(no subject)
Title: Crossfire 5/?
Rating: FRT (series overall FRAO)
Pairing: Morgan/Reid
Summary: Reid makes his choice.
ConCrit: Better than Reid’s boy band haircut. Wait, nothing’s better than that :)
SPOILERS: Some canon from all seasons, but not always in the way it happened on the show.
~~~
Disclaimer: I don’t own any rights or trademarks to Criminal Minds, the FBI, CBS or any of the characters within. No infringements of these copyrights are intended. Any similarities between original characters therein are a coincidence. I make no profit from the following fictional story. (Fictional, maybe, but I swear this happened all in my head).
~~~
Two weeks later, 9:35am at the BAU offices in Quantico
Dr. Spencer Reid
I feel strange wearing jeans, a red plaid shirt and my FBI badge. I have a Visitor’s badge in my hand, because I’ll need it to leave. I’m resigning from the FBI today.
My therapist said I was ready to go back. She insisted I go back early. She thinks I’ve having ‘adjustment disorder.’ Isn’t that the understatement? I still haven’t thrown away Loki’s things, what little of them I have. I’ve only seen and talked to Derek the night he told me about Toby Bell, and I’ve seen Garcia and Jane just last night. I have been writing to my mother, but I’m afraid she’ll start to worry when she notices I’m not writing the same way I used to. My sentences are nothing like Spencer’s.
I bite the inside of my cheek as punishment for thinking that way.
I get to my desk safely, since nobody else is around. Did they take a case today? Maybe this will be easier than I thought. Meet with Strauss, give her my badge, leave a note for Hotch and walk away. A quick glance to the round table room reveals it’s empty. The lights in Hotch’s and Rossi’s offices are on, and through the partially opened blinds I can see they are both at their desks. JJ isn’t in her office, but the door is open and the lights are on. Upon further inspection I see Derek’s car keys on his desk near his computer monitor. They must be in Garcia’s office.
It’s just then when I see JJ rush into the bullpen, folders in hand, with an older man in a suit and a Visitor’s pass on his lapel. He looks a bit overwhelmed. When JJ sees me, she stops. “Reid, I didn’t know you were back already.”
“Oh, I have a meeting with Strauss.”
She nods and quickly moves towards the steps leading up to Hotch’s office. I swallow the lump forming in my throat. I have half an hour until my meeting, so I decide to start cleaning up my desk. Most of these things I can put into a pile to be filed by the clerks. A few things can be thrown out. I find a magazine in the bottom on my desk drawer. A tabloid featuring me and Lila. It makes me smile now, thinking about her. I knew I was gay, even then. But something about her wanting me was so...charming?...that it didn’t really matter. As inappropriate as it was, it was something that I secretly wanted to pursue, if only to feel wanted again.
I don’t notice how much time has gone by until I see Morgan and Garcia rushing out of the round table room with files in their hands. They stop when they see me. “Reid!” Garcia says. “Hi honey.”
I wave nervously. “Got a case?”
Derek nods. “Yes, are you back?”
I shake my head. “Nope.”
“Wait,” Garcia touches the Visitor’s badge on my chest. “What is this for?”
I bite my lip and take a deep breath. “I just didn’t remember to bring my badge.” Now is not the time to tell them.
Just then Hotch and Rossi storm through the bullpen, Hotch stopping in his tracks next to Garcia. “Work with JJ to cross-reference anything the media printed about The Nightmare Killer. If this is a copycat, we’ll be able to tell by what he doesn’t do more than he does.”
“The Nightmare Killer?” I ask, noticing Morgan running off wordlessly with Prentiss to work on a task already assigned.
“Are you familiar with the case?” Rossi questions, looking more upset than I’m used to seeing him.
“Serial killer, murdered ten women. Tortured and raped them for up to three days before posing them to mimic a pose in a particular painting. His signature was leaving a photocopy of the painting,” I finish his sentence, my memory flooding back to me. “When I was in the academy, Gideon took me under his wing and would have me consult on a case,” I turn to Hotch. “It was like a test or an exercise, I never thought it was a real case.”
“Reid, I know you’re on leave but if there is anything you can remember...” Hotch asks me.
“I can come back. I’m technically cleared for duty whenever I feel it’s appropriate.”
Hotch nods. “I know, I was forwarded your paperwork. Are you sure?”
I nod, feeling a sudden rush of adrenaline. “I’m sure, I know this case very well I could help.”
“Fine, then you are coming with me, Rossi and Detective Nelson.”
~
Once I’m settled in the backseat of the car (now wearing a new shirt, thanks to my go-bag strangely being at the office. They must have brought my things back from Autryville and they just never made it home), I check my sidearm for ammunition and the safety. I sit next to Detective Nelson, who is nervously looking out the window.
“Can you brief me?” I ask, since Hotch never had a chance to hand me a file.
“This is Detective Jason Nelson with DC Metro Homicide,” Rossi starts.
“I contacted your liaison here this morning as soon as soon as I arrived at a homicide this morning.” He clears his throat. “I still don’t have pictures, the crime scene techs are still there. Got a call from a landlord. She had an appointment to pain the walls of a tenant’s apartment and when she used her key to get in she found 32-year-old Diane Walters dead. She was laid out on the couch, head and arms hanging to the floor. She was wearing a long white nightgown that wasn’t zipped up in the back, indicating it was forced on her or put on post-mortem. She was gutted, her organs all over the room. And in the mess we found the painting.”
“In 1996 there were a series of murders in the area,” Rossi begins. “Ten women were murdered. All found wearing a white nightgown, all showed signs of being tortured and sexually assaulted before being eviscerated and posed in a fashion similar to the painting. I read about it when I joined the BAU.”
“I remember reading about that in the papers,” Detective Nelson says. “That’s why I came here. I figured I had a copycat and who better to catch a copycat than the people who caught the bastard in the first place?”
“The BAU never caught the original killer,” Hotch frowns, making a harsh right turn. “Gideon profiled that he got arrested or perhaps passed away.”
“At every scene he left a photocopy of the second version of Henry Fuseli’s famous painting ‘The Nightmare.’ First painted in 1781, it was his most popular work. Due to it’s popularity he made three versions of the painting, but only 2 are really known. Each depicts a woman in white with her head and arms hanging off a bed. There is a demon and a horse looking upon her with frightening expressions,” I supply.
“I have JJ doing a media blackout,” Hotch says. “We are saying nothing. If there are leaks, deny them at all. Lie if you have to.”
“Hotch?” I’m surprised. “Do you really think The Nightmare Killer is back?”
I get no answer.
~
We arrive at the apartment building fifteen minutes later. The scene is nothing like I expected. I’m used to vehicles everywhere, yellow tape, authorities bustling about and on-lookers. Instead there is an un-marked black cargo van and now two unmarked SUV’s. Have things changed that much in the past year?
“Where is everyone?” I ask Detective Nelson as we walk into the building.
“The moment I recognized this case, I ordered low profile. Then when Agent Hotchner mentioned a black out, I ordered everyone away but my partner, one crime scene tech and the coroner.”
“You have excellent instincts,” Rossi says. I can tell he’s already but Detective Jason Nelson on his suspect list. It does seem a bit strange that someone would remember this case, I will admit that to myself. Then again, it was local. The case that I studied mentioned that the lead profiler ordered the media go public with part of the signature and the condition of the bodies when they were found in order to draw him out.
“Were you a detective when The Nightmare Killer was active?” I ask as we acsend the stairs.
“I was a beat cop in Bethesda.” We reach the third door on the second floor. “I was gunning for a promotion, which took me a year later, and so I was researching open cases like a fiend. The signature struck a strange chord with me.” He takes keys out of his pocket and begins to unlock the door.
“How long were you a beat cop?” Hotch asks.
“Only three years. I was a high school teacher and needed a life change and when I was a kid I always wanted to be a cop. I taught math to kids who didn’t care. This way I feel like I can actually make a difference.”
The door opens to a scene right out of a horror movie. Blood spatter everywhere, it almost looks like too much blood for one body. There is a crime scene tech taking pictures of spatter along the far right wall of the main room. The coroner is kneeling next to the body, which is laid out on the couch. The room was tossed, and it’s not clear if there was a robbery. There isn’t one of course. The unsub probably did it either in rage while he was torturing the victim or afterwards to confuse the police.
I kneel next to the coroner. “What do you have?”
“Extreme bruising to her inner thighs, back and shoulders. The rate of healing suggests this all started at least twenty-four hours ago, maybe even forty-eight.” He points to her face to show me what he’s talking about. “She was alive when she was eviscerated and raped. Liver temp and the lack of fully dried blood in the deepest of the blood pools indicates she was killed around 2am.”
“Rape? You were able to determine rape already?” I ask.
“I lifted the dress to examine the body. The fucking bastard...” he clears his throat. “He left the knife inside of her. The bruising tells me she was raped repeatedly over perhaps a whole day. The blood present indicates that he sexually assaulted her with the knife immediately before or after she was gutted. All while she was still alive. But I’ll know more after the autopsy.”
“Thank you,” I stand, feeling weak in the knees. Of all the cases to come back to, it had to be this. I don’t remember the case I studied to be this brutal. I can’t trust my memory anymore. I walk over to Rossi, who is examining a day planner splayed out on the floor.
“Her last appointment was two days ago,” he says. “We’ll have to find out if that was the last time anyone saw her.”
“I’ll call Garcia,” Hotch offers. “I need her to crosscheck prison records too, find a correlation.”
I feel myself trembling. This is weird. I don’t react this way on the scene. I’m composed, focused. I don’t get scared. I don’t get scared. “He was very brutal with her,” I reply quietly.
“How so?” Rossi asks.
“He raped her with the blade of his hunting knife,” I swallow, surprised that I can. Hotch hangs his head and moves towards the door with his phone in his hand. I turn to Rossi. “I don’t remember it being this hard.”
“Hard?”
“To be at a crime scene. I feel like I’m on my first case but different. I know what to expect, yet I’m still having that first-time reaction.” I cross my arms in front of my chest. “I don’t know if it’s because I’m coming back or it’s this case in particular.”
“It will get easier, at least I’d like to think it would,” Rossi says.
I lower my voice. “I was at the office today to give Strauss my resignation.”
He doesn’t even bat an eye, which is exactly why I told him. “And?”
“I’m not leaving the team during this case.” I turn around to look at the dead body. “I’m not leaving her.”
What the hell is wrong with me?
~~~
Meanwhile at a house in Binghamton, New York
She wakes up in darkness. She feels heavy, and when she goes to move her arms she can’t. She remembers being ambushed when she came home from walking the dog and the dog...why didn’t he bark? Did her attacker hurt him? Does her attacker know her? Did he rob her and leave? She starts to run through the possibilities.
“Good morning,” a deep voice cuts through the still air. He’s watching her.
“What do you want?” She screams, realizing the darkness is because there is dark fabric over her head.
The voice chuckles. “You have no idea who I am, do you?”
“Just take what you want, I never saw you so I can’t turn you it. Please.” She suddenly remembers her training from a job so long ago. “I have two parents, a brother. My name is Stephanie...”
“Why must you lie to me? I know who you really are. The name on your licsence doesn’t fool me.” His voice is closer.
She starts to tremble as her captor drags a cool metal item against her thigh. She can only guess it’s the blade of a knife, teasing over her with just enough force so that she can feel it, but not so that it will rip through her jeans. “I don’t know who you are.”
“Don’t you?”
She bites her lip hard and stifles the urge to scream when the knife cuts into her leg. She attempts to recall all of her former training, her guts, and her smarts. It’s been a long time, but she’s been through much worse and came out in the end. Right?
“I was a little sad that you didn’t try to fight me harder.”
The knife cuts into her other thigh. Deeper.
“Why aren’t you screaming?”
“B...because that’s what you want,” she manages to pant out.
“You think I’m a sadist? That I get off on the pain?” He cuts her thigh again. “Answer me.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re torturing me. You want to see me suffer.”
“Oh I want you to suffer alright. But it’s not because I want to see the pain on your face.” He pulls the knife away from her and lifts the fabric off her head.
She’s stunned and who she sees in the room with her. “But, but...”
“I want to see the pain in theirs.”