Disclaimer: Criminal Minds and all its associated characters are property to CBS and no profit is being made from this story.

Chapter Eighteen: The Terror of Madness

'To think that the spectre you see is an illusion does not rob him of his terrors:it simply adds the further terror of madness itself - and then on top of that the horrible surmise that those whom the rest call mad have, all along, been the only people who see the world as it really is.' –C.S. Lewis

Hotch and JJ watched as Morgan and the others prepared to break down the door furthest down before doing the same with their door, Hotch running into it and slamming all his weight against it. The hinges cracked and after a creaking second, the door slid open, and Hotch and JJ jumped into the room with their guns raised. But when they saw that it was empty with only furniture occupying the space, they slowly let their arms rest by their sides, a strong grip still on the handle of their weapons.

"Is this..." JJ tried to say as she looked around the room with glistening eyes. Her lower lip trembled and her face was pulled into a look of pity and disgust. "Is this where they kept them?" she finally asked, turning to Hotch who had walked over to the bed, restraints swaying. The metal cuffs clinked gently against the metal railing, dried, copper looking blood staining the inside. The mattress of the bed was thin and pressed down, a sizable indent in the center. He swallowed when he saw the amount of dried blood on the sheets and pillow case- some darker than others as though they had occurred more recently. Yellowing stains from perspiration sat on the pillow case as well, the pillow flattened from what appeared to be near constant use.

Anger welled up in him. What had Reid lived through in the last week? Would he ever be the same? The guilt that had been following him ever since Reid's initial disappearance rocked through him and he nearly fell back with the intensity. How could he have been so careless? How could he have let this happen?

"Hotch, someone's in there," JJ whispered as she pointed towards a door on the wall opposite the bed. The door was cracked open very slightly and a thin sliver of white light fell through. A voice, hushed and hurried with fear, was coming from behind the door in panicked whispers and Hotch stepped closer, trying to hear the words being said.

"Please just go away," the voice begged and his ears perked up. That voice...

He never heard it sound so broken, so hopeless. But there was not a doubt in his mind: Reid was right behind that door.

As the same realization came over him, it dawned on JJ as well, who made to rush forward and through the door but was stopped by a hand on her arm. She looked up at her boss, questioning his actions with her eyes until he said, "Someone's in there with him. We can't just barge in."

After a second of internal battling, she nodded, just as Reid spoke again.

"Nononono," he whispered and she clutched her gun even tighter.

"We need to get to him now, Hotch," she said tersely and he nodded, raising his gun as she did the same.

"Kick the door. I'll try to get an aim on whoever else is in there and stop them so you can get Reid. Got that?" he ordered and she nodded. "Count of three. One..."

Whimpering could be heard now, but he blinked it away. Protocol. Training. He called on all of it to keep his head clear.

"Two."

Heightened whimpering, hitched breathing. He was in pain.

"Three!"

JJ pushed the door open and Hotch jumped in, his gun clattering to the floor as his eyes widened at the sight before him. Reid sat in the center of a bathroom, his hand raised over his eyes with the fingers splayed so he could alternate between seeing and not seeing. His left knee was drawn loosely into his chest while his right leg was stretched out in front of him, wearing a plaster cast that added an extra inch to his lean appendage. But it was not so much the broken position that Reid sat in that had startled the man so much so as to drop his means of defense. It was the way he looked- the way he had changed.

His bones were visible, certain joints pointing out sharply as the white skin pulled over them- skin that was too pale and tinged with an unhealthy sheen of yellow. His curls were laden with grease and dried blood and his bony fingers- bonier than ever- shook in front of his face as he noticed three missing fingernails. But the injuries didn't stop with the missing fingernails or the broken leg. He was covered in ominous looking bandages, blood seeping through. The sole of his feet were scabbed over, the skin rising and wrinkling with healing burns. His shin was stitched, his thighs were covered and bleeding, his wrists were bandaged from the cuffs and his exposed arms were littered in fading scratch marks- though Hotch suspected that that was more Reid's doing than anything else.

As Hotch made to move forward, Reid's hands fell and he looked up, the emptiness in his eyes causing a double take. Once vibrant hazel eyes, green with flecks of amber, were now dead, a dull light brown color. The look in the eyes was so feral- fear, like an animal trapped in a corner- and misted over as though Reid were reflecting on something, something that haunted him. Beneath his eyes were purple swollen bags that puffed out, making his thin face look disturbingly skinny, cheekbones and chin protruding out as the cheeks themselves seemed to cave inward.

He looked so defeated.

"Reid," he breathed, aware of how out of character he sounded but not truly caring. He had let him down. He had let him be broken. He had finally found him, only to have arrived too late.

Reid's eyes widened and his mouth opened in a wide 'O' as he let loose a horrifyingly high scream, his throat too sore to maintain a pitch as it dropped and rose several octaves. But the scream wasn't in response to Hotch- he didn't even seemed to have noticed him. It seemed more like Reid was screaming at something else. Something only he could see.

He looked up to the ceiling, shaking as tears shined down his cheeks. And then he blinked, startled by something as his face scrunched up and he screamed again, more desperate and pain filled than the last. And as though the scream alerted JJ to the world around her, she jumped and looked around her briefly, her eyes finally settling on Reid.

"Spencer!" she shouted as she moved forward, and he fell back, turning with wide eyes to JJ. For just a moment, familiarity flickered into his dead eyes, but soon vanished as it was replaced with fear, anger and contempt. But she didn't seem to notice. She simply fell to her knees, smiling sadly at him as her cheeks, red and blotchy, glistened.

"Go away," Reid said sharply, turning away from JJ even as she reached out to him, her blue eyes filled with tears and shining with relief. But at his words her face fell and she felt a fresh round of tears sting her eyes as she looked up at Hotch and then back to Reid, trying to reach out once more. He shuffled away from her, folding his arms stubbornly across his chest. Did he really mean that? Was he mad at her? Mad at them, for not coming sooner?

No, that couldn't be it. Reid didn't hold grudges, and he especially wasn't so callous and spiteful. Biting her lip and stifling her tears, she leaned forward tried again, lowering her voice as she spoke.

"Spence, it's me-" she started, but he jumped up, standing suddenly- though wobbly- he balled his fists at his side as he growled ferociously, tears falling down his pale cheeks.

"Leave me alone!" His face struck a pained expression, and just as quickly as he stood, he dropped down to his bottom, curling his knees tight against his chest. He grabbed locks of hair tightly as he said in a voice broken by tears, "You're not real."

"But Spence-" she began, desperate for him to take back his words. To forgive her. To be Reid again. But Hotch silenced her, her name calmly spoken and echoing off of the tiled walls.

"JJ," he said, his eyes planted on Reid with an indiscernible expression swimming through their brown depths. He looked unfazed, cooled and professional as he always did. It sickened her, that he could look at their friend in the state he was in and not even bat an eye. But before she could even think of the proper words to say to him, he looked at her, the light hitting his eyes in just the right way to highlight the thin layer of tears that sat on his lower lid, unshed. Her mouth fell and she gaped openly, her words stuck in her throat. He was crying?

She couldn't question it any longer as Hotch looked back to Reid, displacing the light and making it seem as though the tears had simply been sucked back in and he remained impassive. His voice was only barely above a whisper as he said, "Leave him alone."

Her words came to back to her, tears be damned! She jumped up, shooting him a deathly glare as she said, "Leave him alone? You want me to leave him alone? Haven't we left him alone enough? How can you be so heartless as to just stand there is beyond me and now you want me to sit back and twiddle my thumbs as Reid sits by himself, in pain and hating us? I'm not like you, Hotch. I actually have emotions and I actually care about him enough to not give into his trauma-induced demands!" Her voice rang with the finality around her words, the sounds and syllables echoing harshly off the sea foam green porcelain.

Hotch looked only mildly taken aback, his brows raised a quarter inch higher and his gaze turned once more to JJ, his lips parted just enough for them to be divided by a barely there black line. He stared at her for a minute, his features returning to their usual stoic place before he looked back at Reid, who sat with his back turned to them as he rocked himself gently in the fetal position. His fingers were clasped so tightly in his hair he looked about ready to pass out and his mouth was moving in quick intervals as he muttered over and over again.

"Not real. Just a delusion. Not real. Need to be sane. Not real. Just a delusion. Not real. Need to be sane..."

JJ followed her gaze, her heart breaking again as her eyes softened. Ignoring Hotch's demans, she made to move forward once more, stopping when she heard his words. The words that made her fall to the ground with tears and bury her face in her arms. The words that voiced the one fear she had that had been swimming around her mind for the past week.

"He's gone, JJ."

xXx

Morgan never felt as much satisfaction from cuffing a criminal as he did when he pushed Varney up against the wall and pulled his wrists together. He had vaguely been aware of a pop that came from his shoulder and a gasp of pain that escaped the officer's lips, but he hadn't cared. He only cared about digging his knee into the back of Varney's injured one, shoving it into the wall as he clasped the handcuffs shut.

Once finished, he leaned in close, whispering into Varney's ear so that only he could hear he said, "You're lucky I want to be there for Reid. Otherwise I'd have no problem going to prison for you."

Varney snorted, wincing at the pain the action caused as it shook his body. "I don't see what's so special about the little brat," he wheezed out. "He's only good for a fuck or two but anymore and he stops fighting."

Morgan's eyes narrowed as fresh peels of rage spiked his adrenaline. He wasn't even aware of what he was doing when he tossed Varney down to the ground, straddling his waist as he threw punch after punch, bruising his face. Varney grunted and gasped with each blow, struggling as he tried to knock the man off of him. But despite having a wounded shoulder, Morgan's punches were fierce and unrelenting, his voice loud and dripping with toxicity as he spoke.

"You bastard! You don't even deserve to live!" he roared.

He didn't stop punching until Rossi grabbed him and threw him to the floor, knocking the breath out of him. He looked up at the older agent, dark brown eyes cold and dangerous as he shot Morgan a harsh look. Morgan returned the look though, his lips pursing as he slowly rose to a sitting position. He watched as Rossi bent down and grabbed Varney, picking him up carelessly as he walked over to the man. Morgan's body still receiving a rush of adrenaline and anger, he shook as Rossi said in a low, warning tone, "Don't pull that shit again."

He then turned to Emily, who had approached Andrew and was in the process of cuffing him when he said, "Back-up should be here. Let's get these two to a cell and then help Hotch and JJ." She nodded, and as she pulled out the silver cuffs that she kept on her hip, another scream rang out, startling her. She dropped the mechanism, the clang of it hitting the floor intermingling with Reid's hair-raising yell.

And all hell broke loose.

Morgan growled as he pushed Rossi to the side, clearing the hall as he ran into the first room. He needed to get to Reid...

Rossi fell with a grunt to the wall as his grip on Varney gave way.

Varney took the opportunity and shoved Rossi even further down with his shoulder before chasing after Morgan, wincing every time his injured leg pushed off from the floor.

Emily looked out to the commotion that filled the corridor and her hold on Andrew slackened.

Andrew, feeling the release of pressure, pushed his weight backwards and knocked her into a a metal shelf of beeping medical equipment and sharp, glinting instruments.

She gasped in pain, her back landing with a crack on the items as she fell into it, her head thwacking against a sharp, metal edge. Her eyes widened for a second before they fell to a close, slumping back as she fell into unconsciousness, blood spilling down her scalp.

Andrew reached to his waist and pulled out a revolver, examining it for a second before turning to look out in the hall. Rossi was pulling himself up, cursing as he watched Varney chase after Morgan. Andrew didn't even spare Rossi a lingering glance before raising the weapon and shooting it.

Rossi gasped, his eyes widening as he fell to the floor, clutching his abdomen where blood bloomed outward, staining his white shirt and slipping through his fingers. He looked up to his assailant, shock written all over his face when he saw Emily lying unconscious and Andrew standing over her, taking her gun and snapping it around his waist as he held onto the revolver. When had that happened? When was she knocked unconscious? When did Andrew pull out a gun? Everything moved too fast!

Andrew stood and sprinted out the room, pausing to look at Rossi for a second, regarding him slowly before saying in a deep and low voice, "Spencer Reid is mine." He rose his gun high above his head and then swung it down, knocking the second agent unconscious as blood continued to pool around him, his fingers coated in the substance from where they pressed into his stomach.

xXx

Hotch watched the scene for several long drawn out seconds before finally pulling away, listening to the earpiece as a local officer said that the back up had arrived at the house and were swarming the property, three ambulances and ten paramedics ready. But paramedics wouldn't be able to help Reid. His injuries were as taken care of as they could be- even Hotch knew that. They would only look at him, exchange glances about how bad the situation was, load him up in an ambulance and bring him to a hospital. At the hospital, he would be given a psychological evaluation. And from what he had seen since arriving, the results would not be good.

He looked back over at JJ, the initial shock of his words wearing off as she now sat with her arms wrapped around her knees, hugging them. She watched Reid continue to chant his phrase over and over, tears in her eyes.

"Not real. Just a delusion. Not real. Need to be sane. Not real. Just a delusion. Not real. Need to be sane..."

His eyes flickered over to Reid, following her gaze, but only for a moment as he found himself looking away. It hurt too much to see him like that. To know that it was his fault that he was like that. He couldn't stop himself from comparing the Spencer Reid he knew to the shell of Spencer Reid sitting in front of him. Seeing the two side by side in his mind created a wrenching motion in his chest. While Reid never was extraordinarily healthy looking- too pale and too skinny- this Reid made his former self seem like the picture of wellness.

He was torn from his thoughts when he heard people barreling down the hall and crashing into the room. Returning smoothly into his FBI persona, he grabbed his gun and pulled it back to the proper level, JJ doing the same.

"Stay with Reid," he said to her as he left the bathroom, walking into the room just in time to see Morgan fall to the floor, a handcuffed and bloody Varney, having thrown himself at the man, colliding into his back. The two grappled on the floor, a flying pile of limbs and profanity. Blood- from which man, Hotch was not sure- crept onto the tiles surrounding them and his eyes widened. So much blood. Too much.

Shooting the wrestling men a scrutinizing look, he saw that both were injured.

Both were bleeding.

Both were pale.

Both were lethargic.

Both were losing too much blood, too fast.

He needed to get them to stop fighting, needed them to stop speeding up their blood flow. Thinking and aiming as fast as he could, he pulled the trigger.

Whether by the work of karma, poetic justice, or just a well-timed shot, Varney, straddling Morgan as he worked his fingers around the man's neck, jumped at the sound of the gun and moved himself into a position to avoid the bullet. But as he rolled off the man, trying to open the agent up to the attack, the bullet that would've shot the back of his thigh instead embedded itself deep into his groin.

His eyes widened so much so that they seemed to jump out of his sockets as he hollered in agony, clutching to his profusely bleeding crotch as he rolled to his side, tears flowing fast and freely. While Hotch's knees involuntarily buckled as he watched the man writhe in excruciation, he couldn't help but feel an extreme sense of satisfaction. He had been hesitant about shooting in the first place, for fear that he would hit Morgan, but felt his opening was clear enough. And by God, was he happy he took it.

Morgan leapt from the floor, gasping as his airways opened up once more, giving Hotch a wavering smile.

"There is...no way...that could have...worked...out better," he panted, nodding with his head to Varney.

Hotch furrowed his eyebrows. "Where are the others? And Wright?" he asked.

"Unconscious," Andrew said, standing in the doorway as he held his revolver up, shrugging his shoulders as he added, "The one- the one with the beard- said something about back up coming, so hopefully they'll get them to paramedics on time."

Hotch, while initially startled by his sudden appearance in the room, stared at him, his brow furrowed. He...cared about their well-being? Why? He had no reservations with torturing and murdering people, but the idea of killing a police officer saddened him? This UnSub was truly like one they've never seen before. He was almost compassionate. Almost.

The fact that Reid sat in the bathroom, beaten and having lapsed into a stress induced psychotic episode expelled any compassion this man could honestly hold.

"There's nothing you can do for Spencer now. He's gone too far. You might as well let me keep him. He's mine now," Andrew reasoned and Morgan snorted in response.

"Like hell we will," he said.

Andrew opened his mouth to respond, but stopped as his eyes caught hold of Varney, groaning as he continued to hold his bleeding groin. He snorted out a chuckle as he said, "Serves him right, harming my patients."

Morgan's eyes widened as he turned to Hotch, confusion dominating both their faces. What was going on between these two UnSubs?

But at the moment, they heard JJ shout and all three men looked, turning to see Reid grab her shoulders and shove her down. Unsuspecting of the sudden assault, she fell backwards, landing hard on the ground with a groan as Reid ran past her on unsteady legs. Hotch reached out to grab him, but he flew past, dodging the hand as he slid to the floor, wrapping his arms around Andrew's waist. He buried his face in the lab coat, hiding himself away from the shocked expressions of his colleagues.

"It's getting worse," he mumbled, and Andrew patted his head sympathetically, smiling at Hotch and Morgan as their jaws dropped.

"I told you he was mine."

xXx

Author's Note: I can't take credit for coming up with the idea to shoot Varney in the groin. The idea came from a reviewer, 68luvcarter. While it seemed more like a joke at the time, the poetic justice it would create was too tempting to resist. To all the Vengeful-Varney-Haters reading this story, consider that a present for the weekend of no updates, haha.

Thanks for all your reviews and whatnot! Present time!

Chapter Nineteen: Sanity's Spirit (Preview)

"No!" Reid roared as Hotch wrapped his arms around his waist, lifting him up easily despite his attempts to be put down. He clawed at his arms with the seven nails he had as he kicked madly, flailing his legs out and hoping they'd connect with Hotch's shin hard enough that he'd let him go. But he didn't. He just held on tightly, digging his heels into the dirt to steady himself against Reid's struggles.

"Let me go!" he shouted, his struggles becoming desperate as the ambulance door closed and the vehicle took off, Andrew safely inside it.

He was gone.

His doctor was being taken away.

The only chance for sanity he had was being taken away.

And it was all their fault- the people who resembled his hallucinated team. They took Andrew away from him. They held him in place so he couldn't get to Andrew. They stopped him from getting better.

He yelled out in anger, throwing his head back with all other violent notions as he struggled even harder, now fueled by rage and fear. But just as before, Hotch didn't even seem bother by his movements and acted as though he were merely a petulant toddler who wanted freedom from an overbearing parent's hold. He became even angrier when Hotch turned him around, holding him at arm's length as he tried to speak to him.

"Reid, you have-"

"I hate you!" Reid roared, stopping the man in the middle of his speech, his mouth slung open.