Four days left until Christmas! I don't even know why I'm excited, since I won't be able to spend it with family this year, but anyway...

More casework in this chapter, but focus shifts more to the family next time, and action is on the horizon.

FIVE: Too Numerous

"Hotch! Hotch!" Garcia said excitedly when she rejoined the rest of the team, "I think I have something. Well, I'm not sure, but I might have something."

"All right," Hotch said evenly. "Calm down and close the door."

Garcia turned back to close the door and then returned to the table. "I've got a transcript here from the chatroom discussion the other guys just had, and I think their case might be related to our case."

"The power-hungry upstart king is our unsub?" asked Prentiss.

"I know it's a heck of a coincidence, but what with all this prophecy crap and the star... sorry, comet... thingy almost directly over us, I think it's possible."

The others picked up the pieces of paper she laid in front of them. After a few minutes, they began to agree that their cases likely overlapped.

"He's got motive," said Prentiss. "That's the first solid one we've found so far."

"This guy really thinks some savior baby in this town is going to threaten his chance at becoming king?" Morgan asked incredulously.

"It sounds that way," said JJ. "I think our initial age estimate is off. I'd put this unsub in his thirties at least. Maybe older."

"This is good, right?" Garcia asked with nervous excitement. "If Majesty is our unsub, it's a huge lead, isn't it?"

"It is a big lead," said Hotch, "but unfortunately, if Majesty is killing the babies or having them killed on his orders, this conversation will have made his cause seem even more urgent. He'll strike again soon."

Garcia's face fell. "Please don't tell me we just got a baby killed."

"Try to track Majesty down. We need a location as soon as possible."

"Yes, sir."

"Let's hope that doesn't happen," Morgan said when Garcia had retreated from the room. "But if another baby is taken tonight or tomorrow morning, I'd say that's a strong indication that Majesty is our guy."

Unfortunately, news of another abduction came even sooner than the team anticipated. It was mid-afternoon when an officer informed Hotch that a baby boy had been snatched from a park. The team hurried to the location and interviewed witnesses and the family, who were suffering shock and extreme anxiety over the loss.

JJ and Prentiss kept the baby's adoptive older sister occupied while Hotch interviewed the parents. Their description of the kidnapper revealed only a vague idea of height and build. His loose clothing and hooded shirt prevented them from picking out any other details. The vehicle he drove was equally ambiguous: a black four-door sedan with no license plate.

"We know what's been happening in town," the wife said through her tears. "I can't believe we let this happen..."

"You can't blame yourselves," Hotch told them, though he knew his words probably wouldn't help much. "This man is very experienced, and he's getting bolder. Taking your son from such a public place in daylight is very unusual, even for a career criminal."

"You mean a serial killer," the husband said grimly. "What are the chances that Dan is already dead?"

His wife sobbed, but didn't protest. She knew the outlook wasn't good.

"I can't give you a probability," Hotch said. "Ordinarily, if we can find a missing child in the first twenty-four hours, there's a good chance they'll be alive. But in this case... I'm not sure we have that long. I'm very sorry that this happened. I have a son... if anything happened to him, I wouldn't know what to do. We're going to do everything we can to find your son. There just aren't any guarantees."

"Hotch," Morgan called from a few yards away.

Hotch excused himself from the grieving couple and approached Morgan. "Find something?"

"No. Garcia just called. Another nine-one-one call just came in. It's a child abduction too."

Hotch swore. "He's not only accelerating, he's taking two victims in one day now. He's getting desperate."

"Let's hope he's getting careless too. This means Majesty is the unsub, right?"

"He's looking pretty damn good for it."

As it turned out though, the unsub didn't stop at two. By the time the sun was setting, eight male infants had disappeared and three had resurfaced dead.

"This is insane," JJ said. "We've got varying descriptions of kidnappers and vehicles, still five missing kids and three bodies just from today!"

"I don't think I can do this," Garcia said quietly. "It's too much. I can't... I can't think. I can't even... code. I just want to go home and hug something soft and..."

"Garcia," Hotch's firm tone snapped her out of her babbling. "I need you to find Majesty. Shut out everything else if you have to—no, if you can—and find that man." When she stared blankly, he barked, "Find him!"

"O-okay, I'll try," she whimpered and scurried from the room.

"She's' running ragged," Morgan said. "You know how sensitive she is."

"We don't have time for sentiment right now," Hotch countered. "I know this one is rough on all of us, but if we can't do our job and do it fast, the body count will keep rising."

His phone rang. It was Beth. He stepped away to answer it. "Hello?"

"Hey, I was a little worried," Beth said. "Have you had supper yet?"

Hotch checked his watch. "No... I lost track of time. But I don't think I should leave. This case keeps getting worse and worse, and we can't afford to waste any time."

"I heard... it's on the news in the hotel lobby. I didn't watch much because I didn't want Jack picking up what was going on, but... it's just awful."

"I know. I'm sorry you had to hear that. I don't want anything upsetting you right now."

"I'm okay, but... mm."

"Are you okay?" Hotch held his breath.

"Um... Yeah, I'm fine. Just a twinge..."

"Is it a contraction?"

"I'm not sure. It's gone now."

"Is Jenny there?"

"Not at the moment, but I've got her number. She said I could call any time."

"Well... I really think I should stay here for now. Will you be okay?"

"I'll be fine. And I'll call you back if I am having contractions."

"Okay." He hesitated. He wanted to tell Beth that he loved her, but he had kept himself from saying those words since she got pregnant. There was still a nagging worry that she might have cheated on him. Even if he wanted to say it now, he felt he should say it in person and not over the phone. "Take care," he said at last.

"We will."

When he got back to their makeshift office, Garcia had an update.

"He's not currently in Bethlehem, sir, but he's been talking to this guy called Thutmose, who seems to have an IP address that places him much closer to us."

"Thutmose... that's an Egyptian pharaoh," Hotch mused.

"Yes, sir. Gideon told me that Thutmose the second is one of the pharaohs thought to have possibly reigned during the time of the Exodus."

"Odd for the underling of a guy wanting to be king to choose a king name for his chatroom username," said Morgan.

"Have you gotten a subpoena for the ISP?" asked Hotch.

"I'm working on that," Garcia answered. "The trouble is, he and Majesty both log into the chatroom from more than one device. He might not be using his own internet to access it."

"Could there be more than one person using the same username?" asked JJ.

"In theory, yeah, but I haven't seen any evidence that that's going on. There haven't been any attempts to use them when there was already a Thutmose or Majesty in the chatroom. In which case, the server would inform the would-be user that that name was already in use and they would have to use something else."

"So, are we thinking Thutmose is the unsub working on Majesty's orders?" asked Morgan.

"Possibly," said Hotch. "You're right, though: there's something odd about his using the name of a ruler."

The username continued to nag at Hotch throughout the evening. Meanwhile, more bodies turned up.

"They're all being killed with whatever's available at the scene," JJ said in a frustrated tone when the team had received the latest forensic evidence around eleven p.m. "Most of them aren't being suffocated anymore."

"He's evolving or we have two unsubs," said Prentiss. "Maybe Majesty did his own dirty work at first, but now that he's panicking, he's letting Thutmose do it for him."

"Fewer of them are Jewish, too," said Morgan. "Only three of the eight most recent."

"Before, he had time to research them," said Hotch. "Now, he doesn't care. He's killing any baby boy born in Bethlehem who might be of Jewish descent."

Hotch's phone rang; it was Reid this time. "What is it, Reid?" Hotch answered the phone wearily.

"Hey... it's not much," Reid said, "but Gideon and I think we know why the henchman is calling himself Thutmose. If Thutmose the second is the one who chased the Israelites out of Egypt, it stands to reason that Thutmose the first might be the one who was afraid that the Israelites were becoming too numerous and might revolt, so he had all the baby boys killed."

As soon as he said it, Hotch was sure. "I think that's exactly it. This Thutmose person didn't choose the name because it was royal; he chose it because it was an infant-killer. I want you, Dave and Gideon to get to Bethlehem as soon as you can."

"We were planning to come in the morning, but maybe if we head out tonight the roads won't be as busy."

"Do that. We'll see you soon."

He had another call waiting when he finished talking to Reid. "Hello, Beth?"

"Aaron, they're definitely contractions."

Minor cliffhanger... I should be able to post more soon. How about a little feedback? How do you like the story so far?