#major crossover

The man who was giving instructions stopped his pacing right in front of his latest victim. He leaned against the ax he had been swinging while he was pacing. "Do you think you can remember that when you get up there? Dorothy and the Scarecrow will be there waiting for you with Ben and Jamie. I'll be sending the next characters up soon so you can't start telling them the story quite yet since I'm sending characters a little out of order but tell them that it'll be soon, before the year ends. There's just so many characters, you see, that I have to hurry things along a bit."

The man in the gray sweats began to shake his head. On top of being tied to a tree, he also had a gag in his mouth. "But you're perfect. You're the best Tin Man I could find. You're going to have to remember." The man with the ax said, growing frustrated.

"I'll tell you one more time and then you're just going to have to remember. It's getting late and I have to leave so so they don't find me before I'm finished telling my story. Otherwise, Ben and Jamie won't understand and they'll never go to sleep." The man began pacing again, going over the story of the Tin Man once more.

"Do you get it now?" He asked but once again the man in sweats shook his head. "Well, you're just going to have to." The man said with gritted teeth as he brought the ax above his head. With one swift motion, he swung the ax down, lodging it into the other man's head.

The man in sweats slouched, blood dripping down his face from the wound. The killer bent down and removed the gag. Using the cloth that was in the other man's mouth, he tried clearing the blood away so that whenever his children, Ben and Jamie, met him, they wouldn't be scared. "Enjoy kiddos." He said, standing up and walking away from the crime scene once he was satisfied.

"Maybe you should just go with cereal instead?" Jennifer said as she pried open the waffle iron in front of Bex.

At the sound of Jennifer's voice and the smell of burnt waffle, Bex returned back to reality She shook her head with a laugh. "Yeah, maybe you're right. Thanks JJ."

The other agent gave Bex's shoulder a squeeze and a sympathetic smile. "We're gonna get him Bex." Bex just nodded her head, giving JJ a smile of her own before moving in front of the cereal containers.

The news they received walking into the Kansas City police station didn't do anything to lift Bex's spirits. JJ and Tara were speaking to the girlfriend of the man most recently killed. Emily was at the morgue while Rossi and Luke were at the crime scene. "I, uh, brought some tea, hoping it'll help a little bit." Spencer said as he walked into the conference room the BAU was using as their work space.

He placed the cup in front of Bex, who looked up as he sat down next to her. She gave him a grateful smile before taking a sip of the hot beverage. "I should be in there talking to her Spencer but the minute she walked in all I could see was my mom's face after she was told the details and I just couldn't." She set the cup back down on the table before leaning back in her chair, cover her face in her hands. "I don't even know why I'm still brought onto these cases. I'm too emotionally attached."

"You're brought on because you're our best asset on this case. You know him best so where do we start next?" He knew she did best when she was working with facts and what they knew. It helped her focus and feel like she was in control. They had gotten past her 'this is why I work in organized crime' phase of her return and now it was time to finally lock the guy behind 10 years worth of murders so that she could move past it all. He wished Morgan was still on the team so that she would at least laugh a little bit more.

Bex nodded as she started to go through all that they knew. "Well we know that he's not worried too much about physical appearance unless it's stated in the book. Dorothy was a brunette, therefore the person who he chose also needed to be a brunette. The person he chose for the Scarecrow was a farmer and the person he chose for the Tin Man worked at the paper mill. So is the person he's looking for next have to resemble a lion or are they deemed a coward?" She then groaned. "I just wish we knew more about this guy. The profile we came up with can only get us so far I feel like."

Spencer rubs soothing circles along her back. "We have to trust in the profile Bex. Garcia is trying to see if anyone on our list has connections with any of the victims."

"She could even start seeing if anything has come up in the news that our unsub will deem cowardly." Bex suggested, feeling a little better that they were at least trying to get ahead of the unsub.

She went to the board and wrote down their prediction. They had to get this one right or it would be another two years before their shot at tracking him down again. They were still unsure as to why but their unsub followed children's stories, killing and staging his victims as characters from the story. He usually chose four of the main characters, killing them within a six month period before disappearing for two years.

They were all making calls to those they thought, based off of Garcia's list from Bex's hunch earlier, could be potential targets. They were informing of increased police patrols in their areas of home and work as well as tips on being vigilant. Right before Bex was about to call the next person on the list, her phone rang. Mike's name flashed across the screen, making her smile. She excused herself so she could answer the call in private. "Hey, you." She said, hoping she sounded a little more enthusiastic than what she thought she sounded like.

She in fact did not. She sounded tired and that worried Mike. "Hey, what happened?"

She let out a sigh, knowing there was no getting around it. "The unsub killed again. We've got like two months to figure out who this guy is before he disappears again."

Mike looked down at his feet wishing he could give her a hug. "I'm sorry. You guys will get him. I know it. I can offer a distraction if you'd like?" He offered not wanting to just jump right into the problems of his case when it was clear she was upset about her own.

"Yes, please." Bex answered, not wanting to think about how she felt like she was failing her younger sister, yet again.

"Well, something weird is definitely going on. I just got out of a meeting with another agent who was just put on the case. Apparently people's heads are exploding." He whispered the last bit, to make sure no one heard him.

"Did you just say that people's heads are exploding?" She asked, trying so hard not to laugh.

"Yes, I did and that's not the crazy part. I mean, I have no place to judge but Red has completely changed his life around, drinking nothing but those green smoothies and is following this juice cleanse book to the t, where just the other day he was passed out drunk in his office." Mike continued to explain all that he was dealing with.

Bex grew puzzled at that. Even after detoxing Mike had done a few things to make sure that he wasn't ever tempted again but that was after a three day period. It certainly was not an overnight decision to stick to a juice cleanse like it sounded like Red had done. "That is odd. Do you think it's linked?" She asked, trying to help him come up with some wa for him to investigate.

"I'm really not sure. Anthony, the other agent will be taking lead with the explosions since he's with counter terrorism and that's what they're thinking this is. Meanwhile I'm stuck looking into this meteor from Russia that the office thinks could be alien and needs to get to Area 51."

At that Bex laughed. "They took you from bringing in drug lords and arms dealers to look into aliens? You should feel so insulted. See if you can come out to Kansas City. I trust the BAU with this case, I really do but I think a new perspective on it could be really useful."

Mike smiled at that. "I miss you too Bex, but they think that giving me this case will help ease me back into under cover work so I'm stuck here sadly."

Bex sighed, leaning her head against the wall. "Well that sucks. Maybe aliens took over Red."

That made Mike laugh. "Who knows. He's sounding more and more like every other politician on capitol hill so maybe the drink thing is all a rouse until election time." He then sighed when he realized what time it was. "Hey, I gotta go so Red can be on this talk show. I'll call you later. I'll need help getting ready for this tax prom thing tonight."

She started about by taking a few deep breaths but that wasn’t enough. There was still this feeling just sitting on her chest. She then let out a shout of frustration as she beat against the wall with her fist. After that she let out sigh. She felt a little better but she still felt like the weight she was carrying on her shoulders was pushed down just a bit more. Without really thinking, she pulled out her phone and called Mike.

“Why do I do this? I’m clearly not any good at it.” She said as soon as Mike answered the phone.

Her frustration was heard clearly in her voice. “You do it because you want to help keep people safe but give me one minute and we can dive further into this.” He replied, locking his computer as he stood to let Red know that he was stepping out to take the call. He poked his head through the door into Red’s office. “Hey, I’m stepping out of the office real quick. My sister’s having one of her bad days and my mom needs my help.” Red just waved him off and told him to hurry back.

Mike nodded and brought the phone back up to his ear. “Okay, back to why you do this.” He started as he walked out of the office, heading towards the exit of the building. “You do this because you want to help keep people safe, you do this because you fully believe in the constitution, you do this because you don’t want anyone else to feel the way you did at the beginning of your sister’s case. That case is still open and you’re going to close it, giving not only yourself a sense of peace but everyone involved.”

“Well, that’s all grand and good, Mike but I’m definitely not doing that now and I haven’t been doing that since I was put on this case. I should just request to be taken off the case and come back and help you out.” She slid down, bringing her knees up to her chest.

“Bex that is outside of your control. You are doing everything in your power that you can do. Now what happened? You sounded so hopeful last night.” He found a place on the steps outside of the capitol, out of the way and sat down.

She sighed and rested her head on her knees. “Another person was taken last night. Everything matched to a t, Mike. Every detail I predicted, matched. We had people at every bar in town and still we weren’t able to identify the person who’s doing all of this or protect the one deemed character enough.”

“I don’t know about you but that just seems to me like you’re almost there. You were able to predict his next move, Bex. Isn’t that a major break through? You told me at the beginning of this that the one thing you hated about this was that you couldn’t predict the next steps. Sounds like to me, you just did. So go back out to the team and start planning your next move. Think of it as you’re about to raid a buy. You are good at your job, Bex. Don’t ever forget that.” Mike hoped that she would believe him. He also hoped they would finally catch this killer because he wasn’t sure how much longer she would be able to truly cope with him still not being captured.

“So now it’s the search for his location.” Bex looked up from where she was resting her head and slowly stood back up. “We can narrow down our list because he’ll need plenty of space to keep someone and not have a lot of witnesses.”

“Now there’s Special Agent Bex Morris. Go back out to your team and get started on your search. You’ve got this Bex. No one else is gonna fall victim to this guy. If you need a reminder of that or need someone to be your sound board, give me a call. Crazy senators can wait.” He smiled, standing up and slowly turning to head back up the steps.

“I will and thank you, Mike. I don’t know what I would do without you.” She hung up the phone and put it back in her pocket. She took a deep breath and unlocked the bathroom door.

Just as she opened the door, Spencer had raised his fist to knock on the door. In his other hand was a cup of tea. “I brought a peace offering.” He said, holding the cup out to her.

She gave him a small, grateful smile and took the cup. “You know I don’t blame you right. He was probably sitting in some corner that couldn’t be seen all too well. We’ve still got time to figure out our unsub’s location.”

Spencer let out a breath of relief. She wasn’t mad at him. “Can I get a hug before we go back in there?” He asked, raising his arms slightly.

“Of course.” Her small smile grew into a grin as she wrapped her arms around his middle. She nestled her head into his chest and let out another deep breath. “I could never be mad at you. I’m sorry if I made you think that. I just thought that since we were one step ahead that we would be able to get him, you know? I’m just so ready for this case to finally be over.”

Spencer rubbed her back. “I know and we will. I’m sure you’ve already come up with some parameters that could narrow down locations.”

She giggled, giving him one last squeeze before pulling back. “Sure do and I could really use your help with that.”