A/N: Once again, none of it is mine, except for the original character, which is obviously mine... otherwise he wouldn't be an original character. Ah, the life of a poor, unemployed college student.

Chapter 7

"Did you two hear me?" Gibbs bellowed into the mike. "I want you both to be extremely careful."

"Got it, Gibbs," Kate replied. "Sexual sadist equals bad news."

"Don't worry about us," Elle interjected.

"He's compelled to strike again soon," Reid said. "When the urge to kill comes, he won't be able to stop it. And he'll make whoever his victim is suffer. That gives him his sexual release."

"Tony and Derek are close by, and McGee's in the next apartment over. He's got enough video cameras around here that he won't miss the slightest movement of a mouse," Elle said.

"Mouse? What mouse?" Kate asked, looking around frantically.

Elle stared at her.

"Totally kidding," Kate said as she laughed nervously.

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Tony tossed an empty takeout box into the back of Morgan's SUV. Morgan stared at him. He squirmed slightly as he felt the sting of Morgan's glare. "What?" he asked, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

"You're a slob," Morgan said. He gestured to the back of the truck. "You're destroying government property."

"We're after a sexual serial killer who's probably after both of our partners, and you're worried about me messing up your car?"

Morgan tossed his own takeout box in the backseat. "I never said that." He flashed a grin at Tony.

Tony laughed loudly. "Smooth."

"Yeah, just make sure you get it before Elle and Kate get in here."

"Ha. Tell me about it. You ever get yelled at for being 'immature'?

"Eh, every once in a while. Elle's not too bad about that."

"I hear it pretty much every day."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. It sucks sometimes."

Morgan slurped his drink. "Yeah."

They sat in relative silence for a few minutes. The sun began to sink behind the tree line. Morgan saw that Kate and Elle's light was still on. "It's gonna be dark soon."

"You think he moves at night?"

"It's typical. Not many criminals are willing to move during the day."

"I knew that." Tony rubbed his hand through his hair. "It's just, you know, I thought serial killers…"

Morgan's phone chirped, cutting off Tony's half-hearted excuses. He flipped open the phone. "Morgan."

"Kate and Elle are about to turn in," Gideon's voice sounded through the receiver. Morgan quickly put him on speaker phone and Tony leaned in to listen.

"Got it. We're keepin' an eye out, but I don't see or hear anything."

"Keep your eyes open. He's four days away from his kill, so he'll be doing something sometime soon."

"Have we nailed down the time he spent with the victims?"

"Agent Morgan," Ducky's voice came through. "There's really no possible way I can tell you that. The cuts are shallow enough to heal quickly, but deep enough and in the right places to be extremely painful. He left nary a trace on their skin, though it's obvious that he attempted to rape them."

"Sexual sadist, makes sense," Hotch commented.

"Yeah," Morgan continued. "He tries to come through, but he can't, so he has to find some other way to compensate."

Tony glanced up at the agents' window. It had gone dark. "Elle and Kate turned off the lights."

They heard Gideon exhale slowly. "Now we wait."

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He slowly, quietly grasped the door handle. Apartment 3G, he read on the oak door, just to make sure he had the right one. Not that he doubted himself. He never doubted himself. He was always right.

In his left hand he concealed a remote control with two buttons. Not that he ever used the second one, the one that would stop the release of the tranquilizing gas he used to subdue his victims. He had built that himself, like the machine he used to disperse the chemical. He was proud of his work. And not just the mechanical work.

He glanced at his watch. It was time.

Slowly, deliberately, he pushed the button that released the gaseous Gabadaxol. Donning his gas mask, he unlocked the apartment door and pushed his way inside.

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Next door, Agent Timothy McGee swiveled around in his chair as movement on the screen caught his eye. Through the darkness, he could see a large mass moving toward Elle and Kate's bedroom.

"Hey, Boss," he said into his lapel mike. "We got him."

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He leaned over their sleeping forms. They looked so peaceful. It was a shame they had to wake up. They had to make him feel better. And they couldn't while they were asleep.

Suddenly Kate's eyes popped open, and she sprang from the bed, gun in hand. "Freeze!" she yelled.

Elle jumped out of her bed, weapon leveled at him. "Don't move! FBI!" she shouted.

Tony and Morgan burst through the door. "Down on the ground!" they yelled. "Hands on your head! Move it!"

Jack Abrams, janitor for the GMH military housing, dropped the remote control and kneeled on the ground whimpering. "No," he muttered. "This isn't right. This can't be happening."

"You bet your sorry ass it's happening," Tony growled, keeping his weapon aimed at the back of Abrams's head.

"It's not right," Abrams kept saying to himself. "It's not right."

Morgan holstered his weapon and went over to Elle and Kate. "You guys okay?"

They both nodded silently, guns still at the ready.

Morgan went over to the air conditioning duct and pulled it open. Reaching inside, he pulled out Abrams's masterpiece, a machine that dispersed sleeping gas. He removed the canister and showed it to Abrams. "It's empty, in case you were wondering."

Tony holstered his weapon and pulled out his handcuffs. He swiftly jerked Abrams's hands behind his back and slapped the cuffs on him. "Let's move," he said, prodding Abrams with his foot.

"It's not right. It's not right. It's just not right."