Chapter Text
"Hell no, kid! I am not letting you drive all the way from Indiana back to Quantico. That's like a ten hour drive, and didn't the doctor say to take it easy?"
"Actually, it's approximately nine hours and thirty-nine minutes, and you drive like there's an armed armada chasing us. The stress is worse for my health than driving could be."
"At least I don't drive like some old grandma."
"I d-don't - " He started, then remembered the driving test he'd barely passed a year earlier and stopped. Morgan just laughed, jumping into the driver's seat.
-:-
"Two thousand eight hundred and forty one people died last year because of distracted driving." He announced, smiling at the slightly chagrined expression on Morgan's face as he put his hands back on the wheel. As they had pulled out onto the highway, he had reached over and started fiddling with the radio, his eyes flicking between the knobs and the road and keeping one hand steady on the wheel. "That's approximately fourteen percent of all fatal crashes. I don't know about you, but I was planning on actually making it to work on time tomorrow."
Morgan groaned, before gesturing to the radio. "Fine, you do it. But no classical music, and absolutely no radio shows."
-:-
"Morgan, we should really stop."
He looked out of the passenger window into the inky night. Somewhere in Ohio, darkness had fallen, and with it had come heavy rain. It pelted the car, the road, and even with the windshield wipers moving at full speed he could barely see the center lines.
"Pretty boy, there isn't a rest stop for over ten miles unless we turn around. It's fine." Morgan's eyes were now completely focused on the road, hands gripping the steering wheel tightly.
The music had long been turned off. His ears had started ringing again at about the third hour, and he could barely stand the constant pounding of rain and the hum of the engine. But the pain in his head had been pushed aside when he realized just how bad the storm was getting. He trusted Morgan, but he didn't know if any person should be out in this weather.
"Four hundred and eighteen thousand people are injured every year in weather related crashes." He recited, hoping that Morgan would listen and turn around.
"Reid - " The other agent started, but a loud crack! cut him off.
Like it was straight out of a horror film, something fell right across the road in front of them. It towered in the dark, a shadow completely obscured by the rain and night.
"Shit!" Morgan cursed, turning the wheel as quickly as he could. The brakes squealed as he slammed on them, but the car started spinning out of control.
"Morgan!" He screamed, hanging onto the door handle for dear life. The car spun into the tree laying across the road and went airborne, flipping over and over. His head hit something, and everything went black
-:-
Pain.
That was the first thing he felt when he came to. Pain arcing up his side, down from his temple. It was a shooting, electrical kind of agony that stole his breath and replaced it with a choked-off scream. Everything hurt, everything. His mind could hardly focus past that.
It came back in short flashes: fighting with Morgan over who got to drive the long expanse of highways between Indiana and Quantico. The torrential rain that had started soon after they entered Ohio. The tree that'd fallen across the road with a sound like cracking thunder. Spinning, spinning, before an awful feeling of weightlessness that forced his stomach in his throat.
His eyes blinked open, lashes fluttering as he longed to close them again. Blackness kept creeping in from the corner of his vision, and he begged it to stay away. He needed... He needed to move. He needed to find Morgan and get help and get them out of this - !
Looking out the cracked windshield, he saw trees. Trees looming out in the darkness of early morning. They must've flipped over the guardrail, only coming to a stop in the forest that was lining the highway. At least they were right side up.
He twitched his leg, trying to swing them around so he could start to get out, but a new rush of agony hit him and he screamed. God, it hurt so bad! Like a vise was squeezing everything below his ribs. He gritted his teeth as the pain slowly leveled out, and forced himself to face the inevitable: he couldn't move.
He didn't want to look down, he didn't want to face how hurt he could be, but he had to. They were going to get out this. Finding the courage to look, he took in how the dashboard, like the whole front of the car, had crumbled forward. How the heavy plastic was pinning his legs to the seat. How blood was covering it along with the remains of his shirt. His eyes closed again in panic.
Fuck! Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. He was trapped, completely. His legs had to be broken and there was a literal ton of metal pinning him down. They were out in the middle of nowhere, falling trees had probably taken down powerlines, and they weren't expected back in Quantico until tomorrow morning. He wouldn't last that long, not with these injuries, and that was assuming nothing went horribly wrong with the car...
The world wavered as another spike of pain racketed up his legs, pulling a deep groan from his lungs. Morgan, he had to find Morgan. There was something... he could hear something....
"Reid!"
"... morgan?"
The word crawled up his throat, nothing more than a whimper. He forced his eyes open again, looking around the ruined car for his friend. Finally seeing him in the driver's seat, one hand was gripping his shoulder tightly, blood running between his fingers. More fell from a long gash across his forehead. Morgan was hurt, really hurt, but he didn't seem to be trapped like he was.
"M-Morgan? Y-Your shoulder..." His eyes were glued to the blood, far too bright a red. Please don't be arterial, please, was all he could think as he watched it drip, drip. He tried to reach out, but the movement jostled his leg, causing veritable knives to stab all the way up into his ribs and a short scream to leave him.
"Stop, stop! I'm fine kid, just stop moving! Stay still." Morgan said, his eyes filled with worry as they flicked up and down his body. They widened as they lit on the blood coating his button up. "What hurts?"
"M-My legs, and... and abdomen. My c-chest. I t-think something's broken." He gasped sharply as he tried to move again, agony lancing through him. "You're ble... bleeding."
"My collarbone's fractured, but nothing too bad. It barely even hurts." The unfocused look in Morgan's eyes screamed concussion, but he didn't call the man out on his lie, too focused on judging how much blood Morgan was losing. It had to be a compoud fracture, but Morgan's hand was in the way, so he couldn't be sure. He needed medical attention.
"I-Is your door stuck?"
"I don't know." Morgan turned, and after pushing against it several times, his door opened. He breathed a sigh of relief; at least one of them could get out.
"You... You s-hould go... see if t-there's ser-vice. C-call for help."
"I'm not going to leave you here, kid."
"'m not..." He blinked, long and slow as his eyes threatened to close again. "'m not going anywhere."
He watched as Morgan's eyes flicked down, really looking past the blood at his bottom half for the first time. Took in the red-spattered dashboard pushing deeply against his legs and abdomen.
"Shit!" Morgan slammed a hand onto the wheel, his anger getting the best of him. "You're completely pinned?" Reid nodded, regretting it as nausea made its way up his throat. He gagged, retching dryly.
The gags turned to coughs that echoed deep in his chest. Everything ached and pounded as he doubled over as far as he could, trying to relieve some of the pain. His lungs were clenching, it felt like a vise was wrapped firmly around them. Faintly, he felt a hand on his back, rubbing softly.
"Just breathe, kid. C'mon Spencer, breathe." Morgan sounded wrecked. He could hear the pain, the fear, in his voice even if he couldn't see it. So he tried to breathe through the pain, through his crushed lungs.
Slowly, his breath came back and the gasping coughs stopped. Straightening, leaning into the back of his seat, he looked deep into his friend's eyes, hoping he would make the right decision. "I think... I t-think something's wrong w-with my ribs." Morgan was silent. "W-we need help, soon."
He watched as indecision passed over his friend's face, before the older man closed his eyes. "Alright, I'll try the phone, but I'll be back in a minute. Don't you dare go to sleep. Recite statistics or something, just don't drift off."
"D-Did you know that the... the first t-twinkie was invented in C-Chicago?" His voice sounded miserable, throat raw from screaming, but Morgan still gave a small smile.
"No, I didn't kid." With one last long look, the man started to move, wrenching off his seat belt and leaving through the driver's side door. He watched through half lidded eyes, forcing himself to look through the vast libraries in his head to keep his mind from floating.
Many years have passed since that night. The wall of the staircase up which I had watched the light of his candle gradually climb was long demolished.
His mother was reading in his head, her voice floating to him as if on a wind. She had always loved Proust, would read it to him every night. It was one thing she never lost, even when illness took so much else from her.
He hoped, more than anything else, he'd see her again. He'd be able to hear her read to him one last time.
After what seemed like an eternity, Morgan opened the passenger door. More color had faded from his cheeks, his eyes somehow seeming less focused. "We fell really far down, there's no way anyone's going to see us from the road or that we'd be able to climb out. I can't get any service, the storm must've caused trees to fall on the lines, but the team'll realize we're missing, and they'll track our phones."
"I-It's one in the m-orning, Morgan. That's... that's seven h-hours until someone starts l-looking." His eyes flicked nervously back to Morgan's shoulder, to the fresh blood painting his dark shirt. "W-we won't last that long."
Morgan looked down, his shoulders shuddering as he took a deep breath. When his eyes focused back on his, there were unshed tears shining. His heart clenched, panic starting to rise in his throat. The only time he'd seen Morgan cry was in Chicago, when he was being held for murder. And now he was kneeling on the dirty ground as tears started to drip down his face.
"Goddammit, kid! We will make it out of this, we have to make it out of this! We are not dying in the middle of some forest in Ohio, alright? It's not happening!" A rough hand wiped the tears of his face, smearing blood across it.
"Morgan, the... the c-chances of us - "
"No, no! Don't give me some fact or statistic, I can't - " The older agent took another deep breath. Pain was starting to shine in his eyes. Watching more tears run down his face, Reid reached out and put a hand on his uninjured shoulder, squeezing gently. It was as close to a hug as he could give with their positions, and that was something Morgan desperately needed. "We... we can't die out here, Spencer."
Silence reigned as they both looked at each other. Minutes passed, minutes where they sat, trying to ignore the pain lighting through their bodies. Eventually, the tears stopped falling and Morgan managed to stand up, leaning heavily against the car's frame.
"I shouldn't've yelled at you, it's not... it's not fair, just..." Morgan trailed off, eyes gazing far into the distance. He understood. This was different than facing off an UnSub, even though the danger's the same. Their team wasn't here. There was a raw, neverending fear that they'll die, forgotten, in the middle of some woods in rural Ohio. Or worse, that they'll have to watch the other die slowly, painfully, before being left alone for search and rescue to find. That they'll have to live knowing that their brother died because they couldn't save them.
His eyes started close again, as if weighed down by lead. He let them. Everything was cold, he was shaking. Pain radiated everywhere in deep, solid aches. He wanted nothing more than to let darkness claim him.
"'m sorry."
"Don't fall asleep on me, pretty boy!" Morgan shouted, and the pure volume of his voice made his eyes open again. A hand on his shoulder shook him. "You have to stay with me, y'hear? Just focus on me."
"Mmm-hmm." He hummed, forcing his gaze to focus on his friend again. Morgan needed him. "'m tired. 'm not s... sure how l-long I c-can stay a-wake."
The hand gripping him tightened, and he heard Morgan curse softly. Panic laced his voice. "Okay. Okay, I'm going to try to turn the car on."
"W-why?"
"It's freezing out here, you're shivering. If we're going to hunker down until help arrives, we need to be warm. I already tried to get the emergency kit out of the trunk, but the whole thing's crushed to hell."
Morgan waited a second, breathing deeply, before letting go of the car's frame he'd been using for support. The older agent walked unsteadily back to the driver's seat, letting out a loud gasp as he sat back down. The first real sign of pain he'd shown. Squinting in the low light, Spencer was just able to make out the sharp white of bone sticking out from his shoulder. Seat belt injury, his mind supplied him.
With a shaking hand, Morgan turned the key still lodged in the ignition. They listened as once, twice, the engine sputtered but failed to turn over.
You're not getting out of this, a malignant voice whispered. You're both going to die out here.
Morgan turned back to him, eyes dark. Reid watched as his friend, his colleague, his big brother, completely collapsed into the seat. All the tension leeches out of him, like that one spark of hope had been everything holding him together, keeping away the pain, was gone. He was like a puppet with cut strings.
With slow, painful movements, Morgan started to strip his jacket off. A loud moan left his lips as he pulled it off his injured shoulder. Gently, he laid it on top of Reid, tucking the corners in like a blanket.
"N-no...."
"Pretty boy, your teeth are chattering." He realized he was right, but as hard as he tried, he couldn't stop his jaw's shaking. "It's like thirty degrees out and you're in shock."
"Y-you...?" He couldn't get the rest of the sentence out.
"I'm fine, just rest, Reid. We're going to be here a little while."
There was nothing left to do but wait. He was floating, head swimming, even as the pain started to overwhelm his body again. It sneaked past the barriers he has built in his mind, forcing small gasps and whimpers through his lips as his legs started pulsing with agony. His hands convulsively gripped the jacket as he shook.
Seconds, minutes, hours later, just as his eyes started to close again, he smelled something. It was just a hint, barely there, like he was imagining it. But it grew stronger and stronger, and suddenly panic started to come back in full force.
"M-Morgan, I smell s-moke." He whispered the words, like some part of him was hoping that if he said it soft enough, it wouldn't be true.
The pther agent straightened, eyes glancing worriedly over to him, before he jumped out of the seat, throwing open the driver's door and stumbling out of the car. He watched as Morgan walked unsteadily around the front, stopping at the passenger door. Smoke was starting to billow out of the hood.
"Where's the extinguisher?" Morgan asked, eyes staying locked on the grey mist floating up into the sky.
He replied softly, also watching the smoke curl into shapes as it faded away past the trees. "In the... the emergency k-kit."
It was almost peaceful, for a moment, as it sunk in. They both gazed far into the sky, listening as fire started to crackle awake.
He knew what was going to happen. The crash must've caused something to leak, their attempts to turn on the car created a spark. In a moment of startling clarity, he could see it. The fire would spread into the cab. His legs were pinned. Crime scene photos of bodies, burned alive by UnSubs, floated into his mind.
Distantly, he heard Morgan banging against the trunk, trying to get it open, before running back to him. His hands were empty, a look of terror plastered across his face.
He was going to burn alive. Oh god, was going to burn alive! Panic started to rise in his chest, but he forced it back down. He needed to think clearly.
"We need to get you out of here." Morgan gripped his shoulder with his good hand, pulling gently. Looking up, he saw the fear in his friend's eyes.
And he just smiled. Gently. Sadly.
"No."
"What?!"
"Run, Derek."
Orange licks of fire appeared in the corner of his eye. They danced across the hood, creating a display that was beautiful, horrifically, in the dark night of the forest. That same shade of orange reflected back in the older man's eyes as horror grew in them.
"I'm not leaving you here!" The grip on his shoulder became stronger, and he watched as Morgan looked around desperately for something, anything, that could help.
"You... you need t-to go."
"Hell no! I'm not just going to let you burn alive, kid!"
With a shaking hand, he covered Morgan's palm with his own. The older man's hand shifted, holding his tightly, desperately. "I'm p-inned. There's... there's no w-way you're going t-to be able to pull me out, n-not... not with your s-shoulder. The car's... the car's prob-probably going to ex-explode. You n-eed to get as, as f-ar away as p... possible."
The flames were now crawling across the hood, reaching closer and closer to the windshield. Heat seared his legs as the plastic of the dashboard warmed, and he couldn't stop the soft moan that left his lips.
"No! NO! I won't leave you!" Morgan shouted, reaching both hands under his arms and pulling. Reid screamed, long and loud, as the broken fragments of bone shifted and more blood spurted from his wounds. "Goddammit!"
It wasn't enough. His legs were still pinned, and the flames were now licking them. Another yelp, shorter, hoarser, left his throat as the fabric of his pants started to melt to his skin and blister. Pain unlike anything he'd felt before seared everywhere.
He coughed at the smoke gritting on his lungs. He gagged as the horrible smell of burning, melting flesh reached him.
He needed to get Morgan away, he needed to -
"RUN!"
He screamed. He screamed as loud as he could, pushing Morgan away with all his strength as the breath in his lungs turned to coughs. Sweat poured from his face, the world was spinning in black, but he couldn't let his friend sacrifice himself for him, he couldn't! Not after everything they'd been through together.
A fresh tendril of fire started to lick his leg, and the panic that he'd been trying desperately to ignore rose up. He struggled against the dashboard as his legs kept burning, tears flowing freely down his face. His fingernails broke as his hands desperately looked for purchase on the dashboard, the plastic melting to his fingertips. He couldn't breathe, he couldn't think, he just needed to get out. He's going to die, he's going to die right here, in the most painful way possible -
He saw as the determination in Morgan's eyes solidify. For a split second, he watched as the pain and the terror fled from the agent. For a split second, it all stood still. For a split second.
Then Morgan reached down, into the flames.
A startling scream pierced the night. It was loud and hoarse and full of pain as Morgan gripped his burnt legs, yanking with all his strength to free them from the where they were trapped. It was excruciating, pure agony, as he felt melting plastic rip through the bruised and burnt epidermis of his stomach. Skin scraped off his legs as his body was pulled free.
But it worked.
Somehow, someway, it worked.
Within seconds, both of them tumbled out of the car and into the cool grass. The world spun, everything spun. He didn't know what was happening, just that everything hurt. The wet dew from the grass coated his face, and he welcomed the feeling that wasn't heat or pain. Blackness danced calmly around the edges of his vision, asking permission to steal him away. He could make out figures, shadows around him, but nothing more.
His eyes started to drift closed. A fresh slice of agony shot through his legs as Morgan picked him up, carrying him in his arms as they ran away from the car. He fought, desperately, against the strong arms holding him. Each step shot another bullet into him, each one beckoning the blackness closer and closer.
It was barely a minute later that the sound of an explosion rocked the night.
Then the black won.
-:-
Cold wind reached icy fingers down his face. They moved across his neck, playing in the hollow of his throat as another shiver rocked him. The sweat on his forehead, his back, was far too cooling in the cold night.
A memory flashed. Heat, a dreadful heat. Orange, flickering. Strong hands gripping him, pulling him. Saving him.
His eyes fluttered open.
He saw the dark sky. Trees silhouetted against the light cast by a waxing gibbous. Stars were twinkling faintly, barely seen in the black. A forest.
"Kid?"
The voice spoke softly. Painfully. With the kind of hope that's quickly fading. It was hoarse, deep and grating. He forced his head to turn, to look as the man lying on the ground beside him.
Morgan.
His eyes were closed, scrunched tightly. His chest rose and fell with heavy, labored movements. Bone shone brightly out of one shoulder. His hands....
He blinked, long and hard and slow, forcing the nausea to settle back in his stomach. He couldn't think about that, he couldn't, not when they were still here. Still in this goddamned forest.
"spencer?"
The voice was softer this time, weaker. The words 'Derek Morgan' and 'weak' just didn't make sense together and yet, his name was hardly more than air.
"... d-derek?"
"Hey, kid." Morgan said, choked with tears. "I thought..." He swallowed quickly as more saltwater dripped down his face. "Are you okay?"
"I'm f-fine." That was a lie. The lack of pain, the numbness that was in his whole body, the shaking he just couldn't seem to stop, spoke to that. "y-you?"
"I'm alive." Came the response, firm despite the wavering note of pain present. Morgan's eyes opened, locking on his across the leaf mulch.
"Time?" He asked quietly, almost afraid to know the answer. The older man reached a shaky, red hand into his pocket, hissing as he pulled out his cellphone. A quick glance, before his eyes fell closed again.
"Three-oh-five."
"Four hours and... and f-fifty-five minutes." He recited, holding the time in his mind. One hour and fifty-five minutes until the team will realize they're late and start looking for them. "Garcia will f-find us. The t-eam will find u-us"
"Yeah, yeah they will, kid."
"I-I guess we're not going to make it to that... that r-review thing t-ommorow." The words were slurred, but Morgan still smiled. Slightly. "Hotch's going to fire y-you."
"Why only me, you're gonna be late too?!"
Reid smiled, thankful for the distraction keeping his eyes open. "You're the one who... who hit the t-tree. A-and he... he likes m-me more."
"You walked into the house that was rigged to explode. We wouldn't have hit that god... goddamn tree if you'd been c-cleared to fly." Morgan's tone was joking, but he heard the edge hidden underneath. Guilt. Actual guilt.
"'s not... not your fault, Morgan." Disbelieving brown eyes flicked back up to his gaze. He reached a shaking hand across the ground, settling it on the only place he could think wouldn't cause pain: Morgan's forehead. The man leaned up into it, his breaths evening out slightly.
They laid there, for a while, breathing in the smells of a dewy forest and fire far away. Occasionally, a sharp groan, a soft whimper, left Morgan's mouth. He had to be in a lot of pain.
Slowly, everything started fading. Over the minutes and the hours and the decades, life stopped and numb rushed in. Spencer couldn't feel anything anymore. The numbness spread. His vision had been steadily darkening, until there was only blackness left. He couldn't feel his body.
"... morgan?"
"Yeah, kid?"
"Can you... C-can you talk?" He coughed, loudly, harshly, his breathes turning to weezes that took precious minutes to get under control. He barely heard the other agent comforting him through the buzzing.
Even coughing hadn't hurt.
Morgan cleared his throat; tears had clogged it up. "What about?"
"Any... anything." He panted, focusing on his friends breathing as the world twisted and turned.
Then Morgan started talking. About school, his family. About the last custodial he'd had to do, the annoying consults that had plagued him the week prior. About how the Chicago skyline glittered in a way he missed more than anything. About the trees and the sky and the sun.
It was all sound, rushing over him. Tethering him, tenuously, to the earth. He focused as hard as he could on it, staring sightlessly across the ground.
The words stopped, as Morgan took a breath. Licking his lips, forcing moisture back into them, he spoke.
"Is... is it still r-raining?"
His voice broke the short silence. He just... just wanted to know if it was still raining.
Morgan let out a broken sound.
"No, kid."
A beat of silence.
"... m-morgan?"
"Yeah?"
"I can't... I c-can't see."
A sharp inhale. Shaky exhale.
"It's okay."
He took a deep breath, focusing on the only thing he could still feel: the warmth of his hand on Morgan's face.
"I'm... I'm s-scared."
"Jus' breathe, pretty boy. Keep... keep breathing."
He kept looking off into the nothing of his vision, focusing completely on the heat of his friend's skin.
"I'm dying, Derek."
"You're not - " Morgan's voice broke. "Jus' stay... stay with me, kid."
He could feel the blackness calling him. The lure of just giving in.
"I don' wanna go, please, I don' wanna go."
Morgan was crying. Loudly. Openly. The harsh sobs cut through the buzzing of his ears.
"C'mon, Spence, stay with me, stay with me!"
"'m... 'm sorry."
A flash of pain.
Nothing