Garcia and Spencer offered to bring Jessica with them to Sci-Fi-Gate. Jessica considered the invitation, but ultimately declined; finals were approaching and Spencer had taken to randomly quizzing her. She didn't really want to deal with that all day long.

On the other hand, once Spencer had left, Jessica wasn't really sure what she did want to do with her Saturday. She supposed she might as well actually study. The fewer questions she messed up, the less time she would spend watching Spencer turn a simple yes-or-no question into a half hour explanation. But it was much too lovely a day to spend sitting around the apartment, so she decided to pack up some textbooks and head to the Mendel campus.

Almost as soon as she arrived, Jessica received two near-simultaneous texts. The first was from Spencer. "We've just gotten called in. Hostage situation at a bank downtown."

The second text was from JJ. "We've just gotten called in on a local case. Are you available to watch Henry?"

"Sure, I'll be right over," Jessica responded. Tomorrow was Sunday; studying could wait.

Will took a deep breath as he pulled up to his house. He'd had plenty of time to think about how he was going to handle this situation. He felt it would be dangerous to openly sign in front of Izzy, since she would likely suspect a secret message, but that in itself might tip Jessica off. And if not, he'd come up with a potential coded message…

"Daddy!" Henry called excitedly, running across the yard and jumping into his father's arms. Will suppressed a grimace, trying not to let Henry see that he'd hurt him.

Jessica followed more slowly, giving them a curious look. "I thought you were working?"

"Yeah, I am," Will replied, still holding Henry. "This is my cousin, Izzy. She just flew in today, and she's gonna take over watching Henry."

"JJ didn't mention you had family coming today," Jessica remarked, surprised.

"Sorry for not warnin' you, but we didn't know she was coming. That's why she didn't know we were working today."

"Hi!" Henry chirped cheerfully.

Jessica looked prepared to accept this, and Will quickly spoke up before she could turn away. "By the way, Henry's godfather was gonna take him if JJ and I both ran late at work. Would you mind lettin' him know that won't be necessary?"

Jessica frowned. "What are you talking about? If JJ runs late, so does Spencer."

"My phone died," Will replied, silently praying that Izzy hadn't understood Jessica's actual question. "There should be a list of numbers on the fridge."

"I wanna see Uncle Spencer," Henry whined.

"Maybe tomorrow, kiddo." Will leaned over to set Henry down, and had a flash of inspiration. Using Henry to hide his hand from Izzy, he fingerspelled 'unsub'.

To her credit, Jessica kept a straight face. "No problem. I'll take care of that as soon as possible." She headed back into the house.

"No tricks, you can see that list for yourself," Will said quietly to Izzy.

"Good." Izzy crouched down to talk to Henry. "I can't wait to have some cousin-to-cousin bonding time."

Will swallowed back the desire to beat the living daylights out of her, and bent to give Henry another hug. "I love you."

"I…love…you!" Henry responded happily, blissfully unaware that this could be the last time he ever hugged his father.

Nonetheless, Will was relieved as he walked away. No matter what happened to him next, he could face it secure in the knowledge that Jessica would call in the cavalry to save his son.

Izzy wasn't stupid. She would bet money that there was never any arrangement for the godfather to take the kid today. But she would allow the babysitter to pass on the message. Guarding the kid would be tremendously boring if no one tried to rescue him…

Jessica had not passed on any message. Heart pounding, she carefully slung her book bag and her purse onto her left shoulder. Then, forcing an innocent smile onto her face, she approached Izzy in the living room. She adjusted her purse with her left hand while offering her right to shake.

Izzy made an attempt at a friendly smile that came out more like a grimace. She shook Jessica's hand…and suddenly found herself yanked forward into a faceful of pepper spray. Jessica quickly kicked Izzy's feet out from under her and slammed the bag of textbooks into her head. Izzy blindly lashed out, so Jessica hit her over the head again. Izzy slumped to the ground, a trickle of blood running down her forehead.

Jessica didn't bother picking up the textbooks. She grabbed a rather horrified-looking Henry and ran to the car. She yanked open the back door and quickly buckled Henry into the car seat (Spencer had bought one for him). She then made to close the door, but Henry tugged sharply on her hand. "Why did you hurt Daddy's cousin?" he asked, eyes wide.

"Because she was a very bad woman who wanted to hurt you."

"But she's Daddy's cousin. Like you and Uncle Spence."

"Not all cousins are like me and Uncle Spence. You can ask your dad about it later, but right now, we need to go before she catches us."

Jessica made to close the door again, and this time, Henry did not stop her. She strapped herself into the driver's seat and drove to Quantico as fast as she safely could.

Out of the corner of his eye, Rossi saw JJ frantically flipping through Will's wallet. "What's wrong?"

"Will's license is gone," JJ realized. "They know where we live."

Listening over the phone, Reid was equally horrified. "JJ, who's watching Henry right now?"

JJ's horrified silence was answer enough. Rossi spoke instead. "I'll get us there as quickly as I can, kid."

"I'm coming too," Reid insisted.

Hotch shook his head. "Reid, I sympathize, but Rossi and JJ are closer. You can help best by staying here and continuing to work the case. Any additional information we can give Rossi and JJ may prove useful."

Reid reluctantly swallowed and stayed put. He texted Jessica a warning, hoping against hope that the unsubs hadn't reached the house yet, but there was no response.

Rossi and JJ pulled up to the blonde agent's house and saw the door wide open. "Jessica would never leave the door open like that," JJ fretted. "They must have him."

"Wait, wait, wait," Rossi interjected quickly. "We need a distraction."

Rossi's caution proved unwarranted; the only person there was the Queen of Diamonds, unconscious and bleeding from a head wound. Rossi called for an ambulance while JJ frantically searched for any clue as to where Jessica and Henry might have gone.

Rossi soon noticed a key detail that JJ appeared to have overlooked. "JJ. That's Jessica's bag lying by our unsub, isn't it?"

JJ nodded distractedly. "So?"

"So, it would appear that Jessica is the one responsible for the unsub's current condition. Add to that the fact that I don't see the cousins' car outside, and I think Henry may be in much better hands than we were afraid of."

JJ finally looked properly at the scene, hope flooding through her. "She took Henry and ran."

"Whoever's been teaching her self-defense should be very proud."

Jessica finally pulled into a parking space at Quantico and turned off the car. She tried to take off her seatbelt, but fumbled; her hands were shaking like mad. Now that the adrenaline was wearing off, she was starting to go into shock.

Had she really just faced down an unsub and won?

A glance over her shoulder confirmed that Henry was safe. Yes, she really had taken down an unsub.

Jessica had never been particularly religious, but right now she wanted to say a fervent prayer of thanks to whoever had invented pepper spray. Spencer would probably know.

Oh, and she should probably get Henry inside to JJ. JJ would want her son back. That seemed like a good idea.

Jessica freed herself from her seat, then got out of the car and did the same for Henry. She just barely remembered to grab her purse with her ID before locking the car. As she approached the building, she took out her phone so that she could explain their situation to the door guard, and she finally noticed that Spencer and JJ had both been frantically texting her.

"Henry and I are okay, we just got to Quantico," Jessica responded. "I don't THINK the unsub was chasing us. I didn't see anything in the rearview mirror, anyway."

JJ outright laughed in relief. "The unsub was definitely not chasing you, don't worry. You kind of left her unconscious. What did you do, hit her with your textbooks?"

"After I pepper sprayed her." Jessica swallowed before sending a second message. "Is she going to be okay?"

"Well, she's alive. Beyond that, the paramedics didn't say." JJ took a few moments to let the situation sink in, finally certain that she would see her little boy again. "Thank you, from the bottom of my heart. Really, there are no words to express my gratitude."

"You could give me a raise," Jessica joked. "But honestly, just come downstairs. I think Henry needs his mom right now. He's a bit freaked out."

"I'm actually at my place," JJ clarified. "Rossi is with me and the rest of the team is downtown. None of the BAU are at Quantico right now."

"Oops. Should I come back to you?"

"No, stay there. We'll come to you. And don't feel bad; going to Quantico was the smart thing to do."

"Okay, staying here."

Reid and Garcia ended up being the first members of the BAU to reach Quantico. Reid quickly hugged Jessica while Garcia scooped up her godson. Nearly a minute later, they traded.

At long last, Reid put Henry down and signed to Jessica. "I'm very proud of you. But please, never do that again."

"Please, catch the unsubs before I ever have to do that again," Jessica retorted.

Reid winced. "You're right. You should never have been put in that position."

Jessica also winced. "I didn't mean to sound like I was blaming you. Just…I never want to go through that again."

"Jessie hurt Daddy's cousin," Henry announced worriedly.

"Oh, no no no," Garcia quickly interjected. "That was not your daddy's cousin. He just had to say that or they would have hurt him. Because that was a very, very bad lady with a very, very bad friend."

Henry considered this, then cheered. "Yay! Jessie fought the bad lady! Just like Mommy and Daddy and Auntie Penny and Uncle Spence!"

Jessica choked out a laugh. "Jessie got lucky. Jessie is nowhere near as awesome as Mommy and Daddy and Auntie Penny and Uncle Spence."

"Oh I beg to differ," Garcia argued. "You have just become my new hero. And I think you just won babysitter of the century."

"Great. Does that mean I won't have to do this again for the rest of the century?"

"Let's hope so," Reid agreed.

Jessica swallowed. "So…anyone want to explain exactly what was going on with Will today?"

A few hours later, Jessica was invited into Will's hospital room. "Thank you," Will signed, a bit stiff from his injuries. "Thank you, from the bottom of my heart."

Jessica gave a half-hearted, embarrassed little shrug. "Well, what else was I supposed to do? Leave Henry alone with an unsub?"

"That's exactly what you were supposed to do," Will replied seriously. "They were only trying to hold Henry as leverage, but they had no reason to keep you alive. I brought up that list on the fridge so you'd have an excuse to run out the back; I never thought you'd actually confront her. I thought for sure you'd be killed if you tried."

"You didn't explain that, though," Jessica pointed out. "I mean, I get that you couldn't say much with her watching, but for all I knew, they could have been planning to kill Henry. I'd never forgive myself if I abandoned him to save my own skin." She swallowed. "And I'm not stupid; I know that confronting her was dangerous. If I hadn't had the element of surprise on my side, I probably wouldn't be standing here now."

"I'm not complaining about what you did," Will clarified. "Maybe I should, because you're absolutely right that it was very dangerous, but I'm just really glad that Henry wasn't left alone with that woman."

"Me too," JJ agreed. "I know I should probably be giving you some kind of lecture about leaving the unsubs to the professionals…but I can't. Maybe that makes me a terrible person, but all I can say is that I am really, really glad you didn't leave Henry with her."

Jessica gave another embarrassed shrug. "I've had about five years to plan what I would do differently if I ever encounter another unsub. By now, I've come up with about a dozen different plans for various scenarios. That was basically a combination of 'unsub ambushes me on campus' and 'unsub tries to snatch Henry from the playground'. Lucky I had my textbooks with me today."

JJ raised an eyebrow. "You had a plan specifically for Henry? I'm touched."

"Well of course." Jessica smiled thinly. "What kind of babysitter doesn't prepare for the possibility of an unsub trying to snatch the baby?"

"Not one I ever want to hire," Will commented. "If you ever move on to bigger and better things, I want you to train your replacement on that plan, because it clearly works."

"It's a deal," Jessica agreed.

"And you are absolutely getting a bonus today," JJ added. "That was absolutely above and beyond the call of duty. You deserve a far bigger bonus than we could ever give you."

"I'd have done it for free," Jessica replied seriously.

"I know. But let us thank you anyway."

Jessica smiled again. "Well, if you're not complaining about me taking stupid risks, then I won't complain about getting hazard pay for them."

When the cousins finally got home that night, Jessica sank onto the couch and began petting Bianca. Spencer sat next to her. "How are you doing?" he asked.

Jessica petted Bianca again before responding. "I'm not sure."

"It's okay if you're not okay," Spencer continued. "The first time I ever shot someone in the line of duty, it took a while for me to come to terms with it, even though I knew beyond any shadow of a doubt that he was a terrible person."

"I remember that…vaguely." Jessica swallowed. "Did I…did the unsub die? Today, I mean?"

Spencer shook his head. "No. You didn't kill her. But she was unconscious for hours, and the doctors said there might be permanent brain damage."

Jessica swallowed again. "In the heat of the moment, I didn't really think about whether there might be permanent damage. I wasn't outright trying to kill her, but…I wasn't trying not to kill her either."

"Good," Spencer replied seriously. "If you'd hesitated, even for a fraction of a second, she could have turned that to her advantage. You don't have the training to differentiate between killing and disabling…and actually, it's almost impossible to injure someone severely enough to take them out of a fight without at least some possibility that the injury will turn fatal. Just do whatever it takes to protect yourself, and don't worry about the unsub's injuries until you're completely certain they can't inflict any more on you."

Jessica smiled wryly. "All's fair in love and unsubs?"

Spencer briefly smiled back at her, then sobered. "Well, maybe not all's fair…the higher-ups are going to want to talk to you tomorrow."

Jessica frowned worriedly. "Am I in trouble?"

Spencer shook his head. "You shouldn't be, this is just routine procedure. Just…make sure to emphasize that Will only told you she was an unsub, and you had no way of knowing exactly what she had planned for Henry."

Jessica swallowed and nodded. "Okay."

Sure enough, Jessica was not in trouble—the agents questioning her made it very clear that the entire meeting was a formality and none of them actually thought she'd done anything wrong. One agent even joked that he wished she'd killed Izzy, because apparently that would have meant less paperwork.

At least, Jessica hoped that had been a joke.

Shortly after arriving at Rossi's house, Jessica was accosted by a very tipsy Garcia. "I love weddings. Isn't this amazing?"

"Rossi definitely knows how to plan a party," Jessica agreed.

"I should have him plan my wedding. Except I said no to Kevin and now he's here with Gina and it's probably just the alcohol making me regret it but what if it's not? What if I made a really huge mistake?"

Jessica blinked, not quite comfortable giving romantic advice. "Wait until you sober up and see if you still feel bad about it?"

"Oh. Yeah. That sounds like a good idea. Say, do you ever regret not dating and never having a night like this?"

Jessica looked around at the decorations. "Kind of? Maybe? Not the not-dating bit—I'm very solid on that. But I am a bit bummed that there isn't really a singles version of a wedding night. I don't suppose I'll ever get a once-in-a-lifetime party like this for myself."

"I could be your maid of honor," Garcia signed with a hiccup.

"Thanks, but not happening. I'm not going to get into a relationship I don't want just so I can have one magical night like this."

"Maybe Emily will get married," Garcia suggested. "I could be her maid of honor, couldn't I? Why isn't JJ having a maid of honor? I feel cheated."

"I think you should hold off on drinking any more until they've at least said their vows." Jessica gently took Garcia's glass away.

Gideon found Jessica outside. "I must say, I'm very pleased to hear that yesterday's incident ended much better than your previous encounter with an unsub."

Jessica sighed. "And I really wish people would stop talking about it! It's been more than 24 hours, can we move on yet?"

"You know you did the right thing, don't you?"

"Yes, I've already had that talk with Spencer. Can we please talk about wedding things? I came here for a wedding."

Gideon smiled wryly. "Sorry. You're right. This is meant to be a joyous, violence-free occasion."

"Thank you." Jessica looked around at the decorations. "Were Rossi's own weddings like this?"

Gideon chuckled. "No, he didn't become a wealthy, bestselling author until after his third divorce. I didn't even attend the third wedding; apparently, it took place in a Vegas wedding chapel. I think they got divorced in under 24 hours."

"Let's hope that doesn't happen to JJ and Will."

"I think they're safe on that front," Gideon assured.

Reid smiled as he watched the vows, hand clasped tightly with Maeve's. He'd felt worried, after Garcia and Kevin's relationship fell apart over the topic of marriage. He'd been afraid that he might get the same result if he asked Maeve. But standing here now, seeing the look in JJ and Will's eyes, he knew it was worth the risk. But not tonight. The ring he'd purchased could wait until he and Maeve had an occasion all their own.

"They say that good things happen to good people!" Rossi announced, smiling broadly. "Today is one of those days, and these are two of those people. We love you."

Everyone raised their glass for a toast, but Will held up a hand. "We also want to thank someone without whom we might be having a much less happy gathering. Jessica, there is no gift more precious to a parent than the safety of their child. I couldn't imagine a life without Henry any more than I could imagine a life without JJ. You are a hero to our family, and if you ever need anything, you need only ask. To Jessica!"

"To Jessica!" JJ echoed, followed by the rest of the table.

Jessica blushed very deeply as everyone drank. She really hoped they were done praising her now.