Undercover Family
I would love to hear your opinions and look to working further on the story.
I do not own or have connection with the "Criminal Minds" program or its characters.
Chapter 4.
After about 20 minutes, they arrive in Harvard, Illinois at the house they would be living in, on Marengo Road; it is near the corner at Ayer Street. They all get out and look up at the two story house with a large side yard. Momma gets Aaron and they all walk into the house. There is a wide front length of the house covered porch, looking to the left, they see a large toy box and lots of space to play, going right, momma takes them into a large porch with a number of seating spaces and there are wheeled vehicles ready to ridden by good children.
They enter the house through a door which leads them into a dining room and to the left is an arched door into the living room. There is a rocking chair and two love seats with two big comfortable chairs. A large plasma television is on the wall. Going forward to a large bedroom with a full size bed and a crib in the corner of the room, to the right is a door to a den with a wall of computer screens; Penelope falls in love with this room. Next to this door there is a door to a stairway going up. Going back to the dining room, they turn left and there is a door to a bathroom and then a door to the kitchen with a table to the right of the door and a sink with dishwasher to the left. The range is ahead of you and then a door with a refrigerator on the other side of the door. Through the door is a back porch which has a washer/dryer set and a large freezer. Through another door, you go to the very large backyard, which has a lot of running room, a swing set and a large sandbox. In the back of the lot is a two-door garage. Going back into the house, the family has seen the first floor, they go to the dining room and they all take a seat at the table. They bring the high chair in from the kitchen for Aaron to sit in.
Doctor: "Well, what do think of the downstairs of the house? The upstairs has three bedrooms, the boys will be in one, the little girls in the other and Penelope will have the small bedroom at the top of the stairwell. Aaron is downstairs in the main bedroom with me. I know that you really want to get started on the case, however I would ask that you hold off a little bit, because you need to get settled into your new roles and you are not going to learn much until you meet some of the people of the town, like your classmates, etc."
JJ: "Classmates?"
Doctor: "I thought you understood that those of you in school would be attending school. You, JJ, are in the sixth grade and would be attending the Jr. High School; David will also attend that school in the fifth grade. Derek is in the second grade at Central School and Emily will be in the Kindergarten at Washington School for half days, with Spencer attending half days at the pre-kindergarten at Washington. As we are currently at the end of the school year, with only about five weeks left in the school years, I hope that you will make friends and get to know people quickly. Be friendly and open to others. As you were told earlier, there are forty-two children missing. This town has approximately 9000 people in it, of which 60% are white non-hispanic, 38% are Hispanic and a trace of other races. It is a young town, about 25% of the people here are under the age of 18 and most of them are Hispanic. Of the missing children there are 29 non-hispanic and 13 hispanic children missing. As stated before they are between the ages of 4 and 12. All of them attended the public school system, although there is one private school in town, a catholic k-8th grade parochial school. So far there have no children missing from that school. The public school system of k-8th grade is split into four schools; Washington School which has pre-kindergarten and kindergarten classes, Jefferson School which has 1st grade, 3rd grade and 4th grade classes, Central School which has the 2nd grade classes and the Jr. High School which has 5th through 8th grade classes. Penelope will be attending the McHenry County College in Crystal Lake, just a few train stops, so she will be living at home. Since she so proficient at computer science technology, I have signed her up for a different subject matter, I just you do well. During the first few weeks, I hope that you can get to know the children and become accustomed to your roles in the schools and from that we can then find out who might be a next target or how the unsub is targeting them. Aaron and I will also be busy getting to know the parents of the missing children and see how they have been chosen. I hope this is good for you." She gets up and goes to the kitchen because as she was looking at her agents intently listening to her, she saw hunger pangs begin to form. She begins to cook tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches for her hungry brood.
Hotch: "Well, I think that settles a lot of questions we may have had and I agree that momma and I would be best as getting to know the parents. With momma talking with them, I would be able to look around and be able to profile the families and how they are similar. See if we can't find something in common among them. There is one other thing that we need to remember, you have placed yourselves in danger of being taken. I know that is the purpose for this operation, but keep vigilant, we don't want anyone injured in the process, either an agent or another innocent child."
Rossi: "Do we have knowledge of where the abductions took place and when?"
JJ: "Yes we do and the information would be in the files that we were given and should be in one of the bags somewhere." She got up and went to search through the bags to find the files. After a few minutes of searching, she finds the missing files and hands one to each of the team.
Rossi: "Ah, I see, they were in very different locations around the town: library, swimming pool, parks, ice cream parlor, school yards, and street corners. How do they know where they were exactly?"
Reid: "It doesn't look like they do; these are just the locations where the child was last seen." His stomach rumbles, the others look up and he says "Sorry. But I am hungry."
Prentiss: "I could use something to eat too."
Momma: "Well then, let's put away the files and have some lunch. JJ could you please get the some plates and spoons and Derek some bowls. David would you get some glasses for everyone and Penelope would you get out the milk." Momma was bringing in a soup tureen of tomato soup and then went and got a plate of grilled cheese sandwiches, cut into triangles. She also grabbed a pile of napkins. After the others brought the dishes and utensils, she began to fill the bowls for each of her children. Penelope poured a glass of milk for everyone and then sat down and grabbed a sandwich. She did not treat Aaron any differently than the others at this time, because they are at home and not in public. He is grateful for her consideration of this. He was worried about it because of the way she treated him at the restaurant, but that was in public and the rest of world did see him as a baby, not a man who can actually feed himself just fine. (We hope) Of course, he is still in a high chair but he feels he can live with that.
After lunch, momma begins to clear the table, JJ decides to help her and they clear the table in record time. While they begin to do the dishes, voices start to get raised from the other room. It seems that Derek and Spencer are arguing about something they both read in the files, Spencer was talking about the statistics about whether the children were abducted where they were last seen vs. another location more likely, while Derek was stating about whether the statistics were really necessary at this moment when you have this many missing people in such a localized area. There are just so many places that a child can go in this small of a town, especially since there is very likely a chance that someone will see them. As the voices get louder and more seem to get involved in this argument of statistics and whether there would be anyone seeing them. If not, why not. When it seems that there are chairs' moving back and possible violence among these agents, momma decides to check on her 'children'.
Entering the room, she sees Derek and Spencer about to come to blows, which is unusual, because Derek would never really hurt Spencer. He is a great defender of the young man. It seems that Spencer is the one who wants to hit him. Hotch is trying to get these two agents under control, but is still caught in his chair, David is just standing by watching, but ready to step in between the agents if necessary. Momma goes to a bell that is on the wall and rings it, everybody stops yelling at each other and look at her. She just stands there and looks at these grown men about ready to hit each other, they begin to feel like two small children standing in the middle of a pillow fight that momma just interrupted. (The truth is not so different.)
Momma: "Spencer, go to the bedroom. David put the files away and then you need to find something to do. Penelope, take Aaron to the bedroom. Derek, go to the porch and find something to do out there. Emily, go to the bedroom." She goes back to the kitchen. "JJ, would you please finish the dishes and then find something quiet to do out on the front porch."
JJ: "Sure, is there something wrong?"
Momma: "No, just tired children getting cranky."
Momma heads to the bedroom and looks at her three littlest children. She takes Aaron from Penelope and puts him the crib. She walks over to Spencer and picks him up and places him on the bed. She then places Emily next to him. Penelope leaves the room and goes to the computer room next door.
She then explains that the devices do not just make you appear to be the illusion of what is programmed, but do encourage mental changes that encourage the person under the illusion to behave more like what they are programmed. In this case, each of you is very young, which means you can get a little cranky when you don't get enough sleep. That is why, afternoon naps are requirements and that is what you are going to do now.
Hotch: "I don't think that I need a nap, I want to read the files some more." Momma ignores what he is saying and picks him to change him; he fights her because he is cranky and tired, yet does not want to give in to that childish feeling. But the more he fights, the more tired he becomes and when she has finished changing his diaper and places him back in the crib. He is so tired that all he does do is put his thumb in his mouth and falls instantly asleep. While Aaron is giving her this entire problem, the other two had already fallen asleep on the bed. Momma closes the door and leaves the little ones to sleep.