Never To Late

Even if I say
It'll be alright
Still I hear you say
You want to end your life
Now and again we try
To just stay alive
Maybe we'll turn it all around
'Cause it's not too late
It's never too late

-"Never to Late" By Three Days Grace

Something stopped Reid at the last second. He didn't know what it was but for some reason he couldn't just shot himself in the head. Slowly he moved the gun to point on his stomach.

'Lets see what fate has in store for me.' he thought. It was a better thing to do anyway. Instead of killing himself he would let there be a chance that he could be saved. If he didn't die then that meant that it wasn't meant to be.

He wondered if there was anyone around to hear the shot. He really doubted it. It was the middle of the day and he was in a hotel, even one would be out having fun. He also wondered if the team had caught the Batman. He really hoped so. He didn't want anyone else to die.

Then he pulled the trigger. It was the most pain he had felt in his life. He could feel the blood soaking his cloths. The gun dropped from his hands as he closed his eyes and fell back onto the bed. He embraced the pain and wondered into the darkness, not expecting to see the light ever again. Death was scarer then he had thought.

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Hotch ran across the room as fast as he could. When he had gone the short distance to the bed he realized that he had shot himself in the stomach. That meant that he could be saved. Pressing his hand against the wound he tried to stop the bleeding, still not sure if the young man was alive or not.

"Reid?" He called. After a long moment he say the slow rise and fall of his chest. He was alive, but only just. "Reid! Reid Please don't die! Reid." He said then realized he needed to get hi to a hospital.

This was when having another person would have been helpful. Hotch didn't want to remove his hands from the other, afraid that he would die. But he needed to get an ambulance here, and now.

"Someone! HELP!" He shouted never taking his eyes off Reid. "Help! Please! Someone. Anyone!" He continued to call.

A few moments later a young couple walked down the hallway going back to their room. Hearing the shouts the ran in. The girl screamed at the scene huddling into her husband.

"Help... Call 911. Tell them he's been shot!" Hotch said right away.

A moment later he could hear the man talking into the phone. He was talking so fast that Hotch didn't know if the guy on the other side could understand him or not.

"Reid, please don't die..." Hotch muttered ignoring the couple now. "Please... Its not your time. I... You.... Reid?" The rise and fall of his chest was getting slower. He was failing. "No! No! No!"

"They're three minutes out!" He heard from somewhere, but was so focused on Reid he didn't know where,

Tears ran down his face as he continued to hold pressure on the wound, starting to think it was time to do CPR, but he couldn't move. He continued to mutter stuff but by this time he was so out of it himself he didn't know what he was saying, or if it even made sense. Spencer was dieing and he didn't know how to help him.

"Sir, can you move..." He heard but the words never processed. "Sir." The next thing he knew he was being pulled from the young agent.

It was only then that he realized the paramedics had arrived, and where already at work on stabilizing Reid. One of them was walking Hotch out of the room, maybe saying something, but Hotch didn't hear.

Once out side the room Hotch say the note taped to the door. With bloody hands he grabbed it and read it again, this time getting all that it said. This couldn't be happening. Then Reid and about a thousand other people came out of the room and down the hall. Quickly he stuffed the suicide note in his pocket and followed. When they were outside another man stopped him from following Reid anymore.

"You can't come, sir. We need all the room we can have."

"Which hospital are you taking him to?" He asked with out even thinking.

"Memorial, on Lexington."

Hotch, still covered in blood, ran to his FBI issued SUV and got in, taking after the ambulance as fast as he could. In the car he realized that he should call someone, tell them what was going on. It was a phone call he never wanted to make. The first number that came up was Morgan's and thus he called him.

"Yeah, Hotch?" He answered.

At first Hotch couldn't find his voice, and even almost crashed the car when he came to a red light.

"Hotch?" Morgan repeated.

"I...Its Reid..." He stumbled over the words.

"What about him?"

"He... shot... him...himself...He's going to Ma...Mamoarl hosp..." He couldn't say anything else.

"Be right there!" He said and hung up. Hotch trusted him to get the news to the others.

In silence he went the rest of the way there. He arrived only shortly after the ambulance since he went way over the speed limit. He would have gotten there even fast if he had remember he was in a cop car and could us the sirens. Running into the building he was ushered to the waiting room.

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Morgan, Rossi, and Jordan came in only a few minutes later. They looked at Hotch, covered in blood, and though they had so many questions, kept quiet. Which he was very grateful for. he didn't know if he could try and explain now. Emily was there in the next few minutes, along with Detective Parker.

Hotch sat in silence a few more minutes then decided it was time to explain. Never once looking up from the floor he told the story. His voice was lifeless, but the most important thing was it was controlled. He was able to hid his true emotion, even though anyone that knew him knew he was devastated. Maybe he was trying to put on a show for the doctors, maybe he was trying to save the last bit of dignity he had left. he himself wasn't to sure.

As he told the story he left out the note, not sure if he should share that bit with them. If Reid died, then he would let them all look at it, but if he lived he would keep it hidden. He knew there were some things that he didn't want people to know on there when he was alive. That was how it always went. Hotch would respect that and never tell a soul what he knew, and pretended that he didn't know it, even if it was burnt into his head.

The five of them, Parker leaving after he found out it was a suicide attempt, in silence watching every doctor and nurse that walked by. Just waiting to hear the good or bad news. Minutes turned to hours and hours threatened to turn to days. No one knew how much time had past. It was enough time that Garcia, and JJ, along with Will and Henry, to fly in from Virgina.

All Hotch could remember thinking of what that there was still hope. Some how he had found Reid with in enough time that he didn't bleed out. But now it was out of his hands, then again it had never been in his hands. He kept telling him self that it was Never To Late.