Work Text:
A Bandaid for the Soul
by Frogg
Hrshellkw@aol.com
Reid fell heavily to the floor, barely managing to protect his face with one bent arm. Gasping for breath, he lay for several long moments, letting the pain in bruised limbs and wrenched shoulder ebb.
Behind him, the door swung shut and latched with a note of finality; footsteps dwindled beyond it.
A slow chuckle, raspy and mirthless, rolled over him as he struggled to his feet. "Hotch?"
"Mmhh. Yes." The words were slurred.
"I was hoping, but..."
"Are you jinxed," Hotch asked slowly, enunciating carefully, "or am I?"
Reid ignored the question, instead glancing around the room. Late afternoon sunlight streamed through a small, barred window near the ceiling, leaving the rest of the room in shadows. A flat of bottled water, still wrapped in plastic, sat by the door. Lacking both pull-chain and wall switch, a bare light bulb hung in the center, dark and glazed with grime. The only cot stood beneath the window, in almost complete darkness until Reid's eyes adjusted. "Why didn't you--?"
The clink of metal on metal, chain against bar, had Reid fighting down revulsion. Swallowing against the sudden nausea, he forced himself forward a few steps, eyes trained on Hotch's prone form.
Rage flared up, cold and relentless, steeling his resolve and banishing raw nerves. Reid felt his hands curl into fists, every muscle tense. "He hit you."
Hotch swallowed with difficulty, head rocking back and forth. His right arm pulled futilely, the metal cuff securing him to the bed rail clanking against the bar.
"Hotch, look at me," Reid insisted.
Breathing erratic and labored, Hotch fought the thinly veiled order. Fought Reid. Fought himself. Fought his need to trust.
"Hotch," Reid said more softly, protective and coaxing. He knew about Hotch's father, had watched him interrogate Perotta so long ago. He'd seen what that admission had cost, watched the slow disintegration of everything that had once been Hotch's bedrock and the very foundation of his self-image.
Opening that door had led Hotch to the inevitable realization that what he'd wanted in life and what he'd needed were two vastly different things.
The divorce, amicable, if painful, had been finalized for months.
But what he'd needed...
'There will be time for self-recrimination later,' Reid told himself, willing Hotch to look at him, watching as need and self-denial waged war, with a body already battered and weary its battlefield.
Unable to watch any longer, Reid took the last few steps to the edge of the cot and went to one knee, reaching out to brush the side of Hotch's face in a ghostly caress. "He won't hit you again," Reid whispered, unsure whether he was talking about the UnSub, or Hotch's father.
It didn't matter.
All Reid knew was he couldn't let it happen. The damage was already too much. Hotch's right eye was swollen almost completely shut, a wellspring of violet-black, the hair at his temple slicked and matted with blood and sweat. His lower lip was split, dark and crusted over, and another bruise shadowed his jaw on the left side.
"Let me help." Reid's fingers hovered over the bruises.
Hotch swallowed. "Can't..."
"He won't hurt you again," Reid swore fiercely.
At long last, Hotch met his eyes, the tension leeching from his body.
"Let me get you some water."
Hotch nodded unsteadily, knowing that water wasn't the subject.
After a moment's rushed activity, Reid set two bottles of water on the floor, then fished a stiff piece of wire from the hem of his pants. "Hold still."
"Don't...Don't want him," Hotch paused to swallow hard, "to hurt you."
"He won't." Reid blithely continued bending the wire, then went to work on the handcuffs.
Hotch stilled, breath caught in his throat.
Reid could see the recognition in Hotch's eye, the realization that Reid had meant to be taken hostage, and smiled, then wider as the cuff on Hotch's wrist fell open.
Trusting Reid, Hotch closed his eyes, letting Reid tenderly rub feeling back into his wrist and hand. Cloth rustled, and the scent of water made his throat ache for moisture. Gentle fingers touched his chin and along his cheekbone, giving warning before damp cotton dabbed at split skin, wiping away dust and sweat. A gasp escaped him at the touch of lips, soft against his own; he ignored the pain in his lower lip, opening his mouth and swallowing convulsively as water trickled down his throat.
Then the water was gone, and he could only moan into Reid's mouth, his left hand cupping the back of Reid's skull.
~~~
Emily and Morgan eyed the monitors in the UnSub's trophy room, Gideon's barked order still echoing.
"Get them out of there!"
"Gideon's going to kick our asses if we don't," Emily said, making no move to shut off the cameras or activate the mic.
"Nuh-uh. I'd rather face Gideon than Hotch if we interrupt them now. It's about damn time that kid woke up and smelled the coffee," Morgan muttered, watching.
"If I'd known all it took was for Hotch to get kidnapped and smacked around a little--"
"I'd have done it a long time ago," Morgan finished for her.
~~~the end~~~
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