❝Fear is the enemy of logic.❞

FRANK SINATRA

✩

0.2 : chocolate chip cookies

OR

season 3, episode 20 : lo-fi

AMY WINEHOUSE, COOKIE DOUGH, AND COZY SWEATS. THAT'S THE KEY TO A GOOD SUNDAY NIGHT RIGHT THERE. Fin licks the spoon contentedly, her eyes closed, and sighs. "Ah, Jack, Rose. Chocolate chip is the king of cookies, I have to say it."

Jack and Rose don't say anything, but she didn't expect them to. They're ladybugs, they don't talk. They've lived in the corner between her wall and ceiling for the past month, and she doesn't suspect that they're leaving any time soon, so she's named them and she leaves food out for them when she's gone. Cats and dogs are too expensive; why buy one when you can have ladybugs?

After three weeks at the BAU, things are starting to feel normal. Fin's been on two cases, a stalker in Baltimore and a resurfaced serial in Roanoke. Both home cases, both over relatively quickly. It was a nice "welcome to the BAU" in Fin's opinion. She's gotten to know the team, but she's not quite sure she's completely earned their trust yet, especially not Agent Hotchner.

From what Fin can tell, he's a type C personality. Logical, stoic, controlling, detail-oriented. He's a perfect leader on paper, but she has yet to see him smile or show any emotion at all, actually. He's barely spoken to her at all, and she knows he'll be the hardest team member to win over. But she's confident that with time, she can do it.

Everyone else has warmed up to her just fine, especially after she beat Emily at cards and Morgan to a '90s R&B reference. Two things Fin's good at: blackjack and Destiny's Child. Even Dr. Reid--or Spencer, as she's come to call him; the last name thing isn't really her cup of tea--seems interested in her.

She slides the cookie sheet into the oven, moving her hips in time to "Tears Dry On Their Own" and then it happens. Her phone rings.

"Oh, please be Jo or Lars or anyone other than JJ," Fin groans, wiping her hands on a towel and looking at the screen. "God, of course it's JJ." She presses ACCEPT and holds the phone to her ear. "Jaj, I hope you know you're interrupting the baking time of my world-renowned chocolate chip cookies."

A quiet chuckle from the other end. "Sorry, Fin. I was about to leave, too, but Hotch says we have a case."

"Don't you usually decide when we have a case?" Fin asks, leaning back against the counter. JJ's the media liaison, so all cases typically come through her and she decides which ones the BAU takes and when.

"Usually. But this time, Hotch says something came to him directly. Can you be here in twenty?"

"Give me twenty-five and I'll bring the cookies."

"Deal." Fin can hear JJ grinning through the phone. "See you in a minute."

"See you in a minute." Now Fin has to change into work clothes-yuck-and share cookies. She doesn't like to share cookies.

✩

"Don't get comfortable," Hotch says the minute that Fin and the others walk into the room. "There'll be time to debrief on the plane." He's standing in front of the screen, holding the remote and rewatching a grainy security tape over and over.

"Where are we headed?" asks Spencer from behind Fin. "Wait, are those cookies?"

"Yes, they are, but they're for the plane, so hands off." She hugs the container of cookies tight to her chest. "No snitching."

He sticks out his bottom lip in a cute little pout. "You're mean."

"We're going to New York," Hotch replies, turning around to face them.

"Five shootings in two weeks." David Rossi steps into the doorway, hands in his pockets. "It's about time we got the call." He's the newest member of the team behind Fin, and so far one of the coolest, in her opinion. She was delighted to learn that he likes molasses cookies-her personal favorite-and also that he knows Arctic Monkeys, which was a little surprising, considering he's old enough to be her father.

"I want to take Garcia with us," Hotch says. "Hopefully they'll give us access to their surveillance systems."

"What do we know?" asks Emily, immediately all-business. Fin admires her professionalism and the way she can just turn it on; you can tell she's the daughter of a diplomat.

"All the killings are mid-day. Single gunshot to the head with a .22."

"Any witnesses?" asks JJ.

Hotch shakes his head grimly. "No."

"A .22-caliber pistol's only 152 decibels," Spencer says. "New York streets and subways are routinely well over 100. It could be people aren't even registering the gunshot until the unsub's already leaving the scene."

"New York's full of weird things," Fin says. "The only time I was ever there, I saw two men on Broadway protesting the wearing of underwear, and I'll let you picture that for yourselves. A gunshot in a loud area might even go unnoticed when there's so much else to hear and see."

Morgan nods, eyebrows narrowed. "They sound like mob hits."

"Except none of them have ties to organized crime," Hotch says.

"Do they have any connection to each other?" Emily asks.

Hotch shakes his head. "None that they've found."

"How about communication with the police?" Morgan asks. "Has the unsub tried to make contact?"

Hotch turns toward the screen, clicks a button on his remote. "Surveillance cameras have captured video of three of the murders. This is the latest."

Footage appears on the screen again, the same security feed Hotch was watching when they walked in. A man in a hoodie walks up to another man, shoots him in the back of the head, walks away. It's grainy, stilted. Fin wrinkles her nose. "New York City, with all its money and new technology, can't give us anything better than this?"

"They're all the same," Hotch replies. "He wears a hood and keeps his head down."

"This guy's bold." Emily shrugs. "Crowded areas, broad daylight..."

"So they're completely random?" Rossi asks.

Hotch sighs. "It seems that way."

Spencer crosses his arms uncomfortably. "Son of Sam all over again."

Fin doesn't know much about the Son of Sam, but she remembers reading articles about it in the Academy. The terror he caused and the panic he inflicted aren't something she'd ever want to live through, and she hopes nothing like that will happen this time. Please, please, please.

✩

"How come I only get to travel with you guys, like, once every two years?" Penelope Garcia says in disgust, holding her knitting daintily in a gloved hand. Fin had the pleasure of meeting her on their last case and Penelope pronounced her "my beautiful little hazelnut" and invited her for coffee and donuts the next night. Needless to say, they are now the best of friends, as Penelope would say. Fin likes Penelope's refreshing bubbliness; she's like a little ray of sunshine, and there are too few of those in the world.

"Trust me, mama, it can get old." Morgan walks in behind her, grinning. Fin's also a fan of Morgan and Penelope's relationship; they're the flirtiest of friends and Fin's a little jealous. She wishes she had a male friend to call her "baby girl". It looks like it'd be nice.

"Oh, right, like the way that spa treatments in five-star hotels can get old." Penelope takes her bag from Morgan and sits down next to Fin, patting her hand sweetly.

"Remember the time we got on board and they hadn't chilled the Cristal?" Emily asks sarcastically, smirking at Morgan as she passes.

He shakes his head. "Ooh, I almost quit the BAU that day."

"Okay, you know what?" Penelope stands up, putting a finger in Morgan's chest. "You guys can joke all you want, because I am never leaving this plane."

"I wish you'd come more often, Pen," Fin says, leaning over the back of her seat, her hand almost touching the top of Spencer's head. "It'd be more fun with you here."

Morgan places a hand over his heart, looking wounded. "Ouch."

"No, my sweet girl, I can't do that," Penelope replies, shaking her head. "I can't look at everything you look at. Not my cup of tea."

"The victims?" Rossi's flipping through a bunch of photos, sitting next to Hotch, a frown on his face.

"Each killed in a completely different neighborhood," Hotch replies. "Hell's Kitchen, Murray Hill, Lower East Side, Chinatown, East Harlem."

"It doesn't make any sense." Spencer's looking down at his file, nose scrunched up in a way that Fin's come to associate with confusion or deep thought. "There's no common victimology, no sexual component, no robbery, no geographical connection..." He trails off, then asks, "Do the police have any leads?"

"He's killing roughly every two days." Hotch looks down at the table, then back up at Spencer. "The press is having a field day and it sounds like the mood on the street's getting pretty edgy."

"It's a joint FBI-NYPD taskforce?" asks Rossi.

Hotch nods. "Kate Joyner heads up the New York field office. She's running point on the case and called me directly." He looks up, past Fin, to JJ near the front of the plane. "JJ, would you tell them we're ready to go?"

JJ looks up, lifting her chin off her hand, startled out of her thoughts. "Right." She stands up and disappears through the curtain toward the cockpit. There's been something up with her ever since they came in today, and Fin can't figure out what it is. She's not sure if she should ask, being so new, but she's worried about JJ. She hopes nothing's wrong.

"Kate's starting to butt heads with the lead detectives and wanted a fresh set of eyes," Hotch continues, drawing Fin's attention back to the conversation.

"Joyner. I know her." Morgan nods. "She's a Brit, right?"

"Well, dual citizenship." Hotch shrugs. "Her father's British, her mother's American. She was a big deal at Scotland Yard before coming to the Bureau."

"I don't know her, but I've heard she can be kind of a bitch," Fin says quietly, resting her chin on her arms. Some of her instructors at the Academy liked to gossip, and she's a good listener.

"I've heard the same thing," Morgan adds.

Hotch looks between us, calm and calculating. "I didn't think so." Fin's not sure if he's going to reprimand her for calling Kate a bitch; it's so damn hard to read his non-expressions.

"You know her?" Emily asks.

"We liaised when she was still at Scotland Yard." Hotch is all business, but something about this makes Fin think there might be more to the story.

"And she's good?" Rossi asks.

"I think we're lucky to have her." And that's that.

The PA light comes on above their heads, accompanied by a cool ding. "Okay, we're cleared for takeoff. Please take your seats."

And this is the part Fin doesn't like very much. She moves off the couch to sit next to Spencer, carefully buckling her seatbelt, and grips the edge of the seat, resisting the urge to grit her teeth as the engines roar to life and the plane starts to shake.

Spencer looks over at her, his eyebrows raised in concern. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I just-I just don't like planes all that much." Fin can feel her stomach start to churn and tightens her grip on the seat. Just take off already.

"You know, there's actually only a one in 3.37 billion chance that we crash," he says quietly. "Air travel is statistically much safer than traveling by car or train."

"It's not logical, Spencer. Most fears aren't." Fin forces a pained smile. God, flying sucks. She feels the plane lurch upright and closes her eyes, her nails digging into the leather of the seat. It's like she can feel every little movement of the plane, every little gear, every wire.

"Why'd you bring this?" Spencer asks, which forces Fin to open her eyes. He's pointing at the container in her lap. Classic psych trick: distraction by asking questions. Fin's impressed.

"Oh, JJ interrupted my cookie baking, so I decided I'd just bring them to share. Otherwise, they'd just sit in my kitchen sad and alone, which would be an utter tragedy. Cookies are not supposed to go uneaten." She passes him the container with her free hand, attempting to breathe slowly and deeply. "Take as many as you want."

"You bake?" Spencer's eyes are wide with excitement. "These look delicious." He takes one out, already grinning, and takes a bite. "Oh, wow."

"Hey, pretty boy, make sure you share." Morgan reaches out his hands for the container, wiggling his fingers, and looks over at Fin. "You know, sister, I think I'm gonna like having you around."

Fin doesn't have to force the smile this time; it's real, and with a twinge of surprise, she finds that she can let go of the seat to take a cookie.

~

aww poor fin ;-; but i agree with her: chocolate chip is the BEST cookie. 

also spencer's little nose scrunches always make me so happy. anyone else???

also i wanted to let you lovely people know that updates are gonna be hella random because i write randomly, and also they might change a LOT hehe. but i promise to let you know if i decide to change anything major. i don't really edit much before i post, i'm more of a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants typa gal, so i'm sorry for all of the randomness you'll get with this story

but that's enough from me. i'm rambling (gawd you're so stupid maia) but i love you!! have the best day ever <3