When the team arrived at the hospital, they saw something they never thought they would see and hoped they wouldn't ever again. Hotch was crying. There was a steady stream of tears running down his cheeks as he silently berated himself for being so stupid. It stopped the entire team in their tracks. When was the last time they had seen Hotch cry like this? The team remembered hearing Hotch cry as he held the dead body of his former wife and mother of his child. But they hadn't looked. They hated seeing him so broken. Whatever had happened, it must have been really bad.

"Hotch?" JJ asked tentatively, stepping forward slowly.

Hotch looked up at them and the team, minus Gideon, all started remembering Reid's face when Maeve had died. Openly crying, blaming himself, sobbing uncontrollably. Hotch kept a little more composure than Reid, but it was obvious he hated himself at the moment.

"What happened, Aaron?" Rossi demanded.

"She was here, Dave." Hotch said quietly, wiping away his tears impatiently. "Jenny was here. She drugged him. Overdose. I left for five minutes. And I didn't realize it was her. I let her get away." Hotch swallowed and stared at the ground. "I let her get away." He whispered, then stood up and punched the wall in a manner that reminded everyone of Morgan. "Sometimes a man wants to be stupid if it lets him do a thing his cleverness forbids." He sat down again and shook his head sadly. "John Steinbeck."

"You're not stupid, Hotch." Blake said.

"Were you not listening? I let her get away! I left the room to allow her to overdose him and if he dies it's my fault!" Hotch said angrily.

"It's not your fault, Aaron." Gideon said softly, sitting down in the seat next to Hotch. Hotch continued to curse under his breath. "Aaron, don't blame yourself; you know Reid wouldn't want you to." Hotch looked up at him and the expression on his face was one the team couldn't quite place. Relief? Gratitude? Sorrow? Remorse? They couldn't tell, but it didn't take a profiler to tell that Hotch didn't feel much like talking anymore. JJ sat on the other side of him and put her hand on his knee comfortingly. Morgan, Rossi, and Blake sat silently on the other side of the waiting room.

After a while, Garcia rushed in. "How is he?" She said in a frantic voice. Her query was met with shrugs and murmurs of, "We don't know." Garcia sighed and plopped down next to JJ, glaring at Hotch conspicuously.

Morgan noticed this. "It wasn't his fault, Garcia." He said and the usually perky blond turned to him with rage in her eyes. "It could have happened when any one of us was here." Garcia softened when she looked at Hotch again as she realized how upset he was. His misery was radiating off him in huge waves that engulfed the entire team (plus Gideon).

Hotch rubbed his forehead and sighed. "Why is it always Reid?" He asked softly as he sat up.

"What?" Rossi called across the room.

"It's always Reid, isn't it?" Hotch said louder. "Every time shit happens to someone, it has to be Reid."

The team nodded in agreement, but Gideon looked incredulous. "Bull shit." He said. Everyone stared at him. They had never heard Gideon curse. They didn't know if it was scary or funny, so they just stared, waiting for an explanation. "It's not always Reid." He said. "It is a lot but not always. You guys have had some shit thrown at you, too." The team had blank looks on their faces, obviously still shocked at Gideon's words. "Aaron-" Gideon turned to the man beside him. "You had to beat a fellow colleague in order to give him your gun and I know you feel terrible about that, you were blown up, had to watch an agent die, and was almost stabbed to death by a serial killer that killed your wife. JJ,-" The blond looked up at him. "Your sister committed suicide when you were young, you were blamed for Reid being kidnapped –" Morgan shifted uncomfortably. "Attacked by dogs, had to lie about a colleague's death, had to deal with Reid being angry with you-which I somewhat understand-, and your husband was shot and kidnapped, putting your entire family at risk. Garcia-" Garcia was shaking, so Gideon softened his tone. "Your parents died in a car accident when you were eighteen, you were shot on a date, then attacked again.

Morgan, you watched your father die and turned to Bufurd-" Morgan's eyes were filling with tears as he silently asked Gideon to shut up. "He sexually abused you, you were arrested based on a profiler of you provided by me, you were attacked by the Reaper and he used your credentials later, you were attacked by a serial killer who killed a friend right in front of you and kidnapped his daughter, and almost blew yourself up to save a hospital. David Rossi, you lost your son and your first wife and had some very personal connection to Section Chief Strauss and risked getting yourself blown up to kill the replicator. And Alex Blake, your brother was killed intervening in an armed robbery, the Replicator abducted you and wired you with explosives because of some kind of vendetta against you.

"So, Reid does get into a lot of trouble. He's a trouble magnet. But, so are you guys. You shoulder some of the pain." Gideon finished, relishing the stunned look on everyone's faces. It took a while for someone to speak up.

"How did you know all that, Jason?" Hotch asked.

"You didn't think I would just forget all about you guys, did you? I've been keeping tabs on you." Gideon said, looking down sheepishly. He glanced up to see Garcia's tearful grin.

They were all looking around at each other, not knowing what to say, digesting Gideon's words when JJ's cell phone rang. She jumped a little as the ringing echoed throughout the quiet waiting room and pulled it out quickly.

"Agent Jareau." She answered. Her face fell as she listened. "I'm sorry, sir, we can't one of our agents is down.. . Dr. Spencer Reid. . . It was reported by our technical analyst. . . But, sir- . . . I understand, sir, we'll be right there." JJ sighed and hung up, turning towards her team mates. "We have a case." She said softly. "We have to leave."