Are You Profiling Me?

-33-

The jet hums steadily in the air, its low drone filling the cabin with a constant, oppressive sound that's almost soothing in its predictability. But not here. Not tonight.

You sit across from Hotch, the file spread open between you. The weight of it presses down on your shoulders—every detail, every victim, every mutilation, just a piece of the gruesome puzzle that's led you here. You close the file, your eyes tracing the cold, calculated lines of the report one last time, but the images—those never really go away.

This unsub is different. He's always been different.

You glance over at Hotch, whose face is illuminated by the glow of his laptop screen, the sharp lines of his jaw set in a deep frown as he scrolls through the same set of notes you've been running through all night. His brow is furrowed, but there's a stillness to him, a calm that's only broken by the subtle twitch of his hand as he adjusts the screen. He doesn't need to say it out loud—he's already carrying the burden of the case, like always.

The method of torture is what haunts you most. Rat torture. It's as old as time, but it's never been this brutal. Never this deliberate. You can still see the image in your head, even though you wish you couldn't—victims strapped down, glass tubes inserted into their throats, and rats forced through the narrow passage until they suffocate or tear their way out. It's primitive and ancient, but the way the unsub arranges it, the way he does it, it's beyond words. It's ritualistic.

You shudder involuntarily and shake the thought loose, but the cold weight of it remains.

Finally, Hotch speaks, his voice low, almost too soft for the tense silence of the cabin. "We're missing something."

You nod. He's right. There's always something.

"This isn't just about the pain," he continues, never looking up from the screen. "It's about the control. The power over life and death. The fear. He's not just killing them. He's making them suffer in the worst way possible before they die."

You glance back at the file, skimming through the victim's autopsies again, hoping for something—anything—that you've missed. But it's always the same. Every victim, same method. Same brutal end. And the fear in their eyes, captured in the photos before their deaths, is all too real.

"They say the rats will do anything to survive," you whisper, your voice barely audible over the low hum of the jet. "They'll claw their way through anything. Even—" You pause, the words catching in your throat. "Even if it means tearing out the throat of the person they're trapped with."

Hotch's gaze flickers up at you then, dark eyes unreadable. "He's making them part of his fantasy, Danielle. He's trying to turn them into something they're not. He's recreating—something. But we don't know what yet."

You let out a slow breath, trying to steady yourself. The images keep coming back—pictures of the victims, straining against their restraints as rats clawed through their throats. Their agony, the suffocating terror they must have felt, the slow, horrific realization that there was no escape... It's impossible to unsee.

You open your mouth to respond, but before you can, Reid's voice comes from the back of the cabin, pulling you both from the dark thoughts that seem to be swallowing the air.

"I've been running the numbers. He's escalating," he says. "The timing is more frequent, and the locations are narrowing. It's a clear pattern."

"Same M.O., same methods," Hotch says, but there's a tension in his voice you haven't heard before.

"Not just that." Reid pauses for a moment, glancing up from his laptop. "The way he arranges the bodies afterward—it's almost like a ritual. The bodies are staged in certain positions, with the glass tube still in place. Like he's trying to preserve the process."