Hotchniss Challange: Sad/Whump OTP

4. "You deserve so much better than me"

Her leg throbs to the pace of her heart, her brain is blank. Unreliable and unable to recall what it is that lead her to where she is. She just sees her own reflection, staring dirty and disheveled back at her.

Moments flash before her eyes, connecting to nothing and meaning about the same. She can see the fire just behind her but she doesn't feel the need to care. She doesn't feel as if there is a reason to care about the burning flames so hot that she can feel the waves of unabashed heat licking at the back of her arms.

A boy, no older than twenty-five, approaches her. His dark brown eyes, almost the same shade as his hair, flicker concern in the center of her chest. Faint memories of hazelnut eyes fill her mind. She's thrown into sparse moments. Her fingers running through dark colored hair, the deepest chuckle she's ever heard, and something about creamer and going soft.

"Ma'am?" He steps closer, something more prominent than concern in his dark eyes. "Are you... Emily? Agent Pren..tiss?" He's hesitant, unsure of her name or where or who had told him her name. Either way, she nods. "You should probably come with me."

She does, leaning on blind faith and the insistent need to prove that some humans are just good, it's that love of people that always gets her. So she follows him each step throwing her farther and farther back.

"Prentiss," they're still so close to the others and more specifically Kate that he knows better than to address her as anything less then Prentiss. "I was going to tell Kate so that she-"

Emily waves a finger at him, cutting him off. She glances back into the building, keeping her voice low," don't. Just don't. Okay? Get them in the car, get away from me, and when I no longer feel like murdering you, I'll talk to you."

He nods, feeling like he deserves exactly what came his way. Boiling Emily's blood even more because he never fights back. He never pushes her back, he simply just lets it happen. It's his father's fault, she knows it. But as he walks away, shoulder's sagging from exhaustion and overall feeling of... something she wasn't quite able to tell in his face, she almost feels bad.

They're almost to the car when she changes her mind," Aar-"

Now she's here. Bloody and hazy from the after-effects of-

"Emily," she hears his voice, unmistakable no matter how gruff or pain filled. She's heard it in so many ways, loving and hating the way he says her name no matter what's happening around them. Nightmares that leave him hoarse and breathy. In intimate moments of pleasure. When he's no longer grounded and a simple hand to his is all it takes for him to ease back.

His name rolls off her lips the same way it always seems to- full of worry. "Aaron," she's pressing her body against his in a flash. Pulling his hip against her, keeping him upright as his legs threatened to cave out from underneath him. "Careful. Careful."

She sits them down, doing her best to ignore the pain eating up her ribs.

"Sam found you," he's falling, either going to slump against her or the lamppost. She loops an arm around his hips, pulling him so that he leans into her. "I thought he was-" his sentence drops off. He looks forward, distracted by something else. 

She looks in the general direction of his eyes but finds nothing too worthwhile. "Aaron," her eyes are distracted by the red of his tie, by the staining hot blood seeping down his front. "You're bleeding."

He pays her observation little to no mind, eyebrows drawing close as he looks at her. "You have to get out of here." Wounded, fatally if they don't get help soon, and he's still more worried about everyone else. "Get Sam and leave."

He tries to stand, to see her off and to make sure that she leaves him but he simply slumps forward hitting the pavement with his knees. 

"Aaron," Emily's already there, on her own knees, trying to stop him from planting face first into the ground. "Don't do this. Come on."

----------------------------------

Haley had been the one to call him way back when. Gideon was a mess, he had almost killed his entire unit in an explosion, a tactic gone wrong. The only survivors, Derek and Hotch. If you could count them as that. Morgan was confined to a bed, unable to move with his legs broken. And Hotch, the young man who they had both groomed to be the best profiler he had the potential to be, was on life support and the hopes weren't high. 

Dave was at the hospital as quickly as he could be, calling off his book tour with the simple explanation that one of the young men who he had written about was in the hospital. Most fans had understood, pushing the matter out of hand at times to understand who it was that Rossi was going to see. It didn't matter though because as soon as Rossi laid eyes on his protege, he was moved somewhere secure and top notch.

So, after seeing Hotch come back from something like that Rossi has all the faith in the world that he can do it again.

"You know," Emily and Dave seat in the hospital room surrounded by nothing but the sound of the heart monitor bouncing off the walls. "He's tough as nails. After Bale and those six officers that were killed, he wasn't supposed to be able to walk. The blast hit him so damn hard he wasn't even supposed to wake up but..." 

Dave studies the young woman for a moment, unconsciously comparing her to how Haley often sat by Hotch's bedside. "By month's end, he was out of the bed and doing whatever he could to work." Dave smiles at the memory. The young agent was still wounded, hurting and anyone could tell but he didn't let that stop him.

Emily looks up at Rossi, something light sparkling in her eyes," I assume that's where the scar on the back of his calf come from?" Of course, he'd only told her enough about past injuries so that if there were complications she would know but until now, she'd never even known that the bomb had affected him in the way that it had.

Rossi nods in confirmation, remembering the shrapnel the doctor had shown them that they had dug out of his leg. "That, the one behind his ear, under his eye, and the thicker one on his back."

Emily glances at Hotch, her thumb running over his hand as she thinks about that.

That's the difference between Haley and Emily. Haley always wanted to preserve Aaron, to keep him the way he always had been. She sat by his bedside comforting by humming and speaking softly to him. Emily is constantly touching him. She's running her finger over the growth over his chin, interlacing their fingers, and moving unconsciously close no matter the circumstance. Emily's always there, always ready for something new. 

"Before he..." she's unsure of how to go about saying how he technically died at her side. How she pumped his chest for ten minutes. "He told me I deserved better. I wish... I wish I could undo that in his head. You know? Take away all the scars on his back, take his father's voice out of his head but..."

Rossi nods his understanding, he's thought that same statement so many times. "I know, trust me, I know. What did you tell him?"

"I told him to stop lying. To not think about what he thinks I deserve because I know what I deserve and if it comes to the time when he is no longer it..." her voice trails off. It warms Rossi's heart at the way she says it. She's not clouded by Aaron Hotchner, enchatned, yes. But she is not clouded.

She means to say that if he is no longer what is good for her than he will break her heart. That she'll never stop loving him.

"If it ever comes to that," Rossi says, leaning forward and taking her empty hand in his. "I'll kick his ass because you're one hell of a catch, Emily Prentiss."

They sit silently for a moment, he watches her and she watches Hotch. "Thank you, Dave. For everything."

"It's the least I could do."