Aeipathy

CHAPTER 15.

TW: typical case briefing, mentions of missing person, a stalker, significant injury, blood, gore and murder / death. Case based on 5x22.

From the second you'd all stepped foot into the station, the team's presence hadn't been welcomed by the majority of the local officers, the lead detective being the only exception, taking a liking to you and Reid immediately, insisting on calling you both 'the good doctors' despite your instance to just call you by either your first or last name - you'd given up correcting people when they got your title wrong.

"Alright you lot listen up, I want you writing all of this down so pay attention. Hawkes, that includes you" the detective calls out, bringing the room to order so the team can get started on giving the profile you'd spent the morning working up.

"All we know about these murders so far is that they're shown online. The murder of a journalist, the stoning of a dissident; these murders are immoral and this unsub is craving the same immorality". Prentiss begins, keeping her focus on the officers that the detective had reprimanded for not paying attention.

"He recognizes his face on theirs and by killing these women he's saying 'this is what I look like'. We also think this informs his compulsion to take the bodies with him to his secondary location where he is later preserving the bodies. He's doing this because each time he looks at the victims, he can see his own ego reflected" Rossi informs the group of local officers and detectives.

"Fortunately, we've been able to work up a sketch of what he looks like based on the victims' faces. Do keep in mind that this is a rough sketch, but this unsub is an expert in what he's doing so don't take any chances." Reid adds onto the end of Rossi's point before Morgan carries on.

"The unsub we're dealing with is an expert in technology, more specifically, computers and home networks so we're asking you to keep looking into criminal records of men with existing computer training" Morgan begins, but is cut off by bored remarks from the officers, stating that they'd already gone over all the records twice, but are soon cut off by Detective Fordam.

"The search needs to be expanded into electronic stores, computer distributors, the I.T departments where each of the women worked. I will not be hearing any complaints from anybody, keep it to yourselves and get on with it" he instructs his officers and nods toward Hotch for the briefing to continue and you take the opportunity to add your linguistics knowledge into the profile.

"The term 'narcissistic' is often overused in our culture, but here we're going back to the psychological definition. Every aspect of this man's life has been constructed around an inflated sense of self. Unsubs like this are often vulnerable to what we call narcissistic injury. If his self-worth is diminished then he will lash out".

The profile starts to draw to a close as Hotch relays the final pieces of information to the crowd of officers. "If you do find this man, do not challenge him publicly. Tell him you just want to talk, see if he knows anything about the brilliant mastermind behind the stalking and killing of these women. We need to talk up his exploits as if we respected him, but under no circumstances should you denigrate him" he finishes and soon after the room empties out, leaving just the team and Detective Fordam standing at the front of the room, and after a few minutes of discussion, you find yourself accompanying Detective Fordam to the local diner to grab everybody coffee and a bite to eat and upon your arrival back at the station, you're met with a sea of reporters, hounding you both with questions. Exchanging quick looks with the detective next to you and giving the smallest nod as the go ahead for one or two questions, the reporters begin.

"How did you come up with a sketch if there were no eyewitnesses?" one of the reporters asks, moving closer to the pair of you, his eyes flicking toward the entrance to the station for slightly longer than necessary and you instinctively keep an eye on him for the remainder of the questions.