[Criminal Minds] Proud of you
Title: Proud of you
Rating: PG
Genre: Missing Scene
Characters: Spencer Reid, Derek Morgan, Aaron "Hotch" Hotchner
Spoilers: 2x01 The Fisher King part 2
Warnings: none if you saw the episode
Summary: The case had, accidentally, been started by his mother. Now it was on Reid to end it.
All characters are property of CBS, Jeff Davis, Edward Allen Bernero and sadly not mine. I just play with them a little and then hand them back to their owners.
Special thanks to my dear friend Sarah for all her help and encouragement and being my beta. Thanks to everyone who read and/or reviewed one of my others stories.
“The line between failure and success is so fine that we scarcely know when we pass it; so fine that we are often on the line and do not know it.” American writer Elbert Green Hubbard
“There’s someone upstairs,” Reid whispered into the microphone that was attached to his bullet-proof vest.
He was standing halfway up the stairs leading to the second floor at Randall Garner’s house. They knew that they were at the right place after finding Elle’s badge and gun on a table a few minutes ago.
Letting go of the piece of electronic equipment he grabbed the flashlight he had briefly put between his right arm and his body and, bringing his arms in front of him, he crossed his wrists so that the gun in his right hand and the flashlight in the other were pointing in the same direction. When one of the SWAT officers walked past him a few steps, the young agent lowered the items as a safety precaution.
Both Morgan and a second SWAT guy approached, coming to stand below him, and the black agent asked in a low voice, “Where?”
“I saw a shadow,” Spencer replied in the same way. He stayed in the spot where he was standing while both Derek and the black-clad officer passed him and then followed.
“Randall Garner! FBI!” Morgan announced and patted the SWAT officer in front of him on the shoulder to get him to move as the four people reached the top of the stairs.
“Garner?” the agent repeated, again not getting an answer.
They turned right, and then headed down a corridor. Rounding a corner they stopped when another hallway branched off at a ninety degree angle, creating a corner at each side of it. It ended into a room with a partially open door.
One of the officers crossed it to position himself at the far corner with Reid following him. Taking a quick look down the hallway, the profiler saw a person moving past the opening.
“He’s in there,” Spencer whispered and tilted his head in that direction with his gaze on his fellow agent.
Morgan returned it while assessing the situation, and after a moment he said, “All right, cover me. I’m going in.”
Decision made, he rounded the corner he had been standing at, but came to a halt when his colleague whispered, “No, wait, wait, wait.”
Quickly retaking his earlier position, his voice wasn’t quite that low anymore when he asked a bit agitated, “What? What?”, not knowing why the young man had stopped him.
But instead of giving an answer, Reid called, “Mr. Garner? My name is Spencer Reid. You were in the hospital with my mother.” He knew that this time it couldn’t be solved with Derek’s method.
Morgan wasn’t sure what his colleague was getting at with this, but he trusted him as the kid had already proven to be capable of ending a situation like this peacefully by talking the UnSub down. If this case would end without any more casualties, he was all for letting the young man give it a try.
Out of the corner of his eye Spencer saw Hotch slowly approaching them and Morgan turning his head around toward their boss before indicating with his head where the UnSub was.
Reid briefly looked over at his superior coming to a stand next to their fellow agent while he continued, “I-I think-think she might have confused you. All we wanna do is help Rebecca. That’s what you want, right? That’s why you sent us the puzzles? That’s why you said you’d hoped you’d be seeing us soon?”
He couldn’t quite keep his voice from getting higher with every sentence at the lack of response from the UnSub which unintentionally made him sounding a bit insecure.
“Ask the question,” requested a hoarse voice from inside the office.
Relieved at having established communication, Spencer replied, “There’s no magical question, Mr. Garner.”
He turned his head to look at his colleagues and explained in a low voice, “He believes that if I ask him the right question, it’ll heal all of his wounds.”
Raising his eyebrows, Hotch wanted to know, “Do you know the question?” His plan was to play into the UnSub’s delusions for now despite Gideon’s advice back at the hospital, and if their walking library knew what Garner was getting at with this, their chances of finding Rebecca would increase. Morgan turned his head toward him to confirm their course of action.
“I know what he wants,” Reid answered, having formed his own plan which he was sure was different from his teammates’. So he continued, “I’m gonna move to where he can see me.”
Without waiting for a response he stepped forward into the hallway while Hotch protested in an angry but still low voice, “Reid!”
He had let Spencer walk into a dangerous situation once before when an UnSub had taken a train hostage in Texas, though it had been more Gideon’s decision then. Now it was his, but it was more or less taken out of his hands again, this time by that young man. Still, it felt no different.
“Reid, no!” Morgan said forcefully with Aaron adding “Reid!” Both of them didn’t like the idea of letting their youngest team member make himself an easy target like this.
But Spencer ignored them.
Holding his weapon out to the SWAT officer that was kneeling in front of him and touching the man’s shoulder lightly to get his attention, he said with determination, “Fall back.”
“Reid!” Hotch warned but to no avail, and Derek’s repeated “Reid, no!” brought the same result.
The SWAT agents complied and retreated, so that they could still overlook the corridor leading toward the office which Morgan crossed to take Reid’s now vacant place while adding, “Wait a minute, Reid. Wait!”
Their superior moved forward to the edge where Morgan had been standing before.
Both older agents watched their colleague slowly approaching the door, knowing that there would be nothing they could do if the situation went south. They could only observe, powerless to interfere, if they didn’t want to place him in any more danger. Once again they had to rely entirely on Reid’s abilities. So their gazes were directed down the corridor and on their fellow agent’s back.
Raising his hands to make himself appear less of a threat, Spencer slowly walked toward the room’s partially open door. “Stay calm, Mr. Garner.”
He was completely focused on his task now, knowing fully well that he could blow it with just one wrong word. His only chance to find the girl was to try and get Garner back to reality, at least partially.
“Ask the question, Sir Percival,” the UnSub demanded.
“I told you, I’m not Percival. My name is Dr. Spencer Reid from the FBI. You were at the hospital with my mother Diana.” He knew there was only a small chance that he would be able to keep his mother’s mental state a secret any longer.
Now seemingly agitated, Garner replied, “If you want the grail, you must ask the question.”
“She’s not a grail,” Reid clarified, “she’s your daughter. Her name’s Rebecca.”
“My daughters died in a fire, and my son, and my wife.” Garner’s voice cracked at the end.
Encouraged by the fact that the man had talked about reality for the first time, Spencer replied in a softer voice, “Rebecca lived.”
“No! Your mother, she explained it all to me.”
There it was. Now Reid had no choice. He felt responsible for the UnSub’s delusions since his mother’s actions had contributed to those. Because of her telling the mentally unstable man of the Grail legend, he had kidnapped his daughter. So Spencer felt like he had to do something to make it right again and free the girl.
For the moment not caring about the impact he suspected this would have on his fellow agents, Reid stated with a voice that was louder and less calm than before, “My mother’s a paranoid schizophrenic who’d forget to eat if she wasn’t properly medicated and supervised.”
At the other end of the hallway, Morgan looked at Hotch in surprise and mild shock. This was news to him and even though he had met her less than an hour ago, he wouldn’t have taken her for being mentally ill. A bit weird like Reid was acting sometimes, yes, but not schizophrenic. Moments like this made him realize how little he still knew of the young man’s personal life.
Hotch on the other hand didn’t react to it at all, at least not on the outside. He knew from the agent’s personnel file that his mother who was listed as his next of kin, lived in a sanatorium, though he hadn’t known what condition she was suffering of. However he couldn’t allow this to distract him right now, so he blocked out any other thoughts and concentrated on Reid in case he needed any help. Garner’s reply helped him achieving this.
“She made me realize none of it was real. I didn’t lose Rebecca. She never existed in the first place.”
Spencer almost cursed his mother, but he was aware that she couldn’t have known the repercussions her action would have. Still, it made his job a lot harder.
“She does exist, Mr. Garner.” By now he was standing in front of the door, so he reached out with his left hand and pushed it open carefully while he continued, “And we’re here to help her.”
The view inside the room no longer obscured, the young agent saw an old dark-wooden desk in its middle and behind it sat a bald, black-clad man in a brown leather chair, slowly turning around to him. His face and hands were distorted by burn scars.
Reid’s heart rate increased when he saw the bomb that Garner had fastened around his upper body with a wire leading to a detonator in his left hand, his twitching thumb pressing the button on top of it.
For a moment the profiler was shocked, but he still approached despite it while calling over his shoulder with a slightly unsteady voice, “Hotch, Morgan.” He paused to think of a way to phrase it so that he wouldn’t agitate the man any further but still get the message across, then continued, “I-I think maybe… maybe it’d be better if you guys waited downstairs.”
If this situation would go south and Garner would detonate the bomb, he didn’t want for his colleagues to get caught in the blast and more importantly, if it would come to that, they shouldn’t see him getting killed.
Down the corridor, Hotch whispered, “What?” while Morgan turned his gaze to him and shook his head at that, both of them not believing what their colleague had just suggested.
Before any of them could answer however, the young agent entered the room and continued, “Mr. Garner and I are just gonna talk alone up here.”
“Go ahead and talk, Reid, but we’re not going anywhere,” Derek pointed out.
Spencer cursed inwardly, but he knew he couldn’t make it any clearer, so he gave up and focused on the UnSub again who now said in a low voice, “Ask the question, I’ll be healed and you may take the grail. Just ask the question.”
In a matching tone, Reid replied, “I can’t.”
“Heal me!” Garner demanded forcefully. His hand holding the detonator was shaking more considerably now and the agent took a step back.
Knowing that he had to get the UnSub to calm down, the agent told him, “Mr. Garner, a Fisher King wound cannot be healed by somebody else. It’s, uh, it’s not a wound of the body. It’s a wound of the memory.” Pointing toward his head with his left index finger, he added, “a wound of the mind. It’s a wound that only you can find, and a wound that only you can heal.”
“Just ask the question,” the man repeated.
Spencer lowered his hands and brought them in front of his body. Deciding to take it a step further, he replied, “There’s only one question that matters, Mr. Garner. There’s only one really important question.” He paused and then asked, “Can you forgive yourself?”
“I couldn’t get to them,” Garner said, seemingly having a clearer moment.
Encouraged by finally having gotten through, the profiler offered, “If you tell me where she is, you can save Rebecca now.” When he got no answer, he repeated, “Tell me where she is.”
“You already know. I sent your mother the map,” the UnSub told him.
Momentarily confused, Reid asked, more to himself, “What map?”
He didn’t have time to think about it however because Garner said, “Can I forgive myself?”
The agent was pretty sure he knew what would happen now, so he slowly started to back out of the room. Proving him right, the man added, “No, I can’t.”
Spencer stopped for a moment, and then took two steps back before he turned around quickly while yelling to his fellow agents, “Run!”
Just then the bomb exploded and the young profiler leaped forward when its shock wave caught him and catapulted him farther down the hallway.
The explosion came as a surprise for his teammates though and they had barely time to register Reid’s shout prior to the detonation. More on instinct they took cover behind their respective corners for protection from the flying debris.
Spencer landed on his stomach almost next to them and both of his colleagues looked into the hallway to check on him. He felt his left thigh getting very hot, realizing only partially that his pants’ leg had caught fire.
Seeing this, Derek pulled a cloth from a little table nearby, and tried to put it out while he ordered, “Don’t move, Reid! Don’t move!” The young agent complied at first, mostly due to the shock, but then he tried to get up.
His superior reached down to help him. “Get him out. Get…” he stopped when the fire was out and grabbed Spencer’s right arm with his right hand and put his left arm around the young man’s waist to practically drag him up from the floor. Reid’s attempt to get up on his own merely seemed to hinder the success of Hotch’s actions.
“Let’s go!” Aaron hauled him completely upright and repeated, “Let’s go!”
Morgan let go of the piece of cloth and grabbed his friend’s other arm while Spencer reminded them in a high-pitched voice, “The girl!”
“Let’s go!” Putting first one and then the other arm around Reid’s waist Derek was practically holding him upright now that both of Hotch’s hands were on the young man’s arm. The older agents steered their teammate, who coughed briefly, down the corridor and back to the stairs, followed by the SWAT officers, as the fire slowly spread.
“What the hell was that?” Aaron demanded to know.
“He had a bomb,” Spencer explained.
Morgan sounded agitated when he asked, “You didn’t think we needed to know that?”
“I told you to go downstairs,” the young agent defended himself. They reached the stairs and Hotch let go of Reid, going down a few steps while the genius grabbed the handrail.
Trying to steer his colleague downstairs as well, Morgan pointed out, “You didn’t say bomb. You left that part out.”
With his hold on the rail Reid had enough power to counteract his friend’s action, and he came to a stop still on top of the staircase, causing Derek’s arm to slip away from around his waist. “Stop! Stop! Stop! Stop! Stop!” he said rapid-fired, a strand of hair hanging in front of his face.
Morgan came to a halt a few steps below and while both he and Hotch were turning around to the young agent, he stated even more agitated, “What do you mean, ‘stop’? The house is on fire, Reid! Let’s go!”
Still not moving, Spencer’s voice was higher than normal when he replied, “Just let me think, let me think!” He was determined to find the girl and at least save her.
The black agent looked helplessly to Aaron while their colleague continued, though speaking more to himself, “He’s the Fisher King. This is his castle. Rebecca’s got to be here.” He stopped and glanced at his boss.
Seeing that this didn’t seem to go anywhere, Hotch impatiently raised his arm in the younger man’s direction, as if he wanted to grab him by the arm and pull him downstairs. “Reid, there might not be time for a search. Let’s go.”
Completely ignoring that Spencer went on, “Location’s on the map that he gave my mother.”
“Reid, all she told us about was that photo,” Derek reminded him and added with urge evident in his voice, “Let’s go.”
At the mention of the photo, the young profiler recalled its details and noticed that there was a light coming through a window at the cellar. Now he was fairly sure that he knew where the girl was held.
“Down.” He started to run down the steps. “She’s in the basement downstairs.” He passed both of his fellow agents who then followed him, as did the SWAT officers.
“How do you know that?” Morgan asked, but he didn’t get an answer.
On the way across the entrance hall to the door leading to the underground room, Aaron addressed the SWAT guys, “We got this. There’s no point in you staying in here, too. Call paramedics and fire department.”
“Yes, sir.” With that, they both left the house while the three agents rushed downstairs.
Spencer heard a distant voice and shouted, “She’s in here! Rebecca!” Relieved that they had found her in time, he entered the room to his left, Hotch close behind him.
“I’m chained!” the girl told them.
Reid started to bend down, but got stopped by his superior with a hand on his arm, who then passed him to kneel down next to Garner’s daughter.
“Get me out of here. I’m chained,” she pleaded.
Morgan, who by now had entered the room as well, said, “Here. I got the bed.” With that he pulled the metal frame closer to the opposite wall to get access to where the chain was attached to an iron ring at the ground, secured with a small lock. Both Rebecca and Hotch pulled at the chain, but they couldn’t get it free. “Hurry,” she urged.
In the midst of all this, Spencer tried to figure out how to free the girl by mentally going through everything the UnSub had said. There had to have been a clue in all that, because Garner needed to have been sure that they could save Rebecca before he killed himself.
So he murmured, “He called me, ‘Sir Percival’.”
“Hurry,” the young woman repeated.
“Reid, hurry.” Hotch looked up at the team’s youngest member.
It was Derek though who got the right idea. “The key, Reid, the key.” When the other man just stared at him open-mouthed, he explained, “‘The youngest one holds the key.’ Tell me you’ve got the key.”
Snapping out of it, the young profiler reached into his right pants’ pocket for the evidence bag holding the key Garner had sent him in Las Vegas and took out the piece of metal.
“Come on, man, let’s go,” Morgan hurried and Spencer crouched down next to Rebecca and inserted the key into the lock.
“Let’s go! We have no time, let’s go!” his friend reminded them.
Both Hotch and Reid held the lock while the latter turned the key before getting up again and starting to leave the room. Finally freed, Garner’s daughter got scooped up by the senior agent who then also hurried out of the room with their colleague close behind. Leading the way, Reid turned around briefly to see if his fellow agents were following him, then climbed upstairs.
Just then another, smaller explosion set the girl’s former prison on fire and Derek dove away from the door just in time. The agents rushed up the stairs to the first floor and toward the entrance door.
Once outside they were met by the SWAT officers and not a minute later an ambulance arrived. Hotch carried the young woman over to the paramedics while a fire department truck entered the property and Morgan approached it to inform the fire fighters of the situation.
Standing a few feet to the left, Spencer observed the scene, thinking over what had happened. He hadn’t been able to save Garner. Even though he knew that there had only been a small chance to begin with after he had seen the bomb, he’d had to give it a shot. He had failed and had almost gotten killed in the process.
Before he could brood over it however, Derek came over and, seeing the other agent’s slightly detached demeanor, he led him over to a small wall they sat down upon.
Glancing over at the dark-haired man to his right, he asked, “Are you okay?” Spencer’s answer was a simple nodding.
A middle-aged EMT approached them, apparently sent over by Hotch, and checked the young agent for any injuries, just as a precaution since the man’s landing on the floor hadn’t been a gentle one.
Taking a good look at his friend, Derek knew exactly what the man was thinking. He waited until the paramedic had walked back over to the ambulance and then said, “Reid, you can’t always succeed in talking them down. Garner had planned on killing himself from the very beginning. There was nothing you could have said or done to change that.”
Spencer turned his head around to look at him. “I know,” he softly answered.
“You gotta look at the bright side, man. You save the girl,” the older agent reminded him.
Reid’s gaze went over to Rebecca who sat at the back of the ambulance getting treated by an EMT while she talked to their superior. He knew that the young woman had a lot to deal with and that freeing her was only the first step, but he felt a bit better. It didn’t help the feeling of guilt that he had for her getting kidnapped though.
Unnoticed by him, Derek was giving him sideway glances. As much as he wanted to, the agent refrained from asking Spencer about his mother, knowing that if his friend wanted to talk about it, he would come to him. Also, he didn’t have any intention of commenting on the stunt that Reid had pulled, mostly because he was pretty sure that their supervisor would do it in one way or the other. And also because he didn’t know if any other course of action would have enabled them to rescue Rebecca.
“You did good, kid,” he said instead.
Spencer didn’t turn around, his focus still on Garner’s daughter, but he relaxed visibly. Noticing that Morgan hadn’t asked about his mother yet, he was grateful for it. It wasn’t like he was ashamed of her or her condition, but there were some issues attached to that very topic that he hadn’t dealt completely with yet.
Like he had told Garcia, he felt guilty for not being able to visit her that often. But it was more than that. He had let her be taken away to the sanatorium. And even though he knew it was the right decision for both of them, a part of him would never forgive himself for doing that to her. Sometimes he still could hear her screams as they took her away.
“So what was that question Garner was talking about?” Derek wanted to know.
At that sudden change of subject, the young man’s head turned around abruptly to his friend again.
Eagerly accepting the direction the conversation seemed to be going now, he easily slipped into his usual lecture mode and replied, “According to legend, the Fisher King was the Keeper of the Grail. Once he neglected his duties and was punished for it with ailment. He could only be forgiven and thereby healed when a person who is worthy showed his compassion by asking the question. Percival was one of the knights who showed up at the Fisher King’s castle.”
“That’s why he called you Percival,” Morgan concluded, interrupting him. He saw Hotch coming over to them.
Nodding, Spencer continued, “The actual content of the question varies, depending on the version of the story. According to German knight and poet Wolfram von Eschenbach, it’s ‘What ails you?’ whereas a different source states it to actually being two question that need to be asked, ‘What is the secret of the grail? and ‘Whom does it serve?’” By now he talked as animated as usual.
Hotch had come to stand in front of his fellow agents, his arms crossed in front of his chest and wearing a stern expression as he listened to the explanation.
Reid still focused on Morgan who, seemingly interested in the story now, replied, “So he asked the question and freed the Fisher King.”
The fact that Aaron stood there waiting made the young agent nervous, especially because his boss hadn’t said a word yet, so he cut his explanation short. “Eventually yes and he became the Keeper of the Grail.”
Both agents now turned to their colleague and Reid braced himself for getting reprimanded. But before the senior profiler could say anything, Morgan beat him to it and asked, “How’s Rebecca?”
“All things considered, she’s doing pretty well. They’re taking her to the hospital,” Aaron replied and turned his gaze to his youngest agent. Before he could continue however, his cell phone rang. So he walked out of earshot to answer it.
“That’s what I call ‘saved by the bell’,” Morgan remarked, slightly amused.
“Actually, do you know where this phrase originated from?” his friend asked. Recognizing this to be a rhetorical question, Derek motioned for him to go on.
“Morticians would tie one end of a string to the hand of a dead person and the other one to a bell above ground,” the genius explained, “And immediately after the burial a person from the mortuary would be assigned the task to sit by the new graveside and listen for the bell to ring. This was called ‘the graveyard shift’ by the way.”
Hotch had ended his phone call and came over to them again. Spencer looked up at his superior who said, “As I was gonna say, don’t you ever think of doing something like that up there again. It was really close.” His features softened a bit as he continued, “But you did a good job, Reid. Though next time I’d appreciate it if you’d let us in on your plan before you act on it.”
Slowly a small smile started to spread on the young profiler’s slightly soot-covered face. “Yes, Sir,” he replied.
After a moment the ambulance drove off and Aaron stated, “Well, there’s nothing we can do here anymore. Let’s go back to the BAU.” The two agents got up and followed him to the SUV that was parked on the street. He got in on the driver’s side with Morgan on the seat next to him and Reid in the back.
The drive back was in silence as each of them was, now that Rebecca was found and save, lost in their own thoughts, which was pretty much the same one: Their colleague who was still fighting for her life in the hospital.
Knowing that it didn’t look good they had been more determined than ever to catch the man responsible for it, but now that they had, they felt the helplessness taking them over. There was nothing they could do for Elle.
But the youngest one of them also felt guilty for it. He know that both Gideon and Hotch blamed themselves for her getting shot; his mentor because he went against Garner’s rule to keep it within the team and their boss for sending her home to sleep and not making it clear to the agent accompanying her not to leave her alone.
Spencer though felt it was his fault that Garner had chosen the team for his game. If he hadn’t written his mother all about his colleagues and their secrets, this all might have never happened. He knew this thought was irrational, that he couldn’t have known that someone would use it for a perfidious game. And it wasn’t only Elle’s life that was endangered, there were also two men killed in the process, Marty Harris and Frank Giles.
Reid thought back what Garner had said in his video message to the team. ‘I assure you, you will all understand in the end why is must be this way. You might even thank me.’ Having to acknowledge that the first part was somewhat true, if only from the mythological point of view, the second one only showed him the intensity with which their UnSub had believed the story to be true. The young agent felt he should have discovered the connection between Garner and his mother sooner, because of the man’s repeated use of the word ‘adventures’ and the overall theme of the medieval legend. Now he hoped that Elle would pull through. Spencer didn’t know if he could keep going on if she didn’t.
Arriving at the destination the profilers made their way up to the office where Morgan opened the right glass door leading to the bullpen area. He entered, followed by Hotch and held it open until Reid grabbed the handle. JJ, who had seen her colleagues coming in, approached them.
“Elle’s out of surgery. She’s gonna be okay,” the blond liaison informed them with a small smile, looking as tired as her fellow agents felt.
“Good,” Hotch replied while Morgan next to him sighed in relief and Reid, who was standing behind the two, acknowledged it with a quick humorless smile.
“Is Gideon still at the hospital?” the senior agent wanted to know.
“Yeah,” she answered, and then asked, “How’s Rebecca?”
From the left side Garcia was approaching the group, anxious to know how it all turned out, while Derek informed JJ, “She’s in the hospital, but she should be all right.”
“Physically maybe,” Penelope interjected, standing next to Morgan now. Everyone turned to look at her and she averted her gaze, still feeling guilty for making it easier for Garner to hack into the BAU computers by playing an online RPG.
Hotch took a few steps toward his office, then stopped and turned halfway around again. “Thank you everyone.” Looking pointedly at the computer whiz, he added, “All of you”, letting her know that she was forgiven for her mistake, before walking away.
Instantly a huge smile appeared on Garcia’s face and she briefly felt Derek’s hand on her back. “Well, we could’ve only gone so far without Mrs. Reid,” she reminded them and looked up at Morgan who then turned around to Spencer, seeing his gaze being met by the young man.
After giving him a friendly back-handed pat on the chest the black agent walked over to his desk. Passing the now smiling Reid, JJ patted him on the arm before leaving through the glass doors. Garcia threw the young profiler a smile and then followed Morgan.
Hands stuffed into his pants’ pockets Spencer’s gaze went up to the conference room where his mother was sitting. It was true that without her they might not have found Rebecca and saved her.
He remembered what the doctor at the sanatorium had told him. ‘She’s exceptionally proud of you.’
As he made his way upstairs to the room he realized that now he had a chance to tell her that he was proud of her, too.
“Some succeed by what they know; some by what they do; and a few by what they are.” American writer Elbert Green Hubbard
Rating: PG
Genre: Missing Scene
Characters: Spencer Reid, Derek Morgan, Aaron "Hotch" Hotchner
Spoilers: 2x01 The Fisher King part 2
Warnings: none if you saw the episode
Summary: The case had, accidentally, been started by his mother. Now it was on Reid to end it.
All characters are property of CBS, Jeff Davis, Edward Allen Bernero and sadly not mine. I just play with them a little and then hand them back to their owners.
Special thanks to my dear friend Sarah for all her help and encouragement and being my beta. Thanks to everyone who read and/or reviewed one of my others stories.
“The line between failure and success is so fine that we scarcely know when we pass it; so fine that we are often on the line and do not know it.” American writer Elbert Green Hubbard
“There’s someone upstairs,” Reid whispered into the microphone that was attached to his bullet-proof vest.
He was standing halfway up the stairs leading to the second floor at Randall Garner’s house. They knew that they were at the right place after finding Elle’s badge and gun on a table a few minutes ago.
Letting go of the piece of electronic equipment he grabbed the flashlight he had briefly put between his right arm and his body and, bringing his arms in front of him, he crossed his wrists so that the gun in his right hand and the flashlight in the other were pointing in the same direction. When one of the SWAT officers walked past him a few steps, the young agent lowered the items as a safety precaution.
Both Morgan and a second SWAT guy approached, coming to stand below him, and the black agent asked in a low voice, “Where?”
“I saw a shadow,” Spencer replied in the same way. He stayed in the spot where he was standing while both Derek and the black-clad officer passed him and then followed.
“Randall Garner! FBI!” Morgan announced and patted the SWAT officer in front of him on the shoulder to get him to move as the four people reached the top of the stairs.
“Garner?” the agent repeated, again not getting an answer.
They turned right, and then headed down a corridor. Rounding a corner they stopped when another hallway branched off at a ninety degree angle, creating a corner at each side of it. It ended into a room with a partially open door.
One of the officers crossed it to position himself at the far corner with Reid following him. Taking a quick look down the hallway, the profiler saw a person moving past the opening.
“He’s in there,” Spencer whispered and tilted his head in that direction with his gaze on his fellow agent.
Morgan returned it while assessing the situation, and after a moment he said, “All right, cover me. I’m going in.”
Decision made, he rounded the corner he had been standing at, but came to a halt when his colleague whispered, “No, wait, wait, wait.”
Quickly retaking his earlier position, his voice wasn’t quite that low anymore when he asked a bit agitated, “What? What?”, not knowing why the young man had stopped him.
But instead of giving an answer, Reid called, “Mr. Garner? My name is Spencer Reid. You were in the hospital with my mother.” He knew that this time it couldn’t be solved with Derek’s method.
Morgan wasn’t sure what his colleague was getting at with this, but he trusted him as the kid had already proven to be capable of ending a situation like this peacefully by talking the UnSub down. If this case would end without any more casualties, he was all for letting the young man give it a try.
Out of the corner of his eye Spencer saw Hotch slowly approaching them and Morgan turning his head around toward their boss before indicating with his head where the UnSub was.
Reid briefly looked over at his superior coming to a stand next to their fellow agent while he continued, “I-I think-think she might have confused you. All we wanna do is help Rebecca. That’s what you want, right? That’s why you sent us the puzzles? That’s why you said you’d hoped you’d be seeing us soon?”
He couldn’t quite keep his voice from getting higher with every sentence at the lack of response from the UnSub which unintentionally made him sounding a bit insecure.
“Ask the question,” requested a hoarse voice from inside the office.
Relieved at having established communication, Spencer replied, “There’s no magical question, Mr. Garner.”
He turned his head to look at his colleagues and explained in a low voice, “He believes that if I ask him the right question, it’ll heal all of his wounds.”
Raising his eyebrows, Hotch wanted to know, “Do you know the question?” His plan was to play into the UnSub’s delusions for now despite Gideon’s advice back at the hospital, and if their walking library knew what Garner was getting at with this, their chances of finding Rebecca would increase. Morgan turned his head toward him to confirm their course of action.
“I know what he wants,” Reid answered, having formed his own plan which he was sure was different from his teammates’. So he continued, “I’m gonna move to where he can see me.”
Without waiting for a response he stepped forward into the hallway while Hotch protested in an angry but still low voice, “Reid!”
He had let Spencer walk into a dangerous situation once before when an UnSub had taken a train hostage in Texas, though it had been more Gideon’s decision then. Now it was his, but it was more or less taken out of his hands again, this time by that young man. Still, it felt no different.
“Reid, no!” Morgan said forcefully with Aaron adding “Reid!” Both of them didn’t like the idea of letting their youngest team member make himself an easy target like this.
But Spencer ignored them.
Holding his weapon out to the SWAT officer that was kneeling in front of him and touching the man’s shoulder lightly to get his attention, he said with determination, “Fall back.”
“Reid!” Hotch warned but to no avail, and Derek’s repeated “Reid, no!” brought the same result.
The SWAT agents complied and retreated, so that they could still overlook the corridor leading toward the office which Morgan crossed to take Reid’s now vacant place while adding, “Wait a minute, Reid. Wait!”
Their superior moved forward to the edge where Morgan had been standing before.
Both older agents watched their colleague slowly approaching the door, knowing that there would be nothing they could do if the situation went south. They could only observe, powerless to interfere, if they didn’t want to place him in any more danger. Once again they had to rely entirely on Reid’s abilities. So their gazes were directed down the corridor and on their fellow agent’s back.
Raising his hands to make himself appear less of a threat, Spencer slowly walked toward the room’s partially open door. “Stay calm, Mr. Garner.”
He was completely focused on his task now, knowing fully well that he could blow it with just one wrong word. His only chance to find the girl was to try and get Garner back to reality, at least partially.
“Ask the question, Sir Percival,” the UnSub demanded.
“I told you, I’m not Percival. My name is Dr. Spencer Reid from the FBI. You were at the hospital with my mother Diana.” He knew there was only a small chance that he would be able to keep his mother’s mental state a secret any longer.
Now seemingly agitated, Garner replied, “If you want the grail, you must ask the question.”
“She’s not a grail,” Reid clarified, “she’s your daughter. Her name’s Rebecca.”
“My daughters died in a fire, and my son, and my wife.” Garner’s voice cracked at the end.
Encouraged by the fact that the man had talked about reality for the first time, Spencer replied in a softer voice, “Rebecca lived.”
“No! Your mother, she explained it all to me.”
There it was. Now Reid had no choice. He felt responsible for the UnSub’s delusions since his mother’s actions had contributed to those. Because of her telling the mentally unstable man of the Grail legend, he had kidnapped his daughter. So Spencer felt like he had to do something to make it right again and free the girl.
For the moment not caring about the impact he suspected this would have on his fellow agents, Reid stated with a voice that was louder and less calm than before, “My mother’s a paranoid schizophrenic who’d forget to eat if she wasn’t properly medicated and supervised.”
At the other end of the hallway, Morgan looked at Hotch in surprise and mild shock. This was news to him and even though he had met her less than an hour ago, he wouldn’t have taken her for being mentally ill. A bit weird like Reid was acting sometimes, yes, but not schizophrenic. Moments like this made him realize how little he still knew of the young man’s personal life.
Hotch on the other hand didn’t react to it at all, at least not on the outside. He knew from the agent’s personnel file that his mother who was listed as his next of kin, lived in a sanatorium, though he hadn’t known what condition she was suffering of. However he couldn’t allow this to distract him right now, so he blocked out any other thoughts and concentrated on Reid in case he needed any help. Garner’s reply helped him achieving this.
“She made me realize none of it was real. I didn’t lose Rebecca. She never existed in the first place.”
Spencer almost cursed his mother, but he was aware that she couldn’t have known the repercussions her action would have. Still, it made his job a lot harder.
“She does exist, Mr. Garner.” By now he was standing in front of the door, so he reached out with his left hand and pushed it open carefully while he continued, “And we’re here to help her.”
The view inside the room no longer obscured, the young agent saw an old dark-wooden desk in its middle and behind it sat a bald, black-clad man in a brown leather chair, slowly turning around to him. His face and hands were distorted by burn scars.
Reid’s heart rate increased when he saw the bomb that Garner had fastened around his upper body with a wire leading to a detonator in his left hand, his twitching thumb pressing the button on top of it.
For a moment the profiler was shocked, but he still approached despite it while calling over his shoulder with a slightly unsteady voice, “Hotch, Morgan.” He paused to think of a way to phrase it so that he wouldn’t agitate the man any further but still get the message across, then continued, “I-I think maybe… maybe it’d be better if you guys waited downstairs.”
If this situation would go south and Garner would detonate the bomb, he didn’t want for his colleagues to get caught in the blast and more importantly, if it would come to that, they shouldn’t see him getting killed.
Down the corridor, Hotch whispered, “What?” while Morgan turned his gaze to him and shook his head at that, both of them not believing what their colleague had just suggested.
Before any of them could answer however, the young agent entered the room and continued, “Mr. Garner and I are just gonna talk alone up here.”
“Go ahead and talk, Reid, but we’re not going anywhere,” Derek pointed out.
Spencer cursed inwardly, but he knew he couldn’t make it any clearer, so he gave up and focused on the UnSub again who now said in a low voice, “Ask the question, I’ll be healed and you may take the grail. Just ask the question.”
In a matching tone, Reid replied, “I can’t.”
“Heal me!” Garner demanded forcefully. His hand holding the detonator was shaking more considerably now and the agent took a step back.
Knowing that he had to get the UnSub to calm down, the agent told him, “Mr. Garner, a Fisher King wound cannot be healed by somebody else. It’s, uh, it’s not a wound of the body. It’s a wound of the memory.” Pointing toward his head with his left index finger, he added, “a wound of the mind. It’s a wound that only you can find, and a wound that only you can heal.”
“Just ask the question,” the man repeated.
Spencer lowered his hands and brought them in front of his body. Deciding to take it a step further, he replied, “There’s only one question that matters, Mr. Garner. There’s only one really important question.” He paused and then asked, “Can you forgive yourself?”
“I couldn’t get to them,” Garner said, seemingly having a clearer moment.
Encouraged by finally having gotten through, the profiler offered, “If you tell me where she is, you can save Rebecca now.” When he got no answer, he repeated, “Tell me where she is.”
“You already know. I sent your mother the map,” the UnSub told him.
Momentarily confused, Reid asked, more to himself, “What map?”
He didn’t have time to think about it however because Garner said, “Can I forgive myself?”
The agent was pretty sure he knew what would happen now, so he slowly started to back out of the room. Proving him right, the man added, “No, I can’t.”
Spencer stopped for a moment, and then took two steps back before he turned around quickly while yelling to his fellow agents, “Run!”
Just then the bomb exploded and the young profiler leaped forward when its shock wave caught him and catapulted him farther down the hallway.
The explosion came as a surprise for his teammates though and they had barely time to register Reid’s shout prior to the detonation. More on instinct they took cover behind their respective corners for protection from the flying debris.
Spencer landed on his stomach almost next to them and both of his colleagues looked into the hallway to check on him. He felt his left thigh getting very hot, realizing only partially that his pants’ leg had caught fire.
Seeing this, Derek pulled a cloth from a little table nearby, and tried to put it out while he ordered, “Don’t move, Reid! Don’t move!” The young agent complied at first, mostly due to the shock, but then he tried to get up.
His superior reached down to help him. “Get him out. Get…” he stopped when the fire was out and grabbed Spencer’s right arm with his right hand and put his left arm around the young man’s waist to practically drag him up from the floor. Reid’s attempt to get up on his own merely seemed to hinder the success of Hotch’s actions.
“Let’s go!” Aaron hauled him completely upright and repeated, “Let’s go!”
Morgan let go of the piece of cloth and grabbed his friend’s other arm while Spencer reminded them in a high-pitched voice, “The girl!”
“Let’s go!” Putting first one and then the other arm around Reid’s waist Derek was practically holding him upright now that both of Hotch’s hands were on the young man’s arm. The older agents steered their teammate, who coughed briefly, down the corridor and back to the stairs, followed by the SWAT officers, as the fire slowly spread.
“What the hell was that?” Aaron demanded to know.
“He had a bomb,” Spencer explained.
Morgan sounded agitated when he asked, “You didn’t think we needed to know that?”
“I told you to go downstairs,” the young agent defended himself. They reached the stairs and Hotch let go of Reid, going down a few steps while the genius grabbed the handrail.
Trying to steer his colleague downstairs as well, Morgan pointed out, “You didn’t say bomb. You left that part out.”
With his hold on the rail Reid had enough power to counteract his friend’s action, and he came to a stop still on top of the staircase, causing Derek’s arm to slip away from around his waist. “Stop! Stop! Stop! Stop! Stop!” he said rapid-fired, a strand of hair hanging in front of his face.
Morgan came to a halt a few steps below and while both he and Hotch were turning around to the young agent, he stated even more agitated, “What do you mean, ‘stop’? The house is on fire, Reid! Let’s go!”
Still not moving, Spencer’s voice was higher than normal when he replied, “Just let me think, let me think!” He was determined to find the girl and at least save her.
The black agent looked helplessly to Aaron while their colleague continued, though speaking more to himself, “He’s the Fisher King. This is his castle. Rebecca’s got to be here.” He stopped and glanced at his boss.
Seeing that this didn’t seem to go anywhere, Hotch impatiently raised his arm in the younger man’s direction, as if he wanted to grab him by the arm and pull him downstairs. “Reid, there might not be time for a search. Let’s go.”
Completely ignoring that Spencer went on, “Location’s on the map that he gave my mother.”
“Reid, all she told us about was that photo,” Derek reminded him and added with urge evident in his voice, “Let’s go.”
At the mention of the photo, the young profiler recalled its details and noticed that there was a light coming through a window at the cellar. Now he was fairly sure that he knew where the girl was held.
“Down.” He started to run down the steps. “She’s in the basement downstairs.” He passed both of his fellow agents who then followed him, as did the SWAT officers.
“How do you know that?” Morgan asked, but he didn’t get an answer.
On the way across the entrance hall to the door leading to the underground room, Aaron addressed the SWAT guys, “We got this. There’s no point in you staying in here, too. Call paramedics and fire department.”
“Yes, sir.” With that, they both left the house while the three agents rushed downstairs.
Spencer heard a distant voice and shouted, “She’s in here! Rebecca!” Relieved that they had found her in time, he entered the room to his left, Hotch close behind him.
“I’m chained!” the girl told them.
Reid started to bend down, but got stopped by his superior with a hand on his arm, who then passed him to kneel down next to Garner’s daughter.
“Get me out of here. I’m chained,” she pleaded.
Morgan, who by now had entered the room as well, said, “Here. I got the bed.” With that he pulled the metal frame closer to the opposite wall to get access to where the chain was attached to an iron ring at the ground, secured with a small lock. Both Rebecca and Hotch pulled at the chain, but they couldn’t get it free. “Hurry,” she urged.
In the midst of all this, Spencer tried to figure out how to free the girl by mentally going through everything the UnSub had said. There had to have been a clue in all that, because Garner needed to have been sure that they could save Rebecca before he killed himself.
So he murmured, “He called me, ‘Sir Percival’.”
“Hurry,” the young woman repeated.
“Reid, hurry.” Hotch looked up at the team’s youngest member.
It was Derek though who got the right idea. “The key, Reid, the key.” When the other man just stared at him open-mouthed, he explained, “‘The youngest one holds the key.’ Tell me you’ve got the key.”
Snapping out of it, the young profiler reached into his right pants’ pocket for the evidence bag holding the key Garner had sent him in Las Vegas and took out the piece of metal.
“Come on, man, let’s go,” Morgan hurried and Spencer crouched down next to Rebecca and inserted the key into the lock.
“Let’s go! We have no time, let’s go!” his friend reminded them.
Both Hotch and Reid held the lock while the latter turned the key before getting up again and starting to leave the room. Finally freed, Garner’s daughter got scooped up by the senior agent who then also hurried out of the room with their colleague close behind. Leading the way, Reid turned around briefly to see if his fellow agents were following him, then climbed upstairs.
Just then another, smaller explosion set the girl’s former prison on fire and Derek dove away from the door just in time. The agents rushed up the stairs to the first floor and toward the entrance door.
Once outside they were met by the SWAT officers and not a minute later an ambulance arrived. Hotch carried the young woman over to the paramedics while a fire department truck entered the property and Morgan approached it to inform the fire fighters of the situation.
Standing a few feet to the left, Spencer observed the scene, thinking over what had happened. He hadn’t been able to save Garner. Even though he knew that there had only been a small chance to begin with after he had seen the bomb, he’d had to give it a shot. He had failed and had almost gotten killed in the process.
Before he could brood over it however, Derek came over and, seeing the other agent’s slightly detached demeanor, he led him over to a small wall they sat down upon.
Glancing over at the dark-haired man to his right, he asked, “Are you okay?” Spencer’s answer was a simple nodding.
A middle-aged EMT approached them, apparently sent over by Hotch, and checked the young agent for any injuries, just as a precaution since the man’s landing on the floor hadn’t been a gentle one.
Taking a good look at his friend, Derek knew exactly what the man was thinking. He waited until the paramedic had walked back over to the ambulance and then said, “Reid, you can’t always succeed in talking them down. Garner had planned on killing himself from the very beginning. There was nothing you could have said or done to change that.”
Spencer turned his head around to look at him. “I know,” he softly answered.
“You gotta look at the bright side, man. You save the girl,” the older agent reminded him.
Reid’s gaze went over to Rebecca who sat at the back of the ambulance getting treated by an EMT while she talked to their superior. He knew that the young woman had a lot to deal with and that freeing her was only the first step, but he felt a bit better. It didn’t help the feeling of guilt that he had for her getting kidnapped though.
Unnoticed by him, Derek was giving him sideway glances. As much as he wanted to, the agent refrained from asking Spencer about his mother, knowing that if his friend wanted to talk about it, he would come to him. Also, he didn’t have any intention of commenting on the stunt that Reid had pulled, mostly because he was pretty sure that their supervisor would do it in one way or the other. And also because he didn’t know if any other course of action would have enabled them to rescue Rebecca.
“You did good, kid,” he said instead.
Spencer didn’t turn around, his focus still on Garner’s daughter, but he relaxed visibly. Noticing that Morgan hadn’t asked about his mother yet, he was grateful for it. It wasn’t like he was ashamed of her or her condition, but there were some issues attached to that very topic that he hadn’t dealt completely with yet.
Like he had told Garcia, he felt guilty for not being able to visit her that often. But it was more than that. He had let her be taken away to the sanatorium. And even though he knew it was the right decision for both of them, a part of him would never forgive himself for doing that to her. Sometimes he still could hear her screams as they took her away.
“So what was that question Garner was talking about?” Derek wanted to know.
At that sudden change of subject, the young man’s head turned around abruptly to his friend again.
Eagerly accepting the direction the conversation seemed to be going now, he easily slipped into his usual lecture mode and replied, “According to legend, the Fisher King was the Keeper of the Grail. Once he neglected his duties and was punished for it with ailment. He could only be forgiven and thereby healed when a person who is worthy showed his compassion by asking the question. Percival was one of the knights who showed up at the Fisher King’s castle.”
“That’s why he called you Percival,” Morgan concluded, interrupting him. He saw Hotch coming over to them.
Nodding, Spencer continued, “The actual content of the question varies, depending on the version of the story. According to German knight and poet Wolfram von Eschenbach, it’s ‘What ails you?’ whereas a different source states it to actually being two question that need to be asked, ‘What is the secret of the grail? and ‘Whom does it serve?’” By now he talked as animated as usual.
Hotch had come to stand in front of his fellow agents, his arms crossed in front of his chest and wearing a stern expression as he listened to the explanation.
Reid still focused on Morgan who, seemingly interested in the story now, replied, “So he asked the question and freed the Fisher King.”
The fact that Aaron stood there waiting made the young agent nervous, especially because his boss hadn’t said a word yet, so he cut his explanation short. “Eventually yes and he became the Keeper of the Grail.”
Both agents now turned to their colleague and Reid braced himself for getting reprimanded. But before the senior profiler could say anything, Morgan beat him to it and asked, “How’s Rebecca?”
“All things considered, she’s doing pretty well. They’re taking her to the hospital,” Aaron replied and turned his gaze to his youngest agent. Before he could continue however, his cell phone rang. So he walked out of earshot to answer it.
“That’s what I call ‘saved by the bell’,” Morgan remarked, slightly amused.
“Actually, do you know where this phrase originated from?” his friend asked. Recognizing this to be a rhetorical question, Derek motioned for him to go on.
“Morticians would tie one end of a string to the hand of a dead person and the other one to a bell above ground,” the genius explained, “And immediately after the burial a person from the mortuary would be assigned the task to sit by the new graveside and listen for the bell to ring. This was called ‘the graveyard shift’ by the way.”
Hotch had ended his phone call and came over to them again. Spencer looked up at his superior who said, “As I was gonna say, don’t you ever think of doing something like that up there again. It was really close.” His features softened a bit as he continued, “But you did a good job, Reid. Though next time I’d appreciate it if you’d let us in on your plan before you act on it.”
Slowly a small smile started to spread on the young profiler’s slightly soot-covered face. “Yes, Sir,” he replied.
After a moment the ambulance drove off and Aaron stated, “Well, there’s nothing we can do here anymore. Let’s go back to the BAU.” The two agents got up and followed him to the SUV that was parked on the street. He got in on the driver’s side with Morgan on the seat next to him and Reid in the back.
The drive back was in silence as each of them was, now that Rebecca was found and save, lost in their own thoughts, which was pretty much the same one: Their colleague who was still fighting for her life in the hospital.
Knowing that it didn’t look good they had been more determined than ever to catch the man responsible for it, but now that they had, they felt the helplessness taking them over. There was nothing they could do for Elle.
But the youngest one of them also felt guilty for it. He know that both Gideon and Hotch blamed themselves for her getting shot; his mentor because he went against Garner’s rule to keep it within the team and their boss for sending her home to sleep and not making it clear to the agent accompanying her not to leave her alone.
Spencer though felt it was his fault that Garner had chosen the team for his game. If he hadn’t written his mother all about his colleagues and their secrets, this all might have never happened. He knew this thought was irrational, that he couldn’t have known that someone would use it for a perfidious game. And it wasn’t only Elle’s life that was endangered, there were also two men killed in the process, Marty Harris and Frank Giles.
Reid thought back what Garner had said in his video message to the team. ‘I assure you, you will all understand in the end why is must be this way. You might even thank me.’ Having to acknowledge that the first part was somewhat true, if only from the mythological point of view, the second one only showed him the intensity with which their UnSub had believed the story to be true. The young agent felt he should have discovered the connection between Garner and his mother sooner, because of the man’s repeated use of the word ‘adventures’ and the overall theme of the medieval legend. Now he hoped that Elle would pull through. Spencer didn’t know if he could keep going on if she didn’t.
Arriving at the destination the profilers made their way up to the office where Morgan opened the right glass door leading to the bullpen area. He entered, followed by Hotch and held it open until Reid grabbed the handle. JJ, who had seen her colleagues coming in, approached them.
“Elle’s out of surgery. She’s gonna be okay,” the blond liaison informed them with a small smile, looking as tired as her fellow agents felt.
“Good,” Hotch replied while Morgan next to him sighed in relief and Reid, who was standing behind the two, acknowledged it with a quick humorless smile.
“Is Gideon still at the hospital?” the senior agent wanted to know.
“Yeah,” she answered, and then asked, “How’s Rebecca?”
From the left side Garcia was approaching the group, anxious to know how it all turned out, while Derek informed JJ, “She’s in the hospital, but she should be all right.”
“Physically maybe,” Penelope interjected, standing next to Morgan now. Everyone turned to look at her and she averted her gaze, still feeling guilty for making it easier for Garner to hack into the BAU computers by playing an online RPG.
Hotch took a few steps toward his office, then stopped and turned halfway around again. “Thank you everyone.” Looking pointedly at the computer whiz, he added, “All of you”, letting her know that she was forgiven for her mistake, before walking away.
Instantly a huge smile appeared on Garcia’s face and she briefly felt Derek’s hand on her back. “Well, we could’ve only gone so far without Mrs. Reid,” she reminded them and looked up at Morgan who then turned around to Spencer, seeing his gaze being met by the young man.
After giving him a friendly back-handed pat on the chest the black agent walked over to his desk. Passing the now smiling Reid, JJ patted him on the arm before leaving through the glass doors. Garcia threw the young profiler a smile and then followed Morgan.
Hands stuffed into his pants’ pockets Spencer’s gaze went up to the conference room where his mother was sitting. It was true that without her they might not have found Rebecca and saved her.
He remembered what the doctor at the sanatorium had told him. ‘She’s exceptionally proud of you.’
As he made his way upstairs to the room he realized that now he had a chance to tell her that he was proud of her, too.
“Some succeed by what they know; some by what they do; and a few by what they are.” American writer Elbert Green Hubbard