Spencer Reid is missing and Derek is panicking.

Everyone, of course, is panicking, but Derek feels like he's going to split apart at the seams. He can't do this again, not with Hotch.

The entire BAU pours every ounce of themselves into finding Reid. Hotch commandeers half of the police force, sending most of them out on patrol and keeping in the brightest detectives to help with the profile.

The hours tick down steadily. They sleep in shifts, or at least they pretend to sleep. They pour over every inch of evidence, Garcia hacks into every corner of the men's digital lives. They narrow down a list of suspects from seven hundred to seven, but with only a few hours left on their clock, it's not enough time.

It took Morgan a long time to let himself love Reid, even longer to allow anything to happen between them. But he had to be sure. Because he knew as soon as he let Morgan in, that would be it. There would never be anyone else again. For the rest of his life, for the rest of their lives, it would be ReidandMorgan.

Only now it's looking like the rest of their lives means Morgan living his life out alone, without the man he loves more than he thought he ever could, and he feels the panic rising.

He can't do it. He can't. He doesn't know how to live without him, not now that he has him. And he shouldn't have to.

Morgan didn't know what he would do if Spencer didn't pull through. His entire life would fall right out from under him. Spencer was his everything.

His chest tightened, and the tears were back stinging in his eyes.

"Morgan? Oh my god, Morgan," Prentiss worried across the room, voice breathy and strained. He could tell she'd been crying too.

She handed him the coffee and a one handed hug before she sat across from him and touched Morgan's hand gently. "Morgan, everything is going fine ok."

Morgan gave her a moment as she shed a few tears and wiped them on her sleeve, before she said, "Morgan, everything will be fine. Reid is strong and he will make it, we will find him and believe me, everything will be fine but you have to be strong. Starving yourself isn't going to help him. You need to stay healthy so you can be there for him when he comes back."

Reid will be there, waiting for him in their home, ready to put him back together with soft kisses, strong arms and loving words.

Morgan almost corrected her with if but didn't have the heart.

"At least calm yourself down before she decides to attack you," Prentiss said, whispering as she caught sight of the female figure lying on the couch a few meters away from them out of the corner of her eye.

Morgan feels hollow looking at Athena, standing there in a t-shirt and sweats, looking more disheveled than he's seen her in a long time. Her hair is messy, and there are dark circles under her eyes like she hasn't slept all week- which, he realizes, she probably hasn't.

There's so much pain written in her expression, and she's glancing around like she isn't quite sure how he got here. She looks like someone ripped the world out from under her feet, like she's drowning in the middle of the ocean without a speck of dry land in sight. Her eyes are red and puffy, like she's been crying for hours, but there are still tears in her eyes. He can see her trembling.

Morgan's mouth went dry. He tried to swallow. He still remembered Athena's voices on the phone, the screams and the questions, questions that the agent had no answers to. She took the first flight from Germany to Washington when they hung up the phone. He swore that he had felt his heart being torn into two as he had listened to Athena screaming and demamding to see her brother.

It took half an hour for Rossi to calm Athena down with words of comfort and promises that he would do everything to find her brother. He swore that the images of Athena and the terrible noises of strained breaths may haunted him in his dreams.

Now Athena sits on the couch in the conference room with a blanket draped over her shoulders, staring at the blank wall in front of her. Her vision got blurred. She was nodding, but didn't understand a thing. She was sat, but she wanted to crash down. She was alive, but she wanted to be dead. Athena was left sat alone. Her eyes were open, but all she saw was darkness. It would be okay if Spencer was holding her hand in that darkness, but Spencer wasn't there. Her dear twin was missing, oyt there with some shyco , hurting him , make him feel pain and helpess.

This was going to be a world without Spencer Reid. Every day she's going to have to walk into living room, with no smiling face to greet him. Every day she's going to have to do the job but not call from him. Her home won't be home anymore, not without Reid. How did this happen? Why did this happen?

Athena's heart started beating fast, and her head was screaming all kinds of names to herself. She couldn't stand it anymore; she stuffed his face in her hands, letting her rage and sorrow out with sobs that would crush anyone if they heard it. To say that Athena was falling apart was too little. She was dying while still living.

All of a sudden, she felt a strong grip around her shoulders. She could smell a familiar perfume; Hotch was tightly holding her. .

''Athena, hey, look at me!'', Hotch was saying, but Athena didn't move; there were no sobs heard from her anymore. She didn't want to come back to reality. Hotch grabbed her hands and pulled them down by force.

''Athena!'', he yelled, voice cracking.

She raised her head and looked his in the eyes; her eyes were red, her face wet and hopeless. The sight made Hotch tear up.

Athena opens her mouth, but all that comes out is a strangled sob. Bring him back, she wants to say. Beg. Plead. bring my brother back please, please, bring him home, homehomes home.

''Everything is going to be ok", He says.''We will bring him home and...''

"No", Athena spits back and Hotch flinches at the harshness of her tone. ''"This is your fault!" "How could you?! I hate you. God dammit, I hate you! He's gone! He's gone and he's never coming back and it's all your fault!"

Athena turned, a look of murderous rage on her face, and charged at Hotch. Aaron easily overpowered her and held her close, clutching the boy to his chest. Athena struggled. Aaron held on. She screamed and yelled and spit and bit and still, Aaron didn't let go. Finally the anger burned out and turned to sorrow as she began to weep. Huge sobbing gasps of pain poured from her mouth, all the while still cursing the man.

Reid had known that going off by himself to one of the previous crime scenes was a bad idea. It had gotten himself kidnapped before and drug addiction.

Reid felt the wetness start to pour down on him, he shut his eyes and mouth and looked down to hopefully prevent it from getting too much on his face. He was mostly unsuccessful due to the large amount dumped. His body tensed under the fluid, it was as if moving would make it opens his eyes ro see a black fluid, the strong metallic smell that flooded him was more than enough. If he had to guess, he'd say it was likely ink or some machine fluid. He wanted to gag but the fear of tasting it was enough to keep the bile down.

There was cruel laughter that finally broke the silence and dripping. Ηe closed his eyes, trying his best to calm his racing mind. He sounded familiar and felt sick.

He could hear Nico Val in front of him and soon felt him when he started to clean his eyes with his hands. It got to the point where he hesitantly opened his eyes. He was disgusted by the sight that greeted him. Nico was licking the ink off his fingers, he recoiled when his face was stroked with those same fingers again. The ink was being smeared around on his cheeks.

''Nico what the..''The young doctor looks at the man in front of him, the man who has been his neighbor for over 3 years. The young man who greeted him every day when they met in the elevator on their way to work, the man who helped his sister carry the groceries into their apartment. The man couldn't look Reid or Athena in the eye without blushing with embarrassment.

"I've wanted you for years, but I knew it would take your team something big to happen to ever get you out here."Nico licked his cheek, it got more ink off but left a different unwanted texture behind. It didn't stop there, ink clearly got the unsub off because their lips were smashed together uncomfortably. Reid tried not to react, he didn't want his distressed noises to be misinterpreted

''You wanted me but you killed all those innecent women!''He panted when Nico finally pulled off.

"I had to create a distraction!''Nico smiled'I didn't want you to know my real plans and everything went well.''

"The drawings on the walls?"

"Don't you recognize them?"

Reid felt his blood run cold, he didn't remember anything past hearing the sound of glass shattering and vague pain. As far as he was aware, this was the first time he woke up and actually spoke to him.

''What?''

"Come on, Spencer, put that beautiful mind to work!"

Reid felt grossed out at the use of his name.

''None of this was accidental. The victims were not random choices that I just saw one day on the street and killed, the designs meant something to me!''Slowly, Nico unbuttoned his shirt and started to touch his chest softly.'Do the victims' physical postures not remind you of anything?''

The gears in the young doctor's mind began to work, trying to connect the dots. The young women were of no importance to Petros, mere targets to attract the attention of the police. The hidden message he was looking for must have been in the symbols found near the bodies.

butterfly

snake

bird

flower

Lycoris

butterfly

snake

bird

flowerbutterflysnakebirdflowerbutterflysnakebirdLycorisflower

The flower painted on the wall near the last body was not just any flower, it was not a rose or a daisy, but a spider lily.

Spider lily is the common name for a number of different plant species but Marios painted Lycoris specifically.

Lycoris was and is their mother's favorite flower. He would buy her these flowers every time he visited her in the hospital and he had a request from Athena to...

''Tattoo Whispered the young doctor and the pieces of the puzzle fell into positions the women were placed in were not random, it was as if they had been placed in positions for tattoos. The upright arm, the shirtless back, places where someone could get a tattoo and the designs on the wall were not random. Reidrecognized them.

Nico's laughter stopped Reid' train of thought. His laughs sound that echoes through the warehouse. ''I knew you would find the solution''

The man walked slowly towards the young doctor, touching his cheek. He's touching Reid like he's something fragile, something he needs to be careful with.

And he looks like he can't believe his luck.

Athena stands in front of FBI's building, her mind lost in thought. Possibilities ran through her mind, overwhelming her.

Her brother, her little brother somewhere out there locked in a room with a madman. Beaten, in blood, in tears trying to survive, scared. Alone.

She wanted her brother back, in her arms, she couldn't imagine a reality that wasn't the two of them against the world.

She reached into the pocket and extracted the pack of Ace Cigarettes. she shook the pack, gauging how many were left before slowly shaking her head ,pulled a cigarette from the pack and put it in her mouth before working on the buttons of her shirt.

''Do you meant it?''

Athena turns onto his side, blinking slowly.

Hotch voice feels like it's grating the inside of his throat. "You were just being emotional, right?"

Athena takes another puff, holding the smoke for a moment longer than necessary before blowing it out, watching it curl up and dissipate in front of her.

"I'm always emotional," Athena says.

''You think that is my fault that Reid is taken?''

Hotch was quite certain he had never felt pain as acute as this before, had never felt so completely destroyed as he did in that moment.

He was sure, without a shadow of a doubt, that no words could ever do quite so much damage as, "It is your fault"

'No,' Athena responds in a calm, even tone. Hotch waits for her to elaborate. 'I'm just tired.'

'What are you angry at?' he questions, changing the topic quickly.

Athena feels the fire inside her burn brighter, stronger at the five words. Suddenly she has an urge to jump into the water. Maybe that would quench the flames.

'At so many things,' she spits out, and the fire travels up her throat and into her mouth.

'At the word, at Morgan, everyone who has ever worked with me, at myshelf'' The flames fly out her lips, and her clothes start to smoke.

Hotch only stays quiet, staring at her with those doe brown eyes. She knows the tattoo artist isn't finished.

"I always thought Spencer's job was dangerous, you can't imagine how many times I waited for a call from Strauss telling me that my brother was in the hospital or worse, dead!"

"My brother is strong and never gives up, but every man has his limits."Athena breaths, the fire crawling all over her skin.''Hankel, Cyrus , that fucking axthrax's case, his addiction, he grew up with a woman who was slowly losing her mind every day and it destroyed his soul even if he didn't realize it.''She's sobbing now, the flames have consumed her, the red and orange fire scorching her.''I don't know if he'll be able to recover after this.''

Athena chokes on her own cries and folds over, gasping and sobbing as the flames grow. She stands up straight again, but now rage blinds her and she can no longer see, she panics, the fire is consuming her, it's killing her, she's going to die-

A cool hand grabs her wrist, and the fire retreats, and she can see again. 'Stop, Athena.' Athena turns to look at Hotch, tears still sliding down and off her cheeks, panic still dancing in her wild eyes.

"None of this is your fault, I know that right now you are drowning in regret and guilt. None of us could have predicted what happened, but I know one thing."

Hotch moves his hand down off ers wrist and into his hand, entwining their fingers together.

''Reid is stronger than anyone thinks, he knows how to survive not only because of his mind but because he is one of the most exceptional agents I have had the honor of working with.''

''He is a fucking cockroach"Athena had chuckled"An adorable cockroach!"

Hotch made a small, agreeing sound under his breath. Hotch didn't even try to resist the urge of hugging her since he hadn't gotten around to do it at the office, he missed the feeling of the smaller woman melting in his arms and it hadn't even been an entire week yet since he had last hugged her. He needed her.

"I missed you so much," Athena whispered where her face was hidden against Hotch's chest.

It had been all she had gotten to say before Hotch's hands had left her waist and had cradled her face instead, tilting her head back to kiss her. The bold tongue that had pushed its way past her lips a second later had made her whimper "I'm not used to missing someone like that," the agent had muttered, the two of them breaking apart to catch their breath, "and it's driving me crazy,Athena . You're the only thing I can think about all the time. I miss you so much, all the time..."

Hotch paused to catch his breathing, he didn't know when he started crying but raising his hand to his face he pulled it away with wetness on it. Athena was quiet, she wasn't saying anything to him and that had him worried, she didn't have any emotions to her face or body, Athena was as still as a statue, just sitting there staring at him.

''Since the day you left I felt like I couldn't breathe!''Hotch whispered out, his chest was starting to hurt from the shame that was weighing on him.''Every day that passed and the silence and distance between us grew, I slowly lost my mind. I spent all day in the office as I didn't want to return to an empty house, to a reality that you weren't in!''

''What happened with Prentiss was nothing, she kissed me but I pushed her away. She is nothing more than a colleague and friend to me, I don't care if she is in love with me or how many times she will make a love confession to me, what I know is that you are the woman of my life and I want to have a future with you! to keep you safe and to protect you, to share the silence when words are not needed, to live within the warmth of your brave heart and always call it my home, and to help you love life the way you have helped me love it when I'm with you."

Athena bit her lower lip, averting her gaze.

Hotch waited.

The first step was tentative but each one became more sure, more determined until Athena was crowding into his space.

Hotch didn't move. Paralyzed by the weight of the moment.

Finally, after three agonizing seconds that seemed like an eternity, Athena's eyes raised to his.

"I am sorry!"Athena shook her head. «I'm sorry for the way I behaved, for running away like a coward instead of staying and facing the situation. I couldn't contain the storm of emotions I felt when I saw you in that office, with your lips on hers.»

"I've spent most of my life trying to convince myself that I didn't need anyone. That relationships always inevitably end so it was better to not get too invested, to not give too much of myself to another person. And then you came along and somewhere in the past months I actually started to believe that maybe the end wasn't so inevitable after all. "

Athena leans in just so her lips hover and brush Hotch's never actually touching them.

'Athena. Athena, what are you doing?' Hotch gasps.

'I've waited so long Aaron. So long. Now we're at the end, I think I'm ready. I think you're ready too,' Athnea takes a deep breath, and Hotch waits impatiently, the suspense killing him.

'I think... I think I'm in love with you, Aaron.' Athena says this confidently, but Hotch can feel his hand trembling against her cheek.

"Come home, Athena. Come home to me." The words refuse to be held back any longer.

"I want to. Don't you think I want to? But-"

"Please, Athena," Hotch cuts in. "I miss you," he adds softly.

"I miss you too. 'Course I do. But it's not that easy."

"I know that. I do. I promise you. But it's a start. And if you come home we can talk. Really talk. About anything you want. About everything." The words fall from his mouth now, as fast and myriad as the tears had fallen from his eyes before. "I'll tell you anything you want to know. I'll talk so much you'll be begging me to shut up. I'll tell you every single thing that has ever happened to me, every experience. I'll tell you my thoughts and dreams, my hopes and fears. My past, my present, my future. I wanna share it all with you. Just ... come home. Please."

You're not gonna give up, are you, agent?"

, "On us? On you? No. Never. If I can't make it with you,Athena Reid, I can't make it with anyone. I wouldn't even want to. There'll only ever be you for me. Now come home, darling.."

He take the hand of the woman he loves by the hand and leading her to his office. Determined to not think too hard about any declarations made by Emily Prentiss. What he doesn't remember will come to him eventually or it will do not. He doesn't need to hear her saying that she loves him because he'll never love her back. There's no world, no reality in which he would ever consider her as worthy of being pursued. So he's never going to allow her an opportunity to express her feelings for him ever again and if she'll ever find a way.

"I've wanted you for a long time, Spencer," Nico admitted. "I've been watching you from a distance every day, but you'd leave the apartment alone to go to work or to the shops. I wanted to approach you and ask you if you wanted to go out for dinner, but every time I found the courage, you were with someone else!"

Nick was referring to Reid's hoe phase, a time when the young doctor would sleep around and flirt with whatever he had on two legs. It wasn't one of his proudest moments, but at that time he felt like he was going through an emotional breakdown and drugs wouldn't help him. His sister understood the whole situation and never mentioned to her that time when her brother brought a different person, and sometimes two people, into the house every night.

Nico moved one of his hands off from Reid's cheek and brushed it through his ink matted hair, tucking his hair behind his ear. He then leaned forward and placed a light kiss on Reid's forehead.

'I knew none of them were really important to you, just another name in your notebook.''

Reid was too weak to move away from his kidnapper's touch or push the issue. Nico stared at Spencer for a moment, then he stood straighter, eyes darkening and Spencer whimpered.

''But then I saw him!''Nico spat, roughly grabbing Spencer's hair in a tight fist. "How could you do this to me?"

"At first I thought he was one of your new toy," he hummed, "But he kept showing up again and again with no intention of leaving!"

"No, no-nico, please." Spencer's breath quickened in his panic.

''You're mine, do you understand that?''Nico roared in Spencer's face, causing Spencer to weep harder, tied hands coming up to grip Nico's shirt

Spencer nodded, letting Nico pull him into another kiss. When Nico pulled away, he stood, hands going to his belt as he began to unbuckle it. Spencer kept his eyes on Nico, body starting to shake as Nico tossed his belt behind him. He looked down then, taking a shaky breath when he realized that Nico' crotch was right in his face. The tears grew and spilled down his cheeks before he could stop them.

"Shh," Nico hushed him, a hand reaching out to cup Spencer's face, thumb gently rubbing over Spencer's bottom lip, "I'll take care of you."

Nico pushed his thumb against Spencer's lips, slipping the appendage into the man's mouth. With Nico' other hand, he popped open the button on his jeans, slowly pulling the zipper down. His thumb is pulled out of Spencer's mouth, and his hand is on the back of Spencer's head, pushing him forward, but Spencer shakes his head.

"P-please Nico stop, please."

"Why should I?" Nico hummed, "I could show you what it's like to be with a real man. Would you like that?"

Spencer shook his head, "no, no. Please don't, I- I love s-someone, and- and he loves me. I won't do this to him.''

"No don't do that!" Spencer said with a shrill cry as Nico keeled behind him and leaned over, clothed chest pressing against Spencer's back, hands around Spencer's waist and undoing his pants. "Please! Please, Nico,stop, please! Help me, help me..." He trailed off in a whimper, body shaking with the need to /run/ but to terrified to move.