Elysian [Book 1]

twenty-six

twenty-six; a,uh, friend

I walked back into the sheriff's station and walked into the room where my teammates were in. I crossed my hands and leaned on the door frame. "So, prints came back negative, they were Judith Hannity's. " I said and Hotch looked back at me and nodded. "So what does all this tell you?" Thea asked looking around and Hotch turned to face her.

"Impersonal killers are like drug addicts, the first time gives them the ultimate high, and after that, no high is as good." Hotch said and I walked up to him, as Spencer walked around me holding a map. "Is that what we're dealing with?" I asked and he nodded. "Do you guys need help?" I asked and Hotch backed away from the desk. "No, you stay here and try and help Reid, or see if Todd needs help." He said and I sighed and nodded, walking to where Spencer was bent over looking at a map.

"Do you need help?" I asked looking at my boyfriend of 3 months, he shook his head and I sighed, and my stomach growled. A burning sensation shot up my left leg and I hissed, at the pain. Spencer looked at me immediately and set the pen down. "What's wrong?" He asked and I shook my head. "I- I pinched my finger in the side of the chair." I said and he raised an eyebrow. "Are you sure?" He asked and I nodded, looking up at him. "Yeah. I'm probably going to get some food, you want anything?" I asked and he shook his head, his eyes lingering on my left leg.

"Could you get some coffee?" He asked and I nodded, and I turned to walk out of the station.

I returned to the station 45 minutes later and I had 3 bags of fried rice and I had two coffees in a cup holder. Spencer was sitting at the table and I placed his coffee in front of him. I also placed my bags of fried rice on the table along with my coffee.

I pulled out a chair and sat in it, letting my left leg resting on the side under the table. The whole way to the Chinese Restaurant my leg was burning and aching. It wasn't until I was about halfway to the station that I realized I never grabbed my prescription. So on the way back I went to the pharmacy to grab it. 

Spencer thanked me and I nodded, I opened a box and dumped my sauce into it. I looked around and Hotch, Rossi and Salinas wasn't back yet. "How is this going?" I asked and he looked up at me and smiled. "It's going good." He said and I nodded, eating a spoonful of rice. The team walked in and the told us that we were going to give out the profile.

We both nodded and got up going to the other room, where the officers waited." They hyper masculine disguise, victim preference and the emasculating trigger of the first attack, all tell us this is an UnSub suffering and a masculine identity crisis." Hotch said and Emily looked at all of us. "We need to identify the precipitating trauma. Something happened in the UnSub's life , something so traumatic it turned a normal man into a serial killer." She said and I looked at the officers.

"Things like, losing a child, or a sibling even. He's in the middle of suffering from some sort of psychotic break. The world that he sees had changed, even his role in it. We also discovered that he isn't going out of his way to kill his victims. He just shoots and leaves. " I said and they nodded, writing this down.

"So what do we do?" Thea asked and Hotch spoke giving out his orders."Our strategy's three-fold. First we find every small-model blue SUV owner in the estimated kill zone. 2- We set up a single alternate merge scenario in that zone, and we man it with our people. 3- We release our profile to the public. Somebody out there knows this man, they just don't know it." Hotch said and I shifted the weight in my leg to the right, all the officers left to go get some sleep and I left with Derek and Spencer to go to the hotel.

The Next Day.

I arrived at the crime scene wearing my CSI windbreaker. I walked over to the blood stained car and I looked at the blood spatter, dripping down the windshield. I pulled out my camera and started taking my pictures. The Crime Scene Unit van arrived and three other scientist came out and started working. Rossi, Derek and Thea walked over to me. "Joe Karem and Timothy Calvert. D.O.A." She said and I nodded, walking over to the car more, the three of them following.

"We have some flow patterns on the windshield. Gravity is pulling upon that blood and dragging it down to the surface of the car. From the GSWs to the head, they were shot at from the left." I said and Derek looked at Hotch who walked up to us. "It's our man but he went way off script." He said and I shrugged my shoulders.. "Unless they provoked him." I stated and Hotch and Rossi started talking. "I'm going to call Garcia." Derek said and I nodded looking at Hotch. "I'll call Spencer." I said and walked away from them and dialed his number.

"Hey, what's up? What did you guys find?" He asked and I began speaking. "Well, single witness said middle aged white male, wearing a tie and was driving a small blue SUV, but the witness didn't get a plate. Hotch and Rossi think he works in the area. Jordan went on at 2, the male shot at the victims around 2:20." I said and Spencer spoke. 

"So, he works in the area and was watching the news. His new victims were male right?" He asked and I gave him a yeah, confirming it.

"Okay, Garcia's calling, I'll call you back later. Be safe." He said and I smiled. "Always." I said and hung up. I walked back to where Derek was and Jordan walked away with an attitude and Hotch walked the other way with Salinas.

Derek looked at me and tilted his head. "Baby." He said and I put my phone away. "Hm?" I asked and he looked at me. "What was that?" He asked and I looked up at him confused. "What was what?" I asked and he cleared his throat. "'Always'"He said in a high pitched voice and my cheeks already went red.

"A uh friend." I said and he squinted his eyes. "Riiight. Do you always smile at your 'friends' that are calling you?" He asked and I shrugged. 

Later on in the day, I stood back at the station with Hotch and Thea when Hotch got a call on his phone. "We have a chase. Small model SUV. Blue." He said and I looked at him. "We'll head over to the Hill house. He could be ending his break there to finish it." He said and clicked off his phone.

We all got into the SUV wearing our bulletproof vests. Once we arrived at the house. I gripped my gun and held it out as we got out of the SUV fast. I pushed back the pain from my stump and we got inside the house fast.

As soon as we got in the smell of decay immediately filled out noses and Jordan almost puked. "Let's split up." Hotch said and we all nodded. I took the first door with Jordan and she opened up the door and we saw a decayed body that had been shot several times. Jordan stood there with wide eyes and she backed up bumping into me and ran out the house. "Someone get eyes on Jordan!" I yelled and I heard Rossi's steps as he left after her. I walked to where Thea was and I saw the body of the mother who was the wife of Norman. I shook my head and closed the door to the room.

We all stepped off the elevator of the BAU in Quantico and Derek spoke to Jordan. "You alright?" He asked and she looked ahead, not showing any sign of emotion. "I will be." She said and walked to her office. "Hey you guys ever notice how the trip home seems to go much faster?" Emily asked and I nodded. "Yeah, they're usually faster for me." I said and Derek laughed at me. "You're always sleep, Hads." He said and I rolled my eyes at him. "Well, the favor of tailwinds are in our favor." He said and I smiled at him.

"Guys, there's  someone in the BAU room." Spencer said and I looked and saw a girl with blonde hair and a man next to her. My heart skipped a beat and I knew it was Will. I opened the door and saw JJ holding my nephew. "JJ!" I said and walked over to the girl. "I thought you guys could use a surprise." She said and Will turned to me. "Look at you." He said and leaned in to hug me. I hugged him back and I looked at my nephew. "Awe." I said looking at Henry and she smiled at me.

"Hads, look at you. " She said and I smiled at her and Will. Happy that even though the day turned out said, I still got to see my nephew.