It wasn't often that Penelope joined the team in the field, although it seemed to be happening more and more often, especially after Luke Alvez joined the team. Maybe this was because they worked well together, everyone could see that. With Tara off on another assignment, Prentiss paired Luke and Penelope up to go out and track down Mr. Moorehouse.

The team was working on a case that involved 3 ritualistic murders. They were eerily similarities to 2 cases that happened in a nearby town 25 years ago, but there were very few records and nobody currently on the police force that remembered that case. They did find out that the lead detective still lived in the area, his name was Mr. Moorehouse, but he was a reclusive type, holed up in a cabin about 1.5-2hrs away. Luke and Penelope had gone out to track down the guy and found out what they could. They knew this was highly unlikely the unsub because the guy had a stellar record as a cop, and was almost 80, so Prentiss had sent Penelope with Luke, she hoped Penelope might be able to search through any type of electronic records he might have with him or scan any paper records he didn't want to give up.

They had driven out to see Mr. Moorhouse this morning, it taking a little over 2 hours because it was snowing out in Montana where they were. Mr. Moorehouse was very gruff and not interested in talking at first, until Penelope wore him down and he opened up. Finally, by the end of the visit he'd given them a lot of good information about the previous cases, which they felt certain were connected to the current ones, but unfortunately, he didn't have any good leads from those cases and didn't have any records. He did give them a few names of other people to talk to and promised to call them if he thought of something else. They were headed back to the precinct in the early afternoon when the roads started to deteriorate significantly.

"These roads are dangerous, I wouldn't attempt to drive at all if we weren't in an SUV with 4-wheel drive" Luke remarked as he tried to see enough of the road to stay on it.

Penelope was looking at the weather on her phone, "I don't get it, the radar is acting like there's a big band of heavy snow coming right over us, but the official forecast is only 1-2 inches, there's already way more than that"

"I trust current radar more than some weatherman's report" Luke replied.

"Yeah, well unfortunately it looks like more and more snow is coming, and don't think the roads are going to get better and we haven't gone thru that awful windy section yet" Penelope said, shivering as she remembered that part of the drive over, which involved a windy stretch of road going up the mountain that made her carsick even when the reads were clear.

Prentiss called, Penelope put her on speaker phone, "Hey Prentiss, I am putting you on speaker, Luke is driving"

"How are you guys? I got your message about what you found from Mr. Moorhouse and were tracking those names down but I'm more concerned about you guys and the weather"

"The weather keeps changing and looking more and more ominous" Reid added, altering both Penelope and Luke that they were on the speaker phone on the other end as well.

"Believe me, we are becoming aware of that" Luke said, focusing more on staying on the road than talking. Penelope decided it would be better off if she talked even though he knew better what the conditions were.

"There's already several inches of snow here and its coming down thick. The roads are bad, Luke's doing a great job and thankfully the SUV has 4-wheel drive but I'm not feeling real great about the upcoming windy stretch down the mountain-side"

Luke and Penelope both exhaled sharply as the car in front of them slid off the road, the driver panicking and going off the shoulder, rolling down a hill.

"Uh, Prentiss, the car in front of us just crashed, l think we need to pull over and see if they are alright, can we call you back?"

"Of course, but be careful your safety is the most important thing"

Luke went out into the blizzard to check on the guy instructing Penelope to stay in the car unless he called her to come over. After a while he came back, shivering as he got back in their SUV.

"So?"

"The driver is dead, nothing more we can do" Luke said, simply, knowing Penelope would freak out no matter how he told her.

"Oh my god, how? we have to help him, she started trying to open the doors, Luke stopped her with his arm, turning her to him.

"Look at me - there is nothing to be done. The guy wasn't wearing a seatbelt and was ejected from the car. The car rolled over him, crushing him. He's gone."

Luke wasn't actually 100% sure the car had rolled over him, but he was 100% sure the guy was dead, and hoped Penelope could accept that.

"Oh my god" she said, in a bit of shock but recognizing the Luke knew better than she did what they could or couldn't do to help "what do we do?"

"Well, I'm going to get back on the road and try to keep going, you should call Prentiss and update her so she knows what's going on, and if you can use your phone to look up any kind of hotel, restaurant that is at all nearby, I think we need to pull off and take shelter somewhere till the storm passes"

Penelope started calling Prentiss as Luke tried to get back on the road. It was a struggle but finally he managed to get them going again. She told Prentiss about their plan and started looking for anything.

"Luke there isn't anything until after the windy stretch. At the base there appears to be a gas station and a restaurant or diner, and a couple miles more down the road there appears to be a little down with a couple restaurants, a grocery store and at tiny motel" Penelope said in frustration, while still searching for something better.

"We can't make it through that stretch with the roads like this, it'd be suicide" Luke said, realizing that even though the elevation would be going down and the snow might be slightly less the incline alone was going to cause chaos.

"What do we do?"

"We'll hole up in the SUV if we have to" he said looking around, "are you sure you don't see any kind of buildings around?" he asked "at this point I think knocking on a stranger's door and seeing if they'd let us in might not be out of the question"

"Would they even let strangers in?"

"Well it helps if you can show FBI credentials" Luke said, "I think", remembering that out here in Montana in these rural areas the FBI wasn't always so welcome, but he had a feeling in this weather anyone would take pity on them.

"All I see is what looks like on the map a tiny cabin, a driveway of sorts about 500ft ahead, to the right" Penelope said

"I think I see it" Luke said, pointing to this tiny structure at the end of a long dirt, or snow covered road. "do you see it?"

"Yeah I see it, and it looks a lot smaller than it does on the map but I'm pretty sure that's the same thing"

Luke slowed down a lot to navigate turning onto this tiny road, it probably had almost 6" of untouched snow, and it was hard to see but eventually they made it up to the cabin. There were no lights and no smoke coming from the cabin.

"I think it's abandoned Garcia" Luke said, looking around not seeing any signs pointing to someone being here.

"Isn't that a good thing?" Garcia said, thinking at least now they wouldn't have to convince the stranger to let them in, "I mean assuming we can break in? can we do that?"

"I have no problem breaking in, given the situation, we can always pay to have any damage fixed after we leave, but I'm more concerned about there not being any heat, or water if it's not being lived in"

"Oh, good point" Garcia hadn't thought of that, but she was still hopeful as she and Luke got out of the car and walked up the steps to the cabin. The door was locked, looking inside it was clear nobody was home, but it looked like someone might have stayed there recently, it wasn't in disrepair.

"I'm going to walk around and see if there is a back door or a window that would be good to get in through"

"Okay" Garcia said, unsure what she should do. She decided to look through her purse and see if she could find a bobby pin, so they could pick the lock if they needed to. She found one and was working on the lock when Luke came back around, shaking his head.

"There's no back door and the windows are too high, I think our best bet might be these windows on the porch" he said as he realized that Garcia was trying to pick the lock on the front door. He watched her for a second, amused, but they were both surprised when it actually worked and the door opened.

"I can't believe that worked!" she said happily.

"I'm impressed" Luke admitted. He probably could have gotten the door open but he wasn't sure he could have done it any faster than she had and he loved seeing her smile when she got it open.

They looked around. It was a very simple cabin, 1 story, a bedroom and bathroom in the back, a back room that looked like it functioned as a laundry room/mud room/woodpile storage room, and an open kitchen/living area. There was fireplace, but Luke did not see any heat or air ducts. He noticed a few fans that suggested there was no central air, and thought he saw something that was probably a radiant heat on the wall. It was only slightly warmer inside the cabin than outside, and thankfully there was no wind or snow but it was still far too cold to stay for long.

Garcia looked around, the place was rustic but well cared for, it looked like a family's cabin that they came to occasionally but didn't live in full time, the furnishings were basic-looking but comfortable, the electricity appeared to be turned off given the fact that the lights didn't respond when she flipped a switch. She looked at Luke and shrugged.

"Do we have any other options?"

"Just the car, but that gas won't last us all that long, we've got about 1/3rd of a tank"

"This place has a fireplace, and a bathroom, I vote we stay here and make the best of it. It can't be all that long till someone can come help us or we can get back on the road right?" Penelope's anxiety increased when she thought about spending a night, alone, with him in this cabin.

"I agree" he said, she could see he was formulating a plan in his head. "I'm going to get some of that wood I saw in the backroom and get a fire going. Why don't you look around and see what kind of food or drink you can find?" She nodded and started looking around.

About an hour later they were sitting in front of the fire, each wrapped up in a blanket that she had located, Luke holding a pot he'd rigged up so he could put it close to the fire without hurting himself, satisfied that it was hot enough, he took the hot-cocoa packets Penelope had found and mixed it up, then poured it into two mugs. They sat there, drinking the hot cocoa, and thinking this wasn't all that bad. Penelope had found a fair amount of staples and snacks, things like crackers, nuts, hot cocoa mix, canned soup, beef jerky. it wasn't terribly appetizing, beyond the hot cocoa and the canned soup but they had enough food for several days if need be. Penelope expressed that to Luke and asked how long he thought they'd be stuck here.

"Realistically or hoping?" he asked, before answering both, "I'm hoping that by tomorrow morning the snow will have stopped and by tomorrow afternoon someone can come get us or the roads will be cleared enough that we can drive back" he paused, taking another sip of the hot-cocoa, "Unfortunately, based on the weather radar it might not stop snowing until the next day and if we get 12-15 inches like they are now starting to speculate about, it'll be a lot harder to get the roads cleared, so I think there's a decent chance we might not be able to leave before Thursday"

She realized today was Monday. "Oh my god, that's forever!"

"I'm hoping for Tuesday or Wednesday, but we'll figure something out Chica" he smiled at her, "I'm not about to let you get hurt on my watch, the entire team would kill me"

She scoffed at the idea that the team was the reason but knew that somehow he would find a way to get them through it. She was just anxious about what might happen in between.