"…I wanted to have this up Wednesday, but that didn't work. Oh well. R&R if you're still out there and reading…!"

White Light-Chapter 4

Dead and Delusional

Just as he started to take off his pajama shirt, an image caught the corner of his eye, and he turned around. He gasped as he realized that he had just seen a person- a child, more accurately. As he turned around to face the child, his jaw hung open and his eyes became more wide than usual.

"Hello Spencer." Katelynn Michelle smiled.

"Katelynn?" he whispered.

"No, not really." She sighed. And as fast as she had appeared, she disappeared.

Spencer looked around the room. 'Where is she…? Was she actually there?' Quickly, Spencer dashed to his bedside and grabbed his gun. He checked every section of the hotel room, but he still couldn't find her. Sighing to himself, he put his gun away, realizing that he had probably overreacted. He checked the hotel room one last time, though, just to be safe. After one more once-over, he tried to convince himself that he had just fallen to sleep and started back to toward the shower again. He stripped down to nothing and hopped into the hotel shower again.

After about forty-five minutes, Spencer came out and quickly dressed himself. Putting on his favorite shirt, purple with a gray tie with his entitles embroidered at the tip- a present from his mother from last Christmas- and donned a pair of gray pants. After finishing up his hair, he reached for his cell phone and dialed Morgan's number.

"Hey there." A smooth voice said from behind Spencer. The young man gasped and immediately turned around. He saw the child smile widely at him, and he nearly dropped his phone.

"Hey kid, feeling better? You seemed pretty upset last night…" Morgan said.

"Uh, no, not really." Spencer stammered. "I have a splitting migraine. Do you think Hotch will mind if I drop out for the day?"

"Hotch just asked me to call you, actually. He said that he wanted you off for the day after I told him about last night. Er, well, not exactly about last night, but-"

"I know." Spencer nodded. "I'm sorry about blowing up at you. I was just upset and feeling pretty bad. At least I know why now."

"All right." Morgan sighed. "Hotch will most likely stop by, just to let you know. He wants to check you up while Prentiss and I go over a few more things. Think you'll be up to it?"

"Uh, yeah." Spencer nodded. He knew that he probably sounded distracted, but he was distracted- very distracted. His eyes were glued on the mischievously smiling little dead girl sitting on his temporary bed. She waved to him and laughed a little. Spencer turned around and tried to focus back on the phone.

"All right. Get some sleep, okay?"

"Oh, trust me, I will be sleeping." Spencer smirked.

"Glad to hear." Morgan smiled. With that, he hung up. Spencer flipped his phone shut and turned his head back to the dead girl.

"I can't believe I'm saying this to a dead girl, but I think we need to talk." Spencer sighed. The little girl nodded her head before sitting down on his bed. She smiled at Spencer and waited for him to join her. Spencer reluctantly sat down next to Katelynn and waited for her to start talking.

"You're hallucinating."

'No duh!' Spencer hissed in his head.

"Watch it." She glared. "I'm apart of you; of course I know what you're thinking."

"Right of course." Spencer nodded. "But why are you here?"

The little girl frowned at him and scooted closer to him. "I was hoping you could tell me." She whispered. She was going to continue, but a knock on the door interrupted her. She silenced herself and laid low in a corner. Spencer looked at her as if to ask her to go away, but she just shook her head. "I'm apart of you. I go where you go."

"Fine, just…just stay there, I guess." Spencer mumbled as he walked toward the door. He knew that Hotch was going to be stopping by, but he had never expected him to stop by so soon. Shrugging it off, he opened the door.

"Spencer, do you mind if I come in?" a shaky voice asked. Spencer frowned at the unexpected guess, but he nodded his head anyways. Something was definitely bugging him, and he had a feeling he knew what it was.

"Of course, come in Greg." Spencer let Greg push pass him and into the hotel room. He motioned for him to sit down before sitting opposite of him.

"I'm sorry to intrude; I know that you aren't feeling well…"

"No, it's okay. I was getting kinda bored around here, actually. Feels like I'm going to lose my mind." Spencer joked. Katelynn smirked at that.

"It's just…. last night." Greg sighed. "Katelynn Michelle. She was so young…. so smart! She didn't deserve what happened to her, and we both know it. She had her whole life ahead of her; she could have made a difference in the world…"

"And you were just like her." Katelynn said, filling in the blanks. Spencer turned to look at her but stopped himself when he realized Greg wouldn't be able to see her. Instead, he cleared his throat and voiced what Katelynn had said.

"And you were just like her." Spencer supplied. Greg looked up at Spencer, a tear in his eye. "I was too, Greg. I was just a little boy growing up in a Las Vegas public school with an absentee father and a mother who on a good day remembered to get out of bed. I was just like her, too."

"How do you not let it get to you?" Greg asked miserably.

"It gets to me, Greg, it always will." Spencer sighed. "But it's how you use your relation to her that matters. I use it to get inside her head and figure out how she thinks. It's hard to relate to the victim, but it's even harder to relate with the UnSub. But in both cases, you can't let your feelings tie you down. You have to use them to help solve the case, not create a bias." Spencer put a sympathetic hand on Greg's shoulder as the cop wiped away a few stray tears. "It sucks, I know that, but you have to view it as making yourself better at the job." He had remembered Morgan saying those exact same words to him as comfort, and after he had time to think about what Morgan was really saying, he truly appreciated the gesture. He only hoped that Greg would be as understanding as he was…

"I know." Greg finally responded. "It's just…. I don't know. I've seen dead children before, but none like this. I guess I just wanted to talk about it."

"That's fine." Spencer nodded. "I understand how hard this can be, trust me. If you need to talk, just stop by, okay? And if you can't get out of the office, here's my number. Call me anytime."

Greg gratefully accepted the number and placed it in his pocket. "I really appreciate this, thanks." Suddenly, Greg's cell phone started vibrating, and he pulled it out of his pocket. He quickly read the message before standing up. "They found another body. I have to go."

"Do you want me to go with you?"

"No, I can tell that you're still not feeling well. Stay here a rest; we're going to need you refreshed and renewed for tomorrow." Greg waved goodbye at Spencer and left the hotel room.

Spencer waited for Greg to leave before turning his attention to Katelynn. The hallucination remained straight-faced as it stared back at him.

"You're welcome."

"Yeah, thanks." Spencer muttered. He groaned as he picked up his phone again. He punched in the familiar number, but his finger hesitated over the 'send' button. He felt Katelynn sneak up behind him, reading the number in her head before commenting.

"Call him, you know it's important."

Spencer turned his attention back to Katelynn who was currently frowning at his intensely. He glanced from her to his phone before flipping it shut and back into his pocket. When her frown increased, he shrugged his shoulders. "If you are apart of me, you should have seen that coming."

"Your daddy issues aren't the problem right now." She glared. "You need to figure out why I'm here."

Spencer studied the child for a moment. "You know why you're here, don't you?"

"I told you all ready; I have no clue why I'm here."

"Oh yeah? Well, why do I get the feeling you're lying to me?"

The girl smiled at him before letting out a half laugh- half huff. "Because I'm still technically apart of you. Figure it out Spencer; you've always been good at puzzles." When Spencer didn't respond, Katelynn sighed and pointed to the bed. "Go sleep. Maybe that'll help clear things up." Spencer raised his eyebrows at her, but she only shook her head in return. "I'm apart of you Spencer, you need to learn how to trust me."

"How could I trust someone I didn't know?"

"By taking the damn nap and shutting up." She glared. Finally, Spencer gave in and sat back down on his bed, still wary of the hallucination. She lay down opposite of him and turned her head to look at him. He glanced back at her, realizing that she had all ready fallen to sleep. He closed his eyes, not expecting to actually fall to sleep, before he even realized he had just done that exact thing.

"…. Hope you guys like Katelynn, because she's not going anywhere! Oh, and neither is Greg. ;) Thnx for waiting everyone! Hope you liked it..!"