AN: And we're on to chpt 10. Hopefully this won't be another epic like 9 was, but we'll see what happens.
The ride in the ambulance to the hospital was pretty bad. The EMTs were trying to stop or slow down the flow to the stab wound near Alecta's chest; they had to try to stop the bleeding there before they could even begin to work on the bleeding coming from her back. The hard part was getting the blade out of her; they weren't sure if it would have nicked a vein on the way in or if it was a clean entry wound. But she was bleeding A LOT from both areas.
By the time the ambulance pulled into the entry of the emergency room of the hospital, Alecta's pulse was thread at best and her skin was beginning to take on a grey pallor. Her right hand had fallen off of the gurney and Hotch had taken it and put it back where it belonged; it was turning cold. He began to actually worry. What if her usual luck didn't hold out this time?
Getting out at the hospital, Hotch was not allowed beyond the doors to the operating room. It felt oddly enough like the time when they had to fake Emily's death. The only exceptions being that this wasn't Emily, and this wasn't fake.
Hotch had initially stopped just outside of the doors to the O.R., he was standing so close to them that, if anyone came rushing back through them, he would easily be knocked down by the swinging of the doors alone. He turned to his right just a little and saw the rest of the team coming into the hospital. He slipped back into 'Hotch' mode, the usual stone wall that most people got; although, if he had to be damned honest, it took a little force on his part to achieve what he hoped was a believable façade. Realizing that there was nothing to be done on his end for the time being, he made his way over to the rest of the team as they were filing into the waiting room that a nurse had directed them to.
"Where's Kevin?" Hotch didn't see him with the others.
"He's making sure his dad's being seen to, and then he'll join us." Hotch couldn't fool Rossi, he knew better; and it had little to do with Rossi being older and having more experience than Hotch. No. Rossi was damned worried about Alecta as well. He loved that girl. Since he and his first wife had buried the only child he'd ever had, Rossi had never really given much effort to having more children. He wasn't sure he could go through all of that again. Meeting Alecta, getting to know her, that was as close as he'd come since to having someone that he thought of like his own child. Sure, he thought of most of the younger team members as kids, especially Reid. But, Alecta was the only one that he felt like was his kid. Rossi kept thinking back to the poor girl he met in the psychiatric hospital; that poor lonely soul that had nobody on her side at all. She had shut away in that place to be buried and forgotten. All she wanted was to be remembered. She wasn't asking for much. She didn't want a parade in the city streets in her honor. She didn't want a Nobel Prize. She didn't want the Mayor to give her the keys to the city. She just wanted someone that would look her in the eye and tell her 'Thank You'. She wanted to be able to walk into a room and not feel like everyone was looking at pond scum when they looked at her. She had stepped up and done this undercover job when nobody else would. She put everything she had on the line for the job, and after all that she was made to feel like slime on the bottom of their shoes. And it's true, that Rossi had dropped the ball when it came to keeping in contact with her. But since she had come back into his life and the life of the team, he had made the best effort he could to be there if she wanted to talk.
As Hotch sat down, Mrs. 'Ouisa and Mrs. King showed up with the kids. Rachel had called them and told them to meet the team there at the hospital.
Mrs. King looked especially upset.
"What's wrong dear?" Rossi asked, letting an endearment slip.
"Nothing. It's Thursday. My husband has tried yet again to kill my child. What could possibly be wrong?"
"There's more than that though. I know the question sounded stupid, maybe a little insensitive….but talk to me."
"It's just….she was born in this hospital, on the fourth floor actually. And now….now…she might…."Mrs. King was so upset she could only shrug her shoulders as she stood. She began pacing, and then she stepped to the nurse's station and began to ask them what she wanted to know.
"Jake King. He might have been brought in by ambulance by now."
"And who are you to him, ma'am?"
"I'm his wife that's who. And that young woman in there, in surgery right now….that's my only child. Just tell me where Jake is."
"Rachel come sit down. You have to stay calm until we find out what's going on with Lex."
"Don't tell me to calm down. I want to see him."
Rachel, the younger one, jumped up from her seat, knowing her grandmother wouldn't be persuaded to calm down, 'Come on, I can take you to him."
Mrs. King stopped her tirade and turned to the girl and followed her. They got on the elevator and mad their way down to the morgue.
Hotch looked over at Rossi, Rossi just shook his head in exasperation.
"Now do you see the family resemblance?" Rossi asked Hotch in a light hearted manner. Hotch merely nodded his agreement.
The kids all sat down quietly. Sofie hopped up on Oleg's lap, and Emma sat between Sasha and Eva. Jazzy sat with JJ, Will, and Henry; she was actually sitting on JJ's lap, with her head resting on the woman's shoulder. The little girl had been crying her eyes out, like Alecta's young children, when she found out Lex was hurt. Right now Jazzy was just drained and was resting against JJ until she could feel better. Henry was leaning against his father, swinging his feet back and forth; he was holding his daddy's hand in one of his. Jack had curled up leaning against Sasha, laying his little head on her lap; he was dead to the world.
Kevin finally made his way out into the waiting room.
"How's your father?"
"Agent Morgan, he'll be alright. That's what they say anyhow. It seems that not all of Lucky's aim was, um, lucky. Lex, how is she?"
"They still haven't come out and given us an update yet. But they should be telling us something soon." Hotch was somewhat optimistic on that point.
"If not, I will not be afraid to show my ass." Rossi informed everyone.
"Get in line old man. This is my back yard. Mom worked here; Lex and I were born here, weeks apart. Daddy was up here a lot working cases as sheriff. I can get you what you need faster than raising hell. If I can't, then we raise hell."
Rossi clapped the young man on the back with one hand, chuckling at his technique.
"How are the injured deputies doing?"
"They'll live. Lucky for us, those guys couldn't aim for shit."
It was another several hours before the team and Kevin were updated very much at all. There had been a nurse, someone that had gone to school with Kevin and Lex both as children that would come every 30 minutes and let Kevin know something at least; it didn't matter if it was just to say, that there was no change, or to say they closed up the knife wound. None of that mattered. She would come and tell him something, anything. For all the years she gave Lex hell, she knew that Kevin had always watched her back. And Kevin as a grown man was 6'5, could bench press about 400lbs, and, when it came to Lex had a short fuse if you came between them. He was not the one that you wanted to try to hold back if he snapped.
The 30 minute updates weren't enough to keep Kevin and Hotch from pacing, even if it did help to keep one of them from going off on the hospital staff.
"Sit down the both of ya. You're making me nervous." This was the first time that Sky had said much other than when he tried to help keep Rachel under control at the house.
"Sky, is it? Why don't you try me?"
"Listen…Kevin….Lex loves ya to death. But don't think I won't level you if you push me. She spent 25 years paying for one wrong decision. Twenty-five years, Kevin. Even when she was married she was alone. Do you know what that did to her? No, you don't, you have no idea, because you never troubled yourself to pick up a phone or open your mail. You sent everything back to her unopened. You knew where to find her and you did nothing.
I had to watch her try her damnedest to not fall completely apart when she first found out that she was pregnant. Before she even wrote to you the first time, she was terrified to be alone. She had no family, except the baby she was carrying. She had no friends, except for me, Big Ben, and Paul, as well as Moira, Cinnamon, and Lady Heather. We were all she had. She went through every day with a smile plastered on her face, a joke at the ready. But it was either smile and laugh or just fall apart crying. You could see it in her eyes.
And then when the baby was born…Rachel….she had your hair and eyes from day one. It was nearly more than Lex could stand. She had to wake up and see your face on that child every day; and then when she made up her mind to write to you and tell you about her situation you treated her like the plague. All the sudden she was no good to you because you got hurt. She wrote to your parents the whole time. She never expected a penny from them, never asked for one either; they had the common decency to reply and send birthday and Christmas cards. After two years of trying to make headway with you and tearing herself apart inside-out, she gave up.
Rachel was getting bigger, she was getting precocious. She looked like you but had Lex's personality in spades. And you weren't there.
When Lex came back from being under-cover, she lost everything. She even lost her mind for a time. She had left Rachel in Lady Heather's care, and mine. We weren't told what psychiatric hospital she was at. We tried to find her. I went to Los Angeles and spoke to her captain, and he said that she had told him not to reveal it to us. She didn't want us to bring Rachel to see her in that condition.
And of course you weren't there again. At least that's what she said when she was released. She said you never came. Sergei couldn't go see her, but that made sense, he was completely identical to his brother. It set her back every time he did go.
So don't get on your high horse with me son, I will leave you laying right here in the floor until this time next week. You may think you're the biggest dog on the block, but you ain't ever met anyone quite like me. So park it." Then turning to Morgan, 'How is your friend Penelope?" Kevin merely looked into the larger, older man's eyes. He saw that the man meant what he said. Kevin nodded his head a couple of times, and then sat down. He would be willing to fight 10 Jakes or Luckys any day of the week for ever laying a hand on Lex in the first place; but this man, Sky had a point after all, and that was one thing he couldn't and wouldn't argue with.
"I don't know yet. She wasn't as badly injured as the others; but they wanted to look her over just to be safe. They haven't said anything yet. Emily is with her though. Thank you for asking after her."
"Of course. Alecta has always cared a great deal for her. It would kill her if Pen didn't come out of this with minimal damage."
After close to seven hours of mind numbing waiting, a doctor finally came through the doors to the O.R. into the waiting room.
"Alecta Davis?"
At least 15 people stood up.
"Is there any family here?"
Everybody looked around. Sasha stepped forward. "We are her children. But these people are very close friends of hers, so anything you have to say can be said in front of them. She would want them to know."
"Very well then. We were able to finally close the knife wound to her diaphragm. Once that was done, we were finally able to roll her over and close up the wounds to her back."
"What was that wound? It was bleeding quite profusely."
"Agent Hotchner?"
"Yes sir, I rode in with her."
"It appears as though someone took an instrument….the wound tracts looked as though it may have been done with something as precise as a scalpel….and they literally carved into her back."
"What did they carve?" Rossi questioned.
"Angel's wings." Kevin and the doctor said simultaneously.
Everyone looked at Kevin including the doctor.
"Yes. He's correct. The carving was of angel's wings. There was some old scarring that looked like this sort of thing had been done before, and that part of this recent carving opened up the older wounds, continuing down her back. The bottom tips of the wings stop just slightly above her hips. The width of the wings spans nearly the entire width of her back. It was quite extensive, and was done with a fair amount of workmanship. I have stitched her up as well as I can. As she recovers, there should be minimal scarring left in the long run. We will keep clean bandages on her. And once she is released someone will need to care for her around the clock for weeks."
At this point, Kevin tuned the doctor out and looked over at Hotch. Funny thing was, Hotch was staring back at him. Each one knew what the other was thinking without saying a word.
"Dr.?" Rossi asked interrupting, seeing as Kevin and Hotch were out in left field right now.
"Yes sir?"
"Were there any other injuries?"
"What do you mean?" the doctor had some idea of what the older gentleman was getting at, but just make sure that everyone was clear on what was going on, Rossi needed to be specific.
"Had she been…" Kevin couldn't bring himself to say it out loud.
"Was she sexually assaulted?" Rossi had no issues asking the damned question. Alecta was as close as he'd ever get to having his own daughter. And damn it, he wanted to know what was going on.
"I didn't get such a good look while we were in surgery, I had all I could do to stop the bleeding and get her stitched up. I will say that it looked like there was a possibility of it, so I ordered some tests to be run just to cover our bases."
"Well if you're running a rape exam, you may want to make sure that she is still under sedation when it's done."
"Why?"
About that time they heard a commotion coming from one of the exam rooms.
"Well…..she's awake." Kevin said dryly.
The doctor took off running down the hall to check on the staff member who had been assigned to run the rape exam on her; Hotch, Rossi, Kevin, and Reid were all hot on his heels.
Once they reached the exam room they saw Alecta sitting up in the bed, her knees curled closely to her chest, one arm wrapped around them. Her other arm was slightly extended, with a scalpel in her hand. The staff member was half way across the room, having run and slid on the floor to get out of her reach. Her hand was to her neck; apparently when Alecta came too, all she understood was that someone was putting their hands on her and she didn't care for it at all. So she quickly grabbed the first thing she could put her hands on and took a swing with it. Never mind the fact that they had a female doctor to do the exam; in her sedative addled brain, Alecta had not been able to draw any conclusions….all she had managed to figure out is that there were hands on her and they were in some very private places, and needed to be removed.
The doctor who had been responsible for Alecta's surgery ran over and began to attend to his fallen colleague; luckily the cut to the woman's neck wasn't that deep, just about five stitches should be enough to close the wound.
When Kevin went to Alecta's side to try to comfort her she whirled around on him, shoving him away from her.
Hotch put his hand out to pull Kevin back before he got caught by the scalpel of death as well; when he did so, the scalpel sliced through the back of his hand.
"Ow!" Hotch drew back, wincing.
This seemed to wake Alecta up more thoroughly; she dropped the scalpel, allowing it to clatter to the floor. She looked up at Kevin and Hotch, her eyes were wide open, in shock at what had just happened. The same weary look that had been in her eyes since the day Hotch met her was still there if not deeper.
"I'm sorry….I-I-I'm s-s-s-s…."
"Lex, it's nothing, baby. It's just a scratch. He'll live. We'll stick a bandage on him and he'll be good as knew." Kevin knew as soon as he saw tears that this was gonna be harder than he thought. Lex never did like for anyone else to hurt, not if it was one of the good guys. And he knew about her stutter; most of the time she was able to move through life without it, but at times of great emotional stress or panic the stutter would come back. Sometimes she sounded worse than Porky Pig, although Kevin never had the heart to tell her so; that would have made things so much worse for her.
"You're gonna mess up your stitches doll face. Stop trying to move around so much hard head."
As Kevin tried to calm Alecta down, it wasn't lost on anyone present how much like Morgan and Garcia the two sounded; it was uncanny.
Almost as soon as the thought was in the air, Alecta began to really look around.
Sniffling a bit, trying to pull herself together, 'Where's Pen?"
"She's ok. Emily's with her." Rossi tried his best to placate her.
"That's not what I asked. I asked…Where is she?" Alecta began trying to get up out of the bed, still a bit woozy from being under sedation, and weak from her injuries; but she was trying to still be in control of everything in her universe.
"Dr. I think she might have popped a stitch or five." Kevin said, noticing the red staining the bandages and soaking through the hospital gown that was wrapped around her little frame.
"Please lie back down. I will have to close them up again. This is a record for one of my patients to have reopened a wound this quickly. Proud of yourself?"
"Where's Pen?"
"Your friend, the blonde?"
"Yes."
"If I tell you will you get back in the bed please?"
Alecta nodded her head sniffling, not taking her eyes off of Hotch and his injured hand. She reminded him so very much of Sofie and Emma. And of 2; where was the kid, and Chaz? He would have to bring that up as soon as possible.
"First thing's first. Agent Hotchner, go with nurse Metcalf and get that hand seen to.' The doctor watched as the nurse led Agent Hotchner away. He noticed that Alecta seemed to be worried about him leaving the room.
"Do you want her to bring him back and fix it here?"
"Oh, n-n-no. I don't like the sight of blood." This comment struck the doctor as a tad ironic, but he just shrugged it off.
"Where's Pen?" Alecta was relentless in her pursuit to find out what had happened to her friend.
She had gotten back into bed like the doctor asked, aided this time by Kevin.
Holding up his end of the bargain, the doctor answered, 'She is in another exam room down the hall. She wasn't as severely injured as you were, but under the circumstances she needed to be looked over, as a precaution."
Alecta looked at Reid, knowing he was close friends with Morgan…the two were like brothers. 'I tried….I-I t-t-t-tried s-s-s…."
Reid seemed to understand what she was trying to tell him, 'She'll be alright. Emily is sitting with her; Morgan is waiting patiently…"
"Liar. Morgan could chew holes through the nurse's station right now."
Before the doctor could come close enough to try to do anything about her stitches, Alecta jumped back down out of the bed. It took some effort on her part to stay standing, but she drug herself out of the exam room and down the hall, holding on to the wall. She made her way to the waiting room area and saw Morgan sitting there.
"Morgan, I p-promise…I tried to s-s-stop them." Tears were running down her cheeks now. Garcia was her friend, she should have done more to protect her, and she should have fought harder.
Morgan could look at her and tell how hard she fought to make sure they got out alive. There was a nice bump on her head, near her temple; the bruise with it was going to be a lovely shade of purple in a few hours. Morgan simply walked over to her and wrapped his arms around her; she was barely able to stand on her own two feet. She was clutching the wall with a death grip in the effort to try to remain upright.
"I know you did,' he whispered in her ear. She began to cry so much harder at the thought that one of her best friends was hurting. After a couple of minutes Hotch came back out having received about seven stitches in his hand and he saw Morgan hugging Alecta and Alecta sobbing her eyes out about how sorry she was that Garcia had suffered at all.
"Kind sirs, we have to get her back in here so I can stitch her back up, I don't want the wound to become infected. Please."
Morgan looked over at Hotch, then lifted Alecta up in his arms and carried her back to the exam room to have the stitches that she had been in such a hurry to rip reclosed.
In the time that it took to reclose Alecta's stitches, Penelope's exam was all done and she was cleared to leave; she chose to go out to the waiting room and sit with Derek.
"What did the doctor say baby?"
"Not here, not now." Pen was shaking her head no.
Derek had to take a deep breath and realize that he'd have to wait; he couldn't push her to talk. Knowing the way Pen worked though, she'd likely try to find any way that she could to avoid talking about it. And she was good at it, too. She would find some other thing to bring up, like asking about whether his mom was still nagging for grandbabies, and get him distracted. Or if he pushed any of her other buttons, she would start babbling a mile a minute about something mundane going on between herself and JJ and Emily. Penelope Garcia could dodge questions the way he dodged bullets, like a pro. If leading conversations and babbling didn't work Pen was not above trying to use her big brown eyes and considerable curves to make you forget. Morgan supposed she was trained by one of the best.
Just after Pen came into the waiting room and sat down next to Derek, the doctor came back out and let everybody know that the stitches had been doctored up and she was being placed in a private room.
Kevin went first to go see her. He wasn't going to stay long, he just wanted to make sure she was getting settled in as comfortably as possible; he really needed to get back down and see how his daddy was doing. The doctor working on Dan'el said it was likely he could leave in the morning; they were just going to stitch him up and give him a dose of pain killers to let him sleep through the night and then send him home with a prescription. They knew Mrs. 'Ouisa would be able to take proper care of him at home, and few people wanted to test a moody Dan'el; he was worse than the lion with the thorn in his paw.
Rachel had managed to get her grandmother, Mrs. King, down to the morgue without further incident. They walked in and the M.E.'s assistant led them over to the body; afterwards he gave them a few moments to have some time to themselves. Mrs. King kept poking his cheek, expecting him to wake up. There was a part of her that could now understand some of the uncertainty that Alecta must have felt for most of her life. Jake had perpetrated such a reign of absolute terror over their family for so long. The fact that he was lying there cold and dead, no life in him anymore, it was mind boggling to Mrs. King. She kept expecting him to snap awake and grab her by the throat and sling her around the room as he had done on so many occasions.
"Come on Nanna. He isn't going anywhere any time soon."
As Rachel and the older woman exited the morgue, the medical examiner asked Mrs. King what she intended to do about arrangements for the body. Mrs. King was quite unsure about what to do. She had never in a million years thought that this day would ever come or that she would be alive to enjoy it.
Yes, enjoy it. It sounded horrible to even think that she could ever enjoy the death of another human being. But when it came to Jake King, death hadn't come a moment too soon, and it was such a relief that he was finally gone. Mrs. King could finally draw the freest breath that she had been able to take since she was a young girl. Suddenly, it was as though the heaviest weight was off of her chest.
Meanwhile back in the waiting room, Kevin had been talking to one of his deputies that had taken off to go get Chaz and 2 back.
"They will be fine Kevin, don't sweat it."
"What happened?"
The deputy looked behind them as the crane pulled the car out of the water. Chaz and her little girl had been in the trunk when it went in. The two men who were in the front of the car had gotten out and rigged it so the car would go over the bank of the river on its own power. When they got out of the car and turned to make a fast get away, the deputies were there. The third deputy that had come with them was already on the horn to call for the crane and some paramedics to get there immediately.
The two men from the car were brewing for a fight. They charged the deputies and a physical fight ensued. Finally Deputy Spenser was finally able to pull his gun and shot the man that he had been fighting with six times, killing for sure. Ratliff was still struggling with the man he was stuck with. Finally in a desperate attempt, Ratliff reached out his hand and grasped a fairly solid tree limb that was lying near him, and he swung blindly connecting with the side of the man's head. It stunned the man and he let go of Ratliff. Ratliff jumped up and swung on the man three more times; he would have kept swinging too, if Spenser and Stallings hadn't stopped him. But the man was dead now, the only thing that Ratliff would have continued to swing for would have been for sport; and that would have made him no better than the man on the ground.
After thinking over the immediate happenings, Ratliff answered, 'Um, can we discuss this when we get up with you. We're going to be bringing Chaz and the kid to the hospital to get looked over. I'm pretty sure that Chaz will have a concussion but I don't know about 2."
"Fine. Just get here as soon as you can…Is that the crane I hear? What's going on?"
Kevin kept asking questions and Ratliff hung up on him deciding they could hash it out later. Right now, he had to bust open the trunk on this old beater and get Chaz and the little girl out. Kevin could scream at him later all he wanted.
Forty-five minutes later, Ratliff, Spenser, and Stallings had showed up to the hospital; Ratliff had hitched a ride with the ambulance. Chaz and her little girl 2 were quickly taken to be examined. The little girl only had a few bumps and bruises on her from tumbling around in the trunk of the car, especially when it started going into the water. Chaz had been beaten, though not too severely considering all of her training in law enforcement, but she did have a decent concussion brewing. But it seemed as though Chaz and the kid would get to go home within the next couple of hours. The only person with a very lengthy hospital stay would be Alecta; Kevin was overjoyed, Alecta was so cooperative under normal circumstances, she would be an absolute dream to deal with at this time. Having to deal with a hospital bound Alecta was liable to make a root canal look like a trip to Disney World.
Kevin had decided he would go home, following his parents, to see if he could help his mother get his father comfortable and grab a shower, and then he'd come back a little later.
Hotch and Rossi had both been in to visit her for a couple of minutes each. Her mother had been by to see her. The doctor had recommended keeping it short because she was likely to be dozing on and off anyway; they couldn't put her on the typical pain killers and other medications they might would have put someone else on due to her pregnancy, but nonetheless, the meds they did have her on were apt to make her quite sleepy. Mrs. King rode back to the house with Kevin and his parents to get something to eat and rest a bit, and she would be back later, likely coming along with Kevin when he came back. JJ and Will said that they would take the kids with them when they left, if everyone else was in agreement so they wouldn't have to stay cooped up at a hospital all night long.
Of course Sofie, Emma, and Jazzy weren't really having it. For all that Sofie was her mother's little drama queen, it was actually Jazzy this time that led the charge. She took off down the hall, dead set on seeing Alecta or to die trying.
Before the adults could stop her she had made her way into the room and managed to vault up onto the bed without much effort at all. Alecta had been out cold, sleeping hard, due to the effects of the meds they had her on. Jazzy was undaunted. She shook Alecta by the shoulders until she had forced her to open her eyes.
Alecta's eyes were so heavy, they felt as though they had lead weights tied to the lids; she looked at Jazzy and saw the tearful expression in the child's eyes. She knew that the little girl, in her heart of hearts, was concerned about Alecta's health in a way that only a child could be, but she also knew that the little girl was worried about what would happen to her if she was left alone.
Looking into the little girl's blue eyes Alecta just winked at her whispering, 'You can't get rid of me this easily."
The little girl perked up and just planted a big sloppy wet child-like kiss on Alecta's cheek and hugged her the best she could while still doing her best not to hurt her.
"Move it Jazz, my turn." Sofie and Emma came bounding into the room, right behind her. Jazzy was quite alright now; she had heard it from the horse's mouth that things would be alright. You couldn't rain on her parade anymore today.
"Miss Agent lady,' Jazzy started excitedly as she walked over to JJ to wait, 'she tol' me she was 'k." You could see the excitement written all over the little girl's face; judging by the look on her face you would have thought it was Christmas. The little girl practically squealed with excitement.
Sofie and Emma were talking to their mother, and she was giving them instructions to listen to the others while she was gone and she would be out of this hospital as soon as possible. She told the girls that their older sisters and brother would be there to help look after them and that they better do as they were told.
Sofie placed her hands on either side of Alecta's face, stroking her mother's cheek, 'Oh, mommy, of course we'll be good."
"Sure you will." Alecta's eyes started getting heavy again; she could barely keep them open.
"Mommy,' Emma whispered close to her ear.
"Hmmm?" Alecta's eyes closed heavily before opening very slowly again, and not even all of the way when they did.
"How's about I make Sofie behave. Will it be ok?"
"Mmm…" Alecta didn't have the energy to form another thought in her head, much less put a voice to it.
Emma leaned over to Sofie and pinched her arm, 'Ow! Why'd you do that?"
"Sofie, mommy not feel good, you gotsa behave. Don't do no bad stuff. And don't tried ta be the boss of me." With that Emma leaned over and kissed her mother on the cheek and hugged her neck the best she could, as Jazzy had before her. Sofie relented and hugged and kissed her mother as well.
Everyone filed back out into the waiting room to discuss what would happen next. Morgan had talked Pen into going back to the Eason's house. She didn't want to at first, she wanted to stay close to Alecta; they were friends after all, and she wanted to make sure that Lex was going to be ok. But after their ordeal, Pen was super tired, and could use a few good hours rest in a real bed. So in the end, Pen gave up the argument and let Morgan take her back. What he didn't understand is that she wasn't sure she could sleep. You can't just unsee the things that she has seen today. You don't just erase that from your memory. But she also knew that Derek would be there if she had any problems. Knowing how protective Derek could be over her she realized that to be able to pry Derek off of her anytime soon would require a stick of dynamite and a crow bar.
Hotch and Rossi had decided to stay and keep a check on Alecta over night; this didn't shock anybody, although, Hotch had tried to talk Rossi into going back with the others, but the old man refused. He wasn't leaving the side of the closest person he had to a daughter.
There had come a point when the doctor chased them out of the room for the night when the bandages needed to be changed. They had fallen asleep in the waiting room while they waited for the doctors to finish. They didn't see the older man that walked right past them with the smile on his face. He checked at the nurse's station to find out what room number he needed, when asked if he was family, he merely told her in his thick accent that he was the young lady's uncle. His eyes were dark, like the patient's. His hair, although quite grey, looked as though it was at one time dark, like the patient's. There were other ways that he seemed to have some striking favor to the patient. After careful consideration, the nurse gave the man the room number he requested.
After getting the needed information the older, distinguished gentleman made his way down the hall to the room he wanted.
Ok, strange stopping point. But I will reveal the visitor in the next chapter; else this thing would have gone on forever (people's exhibit Chpt. 9). Tzofiya is a Hebrew girl's name, it means 'Guardian'. That should be a small clue as to who this visitor is.