New but maybe not so New

Chapter 9 |✔

"We're going to San Diego." Hotch stated as he and Jennifer entered the room where we all sat together at a round table.

I was beyond excited for my first briefing, my eyes glued on the files JJ handed out to each one of us. Apart from me.
"Sorry Genna, I wasn't aware of you coming so there's one copy too few, but I'm sure you and Spence can look into one."

I swallowed as I looked at the young man on my right side, feeling a sudden rush of nervousness floating through my body as he smiled, scooped a little closer and held the file out in front of us.

My eyes scanned through the pictures and information, while I followed JJ's narrations, sucking in every detail I could. "They're calling him the 'Tommy Killer'."

"Six women raped and murdered in their homes in the last three weeks." Hotch continued while I recalled a similar case six months ago.

"Six in three weeks?"

"That's a short fuse." Gideon added to Elle's surprised statement as I nodded along, reading through the file carefully.

"And the fuse is getting shorter with every victim. First two were eight days apart, and then the next four in two weeks. That's an expeditious escalation."

Spencer nodded, furrowing his eyebrows while looking at me. "You think he's regressing to a psychopathic frenzy?"

I shook my head, examining the pictures before my eyes met his. "No. I had a similar case six months ago and he had a psychopathic frenzy but with every victim he had an overkill. The crime scenes weren't a organized as those."

Hotch nodded along with me. "He's too controlled for that."
He cleared the case information back into the folder, before getting up and grabbing the file.
"See you on the plane."

He was about to leave when Derek stopped him. "Why the 'Tommy Killer'?"

"You know the rock opera? Well, this Unsub glues his victims' eyes wide open."

"He wants them so see and feel him..
     Well, that's interesting and completely normal." I tried to ease the mood before looking at the file again, repeating everything JJ and Hotch had told us about the case.

"How did you- erm- How did you do that?"

I turned around confused as my eyes locked with Spencer's, tilting my head to the side.
"What do you mean?"

"Looking at those pictures without even flinching?"

I smiled slightly as I shrugged, placing my hands on top of the folder. "It wasn't the first time I saw something like this. Working in prison got me used to the horrible world we live in."

I started getting up, as did the others, and Derek nodded, falling into step with the rest of us as we made our way to our traveling bags.
"True words, Weaver. True words."

~○~

On the plane, I sat across from Gideon as we talked about my books and his experiences.
He was a great companion because we would always have a new topic to talk about and it never got bored.

"In your book, you write about anxiety in the childhood and how it feels to still have those same fears. What did you mean by that, on a psychological manner?"

I smiled at his question, knowing that he wasn't the only one curious about the answer because it got asked a lot whenever someone talked about my writings.
"Well, the thing is that most children are anxious but outgrow this anxiety by the time they reach adolescence. It's normal, not a big deal. It's actually a really good thing. You don't see the monsters under your bed anymore, right? But I aready had some cases where the monsters from under the bed grow up with my patients and got even bigger, even more dangerous.