Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The BAU was quiet for once, there were no cases that needed solving, no interpersonal conflicts waiting to bubble to the surface, just the sounds of clicking as the team caught up on paperwork that had been neglected while the team had been busy. Hotch got in first as always, followed closely by Rossi and Morgan. Rossi was clearly nursing a hangover from the team dinner the night before, just slightly on edge compared to normal. The rest of the team had trickled in over the course of the next half hour, with Garcia entering last (it’s hard to tell when she actually got here, considering her ‘sanctum’ is separate from the bullpen). 

Unfortunately, Garcia was wearing an apologetic look and carrying her tablet when she entered Hotch’s office. Emily spotted her and began drinking her coffee with more haste as she went to notify the team that the tranquillity would soon come to an end.

“Hey,” Emily leaned against JJ’s desk, speaking loudly enough that both JJ and Morgan could hear her, “Garcia just went to talk to Hotch.”

JJ began to perk up at the idea of office, well not gossip , but information, before realizing what the implications meant for the hope of getting off work early. She sighed and began gathering her things, shooting a look at Morgan, who looked like he would rather be anywhere else at that moment before moving to gather Reid from the coffee pot. 

Soon enough they were gathered at the round table as Garcia explained the latest case to them.

“This next one takes us to sunny Los Angeles,” Garcia starts passing out the tablets (and the physical file for Reid), “there’s been a string of fires in abandoned buildings”

“I’m not seeing any victims?” Rossi asked while looking throught the file.

“There’s no deaths yet,” Garcia put stress on that last word, “but a firefighter was injured on scene, nothing serious but after that the fires have gotten worse.”

“Worse?” Reid was already done with his file, now leaning back in his chair.

“More frequent and more dangerous” Garcia explained “LAPD sent this to us directly. Sounds like they’re worried what’ll happen if they escalate”

“They should be” Hotch started to rise from his seat, “wheels up in 30.”

Chapter Text

The team headed straight to the station, they’ve worked with Sergeant Athena Grant in the past so getting set up wasn’t an issue. Emily noticed that a lot of the photos of the aftermath had already been pinned up along with a list of names and locations.

“Wow,” Emily muttered, “looks like you’re really putting a lot into this” She turned to Sergeant Grant. The woman glanced at the board, and for a split second, a look of hurt threatened to break through, before being replaced by a hard determination.

“Yeah well,” Sergeant Grant sighed, “One of mine was hurt because of this,” the team shared a confused look, Garcia mentioned a firefighter being injured, nothing about a police officer.

“I’m sorry,” JJ started, “our files didn’t mention a police officer being injured,” Emily could honestly thank god for JJ asking about this apparent oversight in their background research.

“Sorry, my husband’s crew responded to the last fire,” Sergeant Grant looked back to the board again. Emily saw Hotch look away from the woman momentarily, “I’m very close to them.”

“They responded to the fire?” Morgan raised an eyebrow, no doubt running through potential questions to ask the responding crew.

“Yep, I imagine you’ll want to interview them about it?”

“Yes Sergeant, anything they remember could help us find this guy.”

“Well that shouldn’t be a problem,” She pulled out her phone and started typing, “And please call me Athena.”

******

“Wonder kid,” Morgan looked in the rear-view window, making eye contact with Reid “Why does this station sound familiar?” Emily smiled to herself, Derek is objectively smart, but sometimes it seems like he off-loads anything and everything to Reid’s memory instead of his own.

“Station 118?” Reid looked up from his book about, honestly, Emily had no clue what it could be about, “We worked with them a little over 6 years ago, helped us catch an unsub.”

“Oh right,” Emily had to focus to think back that far, “There were the four firefighters on shift that day,” after that, the others in the car started to remember the firefighters they had met on that case as well. Swapping details as they reappeared in their memory, well Hotch didn’t, but he wasn’t stopping them. It was like that for a while as the L.A. traffic proved to be, well, L.A. traffic.

“That captain was so sweet,” JJ laughed, “he really seemed worried that Spencer would get hurt.”

“It wasn’t out of the realm of possibility,” Rossi pointed out, earning an indignant look from the youngest.

“There was that one guy,” Emily tried to pull focus from Reid before it got to another recap of everyone’s on-the-job injuries, “Young, blond-”

“Oh that guy,” Morgan laughed, “He did put the moves on both of you didn’t he?” JJ winced, clearly forgetting about that part of the interaction. Emily knew it wasn’t serious, the kid was nice enough to take a hint. Emily remembered him being at odds with the higher-ups most of the time, wanting to take bigger risks. He almost reminded her of Morgan in that way, ready to be a hero no matter what it costs him.

Given how firefighting is she doubts that he’s still there, it’s been over 6 years. Plus Athena had mentioned that she was close with the crew of the 118, and she and, oh no his name is coming up blank. Well, they didn’t get along by any means.

“Evan Buckley,” Reid pipped up next to Emily, “Goes by…Buck, there was Captain Nash, Howard Han, and Henrietta Wilson” Reid obviously remembered the nickname, Emily can’t recall a single time where Buck was referred to by anything else. 

“Captain Nash is expecting us,” Hotch said looking down at his phone, no doubt reading a message from Athena confirming who to ask for at the station.

*****

The chatter died down as they rounded the corner to the firehouse. The team was shuffling papers and getting ready to act like serious F.B.I. agents instead of the family of the BAU. As Morgan pulled into a parking spot a man Emily didn’t recognize looked up at the black SUV. He was proximity 6 foot, pretty well built, with brown hair, and tan skin. His eyes were focused on the SUV, almost like he was frozen by it. If Emily wasn’t a profiler she would say that his expression was unreadable. Honestly, the look of anxiety, fear, and confusion isn’t a look Emily has ever really forgotten ever since she first saw it. 

The man faced back into the firehouse, most likely calling for Captain Nash, before finishing the task he was working on. He was still watching them out of the corner of his eye when they got out. Hotch and Rossi made their way over first, looking as stereotypical as ever.

“How can I help you?” The man stood rigid, Emily made a note that he was most likely military.

“I’m Special Agent Aaron Hotchner with the BAU,” Hotch shook the man’s hand, his eyebrows shot up in surprise, apparently Captain Nash didn’t warn him about the presence of the F.B.I., “We’re looking for Captain Nash, he should be expecting us.”

“Yeah, he’s uh, on his way out,” he was clearly suspicious, which is fair enough, “I’m Eddie Diaz by the way.”

Before more names could be exchanged Captain Nash came up behind Eddie, clasping a hand on his shoulder. It wasn’t forceful, in the way one would warn a child that they were misbehaving, it was just present. Eddie took the opportunity to leave like a lottery ticket, rushing to talk to literally anyone else. The Captain looked largely the same, just older, maybe a little softer.

“Agent Hotchner,” Captain Nash smiled, it wasn’t a full smile, more like a pleasantry, “My wife told me you would be here. Wish it was under better circumstances.”

“I agree,” Hotch and the Captain seemed to understand each other the last time they were here, “Captain, you remember my team: Special Agents Rossi, Morgan, Jareau, Prentiss, and Doctor Reid.

“Yes of course, I’m sure my wife told you to call her Athena,” He looked at all of the BAU, “And please call me Bobby, if my team starts calling me ‘Captain’ it might be the thing that makes me retire” Bobby laughed but there was a sense of seriousness that Emily did not want to question. 

“Of course, we just have some questions we want to ask you and your crew about the arson fire you responded to.”

“Of course,” Bobby looked back into the firehouse, “You’re lucky, I just made lunch so they’re all in one spot, follow me.”

As they made their way up the stairs Emily could hear loud laughter and various lighthearted complaints. They rounded the corner and it took Emily a moment to truly grasp what was in front of her. She easily recognized ‘Chimney’ and Hen, similar to Bobby they looked older, but not wildly different. They were sitting next to each other at the table, sharing glances and laughing at what it was that they just ‘said’ to each other. 

Then there were the two across from them, she recognized Eddie from minutes before, but the guy he was sitting next to was faced away from Emily at first. This guy was, to put it bluntly, ripped, and had several tattoos to boot. Bobby cleared his throat and they all settled down, the man turning to face the BAU. The birthmark above his eye is now clearly visible, finally allowing Emily to realize that the young kid that they were talking about is now more like Morgan in terms of stature. She snuck a glance at Morgan and JJ who were just as surprised as she was, they didn’t show it, they’re all professionals. 

Besides the physical difference in body language was a complete 180. He was open, relaxed, and looking to Bobby for guidance. This is a completely different man from the one who fought with his Captain on every decision. He also was holding a piece of paper that read ‘Buck: 5 (we think)  Death: 0.5’. How there was a decimal point was beyond Emily, but she’ll probably find out soon.

“Guys this is the BAU,” Bobby started, “Most of you remember them, they’re here about the string of arsons, please answer their questions the best you can.”

Ok, time to start the interviews.

Chapter Text

Once the BAU had gotten set up in the firehouse they pulled half of the A shift into separate rooms at the same time. The arsonist could strike again at any moment so it was a good idea to speed up the questioning process. 

Reid looked over the records after talking to the guy who filled in for Buck while he was on concussion protocol, Ravi, but he was a dead end due to it being only a few days. 

Hotch talked to Bobby and gained pretty good information about the team and the days of the calls, Bobby gave him a name at the fire marshal's office to talk to about the reports. 

Morgan talked to Chimney who assessed the victims at the scene, there were only a couple as the targeted buildings were abandoned buildings but recently escalated to stores in the middle of the night.  

JJ talked to Hen, who gave a lot of the same information as Bobby and Chimney but also mentioned that at the scene of that last fire, it appeared that the fire started from a space in the building that was too small for someone over 6 feet to fit into. 

Soon it was up to them if Emily or Rossi should go with the two left.

“From what I remember,” Emily reasoned, “Buck didn’t respond great to new figures of authority.”

“So you’re saying I shouldn’t question him,” Rossi retorted.

“Well, yeah” Emily grabbed the info that Garcia sent over for Buck, “You don’t exactly put people at ease.”

“I resent that” Rossi grabbed the file for Eddie and they walked into their respective rooms.

As Emily opened the door, shutting it behind her softly, just because Buck was technically off concussion protocol doesn’t mean that loud noises are welcomed. Buck was very clearly nervous, his leg bouncing as he sat slightly hunched over the table in front of him. 

“It’s been a while firefighter Buckley,” Emily reached out for a handshake.

”Please call me Buck,” Buck shook her hand “If you’re going to poke around in my head, might as well be on first-name-basis.”

”Fair enough,” Emily sat down in the chair across from Buck.

”I just wanted to apologize for the last time you guys were here,” Buck blurted out, “I don’t remember much from it but I have a feeling I wasn’t exactly on my best behavior”

”It’s been seven years Buck, but apology accepted,” Emily looked down at her file, trying to find where to start. “So, what do you remember about the fires?”

*****

Unfortunately, while Buck had great observations, none of them pointed them to the Unsub or any motive. Everyone except Rossi had finished by the time Emily had added the information she had gathered to the piles of notes scattered around the office Bobby lent them while they interviewed his team. Emily stood next to Reid and Hotch, all three staring at the crude board they had assembled with scotch tape and lined paper. Emily always secretly hoped that one of these days the answer would simply appear on the paper while she looked. Maybe one day everything will be easy to understand in this job. 

Rossi exited the room with Eddie Diaz right behind him, the latter looking more comfortable with the agent’s presence. Emily watched them exchange a few friendly words before they went their separate ways. Emily couldn’t help but notice that Eddie made a somewhat casual beeline to where Buck was sitting on the couch. The two men relaxed into each other. Emily was already starting to have her suspicions after Buck somehow worked Eddie and his son Chris into the interview at least five separate times, and this seemed like another puzzle piece.

“Well,” Rossi said as he shut the door behind him, “he didn’t have much, but he is former military, so Morgan owes me five bucks.”

“Really?” JJ rolled her eyes as Derek sighed and reached for his wallet.

“I said PD.” Derek just shrugged as he handed Rossi a five-dollar bill.

“Did you find out anything else ?” Emily shot Rossi a joking look.

“Apparently there was a glass bottle at the scene,” Rossi tossed his notepad on the table, “Right where the fire was worst. He spotted it before the beam came down.”

Buck hadn’t mentioned that in his interview with Emily, but to be fair he was having a hard time remembering the call once they were inside the building. 

“The only reason he remembers it is cause Buck shoved him out of the way.” Rossi sighed before looking back at the team, “It’s not much but if he’s right it sounds like our unsub is escalating.”

“Morgan and Reid, you check out the scenes,” Hotch looked at the duo, who nodded and went to grab their things, “Emily and JJ you guys look into the team, Bobby mentioned that this wasn’t their only arson call they’ve responded to recently. Rossi and I work on people of interest.”

Emily nodded and began gathering the notes to bring back to the precinct, glancing slightly at JJ as she helped. Even though the way Buck and Eddie acted made her raise an eyebrow, she could understand it. With jobs like theirs being able to trust someone with life and death is critical, and a level of closeness comes with that. Emily trusts JJ with her life, without a second thought most days. Maybe they were just more open about that trust than she is. 

“You’re driving,” JJ tossed the car keys to Emily, snapping her out of her thoughts, “I’ll ask Garcia for files on everyone on the way.”

Emily nodded and carried the other half of the notes to the SUV. She could only imagine how big those files were going to be.

Chapter Text

Emily had just pulled onto the highway when JJ’s phone started ringing, ‘Hotch’ lighting up the screen. JJ quickly tapped and put him on speaker.

“Hotch you’re on speaker.” JJ held the phone up in between her and Emily, who was trying not to fall victim to 405 traffic.

“Garcia is sending you those files as we speak, but we found something very concerning.” Hotch could be heard moving papers around on the other end. “The 118 responded to all but one of the arsons. They were out of commission for one of them, and they weren’t consistent with shifts at first, but it seems like in the last three, they figured it out.”

“Setting fires when Bobby and his crew will be there?” Emily raised her eyebrow as she interrupted Hotch.

“Bingo,” Rossi sighed from the other line.  

“They're being targeted,” JJ furrowed her brow, “Why would they do that?”

“We’re hoping that’s in the files.” Hotch’s voice was as serious as usual, but something about it still made Emily uneasy. Hotch was clearly worried about this unsub, what seemed to be a case that would be a quick and clear trail to the culprit just became much harder to navigate. “Garcia is going to be meeting you there in about 3 and a half hours. I talked to Athena and she’ll have everything she’ll need there. With the level of depth we’ll need on each member it’s going to be easier to have her there.”

“Understood.” JJ glanced at Emily, clearly worried that Hotch was bringing Garcia to L.A. “We’ll let you know if there’s anything.” With that, JJ hung up, staring straight ahead at the horizon.

Emily sighed, “Looks like we have our work cut out for us.”

*****

The rest of the ride was pretty quiet. The radio was set a few notches above silent, the only other noise coming from the ding of their phones as Garcia’s files arrived in their inboxes and the cars around them. The two agents moved quickly when they got to the station. Thankfully, Athena had kept the room ready for them and didn’t seem too bothered by the two skipping some formalities in their rush to dive into the files. 

“Let me know if you need anything, agents.” Athena was almost out of the room when Emily realized something.

“Athena.” Emily turned to face the officer, who had paused her retreat. “You said you’re close to the 118.”

“I am.”

“When our tech analyst comes in, I’d like to ask you some questions about the team.” As Emily spoke, Athena raised an eyebrow, clearly trying to figure out why the FBI agent needed to know more about the team. 

“Alright, Hotch told me to expect her in about 3 hours from now,” Athena seemed to try to relax as she responded, “I’ll show her up and then I’ll answer any questions you have.”

“Sounds perfect.”

*****

Emily sat alone at the makeshift table, JJ’s voice a low hum from the adjacent room. She couldn’t hear words—just tone, steady and sure, the way JJ always managed to make people feel seen without giving up ground. Athena was in good hands.

In front of Emily, papers and notes were spread out like a battlefield: handwritten transcripts, typed summaries, Garcia’s preliminary personality profiles—all arranged according to interviewee. She took a sip of lukewarm coffee and tapped her pen once on the edge of the page marked “Buck.”

Buck: Open. Eager. Deflects with humor. Included vivid detail about Eddie and Chris five times, and none about himself unless prompted.

Eddie: Reserved. Linear thinker. Subtly avoids emotional context. Brought up Buck three separate times while discussing building layouts.

Hen: Grounded. Thorough. Speaks with clinical precision. Emphasized patterns in fire behavior.

Chimney: Observant. Empathetic. Tangents that return to useful insights. Mentioned being “used to chaos.”

Bobby: Authoritative. Guarded but honest. Protective. He watches his team like they’re family.

Emily leaned back and exhaled. “They’re a unit,” she muttered to herself. “They move like a single organism. But someone’s watching them close enough to set traps...”

She paused on Buck’s transcript again. “The smoke hit harder than I expected. Eddie grabbed my arm before I could push further in. I trust him. Always have.”

The phrasing stuck in her mind—"I trust him. Always have." There was something deeper under that. Something practiced, maybe unconscious, she trusts her team, she has to with a job like this. Obviously it’s the same with firefighting, but the ‘always’ stuck in her mind. She jotted a note: Intimacy disguised as routine?

A knock at the open door jolted her.

“Guess who’s back in your time zone, my dark-hearted goddess?” Garcia stood dramatically framed by the doorway, tablet in hand, glitter in her hair, and neon pink heels that made Emily blink.

Emily actually smiled. “You’re early.”

“I’m efficient. And deeply concerned. You know how many times these people have made the news? Half of them should be on a reality show, not risking their lives.” Garcia marched in, already booting up her files. “We’re talking tsunamis, bomb rescues, two of them got trapped in a prison riot, Emily. A prison. Riot.”

Emily raised an eyebrow. “Let me guess. One of them was Buck?”

“Ding ding ding.”

Garcia settled into a chair beside her and slid a file forward. It was marked with 118: Incident History (Garcia's Pull) in a sparkly font only she could pull off in an official document.

“I just started going through the interviews,” Emily said. “Trying to get a read on everyone’s verbal patterns. Who avoids what, who leans in. Buck gives away too much, Eddie gives away nothing, and they both pretend that’s normal.”

Garcia hummed. “Subtext is my favorite text.”

Before Emily could reply, JJ appeared in the doorway, face unreadable but eyes sharp.

“Athena gave me a lot,” she said. “She’s worried. Said she didn’t realize it was targeted until we pointed it out. But once she saw it... she couldn’t unsee it.”

Emily nodded. “Garcia, I want a full communication pull between the 118 and the media over the last year. Any statements, interviews, even if it’s just someone snapping a selfie outside the firehouse.”

“Oh, baby girl, you know I live for this.” Garcia was already tapping away.

JJ walked over to look at the board Emily had been building. “You see it too, right?”

“The patterns?” Emily asked. “Yeah. But it’s more than that. It’s the way they talk about each other. We’re missing something personal. Something small. But the unsub saw it.”

JJ crossed her arms. “Let’s find out what.”

Emily looked once more at Buck’s transcript and underlined a line near the end. “It wasn’t about the building. I just didn’t want Eddie getting hurt again.”

*****

Emily heard them before she saw them—footsteps echoing through the hallway, low voices peppered with clipped phrases and theory-laden shorthand. The rest of the team had returned from their lead-chasing excursion, and the mood that entered with them was heavier than before.

Reid walked in first, already mid-sentence with Morgan. “—but the accelerant was inconsistent with the previous fires. It was almost improvised.”

“That doesn’t mean it wasn’t planned,” Morgan countered. “Could’ve been a rush job. Could’ve been a distraction.”

Hotch followed, silent but focused, a folder tucked under his arm. Rossi trailed, coat slung over one shoulder, a scowl carved into his face.

Emily stood as they entered. “Tell me someone got something solid.”

Hotch answered, voice even. “Maddie Buckley-Han. Dispatcher, wife of Howard Han, and Evan Buckley’s sister.” He dropped the file on the table. “She didn’t know she was being targeted until I asked the right questions. Someone called in a fake report to divert her attention during the third fire.”

JJ frowned. “They targeted her too?”

“She didn’t say it that way,” Hotch said. “But it fits the pattern. The unsub wants the 118 vulnerable. Wants the people closest to them distracted or endangered.”

“Still think it’s someone on the inside?” Rossi asked, glancing at Emily and Garcia.

Emily shook her head slowly. “Too much heart in this place. If it is, they’re a damn good actor.”

“That’s the problem,” Reid said, fingers tapping his thigh restlessly. “The unsub knows them too well. The way Buck works, the way Eddie reacts, how they enter a building, when they split up—”

“—That could be an ex,” Morgan interrupted. “Someone dumped by one of them. This has passion written all over it.”

Before anyone could respond, the door opened sharply.

Athena walked in.

Her uniform looked crisp despite the late hour, but her expression was tired—and pissed.

“I heard someone float the theory of it being an inside job,” she said, voice like gravel over steel.

The room fell silent.

Athena scanned them all, gaze lingering longest on Morgan. “Let me be absolutely clear. There is not a traitor in that house.”

Morgan raised a brow, unbothered but not dismissive. “No offense, Sergeant—”

“It’s Athena, and believe me, I’d be the first to spot a crack if one existed,” she snapped. “I’ve seen betrayal. This isn’t it. These people walk into flames for strangers. They don’t plant them for kicks.”

Garcia blinked, quiet for once. JJ offered Athena a nod of understanding.

Hotch stepped forward. “We don’t take that theory lightly. It’s one possibility of many, not a conclusion.”

Athena crossed her arms. “Well un-possibility it.”

And with that she was out the door.

The silence that followed Athena’s departure was thick with unspoken tension.

Rossi cleared his throat. “Well. That was definitive.”

“No kidding,” Morgan muttered, folding his arms and leaning against the wall. “She’s got bite.”

“She’s also right,” JJ said, nodding at the door Athena had exited through. “The way the team interacts? It’s not fractured. If anything, it’s too cohesive. Whoever’s doing this isn’t trying to tear them apart—they’re targeting them because they’re so close.”

Hotch turned to Garcia, who had taken over the whiteboard and was rapidly outlining possible motives. “Penelope, how long until we have a full background pull?”

“I’m already mining everything public,” she replied, eyes locked on her tablet. “Socials, press, archived personnel records. But it’s not just about what’s there—it’s what’s missing. Whoever this is, they’ve studied the team deeply.”

Emily exhaled through her nose and rubbed her temple. “Okay. So not internal. But someone close. Someone watching.”

Garcia’s fingers danced across her screen again. “I’m already compiling a list of recent interactions. Fans, media, anyone with access. If this is about obsession, we’ll find the trail.”

Emily sighed before she picked up the transcripts of Athena and Maddie’s interviews. Normally she’d have Reid do it, but something about today made her want to read them. 

ATHENA GRANT – TRANSCRIPT EXCERPT

JJ: You said you're close with the 118. Can you elaborate?

ATHENA: I’ve worked with a lot of crews. This one... they don’t just clock in. They show up. Every time. You don’t see that kind of consistency unless people really love what they do—and each other.

JJ: You mentioned your husband’s crew responded to the last fire.

ATHENA: Yes. And that’s... it’s not just about Bobby. It’s all of them. I know them. I’ve celebrated holidays with them. I’ve yelled at them. I’ve called Henrietta when I couldn’t call anyone else. I’ve patched up their mistakes and sat in ERs with them. I’ve prayed over their unconscious bodies. Some more than others, I swear Buck would die for them before any of them even thought about finding a safer option.

JJ: Can you clarify for the record?

ATHENA: Evan. He’s reckless, infuriating, brave to a fault, and he’s grown so much since the last time you were here. If you’d told me seven years ago that I’d speak this fondly of him, I would’ve laughed. But now? He’s one of the best damn men I know.

Emily felt her breath catch slightly.

That kind of loyalty didn’t happen by accident. And that kind of growth didn’t happen without pain.

She flipped to the next transcript.

MADDIE BUCKLEY-HAN – TRANSCRIPT EXCERPT

HOTCHNER: You’re a dispatcher. So you’ve heard these calls live?

MADDIE: Most of them. I try not to listen if I know it’s the 118. But that never works.

HOTCHNER: What stands out to you about the recent calls?

MADDIE: The panic. Not from the 118—but from the public. Whoever’s setting these fires... they’re staging them for attention. But it’s Buck who keeps showing up in the center of the chaos. He doesn’t look for it, but somehow it finds him. It’s always been that way.

HOTCHNER: How would you describe the crew dynamic?

MADDIE: They’re family. Not metaphorical. Actual family. And I don’t mean that just because I married one of them. Buck and Howie? They bicker like siblings. Hen’s practically his older sister. Bobby and Athena are the parents that he always deserved. And Eddie... well, Eddie’s the other half of whatever Buck doesn’t say out loud.

 

Emily underlined that line with her pen. The other half of whatever Buck doesn’t say out loud .

She was starting to wonder if she’d misjudged the nature of what she was seeing—not the closeness, not the trust—but the boundaries of it.

“Whoever this unsub is, they’ve studied this team deeply, ” JJ said, standing in front of the BAU’s board. 

“They planned out the last fire,” Morgan added, sitting next to Reid and Garcia. “The beam that hit Buck was at the center of the heat. And the unsub left a dummy there to lure them in.”

“Athena was right to shut us down on the traitor angle,” Emily said, stepping towards the board. The fires were set when the crew was already on shift, and the accelerant wasn't started remotely. “So what’s the next step when the motive isn’t betrayal or vengeance?”

“Obsession,” Hotch said, “or idealization gone wrong. A delusional connection. If they’ve elevated the 118 in their mind, any deviation—like a missed rescue or media coverage that focused on the wrong person—could be seen as a betrayal.”

There was a beat of silence as Garcia gasped.

“Cameras,” Garcia added, spinning her tablet around. “The last fire? There was a livestream. Not public. But it was running through a proxy site.”

Reid murmured, “The unsub doesn’t just want chaos. They want an audience. They want a narrative”

“A narrative where heroes burn,” Rossi muttered.

“And the 118 are their unwilling stars,” Emily said with an uncomfortable feeling that this isn’t going to end well.

Chapter Text

Hotch had gathered them in the firehouse the next day. They needed to be close to the crew in case they needed to trail them on a call. Try to notice anything, or anyone , out of place. The conference room had a big glass wall into the hallway, which seems to be a running theme in the design of the firehouse. It felt a bit strange to have all the firefighters’ lives up on boards for anyone to see, but it needs to be done.

Hotch stood in front of the table where the team was sitting. Emily was nursing a coffee that JJ had picked up for her on the way over. Emily wasn’t sure when JJ learned her coffee order, but she wasn’t about to say no.

“We need to look into all of them,” Hotch said. “Past relationships. Conflicts. Trauma. Anyone who might’ve latched on.”

Garcia nodded. “I’ll start dividing the team up—Hen, Chimney, Eddie, Buck, and Maddie. But we start with the head.”

“Bobby,” Emily agreed. “He’s the anchor. Any chain of influence runs through him.”

Reid was already reaching for the stack Garcia handed him. “Robert Nash. Born in Hadley, Minnesota. Widowed. Both his first wife and two kids died in an apartment fire in 2014. Moved to LA shortly thereafter.”

“That fire that killed them—” Morgan interjected, “was it arson?”

Reid’s eyes flicked to the page. “No, a space heater started it, but the building wasn’t up to code. 148 people died.”

Emily felt a twist in her stomach. “That’s… motivation enough to rebuild your life somewhere else.”

Hotch looked grim. “And motivation enough for someone else to think he doesn’t deserve to.”

Garcia’s brow furrowed. “You think someone blames him for what happened?”

Garcia’s fingers flew over the keyboard. “If our unsub’s fixation started with Bobby, we could be dealing with a decade of slow-burn obsession.”

Emily stared at the case board again, eyes trailing over Buck’s face, then Eddie’s. And for a brief moment, she felt the weight of it—how easily someone’s love for heroes could twist into something deadly.

“Let’s get to work,” Hotch said.

*****

Emily pushed her chair back with a sigh, rubbing at the space between her brows where a headache had started to bloom hours ago. The room smelled like stale coffee, whiteboard ink, and exhaustion.

“Nothing?” she asked, though the answer was already written across Reid’s face.

Hotch shut the file on Bobby Nash with a quiet finality. “Everything in his past checks out. Tragic, yes. But nothing that suggests a brewing threat.”

Rossi looked mildly annoyed. “He’s a good man who’s survived a personal hell. I hate to say it, but he’s too clean.”

Emily caught Reid’s eyes when Rossi said that. Yeah, on paper, Bobby was too clean, but anyone that clean had to work to be that way. It doesn’t just happen without motivation, without a reason. But despite that, nothing led them to suspect that Bobby was the main target.

“Too clean isn’t a lead,” Morgan muttered, flipping through another stack of background checks. “It’s a brick wall.”

“We pivot,” JJ said, standing. “What about Hen Wilson?”

Garcia perked up slightly. “Henrietta Wilson. I’ve got her pulled up—medic, foster parent, married to Dr. Karen Wilson, literal rocket scientist. Like, designs spacecrafts. That’s their dinner table conversation.”

Emily raised her eyebrows. “I feel incredibly underachieving.”

“She’s been fostering for years,” Garcia continued, her tone softer now. “Her son Denny is officially adopted. She and Karen recently finalized the adoption of their daughter Mara, too. They had a bit of trouble from a Councilwoman Ortiz, but that seems to have calmed down.”

Reid added, “There are notes in a few public forums—thank you letters from former foster placements. One anonymous, a few signed. She seems to be the kind of person who makes an impact and moves on without expecting anything in return.”

“She’s the kind of person the unsub might idolize,” JJ said. “Or envy.”

Rossi frowned. “Envy could work. You see someone with a wife, kids, community, respect... it’s easy for obsession to twist into resentment.”

“But nothing concrete?” Emily asked, scanning the printouts.

“Just admiration,” Garcia sighed. “And honestly, I kind of get it. She’s ridiculously competent.”

“Add it to the board,” Hotch said. “It doesn’t give us a name, but it helps us tighten the profile. The unsub’s fixation might not be on a single person. It could be the idea of the 118.”

“A family they want to destroy,” Rossi said.

Emily stared at the pinned photos. The 118 gathered around a truck. Bobby and Buck cooking in the firehouse kitchen together. Hen smiling as Mara held up a toy stethoscope. Eddie and Chimney sneaking up behind Buck with a bucket of water, clearly about to pour it on him. A life documented in candid moments

“How do you hate that?” she muttered.

“You don’t,” Morgan said, not looking up from his notes. “You want it. And when you can’t have it—”

“You burn it down,” Hotch finished.

The silence that followed wasn’t surprised—it was grim. Resigned.

“Alright,” JJ said, standing. “Next up is Chimney. Let’s see if saving lives made him any enemies.”

Emily nodded, but her gaze lingered on Hen’s photo. There was warmth there. Earned love. If someone wanted to shatter something beautiful… well, the 118 was a prime target.

*****

Garcia set down the next folder with a flourish. “Howard Han,” she announced, then paused. “Also known as Chimney. Because, of course.”

“Nickname like that, there’s got to be a story,” Rossi muttered, settling into his seat again.

“There is ,” Garcia confirmed, tapping the screen of her tablet. “Unfortunately, every record I found after the nickname never mentioned the origin. And trust me, I looked. First mention of the nickname I could find involves him being impaled in the head with rebar.”

Emily exchanged a glance with JJ. “That story sounds familiar.”

Reid nodded. “Got a lot of press in the medical field. He made a full recovery in less than a year.”

Morgan blinked. “And Buck is the chaotic one?”

Garcia kept scrolling. “Born in Korea, moved to California when he was five. Dad eventually moved back, but Chimney and his mom stayed here. Mom passed away when he was 15. After that, he bounced around jobs until he joined the academy in 2005. Married to Maddie, with a daughter Jee-Yun, who is about 4 and completely adorable.”

“Any enemies?” Hotch asked.

Garcia’s fingers paused. “None on file, at least none that are alive,” Garcia clicked on a file before continuing. “He was at the 118 before the rest of the crew, back when the captain was Vincent Gerrard. Seems like they had a rocky relationship.”

“Rocky how?” Emily leaned forward slightly.

“Poor treatment, microaggressions, the usual.”

“Says here he’s 65 years old,” Rossi sighed. “Bit late to be catching the fire bug. And he’s too tall to go unnoticed at a scene.”

Emily flipped through the file slowly. “You said something earlier, ‘none that are alive’?”

“Yeah, Doug Kendall,” Garcia said, “Maddie’s late husband. He has no living family, but based on what I read, I don’t think anyone would want vengeance for him.”

Emily’s eyes stopped on a photo—Chimney with Maddie, Jee-Yun, and Buck, all four of them laughing in a backyard lit with string lights. It looked like a memory. A safe place.

“So, no enemies, no grudges, no loose ends?” she asked, already knowing the answer.

Garcia just shook her head.

“We’re running out of angles,” Morgan muttered, leaning back.

“No,” Hotch said quietly. “We’re getting closer. The more we learn, the clearer the picture becomes. This unsub doesn’t want revenge. They want attention. They want in .”

Emily looked up at that. “Like they’re trying to earn a spot in the story.”

“Exactly,” Reid said, eyes lit with the realization. “They’re writing their own narrative—twisting reality to fit the version they want.”

“And the fires?” JJ asked.

“They’re the plot points,” Emily said. “Big, public, emotional.”

Rossi stood. “Alright. Let’s see if Buck or Eddie left any fan clubs behind.”

As Rossi made his way over to the coffee pot in the corner, the alarm sounded.  The rest of the BAU stood and raced over to their SUVs.

*****

The call was a fire at least , but not arson. A group of college kids just didn’t know how to put out a grease fire and added water. Emily still paid attention to how the team worked. 

Chimney and Hen were working seamlessly, short quips to the victims to put them at ease, and handing each other supplies. Eddie was an extra pair of hands, holding bandages taut and running to the truck for supplies. Buck and Bobby were telling them how to put out a grease fire correctly and assuring them that they’ll be okay. 

The BAU filed back into the meeting room. Adding their notes to the boards as Garcia pulled out the next file she was working on while they were out.

Garcia let out a long, slow whistle before she started. “Alright my friends, it’s time to get into Eddie Diaz. And this one? Is a ride .”

Emily looked up, already sensing something different in Garcia’s tone. She wasn’t smirking. She wasn’t sparkling with the usual dramatic flair. No—this was her serious voice , the one she used when she'd found something real.

Hotch leaned away from the board. “What do we know?”

Garcia tapped the screen, bringing up a family tree that immediately started branching in unexpected directions.

“Edmundo ‘Eddie’ Diaz,” she began. “Born in El Paso, Texas. Has two sisters, Sophia and Adriana. Competed in ballroom dancing for a few years. Played baseball in high school. Married his wife Shannon at 19, enlisted in the military as a medic, then 8 months later, Christopher was born.”

“Cerebral palsy,” Reid murmured, reading over the medical summary Garcia had handed him while she walked around. “It was a complicated birth. Eddie had to leave to finish his tour a week later. After he got back from a second tour, he joined Shannon in L.A., bringing Chris with him, and enrolled in the academy.”

“Eddie never mentioned Shannon in the interview,” JJ muttered, brow furrowed. “Maybe a bitter divorce?”

Garcia shook her head. “There was an unofficial separation, but nothing was made official before Shannon’s death.”

Emily blinked. “Wait— what? ”

Garcia swiped to the next screen. “Shannon died in 2019. Car accident, she died on the way to the hospital. The 118 was the responding crew.”

Rossi exhaled sharply. “That’s a lot for one person.”

Garcia kept going. “Eddie stayed in L.A. being a single dad and going into dangerous situations, like a well collapse that he escaped by the skin of his teeth, which leads us to this—” she tapped the screen again, quiet now.

Emily leaned in as Garcia pulled up a PDF of a scanned legal document. A will.

“Is that—?” JJ started, but Garcia just nodded.

“It’s Eddie’s will. It should be off limits to me, but I have my ways.”

Emily narrowed her eyes, scanning the highlighted clause near the bottom.

“In the event of my death, legal guardianship of my son, Christopher Diaz, shall pass to Evan Buckley.”

The silence that followed was thick enough to choke on.

Morgan let out a low whistle. “That’s... not nothing.”

Rossi muttered, “That’s not even subtle.”

Hotch didn’t say anything. He just folded his arms and looked at the document like it had personally betrayed him.

JJ was the first to speak again. “Why Buck? Why not family?”

“Eddie’s parents are in another state, aging, and he chose to stay in California after Shannon’s death,” Garcia answered. “There’s no backup listed. Just Buck.”

Reid adjusted his glasses. “Over five years ago. That means Buck had been in Eddie’s life less than a year.”

“And Eddie already trusted him with his kid ,” Emily said softly. Her gaze moved toward the far window, where she could just barely make out the dim outline of Buck sitting on the steps outside the firehouse, looking down at his hands. “That’s not just trust. That’s something else.”

JJ bit her lip. “They’re not…?”

“No,” Garcia said quickly. “At least nothing that's public, or private. They live at different addresses, file everything separately, even when they’re listing each other as emergency contacts, they went with ‘co-worker’ but have shifted to ‘best friend’.”

“But come on,” Morgan muttered, nodding at the will. “This is the guy you make guardian of your son? Over your family? After months ? That’s something. ”

Emily nodded slowly, a small crease forming between her brows. “And if the unsub saw this the way we are...”

“They might’ve assumed the same thing,” Garcia finished.

Emily jotted it all down. The legal tie. The timeline. The assumption. The emotion. It all fit—messy, real, human. Emily glanced out the window again. Buck was gone. The steps were empty. But the shadows hadn’t moved. Just like the feeling in her gut.

“And it still doesn’t mean they’re together,” she muttered. “Just that someone thinks they are.”

“Are there any mentions of people who had it out for Eddie?” Hotch was trying desperately to keep the team on topic, “war buddies, anyone he might've rubbed the wrong way?”

“Unlikely,” Garcia pulled up more photos on the screen. “Everyone Eddie served with has since passed away, and by everything else I’ve seen, is just public appreciation for the LAFD.”

“Hotch,” Emily spoke up from her chair. “We already know this unsub isn’t doing this for vengeance. We need to start thinking about what this unsub wants from the 118. If they view the people as characters in a story, what is their next plotline they want to play out?”

“Like what?” JJ leaned back in her chair.

“Well,” Garcia stretched out the last part of the word. “I might have buried the lead a bit—Eddie and Buck are so intertwined that we need to look at these first.”

Chapter Text

Garcia slid two files over. Emily looked down, the files for Evan Buckley and Maddie Buckley sat side by side on the table—two lives written in neat lines and scanned records, but neither one looking particularly tidy.

Garcia had gone quiet. That was Emily’s first warning.

“Okay,” Garcia said, voice softer than usual, “so these two... I pulled them together. And I think that’s the only way any of it makes sense.”

Emily looked to Hotch, who gave her a nod. “Go ahead.”

Garcia took a breath. “They’re from Hershey, Pennsylvania. Evan Buckley, born June 27th. Maddie Buckley—older sister by seven years. Pretty idyllic neighborhood. But something... broke early.”

JJ leaned forward. “What happened?”

Garcia pulled up a timeline. At the top: Daniel Buckley. Born 1985. Died age 8. Leukemia.

Emily’s stomach twisted.

“Daniel died just a few years after Evan was born,” Garcia continued. 

“Wait. That timing—” Reid interrupted, brows drawing together.

“Yeah.” Garcia nodded grimly. “According to medical records I shouldn’t have access to, Buck went through procedures pretty much immediately, mainly a bone marrow transplant that didn’t work.”

Emily felt a wave of cold roll over her. “He was born because they needed a donor. A match. They had Maddie, they had Daniel, and then when Daniel got sick, they had Buck." Her voice felt rough; she's seen worse parents, but she rarely saw the kids become so selfless despite it.

“He was born to save a brother he never got to know,” JJ whispered.

“And when it didn’t work,” Morgan said darkly, “they had a reminder.”

Garcia nodded. “Buck was too young to remember any of it, but... well, you can guess what that does to a kid.”

Emily flipped the page, eyes meeting a long behavioral report from a High School. 

“Teenage years?” she asked.

“Acted out,” Garcia replied. “Fighting. Impulse control issues. Ran away at sixteen for the first time. Got his GED, bounced between jobs, cities, a few countries, couch-surfed. While this was happening?”

She tapped the screen.

“Maddie.”

The sister. The only stable tether in the middle of it all.

Garcia turned her attention to the other file. “While she was trying to look out for Buck... she was being torn apart.”

A photo of Doug Kendall appeared—handsome, polished, almost too perfect. Emily didn’t trust him on sight.

“Doug was a med student,” Garcia said. "Married Maddie just after Buck turned fifteen. On paper? Seemed like a golden couple. But then... injuries. Excuses. Isolation, even from Buck. Classic signs of abuse.”

Emily felt the mood in the room shift, darken.

“She left him after about ten years,” Garcia continued. “Started to plant roots in L.A., and when he came back. She had an open and shut self-defence case.”

“I bet that drew media attention.” Rossi sat back in his chair.

“It was right before the mass blackout,” Garcia explained. “Went pretty under the radar, and she’s been out of the public eye since. Buck, however —”

Garcia leaned on the back of her chair, the gleam in her eyes returning, though it was threaded with awe more than amusement. Emily flipped open the next folder Garcia had stacked in front of them, already bracing herself. If there was one thing she was learning about Buck, it was that nothing about him ever came in half-measures.

“Okay,” she said, “I was going to go over each incident, but there were too many.”

Emily raised an eyebrow. “That sounds promising.”

“Or deeply concerning,” Reid added.

“Nevertheless, I’m going to read off the quick and dirty notes I wrote down for the major ones,” Garcia pulled her tablet closer, clearly getting ready to read off the list. “Okay, so, first off, we have the fire truck bombing. Which we all heard of.”

“That was him ?” Emily gasped. The BAU was almost called in, but SWAT had handled it before they got the file. “It’s a miracle he survived that.”

“With both legs,” JJ added.

“He was put on blood thinners and sidelined due to his injuries. Standard stuff for post-trauma clot prevention,” Garcia continued, swiping to a medical summary. “But then, five months later , he decides to go to the Santa Monica Pier with Christopher.”

JJ blinked. “Please don’t say this ends with another explosion.”

“Nope,” Garcia said. “ Tsunami. ”

Emily’s head snapped around. “You’re kidding.”

Garcia shook her head. “Nope. One of the rare ones that actually hit the coast hard. And Buck? Was pulling people onto a turned-over fire truck.”

Reid was already reading the incident report. “He saved at least a dozen lives. Including multiple children.”

“And kept Chris safe,” Garcia added. “Not only is there tons of footage, but dozens of eyewitnesses said the only reason he left was because he dived back into the water after an aftershock caused Chris to fall in. Most of them just referred to him being a dad looking for his son, though.”

Emily sat back in her chair. “So let me get this straight. He was injured , on blood thinners, in a tsunami… and he still saved lives.”

“Yup,” Garcia said, popping the ‘p.’

Rossi rubbed a hand over his mouth. “You’d think people like that are too good to be true. But everything we’ve found? The guy reads like a Greek hero.”

“And that might be the problem. The unsub doesn’t see Buck as a person. They see a myth ,” Hotch said with an edge of darkness. “They don’t see the injuries. Or the trauma. They see a symbol. Someone they can build a fantasy around.”

Emily tapped her pen against the file, thinking. “And if that fantasy includes him being a star in a story…”

“They’d see any threat to that illusion as justification,” Reid said. “Anything. Anyone.” 

Emily glanced toward the hallway, where Buck’s laughter echoed faintly from the kitchen, soft and easy. He didn’t act like a myth.

“I don’t think this next one is going to discourage them,” Garcia pulls up a photo. It was low quality, clearly taken by a bystander’s phone by accident, but the image was unmistakable. Buck, in a white linen shirt, not in uniform, covered in blood. The splatter pattern didn’t indicate that Buck was bleeding. It was too spread out. The blood was on his face as well as his shirt. 

That’s when Emily looked at the rest of the photo closely. She could barely make out the face of the person in a firefighter uniform, but it was Eddie. His body, still standing, but clearly limp. Like the photo was snapped a mere second after the shot was fired, before Eddie’s body hit the ground. Leaving Buck covered in blood. Eddie’s blood.

JJ inhaled sharply. “What happened?”

Garcia’s voice was quiet. “Eddie was shot. Few years later. Sniper. Random shooter targeting first responders—mostly firefighters in uniform. Happened during a call in broad daylight.”

Rossi leaned forward, eyes narrowing. “And Buck wasn’t in uniform?”

“No,” Garcia said. “He was off shift, phone records show that Eddie had called Buck less than an hour before this. Another firefighter pulled Buck to cover and—” she tapped again, pulling up grainy video footage “—this is from a city traffic camera.”

The screen flickered to life, slightly pixelated, wide-angle. A fire truck in the middle of a street. People ducking for cover.

And there: Buck, crawling under the fire engine.

“Is he—” Reid started.

“Yeah,” Garcia confirmed, her voice starting to crack. “He’s crawling through broken glass and gunfire to get to Eddie.”

The footage continued. Buck emerging on the far side of the rig, dragging a limp figure towards him—Eddie, clearly in pain, blood pouring from his shoulder.

“He pulls him out on the other side, picks him up, puts him in the truck, and then they drive off.”

Emily couldn’t look away. Not from the footage. Not from Buck’s face when he realized Eddie wasn’t moving. Not from the way his hands shook, but never stopped moving.

No panic. No hesitation. Just instinct.

“I’ve seen someone look that scared,” JJ whispered.

“He thought he was losing him,” Morgan finished JJ’s sentence.

Garcia didn’t say anything. She just pulled up the trauma report filed afterward—Buck had refused medical attention until Eddie was in surgery. Refused to leave the hospital. Refused to sleep.

Emily was silent for a long moment.

She didn’t need a profiler’s training to understand what that kind of moment did to a person—what it did to two people. It bound them. Changed the shape of how they lived afterward.

“That,” she said, nodding at the screen, “is the moment our unsub saw.”

“And that’s when the fantasy took root,” Reid said. “Heroism, sacrifice, protection, fatherhood—all wrapped into one person.”

“ Two people,” JJ corrected. “Because Eddie survived. And they’re inseparable now.”

Garcia’s voice cut in gently. “If you think about it from the unsub’s point of view... that moment was like watching a love story play out in real time.”

Emily leaned back in her chair, her chest heavy with the weight of it. “No wonder they’re being targeted. That kind of loyalty? It’s a magnet for obsession.”

She looked at the frozen frame on the screen—Buck, bloody and frantic, shielding Eddie with his whole body.

It wasn’t just heroic.

It was personal.

Garcia was about to swipe to the next part of the file when the alarm went off. Again. 

*****

That last call was another set was another set up from the Unsub.  No people inside, but that was purely by luck; the owner of the store was sick and didn’t open that day. There was a moment when Hen and Chimney got separated inside, both calling out for each other. Thankfully, they decided to make their way out individually before the structure collapsed. It was definitely too close for comfort.

When Morgan and Reid examined the scene afterwards. A gasoline can was found near a broken window, clearly used as the main accelerant. The unsub was getting more sloppy, clearly starting to rush. It was only a matter of time before they reached a breaking point.

*****

The rest of the team had gathered again, bleary-eyed but focused. No one was pretending this was just another case anymore.

“As if the sniper and tsunami weren’t enough,” Garcia muttered, her fingers flying across the tablet. “Here comes the grand finale.”

“This was about two years after the sniper,” Garcia said. “Routine structure fire, apartment complex. One victim trapped on the third floor. It was raining. Ladder rescue.”

Emily leaned forward. “Let me guess. Buck goes up.”

Garcia just nodded.

A few keystrokes later, a grainy, water-streaked CCTV video played on screen. The fire truck’s ladder extended upward into the gloom. Chimney was halfway into his harness, clearly about to ascend—until Buck placed a hand on his chest and shook his head.

He took the harness. Eddie clipped him in. Buck climbed the ladder. 

“Why would he—” JJ started.

“Lightning,” Reid said softly, already piecing it together.

The next moment proved him right.

A brilliant, blinding flash. A jagged bolt cut through the frame and struck the ladder.

Buck’s body seized, then slumped, caught in the safety strap. Smoke rose from his shoulder. Rain pelted down harder.  Buck hanging there, lifeless. The entire team watching held still.

“Oh my god,” JJ whispered.

The footage shifted—ground-level now, body-cam from Chimney as the camera jostled wildly. They could see Eddie, already scrambling up the rungs, screaming Buck’s name.

The video was muted, but it didn’t matter. They could all feel it. The desperation. The panic.

Chimney climbed up partway, then dropped back down, presumably to grab medical supplies. Meanwhile, Eddie climbed the rest of the way and cut Buck loose . The body dropped like dead weight into his arms.

Emily flinched.

The video cut again—now on the asphalt. Eddie was on his knees over Buck, shirt soaked, face wild. CPR. Over and over. No gloves. No hesitation.

Then Hen took over. Chimney pushed oxygen. Eddie just sat there, hands bloody, not moving.

Morgan exhaled. “How long was he dead?”

The words weren’t meant for anyone in particular. The room went silent.

But a voice answered.

“Three minutes and seventeen seconds.”

Emily turned toward the doorway.

Eddie was leaning in the frame, half in shadow. Still in uniform, but he’d changed into a dry shirt. His arms were crossed tightly across his chest, jaw clenched.

“I timed it,” Eddie said. “I know it doesn’t make sense. I know that’s not how CPR works, not really. But I needed to know. I couldn’t tell Chris without knowing. ” His eyes were locked on the screen, where the frozen frame showed Buck’s motionless body on the ground, steam rising from the heat of the strike.

No one spoke.

Hotch was the first to nod—quiet, respectful.

“We’re sorry you had to relive that,” he said. “It’s a lot for anyone.”

Eddie shrugged. “It comes with the territory.”

Morgan raised an eyebrow. “What kind of territory includes everything in these files?”

“The kind that gets you a silver star,” Rossi quipped from the corner of the room. Eddie let out a small chuckle and shook his head.

“The territory of knowing Buck,” Eddie corrected. 

There was something about the way Eddie said it that made Emily’s gears turn.  The way that Eddie talks about Buck, the softness that creeps in at the edges of his voice. The way Eddie’s eyes gravitate to Buck in any room. Eddie pulled Buck back from being reckless on the scene. The will . It’s not something that the unsub created in their head.

Buck would die to save his family, but Eddie would die trying to stop him.

Emily stood slowly. “You love him.”

Eddie didn’t flinch. He just looked tired. Worn. Like he wasn’t about to fight a profiler about behavior she picked up on.

“I do,” he said, like it was the simplest thing in the world, like if you asked him if he breathed air.

Garcia blinked hard, wiping under her eyes.

Morgan nodded, the puzzle finally locking into place in his head. “You ever tell him?”

Eddie’s lips twitched, a sad, half-smile. “Thought about it a few times. Just,” Eddie sighed. “I can live like this, but ruining his relationship with Chris? Not worth the risk.”

Emily’s heart ached a little. Not as a profiler—but as someone who’d lived in the spaces between “maybe” and “too late.”

Eddie nodded toward the screen again. “It’s not about revenge, isn’t it?”

The observation shocked Emily. 

Hotch stood, serious as ever. “It’s about control. They want to rewrite your story. Give it a different ending. We’re making sure they aren’t able to.”

Eddie gave a single nod before quietly stepping back into the hall, leaving the team with the weight of everything they now understood.

Chapter Text

The sun wasn’t up yet, but the world outside the firehouse was beginning to shift—less night, not quite morning. Inside, the lights stayed dim. Everyone moved slower now, shoulders heavier, silences longer.

But none of them were leaving. Not yet.

Emily sat at the head of the table, hands laced in front of her, the weight of the night’s discoveries pressing into her spine. The assumedly unrequited confession hung heavy in the air.

“Alright,” Hotch said quietly, “we’re not going to stop this by waiting for the unsub to strike again. We have to get ahead of them.”

“They’re watching,” Rossi said. “We need to watch back.”

“Agreed,” Morgan said, pushing away from the wall where he’d been leaning. “But if we follow them and they know we’re following them, it’ll change how they move. We won’t get anything useful.”

Emily nodded. “But if we do it without their knowledge—no warning, no heads-up—we see their real routines. Their patterns. And more importantly, we might see the unsub.”

“No shadowing Maddie,” JJ added. “She’s clearly not the primary target, the unsub only cares about what happens on scene. And she’s with Chimney most of the time anyway. But the rest? They’re all on the unsub’s board.”

Garcia was already dividing names between them. “We go one-on-one. Quiet, detached, no contact unless there’s danger. Just eyes.”

Hotch turned to face the team. “Ok let’s split up then.”

Hotch gave them their assignments: Himself with Bobby, JJ with Hen, Rossi with Chimney, Morgan with Eddie, and Emily with Buck. 

Reid and Garcia stayed back at the precinct. Being ‘eyes in the sky’, analyzing the calls that reported the fires for any common themes, plus Garcia has a stack a mile high of articles for Reid to look over.

Emily looked at each member of her team. They were tired. Frustrated. Wired on adrenaline and old instincts.

But they were ready.

“One shift,” Hotch said. “Then we regroup.”

Emily’s eyes lingered on the photos still pinned to the wall. The difference six years made in Buck, no longer as reckless, but still loyal to a fault. Eddie dragged him to safety. Hen’s calm determination. Chimney’s split-second decision-making. Bobby’s steady leadership.

She saw Buck leave the locker room, looking just as tired as Emily felt, but there was a lightness in how he moved. He walked like the weight of the day would melt off in the sun. Emily sighed as she picked up the keys to a stakeout car.

*****

Emily followed at a block’s distance, she’s done thousands of stakeouts, staying hidden is basically like breathing at this point. Buck’s Jeep turned into the parking of an apartment building. Emily pulled into a spot down the block, her unmarked car basically invisible in the L.A. traffic.

“Alright,” Emily said into her comms mic, “he just pulled into the underground garage. Looks like he’s home.”

She kept her body still and her eyes sharp, watching through the car’s tinted window. 

“Copy that,” Garcia’s voice crackled gently in her ear. “We’ve got him on the building’s exterior cam. Can confirm he’s entering solo.”

“He seems… normal,” Emily muttered.

“Normal for Buck or normal for a person who hasn’t been struck by lightning?” Reid chimed in, dry as ever.

Emily huffed a quiet laugh. “Good point.”

She watched as Buck reappeared in a corner unit window, moving through what looked like a small but open loft space. He pulled off his hoodie and tugged off his boots with one foot. His movements were casual, unguarded. Routine.

Nothing that indicated that he was currently at the center of an arsonist’s dangerous spree.

“He’s changing,” Emily reported. “Switching into a different shirt—black Henley, jeans. No jacket, red flannel. Looks like… maybe heading back out?”

“Any idea where?” Reid asked.

“Not yet.”

A moment later, Buck stepped back out of the building. No phone in hand. No hesitation in his pace. Emily straightened, instantly alert.

“He’s on the move. I’m following.”

Buck got back into his Jeep and got back onto the road. Emily trailed him in her unmarked car with practiced ease. 

*****

The neighborhood he eventually turned 15 minutes later was quiet, single family homes that seemed idealistic. Finding a spot for her car to blend in would be harder than she would like. She rounded the corner, eyes scanning for a spot when she saw a similar unmarked car in the perfect stakeout spot.

Morgan’s car.

Her heart did a strange little hiccup in her chest.

“No way,” she muttered, flicking on her mic. “Reid, Garcia—Buck just arrived at Eddie Diaz’s house.”

“Wait, what?” Reid replied, startled. 

“Oh things just got juicer,” Garcia muttered. “I’ll patch you through to Morgan.”

“Thanks Garcia,” Emily said, watching as Buck rang the doorbell once and then let himself in. No hesitation. Like he’d done it a hundred times before.

She circled the block, finding a spot right next to Morgan’s car, a faint buzzing confirming that they were on the same feed. Morgan rolled down his window anyway, Emily following suit.

“Guess you saw that too,” she muttered as raised her eyebrow at him.

Morgan gave a low whistle. “Didn’t think he’d go home with him.”

“They don’t live together,” Emily replied, leaning her seat back slightly.

“Could’ve fooled me.”

They both shifted to get better angles. From this spot, they could see through a gap in the curtains—just enough to watch Buck kneel down as Christopher greeted him. The kid lit up, all warmth and affection. Buck ruffled his hair and laughed, leaning into the touch like it was the only thing grounding him.

Then Eddie entered the frame, tossing Buck a dish towel and giving him a look that, if Emily was being honest, was pure domestic fondness laced with subtle exhaustion.

Emily swallowed hard.

“You good?” Morgan asked, without looking at her.

“Yeah,” she said too fast. “It’s just…”

Not what she expected.

She’d been on hundreds of stakeouts. Spent hours watching suspects, marks, victims—trying to figure out who they were when they thought no one was looking.

But this? Watching Buck in Eddie’s kitchen?

It didn’t feel like a stake out. It felt like she’d accidentally tuned into the end of a feel-good movie she wasn’t supposed to see.

Buck moved around the kitchen with a confidence and comfort that spoke of repetition. He grabbed spices from the right cabinet on the first try. Stirred something on the stove while Eddie rolled up the sleeves of his shirt and opened the fridge behind him like they were on autopilot.

No spoken instructions. Just... flow.

And Christopher? Sitting on the counter, swinging his legs and grinning as he recounted a story Emily couldn’t hear—something clearly ridiculous, if the way Buck burst out laughing was any indication.

Eddie didn’t laugh, not right away. He just smiled at both of them. A soft smile. Like he’d already heard the story, already loved it, and was just waiting for the punchline to let it play out again.

They looked like a family.

And it wasn’t romantic . Not in any overt way. There were no kisses. No lingering touches. But Emily could see the intimacy in the way Buck handed Eddie a spoon without looking. The way Eddie wiped a sauce smudge from Christopher’s nose without missing a beat. The way Buck tossed a dish towel over his shoulder like he belonged there.

It was quiet.

Unspoken.

Real.

Morgan shifted next to her. “So... we still thinking this is unrequited?” he murmured.

Emily didn’t answer right away. She watched the way Buck cracked eggs one-handed while talking over his shoulder to Christopher. The way Eddie leaned on the counter beside him, sipping coffee and nodding along. They moved like gears in a well-oiled machine.

“No,” she said finally. “But, I can see why Eddie is scared to lose this. What about you?”

He didn’t answer immediately. His eyes tracking as Buck made some joke that sent Eddie into a real laugh—the kind that caught you by surprise and then lingered in your throat.

“I think,” Morgan said finally, “that if anyone comes for them… they’re gonna have to go through both of them. And neither of them would ever let that happen.”

Emily nodded, throat tight.

For a moment, they just watched.

It was the most ordinary thing in the world. Pancakes, orange juice, Christopher insisting he didn’t need help with the syrup and Buck pretending to be scandalized when he poured too much.

Nothing loud. Nothing dramatic.

But Emily had watched hundreds of couples through surveillance glass. And none of them looked as certain as these three did right now.

She tapped her mic. “Reid? Garcia?”

“Go ahead,” Reid answered.

“Nothing suspicious to report,” she said. “Target entered location, made breakfast, and is currently doing dishes in someone else’s home.”

“Noted,” Garcia replied, but her voice was soft. Knowing.

“Do we know why he’s there?” Reid asked.

Emily looked back through the window one more time. Buck was drying a plate while Eddie leaned over Christopher’s shoulder to help him with some homework worksheet. Their arms brushed. Neither flinched. Neither even noticed.

“I think he just went home,” Emily said quietly.

**Garcia POV**

The soft clack of keys and the hum of electronics were the only sounds in the room. Garcia had one monitor tracking each field agent’s location feed, another running a background check matrix, and two more scraping social media for any unusual mentions of the 118.

Reid sat beside her, notebook open, eyes scanning data like they were reading a story no one else could see.

They’d been at it for hours. No conversation. Just the kind of silence born of mutual respect and total focus.

Until Garcia suddenly stopped typing.

She squinted at the screen. Blinked. And then whispered, “Oh no.”

Reid looked up immediately. “What?”

Garcia didn’t answer right away. She just started typing—fast, faster than he’d seen her all night. A few keystrokes pulled up a timestamped string of footage, matched across multiple feeds.

Reid stood and stepped behind her to look. “What are we looking at?”

“The third fire,” Garcia said. “The one where Maddie got distracted by a fake call in the middle.”

“Right,” Reid said. “They said they were talking to Maddie until a different dispatcher called in.”

“Exactly,” Garcia whispered. “Only… they weren’t called in by dispatch. Not officially.”

Reid’s eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?”

Garcia pulled up the dispatch log. There was no entry for the 118’s unit number at that time. No call routed through Maddie. But there was a brief transmission—static-heavy, rushed, almost like it was patched in through an older system.

“Someone spoofed dispatch?” Reid asked, incredulous.

“Yeah,” Garcia said. “And get this—there’s a pattern in the interference. At first, I thought it was audio glitching. But it’s repeating. Like a thumbprint.”

Reid’s eyes lit up. “A signature.”

“Exactly.” Garcia turned to him, eyes wide. “This wasn’t someone just watching. They inserted themselves into the story. ”

“They’re controlling the scenes.”

Reid started flipping pages in his notebook, landing on a map they’d been using to mark the unsub’s escalation timeline. “They didn’t just want the 118 on the scene. They needed them there.”

Garcia nodded, spinning back to her keyboard. “They’re building tension. Setting up arcs. Buck saving Eddie. Eddie protecting Chris. Hen and Chimney being almost too late at the last one? It’s all too perfect.”

Reid stepped back, staring at the board like it had transformed. “We’ve been thinking of them as an obsessed outsider.”

“But they’re a storyteller, ” Garcia said, breath catching. “They’re writing a script. ”

“And they’re not done,” Reid whispered. “We’re only in the third act.”

Garcia’s screen pinged.

An alert. Real-time update. Someone accessing one of the city's emergency override channels. Now.

“Oh god,” Garcia said. “They’re setting up the next one.”

“You call the Sergeant Grant,” Reid pulled out his phone typing in a number. “I’ll call the team.”

*****

Athena arrived with the kind of speed only a cop who knows something is wrong can manage. No uniform this time—just jeans, a dark sweater, and the badge clipped at her hip.

She took one look at the twos' faces and didn’t even ask what was going on.

“Alright,” she said, crossing her arms, “tell me.”

Hotch’s voice cut in over the phone. “The unsub isn’t just watching your team. They’re orchestrating events. Fires. Response times. Where the 118 goes. They spoofed dispatch to get them to one of the scenes. Possibly more.”

Athena blinked. “They’re… what, scripting them?”

“Yes,” Reid said, flipping his notebook open. “There’s a narrative structure forming. Heroism. Sacrifice. Close calls. It’s cinematic. Almost theatrical.”

Athena’s jaw tightened. “You’re telling me someone is setting my people up like they’re in a TV show?”

Garcia nodded grimly. “A very dangerous one. And they’re about to roll out the next act.”

Emily’s voice rang out next. “Which is why we need you. You know your people. You know this department. Has anyone been… hanging around? Too interested in the 118? Especially Buck or Eddie?”

Athena was already shaking her head. “Everyone loves them. Half the city sees them as walking miracles. We’ve had reporters, fans, kids asking for autographs…”

Hotch cut in. “Anyone persistent? Showing up where they shouldn’t be? Maybe someone who tried to get close but was pushed out?”

Athena’s brow furrowed. “There was—” she paused. “There was a woman. Civilian volunteer on a ride-along last year. With Buck and Eddie. She showed up a few times after that. Dropped off cookies. Left notes. Buck thought she was harmless.”

“What was her name?” JJ asked.

Athena squinted. “Jessa? Julia? No— Jenna . Jenna Parker. She said she was a journalism student. Always had a notebook. Asked a lot of questions. Too many .”

Reid was already pulling up his tablet. “Jenna Parker. Got it. Garcia?”

“On it,” Garcia said, typing like her fingers were on fire. “And… bingo. Jenna Parker. Former communications student at UCLA. Blogged about local ‘everyday heroes.’ But her site’s been wiped clean for months. Last update was right after the sniper incident.”

Athena exchanged a glance with Reid. “That’s when she went quiet?”

“She didn’t go quiet,” Garcia said. “She went dark. Deleted every post. Every photo.”

“Because she didn’t want to write about them anymore,” Morgan said. “She wanted to be part of the story.”

Athena’s voice went cold. “And you think she’s about to set the next scene?”

Reid nodded. “It fits. Her obsession with Buck and Eddie. The timing. The escalation. She’s been building toward something.”

“She wants a finale,” Emily added. “And we need to stop her before she writes it in fire.”

“Confirmed. It’s her,” Garcia said, voice trembling with adrenaline. “Jenna Parker just accessed the city’s emergency override system again. Same signal pattern. She directed the fire call specifically to Station 118.”

Athena pulled out her phone. “I’ll contact Bobby now.”

Garcia could hear Hotch moving on the other end of the line. “Let them know it’s an arson. The unsub is likely nearby.”

**Eddie POV**

“Attention, 118,” Athena’s voice echoed through the main comms channel. “This is a direct message from LAPD and the FBI. The fire at 923 Kelton is confirmed to be arson. Repeat, this is another setup. Do not respond until you receive backup.”

Eddie was halfway into his turnout gear, already buckling the last strap on his helmet.

He froze.

Chimney looked up from the call sheet. “What the hell—”

“That’s from Athena,” Hen confirmed, eyes wide.

“The BAU traced it. The arsonist hijacked the dispatch radio,” Bobby had a phone to his ear, Athena’s voice faint through the speaker. “She’s telling us to stand down.”

Eddie turned toward Buck. “How did they even do that?”

But then the radio crackled again. This time Maddie’s voice was loud and clear:

“Fire reported at 923 Kelton, abandoned motel—reporting movement in a second-floor window. There’s someone inside.”

“She didn’t know someone was in there,” Bobby muttered, already moving. “Suit up. We’re going in.”

Buck turned to Eddie. No words. Just the silent agreement that had been forged in fire and blood and years of surviving beside each other.

Eddie nodded once. “Let’s go.”

**POV Emily**

“They’re going in,” Hotch said grimly, hanging up his phone.

“Damn it,” Morgan muttered. “We can’t stop them.”

“Because someone’s inside,” JJ said. “That’s what Jenna didn’t plan for. The real world doesn’t follow scripts.”

“She’s going to panic,” Reid said from the back seat. “She wanted a controlled fire. Symbolic. Now someone innocent is inside. That makes it real.”

Emily stared out the window, jaw set. “Then we’d better get there fast. Because the moment Jenna realizes her finale isn’t going the way she wanted—she’s going to improvise.”

Chapter Text

*Eddie POV*

Flames licked at the windows of the motel. Civilians were being pushed back behind caution tape. Sirens screamed in the distance as more engines arrived. But the 118 was already inside.

Buck and Eddie moved in tandem, cutting through smoke and debris like it was second nature.

“Second floor!” Buck shouted, voice muffled under his mask.

Through the haze, a shape moved.

“Victim!” Eddie confirmed. “Breathing, but unconscious.”

They reached the woman, shielding her with their bodies as beams groaned overhead.

“Backtrack’s blocked!” Bobby called out over the radio. “You’ll have to go down the north stairs.”

“Go!” Buck said, hefting the victim with Eddie.

But even as they turned—

A loud crack shook the floor.

Support beams. Caving.

It clipped Eddie on the back, slashing through his turnout coat, but he kept moving.

Smoke curled like claws through the stairwell as Buck and Eddie hefted the unconscious woman between them. She was light, limp, and dangerously close to not making it.

Buck's voice cut through the roar of the fire. “We’ve gotta move—Chim, check if the side’s still clear!”

Eddie’s grip shifted, his right side starting to feel... wrong. He didn’t need to look to know what it was— something tore when that beam came down. Sharp and deep. Rib, maybe. Could be worse. Probably is.

But Buck didn’t know. And Buck didn’t need to know.

Not yet.

“North stairs should be clear!” Chimney called. “North stairs!”

Buck nodded, already adjusting the victim in his arms, sliding under her to take more of the weight.

Eddie winced but kept his voice steady. “I’m right behind you.”

Buck looked at him, quick, checking for hesitation. “You sure?”

“I’ve got your back.”

Buck nodded and moved.

Eddie watched him go, a blur of motion and flame and focus . Carrying the victim like she was made of glass. Disappearing into smoke like it was second nature.

Eddie stood still for half a second too long.

Because he didn’t have Buck’s back.

Not this time.

Pain lanced through his abdomen when he tried to keep pace. His leg screamed. His shirt was wet—blood or sweat, he didn’t know anymore. His vision swam, and the heat pressed in close. Closer.

He limped after them. Each step dragging a little slower than the last. Buck’s voice echoed once, faint, distant. “Almost there!”

And then—

The floor shifted beneath him. Not completely—just a groan. A subtle drop. But enough to tell him:

You're not gonna make it, Diaz.

Not this time.

He pushed harder.

One step. Another.

A breath caught in his throat. He reached the stairwell just in time to see Buck disappear around the last turn—Buck shouting for paramedics.

“Go,” Eddie whispered, like Buck could still hear him.

He reached out for the wall.

And missed.

*Buck POV*

Buck broke through the smoke, the victim in his arms, gasping on instinct, the second the cool air hit her lungs. He shouted for a medic. Hen was already moving with oxygen.

Buck turned, coughing hard into his shoulder. “Where’s Eddie?”

Hen glanced behind him, eyes narrowing. “I thought he was right behind you.”

Buck froze.

“No. No—he said — Jesus Christ Eds—”

And then Buck was running back into the smoke.

*Emily POV*

Emily stood behind the yellow tape with JJ, Reid, and Rossi, her eyes locked on the burning building as the smoke billowed into the morning sky.

It was chaos.

But her focus was razor-thin, narrowed to a single figure stumbling through the smoke with a limp, unconscious woman in his arms.

Buck.

He burst from the front entrance, coughing hard, eyes red and wild—but alive. The woman was still breathing. Barely. Hen shouted for the medics. Chimney moved in with a gurney.

But Buck?

He didn’t stop.

He turned—looked behind him.

Then bolted back into the fire.

Emily’s stomach dropped.

“Wait—what is he—” JJ started.

Garcia’s voice came through the comms, strained and rapid. “They’re all on open mic—118 team is patched into internal audio. I’ve got it. Listening now.”

Static. Then Buck’s voice.

“Where’s Eddie? Anyone got eyes?”

A beat of silence.

Then another voice—rough, hoarse, barely audible beneath the crackle of flames.

“Buck… no.”

Emily and JJ shared a look. That wasn’t panic. That was command. That was fear, disguised as control.

Then Buck again, sharper now. “Hen? Anyone? I need Eddie’s location—”

“Evan, I swear to God—”

The cough that followed tore through the speaker. Ragged. Wet.

Then, Nothing.

No footsteps. No follow-up. Just open air.

Emily and JJ both froze.

Their eyes met in an instant, minds arriving at the same conclusion a breath apart.

“Did he—” JJ started.

“Yeah,” Emily said, voice low and tight. “He just called him Evan .”

Rossi turned toward them. “You think that means something?”

Reid didn’t even look up from his notes. “I’ve listened to every interview they’ve given. Every public statement. Every piece of media Garcia pulled. Even on contact forms. Eddie never calls him that.”

“Never?” JJ echoed.

“Not once,” Reid confirmed.

“When you call Hotch, ‘Aaron’,” Emily started.

“I need him to hear what I’m about to say,” Rossi finished. Emily felt her blood run cold with Rossi’s understanding.

And now she was watching Buck disappear into a building that might fall apart any second, chasing a man who was calling him by his legal name. A man who’s in love with him.

This wasn’t just another close call.

The radios had gone silent.

Too silent.

Inside the fire, everything was chaos—sirens, shouted orders, a building groaning under its own weight—but around Emily, time had slowed to a crawl. Her eyes stayed locked on the door, now thick with smoke. The visibility was gone. Buck had been inside for four minutes.

Four long minutes.

JJ’s fists were clenched at her sides. Reid was dead still, listening. And Garcia, on comms back at the precinct, was reading the 118’s vitals like prayers. Hen’s oxygen. Chimney’s movement. But Buck and Eddie?

Nothing.

And then—

Hotch’s voice. Quiet. Calm. Controlled.

It came faintly through her earpiece, but in the silence, it might as well have been a shout.

“…You wanted to be part of their story, Jenna. But you’re not the hero here. And this? This isn’t how it ends.”

A pause.

Then Morgan, voice firm, but equally as controlled. “Put it down. Now.”

JJ’s head snapped up. “Is that—?”

Emily held up a hand. “Quiet.”

Hotch’s voice cut through again. “You wanted to watch them save someone. Look behind you. That’s what they’re doing. That’s who they are.”

The static buzzed.

Jenna didn’t speak. At least not loud enough for the mic to pick up. But Emily could hear her breathing. Fast. Staggered.

“She’s breaking,” Garcia whispered over the open line.

And then—

CRASH.

A wall of flame burst outward from the upper left corner of the building. Firefighters scrambled. A hose pivoted direction. But Emily didn’t look away from the door.

Because something was moving through the smoke.

A figure, silhouetted in flickering light, stumbling forward with weight across their shoulders.

Buck .

Carrying Eddie.

Emily’s heart stuttered as he broke fully into the open air, legs shaking, shoulders heaving—but still holding on.

Someone screamed for a medic. Chimney and Hen were tied up with the victim, but Hen grabbed the gear Chimney was holding and nodded. Chimney didn’t need to think twice before he grabbed his kit and ran , joining the two paramedics that were already on the way over.

Buck went to his knees the moment he cleared the line, Eddie’s body sliding gently into the arms of paramedics who swarmed in seconds later. Buck didn’t resist. Didn’t speak. Just sat there, covered in ash and blood and soot, his face buried in one shaking hand. Bobby was there to move Buck away from the building that was actively coming down, keeping calm, but clearly a bit shaken from the close call.

One of the paramedics tried to move Buck to a different spot to check for potential injuries, away from Eddie. Before the suggestion even landed in Buck’s ears, Bobby was already shaking his head. It hit Emily that even though he wasn’t a profiler, Bobby knew his team, he knew Buck and Eddie, he just knew .

And for a moment, Emily didn’t move.

Didn’t breathe.

She looked at Buck, crumpled but alive . She looked at Eddie—breathing, bleeding, but conscious now, his fingers curling weakly on Buck’s arm.

And in the earpiece, Hotch’s voice came one last time.

“It’s over.”

Chapter Text

*Emily POV*

Hospitals always had a strange kind of silence. Not peace—never that—but a pause. Like the world held its breath between what had happened and what would come next.

Emily stood with Hotch, JJ, Reid, and Rossi at the nurses’ station. The smell of antiseptic clung to the back of her throat. She signed in while Hotch checked in with Athena, who had arrived five minutes before them.

Jenna Parker was in custody. Her apartment was a shrine—photos, articles, hand-drawn timelines. The 118 wasn’t just her fixation. They were her narrative . And Buck and Eddie were the climax.

“She said she just wanted the perfect ending,” Athena told them flatly. “Heroes, tragedy, sacrifice. All of it. She didn’t know there was a woman in the building. That ruined the plan.”

Reid added softly, “She wasn’t trying to kill them. Not all the way. She wanted them to almost die . Over and over. So she could watch them survive .”

Emily exhaled. “That’s not admiration. That’s possession.”

Hotch nodded. “She doesn’t see them as people. Just roles.”

They stood in silence for a beat, letting that settle. Then Athena nodded down the hall.

“Eddie’s in 414. Buck hasn’t left since they brought him in.”

No one said, Of course he hasn’t.

Because they all already knew.

The room was dim, lit only by a slant of morning sun. Eddie was propped up in bed, arm in a sling, gauze still wrapped around his ribs. He looked tired, but more alert than Emily expected.

And Buck—curled in the chair beside the bed, shoes kicked off, hoodie crumpled, hand still resting on the edge of Eddie’s blanket—looked like he hadn’t moved in hours.

He probably hadn’t.

When they entered, Buck blinked awake fast, like he’d trained himself not to sleep too deeply.

“You’re okay,” JJ said, smiling at Eddie.

Eddie nodded once. “Mostly.”

“And you,” Rossi added, looking at Buck with something just short of admiration, “need a shower.”

Buck offered a lopsided smile, but his hand didn’t leave the blanket.

“You here for the report?” Eddie asked, voice a little rough.

Hotch nodded. “We wanted you to hear it from us.”

They told him everything—Jenna’s history, her writings, the timeline she’d built. The recordings, the fire setups, the cameras. She’d orchestrated the entire thing like a play.

Eddie listened quietly. Buck stayed silent, eyes never straying from Eddie for long.

When they were done, Eddie sat back against the pillows and let out a breath. “So that’s it?”

“It’s over,” Hotch confirmed. “She won’t get near you again.”

Eddie’s eyes drifted sideways. “Chris knows?”

“I told him,” Buck said, speaking for the first time. “Tried to keep it simple. Said you were a hero. Which he already knew.”

The room was quiet again.

Emily  stepped forward. “We just wanted to say goodbye. We’ll file the paperwork, close the case. But if either of you ever need anything—”

Buck looked up then. Really looked at her. “Thank you.”

Emily smiled gently. “You don’t have to thank us for keeping you alive. You’re the one who did that.”

They filed out, one by one, leaving Emily and Garcia behind for just a moment longer.

She watched the way Buck leaned back in the chair the second the others left, shoulders slumping again. The way Eddie looked at him, quiet and steady.

“You told him?” she asked softly.

Buck blinked. “What?”

“Yeah, I did.” Eddie answered.

Emily gave a single nod.

“Good,” she said, then turned to face Buck. “Don’t make him go back in after you next time.”

Buck smiled. “Can’t make any promises.”

Emily smirked and turned for the door, her heart lighter than it had been in days.She paused, waiting at the door for Garcia as she drifted toward Buck, envelope in hand.

“What’s this?”

Garcia didn’t smile like she usually would. Instead, she held it out gently, fingers grazing his.

“I told you the radios went silent after Eddie called you back.”

Buck nodded. “Yeah. You said there was just static.”

She tilted her head. “I lied, just a little.”

His throat bobbed.

“I muted the channel. The open comms were still active for two minutes after you went back in. I didn’t let anyone hear it. Not Jenna. Not the team.”

She pressed the envelope into his hand. “It’s a transcript. You can read it when you’re ready.”

Buck hesitated. “Why didn’t you tell me earlier?”

Garcia looked up at him, softer than Emily had ever seen her. “Because what you two said in that fire? That wasn’t meant for the rest of the world. And she—” her voice dropped, sharp with something fierce, “—doesn’t get to keep any part of that.”

Buck looked down at the envelope like it might burn him.

Emily and Garcia made their way to the elevator. 

Emily leaned over, curious despite herself. “What did they say?”

Garcia just smiled gently. “They said everything.”

*Buck POV*

Buck had been staring at the envelope for what felt like hours. He knows what they said, but something about seeing it felt daunting. As the hours wore on Eddie drifted back to sleep, and Buck finally broke down and picked the envelope from the side table where he had set it.

He opens the envelope with trembling fingers, sitting alone in the dark hospital room as Eddie sleeps beside him. He unfolds the paper, the smell of smoke and antiseptic still lingering in the air.

At the top, a timestamp.

[00:00:01] BUCK: Hen? Anyone? I need Eddie’s location—

[00:00:03] EDDIE: Evan, I swear to God—

[00:01:12] BUCK (panting): I can’t find you. Eds, you have to answer me—

[00:01:17] EDDIE (weakly): Did you seriously come back? Chris can’t lose both of us.

[00:01:35] BUCK: Good thing he won’t lose either one of us then. You can’t do this. I can’t do this. I need you to hold on. Please.

[00:01:48] EDDIE: Evan—  

[00:01:53] BUCK: I love you, okay? I should’ve said it years ago. I love you Eddie. I fell for you so hard for you I didn’t even realize.

[00:02:04] EDDIE (strained): You’re an idiot.

[00:02:07] BUCK: Yeah, well. You made me run into a burning building to come get you. I think we’re even.

[00:02:15] EDDIE: ...I love you too.

[00:02:21] BUCK: Then hold on. I’m coming.

[00:02:25] EDDIE: I know.

Buck stared at the page, breath caught between a laugh and a sob.

He looked at Eddie, asleep but alive, steady lines on the heart monitor a quiet chorus.

And Buck smiled, tears in his eyes.

Because this?

This was the real ending.

And maybe, just maybe—

The beginning.