GAME
Chapter 9
UnSub

"Where neither love nor hatred is in the game, a woman's game is mediocre" - Friedrich Nietzsche

'Ok that's enough!' Garcia shouted. 'We are not playing any more, so forget your stupid game!'

She drew Hotch closer as if to protect him from whatever Gamagic had planned. Her wrist was swollen and painful, and her skin was sore and tender. She was having trouble focusing, and wondered if that was the bee venom. Her hands were shaking as she tenderly touched the man she held to her chest.

'We're not playing any more.' she sobbed.

Hotch had had a convulsion, and it had frightened Garcia. He had fresh blood on his lips where he had bitten his tongue, and his broken arm bent at an impossible angle. His temperature was very high, and he was moaning in his delirium. Garcia thought he might die in her arms.

At least there was plenty of water here. They were both soaked through, and she was shivering, although Hotch wasn't; he was burning up with fever.

She was also very tired. She wouldn't be able to think straight until she had slept.

She pulled Hotch closer on her lap, and rested her head on the wall behind her. She closed her eyes and fell asleep almost at once.

-0-0-0-

Gamagic didn't see her protest. He was otherwise occupied by a gun battle that he had no hope of winning. Morgan and Rossi had him pinned down, Prentiss had made her move to approach the hangar from the other side.

It was a long walk, but Prentiss didn't want to be seen. Crouching low, she was now behind the UnSub, and slowly, silently, crept up on him from behind.

'Don't move, you freak.' she said in a low threatening voice, her gun inches from his head. 'Throw your gun out.'

Lomax tried to turn and face her but the sound of her gun cocking made him freeze.

'Don't give me a reason, Lomax, or I'll blow your head off.'

He dropped the gun and stood up.

She called the other two over to them.

'UnSub is secure.'

'Now', Dave said, 'We want to get our people out. Show us how.'

'There's no way of ending the game early, you idiots!' Lomax grinned. 'Don't you know anything about computer games?'

-0-0-0-

Jordan raced into the ER.

'Help me someone! I need help!' she shouted as she entered. Heads turned and the ER Doctor, a tall dark handsome man, ran to her.

'What is it?'

'In my car. An FBI Agent with a gunshot wound to the chest.' she said, leading the way out to her car. Dr Nyland followed her out, with an ER nurse.

Nyland climbed into the back of the SUV, and quickly checked the injured man's vital signs.

'His pulse is thready........ A gurney here! Now!'

Carefully, gently, Nyland lifted Reid onto the gurney, and checked his pupils. Reid's eyes flickered open.

'Can you tell me your name?'

'Reid......... Hotch?'

'I'm Doctor Nyland, Reid, we're going to take care of you........ Get him into Resuss quickly!'

With Nyland and Todd following, the gurney bearing Spencer Reid was rushed through the ER into Resuss. Todd was stopped at the door.

'You will have to wait here I'm afraid.' Nyland said. 'I'll let you know as soon as we have anything to tell you.'

And he was through the doors with his patient.

Todd paced the corridor outside the ER. She didn't know much about Reid except what she had heard before she joined the team; she had hardly spoken to him. But what she had seen she liked, and was always interested in someone who was not quite the norm. She stopped at the window in the Resuss door and watched Nyland and his team working to save Reid's life. There was nothing she could do except wait.

-0-0-0-

Garcia was woken up when Hotch moved on her lap. She stroked his hair, when suddenly, his back arched againand he convulsed in her arms. She was shocked by the ferocity of the seizure, and she clung to his body to try to comfort him. She looked down at his face as the convulsion subsided, and saw tears in his eyes. Her own tears fell onto his face as he looked back up at her.

He tried to say something but his voice was so quiet that she was unable to hear what he was saying to her. She touched his hot skin of his face with the backs of manicured fingers and spoke to him softly.

'I need to check this room for a way out, Hotch.' she whispered. 'I'm not going far.'

She didn't want to continue with the game, but the alternative was to sit and wait until they were either rescued, or for Hotch to die.

She laid him down on the floor and he groaned in agony, and deliriously mumbled something under his breath. His cheeks were bright against the pallor of his skin, and it scared her. She understood that a high temperature was the body's way of fighting infection, but Hotch's fever was way too high, and now he had had a convulsion, she knew his hours were numbered and she had to get him out of there.

But first she got him a drink, and refilled the bottle which was now empty. He sucked at the bottle thirstily and smiled his thanks.

'I need to find the way out now. I won't leave you.'

She realised now what the second half of the clue meant. Fibonacci sequence had two ones in it, and she should have turned the key twice. 'Two ones or bees'. Of course.

This Gamagic was very precise in his instructions. She needed to be more careful. Her eagerness may have cost Hotch his life.

She glanced across at him. He was quieter now, no longer trying to speak, but his stillness frightened her as much as the convulsion had.

Sighing, she went back to checking the room.

There was no key here, and no box. She had hoped for a medical box to help her with her painful skin; some soothing cream, or even some antibiotics for Hotch.

But there was nothing.

The only door was the one they had entered through. That was the only visible way out.

She began her search of the walls.

-0-0-0-

'Just show us the way in, you sonofabitch!' Morgan raged. 'You designed it, you must be able to end it!'

'Only Penelope can end this game. She said it was rubbish, and yet she has almost died on at least two occasions, and as for the man she is with, he is worse than useless, slowing her down and making her lose the game', he added, 'but we can watch.'

'Show us.' Dave said, his hand on Morgan's arm.

'There are cameras in all the rooms. I can watch them on my monitor I have set up.' He smiled at his own ingenuity. 'Would you like to watch?'

Lomax led the way under gun escort, to the pill box closest to them. It was filthy inside, but opposite the way in was a table with a monitor set up on it, and a chair where he had been sitting until recently. He walked forwards and turned the monitor on.

On the screen they could see Garcia running her hands over the walls trying to locate the way out. They could see Hotch also. His arm was a mess of blood and tissue, twisted at an angle, and still bleeding onto the floor. They could also see the bite on his neck and the swelling around it. He wasn't moving, apart from the almost imperceptible rise and fall of his chest as he struggled to breathe. They could see he was ill, even over the link.

'Can you speak to them?'

'Of course. But that would be cheating.'

'Open the link! Now!' Dave said, uncharacteristically shouting. Lomax leaned forwards and flicked a switch.

'Ok, they can hear you now.'

'Garcia, It's David Rossi here.' They watched on the monitor as she turned around, looking for the speaker. 'Garcia, we are going to get you out.'

They could see how the news relaxed her, but they still didn't know how they were going to do it.

'Lomax, tell her how to get out.' Morgan said.

'No. I won't compromise the Game. It's my life's work. They solved it all up to now, they can do the rest.'

'Garcia's trying to tell us something.' Emily said, and they turned back to the screen.

-0-0-0-

Reid was in theatre, having the bullet removed from the top lobe of his right lung. Nyland was performing the procedure. Todd was pacing a different length of carpet now. A nurse came and put her hand on her shoulder.

'I've brought you a coffee; I hope you take sugar.'

'Oh thank you.' Jordan took the cup gratefully, and sat down. The nurse sat down with her.

'Who is it?' she asked nodding towards the OR.

'A work colleague.' Todd answered. 'I hardly know him, and I dearly want the chance to.'

'It takes a crisis like this sometimes to show us what's important in life. What work do you do?'

'I'm with the FBI. I've only just been assigned to this team, and I mess up every way I look. At least I got this right.'

'You're the one who brought him in, are you?'

'Yeah. He got shot on duty and I drove him here.' she said. 'One of the guys was going to, and I said I would. We were in a shoot out, and I'm not a very good shot. I thought they could do without me, but not without the others.' she paused, wondering why she was pouring her heart out to a stranger, and then thought, it was because she was a stranger that she was able to. 'I just think looking back that maybe I was afraid to stay, and it was an act of cowardice.' She sighed and looked at her hands twisting a tissue in her lap. 'When this secondment is over, I'm going to quit.'

The nurse took Jordan's hand and squeezed it.

'Most of us don't have to make life or death choices on the spur of the moment. People like you make life safe for people like me. You are needed and valuable. Don't forget that.'

The nurse got up and walked away, Jordan sipped her coffee.

Needed and valuable......

That was so nice!

Maybe she won't quit.

She looked up from her coffee, and Nyland was coming over.

'He's going to be ok, Miss.... uh...'

'Todd. Jordan Todd.'

Yes. Jordan. We got the bullet out, no permanent harm. As soon as he's out of recovery, you can sit with him. Is he your boyfriend?'

'No, he's a colleague.'

'What time do you finish work? Maybe we could have dinner?'

-0-0-0-

They watched Garcia carefully as she tired to tell them something.

'I think she's telling us about Hotch' Emily said.

'We know about Hotch, Doll Face.' Morgan said. 'You're doing great!'

Garcia smiled briefly and resumed her search. Soon she had found a depression in the wall, and was now looking for a second.

'Tell her where the other one is, Lomax.' Morgan said

'Do you realise that if Hotch dies, you will be indicted for murder?' Rossi said. He pushed Lomax's head closer to the microphone. 'Now help her.'

'The other switch', he said reluctantly, 'is on the floor.'

Garcia immediately ended her search of the walls and started on the floor. She found the switch almost at once.

Before she pressed them she went across to Hotch. Holding him under the arms, she pulled him over to the switches so that she could hold onto him as she pressed them. She sat between them, and held Hotch in her arms, pressing the two switches simultaneously with her feet. A trap door opened in front of them, with steps leading down into the darkness.

Garcia shuffled forwards and put her feet on the first step, wondering how she was going to get down the steps with Hotch in her arms.

Holding him tightly against her, she bumped down the stairs without standing up again. Dave, Morgan and Prentiss watched as she disappeared into the darkness.