The First Promise Pt. 2
Carrie
I woke up to a blinding light in my eyes. My head was throbbing, and when I tried to cover my eyes, I found myself handcuffed to the chair. I was disoriented and felt sick.
"Where the hell am I?" I called out, unsure if anyone else was even there with me.
"Carrie?" Penelope gasped. "Oh-my-god-Carrie!" She managed to squeeze the words out between sobs.
"Penny? Where are you?" I looked around the area in vain. I couldn't see anything due to the blinding light that seemed to be merely inches from my face.
"I can't see anything," She cried. "There's a bright light shining in my face."
I told myself, at least we were together and alive. For now.
"Penny, how did you get here?" I tried to keep my voice calm. I knew she was scared enough without me freaking her out more. "When you called me, you were already driving to my house."
She cleared her throat and sniffled. "When I pulled into your road, the first part between the two corn fields, there was car stopped there, with the hazard lights on."
I interrupted her. The details would be important. "Do you remember what kind of car it was?"
She hesitated. "Umm...I think it was a Chevy. Impala."
"What color?" I hated to press her like this, but I was trying to come up with a plan to get out of here, and the team would need as many details as we could provide.
"Black. It was definitely black." She sounded a little more sure of herself, which relieved me.
"Ok, so you stopped?"
"I stopped, and there was a man looking under the hood of the car. I asked if anyone was coming to help him, and he said he had left his cell phone at home and asked if he could use mine to call Triple A. Then as I leaned over the passenger seat to get my phone out of my purse, he came around to the driver's side and hit me with something. That's the last thing I remember." I pictured Penelope sitting in her convertible, parked in the road. I imagined how easy it would have been for the UNSUB to hit her, sitting in her car with the top down. I shuddered at the thought.
"Do you remember what he looked like? You got a much better look at him than I did. He knocked me out as soon as I opened my front door." My head throbbed as a reminder.
"He looked normal, average. About as tall as Rossi, with blonde hair. Not bad looking, but nothing to write home about. He wouldn't stand out in a crowd." She paused, thinking. "Oh, he didn't seem to be from around here. He had a distinct Northern accent. He said 'caah' instead of car. Like a Boston accent."
I closed my eyes, trying to commit everything she had said to memory. It definitely didn't sound like we had encountered the man before. I would have remembered a Boston accent.
I tensed as I heard a door open. The room echoed, so I couldn't really tell where I sat in relation to the door. The echoing footsteps didn't help either.
Spencer
"I'm convinced the only person who can find Garcia is Garcia!" Veronica growled in exasperation, pounding the computer keys. She and I had been trying in vain for hours to "work a little magic," as Pen would say. I had been trying and trying to find connections between the previous victims, anything to try to connect the points on my geographical profile and give us the slightest clue as to where he would have taken Carrie and Penelope.
"You guys, we have some new information," JJ entered the room, tossing me a file. "Alicia Banks' medical files." She left again, presumably back to her own frantic search for information.
"Wait, who's Alicia Banks again?" Veronica squinted at the screens in front of her, trying to manage Garcia's immense layout.
"The first victim. Carrie found an injection point, hidden on the body. We determined the UNSUB had to have known Alicia, because she had no defensive wounds." I opened the file as I spoke, and when I read the page it was like a lightbulb clicked on in my head.
"Alicia was diabetic! That's why she didn't struggle against the needle, she probably thought it was an insulin shot." I probably sounded a little too excited, but I couldn't help it. Any clue that would get us closer to finding Carrie and Penelope was a treasure. "We need to find out who her doctor is, where she got her medical supplies, everything." Veronica whipped her head around and glared at me.
"Maybe you could help a little, instead of just barking orders at me. I'm not exactly a technical analyst, and you've spent enough time in this office with Garcia, I would think with all your genius you could have figured out how the hell she does this shit!" She snapped. I was taken aback for a moment, but we were so on edge I didn't take it personally.
"Here, let's switch places for a while. You read me the information from the file and I'll see what I can do." I sat down as soon as she was out of the chair, and started typing. I had committed the whole file to memory but I didn't want to upset Veronica by telling her that I didn't need her help.
Hotch burst through the door, startling Veronica and me out of our seats.
"We're going to Carrie's house." He ordered. "Police just called in Garcia's car, it's been abandoned on Carrie's road. We think she was on her way when she was abducted, meaning Carrie was probably still home." Veronica and I followed without hesitation. As we stepped into the hallway, my heart sank. Devin was coming towards us with Emily and JJ.
As if he were reading my mind, Hotch announced, "We pulled Agent Tibor from the Organized Crime Unit to help, since we're short two agents and it's going to be harder and harder for the rest of us to stay focused." As if staying focused were an option for me.
Carrie
"Penny, don't freak out, but I'm about to get out of my cuffs." We were alone again, and despite the blood dripping from my nose and mouth and the pounding in my head, I was inches away from a plan.
"What do you mean you're getting out of your cuffs?" She cried. She had screamed every time he hit me. I had cussed and provoked him, trying to keep him from turning on Penny. And I paid for it.
"Remember my double jointed thumbs? I've almost got my hands through the cuffs now. God it hurts like a bitch!" I bit my lip as I tried to squeeze my hands through the cuffs. One last pull and my right hand fell free. I held it to my chest for a moment, allowed a few tears to mingle with the blood on my face, and got to work on my left hand.
"Carrie, don't do it. If he sees you're gone, he'll kill me, then find you and kill you too." Penelope was panicking, and I couldn't blame her. But I had my own logic.
"If I sit here, he's liable to kill us both anyway. I have to do something."
I pulled my left hand free and reached down, clawing at the duct tape around my ankles. When I was finally free, I fell to my hands and knees, afraid to just start walking around, since I didn't know where I was or what was in the room. I felt my way to the base of the lamp that had been pointed at my face, and stood carefully, holding the lamp for guidance. When I was fully upright I turned the lamp away from me, using it as a flashlight to see the rest of the room. It was mostly empty, with what appeared to be stone walls and a stone floor. The only light came from the two lamps, and as I looked around I realized the room wasn't actually that large, but in the darkness it had seemed like we were trapped on an empty planet.
A sudden noise froze me where I was standing. "Penny, was that you?" I looked around frantically.
"I haven't moved." She whispered. I turned, and when I brought the lamp around, there he was, his face inches from mine.
He headbutted me as soon as I was facing him, and I went down, taking the lamp with me. The bulb broke, leaving us in complete darkness other than the light in Penny's face, which only provided a shadow on the wall behind her.
Disoriented, I held tightly to the lamp, and swung wildly, until I made contact. He caught the end of the lamp pole and pulled, catching my off balance. I could hear the shuffle as he felt his way along the pole, getting closer to me. I let go and rolled away, scrambling to find a wall.
"You're going to die, you little hick bitch. And so is your friend." His voice was alarmingly close, and suddenly I was hit in the side with the most intense pain I'd ever felt. I felt everything, as the knife broke the skin and plunged into the soft area under my ribs. The pain was unimaginable, but I couldn't let him get to Penny. I felt for his wrist as he pulled out the knife, and reached up just as he stabbed me in the chest. The force would have knocked me down, the pain was excruciating, but adrenaline was pumping through me like a live electrical wire. I clung to his shirt and pulled myself to him until I got my hands on his face.
Before he could stab me again, I jumped on him, throwing my full weight into his stomach. I took him down, never letting go of his face. As he fumbled for his knife, I pinned his arms with my knees. He was just as blind as I was in the darkness, which gave me the advantage now that he had no weapon. He wasn't particularly big or strong, and as I held him down I felt his panic at losing his weapon.
"You're not getting rid of me that easy buddy boy," I snarled at him, holding his head in my hands, "and you certainly aren't getting near my friend again." I slammed his head on the stone floor. Then I slammed it again. Then I lost count. When I was too tired to lift his head again, I stopped, remembering Penny.
"Penny," my voice sounded like I was under water because of the blood pouring from my nose and mouth. I found the key in our captor's pants pocket and crawled toward the light, coughing and gagging. "I have the key, I'm going to unlock you."
My bloody hands were slippery, but I finally got the cuffs unlocked. I laid down, feeling like I couldn't get up again. Penny untied her own feet and then felt around, sobbing, until she found me.
"Oh Carrie," she cried, pulling me into her arms. Every movement sent pain shooting through my entire body, but I was too exhausted from the blood loss to complain.
Spencer
I felt like I was frozen in place, while everyone moved quickly around me. As if I were paused and they were on fast forward. Rossi, Prentiss, and Veronica ran to the back door while Hotch, Morgan and Devin approached the front. I stood next to the car with JJ, wondering how much longer I could keep myself together.
I flinched when Morgan kicked the door in, shaking me from my reverie. I watched them file into Carrie's home, weapons at the ready, and the juxtaposition of today's events against last night made me shudder. I followed JJ across the lawn and up the front steps.
"Her gun and credentials are on the floor in the entryway. She must have picked them up, thinking Garcia was here to get her, then he got her as soon as she opened the door." JJ picked up the gun and wallet as she spoke.
"He would have known she would have them in her hand when she answered the door. He couldn't hesitate." I felt like my voice was coming from somewhere besides my own mouth. Like someone else was talking. I heard the others call clear from throughout the house.
Morgan came down the steps. "I doubt we'll find anything here. He obviously got to her as soon as she came to the door. There couldn't have been a struggle, the house is immaculate." There was a fire in his eye that made me jealous. He had a right to be angry about Penelope being taken. All I could do is look around Carrie's house and pretend I'd never been inside.
"He had to have gotten Garcia first, left her car there and come for Carrie. Carrie knew Garcia was coming, and wouldn't have hesitated to open the door." Hotch looked around the entryway. "That's why there are no signs of forced entry or struggle. She opened the door, and he took her. There's no blood, so he must have knocked her out with a tazer or blunt object." Morgan threw his fist into the door.
"We get here, and still we got nothing. We're working our asses off and nothing we find is getting us any closer to finding them! I swear to God I am not going to wait around to hear some park ranger found my babygirl mauled by a bear." He sat on the steps, dropping his head into his hands. I felt a warm hand on my arm and turned to see Devin standing next to me.
"We'll find them, we always do." She whispered, trying to offer me a smile. I couldn't take it anymore. I shook her hand off my arm and walked out the front door. Sitting on the front step, I tried again to run through the few clues we had so far. I was reaching for anything that would help us find Pen and Carrie.
Then it hit me.
I stood and hurried back into the house. "Morgan, you may be right!" My mind was working faster than my mouth could.
"The hell you talking about, kid?" He raised an eyebrow at me.
"About the bear. I mean not that Garcia will be mauled by one but that it's a clue. In 'Snow White and Rose Red,' the two girls befriend a bear that turns out to actually be a Prince, who's been cursed into the form of a bear. The first victim was found in a bed, like 'Sleeping Beauty.' The second victim was found in her kitchen floor like 'Snow White.' The third victim was found in the ocean like 'The Little Mermaid.' So it would make sense for him to stage his 'Snow White and Rose Red' somewhere in the woods, where there are bears!" My voice broke as I was speaking, but I didn't care anymore.
The entire time I had been rambling, Morgan's expression gradually changed.
"Kid, this is why we keep you around. You're pretty smart sometimes." He patted my back as he headed out the door.
"I'll call the Allegheney Mountains park service and let them know we're coming." Hotch pulled out his phone as he spoke.