Criminal Mind One Shots

4: Silence

The hospitable hallway was brightly lit with fluorescent light bulbs. Down a bit to the left sat a large waiting room. It held anxious families and friends. All worried about whether their loved ones were gonna make it out of surgery or not. Some sat there with no emotion on their face, masking the inner turmoil that was occurring. Others sat there sobbing, not having the energy to care anymore. Some couldn't even sit still, and anxiously paced back and forth.

I had no energy left, but I still couldn't keep myself from pacing .The sound of my steps repeated in my ears. Driving me a bit crazy. In moments like these people tell you to have hope, and I was definitely trying.

Almost the whole team sat in the uncomfortable hospital chairs, looks of dread on their faces. We all felt incomplete. One member of our family was rushed into surgery about 40 minutes ago. And about 20 minutes ago my life started to crumble right before my eyes.

Before then I sat there in my office as always. Collecting the information that the team needed. This seemed to be an easy case. The unsub identified himself so the team just had to track him down. I managed to locate the address of the abandoned building, he was holding his potential 4th victim in. The team seemed to infiltrate the building successfully and saved the young girl. The unsub, Matthew Sallee was arrested and taken into custody. Everything seemed to run smoothly, as smooth as a serial murder investagation can. That's what I thought at least. Until I got a phone call from Hotch.

" Garcia, we need you down to the hospital right away," he said through the phone.

"Uh, oh my god sir is everyone ok?" I managed to mumble out.

"Just get down here, we'll talk then."

I left the building after grabbing my bag and laptop. I drove down to the hospital as fast as I could, while still being safe. We didn't need another one of us in the hospital. I was glad that this case happened to be local, maybe that was god being on our side I thought. I managed to get to the hospital in about 12 minutes. I met Hotch just outside. We walked in together as I asked questions, him ignoring all of them. I got my visitors sticker and hotch showed me the way to what assumed was one of my friends rooms. He walked swiftly as I tried to keep up, my heels clanking on the tiled floor.

Just as we turned the corner I saw derek. I took a step back and looked up at him. I gave him a hug. He immediately wrapped his arms around me. I was glad he was ok. But I really didn't want to find out who wasn't.

We pulled apart and he said, "Hi, baby girl."

"Hi Derek. I'm glad you are ok.", I replied then turned to Hotch, still unable to see into the waiting room and asked "can you please tell me what's going on now."

"Uh- so. . ." , for the first time in our career Arron Hotchner was speechless. This couldn't have been good.

I looked between the two men. I noticed how truly exhausted Derek looked now. My mind began to rush. I continued to look at each of them, making eye contact with both of them. My breathing increased. I finally pushed Derek's beautiful body out of the way. I scanned the room. From left to right my eyes slowly sweeped the room. I saw people full of fear. None seemed to have hope left.

I finally laid my eyes on Jj. Her facial expression fit right in. She looked up at me and gave me a half hearted, weak, sad smile. She stayed where she was, allowing me to catch up probably. Good she was ok, I thought. There just beside her was Emily. She was asleep, leaning back in her chair as she covered herself in her jacket. She was ok too. As was Rossi I noticed, he stood up and took a couple steps towards us. Seeing each of them gave me a little weight off my shoulders