Oxytocin [aaron hotchner]

two

You're sitting in the four seat with JJ, Emily and Morgan. Your boss is leaning against the back of another seat, he's facing you. Reid is sitting next to him. Rossi is are in another seat. You're all going over the details again before you land in Boise, Idaho.

Penelope suddenly pops up on the computer screen and addresses Hotchner, "sir, I've found that the last status updates of all three victims were posted the morning after they went missing."

"So the unsub posted them?" Morgan asks. Garcia nods in reply. "He's buying himself time with this. They're letting their friends know they'll be out of town the next couple of days but in reality, he's already taken them."

"Is there a connection between the victims yet that we know of?" Emily asks the group as she's frowning down at the case file. "Not yet anyway", Rossi replies. Your eyes wander from one colleague to another and they land on your unit chief. His gaze is focused on the screen, looking at Penelope as she's telling us she'll do some more digging in their not-so- personal online lives and reassuring us that if there's a connection, she'll find it. "Garcia out, my sweets".

Your eyes follow the slight movements in Hotchner's face, the way his jaw moves as he's slightly grinding his teeth. His dark and thick brows narrowing as he's lost in his thoughts, thinking about this case. You can tell he's worried we might not find these women alive. It doesn't take a professional to know that this chance is very slim, but still you always try to keep your hopes up, even just a little bit. Because everyone deserves at least a little bit of hope. You're completely lost in your own thoughts looking at his defined facial features as he suddenly turns his head and makes eye contact with you. You immediately are snapped out of your trance as you hear him divide the team. You didn't hear who was with who, but you heard the last sentence "Y/N, you're with me." You quickly nod.

"We have three hours left before we land, everybody get some shut eye", Rossi kindly commands as he gets himself comfortable in his seat, reclining it back a little bit and immediately closing his eyes.

Hotchner gets up and you feel his presence pass you down the aisle to the back of the plane, he's grabbing a bottle of water from the mini fridge and immediately drinking almost half of it. You decide to get up from your seat, looking around you almost everyone has listened to David and closed their eyes. Derek is the only one still awake, he's listening to music and looking out the window. You make your way to the back of the plane where your boss is leaning against the one kitchen cupboard, holding the bottle in his hand and kind of crushing the plastic.

You brush past him, your bodies lightly touching. He stands up a little straighter to let you pass him. "You okay?" you ask as you're crouching down and look into the mini fridge. He nods, "yes of course" and takes another sip "and you?"

You close the fridge and turn to him, focusing your attention on the bottle of water instead of his gaze. There's a mere couple of inches between your bodies. This is embarrassing but you struggle with the cap of the bottle, sometimes strength just seems to fail you. You have zero problems putting adult men in headlocks but opening a bottle of water with a challenging cap is just not the same apparently. Hotchner grabs the bottle from you and opens it quickly, handing it back to you carefully as the water is near the brim now because he squeezed a little too hard. "Good, that's good." you say in response to his comment and assure him that you're okay too. "Good" he says.

Just as you're about to make your way to your seat again, he asks "were you always shy? As a kid too?"

You're taken aback by the question at first but then think back about the conversation you had earlier this morning in the conference room. You remember you were cut short by Rossi walking in. "Oh", you take another sip of water. He stares down at you with focused eyes, ready to listen carefully to every word you'll throw his way. "You know, yeah" you continue. "It's all I've ever known. I'm the youngest of three siblings and my brother and sister were always demanding attention anywhere and everywhere. In any way they could. There's even an old recording of them giving an annoyingly loud 'concert' in the living room when they were 9 and 6 years old, and all of a sudden little 4 year old me comes out of hiding from behind the curtains. They didn't know I was there. Nobody knew." You snicker at the memory of seeing the video recording. You didn't really have any actual memory of it though.
This anecdote earns a slight smile from him. "Sometimes it feels like God gave all of my extrovert genes to them and left nothing for me. Not that I believe in God, I don't actually- but if he was real, that's definitely what happened."

There's a short silence between you. "It was the opposite for me actually, I was kind of the wild child between me and my brother. Until I was sent to boarding school and got my act straight. I figured I could keep acting out or I could you know- not. And I did just that." Your boss says as his eyes unfocus, it seems like he's reliving the memories. His expression doesn't reveal how he feels about this. He was always the one member of the most difficult to read.

It's the first time your unit chief has revealed these kind of details about himself to you. It wasn't much, but by his standard, you know- being all mysterious, tall and dark haired... it was something worth telling.

"I can't imagine you as a wild child" you chuckle, making him snap out of his thoughts. He smiles "what kind of image do you have of me agent Y/L/N?". You shrug and hold up your arms in defeat, "the one you wanted me to see, sir". You start to make your way back to your seat and sink back into it. He's following you and sits down in his own seat across the aisle but next to you. You close your eyes, hoping to get some rest for the remaining hours on the flight. After a couple of minutes in complete silence, you slightly open your eyes and look to your right, where Hotchner is sitting. You see he's struggling to keep his eyes open for a moment, his long and dark eyelashes colliding with each other every few seconds. You feel he's decided to stop fighting it and he closes his eyes. It doesn't take long for you to close yours too.