(no subject)
Title: Crossfire 9/?
Rating: FRT (series overall FRAO)
Pairing: Morgan/Reid
Summary: Derek is weary of Gideon, while Spencer is welcoming. But with Gideon comes more mystery, and another visit from The Nightmare Killer.
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.
*I may have injected some of my criticisms of how criminal risk assessment and profiling is used by the FBI into this story (via Garcia). Just a head’s up :)
*I know I keep saying that I will be turning out more chapters, and I want to finish this story because I’ve had the outline (and conclusion of the saga) lined up since before AJ got fired (spoiler???) and I want to wrap it up. Just...grad school is hard. Behavior Analysis is hard...they only make it look easy on TV cuz they are doing it wrong ;)
~~~
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).
~~~
The following afternoon, BAU offices at Quantico, WV
Agent Derek Morgan
I don’t like the way my skin crawls. It’s been crawling since I left Chicago. It feels like tiny little spiders are running races over my body, pausing only to laugh at me. This unsub is purposely playing with us, and its working. I turn around to see Spencer standing awkwardly in the elevator behind me. There’s a few other agents and employees in this elevator, or I’d say something. I feel like, since I got the call from my family, that I’ve completely ignored his support and care. It makes my skin crawl all the worse.
We get off on our floor and make a beeline to the round table room, where the team is gathered. They look tired. While Spencer and I were on the plane on the way to Chicago, they were having their families put into protective custody. Garcia is chewing on her lip, barely focused on her laptop computer screen as she types away.
“Hey momma,” I approach her calmly, putting my hands on her shoulders.
“I swear I’m going to kick this Nightmare Killer’s ass...I have no idea where my daughter OR my husband are!”
“I know Garcia, I’m sorry, we’ll catch him.”
“At least they are safe,” Reid says. “The safest they can be. And together.”
“My girl still needs her momma.”
I turn to look at Hotch. “We’ve got nothing from Chicago.”
“That’s not a surprise,” Gideon interjects.
I look him up and down. He’s dressed the way he used to dress, I guess some things never change. He doesn’t seem to have changed much at all. He’s still taking command, when he isn’t the leader of the team. I suppose it’s only been a few years, expecting him to have changed that much is unrealistic. That’s when I notice...
“Why does Gideon have a weapon?” I ask.
“He’s certified to carry, and Strauss gave him clearance, considering our unsub is targeting us he needs to be armed,” Hotch says.
I look to Gideon. “I suppose next you’ll be telling us what to do.”
“I’m only here to help.” He says, with that familiar smug grin on his face. I want to smack it off.
“I’m not so sure.”
“Derek, come on, when is the last time you ate anything?” Garcia touches my arm. “You’ve had a very long day.”
“I’m fine.”
“Agent Morgan, go with her,” Hotch says with authority.
“We have a case,” I retort. But the look on his face tells me that I better listen to him. With a huff and an eye roll, I follow Garcia out of the room and to her office.
Once inside the safety of her technological den, she hands me a wrapped muffin from her desk and huffs. “Dammit Morgan why are you trying to pick fights with Gideon? We need all the help we can get. My baby is in some safe house somewhere in danger, and if you decide to have a pissing contest with him and something happens to her I will fucking kill you.”
“Uhm...okay Penelope. I understand.”
She hugs me. “I’m sorry I threatened to kill you, but dammit Derek you best not stand between a mother and her kid.”
I kiss the top of her head. “Got it Mamma.”
She moves to her desk. “I’ve been doing just about every matrix, database, program I can think of to find any potential link in these cases. I’ve compiled all the data I possibly can and I just can’t seem to crack it.”
“It’s not a code,” I reply, taking a big bite of muffin.
“But maybe it is.” She beings to feverishly type on one of her many keyboards. “You guys look at the behavior, the scenes, and you totally make inferences based on other cases, right? Let’s face it, what you do is an art, not a science. Just because other serial killers wet their beds and tortured little kittens doesn’t mean this one did, or that those behaviors caused them to be serial killers. You can infer all you want to, but at the end of the day it’s just a guess, there’s no science behind it. And there are plenty of bed wetters that don’t grow up to gut women and hunt FBI agents.”
“True, but...”
“So, if you are looking at the art of it and getting nowhere, I’ve gotta come in and look at the science of it. Somewhere there is a connection, there is something concrete that can help us nail the bastard. I gotta find it.”
I pat her on the shoulder. “I hope you’re right.”
“Me too cupcake. Now get back in there and if you fight with Gideon I’ll cut your nuts off and Reid will have nothing to play with.”
Not that he’s playing with them at all, I want to retort, but now is not the time to get into that discussion. “Garcia, did you know where Gideon was this whole time?”
“What? Why?” She stops typing.
“Don’t tell me you didn’t try to track him down.” I give her a puppy dog eyes look. “Right after he left.”
“I couldn’t find him for almost six months,” she says quietly. “When I did find him, I didn’t want to tell anyone, I didn’t want it to get back to Reid. I thought it was just best to let him go and move on.”
“Good choice. Do you think Reid would have gone to try to find him?”
She shrugs. “He was messed up after Tobias Hankel. Who knows what he would have done. I was just trying to protect my genius.”
“Would you do me a favor? Don’t tell Hotch?”
“Geez Derek now is not the time...”
“Can you look into what Gideon’s been up to? It’s related to the case, he was targeted by our unsub for a reason, right? Maybe you can plug his information into your databases...”
“Why am I keeping this from Hotch?”
“Because he’ll think I’m just on a witch hunt.”
“Are you?”
I stand up and toss the muffin wrapper in the trash can. “I’m trying to find a serial killer and if dissecting Gideon’s time away from us is what I have to do, I’m going to do it.”
~~~
That evening at Dr. Reid’s home
Dr. Spencer Reid
“I don’t have much variety to drink, I’m sorry,” I walk into my kitchen, leaving Gideon to be stared down by Taffy and Sally.
“Tea?” He calls out.
“Sure,” I fill the kettle and put it on the stove. I walk back into the living room to see the cats sitting on the armchair, staring at Gideon like he’s not to be trusted. I wonder if they know something I don’t. Or do. I’m not sure. “Taffy and Sally.”
“When did you get cats?”
“I wanted cats, I just liked the idea of someone to come home to.”
“You could starting dating. Find yourself a good woman.” He settles onto the couch. “You are capable of it.”
“I’m...well, I’m sort of involved with someone.” I sit next to him. “I mean, it’s overly complicated is all.” I want to bite my tongue, wishing I hadn’t given him that much information.
“It’s only complicated because you make it that way. How’s your mother?”
“She was okay before she got taken into protective custody, I had to spend the whole flight on the phone with her, but then Derek talked to her and she seems okay.”
“Derek?”
I bite my lip. “I think I’m going to get some sleep. You need to call a cab to the hotel?”
“Actually, I don’t think it’s a good idea for any of us to be alone. I don’t mind taking the couch,” Gideon smiles at me. “I know Morgan is staying with Prentiss, JJ and Garcia are sharing a hotel room nearby and Hotch is no doubt pulling an all-nighter with Rossi.”
I stand up. “There are plenty of linens and towels for you in the hallway closet, please help yourself. I’m going to sleep.”
“Spencer, you know why I left right?”
I look him straight in the eye. “Yeah, I didn’t really figure it out for a long time, not until recently, but I get it. I don’t blame you.”
“Tough case?”
“I was kidnapped, raped, nearly killed. I watched...” I swallow. “It seems like a repeating cycle, just when I think I can do this, and one more bad guy is gone, ten more pop up in their place and they all have a gun pointed straight at me.”
“I read about the case in Deep Lake, where several federal agents were ambushed by rouge environmentalists that had been murdering and stealing from local campers. Was that the team?”
“Yes, it was us. JJ got shot, Prentiss was practically gutted, they slashed her throat and it’s only a miracle she can talk as well as she can now.” And you were high and thought you shot someone but you didn’t, not like you will let yourself absorb that and move on. “I was in the middle of the woods in a snow storm, I almost died. Rossi and Morgan came out there and found me. But we got them.”
“Is that all that matters though?” Gideon stands up. “I used to believe that too, that the outcome was worth the pain and suffering we took. That our sacrifices only had meaning if we got the right person to pay for what they did, if we took someone off the streets and gave a grieving family some closure. But what about you Spencer? What good can you be to anyone if you are just a shell of who you should be? That’s a lesson I learned. I’m nothing if I’m not Jason Gideon. This job took me away from myself and turned me into a machine. It wasn’t fair to anyone, especially to me. Anyway, I think it’s time to get some sleep.”
“Or at least try,” I manage to smirk.
“It shouldn’t have to be that way.”
I disappear down the hall into my bedroom and close the door behind the cats. I’m starting to think Gideon is right, that maybe pulling myself too thin is doing more harm to the people I’m helping than good. I was so broken that I got high on a case and cost a man his life. For what? Because I was using drugs to try to hold myself together?
I change and slide into my bed, instantly joined by Taffy and Sally. I haven’t slept well in a few days, not that I ever really slept well anymore. Not since I joined the FBI. Is this the reason Elle left too? She started to realize that she couldn’t only be SSA Elle Greenaway? I’ve thought about quitting, but I’ve decided to come back. I felt empty, somehow lost when I was teaching in Las Vegas, because I was so used to this job. Maybe if I really did leave the FBI, I could have enough time to adjust.
Or perhaps it’s too late. I either crack or die. Which one is worse?
I don’t get a chance to think about it, my phone rings. Derek. “Hello?”
“You okay? Prentiss and I could come get you.”
“I’m fine, Gideon is here. He insisted on staying on my couch.”
I hear a loud sigh on the other end. “At least he’s armed.”
“Why does Gideon bother you?”
“Because he only bothers to show up when the unsub targets him. Are feeling okay? We could come over anyway.”
“No, get some sleep. Did you contact the Marshal’s?”
“See, there you go with that big brain of yours reading my mind, yeah, I did and of course they gave me nothing. Like they are trained. But they did say that they only report to the lead on each case when there is a problem, and I called Hotch and he said he heard nothing.”
“It’s nights like these that I do miss you,” I mutter, laying back down. “It was nice not to be alone in this bed.”
“You know, if we figure this out, you never have to be alone again Spencer.”
We. He didn’t place blame nor take the entire burden. He said we. “Derek, I think Gideon was right. I need to put down this job and be myself. And I can be with you, and be happy, because I’ll be me. Do you know how many times I’ve nearly quit? I wasn’t going to come back after I was done with the undercover job. I was going to move back to Vegas and be with mom and I was scared of only one thing...leaving you.”
“Spencer, I love you.”
“I love you too.”
“Then get some sleep, so I can see your bright smile in the morning. Okay? Tomorrow night Gideon stays at the hotel. I’m coming home.”
“Good.”
We say goodbye and a close my eyes.
~
Five hours later
“Reid?”
I wake up to my name being whispered, it’s coming from my doorway. It’s Gideon. “Yeah, did I sleep through my alarm?”
“No, I uhm, I was going to head downstairs and see if I left something in my rental car when I saw something taped to the outside of your door.” He hands it to me, a piece of paper already in a Ziploc bag. “Hotch and forensics are on the way.”
It’s a copy of the painting, just like at the crime scenes. Except a picture of a face has been cut out and glued over the face of the woman.
Elle.