Spencer Reid was getting tired of waking up secured to hard surfaces. Unlike the last time, his head hurt and the restraints were cutting into his wrists and ankles. He groaned, lightly testing his bonds. The laugh that greeted this was not reassuring. It sounded like an old style matinee villain, grating on the nerves. Reid opened his eyes to see a disheveled and maniacal Jason Weeks grinning down at him in a bad Joker imitation. The suave and debonair movie idol looks were gone, leaving a ravaged and savage distortion behind.

"You're awake! - He's awake!" Weeks turned his attention to someone else.

Reid tried to turn his head to see who else was in the room. Jett? Her dark hair tumbled around her shoulders, lank and dirty to match the tatters of what had been an evening gown. Why was she wearing an evening gown? Her eyes glittered behind the screen of dirt and oil. Oh hell. Reid wondered if he would survive this encounter.

"So, what do you think?" Jason asked her.

"I think you should not have started this," she told him, seeming to choose her words carefully as she shifted slightly in the chair, letting Reid see that her wrists were bound to the arms. "I think this will end – badly," she added, taking a deep breath and releasing it slowly.

Reid could hear a difference in her voice. Jett was getting ... aroused? He jerked as Jason cut a button off his shirt. Concentrating on Jett, he'd almost forgotten the other psycho menacing him. The nutcase above him looked at Jett again.

"He told me about you," the man breathed. "Told me all about his psycho slut ... about the bitch he could care about instead of me!" The last was a shriek as the knife plunged into the table a scant inch from Reid's head.

Reid sensed Jett more than seeing or hearing her cock her head to one side as they both tried to make sense of the rant. Wood cracked and splintered. Jason yanked the knife up only to have it knocked up and out of his hand by the solid chair arm still attached to Jett. She let go of the wood to catch the knife as it fell, a glittering streak that fit her dirty hand. Reid shuddered as he watched her smile.

A swift slice set his right arm free. He jerked away as Jason moved forward to attack Jett with his bare hands. The maniac back pedaled as Jett went on the offensive, narrowly missing the man as he tried to get away. Reid yanked against the remaining fastening and toppled the table to the floor as Jason snarled at Jett, his words incomprehensible. Whatever was eating at him, the crazed agent apparently decided discretion was a good idea and dove into the dark recesses of the workroom he'd set up leaving Jett a moment to free Reid from the rest of his bonds.

"Jett ..." Reid began as she lifted the table to get at the plastic ties holding him.

"Shhh." She held a battered finger to her lips to silence him, then licked the dirt from one as she regarded him obliquely. She leaned in close, her lips so tantalizingly near, her breath sizzling his ear. "Get out. Now."

He tried to search her face to see what she would do if he disobeyed her. The smile became feral as he watched, her eyes oddly flat, like a shark. With a nod, he turned and lurched out. What a time for his foot to be asleep. Outside, he looked around to see where he was. Somehow, he hadn't expected to see neat white painted numbers on the house. There was a SUV parked in the dirt back yard. Reid was overjoyed to find his cell phone in the back seat, along with his shoes. He tested the door. It was unlocked. Retrieving his phone, he dialed and resolutely ignored the sounds coming from inside as he called in to report on where he was. One of the killers had apparently caught the other. Agonized screams and yells tried to shred his nerves as he waited for an answer.

"Are you all right?" Hotchner, his boss, demanded upon hearing the missing agent's voice.

"I'm ... OK. I wasn't hurt, much. Lump on my head and headache, but nothing more. Close, but ... saved again," he admitted. He gave the address of the house. "It's getting ... noisy inside," he appended as another agonized scream, muted by intervening walls and doors, reached his ears. "I should probably go stop her," he started to say.

Hotch overrode him, for which he was somewhat grateful "On our way! Stay where you are."

Reid followed Hotch's order, sitting on the floor of the SUV, his feet firmly on the ground in case he needed to take off after a fleeing perp. He wondered what he'd be dong if he was armed. Five minutes later, Hotch and company screeched to a halt in front of the house, lights flashing, sirens silent.
The sounds had quieted. The other members of the team poured out of the two vehicles, guns at the ready. A raised eyebrow asked the question and Reid nodded. As far as he was aware, both the unsub and the woman were still in there.

He was wrong. Jason Weeks, pinned to the wall by a chunk of rebar shoved through each shoulder. He was quietly blubbering about why someone could want that psycho bitch and not him. Wasn't he worthy? What had he done wrong? Hotchner and his crew went through the house finding boxes, suitcases and containers, but no sign of Jett Tesuque. Reid guided the EMTs in to their subject, making sure Jason was restrained before they lifted him off the wall and onto the gurney. He made notes of everything the EMTs said for his report to Hotch who returned just as they were loading Weeks into the ambulance.

"They're ready to transport." That was stating the obvious a part of Reid's mind observed.

Hotchner nodded. "You're sure it's Weeks?" He had everyone's attention at that.

"It ... well, disregarding the dirt, blood and general lack of hygiene, it looks like him," Reid answered.

"We need positive ID as soon as possible. Fingerprints at the least. Keep this place cleared."

Reid went to the hospital. With a head wound, he needed to be checked out anyway. How the hell had Jett eluded them? Where was she? Why wasn't Weeks dead? He had too many questions and found he was really worried about the answers.

^.^

Hotchner sat at the table in the meeting room at the local sheriff's office and stared at the sheaf of papers in his hand. Spencer Reid stepped into the room with coffee and a box of donuts that he set down on the corner before clearing his throat. His supervisor looked up, not with expectation, but with confusion on his face.

"Something wrong?"

Hotch flipped the folder closed and looked thoughtful. "The man we ... found ... is not Jason Weeks."

"What?" Reid couldn't help sounding surprised. "But ... I mean ... Well, he didn't really get around to ... introducing himself ... damn. That's what that tirade was all about." He met the other's dark gaze. "He was going on about why someone could care about Jett but not him. He was fixated on Weeks?"

Hotchner shrugged his suit clad shoulders. "Looks like it. The prints identify him as Robert Austin. The name was given to him at the orphanage where he was deposited at about three days old. He has a long, long list of crimes to his name starting at about nine years of age; diagnosed as schizophrenic at thirteen, with major psychotic episodes triggered by anything from not getting pudding for desert to seeing images on TV. How he's connected to Weeks, we don't know."

Reid let that sink in for a moment. "And no one's seen Weeks since before my first encounter with Jett Tesuque," he voiced the others concern.

Silence.