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pesterloglog · 11 months ago

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Aranea Serket, John Egbert, Vriska Serket

Act 6, page 5982-6008

ARANEA: Anyway, where was I?

JOHN: the heroine story ends and the villain story begins.

JOHN: i think...

ARANEA: Yes, that's right.

ARANEA: It is with the predomin8tion of her son that our heroine's story ends, and the story of our villain 8egins.

ARANEA: 8ut as we all know, 8eginnings are not always so easy to pinpoint in paradox space.

ARANEA: One could say his story 8egan the day he claimed immortality. Or the moment his 8eing was inexplica8ly confined to a juju, allowing him access to any realm in which his vessel would capriciously materialize.

ARANEA: 8ut for the sake of linearity, we may as well say his story 8egan the day he and his sister hatched.

ARANEA: When a cheru8 hatches, the two undeveloped personalities mingle together in the same 8ody. There is not yet a clear division 8etween the two.

ARANEA: It will then consume the egg shell for the vital nutrients it contains. The sugary snack is irresisti8le to the starving wiggler.

ARANEA: Once it finishes its first meal, the two personalities will 8e pulled apart for good, and the child will pup8.

ARANEA: The two halves then 8egin vacill8ting with their sleep cycles, as I descri8ed.

ARANEA: As you might expect, the female child was as cheerful and friendly as could 8e.

ARANEA: She took after her mother in every way. At least, the way her mother used to 8e, long 8efore she was hardened 8y centuries of isol8tion and o8sessive pursuit of justice.

ARANEA: And to just as little surprise, the male child was an insuffera8le 8rat.

ARANEA: It is just as well that cheru8 parents a8andon their offspring. Raising such a child 8y the familial standards of any race would 8e a monumental challenge.

ARANEA: Nevertheless, it would seem there were those who tried.

ARANEA: Details in my research suggest our villain had a num8er of acolytes oper8ting in the shadows, preparing for his arrival.

ARANEA: We will pro8a8ly never know who these scurrilous conspir8tors were. 8ut it is evident that at some point the cheru8 was locked in a room, either out of exasper8tion, or for its own good, until it was old enough to enter the session.

ARANEA: The children were left with everything a young cheru8 could ever want. Meat, candy, computers, a lifetime supply of special stardust, and of course their precious jujus.

ARANEA: The acolytes had clearly gone to gr8 lengths to harvest such items from all over the cosmos, so they could lavish their young master with gifts.

ARANEA: They may have 8een prisoners, yes. 8ut if you ask me, these children were very spoiled.

ARANEA: While the female was preparing for a colla8or8tive approach to the game, the male was plotting furiously against her. He never had any intention of working with her.

ARANEA: As far as he was concerned, the game was his and his alone to conquer.

ARANEA: One day, he put his plan into motion. He had his sister's dream self assassin8ted on Prospit.

ARANEA: The next time she went to sleep, she would never wake up again. When her 8rother woke up, he 8ecame the sole occupant of the 8ody.

ARANEA: He then freed himself from his chains, and launched the session 8y himself.

ARANEA: 8ut this game was never meant to 8e played solo.

ARANEA: Its format is inherently cooper8tive. The diversity of players, the com8in8tion of their efforts and aspects, this is what awakens the true cre8tive potential of the game. Without them, a session will wither and die.

ARANEA: If one enters alone, it completely alters the nature of the game. It changes its purpose.

ARANEA: For a solo player, a challenging quest 8ecomes an insurmounta8le one. A reward of infinite promise 8ecomes a 8oon far more sinister.

ARANEA: The gauntlet which the player must overcome is seemingly designed to 8e impossi8le. For all intents and purposes, it is not actually a game at all. It is a death sentence for any player foolish enough to accept the challenge.

ARANEA: 8ut it 8ears repeating.

ARANEA: This was very special cheru8.

ARANEA: He entered what is called a dead session.

ARANEA: This qualifies as 8oth a null and void session, 8ut is even less than either of those. Compared to a typical session, it is almost unrecogniza8le.

ARANEA: 8efore the game 8egins, Skaia is 8lotted out with a dark layer of clouds. Its light is extinguished for good.

ARANEA: There is no planet w8ting for the player in the medium.

ARANEA: So instead, he 8rought it with him.

ARANEA: 8ut when he arrived, there was no heroic journey for him to em8ark on.

ARANEA: There was nothing. No sprite, no consorts, no underlings.

ARANEA: The land had no name.

ARANEA: Those things all needed to 8e unlocked.

ARANEA: To unlock his true quest, he was forced to undergo a series of excruci8tingly tedious trials.

ARANEA: Only then would the way to the planet's core 8e revealed. There, he would consult with the most monstrous denizen of all.

ARANEA: And while such trials might discourage most players from even trying, our villain's response was quite the contrary.

ARANEA: He was only em8oldened 8y the mind num8ing chores. He took to them with gusto, as if performing them out of spite.

ARANEA: With perseverance, he found the final door and unlocked it.

ARANEA: W8ting for him on the other side was a terri8le creature named Yalda8aoth.

ARANEA: His denizen would allow him a 8rief audience. One just long enough for him to make The Choice.

ARANEA: No denizen has ever 8een mistaken for pleasant company. 8ut the self-proclaimed god of all monsters is notoriously inhospita8le to his players.

ARANEA: His choices are known for their wild extremes.

ARANEA: And to this player, in this session, he offered his most extreme choice of all.

ARANEA: It was the choice 8etween a path of conquest, and a path of sacrifice.

ARANEA: 8ut this is putting it lightly.

ARANEA: In a tongue only his player could understand, he descri8ed what the path of the martyr entailed.

ARANEA: In short, it involved nothing.

ARANEA: The player chooses to walk away from the tempt8tion of power. To surrender all am8ition, and to welcome death.

ARANEA: In exchange for this pledge comes a promise. The player's sacrifice is assured to 8enefit all who will ever live.

ARANEA: In death, the player would later 8e in the position to help 8ring an end to a force of unfathoma8le evil and destruction.

ARANEA: A force which was unleashed, for instance, 8y someone who once opted for the other choice.

ARANEA: Yalda8aoth then descri8ed what it meant to choose the path of the conqueror.

ARANEA: It was a path for a more active player, to 8e sure. The player's mettle as a conquering force would 8e tested directly, and repeatedly.

ARANEA: One 8y one, he would have to conquer and destroy a num8er of planets spawned for him in the session. Each would 8e more difficult than the last.

ARANEA: After destroying them all, his true land would 8ecome unlocked.

ARANEA: He would then return to face his denizen again, and defeat him in com8at.

ARANEA: If successful, his reward would 8e unprecedented.

ARANEA: He would receive the 8oon of unconditional immortality, where resurrection would not 8e linked with the just or heroic nature of death.

ARANEA: It is unclear how this 8oon would 8e awarded, since to my knowledge it is 8eyond even the a8ility of a denizen to allow this.

ARANEA: 8ut through whatever mechanism the 8oon is 8estowed, immortality is only the 8eginning.

ARANEA: The player is somehow also im8ued with a limitless supply of power. Enough to destroy anything he wanted, for as long as he wanted.

ARANEA: And knowing the villain of our story, anything he wanted would be everything. And as long as he wanted would be forever.

ARANEA: Yes, knowing our villain, the choice he would make is quite clear.

ARANEA: Knowing him, in fact, proves it could hardly 8e considered a choice at all.

ARANEA: It was at this point the real game would 8egin.

ARANEA: Skaia would undergo a dramatic transform8tion, 8ecoming even darker and heavier.

ARANEA: Soon it would 8ecome a very massive solid sphere. It would 8egin to gener8 heat within due to rising density.

ARANEA: The surface would 8egin to crack.

ARANEA: The resulting explosion is known as the First 8r8k.

ARANEA: From the primordial 8last would emerge fifteen planets for the player to conquer.

ARANEA: They would scatter and ricochet at high velocity 8efore settling into or8it in the medium.

ARANEA: The 8r8k is a very violent phenomenon though. Not all planets will necessarily clear the 8last 8efore the Skaian de8ris settles into its final st8.

ARANEA: The vast amount of resulting matter then collapses into a 8lack hole.

ARANEA: Its gravit8tional pull is tremendous. Any o8ject within range will 8e sucked in and destroyed.

ARANEA: Those planets which settle into or8it will 8e safe, for the time 8eing.

ARANEA: 8ut in the case of our villain's session, three of the planets did not make it and fell 8ack into the hole.

ARANEA: This was a very lucky 8r8k for him!

ARANEA: It meant that he would only have to conquer twelve planets instead.

ARANEA: This 8it of good fortune could very well have 8een the difference which allowed him to overcome a nearly impossi8le challenge.

ARANEA: His task was to destroy all of these planets in order, each within a time allowance that gets shorter with every planet.

ARANEA: To destroy a planet, first it must 8e conquered.

ARANEA: He would have to overcome all forces of resistance on the planet, and ultim8tely defeat whatever powerful underling ruled there.

ARANEA: Then, much like he did to unlock the quest in the first place, he would have to travel to the planet's core.

ARANEA: There he would retrieve a 8om8, and return to the surface.

ARANEA: If he did not accomplish this in time, the 8om8 would deton8 in the core, and the game would 8e lost automatically.

ARANEA: The 8om8 is not powerful enough to destroy the planet alone.

ARANEA: In fact, its purpose is not to damage the planet at all, 8ut to move it.

ARANEA: So he must 8ring it to a design8ted loc8tion on the surface.

ARANEA: When it explodes, the planet will 8e knocked out of or8it, and sucked into the hole.

ARANEA: Of course he must make sure he has moved on to the next planet 8efore this happens!

ARANEA: He repeats this process for each planet until they are all gone.

ARANEA: There is one caveat though. He must skip the eighth planet.

ARANEA: If he sinks that one 8efore any of the others, it will result in the destruction of the entire session.

ARANEA: Thus it must 8e the final planet he conquers.

ARANEA: Upon destroying the eighth planet, his true land will reveal itself.

ARANEA: The dead planet will come to life, and there he must prepare for 8attle with his denizen.

ARANEA: He may sharpen his com8at skills, craft new weaponry, anything he can do to improve his chances against a very powerful endgame foe.

ARANEA: Fortun8tely for him, he would not have to face the monster alone.

ARANEA: 8y then he will have accumul8ted a party of loyal minions.

ARANEA: With each planet he destroys, he will 8e awarded a new leprechaun follower.

ARANEA: Even if a planet was destroyed in the 8r8k, he will still 8e awarded that planet's leprechaun upon destroying the planet preceding it. Sort of like a two for one deal!

JOHN: wait.

JOHN: leprechauns??

ARANEA: Yes, John!

ARANEA: I'm delighted to see you have pounced on what is clearly the most interesting part of the story thus far.

ARANEA: Leprechauns are a fascin8ting mythical race, although there is some dispute among scholars as to whether they are actually a 8reed of gnome.

JOHN: ...

ARANEA: I can't say I 8lame you for 8eing speechless. There are no dou8t hundreds of questions swirling in your head at once a8out these wonderful creatures.

ARANEA: Where do I even 8egin? You must forgive me, I find it very difficult to resist going on at length a8out them. I just think they are so gr8.

ARANEA: For instance, I can and have given lectures for weeks at a time on their marvelous and widely varying magical a8ilities.

ARANEA: More intriguing yet would 8e any medium-to-longform harangue on the topic of their culture and customs, most of which revolve around luck.

ARANEA: 8ut most captiv8ting of all, and the su8ject upon which I will now assiduously expound, would 8e the positively scintill8ting su8ject of leprechaun romance.

ARANEA: The pro8lem is that when the su8ject of leprechaun romance is 8roached, our overly o8essive troll intellects instantly assume the most ingrati8ting posture of admir8tion imagina8le.

ARANEA: Which makes it hard! Hard to give it proper academic focus I mean, 8ecause of how gr8 it is.

ARANEA: 8ut we will do our 8est to understand regardless.

ARANEA: Trolls have only four forms of romance. And though we consider it a complic8ted su8ject, spanning a wide range of emotions, social conventions, and implic8tions for reproduction, it is ultim8tely a superficial slice of what leprechauns consider the full 8ody of romantic experience. Our concept of romance, in spite of its capacity to fill our art and literature and to rule our individual destinies like little else, is still just that. A single, quaternary concept. A concept usually denoted 8y four sym8ols.

ARANEA: <3 <3< <> o8<

ARANEA: Leprechaun romance is more complic8ted than that. Leprechaun romance needs nine sym8ols.

ARANEA: The nine quadrants of leprechaun romance are considera8ly more nuanced than our quaint notions of romance, and certainly more alien.

ARANEA: In fact, so conditioned is my own understanding of romance that I can't help 8ut refer to them as quadrants, when in fact they are not quadrants at all! They are referred to as charms.

ARANEA: One of the charms is characterized 8y romantic love, as understood 8y 8oth trolls and humans. 8ut after that, all 8ets are off. There is no division 8etween 8lack or red, concupiscent or conciliatory. Instead their charms comprise a spectral continuum of more su8tly varying types of relationships, most of which are esta8lished in mutual chicanery, such as the exchange of pranks, coy riddles, slapstick shenanigans, and games of chance. Furthermore, a pair of leprechauns is not limited to a single charm. A relationship may 8e defined 8y multiple charms at once! In fact, some of the most interesting relationships arise from exotic charm com8in8tions. A sta8le relationship consisting of three or more charms is called a trove. These advanced relationships are often viewed as the ideal end result for a romance, much the way certain pairing rituals are for humans.

ARANEA: No charm is specifically tied to procre8tion, though any type of relationship could 8egin waxing concupiscent if lady luck should so decide. Certain charm com8in8tions are known to 8e more conducive to fertility than others. If the leprechaun pair has 8een so 8lessed, they will 8egin an ela8orate coupling procedure culmin8ting in a lively m8ting jig. The jigs are specific to the charms of course, similar to how different kinds of music lend themselves to various styles of dance.

ARANEA: While their romance is endlessly captiv8ting, leprechaun reproduction may 8e the most interesting su8ject of all. Particularly from a perspective of detailed anatomical study, which I will get to shortly. 8ut first it 8ears pointing out that while for humans reproductive relationships are exclusively heterosexual, and for trolls they are 8isexual, for leprechauns they-

VRISKA: WOW, WHAT A STORY!!!!!!!!

ARANEA: 8ut I wasn't fin-

VRISKA: WASN'T THAT STORY GR8 EVERYONE?

VRISKA: WOW!!!!!!!!

ARANEA: Hmm.

ARANEA: You really liked it that much, Vriska?

VRISKA: Hell yeah!

VRISKA: Oh my god. That leprechaun stuff? Soooooooo good.

VRISKA: Right guys?

ARANEA: Wow. Well, I would 8e happy to continue then, if you-

VRISKA: Mindfang, have I told you how gr8 it's 8een to get to know each other, and team up on adventures and stuff?

VRISKA: I really feel like you've helped me get in touch with my ancestral roots. Mainly as a kickass storyteller.

VRISKA: It was like this whole part of my personality I was never aware of. Like the part that's compelled to just outright explain tons of really interesting things to people, while sparing no detail whatsoever.

VRISKA: It's made me feel a lot closer to understanding my aspect, as well as closer to you. So I just wanted to say, thanks!

ARANEA: Aw, you're welcome!

ARANEA: I feel the exact same way a8out my time with you.

ARANEA: You have really helped me get in touch with the true pir8 within. I saw in you the adventurous spirit I always wished I could 8e.

ARANEA: You helped me finally understand the virtue in rationalizing questiona8le decisions, and 8ehaving unscrupulously for the gr8ter good!

VRISKA: Haha, stop! You're going to make me start tearing up.

VRISKA: Get over here and give me a hug, alpha sister.

ARANEA: ::::)

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imagineaworlds · 4 years ago

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I Love You (Part Five) -- Aaron Hotchner

Written By: @desperately-bisexual

Request: None.

Warnings: Cursing. Descriptions of murder and kidnapping. Being held hostage at gunpoint. All around mature content!

Pairing: Aaron Hotchner x Greenaway!Reader

Word Count: 5994

Timeline: Season 2 Episode 9. Day after part four.

In the morning, Hotch drove me, JJ, and Spencer to the precinct from the hotel. We were up bright and early, but we were still way behind Gideon and Morgan, who must have left hours before us. Granted, they were hunting a killer who preyed at night, whereas we were searching for one in the day. It made sense that they needed to collect themselves and their itinerary for the day long before us.

After spending the day in the field yesterday, Hotch and I planned on taking some time to look over the evidence for any patterns or discrepancies which would help us catch the Mill Creek Killer. No one was perfect, not even our Unsub. He had to have made a mistake somewhere. There had to be something pointing us to him past just waiting to catch him in the act of performing his ritual. Realistically, that was what we had to do. But it was weighing on me, the guilt of letting another woman be taken and killed just so we could catch one man.

We all immediately got to work at the office. JJ found Mr. Meyers, the reporter who had contact with the Hollow Man, waiting in the lobby for her. They went off to discuss the Hollow Man separately, while Hotch, Spencer, and I continued on towards the boardroom. Sheridan was waiting there for us. It looked like he hadn’t even gone home at all. His clothes were the same as the day before, and his eyes looked as though he hadn’t slept in days.

Hotch noticed right away. He patted Sheridan’s shoulder to gain his attention, then told him to go home for a few hours. Sheridan, surprisingly, didn’t argue. He must have been waiting for us to come in to start working so that he could go rest.

Spencer went digging into one of the boxes for a piece of paper he wanted to scan; meanwhile, Hotch and I sat down at the table to start reviewing everything the detective and his team had collected before calling us in for help. Hotch was reading while reclining in his chair and mindlessly playing with the stubble on his chin.

I leaned back in my seat and put my feet up on the table. He didn’t even look up when he told me to put my feet down. I stared at him, almost daring him to look at me, but he didn’t. I went back to the papers I was evaluating and it took him another minute or so before he told me to put my feet down again. But he still didn’t look at me.

JJ burst into the boardroom and hurried over to us. We looked up at her to see the panic plastered to her face. “We just got a call about another missing woman. Merideth Dale. 25.”

I slid my feet off the table and sat up straight. “Does she match the appearance type of the other victims?”

“Perfectly. She was supposed to meet her friend for a bike ride this morning, but disappeared after calling from the trail.”

“Mark Twain National Forest?”

JJ nodded while handing both Hotch and I new case files. We both accepted them and hastily began flipping through the pages. There was a picture of Meredith Dale attached, and JJ was entirely right. She matched the description perfectly. It had to be our guy.

I flipped to the next page to find a mini map of where Meredith’s phone was found. She had been traveling on her bike along a fairly popular path before stopping at a bench to call her friend. That was where her friend found her phone and decided to call the police.

Spencer came back and Hotch caught him up to speed. I spun around in my chair to face the bigger map of the forest that was pinned to the wall. When I realized that the path was near where the second victim was found, I stood from my chair and approached the map so as to get a better look.

“What do you see?” Hotch questioned.

I squinted and got real close to the map before pointing to something with my index finger. I glided the tip of my nail along the paper as I followed the path Meredith was last seen on, all the way down to where the second body was found. Then I traced it to where the first victim was taken then found. And so on.

Hotch realized that I was spotting something important. He grabbed a spool of string from the table and came over. As I continued to trace the path between all of the victims, Hotch followed my finger with the string, marking the spots of the kidnappings and murders with pins. When we had marked all of them, I dropped my finger from the map and took a step back to get a clearer view of our work.

The Unsub was rotating between sectors of the park, but only a few number of them that were close to the highway. The paths he was taking and the sectors he was staying in were all easy to access and easy to escape from quickly. The parking lot nearby was huge, which meant that his car would blend in easily, and he had direct paths to the park where Ellen Carroll was taken, the bike path where Meredith Dale was taken, and all of the woods where the bodies were found.

But why rotate like that? And how the fuck had we missed this?

I snapped behind me while still staring at the map. “Spencer, call Garcia. Ask her to check the park rangers’ forest search schedules.”

“What are you thinking about?” Hotch asked me quietly.

I broke my concentration with the map for a second to make eye contact with Hotch. It was the first time that he had looked at me since I asked him about having more kids yesterday. For a moment, I got lost in his eyes. I didn’t think that I could miss them so much… Yet, even just a day without them made me yearn for all of his love. I thought about how I never wanted him to look away. But not all wishes come true. He broke eye contact first to look back at the map before I began my explanation.

“He’s staying relatively in the same area with the abductions and murders. And depending on the day, he takes the bodies to a certain sector of the forest,” I said.

“Yeah, but the first one is way deeper into the forest. It would take nearly three hours to get there, while the rest of them take not even an hour. So why the change after the first one?”

“He was nervous. He wanted to be cautious to not get caught with the first body because he was unsure of how to go about hiding it at that point. But once he knew what he was doing, he got more confident, and decided to stay closer for convenience and easy escape. And he only takes them from the most populated sectors, but takes them to the more secluded ones.”

“So, then, he knows about how the forest rangers operate. He knows when the parks open, when people will be around, when officers will be on patrol, and where to put the bodies so that they won’t be found for a few days. But how could he be sure that those sectors are safe?”

I pointed back at Spencer, who immediately took the cue to repeat what Garcia was saying over the phone. “The forest is broken up into six districts, and each of them are patrolled every…” Spencer paused as a realization dawned on him after Penelope told him something. He started interrupting and thanking Garcia for her help before hanging up and running to the map. “These sections are patrolled every three to five days, officially, but with department cutbacks, they’ve had to spread out the searches even more. Now they’re only being checked every five to eight days.”

“Approximately how long it took to find the bodies,” Hotch said, the realization dawning on him, too. “That’s why he’s rotating. He's dumping the bodies in the sectors that have just been checked so that he has the longest period of time to spend time with the bodies without being distrubed.”

“So we know where he’s going to dump Meredith Dale.”

“If he hasn’t already,” I added.

“The question is, where in the sector is he dumping the body? He can’t do it anywhere near where the last body was found.”

“That shouldn’t be a problem for him. The sectors are hundreds of square miles large. He could leave the body even five miles away from the first one and we still wouldn’t be able to find her in time,” Hotch said.

I turned away from the map and slowly went to sit back down. My mind was racing for answers. The Mill Creek Killer had to know that we were looking for him. And he had to know that we were close. He wouldn’t have rushed to take another woman if he didn’t think that way. That was his first mistake, though. He rushed and it gave us time to find him.

The mini map on the desk was staring at me for some reason. There was something I was missing in that map. Something important about where the Mill Creek Killer would have taken Meredith Dale. Where could he have taken her? Supposedly her friend was just up the path, which meant that right after the call ended, he would have approached her, taken her, and run before being seen.

The hiking path.

Just across from the bench where Meredith was last reported to have been was a small hiking path that led straight into the woods. It wasn’t a popular path, and it wasn’t clearly marked. Locals and experienced hikers liked to take it, though. At least that was what the park ranger explained to us yesterday when talking to us about the forest.

“Spencer, where does the path across from the bench where Ms. Dale went missing lead to?”

“Uh…” He started to trace the map. “Saltgrass Cove.”

“That’s where we’ll find her.” I stood back up, grabbed the case file, and hurried towards the door with Hotch and Spencer following closely.

Hotch drove the undercover cop car with the lights and sirens on. We arrived at the scene first, Sheridan and his team right behind us once we called from the car. By the time we got out of the car, found the path, and ran deep into the woods, the K-9 unit had released their dogs in search of a body.

We knew where we needed to look, it was just a matter of pinpointing the exact location. The dogs would certainly help, but we couldn’t just stand around while they searched. The team and the group of officers following us tried to keep up with me as I stepped off the path and started racing through the woods.

Hotch called after me to slow down, and I tried, but when we heard one of the search dogs barking south of our location, I started sprinting again. The dog kept barking to call over the entire force until his handler commanded him to stop.

I stopped at the edge of the clearing around Saltgrass Cove when I saw what the dog had found. Hotch came speeding up behind me, taking a few extra steps past before stopping, too. Spencer and JJ stopped behind us.

We were too late.

Meredith Dale’s body was lying in the middle of the clearing, covered with leaves, just as Ellen Carroll had been found. Only this time, Dale’s face wasn’t exposed. It could have been because the last body was tampered with before we got to the scene, or maybe it was because the Mill Creek Killer hadn’t come back yet to prepare or defile the body.

Detective Sheridan approached the body and pushed the leaves covering the face to the side. He cursed under his breath then started pushing the rest of the leaves away. Hotch sprang into action, running over and telling the detective to stop immediately. Sheridan halted, but didn’t move away. He looked up and Hotch asked why they shouldn’t examine the body.

“We need to leave the body as it is. He hasn’t completed the ritual yet, which means that he has to come back. And when he does, we’ll be here, waiting for him.” Hotch turned to the rest of the officers standing around, “Search the nearby area, find spots to hide in the treeline. If we’re going to catch the Mill Creek Killer at any point, it’s going to be today. Please, do not touch anything that you might think is evidence. Leave it all as it is for now. Once we catch this bastard, we’ll start to proceed with crime scene protocol.”

Everyone threw their hands up and groaned or sighed. They didn’t understand like we did how important it was to not touch a single thing. If the Mill Creek Killer was as smart as we profiled him to be, he would know if anything was out of place. Perhaps he would even know if one leaf on Meredith’s body was out of place. But by the time he would be able to get close enough to notice, we would have him. So Hotch leaned down and started covering the body again.

Everyone dispersed except for our team. We waited for Hotch to come talk to us. When he was done resetting the body, he dusted his hands off and approached us. “He’ll be back soon. She looked like she hasn’t been dead more than an hour or so. The blood was still fresh and her skin was only just now starting to grow cold. He’s rushing the process now, so we’ll likely see him in the next hour or so.”

“Should we set up watch times?” JJ questioned.

Hotch shook his head, “No. We need all eyes on this guy. It’s easier to trick people when they aren’t in large groups. We have the upperhand if we all stay. JJ and Spencer, why don’t you guys take up the north side of the clearing, Y/N and I will take this side.”

“Sure,” JJ and Spencer answered almost in unison. They smiled at each other after realizing what happened. Then, they left together to walk across the clearing towards where Hotch wanted them to stay for the next hour while we would wait.

Hotch pointed to a fallen log hiding behind a patch of bushes. “Let’s go there.”

We strolled over around the bushes and sat on the log. I wiped off the dirt from the hem of my pants. While running through the forest, mud had collected there, which was less than ideal. And we had some time to spare with stupid things like that. Besides, it was nice to not think about the dead girl a few feet away from us.

“I’m sorry,” Hotch began hesitantly. I raised a brow, but continued picking at the mud. “About yesterday…” My brow fell. “I didn’t mean to snap.”

“It’s alright,” I responded, sitting upright. “You were right. I shouldn’t have asked about it and certainly not while we’re trying to focus on a case. It was out of line.”

We both knew that this job came first for us. We had worked too damn hard to get where we were in our careers, and even though we loved each other very much, we had to respect that our careers were just as important to us. When we first started dating, we made sure to be very clear with one another that the cases come first, not our relationship. That might sound odd to others, but it was what worked for us. It was what made sense for us. It was how we made our relationship work.

“It wasn’t that.” Hotch took my hand and flipped my palm over in order to clean the dirt off my fingertips. I stared at his jawline as he stared at my hands. “Truth is, I’m scared to have that conversation right now. Ever since Haley left, I haven’t been so confident about the idea of raising a family. I hardly ever get to see Jack as it is. I couldn’t imagine having another kid and not being able to see them just as often.”

“Aaron... You don’t have to be afraid of having a family. The right person should just… get it. Your job is important to you, but, of course, you’re going to make the time you have with your family special. You do it with Jack every time you have custody of him. I don’t think for a second that Jack hates you for doing your job. In fact, I think he admires you.”

“Yeah, but we’re both gone all the time. When would we ever make time for a kid—”

“There’s someone coming,” Sheridan whispered from the trees nearby.

Hotch and I pushed ourselves off the log we were sitting on and turned towards the clearing. The Unsub had come from the direction of the hiking trail. And he approached Meredith’s body with intent, not like a civilian who had just happened upon the pile of leaves and was curious to see what was underneath. This had to be our guy.

As the Unsub crouched and reached out to brush away the leaves, we made our move. JJ and Spencer jumped out of the treeline to the north with their guns raised, while Hotch, Sheridan, and I jumped out from the south. Once we revealed ourselves, the other cops came forward from their hiding spots, too.

“FBI! Put your hands on your head and step away from the body!” Hotch shouted.

The man hunched over the body immediately put his hands behind his head and stumbled back from the body. JJ holstered her weapon, pulled out her handcuffs, and grabbed the guy. She pushed him against the tree and turned him around to get a good look at the bastard's face. We all expected her to cuff the guy then and there, and we would call it a day, but she hesitated.

“Meyers?” she questioned. We all looked around to each other for answers, but none of us had any except for JJ. “This is the reporter who has been talking to the Hollow Man,” she told us. “You’re the Mill Creek Killer?”

“What? No!” he exclaimed defensively.

“Then how the hell did you find this place?” I asked.

“I got another letter from the Hollow Man. He told me that the Mill Creek Killer had struck again and where to go for the scoop. I showed up here thinking that I was going to meet the guy, get an exclusive or something.”

JJ’s grip on Meyers fell and she took a step back. “How did he tell you this?”

“He sent me a letter. Here, take a look at it yourself.” Meyers pulled out a piece of paper from his back pocket, and while shaking harder than a chihuahua, handed it to JJ. “I swear, I didn’t do this.”

JJ looked over the letter as the sound of a helicopter flying overhead buzzed through the trees. We all looked up to see a news helicopter hovering over the crime scene. I sighed and pinched the bridge of my nose. That was our one chance of catching the Mill Creek Killer, and the Hollow Man ruined it. Fuck.

Hotch grabbed my arm and turned me around so that we could talk privately for a moment. “We can arrest him for interfering in a police investigation, question him back at the precinct, but I don’t know how much help it’ll be.”

“If you thought we were rushing before…” I began, thinking long and hard about what was going to happen next with the Mill Creek Killer. With the news hovering overhead, he was surely going to see it and we wouldn’t be able to set up another sting. “He didn’t finish the ritual. He was already in a hurry to find a new victim because we were close to finding him, but now that he hasn’t completed the one thing that gives him relief, he’ll be desperate for another. He won’t wait anymore than a day. We have to find this guy now.”

“I just don’t get it. If these guys are friends of some sort, why would the Hollow Man lead the press to the Mill Creek Killer’s crime scene?”

I considered his question. Like Hotch said, if they were friends, they wouldn’t have betrayed the other like this. Even if they were a master and apprentice duo, too, it wouldn’t unfold like this. If the Hollow Man wanted the Mill Creek Killer to be caught, he would have contacted us directly. But he didn’t. He wanted the media to connect him to the Mill Creek Killer’s cases. By doing so, he has injected himself into another part of the situation. He wasn’t getting the attention he wanted for killing those prostitutes, so he resorted to diverting the attention on the Mill Creek Killer to himself.

“They’re not friends. They’re competitors. They both want the media attention, but neither of them want to turn in the other because they are fascinated by the other murders. The Mill Creek Killer has to know that the Hollow Man did this to take his attention away. So not only was the ritual ruined, but the media high afterwards. That means he’s not going to be thinking when it comes to his next victim. He doesn’t care about being careful now. He only cares about the attention.”

“He’s going to start taking them off the streets.”

“Or from their homes, their jobs, restaurants. Anywhere.”

“Hotch,” Spencer said, nearing us, “I just got a call from the precinct. A woman called 911, said that a guy just tried to kidnap her off the street.”

“So we were right,” I told Hotch.

He scratched his temple. “Alright, Reid, we’ll drop you and JJ off at the precinct. Sort out this Hollow Man mess while we go to interview the woman to see if it’s connected.”

A crowd had gathered around the caution tape surrounding the scene. Cops were standing around in the middle of the street, trying to redirect traffic and deal with the worried bystanders. One cop, specifically, was standing at the border of the scene, likely under orders to only let us in since they were waiting for us to show up and question the victim. When Hotch and I showed our badges, the cop smiled lightly and lifted the tape up for us. We ducked ever so slightly under before heading over to where the victim was standing with two officers.

We flashed our badges again to the woman and dismissed the officers so that we could talk to her alone. She had obviously been through this process of questioning a few times already, so she was already keen to tell her story again before we could even ask her to. A sign that she was still anxious about what had just transpired— and rightfully so, too.

She began to give us a detailed account of the man who approached her, what he said to her, and then how he tried to take her. Just as we had profiled him to appear, she explained that he was very handsome— which was why she had stopped to talk to him in the first place. He had approached her and asked if she had a phone that he could borrow since his car wasn’t starting and his phone was dead. When she couldn’t find her phone and he offered her the chance to come look at the car with him, that was when she declined; and when she did, he tried to forcefully take her.

“I’d been watching the news, and saw that they were looking for a guy who has been taking women during the day. I didn’t know what to do besides scream.”

We thanked her for telling us what happened, then Hotch asked if she would be willing to sit with a sketch artist in order to give us a visual of what her attacker looked like. She was more than happy to do so, and we immediately sent her along with another officer who would take her to the precinct to meet with the artist.

As we headed back to the car, Hotch got a call from Gideon. I leaned against the side of the car while he answered. From Hotch’s side of the call, I was beginning to get the gist of what was going on. Spencer, Gideon, and Morgan had finally found the way that the Hollow Man and the Mill Creek Killer were saying connected: the classifieds in the newspaper. That was how the Hollow Man was able to tell Jim Meyers where Meredith Dale’s body was.

I pushed myself off of the car and turned to Hotch. He raised a brow while still on the phone, letting me know that he was aware I had something important to say. If they were communicating via the classifieds, then that was how we were going to lure the Mill Creek Killer into our next sting operation.

It was getting late in the day, we would likely only have another hour or so to put another message into the classifieds for the morning paper. And Spencer was perhaps the only one who knew their speech patterns well enough to write a convincing coded message. But it was our only shot— it was our last shot, really.

So I told Hotch the plan I had pieced together in my head over the last few seconds, and he relayed the information to Spencer and the team over the phone. Spencer would have to write a message to the Mill Creek Killer from the Hollow Man, telling him that he was sorry for ruining his plans with Meredith Dale, so he wanted to make it up to him by giving him the gift of another victim. The location would be hidden in the message, and in the morning, we would take an agent out there who matched the descriptions of his usual victims to play dead in order to lure him in. Since he was desperate to complete the ritual, he was sure to come. I had no doubts. He wouldn’t be thinking straight, so he would fall for the trap easily. But we had to hurry.

Hotch hung up the phone with the team so that they could start working on the message. We headed back to the precinct and managed to catch the tail end of them working on it. By that point, though, Spencer was rushing as the deadline was only twenty or so minutes away. Meanwhile, JJ was talking to Meyers about controlling the Hollow Man in the media for the next day or so to keep him distracted from the Mill Creek Killer sting, and Detective Sheridan was asking around for a female detective that was willing to sit in as our cadaver for the sting. Most of the women were understandably not too keen on the idea, but there were two girls who offered and were brought to me and Hotch for consideration.

We walked them both through the plan and what the Mill Creek Killer would likely do— but it would be in a controlled space and we wouldn’t let him get too far. We just couldn’t afford to have another mess up like with Meyers. We needed to make sure we got the right guy this time. And by the time we ran through it all with both of the women, one decided they weren’t brave enough to take on the task anymore, but the other didn’t budge and insisted that she was ready.

Everyone slept at the office that night. There was no reason to go to the hotel when there was still so much work left to be done. I hadn’t even intended to fall asleep at all. Morgan and Gideon were discussing their case with us since they were struggling to connect more clues with the Hollow Man. The last thing I remembered before falling asleep at the table was looking at the pictures from the most recent crime scene. The Hollow Man had killed a sixteen year old girl prostitute behind a dumpster and her friend was the one to find her. And there were still no leads.

When Hotch woke me up in the morning, I was laying down on the couch in the break room, which had practically been turned into a second board room for our team to work in. I figured that Hotch must have moved me at some point, because he was sitting in a chair that he placed right beside me, reading through another file while tracing light figure eights on my shoulder.

“Morning, sleepyhead,” he smiled at me as I sat up.

I stretched and yawned away my exhaustion. “What time is it?”

“8:30. We’re leaving in about thirty minutes.”

“Did you guys make any progress with the Hollow Man?”

He shook his head and I shrugged disappointedly. It wasn’t a shock, but it was still upsetting that we weren’t any closer. Granted, if we were going to catch the Mill Creek Killer later, he was sure to give up his competitor after some interrogation, so maybe it didn’t really matter in the end what they did or didn’t find while I was asleep.

I stood up and stretched again for extra measure, acutely aware that Hotch was staring at me out of the corner of his eye. After a moment of waking myself up, I strolled over to the coffee pot and poured myself a cup before offering Hotch one, too. He accepted the offer and I poured another cup full, then walked back over to the couch. I handed him his drink as I sat down. I leaned forward and propped both of my elbows up on his knee closest to me and kept the warm rim of the cup pressed against my lips so that I could smell the coffee while also warming up my nose from the steam.

“What are you looking at?”

“We got the sketch back from yesterday’s victim,” he answered, holding the drawing up for me to see.

He was almost exactly how I imagined him. He was definitely attractive, if you could get past the fact that he was a total sociopath. His face was square. His eyes were light, bright, and wide. His lips were perk, perfect for kissing— which was always an unconscious factor people tended to put into consideration when it came to potential partners. And most noticeable about his appearance was his hair. He was clean shaven, and his hair was short and nicely cut. He didn’t match any physical features one would expect from a textbook sociopath. But that was definitely a reason why we hadn’t found him yet and why these women were so interested in going with him somewhere private. He didn’t look at all scary. That was what made him dangerous.

“Well, at least we’ll know if we get the right guy this time,” I laughed.

Hotch chuckled slightly but bit it back when he realized that he had let it escape him. My smile faded and I stared at his cheek for a second before feeling the urge to look at his eyes again. I let go of the coffee cup with one hand and went to hold his face in my palm. His skin was so cold compared to my warm hand, and he noticed it, too, right away. I dragged my thumb down his jawline, applying slight pressure towards his chin to make him look at me. He leaned into my touch, his eyes falling shut as he relaxed.

“We’re going to get this guy,” I reassured him. “And then we get to go home and see Jack.” He smiled at the thought. “We’re going to be okay.”

He opened his eyes and leaned towards me before kissing me. “We’re going to be okay,” he whispered against my lips. I kissed him again eagerly.

The door to the break room opened. Hotch and I immediately pulled away and looked over. “Hotch, Y/N—” JJ had come in hurriedly, but was slowly realizing that she had interrupted and regretted not knocking. “Sorry… Uh. We’re getting ready to head out. You guys should gear up.”

“Thanks, JJ,” I said. She smiled politely and backed out of the room much faster than she had come in. I started laughing once the door closed behind her. Hotch looked me up and down and started laughing, too. “Well…” I shrugged before kissing him again.

At the sting operation site, a makeup artist sat with the detective who was going to lay down as the body so as to make her look convingly dead. While JJ and Spencer were covering her body in leaves, Hotch and I reviewed the plan with her one more time. It was very possible that the Mill Creek Killer would come up to her and touch her, but we wouldn’t let him get much further than that. She just had to stay still until we decided to reveal ourselves. She would be okay, we promised that much.

When she was ready, we helped her lay down without rustling any of the leaves, then covered her face. Afterwards, when she looked as the other victims had, we all retreated into the forest to hide until the Mill Creek Killer would show up. I checked my watch to see that we had only five minutes until he was supposed to show up— at least according to the note we put in the classifieds. He could possibly have been too scared to show up on time, so we had to expect that he could perhaps show up late.

Hotch and I didn’t sit down or talk this time around. The stakes were too high to think about anything other than catching this asshole once and for all. I wouldn’t let him get away again. I couldn’t. And I was sure that the rest of the team felt the same way. In fact, I knew it. JJ looked as nervous as I did, Hotch’s silence told me that he was focusing on not jumping out too soon, and Spencer was searching the treeline frantically for any sign of movement.

Nearly five more minutes after the Unsub was supposed to arrive, we heard rustling in the forest coming from across where we stood. As a man walked into the clearing, he kept his head low, focusing only on the girl covered by leaves laying before him. He chuckled to himself and giddy approached the detective. He crouched down, tore off his jacket, and pulled out a tube of lipstick from one of the pockets.

Once we saw the lipstick, we knew we finally had the Mill Creek Killer. The lipstick was his signature. He wouldn’t complete the ritual without it.

“Go,” I ordered quietly. Simultaneously, we all jumped out of the bushes and into the clearing with our weapons raised. Hotch ran at the Unsub and tackled him before he could put a finger on the detective. She sat up, her weapon pointed at him as Hotch put his knee on the Mill Creek Killer’s lower back and started handcuffing him. I turned to the detective, “You alright?” She nodded. “Good.” I held out a hand, she took it, then I pulled her up to her feet.

We did it. We won. We got the son of a bitch.

criminal minds family: @peggy1999 @gorgeousdarkangel @marvelismylifffe @alex--awesome--22

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