slowly fracturing? loosing their place in the bigger picture? more risks are taken? instead of talking them down they trip them up? starts with Elle, carries over to Hotch and Morgan and Reid and then surges up, suffocating Hotch, coating him in Foyets blood, seeping into his brain, until all he can think about is never letting someone have that power over a family again. Morgans slow break starts with Elle and splinters with Penelope and matches with Hotches
*****
it had started far before Foyet. it had started when Elle had cocked her gun and taken a shot, the cool air whipping around her as the sound echoed off the buildings and into the sky.
she had taken the shot, never realizing just what, besides her, was going to fracture.
for too long, she lingered on the edges of the teams memories, in the dark crevices that none of them liked to look into. she stood behind them in mirrors, her confident face flashing behind eyelids.
in each gunshot, Derek, Spencer, and Hotch heard her impatient whisper, felt the curl of her lips pressed against their skin.
it was enough to drive anyone mad.
***
with Foyet, things shifted in a different manner, both more overt and subtle than when Elle left.
they had killed before, shot men and women to death, seen horrific crime scenes, and felt the spray of blood across their face.
with Foyet - with Foyet, it was different.
beating a man to death is a far different method of killing than a simple bullet fired from a chamber.
***
none of them talked about Hankel.
***
for Derek, Elle was the bullet in the chamber. Hankel was the cocking.
Penelope Garcia being shot was the trigger.
***
for JJ, it was a slow burn.
she knew, she knew, what sorrow was, how it melted through a person, a slow sweep of cold realization, the sudden pit in her stomach that swallowed all emotions that made her feel, the numbness that followed and echoed in her joints.
she knew.
hollow people led to hollow decisions and she hadn't felt real in a long, long time.
***
Penelope had never expected it.
she was bright. bubbly. effervescent.
she dug through muck and shit - she didn't absorb it - she wasn't it.
she was simple, colorful, a dreadful gossip, unassuming, harmless.
she was. she was.
((she wasn't))
***
Spencer felt the gaps of his ribs, felt the press of his soles to the ground, felt the caress of his curls on his forehead.
he touched the back of his knuckles, pressed the tip of his tongue to the roof of his mouth, rolled his ankles.
he felt and searched and pressed and still, still, he wrong, empty, a husk.
he rattled off statistics, read hundreds of thousands of words, solved cases.
he was missing something.
he just knew it.
***
Strauss had no idea the powder keg she had dumped on the BAU in the form of one Emily Prentiss.
***
Emily was put together wrong.
she was missing things, like the right reactions or the correct emotion.
when she was thirteen, she watched a man die protecting her.
her mother couldn't look at her for months after, a twisted expression on her face as she watched Emily grow.
it didn't bother Emily.
and in hindsight, that was a huge red flag.
***
Will would sometimes come home and watch JJ, his face open and uncomplicated, his eyes fond.
she'd extend a hand and he'd come into their room, a small smile making its way across his face.
'how was work,' Will would ask.
'good,' JJ would say, tightening her hand just enough so that Will would know that they hadn't just caught the unsub but had put them in the ground where they belonged.
'good,' Will would respond, the fondness leaching from his eyes for a moment, satisfaction curling in the corners of his lips.
they would sit for hours, hands latched together, content in their work and their world, something like happiness curling in the air around each other.
***
none of them voiced it.
***
Rossi joined the team, clicking into place as though he had been there forever.
he smoothed certain edges, calmed the team just enough, up-lifted them to a new standard.
he didn't stop them.
he made them better.
***
the first time he kills someone like they have in the past the team opens up like the sea, pulling back in a low rush of sound, before crashing down around him, thundering through the earth, sweeping him up into an exhilaration he hadn't known was possible.
he had paused, on the brink, in the moment before he pressed down the trigger, and let himself entertain the thought of not.
in the end though, it was inevitable.
he was inevitable.
***
the team broke in places, splintering in more and more devastating ways.
***
Gideon would have been horrified.
((if he had been able to see it.))
He knew his team like they were his family.
((he would've been blind until he wasn't and it would've broken him.))
Leaving was the worst thing he had done.
((it was the best.))
((but not for him.))
***
Spencer watched with cool eyes at the edges of the bar, the smokey air a smooth drag in his throat. his eyes almost like a caress on Emily's skin, her heartbeat a steady thud against her breastbone.
JJ, her hair glinting in the dim light, Will, a steady presence at her back. Derek, perched on a chair with his back to the wall, looking like someone from a magazine spread. Hotch and Rossi deep in the shadows of the club, whiskey in hand. Even Penelope was there, tucked under Derek's arm.
Emily knew what she looked like. she knew what she projected. she knew how she was acting.
drunk, sloppy, easy - a target.
they had never done this before.
***
Rossi knew the potential the BAU. he knew the good it could do.
Gideon knew the potential too. and he had his reservations.
((Gideon was right.))
***
Derek grinned across the plane, taking in the smooth inhales of Spencer fast asleep before turning back to JJ. She cocked an eyebrow, a glimmer of amusement in her gaze.
Derek shrugged back, his face fond and open as Will's was and JJ reached out, clasping his hand in hers, squeezing like she would to Will.
Derek blinked back at her, before a look of satisfaction crawled across his face and he squeezed back.
His hands were the same as they had always been. Big, strong, bruised knuckles, with gunpowder residue across his palm.
JJ grinned at him, letting her delight shine through.
They were good at this.
***
Almost too good.
***
Elle was the first to find it, the peacefulness in a gunshot, the way the sensation of killing lingered in her hands, the smell of smoke wreathed around her.
Hotch fell next, bloodied and bruised and damaged, soaking up the feeling of I did this, I did this, I did this, even as this was a broken body.
Derek tipped over the line, watching Penelope breath with tubes in her nose. he knew what was coming. out of all of them, he knew what steps to take to make that choice. and he did, he tipped right over the line, easy as pie.
Emily slotted into place, taking up their mantle with only a single blink and a raised eyebrow.
Penelope followed, drawn to lessening the violence. no one said anything otherwise, even when she crossed lines that none of them dared.
Spencer watched and waited and learned and read and when he was ready, he put down his books and he took up his gun.
JJ, his twin flame in all universes smiled, clenched Will's hand a little tighter, and followed him in, feet first.
Rossi sighed, tipped his head back and stood, the final piece to their puzzle. the beginning to their end and the end to their beginning.
***
A single gunshot echoed in the air and unbeknownst to anyone, the nine of them began to fall.
Imagine the team hunting you, an unsub who is a vigilante hacker exposing big companies and people (like Aiden Pearce and Marcus from Watch Dogs [videogame]).
Please do not reblog to another imagine blog; reblogging to your personal blog is encouraged.
