Title: Transhuman
Rating: PG-13
Fandom: Criminal Minds
Characters/Pairing: Garcia-centric, team - gen
Genre: Science-fiction/Drama
Summary: In a dystopian future, hacker Penelope Garcia finds herself being hunted by a corrupt organization. Fearing for her life, she must search for help in the strangest of places.
Author's Notes: Betaed by Windy City Dreamer.

Chapter Twelve

Spencer Reid was intrigued by his new neighbors. Their arrival had been atypical; usually, a new tenant brought furniture with them, a few boxes at the very least. Between the three of them, they'd had two bags, and nothing else. None of the apartments in the building were furnished – a consequence of the dirt cheap rent. He thought at first they were only staying to look around, but an hour passed, and there was still no sign of any worldly possessions at all. Then, when he was taking out the trash, he saw a couple walk straight to the door and knock.

The man was tall, with dark hair, and a somber expression. The woman was shorter and blonde. Her hand kept palming her abdomen. He gave them a nod as he walked past. The man gave him a glare, and he kept walking.

He wondered why they'd have visitors, if they didn't even have furniture yet. Part of him thought they might be involved in some kind of shady business – drug dealings or the like – but Derek, Winifred and Frank, as they had introduced themselves, seemed like genuinely nice people.

He dumped the trash bag into the chute at the end of the hallway, and then returned to his tiny apartment. Houdini's cage was sitting on the table beside his bed, displacing the half a dozen books that had been there previously. The rat looked at him with dark, beady eyes, as if to say, "Well what now?"

'I don't know,' he said, slumping onto the bed. He picked up one of the books and started to read, but not even that could hold his attention for long.

He had no idea whatsoever that soon, his life would be turned around forever.

***

It was almost five p.m before Emily managed to get out of the meeting. It had continued in much the same fashion; boring reports, boring discussions stemming from these reports. By the time she managed to escape, she was just about ready to quit, screw the consequences.

Fortunately, the meetings were only once a quarter. The one-on-one meetings between Department heads and the Director were a more common occurrence, and Emily loathed them as much as anything else the Corporation had given her.

The first thing she did, once clear of any curious on-lookers, was flip her phone open. There was a single message.

Kath can't make dinner tonite – reschedule nxt Thrs?

She didn't know anyone named Kath, but she did know exactly what the message meant.

Pilgrim was compromised.

Shit.

She couldn't contact him on that number again. It too, was probably compromised. She hoped like hell that both Derek and his associates had made it out safely. A different part of her hoped that they hadn't managed to pinpoint her as the source, because if that happened, then they were all screwed.

It would have been pretty poor covert operation if they didn't have a back-up plan, though. She made her way to the bathrooms again once the post-meeting crowd had died down.

Locked inside the toilet cubicle, she navigated her way to a virtual dead-drop that she'd set up, leaving him a message.

Find a phone, call 7d4-2tkk9s at 1900. Stay safe. Montana.

Hopefully, he was still alive to get the message.

***

Just before seven, Spencer heard the knock on his door. The sound had pulled him from the short nap he'd been taking. He sat up, somewhat confused. He didn't get visitors – the only family he had left was his mother, and she wasn't in the position to make house calls. Not anymore.

He checked through the peephole, and saw Derek. He opened the door with a little more enthusiasm than he had before realizing who was knocking. His new neighbor had a warm smile, and Spencer couldn't help but like him, even though they'd shared all of two sentences. He was a good guy. Spencer knew that much, even if he didn't know why.

'Hi,' said Derek. 'I was wondering…our phone-line hasn't been connected yet – would I be able to borrow your phone. It won't take long.'

'Of course.' Spencer stepped back to let the other man inside. He didn't ask any of the questions that were plaguing his mind, like why none of them had cell phones. It just felt nice to be needed.

Derek's eyes flittered across the apartment, but it wasn't a judging gaze. Spencer handed him the phone from the kitchen counter, and gave a brief rundown on the intricacies of the device, before leaving to give Derek some privacy.

***

Morgan watched Spencer's retreating figure. He was a good kid, and Morgan was reluctant to get him involved in this mess, but he'd checked the dead-drop, read Montana's message, and realized that he had no other way of calling his contact. He didn't want to find a pay-phone – he didn't want to be further away from his friends than was absolutely necessary.

The mechanical voice on the other end asked him for his pass-code, to which he replied, with the clearest enunciation he could manage, 'Tiger got to hunt, bird got to fly; Man got to sit and wonder, "why, why, why?"'

There was a brief crackling on the line, before he heard the distorted voice of Montana. 'What happened?' she asked.

'We got jumped – Corp agent. DoS. She used to work for us. I'm not sure how much she told them, but I'd rather be safe than dead.'

'I'll look into it. You have a safe location for now?'

'Safe enough, but we're a little lacking in the homewares.'

'I'll move some money around if you need, but I think you should consider moving back to the Slums. There's a greater Corp presence, but it's also a lot easier to hide.'

He frowned. There was something in her voice – as much as he could tell from the digitally distorted derivative of what was her voice.

'There's something else?'

She took a breath, which sounded bizarre with the electronic manipulation. 'Things are moving forward,' she said, 'We'll be at a point soon where I can't actively hide what I'm doing from the Corp.'

His frown deepened. 'Are you breaking off contact?' The thought of that hurt him more on a personal level than he had imagined was possible. Montana had been as much a part of his life as any one of his other friends.

'No,' her voice crackled. 'I'm saying I think we should meet.'