"god knows all of your ugliness,' my mother says, 'and loves you despite.' /// (you've instilled a violence in me. drilled it into my bones placed it in my hands-)
ii.
'is that supposed to make me feel loved?' i reply. 'i am still ugly. he is still god.' /// (-hid it beneath the soles of my feet. it's mine, now.)
ALISON DILAURENTIS AND MONA VANDERWAAL/JESSICA LANGE (IN AHS) AND FRANCES CONROY (IN AHS): PARALLELS (Pretty Little Liars/American Horror Story)
Shachath’s Kiss | | Spencer Reid x Angel!Character
A Halloween fic based on @imagining-in-the-margins prompt: Person A thinks Person B is in a costume..they’re not.
Summary: It’s Halloween and the team are sent out to investigate strange occurrences in California, but the holiday isn’t the only mysterious and spooky goings on.
Warnings/Includes: death (no main characters), mentions of terminal illness, somewhat of an oc? based on Shachath from AHS!, mentions of guns.
Word count: 3.6k
The sharp clanging of the drug trolley coming down the hall awoke the resident opposite room 09, evoking miserable grumbles from the elderly man trying to watch TV.
“Sorry Jim, you know what time it is. Frances? It’s medication time sweetheart.”
Stepping into the dimly lit room and setting down the small paper cup on the bedside table, the nurse looked up at the elderly lady laid out in bed. There was no response, no greeting, no sigh of relief.
Her thin, ivory hair fanned out around her face, almost like a halo; her eyes closed and her expression showing contentment. She looked peaceful.
While this should have been a calming sight to see, Frances had been in constant pain every two to three hours, due to being bed ridden for two years.
She would wriggle and squirm, constantly unsettled unless she had her pain medication.
“Oh no. Lou? Can you come in here?” The nurse called with extreme sadness in her voice, as it became apparent why she was met with silence.
As her co-worker joined her at the foot of the bed, they both sighed regrettably.
“She’s gone too?”
“That’s the sixth this week. Is there some sort of invisible plague going around that we aren’t aware of?”
Both nurses shook their heads lamentably, walking to each side of the bed and taking turns sweetly squeezing Frances’ hands.
“I’ll call them this time, you stay here.” Lou spoke softly, aware that Frances was one of the young nurses who grew particularly close to the residents.
Meanwhile, within the same hour in seven different residential homes in the same city, other staff members had also been doing the same routine of calling the doctors and coroners for the sixth time that week.
“Okay my Inspector Gadgets, if you would kindly look down at your uh, gadgets… you will see that we have a large and creepy amount of deaths in the North California area. Exactly six deaths this week alone, each in eight different residential homes.”
Penelope tapped at her own tablet, before displaying the multitude of scene photos on the other agents' screens.
Pushing her glasses up on the bridge of her nose, she watched to see everyone else’s reactions instead of looking at the bodies herself.
“Okay, I’m sorry to state the obvious here, but is this not just coincidental age related death? These are all elderly people who were more than close enough in age to pass away from natural causes.” JJ spoke, swiping to see each birth date of the residents.
“Or, is there a flu or disease spreading around that they haven’t considered?” Emily followed.
“You know that it’s been shown that the rate of influenza begins to heighten around the month of October, the peak month being February. Not only that, but other viruses such as the Respiratory Syncytial Virus spread faster too, which is a leading cause of death to over sixty-fives.” Spencer stated in agreement with the two women’s estimation.
The bubbly voice of the technical analyst arose as she tapped her screen once more in defence.
“So your points are very valid, but the weird catch about this entire thing is that all residents were female, declared dead at the ninth minute of the ninth hour - morning and evening. They also were reported to be staying in rooms with a nine in the door number.”
“That is weird…” Tara murmured.
“Too much to be sheer coincidence. If our unsub is sticking to specific times, we need to leave ASAP. Wheels up in twenty.” Hotch ordered, gathering all the paper files and piling them into a bag ready for the jet.
A high pitched beep sounded around the jet followed by a forlorn looking Penelope Garcia upon their communal screen, ready to give them more updates as the team flew to San Francisco.
“What’s going on Garcia?” Hotch asked, concerned.
“So, as you all know I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but as you boarded your beautiful jet at twelve fifteen, another resident was found deceased at a home called the Angelic Companions Care Home. Pronounced dead at nine.”
Different sighs left the mouths of the team as they racked their brains.
“Thanks Garcia. So this is now the ninth home. What is so significant about the number nine?” Hotch furrowed his brow in thought as the thoughts began to accumulate in the air.
“I’m wondering if not only was the unsub in the care of a grandmother, maybe something happened at age nine to trigger this anger and rage towards the elderly?” Emily spoke, receiving small nods from the other members sitting around the plane.
“Maybe the grandmother passed away from natural causes? It’s also coming up to Halloween, the unsub might not have had the opportunity to go out with other kids due to caring for her?” The suggestion from Tara got everybody raising eyebrows and flipping back through their file notes.
“I have an idea. Garcia, could you do a search for residents in the state with a grandmother as their legal guardian?” asked Spencer, leaning forward to hear the results better.
“You’re whittled down to a tiny seven hundred and fifty thousand boy genius. Give me more.” Garcia chimed, her fingernails loudly tapping through the speaker.
“This is bugging me. The bigger picture here is that this isn’t just one or two unsubs. Perfect timing, in nine different homes across the entirety of California?” JJ muttered as if she was thinking aloud.
“Well obviously, how would two people get in to these homes, gain enough trust to be let in to somehow murder these people with no physical evidence and then move onto the next one within minutes?” Hotch responded, sitting up straighter as everybody also began to do the math.
“So are we thinking of a group? Nine people perhaps?” Spencer questioned, thinking to himself about his mother in her own home; wondering how long it had been since he’d seen her. She’d seen him in hospital, seen him home and then she was back off to her residence. At least she was safe in Brookfield.
“I think we could be looking at some sort of cult. When we land I want you and Tara to check out the latest scene……”
There was something odd in the air, Spencer could feel it; the goosebumps that arose across his forearms and shoulders sensed it too. Regardless of it being the middle of October,it wasn’t overly cold; sky blue and cloud free, yet the city glowed orange with its leaves and it’s sunlight glares from the glass buildings.
Footsteps scraping along the thin, bristled carpet of the entrance hall, Spencer and Tara strolled across to the reception desk in the centre.
A small bell sat directly in the middle of the counter, waiting to be pressed; the absence of a receptionist caused Tara to roll her eyes with impatience and bring her hand up to smack the bell with force.
“It’s understaffed here. Everybody is keeping their eyes on the residents.” A silky voice spoke from behind the agents, startling them both.
As they turned to match the voice to a face, Spencer felt the same goosebumps arise again, the tingle across his skin feeling as though it was seeping into his veins. She somehow made him feel strangely calm and familiar. Had they met before?
A young woman radiating the most warm and serene energy he’d ever felt stood before them. A contrast to the entire black ensemble she wore, a serious two piece suit but with a silly white fancy dress halo and wings. Hands clasped together at her front, she smiled; a slight twinkle in her eyes shimmering at the agent smiling back.
“I’m uh, Doctor Spencer Reid, this is Doctor Tara Lewis.”
“Of course. You’re here to investigate the deaths. Excuse my costume, it’s that time of year,” she chuckled, gesturing to the halo springing around attached to a headband in the coils of her hair, “I’m Cath.”
“Did you know people used to dress up in costumes to hide from other spirits? It’s said that they would dress similarly to ghosts so they would be familiar and not targeted by them.”
Cath smiled as the doctor spoke, a twinkle glimmering in one of her eyes as he spoke fondly of the supernatural.
“I didn’t know that but if you’d kindly follow me.”
As she took off down the hallway, the sound of her heels thumping across the floor rang louder in Spencer’s ears than any normal sound he’d heard before.
“I just volunteer here, but I’ve grown to love all of these residents. Junie was a staff favourite, she was so sweet. Whenever anybody entered her room she would yell out a wild ‘Heeey’.” Cath chuckled softly as she reminisced, pushing open the bedroom door of Junie’s room and letting the agents shuffle past her.
Softly closing the door behind them, Spencer’s senses came alive as he took one last glimpse at the charmingly intense gaze she had on him.
The room smells musty, a perfume that could have been dated multiple decades hanging faintly in the air. As Spencer and Tara rounded the corner of the entryway, they stopped to take in the sight before them.
It wasn’t disturbing, bloody or horrific as they were used to by now, but a scene of tranquility. Family photos neatly lined up along her windowsill, opened bags of boiled sweets littered the bedside table and the incandescent light of her lamp cast a glow across her as she laid in bed.
“Reid, look.” Tara pointed to the machines and set up in the corner behind her bed, an oxygen mask dangling from one of them.
“Cancer,” The woman spoke from the doorway again startling the pair at the end of the bed; somehow appearing without making a single sound, “She kept smiling right until the end. It’s so weird to see her so peaceful even though she must have been in so much pain.”
A few moments went past in respectable silence, before Spencer cleared his throat and nodded his head towards the door, suggesting to Tara they should leave the room.
Looking over Tara’s shoulder at the figure standing at the end of Junie’s bed. There was nothing logical as to why he felt uneasy about her besides the intimidating aura she emitted; even from the metres away they both stood apart, Spencer could feel her vehemence.
“The M.E said that the last victim from the last home showed an undiagnosed heart condition. She was on pain meds for a long time.” Tara spoke, reading the autopsy report from her phone.
“Maybe our unsubs think they’re doing the women a favour by putting them out of their misery?” Spencer asked, eyes drifting over her shoulder to the bewitching figure that was pulling him in like a magnet.
“Yeah, like a vigilante…what are you staring at Reid?” Tara asked, following his eyes to where they lay intently on Cath.
“She’s whispering in a different language. I’m trying to figure out what she’s saying.” Squinting as if making his eyes smaller would help him hear better.
Her lips moved swiftly, the sangria coloured stain on them hypnotising as Spencer muted out any other sounds and focused on what they were saying.
Aloho amoch. Aloho amoch. Aloho amoch. What was that?
Drilling his memory for both an answer and a translation, it came to him like a light bulb switching on.
“It’s Aramaic. She’s saying ‘bye, god be with you’. It’s essentially a dead language, although it is used in small corners of the world.”
“Spencer.” Tara interrupted, looking back into the room behind her.
He wasn’t paying attention, too busy staring at Cath’s lips. Why was she repeating herself? Over and over. Something wasn’t right but he couldn’t concentrate and think because Tara kept calling his name.
“Reid-“
“What!” Spencer snapped a little before apologising and regaining his train of thought and composure. Scrunching his nose in confusion, he rubbed his eyes as if to soothe the million mile answers shooting through his head.
“What are you talking about?” Tara asked gently.
“Cath. She’s speaking Aramaic, an old Jewish language. She keeps repeating goodbye, God be with you to Junie.” Spencer replied calmer, blinking a few times before looking at Tara.
But he was met with confusion and perplexity, that he was quick to return.
“Spencer, there’s nobody in there. Cath left after us.”
Looking over Tara’s shoulder to defend himself, he became overpowered with fear and perturbation.
It had been a day and a half. The team had suffered from another three victims, bringing the total to five.
The team of unsubs they suspected to be doing this had one person left before the game was over. They had all of two hours to go until somebody's life ended.
They had different services on protection for each room in the home, day staff escorted in and out by police and night staff being searched fully before coming in.
Members of the BAU stood outside the rooms containing nine in the number, residents inside the rooms with severe illnesses or terminal being watched with double the amount of agents.
“We’re almost out of time and we still have no idea how they’re doing this, what they’re using and why. Anybody got any ideas?” Hotch delivered to the managers and the others, switching between files of residents and the notes everyone had come up with.
“Spencer?” Tara suggested, looking at him seriously over the lid of her coffee cup.
Clearing his throat and shuffling in his seat, Spencer tried to keep his face straight so as not to give away the strange fact that he had potentially hallucinated somebody.
“I, uh, I saw something odd when we first got here to see Junie. The woman who showed us around made me feel…”
He didn’t know how to explain it. His mind told him it was like holding a ribbon of magnesium to a flame, or like when the universe was created with the explosion of matter. Just looking at her sent his body alight and it was completely unnatural.
“She made me feel odd. My body - I just felt weird. A gut instinct would be an understatement but at the same time as feeling nervous, I felt extremely calm.”
“What was her name Reid?” Hotch asked sternly, picking up on the strange behaviour of the doctor before him.
“She said everybody calls her Cath. She was volunteering.”
Whispers broke out among the care home leaders in the corner of the room, causing Hotch to stand straighter and furrow his brow.
“We like to share any and all information in this room. Who is Cath and is she on a shift right now?”
A timid hand raised before a voice spoke from the leaders. “We um, we don’t have a volunteer called Cath. All of our volunteers have names beginning with A, like angel. It’s an odd coincidence but one we don’t forget here.”
“I want doors locked down, nobody goes in or out. JJ, I want you and Emily on the ground floor, Reid and Tara head to the top floor and I and Rossi will stay on this floor. Anything or anybody acting suspicious gets called in.”
Whether it was the eerie energy of Halloween that wafted through the corridors, or the sound of elderly residents grumbling and groaning out through the walls; there was a permanent shiver running down Spencer’s spine.
Something felt off, and he loved Halloween. He liked being jokingly scared, but this was different. An apocalyptic type air was thick in this particular hallway he patrolled, filling up his lungs with uncertainty and fear with each breath.
Since Tara had gone down the corridor on the opposite side of the elevator, he was alone.
Or so he thought.
A rectangular shaft of light shone onto the carpet, around two doors down from where he stood, moulded into the carpet.
And then the whispers came. Differentiating between loud and quiet, they seemed mostly to be in English.
“It’s okay...”
“…understand.”
“…please help me.”
Hearing those last words brought Spencer to reality, hands fumbling at his gun and aiming it to the ground. Shuffling as quietly as he could, and leaning against the wall next to the open door.
Trying to peek around the corner without alerting whoever was inside, with one eye he managed to see the bed frame and the elderly lady occupying it.
She was looking at someone to her right, but Spencer couldn’t see anybody from this angle. More whispers were heard, and words began to come out choked as if the lady was crying.
This could escalate and he was alone. But if the tingling across his arms and his spine was correct, he could easily arrest Cath. She was sweet, albeit terrifyingly enchanting.
“FBI, put your hands where I can-“
His voice broke, becoming completely silenced as he took in the sight before him.
She stood taller than before, not far from the ceiling. Her thick corkscrew curls flared out around her head and shoulders, resting gently on her bare shoulders. Her umber skin glowed with a bright golden tone, with a disparity to the obsidian colour of the dress she wore.
Spencer was in awe, eyes and memory taking in every square inch of this ethereal being in front of him.
Feathers littered the floor around her and the bed, as if they fell off of her. Although her dress was covered entirely in black feathers these were different, less fluffier compared to the ones on the floor.
“Who are-“ He began to speak but one squint of her striking black irises shut him up.
“They say when you die, your life flashes before your eyes,” Cath spoke; her voice echoing around the room but sounding muffled as if they were all in a bubble, “what do you think you would see, Spencer?”
His body began to tremble out of nervousness, throat becoming so dry he attempted to gather some saliva on his tongue but failed. It’s as if he couldn’t control his own body, like it was being held still; but words tumbled out of his lips as if somebody was pouring his thoughts out like a cold coffee down a drain.
“I would see my mother, I would see us reading in bed together as a child, I would see the countless times I loved and lost.”
“That’s not life Spencer. That wasn’t when you were alive. That was when you were surviving, coping.” She responded softly. She drifted towards the bed in which the old lady was too stuck in awe.
Spencer knew he needed to aim at her, whatever she was doing to these people she could clearly do very quickly; but he was frozen.
“I-“
“Spencer. Look at this woman. Look at how beautiful she’s aged. How much she’s lived and seen. How much she’s experienced and fought through. She’s survived AND lived. It’s her time.”
Stroking her wispy hair softly, Cath leant in closer to the lady looking up at her with pain in her eyes. Spencer tried to object to no avail.
“She’s ready Spencer, can’t you see that? Let me help her.”
Spencer couldn’t move or say anything even if he wanted to. He stood in the room speechless, watching the events unfold like a tragic movie.
“To live in hearts we leave behind, is to never truly die. The pain passes, but the beauty remains. You will be free Nell.”
Cath spoke so quietly, smoothly and gently; the lady named Nell smiled contently up at her. She knew she was ready, it was obvious. He couldn’t do a thing about it, couldn’t alert the team to help him or Nell.
But as if he’d communicated telepathically to the team, he could hear them begin to come down the hallway. Faint ‘Spencer?’s could be heard outside the atmospheric and hypothetical bubble he was trapped in.
As Cath meant down to Nell’s head, she looked at Spencer one last time before pressing a kiss to the tired lady’s forehead. As her lips touched the pallid skin, a loud whoosh sounded.
A gigantic span of wings extended out before him, emerging from between the shoulder blades of the gentle figure beside the bed. Black feathers matching the ones scattered on the floor exposed themselves, fluffy and beautiful.
The only sound that could be heard was Spencer’s erratic heartbeat and heavy breathing, as Nell smiled at Cath before gasping her final breath. As if in slow motion, Cath slowly smiled at Spencer before muttering the same words as before.
“Aloho amoch. Goodbye Spencer.”
With a majestic ripple of her wings, they collapsed down and as they disappeared from his view; so did she, leaving nothing but nine feathers circled around the bed, Nell gone and peaceful and Spencer stood with his gun still pointed at the floor.
“Reid, what did you see? Who was here? What happened?”
Muffled questions were thrown in his ears, the team filling the room and examining Nell, and demanding answers as their recent victim lay still.
Spencer shakily breathed out as the feeling returned to his body, the nerves responding as usual as he tucked his gun away and blinked desperately.
Hotch stood panicked, eyebrows raised as he and the rest of the team waited for Spencer to say something. The same confused face he had before suddenly fell calm, awe glimmering in his eyes once more as he realised what had just happened.
