A/N: So, this is supposed to be Sci-Fi, but I am the first to admit that the genre has been pushed a bit to the side here a bit. The chapter revolves around a Sci-Fi movie and to make reading it a bit easier the movie scenes are in italics. I hope you will enjoy!

Genre: Sci-Fi

Author: SussiRay


"Hey, uhm, Emily?"

The slightly stuttering voice behind her made Emily look up from her computer screen. Twisting her head she looked straight into a pair of, slightly hesitant, blue eyes hiding behind a pair of thick, out-of-style glasses.

"What's up Reid?" she said, giving him a smile.

"Uh, it's okay if I call you Emily, right?" He shifted his weight nervously from his left foot to right and back again and for a second she was really worried that he was about to ask her out. "Um, I've never asked, so if you prefer Prentiss that's okay, uh, just correct me."

"Emily is fine, Reid," Emily smiled, however a little more reservedly, at him, "You wanted to ask me something?"

"Uh, yeah." He smiled awkwardly back, her calm demeanor obviously putting him more at ease. "The rest of the team is going out to the movies later tonight and I just wanted to ask if you'd like to tag along?"

"The whole team's going?" Emily said, one eyebrow sliding up in question. At the thought of spending time with the entire team, with all that that entailed made her heart beat a little faster. She swallowed thickly, hoping it would slow her pulse down.

"Yeah," Reid said, his smile growing wider, "well, not Gideon, but he never comes along when we go out. He says he'd rather read a book. For once though I've managed to convince Hotch to go out, he usually says no and never really gives any reason as to why but, I dunno, he's coming with us tonight." Reid rambled, the words spilling from his lips, apparently oblivious to the frown pinching Emily's brow together. Emily didn't mind his little speech though, it gave her a moment to herself to take a few deep breaths and collect herself. "Anyway," Reid continued, snapping Emily's focus back onto him, "you really should come with us, I've chosen the film we're going to see and it will be great."

"What movie?" Emily said, surprising herself with how calm her voice sounded.

"Oh, it's this new sci-fi movie that's supposed to be really good. It's a love story set in the future. It's about a man and a woman who meet when they are teenagers and they fall in love, then they are forced to live separate for a number of years and when they finally meet again she has been replaced by a robot who can't reciprocate his feelings no matter how hard he tries. I hear it has a happy ending though and I think it'll have sufficient amounts of romance, action and faulty science references to please everyone." He looked down at her, towering over her as she was still sitting down, and gave her such a hopeful smile that she just couldn't say no.

"That actually sounds like a lot of fun, Reid," Emily said, "I guess I could skip on sitting home alone and eating old take out just this one night."

Reid's eyebrows knitted tightly together and sank in deep confusion. "I…uhm…I," he sputtered, grasping for something to say.

"That was a joke Reid," Emily laughed, "I'd love to tag along. Thanks for inviting me."

"Of course, Emily," Reid said, letting go of a small sigh of relief, "It wouldn't be as much fun if you weren't there. Okay, I will see you in maybe half an hour. Garcia wants my help with something." With a small, awkward, wave he started walking from the bullpen and out through the glass doors his lanky frame making even such a simple task look awkward and prompting Emily to chuckle to herself.

She smiled as she watched him disappear round a corner. She had been so nervous starting a new job where it was so widely known that the chemistry between the team members was almost as important as skill and experience. What if everyone had disliked her? What if they had thought that she didn't belong in their tight-knit unit? Those fears had only grown when she'd realized that Hotch was her supervisor. He did not like her at all and she very well knew it. He took every opportunity possible to show her by second guessing her and rarely saying more than a few words at a time to her. She knew she had hurt him all those years ago but she never thought that he would hold onto a grudge with such fierceness.

But the rest of the team was beginning to warm up to her after the initial disruption that was a new member. She definitely wasn't about to let Aaron Hotchner stand in her way of growing closer to them and becoming their friend. She didn't think the awkward silence that existed between them at work would be much different to the one that would linger between them at a movie theater.


Hotch watched Reid talk, somewhat awkwardly it seemed, with Emily and he could tell from the smile on her face and the slight bob of her head that the answer he had got was a positive one. Emily would apparently be accompanying them to the movies later that night. And why wouldn't she? The rest of the team seemed to really like her. They had accepted her as a valued member almost immediately. And though he could tell that she was still felt a bit like an outsider he saw that she wasn't.

In fact he was the only one still on the fence about her. She was a good agent, of course he knew that, but he still definitely had his reasons to be wary. He did not approve of the way Strauss had gone over his head when hiring her. He blamed Emily a bit for that too; she should have known something was not right when she wasn't told who her unit chief would be until her very first day on the unit. If he looked a little deeper inside himself it was obvious that the fact that seeing her face every day reminded him of every little piece she had smashed his heart into and that that was making him more bitter by the minute. So he had kept his distance.

Now though he had to sit through a two hour long movie with her. Granted the rest of the team, minus Gideon, would be there as well, but it was still two hours in close proximity to the one person he just didn't seem to be able to be in the same room as. He sighed and closed his briefcase. Walking over to the window overlooking the bullpen, he peeked through the blinds and waited till he saw Emily pick up her things and leave.


"This row is perfect," Reid said, turned to Morgan, as Emily squeezed by them both, "It's the best distance from the screen and satisfactorily close to the emergency exits. You know rigorous research have shown that sitting –"

Emily shook her head with mirth as she heard Morgan cut Reid off and say something about him needing the emergency exit sooner rather than later if he didn't shut up. She looked down at the last empty seat as she passed JJ and her throat went dry as she stumbled. "Oh," she said, looking down dumbfounded, "Ah, it's…it's okay if I sit here, right?"

Hotch looked up, his brow pinched together in an uncomfortable knot. "It's the last free seat, I think, Prentiss," he said and he couldn't help but notice her cringe at the use of her last name, "it's here or the floor."

She laughed a little as she took her seat, but there was no humor in her voice and he could clearly see that it didn't reach her eyes. He turned, returning his attention to the ridiculously loud commercials running on the large screen. He could feel Emily next to him, he felt her knee bump against his so he pulled his legs closer together and he felt her discreet perfume tickle his nose so for a second he held his breath.

When he glanced to his left, he could see that she had turned her attention and her body towards JJ and was talking with her in a low, hushed tone. He drew in a breath but the little bit of her perfume that had lingered in the air had been replaced with the smell of popcorn and soda.

A minute later as the lights were dimmed, shrouding the large room in darkness, he could feel her shifting in her seat. For a second a fleeting impulse, coming from somewhere in the very back of his mind, told him to wrap his arm around her shoulders and the feeling made him shudder. However before he could act on it the memory of her ripping him to pieces stamped the impulse down and instead he crossed his arms tightly over his own chest.

Leaning back in his seat that felt too small and very uncomfortable as his back tensed, he hoped that the mindless entertainment of the film would be enough to distract him. Ignoring all thought of the woman next to him, he focused every ounce of attention on the two people appearing on the large screen.

Unfortunately not even thirty minutes into the movie he was painfully aware of the fact that there would be no forgetting and no pushing lingering emotions down deep into some black hole inside him that night. The story that was playing out before him seemed so excruciatingly familiar. He had watched as the young, very beautiful, woman with dark hair and even darker eyes met the young handsome man and how they fell in love within an instant. He managed to ignore the implausible futuristic setting, where everything was metallic and bare, even though he could hear Reid harrumphing in the background, and focused on the obvious love story.

As the minutes and the story ticked by, he felt like reality and fiction was starting to bleed together more and more and more until he felt like it was his story that was being put on show on the giant screen for the world to see. He closed his eyes and all he could see was himself, waiting for that girl he knew wouldn't come.

On the screen the dark haired man stood by himself leaning against a tall building, surrounded by that cold, steely environment in which the story took place. He looked to his left and to his right, searching for that familiar face but all he could see was a jumble of people and machines littering the streets. The sky was dark, the sun had stopped shining many years ago as well as all of the stars, and when he looked up he couldn't see where the buildings ended. Only bridges floating in the air and the odd hovercraft sweeping through it could be seen in the dim light.

He shuddered and sank to the ground when he finally realized that she wasn't coming. Three months of pure bliss was finally ending and he was alone on the cold hard ground with strangers walking so close that they were nearly stepping on him. Then he felt it; the long, steel arms slithering around his torso and gripping his shoulders, heaving him up into the air and tossing him around. He knew exactly what was happening and he allowed himself to be removed from the ground with not so much as a word of protest.

He had seen people scream and yell as they were being pulled away but he felt too weak to fight it. When you had nothing left in your life then you were no longer considered a valued member of society by the government and you were removed – sent away until you could prove yourself worthy of living in the city again. Closing his eyes, he let himself be swept away from his home.

Hotch was startled when he felt moisture sting in his eyes. Granted he hadn't been pulled away from the life he knew by steel claws, he had been reassigned, but the outcome had essentially been the same. He had been, more or less, forced to leave the town he knew the best, the town where he had his life and in the end it had cost him at the screen, he delved back into the story and let it serve almost as a way to work through the emotions that had accumulated over the last ten years.

He watched the young man being shipped off to a work camp. He watched him work hard he nearly went crazy – though never forgetting the woman he loved – until finally he was let back to the city.

He wandered down street after street, looking for that familiar face. Nothing seemed to be like it used to, the buildings were taller, the people seemed colder and the sky seemed even darker than before. After several years outside the city he knew that some people that were taken away never came back. They were replaced with artificial versions of themselves, robots that had no emotions and could feel no heartbreak and would thus never become useless in the all-seeing eye of the government. He felt empty inside as he aimlessly wandered the streets. The years in the work camp had destroyed most of his spirit. He felt like he was only half a man.

Hotch watched with rapt attention. How in the world had Reid managed to select a movie that seemed like it was his life story being told? He shifted in his seat. He was feeling increasingly uncomfortable. Was Emily thinking the same things as he was? Did she also see some of the parallels? Trying to move his hand as discreetly as possible he swiped at the little tear that had managed to escape his eye as he watched the young man on the screen finally catch a glimpse of the girl he loved.

He ran as fast as he could. His feet hit the pavement hard as he weaved and bobbed between people – real and fake. He could feel the difference when he touched them. The ones that hadn't been replaced for good, the ones that were still human and had blood running through their veins were warm to his touch as he maneuvered by them. The ones that had been replaced with machines were cold and hard – like everything else around them.

When he finally caught up with her she stopped abruptly as he yelled her name. She turned and looked at him with empty eyes.

"You're here," he said, reaching out tentatively to run his fingers over her cheek but she backed away and his heart cried.

"I am," she answered and he flinched at the distant tone in her voice that made it sound just as harsh as their bare surroundings.

He wanted to take her in his arms but her tense posture and the way her eyes looked at him with no warmth and no feelings held him back. This had to be the same girl that he had known and loved with his entire heart ten years ago. She looked almost exactly the same as the last day he had seen her. He had never learned why she had left him, one day she had disappeared and then he had been pulled from the city and sent away.

But here she was. Standing in front of him again, ten years after the day he had thought he had lost her forever. Tentatively he reached out a hand again and this time she let him run his fingers along her bare arm. She was cold and the skin of her arm felt hard. There was no pink flush creeping over it and no goose bumps erupting where his fingers danced. His heart sank into his stomach. She was cold and she was hard, like everyone else who had been replaced.

"Why did you leave me?" he choked out, hoping that her answer would prove that she was still herself and not a soulless machine. He couldn't believe that he was fighting to hold back tears but she was just standing there looking at him with her empty, almost metallic, eyes and he couldn't keep them at bay.

"I didn't have a choice," she said, and he was so desperately hoping to hear a hint of his own conflicting emotions in her that her monotone voice was like a knife cutting through his flesh and he sat down on the ground in defeat.

Hotch shook his head and gripped his forehead. Pinching his eyes closed and opening them again he slowly came to from the daze the familiar storyline had put him in. Distinct lines between his life and the life happening on the screen were put back in their place. He tried to watch the tall, dark haired man talk to the almost unresponsive woman, but his focus was lost. All he could think of was the dark haired woman sitting next to him.


"What did you think, Emily?" Reid said, as he jogged a few steps to catch up with her.

"It was good," Emily said. "Pretty sad though," she continued. She wouldn't tell him how uncomfortably close to home it had hit a few times. She would never go as far as to think of herself as some unfeeling machine, like the woman in the movie had been, but she knew how badly she had hurt Hotch and maybe that was the way he thought of her now. The protagonist had fallen in love with her all over again and for all intents and purposes it had ended happily but there had been no way of telling whether she was the real girl or the robot version of her. And that was a little how she felt. Had she changed so much over the years that there was no chance for her and Hotch or would he still be able to love her?

"You didn't like the ending?" Reid said, confused, "I thought it was a happy, romantic ending. They fell back in love and everyone was happy."

"I guess," Emily said, slowly. She didn't say anything else, instead her mind grew busy running mile after mile around the same man.

A/N: Like I said in the first A/N, there wasn't that much Sci-Fi in this chapter. Hopefully you liked it anyway. Please leave a review if you have the time.