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In the cramped, stale smelling old archive room of the rural precinct of Littletown, Georgia, one Dr. Spencer Reid was surrounded by high stacks of journals sitting precariously on the big, dusty table in front of him, most of them looming a couple of inches higher than his head. The clock on the wall read 18:21 pm and the four stacks riddled with colourful post its to the left of the table clearly showed that he had been sitting there for a while. Not as ages long as it would take any other person to go through the papers, mind you, but it was still a bleak task to read through the dark thoughts of a psychopath, maybe even more so for him, given that his eidetic memory never would let him forget any of the cruel details and violent descriptions he was just reading through in record speed. Not that he would complain, though.
It might look easy enough, just reading for hour after hour, and normally, it would be indeed an enjoyable task for the young agent, if just the contents weren´t quite so depressing. But he had given Hotch an estimated time of 5 hours and 43 minutes to go through all of it, not allowing for more than one short toilet break in his calculation, since time was of the essence if they wanted to find the missing student in time.
After all, cluing in all that he could find out from reading the journals might give them just the hint that they needed to push the case forward, which was at sort of a stillstand at the moment; so he would do everything he could to get through them quickly, to not let Hotch and the team down, even if that meant neglecting his personal needs for a little while.
He could allow himself a proper break afterwards, that is, after disclosing every useful information he learned to the team, he told himself now, slowly growing thirsty after the first three hours spent in the small room. The cup of coffee Morgan had brought him after the first twenty minutes, didn´t last for long and he didn´t had any resupply since, not even to speak of food, but he had gone much longer without food and water before, so it wasn´t bothering him. Finding clues was way more important.
The door, which was to his back, creaked open and his head shot up from the journal he was currently buried in, more startled then alarmed from the loud and sudden noise the old door made every time someone dared to open it.
He was expecting it to be one of his colleagues, maybe to check on his process again (although they all knew by now how accurate his prognoses tended to be, after he saw how much material there was to read through) or to ask if he found something promising yet.
But when he saw that it was the officer which he had met earlier, the one that was told to show him to the archive room to get him settled in, he paled, his body tensing up as he remembered the earlier and very much unpleasant first meeting of the alpha man.
+++ 3 hours earlier +++
“By the way, the journals we confiscated from the lead suspect are all down in the archive room. No one touched them yet – there are so many of them that it would take all my whole team days if not weeks to go through them and quite frankly, I don´t think we have time for that, right?” the head of the precinct laughed as he told that information Hotch and Spencer, who didn´t find it as funny.
“But if you guys wanna take a look anyhow, just tell me and I´ll let one of my officers show you the room,” he added, clearly thinking that they wouldn´t bother, but his laughter died when he noticed the two of them exchanging a meaningful and serious look.
He hadn´t mentioned the journals at all when they had set up the station earlier this evening, apparently not having deemed them important enough to even mention them until now and Hotch was clearly very much unamused by the fact, while Spencer couldn´t understand how the man didn´t seem to know how important “little” thinks like that could be to any profiler worth his money.
Furthermore, keeping evidence unmentioned was neglective at best and Hotch let the chief know that, looking at him sternly when he replied: “Indeed we do want to take a look, and I very much hope this is the only evidence sitting in the cellar, that you failed to mention to us, or we might think you want to hinder the investigation,” his voice clearly stating how unhappy he was with the situation.
Chief Henderson acted surprised and Hotch, annoyed by his ignorance, grilled him a little bit more, but then quickly turned to Spencer after having learned from the man just how many journals were waiting for them there, each for every month since the unsub turned 16 and Spencer knew what was coming even before he said his next word, so he did his mental calculation off the question that was bound to follow to hold the answer ready for him.
“Reid, I want you to go through the journals and tell us everything you can surmise of them when you´re through. How much time will you need?”
“Approximately 5 hours, 43 minutes and 43 seconds,” he shot out as soon as Hotch stopped talking, and the shocked and surprised expression of the police chief was almost comical, funny even, had the situation not been so serious, while Hotch didn´t even blink, clearly having expected no less of his youngest agent.
Hotch turned to Chief Henderson again, not letting him recover from his shock before he demanded that someone showed Reid the archive room, as he had indeed offered them.
For most people, it would have been satisfying to see the man basically shrinking in on himself while Hotch spoke to him firmly, clearly realising how dumb his not-mention had been, but Spencer quickly turned his attention to the officer that the man had called to show him downstairs, not having the time nor the mind for malicious joy, or schadenfreude, as it was also called, the word being a foreign word borrowed from the German language.
Officer Adams seemed annoyed with the mundane task given to him by his chief, even rolling his eyes when the man looked away, but didn´t outright protest it. Instead, he started walking briskly, obviously expecting him to follow right away, without even checking if he did so. Spencer shot one last glance to Hotch and the chief of the precinct and then followed the officer to the elevator around the corner.
The man looked disgruntled and the silence while they waited for the cubicle to arrive was uncomfortable, but it wasn´t uncommon for some officers, especially from the more rural precincts, to be annoyed with the involvement of the FBI and especially with him, looking not exactly like a role model for an agent. Some of them would always look at him critically or even with an unveiled expression of dislike and it would be immediately clear to Spencer that they were thinking he didn´t deserve to have that position, a position that was clearly higher in rank and esteem than their own. It hurt some of their egos.
Spencer tried to not let it get to him and to be as neutral to them as possible, given his past of an often-bullied child, he knew that it was best to do nothing to give them further ammunition to dislike him and be especially careful with what he said to them.
But of course, he wasn´t a child anymore and it was expected of him to cooperate with local officers, including communicating with them, so he couldn´t just avoid them all of the time, even if they were giving him a bad feeling. He also tried no to be prejudiced against anyone, no matter how unlikable they seemed at first glance and what his instincts told him, so Spencer looked to the officer openly, patiently waiting for him to say something, while they waited for their lift, but the man seemed to be content to stay silent for now, not that Spencer was unhappy about that.
The elevator finally dinged and opened in front of them. They stepped in and Officer Adams pressed the button for -1. Then he leaned casually against the wall and eventually looked to Spencer with an undisguised sneer on his face.
“Now who made you an agent, and what did you do for it?” he asked, the question clearly dismissive. Spencer couldn´t help and say something, but kept his voice carefully neutral. “The FBI did and I went through the academy for it, just like any other agent.”
The officer snorted, clearly not impressed. “Oh yeah? And who did you fuck to pass the physical tests?”
“No one,” Spencer said slowly, trying hard to keep calm and level. He had dealt with worse guys, that officer was just talking a little rude, no problem. Or so he thought, but when the man stepped closer to him, right into his personal space in front of his body, he became slightly nervous, but still forced his breathing to remain even, even when there was no more than a hand width of space between them now.
“I bet you´re one of those pathetic, weak little guys who hide behind their boss and can´t do shit on their own, right? I bet you want him here now, to protect you from strong guys like me, right? Or maybe go running to him, tell him I´ve been mean to you the second I´m leaving you alone? But you know what´s great about this station? It´s full of real men, men that hate the fucking FBI for just coming here like they own the place and taking over the most interesting case we´ve had in years, like it´s their place to solve it and not rightfully ours. They hate our stupid chief for trusting you more with solving this then his own damn people and, what´s the best, because of that, they look up to me so much more than they ever will to Henderson, and when I tell them to rile you up a little, but leave no marks, they´ll do it, no questions asked, and if I want to mess with you myself a little, they´ll all look away, and when you come running to your boss daddy, every single man of the force will have my back and you sure will look mighty dumb in front of your team, trying to blame me. Cause you could tell them what I did how often you want and it won´t stick, cause I´ll have plenty of “witnesses” who´ll tell everyone that you started the fight,” he hissed in Reid´s face, who gulped, but refused to look down and kept staring back at the officer, not wanting to give the man the satisfaction of knowing that he was being successful with his intimidating tactics.
“Or...” the officer continued more softly, stepping back a little bit, finally giving him enough place so he felt that he could breathe again, “...or you can keep everything I´m saying or doing to you to yourself, and I might just be a little more lenient and not do any of the really mean things. Think about it, weakling,” he said, sounding like he already won, like he could do anything he wanted and the agent in front of him would be too scared to tell.
The think was, it might just work. Even thinking about running to Hotch and telling him about an officer bullying him, he knew that he wouldn´t do it. Even if it was warranted, he hated bothering Hotch with unimportant stuff like having it a little rough with the local officers, wasting not only his but more important his team leaders precious time, time they needed to concentrate on and solve the case.
Also, if he would´ve taken more time to analyse his reluctance, he might have concluded that this kind of strategy, go and tell your superior, went awfully wrong too many times when he was a naive little kid in school, trying to deal with his first bullies.
Each time that it had gotten so bad that he went to a teacher, they would listen to him, sure, they would give the bully a warning, maybe even a day or two of suspension from class and made them apologise to Spencer – only to make the bullying SO much worse afterwards, every single time when the teachers weren´t present...
“So, what´s it gonna be?” the officer wanted to know, smiling threateningly.
So, who could blame him for taking a shaky breath and saying “There´s no need to get mean, I´m a professional, I deal with problems myself, I can assure you of that,” trying and failing to keep his voice strong and steady.
The officer smiled only more and clapped him on the shoulder, in a fake-friendly way.
“Clever boy. Now, take this and remember that it can always get so much worse, whenever I want it to,” he said, before punching him in his belly, causing Spencer to double over, taking strained gasps until the pain abated.
The elevator dinged merrily, indicating their arrival, and Spencer hurried to follow officer Adams, like nothing had just happened, only his slightly hunched figure being a sign of his unease, but no one was down there to notice it.
The door to the archive room was opened, and Spencer had to suppress a cough as the dusty air hit him. He didn´t want to show any weakness while officer Adams was present and kept himself upright when said man turned around, sneering at him ones again.
“Have fun with those journals,” he said to Reid, his voice dripping with sarcasm, before leaving the room and letting the heavyset door swing close with a shrieky noise, indicating that no one bothered to oil the door hinges in a long time. Of course, the officer hadn´t bothered to turn the light on before leaving, so, with the archive room having no windows, Spencer suddenly found himself in utter darkness, his heart rate picking up from unexpectedly having to face one of his fears. He turned around and stumbled a step forward until he hit the wall, his arms outstretched and his shaking hands urgently searching for the light switch.
When he finally found it, he was drenched in a light sweat, despite the rather chilly atmosphere of the room with thick walls, and breathed in deeply in relieve when the room was flooded with glaring neon light. Of course, that promptly sent him into a coughing attack, because of all the dust that was in the air, and it took a minute until he could breathe normally again. Since the anthrax case, his lungs just weren´t the same, no wonder since his lung capacity was reduced to 79 % ever since. But of course, he was lucky it wasn´t more, given how long it had taken back then until he had gotten the antidote.
Finally taking the time to properly look around the room, he saw that the stacks were high indeed, and he would need to begin reading through them asap if he wanted to have any change of keeping his estimated time frame. He still wanted to sort them chronologically though, even if that took some time, it would make it easier to sort the mountains of information into his mind and notice much more quickly if at some point, something changed in the writing style.
+++ backflash over +++
It took officer Adams only two steps to reach Reid´s side and lean his hip demonstratively against the table, crossing his strong arms across his well-built body in a typical alpha man pose demanding attention. Officer Adams clearly enjoyed to make him feel nervous, smiling in a clearly up-to-no-good way, but not saying anything. Reid squirmed in his seat just a little, feeling like an ugly microbe under someone´s microscope.
“What do you want?” Reid eventually asked, when he couldn´t stand the uncomfortable silence any longer. He needed the man to get out of this room and stop distracting him, as his mind was being hyper aware of every second passing since the distraction, since they meant a delay of the finishing of his task. Not to speak of the bad feeling in his belly because of his presence.
”It’s officer Adams for you, dumbass, seems like I need to teach you a lesson,” he said rudely, grabbing him by his arm and pulling him out of his chair with force.
Reid bit his teeth together, hurriedly scrambling on his feet before Adams let him go, so he wouldn´t crash down.
“What do you want, officer Adams,” he repeated a little breathless, looking in the other man´s dark eyes.
“Too late to make up that mistake,” the officer shook his head as if sad. “Also, you don´t get to ask me questions, you only answer when I ask you something, understood?”
Reid´s “yes, sir,” might have been a little too sarcastic, given the answer was a mean kick in his belly, in the exact same spot that was still sore from before, only harder this time, so he couldn´t help a pained gasp from escaping his lips.
Not wanting to fuel the anger of the pissed off officer even more, he pressed out “I´m sorry,” as soon as he had enough air to do so.
“Well, sorry, doesn´t cut it,” Adams hissed, kicking him again, even lower, where it really hurt, and Reid curled in on himself more, trying to protect his body while wheezing and wincing in pain. Another kick, and a third and fourth quickly followed, hitting different spots on his body, until he laid on the ground, seeing stars.
“Please, I need to get back to my work,” Reid gasped, evading another kick, only for the next one to hit him more viciously. So far, the man had only evaded hitting his head and hands, the parts of him uncovered by clothing, he clearly didn´t wanted to leave visible marks.
“Uuuh, but we´re having so much fun,” officer Adams laughed, each word of the second part accompanied by a kick. Reid curled in on himself even more, most of the hit´s landing on his back, shoulders, and arms now.
When Adams was finally getting bored and the kicks stopped, Reid was aching all over. He carefully pulled himself in a sitting position and watched as Adams turned around to the door, deliberately knocking over a few stacks of books that he still needed to go through on his way, burying him under a lot of them as he left the room. The only good thing was that he didn´t shut off the light off on his way out, at least he didn´t knew about Spencer´s fear of the dark. That would really give him the rest about right now. The door closed with a resonating bang, hurting in his ears.
“Shit,” Spencer uttered a rare curse, wincing as every movement hurt while he slowly stood up, supporting himself on the wall while pulling himself up. He then grabbed the back of his chair to pull it back and sighed when he sank back down in said furniture, wincing more as his back and behind protested against the contact with the harsh, unpadded chair. He must have sore spots all over and he was sure that the next hours would be very uncomfortable.
Gritting his teeth together, he overlooked the table, feeling like he might cry when he saw how many of the journals were strewn around, destroying all of his work of having carefully sorted them at the beginning. A lot of them were still lying on the ground, too, but he was too tired and sore to get them all off the ground right now, it had been hard enough to pick himself up...
So, for now, he just sorted the journals which hadn´t fallen over the table edge, from old to new, making neat stacks for each year and rotating them minimally where a journal was missing, so he would find the appropriate places for the journals on the ground more quickly later, when he would have the energy to actually pick them up.
Then, with a heavy sigh, and being much more behind his schedule than he liked to admit, he went back to reading one dreadful journal after the other, wincing now and then when he moved too much while picking up a new one, but not letting himself have a break since he couldn´t afford it.
153 minutes later, just some minutes before he was supposed to be done with his reading task, the door behind him creaked open ones again and he couldn´t help but tense up, preparing himself for the possibility that Adams was back.
Remembering how it went the last time that he spoke to him, he stubbornly kept his mouth shut, not even turning in his seat to see if it was really him, but just kept reading, hunched over his current journal, trying to look as if he was too concentrated in his reading to notice the harsh shriek of the door. He couldn´t really allow for any more delay if he could help it and he wouldn´t give Adams any more material to use against him by daring to speak to him without prompt from him this time. He just couldn´t afford it.
“Reid,” the voice of his boss reached his ears, making him relax his shoulders involuntarily from the relieve he felt at realizing it was Hotch and not the bullying officer. Hotch stepped closer to his desk and Reid finally turned his head, looking up at him expectantly, but not saying anything yet, for fear that his voice might betray how he felt. Hotch could read him too easily and if his voice sounded even a little bit shaky, he would know right away that something was wrong.
He seemed to be slightly alarmed already, pinning Spencer with that searching look of him, his eyebrows slightly knitted, but thankfully, he didn´t comment on his state yet.
“How is your progress, did you find out where the victims are taken yet, or anything about where he might be? How much longer do you need?”
Reid took a deep breath, calming himself before answering, starting with the easier part.
“Sadly, he never gives an address, he is just talking about “his house” and “the cellar” when he writes about where he takes his current victim, and the most telling that he describes about the place is that the walls are so thick that no one can hear them scream. Nothing at all about where his execution place is exactly, but from the timing of the entrances, I can estimate that this cellar is no more than three hours of driving per car away from his house in Littletown. As for where he is now, I´ll need 26 minutes to read through the rest of it, including the most recent journals, I´m sorry I can´t give you more now, Hotch,” he concluded, his voice small and somewhat defeated despite how much he tried to sound like his usual self, plus, feeling guilty for needing more time didn´t help.
The eyebrows of his boss crinkled more deeply and Spencer was suddenly very glad that he had picked up the books from the ground just half an hour ago, or Hotch would be much more suspicious.
His back had protested with a lot of pain while bending over to pick them up and his legs had felt heavy as lead, but he had worked through the pain until they were all back on the table.
“Whatever you can tell us is helping, it´s not your fault the unsub is being vague about his descriptions, he must have thought about the possibility of someone finding his journals and did it as a countermeasure. We can only hope for him to have slipped up in the more recent journals. For now, you are doing everything you can, keep at it,” he ended calmly, having at least noticed how frustrated Spencer was.
“Thank you, Hotch, I´ll notify you right away if he slips up anything,” Reid replied, glad that Hotch obviously didn´t planned a long visit, just wanting the update. He hadn´t even commented on the not so short delay and for that too, Spencer was glad.
Hotch just nodded and then looked at something on the ground which Spencer couldn´t see from his position, and, after squatting down shortly, set a journal on the table, one which Spencer obviously must have missed while picking up the others. He didn´t comment on it though, apparently just thinking that it had fallen down by accident.
“Thanks, Hotch,” Spencer stammered, taking the journal and setting it on the right stack, one of the few he still had to read through, or he would´ve noticed it missing earlier.
“No problem,” Hotch smiled slightly and clapped a comforting hand on his back, already preparing to move on, but he froze as Spencer flinched upon the contact, Hotch´ hand having found a particularly painful spot on his back.
Great, now he was fully back in suspicious mode, well done, Spencer sarcastically thought to himself.
It wasn´t like he didn´t wanted Hotch to knew, really, he knew that his boss would do anything to make sure the offending officer would be reprimanded, but what if his chief didn´t take thinks seriously and he wouldn´t get suspended but only reprimanded? The bullying would get so much worse, Spencer was sure of it.
“Reid, what happened?” Hotch wanted to know now, worry in his voice.
“N..nothing, I just tripped over something on the ground and fell down, my own fault, I was being clumsy,” Spencer quickly thought of an excuse, hoping Hotch wouldn´t question him further, but of course he had no such luck.
“You fell on your back?” Hotch asked, rising his eyebrows, clearly not believing it.
“I did. Like I said, I was being clumsy,” Spencer remained stubborn, not quite looking in Hotch´ piercing eyes. Of course, that was a severe mistake.
“Spencer, I can tell when you´re lying and you´re lying right now. You know that you can tell me anything, right? So, please don´t let me ask you again, tell me what happened,” he pleaded with him.
Spencer rubbed his neck nervously, quite at a loss. Hotch had even used his first name, a clear sign that he was worried about him, and he was seeing through him too easily, so he had to give him something, but he didn´t wanted to tell him everything. Maybe he could just leave out the worst parts. His mind made up, he looked up at his boss, who was waiting patiently for his answer.
“Officer Adams, who showed me down here, was upset with how we came here to solve the case, he thinks that it should be him and his people working the case, not us. He, well, he let out some of his frustrations on me by, ahem, by throwing me on the ground. I´m fine though, it´s ok, really, I get it that they´re frustrated, we did just show up here and no one asked the officers if they were ok with it, after all. You know how they are at rural precincts like this one, they aren´t exactly the greatest fans of the FBI, and I just didn´t wanted to make any trouble, so I kept it quiet. I don´t think he´ll bother me again today, given the time I think he went home a while ago, so you don´t have to worry,” he said, making it sound like it wasn´t a big deal at all and trying to steer the topic away from the details of what happened.
Hotch looked very unhappy though. “He threw you to the ground?? What else did he do?” he asked in an icy voice, not letting himself be distracted and clearly having guessed that Reid hadn´t told him everything.
Reid gulped, hardly suppressing another flinch. Logically, he knew that Hotch was angry with the officer who hurt him, not him, but Hotch sounding so cold and enraged still sent a shiver down his back, his boss could certainly be intimidating.
He stammered through his next answer, cursing himself for having told Hotch too much already, instinctively knowing that he wouldn´t rest until he knew more details. Plus, if he thought about it from another angle, they would be gone from this precinct sooner or later, but Hotch was on his team, more so, he was his superior, and he really didn´t want him to be angry with him or lie to him anymore, more so than he didn´t want Adams to not find out that he told him, so he would just have to gather his nerves and tell him more.
“He told me to not tell anyone what he did or would do, more exactly, that he had the whole force behind him and I would only have it worse if I tell you or anyone else,” Reid explained his reluctance to Hotch, thinking he deserved to know.
Hotch nodded, looking like he was trying hard to remain calm on Spencer’s behalf, but his eyelid was twitching, a tell of his nerves. He urged him to go on with a brisk gesture and a “Please tell me everything from the start, Reid, and don´t hold back on the details,” his voice grim.
Reid sighed, thinking that it really wasn´t any more use to hold back, Hotch was clearly more than upset with the situation, and he would notice how stiff his movements were whenever he saw him walking around next or doing anything more than just sitting, really. He had no wish to explain what happened in the front of the whole team tomorrow, so he better should be getting it out now.
“Nothing happened until we got into the elevator, he only started talking to me when we were in there, asking how I got into the FBI,” he began, wisely leaving out the part where he indicated to have gotten his position by sleeping with people.
“Next, like I already told you, he urged me to keep quiet about his behaviour towards me, and I more or less told him that I would – I didn´t wanted to make the situation worse,” he said, hoping Hotch wouldn´t think less of him because of it, and his superior just nodded calmly, so he took another deep breath and continued.
“Before we left the elevator, he kicked me in the stomach once, not too badly, and then he went ahead, leading the way to the archive room.” Reid mostly looked down on the table while retelling his encounters with officer Adams, but now sneaked a quick look at Hotch, trying to judge just how pissed off the agent was.
He looked about 10 seconds away from exploding, so Reid made sure that his voice was calm and light as he continued, like he wasn´t impacted by what had happened, and tried to skim over the details, making it sound less severe.
“He then just showed me the room and left right away, so I was fine then.” When Hotch was looking doubtful, he added quickly: “nothing more happened in the next few hours.”
Hotch looked a little relieved now and Spencer wishfully thought about leaving out the next part entirely, but sadly, Hotch apparently hadn´t forgotten the part that he had already told him before starting at the beginning, because he asking him about it now, his voice turning worried again, but still sounding somewhat cold while he kept looking at him intensely:
“Did he come by again later? You said he threw you to the ground, when exactly did that happen?” Hotch asked in a brisk voice, wanting to know everything, and Reid hunched his shoulders in reflex, not happy to tell him more about that part. He closed his eyes momentarily, and then continued, staring at the journal in front of him.
“Yes, he did come by again, about one and a half hour ago,” he said, too tired to bother to give Hotch the exact amount of minutes that had passed since then.
“He just stood there at first and I asked him what he wanted. He took it the wrong way and throw me on the ground, and then kicked me some, before leaving for good,” Spencer told, keeping it short and vague, and trying to keep his voice steady, but it might have trembled just a little, and only now Spencer noticed that his shoulders were hunched forward and his body was hold way too tense and he deliberately rolled his shoulders back and sat more upright, doing a bad job of suppressing another wince as he moved, but it was too late to fool Hotch anyway, of course.
The older agent looked at him with sad eyes and when he said his next words, his voice was much softer than before, almost gentle, maybe having noticed that his coldness was unsettling Reid.
“Where did he kick you? And for how long?”
“More or less my whole body, minus the head, for... a couple of minutes,” he said in a small voice, uplifting it at the end to make it sound like a question, but of course he was conscious of the exact time it had taken.
And of course, Hotch knew exactly how good Spencer was with remembering things like the passing of time, so he looked at him sternly and asked again: “How long, Spencer? And no playing it down, please.”
“14 minutes and 23 seconds,” he admitted reluctantly, and Hotch looked at him in alarm, his eyes widening as he cursed under his breath.
“That´s a long time, how bad are you injured? Do I need to take you to the hospital?” he worried, watching Spencer closely and moving in a bit more, one of his hands twitching, as if he could barely restrain himself of just lifting his shirt and checking for himself.
Spencer paled a little, he hated hospitals. The only good thing about them was the free Jello, that was, if Morgan didn´t eat it all up before he would even wake up and could protest.
“No, please, I´m fine, I promise, no need for a trip to the hospital. I´m just a little sore, nothing serious, really!” he pleaded with Hotch, his eyes wide.
“Can I see it, please?” Hotch likewise pleaded, knowing how much he liked to downplay his injuries and that “I´m fine” honestly meant “I´m feeling terrible, but I don´t want to tell you, please leave it be!” in Spencer talk.
“If you must,” Reid said in a small voice, not happy about it, but he knew that Hotch wouldn´t let it go easily and also, since the kicking was only 65 minutes ago, the hematomas actually shouldn´t look too horrid now, since they would change colour from red to green or blue only after a day at least. How bad can a couple of reddish spots look, right? Or so he thought.
Hotch edged even closer and lifted his shirt, with careful movements, to not accidentally brush against Spencer´s skin.
He breathed in harshly upon seeing all the angry looking and very vibrant red spots, the bright light of the glaring overhead lamp made them much more than just visible, more like enhancing their deep red colour, contrasting against Spencer’s otherwise pale skin. And of course, his whole body was covered in hematomas, and from how it looked, Hotch wouldn´t have trouble figuring out that the sore spots went farther down than just his upper body.
“You were in here the whole time since this happened?” Hotch asked him with a deep frown, his serious eyes trailing back up to his face.
“I was already way behind with the journals, I couldn’t just stop,” Reid said as an answer, one that Hotch apparently wasn´t happy with given his expression and Spencer looked down again.
Spencer hunched his shoulders, beginning to feel uncomfortable with his upper body exposed like that and under Hotch’s attentive presence. He shivered and stuck his hands under his legs, so Hotch at least wouldn´t see how his hands trembled.
“Here,” Hotch said softly, holding out his shirt and then helping him to get it back on, which Spencer was thankful for.
“Now, we need to get you out of here, I want you to take a break and rest a little and that´s an order. You´re in no state to keep working and the others can read through the rest of the journals, there aren´t too many left, and there´s not much else for them to do at the moment anyway, not to speak of the fact that it´s getting late and we´ll stop for the night soon, tomorrow is another day, and we all need some rest sooner or later,” he quenched Spencer´s protest in advance.
“Alright, but after my break, I´ll help with the rest of the journals, if there´s any left then,” Spencer wanted to at least be of help again later.
“We´ll see about that, now just leave them all here for the moment,” Hotch insisted, stepping a little away from the table to make room for Reid in the small archive, but staying close enough to be able to assist him.
Reid carefully stood up from his chair, his body protesting with pain flaming up everywhere as he moved. He took a cautious first step towards the door, and, when he didn’t stumble, continued walking with as smooth movements as possible. Hotch held open the door for him and then they walked rather slowly to the elevator, Spencer walking rather stiffly and Hotch adjusting his speed to match his.
Once they entered the elevator, Spencer leaned heavily against the wall, his legs suddenly feeling like cooked noodles. His closed his eyes shortly, but not so long that Hotch would worry even more, he was still watching him like a Hawk.
He really hated to feel like a weak baby, so when the elevator doors opened again and they had to enter the more public part of the precinct, turning towards the conference room that the chief had given their team, Spencer walked faster to not appear like an invalid to anyone still here at this hour, even if his joints were protesting painfully against it. Hotch more then easily kept up of course and kept throwing him worried side glances.
Then he was taking one turn a little too quickly, and when he had to avoid someone coming the other way, it made him stumble. He might´ve fallen down if not for Hotch´s stabilising grip on his arm.
His cheeks flushed a little out of embarrassment, and the grip hurt a little because his arms were also covered in bruises, but he thanked Hotch and luckily, it was just some more meters toward their room now. Instead of just letting him go after Spencer found back his balance, Hotch kept a protective hand on his back for the rest of the way. It made him feel like he had his own personal bodyguard, making him flush a little more.
When they entered the conference room, only Rossi was in there, standing in front of the evidence board, looking at the pictures in thought. Hearing them enter, he turned around, rising a curious eyebrow when he noticed the gentlemanly way that Hotch led him to the couch as well as Reid´s flushed appearance.
“What, are you a couple now?” Rossi asked teasingly and Spencer would´ve turned even more red, if that was possible. Hotch entirely kept his cool, of course, silencing at his old friend with one single unimpressed look, before telling Reid to lie down. Rossi quickly noticed that something wasn´t quite right, and watched them more intently, his expression losing some of its amusement when he noticed Spencer´s stiff movements.
“I´ll bring you some water and something for the pain, try and rest a little,” Hotch added softly, and Spencer sunk tiredly down on the soft couch material, more collapsing than sitting down really, while Hotch wasted no time in hurrying out of the room.
Rossi, stepping closer to Spencer, frowned when he noticed his pained expression and pale complexion.
“What happened?” he asked quietly from his spot two feet away from Spencer.
“One of the officers here doesn´t like me very much,” Spencer shrugged, wincing when the movement made his chest hurt.
Rossi´s frown deepened. “Meaning?” he tried to get Spencer to tell him more.
“Can we... I don´t want to answer this question a dozen times, can we just wait till the rest of the team is back?” Spencer tried to at least postpone his answer.
“Alright,” Rossi sighed. “I have a feeling I won´t like the answer any way,” he tiredly rubbed his face.
“Did you find some new connection?” Spencer tried to distract him, indicating towards the board.
“JJ and Morgan found a possible witness; they should come back soon from interviewing her. Apart from that, no.”
At that moment, Prentiss came around the corner with an exasperated expression, a file in her hand.
“You wouldn´t believe the nerve of some people here. The officer giving me this file was super reluctant, you would think his job was to keep us from doing our job,” she complained, waving the file around.
“I have to say, I like the officers here less and less,” Rossi commented dryly, making Emily come closer, properly taking them in and blinking in surprise when she saw Spencer lying on the couch.
“Is there a particular reason for you to say that?” she asked, turning to Rossi.
Rossi opened his mouth, but just then, Morgan and JJ came in too, and the older agent shut his mouth again as JJ exclaimed “Hey guys, we have some interesting new information!”
“What´s that?” Emily asked and Morgan quickly explained how Mrs. Winslof noticed someone fitting their unsub´s description coming into her equipment store and asking about fishing spots of lake Egon.
“That´s good, we should check that out,” Rossi went to the board, writing the name of the little lake on it.
A conversation broke out, everyone discussing the new information, and Spencer happily joined in from his spot on the sofa, glad that the focus was on the news now and not on him. That was, until Hotch came back in, a glass of water in one hand and a package of pain medication in the other, heading straight to him.
The discussion faded while the team watched Hotch urging him to take a pill, completely ignoring the rest of the team, especially when Spencer didn´t complain much but took the medicine without complaint, drinking water to wash it down afterwards. He was in considerable pain after all, even if he tried to hide it.
“Thanks Hotch,” he said softly, smiling at him a little. His smile faded when he noticed everyone staring at him in confusion or worry, becoming the focus of attention once more.
“Spence, are you unwell, you look pale?” JJ asked worriedly, stepping closer to him, taking a good look at him for the first time since she and Morgan came into the room.
That made the others step closer as well of course, while Hotch remained standing at his side with a serious expression, alarming the rest of the team even more.
Spencer unhappily looked up to Hotch for help, who, after seeing that he was rather unwilling to answer, told the others:
“An officer attacked Reid while he was working in the archive room.”
That resulted in an onslaught of appalled gasps and questions, which Spencer tiredly answered, telling them the gist of what had happened, while revealing as little details as possible.
The team was shocked when they heard about officer Adams beating him, reacting differently, but similarly strong in their own ways to the news.
Morgan looked angry, fisting his hands like he wanted to hit something hard, preferably the face of the guilty officer, JJ was hurrying over to him, squatting down besides Hotch (who was still standing only a feet away) in front of him, gently taking the empty glass out of his hands, which he still had held in his slightly shaking fingers, setting it on the ground and looking at him with worry and sadness, while Hotch continued watching him as well as taking in the reaction of the others with a serious expression. Dave continued to frown unhappily and Emily looked outright furious, walking up and down the room like a hungry lioness roaming her cage.
Needless to say, the new, but not case-breaking information they had vividly discussed just moments ago where forgotten, or at least put aside for the moment.
Spencer sighed, this was exactly what he didn´t wanted, them all worrying over him and forgetting the case over it. He didn´t wanted to be the reason that they needed longer to solve it, giving the unsub an opportunity to kill another person before they got him.
“Don´t worry about me, I´m fine,” he insisted stoically, even while his ribs hurt with every breath he took and all his limbs, his whole body if he was honest, were sore and heavy, hurting at every move or contact.
Hotch shook his head, looking down at him with a frown. “No, you´re not. You´re lucky I didn´t drive you straight to the next hospital, but only because I know you would´ve released yourself against recommendation the minute your doctor would´ve left the room. I´ve seen what Adams did to you Reid, and it´s not pretty. You need to rest,” he ended his little stern talk.
Spencer refrained from rolling his eyes, but sighed again, settling deeper into the sofa, knowing when he had the weaker cards.
“You agreed that I could help with the rest of the journals, we still need to read through them,” he merely protested weakly, reminding Hotch of them.
“You know fully well that I said we´ll see about that, and only after you took a break,” Hotch shot back immediately, but not unfriendly so, his voice still more gentle then normal while speaking to Reid.
“Alright,” Reid gave in, shuffling a little while trying to find a more comfortable position, as comfortable as was possible with how bruised he was, that is, and closing his eyes tiredly. He still listened in to what the others said after his short discussion with Hotch though. Falling asleep was hard when you were in so much pain and the medicine Hotch had given him would need at least another 30 minutes to kick in.
JJ, still at his side, softly wiped a strand of hair out of his face and laid a comforting hand on his shoulder for a moment, before reluctantly standing up and rejoining the others, giving him space to rest.
“Where is the bastard that did this?” Prentiss asked, her voice sounding tense and like she was still restless.
“Easy, Prentiss, remember we´re still guests here,” Hotch lightly reprimanded her, but in a flat voice which didn´t hold any true scolding and told Spencer that he didn´t really care about Emily calling him names, before answering: “I didn´t see him around anywhere recently, but given the time, he must´ve went home for the night hours ago, possibly right after his attack on Reid. Chief Henderson went home an hour ago, but I´ve already called him to ask when he comes in tomorrow – we´ll talk about this first thing in the morning, before officer Adams comes in.”
“He should fire this son of a bitch for what he did to Spencer, or better, throw him in prison to rot there for the rest of his live,” Morgan chimed in, his voice dark and bitter, sounding just as pissed off as Emily. Spencer´s lip twitched, he secretly loved the two of them for being so fiercely protective of him, it made him feel like they were his older siblings, looking out for him.
“Morgan,” Hotch said in a mildly warning tone.
“What, don´t you think that behaviour was completely unacceptable? Which side are you on?” Morgan exclaimed angrily, his nerves clearly getting the better of him.
“Of course I think it was utterly unbecoming for an officer to act like this, but remember that this is not our precinct, and officer Adams is not under my command. That is why I have to speak with chief Henderson about this, who will have to decide what to do with his officer, but I´ll do everything in my power to at least make sure Adams will not come anywhere close to Reid again while we´re here, and believe me, I would like him to get a sentence for this, too,” he ended seriously, allowing the grimness in his voice to become more apparent in his normally stoic and always calm voice, making it clear that he cared just as much as the others, even if he wasn´t showing it in the same way.
Spencer felt touched.
“And we´ll definitely look out for him, too,” Dave added, sounding unusually serious. The others made sounds of agreement and the tense atmosphere seemed to settle a little, becoming more focused again.
They continued to talk some more about the topic, before eventually coming back to the case again, but Spencer´s alertness wavered after all the high-level concentration and stress of the past hours, his exhaustion and the familiar voices of his teammates slowly luring him to sleep as his pain medicine started to work. The dreadful journals would still be there tomorrow and for once, Spencer didn´t worry about them, instead dreaming about his found family.