#erek kills slowly

[thejakeformerlyknownasprince]

You know, in the whole thing with Aftran, I find it funny that Cassie stresses about how getting her Kadrona is impossible...when the Chee have shown THEY have Kadrona technology to keep THEIR Yeerks alive.

Yeeaaah, but Marco mentions that the chee's system is basically solitary confinement — the kind with 0 sensory input — to the point where he mentally calls bullshit on their whole "do no harm" idea just from looking at the poor yeerk Erek has trapped inside. And this is Marco. Looking at a yeerk.

Seems to me that it's the equivalent of going "you can have food, but only if you spend the rest of eternity in this iron lung in a dark silent room with a tube down your throat." I guess if the alternative is that Aftran starves to death then she should maybe be offered that option, but it's hardly a good solution.

[scribblingmuchlyrexan]

i finished reading Animorphs last night and then, after the last book, i looked up [REDACTED FOR MAJOR SPOILERS] to go "wait a second, did that character really just vanish from the narration?"

aND I REALIZED I SOMEHOW MISSED READING THE ANDALITE CHRONICLES QSKFSKS

SUPER HAPPY TO STILL HAVE MORE TO READ

so many major spoilers under the cut:

Loren. Tobias's mother. i could reread the last book or two to be sure, but i think the last time she was mentioned was just to say basically "yeah she can morph and see now, but she agreed to stay out of the fighting"

so, after the war ended, Tobias went and moped about losing Rachel and entirely forgot his mother even existed, as did all the other Animorphs

(maybe she got mentioned at Rachel's funeral. i'll need to check)

(i realized i missed the Andalite Chronicles because, looking up character background info to try and confirm if i was right about Loren vanishing, i saw more and more things that eventually had me going "wait a minute, it's not just that i don't remember that part. i think i actually didn't read that. or that. or that. ...HOLD ON")

(OKAY ABOUT OTHER CHARACTERS WHO DISAPPEARED FROM THE NARRATION, THIS POST TURNED INTO A MILD RANT BUT WHATEVER I GUESS LOL. I DO STILL OVERALL REALLY LIKE ANIMORPHS)

also i'm not happy with how James and his group were handled in the end. i really thought K.A. Applegate was slowly getting better about ableism through the series, and i suppose they were, but yeah, the narration totally forgot about them after saying something like "most of them were killed by the Pool ship's Dracon beam."

so AT FIRST i was like "oh phew, 'most of them,' not 'all,' and James probably survived," but then i don't think ANY of them were EVER mentioned again. ew @ the narration and plotting

i think the Chee also disappeared from being mentioned after Erek left the Pool ship

just, the whole "one year later" and on sections didn't seem quite right. with how the series up to that point had been going, i'd really figured there'd be more PTSD, trauma, and mental struggle in these kids' everyday lives, even after "succeeding" in turning away the Yeerks and stopping the Andalites from destroying Earth

(sO YEAH, overall i still think it's an AMAZING series but yeesh. lots of accidental ableism to the end, not to mention "the only way to solve the Taxxons' and Yeerks' problems is changing their species." yikes)

[sexyrasputin]

a recap of sorts

“So, how was Christmas at the Cole household?” Torin asked, sitting beside Ravyn at lunch. It seemed everything nowadays happened at lunchtime.

“Hell.” To say the least, the holiday had been disastrous.

“Isn’t it always, Ray?” Torin asked tentatively. She gave him a flat look.

“Much more than usual. Ksenia was there with Cal and showing all the PDA, Meg was a bigger brat than usual and smug, too. Avalon spent the holiday with her fiancé, so our peacemaker was painfully absent. And Cal and I might have gotten into a screaming match that made Ksenia cry and freak out for no reason really. I actually tried not to involve her.” She took a moment to breathe, still talking a little too quickly. Torin, when she glanced at him, paid attention to her with silent interest and his fist under his chin.

“And then, just for funsies, the screaming match devolved into a fist fight. Then Erek broke up us up, which, may I add, usually I’m the one breaking him and Cal up. And then, before Uncle Aldric could kick me out, I left and came back here early. I swear, Tori, if your family wasn’t three hours away and I had a car I would have spent the majority of break with you.” Ravyn sighed dramatically, poking at her lasagna with her fork. She didn’t really have an appetite after thinking about the disastrous Christmas Eve. She never even got to Christmas. Aunt Daisy sent her her presents, but Ravyn had yet to open them.

“And that was just Christmas break? Goodness, Ravyn, you need therapy,” Torin groaned. Her glower was met with his simple stare. He was not about to take any of her crap and wanted her to know that.

“Fine. I probably need therapy. But so does everybody else in the Coalition. Some of you guys kill people for a living.”

“True, but we’re not going to talk about assassinations today. Have you talked to Atticus or Alice since the Christmas party?”

It was like Torin could read Ravyn’s mind. He always knew the exact right questions to ask, even when, like his last one, they made her want to start sobbing on the spot.

“I’ve talked with Atticus for what’s probably the last time,” she sighed, pushing her tray away and letting her head fall into her hands. To say she was frustrated with herself would be a tragic understatement.

“Ravyn,” Torin began slowly, his voice steady and scarily calm, just like Ace’s had been. “What did you do?” Her head shot up, eyes narrowed.

“What do you mean, ‘what did you do?’ Why couldn’t he have done something to end things?” she countered.

“Because you don’t give up on people easily. Lev has shown every single sign that he only wants you for sex, and yet you’re still obsessed with him. You’ve not given up on Excalibur and me, even if it seems like he’s never coming back to me. You haven’t given up on your mom. For a friendship like the one you have with Atticus to end, he must have given up on you, which means you did or said something horrible.” And again, Torin could read her mind. Why did he have to know her so well? And why did he have to bring up her mom? Ravyn already had enough to think about without getting distracted by the fact that her dad was still getting away with her mom’s death. Then, to conclude it all, Torin could tell the gravity of the situation. He really should have been a psychologist, not an assassin.

“What happened, Ray?” he prompted with a gentle tone that reminded her of how one spoke to an upset child. Which, to be fair, she was.

“He asked me to stop avoiding Alice, and long story short I chose my crush on Lev over my friendship with both of them.” Her head of dark hair fell into her arms, now folded on the table. She knew she had messed up. Atticus had been her partner in crime, her confidante, her best friend. She had taken care of him when he needed it, and, in turn, he’d taken care of her when she needed it. Ace knew her deepest secrets, despite the fact that she hadn’t even known him for two whole years. He even knew about her mom, something only Cal, Avalon, Erek, her family, her aunt and uncle, and then Torin knew about. Not even Meg had an idea of the full depth of why Ravyn had been sent to live with her cousins at the young age of ten. In short, Ace knew her as well as she knew herself.

And now she didn’t have him at all.

Torin reached over, pulling his little sister figure into a bear hug. He didn’t say anything about her horrible choice and how she messed up. He didn’t say anything judgmental or prejudiced. He just accepted her. This was one of the reasons Ravyn wished Torin could have been her older brother, not Peter or James.

“You two will figure it out, Ray. Just like Excalibur and I will.” A dark chuckle exited her mouth.

“That’s not true. You and Cal will actually have a happy ending. I don’t think Ace and I will. Not anymore. Anyways, it’s not like we have any love to hold us together past platonic.” She pulled away to look at him.

“Whatever. Now, what do you say to blowing off class and eating loads of ice cream and watching sad chick flicks until we feel better?” Torin’s bright smile and painful positivity managed to bring a smile to her dreary world.

“I think that sounds perfect, Tori.”

[unidentifiedprimate]

Okay hello I’d like to talk about Animorphs.

In particular I want to talk about one of the really unique (if soul-crushing) things about the series, something that I have rarely encountered in other media, one of the main reasons that I have been less impressed with other children’s books that tackle similar issues (like Harry Potter). I’m talking about the moral decline of Jake.

All the animorphs make at least one morally questionable decision as the series progresses, but I want to focus on Jake because his were the ones that hit me the hardest. I read these books in my formative years - I was a little younger than the characters when I started and a little older when it ended - and they had a significant role in my development. I was Maturing as I went through the series, and I internalized a lot of the ideas and themes more than I realized at the time. And Jake taught me something so profound, so essential, that it took me years to fully comprehend the scale of it. Jake taught me that Good Guys can do Bad Things.

See, in the books, after Jake loses his parents and his chance to save Tom, he starts to slip away. He’s unfocused, angry, depressed, and reckless in turns. And of course little innocent me, reading, felt for him. The poor guy had lost everything, and he was obviously taking it hard. But I wasn’t really worried. I knew Jake; I had seen him get through tough situations before. He always pulled through in the end. He was the leader, the prince. I remember being annoyed at the characters who questioned him, like Cassie. I knew he’d be okay. I knew it like I knew that every problem in a sitcom episode would be wrapped up by the end of the 30 minutes. Even if things got really bad, they would find a way to resolve it and in the next episodes probably wouldn’t even mention it. There are Rules, and one of the Rules is that the Good Guys always figure out the right thing to do, and do it.

So I was horrified by the final battle. Truly, deeply horrified as I watched Jake order the Auxiliary Animorphs to the their deaths as a distraction. There wasn’t even a chance of survival; he knew they would die. The whole point was that they would die. I remember that as I read it I kept thinking, “this isn’t real. this is a hologram or something”, and slowly realizing the truth. I watched him manipulate his ally, Erek, into helping him against his will by threatening to kill a hostage. I watched him murder thousands of defenseless Yeerks in cold blood for no reason, even after everything we had learned about them, that they are not mindlessly evil and some are even against enslaving other races. And I watched him order Rachel to kill Tom, his brother, knowing that she would die as well.

I had never before and never since seen a story’s hero do such horrible things. I felt so betrayed - by Jake and by Applegate, who dared to write such things. A fundamental Rule had been broken; Good Guys were not supposed to Bad Things. They always do the right thing, because they’re they heroes. But the lesson was that in real life there are no Good Guys or Bad Guys. People have to make choices every day, and sometimes even good people can make terrible choices. It’s an incredibly mature lesson, and one that I can’t remember seeing in any other book or series. Many stories will make their villains morally grey - and, great! I love complex villains. But their heroes are always Good through and through. Even if a hero makes a mistake, it is never bad enough that they can’t learn a valuable lesson and vow to never turn to the dark path again, or something similar. There are Rules, you know, and heroes can’t make a choice so ugly that you can rightfully label it as a war crime.

But Animorphs did. Jake did. And in doing that it presented poor little young me with the most truthful portrayal of the consequences of war that I have ever seen.  

[desertandstars]

Elders

“Elma!” A booming voice could be heard as Ario stepped into the tent. The elder hunter’s grizzled face was tense and his fists were clenched tightly. 

“I’ve trusted your decisions on many different things.” He approached her slowly, each step carried a thud of frustration. “Erek is clearly shaken by this though. As much as he stands by tradition, he seems set on seeking out a mate himself rather than accepting your decision.” Ario stood before her, his brows furrowed as he folded his arms over his chest. Elma shook her head, a simple smirk playing at her wrinkled lips. “And yet you let his frustration become your own?” She questioned, offering the seat in front of her as she looked up at Ario. His tail swayed back and forth impatiently, not amused at her initial response. “How would you react if you saw him acting in such a manner? His hunts were generally clean kills because of how he kept a level head. Now I’m getting beasts that are practically decimated. The bones are mostly rendered useless and it’s becoming difficult for the others to carve up.” Ario sighed and took a seat, looking over his shoulder towards the flap of the tent before facing Elma. 

“I know you’ve made good decisions in the past regarding pairings and guiding the tribe with your experience, but could we make an exception just this once?" 

"Ario, while you’re the newest elder you are by no means new to our traditions..” Elma raised a steaming cup of tea to her lips, blowing the steam away before taking a light sip. “Trust in the traditions of the tribe. Erek may not know it yet, but there are reasons that the two will work well together.”

“Damn right they’re gonna work well together!” A voice called out from the entrance to the tent as Tor walked in. “Ario, you can’t always spoil someone just because they’re whining about something. I know you can’t say no to giving your daughters new dolls when I bring them in, but you can’t treat Erek in that same manner.” He teased, quickly making his way to the table as well. With a warm smile he leaned down and kissed Elma’s forehead before taking a seat with them. 

“You know our tribe is very unique in our traditions, but there are reasons behind them. I understand you want the best for your best hunter, but you shouldn’t doubt our judgement.” Tor leaned into his seat as he looked at Ario. 

“I swear you youngsters are so quick to judge things when you don’t know the full picture. There are reasons as to why we both agree to these two being paired, and Erek throwing this fit before having met his mate is premature. I had already spoken with him last night. He’s willing to give it a month, and within that time you’ll see just how good our judgement is.”

[derekswhore]

RUSSIAN ROULETTE CHAPTER FOUR

chapters zero, one, two, three

2x06. the boogeyman.

    Kitanna Egorova was nothing more than a weapon. Or, that's how she felt, anyway. And due to never sharing her problems with anyone, no one knew how she felt. Not even her brother, who has mostly the same problems as her.

   Kit's phone rang and she sighed. "Hello?" She asked.

   "Привет Китти," a male voice on the other end answered. ( Hello, Kitty. )

   Kit stopped and glanced around. "Лорен, сейчас не время говорить," she replied. ( Loren, now isn't the time to talk. )

   She heard Loren sigh on the other end. "Китанна, скажи мне это. Вы тоже получили фотографии?" He asked. ( Kitanna, tell me. Did you also get photos? )

   "У тебя есть фотографии?" Kit asked, panicked. ( You got photos? )

   "Я так понимаю, у тебя есть фотографии," Loren said. ( I take it you got photos. )

   "Да. Запомни мой номер, потому что я знаю, что ты разговариваешь по телефону. Поговорим позже," Kit said, hanging up. ( Yes, I did. Remember my number, because I know you're on a burner phone. We'll talk later. )

   Kit walked up to the front door of Hotch's house and sighed. She knocked quickly and Haley opened the door almost immediately. "Hi," Kit said, smiling.

   Haley smiled brightly. "Hi! Jack's missed you a ton," she said, letting Kit into the house, "he's starting to think of you as his big sister."

   That warmed Kit's heart a bit. "Really?" She asked.

   "Oh, yeah," Haley nodded, "he absolutely loves you."

   "I'm so sorry I missed his birthday, by the way," Kit said, "Aleksander and his boyfriend, Noah, were going out all day for Noah's birthday and dragged me along."

   "It's no problem, don't worry about it," Haley said. Kit heard Jack's footsteps and smiled once he ran into the room. He ran over to Kit and she picked him up. "Kit?" Hotch asked as he followed Jack into the room.

   Kit smiled. "It's almost Halloween, I thought I'd see Jack before we're bombarded with cases," she said.

   Hotch nodded, giving her a small smile. "Well, after you're done, I'll give you a ride," he said. Kit nodded.

   "Thanks," she said.

   "Nicholas Faye of Ozona, Texas, was beaten to death roughly thirteen hours ago. Blunt force trauma to the head. He's the second young boy in Ozona to die the same death in the last two months," JJ said, "local hunter found his body in the woods. First victim's name, Robbie Davis."

   "Are these boys connected somehow?" Derek asked.

   "Ozona's population is roughly 2,500," JJ said, "everyone has some kind of connection."

   "Well, shit," Kit said softly.

   "Well, if they weren't linked before, they most certainly are now," Derek said.

   "Both murdered by the same offender," Spencer said.

   "Who's hunting children," Jason said.

plato wrote, " we can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark. the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light. "

   "You guys hear Elle was cleared?" Spencer asked as he sat down.

   "Self-defense," Kit and Derek said. Derek noticed her fiddling with the thin chain of her necklace.

   "So, it was a good shoot," Spencer said.

   "She hit what she was aimin' for," JJ said. Kit snorted and looked down, biting her lip.

   "That's not what I meant," Spencer said.

   "I know," JJ said.

   "If they cleared her, how come she's not here with us?" Derek asked, "or Hotch?"

   "Who knows," Kit said, looking up.

   "Focus on the case," Jason said.

   JJ looked at them and sighed. "Ozona police and autopsy report for Nicholas Faye and Robbie Davis," she said, handing it to Jason.

   "Well, the bludgeoning could suggest frustration or rage," Derek said.

   "With no apparent sexual motivation. That's rare when the victims are this young," Spencer said.

   "My maternal instinct is telling me to slap flex tape over Spencer's mouth the next time he mentions that," Kit said.

   "Maternal instinct?" JJ questioned.

   "Flex tape?!" Spencer asked loudly, alarmed.

   "You heard her, Pretty Boy, time to stop with your rambling," Derek smirked.

   "This unsub seems to be taking pleasure from the kill itself," Jason said.

   "So if it's not sexual, what's the significance of targeting young males?" Cora asked.

   "Most serial killers prey upon specific types to carry out their fantasies of revenge," Aleksander said.

   "You've been hanging out with one of the doctors too much, my money's on Spencer," Kit said. Spencer continued to talk ad JJ's phone rang.

   "Bundy killed that looked like an ex-girlfriend who jilted him. Dahmer claimed that schoolyard harassment fed into his fury," Spencer said.

   "So maybe these little boys represent someone who victimized the offender," Kit said.

   "Like a young male from his past," Spencer said, "maybe a bully, an older brother, someone who abused him."

   "No, that's unlikely," JJ said as she got off the phone, "they just found another body. 11-year-old girl."

   Kit sighed and bit the inside of her cheek. Derek grabbed her hand gently. "Why would the victimology change like that?" Cora asked.

   "Maybe the girl wasn't the target. Maybe she just got in the way," Derek said.

   "Or the sex of his victim isn't significant. The pace he's killing certainly indicates a velocity of change," Jason said.

   "We can't surveil every kid in Ozona. How are we supposed to keep them all safe?" JJ asked.

   "Enforce a curfew?" Spencer asked.

   Kit and Derek both shook their heads slightly. "Children shouldn't have to worry about something like that," Derek said.

   "Tell me about it," JJ muttered, "the woods were the only thing I was afraid of when I was a kid."

   "Seriously?" Derek asked, "thought you grew up in a small town."

   "Yeah, surrounded by woods," JJ said.

   "Bummer for you," Derek said.

   "Yeah," JJ sighed.

   "Only thing I was afraid of was the dark," Derek said.

   "Some of us still are," Spencer said.

   "You're afraid of the dark?" Kit asked, "that's okay, I'm afraid of medical masks."

   "When we land, Morgan and Kit go to the new crime scene. The little girl," Jason said, "I'll look at the scene where Nicholas Faye was found."

   Derek sighed and looked at Kit as she spoke with the ME. The deputy ( or, that's what Kit guessed he was ) had told them the little girl was bludgeoned to death the same way the boys had been. "Not entirely true. I found some markings on her scalp that indicated that this psycho beat her post-mortem," the ME said.

   "The unsub's getting more brazen," Kit said.

   "He's getting brazen, all right," the ME said, "I've bagged three children in the last month."

   "Now he's spending more time with the victims even after death," Derek said, "he had to know he wasn't gonna be interrupted, but how? Hoe could he be so sure?"

   "The forest goes for miles and miles, but nobody goes walkin' in it unless they're lookin' to kill," the ME said.

   Kit and Derek looked at the sign. "Or hunt," Kit said.

   "In which case, he'd know every inch of these woods, right, every trail?" Derek asked, "Kit Kat, whoever killed these children is very familiar with this area. In my opinion, he probably lived on Ozona his whole life."

   "It's something we call the buddy system. That means you always go everywhere with a friend," JJ said.

   "That's right, because bad men and women are more likely to talk to us only when we're by ourselves," Derek said.

   "We don't know what these guys look like yet. It could be somebody you know," Kit said.

   A little girl raised her hand. "Yes, sweetheart, you got a question?" Derek asked.

   "There was this little girl once on the news, who just got grabbed right in front of her house. Could that happen to us?" The girl asked.

   Derek glanced at Kit and JJ, Kit simply shrugging, as if to say, 'you're in your own with this one.' He gave her a dirty look.

   "Nothing's gonna happen to any of you, as long as you remember this buddy system, okay?" Derek asked.

   "Can I have your attention, please?" Jason asked, "good afternoon. We want to make something clear. Due to the velocity of change, we predict this offender could try and strike again anytime. His confidence builds with every attack."

   "Look for someone physically fit, shy, kind disposition, someone you may trust with your own child. Because the killer targets kids, he may be small himself," Derek said.

   "And though we keep referring to this unsub as "he," do not rule out a woman," Kit said.

   "Excuse me," a woman said.

   "Chief," deputy said, "you're gonna want to hear this."

   "My son Matthew never same home today," the woman said.

   "Here we go," Aleksander mumbled.

   "When was he last seen?" Jason asked.

   "His teacher saw him in the parking lot after school," the woman said.

   "Search team."

   "Yes, sir."

   "Okay, Reid, Cora, the school is on Willow Road," Derek said.

   "If the boy was abducted, then this area would be the most secluded nearby," Cora said.

   "So Jones can put his guys at the gas station..."

   The story about Finnegan gave Kit chills. An old man who watchers children and hunts them. Skins them. Eats them. Possibly the worst story Kit had heard.

   "Folks have been tellin' that story since I was a kid," the counselor said.

   "Why haven't we heard about this?" Kit asked.

   "Fables are often sparked by an ounce of truth. We should exhaust every possibility," Derek said.

   "Sure looks like a haunted house," Spencer said as everyone got out of the SUV.

   "Morgan, you, Kit, and Jones take the front. Reid, Cora, and I will cover the outbuildings," Jason said.

   Kit, Derek, and Jones ran up to the front quickly. The door was already open, and creaked as it opened slowly. "Mr. Finnegan!" Jones yelled.

   "God, if this isn't horror movie material I don't know what is," Kit mumbled to Derek, who smiled a bit.

   "Always know how to brighten the mood, huh, babe?" He asked as the three ran into the house.

   "Of course," Kit smirked.

   "Upstairs is clear," Jones said, "Finnegan's not here."

   "Yeah, and neither is the missing boy," Kit said.

   "Electricity's out," Jones pointed out. Kit rolled her eyes.

   "Thank you, Captain Obvious," she scoffed.

   "I know," Derek said.

   "Maybe he's been away," Jones said.

   "No. This paper was delivered today," Derek said.

   "So Finnegan was here earlier," Jones said.

   "Yeah, but where is he now?" Kit asked.

   Kit was watching the entire time Spencer was on the phone with Garcia. Spencer had gotten up and bumped into Derek and almost screamed, stumbling slightly. This caused Kit to almost collapse laughing.

   "You really are afraid of the dark," Derek said with a smile.

   "I'm workin' on that," Spencer replied as he walked away.

   "You should work a little harder," Kit teased.

   "My deputy got the boy home safe," the sheriff ( ? ) said as he entered the home.

   "Turns out the poor kid was scared by a tree branch," Cora said.

   "This whole town's on edge," Derek said, sighing.

   "Maybe that's why Finnegan's in the wind," Kit said.

   Kit and Derek walked over into a separate room and sighed. "Hey, that's interesting," Derek said.

   "The unsub didn't use a gun," Spencer said.

   "Bet he knows every trail in Ozona," Jason said, "Finnegan's an avid hunter. Why didn't he use a..." He picked up a lunch box under the table, "Robbie Davis."

   "First victim," the sheriff said.

   Jason picked up another lunch box. "Sarah P. Sarah Peterson, right?" He asked.

   "I guess Finnegan brought the kids back here first before baitin' 'em into the woods," Derek said, "but why wouldn't he get rid of the evidence?"

   "He considers them trophies," Spencer and Cora said.

   "When this is all said and done, I'd like to hang his head on my wall," Derek said.

   "You're lucky I live with three children, Derek," Kit replied blankly. The two walked away quickly.

   Finnegan had died. They guessed natural causes, Spencer had even pointed out that his heart had probably gave out setting a trap.

   "Those Coyotes were gnawing on him for a week," the ME said.

   "Before the second and third murders happened," Kit sighed.

   "The area's off the traveled path. It's a wonder anyone discovered him at all," Spencer said.

   "Is it?" The ME asked, "those leaves didn't cover him up by themselves."

   "He's right. The deputy may have not been the first to find him," Derek said.

   "And our only suspects been cleared," Cora scoffed.

   Kit and Derek looked at Jason. "Square one?" Derek asked.

   "No," Jason said, "if Finnegan's been dead all this time, who's livin' in his house?" He began to walk away. "Let's go."

   "Here's a question— if a tree falls in the forest, does it make a sound if there's nobody there to hear it?" Spencer asked

   "What the hell are you reading?" Kit asked.

   "I was just thinking," Spencer said.

   "The unsub found Finnegan's corpse in a lightly traveled part of the woods, and no one else knew," Derek said, "so he was able to use this house, and no one was the wiser."

   "Actually, I was referring to Finnegan's wife," Spencer said. Kit laughed and looked down.

   "What are you talking about?" Derek asked.

   "She was rumored missing, perhaps killed, almost 50 years ago, when, in actuality, she left Finnegan for another man. Hr writes about it in hid journals, how he would look out the window on a daily basis to see if she would come home. She never did. He never recovered. He ended up turning into a recluse that people in town misunderstood," Spencer said.

   "Found somethin'," Jason said as he walked into the room, "come here." He walked away.

   "Provisions, delivered by the church to every elder's doorstep, each one dated after Finnegan died," Jason said.

   "So the unsub ate everything," Derek said.

   "Almost everything," Jason said, "unopened bowls of creamed spinach thrown into the trash, each other wrapped with ductape."

   "One with each tray," Spencer said.

   "So were looking for a guy who really, really hates spinach?" Kit asked, turning to Derek and holding her hands out, "might as well arrest me." Derek shook his head and shoved her shoulder gently.

   "I bet you'd like getting cuffed," Derek scoffed.

   "Only if it's you cuffing me," Kit smirked.

   "Who doesn't hate spinach?" Cora asked.

   "Me," Aleksander piped up as he walked up to him.

   "Ritualized, meticulous, organized," Jason said.

   "He would eat with the same particulars," Spencer said.

   "Pull prints," Jason said. His phone started to ring, "have Garcia run 'em for a match."

   "It's about Elle, isn't it?" Spencer asked, directing his question more towards Kit.

   "Hotch tells me a lot, but he doesn't tell me everything," Kit said softly.

   "Okay, Miss Future Unit Chief," Aleksander scoffed.

   "I don't know," Derek said to Spencer.

   "You know, I talked to her in Ohio."

   "Reid, we all talked to her."

   "No, I—I—I talked to her before. I went to her room one night, and she was drinking," Spencer said.

   "She almost died. I'd be drinkin', too," Derek said.

   Kit sat on the floor by Derek's legs, picking at her nail as Aleksander braided her hair. "Why the woods, JJ?" Derek asked. Aleksander sighed in annoyance when Kit looked at him, aggressively jerking her head so she groaned.

   "Ow!"

   "Hm?" JJ asked Derek.

   "Your fear. You said it was of the woods," Derek said.

   "Um, I used to be a camp counselor when I was a teenager in the woods up in Vermont. I had the night shift— tuck the girls in, turn off the lights, you know, the typical drill. Everything seemed fine, all the kids were asleep. You know, nothing seemed out of the ordinary… until I noticed that there was some blood on the hallway floor. So I followed the blood trail out to the camp directors cabin, walked up to his bed, and he was just laying there underneath his covers… dead. Someone stabbed him." Kit's eyes widened as Aleksander finished the braid. "I ran out if there so fast. Out the door, down the hall. I just remember it being really dark. Once I got to the door, there was another counselor there. I guess she heard me scream. They caught the caretaker on his way into town. I guess he still had the knife on him. Anyway, I guess that's probably when I decided I didn't like the woods."

   Kit and Derek glanced at each other. "You're serious?" Derek asked.

   JJ took a sip of her coffee, giving Derek a dead serious look before making a face. "No," she said. Kit rolled her eyes, as JJ laughed, "no, I… you fell for that?"

   Derek chuckled and leaned back into the couch. "Come on, I don't know why I'm afraid of the woods. I just… I am." JJ pointed to Spencer, still looking at Derek. "Why is he still afraid of the dark?" She then pointed to Kit. "And why is she afraid of medical masks?"

   Derek disregarded the question about Kit's fear, knowing it was a bad thing to look back on for her. "Yeah, Reid, why are you still afraid of the dark?"

   "Because of the inherent absence of light!" Spencer answered.

   "Oh," JJ said, Kit hearing an ounce of sarcasm in her voice.

   "JJ, that was pretty good," Derek said as his phone rang.

   "Ha! That's what she said!" Kit exclaimed.

   Derek gave her a look. "Just know that paybacks are a bitch," he said. Kit and Aleksander looked at each other with small smirks.

   "I'm shakin'," JJ joked.

   Derek answered his phone. "Yeah." He got off with the phone with Garcia after mentioning the guidence counselor. "Call Gideon. We just found our unsub."

   Derek walked into the cell with Kit and closed the door. He then walked over to Charles and placed the file down. "Here's the deal. I could stand here and tell you what I think you were doin' in Finnegan's house for the last two weeks, or you could do us all a favor. Sign a confession, maybe get a little something taken off your time. What do you say?" Derek asked.

   "I never stepped inside Finnegan's house," Charles said. Derek dropped the pen.

   "That isn't the answer we were looking for, sweetheart," Kit mocked. Earlier, Charles had called her sweetheart, so it was coming back to bite him in the ass.

   "See, fact is, we got your fingerprints inside the house all over the trays of food," Derek said.

   "Of course you did. I delivered 'em every week," Charles said.

   Derek grabbed the red hat. "What are you doin' with Nicholas Faye's hat? Hmm?" Derek asked.

   "Maybe he was trying to dispose of it. Or maybe he was so proud of his keepsake, he wanted a safe place to hide it," Kit said.

   "How these last six months been for you, James?" Derek asked, "not too good, huh? Oh, no, your whole life is fallin' apart, isn't it? Oh, yeah, you gotta be feelin' a loss of control."

   "Sense of abandonment," Kit continued.

   "And we would guess, uh… little impotent maybe," Derek said, "come on, man, give me somethin'."

   Kit smirked. "Why did your wife leave you, hmm?" She asked with a mock pout.

   "What happened, James? She get bored? I mean, you don't seem all that exciting to me," Derek said, "she start feeling a little uninspired? Hey, you're not a Minuteman, are you?" Charles stayed silent.

   "Oh, so that's what it is," Kit said snarkily, smiling as she walked over, "you're done before she even gets started, huh? She left you for another man who has—" James got up, pushing everything off the table and hitting Kit in the process, "okay then!"

   "James, that was exciting!" Derek yelled, "did she hit a nerve?"

   "I want to go home," Charles said.

   "Oh, you want to go home?" Kit asked.

   "Well, we're sorry. That ain't about to happen, so why don't you come over here and sit your ass down?" Derek asked. Charles didn't move, "I said sit down!"

   "I'm done talkin' to you," Charles said.

   Derek looked at Kit and she sighed. "I will tell you what you're done doing, understood?" She asked, "James, we can't help you if you don't start talking."

   "Somethin'!" Derek yelled. Derek got off the phone and Kit gave him a curious look. "What were you doin'? Workin' your way up to the victim you wanted to kill most? Your son?"

   Kit's eyes widened, before finally starting go catch onto what Derek was saying. "What'd you do with him, James?" Kit asked. James shook his head, sparking a new kind of rage in Kit. "Are you really so fucking weak you have to blame your own child for your failed marriage?!"

   "Shut up!" Charles yelled.

   "No! Start talking! Because we need to understand this!" Kit screamed, almost at the top of her lungs, "you beat those children who trusted you! Why?! So you could regain your power?!"

   Derek looked at her before looking back at Charles. "We got a news flash for you. You never had any to begin with," he said.

   "That's right. Keep it comin', keep it comin'," Charles said.

   "We are so far from finished with you, you son of a bitch," Derek said.

   "I could do this all day if I really wanted to," Kit said, "it's only a matter of time before I snap and you're on the floor, knocked out cold. You make me sick!"

   "You know what happens to guys who mess with kids on the inside?" Derek asked, "do you?"

   "Can I have a word with him?" Jason asked as he entered the room. Kit took a deep breath.

   "Yeah," Derek said, grabbing Kit's wrist gently and walking out. Kit leaned against the wall, rubbing her throat gently.

   "Screaming really took a toll on my vocal cords," she chuckled. Derek gave her the slightest smile, looking down at her wrist. He noticed the sever circular scars around her wrists.

   "What's that about?" He asked, nodding to the scars.

   "The US really needs to get better handcuffs," Kit smiled.

   "Ah," Derek nodded.

   "I also handcuff my wrist to the bed at night," Kit said softly, "PTSD has made me anxious. That I might get up and hurt someone without realizing it. Safety precautions, you know?"

   "Kit Kat," Derek sighed, "if you need help, talk to someone. Cora, Reid, Hotch Gideon, your brother, me."

   "None of you are professionals other than Cora, who despises me," Kit said.

   Derek nodded. "I get your point, but still..."

   "I'll keep it in mind," Kit smiled, starting to walk again.

   Derek smiled as well. "Yeah, you better."

   Kit, Derek, Jones, and Jason got out of the car quickly to meet JJ, Cora, and Spencer. "You know, after this mom left, Jeffery probably resented the fact that his dad spends more time at work with other kids than with his own," Derek said.

   "And took that rage out on any kid he viewed as having anything he didn't," Jason said.

   "So Tracy's mom said the bus would have dropped her off here after school," JJ said, "she was supposed to walk home with a neighbor."

   "That's most likely when Jeffery approached, but where would he have taken her?" Spencer asked.

   "There's such heavy patrolling in this town," JJ said, "how do you manage to take a little girl without being seen?"

   "Because we taught him," Kit realized, "nobody will think anything of two kids walking together—"

   "Buddy system, remember?" Aleksander asked.

   "In the process of educating the public, we educated a killer," Kit said.

   "When it's off season baseball, where would a 12-year-old kid hang out?" JJ asked.

   "The park," Jason said.

   "Surrounded by woods," Cora said.

   "Let's go."

   Kit and Jason had found Tracy and Jeffery at almost the exact same time. Jason had grabbed Jeffery while Tracy clung to Kit, Kit holding the young blonde tightly.

   "Are you okay?" Kit asked Tracy softly, stroking her hair a bit. Tracy nodded. "Good. Good. Okay."

   Kit sighed and looked at Charles, feeling slightly guilty. "I'm not gonna apologize, but if you want or need to, Kit Kat, go ahead," Derek said to her. Kit hesitated before nodding and walking over to Charles.

   "Mr. Charles," Kit said, "I think an apology is in order. Had I put it together before hand, I wouldn't have treated you the way I did."

   "You were doing your job, Agent Egorova," Charles replied. Kit smiled sadly.

   "I still shouldn't have said those things." She put her hand out and Charles shook it quickly, "have a nice day."

   Charles nodded. "You too." Kit walked away and over to Derek quickly.

   "You tell him everything you needed to?" Derek asked. Kit nodded and sighed, giving Derek a small smile.

   "Yeah. I did."

DAI SPEAKS howdy hoe

[todaynewsstories]

World War I: Brussels at the end of the Great War | Europe| News and current affairs from around the continent | DW

“Is the war really over?” On November 11, 1918, rumors began circulating in occupied Brussels; the Germans had finally been defeated, it was said, and a ceasefire had been signed.

But around the city — at the town hall, at the train station, in many streets — shots were still being fired. The fighting continued in many areas, and people didn’t know exactly what was going on. The German occupiers had censored the press in Belgium, and reliable information was only available from a few underground newspapers and news trickling in via foreign media — from the Netherlands, for example.

Days later, however, people finally had the confirmation they had been hoping for: the war was indeed over.

Read more: World War I: The ‘Black Army’ that marched in from Africa

Revolution, cautious euphoria

In the final days of the war in Belgium, rebellious German soldiers declared a revolution after the fall of the German Empire. On November 10, a Sunday, they founded a soldiers’ council in an effort to control the city. But officers and soldiers loyal to Kaiser Wilhelm II refused to join them, shooting at their former comrades and waiting for orders from Berlin which never came.

“The situation was very strange,” said Chantal Kesteloot, a historian at the Center for Historical Research and Documentation on War and Society. Until November 14, “the power was more in the hands of the German soldiers. The city was not freed by the Allied troops, but by German soldiers.”

Read more: When church bells were transformed into weapons of war

The revolutionaries of the soldiers’ council even tried to ally themselves with the Belgians. But the people of Brussels had suffered greatly during the four years of German occupation. They were starving, they were freezing; both food and coal were scarce in those cold November days.

“It was not the euphoria which one might have expected,” said Kesteloot of the days following the armistice. “People stayed at home, they were afraid because of the violence…between the two groups of German soldiers.” Celebrations were muted as long as the Germans were still in the city; Kesteloot said the Allied troops only arrived in the city on November 16, five days after the ceasefire.

One day later — on Sunday, November 17 —Mayor Adolphe Max returned from prison. As he spoke on the Grand Place in front of Brussels’ historic town hall to a crowd of thousands, it was finally clear: the war was over.

It was as if the country had won the football World Cup, said Kesteloot. Once again, people dared to celebrate in the streets, waving the tricolor Belgian flag for the first time in years.

King Albert I made a triumphant return to his capital city on November 22

The king returns

King Albert I also took his time to make his way back to Brussels. For four years, he had commanded the Belgian army from the western part of the country, which had not been occupied by the Germans. With the war finally over, the image-conscious king wanted to make a triumphant entrance into Brussels.

The king’s official return was slated for November 22, said Kesteloot — a day or two after he actually arrived back in the city. “That was really the day Brussels was liberated, the symbolic moment of Belgium’s liberation,” she said.

In the time between his arrival and the official celebration, statues and monuments were quickly erected. Thousands of onlookers travelled to Brussels from all over Belgium, arriving by foot or by wagon; the king had remained popular with his subjects throughout the long occupation. Historical footage from the time captured the king’s dramatic entrance, riding a silver-white horse so that he could be easily distinguished from other riders on their dark mounts.

Albert announced democratic reforms on his return, introducing the electoral principle of “one man, one vote” — further endearing himself to his public.

Refugees and a new threat

With the war over, life slowly began to return to Brussels. Kesteloot said the city had escaped the destruction of other Belgian cities, parts of which were heavily bombarded in the fighting.

In 1918, around 700,000 people lived in the greater Brussels area. In addition to this came the 100,000 refugees from the battlefields of northern France and Flanders.

“Helping the refugees was for some people a patriotic duty, a kind of resistance against the Germans, showing their solidarity,” said Kesteloot. “But other people were more xenophobic.”

To accommodate and feed so many people was difficult. Well into 1920, food in Brussels was distributed with special coupons and subject to state-run rationing. “The population was very weak compared to [prewar period],” said Kesteloot.

1914/1918 – Not then, not now, not ever

Germany / Günther Uecker: Untitled

The exhibition “1914/1918 – Not Then, Not Now, Not Ever,” shown at the German Reichstag in Berlin, was commissioned to commemorate the end of the First World War on November 11, 1918. The works were created by artists from the 31 countries involved in the conflict. This one is from the German sculptor and installation artist Günther Uecker.

1914/1918 – Not then, not now, not ever

Günther Uecker: Untitled, detail

Uecker has been using nails in his art since the 1950s. The Düsseldorf artist’s symbolic works, which deal with different political issues, have been featured in different Bundestag exhibitions, including the 1996 installation entitled Fall, in remembrance of the pogrom night in Germany on November 9, 1938. He also designed the Bundestag’s Prayer Room in 1998–99.

1914/1918 – Not then, not now, not ever

Bulgaria / Nedko Solakov: Dead Warriors

Each artist was given the same material to create a work for the exhibition: a cube of wood of 30 by 30 by 30 centimeters (12″ x 12″ x 12″) from oak trees that stood in a fiercely disputed section of the front in Alsace. Through discolorations or even leftover war projectiles, traces of the conflict can still be seen in the wood itself. This work is by Bulgarian artist Nedko Solakov.

1914/1918 – Not then, not now, not ever

Nedko Solakov: Dead Warriors, detail

One of the best-known Bulgarian artists of his generation, Solakov has regularly participated in international exhibitions, such as the Documenta 12 (2007) and Documenta 13 (2012), and the Venice Biennale in 2001, 2003 and 2007. His storytelling works include historical references and touches of humor. Here, he added a few ink spots to the cube of wood to create a work called Dead Warriors.

1914/1918 – Not then, not now, not ever

Austria / Hermann Nitsch: Untitled

Austrian avant-garde artist Hermann Nitsch turned the cube of wood into a symbolic butcher’s block covered with blood, recalling the brutality of war. World War I caused 20 million deaths and about 23 million military personnel were wounded, making it one of the deadliest conflicts in human history.

1914/1918 – Not then, not now, not ever

Hermann Nitsch: Untitled, detail

Nitsch has long shown his fascination with bloody scenes. His performances in the early 1960s were so provocative that they led to court trials and imprisonment. Although the 80-year-old artist now avoids killing animals during his performances, his “120. Aktion” from 2004 still involved a slaughtered bull, five dead pigs and 600 liters of blood. The blood on the wooden block, however, is paint.

1914/1918 – Not then, not now, not ever

South Africa / Wim Botha: Untitled

Botha is best known for his sculptures carved out of books. The South African artist often juxtaposes light and movement with dark figures in a state of conflict. The pieces of glass placed around the wooden skeleton in this piece mirror the work’s current surroundings, adding new elements and questions to the history of war.

1914/1918 – Not then, not now, not ever

Wim Botha: Untitled, detail

Born in 1974, Botha is one of the youngest artists in the show, along with the Ukrainian Aljoscha and the Turk Cevdet Erek. The exhibition’s oldest artist, the Romanian Geta Bratescu, was born in 1926. Interestingly, her installation was the only one to include a video on an iPad. “Variety in the forms of expression was important in the selection of the artists,” said curator Mattijs Visser.

1914/1918 – Not then, not now, not ever

Ireland / Sean Scully: The Disappearing Boys

The Irish-born American-based artist Sean Scully is renowned for his large abstract paintings. However, for his work entitled The Disappearing Boys, he created a very concrete sculpture. John, Johannes, Jean: three versions of the same name in English, German and French are engraved on a coffin, referring to three of the major European powers at the center of the world conflict.

1914/1918 – Not then, not now, not ever

Sean Scully: The Disappearing Boys, detail

The curator of the exhibition, Mattijs Visser, said he was fascinated by how the works on show reveal deep connections with the country of origin of the artists. The title of Scully’s work can be seen as a reference to those who were abducted, killed and secretly buried during the Troubles in Northern Ireland. These victims were known as the Disappeared.

1914/1918 – Not then, not now, not ever

Australia / Fiona Hall: Fell

War and death also have consequences for subsequent generations. The Australian artist Fiona Hall placed a charred cradle on a coffin in her work, entitled Fell. The sculptor was the first to represent Australia in its new pavilion at the Venice Biennale when it opened in May 2015.

1914/1918 – Not then, not now, not ever

Fiona Hall: Fell, detail

Hall is renowned for transforming ordinary, everyday materials into organic forms in her works, giving them historical and contemporary relevance. With the sawdust from her sculpture, she also created a bread that’s wrapped in barbed wire. Sawdust was sometimes added to baked goods during World War I to compensate for shortages of flour.

1914/1918 – Not then, not now, not ever

Armenia / Jean Boghossian: Double World

Born in Syria, the painter and sculptor Jean Boghossian is Lebanese and has been living in Brussels since 1975. Since he is also of Armenian descent, the international artist represented the country at the Venice Biennale in 2017 as well as in the “1914/1918 – Not Then, Not Now, Not Ever” exhibition. He split his block of wood into two pieces.

1914/1918 – Not then, not now, not ever

Jean Boghossian: Double World, detail

Boghossian is renowned for his experimentation with fire and smoke in his works. In Double World, one side is burnt, representing the losers of the conflict. The sharp edges of the two pieces show how the different camps appear threatening to each other and clash, but the two laser-cut blocks also fit perfectly together, which the artist sees as a symbol of hope.

1914/1918 – Not then, not now, not ever

1914/1918 – Not Then, Not Now, Not Ever

Tours can be booked to visit the memorial exhibition “1914/1918 – Not Then, Not Now, Not Ever,” on show in the German Reichstag building until January 6, 2019. The exhibition will travel to the UN’s headquarters in New York in 2019.

Author: Elizabeth Grenier

That weakness would prove fatal when another (invisible) enemy arrived in the Belgian capital: the Spanish flu. Worldwide, the virus would go on to kill at least 25 million people between 1918 and 1920. In Brussels, thousands of people died — far more than were killed during the war.

The virus — which despite its name did not come from Spain but was probably brought to Europe by US soldiers — had a devastating effect on the weakened population, particularly the younger population between 18 and 28.

“It was very difficult for parents to accept that their son had survived four years in the trenches or in an occupied city, to just suddenly die of the flu,” said Kesteloot, who experienced their grief through the diaries of the soldiers and their families.

To commemorate the end of World War I in Brussels, around 300 street names recall past battles or war heroes. Dozens of memorials have been erected, including those for fallen railway men or for carrier pigeons, used as messengers on the front. One hundred years after the war, their memory remains.

“Brussels, November 1918,” an exhibition at the BELvue Museum in Brussels, features historical photographs, films and documents detailing life in the city in the confusing final days of World War I. It runs until January 6.

Every day, DW’s editors send out a selection of the day’s hard news and quality feature journalism. Sign up to receive it here.

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[thejakeformerlyknownasprince]

This might be a little too specific, but do you have a particular chapter in the series that you think is the best/most well-written/something along those lines? Like are there any specific chapters that stand out to you as individually fantastic?

Two that come to the top of my mind: the kids' calamari conversation in #27 (p. 29 - 34 in my pdf), and the talk on the swing-set between Jake and his mom at the end of #16 (p. 93 - 95 in my pdf). They're almost opposite in tone — the calamari conversation is silly and chaotic, the swing-set talk is serious and to the point — but they're both examples of Animorphs' masterful dialogue at its best. I also think I speak for a lot of readers, in that both are heavily quoted and excerpted in fan spaces.

The calamari conversation (and much of #27) captures perfectly how real people talk to each other, including how real teenagers talk. Cassie tries to make a joke ("think calamari") of her reveal that giant squids are the right morph, it gets misinterpreted ("«I am not in favor of snails,» Ax said...") and it spirals off into a few different tangents. The kids spend a while trying to remember the name of a show, there's a whole reference to Ax accidentally ingesting a snail, and Jake repeatedly drags people back to talking about the real problem, and eventually they realize that they don't have a way to get a giant squid. That's how real people talk: they wander off topic, they contradict each other, they interrupt themselves, and they repeatedly return to the original point only to get distracted again.

As hilarious as that whole exchange is, there's this inescapable seriousness that the kids are deliberately talking around. They're scared, and fighting off despair, and coming off a battle that they lost with catastrophic injuries all around. The dialogue is silly and fun, but we know about the tension underpinning it. Like The Martian (the book, not its adaptation), it uses peril to enhance its wittiness and vice versa.

Honestly, that's the whole of #27, and I love it. We get moments with Rachel slowly walking home, looking at her neighborhood and wondering how soon it will be destroyed, cross-cut with side conversations about Marco's accidental King Kong crossover. Tobias and Rachel distract themselves from the horror of the deep ocean by chatting about their dating plans. Rachel and Cassie's frantic scramble to save Erek from discovery is undercut with Rachel's buying designer underwear and Cassie's attempt to market Erek as a food processor.

If you look at footage of real disasters — plane mechanical problems, fire evacuations, injury triage — that's how people really talk. Pilots from Flight 232 (which lost all ability to steer in midair) joked about buying beers for Air Traffic controllers while slowly falling from the sky. WWII gunners gave each other stupid nicknames and compared farts while attempting a no-fuel landing. Because when you're scared and helpless and there's nothing you can do but try to remain calm, might as well trash-talk Budweiser or complain about Calvin Klein underwear.

The swing-set talk is still incredibly realistic (IMHO), but it's a really different type of conversation. Jake comes back from the mission where he almost got Rachel and Ax killed with his mistake and where Cassie asked him to kill a controller for the greater good. He's sitting there in the backyard, staring up at the stars, and his mom comes out to join him. She acknowledges he's upset and she says "when I was your age and feeling upset, my mother, your gram, would always just say, 'You don't know what unhappy is, you're just a kid.' Like anything a kid would feel would be less difficult or painful than what an adult would feel...In a lot of ways being a kid is worse than being an adult. You have the same things to deal with: friends, temptations, love and hate, and all that. Only you don't have... experience that you've survived this before" (#16).

It's a great conversation, because it's such excellent parenting. Jean doesn't try to tell Jake she knows how he feels; she just tells him that she can tell it's hard. She doesn't dismiss him, but she tries to offer assurance that he's strong enough to make it through. It's a truth so rarely expressed in children's books, but being a kid is frustrating and awful in a lot of ways — you don't yet know how the world works, and the world is more than happy to treat you like a cute helpless object. I love that #16 takes the time to say it, and I love that it's such a quiet moment of melancholy in an otherwise action-packed book.

Not only that, but it's a moment when we (including Jake) feel tremendous affection for Jean, but also awareness that Jean isn't much help anymore. She doesn't have experience with Jake's current problems, and Jake can't rely on her or even be vulnerable because he can't trust her anymore. It's a sad moment, but it also has moments of humor — Jean ends by suggesting they watch the X-Files, and jokes that she solves problems by thinking "at least it isn't as bad as being a teenager." Like many of the series's best moments, like most of Animorphs, it's so good because it's warm and sad and funny and melancholy all at once.

[thejakeformerlyknownasprince]

Idea: What if, partway through the war, all the yeerks (on Earth) died? Not killed by the Animorphs-- maybe the Andalites got their act together, maybe they were wiped out by an unexpected plague, whatever. But suddenly, the teen soldiers find their enemies just... gone.

Embarrassingly enough, it takes them almost two weeks to notice.  Well, that’s not quite true.  They notice the suspicious lack of yeerk activity in less than a week, but mostly in the form of Marco declaring it to be “quiet… too quiet” and Jake wondering what has the yeerk inside Tom acting so morose all of a sudden.  It takes almost two weeks of Tobias lurking over known Yeerk Pool entrances wondering where the heck the controllers are, two weeks of Ax mentioning that the internet chatter is more full of yeerk talk than usual, two weeks of Erek reporting no Sharing meetings anywhere in the country, and two weeks of Cassie telling them to appreciate the break for a change… and then Rachel snaps.

Specifically, she gets fed up with the tension, marches up to Tom in the middle of a school hallway, and (poking him in the chest every so often for emphasis) demands to know whether the entire Yeerk Empire has suddenly gone into hibernation or— or what.

Tom’s response is to grab her by the arm and drag her into Chapman’s office.

Rachel fights him with literal teeth and literal nails, of course — right up until the moment Tom turns to Chapman and goes “See?  She remembers that there were brain-stealing aliens too.  That proves I’m not crazy.”

Rachel stares at Tom in shock.  Chapman heaves a put-upon sigh and says, “I never said you were crazy.  I said that we should all probably forget it ever happened and move on, because if we told anyone then we’d appear to be crazy.”

“But…”  Tom frowns, petulant.  “But if we, like, got a reporter to talk about the yeerks, and enough of us agreed about what happened…”

“Then no doubt the school district would send gas inspectors out to determine why so many people in this town are hallucinating,” Chapman drawls.  “The yeerks are all dead, their bodies entirely decomposed in the Earth atmosphere by now.  The nonhuman hosts were last seen wandering off in search of that mystical colony of free hork-bajir somewhere in the mountains.  I don’t have a way to contact the andalites.  All of which means that the only proof you have is a rapidly-evaporating puddle of kandrona under the school.”  He sighs.  “Any reporter with an ounce of sense will blame the fumes from that for the gas leak, and we’re back to square one.”

“The yeerks… are dead?” Rachel asks.

“How did you not already know this, if you were a controller?” Tom says.

She should probably wait and confirm this with Jake and the others.  Probably.  But then, she’s never been very good at waiting.  “Because I’m one of the morphers who’s been fighting them.”

After all that, Rachel doesn’t even get to tell the others the news.  Because she bursts into their meeting only to find that Toby is already standing there looking grave, and Cassie’s mouth is hanging open.  By the time Toby is done telling her story — and answering all 500 of Marco’s suspicious questions — most of the details come out.

A few days ago, close to a thousand hork-bajir and taxxons had simply wandered into the free hork-bajir valley.  Toby had assumed an attack, until one of the taxxons, who gave the unusual-for-a-taxxon name of Arbron, had explained that none of them were controllers.  Because, to the best of anyone’s knowledge, all the yeerks simply dropped dead a few days back.  

Toby, not being born yesterday, had forced the entire cavalcade to wait three days under constant guard before letting them into the valley. They passed.  All signs point to the conclusion that they’re telling the truth: the yeerks inside them all have died without warning.

Marco, being Marco, maintains that this is all some elaborate yeerk conspiracy.  Until Rachel shamefacedly mentions that she blurted the whole thing out to Tom.  Until Tom, muttering about their questionable taste in tourism destinations, takes them through a Yeerk Pool entrance under the car wash and shows them the cavern: empty, echoing, deserted.  Filled with detritus and congealing kandrona and abandoned junk.

Cassie becomes the one to voice the question that’s been on all their minds, later that afternoon as they sit around her barn.  “So…” she says slowly.  “Now what?”

“We’ve gotta tell someone, right?”  Rachel looks around at them.  “Just pick any adult, show them that we can morph, and then…”

«And then come the conspiracy theorists,» Tobias points out.  «Then come the social workers.  Then come the paparazzi.  Is that really what we want?»

«Prince Jake?  What do you recommend?»

Jake runs his hands through his hair.  “Honestly?  I want to go home.  I want to finish my stupid English essay, since I guess I’ve got time for it now.  I want to go to the UCSB game on Saturday.  I want to…”  He takes a breath.  “To catch up with my brother.  Maybe even get some sleep for once, while I’m at it.”

They vote on it, for lack of a better solution.  Rachel and Marco are all for telling the world.  Cassie thinks they should wait on a decision until they talk to Toby and some of the ex-hosts about what everyone else wants.  Tobias and Jake seem exhausted even by the thought of the media circus that would ensue.  Ax, as always, abstains.

“Okay,” Jake says.  “I guess that’s two votes in favor of sharing our story, three against.  We’ll go with Cassie’s suggestion: hold off for now, revisit the idea after talking to the others.”

Things get back to normal.  Kind of.  Sure.

Rachel punches a girl she doesn’t even know in the face after said girl rudely ignores Marco.  And then, when Marco makes a breathy comment about Rachel defending his honor, she punches him too.  Detention is a relief; it’s high time someone punished her.

Cassie breaks down crying in the middle of dinner for, really, no reason at all, and finds herself crying harder when her parents hover and worry and offer explanations: it’s about a boy, it’s about the goose last week they couldn’t save, it’s about hormones.

Tobias wavers.  He practices, a little bit at a time.  Pretends to be human long enough to walk downtown.  Grows fingers and dull eyes to see what happens when he rings Rachel’s doorbell like any other boy on the planet.  Each time he goes back.  Each time giving up human shape feels more like disappointment, more like relief.

Jake wanders the house in restless circles for six or more hours a night, trying to wear himself out so that the nightmares won’t wake him yet again.  Sometimes he hears the crisp pock-pock-pock of a basketball on concrete outside, and feels less alone.

Marco’s dad comments on how many evenings they’ve spent together with a reheated pizza and the latest Madden.  Marco brushes it off with a comment about earning enough brownie points to get a car.

Ax, with a little help from some commandeered yeerk tech, calls home again.  He tries to tell his parents everything that happened, and finds he doesn’t have the words.  They assure him they’re coming for him the moment they get permission from the Electorate, and he tries to believe that that time is coming soon.

Ten days later, when it seems that every single trace of yeerk activity really has disappeared for good, a kid with messy blond hair and soft grey eyes walks into their high school to enroll.  There are some inconsistencies in his paperwork, of course — he lists his uncle as his legal guardian in spite of said uncle being less than a year older than him, he gives his home address as a P.O. box downtown, he has no transcripts from previous schools — but the vice principal proves willing to overlook all of those issues in light of everything that this kid has done to keep the planet safe.  Chapman even signs off on the form claiming that Tobias requires access to a private bathroom once every two hours all day long for unspecified medical needs.  It feels, in some ways, like the first true commitment to the idea that this peace might just last.

Which is why Marco corners Tom the next day in school.  “So,” Marco says, “I had a question.  And you probably don’t know the answer, but you’re like, my second-to-last resort before Chapman, so let’s go with you’re kinda my last hope.  Anyway, I was just wondering, in case you happened to know—”

“Supervising the invasion of the Anati system,” Tom says over him, “as of the day all the yeerks on Earth kicked it.  No one’s heard from Visser One or her forces since.”

“Anati.  That’s far away, isn’t it.”  Marco doesn’t wait for confirmation.  “And if I wanted to, say, send a message to Anati…?”

Tom considers for a minute.  “Find Alloran.  He’ll know how.”

So Marco goes to Ax.  Just to Ax.  He’s getting closer and closer to the others all finding out about this, but… it’s his mom.  His problem.  He doesn’t want to trouble the others, who all deserve their rest.

Ax, however, seems to be bored out of his mind.  He seizes on Marco’s “mission” with enthusiasm, hacking every open-circuit camera he can get his hands on in about two hours flat.

Between Tobias being at school for several hours a day and Jake having essentially ordered them all to take a break, Ax has a lot of time on his hands.  It takes him less than three days to catch sight of a very familiar human morph — tall, balding, with a commanding smile — and figure out where Alloran has been hiding.  The paper trail takes a little more tracing from there, but eventually he gets a hit on a four-star hotel whose penthouse is currently being paid for by a Yeerk Empire shell corporation… and whose penthouse guest has already been reprimanded twice for stealing too many tiny Danishes from the breakfast bar.

Alloran listens to Marco, and even seems sympathetic, but insists that, as long as they don’t know what killed the yeerks on Earth, he’s not going to contact the yeerks elsewhere to let them know so that they can start invading Earth all over again.  Which is when Marco reluctantly gets the others involved, on the assumption that one of them will know how so many yeerks ended up kicking the bucket all at once.

Chapman, when asked, immediately blames the oatmeal crisis that was underway at the time when the yeerks died.  However, he has no proof to back up this theory, so he’s not much use.

Tom blames the whole thing on inbreeding.  He does not listen to Ax when Ax points out there’s no way a lack of genetic diversity could kill a whole species that quickly.

Jake comes up with an elaborate explanation about them having all died of the common cold.  Rachel pokes fun at him for plagiarizing War of the Worlds, until Cassie points out that technically a lack of genetic diversity could in theory leave them open to all being affected by the same disease.

Marco and Tobias, it might be said, get a little too far into tinfoil-hat territory around the time they connect an experimental weapons test out of Zone 91 with a fractional shift in the pH of the surrounding atmosphere, which might have something to do with the acid rain out of Nevada… which probably has nothing to do with the yeerks dying.

Alloran makes a single, muttered comment about quantum viruses.  He refuses to explain himself, or even to tell anyone what a quantum virus is.

Marco writes the whole thing off as a colossal waste of time.  He goes home that night frustrated, defeated, and wondering if Ax is quite bored enough to steal an unused Bug fighter so that they can go on a kamikaze run for Anati.

He wakes up tied to a chair in the middle of an abandoned warehouse.

“Listen to me, parasite,” a very familiar voice says.  “We can do this the easy way, where you worm yourself out of him right now and no one has to get hurt… or we can do it the very, very hard way.”

Which is right around the time that Marco remembers that he  pretended to be a controller the last time he saw his mom.  “Oh crap,” he says out loud, and then, “I’m guessing you’re not a controller anymore.”

“Edriss dropped dead out of the blue, don’t know why.  I stole a Bug fighter and came straight here.”

“Huh,” Marco mumbles.  Must be genetic.

Eva raises the dracon beam in her hands until it’s pointed at his head.  “Surrender or don’t.  Either way, I’ve got no plans for the next three days.”

Marco blinks several times.  Judging by the fuzziness of his vision and the cloying taste in the back of his throat, his mom friggin’ drugged him.  There’s no telling how long he’s been gone.  “I should probably warn you.  Jake and a couple of my other very dangerous friends are gonna be looking for me, and I can pretty much guarantee that when they find us—”

“Your threats don’t mean anything to me.”  Eva smiles bitterly.  “After all, I’m already dead.  So I suggest you be quiet, or I might be forced to gag you.”

Marco does as he’s told.  Staying quiet and staying put until his mom figures out he’s not a controller seems preferable to fighting her, at any rate.

By his extremely crappy system of internal timekeeping, it is either two hours or two days later that there’s a scraping sound on the roof of the warehouse… almost like a bird of prey landing on the corrugated iron.  Eva stands up, tilting her head to listen.  In the process, she lets the dracon beam drop to her side — which is when the grizzly bear hits her like a freight train.  Her body goes skidding across the floor, a small mountain of brown fur and claws following.

“Stop!” Marco bellows.  “Rachel, STOP!”

«I’m not gonna kill her, jeez.»  Rachel pins Eva to the ground, leaning just enough weight on the arm that holds the dracon beam that the weapon clatters out of her hand.

“She’s not a controller!” Marco says.  “Visser One is dead.”

«She has you tied to a chair—»

“Yeah, exactly!”  Marco really wishes he could hold up his hands in a placating gesture right now.  “Which we both know I could get out of in about two seconds.  So if she knew I could morph, why bother trying to capture me alone?  If she didn’t know I could morph, why capture me at all?”

Rachel pauses for a second, looking between him and Eva.  «I don’t get it.  Why did she kidnap you, then?»

“Because she thinks I’m a controller.”  Marco raises his eyebrows.  “Which means she isn’t.”

«Marco’s logic does appear to be sound.»  Ax steps delicately forward.  «In that case, we apologize for inconveniencing you, Mrs. Marco’s Mom.»

Rachel sits back on her rump with a whuff of indignation.  

Eva climbs slowly to her feet.  She looks over at where Marco is awkwardly shifting out of the way so that Ax can cut him loose.  “Mijo,” she whispers, “who the hell told you that you were allowed to fight in a war?”

Marco stands up, stuffing his hands in his pockets.  “Does this mean I’m grounded?”

“Oh yes,” Eva says, pulling him into the tightest hug he’s had in his life.  “For the rest of existence.”

It finally happens less with a bang than with a whimper.  The mall downtown is expanding to a new wing, and the construction equipment encounters a sinkhole larger than any California has yet seen.  After a trackhoe breaks through to an underground cavern the size of a football stadium, the county immediately halts all activity and sends a team of archaeologists down to excavate what everyone is clearly expecting to be ancient ruins… and instead proves to be stranger than anyone imagined.

It is with no small sense of surreality that Cassie finds herself sitting on her couch with her parents to her left and Rachel to her right, watching on TV as scientists dissect a dracon beam while a Discovery Channel personality narrates the debate about lost civilizations and secret underground cities.

“I think it’s high time we gave them some answers,” Rachel says.  “Don’t you?”  Her tone is casual in a way that Cassie recognizes as an act, covering for some of the same nerves she’s feeling herself.

Cassie thinks of Toby, struggling to keep her colony alive and hidden.  Thinks of Tom, too-casual just like Rachel when saying “I’m not crazy, right?” five or six times.  Thinks of Ax swinging by twice a day, just to see if there’s anything she needs.  Thinks of Aftran, who — she hopes — would’ve wanted this.

And then she picks up the remote and turns off the TV.  “Mom.  Dad.”  She smiles in a way she hopes is reassuring.  “There’s something we have to tell you.”

[derekswhore]

RUSSIAN ROULETTE: CHAPTER ONE

kick-off chapter here

original episode.

   "Last night, a team of two criminals was identified," Hotch said, "we originally profiled him as a couple, but we've recently learned that they're twins. Kitanna and Aleksander Egorova, originally Andreyev."

   "They were caught on tape leaving a bar last night, and then a dead body was found in there only minutes after they left," JJ said.

   "They work so well together everyone assumes that they're a couple," Cora said.

   "Typically, siblings tend to argue over everything, especially if they've committed a crime like murder," Spencer spoke up, "but they don't. So everyone assumes that they're either friends or a couple, but didn't think of them as twins."

   "What do we know about them already?" Maribelle asked.

   "Uh— they were born in far eastern Russia, and into a very wealthy community in Nakhodka," Hotch said, "a fire on their birthday, February 14th when they were about seven, burned their entire family mansion and killed all of their family."

   "They had eight other siblings, plus their parents, so in all, that was twelve people living there," JJ said, "they were almost never seen or heard from again after the fire."

   "Except, they've been doing this since they were young," Elle said, "the original profile says that they've been doing work like this since a young age."

   Hotch sighed. "That's where this case get's extremely morbid. They've been working for the Russian government as assassins and spies," he said, "they've been training since seven and going on missions since fourteen."

   "They're wanted for murder, arson, kidnapping, torture, and espionage in almost every country that's not affiliated with Russia and controlled under it's government," JJ said.

   "These kids have been used as weapons all most their entire life," Derek said.

   "But they're adults now—" Cora started.

   "They can't be more than what, 25? 26?" Derek asked.

   "Then why not leave?" Cora asked.

   "Their government still has leverage about something over them," Jason said, shaking his head, "they won't leave because they can't."

" do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment. " — gautama buddha

   Maribelle sighed as she looked at the list of aliases Kit and Aleksander had used overtime. Samantha Windsley.

   Maribelle looked up immediately. "That bitch," she whispered.

   "What?" Cora asked, turning to her.

   "When I first joined... Kit and Aleksander came to me for help," Maribelle sighed, "they said Kit had poisoned Russia's leader and that they needed to get away. I gave them the aliases Samantha Windsley and Connor Lucas. Those are aliases I gave to them so the Russian government didn't track them down."

   "You helped two of the most wanted criminals in the world and didn't tell anyone?" Derek asked.

   "Y-yeah," Maribelle said softly, looking down, "it was wrong, but—"

   "But nothing!" Derek yelled.

   "That's enough," Jason interrupted quickly.

   "She shouldn't be working this case. There's a personal connection," Hotch said.

   "Actually, it'd be beneficial if she were working this case," Cora spoke up.

   Maribelle nodded. "I met the twins in my early CIA days. I know them and they know me. It'll help," she said.

   Hotch glanced at Jason, who nodded. "All right. We'll see how it goes."

   To put it simply, Kitanna Egorova was quite pissed off. Not only at her brother Aleksander, but at her boss and friend, Liv, as well.

   A last minute mission. Were they crazy? If something went wrong, Kit and Aleksander were screwed. They weren't prepared. They hadn't trained at all before the mission had happened.

   "Got anything, Liv?" Aleksander asked.

   Olivia Latimoff was quite possibly the best tech genius you'd ever meet. Her skills, so far, remained unmatched by anyone Kit and Aleksander ever met. "Not yet," Liv replied, biting at her lip gently, "wait. Wait, wait, wait... Oh, never mind, they're only passing by."

   "Who?" Kit asked, furrowing her eyebrows.

   "The cops," Liv replied, "fuck, wait. Guys they're not just passing! It's the cops! They're searching the place!"

   Kit panicked and glanced at Aleksander. They heard the warehouse doors open, causing them both to pull their guns. "Higher ground," Kit said quietly, "they won't see it coming." Aleksander nodded and lifted up his sister, Kit pulling herself up quickly and quietly. Aleksander lifted himself up, aiming his gun at one of the two officers that entered the building.

   He fired, the bullet hitting his head. Almost right between the eyes, leaning towards the right. "Bet I could do better," Kit whispered, aiming her gun at the other officer's head. She fired, the bullet hitting him right between the eyes, "bullseye."

   "Bitch," Aleksander scoffed, climbing down.

   Kit smirked. "We got any thing to burn the Five-O?" She asked. Aleksander pulled a box of matches, "might not be enough, Alek."

   "We can try, Kitty," Aleksander said. Kit rolled her eyes as Aleksander lit two matches, throwing them on the officer's bodies.

   "Let's get out of here, we still have that strip club to hit," Kit said, walking out of the warehouse.

   Aleksander followed quickly. "Yes, ma'am."

   Maribelle sighed as she looked at the board. She bit her lip. "Guys," Derek said as he walked into the room, "two police officers were just found dead and burning at a warehouse."

   "The warehouse was a hiding place to extremely important government documents," Cora said, "we checked security cameras, they said they needed to hit a strip club. There's four in the immediate area, so Spencer and Derek will go to one, Mari and me to another, Jason and Elle to one, and then Hotch by himself."

   Everyone nodded. "We'll leave when the club opens. No drinking, keep badges and guns hidden," Hotch said, "I'll allow smoking if it helps you fit in. Just no drugs."

   Derek glanced around the club. "I don't see her," Spencer said quietly.

   "She probably fits right in," Derek replied, "or she's giving someone a lap dance in private." Spencer gave him a look, "you do know what a lap dance is, right?"

   "Yes, I know what a lap dance is, Morgan," Spencer scoffed.

   "Doubt that," Derek said quietly, causing Spencer to shoot him an offended look.

   "Wait, look," Spencer said, hitting Derek's arm gently before nodding towards a group of people.

   Kit was sat on a man's lap, Aleksander sitting across from her. Everyone in the group was drinking, smoking, or using some sort of drug.

   "You stay and order a drink, pretty boy, I don't need you choking on cigarette smoke," Derek said, starting to walk over. Spencer opened his mouth to say something before sighing.

   Once Derek had walked over, Kit looked up at him with a small smile. The man who's lap Kit was sitting on glanced at Derek before looking back at Kit. His phone went off. "I gotta go, doll, excuse me," he said. Kit stood up and backed up a bit, the man leaving.

   Kit looked at Derek and bit her lip. Derek walked over and sat down, Kit sitting on his lap with a small smirk. Derek took a deep breath, placing a hand on Kit's waist gently.

   Kit glanced at Aleksander, who shook his head. Kit raised her eyebrows before putting her cigarette out, turning to connect her lips to Derek's. Aleksander sighed and rolled his eyes, taking a hit of the blunt that was being passed around.

   Derek deepened the kiss slightly, his grip on Kit's waist getting tighter. Kit smirked slightly as Aleksander's phone went off. He handed the blunt to some random chick next to him, standing up and starting to walk away. Kit pulled away from the kiss with Derek and got off his lap, following Aleksander quickly.

   Aleksander and Kit turned the corner, Aleksander immediately stopping and looking at Kit. "You really can't help yourself, can you?" He asked.

   Kit smirked, tilting her head slightly. "You've been getting high the entire night. I've been making out with random men and women. Call it even," she said. Aleksander pushed her against the wall, the back of her head hitting it, "ah! Ow!"

   "Have a little self control next time," Aleksander said, before walking away.

   "The weeds really getting to you now, huh?" Kit asked.

   "Shut it." The two walked outside, spotting a ladder that leaded to the roof of the building.

   The club had an upstairs 'VIP' section, so there was a staircase leading to the roof. The man who they were to kill stood up there patiently.

   "You're the two best people Vladimir sent?" He asked. Irish. Noted, Kit thought.

   "Is your reaction because I'm a girl or because we look like children?" Kit asked. Aleksander hit her arm gently, "what?!"

   "We'll go with both," the Irish man replied. Kit rolled her eyes.

   "Look, I just want to know if you got the weapons," Kit said, taking a step closer

   "I do. But I won't deal with the girl here."

   Any second now... Kit thought to herself, biting her lip. She glanced at Aleksander and he nodded. "Fine then," she said, pulling her gun. She shot the Irish man in the head twice.

   "FBI, drop your weapon," Derek said. Spencer and Derek were now on the roof, Spencer having his gun aimed at Kit and Derek's at Aleksander. The two froze and Kit dropped her gun.

   Spencer walked over, his gun still raised. Once he was close enough, Kit pulled a stun gun and stun gunned Spencer in the neck. He was down for a minute. Kit grabbed his gun and pointed it at him, Aleksander pointing his at Derek.

   "Let us go and maybe I won't shoot the pretty agent," Kit said with a small smirk.

   "In your dreams, Egorova," Derek replied. Kit sighed.

   "You know, the more I look at his pretty face, the more I'm gonna regret it if I kill him," Kit hummed.

   "Then don't," Derek said. Kit bit her lip.

   "I have to," she said softly. Derek shook his head.

   "You don't," he said, "I promise you, you do not have to kill him. Drop the gun and come with us." Kit sighed and tossed the gun, putting her hands up as Aleksander did the same. Derek walked over slowly, grabbing a pair of handcuffs. He began to cuff hit and she immediately spun around, kneeing him in the groin.

   Aleksander ran over, wrapping his arm around Derek's neck. "We're 27 and already overpowering FBI agents," Kit smirked as Derek began to lose consciousness, "I'd say that's a pretty good win."

   "Wait, wait, wait," Maribelle said, "you played lip guitar with Kit and then she stun gunned Spencer in the neck, then her brother choked you out?"

   "Weak," Cora snorted.

   "Oh, and what did you two do at the club?" Derek asked.

   Cora and Maribelle glanced at each other with small smirks. "One got laid, one got high, we'll let you figure it out yourself," Maribelle said.

   Derek's mouth went agape. "Cora said she wanted to stay a virgin until she got married—" Spencer started.

   Elle snorted. "Ha. That's funny. Cora? A virgin? Nope," she smirked.

   "Place your bets now. Cora got laid and Maribelle got high," Derek laughed.

   "Guys," Hotch said, turning on a TV that was in the conference room. On the news was a raging fire at a government building, with pictures of Kit and Aleksander on the side.

   "Who leaked the profile?!" JJ asked.

   "Who knows," Maribelle scoffed, "plenty of cops that want them caught."

   "But we specifically said not to release the profile to anyone. That it was premature," Cora said.

   "Cops talk. Pissed off cops talk loud," Maribelle and Derek said.

   Jason walked into the room. "There's talk of them at a warehouse. A hideout," he said.

   Everyone looked at him and nodded. "Let's get going," Hotch said.

   "So now what? We wait?" Kit asked, raising her eyebrows.

   "Yup," Aleksander replied, turning to face Kit, "spar with me."

   "Absolutely not," Kit said, "those agents could enter at any moment. If we spar, they will catch us."

   "Fine," Aleksander scoffed, crossing his arms, "spread out."

   "What? Why?" Kit asked, furrowing her eyebrows.

   "They're used to us being together. Besides, more firing from different locations," Aleksander said. Kit nodded and sighed.

   The twins heard the door open as they began to walk away. They both pulled their guns and turned around, pointing them at the FBI agents that had ran in.

   "Kitanna and Aleksander Egorova, drop your weapons and put your hands on your head," Derek said.

   "Well hey there, hot stuff, nice to see you again," Kit smirked, "and of course pretty boy."

   "Drop your weapons," Derek said. Kit glanced at Aleksander and nodded, placing her gun on the ground. Derek walked over, grabbing a pair of handcuffs and cuffing Kit quickly, Hotch doing the same to Aleksander.

   Derek caught sight of the A. 550 on the back of her neck and froze.

   They branded the poor kids.

   Kit sat in the interrogation room, tapping her fingers on the table as she bounced her knee up and down. The door opened and Derek and Spencer walked into the room. Kit jumped and looked at them, biting her lip.

   "They branded you," Spencer said, placing the file down, "what else have they done to you?"

   "You want it in exact detail or just a vague explanation?" Kit asked, raising her eyebrows.

   "So I assume they've done a lot to you?"

   "Yeah," Kit nodded, "they did."

   Spencer nodded. "Agent Hotchner has talked with the US government about letting you and your brother stay under immunity," he said, "if you break immunity—"

   "I know, I know," Kit said, "I get thrown in prison... Or I get deported. One of the two."

   Spencer nodded. "Good to know you know your rights," he said.

   Kit almost let a smile slip. "I'm not stupid, Dr. Reid," she said, biting her lip again.

   "You know, you should stop biting your lip so much. There's a bit of blood," Spencer said as he and Derek got up.

   "What're you sitting there for?" Derek asked, "you and your brother are on the jet ride with us."

   Kit raised her eyebrows and got up slowly, walking with the two men. "Does it hurt?" Derek asked. Kit looked at him, confused, "the brand."

   Kit smirked slightly. "Only when I think about it."

" the love between friends could create life. " — betsy cornwell.

DAI SPEAKS welcome to chapter one y'all !!!