"Over the past two months, the L.A. Field office has been tracking a series of 4 bank robberies in the L.A. Metro area", JJ started. "It's one individual wearing a black ski mask. He's highly skilled. It's his unique M.O. that put him squarely in our court. This happened two days ago."

The profilers turned their gaze to the screen.

The footage showed the UnSub taking turns aiming his weapon at the hostages as they put out their clothes.

"He's making her undress?"

"He takes their clothes and locks them in the vault, then he goes for the cash."

"Smart. Nobody's going to run after him butt naked."

"It's also a psychological advantage. Make the captives feel exposed, intimidated, and much less likely to fight back," said Spencer.

"That, and the gun he's waving around."

"– mac-10. Boy's got a lot of firepower."

"But why is this case for us?" asked Elle.

Parker wondered the same thing.

The fact that the hostages had to take off their clothes was unusual, but not 'BAU-unusual'.

"Because in the last robbery, two things changed," JJ replied. "One, he beat the security guard nearly senseless, and two, after he made everyone undress, he forced two pairs of victims together at gunpoint, then he made them simulate sex with each other."

JJ clicked on her remote and showed the team a middle-aged woman and a man, a young man and an older woman.

"It's remarkable. By utilizing a practical M.O. The UnSub has stumbled on to a psychological signature. It's fascinating."

"He's a sex offender now."

"Fueled by violent rage. Only our UnSub doesn't know it yet. If he did, he wouldn't be robbing banks anymore."

"So, he's a violent sex offender in denial."

"And a sexual predator who's just escalated his crimes."

~~

"Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask and he will tell you the truth."

Oscar Wilde.

Parker handed JJ one of the coffee cups and sat down in one of the empty seats.

At that moment, Elle was standing at the fax machine and receiving the fax that Garcia had just sent to the others.

"'Stripping bandit'", Elle read the headline. "That's terrible. That makes it sound like the bandit's doing the stripping."

"What would you call him?"

"Pervert."

"Scumbag."

"Son of a B...  Mother," Parker replied.

"I'd call him an ass–"

"Hey, focus, please," Hotch tried to change the subject. "We have the details of the 4 bank robberies to learn before we get to Los Angeles."

Parker placed the file on their lap and opened it.

"At this point is he more a bank robber or a sex offender?", Spencer asked an important question.

"Seriously. What's he going to do next, rob a bank or rape someone?"

"I'd say we need to know more about how he robs the banks and who he chooses to victimize," Elle suggested

"Why these banks and why these victims?"

"Pairing these specific people together is a fantasy. If we can figure out the nature of that fantasy, we may be able to predict its targets."

"In the last robbery I don't see any photos of what he made the victims actually do," Elle noticed as she looked at the pictures again.

"There is a problem with this surveillance system. We're working on it. We should hit the ground running. How should we break it down?"

"There's got to be a pattern to the banks. We should run a geographical profile," said Spencer.

"That's yours."

"And for the sexual aspects, we need to look at the specific victimology."

"You, Parker and I can go with the victim reports, see whatever surveillance footage they've got," Hotch addressed Elle.

"Leave the UnSub himself. We'll need his perspective."

"Crime scene."

~~

"Witness statements," the detective explained as he placed the box containing the CD's on the table. "Not planning on seeing any of the sights this afternoon, were you?"

"At least I've already seen the Hollywood sign, been to the Getty center, I'm not really interested in John Wayne's footprints, so I guess that covers the sights of Los Angeles," replied Elle. "Parker?"

"Nope, I'm good," the young agent muttered.

They had already started sorting the CDs according to importance.

"Let me guess, New York?"

"Now, what would make you say that?"

Before the detective could reply, Hotch walked through the door and asked, "Is this all the video equipment you've got?"

"That ain't Quantico," the profiler was reminded by the detective.

"I need to set up a link with our tech back there."

"We got another bay as crappy as this one down the hall."

The two men started walking towards the door.

"You two all right?" Hotch wanted to know from his colleagues.

"We just need some popcorn."

"Have fun."

"I don't have popcorn, but I do have other snacks," Parker reported proudly and put the snacks on the table.

Parker always had snacks with them, always. Not just for them, but also for Spencer.

Both of them became very hangry when they were hungry.

"I should have known."

~~

"See anything interesting?" Hotch asked.

"Maybe."

Elle rewound the footage a bit.

"He took his time, he looked at me, then he pointed his gun at me," reported the woman.

"And you were all naked at this point?", a male voice was heard offscreen.

"Yes."

"That's the bank manager's wife," Parker explained. "She stopped by to pick him up. They were going to celebrate their son's 16th birthday"

"The Son was with them?" Hotch asked.

"The Daughter, too."

~~

"That's Henderson, the bank manager–" Agent Wallace began.

He had accompanied Derek and Gideon to the last crime scene and the team now wanted to see the footage of the attack themselves.

On them you could see Mr Henderson, dressed only in shorts, being threatened by the UnSub and then the recordings stopped.

"– Said he was so flustered after what he had been through, that when he was gathering the tapes for us, he hit the wrong buttons and erased part of them."

"You believe him?"

"No. I told him I thought he was embarrassed about the tapes getting out and he erased them on purpose. He denied it."

"You rule out the possibility he was in on it?" Parker asked.

"Why would he be involved in a robbery when he had to go through something like that?" Agent Wallace asked the counter question.

"Maybe he didn't know what was gonna happen. Maybe he was betrayed by the UnSub," Elle advised.

"Or perhaps he was coerced. There's been many documented cases of robbers forcing bank managers to assist them with their crimes."

"None of that is consistent with the M.O.'s of the other robberies."

"He's right," said Parker, "there's probably a reason this last one was different from the others."

Before anyone could respond, the detective Parker and Elle had just spoken to briefly came to them.

"A call from Quantico on one."

"Thanks."

Hotch answered the phone and immediately turned it on loud.

"Garcia, it's Hotch."

"Are we ready for something completely weird?"

"How weird are we talking, Garcia?"

"The security footage Hotch gave me, I ran it through my software 3 times..."

"– and?"

"And there are weird height issues. i.e., the UnSub in the first three robberies is 6 foot 1 and the UnSub in the last robbery, he's 5'10."

"So what? In the last robbery we're dealing with a different UnSub?" asked Derek.

"An UnSub who is somehow able to erase tapes that show exactly what happened at that bank."

"An UnSub who may have possibly had inside help."

"I think it's time we sit down with the bank manager."

~~

After Gideon and Hotch spoke to Mr. Henderson (who had deleted the videos), they realized what the bank robbery was about. Shame and humiliation.

With the new clue, Parker and the others went through the files again.

Then the phone rang. Derek answered and immediately put it on speaker.

"Yeah?"

"Pals, don't be ticked, but I think I may have missed the sort of glaringly obvious here," confessed the technical analyst. "How would you make yourself taller without being a different person entirely or having some sort of weird surgery?"

"Heels."

"Right, sunshine, but would have seen heels, unless the UnSub had them hidden inside his shoe. The point is, lifts."

"Lifts," Derek repeated, irritated.

"Lifts, all hidden up inside his boot. With a little fancy footwork, pun emphatically intended, Garcia here managed to dig him out."

"Thanks, girl," said Derek and ended the conversation.

"He's trying to throw us off, hide his real height," he then addressed the other profilers.

"But why would he take the lifts out just for the last robbery?"

"Maybe he's getting careless."

"Which means he's also getting more dangerous."

"At least we know we're only dealing with one UnSub."

~~

With the new information, the team was able to present the profile.

"Based on the knowledge that spending a significant time in prison stunts emotional growth while increasing professional skills, we can estimate this UnSub went to jail between the ages of 18 and 22 and spent between 5 and 10 years inside," Hotch began.

"That puts him at the approximate age between 23 and 35."

"This guy's much more than just a bank robber though. What started out as a practical M.O., stripping his hostages, triggered a deep psycho-sexual response," explained Parker.

"In other words, when he found himself in front of a bunch of naked people under his control, he snapped, then he decided to manipulate them."

"And better, or just getting worse, he's attacking banks earlier in the day when more and more people are present."

"This sounds like he's sacrificing the safety of having just a few hostages to contain, for the satisfaction of having more subjects to control."

"He'll be less interested in money and more interested in sadistically manipulating his captives."

"In all likelihood, he'll be high on drugs."

"It would be wrong, however, to write this guy off as crazy. Bank robbing is an ambitious crime and it takes time and planning to pull it off."

"What makes this UnSub unique is his fractured psyche. On the one hand, a cold, organized bank robber. On the other, a disorganized sexual sadist full of bottled up rage."

"The two parts of his psyche have just begun to bleed together, now when they finally converge, we're talking about a criminal with the skills and efficiency of a master bank robber and the rage of a suicide bomber. He will explode", Parker warned the detectives present.

~~

As soon as the profilers presented the profile, someone called 911. Another bank robbery was in progress.

But unfortunately they were too late and the guy managed to escape on his motorcycle.

"It's the first time he's made so many mistakes," Hotch said as he, Gideon, Derek and Parker entered the bank. "Hit the bank in the morning, more people around."

"Didn't clear the back room, parked his bike right out front", Derek continued to list.

"Didn't bother taking any money," Parker added.

"Did almost everything you predicted," said Agent Wallace.

"Sometimes it sucks to be right," Derek muttered, looking at the victim, who wasn't always lying on the floor.

"Witnesses said he refused to take off his clothes," Agent Wallace reported.

"Damn."

"That's enough. It's not the kind of rage you bottle back up. This could be the beginning of a spree. How's JJ doing on that suspect list?" Derek addressed Hotch.

"I'll call her. I'll call Reid and Elle and get them on it, too."

"You don't think he's going to rob another bank?" Agent Wallace asked Gideon and Parker.

Parker shook their head and Gideon replied: "No. He doesn't care about money anymore. Whatever he's after, he'll hurt anyone who gets in his way."

~~

Parker and the others were leaving the bank when Spencer called.

They had a suspect, his name was Roland Lynch and the others were supposed to speak to his parole officer.

This helped them locate Lynch. They found the guy in a bar. And the guy was a creep, but not the creep the profilers were looking for.

At the same time, the UnSub robbed a restaurant where he shot a 14-year-old boy.

The restaurant was a small diner. Inconspicuous to most people who walked past it. But not for the UnSub.

"According to witnesses, he came in and fired into the ceiling. He separated all the kids from their parents."

The recordings showed what the detective summarized.

He entered the diner, the guests looked for shelter under the tables, and he separated the children from their parents.

He then chose a mother and her son.

The UnSub was talking to the son, who had his back to the camera, but he didn't seem to like what the UnSub was saying.

The mother tried to persuade her son and–

"Then–"

The boy then forcefully punched his mother in the face.

"He's forcing the sons to hit their mothers."

"He started to. When he tried to get the first one to hit his mother harder, he refused, and when he refused..."

The UnSub pushed the boy. The 14-year-old landed on the ground off camera, but you could still see in the recording how the UnSub aimed his weapon at the boy and fired several times.

"It doesn't make sense. They're children," Hotch muttered.

"He's playing out a fantasy."

"Yeah, but it's his fantasy and someone else's children."

"They're surrogates of some kind. No. You don't do this to someone else's kids to get off. You just don't do it," Hotch said and stepped away from the others.

The others went back to work. Only Parker and Gideon followed Hotch into the kitchen to check on him.

"It just doesn't make sense to me," Hotch addressed his two colleagues. "You internalize violence. You take it out on other people. Why force someone else to do it? Why force children to act out your rage?"

"He didn't make the children do anything at the bank. Manager said he put the parents together."

"So, why is he so focused on the kids now?"

"I want to talk to the bank manager again," said Gideon and left the kitchen.

"You okay?" Parker asked.

"It's a long story," Hotch explained.

The younger profiler nodded and left it at that. They knew that if Hotch wanted to talk to them about it, he would.

~~

Back at the police station, the three profilers spoke to Mr Henderson and his family.

"I don't know what else I can tell you. I've already gone over it 3 times," said Mr. Henderson.

"What we need to know is if there's something in that tape that you don't want us to know about."

"There were 12 other people in that bank who were forced to watch. What could I possibly be hiding?" replied the father of the family.

"This is about your children, isn't it?" Hotch asked when no one said anything.

"We're sorry," said Gideon.

"Mr. Henderson, this is very important," Parker took over. "He's already killed 2 people and he's not going to stop."

"God! Go ahead," said Mrs. Henderson to her husband. "Why don't you tell them what he did to us, what you let him do?"

"He had a gun. He was going to kill me."

It seemed like that wasn't a good enough 'apology' for Mrs. Henderson. She grabbed her purse and stood up.

"Come on," she said to her children.

The three left the room. Parker also got up to accompany the family to the door.

Mrs. Henderson thanked the young profiler and left the building with her daughter.

They expected Darren, the Son, to follow them, but he stopped and turned back to Parker.

"Is it true he would have killed my father if he tried to stand up to him?"

"There's no way to know, Darren, but your father did the right thing."

The teenager nodded.

"Is there some reason you doubt that?"

"It's just... the robber said something afterwards. He said he was sorry."

~~

"He apologized," Derek repeated, surprised.

"Sadists don't apologize. They gloat, maybe, but they don't apologize," Elle pointed out.

"Our guy's not a sadist. We got that part of the profile wrong," explained Gideon.

"He doesn't derive any sadistic pleasure from these fantasies, they're more like a compulsion."

"Compulsion that's literally life or death? I mean, if anyone interferes, he kills them. It's like he's compelled to direct these fantasies using these people as actors."

"Actors on a stage, it's a play."

"It's a psychodrama," said Spencer.

"What's that?" asked JJ.

"It's a form of psychotherapy whereby actors serve as surrogates for actual people in the patient's life."

"Incorporates many elements of theater, including an audience."

"There's a very famous pilot program at the San Luis Obispo county jail in the mid-nineties."

"Isn't that just a few hours away from here?"

"Let's go over the suspect list and see how many of them did time in San Luis Obispo."

Morgan immediately dialed Garcia's number and a few moments later they had the answer.

"The answer is four," Garcia reported.

"Come on. Tell me you narrowed it down a little more than that."

"Only two live in the state, but only one lives in L.A."

"Ha, that's a girl."

"Caleb Dale Sheppard, last known address 236 Harbor Lane, Inglewood."

"Thanks, mama", Morgan said and hung up.

"That's only 1.6 miles from the last restaurant that he hit," said Spencer.

"I've been studying a lot of L.A. Maps," the young genius added as the others, except Parker, looked at him.

They looked at their file with a small smile on their face.

"If he's been attacking that close to home, he's given up any interest in protecting his identity."

"We need to all go down there and split up, half to his address, half patrol in the area around the restaurant in case he's on the hunt."

~~

Caleb Sheppard was not at the address, but his mother was.

She let the investigators into the house without resistance.

"Mrs. Sheppard, do you know where your son is?" asked Spencer.

"Dale doesn't live here anymore," the woman explained.

"Where is he, Mrs. Sheppard?"

"He's a grown man."

"You have any idea how much trouble your son could be in?" asked Gideon.

"Jail? He's a good boy. Lost his way a bit, that's all."

"Well, that's one way to look at 12 years in and out of prison," commented Parker.

"You've never made a mistake?" countered Mrs. Sheppard.

Of course, Parker had made mistakes before. But none that would have put them in prison.

"Your son spent time in a juvenile home?"

"He was out of control, even attacked his own sister once, but his father died. It wasn't his fault."

"What's it yours?", Gideon wanted to know.

"What?"

"What's your fault?"

While Gideon was talking to the woman, Parker and Spencer looked around discreetly.

"How many of these did you take today, Mrs. Sheppard?" Spencer asked, holding up a medicine container.

"I had... back problems my whole life."

~~

"She's completely out of her mind," Hotch muttered.

The profilers were standing in front of the house.

"She's so lonely she'll just keep talking to us. I doubt she'll tell us where he is," said Gideon and Parker nodded.

"That was Garcia," Spencer explained and joined the others. "Apparently Sheppard's sister died 12 years ago, suicide."

"Lady sure did a number on her kids."

"She's probably lonely after the husband died and on painkillers, not in her right mind, and nobody there to turn to but Sheppard and his sister."

"So, now he's symbolically punishing his mother?" Spencer asked.

"He's playing out a fantasy. Sons gaining total control over their mothers."

"We got something," the detective drew attention to himself.

He handed Hotch a pack of matches. Sheppard had written something on the inside.

'Dale Daybreak Hotel'

~~

Sheppard definitely lived there, but was no longer there when Elle and Derek got the Hotel Room.

They first looked in the public park near the hotel, but there was no sign of him there either.

But they found him at a birthday party in a garden right next to the park.

Again, he wanted a boy to hurt his mother.

However, he wanted the boy to shoot her with the gun while he held a knife to the child's throat.

"Put it down."

"Drop the knife."

"It won't fix you, Sheppard," Gideon tries. "It doesn't matter what you make them do, how many people are watching you–"

Hotch took the first opportunity, he hit Sheppard in the shoulder.

Sheppard let go of the boy, who ran to his mother.

Parker and Spencer put their weapons away.

The young man secured Sheppard's gun while Parker took the mother and son away.

~~

"The basis of shame is not some personal mistake of ours, but that this humiliation is seen by everyone."

Milan Kundera.

On the Jet, Parker couldn't sleep and decided to work on their scarf instead.

But she wasn't the only one who couldn't find peace.

"You okay?" Gideon asked Hotch.

"I was showing those trainees around the offices the other day. They all want to be in the BAU. I told them what a great job it is. And they even applauded when the tour was over."

"I heard."

"Yeah, but I didn't really tell them the truth. I didn't tell them what it's like to spend your days in this hell."

"It's fun, huh?" Parker chimed in.

"I mean, who's to blame for someone like Sheppard?

"His mother? Broken home? Society? All of it? None of it? It gets worse and worse with each case."

"Save one life, we save the world."

Parker liked the saying. They found it quite impressive how Gideon usually found the right words.

"Yeah."

"Well, the one thing I didn't tell the trainees."

"What's that?"

"We don't get paid enough."

"You got that right," Gideon agreed with Hotch and Parker scoffed.