A Way with the Written Word (1/6)
Title: A Way with the Written Word (1/6)
Rating: FRT/PG-13 (this part, ratings will vary by chapter)
Characters/Pairings: Derek Morgan/Spencer Reid, BAU team, Diana Reid
Warnings: AU piece, implied violence, unbetaed
Spoilers: past Season Four
Disclaimer: I don't own these characters. I put them back when I am done.
Summary: Science fiction writer and genius Spencer Reid’s world is turned upside down when his mother becomes involved in the BAU’s latest case. Accompanying him is his fateful agent Penelope Garcia who helps him adjust as he meets some new people and perhaps some new friends.
Author's Note: Comments, constructive criticism accepted/appreciated/loved. Cookies given out upon request.
“There is no mistaking a real book when one meets it. It is like falling in love.” -Christopher Morley
The sound of a stop and start typewriter was nothing new to the small studio apartment. In fact, at most hours of the day and night, the sounds of a writer, hard at work at his next novel, could be heard.
Spencer Reid’s fingers moved deftly on the old typewriter. He thought as he typed. It would be minutes, sentences, before he would pause to collect his train of thought. His fingers hurt. He leaned back from the typewriter with a sigh. Rubbing his knuckles gingerly, he looked at what he had already written.
It looked foreign to him, as if someone else wrote it.
Spencer sighed.
He was writing what his publisher had suggested, not what he really wanted to write. Taking a deep breath, he looked up at the room. On the walls of his apartment were the movie poster-sized covers of his past books. There was one for Gogart’s Requiem, The Return to Algot, Gogart’s Forces and the last to be published, Son of Gogart.
Writing science fiction wasn’t really what had had planned to do growing up. When his teacher had asked him what he wanted to do, he hadn’t answered like his classmates, who all wanted to be firemen, policemen or Nascar drivers. He had wanted to be a mime.
Smiling to himself, Spencer remembered this special affinity for mimes. His mother had encouraged him, of course, but she always did. She wanted him to be happy, no matter what he wanted. Of course, as he grew older, it became apparent that he couldn’t live off of it and it wasn’t really a good choice for a livelihood.
And he had to help take care of his mother, who had recently lost her job at the university. So what had he done? He had found a way to make money; a local science fiction publisher was looking for more talent. He had always had a way with the written word. Soon after, he had found his mother’s old typewriter. He never really believed in fate, or God really, but at that moment, it was all he needed to confirm that he was supposed to be doing this.
Now, he was stuck doing it because it was all he really knew. Sure he could probably do something else if he really wanted to…but did he?
His cell phone started ringing.
“Yes?”
“Hey Spencer!” exclaimed the cheery voice of his agent, Penelope Garcia.
“Hi Penelope.”
He sighed as his agent’s voice on the other end of the cell phone faded into the background. She was hyper and excited, but that was nothing new. Penelope was always this bubbly, happy-go-lucky person. Spencer personally believed that the day she stopped being happy was the day the world would end.
“Spencer, are you listening to me?”
Her voice snapped him back into reality.
“I’m here.”
“That wasn’t my question, Spencer.”
“No. I’m tired and I have a novel to finish.”
“That’s why I’m calling. You haven’t checked up with me in three days.”
“I’ve been busy.”
“Honey,” Penelope sighed, “I’ve been your agent long enough to know a thing or two. What’s wrong?”
Spencer took a long drink of coffee from a nearby mug. It was cold and he almost spit it out.
“I’m tired of writing about Gogot.”
He heard the shuffling of some papers on Penelope’s end.
“Well, you have written four books already. It’s understandable.”
“No, you don’t get it,” he sighed, “I can’t write another one of these. I’m done.”
Penelope was silent.
“Well, I suppose you could end the series with a cliffhanger…”
“I wish it was that easy, Pen. Gideon is expecting the next novel in the series by the end of the month.”
“Jason?” Pen chuckled, “He doesn’t know a comma from a semi-colon.”
“Yes well, he happens to be my publisher. It doesn’t really matter what he knows and what he doesn’t, does it? If I want to keep my job, I guess I’ll need to keep churning out fifteen cent mass market paperbacks to make him a quick buck.”
“You’re not being fair. Jason has been really good to you.”
Spencer sighed.
“I know. I just feel…sometimes that he just asks too much of me.”
“Oh, honey, it’s just because he’s trying to push you to be better,” Penelope cooed, “I’ll talk to him, okay?”
“Yeah, all right.”
“Until then, try to work on it, okay? I’ll be in touch.”
“Bye Pen.”
He hung up the cell phone and went back to staring at the page. After two minutes of disgustedly staring at it, he tore the paper out of the typewriter and threw it on the mess that was his desk.
Spencer rolled a fresh sheet of paper in the typewriter and started a fresh pot of coffee.
It was going to be a long night.
He sat at the typewriter and started to type what was on his soul.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“I would like to personally thank all of you for all the hard work on this last case,” S.S.A. Aaron Hotchner addressed the BAU team in the conference room, “I know all of you are extremely tired and working on only several hours of sleep.”
There was mutual of agreement murmured among the BAU team.
“So, I have requested some well-deserved vacation time for all of you. Enjoy the next week off.”
“Alright,” S.S.A. Derek Morgan grinned, “finally a chance to get my groove thing on.”
Agent Jennifer Jareau and Emily Prentiss snorted. Agent David Rossi raised an eyebrow.
“Should I be worried?”
“I would be,” Emily laughed.
“Hey now,” Derek answered, “That’s no way to treat the good-looking member of the team.”
“What does that make me?” Hotch deadpanned. He folded his arms.
Derek felt his face go red. He was struck with a loss for words. He gaped like a fish out of water.
“Uh, what I meant was, uh…”
The BAU team erupted into laughter. J.J. almost fell out of her chair.
Hotch cracked a rare smile.
“Enjoy your vacation, Morgan.”
As Derek left the office, the fresh cool air from the outside made him smile. It was time to enjoy some time off. For the BAU, this was a luxury and he intended to enjoy it while he still could.
He slipped on his motorcycle helmet and lifted a leg to stride the yellow rocket below him before kicking the ignition on with a flourish. Underneath his helmet, he grinned. This was going to be a Friday night he’d never forget.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Gogart cautiously stepped out from the spaceship unto the new planet. He immediately spotted the humanoid creature by the shady rocks.
“Ner keese dar may!” the creature yelled, beating its orange chest vigorously.
Gogart paused as he tried to understand the strange creature.
“What?”
“This is bullshit,” the creature clarified at the top of its voice, “the plot line is bullshit and you know it!”
Spencer grumbled and crumpled the paper. He tossed it towards the trash can into the pile of previous prototypes. This wasn’t going well.
He sighed and leaned on his hands. The novel was due in a month. How on earth could he finish it when he couldn’t write the first chapter?
His eyes hurt. He hadn’t slept very well over the last few days.
There was a knock on the door.
Spencer got up from the desk chair, which he was certain by now had his rear end permanently plastered in the cushion. He opened the door slowly because he really wasn’t expecting anyone.
It was Penelope.
“Spencer baby!” she pushed past him into the rather unorganized studio apartment.
“Sure, why don’t you just come on in,” he said sarcastically to the agent, “it’s not like I had plans…”
“Your sarcasm is wasted on me precious,” Penelope chortled back, “Besides; I’m here to help you.”
“Help me?”
Pen surveyed the misplaced books around the apartment, as well as the Chinese take-out and pizza boxes that littered the living area.
“I swear, Spencer, you go through two phases. There’s your extremely anal-retentive phase when I need to take off my shoes to enter the house. That’s when you are just starting a book and brainstorming. Then, right after, obviously now, you’re in your no eating, sleeping or practicing proper hygiene phase until you finish the book.”
“Hey,” he opened his mouth to protest, but he realized he couldn’t remember the last time he had shaved.
“Listen,” Pen said, “I talked to Jason.”
“What did he say?”
“Well, he still wants the next Gogart novel,” she answered and his shoulders sagged a little, “but we talked and he seems content on making this the last one.”
“Thanks,” Spencer said half-heartedly.
“Don’t sound so thrilled,” she hugged, “and I got you a three week extension.”
He breathed a sigh.
“Thank you.”
“That’s more like it,” she grinned and clasped his shoulder, “Now, clean yourself up.”
“What?”
“I’m taking you out, Spencer Reid. This place looks depressing. Besides, you look like you haven’t eaten in a week or so.”
“Pen-“
“I don’t want to hear it. Go take a shower and shave. Every minute you make me wait, I’ll charge you!”
She slapped his backside and he yelped as he ran into the backroom to get ready.
Later, when the two left for the evening, his mind was finally at rest. He was too excited and giddy to remember to put his cell phone in his pocket. So when it rang two hours later, he was nowhere to be found.
It was around three in the morning by the time Spencer got home, but it was only around noon the next day he checked his phone. One missed call.
“Hello Mr. Reid,” the bright, but professional female voice said on the phone, “my name is Jennifer Jareau and I’m with the FBI’s BAU unit…”
Why would the FBI be interested in him?
“…emergency situation…”
He tried to listen, but he was too shocked to pay attention to every word.
“…your mother. Please call me immediately at…”
What happened to his mother? He felt himself starting to freak out.
He called Penelope.
“Mistress of all things and one bad-ass Mama Jama, Penelope Garcia here.”
“Penelope,” his voice cracked, “I just got a call from the F.B.I. Something has happened to my mother. I-I…” He felt his resolve slowly falling.
“Not another word. I’m coming over. We’re going to figure this out, okay?”
“O-okay.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“This case letter better involve a supermodel or I’m going postal on Hotch,” Derek grumbled as he walked into the BAU bullpen. He had thrown on a lot of aftershave, to try and cover up the fact he struck of alcohol. Emily was walking with him and just scowled.
“I’m pretty sure I’d bet on Hotch,” Emily retorted, her own eyes red from lack of sleep, “Maybe even Rossi before you.”
“Ouch, my pride,” Derek made a faux jab at his heart.
The two agents walked into the BAU and immediately ran into Hotch, who looked as though he, himself, hadn’t slept more than a few hours.
“Sorry to have to bring you in, but there’s a situation developing. We have received word about six murders in the Las Vegas area over the last four weeks. All of the victims were found strangled, face down, half-buried in the desert. There are very few leads, but the last attack left a survivor.”
“A survivor?” Derek asked as the three agents joined J.J. and Rossi in the conference room. “Has she already been questioned?”
“She won’t talk to us,” J.J. answered, displaying a picture of the survivor on the big screen.
“Won’t talk? She was almost just killed by a psychopath!” Derek exclaimed.
“Well, it seems she suffers from paranoid schizophrenia that includes an extreme mistrust of the government.”
“Great,” Derek sighed.
“But, luckily for me, I was able to contact her son, who is very close with her and has volunteered to help us in any way he can.”
“What’s the victim’s name?”
“Diana Reid,” J.J. said, displaying a picture on the projector, “and her son, Spencer Reid.”
“Wait a second,” Emily Prentiss asked, as pictures from the scene were passed around, “Spencer Reid? The Spencer Reid? The famous science fiction writer of the Gogart series?”
Derek knew the name sounded familiar.
Rossi raised an eyebrow.
“What? There’s nothing wrong with a little science fiction.”
“Just never took you as the science fiction type.”
Emily rolled her eyes.
Derek didn’t say it out loud, but he himself was very familiar with the series. He had started reading science fiction when he was a young kid to escape into another world. He had actually just finished reading the last novel by Spencer Reid, Son of Gogart, and liked it, but not as much as the first couple books. It seemed almost rushed to him and didn’t contain the subtle details that Reid usually put in the books. Like the profiler he was, he wondered if there was a reason to this.
“Focus,” Hotch barked out, “please, we have to sit down and talk to Ms. Reid. The killer is still out there and, according to his previous kill pattern, we only have three days, maybe, until he strikes again.”
At that, the BAU team grew quiet and solemn again.
“I’ll do the preliminary interview,” Hotch said, straightening his tie, “while the two are in the same room, then I’ll expect an interview or two with just Spencer, for more information if possible.”
The team nodded as Hotch walked into the interrogation room.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
He was busy trying to calm his mother down about being in a government building when the FBI agent came into the room. He was tall, with dark hair and a stern face. This wasn’t a man to mess with, not if you wanted to get out alive. The man had on the finest blue silk tie he’d ever seen. He also carried a brown folder under one arm.
“My name is Aaron Hotchner. I’m the lead agent of the BAU. We are currently handling the case in assistance with the local authorities.”
Reid’s mother narrowed her eyes.
“I know all your games,” she said warningly.
“Ma’am?”
“You watch me every day. You know what happened. How do I know it wasn’t one of you?”
The agent merely raised an eyebrow. Spencer was silently grateful he wasn’t getting angry. He must have been aware of her disease.
“Mom,” he said, “he’s not here to hurt you.”
She gripped his hand and squeezed. She didn’t look like she really believed him, but she knew he would never let anyone hurt her.
He looked up at the agent.
“I can help her. Ask your questions, Agent Hotchner.”
“Mrs. Reid, I-“
“Ms. Reid,” she snapped curtly.
“My apologies. Ms. Reid, the person who attacked you, what did they look like?”
“How am I supposed to know? It was dark!”
“Mom,” Spencer pleaded, “please. We know that. They are trying to help.”
Spencer’s mother sighed and folded her hands on the desk.
“There’s really not much to tell. I was in my room getting ready for bed. I had just turned out the light when I felt hands at my neck,” she pantomimed hands around her neck, “it was awful. I was feeling dizzy and I knew soon that I would be dead. Behind me, I heard one of the male aides come in. I’m pretty sure he hit him pretty hard with something like a baseball bat or pipe because I heard the sound of something connecting with bone.”
She stopped and squeezed Spencer’s hand tighter.
“Anything else?”
“The man ran away I guess. The fact you are asking me about him means he wasn’t caught, I suppose, by the orderly.”
“Your room, it is in Bennington Sanitarium, correct?”
“What are you implying?”
“Mom, please.”
“Nothing Ms. Reid. I was just verifying the information.”
She seemed content enough with this to drop it.
“Is there anything else you remember? About the assailant? Anything out of the ordinary?”
“I…I really didn’t see his face.”
“A male?”
“Definitely. He was stocky. Unlike Spencer here,” she smiled. Spencer winced. “I really don’t know anything else. It was too dark to see.”
“Did he say anything to you?”
“No, he did-,” she stopped mid-section.
“Mom?”
“I just remembered…well, I swore I heard him say something when he first…well, I wasn’t sure I really heard it.”
In a second, the truth of the statement clicked with the agent.
“Could you make out what he was saying?”
“It was…almost like a whisper so, no, not most of it. I swore he said… ‘bluebird.’
“’Bluebird?’”
“Don’t tell me it sounds crazy,” she wagged her finger at him, “You’re the one who wanted to hear it from me.”
“I’m not implying anything of the sort.”
“Of course.”
She didn’t sound even half-way convinced.
“Thank you for your time.”
The man got up and left the room to talk to the rest of the BAU and get an accurate depiction of the unsub.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Spencer watched the man walk away and looked over at his mother.
“Are you okay, mom?”
She nodded sullenly, but her eyes were wild.
“I don’t know how I feel about you going back there,” he said, “Especially not when they can’t protect you.”
She smiled at him and put an arm around him.
“You always want to solve everything, don’t you?”
“Mom, you were just attacked by a violent man who almost killed you,” he said, trying not to be short. “I think I have every right to be concerned.”
“A violent man who was going after someone in a mental hospital,” his mother said with a laugh, “I doubt that there are too many of them running around.”
She winked and tightened her hug around him before pulling back. Spencer managed a small smile.
At that moment, the dark-haired man came back.
“Spencer Reid, can I ask that you leave your mother for a second? I would like to ask her several questions.”
“With all due respect, sir,” he said, “I’d like to be with her, in case…well, sometimes Mom doesn’t remember where she is.”
“Its protocol,” Agent Hotchner retorted, “you don’t have to be too far away, but I do need to speak to her confidentially.”
Spencer bit his lip. The man looked slightly annoyed.
Finally he nodded and looked over at his Mom. She was nervously looking around the room.
“Mom,” he said softly, “I’m going to be right back, okay?”
“Okay.”
She looked as if she were drifting off slightly. He bit his lip and left the room to let his mom talk to the agent. He was looking around for a cup of coffee when he heard a familiar voice.
“Not when I’m through with you, you tasty hunk of chocolate.”
He spun around to see none other than his agent Penelope.
“Pen?”
She turned from talking very closely with a dark-skinned agent. As usual, she was wearing one of the brightest outfits he’d ever seen. Oh and sequined shoes…
“Spencer, honey! I’m so glad you’re out. How’s Mom?”
“She was okay, but I don’t think she’s going to be like that very long…she was drifting off a bit…”
She looked a little sad at this, but she nodded.
“I’m sorry about that…”
“Thanks.”
“Are you part of the investigation?” the dark-skinned man asked her.
“Me? No, Spencer is my client and good friend. I’m just here supporting him.”
Spencer allowed himself a small smile.
Penelope walked over to Spencer and he noticed that the agent followed as well.
“Spencer, have you met Agent Morgan? He’s one of the agent’s assigned to your mother’s case.”
The two shook hands. Spencer ignored the spark that shot down his spine.
“No, I haven’t yet. I’m Spencer Reid.”
“Agent Derek Morgan.”
TBC