Every now and again, a consulting agent would join the BAU on their flights to their destination and almost every time, the agent would either feel air-sick or be so distracted by flying in a private jet, hardly any work would get done from their end. Hotch would always give a surprisingly amount of leeway, unbeknownst to the rest of the team that the first time he flew this way, he spent most of the time hugging the toilet seat in between sips of strong ginger tea, shouting suggestions from the cracked open door. JJ would console and have sympathy for first time flyers, and Prentiss, wanting to remain professional and impartial, simply opted to remain completely ignorant and just continued working away. Besides, she had grown up as a Diplomat's daughter, and the idea of luxury travel was not new to her. Reid however, would offer trivia on the inner mechanics of air-sickness very enthusiastically which would normally drive the visiting agent to stumble to the bathroom and Morgan would tease Reid about how it was a new record for someone to walk away from his conversations. Rossi would place a hand on Reid's shoulder and say something like "maybe next time kiddo." As he chuckled to himself.
This time however, there was no visiting agent, just the regular team of Aaron Hotchner, Derek Morgan, Spencer Reid, Emily Prentiss, Jennifer Jarau, and David Rossi. There was also no excitement about flying, partly because they had been grounded for forty minutes and partly because the case in hand was becoming more of an issue by the second. There was however, a surprising case of what appeared to be air-sickness within ten minutes of leaving the jetway.
"Is there something on my face?" Queried Reid, pre-emptively wiping his mouth and glancing down at his jumper with a puzzled expression on his face.
"No…you just look a little on the pale side that's all." Replied Prentiss, having had her head cocked and brow slightly furrowed for the last thirty seconds at Reid.
Reid shrugged and considered giving a fact about the causes of differential skin pallor, but now that he was thinking about it, he did feel a little off. He hadn't noticed with the drama surrounding the delayed take-off and Hotch wanting to immediately dive into the case at hand - an UNSUB who was particularly interested in identical twins but with no apparent sexual motive. Reid reached for the bottle of water in his go-bag and took a few swigs before diving into his analysis.
"So," began Reid "I think we could be looking at a case inspired in part by Josef Mengele, otherwise known as 'The Angel of Death', I think this UNSUB is actually performing experiments on these individuals in order to come up with scientific conclusions. Mengele was know for his genetic research so we could be looking for someone with a medical background or similar."
Reid finished speaking rather hurriedly as he clasped his left hand to his mouth and took a moment to compose himself - a wave of nausea had just hit him and there was a chill in the air of the cabin he had not noticed before. They had been in the air for eight minutes and thirty-two seconds at this point, and still had three hours and four minutes left of flight time.
"I'll get Garcia to start research but it's still not enough to go off yet." Replied Hotch, glancing from the young man in front of him down at his case file which had not been fleshed out as much as he would have liked by now. Reid's theory did seem to fit, but theory wasn't enough - they needed facts.
"With the lack of any apparent sexual motive," continued Hotch "I'd like to do a further dive of the autopsy to look for evidence of experimentation, Morgan - can you patch us through to Garcia and bring up the findings?"
Morgan nodded and reached over Reid to grab the laptop that was, for some reason, sitting in from of him. As he lifted up the machine Morgan noticed Reid had his hands clasped together in a tense manner, his knuckles pale and if he wasn't mistaken, a slight tremor was evident. Noticing that Morgan was tracking his hand movement, Reid unclasped his hands and placed them in his lap as casually as he felt was necessary to avoid suspicion. Thankfully within seconds, an animated voice echoed from the laptop's speaker.
"Miss Penelope Garcia at your service, how may I help you with this call today?" She said in a faux-formal manner then let out a small giggle.
"Hey sweet thang, looking gorgeous as always," started Morgan but quickly taking notice of Hatch's impatient face glaring from next to Reid's uncomfortable one.
"Listen, you know I'd love to chat but can you bring up the autopsy findings from the latest set of twins for me? We're looking for anything out of the ordinary beyond the normal signs of a struggle."
Thankfully Garcia took the hint and got to work silently, bringing up the photos from the medical examiner's office.
"Wait Garcia, go back to the previous one." Said Prentiss suddenly, leaning in to huddle next to Reid in order to get a closer look. She squinted her eyes and stared for a few moments at what looked like a left arm belonging to a twelve-year old boy on a metal table.
Reid could smell Emily's perfume, the same one she had worn for several years and yet in the small confines of the cabin it seemed to be ten times as strong and sickly sweet. The smell combined with the carousal of autopsy photos was becoming a sensory nightmare and a fresh wave of nausea hit up so strong he actually considered excusing himself from the meeting.
"Um, Reid? Are you okay?"
A voice pulled him from the strange sensory trance he had been in during Emily's silent analysis and he looked up to find Rossi, who had just spoken, as well as JJ and Morgan staring at him in half bewilderment and half amusement. At first Reid was confused, a rare feeling for him, but as he went to speak he realised he had been making a face of disgust and discomfort that he originally only thought he was internalising.
"Oh, yea, er, I was just looking at the photos, it's pretty horrific right?" He said clumsily in a weak excuse to keep the truth from showing.
"Nothing we've not seen before." Replied Emily casually as she leant away from Reid.
"Well I've got a migraine too." Quipped Reid, far faster and harsher than he had meant to.
He didn't know why he just didn't say he wasn't feeling well, after all air-sickness was perfectly common with eight percent of the population experiencing it during short haul flights. Perhaps he didn't like to think of himself of someone who gets 'common ailments' or perhaps he knew that this wasn't air-sickness at all but something different - something more sinister. He took another swig of water and pretended to be busy with a fastening the lid until someone spoke again.
Prentiss knew better than to be offended by a short tone, especially from Reid, and launched into her analysis.
"We've got needle marks, here and and here," pointing to various parts of the boys arm, "and what looks like a small chunk of hair taken from just below the occipital bone but it looks cut like with scissors or a knife, not torn from the struggle of the kidnap."
Emily looked at Reid kindly as he screwed on the water bottle lid for the seventh time and said,
"Looks like you're right, I'm backing the twin experiment theory too."
Reid nodded slowly and rubbed his face unconsciously, his mind swimming with ideas but none of them reaching the surface just yet.