On the fifth day of Spencer's suspension, he actually slept in for the first time in a while. He was only woken up when he heard his phone ringing several hours after JJ had left. He sighed, poking his head out of his blankets and pulling his phone over. He checked the caller ID and raised his eyebrow at the 'John' flashing. He couldn't help but wonder why his Narcotics Anonymous sponsor would be calling him, especially considering his status in the FBI. Shrugging it off, he cleared his throat and answered.

"Hello, sir."

Spencer could practically feel the headshake and chuckle through the phone. "For the last time, Spencer, when it comes to situations outside of work, it's just John. Save the 'sir' for the office."

He sat up in bed, stretching slightly. "Right. Sorry, sir." He winced. "Sorry."

"Don't worry about it."

He looked over at the clock and saw that it was nearly afternoon. Impressed with himself, he raised his eyebrows. "Not that I don't appreciate the call, but… why are you calling?"

"I just wanted to check in. I've got to admit, I'm a little worried about you."

"Worried? Why?"

"I haven't seen you at any of the meetings lately, and I heard around the bureau that you haven't been at work all week. I just wanted to be sure everything was okay."

"Wow, I um, I really appreciate the check-in. I've-I've been fine. Pretty great, actually. Considering."

"…Considering what?"

He paused. Did the FBI director really not hear about one of his agents being attacked? "…Last Tuesday, I was attacked on the way home from the subway station near my house. Ended up in the hospital with several injuries after I all but bled out on the pavement. I was out of work a few days and-"

"And you're okay? You haven't had any cravings, considering the situation?"

"Surprisingly, not." He pushed himself off the bed, limping to the kitchen and filling a glass with water. "I don't have a medication strong enough for the pain, unfortunately, but weighing the options, it wasn't worth giving up two years." He popped the pills into his mouth, swallowing and taking a sip of the water. "The thought really hasn't even crossed my mind, which I find extremely impressive."

"It is indeed. So you're out of work on disability?"

He laughed softly. "Not quite." He finished his water and set the glass in the sink, making a mental note to wash it before JJ came home.

"I'm sorry, I don't follow you."

He sighed. "I had to find a way to get my attackers to back off and stop beating me, so I reached for my gun and shot it into the air to scare them off. Luckily it worked and nobody was harmed, well, except for me. After my boss came to get me at the hospital, I talked to the police the next morning. It ended up being a pending case that became federal when I was attacked, and the team spent the last week on the case. I'm sorry, I'm rambling. I'll stop."

"No, by all means, keep going."

He sighed, knowing he couldn't lie to the director. Bending the truth with Strauss was fine, but the last thing he wanted to do was piss someone off as high in the chain of command as he is. "Well, I tried telling the team to back off the case and that it wasn't important to me, because I didn't want them in trouble. The team stayed on the case, I injected myself into it after they asked for help, I made the case personal while interviewing the unsubs, but we caught them." He cleared his throat. "Understandably, I needed to go through a psychological evaluation with Chief Strauss, since my weapon was fired when I was off duty, and I had gone through a trauma. She gave me the interview, she talked about it with my superior, and called me into the office. I was handed a three week suspension for firing my weapon off duty, which I took, because it was a stupid thing for me to do-"

"…You were given three weeks for firing a weapon off the clock?"

He raised an eyebrow. "Well, yeah? Chief Strauss said that was the standard punishment for such an offense-"

"…Spencer, the maximum amount of time that can be given for firing your weapon while off-duty is two weeks. Considering it was in self-defense and your life was on the line, it'd be a maximum of five days. She gave you three weeks?"

"…Like I said, she said it was standard-"

"No, it isn't. It's the maximum punishment that a section chief can hand out without having to run it through me." He heard a frustrated groan and a pause. "Don't worry, Spencer. I'll have you back to work in no time."

His eyes widened. "John, sir, please don't get me in any more trouble with her. She already has a personal vendetta against my team. I don't mind taking the three weeks if it means that my team isn't affected by her."

Again, he could hear the headshake. "Don't worry, Spencer. You're not the one in trouble. I'll have you back at work on Monday, guaranteed."

He couldn't help but feel extremely relieved while a smile crawled across his face. "Thank you, John."

"Anytime, Spencer. And if you feel yourself slipping because of all this, even if it's the slightest bit, don't hesitate to call me."

"I won't."

"And Spencer?"

"Yes?"

"We miss you at the meetings."

He smirked. "I'll be at the next one. Maybe I can give a pep talk."

"That'd be great. Goodbye, Spencer. I'll talk to you soon."

"Goodbye, sir." He scrunched his face, cursing himself before hanging up. He wasn't sure what was going to happen at work, and wished he could be there to see it unfold. However, it felt great that come Monday morning, he could be over this slump of doing absolutely nothing, considering he already finished his coursework a few weeks into the semester, and could actually do something again.

JJ walked in after work, typing in the security code to disable the alarm. "Spence, are you up?"

"Yeah, I'm in here," he called from the guest room, sitting up with the laptop.

"Did Will not come home with Henry yet?" she asked, walking toward the room.

"He did, and he decided he was going to take him for a walk in the park about twenty minutes ago." He glanced up at her, eyebrow raised. "Why do you look so happy?"

"Oh, Spence, you missed a good one today."

"…A good what?"

She smirked, shaking her head and sitting at the foot of the bed. Before she started her story, she looked at his face, gasping. "Spence, your bruising's almost gone!"

He raised an eyebrow. "It is?"

She reached in her purse, taking out her mirror and handing it to him. "See for yourself. The swelling's gone on your eyes and nose, and the discoloration is fading."

He checked his own reflection for the first time that day and was pleasantly surprised. "I almost look human again."

She smirked, shaking her head. "You look fine, Spence." She took back the mirror, throwing it into her bag.

"So what happened today?

She crossed her legs underneath herself. "I can't even begin to describe how great it was. Did you know the maximum suspension that can be given for firing your weapon in self-defense is five days?"

He thought for a moment. John had told him that earlier this morning, but JJ didn't know about their friendship. Instead, he looked and shook his head. "Strauss gave me three weeks?"

She put up a finger. "Ah! I'm getting there. It turns out that three weeks is the maximum punishment that a section chief can assign to an agent without having to involve the director. With your passed psychological evaluation being turned in, he wouldn't be checking the suspension period."

"I'm not following?"

She smiled at him. "It turns out the director went to Strauss today about your file, because he was looking through psychological evaluations. It got extremely loud very fast. She tried arguing with him that you needed the three week suspension to think about what you'd done, while he argued that there was no justification behind the suspension. She did it because of her personal vendetta instead of for a fair reason."

"Is there a point to this story?"

She hit his leg. "I'm getting there! He reviewed your evaluation and the case file, and saw no problem with the team taking the case, nor did he think you made it personal, unlike what Strauss's notes said. He'd gone to Hotch and gotten the story from his point of view, and also got it from everyone on the team. She bent the truth on it to make it seem worse than it actually was, and he was pissed."

"So what happened?"

She hit his leg again. "You're so impatient."

"I'm just saying, if you'd written it down, I'd have read it, memorized it, and be telling it to you right now verbatim."

She shook her head. "He looked over the evaluations, took our accounts, and came to the conclusion that not only is your suspension too long, it's unnecessary. According to the director, you should've never been suspended in the first place, and Strauss applied her personal bias to your evaluation in order to break up the team, even if it was only for a few weeks."

"…Wait. I can go back to work?"

"First thing Monday morning. He said to tell you he's sorry, and he'll hand deliver your gun and new credentials to your desk on Monday, along with a personal apology."

He raised his eyebrows, trying to seem surprised. He was, but he didn't want to make it seem like seeing John was more than every once in a while around the office. "So, I'm back?"

"You're back!" she reached over, wrapping her arms around him and pulling him into a hug.

He ignored the pain in his shoulder, hugging her back. This was definitely the best news he'd gotten in a while.

"So what happened to Strauss?" he asked, hooking his chin on her shoulder.

"She's been asked to take a temporary leave of absence, and when she gets back, she needs to issue an apology to you and the rest of the team for her actions."

He couldn't hold in his laughter, burying his head in her shoulder.

She raised an eyebrow. "Okay, Spence?"

He nodded, laughing to himself. "Oh, this is perfect."

Author's Note: For anyone who's curious, this is the same John from the episode 'Elephant's Memory'. I always thought that he was someone high up in the FBI and wanted to include him as Spencer's sponsor.