18 months later

"Wil!" Emily yelled from the large office as she hung up the Skype call, absentmindedly watching the traffic below from her large wall of windows. Emily had found that calling her coworkers was rather pointless. They never answered interoffice phone calls. She stretched back in her chair, running her fingers over her tired eyes and resting her crossed shoes on the edge of her desk. She was quickly turning into Hotch, never leaving work. "Grainger," She called out once again until the young woman came scurrying into the white, modern office.

"Sorry, here are those files," The woman offered with an apologetic smile. Wilhelmina Grainger was Emily's assistant and not an 'official' member of her Interpol team, but Emily valued her nevertheless. She was slim, about twenty-six years old with blonde hair, brown eyes and her ever-present pair of large, hard-framed black glasses. She always wore a stylish monochromatic outfit, her overall appearance prompting Emily to refer to her as bizarro Garcia. Not only did she most closely resemble her American counterpart, but Wilhelmina Grainger also didn't respect boundaries, constantly trying to get Emily to go out clubbing with her or sign up for dating apps. Emily had told her time and time again that she had just gotten out of a long semi-toxic relationship, but it didn't seem to deter the younger woman.

"So," Wilhelmina began with a smile, "My aunt has a friend-"

"No."

"Oh come on Em," The younger woman sighed in a charming British accent. "You won't meet any lads so I scare up a few lesbians for you and still no appreciation."

Emily broke into a fit of laughter at the other's woman's frustration, "I will fire you."

"Please," Wilhelmina waved off the ridiculous claim, "You still don't know how to work the copier."

"Because you won't teach me!"

"It's called job security, mate." The younger woman grinned as she walked out the glass doorway.

"Have a great night, Wil," Emily chuckled as she flipped open the case file and rubbed her temples to stave off the impending headache. The location might have changed, but the cases hadn't.

"You too, boss," was called out in the distance.

JJ heard the call hang up and immediately ducked her into the cramped office, making sure that Garcia was no longer busy and was able to talk, "Important call?"

"You could say that," The technical analyst grinned, "I just got off with Emmy 202, well Emmy- what is the area code for London again?"

"You were the one who was just on with her," JJ laughed as she leaned against the doorframe, not really wanting to sit down and talk to Garcia about Emily, just looking for the highlights. However, she knew that she really wasn't going to be able to avoid the conversation. "She good?"

Garcia bite the inside of her cheek, appearing to be deep in thought, "I think so? I never could tell with Emily. Do you think she's good?"

"I think so."

"You think so?" Garcia questioned and then JJ knew that Garcia wasn't going to let the topic go.

JJ shrugged, "She's busy. I'm busy. Time zones-"

"Yeah, I didn't think you two talked, to be honest."

"That's not true," JJ defended, for some reason offended by the assumption. Garcia was right of course; her and Emily hardly talked anymore. Emily and Henry were international pen pals, which the entire family appreciated because Henry got a pen pal and JJ and Will got assurance that he wasn't writing to a predator. But JJ and Emily? Well first they didn't talk because of the wedding, or rather Emily's absence at it. If she was honest with herself she could hardly blame Emily for not showing up, but Emily didn't even say goodbye. She said goodbye to the entire team- to Henry, but not to JJ. Hell, Garcia and Morgan even got to go visit her, offering general details about how the other woman was doing.

"Oh, she loves her job."

"She has a great flat."

"She had a great team."

"The weather is better than she anticipated."

So the months passed and JJ didn't reach out, and Emily didn't either, assuming it was crossing boundaries. Yes, she was an ocean away, but JJ was officially married. It was different.

Around the six-month mark JJ had reached out and sent an email wishing Emily a happy birthday. They would occasionally email about Henry, Emily would send pictures of things she saw that would remind her of JJ, or that JJ might like. JJ kept her informed on the goings on of the team. It was cordial and friendly, but not them.

"Okay," Garcia spoke up, shaking JJ from her internal rambling. "Anywhoos, you should call her. She's working on a really tough case- maybe she could use another set of eyes."

JJ twisted and cracked her back before yawning, "Emily was always a better profiler than me. I was just coming down to see if you wanted a lunch break." And just like that the conversation was over, and JJ still had no additional information about how Emily was really doing. People were respecting her boundaries way too much.

There is a slight breeze, the trees barely rustling from the movement of air through their branches. The setting is eerily calm until the quiet is disturbed by the sound of heavy panting and branches breaking, upsetting the sense of tranquility. The cold air burns her lungs, but she doesn't care because she's determined.

She's aimlessly running, unsure if she has been moving at that pace for minutes, hours, days? Time is relative and her exhaustion doesn't even register. It doesn't matter, because she has to have it. She's not even sure why it's so important, what it truly means, but that's irrelevant because she's possessed by the need to find it again. Somehow it's become an inherent need, like breathing. She has to find it.

Her chest is heaving as she desperately cuts through the forestry frantically, experiencing a gratifying sense of relief as she begins to progressively remember her surroundings. She can't help but smile; however, the smile quickly fades when she finally reaches the place that looks so similar to before but tortuously different. It's an idyllic place, one that she still can't believe she happened upon by accident. She doesn't even know where she is. The snow-capped Mountains and a line of pine trees surround a daisy filled meadow, the sight almost Edenic. But the beauty of the place doesn't matter because it's not there.

She's sure this is where she saw it last time.

Her breathing becomes impossibly more rapid as she runs her hands through her hair and shakes her head in disbelief. "No, no, no, please no" JJ merely whispers as she bits her bottom lip, trying to choke back a sob, for some reason having an inexplicable need to cry.

Because the, her, black rose is nowhere to be found.

JJ awakens with a gasp, running her hands through her hair, noticing a thin layer of sweat on her neck. She had been having the nightmare for a while. It felt like years. She looks over to the empty bed beside her, Will must've slept on the sofa again. It was a rule they had made when Will started working more unstable hours, but if they were honest it was just something they wanted to do and the work hours just gave them an out. They liked the space apart.

JJ had blamed it on newlywed blues. She didn't even know if it was a thing, but that was what she was intent on calling it, well to herself anyway because she didn't dare say it out loud. Will, on the other hand, blamed the distance between them on JJ's old boss showing up at her job, but deep down they both knew it was Emily.

Emily.

Just the name haunted her thoughts. Before she realizes what she's doing she picks up her phone and calls the number she had stolen from Garcia's phone.

"JJ?" Emily questions when she finally answers the Skype call. She barely see an outline of the other woman in the dark room. "Are you okay?" She looks over to the large clock hanging above her office doorway, "It's like 3am over there. What's going on?" JJ picks up on the concern in Emily's voice and immediately turns on her bedside lamp, hoping that it'll show the other woman she's okay. Instead Emily notices the fine sheen of sweat and the dark bags under the blonde's eyes, the blonde who's sitting in the large bed alone. "JJ."

"I don't know why I called," the younger woman admits as she briefly puts the phone down to rub her eyes.

"You can always call," Emily offers in a soothing, gentle tone.

"Can I?" JJ scoffs. She's upset at the brunette and she doesn't even know why- probably because she left.

It's morning, in fact she's been up for nearly three hours by that point but she's still caught off guard by the accusation, the suggestion that she had turned her back on JJ when all she had done was leave out of self-preservation. "I need to know you're okay," the older woman requests.

"I'm okay."

Emily nods at the statement, looking outside her office window at the London skyline. "I didn't want to…you're married now."

"I know," JJ says as she pulls her knees to her chest.

"Why did you call? Now of all times I mean." The blonde actually isn't sure why she called. She had the dream, the same dream that had plagued her almost every night for the past few weeks and she thought of Emily, but she wasn't sure if that meant that she needed the other woman for comfort or that she was worried about Emily. Maybe it was a combination of both. "JJ?"

"I don't know," JJ finally answers. "I just miss you." I miss us. "I wonder about how you're doing over there. I guess when I'm not feeling my happiest I hope you are at least."

"I think I'm happy?" Emily thinks about the statement before clarifying. What is she deduced over that year and a half was that London didn't really give her anything, but unlike D.C. it didn't take anything from her either. "I operate at a six- I'm fine but I'm not 'happy.' But it's better than when I was…"

"When you were here," JJ completes and Emily can make out the hurt expression on her face.

"Not because of you," Emily sighs before swirling around her coffee mug, "It was just everything else. The way the team had changed. The way I had changed. Every fucking place was tainted by Doyle. It was just hard being there."

JJ stared ahead at the TV sitting on the dresser in the middle of her and Will's room. It was an old model and she could see her reflection in the glass screen. For some reason, seeing herself like Emily was seeing her now- tired, vulnerable, sad- it gave her a feeling of courage. So she asked the question she had been asking herself for the past 18 months, "So you would've left even if I hadn't married Will?"

Emily studies the face of the woman on her computer screen. There were a few fine lines around her tired, piercing blue eyes. Her hair was disheveled, her t-shirt wrinkled and soggy looking, but she was still as beautiful as ever. She was still the same JJ Emily had met and fallen in love with six and a half years before. They had hurt each other so many times before, and they had tired to conceal their true thoughts and feelings from each other more times than she could count, but they never straight out lied to each other. And looking at the women on the other side of the world, remembering her touch and smell, Emily still couldn't do it. So she told the truth.

"No, I wouldn't have."

"So you left because of me."

"JJ," Emily begins with a smile. Just the other woman's name makes her smile, "From the outside people might think you're selfish. The years long affair- it doesn't look good from the outside, but only we know. Only we know. Only I know how selfless you really are. The way you'll put everyone else's needs before your own. So I couldn't stay, because I'm always going to want you. I'm always going to want you and you're always going to give yourself to me, and doing that in a marriage? You'd never forgive yourself for that."

Emily smooths out her hair behind her ears and offers the other woman sad smile, "I admit that when I first got on the plane there was anger and I was jealous, but at the base of it all there was the acceptance that there was nothing left for me back in D.C., but you. And me being there, it would just torture you."

JJ scratched the back of her neck before cupping her cheek in her hand, resting her elbow on her knee. "You were right- what you said a few years ago. You're the only one who's ever really known me."

"Emily we need you," Wilhelmina interrupted as she popped her head into Emily's office.

"I'll be right there," Emily replied before looking back at the computer screen and giving JJ an apologetic smile.

"I get it," said the blonde, offering a small smile herself, "Go. I know you have to work."

"Yeah," Emily groaned as she stretched out her back, "I gotta pay back all this karma from all the times everyone saved me." JJ didn't say anything in reply, the two just content to look at each other. It had been so long they had forgotten the last time they had seen each other. "You know, every time Garcia calls she asks me the same question."

"And what's that?"

Emily chuckled and rolled her eyes at the question, "'Are you seeing anyone?' And every time I tell her the same answer- No."

And with that Emily hung up the Skype call, leaving JJ with a smile on her face. It's a cruel thing- life that is. Maybe under different circumstances, if they were different people they would've worked out. But then they wouldn't be Emily and JJ, so would it really be worth it?

It hurt to admit and to hear- that first, no one had ever known, ever loved her as thoroughly as Emily, and second, no one else in Emily's life could ever replace the blonde. But it hurt in the best possible way.

JJ's thoughts are interrupted by her the ringing of her phone, but it's not Emily this time. Instead it looks like it's Cruz trying to contact her.

"Jareau," She answers as she gets up and starts to get dressed, preparing to meet whomever in the darkness of early morning.

The black SUV accelerated as Morgan weaved through the traffic to meet at the team's rendezvous point. "Shit," Morgan hissed as he avoiding rear-ending the car in front of him.

Emily meanwhile was completely unaffected by Morgan's frantic driving. She might normally complain about it, but there was hardly anything normal about JJ being kidnapped and being tortured for State Department information. Emily shouldn't have even been there. She should've been in bed in her London flat.

Instead she absentmindedly stared out the SUV window, watching as the buildings zipped by her. It was the cycle of insuppressible nervous panicking and the crash of depression that had tormented Emily the entire seven-hour plane ride. Emily knew how these type of intelligence "extractions" went. She wished she could tell herself that her imagination was worse than any reality, but she knew from firsthand experience that it was true. She clenched the car's door handle so hard her knuckles turned white, her hands cramped, but she couldn't let go. The dashboard clock confirmed that she had been up for twenty hours thus far.

"I should've noticed," She quietly stated as Morgan avoided hitting another car.

"Don't do that."

"I was so wrapped in myself and what I needed from her-"

"Don't blame yourself for this," Morgan scolded. He was legitimately getting angry with the other woman. He wouldn't let her do this. He wouldn't allow this to be another weight on Emily's shoulders. "You were trying to survive. You were going on the run after being stabbed-"

"She was scared!" Emily yells back, her voice cracking. "She needed me."

Morgan briefly took his eyes off the road to glance at the clock. They would probably get there before Hotch, "You're here now."

Emily just nodded in response, reverting back to silence as they prepared to meet up with the rest of the team. He would never say it, but Morgan had internally questioned if it was the smartest decision to bring Emily in on the case. Sure, she was the most experienced Agent in situations like this. She was the one who probably had the most knowledge about JJ's operation, but then again that wasn't really saying much. She was probably their most skilled field agent, even including himself. But there was something he didn't like about it, and he couldn't figure out why. Regardless, it wasn't his decision to make, and the woman beside him was Emily Prentiss so she was getting on that plane no matter what anyone else said.

Sure enough Morgan had been mistaken, Hotch was already there waiting for them. As he turned off the engine, Morgan shared a look with Emily. It was a second at most, but he still understood what he was wordlessly telling him. JJ needed to make it home alive. And just like that their moment was over, Emily hastily opening her car door.

"Prentiss you're with me," Hotch ordered as Emily jumped out of the vehicle, re-securing her vest and drawing her gun. "Keep your head about you," He quietly added with a nod as they jogged ahead towards the large building.

"How's JJ?"

"She's standing, but that's- where the hell did she go?" Emily questioned as she looked from Hotch to where JJ was just standing.

"She went to get Hastings."

"It's personal for her," Cruz elaborated.

"Go help her. I've got him."

Emily cut through the building running after JJ. Why couldn't she just wait she internally chided as she pushed herself to run faster, finally reaching the blonde as she ran out of bullets. Emily took over, shooting at Hastings but unable to get a clean shot. Assuming that he was out of bullets too, she shared a look with the other woman before they both began running towards the ladder in pursuit. As they reached the roof Emily immediately charged him, landing several hits before being pushed aside. JJ then attacked, kicking his groin and attempting to land a hit on his head. As Emily got off the ground, Hastings moved back and reached for the gun, firing the single shot at her head.

"Emily!" JJ screamed before launching herself at Hastings again, beating him and battering him, causing him to fall off the roof almost taking her with him. She pulled herself off the ledge and immediately ran to Emily, the blood pouring out from a small hole above her browline.

"Emily, please," JJ began to cry as she futilely tried to apply pressure to the exit wound. "Emily, come on," she choked out again as Reid and Hotch reached the roof. "Em, please. Please," she repeated over and over again as Hotch nodded for Reid to go down to the ground to notify Morgan and the ambulance.

"JJ," Hotch soothed quietly as she walked towards JJ, who was supporting Emily's head in her hands.

"She's going to be okay," JJ assured him as she brushed Emily's hair back, her blood soaked hands staining the porcelain skin.

"JJ-"

"If we just get her to a doctor. She's lost some blood, but if we can get a blood transfusion or something- she's just tired right now," She stated as she continued stroked her red fingers through the woman's dark hair. "Why aren't you calling someone?" JJ screamed at him before going back to press her fingers against the wound at the back of Emily's head, the blood pooling in JJ's hands. "I can't do this by myself."

Hotch turned to see Morgan and three paramedics approach the roof. The unit chief merely shook his head at the other agent, signaling that Emily was really, truly gone.

"Stop doing nothing!" JJ screamed helplessly as Morgan crouched next to her. "She's hurt really bad, Derek," JJ whispered, as if it was a secret that no one else, not even Emily could hear.

"I know," Morgan nodded, biting his lip to keep from crying after he saw Emily's lifeless body. He put his folded hands in front of his face, inhaling to steady himself before wrapping her arms around JJ's waist and helping her up. JJ immediately began to fight him, trying to kick him away after figuring out what he was doing. "Stop fighting me," Morgan commanded before whispering firmly in her ear, "You did everything you could, JJ. You did everything."

It takes a nearly a minute, but JJ finally stopped struggling and thrashing, her body going limp as she broke down in his arms.

"She hates bagpipes," She cried as Emily's words replayed in her head: If that's something you can't accept then go teach criminology or something.

Cries evolved into gut-wrenching sobs as Morgan sank back to the ground, rocking her in his arms, Hotch, Reid, Rossi and Blake unable to do anything besides watch on.