Who is the Victim Here
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 Three.
BAU Headquarters
Wednesday morning
Morgan asks, "Do you remember where you might have purchased the bed and accessories. If they are using the same items, it could help narrow down the suspects. If they bought at the same place, there might be a record of the purchase."
Angie reply is, "I don't think it would help, I designed it and had it built in place by a regular carpenter. I do have him still in my QuickBooks account. Where is my laptop?" She finds it and opens it to check out who she had as a carpenter when she built the bed and room and gives the information to Garcia. Who checked it out and gave the Morgan the information. Morgan and Prentiss head to New York to talk to the carpenters and builders of the room.
She looks at the screen again and still thinks that there is something funny about it but she can't seem to put her finger on it. JJ comes and stands beside her and asks, "What is the problem?"
"I don't know there is just something strange about now and what it looked like just a few hours ago."
"Well, it has been a few hours of more data, it probably looks dirtier than before because of all the things that the unsub did to him."
"Yeah, that could be it." She begins to turn away and then gets a good look at Hotch and finally realizes what is different. "Oh my god, this is a live feed."
JJ and the others look at her and then the screen and JJ asks, "How do you see that?"
As Angie points at the man's chin and say, "five days of beard growth." She looks at JJ sadly. "This is your Hotch right now."
The team that is there looks at the screen and sees a naked man on his hands and knees on the bed with his head down and looking pale and weak. It looks like he can barely stay still; he is wavering back and forth on his hands and knees. They see the man enter wearing a pair of jeans and t-shirt and leather hood and gloves. Rossi turns the sound back on and they hear the man say, "Well, little puppy are you ready to behave yourself and go back to your cage." The unsub pulls down the chain that is holding the man up and pulls the chain to force the man down on the floor on his hands and knees. He kicks him to force him to move toward the cage and Hotch refuses to move. "So you still won't go to your cage well, little puppy, you are going to learn to obey your master."
Very quietly another voice is heard, "You are not my master."
This enrages the unsub who throws a bucket of cold salt water on the man and then whips him until the man collapses into unconsciousness, the unsub pulls the unconscious man into the cage and locked the gate. He leaves the room.
In the round room, there are sobs, tears and feelings of anger and rage as they see what has just happened to their boss man. During this time a delivery man comes and is sent to the room. He is carrying what looks to be a box of flowers.
The delivery person says, "Is there an Angie Eskridge here?"
Angie responds, "Yes."
"These are for you ma'am."
She looks at the package in his hands and says, "You can take them back from where you got them." She turns away and leaves the room. Rossi looks at her with questions and accepts the box from the delivery person, who leaves. He opens the package and sees three dead flowers. He pushes the package away and the other team members gasp at the site as well. He walks out to find Angie.
When he does, he finds it difficult but asks, "Who would send dead flowers?"
She looks at him and says, "I don't know, but I've been receiving them during this week of the year for twenty years. For five days I would get three dead flowers, each day a different kind and then on the sixth day, I would get three dozen, all dead of my three favorite flowers; tulips, tiger lilies and roses. I don't know who sends them and I don't care; I just wish they would stop. I have done everything I can do to not receive them. I have gone on vacation; cruises, tours, any kind of package, but the flowers still came. I have disappeared without telling anybody and the flowers still came. I am here with you and the flowers still come. Yesterday, I didn't get flowers; I got a note and a DVD instead."
"Why didn't you ever tell me about this?" She looks at him incredulously.
"And what could you have done?"
"I could have found where they got the flowers from and maybe more but you never told me; so how could I do anything to stop it. Why didn't you trust me to help?"
"Thank you darling, but there wasn't anything you could do. You were busy with your own life and I wasn't going to burden with my sorrows. But I love you for at least telling me that you care to try." She smiles at him.
"Well, maybe this year will be the last."
"Ever the optimist."
"Steven and I used to say that about you. You could always bring a smile and hope to any situation."
"I am not that person anymore. I don't see hope. She left my life."
"Not true, she just got caught in a box that you need to open."
"I don't want to open that box."
"Angie, tell me what happened the year before your parents were killed. That is when this started. When I saw the spark of optimism and hope leave your eyes. You were the kindest, gentlest and most forgiving and loving person that I ever knew until that year and you did a complete personality change. You cared about everybody, including men." She looks at the man and can't believe that he could really be that dense about what could cause a woman to change. Did he really know so little about women? He's been three times; didn't he learn anything while he was married?
"Sometimes I do wonder about your intelligence dear boy."
Spencer who had walked up and only heard the last part of the conversation says, "He is a very intelligent man and if you knew him, you would know that."
"Ah, the voice of the young and impressionable Doctor Reid, a young man of extraordinary intelligence but not very much confidence beyond your knowledge. You need to expand your horizons beyond what you can learn from a book. Books are wonderful tools but they are cold comfort when the world is falling down around you."
"I know that, but I won't stop doing what I do. I like it."
"You know you are a very sweet young man and you need a sweet young woman to love you. I think I know someone who would be perfect. She is a lot like you; intelligent, shy, and sometimes a buttinsky. What do you want?"
"We think we can find Hotch through the live feed triangulation."
Rossi says, "Well let us see what you have." The day continues until latenight and the agents and Angie have been getting cat naps in where they can. Nobody wants to leave the place where they at least can see Hotch.
He is suffering at the hands of the unsub, once again he is hanging on the chains on the bed and has been recently beaten by the horsewhip, he is bleeding and looking more pale and wan than before. He has not eaten or drank anything since he got there because he won't suckle like an animal against that pink blanket on the wall. He is shivering on the bed because he won't go into the cage to get warm against that pink blanket on the wall, which is the only warm place in the room. But he still has his dignity and will not be broken into allowing the man to think that it acceptable for him to treat him as an animal. The unsub comes in with what looks like a giant size matchstick and puts it near the door. He grabs the chain and pulls the man off the bed. He says, "You stink, I think that the momma needs to clean her puppy," and another person comes in completely covered from head to toe in rubber. It appears to be a female. Aaron just stands there on his hands and knees and does not look up at her face. She takes the matchstick and puts it in a bucket of water and starts to stroke the man, after a few strokes, she would rewet the stick in the water and stroke him again. She washed him from head to butt and then pushed him down on his side and although he tried to keep himself curled up in a fetal position, she forced the stick and washed his chest, belly and lower extremities. He felt so violated and sore and very cold and weak. The unsub picked up his chain and pulled at the man, when the man didn't move, he was kicked and kicked again. The unsub cursed, "Shit, get up you fucking baby puppy and get in your cage, I don't want to kill you yet. It is not time yet for you to die. Get up and swallow your pride puppy. Think, what are more important, life or pride and dignity. Or don't you have anything to live for." This message got through to Hotch has he struggled to get up. He wondered did he have anything to live for and thought of Jack and said to himself, yes I have something to live for. I don't want Jack to grow up like Sean and lose his father when he is young. He forced himself to get up and crawl into the cage and turned around to get as close to the warmth that the wall had to offer. He saw the nipples that promised sustenance. He moved his head down and lay in the position to place his mouth on the nipple and began to suckle. He was shocked when he discovered it was delicious. (The woman with the unsub had put human infant formula in the bottle that the nipple is attached to.)
Our team watches this interaction on the plasma as it was being done. They saw the beating, the washing and determination of the man to live even at the expense of his pride.
Rossi curses, "Fuck, what are we doing to find this feed, where is coming from. Garcia?"
Garcia answers, "I have been trying sir and so far it has bounced off twenty-two satellites and towers, I keep going back and farther and hopefully we will get to it soon. I am trying sir."
Morgan and Prentiss came back from New York without much success, the carpenter and builders that they went to remembered building Angie's dungeon but have no records of orders to build a duplicate anywhere else. They saw the latest beating and humiliation of Hotch and like Rossi are angry and upset that they still don't where it is coming from.
