[5.12]

"i already snagged a boyfriend. no need to put in effort now"

When Hotch walked into the bullpen two days before he was officially scheduled to return from his leave, everyone looked at him in surprise.

"I thought you weren't coming back until the beginning of next week," Rossi said, walking up to Hotch. Prentiss also got up from her desk and joined his side. Both glanced warily at his office, which had the blinds closed.

"Way to make me feel welcome, Dave," Hotch said, rolling his eyes. "Jack went back to his Preschool and I didn't feel like sitting at home alone all day. Thought I'd come in and get a head start on some paperwork."

As Hotch started to walk to his office, they followed quickly behind. Morgan grinned mischievously but stayed put at his desk. JJ too watched from the sidelines, smiling at what he would find.

"Before you go in your office," Prentiss said, clearing her throat. "We all agreed that it would be best to not treat you differently given the circumstances."

"And I would appreciate that," Hotch said, frowning. "What?"

Prentiss sighed. "Well, Florence may have taken that as "annoy Hotch more"."

Rossi snickered into his hand. "In her defense though, most of this was going to be cleaned up by the time you returned. But you got here early, so you can't be that angry."

"And, she and Reid are technically on their lunch break, so they aren't wasting company time," Prentiss added.

Hotch had no idea what he expected, but what he saw wasn't it. His office was in disarray. He had never seen something so chaotic. There were countless different coloring pages taped to his walls of different cartoon characters. Friendship bracelet making materials were in a tangled pile in the corner. Empty Capri Sun pouches overflowed the garbage can. There was a paper sign hanging crookedly from the ceiling that read "Welc Hocotch!"

But what really drew his eye was the fact that Florence and Reid were sitting on the office floor. In between them was a medium sized paper mache volcano, which they had painted to look like a real one. It was sitting on top of a deep metal pan, and when Hotch saw the containers of dish soap, baking soda, and vinegar, he knew exactly what they were doing, unfortunately.

"Thanks for helping me, Reid," Florence said, adding the baking soda. They had no idea that the others had entered. "I always saw these on tv shows but never got to make one myself."

"I don't mind. This has been very enjoyable. Did you know that the largest volcano in the solar system isn't even on Earth? Olympus Mons, which is on Mars, is a giant shield volcano that rises to an elevation of twenty-seven kilometers, and it measures five hundred and fifty kilometers across. It was likely able to grow so large because there are no tectonic plates on Mars."

"That's really cool. Hope it doesn't erupt and wipe out the Martians like that town in the Bastille song," Florence said, adding some red food coloring to the volcano.

"Ah, Pompeii," he informed her.

"Is this not something you two should be doing outside and not in my office?"

Florence jumped up when she heard Hotch's voice. "Hopscotch, you're back!"

Reid too had been surprised. He had been holding the bottle of vinegar, and accidentally poured it in the volcano, which immediately started the chemical reaction. Thankfully he hadn't added a lot, so the explosion was rather small. By the time Florence had turned around, realizing what was happening, the orange foam had settled down in the bottom of the pan and the experiment was over.

"Oh, I missed it," Florence groaned, hanging her head.

"Sorry," Reid said, frowning. "We can clean the inside out and start over."

"What have you done to my office?" Hotch asked, looking around it again. If his ex-wife hadn't just died, he might've smiled at the sight. Maybe that had been her goal — to make him smile.

"I was gonna clean most of it up," Florence said, smiling sheepishly. "I've been having my "me time" in here while you've been gone. Oh, also, can you get my shoe down? Derek put it up there to annoy me and you're the only other one tall enough to reach it."

She pointed at the top of one of his filing cabinets, where a yellow Croc was sitting on it. The image of Florence hobbling around without one of her shoes immediately entered Hotch's mind. Logically, she probably just took the other one off though.

"No, leave it there," Rossi said, crossing his arms. "That way she can't wear it. You were doing so good about wearing the boots I got you."

Hotch rolled his eyes but did walk over to the filing cabinet and grab the shoes. He tossed it to Florence, who grinned happily. Then she ran off to wave it in Morgan's face.

"She'd burn this building to the ground if I went away for too long," Hotch said, rubbing his forehead.

Prentiss chuckled. "She'd probably burn it down on purpose as a way to lure you back into her life."

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"Did you guys know that there's a direct linkage between the Nine Eleven attack and Fifty Shades of Grey?"

"Florence, I'm begging of you to please stop," Morgan said, laying his head on the table. They had been called in very early on a Saturday morning for a case, and it had ruined Morgan's plans. They were waiting for Rossi, Hotch, and Prentiss to arrive, so Florence thought she'd fill the silence since she had already looked up the two victims, while Garcia stayed in their office to get a head start on background checks.

"Actually, I'm a little curious," Reid said, smirking. Sure, he welcomed new knowledge, but mostly it was to annoy Morgan.

Before Florence could go into detail though, Rossi, Hotch, and Prentiss entered the room. Morgan sighed in relief, but it was too soon.

"Nine Eleven to My Chemical Romance. MCR to Twilight. Twilight to Fifty Shades," she said very quickly. She received strange looks from the three that had just arrived, but she felt accomplished.

JJ tried to hide her smile as she started to present the case. "Rita Stuart, twenty-five. Second victim in Atlantic City."

"Pretty public spot for a dump site," Rossi noted.

"You know, technically, I think it would qualify more as a disposal site," Reid corrected. "You don't leave a body on a merry-go-round out of convenience."

"He took some time with her appearance, didn't he?" Prentiss said.

"Yeah. Her nails were polished, her hair was cut, clothes were brand-new," JJ said.

"Wants her to look her best when found," Morgan stated. "That's a lot of remorse."

"Who is victim number one?" Hotch asked.

"Stacia Jackson, twenty-nine," JJ said, putting up her picture. "She was found at a local playground."

"A change in victimology," Rossi said, noticing a change in the women's races. It was a very rare thing in their line of work.

"What's the connection between these women?" Hotch asked.

"None," Florence said, frowning. She showed them her laptop with the information she had found. "Rita was married. Stacia was single. Rita worked at a diner. Stacia was a corporate lawyer. Credit cards show that they never came within ten miles of each other."

"Both women were taken two months ago?" Hotch asked.

"Yeah. They lived such completely different lives that the police didn't tie their abduction together until now," JJ answered.

"Was there any evidence of sexual assault?" Reid asked.

"There was no evidence of violence of any kind," she told them.

"So how did they die?" Prentiss asked.

"Rita had a stroke. Stacia had a brain hemorrhage."

"Look at this, the unsub gave them a battery of drugs," Reid said, looking through the file. "Atracurium, doxacurium. These are neural inhibitors. They block signals from the brain to the muscles."

"He put them in medical comas for two months," JJ said.

"Actually, they weren't in a coma. You'd need phenobarbital to keep them unconscious, and they didn't have that," Reid corrected.

"So, wait a minute. These victims were paralyzed but they were still conscious?" Morgan asked.

"They could open their eyes, hear, probably even feel stimulation," Reid told them.

"Physical immobility but mental awareness," Rossi said. "This unsub wants total domination over them."

"And he turns their bodies into prisons to do it," Hotch stated.

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Once the team was in the air and Florence had obsessed over Garcia's new red hair, they video-called in to get further instructions after they looked into the victims more. The call connected as Reid was talking.

"You see this in the angel of mercy killers, like Genene Jones and Amy Archer," he said. "They didn't care about race or hair color. It's men that do."

"Damn straight, men do," Garcia said, leaning towards the camera and grinning.

Morgan grinned when he saw her. "Well, hello, red. Look at you. Guys." He moved the laptop so that everyone could see her.

"Wow," JJ and Prentiss said.

"Well, I've never gotten such a reaction for my hair," Florence said, pretending to be jealous as she flipped her pink locks.

"Garcia, Florence, what did you find out about the clothing the unsub's dressing the victims in?" Hotch asked them.

"At first, only that both garments were made from chiffon, but with the wonder twin powers of the Atlantic City Police and my impeccable eye for fashion — something Ren lacks by the way — we have also determined that these garments fit ridiculously well. They're super flattering to each victim's exact measurements, kind of exactly like the unsub whipped them up herself," Garcia explained.

"Maybe that's what connects the victims," Prentiss said.

"How so?" Hotch asked her.

"Maybe she isn't just killing petite women because they're easier to abduct and pose but because of a physical type. She wants a body type."

"Sewing clothes for a specific size of woman," Morgan realized.

"Please tell me she is not killing these women because she needs human models," JJ said, shaking her head. "I mean, there's gotta be more to it than that."

"There probably is, but at least we have a start on the victimology," Rossi said.

"Prentiss and Morgan, I want you to interview the victims' families," Hotch ordered. "Talk to them about lifestyle choices. Any body image issues these women may have had. Reid, go to Rita Stuart's autopsy. See if the drugs point to any specific medical training the unsub might have had. Dave and I will go to the disposal site. And, Garcia and Florence."

"Sir."

"I want you to check missing persons reports for the last two months. See if any abductions match what we know. We need to find out If the unsub's already taken another victim," he said.

"On it," Florence said, shooting finger guns at the camera. When they hung up, Florence turned to Garcia and pouted. "I don't have a bad sense of fashion."

"You wear sweatpants every single day."

"Uh, that's cause it's comfy and I'm not trying to impress you people. I already snagged a boyfriend. No need to put in effort now."

Florence and Garcia quickly got back to work, digging through all the missing persons reports like Hotch had ordered. Later, they also got a call requesting they pull all vehicles with handicap registration, which was very easy to get. Once they had that, they finished up the missing reports and called JJ to fill them in.

"Go ahead, Garcia," Hotch said.

"Hello, my pretties. We have finished our missing persons sweep. I've got nothing on the medical vehicle, but two new matches on the clothes make the woman front. Cindy Edmundson. She was abducted outside a thrift store, and Maxine Wynan was last seen at the Hillridge Mall."

"That sounds like our girl," Morgan said.

"Any surveillance footage at the mall?" Rossi asked.

"Hope," Florence said, frowning. "It was an outside parking lot. Sorry."

"The new abductees? What's their physical type?" Hotch asked.

"They look pretty tiny to me. I'm gonna send you pictures," Garcia replied. "Also, if it pleases the court, I would like to direct your attention to exhibit A. The calendar map."

"What about it?" JJ asked.

"Both of these new victims were abducted one week ago, exactly one day before the bodies of Rita Stuart and Stacia Jackson, respectively, turned up," Garcia explained.

"She doesn't let a body go until she has a replacement," Hotch realized.

By the time the next morning arrived, there was another body found and another girl had been taken. Byt combing through missing person reports from the last two days, they deduced that it was Bethany Wallace who had been taken, and she fit the victimology. When her husband showed up at the precinct for questioning, he revealed that she was diabetic, and if not found within twenty-four hours so that she could take her insulin, she'd die.

The team spread out to try and put together the pieces of the case. JJ managed to learn from a local dressmaker that the unsub handmade the dresses that the victims were in. Also, the unsub had been sewing for a long time. Morgan and Reid then went to talk to a doll collector, who managed to pinpoint the exact doll line the unsub was trying to recreate from her childhood.

It was some local doll company from the eighties. They had held a contest for a new doll idea, which ended up uncovering a lot of sexual assaults for the girls that entered. After combing through essay entries, looking through the clothing entries, and looking at seamstresses in the area, they narrowed the unsub down to Samantha Malcolm. They immediately worked on a background check for her.

"Ok, guys, I just got Samantha Malcolm's medical records, and," Garcia stopped to sigh heavily. "Oh, my god, she was doomed."

"Like Star Trek red shirt doomed. The first couple to have sex in a horror movie doomed. Buffy's mom doomed—"

"Ren, focus up," Morgan said.

"Sorry," Florence muttered.

"Florence, Garcia, what happened to her?" Hotch asked.

"Well, for the first ten years, nothing," Garcia said. "And then she started a battery of electroshock treatments."

"At ten?" Reid asked in disbelief. "Who subjects a child to ECT?"

"That would be dear old dad," Florence told them. "Dr. Arthur Malcolm. He runs an inpatient mental health facility for troubled young people called New Lives."

"At first, the essay that Samantha wrote raised some flags, but her father explained that the therapy was to deal with the recent death of her mother. After that, he started her on a serious regimen of antipsychotic drugs, which he weaned her off of a few years ago," Garcia explained.

"It explains her familiarity with medication," JJ said.

"Where is she now?" Prentiss asked.

"Uh, her father declared her incompetent, so he's still the legal guardian," Garcia replied. "Everything is in his name. And all of her records list New Lives as her residence."

"She couldn't keep victims in an inpatient facility. She needs privacy," Rossi said.

"Garcia, what about real estate holdings in her father's name?" Hotch asked.

"Just his own, but New Lives has a bunch of outpatient and halfway houses all over town," hse said.

"JJ, where does she work?" Hotch asked.

"I have her placed at three different shops around town," JJ answered.

"All right, let's split up and cover the shops and the facility."

"I want to go to New Lives," Reid insisted. "Whether or not she's there, I want to talk to the father. There are literally hundreds of therapies to help kids through loss. Electroshock is not one of them."

"Take Rossi."

Once the team split up, they managed to track down Samantha. Her father, after being threatened, of course, gave up the address she was at. There, they found Samantha as well as the three missing girls. Samantha was apprehended and the girls made it out alive.

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After the case was wrapped up, Reid had invited Florence to come with him to some chess park he liked to go with. She had nothing better to do, so didn't mind tagging along. Apparently, he had recently lost his joy for the game and was trying to get it back. Teaching Florence how to play might help him a little.

When they arrived at the park, he walked over to a younger guy who seemed to be playing against himself. Florence kept any nerd comments to herself though, because even if she thought it was a little sad, she wasn't mean.

"Checkmate in twelve," Reid told the boy after studying his board.

"No way," he said, scoffing.

"Let me show you," Reid said, smiling.

He took a seat across from the guy and they began playing. Each only took seconds to make a move before hitting the little clock on the table — Florence didn't really know what it was for. As they quickly played, people started to gather around them and watch. Florence looked around and saw their amazed faces.

The game soon ended in exactly twelve moves just like Reid had predicted. The crowd started to clap and congratulate him, which confused Florence even more. She leaned down next to him.

"Teach me how to do that, Boy Genius. I wanna be cool with the chess crowd."

"Ren, I've been perfecting my skills at this game since I was a child. It has taken years."

She made a face. "Oh. Nevermind, that sounds like a lot of work."