the violet effect // spencer reid

26 • crossing lines

• chapter warnings: mention of bomb threats, bombs, spoilers for s2e8 •

previously:

The team exchanged grim looks. The UnSub had struck again—and this time, he was escalating.

•••

The gas station was a chaotic scene, its skeletal remains blackened by the explosion. Smoke lingered in the air, mingling with the acrid stench of burnt gasoline and charred metal. Officers and agents hurriedly moved between yellow-taped perimeters, sifting through debris, their radios crackling with instructions. Among them were Rossi, Hotch, Reid, Violet, and Cassandra, the bomb tech, circling the mangled remains of a vehicle.

Violet sniffed the air, glancing at Spencer. “Can you smell that? Same explosive, just more of it.”

Cassandra crouched, inspecting a scorched fragment near the car. “Yeah, and the same detonation device too.”

Spencer adjusted his scarf, peering through the smoke. “The gas station closed 15 minutes prior to the explosion. Fortunately, the worker had already gone home.”

Hotch folded his arms, surveying the scene. “No casualties. An escalation in the size of the explosion and a decrease in the number of victims. We need to do a grid search as soon as possible.”

A local agent approached, looking uncertain. “What do I tell them we’re looking for?”

Rossi glanced around the destruction. “He said his ‘message’ would be here when we arrived.”

Inside the gas station’s office, Cassandra’s voice echoed, breaking the tense silence. “Clear!”

Spencer and Violet stepped inside carefully. The faint scent of burnt wood and melted plastic lingered in the room. Cassandra gestured to a small metal box on the floor. “It’s a book.”

Spencer donned gloves, kneeling beside the box. He pulled the object free, his brow furrowing. “It’s his manifesto.”

Violet tilted her head, frowning at the item. “Bag it.”

As Spencer moved to bag the manifesto, Violet’s gaze drifted downward. Something crude was scrawled beneath the box on the floor—a drawing. “Look at this,” she said, pointing. It was a roughly drawn robot with an arrow piercing through it.

•••

Back at the office, the team huddled around the conference table, the atmosphere tense. The manifesto sat at the center, its ominous presence unspoken but felt.

Hotch scanned the typed pages. “His manifesto’s main demand is completely unrealistic: stop all automated machinery that’s replaced American workers within a week.”

JJ tapped her pen against her notebook. “And if his demands aren’t met, he says he’ll detonate even larger bombs.”

Hotch leaned back slightly. “So we have an anti-technology bomber who so far has attacked computers, an automated cashier, an automated gas station, and a Smart Bus.”

Rossi folded his arms. “Who calls himself Allegro.”

Spencer looked up sharply. “Wait… what was that?”

Rossi frowned. “He told me to call him Allegro.”

Spencer’s face lit up with recognition. “Of course! Yeah! It’s a book! A novel I read as a kid. It’s called Empty Planet by one-hit-wonder author David Hansberry. It’s got it all—Technoids, Minutians. Robots that take over the world once they figure out how to reproduce with humans. Essentially, humanity’s lost to technology. And the hero of the book is a 12-year-old boy named Allegro who builds an army and fights for the humans.”