Once again I would like to thank my reviewers, especially Clonksholic, who aside from giving a well-rounded review, had kind words of support concerning real life. In your honor I tried to make this chapter longer, but didn't quite succeed--it depends on the mood, I guess. Maybe next time. The earth keeps shaking beneath my feet and it's distracting... to say the least.
A few things I forgot to mention last time...
Timeline: Sometime during season 4. Spoilers up to that point anyway, mostly because I'm only a few episodes into season 5, and because I can't really write around the whole Hotch/Foyet ordeal--it's too big, it would claim the story for its own. So in my universe, it hasn't happened yet.
Pairings: I can't promise anything yet, but probably no pairings. I'll do my best to stay in character.
Disclaimers: I don't own Criminal Minds (obviously). Also... there's no such town as South Creedon as far as I know, and though I'm pretty sure US residents know what area I'm referring to, I'm hoping to keep this vague enough so no one feels insulted by it. I'm not in any way implying ALL small country towns are bigoted and redneck-ish. That's just an artistic license I'm taking for THIS particular place and this particular story. Because it's fun, and it gives me a chance to explore gender issues in the workplace.
That being said, on with the show.
3.
"What beckons thee, my pretties?" crooned Penelope, from the depths of her cozy, fuzzy, overdecked work environment.
But her good mood dissipated almost at once. JJ's face was visible for the merest second before she turned away, just enough to see the Duck Stance was on—full blown. Something had to be wrong. "Out with it, JJ:"
She wasn't completely terrified yet. Thankfully the Duck Stance signaled only minor inconveniences. It wasn't something that sprang up under catastrophic circumstances—like someone getting injured, kidnapped, or—God forbid—killed. JJ's catastrophe face was direly different, and didn't resemble a duck at all. It was frantic and haunted and driven all at the same time. So chances were, whatever the problem was, it wasn't of the life-threatening kind.
Didn't mean she shouldn't address it, though.
"JJ…"
She held up a finger—no, not that finger—she was on the phone. Reid, hovering in the background, instantly took over the conversation, spouting out coordinates and asking for criminal records on the townspeople, satellite pictures of the crime scenes and so forth and so on. His soliloquy eventually became so long-winded and hyper she could hardly keep up with it, and was more than relieved when JJ finally hung up and turned back to the screen, Duck Stance still firmly in place.
"Spit it out, Jayje," she lovingly commanded.
"Morgan found another body." Penelope knew JJ always took it hard when there were more victims than initially anticipated, but this level of dejection was excessive even for her. It reminded her more of when she'd found out she was pregnant with Henry—like the dilemma, whatever it was, was personal.
"Older or newer?"
"Older—skeletal remains." Insert sigh. "Garcia, we're gonna have to call in FBI forensic experts. Local police don't have CSU."
So that was it?
"I know—not too computer savvy either. I hardly got anything on the people living there, except for criminal records, driver's licenses, birth certificates and a whole bunch of nothing stuff like that. Bet the police files are all ratty brown construction paper folders."
"You guess right," JJ ironized, and Penelope was soothed. If her girl was chipper enough to be sarcastic, whatever was going on couldn't be that bad.
Still… there was definitely something. "What else? Hit me."
"I need you to put a BOLO out on a car. Dave and Emily got carjacked."
"What?" Blood rushed to Penelope's chest, making it momentarily hard to breathe—her voice rose an octave. "Are they okay?"
"They're fine. Morgan's picking them up now. But there were three kids in that car—two girls and a boy. So now we've got a serial killer and a kidnapping."
She sounded so worn out, poor baby. Of course it had to be draining, having no leads and now a new crime on their hands, with the prospect of a furious Hotch in the near future, when probably all she had longed for when she left that morning, was to get home in time to give baby Henry his bottle and tuck him in.
If there were time, she would have coerced JJ into spilling her guts and maybe even indulging in a good refreshing cry on her virtual shoulder. But there was no time. Two of their teammates were stranded, a car had been stolen, and three tiny innocents were missing.
"Consider it done, chèrie. Garcia out."
Rossi finally relented to setting Matt Culver down by the side of the road. His arms were sore from the effort of keeping him upright. It was one thing to walk a drunken man a couple of yards to a car, and quite another to prop him up indefinitely while you waited for someone else to come get you. Culver looked so harmless sitting there, head bowed, that he felt tempted to join him. But he wasn't about to let his guard down. They'd already been duped once. There was no way he was letting it occur again. Stranger things had happened.
Stranger things have happened. Like the car vanishing from under their very noses, without them hearing or seeing a thing.
Emily had run on ahead, following the tire tracks to see if she could make sense of it. They'd discovered a set of footprints—adult size, work boots, probably male—leading up to the car from the fields beyond. So obviously the children hadn't abducted themselves. The keys were still in his pocket too, which meant the person who had taken the car either had keys of his own—not likely, considering it was a rental, and from the next town—or had managed to short circuit the ignition in record time.
He was mostly afraid for the kids. Though his gut told him he shouldn't be—that this little stunt was probably more of a diversion than an actual kidnapping. The joyrider was male, presumably a neighbor—who'd seen what was going down, decided his buddy was in trouble and felt it his duty to sabotage the feds. He'd probably dump the car somewhere nearby, and the kids would turn up fed, bathed, and clothed at some concerned citizen's house.
It was a plausible scenario. But no matter what his gut surmised, they were forced to run this like any other kidnapping—giving it top priority, even over the murders. Which was probably what the carjacker wanted, whether he realized it or not. The murder victims were already dead—nothing would bring them back to life. But the kids were alive and had to be returned safely. They were all familiar with the statistics—75% of abducted children were killed within the first three hours. As the three tear-streaked, wretched little faces crossed his mind—reminding his of another case long past—he knew he couldn't bear to have anything happen to them.
"Anyone around here know how to bypass ignition?" he asked, mostly for conversational purposes. He doubted Culver would be sober enough to give a sensible response.
Culver snorted. "Who don't? Ain't hardly any of us got keys around here."
Maybe he wasn't so plastered after all.
"Who are your neighbors, Mr. Culver?"
He was tight-lipped about it at first, but a gentle prod from Rossi's foot got him going. "Bob Lawton down yonder, 'bout half-mile," he mumbled. "Cletus Tate 'bout three miles thataway."
The rumble of an engine in the distance put an end to their tête-à-tête. Rossi hauled an unwilling Culver to his feet just as Emily hobbled into view, flushed and covered in dust. "Find anything?"
"Tell you in the car," she wheezed.
Reid was ecstatic to finally be at an actual crime scene. For some reason, Hotch had insisted on keeping him indoors lately, working on victimology, geographical profiles and other deskbound occupations. Deep down he knew it was a good call—he kept more facts stored away in his brain than most encyclopedias, and could probably find links and build a sketch of the victim faster than anyone. But it did make him feel a bit like a fraud. What was the use of being a full-fledged, firearm-certified agent if he was never in the field? Not that he was particularly fond of raids and stakeouts and shootings—but it was welcome change to step out of Headquarters every once in a while.
And now, just as he'd resigned himself to an afternoon of map-coloring while JJ patiently babysat him, Hotch stopped by and demanded his presence at a crime scene.
His mind swam with ideas. There was no real reason to believe this new body of Morgan's had anything to do with the other homicides. That was mere speculation. They'd have to wait for the coroner to go over it, of course—but aside from being physically near the other dump site, there might be no other similarities.
His opinion began to change the minute the corpse was exposed.
It seemed older, true—stripped of nearly all soft tissue. He knew, however, a cadaver exposed to forensic fauna and the elements could be reduced to skeletal remains in less than a week. And the other women, Megan Sarkoff, Callie Tanner, and Elizabeth Culver, had been murdered a month apart. This could very well be another victim.
And it was female. The long, sandy-colored strands on her skull gave her away—along with what was left of her clothes and the rounded pelvic bone. The medical examiner confirmed it.
Sheriff Sheridan looked decidedly shaken as he gazed down at the makeshift grave—almost as if it made him physically ill. For once there wasn't a trace of defiance in his demeanor.
"We can't be one hundred percent sure she belongs to the same UnSub," burst Reid, anxious to help. "She has similar physical characteristics to the other three, but age and time of death have still to be verified, and that could change everything. Besides, there are no obvious signs of violence and she was buried, not dumped, which constitutes a significant change of MO. It's similar to a 2003 case in Texas, where the whole investigative force was led astray by a corpse found within the UnSub's comfort zone, but actually turned out to be the work of another—"
"You don't understand," Sheridan broke in. "We ain't got anymore missin' persons. I know everyone in this whole damn town. This lady—I got no idea who she could be."