Wow. I really wasn't expecting this to take off. Now I feel like I'm going to disappoint everyone with this chapter because there isn't more. Nonetheless, I hope that you all enjoyed for this short period of time. I'll have you know this is one of the best reactions I have ever received for any of my works.

This was written before the first chapter was published and extended and edited after the first chapter was published. Thank you for reading.

I may write time-stamps and extensions later on, but for now this is it.

For this car ride, Spencer was bundled into the back seat of one of the federal SUVs, Agent Morgan driving with no one else in the car. Agent Jareau and Agent Hotchner had taken a second SUV, picking up the final team member along the way. The first ten minutes or so, driving through the city, was awkward and Spencer shifted in the soft seat.

In comparison to his entire world, that of the police department was his version of a five star hotel. He was relaxed in the back seat, despite being around a person who blatantly disliked him.

Something in Agent Morgan's eyes revealed to Spencer a small clue he had been looking for. "You don't like me because I'm what you could have been, in a different world."

The man practically jumped out of his skin at the young man's sudden words and he sighed. "I don't like you because you're a criminal."

"No I'm not. I'm just the kid that was unlucky enough to have a father that didn't like him. If that makes me a criminal I'm not sure how anyone can not be a criminal." The calm logic was soothing to Spencer, something that he found inherently soothing no matter what the circumstances. When he had been a young boy worrying about kids at school, he'd done complicated math equations to calm himself, or pulled out his mother's annotated copy of The Canterbury Tails and read to his heart's delight.

Math was a constant, something that never changed. The same could be said for Chaucer's best known work, though in a different way.

There was a long pause before Agent Morgan spoke. "Why do you say that you're what I could have been?"

"Because of what they did to you." Spencer rolled his eyes at Agent Morgan's in the mirror, then smiled gently. "I know that they hurt you and made you feel like nothing, and that you can't do anything about it without becoming like me, which is an even worse fate."

Again, there was a pause. "How bad can those facilities be?"

Spencer considered the question, and eventually came to a horrific conclusion. "I've spent the last eleven years of my life locked in a cell three feet by six feet, too weak to stand from lack of food. I had my first solid meal in five months today, and it consisted almost entirely of carbohydrates. Since I turned fourteen, I haven't been around anyone my age and even then spending time with others was rare. We sometimes shared cells, but that was it. Before today, I hadn't felt the warmth of the sun on my skin in at least seven months. I was unable to complete my high school diploma, let alone attend a good university as was my dream."

"What uni did you want to go to?"

Now that was a question to consider. "Caltech was my first choice. Then maybe MIT. I also looked into ETH Zurich. They have one of the best mathematics programs in the world, and it would have been a good place for me to continue to learn new languages. Switzerland is, by all means, is the centre of Europe. I'd have had easy access to almost the entire continent by train. Imperial College London would have been great, too. That's the British version of MIT. I was going to apply to UBC as my backup plan, if I didn't get accepted anywhere else."

"Wow. I haven't even heard of half of those places."

Spencer laughed, for the first time in what felt like years. It made his throat hurt, and he cut off the sound quickly. "Half of them are foreign. ETH Zurich is in Switzerland, Imperial College in London and UBC is in Canada. They're all ranked as some of the best colleges and universities in the world."

"What were you going to study?"

Another question worthy of consideration. Spencer thought for a long minute. "Everything. Mom was a fifteenth century literature professor and my dad was a lawyer. I intended to cure schizophrenia by twenty-five and improve lives internationally because of it. Now it doesn't matter what I want. I'll never get out of that place, Agent Morgan."

They drove in silence after that, the grim truth of Spencer's statement hanging over them both like an angry cloud.

Spencer Reid had never really understood metaphors, but as time went on he got increasingly good at masking his odd behaviour and acting normal. He stopped flinching away from hugs, no matter how much he hated a stranger's body against his. He stopped tapping his foot in the erratic patterns of Ligeti: Etudes, an extremely difficult piece written by an extremely talented Parisian pianist. Slowly, Spencer learned to create connections between seemingly nonsensical metaphors. An angry cloud, he figured, came from the very young interpretation of storms as the sky being angry, and it's association with grimness from the way it seemed like the sky cried.

All of his knowledge and acting ability couldn't prevent Spencer from tapping his leg in a complicated melody the rest of the ride.

He stepped from the black car, and followed Agent Morgan.

The crime scene was taped off, yellow bands creating a large square around the freshly dug out grave. Spencer ducked down to peer at the grave, and took note of the wooden structure over top of it. The planks had been carefully moved aside, but it didn't take much imagination to see how they would have fit together with the grave. Looking into the dark cavern beneath, Spencer felt the overwhelming feeling, again, that he knew what was going on. Something was just... familiar about the whole thing.

Agent Morgan hovered nearby, throwing theories off Agent Jareau. "Agent Morgan?" Spencer asked, directing his voice towards the intimidating man. "The grave is exactly six feet by three feet, correct? And from the planks to the bottom, it's seven feet?"

He received a nod of response, and Spencer closed his eyes. "I know what this is about. I know who did this, I know why he did this, and I might know how to stop him."

Later that day, Spencer had a blanket around his shoulders and a warm cup of something or other in his hands. The wind had grown colder, and the meager clothes he'd been given simply didn't block out the wind. His hands remained chained together, though the cuffs had been loosened and Agent Jareau assured him that she was working to get the police chief to agree to remove them entirely. The FBI agents sat around the conference table, all eyes resting on Spencer. He took another sip of his drink and savoured the sweet flavour on his tongue. "The Detention Facilities that children like me are kept in are horrendous. We have hardly enough room to more and it wasn't uncommon for us to be forced to share tiny cells with other kids. They were exactly the same size as the graves. I shared with a guy named Ángel Rios.

"Ángel was reported by his fifth grade teacher, Carmen McCall, when she realized how bad the bullying had gotten."

Spencer was a bullied kid too, and he knew that it had played a part in his illegal incarceration. If he hadn't been bullied, maybe they would have let him graduate high school when he was twelve and then move him into a tiny cell. Two years had been too long for them to risk hurting someone, even though he'd been a four foot ten kid with no muscle mass beyond what he used to carry his piles of books.

"They eventually deemed him a threat to society and he was locked up for no reason other than his Hispanic heritage. The guy never did anything or said anything. If he were white, he'd probably be a free, happy man today. Anyways, Ángel went through hell in those places, probably even worse than most of us because of his ethnicity, but he's also one of the only guys to have ever gotten out. At some point, someone looked over his file again and said that he shouldn't be imprisoned so they let him go and through him on the streets. I haven't seen Ángel in years, but to the best of my knowledge he's now killing people who remind him of his teacher because he blames her for being locked up."

There was a pause in the words.

"Understandable really. If I had been locked up for my colouration by a bitter woman, I'd be pretty upset too."

Supervisory Special Agent Jason Gideon, Unit Chief of the BAU team with the highest percentage of cases solved, was an intimidating man despite his initial appearance. He had an aging, weathered face and a balding head, what was left combed backwards on his head. The man had a long, crooked nose resting above a thin mouth and stubble-covered chin. Agent Gideon dressed like a college professor, with a simple plaid button up beneath a fleece, beneath a tweed blazer that was only missing the clichéd arm patches. He wore slacks and simple dress shoes.

Overall, the man looked like somebody's grandfather, kind and gentle.

But when Spencer felt those dark eyes digging into his own hazel eyes, he felt the sudden urge to shrink farther under the blanket and take back any word he might have said to offend the man. The gaze was deep, and soul-piercing.

In contrast to Agent Gideon's harsh gaze Agent Jareau seemed warm and kind, twirling her honey-blonde hair around a finger and offering Spencer a warm smile, a silent encouragement. Likewise, Agent Morgan did not smile but rather gave Spencer a look that said clearly, "I'm with you."

Despite his unfeeling face, Agent Hotchner remained kinder than Agent Gideon. "You catch that Garcia?" He asked, and there was a sharp clicking noise from the phone resting on the table that had Spencer flinching slightly.

"That is right my sweets. Ángel Rios was nine when he was placed in the Criminal Prevention Program and sixteen when he was released into... a mental hospital. He stayed there for about two years and then they released him since he'd just turned eighteen. No high school diploma, no college education and no known address. This guy is a ghost. You'll need to give me more, sweetie."

Spencer blinked, unused to being called anything aside from prisoner or freak. Even his name felt foreign, sometimes. "His mom lived in San Francisco. They were Catholic. We all get something from home up until the age of eighteen and Ángel had a coin with... Gabriel on it. He used to say that the only way he'd ever be free of the government was if he were the fastest angel in all of heaven. Search for people named Gabriel living in ess-eff that fit Ángel's description."

There was a ferocious tapping on the other end of the line, and Spencer shrunk back at the noise.

"We have a Gabriel Castell, twenty years old, matches the descriptions of Ángel Rios. And his history looks fake."

Agent Hotchner nodded, already standing to move. "Good work Garcia. Send us the address."

"Already sent," the woman chirped, and there was a sharp click on the other end.

Agent Gideon's gaze remained on Spencer. "Seven-five-oh-nine-four-zero, you're staying here."

Internally, Spencer growled at the use of his serial number. Each time he heard it, the digits acted as a painful reminder or what he had lost, and of what he could never regain. Spencer shrunk back, pulling the blanket tighter around his shoulders and tried to stop the desperate shivers that ran down his spine. Despite his misgivings, Spencer nodded. Even if he hadn't agreed with the agent, he was a malnourished man too young to be an FBI agent with his hands chained together. Agent Jareau shot him a sympathetic look, but rose with the rest of the team. She, like the others, had a gun at her hip.

"Just... Stay here."

And he did.

A few hours later saw Spencer curled up on the couch beneath the blanket, his wrists sore from the restraints but unbound. Agent Jareau, JJ as she told Spencer to call her, sat nearby; her gentle gaze flickered back to the young man every few minutes. In sleep, he flinched at every noise. Soft mutters came from his mouth and Spencer shifted. In an instant, JJ was at his side and rubbing a gentle hand through his hair. He calmed beneath her hand, and JJ returned to her post.

Agent Hotchner, Hotch as he insisted, popped his head in and JJ caught him with a sad gaze. "He's too young for this."

The rare smile he offered up was sad. "We're all too young for the things that happen to us."

"Hotch, those people beat him. They starved him and treated him worse than the dirt beneath their feet. He can hardly sleep and a top of that we're sending him back there. He's gonna starve and he'll keep starving until they lend him out to some cop who'll hurt him."

"I spoke to Gideon," Hotch said. "He agrees; we've gotten permission to take him with us on cases, and while in Quantico he's gonna help with consults."

JJ perked up at the news, grinning at the older agent. Her smile pulled a sincere one from Hotch. "Where will he stay?"

"I've heard he and Morgan are getting along."

As it turned out, Derek Morgan was a kind man who was more than willing to deal with a traumatized young man. Each time Spencer awoke sobbing in the middle of the night, arms wrapped around his own body, Morgan slipped into the room and rested a hand on his smooth, mahogany hair. Each night, Morgan spent at least fifteen minutes soothing Spencer, curling the young man up to him and assuring that his touch was always firm, very much there.

The touch was always comforting, and Morgan often found himself rubbing at Spencer's scalp to soothe the younger man.

Each morning, Morgan guided Spencer through regular morning routines, reminding the other man to brush his teeth and eat breakfast. Since, of course, neither had ever been part of Spencer's routine before. At around seven-thirty, the pair hopped into Morgan's car (he was teacher Spencer to drive, but for a genius the other was having a hard time picking up on it) to drive to the FBI headquarters in Quantico.

Not everyone was kind to Spencer at the FBI, but given that he was under the protection of a team with the reputation of being rather protective, the comments and other such bullying behaviours were kept to a minimum. Often, he leaned over varying shoulders and offered his opinion on the case files presented to them.

At some point in time, the FBI through their hands in the air and petitioned for Spencer to be declared a free man. It was done after extensive psychological exams and an impromptu trial. The jury's verdict was, of course, that schizophrenia did not equal violence. Especially when it was shown that Dr. Reid (to be the elder, soon) had no history of violent actions whether before or after her schizophrenic break.

Spencer was entered in the FBI Academy under special circumstances, and was not required the same physical levels as the other cadets, largely because eleven years of severe malnutrition made it difficult for him to put on any weight at all, though with time he was assured that he could gain the muscle mass that he would have had if Spencer had lived a normal life.

The doctors also expected his IQ to rise and for his memory to improve as time went on. Twenty weeks later, Spencer was a full probationary agent assigned to the Behavioural Analysis Unit in Quantico. It had been determined that Spencer would likely have difficulty working with unfamiliar people.

Both the BAU and Spencer were thankful for the development.

They became the first government employees to speak against the Crime Prevention Program, some of the first people to do so at all.

"Crime is not caused by poverty or a cruel childhood. As horrible as it seems, it is these people who grow up to be empathetic and meaningful members of the community. By all means, if we look to destroy crime, we should be destroying it from it's roots in the greedy upper class. In my short time with the FBI, I have discovered that only one member of my team had a happy childhood, and yet these are the people that are saving the lives of the American people. If they had all been imprisoned, there would have been no one capable of taking their places and this leads me to believe that it is not the circumstances that make the criminal rather predisposed traits and subtle anomalies in the brain. These are not traits that we can just pick out. Trying to predict who is to become a criminal is like trying to find a needle in a stack of needles, or a fleck of gold at the bottom of the ocean."

Metaphors were so useful, sometimes.

A year later, Spencer was testifying as a witness to the unspeakable acts taken against the youth in the Crime Prevention Program. He spoke of Jack Richardos, who had starved to death at the tender age of eleven, and of Scott Taylor, who had been beaten to death not long later. The guard responsible for Scott's death hadn't even received a reprimand, Spencer recalled, and rather had received a medal of honour. As though beating a skinny thirteen year old to death was something to be proud of.

The young man spoke of what little he had seen of the other wings, racks that reminded him, horribly, of torture implements from the Medieval Era.

Charges were levelled, and psychological evaluations were taken of all of the people who had suffered at the hands of the corrupted system. All but very few, numbers consistent with the nation-wide statistics for people with murderous intent, were deemed safe for society, and released into halfway homes or programs designed to help them deal with the trauma.

Spencer grinned as Garcia passed him a glass of hot chocolate. He was twenty-three years old and had just submitted a dissertation, a mathematics one he had written in his head a thousand times, to Caltech and was hoping to have earned his first doctorate soon.

For the first time since he'd been locked away like a criminal, he had a family.

Golden sunshine, and long grass swishing in a cool wind. An oak tree, perched in the branches beautiful birds and squirrels and his friends. A blue sky, not a cloud to be seen and a gentle breeze. His auburn hair swayed in the wind, and the sound of laughter drew him from his reverie. His friends grinned down at him, offering him a hand up and he took it. The air was warm, in more ways than one. Like music to his ears, their laughs rained down with his own.

Let freedom reign. The sun never set on so glorious a human achievement.
Activist Nelson Mandela