The night of the Super Bowl, Jessica accompanied Gideon to the Smithsonian. Though she'd never been much of an artist herself, she did find other people's art interesting. Especially the Audubon etching that the curator showed them. However, she was less interested when Gideon started talking about mockingbird cries. Imitating birds, people, machinery—that was all well and good for people who could hear them.
When the call came in about the double homicide, Gideon took Jessica to the office with him, deciding to pass her off to Garcia there. Jessica waited at Reid's desk, sadly staring at a photo of herself with Patches. She was fairly certain that hadn't been on his desk the last time she was here.
A few minutes later, the team emerged from the conference room. Reid headed over to Jessica. "Sorry we got called in," he apologized. "We can rent a James Bond movie when I get back."
Jessica sighed. "It's okay. Just…make sure you do come back."
"Have I ever not?" Reid gave her a hug, then followed the team to the elevators.
Garcia gave Jessica a curious look. "James Bond movie? What's that about?"
Jessica swallowed. "My parents died two years ago tomorrow. We used to watch a lot of James Bond movies together, so last year Spencer suggested we do that as a tradition to honor them."
Garcia smiled sadly. "That's sweet. Come on, I'll let you use a monitor in my office if you promise not to snoop through federal databases."
The next day, Jessica couldn't shake a terrible sense of foreboding. To make matters worse, one of her filmography classmates had decided to make a video of a simulated car accident. As soon as the final bell rang, Jessica pulled out her phone to text Spencer. To her surprise, she already had a message from him. "Still alive, I promise. Love you."
"Love you too," Jessica replied, heaving a small sigh of relief.
He never responded.
In the evening, Garcia returned to her apartment with a bag of take-out and a James Bond DVD. "I'm probably a terrible person for bringing you a movie on a school night, but screw school. I lost my parents in a car accident too."
Jessica smiled thinly. "Thanks. How's the case going?"
Garcia shuddered. "My advice: don't watch any online videos until we catch the guy. He's filming his murders and posting them on the web. Seriously, you do not want to watch those."
Jessica frowned. "Wait…you mean, that throat-slashing video everyone was talking about…"
Garcia's eyes widened. "You saw that?"
"No, but Mike tried to convince our filmography teacher to let us analyze it in class."
"But…you guys can't even hear the psycho's sermon!" Garcia objected, horrified at the thought that the video had made its way into schools.
"He wanted to analyze how they made the throat-cutting look so realistic." Jessica grimaced. "I really wish I hadn't learned the answer…"
Garcia started to sign something else, then cut herself off to answer her phone. Jessica watched as Garcia's eyes widened in horror. A minute later, she hung up the phone, looking thoroughly shaken.
"What happened?" Jessica demanded worriedly.
"They need me in Georgia," Garcia replied, not meeting Jessica's eyes. "You'd better find a friend to stay with. Can you take care of Chocolate Thunder for me?"
"Yes, but what happened?"
"Great. Thanks." Garcia hurried into her bedroom.
Jessica followed her, grabbed her arm and forced Garcia to face her again. "Penelope! What aren't you telling me?!"
Garcia sighed, a tear rolling down her cheek. "Your cousin's been taken by the unsub."
Jessica gasped in horror. "Is he alive?"
"They haven't found a body, so they hope so."
"I'm coming with you," Jessica decided.
"Sweetie, I'm sorry, but I can't just bring an underage civilian with me," Garcia signed sympathetically. "Besides, you have school."
"Like I'm going to be able to focus when I have no idea if my cousin is even alive," Jessica retorted. "This is already the day I lost my parents. It can't be the day I lose Spencer too. It just can't."
Garcia looked at the distraught teen. Remembering the day she'd lost her own parents, she found herself unable to refuse Jessica's desperate plea to get as close to her cousin as possible. "Pack your stuff, then."
"Please, you don't have to do this," Reid moaned. "Please, I have a kid, I'm all she has…"
Hotch stared incredulously. "You brought Jessica?"
"I'm not going home without Spencer," Jessica signed defiantly.
"He's her only family," Garcia added. "We're her only family. And it's my job to be with her when Reid can't."
Hotch sighed. "We don't have time to argue. Get in the car. And keep that gerbil out of our way."
Jessica obeyed, clutching Chocolate Thunder's carrier. They'd been in too much of a hurry to find someone to watch him.
"What are you doing here?" Morgan demanded, staring.
"Why are you asking stupid questions instead of finding my cousin?" Jessica retorted.
"I think he'd like you to be in one piece when we do find him," Morgan pointed out.
"If it's safe for Penelope to be here, it's safe for me to be here."
"Do not leave this house without one of us accompanying you," Gideon signed sternly. He turned to Garcia. "His computer is an extension of his brain, I need you to dissect it."
Recognizing that the team had returned their focus to the case, Jessica got out of their way and found a couch to sit on. She petted Chocolate Thunder for a bit, then pulled out her phone and looked at her last conversation with Spencer.
"Still alive, I promise. Love you."
"Love you too."
At the time, it had been reassuring. Now, the exchange felt disturbingly like a good-bye. Jessica swallowed, tears brimming in her eyes.
Several hours later, JJ passed through while looking for the bathroom. Jessica noticed a bloody bandage on her arm. "Are you okay?"
"Fine," JJ signed, wincing. "There were…dogs." She shuddered.
Jessica frowned. "What happened?"
"I shot them. I shot them…" JJ seemed rather freaked out. Jessica decided to drop the subject, and JJ continued on her way.
At about 4:00 in the afternoon, Sheriff Watson approached the team in the dining room. "'Scuse me. Got a call down at the precinct about Agent Reid's daughter bein' missing?"
"What?" Prentiss exclaimed, surprised.
"Apparently, when she didn't show up to school, the school tried to get in touch with Agent Reid. Couldn't get a hold o' him, nor Miss Warner, nor Miss Garcia, so they called the police."
"No cell reception," Gideon realized, rubbing his forehead. "Is there a number I can call back to let them know she's all right?"
"Here." The Sheriff handed Gideon a scrap of paper with a phone number scribbled down.
"Thank you." Gideon headed out to drive to somewhere with reception.
"Hello, this is Supervisory Special Agent Jason Gideon with the BAU. I understand that my agent's ward, Jessica Warner, has been reported missing?"
"Yes, sir. Is the BAU taking the case?"
"Actually, I'm calling to report that Miss Warner is safe and sound, here with us in Georgia."
"Would you mind if I speak to her myself to confirm that?"
"I'm afraid that's not possible. She's deaf." Suddenly, a conversation from more than a year previously came back to Gideon. "But since Agent Reid is presently well and truly missing, I am Miss Warner's temporary guardian. I assure you, she is safely in my custody. You can tell her school she has had a family emergency."
"All right. Thank you very much, Agent Gideon." The policeman hung up the phone.
Gideon took a deep breath. Back when he'd first agreed to take Jessica in the event that the worst should happen, he'd never truly believed a day like this might come. He fervently prayed that it would be temporary.
Back at the house, Gideon sat down next to Jessica. "You know, no one told your school you'd be absent."
"I had other things on my mind," Jessica replied, scowling.
"I know," Gideon signed sympathetically. "And I understand that it's hard for you to think about school at a time like this. But you made things very complicated by coming out here. When they couldn't get a hold of you or any of your emergency contacts, they issued an Amber Alert."
Jessica's eyes widened. "They did what?"
"They thought you were missing." Gideon sighed. "I know, you were worried about Spencer. But charging off without thinking is exactly what got your cousin into this mess. Don't follow that example."
"I'm sorry," Jessica signed, meaning it.
"Think ahead next time." Gideon patted Jessica on the shoulder, then returned to the dining room.
At some point that night, the agents discovered something outside. When they came back in, Jessica grabbed the first agent she saw—Prentiss. "What happened? Did you find something?"
"I, uh…" Prentiss took a guess as to what Jessica had just said. "We found Hankel's father. Dead. You don't wanna go down there."
Face falling, Jessica sat back down. Prentiss hesitated, then joined her. Jessica typed out a message and showed it to her. "Do you think we'll find him?"
"I wish I could tell you we will, but…the truth is, I don't know," Prentiss admitted. "We've got some leads. We're not giving up." She eyed the text exchange with Reid, still visible on the screen. "That the last conversation you had?"
Jessica nodded, sniffling. "I keep wondering…did he even see my reply?"
Prentiss looked thoughtful. "I'll be right back." She headed into the dining room, then returned with Reid's phone. "We found this in the corn field. And…" She flipped it open. "No notification of new messages. When did you send that?"
Jessica thought about it, then held up three fingers.
"He and JJ didn't leave the precinct until about 4:30 yesterday. He still had cell reception when you sent that. So if there's no notification, he must have seen it."
Jessica heaved a sigh of relief and managed a small smile.
"Hey." Prentiss gently put a hand on Jessica's shoulder. "He didn't need a text. He knows. Wherever he is, he knows."
"Thanks."
"Why don't you get some sleep?" Prentiss suggested, standing up. "I'll wake you up if we find him. I promise."
Jessica nodded and stretched out on the couch. A few minutes later, she felt someone drape a blanket over her.
JJ straightened, sadly surveying the young blonde. Tucking in Reid's cousin felt like the most useful thing she'd done that day, which just went to show how much the day had sucked. They had a frozen body, a wall full of crazy, and a computer system with disturbing surveillance, but they still didn't have their missing genius.
Footsteps made her briefly look up, then she looked back at Jessica. "What happens to her if…if we don't find him? If he…" JJ swallowed, unable to bring herself to complete the thought.
"I think Gideon once mentioned Reid making arrangements with him," Hotch replied.
"How do you do it?" JJ asked quietly. "How do you go out on cases, knowing you might never come home to your son? Knowing that Jack could grow up fatherless, that he wouldn't even remember you, that you'd just be a story to him?"
"It's hard," Hotch admitted. "But I'm making the world a safer place for him. A better place."
"You know, there are days when I want kids," JJ confessed. "And then there are days when I wonder, how could I possibly be a mother? How could I bring kids into this life?" She swallowed again. "Spence does his best to keep her away from this, but look at what's happened already. First Randall Garner, then Nathan Harris, and now this. She's fourteen, Hotch. Just fourteen."
"And she lost her hearing to an illness, lost her parents to a car accident and spent a month in a group home with lackluster care," Hotch pointed out. "We can't shield our children from everything, no matter how much we may want to."
JJ straightened the blanket. "We have to get him back. We have to."
In the morning, Jessica was bored. Now that her panic had begun to subside to manageable levels, she realized that there was nothing she could actually do here. She dug through her bag, looking for something, anything. All she had were the textbooks and homework assignments that she had never unpacked at Garcia's. Well, Spencer wouldn't like it if she fell too far behind in her studies. The best thing she could do for him now was to finish her homework.
Around noon, JJ walked into the living room and sat on the other end of the couch. "So, this is Garcia's gerbil?"
"Yes. Chocolate Thunder."
JJ choked out a small laugh. "Only she would name a pet that way."
"Are you any closer to finding him?" Jessica asked hopefully.
JJ sighed. "Not really." She hesitated. "I'm sorry."
"Not your fault," Jessica signed morosely.
JJ shook her head. "But it is. We split up. I should have had his back. I should have kept him safe for you. I'm sorry."
Jessica stared wide-eyed at JJ, taking several deep breaths to try to rein in her emotions. "What exactly did happen? No one's really said."
"We went to interview this guy. We thought he was just a witness. But he was acting strange and refusing to talk to us, and then Spence went around the side of the house and saw the computers through a window, and he put it together. And…and then the unsub ran out the back, and we followed. There's no reception, we couldn't call for backup. There was a barn. Spence told me to check the barn, and he ran into the corn field, and…that was the last time I saw him."
Jessica swallowed. "So…it was his idea to split up?"
"I shouldn't have let him."
"But it was his idea."
"Yes."
"Then I don't blame you." Jessica gave JJ a hug.
Several hours later, Jessica noticed the entire team getting up from the dining room table and hurrying into the computer room. Curious now, and desperate for news, she followed them. Standing on tip-toe behind Gideon and JJ, she saw what had attracted everyone's attention—several monitors showed Reid tethered and handcuffed to a chair in some nondescript shack, blood matting one side of his head. Emotions warred in Jessica's mind—horror, to see her cousin so battered, and yet relief, that he appeared to still be alive.
Reid seemed to be saying something, but between the bad lighting and mediocre video quality, Jessica couldn't read his lips. Then a man moved into view. A few moments later, he pulled Reid out of the chair and shook him. Jessica clapped a hand to her mouth in fear.
Fortunately, the man soon released Reid and shoved him back into the chair. Reid said something else, Garcia did a search on her computer, and Gideon made a phone call. Then the live stream went black. Morgan turned away and punched the door in frustration, at which point he finally noticed Jessica.
"You shouldn't be in here," he signed, speaking out loud as well and alerting the others to her presence.
"He's alive," Jessica signed dazedly. "That video, that means he's alive, right?"
"Yes, he is, but you do not need to see this," Gideon replied sternly. "We will tell you if something happens." He tried to steer Jessica out of the room, but she pulled away.
"No! I'm not leaving!" Jessica swallowed, tearing up. "Can't I at least sit in here? I don't need to watch the computer, I just need to…be here."
Gideon and Hotch shared a look, then Gideon nodded. "Fine. Sit facing away from the screen."
"Thank you!" Jessica hugged Gideon, then returned to the living room to fetch her homework and the gerbil.
"Oh god," Garcia murmured. She reached over to take Chocolate Thunder out of his carrier and snuggle him.
"Something happen?" Jessica asked, looking up from her textbook.
Garcia carefully set Chocolate Thunder on her lap in order to reply. "He posted another murder. Don't look."
"Another murder?" Jessica repeated, alarmed.
"Not Reid," Garcia quickly assured.
"Good. Well, not good, but you know…" Jessica looked down at her textbook again.
"Thank god you can't hear the screams," Garcia added, shuddering. "Right about now, I actually kind of envy you…"
A few minutes later, JJ came in. She argued with Garcia, then Garcia left. Jessica looked up to ask what was going on…then she caught a glimpse of the website on the screen, and decided she didn't want to know.
Garcia soon returned, accompanied by Gideon. Garcia wordlessly deposited Chocolate Thunder in Jessica's lap. Jessica stroked the gerbil, who seemed to have picked up on the general mood in the house. He nervously wandered around Jessica's lap, twitching and sniffing.
Then, Jessica also sensed a shift in mood. Gideon was leaning over Garcia's shoulder, holding her hand, and both of them were quivering with tension. Jessica couldn't help herself. She glanced at the screen…and quickly looked away again. She put Chocolate Thunder back in his carrier and then clung to Gideon, burying her face in his shoulder. He shifted his arm to embrace her.
After what felt like forever, she felt Gideon freeze up. Then, abruptly, he pulled away and tore out of the room. Once again, Jessica couldn't resist the urge to look at the screen. She, too, froze. This couldn't be happening. It had to be a nightmare. It had to be. Because Spencer couldn't be…he couldn't be…
"He's not dead, is he?" she begged Garcia. "Tell me he's not dead."
Garcia simply hugged her, clinging tightly, tears running down her cheeks. Jessica broke down, sliding out of Garcia's embrace and down to the floor, shaking with sobs. She scarcely noticed when the rest of the team entered the room and reacted with their own varied expressions of grief. It wasn't fair; Spencer had been her own personal miracle when she'd feared she would spend the next six years being treated like an inconvenience in foster care. Or maybe it had all been a dream, and she would wake up in the group home and find out Spencer had never existed at all. Maybe she'd inherited the family schizophrenia and he was just her delusion. Or maybe she was sane now, but she would inherit the family schizophrenia and then she'd forget she'd ever lost anyone…
Suddenly, Garcia roughly yanked on Jessica's arm, pulling her back up. She pointed at the screen, and Jessica followed her gaze to see Hankel performing CPR. Jessica held her breath, desperately willing it to work. She neither knew nor cared why her cousin's killer would suddenly have a change of heart and try to revive him; if there was any justice in the world, it would work.
And it did. Spencer coughed and gasped, moving again. Jessica sank to the ground again, this time in relief. She shut her eyes, determined not to watch anything else. Determined not to let anything spoil the memory of the moment Spencer had come back to life. So long as that was the last thing she'd seen, she could believe everything would be all right.
Eventually, she felt someone shaking her. She signed without opening her eyes. "Unless you've found Spencer, leave me alone."
The shaking continued. Jessica opened her eyes to see Garcia looking hopeful for the first time since they'd learned about the abduction. "You did find him?" Jessica asked tentatively.
"We think so," Garcia replied.
"Alive?"
"He was alive when the video feed ended."
Jessica sprang to her feet. "Then what are we still doing here?!"
"Waiting for confirmation." Garcia held up a police radio. "The moment they tell us they actually have him, we'll go see him."
Jessica hurriedly began packing up her things, anxiously anticipating the moment the nightmare would finally be over.
A/N: Funnily enough, the timing with Jessica's parents' deaths was a genuine coincidence on my part. I had assigned them a specific date of death and written out the first death-anniversary in season 1 before checking the calendar and noticing where that date fell during season 2. Once I did notice, naturally I had to run with it.