He blinks

Spencer can see Hotch and Morgan running towards him - almost in slow motion - they're mouthing something and staring at him with fear, pain and… shock in their eyes.

Why are they shocked?

The right side of his chest feels sticky, and cold but warm in the middle. Weirdly warm. But it's not warm, it's hot and it hurts. Not like a punch, he'd had more than enough of those in his life to know what it felt like he was punched. This was more like a pinch, that was blossoming into a cramp - a horrible, numbing cramp.

A flash of light bounces into his sight, blinding him for a second. He turns to his right, following the source of the light but there was a gun. A gun held in a shaking pale hand, pointing at him. Reid took in the woman with the weapon; her cardigan was worn, the buttons had all been replaced at least twice judging by the colours of the worn thread that loosely held them in place. Her face is pale, whiter by far than her trembling hand - shock? 'She's going into shock' he realises, he needs to get her to sit down.

Maybe he should sit down, his brain suggests, he was feeling light-headed and the cramp in his chest is getting worse. Hotch and Morgan were getting closer, but the distance between them is considerable: they were walking the latest unsub to a police car before they started running towards him. He looked at the distance between them and measured it to be around 120ft. Their running strides were around 3ft 10 inches so it would take them at least 40 seconds to get here and take the gun off of her.

Spencer turns his attention back to the woman, she's staring at his chest, right where the weird hot-cold-sticky patch is. Why is she staring at his chest? Her hand is still shaking, he watches as her fingers reflexively dropped the black lump of metal. Rejecting it. He watches as it turns in the air and catches the light before hitting the grass below her outstretched arm. Her hand is still pointed at him, and her eyes are trained on his chest.

Oh.

Oh.

His memories drown his mind and it all makes sense. The woman was Jane Prailan, the 47 year-old mother of 7 year-old James and 5 year-old fraternal twins Lily and Jackson Prailan - the last victims of Arthur Greening, a pedophile with sociopathic tendencies who kidnapped and murdered 6 kids in 8 weeks. She lived 9 houses down from him and saw the FBI ars race down the street and the agents run into his house, guns in hand. She had made up her mind as she palmed the cool metal of the gun in her own pocket and started walking towards the house.

Spencer had seen her walking towards the scene and had gone to explain to her that they'd found the man who had killed her children when he saw the lump in her pocket. She stopped in mid step when she realised he was walking to her with his hands slightly raised, with a look of trepidation on his face.

"Mrs Prailan? Please don't do this" he implored as he watched her hand grasp the gun in her pocket tighter. It shook lightly but he knew it wasn't from nerves, it was from grief and the anguish she was suffering.

"He killed my babies agent. He killed them. They had their whole lives ahead of them, they were supposed to finish grade school and go to high school and college and I was supposed to walk my babies down the aisle at their weddings!" she sobbed, choking at the despair clogging her throat

"But I can't. Because that…" she shook her head and smiled an empty, despairing grimace then steadied herself.

"Because that monster decided that my children were his playthings and robbed them of everything. He stole their life, their joy, their innocence! Because he wanted To. Because his need to play God was greater than my babies lives"

Spencer could hear Morgan and Hotch inside the house, kicking through doors and yelling at Greening to drop the knife. He knew he didn't have long until Jane had a clear shot at the man who killed her kids.

"I know that you're hurting. Mrs Prailan, I know that you're in an unimaginable amount of pain right now and you think that killing this man will right the wrongs done to your children and make him feel that pain but I can promise you it won't. All it will do is put you in prison and leave your husband and son with more pain and devastation in their lives."

He took a step towards her and another to his left when she pulled out the gun and took several steps back.

" He killed them! They were our kids and he killed them! He deserves a million bullets in that slimy, filthy head of his!" she gestured wildly towards the house but her gun hand was steady.

"Please just calm down-" he placated

"No, don't tell me to calm down! He's coming out of that house and when does I will put a bullet in him" She looked in his eyes earnestly, "Please, let me do this"

Spencer took two more steps to his left, turning Jane slightly. The house was no longer behind but to him right, giving him a clear view of the front door where Hotch and Morgan would exit with the suspect in less than a minute by his estimate due to the lack of sound coming from the house which meant they were subduing Greening. A mental countdown started in his head to when they would walk out.

"I understand why you want to do this but you can't" he stressed "What if you miss? What if you hit an innocent agent or passerby?"

46, 45, 44, 43…

She looked past him at the crowd that was beginning to grow around the cars and on the pavement, there were couples holding eachothers hands and parents silently praying that they would get their children back alive from the basement he kept them in.

32, 31, 30, 29…

"I won't miss" Jane insisted, "I won't". She was doing this for them, those children, their siblings and those parents who had their family ripped away from them.

19, 18, 16, 15...

Jane Prailan watched the perfectly painted door of Greening's house open and agents started pouring out onto the street; she pulled out her gun and pointed it towards the house, focusing on Greening's rumpled white shirt in a sea of navy Vests. Jane steeled herself, placed her finger on the trigger and slid the safety off.

8, 7, 6, 5...

"I won't"

Reid whipped his head around to see Morgan marching out Greening with Hotch by his side. Directly in the crosshairs of Prailan's shot. He couldn't let her shoot into a crowd, at his friends, his family. He pushed himself in front of the barrel as he watched the woman squeeze the trigger. Her eyes widened almost in slow-motion and they sank straight to his chest, where not even 4 feet away the gun was smoking.

The bang reached his ears a second later, it was loud, deafening, it made his ears ring. He knew Hotch and Morgan had heard it but it would take them a few precious seconds to figure out where it had come from. Seconds he didn't have. He stepped, no, stumbled to the side and his view of the world stopped for a while.

He feels his blood on his hands, the heat and pain building up in his chest, the warmth of the sun seeping into his back. His knees give way and he starts falling backwards as his hand stretches out towards Morgan and Hotch - a silent 'help me'. They're too far for them to catch him but they both try, running as fast as they can with a hand outstretched, and the other on a gun. Telling them they're here, he's not on his own.

His head hits the pavement with a startling thud and it feels strangely numb, he can hear Hotch yelling for an officer to arrest Jane Prailan, for an ambulance to be called and their footsteps getting closer. He blinks, closes his eyes for a second and suddenly they're there above him. Morgan's hands are clamping down on the bullet wound and Hotch is cradling his face, he's saying something, tapping his face too hard.

"-eid!"

"-pen your eyes!"

"Come on Spencer! Please! Don't do this!"

'I'm awake, stop hitting me' he thinks, it's annoying and everything too much

"We will when you open your eyes Pretty Boy". He'd said that out loud? He tries to open his eyes but the sun is too bright and he can't see anything but bright and shadows until Hotch moves his torso to block the light.

"Reid! You're okay, you're alright, you're gonna be fine. Prailan is in cuffs and there's an ambulance on the way" Hotch reassures him, it's nice - people tend to baby him but never reassure him.

"She didn't mean to, sh-she was trying to get G-Greening ah-!" His back arches and he tries to curl onto his side and make the pain go away but Morgan's hand on his chest stops him. His blood is still pouring out of him like a grotesque tap that can't be turned off.

"I couldn't let her sh-shoot him, you could've b-been hit, it was too far away. I-I couldn't let her h-hurt either of you. Sh-she didn't m-mean to" He rambles, he knows he's rambling but they have to know.

"Hey, we know G-man, it's okay. But once you're okay I am gonna kick you 7 ways to Sunday for putting yourself in front of a bullet for us" Morgan gripes.

He feels sick with Spencer blood running through his fingers, he presses harder, trying to stop the flow. Derek hears Reid moan in pain and it makes him wince. He whispers a silent apology and whips his head around searching for the ambulance. He can hear distant sirens and thanks every god for their luck.

Reid tries to cough but it's a nasty gurgling sound that comes out instead and some drops of blood splash on his cheek and Hotch's hands.

He looks up at Hotch and sees the poorly concealed panic in his eyes, he can tell that he's scared of losing another member of their small family "Hey Spencer, do you hear that? That's the ambulance, you're gonna be fine!"

"If something happens-"

"It won't" Morgan cuts him off

"But if it does, I need you to pass on a message to my mom. She's not gonna do well if I'm not here and-"

"You can tell her yourself Pretty Boy" Morgan insists and Hotch knows he's begging him not to do it.

"Hotch?"

"Yeah?"

"Tell her I love her, and I'm sorry I didn't visit her more often. She needs to know that I'm gone and that I'm with her in my letters and that-" he's cut off by the blood in his throat that he coughs out onto his chin. "And that my time in the BAU was one of the best things to ever happen to me"

He smiles up at them both and he knows that the tears are streaming out of his eyes, not just from saying goodbye but the agony of the hole ripped through his chest. He feels Hotch brush them away and check his pulse but that's minor to the feeling that he's drowning in his own lungs and he knows it's probably because there's blood pouring into his lung and chest cavities.

Blue and red lights colour Morgan and Hotch, painting their expressions of pain and fear like art on canvas. He hears EMTs telling them to step back and a board being shoved under his back. He can't keep his eyes open anymore but he hopes he'll wake up tomorrow. He feels pads being held down on his chest and he grabs Derek and Aaron's hands with his last bit of energy before he passes out.

But he knows he'll survive.