❝In another world we shall understand it all.❞

LEO TOLSTOY

✩

1.1 : how many chances you get

OR

season 6, episode 18 : lauren

THE PROFILE HAS BEEN GIVEN, THE DOCUMENT EMILY'S FRIENDS AT INTERPOL SENT OVER CHECKED AND RECHECKED, AND EVERY INCH OF EVERY BRAIN IN THE ROOM RACKED. Fin is exhausted. She's so ready to go back to the safe house and watch Seinfeld reruns, maybe order Chinese–

But this fantasy is heartbreakingly interrupted by Morgan, walking up to the evidence board with a green sticky note. "I've got four names on the bottom of the list Prentiss gave us. Luke Renault, Lawrence Riley, Lila Rafferty, Lyle Rogers."

"Is there a specific reason those names have the same initials?" Fin asks, pulling her legs tighter beneath her, sitting cross-legged on the floor next to Rossi.

"The CIA uses cryptograms like that to assign to non-official cover agents working the same case," Hotch replies.

"So do other foreign countries," Morgan adds, pulling the list Emily printed off from the board and gesturing to the last four lines. "These last four names are covers–spies."

"Wait." Penelope frowns, taking the list from Morgan's hands and examining it closely. "No. This isn't right." She shakes her head, turning the paper so everyone can see it. "Do you see this space? That shouldn't be here."

"Could it be a formatting error?" Spencer asks.

"No, this is a spreadsheet template," Penelope says. "Formatting doesn't allow for this. There's a missing name on here."

Hotch nods grimly. "It's another spy whose cover is L.R."

"'Lauren Reynolds is dead,'" Spencer mutters under his breath, eyes unfocused, and Fin looks over at him.

"What did you say?"

Spencer blinks back into reality, eyes widening. "'Lauren Reynolds is dead,'" he says louder, looking around at all of them. "Prentiss said that on a phone call seventeen days ago, but her intonation wasn't surprise or grief. It was like a mantra, like she was reminding herself. Lauren Reynolds. L.R."

Fin's stomach is suddenly an ocean of discomfort. "Emily's Lauren Reynolds." She can't breathe.

Hotch says nothing, just pulls out his phone, walking out of the circle.

"Then that means–" Penelope covers her mouth, gasping softly.

"She's on Doyle's list, too," Morgan finishes grimly.

"That explains her behavior the past month," Rossi says. "The secrets, the evasion."

"She's been biting her fingernails again, too," Spencer adds, chewing on his lip anxiously.

"Guys."

Everyone turns to look at Hotch, who's standing over at Emily's desk, phone in hand. But it's not his phone. Fin leaps to her feet to get a closer look. She sucks in a breath.

It's Emily's phone.

And her badge.

And her gun.

Fin suddenly realizes she hasn't seen Emily in almost two hours. She didn't even think about it. Didn't even think to check. If something happens to Emily, it could be her fault.

"She left her badge and gun?" Morgan frowns. "Why would she do that?"

"That doesn't make sense. Why run?" Spencer almost sounds betrayed, his voice soft and at the same time the loudest one in the room. "We're her family. We can help."

"Doyle's killing families," Rossi replies. "She's not married, not close to relatives. He was ready to wipe us out. She ran to protect us."

Penelope swallows hard, bottom lip quivering. Morgan closes his eyes, turning away, an pained expression on his face. Fin tugs her sleeves over her hands, shivering from head to toe, but not because it's cold.

"And she's a trained spy," Rossi continues. "She doesn't want to be found."

"She knows all of our tricks." Morgan folds his arms over his chest, closing himself off from them. He's probably closing himself off emotionally, too. "We don't know any of hers."

"All right, then how do we find her?" asks Penelope.

"Here's how," says Hotch, striding over to the evidence board determinedly, shoving his phone back into his pocket. "Ian Doyle is our unsub. Prentiss is our victim. We profile their behavior and we treat it like any other case. Because terrorism isn't an area all of us specialize in–" He cuts his eyes at Fin, and she wishes she could be proud right now– "I've reached out to an expert from the state department, someone who can also shed light on Prentiss's past."

"Who?" asks Spencer hoarsely.

Hotch looks behind them, at the BAU doors, and the ghost of a smile crosses his face. "Her."

Everyone looks around and despite the darkness surrounding them, despite the worry and the fear and the utter terror clenching at Fin's stomach, a little light appears in the margins.

Because Jennifer Jareau is there.

"Oh, god." Fin's hands fly to her mouth. And then she leaps into action, almost pushing Morgan out of the way, nearly sprinting around desks and engulfing JJ in a tight hug. "Oh, god, JJ."

"I missed you, too," says JJ into her hair, arms tight around her. She smells achingly like vanilla and her blonde hair is soft and Fin feels so much better. When JJ is around, everything is alright. It has to be. "Hotch told me you were back."

"I only came back because you left," Fin says quietly, pulling away reluctantly. "JJ--"

"I know." JJ nods, eyes serious. She looks away from Fin, at the others still gathered around the evidence board. "Let's get to work."

✩

"Okay, so I talked to a friend from Langley," JJ says, facing the table in the conference room. It feels almost like old times again, JJ with remote in hand, the rest of them flipping through files at the table. "He couldn't give me Emily's full CIA history, but he could give me this."

She clicks a button on the remote, bringing up a mostly redacted file with Emily's name and photo on it. Fin shivers. She doesn't like when one of their own is a victim.

"She assumed the identity of Lauren Reynolds as part of a special task force called JTF-12," JJ continues, averting her eyes from the screen. Fin guesses she doesn't like seeing Emily up there, either.

"I heard about them." Rossi leans back in his chair, strangely the calmest one of them all. "They were profiling terrorists, weren't they?"

"Yeah. Assembled after 9/11." JJ nods. "CIA and Western agencies contributed their best and brightest."

"How does Doyle fit in?" Spencer asks, tilting back to look at JJ.

"He was their last case," she replies. "And now the JTF is on his hit list." JJ turns back to the screen and clicks a button, pulling up a photo of a man in his mid-30s. "Jeremy Wolff was victim number one, from Germany's BND."

Another photo of a man, this time of an older man. "Sean McAlister at Interpol was the second. He's the one that brought the JTF in to work the Doyle case. He was murdered last week in Brussels with his wife and daughter."

A third photo, this time of a woman, also in her mid-30s, and pretty. Fin recognizes her as the woman who was murdered last night on 9th Street. "Tsia Mosely of France's DCRI. She got engaged to Jeremy earlier this year. After he died, she fled to D.C."

A final photo, also a man, rugged, worn, but smiling slightly. "And team leader Clyde Easter, British SIS. He hasn't checked in since Tsia's murder. He was also in D.C."

Fin closes her eyes, digging her fingernails painfully into her palms. If all these people, well-trained spies, handpicked by the best agencies in the world, intelligent and crafty, couldn't escape Doyle while doing their best... God, Emily, please be safe.

"Did JTF make the arrests?" Hotch asks, speaking for the first time since JJ arrived. He's worried, more than usual; Fin can see his hands shaking when she looks close enough.

"No." JJ shakes her head. "The host countries handled that. The team moved on to the next case."

"If all they did was deliver a profile, how does Doyle even know about them?" Hotch frowns.

"Well, considering the shadowy nature of terrorist cells, they utilize a skill we don't," JJ replies, pursing her lips gravely. "Infiltration."

"Who was undercover on Doyle?" Spencer asks, but Fin knows the answer before JJ opens her mouth.

"Emily."

JJ glances at Fin, surprised, and nods. "That's right. She made contact with him in Boston to get intel on Valhalla." She's bringing up more pictures that make Fin ache to look at: Emily, eight years younger, but hardly changed. "She was posing as another weapons dealer."

"Look at how she's dressed," says Morgan softly, gesturing to the photos. "She seems awfully comfortable."

"How close did she get to Doyle as part of her cover?" Hotch asks, and this question, different from the others, seems more personal than anything else.

"The recon they did on Doyle included a background of all of his romantic relationships," JJ replies, and hesitates before continuing, a careful glance at both Hotch and Morgan: "Emily was his type."

"Morgan, Rossi, go to Prentiss's apartment," Hotch says, tearing his eyes away from the photos on the screen. "See if you can find anything that might tell us where she's going next, what her next move might be. The rest of us will stay here, work on finding Clyde Easter. If he's not dead yet, he's our best chance at finding Prentiss."

✩

Clyde Easter is being detained in an airport just outside of Boston with a suitcase full of cash. Emily was in love with Doyle. Doyle was Valhalla. Emily walked into Doyle's trap just hours ago. He thinks she was his stressor.

She is dead if they don't act quickly.

All of this information is rattling around inside Fin's brain as she sits on the sofa next to Spencer, the BAU jet currently somewhere over New Jersey. She's thinking about how angry Morgan is that Emily slept with Doyle. How Penelope left voicemails for every single one of Emily's numbers, with only a slim chance that she might hear one. How Rossi is as calm as ever on the outside, but he's swirling his tea bag around his cup and staring out the window–and he never drinks tea.

Fin's not angry at Emily for what she's done, for any of it. She might be the one person on this plane that truly understands Emily. How secrets like that can destroy you. How telling the people you love can make everything worse. And how leaving it all behind is the hardest thing in the world to do.

But she does know now what it felt like when she left for Greece.

And it breaks her heart to know that everyone felt this way because of her.

Fin glances around the plane: JJ and Rossi, sitting at one table; Morgan and Penelope, next to each other on the opposite sofa; and Hotch, sitting at the very back of the plane alone, staring at the wall, clearly deep in thought.

She should say something. To lighten the mood.

And honestly? To kick Hotch's ass into gear.

He starts when she sits down across from him, but then relaxes slightly when he sees that it's her.

"Hotch, we're gonna get Doyle," Fin says after a moment, watching him carefully. "I swear we will."

Hotch nods, resting his chin on his hand, and says nothing, eyes drifting toward the window.

"And when this is all over, you should say something to Emily," Fin continues, lowering her voice so only he can hear her.

"About what?" Hotch looks back at her, eyebrows raised.

"You know what." Fin smiles for what feels like the first time in days.

"I have no idea what you're–"

"Bullshit, Aaron. We're not blind." Fin shakes her head, chuckling. "Don't worry, she likes you, too."

For the first time ever, Aaron Hotchner actually blushes. Not a lot, but his cheeks definitely turn pink. He attempts to formulate a coherent sentence about how she's wrong, but can't manage to do it.

"It wouldn't hurt anything to ask her out," Fin whispers, grinning.

"I'm–I'm her superior," Hotch finally manages to choke out. "It wouldn't be appropriate."

"Aaron, if there's anything this job has taught me, it's that you can't take anything for granted," Fin replies, the grin fading from her face. "Take it from me: Any person who looks at you the way Emily does deserves a chance. You never know how many chances you get."

She looks back behind her, at Spencer, who's pretending to read a book, bouncing his leg anxiously as he chews on his lip. "Or how many chances you lose," she whispers, mostly to herself.

There is an air of unrest in the plane tonight, an ocean of worry that refuses to be settled. Fin feels nauseous. She prays silently that they have enough time.

~

JJ'S BACK!!!! *victory lap* y'all i missed her so much frrr

also, speaking of hotch (this is like... a bad time but i gotta ask), who all would be interested in a hotch fic at some point? maybe post-htbl. i've tried the three fics at once thing and that didn't work out, but two at a time seems to go okay for me, and rewatching seasons 6 & 7 is giving me the itch to make hotch extremely happy in an alternate timeline. but idk...