The conference room that the BAU had set up in is practically a revolving door for the remainder of the case. Everybody drops by at some point, but mostly to riffle through some files and book it once they find what they need. Reid stays for a while after a bus full of people were killed by the unsub. He's tasked with trying to understand the escalation. Between the two of you, the working theory is that the bus was chosen as a message for the team. Reid puts the numbers together and you feed Garcia what you've worked out. She calls you back in under five minutes, sounding panicked.

"The survivor? Foyet?" she reminds you. "You were right about the significance of the bus route. All of the street addresses matching the numbers of the stops are linked to his identities."

"I'll call Hotch." you offer. Bitterly, you add "He's hunting Foyet, and now he's taunting us."

While Garcia sends a full list of the survivor's addresses and aliases, you explain the finding to Hotch.

"We're going to have to split up and cover all of them."

JJ and Reid both haul ass out of the station.

You've never been pulled from a field operation before. When you're sitting at the table listening to the team's communications, you feel a pang of sympathy for Garcia. Plenty of cases involve some sort of chase, and she probably doesn't know what happened until the unsub is caught.

The news crackles into your ears that an agent is down. You try to recount whose voices you've heard most recently, but you can't focus on two things at a time. You opt to listen to the comms. For several minutes, there's just commotion.

Then Hotch is calling your name.

"Morgan was knocked unconscious. We're sending him in an ambulance to a hospital now. I need you to meet him at the emergency room and keep an eye on him. I'll send you the address. Got it?" His tone is tight and short.

"Got it." you confirm.

The emergency room receptionist directs you to have a seat. You flash your badge and ask about his condition again. This time, she agrees to send a nurse out to talk to you.

You wait for a minute with your head between your knees, trying to avoid the sterile fluorescence beating down on you.

"Agent?" a nurse approaches you. "He's alright, he'll be cleared to go in a few minutes."

You thank him. Your nerves have been calmed somewhat by the news that Morgan is fine, but you still want to see it to believe it.

Your phone buzzes with a text.

"Foyet is dead."

You hadn't met him, but Hotch had worked with him during the original investigation. By all accounts, he was a nice man who was about to get married and start a new life. He'd spent the last ten years running from the man who killed the love of his life and tried to kill him.

"C.O.D?" You send back. He could have been killed by whoever attacked Morgan, but it's possible he went into cardiac arrest, or killed himself, or any number of other ways to die.

"He bled out. There's at least two quarts of his blood on the floor. Unsub took the body with him."

Away from the field, you have more time to think about the killing than you would if you were on your feet. What a horrible way to die. You try to imagine seeing the man you've run from for ten years, the man who ruined your life, in your kitchen. You try to imagine the kind of injuries it would take to spill that much blood. You try to imagine how it would feel to die in the arms of that man as he drags your body out.

Field or not, you can't turn off the profiler part of your brain. It's a significant change of M.O. It would make sense for an M.O. to change for a victim he's been waiting ten years to kill, but it doesn't fit the profile. This unsub thrives on fear and fame. He doesn't have a use for a body unless he's devolving somehow. Necrophilia is unlikely, given the lack of sexual interest in all of the previous victims. Maybe he has some sort of stunt lined up? Putting the body somewhere public?

"Hey, kid."

Your head snaps up. In front of you is Derek Morgan, looking as pretty as ever.

"Hey," you smile. "How do you feel?"

"I've been better, but I've been worse."

"What did the doctor tell you?"

"I got the all clear- nothing broken, no concussion, nothing."

Relief sets in. "We should head back to the station. Ready?"

You dial Hotch while you walk to the car. The line is busy, so you call Prentiss.

You fill her in on Morgan.

"Hey, Em?" you stop her before she ends the call. "What do you think about the body being moved?"

"We don't have a good theory yet. Foyet was clearly special, but I don't know what would make him break his pattern."

"If he had time to move the body of an adult man, he had enough time to place objects and follow his pattern. What could he need Foyet's body for so badly that he threw out his own method?" you muse.

"We're missing something." she states what you're both thinking.

"Maybe Foyet was significant for some other reason than being the survivor? We know the unsub pays attention to the women more than the men- maybe something about Foyet's relationship made him stand out, and the failure to kill him compounded to make him the ultimate victim?"

"I'll see what Garcia has on the girlfriend. You make sure Morgan gets delivered safely, okay?"

Morgan's phone rings as you pull into the parking lot of the station. He puts it on speaker.

Prentiss gives you the cliff notes. "Guys, Foyet is the reaper. He faked his death. We have a location for him now- Morgan, I need you to meet us here as soon as you can."

You hop out of the driver's seat. Your comms click on and you stand on the pavement in front of the station as you watch Morgan drive off.

Then, for the second time that day, you find yourself listening to your team coordinate a raid.

"How'd you figure it out?" you type out to Garcia. As smart as the team is, this is the sort of case it would take Garcia to crack.

"Hotch had me look into Foyet. He had only met the girl he said he wanted to propose to four weeks before the killing. His aliases were all hired as computer science substitutes and fired for inappropriate conduct with teen girls." she sends back. "How are you feeling?"

Your ears are filled with the sounds of the team entering an apartment and trying to deescalate the situation inside. Hotch is trying to convince Foyet not to kill whoever was inside.

"It's tough to sit and listen to it." you write.

Your phone buzzes: "You never get used to it."

Despite Foyet insisting he'll kill what you think is a reporter, things seem to be going well. Hotch's voice is clear and steady as he lists the reasons Foyet won't do it.

Morgan's voice interrupts. "Where is it, you son of a bitch?". The sound of handcuffs closing reach your ears.

"I'm gonna be more famous than you even realize." George Foyet hisses at the team. Then the audio is cut.

You wait on the pavement until the team pulls into the lot. Officers from the station take Foyet from Hotch and bring him inside.

The rest of the team stands in a huddle with you while Hotch stares through the glass doors and watches Foyet disappear inside.

Then he turns to the group. His frown makes his features sharper.

"Let's go home." he orders.

It's only an hour flight back to D.C, which is fortunate because Morgan and Hotch are both radiating anger for most of it. Afterwards, Hotch insists on everybody going home.

"I'll see you all at nine on Monday."

"Nine? Aren't we lucky." Prentiss snorts under her breath.

A/N:

ik this wasn't the wildest ch, but now foyet is officially a bad guy so i promise things will go sideways before too long
also i forgot to mention last time that ch 27 brought us to over 30k words and over 100pages in my google doc which is crazy!!!!

happy saturday!

"Die hard, die kicking, old habit of mine" The Mountain Goats