I'm back, babe! I know—it's been forever. I can explain, though—the first reason I left this story was because I got over-excited with my other. That one is now on hiatus. But then I left for a while for medical reasons. Now here I am, back to writing.

I just want ya'll to know I got your messages/reviews urging me to continue this story. I'm so sorry about the wait—if I could go back and focus more on this one I would, I swear. Sadly, I just have to make up for lost time now.

So, I also wanna apologize for continuity errors—as you may know, I'm lazy. So lazy, in fact—not to mention such a self-ego-basher (does that make sense?) that I would have gotten sick—that I couldn't go and read what I wrote. And since so much time has passed, you know…

So here we go. I don't own anything but the plot. And maybe an OC or two.

By the way, sorry about the lack of defining my jumps from Spencer to Bella. I used to put 3 asterisks, but they like to disappear. If you would, could you let me know if my new method works or not? You'd be a doll, dear.

So, here we go. For real this time. I hope you like…and don't kill me for making you wait. :D

The sun was bright and the air was dry—she was used to excessive moisture, and began to cough, wondering where the green was. She looked around herself, examining her dull gray and sand surroundings. The sky was large around her, the desert spanning out of sight in all directions.

Suddenly it was cool. She felt him next to her, watching the little sparkly reflections dance on her skin. She looked over at him, and he was beautiful, breathtaking—and smiling at her. She gave him one back, and it came easily. She forgot why she was so hesitant of being here.

"Bella." She looked to the soft feminine voice, and her eyes welled up as her heart wrenched with built up emotion and ache.

"Mom," she said back, her voice choked, her vision blurring, her eye tickled with excess water—she felt her nose tingle and burn. "Mom," she said again.

Her mother was glowing, in a light colored sundress and her hair catching the sunlight in beautiful red twists. She gave Bella a beautiful smile and looked next to her. Bella did not feel panic at the fact that her boyfriend was sparkling in front o her mother—just peace. They were all together now.

"Hello Bella. Edward." Her mother nodded to the both of them, but reached forward and grasped Bella's hand. It was warm and soft, light as air in her own. Bella curled her fingers around her mother's and held on tightly, afraid she'd disappear.

"Mom," Bella said again. Her tears fell and gathered dust from a light wind. Her mom gave her a radiant white smile, before letting go of her hand. She opened her arms.

Bella let go of the other cold hand in her own and threw her arms around her mother. She felt herself crying, and there were embarrassing noises coming out of her mouth, but that didn't matter. Her mom was warm and soft and solid and something safe to hold onto. She squeezed.

And with a nearly audible pop, it was all gone. Bella was cold and sweaty, shivering and crying all at the same time. She looked frantically around her room and saw her alarm, which had shattered her dreams and woken her. For a moment, she didn't remember the dream or her reality. But soon the worse of the two came back to her, like a tidal wave sweeping over the shore. An ache, so painful, Bella couldn't breathe.

She closed her eyes and cried. The alarm blared, but she could barely hear it over her heart. It beat frantically, irregularly, and she felt like she was sliding down a mountain, toward a rocky end that would be painful, horrible, but peaceful. Freeing.

Finally, she managed to shut off the alarm. She opened her eyes and looked at the ceiling, counting the cracks and the shadows. She was about to force herself up and moving like any other day, but for some reason, it was different today. She felt different.

She didn't get up.

Laying there, staring at the ceiling, she felt like she was too heavy to move. And so she didn't. The daylight came and went, her roommate left her, and she simply stayed in bed. Everything was tired, the room was buzzing, and she knew if she got up she'd have a terrible case of head rush. So she stayed, and she convinced herself that was the only reason she was staying.

She stared at the ceiling for hours, barely blinking, just watching. Everything seemed simpler when she was laying down, watching the ceiling. It was a constant thing—it didn't change or disappear or anything crazy. It stayed.

So she, too, stayed.

##

He went nearly crazy. He wasn't quite sure why he was so frantic over her not showing up to either of their classes, but he was and that was that. The killer wasn't known for taking two victims at a time, but Bella was obviously special. She couldn't just be special to him—no, that was impossible. She was different to everybody, right—he didn't just feel this way. Because if it was just him, then that spelled trouble.

He watched the clock. He tried to pay attention to the professors, but when he already knew the topics they discussed—it was hard. So he worried and waited and glared at Derek when he started to do something stupid. But soon he found himself so out of character it was crazy—he actually began to flick the pen cap back, in a game of impromptu hockey. Derek won, of course, but for a few seconds he was happily distracted.

Finally, after what seemed to be ages, he was done for the day. He left and went to meet Derek at the café where she worked. He felt a small bit of hope he quashed before he could get disappointed. And the whole way there, he convinced himself he was worried about the killer, not necessarily Bella specifically.

He walked in and Derek was there, looking at a menu. He went to the table and sat, and Derek looked up at him. He threw Spencer a cheesy grin. "Hey R—Spencer. Damn. Still not used to that."

Spencer spared him an eye roll before cutting to business. "Who's our waitress?"

His partner's answering grin was slow and sly. By the look of it, Spencer felt relief. "A really hot redhead," Derek answered. "Damn. Always so spicy, those ones."

Spencer felt something drop as a woman with a small pen and pad of paper asked them what they'd like, confirming just that. Before Derek could offer his most likely sexual answer, Spencer cut in, "Is Bella here?"

The girl gave him a flat, bored look. "That quiet girl with the brown hair? No. Didn't even call off." She made an annoyed clicking noise and shook her head, before repeating her original question.

Spencer gripped the table, waiting for Derek to order before saying, "Same."

She left, slightly disgruntled for…whatever reason. He didn't really care.

Derek gave him another evil grin. "So your dream girl ain't here, huh?"

Spencer sighed. "It's not that," he said, slightly impatient. "Didn't you even notice her? Pretty, brunette, petite—she's exactly the killer's type."

Derek paused. There was a change in his demeanor—it wasn't so funny anymore. "I see your point," he said at last. He paused again, leaning his chin on his clasped hands, thinking. "Let's just wait, 'kay? We don't wanna jump to conclusions."

Spencer found this advice to be very sensible, and didn't question, simply eating slowly. He didn't really taste anything, opting to go over the case and forget about Bella. She was probably sick or partied too much or something college-like.

When they finished, Derek took them back to the police station, as planned. They met up with the team there, and before they could start, JJ walked into the room.

"The public's still anxious about the leaked information, so I'm gonna be gone on a press conference spree. Yay," she said sarcastically. She grabbed her jacket, which was folded over the back of a chair, and walked out of the room.

"Speaking of the leak," Spencer began, "could it have been the killer who did it?"

"Usually they like to relieve the crime by being involved—either by providing information or making it more known to the public," Hotch chimed, looking at Gideon.

"Yes," Gideon responded. "But he also takes trophies…the fingers. They don't normally get involved and also take a prize. Either our guy's upping his game for more fun—or there's two."

"All the evidence at the crime scenes point to only one," Derek reported. "I mean—the scene of his latest kidnapping showed a serious struggle. But usually there is no struggle if there's more than one."

Gideon contemplated this. "This is true," he said. "So say he's just anxious for more of a thrill—a real adrenaline junky. If this is the case, then it's only a matter of time before he ups the ante more."

"And takes more of a risk," Spencer said.

"And takes too much of a risk," Gideon stated.

"Are you saying we just wait it out?" Garcia said from her seat. Spencer wondered briefly why she was here and not at the computer as she usually was, but she must have picked up on his inquisitive stare—as well as Derek's—and pointed to a sandwich. "Lunch break."

"No…" Gideon said slowly. "I'm saying…we try our best. But if worse comes to worst, he'll reveal himself eventually."

"Well, what do you think his next step might be?" Hotch asked, leaning forward in his chair.

"Maybe…a letter to friends or family, a public kidnapping, taking more than one victim…" Spencer trailed off at that thought, remembering his earlier worries about a girl he barely knew.

"He'll bite off more than he can chew eventually," he finished, weakly.

"So this guy's looking for a bigger thrill every time?" Derek asked.

"Exactly. So we can guess he's no older than his mid-forties, but no younger than his early thirties. If he was older, he'd most likely stick with one consistent method, while he couldn't possibly be as careful and calculating if he was younger," Gideon reasoned.

"He couldn't be very large or strong," Derek said. "These girls are all pretty small and fragile-looking; but he still has to struggle with them. So he's probably around 5'8", 5'9" or so. Thin like Reid." Spencer gave him a half-glare.

"So it has to be a professor…unless the school takes older students?" Hotch asked.

Gideon opened his mouth to answer, but they were interrupted by an extremely loud crunching noise. Their heads all turned to Garcia, who was rustling in a Sun Chips bag for another. She stopped and gave them a close-lipped smile, before swallowing. "Sorry," she said quietly.

"I don't think they do," Gideon continued.

"So we've narrowed it down to a skinny professor with obvious mental issues," a now focused Garcia said. "Great."

"Well…most likely. It may not even be a professor—just a man who lives near the campus," Hotch said.

Gideon steepled his fingers and pursed his lips. After a moment of silent contemplation, he stood from his chair. "Hotch, you and I are going to meet with Elle and tell the department about our findings. Don't mention the leak. Garcia, find out how many male professors fit our description. Derek, Spencer—find some professors and talk to them. I don't care how you do it, just do it. And don't blow cover," he looked to Derek as he said this, before leaving the room. Hotch followed.

##

Bella finally sat up, pain blooming up her back and neck from her lack of movement. Her stomach grumbled. But she didn't care about that—she just needed to do something.

She knew Phil was counting on her success. She knew Jacob was, too. If she didn't make it through college, they'd be more worried about her than they were currently. She couldn't deal with that attention on her—she just couldn't. And it would be her luck that what she missed this very day would be the one thing she'd need above all else.

So she forced herself out of bed. She forced herself to move. She forced herself to shower, to change, and to head to campus. Night had fallen and there was a small wind, as well as a light mist falling, but she didn't care. She needed to find her professors.

This day she'd had calculus, her foreign language, and her English class.

She rushed to her English classroom, but it was locked and the lights were off. She groaned, but had no choice but to leave. She headed to her foreign language.

Her instructor was a nice woman, who was just on her way out when Bella caught her. But she smiled and quickly reviewed the day, before leaving for her early appointment.

She finally made it to calculus. Her professor and his aide were sitting there, shuffling papers around and talking. She sighed, glad they were still there, and rushed into the room.

Both men looked at her, their conversation stopping. The aide froze, while her instructor smiled. She almost felt bad—the aide was known for being skittish and easy to frighten. Her sudden appearance probably did just that.

"What can I do for you, Ms. Swan?" her instructor asked. He got up to meet her. He was a small guy with big glasses. She shook his hand, and noticed he'd lost his wedding ring again. She wasn't sure why she noticed this fact—maybe because he shook everyone's hand before each and every class—but she did. Almost once a month it would be missing for a few days, then back again.

Bella shook her head. She was getting distracted. She glanced at the aide, who kept his head down as he shuffled his papers around listlessly, before looking back to her professor.

"I was wondering what we had done today?" she asked.

"Ah," he professor took her to the desk his aide was at, who visibly shrunk in his seat. "Dr. Kay here could tell you. He took over while I was gone all this morning."

The aide looked up at her slowly, as if it was painful to do so. Their eyes didn't meet.

"We reviewed your notes and I assigned a large report on the history of math and the impact it makes on today's society." It was an odd assignment, but she said her thanks and left. Her professor made sure to shake her hand again.

Shorter than I'd rather, but not terrible. I dropped in some plot stuffs. You know, like making gravy—gotta slowly and gradually add the flour to thicken. :D

I do adore reviews. I don't deserve them, but you're all nice people, right? And I love you readers who have yet to chop off my head! :D Even though you're most likely thinking about it. Man I'm a horrible author. D: