As From Discretion Comes Isolation
Chapter Nine
A/N - Sorry it's taken so long, life is getting in the way! Hope it was worth the wait though...
There was silence as the forensic scientist and the profiler travelled to the crime scene of their mutual friend. Despite being similar in age the two men could not be more different and their blatant lack of conversation emphasised this.
They hastily walked through the official building of the Interpol headquarters and Jack led the way to Emily's office. The large office overlooking the city had copious amounts of space despite there being several filing cabinets, a desk and a several chairs filling the area. The main addition left by the killer was the scrawling of 'This is not The End' written in black ink along the wall opposite where Emily was shot. They ducked under the yellow crime scene tape and began busying themselves with their own jobs.
The young FBI agent frowned as he looked up at the wall, "this wasn't at any of the other crime scenes?" he asked pulling the blue latex gloves over his hands, the elastic snapping into place.
Jack frowned and shook his head, "nope, that's definitely new."
Reid stared at the jagged letters scrawled on the wall, his brow knitted together in thought. How had the unsub had time to write that on the wall and escape after he had shot Emily before the janitor had heard the gunshot and come in to stabilise her? They had called the police and paramedics as soon as Garcia had heard him on the phone, the chronology did not make sense but he ignored it for the moment; he had a job to do.
Reid suddenly felt his chest tightening as he began looking through his friend's belongings. He soon saw that despite the room being bland and ordinary she kept several souvenirs from Garcia in her top drawer, a small, pink plastic unicorn and a flashing pen. He smiled as he also saw a framed photograph of their seven-piece family together at J.J. and Will's wedding before she left which was situated beneath her gun. These small things were the only personal touches to the official room and if Reid had been profiling her, he would have been able to reveal very little of Emily and her life. She was smart and this was a deliberate decision on her part to remain as anonymous in her job as she could. She was a fantastic profiler, but Reid knew that she liked to keep herself to herself. The office had been left exactly as it was, untouched since Emily had been rushed to the hospital. This drawer was open, but nothing appeared to have been removed which was an indicator that Emily had reached for the gun, but she hadn't been quick enough. Reid knew Emily as a fierce fighter and knew that she would have put up a fight before she was shot. This crime scene would look very different if she had just been able to reach her gun.
After Jack had scooped a small pile of ash into a test tube from the carpet near the closest filing cabinet to the door he looked over to Reid, "so I'm curious, if you're a genius how come you're in the FBI? Couldn't you have cured cancer or something?"
Reid glanced up from the drawer so that his long hair fell in front of his face, "I found I had a purpose there that I hadn't found before, there is something very right about being in my team. I feel useful to them, like I belong there, you know," he replied with a small fond smile.
Jack nodded, "this profiling stuff actually works then?"
"If it didn't the last nine years of my life would have been useless, yeah it does."
Cockily Jack crossed his arms across his chest, "profile me?" he grinned, eyebrows raised in a silent challenge.
Reid stood up straight behind the desk, "ok, you like to defend your independence and show your male dominance that's why you fight, which is shown by the cuts on your face and the older scars on your hands and arms, I know it is cage fighting as there was a ticket from your fight two nights ago in your car. Your car also showed that you are single and enjoy the bachelor lifestyle as you dedicate your time to your cases through work..."
Jack looked quite taken back but a smile crept onto his face in amusement, "alright smartboy I'm convinced! Emily profiled me when I first met her but I thought that was just her" he paused and looked down at the blood stain, "I can't believe this has happened to her, I know we've only known her a year but this case has had us spending a lot of time together you know."
Reid just looked at him, a wave of jealousy flowed through him at the thought that these strangers had spent the past year with Emily when she should have been safe with her family, but that wasn't her life anymore, he had to keep reminding himself.
"She's an easy person to like" he said croakily, struggling to get his words out. He dropped his eyes away from Jack's and cleared his throat.
"Yeah..." Jack noted the sadness on Reid's face. He walked over and placed his hand on his shoulder, "she'll be alright, she's strong; I know she'll pull through this."
He was unsure if Jack was fully aware of what Emily had been through the year before but he of all people knew how strong she was. He smiled gratefully at him before turning and picking up the black laptop with his blue latex gloves, "do you think I can take this for our technical analyst to use?"
Jack shrugged, "I suppose so, Emily would've wanted you to have all the records just get your boss to check with James" Reid quickly sent a text to Hotch before placing the laptop in his brown satchel, "so what have you learnt from the scene then? My job's pretty wasted cause this guy takes forensic countermeasures but that ash is questionable."
"Ash?" he said with a surprised tone, "he must have done that, she must have found something that he didn't want to be seen, that must have been where the confrontation began. She would have moved slowly trying to reach for her gun in her desk but he was too fast, pushed her onto the desk so the papers scattered onto the floor and then shot her. The writing on the wall is interesting though, he has capitalised 'The End' like the ending of a story which means he sees this vendetta against Emily as his own story, a story that has not reached its final chapters yet."
The conference room was quiet as Leo, Hotch, Nikki and J.J. scoured through the case files of the twelve victims.
J.J. frowned at two open files in front of her, "he appears to be killing twice a month but is the unsub killing in two different parts of the country?"
"Excuse my ignorance but what's an unsub?" Nikki asked from across the table.
"Unknown subject, it's a term we use to call the offender" Hotch explained.
Nikki nodded, "right, yes it does appear that he kills once a month and Emily assumed he commuted to and from London and Leeds which is his secondary location. She deduced one is his home and the other is where he works, which is why he alternates between the two locations"
"What did you learn from the postmortems?" Hotch asked.
"We only did the postmortems of the victims in London but we have connections with the pathologist in Leeds so he sent us his autopsies. The victims seemed to be opportunistic as they crossed racial and gender lines, they were taken the city from the evening when it's quieter but not empty and tortured for around twenty four hours before disposing of the body. Emily said his disposal of the bodies meant he showed no remorse and he left them open in relatively public spaces so to make a statement. MO was a gunshot to the back of the head, no forensic evidence was left, the worrying part and how we knew they were linking was the signature" Leo pulled out one of the photos of the victims bodies, "see the deep cuts these are apparent on each of our victims, one on the left shoulder and one on the right hip."
Hotch took the photograph and looked at it carefully, "an unusual signature, would it be ok for me to invite the rest of our team here?"
Leo nodded, "of course"
J.J. turned to Hotch, "what about the boys? We were on vacation visiting Emily and we brought our sons with us, would it be possible for them to play somewhere?" she asked.
Nikki smiled, "there is a room next door that'd be fine, Clarissa can keep an eye on them"
"Great" J.J. said returning her grin.
Twenty minutes after calling the other half of the BAU team arrived. Rossi led the group as Morgan carried Jack and Garcia held Henry. They couldn't look less like FBI agents as Rossi was wearing a brown fleece with his faded jeans, Morgan had one of his tight black t-shirts and black jeans and then there was Garcia. Before coming she had coordinated her wardrobe to stick with a red, white and blue them, today despite the problems of the day she was wearing her Union Jack top which she had purchased on her last visit to the country, a red skirt and white heels complete with large Union Jack earrings and blue sparkling glasses.
"Professor Leo Dalton and Dr Nikki Alexander I would like you to meet Agents David Rossi and Derek Morgan and our Technical Analyst Penelope Garcia"
Garcia smiled broadly and waved, "hi!" she looked at the little boy in her arms, "are you going to say hi Henry?" shyly he waved his little hand.
"This is my son Henry and Hotch's son Jack" J.J. explained taking the boy into her arms, "can I take them into that room now please?"
"Of course, this way" said Leo leading her out of the room.
Rossi looked around as he sat down at the table, "what've you done with Reid?"
"He's gone to Emily's office with our forensic scientist Jack" Nikki answered.
Hotch looked at Morgan, "what did you learn from Emily's notes?"
Garcia handed him the file out of her handbag from beside him, "the same as what you've deduced I think" he replied glancing at the notes they'd made so far on the whiteboard, "her preliminary profile says a white male, mid to late 30s commutes between Leeds and London, he's methodical and organised because he takes forensic counter measures, she's not clear how this is linked to her stalker."
"I think we need to look at them as two separate cases first, Dave what were your thoughts?" Hotch asked as Leo and J.J. reentered the room.
The older man frowned, "something has been nagging at me, this guy doesn't miss, all these kills are methodical, organised, he sets out to kill and he does. Prentiss was in the room alone with the killer, she was unarmed, so why is she still alive?"
"That crossed my mind too, this links back to it being personal, he wanted to keep her alive. The only question is why?"
Rossi nodded with the frown still on his face, "but if it was personal then what would he gain from her being alive?"
Their thoughts were interrupted by the return of Jack and Reid, "hey troops!" Jack smiled taking a seat beside Nikki. He slouched deeply in the seat, balancing one foot on his knee and drooping an arm across the back of Nikki's chair. He looked around the room with an eager grin and his eyes lingered several moments on Garcia's colourfull attire.
Leo shook his head slightly, "Jack Hodgson, David Rossi, Derek Morgan and Penelope Garcia" he introduced quickly, "what did you find in her office?"
"The crime scene was pretty clean like the rest of them but there was one significant difference, 'this is not The End' was written on the wall, there were also some ashes by the filing cabinet, we think they are paper remains as if Emily found something that the killer didn't want anyone else to know about so he burnt it," Jack explained.
Hotch looked across the table, "is that the impression you got as well Reid?"
Reid looked up, "uh, yeah, is it ok if I go and see Emily? I need to get out for a bit, sorry."
Hotch nodded, "we'll call you if there are any new advancements."
He gave a weak smile in response and placed Emily's laptop on the conference table before leaving hastily.
"Is he going to be ok?" Garcia asked concernedly
"He will be, his grief for Maeve is still fresh; he can't lose Emily again."