Emily Prentiss One-Shots

Emily One-Shot

Title: Ghost -tfm (AO3 * Fanfiction.net)

Summary: She takes her memories, and her hopes, and her dreams and she crushes them into a ball. She is a ghost, a chameleon, a shadow. Spoilers to 6x18 - Lauren.

Rating: Teens and Up Audience 

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Four weeks, three days, nine hours.

Eight different identities.

Six countries.

It starts as a measure of survival, and it becomes a way of life.

In Paris, she takes the envelope that Jennifer Jareau gives her. The identities that she doesn't need. It feels like a lifetime. Jennifer Jareau's face is familiar, and yet she can't quite help but see the eyes of a stranger.

After all, Emily Prentiss is dead.

The woman left behind is a ghost, a chameleon. A shadow.

She lurks in the darkness, and no-one ever sees her true face.

From Paris, she goes to Berlin, stopping by a train station bathroom to dump the designer clothes that had been her identity. The clothes change, and she turns from a sophisticated socialite, to a middle-aged woman that blends into the crowd.

It's not the best disguise, but it's what she's got. A couple of hours, and the right equipment, and she can make sure that not even her closest friends would recognize her.

But now, she does what she needs to do.

A professional can slip away, like dust in the wind. An amateur will change the hair, and the clothes, and the attitude, but they will still stick out like a sore thumb. An amateur will make the one mistake that no spy should ever make.

They keep their identity with them, like a crutch. They hold on to who they are, and that's what gets them killed. Sometimes it's the way they walk, or the way they talk, or the way they hold themselves, but something will always give them away.

She takes who she was – she takes her memories, and her hopes, and her dreams and she crushes them into a ball. Emily Prentiss is dead. She is a ghost, a chameleon, a shadow.

In Berlin, she finds a forger. He doesn't recognize her, but then, she's never met him. Intelligence is all about being able to ask the right questions, build networks. More than anything else, intelligence is about being somebody else.

About being the right person for the right job.

Roberta Southwell could slit a man's throat without even flinching.

Janet Danvers could field strip an M1911 blindfolded.

Lauren Reynolds could broker a multi-million dollar weapons deal.

Emily Prentiss could profile a disorganized sociopath.

They are all her, and yet none of them are her. That's what she tells herself.

She does whatever she needs to do.

Her finger itches against the trigger, and for a moment, she considers it. He can't tell anyone who she is, if he's dead.

The gun, she'd picked up in Brussels. Her old stomping grounds. She hadn't stayed long. It brings up memories that aren't going to do her any good.

It's a heavy gun, but the aim is true. She's lost count of how many people she's killed. Tens, at least. She's lost count of how many times she's died.

For a brief moment, compassion overtakes practicality, and she lets him live. Afterwards, she rationalizes. A body will draw more attention than whatever information he can give away. As far as Ian Doyle is aware, she's dead.