#only time will tell...

This case was a tough one. The BAU were up in a small town in Maine, where a serial arsonist had been taunting local emergency response teams with coded letters. Multiple up close and personal encounters with the (as yet still unidentified) unsub had the team, and the local police department, feeling antsy. The latest run in had ended badly for Morgan, who’d had the suspect at gunpoint, only to be ambushed from the side and pushed into the freezing cold lake they were standing by.

Garcia’s reaction (when updated by the team as they arrived at the scene) had at first been extreme concern, but once she ascertained the uninjured state of the agent, had switched to asking Emily if he looked at all like Colin Firth circa 1995 as he emerged from the water.

“I mean,” Penelope’s ‘Mr Darcy’ was currently complaining to Hotch and Rossi as he sat in the back of an ambulance, wrapped in both a towel and a shock blanket, “He’s an arsonist. Why’d he push me into freezing cold water? That’s literally the opposite of a fire.”

“Would you have rather he pushed you into a fire?” Rossi questioned him back.

“Regardless.” Hotch interrupted before the discussion could get too out of hand, “The attack gave us more information. We’re dealing with two unsubs working as a team. This dynamic changes the profile drastically.”

“Yeah, well.” Derek tugged the towel around himself more tightly before standing up to head over to where Emily was still on the phone with his Garcia, “Glad to be of service.”

Prentiss and Reid watched him approach, Emily holding out the phone as he got closer, Garcia’s voice audible on the other end.

“-not that I’d want him to fall in again, but I would like to see that.”

“See what babygirl?” Derek smiled, hearing her gasp.

“Oh wonder of wonders, blessing of blessings, do my ears deceive me?”

“Not at all sweetness, this is the one and only Derek Morgan.”

“I think she was hoping for Darcy,” Reid whispered to Emily, who laughed.

“They’re telling me that you fell into a lake? Say it’s not so.”

“It’s not. I didn’t fall, I was pushed.” Derek frowned at the idea that he’d fallen of his own accord.

“Even worse! The unsub had contact with you? Ooh when I find that little firebug, I’m going to-”

“Bring down the full force of the law on him?” Reid suggested.

“Exactly, boy wonder. Exactly.”

Derek laughed, taking Emily’s phone off speaker and walking a few paces away from the others. “Now that we’re in private, Garcia, I can assure you that I’m okay. It was cold but I didn’t swallow any water, and it was shallow, so I got out just fine. Don’t go worrying that pretty head about me.”

“Well don’t go falling into bodies of water by yourself then.” she sounded indignant, “I hope you’re drying off and warming up as we speak, I wouldn’t want you to catch a chill.”

“I’ve got a towel and a blanket and we’re heading back to the hotel as soon as officers have canvassed the area.” he reassured her. “But I’m pretty sure that Reid would tell you that that’s not how that works.”

“I’ve seen it before.” she insisted, “Big strong man who thinks he’s stronger than a little water and a cold wind, all of a sudden struck down with manflu.”

“Not me. You know I’m more than just talk.” he smiled, imagining her face. “I’ve got to go, talk to you soon girl.”

“Not if I talk to you sooner.”

The line clicked. Derek shivered. Damn, when did it get so cold out here?

…

Before the next day had ended, there was another fire. Morgan looked around grimly at the husk that remained of the house.

“These guys are escalating.”

“Yeah, not only in terms of the timeframe, but the method too.” Reid responded, pointing a gloved finger up to what had once been the second floor. “It looks like they used accelerant up there as well as on the ground floor this time.”

“Victims are a Mr and Mrs White, both escaped with their lives, but will need serious medical treatment.” Hotch walked over to update them. “Morgan, get Garcia to cross-reference these two with the other homeowners.”

“On it.” Morgan moved away from all the hubbub, sidestepping firefighters and rubberneckers as he selected Garcia’s number on his cell. She picked up on the second ring.

“This is the search engine soothsayer Penelope Garcia, how may I clear your future path today?”

Derek couldn’t help but smile, “Sorry to unbalance your vibes babygirl, but there’s been another fire.”

“Oh my stars.” He heard her chair wheel speedily across the floor, presumably back to her desk, “What can I do?”

“Everyone’s okay sweetness, I just need you to cross reference these victims; Mr and Mrs White, with the others, looking for a connection.”

“Well okay, but if we haven’t found anything of import thus far-” Penelope’s attempt to manage Morgan’s expectations was cut short as the agent suddenly found himself sucking in a sharp breath. Derek held the phone away from his face as he pressed a fist under his nose, “hhRRSHH!”

When he put the phone back to his ear there was silence on the other side of the line. “Babygirl?”

“Yes. Uh, as I was saying,” Penelope evidently had decided not to address the sneeze if he wasn’t going to, “If we haven’t found anything yet, I don’t know what this couple can add. Maybe it’s just random.”

“You know what Rossi would say.” Morgan pinched the bridge of his nose, trying not to sneeze again, “It’s never completely random.”

“I’ll get right on it then.” This time Garcia was the one subjected to a few seconds of silence. “Hel-”

“hhRRSHHOO!” Derek cleared his throat lightly before returning the phone to his face, “Excuse me.”

“God bless you Derek Morgan.” her tone was pointed. “I hope you aren’t coming down with something after your little dip yesterday.”

“It’s the damn smoke getting up my nose.” Morgan turned to look at the house behind him, which was no longer even smouldering. “And that is still not how that works.”

“Whatever you say.” she replied in a sing-song voice as he hung up, shaking his head in exasperation.

…

Much to Derek’s chagrin, when he awoke the next day, he did indeed feel like he might be coming down with something. His normally fighting fit body felt like it was made of rusted metal, every movement he made getting out of bed making his joints ache and creak. He staggered through to the bathroom of his hotel room and looked at himself in the mirror. There were slightly prominent bags under his eyes, and his lips were chapped from breathing through them. He sighed, coughed, and turned on the shower. One of the victims he’d interviewed must have been sick, because Penelope was definitely not right about the whole cold and wet thing.

…

“-so they have to be from the opposing team.” Reid’s tone was excited as he gestured to the hockey team photo he’d been studying.

“But committing arson over a sports match?” Emily looked doubtful.

“And not even a professional one.” Rossi looked over Reid’s shoulder at the team of amateur players in their early 20s.

“I think there’s more to this than meets the eye.” Hotch said. “Morgan, call Garcia and have her check the opposing team for criminal records. That should give us somewhere to start.”

Morgan nodded, standing up from the table they were all crowded around, and getting his phone out. Before he could press the buttons to call Penelope, he felt an itch creeping up in the back of his nose. After a millisecond of hesitation, he stepped away from the table and walked to the door of the conference room, eyes on his phone like he planned to take the call outside.

The others sat in silence for a moment before Rossi spoke up, “What on earth is he going to say to her that he doesn’t want us to hear? I think we’ve heard it all at this point.”

“Maybe they’re actually going to have a professional conversation for once.” Hotch looked resigned for a moment, before returning to examining the most recent note sent by the arsonists.

Morgan was jogging through the precinct, trying to look like he was on ‘important FBI business’ and not like he was trying desperately to suppress a sneeze. He made it out of the front doors, took a sharp left into a grassy area by the carpark, and raised his elbow to his face, “hrRSHH! hAHSHH! hASHHhoO!”. He pressed a hand to his chest and tilted his head back, trying to catch his breath, before punching in Penelope’s number again.

“You’ve reached the hall of the Mountain Queen, speak your mind.” Morgan could hear classical music playing in the background, a tell tale sign that she was trying to destress.

“Hey mamacita, how do you feel about a background check?” his voice was slightly hoarse, and he swallowed hard as he waited for her reply.

“On me? You won’t like what you find.” She responded playfully.

“On a sixteen member hockey team.”

“Well then I feel like that may take a while. But less because it’s me.”

“And we are lucky to have you.” He smiled, “We’re looking for criminal records or any- ehh-any- ehHEHSHOO!” he ducked away into his elbow again. “Goddamn. Excuse me, babygirl.”

“You are not excused until you provide an excuse.” she replied, “But you are blessed.”

“I know I’m blessed,” he looked around for inspiration to explain away his sneezes, “I’m talking to you.”

“Flattered, but not distracted.”

“It’s just the…grass.” He stared at the floor under his feet.

“Grass, you’re outside?”

“Yeah, we’re… bringing evidence in from the cars.” he rubbed at his nose gently.

“And you chose to take this phone call outside, instead of inside where the information is?”

“Yes.” he was regretting not passing the fit off as being the result of dust or something else more universally available.

“Derek,” her tone was as sweet and pure as sugar, full of concern and care, “If you are feeling under the weather, it’s okay.”

“I know babygirl. But I’m fine. Really.” Fine to keep working, that was.

“Okay, I trust you to take care of yourself.”

“And I trust you to background check these suspects.”

“Thank you. I’ll call you back when I have something.”

“I look forward to it.”

The line clicked as she hung up, and Derek immediately pitched into his elbow again, “hrrRSHHH!”. He coughed forcefully afterwards, straightening up and scouring the scene for witnesses. When he saw none he relaxed, took a deep breath in, and headed back to the conference room.

…

Penelope’s brilliance had paid off. Within the hour they had two prime suspects, a cryptography major and a criminology major from the rival hockey team, both of whom had recently written papers on famous coded letters. After tracking their phones to yet another hockey player’s house, they caught the pair red handed preparing Molotov cocktails, and took them into custody.

It was a surprisingly quick turnaround on the case, but they were all glad of it, after a few days of being dragged out of bed at the same time as the local firefighters, every time. The team retired to their hotel rooms, planning to board the jet back to Quantico in the morning.

Derek walked back to his room with Reid chattering in his ear about the odds of two pyromaniacs finding each other on one hockey team. He bid the younger agent goodnight and stepped into his room, posture immediately sagging with exhaustion. He headed through to the bathroom to check on himself in the mirror, and found that he still somehow was managing to look okay, if a little tired. The diet and workout regimen must be paying off.

Morgan changed into some slightly more comfortable clothes and slipped back out of his room, heading down the street to the corner shop to pick up some cold medicine. He grabbed a sports drink too, to wash it down and to hydrate, and then made his way back to the hotel.

He sat on the end of his bed and took the pills, his hand hovering over the pocket his phone was in, before he pushed the thought from his mind. Garcia was 800 miles away, what help could she offer for his extremely minor cold? It wasn’t worth bothering her. It also probably wasn’t worth her ‘I told you so’ song.

Morgan sighed, took another swig of the sports drink, and then went for the shower that he’d been (literally) aching for all day. Feeling the warm water run over his skin made all the running around and thinking so hard he gave himself a headache, worth it. Derek took a deep, cleansing breath, letting the steam fill his lungs.

“hAHSHHuh!” the agent bent double, directing the sudden sneeze openly towards the shower floor, and then cringing as the sound echoed. He waited for a few seconds, alone with the sound of the water, to see if anyone would yell out a blessing, or knock on his door, or text him- any sign that he’d been heard. Silence. He relaxed again, imagining himself in his shower at home, where the walls weren’t paper thin, and he could sneeze as much as he wanted to.

…

The jet ride home from a case was always a toss up. It could be fun, light-hearted banter being shared between the team, sometimes a lively card game started up, or they’d start sharing silly anecdotes. It could be sombre, everyone privately going over their part in the case, what they could have done differently, who they feel they should have saved. This ride was calm. Reid and JJ were having a conversation about their respective high school sports teams, Rossi and Emily were playing gin rummy, and Hotch was flicking through and annotating a case file, preparing to write his after action report.

Morgan sat alone, headphones on, trying to get some more sleep, having been up half the night struggling to breathe through his building congestion, and throwing the covers on and off with what he refused to believe was a fever. His phone buzzed in his pocket, and he pulled it out to see a text from Penelope.

bbgirl: hey hot stuff, how’s the flight?

chocl8thundr: better now I’m hearing from u.

He smiled down at the screen, waiting for her to reply.

bbgirl: come see me when u get back?

chocl8thundr: always

bbgirl: <3

Derek was just considering texting her back two hearts to one up her, because he knew it would get under her skin in all the right ways, when his nose started to itch. Mercifully thus far he’d managed to avoid showing any serious symptoms in front of the rest of the team, just a few small coughing fits that he’d waved off as being from the smoke of the crime scenes, or swallowing wrong.

He knuckled at the side of his nose, adjusting his headphones with his other hand so that he could hear out of one ear. The tickle was only growing so he resigned himself to it, not wanting to go and hide in the bathroom, where they’d all still be able to hear him anyway, and make a scene of it.

“hh- HRSHHHah!”

The rest of the team blessed him in sync, JJ sounding surprised, Rossi in Italian, and Hotch without looking up from his file.

“Excuse me. ” He cleared his throat and fiddled with his mp3 player, changing the song. When he looked up, Reid’s eyes were still fixed on him, the genius’ eyes slightly narrowed as if working something out. JJ elbowed him softly, and Reid looked away again, the two of them continuing their conversation in a more hushed tone. Great.

…

After what felt like forever, but was actually a little under 2 hours, Derek was back in the FBI building, swinging by the bullpen to drop off his bag at his desk before making his way to Penelope’s office with her gift. He ran into Hotch on his way through the double doors, and the older agent stopped him.

“Morgan, just checking in after the case.” Hotch’s eyes roved over his face piercingly.

“Yeah, glad we got those guys.” Morgan wasn’t really sure what was needed from him, and he really wanted to get to Garcia as soon as possible. “I’ll write up my report by the end of the day.”

Hotch waved a hand dismissively, “That’s not why I’m checking on you.” He hesitated. “The lake. Are you sure you’re alright?”

Derek thought back to the plane, and how Hotch hadn’t looked up, but how his hand had hesitated halfway through writing a note, as if he was processing. Shit. “Yeah, I’m all good.”

“Okay, well if you’re not, or if anything changes, let me know.” Hotch patted him impassively on the arm, moving by him to head in the direction of his office.

“Will do.” Derek was already moving the opposite way, towards Garcia. It had been a good few days and he needed to see his babygirl.

…

She was tapping away at her computer, as always, when he opened the door to her office. He took a soft step in, taking a few seconds to admire the familiar scene before announcing himself. She was wearing a cute headband with 3d daisies all over it, and holding a matching pen in one hand, balanced between her fingers as she typed. Derek smiled.

“Hey babygirl. You miss me?”

“Oh!” she spun around in her chair so fast she almost missed him and did a full 360. “It’s you! You’re here and you’re okay, and you brought…”

Derek revealed the hand he’d been holding behind his back.

“Blueberry jam! Oh did I ever mention how much I love you?” She stood up and took the jar from him, turning it over in her hands before putting it down on the desk behind her and pulling him into a hug.

“I think you might have.” he chuckled.

“I was so worried.” Garcia said, her face still smushed into his chest.

“About what? About me?” he drank in the scent of her perfume and herbal tea, the scent of being home.

“Yes about you!” just because she was mad, didn’t mean she was planning to let go anytime soon. “You fell in a lake. All alone. In the middle of the night.”

“Okay firstly,” he rested his chin on her head. “I did not fall. I was pushed. And I wasn’t alone, Reid was there, and he called the rest of the team, and the ambulance- which I didn’t even need. Also it was not the middle of the night, it was early evening, as you well know because we were still in the same timezone.”

“You were still cold and wet and miles and miles away, though.” He could hear her pout.

“And now I’m warm, and dry, and right h-hh here.” He gently pushed her away, holding her at arm’s length while he ducked into his opposite elbow, “hhRRSHHoo! Forgive me.”

“God bless you!” She looked like she wanted to say more, but knew him well enough to know what his answer would be.

“Thank you, sweetness.” He pulled her back in.

“I know you just said you were warm and dry,” she piped up after a moment, “But you feel quite literally warm, like to the touch. And I’ve been sitting in my cozy little office all day, so you must be really hot.”

“Now, Penelope.” He let her go so he could look at her, “Are you flirting with me?” The words blended into each other slightly and the agent found himself swaying slightly, without her to lean on.

“Always, my love.” She gently steered him towards her desk and, with a light push, sat him down in her chair. He groaned quietly and sat forward to put his head in his hands. Garcia tutted.

“I distinctly remember saying to you that I trusted you to take care of yourself. Was my trust misplaced?”

“No.” he responded, “I did. I am.”

“Yeah? Then what’s eating at you, hot stuff?”

“’M just a little dizzy. Long flight, and I didn’t have much of a breakfast.”

“I think that comes under taking care of yourself.” Is what Garcia very much wanted to say. Instead she put a hand on his neck and stroked it softly, watching his shoulders relax at her cool touch.

Derek coughed against the back of his wrist a couple of times, and then straightened up quickly. Garcia pulled her hand back, about to ask if he was okay, when she saw the look on his face. The technical analyst was quick to grab a bedazzled box of tissues from the desk and hold it out to him, Morgan having just enough time to see it shimmering in the corner of his vision and snatch a couple out as his eyes screwed shut.

“hhASHH! hhRRSHH! hAhSHOO!”

“Bless you and bless you and bless you!”

“Thank you, sweet lady. Ugh, forgive me. I don’t know what’s going on with me right now.”

“Yeah, you do.” Penelope said quietly.

“…yeah, I do.” he admitted after a moment, looking up into those understanding brown eyes.

She reached out to squeeze his shoulder- partially in comfort, partially as a reward for herself for profiling him correctly- but he pulled away. She tipped her head to one side, a silent ‘what gives?’

“Babygirl, I don’t want you to catch this.”

“Why not? I’m already lovesick, what’s a little cold gonna do?”

“It’s gonna make you miserable, that’s what. And that’s the last thing I would ever want for you.”

“I’ll be even more miserable if you don’t let me dote over you for every single second of this.” She raised her eyebrows, challenging him, “I’ve already missed two days, I refuse to lose another second.”

Derek laughed, and then coughed against his fist, turning away from her. “Well I’ve got to write up my report first-”

“Nope. Not a chance.” She was going full caretaker mode, “I am going to talk to Hotch, and if he won’t let you leave until it’s written, I will write it myself. And then I am taking you home. And I’ll even make you soup. And teeny tiny sick day cookies.”

Morgan made to get up, but she pushed him firmly back down. “You stay here.” She picked up her half full cup of herbal tea and pressed it into his hands, “Drink this.” He wrinkled up his nose, much preferring the idea of coffee. She ignored him, picking up the bedazzled tissue box again and moving it closer to him “Have these.” And as an afterthought she tapped something into her computer and smiled as a series of cute photos of various animals appeared on the screen. “And look at these.”