Aitana brought her game tonight even if it meant feeling her soreness each time she moved quicker than she should. Still, she was very proud when she fit the last piece of the puzzle before Spencer could even reach for the damn thing.

"Ha! Yes! I win—" She had barely cheered with fists in the air when she felt the sharp jab on her side and was forced to pull her arms down. She settled for one mock salute afterwards.

Spencer was only holding his laugh because it looked like she'd hurt herself badly. "I, uh, thought this was supposed to be a friendly puzzle..." He remarked, pushing his chair closer to the table.

Aitana snorted, very subtle passing a hand over her wound. The kitchen table thankfully hid the movement from Spencer. "You do realize that everyone else was happy to tell me that you're secretly competitive, right?"

"Spencer frowned. "I'm not competitive."

"That's not what Morgan swears."

"I'm not!"

Aitana raised a hand, indicating she would pause the argument. "You know what? Because you so kindly came over to lend me a new book and you actually sat down to do a puzzle with me, I'm going to pretend that Morgan wasn't right. You've given me some fun on this solitary evening of mine."

Spencer deadpanned her. "Wow, so big of you. Thanks."

Aitana smiled proudly. "Yes, I am."

Spencer pretended to disapprove of her tidbits. She was right, though, in that the evening had turned out to be a little more fun than expected. Keeping true to his promise, he had let her borrow some of his books while she recuperated at home. Tonight, he'd stopped by to pick up the finished book from her and to give her a new one in place. He found her alone at home doing a puzzle and when she asked if he wanted to stay for a bit, he couldn't refuse. More to the fact that he actually liked doing puzzles, he wasn't fond of the idea of her being alone while she was healing a bullet wound. In the case of an emergency, it would be better if someone was with her. It was also a better way to spend his free evenings. He had found himself drifting to JJ's home a lot more lately and he would like to give her couch a break. Aitana seemed to help distract him in a good way.

So, she allowed him to help her with her puzzle. Somehow along the way, it may have turned into an unspoken race to see who could finish it first. She did, apparently. It was all still very shocking to Spencer.

"Alright, I'm sorry," Aitana said in the end, offering him one genuine smile. "I may get a little competitive myself."

"Noo," Spencer feigned shock.

"But it's not often I can do it with puzzles!" she exclaimed. "My family doesn't do them and Elia thinks they're kind of stupid so I'm usually only competitive with myself. But now I have you!"

"Lucky me…"

"I'll stop," Aitana said, leading Spencer to laugh.

"No, it's fine. But you do know that I let you win, right?"

Aitana raised an eyebrow at him. "Oh? You let me win?"

Spencer nodded, now growing his own smirk. "Sorry to tell you the truth, but you don't get a pass just because you have an injury."

Her 'ha!' echoed in the kitchen. "We'll just see about that," she warned. She reached for the puzzle box and pulled the lid open. "You know I have like a hundred more of these boxes, right?" She asked as she started dumping their finished puzzle into the box.

"Are they actually challenging?" Spencer was full blown proud of himself by this point. He couldn't tell if the incredulous shock on Aitana's face was real or not but he liked it either way.

"Oh, oh, it's on!" she pointed at him. "It is so on! Just you wait!"

"I look forward to it," he said, flashing her a casual smile that just irked her even more.

Before she said anything else, they heard the front door opening. Spencer didn't even have the time to consider the possibility of an intruder when a familiar voice called.

"Aitana?"

"Kitchen!" Aitana didn't look up from the puzzle she was dumping into the box.

Spencer recognized Angel when he walked into the room.

"We have visitors?" He looked at Spencer with some curiosity.

"Competition," Aitana corrected, shooting Spencer a little mock-glare.

Spencer smiled only briefly now. It was hard not to feel self conscious around Angel after everything that happened — things that almost happened. He was beginning to realize that he had actually spent quite a few hours with Aitana tonight. There was nothing wrong with it of course (they hadn't done anything wrong) but there was the senseless guilt gnawing at him anyways.

"I'm sorry, what was the name again?" Angel asked.

Spencer cleared his throat as he pulled himself up from his chair. "Spencer Reid," he could only wave a hand at Angel.

"I'm Angel, nice to see you again. Sorry, I forget just about everything."

"His head wouldn't be there if it wasn't attached," Aitana remarked and smirked when Angel shot her a look.

"Ignoring her," Angel pulled his attention off her a second later. "If you stayed with her voluntarily, I commend you."

"Uh, it was…" Spencer was naturally puzzled with the words. They seemed a little harsh, in his opinion.

Aitana rolled her eyes at the comment. "Don't mind him, he's extra rude when he comes home from work."

"I own a restaurant so I deal with a lot of people," Angel exhaled a heavy breath, his dark eyes widening as he probably thought of his day. "We had multiple big parties today, so..."

Spencer nodded. That sounded hectic and definitely not what he would want to do with his day. "I should get going," he said.

"What?" Aitana blinked in surprise. "But I said it was on! You can't leave once I say it's on!"

Spencer smiled at her. It was a whole other side he was seeing of her and it was very amusing.

"She is so competitive, don't mind her," Angel shook his head.

"I am not!"

"Right."

"It's fine, Aitana, you need to rest. Penelope really wants you to come back already." Spencer counted at least a dozen moments in which Penelope said those exact words. She had grown attached to Aitana working as co-liaison partners.

"Do you mean to tell me it's just Penelope who wants me back?" Aitana feigned offence. "Nobody else?"

"Of course we all want you back," Spencer amended his fault even if he didn't have any. "But to do that, you do need to rest."

Aitana sighed. "Fine, but you're not off the hook."

"God forbid you get off the hook," Angel reiterated with a small laugh to follow.

Aitana chose to ignore him. "Thanks for the books, Spencer. I'll take good care of them, I promise."

He had no doubt that she would. She was the most organized person in the team. "I'm glad they're helping with the boredom. I'll see you soon."

She nodded. "Yup!" If it was up to her, she'd already be back at the BAU.

"Bye." For some reason, Spencer left in a hasty manner like he was trying to get away. He was smart enough to know why but it was better to pretend to be confused. It saved him the embarrassment.

"I cannot believe you forced that poor guy to do a puzzle with you," Angel said as soon as they heard the front door close. "Seriously? Did you want to torture him like that?"

Aitana rolled her eyes as she finished placing the lid over her puzzle box. "Some people actually like doing puzzles and for your information, Spencer is one of them."

Angel snorted at the idea. "Why?" He headed for the kitchen cabinets.

"They're relaxing!"

"Not with you! Ten bucks says you got competitive with him." Angel paused to see Aitana's face and was more than pleased with himself to see her looking away with guilt. "I knew it." He snagged a glass from the cabinet and headed for the filter.

"It's not my fault," Aitana shrugged. "You and Mateo never wanted to do puzzles with me. I always did them by myself so now that I actually have a friend who likes to do puzzles, I want to keep my winning streak." Angel shook his head at her then drank water. "And I'm going to keep them, eidetic memory or not."

Angel snorted again, nearly choking on his water because of it. "It's not healthy to be that competitive, you know."

"It's fun." Aitana gathered her puzzle box and got out of her chair.

"You're going to run him off, you know!"

Aitana smirked. "Doubt it. He invited me to the movies Friday."

"Oh!" Angel barely made a face when Aitana added that it was a group invitation. It was nowhere near what he was thinking.

"There's a movie that Penelope wants to watch," Aitana said, shrugging her shoulders. "So there's your FYI. You better cook dinner yourself tonight."

Angel snorted then fully laughed. "When do you ever cook dinner for me!?"

Aitana rolled her eyes and decided to head upstairs for some relaxing reading. She did have something new to read after all.

~0~

On Friday, Aitana received an apology text from Penelope because they'd gotten a new case and their movie plans were unfortunately put on hold. Aitana sent back a response assuring her that she of course understood.

She spent the weekend moving around as much as she could without forcing herself too much. The idea was to slowly ease her body back to her old routine so she could finally go back to work.

She went around her room organizing her things. Her shelves had gathered dust from her bed rest days and her poor plants needed more of her attention. Even her fish tank downstairs got a well deserved cleaning. After she felt like her home was decent enough to live in, she got to reading the books Spencer let her borrow. He'd been so nice this whole recuperation time, letting her read from his personal shelves. She wasn't a big reader growing up, at least not out of her favorite subjects (space and marine life). And wouldn't you know it, the first book that Spencer let her borrow was a space fiction story. After that, Spencer started bringing her a few classics he thought she might like.

This time, it was Crime and Punishment. Aitana couldn't help her smile when she first saw the title. It turned out to be a book of moral dilemmas, reminding her of the trolley problem (which she would happily compare to when Spencer asked her about the book). It was fascinating and she couldn't wait to find out how it ended. She hoped to finish soon. She had an inkling fear that Spencer was too nice to tell her not to take too much time with his book. She learned well by now how he was with his things and she did not want to upset him by any means.

She was so deep into her book that she almost missed Penelope's text message on Sunday night.

Hey Sprinkles! I know it's a little late but I managed to convince the others to go to the movies! If you're interested, we can pick you up!

Aitana answered within the minute. Of course she was ready to go at any time. And even though she insisted on getting to the theater on her own, Penelope insisted that she should take it easy. Seaver would pick her up. And in an hour, Seaver was at her front step.

"You're going out?" Angel caught the pair unexpectedly just as they were getting ready to leave. "Kinda late, don't you think?"

"What are you? My mother?" Aitana playfully rolled her eyes.

"Well, I know Pamela wouldn't like it."

Seaver smiled at the pair. "It'll just be a movie," she assured Angel but Aitana scoffed.

"Please don't indulge him. He thinks he's so cool being an annoying big brother."

"It's a fun job," Angel said with a completely serious face. Seaver had to laugh.

"Goodbye!" Aitana ushered Seaver out so she could shut the door. "God I hate him sometimes!"

"He's funny," Seaver remarked on the way to her car. "I always wanted a sibling…"

"You want him?" Aitana gestured back to the house. "You can have him. Or Mateo, really. He's my other brother. Both of them are up for grabs, seriously."

Seaver laughed again. She unlocked the car so they could get in. "I just thought it would be fun having someone else in the house. A sibling would've made a big difference."

"I guess they would," Aitana would have to agree. As rowdy as her childhood had been with Mateo and Angel around, she couldn't fathom the idea of living as an only child. "It would be too quiet without them," she realized. "My house was always loud. Angel's my step brother so he wasn't always in our house. He came by every weekend but even then, it was still loud."

Seaver turned the ignition on and soon drove into the street. "You know my childhood," she said with a sigh. "It was so quiet at times. I could hear every little noise in the house."

"You didn't have friends over?" Aitana curiously asked. "I always had Elia over too."

Seaver shook her head. "Not a lot. My father didn't really like them coming over."

"Oh, sorry about that…"

Seaver didn't seem to think long about it. She had long ago learned to move past the troubles in her home.

"You're more than welcome to stop by my place anytime you want," Aitana promised, "As annoying as Angel is, he's actually really easy going. It's why we work as roommates."

"Looks like it," Seaver chuckled. "I've never met any pair of siblings willingly living together, honestly."

"Ah, well, there's a reason why we have this arrangement," Aitana admitted. "I, um, had a lot of trouble living by myself after coming out of WPP. My parents had been looking for a while to rent the house so they decided to let me rent it. And I know they didn't want to say it out loud but I knew that they didn't really trust me to live on my own yet. Angel offered to pay half the rent. I couldn't say no."

"I'm sorry about that too," Seaver said. "It's ironic how many different ways there are to ruin a person who's lived peacefully all their lives."

Aitana hummed in agreement. "I was different," she said. "I know that I'm better now but I also know that I will never be who I used to be, not with the things I saw and lived through."

"I can share that sentiment too," Seaver said and shared a small laugh with Aitana. "The things that my father did...I could never go back to being who I used to be before we found out what he was. And I tried…"

"Yeah, we always try," Aitana whispered, falling distant with the memories of her failed attempts to reintegrate into society after WPP. "I went through so many jobs within the FBI. The leniency they had with me...dear Lord."

"I changed my name," Seaver reminded lightly, exchanging a brief glance with Aitana. "I was naive for thinking I wouldn't have to do it. The stares that I used to get…"

Aitana sympathetically looked at the woman. That would have to be something hard to live with.

~0~

"They're parking," Penelope looked up from her phone to Morgan and Spencer. "We should start buying the tickets. Save Aitana the extra walk."

"Well, we could've avoided it altogether if someone had just postponed the plans for later," Morgan shot her a look. She was so eager, as usual, to go out even after what felt like the longest case.

"Shush," Penelope waved him off. "She's bored. And I want to see a movie!"

"Can't be that bored…" Morgan swayed his head in Spencer's direction, leaving the man little time to ready himself for the inevitable teasing, "Not when Pretty Boy over here is stopping by every night to see her." Penelope snickered between them.

"I am not!" Spencer frowned.

"But you have been several times," Morgan flashed him a smirk.

Spencer's eyes landed on Penelope, accusing her for all this. She should know better than to tell Morgan this kind of stuff. She had the decency to smile a little bashfully.

"So has Penelope, so has Seaver," he said as his genius defense.

"Yeah, but you're doing puzzles with her and lending her books…"

"Talking about fishes and space," Penelope decided to add, giggling when Spencer glared at her. "Oh c'mon, you guys talked for guys about her little space project for her fish tank! It was really cute!"

Spencer shook his head at the pair. It was all harmless talking and they knew it. He knew it. It was actually really fun getting to know more about Aitana's side projects at home. She was more in depth than anyone at the BAU would expect their liaison/profiler to be. For the past 7 months, she'd been thoroughly focused on healing and reintegrating, leaving very few moments to really get to know her. Now she was beginning to open up and she was turning out to be a very interesting person. She was huge on space and, by an odd extension, fishes. He even learned that she had been president of an astrology club in her old high school. She had more plants than she needed to, she was constantly on the hunt for new fishes for her tank, she liked to dance, and there was still much more to her. She was surprisingly competitive when it came to doing puzzles, though he should've seen that coming with her little playful point system with him. Her easy going nature provided for a comfortable atmosphere, a trusting atmosphere. It was easy talking to her and therefore spending time with her, even alone.

To say, she even made it a little easier to tell her more of the situation with his mother. He still felt guilty for lashing out at her on their last case and though she had every right to still be upset with him about it, she welcomed anything he wanted to talk about. Everything was nice, everything was easy. The last thing he needed was for it to shatter because of some incessant, baseless accusations. Everyone also seemed to conveniently forget that Aitana was very much in a relationship. That alone proved she was just a friend.

"Hey there Sprinkles," Penelope was the first to greet Aitana when she and Seaver joined them. They already had the tickets and were merely waiting for the group to be together.

"Hey," Aitana waved before hurriedly stuffing her hand into her pocket. She was a little cold. "You guys look like crap, no offence."

"Just because it's you, I'm going to let it go," Morgan sarcastically wagged a finger at her.

Aitana's small laugh was short but it appeared like she could laugh freely without feeling the pain of her wound now. "Spencer, still reading the book. Might hang onto it for a couple more days if that's alright."

"Take your time," he said. "And I always have more."

"Yeah, I'm sure you do," she nodded, chuckling.

"More space?" Morgan asked with a healthy tease smile.

"Don't diss it," Aitana waved him off. Penelope started leading the way into the theater. "You know I was president of my astronomy club in high school?"

"And that's supposed to be cool?"

"It sounds cool to me," Seaver said, earning a grateful 'thank you' from Aitana.

"I even got us a camping trip to see the constellations! We saw Ursa Major on the first night, then Cepheus and Cassiopeia the following nights!"

"What? No shooting stars?" Morgan reached for the entry door first to hold for the others.

"Unfortunately, nothing fell from the sky those three days," Aitana dramatically sighed.

"You know, it's estimated that 60 tons of debris falls from space each day into our atmosphere," Spencer remarked.

Aitana scrunched her face at the fact. "I think I would've seen it."

He smiled. "A lot of it is microscopic particles that burn up when they enter the atmosphere."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah, a lot of it ends up falling into the ocean."

"Those lucky fishes!"

Spencer laughed with her. From behind, Penelope nudged Morgan. She mouthed 'this is what I meant' to him, and consequently, Seaver. The two had a fairly amusing time understanding exactly what she meant.

~0~

"Unnecessary!" Penelope huffed as soon as they were out of the theater. Not even the chillier air could distract her from the deep disappointment of their movie. "There's too much blood and gore and eew!"

"Garcia, it's a slasher film," Spencer reminded her. "How do you do a slasher film without violence?"

"You imply it!"

"Baby, the movie is called "Slice 6." What were you expecting?" Morgan could barely hold his laugh for her sake.

"A refreshing beverage with a twist of comedy!?"

"That's what you got from the title?" Aitana made a face. "I would think the word 'slice' is a dead giveaway of what the genre was."

Penelope did not care for reason. "I'm gonna have nightmares for a week!"

"With everything that we do and see on a daily basis, that got to you?" Seaver had to ask because from a logical point, it didn't make sense.

"Listen, newbie, you may be all Sigourney Weaver ass-kicking tough, which is awesome, but the mystical mavens of innocence like myself jump at things that go bump in the night!"

"Why are you worried? I'm sure that Morgan will protect you," Spencer gestured to the man, though he added with a growing smirk: "As long as he's not jumping out of his chair like a prepubescent schoolgirl." The others snickered.

"The only reason I jumped is 'cause you guys woke me up," Morgan said.

"How could you sleep during that?" Aitana asked. Several people had screamed around them multiple times.

"Easy. They dragged me out after a 12-hour workday...for what? You telling me that girl didn't know that the unsub was waiting for her upstairs? Come on, now."

"Villain," Spencer corrected.

"What?"

"Villain. In movies, unsubs are called villains."

Morgan playfully rolled his eyes. "My bad."

"You want to know why horror movies are so successful?"

"Why is that, genius?"

"They prey on our instinctual need to survive. In tribal days, a woman's scream would signal danger and the men would return from hunting to protect their pack. That's why it's always the women and not the men who fall victim to the bogeyman."

"Count on you, Reid, to break a movie down to science," Seaver said with eyebrows raised. At this point, she shouldn't even be surprised.

"I don't know, if you ever meet my maternal grandmother, the boogeyman will seem scarier," Aitana said, causing an eruption of laughter from the group. "She's got a tough attitude if you cross her."

"Oh, so we know where you get it from then," Morgan smirked. "Spicy Sprinkles."

She rolled her eyes at him. She would keep in the fact her parents often said the same thing. He didn't need the extra ammunition.

"I actually like horror movies but I need to be mentally prepared for them," Penelope said, thankfully changing the topic. "My favorite thing about horror movies is the suspense factor."

"Ah, the ticking clock," Spencer hummed. "The helpless victim walks through the dark. Shadows reaching out to get her. A sudden noise draws her attention. Is someone there, or is it just in her head?"

"Still, it's totally unrealistic," Penelope said, "No one should be walking through a dark alley by themselves at night."

"Ahem, hello?" Morgan made a clear gesture to himself.

"Ah," Penelope immediately endeavored to fix her mistake, "No one should be walking through a dark alley without a Derek Morgan by their side."

"But the best part of a horror movie is you never know when the end is gonna come," Spencer said. Their movie had ended suddenly on them, leaving a big 'what if?' for the audience to leave with.

"Unfortunately, that's also how it goes in real life," Aitana said, folding her arms over her chest. She turned around to the group, smiling wryly at them. "And with that, I bid you all goodnight."

"Oh, what a lovely send off," Morgan remarked.

Aitana mocked a bow, almost losing it when Penelope exclaimed a sharp 'Oh my god!' and tried straightening her back up. "Your wound!" She reminded.

Aitana laughed. "Pen, I'm good. Doctor says that I'll be able to go back to work next Monday."

"That'll be good," Seaver nodded, "We really need you around."

"I'll be back, promise," Aitana raised a hand. "I can't wait, honestly."

"Well you take care of yourself," Penelope said, reaching over to close Aitana's coat. "We want you nice and healthy for Monday."

Aitana promised her that she would take care of herself. She was going crazy at home doing nothing. She couldn't wait to go back to work. She just hoped she didn't miss anything important in the meantime. She also hoped that the first case back would be an easier one to prove for sure that she was just fine.

A/N:

If it wasn't obvious, this is pretty much a filler chapter ;). Sometimes, they're needed!

P.S. As always, I have an AO3/Wattpad account under "noblecrescent" and a tumblr account under "saiilorstars" if you'd like to follow!