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𝑷 𝑶 𝑽
❝ 𝚊𝚛𝚎 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚜𝚎𝚛𝚒𝚘𝚞𝚜? 𝚛𝚒𝚐𝚑𝚝 𝚒𝚗 𝚏𝚛𝚘𝚗𝚝 𝚘𝚏 𝚖𝚢 𝚜𝚒𝚗𝚒𝚐𝚊𝚗𝚐? ❞

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ㅤ"𝐖𝐇𝐀𝐓 𝐈𝐒 𝐒𝐇𝐄 𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐆?" Emily asked with a frown as she looked towards Finley from the break room as she sipped on some coffee. The brunette in question was happily eating from two food containers while swaying slightly as she listened to something from her earphones, eyes trained on her phone that was propped up on a tissue box.

"Better yet, what is she watching?" Derek scoffed in amusement, sipping his own coffee while standing next to her, also observing Finley.

Spencer, who was sat beside her, had turned to her in confusion. He figured that Finley probably didn't realize she was actually singing...chanting out loud. He tried to tune into her what she was saying under her breath, glancing at her phone's screen.

"Snape, Snape, Severus Snape. Snape, Snape, Severs Snape--Dumbledore," she muttered.

The genius was baffled. He was familiar with the characters—having been forced by Finley to read the entire Harry Potter series, swearing he was a textbook Ravenclaw—but he couldn't understand what she was doing. He hesitantly tapped her on the shoulder, causing her to lift her head up and pull out a bud.

"Yeah?" She asked, confused. She was still holding her spoon in midair, as the genius cut her off from shoving a spoonful of sinigang na bangus with rice into her mouth.

"What...what are you chanting?"

"'The Mysterious Ticking Noise.'"

"The what?"

Finley could only raise her eyebrows in amusement before they were all called into the round table by JJ with a new case in hand. She immediately closed up her food containers—one holding the rice and the other holding the viand—and stored it carefully into her go-bag to make sure it doesn't spill.

I'll just finish all that in the plane, she thought to herself before following the rest of the team. She was sat in between Derek and Rossi.

Emily was the last one in, walking into the room while asking, "Hey, where's Hotch?"

"Budget meeting," JJ replied as she arranged the case files. Finley had immediately opened hers, skimming through the papers and the photos of decapitated heads.

"Maybe he'll get us a raise," Derek joked, still nursing his cup of coffee.

"They're cutting, not raising," Rossi interjected. "I just hope they don't take the coffee."

"I'd quit," Spencer chuckled while taking down a few notes.

"Oh, yeah. That'll save 'em like fifty bucks a week."

This made Finley snort, right before taking a sip of her cold water from her insulated water bottle that she swears tastes different than warm water. She even puts ice in it because she finds that cold water tastes better.

"He'll meet us on the plane," JJ informed them.

"Where are we going?" Emily wondered.

"Last night, three decapitated heads were found in front of a sheriff's station in the small border town of Terlingua, Texas," JJ began as she pulled up images on the screen. Finley raised her eyebrows at this.

"Three victims at once?" Rossi asked.

"Actually, they appear to be in different stages of decomposition," Finley frowned, looking at the photos closely.

"ME confirmed that one of the heads is a day or so old," JJ told them. "The other two appear to have died a few months ago, but the wound edges suggest that they were decapitated recently."

"Dirt in their mouth, ears, and nose," Spencer noted as he held a picture up closer to his face as he studied them. "At some point, these two heads were buried."

"And then dug up," Derek added.

"Okay, so why the sudden need to display them?" Emily thought out loud.

"The need may not be so sudden," Penelope said as soon as she walked in, her heels clacking as she marched around the table to the only empty chair next to Spencer. "Mexico, in 2009 alone, ten heads in coolers, and the people belonging to these heads were killed just hours before they were found. Result of a battle between feuding drug cartels."

This information made Finley fall back into her seat, sighing. She rubbed her eyes a little, fighting away the want to drop her head onto the table in exasperation.

"DEA's not interested?" Derek frowned as he asked JJ.

"They asked us to take a look at it," she answered. "Considering the different decomposition, this might not even be about drugs."

"Then...what do we have?" Rossi pondered.

Emily was the one who spoke up next. "Well, the victims are two males, one female, so no gender preference. Staging the heads in front of a sheriff's station...that's aggressive."

"It's a message," Finley theorized, earning her a nod from Emily.

"All three victims are Hispanic," Derek observed.

"And unidentified," JJ nodded. "Terlingua has a large illegal population. It's made ID-ing the victims that much harder."

"He might be trying to make some type of political statement. Volunteer border patrols do a lot of personal policing down there."

"Groups like the Minutemen prize law and order above everything else," Rossi pointed out. "And those patrols serve their political agenda. Murder would be bad for their image."

"Staging the heads in front of a police in front of a police station suggests that the unsub might be local," Emily offered. "He'd have to have a knowledge about how to do something like that without being seen." She turned towards the screen. "So what we have is hundreds of miles of unincorporated desert...and an endless supply of anonymous victims crossing the border everyday."

Derek stared at the screen. "It's a serial killer's perfect storm."

As soon as she settled in the plane, Finley rushed to the back and pulled out her food, setting it carefully onto the table in front of her. She still listened to their brainstorming, but chose not to speak up as she began eating, sitting comfortably on the leather seat. She slowly opened her containers to make sure not to spill on her clothes.

She was wearing a loose button-up that was a dark, grayish orange, tucked into an equally loose, olive-green pair of slacks, held together by a brown, leather belt. She had on her usual white gold necklace, and studs in her multiple ear piercings as accessories, while her hair was in a low bun. She tied everything off with a pair of brown Doc Martens oxfords. 

Hotch was sitting on the bench-thing on the side, right in front of her, as he spoke up, "The Lugo cartel killed two DEA agents last year."

"We're going to need to watch our backs," Derek stated as he assembled the MP-5's, snickering at the sight of Finley burning her tongue as she sipped some broth. "To cartels, feds are fair game. There's even usually a bounty, so...we're gonna bring in the toys."

"Be careful with those," Hotch instructed, turning back to face Derek. "I don't need broken MP-5's on our budget."

"Guys, here's the thing," Spencer spoke up. "I don't think I technically have authorization to carry a weapon like that."

"You don't," Hotch and Derek emphasized in unison. This caused Finley to nearly choke on her kangkong, especially when she glanced at Spencer who turned to her in concern after hearing her cough, while looking like a kicked puppy. She silently cooed.

"You know, we're going to have a victim pool that is extremely hesitant to talk to us," Emily told them.

Hotch began giving off assignments. "Prentiss, you and Morgan start with the migrant community, see what inroads you can make. Stress that we're only there to catch a killer. Rossi, Reid, and Finn," he tilted his head at her as she practically inhaled her rice, "the ME is waiting to show you the heads."

"Are you serious? Right in front of my sinigang?" Finley quietly whined.

Not hearing her, Rossi lifted up a picture. "Maybe they can tell us something."

Finley grumbled under her breath, snagging a piece of fish with her spoon before scooping some rice. She was about to shove it into her mouth when she realized everyone was looking at her—Spencer had turned his entire body and was leaning against the back of his chair—while her mouth was wide open.

She slowly closed her mouth a tad insecurely. "What?"

JJ let out a huff of amusement. "You're still eating?"

"Well, I can't let all this go to waste!" She exclaimed, putting her spoon down. "I woke up an hour earlier than usual just to cook this!"

"You know, people who eat in airplanes or eat airplane food often complain how bland it is, and that's mostly because of the low pressure and low humidity levels," Spencer began rattling off, earning him an amused look from Finley. "Studies show that this reduces the sensitivity of our taste buds to sweet and salty foods by around thirty percent, while sour, bitter, and umami flavored foods are generally unaffected."

"Well, thank God my food is sour and umami flavored," Finley teased. Spencer's face contorted into one of slight admiration when he realized that she actually paid attention to his words.

"What is that anyway?" Emily asked, gesturing to her two food containers.

Finley lifted one up, "Rice," she put down that one and lifted the other, "Sinigang na bangus, it's a Filipino dish. One of my favorites, actually. Y'all want some?"

"Absolutely," Derek nodded, walking over to her. He gestured to her spoon. "You mind?"

"Not at all."

She watched in amusement as he tried out her food, following her instructions to at least douse the rice with broth first before grabbing a piece of fish or vegetable from the viand, and putting all that together on the spoon.

"Go on," she encouraged. She smiled when he took his first spoonful and began chewing.

"It's good," he nodded. She grinned triumphantly, taking her spoon back. "It's a little sour, but the fish balances it out. What kind of fish is this?"

"Bangus, milkfish."

"C-Can I have some?" Spencer suddenly spoke up, earning him amused smiles from the others. It's becoming blatantly obvious that the genius had taken a liking to their newest member.

"Sure," Finley smiled, doing her little routine before walking closer to him while holding the container filled with rice to make sure nothing on the spoon spills down to the floor.

Everyone's eyes were trained on the two, and even Penelope was trying her hardest to see the interaction. Rossi luckily held up the laptop and had the camera trained on the two, right before Finley fed Spencer. Penelope had to hold back her squeal at the sight.

Both Emily and JJ held back their giggles, each placing a hand over their mouths to hide their grins. Derek was not at all hiding his amusement from the two young geniuses, clapping a little while sharing a look with Hotch had to look down to hide his smile. Rossi was still holding the laptop, now with a smirk on his face.

"What do you think?" Finley asked, keeping eye contact with Spencer who had begun chewing, his hazel eyes so soft and tender, almost lovingly.

"It's good."

"I'm glad."

"You know, contrary to popular belief, decapitation is not that easy," Spencer said, staring at the heads that were stored inside large jar containers. Rossi and Finley were stood a little ways from him, observing the heads from a distance.

"Hmm, you don't often hear popular and decapitation in the same sentence," Rossi commented. Finley held back a giggle at his words.

"You need to strike on the weakest point of the spine," the genius informed them, "it's normally between the C3 and C7 vertebrae."

"Should I be worried?" Finley joked. Spencer looked at her with a shy smile before continuing.

"There are multiple strikes," he leaned down again to take a closer look, "but they don't show any hesitation."

"I realize you didn't have much to work with here," Rossi told the ME who looked at him. "But outside of the obvious, was there anything unusual about these victims?"

Finley shifted her stance to face the ME as she answered. "Well, the second victim appeared to have been blind, if not completely, then he had cataracts bad enough that it was difficult for him to get around."

"What about the other two?" Finley asked.

"No."

"The most recent victim is older," Spencer noted. "So is the first one, the woman."

"Well, I only had the teeth to go by so it would take some time to get an accurate age." At this point, even Rossi had leaned down to examine the heads. Finley opted not to join the two. "But, yeah, I'd agree. They were older."

Rossi stood up straight. "We're looking for something that we call a signature. Something that all the victims share. Some physical mark, something postmortem," he listed, walking closer to the ME.

"Well, I don't know if this is what you mean," the ME frowned. "But they all had sand residue in their noses and throats."

"Could that be from being buried?" Finley frowned.

"Possibly. But the trachea and the nasal passage, they were kinda torn up. If I had the lungs here, I'd guess that they were full of sand as well."

"You mean like the breathed in the sand?" Spencer clarified.

"Forcefully enough that it lacerated the passages."

Rossi turned to make eye contact with the younger agents as he put the pieces together. "They were running."

author's note: now i want some sinigang :<

anyway, sinigang na bangus is a filipino dish that i absolutely love!! if y'all can cook one or eat one somewhere, you should. it doesn't have to be bangus (milkfish), it can also be shrimp, or even meat. its really good.

also, kangkong is also called water spinach or chinese spinach in english, just in case y'all don't know what that is. it's commonly referred to as kangkong in southeast asia. 

i hope you guys liked this chapter! and don't worry, there aren't any easter eggs in this one, just a regular ol' chapter :) i'll probably be swift with this episode, i really don't wanna drag this out because it's not that integral to the story, but i wanted to introduce it still, mostly so i can add that little scene with spence and finn.

the whole time while writing that i was just:

i'll also probably breeze through the other episodes, not unless finn can actually 'relate' to the cases....if ya know what i mean *wink wonk*