David Rossi stared at the young man sitting in the bed; he nearly yelped aloud when he saw Spencer Reid's eyes constrict with fear at his name, but only after he'd been relieved to not have been someone else. He wondered what on earth the boy was so frightened of, and how he had known who he was.

"Please, please don't tell them." He looked at the pleading eyes of the young man. Innocent and large, Rossi swallowed hard, he had seen that look several times before in his career. The kid was begging, for his life. "Did you kill your parents?" he asked, he leant forward and stared Spencer in the eye.

Just then Spencer could see a nurse heading his way to check on him. He began the catatonic movements once more as he entered the room. David watched critically but remained silent. Before approaching the nurse made sure the straps on Spencer's hands and feet were secured. "Hello Spencer." The nurse's voice was calm, not forced. "You've done one hell of a number on yourself haven't you? I'm going to check your stats and that's all, alright?" Spencer kept up the charade and said nothing while he continued his movements. The nurse checked everything and nodded to himself. "Everything seems to be going back to normal. I'll leave you alone now with your visitor, alright Spencer?" Again Spencer said nothing and continued the calculated swaying.

When the nurse left again, David relaxed and decided to engage Spencer once more. "Do you not get tired or bored doing that?"

"No. I switch off my brain."

"Not really the small talking type, are you?"

"No."

"Good, that makes two of us. I'll ask you the same thing I asked you before our little interruption. Did you kill your parents?" Rossi looked at the younger man intently.

"No."

"You're going to have to give me more than that kid."

"No, I did not kill my parents." David thought he was just being a smartass. But then he noted Spencer's voice was quivering, he thought for a mere moment it was out of anger, but as he looked at the diverted eyes of the younger man, he realised in was pain and sadness. His features seemed so truthful, but he had spent the last eight years acting, convincingly enough to fool highly trained psychiatrists and psychologists, was he fooling him too?

"I'm sorry Kid. I just need to know this so to see if I can help you. I won't say anything, for now. I believe it to be in the best interests of your personal safety to keep this between you and me. However, if circumstances change, so will the knowledge of your stellar acting techniques, do I make myself clear?"

Spencer nodded. "Yes sir." He agreed submissively.

David shook his head, how could someone so timid be accused of such horrific murders. He saw the crime scene photos. No one this meek and timid could have been so brutal, could they? Then he thought of the nurse. "Reid?" the young man looked to him, his face scrunched slightly as he heard his surname being used to call him. "Why did you attack that nurse?"

"I had to. I needed to defend myself. I didn't want to, honest." He kept staring at the radiator on the far wall. His voice quiet.

"From him?" Spencer nodded. "Why?" Spencer became silent. "I can't help you son if you won't give me answers." Spencer remained in his muted state.

David was beginning to lose his patience. "Look kid, if you don't give me something, I can't help you." And with that he stormed out of the room. He could feel the fearful eyes of the younger man watching him as he walked down the hallway and then out of sight.

He took out his phone and pressed the speed dial for Hotch. "Dave. How are things there?"

"Something odd is going on with this kid Aaron." He proceeded to tell Hotch everything that had happened since the last phone call. Hotch paused him half way through and called Morgan to his office to hear the conversation.

"Why would he allow them think he killed his parents if he didn't?" Hotch wondered aloud.

"Come on Hotch, you don't actually think the kid is innocent do you?" Morgan asked disbelievingly.

"Do you doubt Dave's ability?" Hotch responded. Morgan fell silent.

"What do you think would cause him to say nothing and act the way he is?" Hotch asked no one in particular.

"It was here or prison and trust me when I say, this kid wouldn't last ten minutes on the inside. Especially in gen pop. But I have to say, this kid is petrified, I just want to know of what." Dave added.

"Maybe it's not of what but of who. And prisons are known for their gangs. What if it's part of the reason? Wasn't his father a lawyer? We should get Garcia to see who he used represent. What if he knew he was in danger on the inside so he thought to imitate his mother's illness instead? Knowing he would be put in a mental health facility." Morgan hypothesised.

"He acted as though he had PTSD until he hit his twenties, because when schizophrenic breaks tend to occur and no one would question it as his mother had it." Hotch added. "Dave, is he that smart?"

"He's been smart enough to keep at least three teams of psychologists and psychiatrists off his scent, and he is naturally socially awkward, adding to the effect, so I can't see how he wouldn't be able to do that." Dave acknowledged.

"So what do we do now?" Asked Morgan.

"Dave, can you get him brought here?" Hotch looked at the phone.

"He's almost back to full health, I can see if his doctor will sign off on it why?"

"I want to talk to him, away from the hospital, see if it is really as great an act as we think it is." Hotch stated.

"You got it, I'll keep you posted." Dave hung up the phone and left the small room he had entered to make his confidential call. He walked up to the nurses' station and they directed him in the right direction to Dr. Mitre's ward office.

He looked around at the different rooms, all containing people of different severities of mental incapacity and shuddered as he thought of how bad things must be for the scared kid that was more willing to be surrounded with all of these people for the rest of his life than try and deal with whatever he was hiding.

He walked through the ward and went to the doctor's office where he had met Dr. Mitre earlier in the day. As he came to the door he heard the man's voice from the small office. "I know, but the agent seems to have the opposite effect on him he was in a catatonic state there a minute ago, yes, yes I know. Alright, I will do what I have to." David's gut twisted as he heard the terror in the doctor's voice.

"This isn't good" was all that went through the agents mind.