AUTHOR'S NOTES: Bet you forgot about me, eh? Anyway, I know it's been awhile. Work and all that. Lame excuses, but just the same. I'll try to get this wrapped up pretty quick now. Just a couple more chapters left. I thank you for the constant and considerable interest. I would advise if it has been awhile that you go back and start from the beginning(even I had to do that and I still may have missed some continuity issue).

STORY NOTES: As previously stated, considerable creative liberties have been taken with JJ's life and family. This chapter is a bit on the dark side, but nothing graphic so much as implied.

March, 1994.

They wrestled like two boys.

Which wouldn't have been a problem if they had been two boys. But they weren't. Despite what apparently David Jareau believed, his little sister Jennifer was most certainly not a boy.

But sometimes she sure as hell acted like one and he sure as hell treated her like one.


Well most of the time anyway.

Unless boyfriends were involved. In that case, David became a real pain in the ass. He'd rag and tease his sister until she threatened to maim him in some way or another.

Not that her irritation with him in regards to her boyfriends or anything else had ever stopped him from mercilessly harassing her.

Siblings were like that.

He was seventeen and she fifteen and they were closer than Kate and Matthew could have ever hoped for.


That, Kristina Jareau believed, was her gift to her deceased brother and his wife. That was her tribute to them.

To raise their children to be happy, healthy and full of life.

Even if that life meant horsing around like two teenaged boys.

Kristina passed by the kitchen window and glanced out into the backyard. The two of them were out there, kicking a soccer ball around and generally shit-talking each other.

Who was slower, who kicked like a girl…

And they were laughing.

It was a painfully familiar sight to her.

It reminded her off growing up with Matthew.

Laughing with the wildness of youth.

She swallowed hard, closed her eyes and allowed a moment of grief to overtake her. It held on, swept through her soul, crushed her heart and took her breath away.

And then she heard the laughter again, a loud dancing noise. It came from Jennifer as she tore a path around her brother and kicked the ball into a makeshift net at the back of the yard.

Kristina's chest released and she found she could breathe again. She glanced out the window, saw Jennifer dancing around, hands up in the air, taunting David with both her words and her actions.

And then, of course, David tackled her.

They both fell to the grass, laughing like wild hyenas.

Kristina felt her heart swell with bittersweet pride and joy.

And then she yelled out, "Stop horsing around and come in here and set the table!"

They stopped their wrestling, glanced up at the window and then both, at the exact same time, burst into another mad fit of laughter.

"So, tell me about Marcus," David began, his eyes still on the road.

"No," she replied.

"Oh come on, I promise I'll be good."

"You're a liar."

"Yeah, of course I am, but I'm supposed to be; I'm your big brother."

"And that gives you a right to make my lovelife hell?"

"You're fifteen, J, your lovelife should involve some kissing and a few quick pats on the chest."

"Classy," she snorted.

"I'm serious, Jen, none of those boys have any business trying to get past first base with you."

She laughed. "I am so not talking about this with you."

His eyebrow shot up. "Who?"

"Who what?"

"Who got past first base?"

"I didn't say anyone had."

"Yes, you did."

"No, I didn't."

"Yes, you did. By saying you weren't going to talk to me about it."

"No, I just said I wasn't going to discuss sex with my overbearing big brother. That's all I said."

"Marcus, right? He tried to get you to-"

"Don't you dare finish that sentence," she warned, glaring at him.

"He did, didn't he? I'm going to kick his ass."

"David, it's our first date."

"Well then maybe I should have a talk with him first."

"You really are an ass, you know that?"

He smirked. "I have a pretty good idea."

"Mm, we're here. Just drop me off and go away."

"Okay, okay. Jeez, just try to have a little conversation with my baby sister and I get nothing but a cold shoulder. I'm hurt, you know that."

"No, but I can hurt you if you'd like," JJ shot back.

He winked. "You could try."

"Just let me out, okay?"

"Okay." He pulled the car up in front of a house. Two other teenaged girls, members of JJ's soccer team, were waiting out front for her. "Enjoy your party tonight. Enjoy Marcus."

"Bite me," she replied, before getting out. Then she grinned at him and slammed the door shut behind her.

He watched her stride up to the two other girls. After a beat, he pulled out into the street and drove away.

David Jareau liked his dreams. He never quite remembered them when he woke up, but the good ones, they stuck somewhere in his subconscious and when his mind was clear of other nonsense such as English and Trig, he found that he could draw those dreams.

Draw them into images full of colors.

He wasn't bad at drawing, but it had never felt like a calling.

A release of restless energy, yeah, that was better.

But that release always started from the dreams.

Sometimes they were strange, full of violence.

Sometimes they were beautiful, full of women.

And sometimes, like the dreams of seventeen year old boys were apt to be, they were full of both.

Tonight was pretty though. Lots of girls, most of them much older(to only his mirror would he admit to having a Mrs. Robinson fixation) than him. All of them very well…endowed.

And they were all over him.

Saying his name. Purring his name. Ringing his name.

Ringing? What?

He came awake with a start, saw the phone next to his bed ringing. Both he and JJ had personal lines in their rooms, something Kristina had relented to upon realizing just how social they both were.

He picked the phone up and muttered a groggy, "Whu?"

"David," a voice whispered, before that whispered cracked into a sob.

"Jen?" he said, sitting up straight. "Jen, are you okay?"

"I need you to come get me, please."

He was already up and on his feet. "Where are you?"

"Peter Bannister's house."

"Where are the other girls?"

"I don't know. I can't find them. I don't want to ruin their nights. I just…David, I just want to go home."

"I'm on my way, Jen, just hang on. I'm on my way."

He'd never driven so fast in his life. Typically, Pete Bannister's house, which was on the other side of town, was about a ten minute drive.

He made it in six flat.

Pete was a sophomore just like Jen which meant that the parties he threw tended to get the younger teenage set, very few seniors.

After all, seniors were too cool to hang around with kids.

Kids didn't know how to sneak the good alcohol in.

Kids didn't know how to not get caught.

Just the same, some of the older set did occasionally show at the parties. Mostly because any party would do.

It occurred to David as he parked in front of Pete Bannister's house that the guy Jen had been meeting up with, Marcus Frey, was a senior.

A guy in his own grade.

Too old to be dating his sister.

He saw her immediately. Sitting out on the curb, arms around her, her mascara streaked. She'd been crying.

And yet still…she looked okay…

He jumped out of the car and rushed to her. "Jen?"

She stood up and nearly fell into his arms.

"What happened?" he asked, fear turning his insides cold.

"I just want to go home."

"Tell me what happened," he urged.

"He just…I thought…we were just joking…I wasn't…I thought he wasn't like that…but he kept grabbing me…I had to hit him and he called me a…"

Her face pressed into his chest and he felt her shake.

And in that moment, he understood.

His sister was tough as nails and because of that, he often forgot that she was a girl at all. She let him forget. She was a better athlete than him, could spit further than he could and played a mean thumb war.

It made him forget sometimes that she was still his little sister.

Her tears now made him remember that loud and clear.

"Did he hurt you?"

"No," she said, her voice muffled against his chest. "But I thought…I'm such an idiot…"

And then she was trembling again. He heard a cracked sob and that was all it took. Slowly, he led her back to the car. He slid her into the passenger seat and then leaned in.

"I want you to stay right here. I'll be right back, okay?"

She looked up at him, realizing what he meant to do. "David, no. I just want to go home."

"Stay here, Jen."

"David…"

But he was already walking towards the house, anger in each stride.

She waited for about five minutes, her mind circling around viciously, new scenarios presenting themselves at breakneck speed.

What if he got hurt? What if…

But then he was walking back towards the car. He got in and started the engine. She looked down and saw his hand, his knuckles cut and bloody.

She reached out and touched his hand. He looked up at her and then cold anger in her face melted away. He smiled at her, leaned over and kissed her on the cheek, then slid his hand over hers and squeezed.

He made it very clear to her that everything was okay.

PRESENT DAY.

Everything was most certainly not okay for Jennifer Jareau.

She was alone in the mock up of her childhood room, staring at walls that had been papered to resemble a memory she'd long ago boxed up.

A memory filled with pain and loss.

And murder.

And now more murder.

Her parents had died in a room just down the hall from hers.

She had a good idea that a little girl named Anna Maroney had been brutally murdered in this room. And God only knew what other horrors had been visited upon her.

JJ had been alone in the room for awhile now. At least an hour. She had no idea where Tyler was, but it hardly mattered.

He'd bound her at the wrists and ankles with heavy ropes and then tossed her onto the single bed with an atrocious bright pink quilt.

The quilt, well that was from her childhood as well.

The real one had been her mother's idea; a Hail Mary attempt at turning her tomboy daughter into a princess.

As a child of five, JJ hadn't cared what color her quilt had been.

As an adult, it scared the shit out of her.

She could have rolled herself off he bed, but what would have been the point? The room looked exactly like her childhood one, but it was completely void of anything she could use to get the binds undone.

It was completely lacking in anything she could use to find a way to get the hell out of here before Tyler returned.

And so while she lay there on the bed, her hands and feet cramping just a bit, she tried not to think of the vibrant color pictures she'd seen of Tyler's victims.

She tried not to think of the little girls.

She tried not to think about how he plainly still saw her as a little girl.

She thought about her team instead.

How they wouldn't rest until they found her.

How she knew that they would find her.

How she had faith in that.

How fear and faith weren't the best of partners.

And just as she was thinking that, the door to the room opened and Tyler entered. He looked even more disturbed than when he'd left.

He was muttering to himself and running his hands through his hair.

Until he saw her.

And smiled.

"They just said it on TV," he told her. "They just confirmed that I got you. I got you, Jennifer. I got you."

"Tell me again why we just did that?" Derek Morgan demanded, glaring back at his boss. Every part of his body felt tense and on-edge.

He felt like he was about to explode with fear and frustration.

"Because he killed Anna Maroney immediately after realizing that he wasn't JJ," Aaron Hotchner said softly, his tone perfectly controlled not to show the same anger and agitation that Morgan's was.

"You think if he knows he has JJ, he's more likely not to kill her immediately. He's more...he's more likely to take his time with her," Prentiss said softly. It was a statement, not a question. A chilling one at that.

Slowly, Hotch nodded.

"God knows what that sick bastard could do to her now that he knows it's her," Morgan said, his jaw clenching.

Again, Hotch nodded. But this time he added, "We have to give ourselves time to get to her. It's our only chance."

"He's right," Gideon said as he and Reid entered the room. Reid was fidgeting nervously, his hands twitching.

And that made much of Morgan's anger fade away.

Because suddenly everything came into focus.

They were all on edge but only one of them had fallen over that edge recently. Only one of them within the room was likely to fall over it again if everything went to hell. If the worst case scenario happened…

"What about the using his own child to integrate with the families of his victims theory?" Morgan asked suddenly, cutting off whatever else Gideon had been about to say. He was looking directly at Reid, trying to pull him into case, trying to keep him connected.

"We haven't found anything to suggest that Tyler Krause had a child," Reid noted, his eyes snapping to attention as he scanned his memory from any signs of a Krause offspring. To himself, Morgan sighed with relief.

"Then maybe the theory was wrong," Prentiss offered.

"Maybe, but then we still have to explain how he got to know these families so well. How he knew their houses," Hotch replied. "Now that we know who our Unsub is, we need to track backwards, see what if any connections he had to our victims."

"Good," Gideon nodded. "Break up. We have five families and a very short amount of time to tie everything together."

That was all that need be said. The group was up and out of the room.

At the tail of them, Gideon and Hotch exchanged a wary look.

A look full of the kind of fear that comes from having been around this block a time or two.

A look that said something like "sometimes, you don't get there in time."

A look that said something like "but sometimes you don't. Sometimes, time runs out first."

Penelope Garcia had never typed so fast in her life.

And she was hardly the only one.

As a general rule, she wasn't keen with letting other techs play in her kitchen, but when it came to JJ, ego and ownership be damned.

She'd let every FBI tech that had ten minutes to spare see her files on the case. And every one of those techs was now looking over the lives of Tyler Krause and his victims with a magnifying glass with 500x magnification.

And so far finding very little of any use.

One of the families had been funneling money to a bank account in a foreign country with about thirty vowels in the name.

Another one, well the husband had most assuredly been having an affair.

Bastard.

Hardly deserved to die.

Another had recently had a consult with a plastic surgeon who specialized in breast augmentation.

All of these peaks inside, but, no sign of Krause being connected to them.

But, of course, he had to be,

In some way.

And she was going to find it.

Because JJ was her girl.

In many ways, her best friend.

No, in all ways.

She'd had a lot of friends at one time, before her parents had died. And then after they'd died, she'd had a different kind of friends.

The kind that stuck around to watch the chaos but not the tears.

Jayje, well, she was the real deal.

The whole team was, but Derek and JJ, they were something more.

They were something crucial to her soul.

Garcia considered herself a strong woman; she'd certainly been forced to endure more than was fair.

Too much loss. Too much pain.

And so she'd created her own peace.

A modified Zen if you will.

A way to survive the reality of the nightmares.

Because the monsters under your bed and in your closet? Well she now knew them to be true. In more ways than one.

But she had to survive. She had to stay sane.

And that required the presence of the only family she had left.

Her team.

All of them.

She'd do anything for them. Anything.

But for Morgan and JJ maybe just a tad bit more than the others.

Just a small itty bit tad, but a tad nonetheless.

And that included something that was small to others, but huge to her.

Letting outsiders inside.

Allowing other techs into her files.

Because her team….because JJ meant more.

She'd waited so long for him to hurt her that finally her frayed and exhausted nerves had tossed her into a darkly troubled sleep.

One that was restless and full of chaos.

Images from past and present.

It started out kind to her.

Her parents, her dad laughing wildly as her mom attempted to scowl.

She and David kicking a ball around. She driving around him, leaving him in her wake.

Her college boyfriend, Rory Stone, as he kissed her. As they fell backwards onto a bed. The simplicity of blind ignorant youth around them.

And then sitting with Reid, Prentiss and Morgan in her office as they mocked Derek for getting hustled. The laughter of cynical, but otherwise happy adults.

God that seemed like so long ago.

The violent images followed soon after.

Her parents faces melted into the horrifying crime scene photos she'd finally seen when she'd joined the FBI. Pictures that had driven her into the bathroom, her stomach lurching heinously.

Pictures that had buckled her knees and made her sob like a child.

Everything after that came fast and furious. Flashes of the past.

The pain of breaking up with Rory, knowing that he was a good guy, maybe once upon a time even "the guy", but now no longer.

The terror of finding Reid on the floor of his room, a needle nearby.

Too many pictures, too much emotion…

Too much…too much…

"Jennifer," he said, his hand stroking her face.

She stirred and whimpered a bit in her sleep.

"Jennifer, wake up."

And then he grabbed her jaw roughly and forced it upwards.

Her eyes snapped open and she stared up at him. He was looking down at her with a strange kind of wonderment. Like he was curious.

"I sleep like that, too," he said softly. "Even the pills don't work."

She didn't know what to say to that so she said nothing.

Just waited.

For something.

Anything.

And then he said, "Did you know my father loved your mother?"

She swallowed hard. She desperately didn't want to hear this, but knew that had no choice.

Knew that her only chance to survive was to endure him.

Even if that meant finding a way to keep him talking.

"Where is he?" she asked softly.

Tyler blinked as if suddenly(and quite strangely, JJ thought, especially considering his obsession with her) remembering that she was in the room.

Then, flatly, "Dead. He's dead."

"Did you kill him?"

"Yes,"

It was so cold, so devoid of emotion. Involuntarily, she shuddered.

"Why?" she asked finally, gritting the words out.

"Because I learned the truth. He threw me away, you know that? After your mother, after what happened, he ran. He left me to my mom, but she didn't want me. She wanted everything else, but me. I lived with relatives, but they didn't want me either."

She forced herself to say, "I'm sorry", but the truth was that she could care less about his sob story. She had no doubt that he intended to hurt her badly and thus her sympathy for him, well it wasn't likely.

Still, keeping him talking…

Time…it bought time.

"They tossed me to the state the first chance they could. I spent almost ten years in fifteen different Boy's Homes. You know the things that happen to you in those places?"

The person she was sent a shot of sympathy through her soul.

Because she did know.

She knew that those places, meant to save lost children, could often do more to destroy the soul of their charges than the meanest streets could.

And yet…fury, anger, fear…she held onto it.

If she sympathized, if she felt even a second of human pain for this monster, well then she was probably lost.

So instead of speaking, she nodded slowly.

He ignored her though, off in his own world, now mercifully several feet away from the bed, pacing around anxiously, agitated.

"Things you can't imagine, things a child should never have to go through. And you do things, horrible things to survive. You know, I grew up thinking that every child went through that. I figured it was just life. I figured that life just sucked for everyone. I could deal with that."

It was really shame that she had binds on her hands and feet, she mused bitterly, because now would have been a great time to take him out.

"When I turned eighteen, I got the hell away from that town and I went out into the world. I lived my life. I got a shitty job. I got two of them. I was okay. I was surviving. And then I saw him. Here. In San Diego. In my city."

To herself, JJ said the word "trigger". And then mentally added on a bitter, "Wouldn't Hotch me proud of me now?"

"You know no one ever knew what happened to Dad. Mom said he just ran off. Said sometimes men do that. Said I was better off without him, but I wasn't. With him I was lonely, without him I was in hell."

He swallowed hard and again, JJ felt the surge of empathy for him.

It made her sick to her stomach.

This man was a monster.

Who hadn't started off a monster…

That said, she reminded herself, he was now a monster who intended to do unthinkably horrible things to her.

Empathy could – and should – only go so far.

"What did you do?" she asked.

"I walked right up to him and said 'dad'. He looked at me like an idiot. I told him who I was and he didn't care. He shook my hand and said 'good to see you, son' and then walked away. He walked away from me again. Can you believe that?"

Tyler laughed, an edge of hysteria there. He was losing it. And to her chagrin, she noticed that his wild steps were drawing him closer to her.

"So I followed him back to his hotel room and I made him tell me why he left me, why he let me go through the things I did. You know what he told me, Jennifer? You know why he deserted me?"

She tensed up,

"Because he was in love with your bitch mother. Because he wanted to be your father. Your father, not mine. Not mine!"

And with that he spun around and cracked his fist into her jaw.

The pain, utterly unexpected, ripped through her body like an earthquake. She held on for just a second and then finally, after a few seconds of desperately trying not to, succumbed to the darkness.

Her last conscious thought was wondering if she'd ever wake up again.

They were all sitting around the tables, files opened in front of them, plastic coffee cups scattered about the table. Morgan was pacing back and forth, too much energy and caffeine coursing through him.

"Nothing," Emily sighed, surrendering the first show of frustrated failure. And then she followed it up by tossing the file into the middle of the table.

"Keep looking," Hotch urged, even as he closed his own file. "There has to be…there is something. We're just not seeing it."

"Jason," a voice from the door said. The group turned to see a very weary and exhausted looking Oscar Baron in the doorway. He had refused to leave the station, offering to assist with looking through the files.

He hadn't been the only officer to volunteer to do so.

There were many families.

Law enforcement was one of the biggest.

"There's a young man out here asking to see you."

Gideon lifted an eyebrow.

"He says his name is David Jareau."

Looks were passed around the room and then everyone was up and filing out, into the hallway.

Where a handsome young man with brown hair and eyes was standing, talking to Detective Palmer. His jaw was set hard, bags under his eyes suggesting lack of sleep.

"Mr. Jareau," Hotch said, walking towards him. "I'm Aaron Hotchner."

"David Jareau," David replied. He took Hotch's hand and gave it a quick hard shake. And then, his voice cracking a bit, "Where's my sister?"

Another look was exchanged, this one plainly saying, "good question."

TBC….