the only exception

𝚠𝚘𝚗'𝚝 𝚐𝚎𝚝 𝚏𝚘𝚘𝚕𝚎𝚍 𝚊𝚐𝚊𝚒𝚗

Lorelai got in the elevator as Spencer lightly jogged behind her making it in before the doors closed.

"Good morning," she said looking at him.

He smiled, "Good morning is a little ironic, Rory."

"I know," she said as her phone went off getting a text.

She grabbed it out of her sweater's pocket reading it then looked at Spencer, "another case."

The elevator dinged as the doors opened and the two got out. They made their way to their desk leaving their work bags at their desk then headed to the conference room. They sat down and were given their copy of the case file dealing with a bomber in Palm Beach, Florida.

"Pipe bombs," said Gideon as he looked at the photo evidence.

Morgan nodded handing him another picture, "packaged in cardboard boxes."

"Package bombs," continued Hotch.

"Sent through the mail?" asked Gideon.

Morgan shook his head, "no, the other picture in your hand is of the switch that ATF found. Same mechanism for both bombs, mercury-activated."

"What does that mean?" asked Elle.

Spencer looked up at her for his seat, "there are contacts to a detonator on either end of a bent tube full of mercury."

"What it means is that all you have to do tilt the package to detonate it," explained Morgan.

Elle put the picture in her hand down, "so they couldn't have been sent through the mail. The bomber had to deliver them himself."

"Exactly," nodded Morgan.

Hotch shook his head, "strange way to commit an act of terrorism. Why go through all this trouble to kill just a few people?"

"Let's recommend not raising the terror alert level for now," suggested Gideon, "no reason to spread panic."

They all nodded looking at Gideon when JJ walked in.

"We got news," she said turning on the TV, "this is just the local channel, but the coverage is everywhere now--CNN, Fox, MSNBC, Al Jazeera, you name it."

Lorelai shook her head, crossing her arms, "I guess we can toss the idea of not spreading panic out the window."

JJ then turned up the volume to hear the reporter.

"According to the doctors, he's badly injured, but in stable condition in the ICU," the news anchor Rosalie Escobar said, "now neighbors say that they heard a blast at about ten-thirty this morning, and police arrived..."

"If DHS doesn't raise the terror alert now, they'll look weak," said Gideon.

Hotch nodded then looked at JJ, "make sure homeland security knows that this is everywhere."

JJ nodded walking back to her office, but before she could another bomb went off behind the news anchor.

"Woah," said JJ looking up at the TV.

"I just felt that. Are you alright?" asked the reporter.

Hotch looked at everyone, "It looks like we're going to Palm Beach. Let's meet at the airstrip in twenty."

******

"Bombings occurred within three miles of each other. The first victim was a seventy-three-year-old widow, Barbara Keller, " said Hotch putting down the picture of Spencer and Elle, "two hours after that, Clurman got hit in his driveway," he put another picture down of the second victim in front of Lorelai, " and forty-five minutes later...well, we all saw that," he walked over to Gideon putting down a picture in front of him, "Jill Swenson, thirty-four-year-old housewife, who lived across the street from Clurman. Of the three only Clurman survived."