The set up

1.2K 25 26
                                    


Athena sat in the busy holding cell next to a prostitute and two drunk drag queens who she had been having a pleasant conversation with about her now empty gun holster she had made. Her gun and badge had been taken away from her. She wiggled her legs off the bench and looked around the cell. There was almost a comical amount of people in there, all speaking various languages and exchanging glares at each other.

Athena was quick to pick up the dynamics in the hour that she had been there. She knew from the moment she walked in who had been there the longest, who was 'in charge' and who to avoid. She had found that tactic handy in prison, it kept her out of trouble, or in trouble, with the right people when she needed it. This time instead of picking a fight with the biggest, toughest person in the room to assert dominance- she just sat there. She wiggled her legs slightly out of boredom and stared at the seams of her trousers, remembering just a few hours ago when she sat on the floor sewing them next to Reid who was asking her to teach him to sew.


"I'm not letting you find yet another thing to be a genius in" Athena rolled her eyes as he sat on the floor in front of her as she sewed at the back of the plane.

"I just want to learn how to thread a needle" he chuckled.

"You put the thingy through the thingy- there, now you know" Athena poorly explained and threaded the needle quickly.

"That wasn't a helpful tutorial at all" he said before noticing her frustration which he assumed meant something was on her mind other than getting the trousers sewn in time.

"Are you okay?" He asked her quietly.

"I'd be better if you stopped nagging me to teach you to sew which by the way is a very basic skill you could just google" she deflected.

"You bit off your fingernail again earlier and keep checking the time on your phone- something is bothering you" he said pointing to the plaster she had sneakily placed on her thumb where she had indeed accidently ripped off her fingernail.

"I'm fine- son of a-" she huffed before pricking her finger and putting it in her mouth to stop the bleeding like she had done the last few hours.

"Athena" he caught her attention.

"I know you don't like to talk about things but if you're worried about telling us something that you might have done or something that happened that's making you nervous- don't be. We've seen you do a lot and you've seen us do probably worse, we're not going to judge you. We're your friends and honestly nothing you've done could surprise us- you've surprised us a lot with your past I don't think there's much we don't know about you now so please don't worry about it" he said kindly. 

She gave him a sweet smile at his kind words as she thought how wrong he was going to be once they found out- she still had a lot of surprises about her past that she was hoping to take to the grave without telling them.

"Okay" she said and handed him a needle.

"What?" He looked confused.

"I know you didn't really want to learn how to sew and just came over to lecturer me about talking about my emotions" she mocked "but now you have to learn how to sew as a punishment for being a good friend."

He laughed before following her instructions and helping her sew her trousers.


"Oi, toi aux cheveux roux – Athéna!" A deep French voice of a police man called out to her from the other side of the bars and pulled her from her reminiscing. The crowd in front of her split down the middle so he could see her. When she looked up, she saw not only him looking back at her but the team stood behind him.

Cruel - Criminal minds enemies to loversWhere stories live. Discover now