Imagination is the one wpn in the war gnst reality

caro // 39 // married/kids // she/her

[resslersprentiss]

Criminal Minds (2005-) | Aaron Hotchner | 4x03

[buspir-deactivated20230127]

the notes are broken 😂

[calvin-reads-problem-sleuth]

Reblogging partly for awesome computer shortcuts, and partly because I wish to once again take part in a Post That Broke The Notes. 

[lookitsmorefandomtrash-deactiva]

WAH

[dreamyorion84]

Awesome info!

[the-last-rat-standing]

You may be old, but are you 'Windows 95 Defrag' old?

[dreamyorion84]

Yes, I am absolutely that old and do remember this :-)

[sequinsmile-x]

Stained Glass Windows - Chapter Forty Five

Life was complicated, but they wouldn't have it any other way.

-x-

Hi friends!

As always, thank you so so much for your love on this fic. This chapter takes us over 150k for this fic and it means more than I could ever say how much you love this version of them.

This chapter includes inspiration from an ask I got from @dreamyorion84 a little while ago who wanted to read something where Dave talks to Emily and/or Aaron about his son James whom he lost.

Please keep that is a subject discussed in part of this chapter in mind if that is something you could struggle with <3

Please do let me know what you think!

-x-

Words: 3k

A full list of warnings for the fic can be found on the Series Master List and will be updated as we go along. Please note the additional warning mentioned above relevant to this chapter only.

Read over on Ao3, or below the cut

She can’t explain the anxiety she feels when Aaron suggests that they go to the park with Jack and Lily. His smile soft as he says the weather was perfect for it, the early evenings finally slightly cooler now autumn was approaching, and that it was a good way for Jack to burn off some of his seemingly endless energy. She knows she can’t argue with his logic, that it would be nice to go somewhere just the four of them, but anytime she thinks about taking Lily anywhere outside of their home she feels overwhelmed. Anxiety steals her breath as she watches Aaron pack the diaper bag, his attention to detail as diligent as ever as he makes sure to pack everything they need for a newborn even on a short excursion. 

The anxiety bubbles deep in Emily’s gut, burning against the scar she bore for bringing her daughter into the world. The scar she was still getting used to whenever she spotted it in the mirror, another change to her body that pregnancy had brought along, one she’d been entirely unprepared for. She clears her throat as she sways side to side, her gaze drifting between Lily, who was strapped to her chest in the baby wrap, and Aaron as he double-checks his work on the diaper bag. 

“Maybe…” she drifts off, the thought dying as it’s halfway out, not sure how she would explain even to herself how she was feeling. She loves being a mom, loves her little girl and Jack more than she thought she ever would, but there were moments when she struggled with how much it had changed her. 

She’d never felt further away from the woman whose job meant she faced danger every day. The woman who would chase down serial killers with her gun drawn whilst wearing healed boots. Now she felt undone by the thought of going to the park. Every terrible thing she knew about the world and the people in it threatening to overwhelm her in a way that made her want to keep Lily and Jack inside forever where she could keep them safe. 

She tightens her hold on Lily a little, something that was unnecessary anyway since the baby was secured to her in the wrap, as a voice in the back of her head tells her she hadn’t been able to do that when her little girl was being born. That her body had failed to do things correctly, putting them both in danger she still felt the sharp edge of most days. 

She had Aaron hadn’t talked about it in any depth. Neither of them sure how to bring up how it felt for them, both too afraid of upsetting the other when emotions were still high in their house from a lack of sleep and the stress that came from having a newborn. She knows they need to speak about it eventually, that she wants and needs to know how he felt whilst she was having surgery, and that she needs to try to find a way to put it all into words. To explain to him that, even though she and Lily were fine, she felt like she’d had something stolen from her because she’d been unconscious when her baby was born. The moment she’d been thinking of for months pulled out from underneath her, forcing her to lose the footing she knew she hadn’t gained back yet. 

Aaron smiles softly as he sets the diaper bag down and walks over, wrapping his arm around Emily, and smiling down at Lily for a moment before he turns his attention back to his wife.

“Em,” He says, his hand running up and down her back, “Tell me what-”

“I’m ready!” Jack exclaims as he runs into the room, his soccer ball clutched in his hands as he beams at them, “I got my ball so we can show Lily how good I am at soccer.” 

Emily smiles, his excitement dampening her anxiety a little his wide smile every bit as enchanting to her as it had been the first time she’d met him. It felt like an honour to be part of his life in the way she was, to see how he’d changed so much in the two years she’d been with Aaron, and she feels excited at the prospect of watching Lily grow up too. 

“Lily would love that,” she says, peeking down at her daughter and seeing she was fast asleep, something that would likely continue the entire time they were out. She steps away from her husband, not missing how he chases her with his embrace, his fingers falling from her back once she’s finally out of reach, “We should get going though so we’re back in time for dinner.” 

“Em,” Aaron says, stepping towards her, concern for her and the clear fear he’d seen flash in her eyes at the prospect of taking Lily out making his chest tight. She turns to look at him, her eyes wide as she nods down towards Jack. 

“Later,” she says, only half-meaning it, not sure how she can talk to him about any of this without making him worry about her any more than he already did, “Can you get the diaper bag?” 

He pauses, briefly considering putting a stop to this. Distracting Jack with the prospect of just kicking the ball around their backyard whilst he tried to talk to his wife about what was bothering her. But he stops himself, the quiet desperation in Emily’s eyes for him to drop it and the excitement shining out of Jack’s forcing him to simply nod as he grabs the diaper bag. The pale yellow elephants dancing across the material standing out against his outfit of dark jeans and a black polo shirt. 

“Let’s get going, the sooner we get there the sooner we can get home.” 

He lets himself pretend that he doesn’t see his wife swallow thickly, or the way she adjusts her hold on the baby in her arms. 

“Come on, sweet girl,” she says, dropping a kiss to Lily’s dark hair, “Let’s go watch Daddy and Jack play soccer.” 

___

Emily has just put Lily down, the baby barely relaxed on the mattress in her bassinet, when she hears a knock on the front door. She freezes, standing perfectly still for a second as she waits for her daughter to wake up. She’s grateful when nothing happens, when Lily continues to sleep, and she smiles before she grabs the baby monitor, heading downstairs to answer the front door before whoever is there knocks again, something she is sure would be pushing her luck with Lily sleeping through her whole nap for once. 

Whoever she thought she’d find on the other side of the door when she looks through the peephole, she hadn’t expected it to be Dave. She feels a flash of panic as she thinks about the last time she’d heard from Aaron, how he’d sent her a text explaining he’d be a little late because he’d been pulled into a meeting he couldn’t get out of. She opens the door and comes face to face with her friend.

“Dave, is everything okay?” 

He smiles softly at her, the relaxed nature of it putting out the fire of her anxiety before it could spread, “Everything is fine, Bella,” he assures her, walking into the house as she steps back to let him in, “I know Aaron is stuck at work so I thought I’d come to see you and Mini Bella.” 

She smiles as she closes the front door and turns to him, “I hate to break it to you but the littlest Hotchner is currently asleep. Coffee?”

Dave smiles and nods as they walk towards the kitchen, “That’s okay, as adorable as she is I mostly came by to see you,” he leans against the kitchen counter and looks at her, a glimmer in his eyes that she recognises from when he’s speaking to suspects on a case, the way he could pull information out of people second to none, “You’re much better to have a conversation with than she is.” 

She narrows her eyes at him as places down the baby monitor and she switches on the coffee machine, her arms crossed over her chest as she looks him up and down, “What did Aaron say to you?” 

Since the trip to the park a few days ago she’d been avoiding speaking to Aaron about how she was feeling about everything. Dodging the conversation even though she desperately wanted to have it. Coping mechanisms she was sure she’d rid herself of sneaking their way back in after he’d helped her push them all away months ago. Exhaustion and everything with her parents that had happened recently allowing her to regress into old habits. 

“He didn’t say anything,” Dave assures her, and she knows he’s telling the truth, “But he’s worried and he’s not hiding it,” he says, shrugging as he pushes his hands into the pockets in his pants, “And the only person who can break down his defences like that is you.” 

Emily stares at him for a moment before clearing her throat and turning her attention to the coffee machine as it beeps, indicating the coffee is ready. She pours two cups of it, making sure hers is smaller than she would have poured herself before because she was breastfeeding, and she sighs. 

“I’m fine, Dave,” she says, turning and smiling tightly at him as she hands him his coffee.

He takes the cup offered to him and stares at her for a moment, clearly using the skills they both had against her, “Well, no one would blame you if you weren’t,” he says, pausing to take a sip of his coffee, “You had traumatic labour, you were worried something would happen to your baby. That’s a lot for anyone to go through, even someone as good at compartmentalising as you.” 

She clenches her teeth as she looks down at the ground, her grip on her coffee cup briefly tightening. Irritation at her friend for hitting the nail on the head making her tense, “Dave-”

“And I know you’re probably resistant to talk to Aaron about it because you know he’s struggling with what happened too,” he says, cutting off what they both knew would have been a denial of everything he’d said, “But you need to talk to him about it, to understand what each other went through so you can move forward. Otherwise…you risk letting it be the first thing that grows between you.” 

She smiles wryly, letting it cover the almost visceral reaction she had to the thought of this causing damage to her marriage. She takes a sip of her coffee, “What makes you such an expert?” 

His smile turns sad and he sighs, “I had a son,” he says and she frowns, her breath catching in her chest, “He was called James.” 

She stutters uncharacteristically, “Dave…I…” she drifts off, unsure what to say as he looks at the ground.

“He died the same day he was born, he didn’t live for very long and Caroline, my wife, and I…we never talked about it,” he shakes his head at himself, “It was the 70s so we were encouraged not to, to accept that it was ‘just one of those things’ but…it was the beginning of the end for us,” he looks up at her and smiles, “You idiots love each other so much it puts what Caroline and I had to shame, so just talk to each other. For me?” 

She nods absentmindedly, swallowing thickly as she tries to grapple with what she’s been told, the part of his past that her friend had revealed to her. Something he clearly rarely, if ever, spoke about.

“Dave, I’m so sorry,” she says, the thought of it pushing her almost to tears, something she forces back, aware that this wasn’t about her but her friend and what he’d kept to himself for so long, “What…if you don’t mind telling me…what happened?” 

He smiles sadly, “Same thing as with you and Lily,” he says carefully, watching as she reacts without meaning to, her eyes going wide, “Except back then c-sections were a last resort, not the first thing they did when the chord became visible,” he sighs, “If they’d done what they did for you…he probably would have lived.” 

She feels guilt overwhelm her, stealing the breath from her lungs as she steps towards him, “I’m sorry, I-”

“You have nothing to be sorry for, Bella,” he says, “Nothing. And I’m not saying this to compare battle scars, what happened with James doesn’t invalidate what happened with you and Lily. It’s still a trauma, it’s still something you need to recover from,” he pulls her into a hug, one she returns gladly, “It’s still something you need to talk to your husband about.” 

She nods against him, tightening her hold on him, everything she knew about him, how he looked after everyone on the team, making more sense than it ever had. 

“Okay,” she promises, the word chased by a cry upstairs, echoed by the sound coming out of the baby monitor. She chuckles as she pulls back and smiles at him, patting him on the arm, “Come on Uncle Dave,” she says, grabbing the baby monitor as she starts to lead him upstairs, “Let’s see if Lily likes your singing any more than she did the last time you came over.” 

___

She paces the bedroom as she rocks Lily back and forth, softly singing as she smiles down at her sleepy face, the baby fighting sleep even though she was milk-drunk and already halfway there. 

“Bonne nuit, cher trésor,

Ferme tes yeux et dors.

Laisse ta tête, s'envoler,

Au creux de ton oreiller.

Un beau rêve passera,

Et tu l'attraperas.

Un beau rêve passera,

Et tu le retiendras.”

She looks up as the bedroom door opens and she smiles at her husband as he walks in, his exhaustion from a long day at work clear. 

“I love it when you sing in French,” he says, walking over to kiss Emily and smiling down at Lily, “Can I take her?”

“Of course,” Emily replies, handing her over resting against Aaron’s side as she looks at her daughter, “She’s doing her usual fighting sleep thing.” 

He smiles as he settles Lily against his chest, his palm still almost the same size as her back as he holds her in place, “Is that right, Lily-Pad?” 

“Don’t call her that-”

“Maybe Mommy should sing some more,” he says, smiling when he cuts Emily off at her protest at the nickname he’d started to use as a joke but had somehow stuck. He looks at his wife, “Is Mommy going to sing for us?” 

She rolls her eyes at her husband and rests her head on his shoulder, wrapping her arms around his waist as she looks at her daughter, restarting the same lullaby she’d been singing when he walked in. 

“Bonne nuit-”

“Can you sing it in English?” He asks, and she looks at him, her confused frown turning into a smile as embarrassment flashes in his eyes, “So I can understand.” 

She nods and presses a kiss to his lips before she starts again.

“Good night, dear treasure,

Close your eyes and sleep.

Let your head fly away

In the hollow of your pillow.

A beautiful dream will pass,

And you will catch it.

A beautiful dream will pass,

And you will remember it.”

She smiles as she realises Lily has finally fallen asleep, her cheek squished against Aaron’s chest, and then she looks back up at Aaron, her eyebrows furrowing as he just stares at her. 

“What?” She asks, her cheeks flushing, “The lyrics don’t always make sense when you translate them directly.”

He kisses her and steps away to set Lily down in the bassinet, laying her down expertly so she doesn’t wake up. He turns back to his wife and pulls her into his arms.

“It’s not that,” he says, stamping a kiss against her lips as he pulls her closer, his palms against her back, “You’re just an amazing mom,” he says, warmth spreading inside his chest as she beams at him, her smile wide and genuine. 

She bites her lower lip, her cheeks warm with the praise, and she curses the fact she’s still at least two weeks away from being able to have sex with her husband. 

“Well,” she says, playing with the collar of his shirt, “You’re a pretty amazing father,” she says, leaning in to kiss him, “And a fantastic husband,” she sighs softly as she thinks of the conversation she’d had with Dave earlier, the heaviness of it still weighing on her, “I’m sorry I’ve been…a bit distant recently.” 

He pulls her closer, “Oh, sweetheart, no you have nothing to apologise for,” he assures her, “I’ve been worried but…that’s just because I love you.” 

She nods, tears blurring her vision as her eyes search his, “And I love you too, so much, but I don’t know if I’m ready to talk about it quite yet. I still…”

“Need to process,” he finishes for her, tucking some of her hair behind her ear, “I know sweetheart,” he says, leaning forward and kissing her forehead, “I know.” 

“As soon as I am though…I promise we’ll talk about all of it.” 

He smiles and pulls her into a hug, stamping a kiss against her temple, “I know we will,” he assures her, kissing her temple again before he pulls back, “Come on,” he says, linking their hands together as he leads her towards the hallway, grabbing the baby monitor as he goes, “Let’s try and eat a hot meal before she wakes up again.” 

She chuckles as she leans against him, wrapping both of her arms around one of his, her cheek against his shoulder, “We could be so lucky.” 

-x-

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[dreamyorion84]

Thank you!!

[milla984]

Thomas Gibson and Mandy Patinkin as Dr. Daniel Nyland/Aaron Hotchner and Dr. Jeffrey Geiger/Jason Gideon Chicago Hope S02E03 (1995) Criminal Minds S01E04 (2005)

@redwithjoon, @callm3c0nfus3d, @reidsbookclub

[the-last-rat-standing]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Two strangers meet at a ballgame.

[atrxides]

Slibbs x Would That I by Hozier

With each love I could lose, I was never the same Watch it still live in roofs, Be consumed by the flame I was fixed on your hand of gold, Lay in waste of my lovin’ long ago

[tangocharliekilo]

Okay, if more than one is allowed then please also: Don’t move you’ll make it worse, Shovel Talk and JackcentricHC?

Thank you for the ask! More than one is definitely allowed :). The interest in my WIPs is inspiring me to revisit some docs I haven't touched in a long time so thank you thank thank you.

Don't move you'll make it worse--this is another Slibbs H/C Bingo fill, the doc title is the same as the prompt. It was meant to be my Valentine's fic for this year, but 🤷‍♂️ At this point, it's a bunch of fragmented dialogue and disjointed jotted action, but this part is mostly intelligible:

“Screwed up. Ruined dinner.”

“Mmhm,” “we talked about this.” “You not taking unnecessary risks.”

“not on date night.”

“On any day.” "REACT is supposed to take the lead.”

“They weren’t there.”

“So you wait.”

He huffs.

“There was no time.”

“Sure there was. You just don’t like to wait.”

She’s not lying. She’s all the way over there, messing around with something in the kitchen and he’s tired of her not being nearer to him.

He pushes himself from the couch. His heavy boots he didn’t bother to take off hit the floor and give him away. It hurts like hell, pulling on the stitches in his side, but it gets the job done. ‘Cause she’s there when he can see straight again. Sighing and slipping his boots off for him.

---

Shovel Talk--This Slibbs ficlet was basically finished back in 2021. I even had the graphic in my drafts at one point, ready to post. But I just didn't like it enough to work through the revisions? And so I've been letting it die in my ever growing trash heap aka WIP folder.

“If you hurt her…”

“You gonna take my badge? Reassign me?”

“Not what I had in mind, but NCIS is always in need of an Agent Afloat.”

“I’d sooner retire.”

“No, you wouldn’t,” Leon said.

Gibbs rubbed his face in frustration. No, he wouldn’t.

“All I’m saying is: Don’t screw this up.”

“Sloane can take care of herself.”

He’d seen her mean right hook in action and knew she logged a lot of hours in the agency gym. She might’ve sat behind a head doctor’s desk, but she could be street fighter scrappy or technically sound and both were equally ferocious. He wasn’t eager to be on the receiving end of either.

---

JackCentricHC--This one is super old; I legit do not remember it at all lol. But it's what it says on the tin? Anyway, here's a selection:

He pictures her tiny car plunged over a cliff. A bullet through her forehead; her cold blue body lying on a slab in autopsy.

He sees the flashing lights and turns into the lot. This must be the place. And there's her car. No bullets piercing the glass, no front end crumpled. Not even a scratch on the blue paint job.

Out of the truck in an instant, his eyes scan the area, finding a blonde head stained with red and hears a tired, gravely voice protesting from the back of an EMS truck. He would worry about repairing relationships with the local LEOs later for busting through their scene.

He has no idea what's happened, but his only concern is for her. They're tending to a cut on her cheek, and someone's cracked a cold pack for her knuckles.

He slows his pace and calms the fear that had been building.

“You go lookin’ for trouble?”

“No, it has a pretty good idea where to find me most of the time.” “and I guess you do too.”

"Maybe." He glances at the strip mall, there's a quick stop and a dry cleaner and a sushi place. Why'd she stop here?

“Knew if I wanted something more than TV dinner I’d better bring it with me” / “My mother raised me to never show up empty handed.” / “If it wasn’t a two bottle kind of day before, it is now.”

[dreamyorion84]

I’d love to read the finished works someday :-)

[the-last-rat-standing]

I wish you would write a fic where, during the first few weeks/months after Jack joined NCIS, Gibbs has a reaction to something because of his captivity in Paraguay and Jack witnesses this. :-)

Hope you like it, @dreamyorion84!

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

[the-last-rat-standing]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Gibbs slowly invites Jack into his life. Fill-in fic between “Skeleton Crew” and “Fake It ‘Til You Make It”.

[siyvaruli]

One of @unionjackpillow's many awesome prompts was something about one of them being shot but the other not knowing the bullet-proof vest had saved their life, so here it sort of is. It's platonic Hotch/Morgan, set in an alternate 3x06 where the unsub actually shoots Morgan as he comes out of the elevator, but he's wearing a vest. 1500 words, no real warnings outside standard canon violence.

--

“Down!” Aaron shouted as Derek stepped out of the elevator, and it was enough of a warning to spin Derek to face the threat, to reach for the weapon at his hip.

It was a good warning: concise, direct, redolent with the panic that Aaron couldn’t hide. Derek heeded it instantly, knew from years of experience that he could trust Aaron to have his back.

It was a good warning. But it wasn’t enough to keep the bullet from slamming into Derek’s chest, knocking his controlled fall into a bone-jarring skid across the tiled floor.

He got his gun up and ready despite not being able to take a deep breath, adrenaline covering for the oxygen he was missing from his lungs. He was a little late, though. The unsub was already on the ground beside him, filled with far more bullets and well past needing one good inhale to get some air.

“Jesus,” Derek wheezed, contemplated the effort involved in levering himself off the floor and unstrapping his vest, and decided maybe he’d just lay down and pretend to be dead for a few minutes first. It wasn’t like Rossi wouldn’t deserve that on his conscience, sending them all careening off the goddamn rickety bridge that he’d built to their unsub.

Derek might have been a little bitter, but since he was the one who was coming out of the showdown with a bruised chest bone, he figured a little bitterness was allowed.

Then Aaron came hurtling into Derek’s space, knees hitting the floor hard enough to make Derek wince, hands pushing aside Derek’s jacket to press against his vest.

“You’ll be fine,” Aaron insisted, nodding along to his own pronouncement like the bobblehead on the dashboard of JJ’s car. His hands were shaking as they skated across Derek’s chest. “Just stay still, Derek, it’ll be fine.”

He wasn’t reassuring Derek, but Derek knew better than to point that out, had years of experience with Aaron’s hands searching for a wound to staunch. It was the first time that Aaron had been so concerned for Derek’s health when he was wearing a vest, but then Derek recalled that he put his vest and jacket on after he got in the elevator to check on the upper floors. He’d had a bad feeling, a lead weight in his gut that might have just saved him from some steel in his heart.

“’m fine,” Derek managed, set his gun down and caught one of Aaron’s hands in his to keep it from running frantically up and down Derek’s chest. “Vest.” He glanced over to see Rossi check the unsub for a pulse, watched him come back to his feet and take an aborted step toward them before staying where he was.

Then he turned his attention back to Aaron, who was still trying to put pressure on a chest wound that wasn’t there.

“Aaron,” Derek bit out, harsh enough to snap Aaron out of wherever he’d gone, but that only got him both of Aaron’s hands clutching the collar of his jacket, Aaron’s forehead bent to the top of Derek’s head.

“I watched you get shot,” Aaron whispered, the words barely more than air, an almost silent sob from the back of his throat. “Derek. He shot you.”

Ah, Derek realized. He’d been thinking about this all wrong. “We’ll be right back,” he announced to Rossi and the crowd of curious onlookers, successfully pulled off a rather ungraceful and painful lurch into the elevator that Emily had thankfully just exited, dragging Aaron along with him and offering a bemused Emily a cheerful wave as he hit the button for the parking garage and closed the doors before Rossi could batter his way in.

This elevator did not have a helpful shut off button, so Derek shuffled them both off into the deserted parking garage and prayed the team was smart enough to keep everyone and their curiosity contained for the few minutes Derek needed to take one extremely painful deep breath and get this under control.

Aaron still hadn’t let go of Derek’s shirt.

“I’m okay,” Derek promised, knew from experience that it was what Aaron needed to hear. “Aaron, man, I’m all right.”

“Derek,” Aaron wheezed, sounding like he was the one who’d gotten hit point-blank in the vest, his fingers trembling where they brushed against Derek’s neck. He had his nose mashed into the top of Derek’s ear, but was otherwise sprawled out rather gracefully beside Derek’s half-prone body just beyond the elevator doors.

It was a good thing the parking garage had been cleared before they’d arrived.

“I’m not dead,” Derek assured him. He curled one hand around the back of Aaron’s neck, solid and reassuring, but that was all. After six years he could teach a seminar on Aaron Hotchner, could aim his laser pointer at a slide and inform the audience that SSA Hotchner could be castigated or cajoled, but he couldn’t be hauled anywhere until he had chosen to arrive.

Sometimes, they all just needed a little time.

It wasn’t that Aaron was unfamiliar with death. They’d lost friends and colleagues in Boston three years before. They’d lost witnesses and unsubs, lost Marika to an unsub and Donovan to his own demons the year before that. Derek had watched Aaron pay quiet respects to the fallen, tears tracking down his face, handling grief and loss the way they’d been trained. Aaron knew how to cope with loss.

However, they’d discovered over the years, he wasn’t quite as adept at coping with Derek’s loss.

Derek’s second year at the BAU he’d been out with one of the deputy sheriffs when they accidentally stumbled upon both the third crime scene and the unsub, and the deputy had managed to radio his boss and Aaron just in time for them to hear the gunfire and “agent down!” before the unsub shot out the radio.

Derek hadn’t seen any of it, but according to the sheriff, Aaron had stolen a law enforcement vehicle, nearly abandoned the sheriff at the second crime scene until he’d realized he would need him for directions, and proceeded to drive at speeds no one but test pilots had ever reached. Thankfully Jason had radioed for an ambulance, because Aaron’s plan upon arrival had appeared to involve healing Derek’s gunshot wound by sheer force of will.

“Do not die,” he snapped at Derek, and Derek did remember Aaron shoving the deputy out of the way and pressing his own hands down hard just under Derek’s ribs.

“You’re not the boss of me,” Derek had replied, passed out and woken up six hours later after surgery to find Aaron gripping the bed rail, couldn’t convince him to take a deep breath until he’d measured Derek’s pulse at his wrist and neck, until Derek had promised he was all right so many times that it seemed like Aaron was the one shaking off the anesthetic fog.

They hadn’t had the jet then, but Jason had suggested they leave Derek and head back to the BAU and Aaron had made a sound that wasn’t exactly a snarl but was close enough that Jason coughed and declared that maybe one of the team should stay.

Or there was the time a year after that, when they’d all been chasing the unsub through hundreds of acres of state forest, Derek up on the ridge when the unsub appeared in front of him and fired, the report echoing for miles.

Aaron had been close enough to just see their silhouettes, heard the gunshot and saw Derek fall and was too far away to know that Derek had tripped over an exposed tree root and not been hit with a bullet and died.

The unsub took a bullet to the skull, and Aaron might have stayed there to empty the clip into the dead man’s chest except that Derek had muttered, “Fuck, that hurt,” and, as Donovan had put it, teleported Aaron to his side.

It had taken several minutes back then, as well, time for Aaron to press his palms under Derek’s ribs and his face into Derek’s neck and recalibrate himself to a world where Derek wasn’t dead.

Then, of course, there was Omaha. Two weeks before Boston, and the reason Derek hadn’t been there with the rest of his team. Omaha, with the bomber who profiled as an arsonist, or maybe it had been the other way around, with the explosion and the fire and that time Derek might have hung on just as tightly, needed a moment to believe that Aaron had stupidly come for him, to calibrate himself to Aaron’s fingers pressed to his neck and promising he was alive.

Aaron had his own stories, of course. It wasn’t like Derek had handled the whole situation in Las Cruces very well, and -

“You’re all right,” Aaron declared, took a damp and shuddering breath and let Derek haul him in close, unstrapped Derek’s vest so he could press his hands under Derek’s ribs. “You’re alive.”

Derek shrugged and winced, wrapped his arms around Aaron’s broad shoulders and allowed them both one more minute to breathe, to get back to where they needed to be.

“My boss said I wasn’t allowed to die,” he told Aaron, because Aaron couldn’t be dragged, but sometimes he could be cajoled into rolling his eyes at Derek’s bad jokes, coaxed into a reluctant smile. Sometimes, all they needed was a little time.

[temilyrights]

never let this cruel world steal your spark.

[tangocharliekilo]

Find the Word WIP tag game

Many thanks for the tag @mrsmungus!! I hope I did this right!

Passing the same five words (Take, Leave, Send, Spiral, Arch) on to @the-last-rat-standing @unreliablenarratorink @justagibbsgirl if they’d like to participate as well as anyone else who might have a WIP or two going

Selections below the cut, all from various Slibbs WIPs

Keep reading

[dreamyorion84]

Looking forward to reading the completed stories one day. Just a gentle nudge to keep at it :-)

[reiding-and-writing]

Reblog if you're a fanfic writer and you wanna know what your followers' favorite story of yours is ❤

[dreamyorion84]

@sequinsmile-x Impossible choice, you write them so well!! But if I have to choose I’ll go with “Defence” :-)

[perfectlyweepingtree]

Slibbs Moments - Number 39

Hold My Hand

[sequinsmile-x]

Could I request a protective Hotch fic? He sees someone bothering/attacking Emily and intervenes, or notices a bruise and wants to know what happened....

This IMMEDIATELY inspired me, and you even got a banner , so here you go ❤️

New Ways to be Awed Each Minute

He had always known she was beautiful

-x-

Words: 3.8k

Warnings: Smut, 18+

Read over on Ao3, or below the cut

He had always thought she was beautiful.

It was one of the first things he noticed about her, and it had fueled some of the initial distrust of her, the annoyance he felt in her presence. Aaron knew even at the time that it hadn’t been fair. It wasn’t her fault he found her attractive, something that made him feel uneasy as his marriage crumbled around him, but it was easier to project that onto her than look inward. To see the gulf that had grown between him and his wife, to acknowledge that it was already over, even though it would take Haley several more months to serve him with papers.

By the time she did, he already trusted Emily just as much as the rest of the team, if not more. Everything he learnt about her, her kindness, her empathy, her wilfulness that often morphed into self-sacrifice in a way that made his breath catch every time, made her all the more beautiful to him. He was enraptured by her, and as time went on he realised he had been since the moment they met. His life unknowingly changed by the smile he now knew wasn’t her real one, but the one she put on for show, and a confident squeeze of his hand as she shook it.

She’d become his best friend somewhere along the way. The way she’d cared for him after Foyet was something he’d never forget, forever cementing her as someone he would trust with not just his life, but his son’s. She’d helped after Haley died, holding him and Jack together in a way he knows he would have been lost without.

Aaron had hoped they were edging towards more, hoping that he wasn’t reading too much into the way she sometimes looked at him when she thought he wasn’t looking. Then Doyle happened, tearing through their lives with the same efficiency that he’d impaled her with, leaving destruction in his wake. Deciding to fake Emily’s death was one of the hardest things he’d had to do. There were days when he’d wished he had the ignorance that the team did, the knowledge that she was alive no comfort to him when he didn’t know if they’d ever get her back.

He learnt that standing over a grave he knew was empty was no different to standing over one that he knew wasn’t.

That was when he realised he was in love with her. The same feeling threatened to choke him as he stared at a stone with her name etched into it as it did when he stood over Haley’s grave.

When she came back things were different, she was different. Her promise to come to him when she was struggling became the thing that started to bring them back to each other. They became each other’s solid ground again, and everyone knew it.

Which was why the team always sent Emily to his office to convince him to join them for drinks. It’s how he found himself standing with the team in a bar not too far from work, all of them giddy that they had a few well-earned days off ahead of them.

“Look’s like Em’s made a friend,” Derek says, an amused tinge to his voice

Aaron scans the bar to find her and sees she’s standing by the hallway that leads to the bathrooms. A man is standing next to her, his hand on her arm as he leans in to talk over the loud music around them. The man is tall, handsome. The type he knew Emily would go for. He feels a surge of jealousy before he analyses the situation a little more closely. The man’s hand is a little tight around her wrist, given away by his white knuckles, and the way the material of her shirt bunches around his fingers. Emily is smiling at the man but isn’t her real one, it isn’t the one that Aaron would set the world on fire just to have thrown in his direction. There’s a tension in her frame, and her eyes flit across to the team, where they’d been standing all evening, and they meet his before she looks back at the man in front of her.

“I don’t think that guys a friend,” JJ says, clearly having spotted the same thing Aaron had, and she steps forward as if she’s going to intervene.

“I’ve got this JJ,” he says, stopping her in place with a quick smile as he takes a swig of his beer before placing the bottle down.

He makes it across the dancefloor in seconds, using his height and size to his advantage as he walks through the crowd. He doesn’t miss the relief on her face when he approaches, his face stern as he stands next to her.

“Everything ok over here, Em?” He asks her, but his eyes are fixed on the man who lets go of her arm but doesn’t make a move to leave.

“Yeah,” she replies, stepping back to lean into his side as if it was something they did every day, “I’m fine, honey.”

Despite how he’s momentarily paralysed by the scent of her, the warmth of her against him, he picks up on what she’s trying to do. He wraps his arm around her, his hand on her shoulder as he pulls her in impossibly closer.

“Glad to hear it,” he says, still glaring at the other man who simply rolls his eyes and walks away, muttering something Aaron is glad he doesn’t hear under his breath. As soon as they are alone he disentangles himself from Emily, turning so he is standing in front of her.

She watches as he switches from Hotch to Aaron, the anger he’d put on show for the man who’d accosted her outside the bathroom melting away into concern. She smiles at him, pretending she doesn’t feel the loss of his arm around her.

“Thanks for that, that guy wouldn’t take no for an answer,” she says, feeling the tension radiating off of him.

“Are you ok?” He asks, looking over his shoulder for the man that had walked away, “Did you get his name? I’m sure Garica could find-”

Emily chuckles and places her hand on his arm, squeezing his bare skin from where he’d rolled his sleeves up, and he pauses, looking back at her.

“Aaron, I’m fine. It’s just a creep in a bar, it happens.”

Aaron frowns, fury that this was something she was so used to she was dismissing it rolling through his chest.

“That doesn’t make it ok, Emily,” he says, his eyebrows knitting together, “It shouldn’t just be something that happens.”

Emily beams at him, and she squeezes his arm again before letting go and looping her arm through his, leading him back towards where the team were standing.

“I agree, but we aren’t going to fix all of society's problems tonight,” she quips, smiling up at him, “Now, let me buy my hero a drink.”

___

He insists on walking her to her door.

Emily playfully rolls her eyes at him as they exit the elevator on her floor, “I think I’m good from here, Aaron. I don’t think that creep knows where I live.”

“I’m just being cautious,” he says, smiling at her in a way that never fails to make her stomach flip, “You never know who might be lingering around a corner.”

She chuckles as she roots through her bag for her keys, “Well, I doubt Mrs Rooney who lives next door is going to try and grab me,” she sticks her key in the door and unlocks it, turning back to look at him as she does, “You may as well come in for a drink since you’ve come all the way up here.”

Aaron agrees with a nod, not wanting to leave her company any time soon, and follows her into the apartment. He stands aside as she closes the door and locks it before heading towards her kitchen.

“Beer? Scotch?” She asks, and he follows her, shrugging in response.

“Your choice.”

She smiles, “Scotch it is, Dave got me a really nice bottle and I’ve been waiting for a reason to open it,” she says, moving around her kitchen as she gets two glasses out, reaching for the bottle in question. He laughs and shakes his head.

“Someone should tell him that there are gifts other than…” his quip about their friend's gift-giving skills trails off as her arm stretches for the bottle of scotch. Her shirt sleeve shifts, revealing a bruise on her arm, fingerprints left behind where he had seen the man from earlier grasping her, “Em.”

“What?” She asks, and she follows his line of sight, putting the bottle back down as she pulls her sleeve further back to inspect the damage. She groans in irritation as she presses her fingers into the marks, relieved that so far they didn’t seem to hurt. “Son of a bitch,” she complains, as if it was a mere annoyance more than anything else, “I didn’t think he’d been quite that rough.”

Aaron rounds her kitchen counter and gently cups her elbow, bringing her arm closer to inspect it.

“Are you ok?” He asks, careful to not touch the bruise itself, “I knew I should have tried to get his-”

“Aaron,” she says, placing her hand over his on her arm, “It’s just a bruise, it’s fine.”

“It’s assault,” he replies, more venom in his voice than he means to. He sees a flash of something across her face, and he sighs, closing his eyes to centre himself, to remind himself it wasn’t her he was angry at. “Sorry.”

“It’s ok,” she replies, brushing off his unnecessary apology. She hates the look in his eyes, the over-the-top reaction to the injury she hadn’t even realised she’d endured. She offers him a smile, a small twitch at the corner of her lips. “I’m fine, I promise,” she says, squeezing his hand, “We both know I’ve survived worse.”

She immediately knows it was the wrong thing to say, his jaw tense as he lets go of her, and she sighs.

“Aaron-”

“You should never have had to survive worse,” he says, so quietly she almost misses it. “I should have…”

He drifts off, unable to put into words what he’d been feeling for months. He’d replayed her actions in the lead-up to her showdown with Doyle over and over in his head, desperately looking for things he could have spotted. As if the hindsight alone would have been enough to save her.

“You should have…what?” She asks, taking a step closer to him, a kind smile on her face that he’s sure he doesn’t deserve, “Seen what I was trained to keep hidden from you?”

He sighs, closing his eyes as he looks down at the kitchen counter, and he shakes his head at himself.

“I should have looked after you, realised something was wrong when you pulled back from me.”

“I didn't need you to look after me then.”

He looks up at her, surprised to find her even closer than she had been before. Emily was always careful with her words. She’d been taught from just about as early as she could talk how to reveal only what she wanted to. She never said anything she didn’t mean.

“Do you need me to now?” He asks, and he swears the air leaves the room, both of them staring at each other as if they were searching for answers in each other’s faces that they had been seeking for years.

“No,” she answers quietly, taking in a slow breath as she sees his body sag, his eyes closing again, “But I want you to.”

She sees the second her words register, his head snapping back up so quickly she’s sure it must hurt his neck. They stare at each other, the sound of their breathing the only noise in her apartment.

“Em…” he trails off, sure if he moves even a fraction, if he breathes a little too loudly, he’d snap out of this moment. Maybe wake up in his bed, this whole night a strange creation of his subconscious.

Emily smiles as she closes the final gap between them, her hand cupping his cheek, her thumb skating over his lower lip. Her smile widens as she feels his breath skip over her skin, her eyes meet his and she can still see the question in them, the uncertainty, so she makes the decision for them both, and leans forward.

When their lips meet, it feels new but somehow familiar. Like everything they had done, everything they had been through, had led to this moment. A tender kiss in her kitchen, her sleeve still rolled up from where he’d been inspecting the small bruise that had been the final push they needed

It takes Aaron a moment to respond, but when he does he’s fierce. His hands grasp her hips as he pulls her closer, turning them so she’s pressed between him and her kitchen counter. She sighs, opening her mouth to lick along the seam of his lips, her hands moving as they meet at the back of his head. Her fingers trail through his hair as she holds him in place.

He kisses her back just as enthusiastically, making sure to remember as much about this as he could. The feel of her, the taste of her.

She moans as he licks into her mouth and it seems to reset his brain, making him pull back from her, his forehead resting against hers as she chases his lips.

“Em…”

“I think,” she says, breathlessly, licking her lower lip as she seeks out the taste of him still lingering on her skin, “I think we both know we want this,” she says, one of her hands slinking down his neck, grasping at the collar of his shirt, “And I think we both know this isn’t just a one-time thing.”

He closes his eyes, hope catching fire in his chest as he nods against her, his forehead gently knocking against hers.

“I’ve wanted this…you…for a long time,” he admits, his voice hoarse. She doesn’t know if it’s the barely restrained arousal she can see in his eyes or giving something so personal away that has him almost falling to pieces against her, but either way, it makes her smile.

“I want you too,” she replies, kissing him quickly, her smile widening at the feel of him holding her even tighter. She can feel him pressing into her thigh, and she heaves out a breath, and she cups his face again, “Please, Aaron.”

He doesn’t need asking again, surging forward and putting everything into the way he kisses her, leaving her moaning and breathless as she’s pressed between him and the counter.

“Bedroom,” he mumbles against her lips, and she nods, turning them and leading him down the hall of her apartment.

He’s behind her, his arms wrapped around her, one hand cupping her breast through her shirt as he kisses her neck, his lips trailing down to her collarbone.

She turns to face him the second they are in her room, making sure she flicks the light on so she can see all of him. For a moment they just look at each other, both taking in how everything was about to change.

He leans in to kiss her again, knowing he could never get bored of it. His hands drift from her hips and up under her shirt, making her gasp as his hands skim her waist, his palms scalding hot. He pulls her shirt up, only disconnecting his lips from hers to pull it off.

He had always thought she was beautiful, but he realises she was more than he could have ever imagined. Her pale skin over her peaks and valleys mesmerising to him in a way he knew he could, and later would stare at for hours. He takes a small step back to take her in, his eyes honing in on the scar above her left breast, just visible over the top of the cup of her bra.

He remembered reading her file after she was sent away, and could still taste the bitter anger as he realised Doyle had branded her. He hadn’t been able to picture it, his brain not allowing him to do so, but now he’s looking at it all he can think of is that it’s beautiful. Not because Doyle had taken any particular care, or because of the skin grafts she’d clearly had to try and cover it. But because it was made of her. The slight thickness of her skin there proof that she had survived.

“It doesn’t hurt anymore,” she says, and he looks back at her face, a slight smile paired with a flush to her cheeks that he knew was everything to do with him, “and I’m used to it, I don’t even really notice it.”

She reaches behind her back and unhooks her bra, letting it slip down her arms and down to the floor. He feels breathless for a moment, taken aback by her, before he steps forward, crowding her against her bed. He kisses her quickly before moving down her neck and chest, stopping to make a point of kissing her scar, sucking a mark next to it that makes her breath catch in a way that could be a laugh or a moan.

He pays attention to both of her breasts, making her throw her head back, her eyes closed as he licks at her skin. Then he kneels in front of her, kissing the scar beneath her ribcage. She grasps his head, her fingers tight in his hair at the strange sensation, her skin still partially numb.

“Aaron.”

He manoeuvres them so she’s sitting on the edge of the bed, leaning back on her elbows as he carefully takes off her shoes before moving onto her pants and underwear, pulling them down her legs as if he’s unwrapping a precious gift.

She briefly thinks about the fact she’s now completely naked, and he’s still fully clothed, but her attempt to point that out is lost as he runs his hands back up her legs, his palms pushing at the inside of her thighs.

He takes her apart, expertly using his fingers and his tongue, his comments about how good she tastes lost against her thigh. It’s like he has a manual, or has studied her so intently over the years he doesn’t need to be directed. She’s still breathless, every single one of her nerves tingling, when he leans over her, kissing her cheek, her nose and then finally her lips.

“You ok?” Aaron asks, kissing her neck and she nods, laughing as she lifts her arm to cup the back of his neck, the collar of his shirt brushing against her skin. She kisses him, tasting herself on him, and she pulls back as she nods.

“I’m more than ok,” she kisses him again, biting at his bottom lip, “please take off your clothes.”

Aaron is sure he’s never moved faster, standing up and shedding his suit jacket, for once not caring about where it fell, wrinkles in the material the last thing on his mind. He shucks off his shirt, and his shoes, socks and pants soon follow. Emily laughs at him from her position on the bed when he almost trips on his pants, and he raises an eyebrow at her, a fake glare on his face as he makes it back to the bed, kissing her laugh away as he joins her.

She encourages him backwards so he’s sitting up against the headboard, and she settles over his lap, reaching between them and gently squeezing him, taking pleasure in the punched out groan she gets in return.

“Em.”

She rests her forehead against his as she sinks down on him, matching moans escaping them both. They pause for a moment, Emily taking a second to adjust, before she nods, leaning forward and kissing him.

They move in tandem, finding their rhythm quickly. Giving and taking as much as they can, hands grasping at skin in a way they both know will leave bruises they’ll find in the morning. His hands find her waist, holding her in place as she tips over the edge, her nerves shot.

He’s not far behind, and he has to lean forward, his face pressed into her skin as he tries to muffle his words, knowing he cannot stop them from escaping as he follows her over the precipice.

“Love you,” He chokes out, “Fuck I love you.”

He’s breathless against her, and for a moment thinks she hasn’t heard him, that his attempts to muffle his confession had been successful. But then she kisses his forehead, her fingers running skating over the scars on his torso, lingering over the thickest one at the top of his chest.

“I love you too,” she says quietly, “I have for a long time.”

He pulls back to look at her, tucking some of her now messy hair behind her ear. He isn’t sure what to say, his words lost somewhere between their confession and the fact she was still in his lap, that he was still inside of her.

“What do we do now?” He manages, and she laughs, her head resting on his shoulder as her body shakes with it.

“Well,” she says, sitting back up properly to look at him, “I think we should do that again, and then maybe shower, and then sleep…so we can do this again in the morning,” she says, kissing his jawline. She bites her lip, unsure why she feels so nervous now, after all that happened that night, “And then we do whatever comes next together.”

“I like the sound of that.” He smiles at her and nods, she kisses him once more before she rolls off of him, sitting next to him before snuggling into his side, as he pulls the covers over them. Her smile somehow gets wider when he puts his arm around her. She looks at her arm, the bruise left behind by the man at the bar and she chuckles. “What’s funny, sweetheart?”

The term of endearment makes warmth spread through her chest, but she pushes past it, linking their fingers together as she turns her head to kiss his shoulder.

“We really should let Pen find out who that guy was,” she says mindlessly, “I wonder if she could get the bar’s CCTV.”

Aaron looks down at her, worry making him freeze, “Why? Do you want to press charges?”

“Oh, no,” she replies, waving off his concern, “I want to send him a thank you card.”

Aaron laughs, shaking his head at her, the sound bright and beautiful as it surrounds them.

-x-

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[the-last-rat-standing]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Went back and added a chapter!