Hello all, so Amalya's background is actually loosely based on someone I met on my trip to Egypt a couple of years ago. But the laws and history required a bit of research :)
Hope you all enjoy it, and let me know.
"Hi, I wanna have better news, mon amie. But there are zero RVs in the State of California with (M, D, 3) in that order on their plate. I'm sorry." Garcia sounded genuinely sorry as she spoke to Morgan on the satellite phone.
Billy Flynn was proving to be one of the worse they've ever seen, and his latest crime was proving a bit difficult to profile. It didn't fit with usual behavioral patterns of UNSUBs like him, and their hope was the license plate.
"Sorry is not helping anybody, I need results." Morgan all but yelled at Garcia, and the team shared a look.
Amalya's eyebrow arched, and her posture changed as she looked at Morgan, and it didn't go unnoticed by Hotch. He knew she had something on her mind, and he wasn't sure Morgan was going to like it. He suspected what her next move would be.
"Garcia's got nothing on the partial plate." He informed the rest of the team, a bit more calmly now.
"Really?!" she scoffed, the sarcastic tone couldn't be missed by a layman, let alone a profiler.
"Excuse me?" he said in disbelief.
"What exactly do you want her to do? Fabricate something out of thin air, just because you want results?" Amalya challenged. She knew Derek's subconscious mind caught more than what he was letting on, but his shocked conscious wasn't catching up.
Morgan stood taller and inhaled deeply, inadvertently expanding his chest. "You need to back off." He enunciated in a low, warning tone. His eyes bore into her own. He knew he would never hurt her, physically. But he didn't want to have to use his words either. She'd moved closer to him, and was standing toe-to-toe with him.
Hotch took an almost imperceptible step towards the duo when Morgan stood taller and Amalya got too close to Morgan for Hotch's liking. Consciously, he was sure Morgan would never hurt Amalya – or any other woman for that matter – but his subconscious was the one in control at the moment.
Amalya's only response to Morgan's warning was an audacious smile. "Derek, I've been threatened by larger men, who actually wanted to hurt me." She shot back confidently. "So why don't you lose the tone, and focus?" she snapped. "He may have deviated from our profile, but like you said he's not devolving. So, nothing he did in that house was by chance or a mistake, least of all was leaving behind not one, but two witnesses, one of which was an FBI profiler." She countered defiantly.
"You don't think I went over it a million times, I gave you guys everything I've got." He defended, his voice rising.
"Psychopaths are profilers by nature. He didn't leave you by chance, he knew exactly the kind of state you were going to be in if left behind. Otherwise, your body would've been lying next to Spicer's." She retorted harshly.
"I'm not a victim," he hissed.
"Not his, but of your own damned mind!" she snapped.
The entire room was silent, for whatever reason, no one thought to interfere. No one thought to try and diffuse the situation. They were all enthralled by the exchange. Even the detective.
"What is it that you think I know?" he barked.
"How did he get the drop on you?" she asked calmly, and he looked personally insulted. Like she just punched him in the gut.
"You think I let my guard down? That this is my fault?" he fired back angrily.
She shook her head at him without backing down, or even showing the faintest hints of compassion. "Not what I asked. Stop profiling what you think my question means, and answer me. How did he get the drop on you?" she pressed.
"Am." JJ finally decided to try to interfere. She saw how angry and hurt Morgan was and it hurt her. She knew that he probably registered more than he thought, but she didn't think badgering it out of him was the solution.
"Morgan!" Amalya called determinedly instead, which made it clear she wasn't backing down. Which also explained to JJ why no one else had interfered. They knew it would be pointless.
"He had Kristen and Ellie sitting on the bed in front of the door." He replied.
"Did he reveal himself or knock you out immediately?" she shot off without missing a beat.
"No, he knocked me out as soon as I stepped into the room." He responded.
"What's the first thing you saw when you came to? First thing you laid eyes on?"
Was she even breathing between those questions?
"Ellie was taping my feet together." He stated, and that finally got a reaction out of her. She frowned, clearly not expecting that answer.
"Was Spicer in the room?" she asked, her voice losing the edge it had mere seconds ago, and Morgan immediately recognized the look on her face, and tone of her voice.
"No, he came after." His own voice was softer now, as her frown deepened even further.
"How long were you out?" she wondered.
"A few seconds." He replied, far less resistant now.
"So, Ellie wasn't tied up?" she sought confirmation, and he shook his head.
"I know that tone." Hotch finally pipped up. "What's on your mind?" he asked.
"Ellie tying Morgan wasn't out of convenience; she wasn't tied from the start; Spicer wasn't in the room yet and he could've easily done it himself." She started. "And yet, he has the eight-year-old do it. If it's mind-games he's after, why not wait for Spicer?" she continued.
"Morgan would've come to," Reid suggested. "He couldn't risk him attacking." He added.
"Then I would've found him holding a gun to Ellie's head." Morgan pointed out, and she smiled at him.
"I don't think she's his hostage, I think she's his apprentice." She concluded.
"But every interaction he's had with children so far was an homage to his childhood; why would he take an apprentice now?" JJ inquired.
"That's actually more to Amalya's point. Whoever had him at Ellie's age is the person who shaped who he is now. He's simply passing down the torch." Reid explained.
"It's the ultimate revenge against Spicer." Morgan finished in horror.
They packed up their papers fairly quickly, all very eager to leave. The case was long and difficult, and left all of them with a bad taste in their mouths. They all wanted to be with their families as soon as possible.
"Amalya, can you grab that last box?" Morgan called after her as she slung a bag over her shoulder. Neither one noticed the old woman sitting at a desk filling out some paperwork, who immediately looked up at the mention of the name.
Amalya obliged his request, and grabbed the box. He held the door open with his body for her, and allowed her to pass through it before he leaned off of it, and it slid closed.
They'd barely walked a couple of feet from the entrance, when someone's voice from behind them stopped them.
"Is your name Amalya?" the woman wondered.
"Yeah." Amalya replied, a bit cautiously.
"Amalya Youssef Dawoud Hanna?" the woman prattled off the names, much to Amalya's surprise, and the entire team's discomfort.
Rossi and Hotch had already placed their boxes inside the SUVs, so they walked towards Morgan and Amalya who seemed frozen in their place. And they didn't particularly like it when the woman started to move closer to Amalya.
"You've grown." She commented, and Amalya's eyebrows shot up her forehead.
"I'm sorry, do I know you?" she wondered.
"I suppose I shouldn't be surprised you didn't recognize me," the woman started. "My name is Vivian Anderson," she started, and Amalya's eyes started to darken as her entire posture changed. She was starting to doubt the woman's identity. "But my maiden name was Thompson. Vivian Thompson." She finished.
"What do you want?" Amalya's voice was dark, menacing even. And it surprised them all. They hadn't heard that tone from her since Foyet. So, who was this woman to warrant such a tone from her? What could she have done?
"I want to talk." The woman – Vivian – responded simply.
"We have nothing to say to each other." Her voice was neutral now. No emotions. No anger. Just dryness.
And with that she turned around towards the SUVs, and started to walk towards them again.
"I thought they raised you better than that." Vivian called after her.
Big mistake! They all thought. It didn't need profilers to realize the woman meant Amalya's late parents, whom she was very protective of.
She turned around, and was about to step towards her when Hotch's voice from behind her made her stop.
"Lya!"
He'd never called her that. Only two other people ever called her that.
The nickname surprised Hotch himself, but if it made her stop, he wasn't complaining.
She hissed something at the woman in Arabic, and Rossi bit the inside of his cheek to hide his smirk. She was right; it did sound different when you're using it to rip someone's head off.
"And don't you dare pretend not to understand, because I know you do." She spat at the end, before she turned back around, and headed straight for the car. Without a word to the team, or even a glance towards the woman who apparently managed to enrage their usually hard-to-piss-off teammate. She put the box in the back of the SUV, and made her way towards the driver seat, and climbed in.
"I guess she's driving." Morgan muttered quietly.
"Care to disagree with her?" Rossi argued, and he shook his head.
Hotch climbed in next to her, along with Reid, and silently handed her the keys. Morgan, Rossi, Emily and JJ all took the other car.
To their surprise, when they made it to the air-strip, they found the other car parked, with its occupants unloading the trunks already.
"How did you guys make it here before we did when I'm driving?" Morgan wondered in disbelief, and Reid simply looked over at Amalya – who was handing her go back to the cargo worker – and looked back at him in bemusement.
"I think someone finally has you beat." He teased, and Morgan chuckled.
Morgan found her sitting by the window in the double seats, so he took the one on the other side of the table, and Rossi took the one next to her. Hotch sat next to Morgan, and the rest scattered. They all wanted to understand what had happened, but they decided to wait for lift off.
She seemed lost in thought, staring out the window at the runway as the plane gained speed and lifted off. Once they reached cruising altitude, she snapped out of her own thoughts when Rossi sat back down next to her – she wasn't even aware that he'd gotten up – and slid a tumbler in his hand towards her.
She took it from him, and smiled appreciatively at him, before she gulped the liquid down in one swig.
"I guess I owe you an apology for low-key threatening you." Morgan quipped, and she chuckled.
"Low-key?" she teased, and he laughed. "No apology needed, Morgan. I knew you would never follow through, and whatever you would've said I would've ignored. Someone had to be the villain who pushed you when you were down, and I didn't mind being cast in that role." She said softly.
"You know, I will say this to my dying breath; but I have never seen someone whose looks are as deceiving as yours." He said, and she laughed.
"Selim thinks it's what makes me so deadly." She told him, and he scoffed.
"I concur." He chuckled.
She sighed, as she sat up straighter. "I guess I owe you guys an explanation."
"Only if you want to." Rossi offered.
"She knew her full name." Reid interjected. His worry that this woman might be a danger to them evident.
"Yeah, because she's my mother." She dead-panned, and they all gaped at her.
"I thought you said she passed away after you graduated." Emily was the first to find her voice.
Amalya smiled as she pulled at the necklace around her neck; only the chain was visible from her boat-neck blouse, and she fumbled with it until she found the lock and released it. She pulled out of her blouse, and put it on the table between them. The silver pendant was intricate and beautiful. At first glance, you could tell it was quite complex.
"It's Isis, kneeling down on one knee, the eye of Horus between her wings," Reid immediately started to count off the symbols. "But I can't quite make what's inside the eye. I can see a cross, but don't understand what's around it." He added.
"It's the crescent; the symbol for Islam since they base their calendar on the lunar cycle." She explained. "The combination of the cross and the crescent is an homage to the harmony between both religions in Egypt. And Isis and the Eye of Horus are pretty self-explanatory." She elaborated.
"Isis was the Goddess of life and magic, while the eye of Horus symbolizes protection." Reid prattled.
"My father used to call me Teiba, Arabic for Thebes." She started, "and also what Luxor was called during Ancient Egypt, and what Egypt is sometimes referred to." She explained. "Vivian moved with her parents to Alexandria when she was three, stayed there till she was fourteen, before they moved back to the States. She came back as a college graduate to finish her thesis about the Roman's time in Egypt. She met my father, they got married and a few years later, I came by. About six months after that, she decided that she wasn't really into the whole 'motherhood' thing, and took off." She began her story. "Copts don't get divorced, so he couldn't really re-marry." She continued. "Luckily for both of us, his best friend, and business partner – ironically named Youssef as well – lived on the same floor as us, along with his wife; Thuraya. But they didn't have children; so, she took me in. She'd watch me all day, cook for all of us, my father would come by after they were done for the day, we would all have dinner together, then we would retire to our apartment." She paused to catch her breath, her fingers fumbling with the pendant that was still lying on the table between them. She looked up and saw them listening intently to her. "It stayed like that until I was six, when my father passed away unexpectantly." She stated, and heard JJ gasp softly. "And that's when Vivian came out of the woodwork," she chuckled dryly. "You see, he owned quite the successful business, and it was all in my name." she stated, and Hotch – forever the former prosecutor – immediately caught on.
"She'd be your legal guardian, and have full access to the money."
"That's what she thought," Amalya smiled predatorily at him. "You see, the law in Egypt is different when it comes to the inheritance of a minor." She ran her tongue over her lips to moisten them, and it took everything within Hotch not to follow the movement with his eyes. "For starters; she doesn't get unsupervised access to the money. The government puts it into sort of a trust; it doesn't make profit, but you can't withdraw from it at will either. The money tied in the business will remain in the business making profit, and they will designate a sum of money to be given to the legal guardian monthly to help with my expenses. And you have to provide proper paperwork for any unexpected expenses, but it's usually a reimbursement." She elaborated.
"But she could still be your guardian; and if she was never divorced in the eyes of the government, she also gets a monthly allowance, if I remember correctly." Emily interjected.
"Well, the money and the business were in my name, so no she doesn't get anything until I'm dead. As for the guardianship; both she and I have to be physically in the country for her to see a dime. She sets foot out of the country, and she loses guardianship."
"And that's when she bolted again." Morgan deduced.
"Not before she tried to claim religious persecution!" she almost sing-songed.
"How?" Rossi was baffled. "Why would your father's family persecute you?"
"My father's parents were long gone by then, and his only sister worked with the UN at the time and traveled a lot, so I couldn't stay with her. Youssef and Thuraya were the ones who took me." She alluded.
"So?" JJ wasn't quite sure how that made it 'religious persecution'.
"They're Muslim." Hotch revealed simply, and they all gawked at him, save for Amalya.
"I read your file." He told them, though he was looking at Amalya.
"When you said that my complex background would give me a leg up, I knew you meant that part. Sort of surprised you didn't share it with them though," she confessed.
"It's not my story to tell." He said simply.
"So, she claimed they were going to force you into Islam." Emily hinted, and Amalya nodded.
"Of course, when the Consulate employee asked me about that; I told him where she can put that claim." She quipped, and they all laughed. "In case you guys haven't put it together yet, I always had a mouth on me." She joked.
"Oh, I have no doubt." Morgan purred with a bantering tone, and she grinned at him.
"So, the cross and crescent is you; inside the eye of Horus, looked over by Isis. The Egyptian who was born a Christian and raised by Muslims." Rossi realized.
"I think that's the first time anyone has ever profiled a pendant, Rossi," she teased. "But, yes, precisely. I was the perfect mesh of it all."
"Thebes. The land that stood the test of time." Rossi said in a narrator-like voice, as he pulled the necklace off the table by the open lock. Amalya turned around in the seat, and moved her hair to the side as he secured it around her neck. "Wear it proudly, kiddo." He murmured in a fatherly tone.
"I would love to, but it's one of a kind. I was dabbling once as I studied, and drew this. Dad had it custom-made for my high school graduation. If it tore off during a struggle or a chase, and I lost it…" she trailed off, and he nodded in understanding at her.
"And you haven't heard from her since?" Reid asked, and she shook her head.
"Nope. She didn't even come to the consulate inquiry, it was a simple 'ship her to me once you're done', and when it led nowhere…" she shrugged her shoulders. "That's why I didn't recognize her. I saw only one picture of her when I was four, I think, and after he passed away and she pulled that stunt, I threw it away. So, I have no memory of her." She recalled.
"And your parents never spoke of her?" Morgan wondered.
"They tried to give me the 'she's your mother, you can't talk ill of her' spiel, but I told them if they don't want me to badmouth her, then to stop bringing her up. And they agreed. They never forced anything on me; they even told me they won't be mad if I contacted her. But I never had the desire, even after they passed. Their siblings had never treated me differently, or like I didn't belong, so they were my family and that was that."
"Her loss." Emily observed, and she smiled gratefully at her.
"Do you ever wish for it to be different?" Reid wondered. He'd always wished for his life to be different growing up, and wanted to see if she shared the same sentiment.
"Only for my parents, and my father to have not died. I never wished for a life with her; because it would've meant a life without them. And I had a damn good life with them. I mean, Egypt is different when it comes to religious holidays. There are certain traditions that are followed regardless of what the occasion is. Spiritually speaking, it's completely different than anywhere I've ever been." She mused.
"Yeah, I remember Ramadan. They had killer pastries that were only made for Ramadan, and everyone made them. Didn't matter if you were Muslim or not; you made or bought the pastries. And you bought those special lanterns for your kids." Emily reminisced.
"Woah, woah. You didn't say anything about any special foods!" Morgan interjected.
"Well, it's not like I can run down to the corner shop and get the ingredients. Some of them are available in Turkish and Lebanese places, but they're done a bit differently." Amalya countered.
"Well, you took Rossi and Hotch. You need to take us too, this isn't fair, mama." He whined.
"Yes, dear." She batted her eyelashes at him, and he grinned back at her.
"Oh, what was that song?" Emily asked her, squealing with glee when Amalya started singing.
They passed the time with stories of Emily's time in Cairo, Amalya explaining different songs, traditions and foods, and the occasional banter between them. And before they knew it, the four hours between California and Washington had passed and they were once again back at the FBI's airstrip. Morgan had wanted to hit the restraunt, but they were all beat, and the night concluded with Amalya promising him to take them the next time they get off work early.
Hotch didn't even attempt to head for the elevator, and instead got into his car and drove off.
"What the hell is the woman doing to Hotch!" Morgan exclaimed.
I thought Emily's time in Egypt that was mentioned when she first joined the team would be a nice way for her and Amalya to bond.
This chapter does feel a bit like a filler, and I am trying my best to combine the fillers as much as possible. Let me know what you all think.