her brows furrowed as her ever-long-suffering expression hardened. "You're taking advantage of my emotional state by giving me an opt-out with something anyone could dream for. I won't decide this now. I won't."
He tilted his head and took her hand, and her fingers curled around his. "You're right, Alex. I'm sorry. Can you blame me? I want you safe. I wanna be selfish this once."
Alex lifted his hand to her lips, looking up at her husband through her lashes. "I know you do." She corrected herself when he made an aborted sound of mock hurt. She pressed the back of his hand to her cheek, chuckling. "Want me safe, that is. I know you want me safe. But now you're trying to guilt-trip me. I'm the linguist here." With a scrunch of her nose and the return to a congenial and soft and playful expression, she continued, "You can't manipulate me."
"Bah—I tried." James pouted.
"Big fail. But you know what? I'm pretty selfish too."
"Mm. Big time." James flinched and laughed when she slapped his arm playfully. "Ya know, it's what makes our marriage work," he said with a snort, wrinkling his nose. "Two wacko selfish people in love. In our case two wrongs made a right."
"Mm. No. Two people who love each other because we love how unwaveringly passionate we are about what we do."
"Ugh." He drawled out before he sighed. "Don't worry about giving me an answer just yet, hon. Take some time to think it over." He then rolled his eyes upward and gave an exaggerated groan, slurring the next words: "When you're in a less delicate emotional state." He snorted, and Alex cuffed his leg with the back of her hand.
"Cheeky jerk."
"Hah! Welp! I still have a couple more weeks before I need to get back to them with anything final, anyway." James slapped his hands on his thighs and stood up. "I'm going to make dinner for us tonight," he declared. "I've learned a few good dishes in South Sandistan."
Alex laughed at her husband. "You can meet Penelope, too. She'll be dropping off a batch of her cookies after she's done for the evening. Hands down the best oatmeal cookies you'll ever eat."
QUANTICO, VIRGINIA
The days moved on, and the team continued the slow and difficult process of doing the same. Every case, though, tended to make them think of Spencer in some way or another. Each time, Aaron had to remind them to maintain focus, as he had done for the most recent case. The unsub was both a physical and psychological sadist who had abducted married couples and used a ruse to get them to stab each other.
He began, at first, as an equal opportunity, anger-retaliatory sadist. There wasn't a sexual component to what he did to his victims, but rather what he had them do to him in letting them stab him. Those married women that he later abducted had validated his obsessive-compulsive disorder while being held captive, turning it into a shared bonding experience.
The use of the victim's vehicles was what got to them the most in the beginning, but they were able to hurdle over it. The burgeoning profile that included the OCD made them freeze up again. In the end, they were able to apprehend him and save his latest victim as well.
All in all, they were carrying on despite their diminished numbers. Aaron had to continue keeping things as they were. But there were other worries that weighed on him—beyond Spencer's abduction, beyond the ever-looming director—there were issues lately with Beth that were all on him and which would affect Jack. Jack liked her. He liked her. He sighed the thoughts away.
One other worry that continued to weigh on him was the unfinished business with The Replicator. There were no recently solved (or unsolved) cases that he was copying. The tongue removal in the case back in New Jersey was the only echo of a more recent case, but it was obvious from the beginning that it had nothing to do with The Replicator.
Aaron theorized the possibility that the unsub was only interested in them as a more cohesive unit, that which they weren't at the moment. Beyond attacking the Bureau, something about the dynamics of a team structure—of theirs in particular—that grated at this unsub, and he didn't know why.
It disturbed him that the unsub might have a more intimate awareness of the inner workings of what the team was suffering. The hacker theory, that of The Replicator breaching the Bureau, was negated, but who knew? Aaron was beginning to entertain the idea that it might be a fellow agent who no longer had a desire to uphold the oath he swore to protect. Or a bureau worker who was in a position far below his intellectual abilities—a janitor, a file clerk, anyone—or one who might have been shafted.
He was waiting, then, for the other shoe to drop with this perpetrator. He knew the recommencement of that attack might come at an inopportune moment.
It was all troubling, but he shook his head once to erase the thoughts for now and get back on task. While he continued to look over the deposition he was writing, his office phone rang. He looked at the Caller ID, and all it indicated was that the caller was from Washington, DC.
"This is SSA Aaron Hotchner," he answered.
"Agent Hotchner, hello," the other voice returned. It was a woman's voice. "This is Mary."
Who?
"Mary Donovan, the mother of Maeve. Donovan."
Aaron's chest tightened and he sucked in a quick breath. Why could she be calling him?
"Mrs Donovan, yes, hello. How . . ." He wasn't sure how to approach this.
"My husband and I are both doing fine, thank you," she supplied.
"I'm glad to hear of it. How can I help you, Mrs Donovan? Please allow me to apologize, again, for the events of—"
"Agent Hotchner, I was calling concerning the last bit of evidence that was being held for processing."
Aaron started, sitting more upright in his seat. "Oh. Yes, Mrs Donovan; you can reclaim items used in an investigation from our DC Field office Evidence Unit and they can turn the items over to you." Even as he was saying it, though, Aaron felt obligated—not only to these people, but to Spencer—to iron this out for them so they could get what they needed expeditiously. It might give them closure.
"We might need a little assistance with the process," Mary stated.
"Right. Of course—yes." He cleared his throat. "Since the, ah, letter was part of the investigation, I can check to make sure that it's indeed been cleared for release. I couldn't see why not. I can do this immediately for you and give you a call back as soon as the release is confirmed."
"We would appreciate that, Agent Hotchner. Thank you," she said, and then she confirmed her phone number when Aaron read it back to her.
"Is there anything else that I can do for you, Mrs Donovan?"
There was a pause on the other line.
"We . . ." The voice trembled, and then she cleared it. "We would like to get into contact with Agent Dr Spencer Reid's line?"
Oh.
Oh, no.
This was—why did they want to—Oh, god.
"Agent Hotchner?"
"Apologies. Yes."
"Is this a problem, Agent Hotchner, to request that of you? I apologize. Is it some type of breech?" There was no contention in Mary's voice, but an edge of despair.
"Ah—"
"There's no other—she—Maeve—she never had his personal or work number, I don't think. She'd used a burner phone once, I think, to speak with him, but it's not with her belongings, you see, and—well—we know this is terribly intrusive, but—"
It finally came to him, and Aaron calmed. "Unfortunately, Mrs Donovan, Agent Reid is currently unavailable at his post for an unforeseeable amount of time."
"Oh, no." She seemed disheartened. "We don't know how we can get into contact with him. We would like to do so, and soon."
"That . . . may not be a possibility."
"Why not?"
Again, Aaron was careful, poised. "A recent complication is inconveniencing Dr Reid."
"A complication."
"Yes." Perfectly composed. Simple. Neutral. He had many years of experience in this. She'd just unsettled him for a moment with her unexpected request.
"I see." Mary's tone shifted, a strange medley of even, hard, and hollow with just the two words. "It wouldn't be in the same manner that there was a complication when our daughter was murdered, would it?"
Oh.
'Mr and Mrs Donovan. I'm—I'm sorry to have to tell you this. There was a, ah, complication with Maeve's stalker and . . . I'm sorry to have to inform you of this, but Maeve—'
Damn it.
He was silent. Flummoxed.
"It seems, Agent Hotchner, that those under your charge experience far too many complications."
The tongue could be a knife, and hers had just plunged into a place that pierced his very composition.
She wasn't wrong. Her words were not at all far from truth.
"Mrs Donovan," Aaron began, seeking some restitution. "I want to express my deepest and most sincere—"
"I expect to hear a call from you soon regarding the release of the evidence." It was a dismissal. "Until then, have a good day, Agent."
The phone clicked on the other end and Aaron let out a breath, balancing his head in his hand.
—
The following morning after Spencer's hair was colored and cut and went through his daily ritual, he awoke ill and indisposed. The woman tended to him every moment she could for the next few days, and when he was well, he made an unwise decision. For it, he experienced the large sting of discipline from both of his captors unlike that since the beginning of his captivity.
But—he would come to find—it would not be the last, and those harsher punishments waxed, no matter how punitive the reason—and Spencer Reid fought not to wane.
.
.
.
Some dialogue in this chapter, as well as the unsub and case mentioned in passing, was taken from the Criminal Minds episode 08x22 #6 with a slight twist per this divergence.
Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed!
