Chapter 10

A/N: Oh my god guys its been so long! I am so so sorry it's taken me so long to update. I started writing this chapter and got 3/4 of the way through when I just could not find the way to finish this chapter. But its finally finished and I promise it will never take me this long to update again. I hope you enjoy it :)

Penelope walked down the hospital hallway, none of the usual joy in her demeanour. Instead she walked with such a weight on her shoulders she hadn't felt in a long time. She couldn't believe how she had one off at the team. She knew she didn't believe what she said. She didn't blame the team, not really. Truthfully, she blamed herself more.

She had been there. Sure, the team could have stayed but they were just doing their job, trying to catch a killer. She had just been sitting in her office, completely oblivious to the fact that one of her best friends was on the brink of death so close to where she sat. She should have gone to check on JJ, to comfort her, to do anything other than be so ignorant of the pain JJ was in. If she had, maybe she could have prevented it.

So caught up in her guilt, Penelope forgot why she'd even gone walking in the first place and had somehow found her way back to the team. When she got there, she didn't bother to go back and get coffee. Instead, she sat back down in the waiting room, watching the team. She hated to see them suffering, but honestly, she didn't have the strength to try and cheer them up. Even if she tried, she knew it wasn't possible.

Her eyes wandered over to Emily. She looked absolutely broken. She still sat with her head in her hands, completely devastated, still full of guilt. There was a lot of that going around that night.

Penelope was broken from her thoughts by a call from a doctor walking into the waiting room.

"Family of Jennifer Jareau?" the doctor asked.

Emily's head immediately shot up, rushing straight to him.

"Uh yes, that's us. How is she? Is she okay?" Emily asked frantically.

"Well she's alive. Jennifer is still in critical condition, but she's stable for now. They're just moving her to the ICU now," he told the team as everyone breathed a hesitant sigh of relief.

"Please, call her JJ," Emily asked softly.

The doctor nodded and continued. "JJ lost a lot of blood, but we managed to stop the bleeding. The next 24 hours are critical. There was significant nerve and tissue damage where the knives pierced her hands and feet, and the needles also caused quite extensive damage. The main thing I'm worried about is her brain," he said, causing the team's anxiety to increase.

"The brain is very delicate. While it wasn't affected directly by the needle, there was a lot of pressure around her skull. Because of this, we've had to place her into a medically induced coma."

"Oh God," Emily whispered, covering her mouth with her hand. Garcia simply walked over to her and placed an arm around her shoulder. Unfortunately, it appeared as though the doctor wasn't finished.

"The rest of her condition is dependent on whether she survives the next 24 hours, and then whether she wakes up from the coma. Due to the damage in her knees and feet, if she does wake up, she may not be able to walk for a little while."

This reminded Hotch of something,

"What about her spine, was there any damage from the needles?" he asked, not sure he wanted to hear the answer.

"Fortunately no, there was no damage," the doctor replied.

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief, the biggest reaction coming from Morgan. He had been holding so much worry that something he had done may have hurt JJ even more. Rossi had noticed this, patting him on the back before placing a reassuring hand on his shoulder, doing his best to provide some sort of comfort in the wake of all this bad news.

"As I said before, the main thing I'm worried about is her brain. There's no telling what so much pressure to it will have done."

"Wait, what does that mean? What exactly are you worried about?" Emily asked frantically, worried about what the doctor wasn't telling her.

"Well the pressure of the blood around her skull combined with the blood loss she suffered and going without oxygen for some time could potentially have caused any level of memory loss. There's really no telling until… if she wakes up," he said.

If, Emily thought, the word resounding in her head. She'd never realised how terrible a word that was. She felt so overwhelmed with all of this information, everything being so uncertain. She had hoped the doctor might provide her with some semblance of comfort if that were even possible. She realised then that it wasn't. She really couldn't think straight, but the one thing she knew was that she had to see JJ.

"Can we go see her?" she asked, her voice so full of the uncertainty that she couldn't shake.

"Yes, but only two people at this time," the doctor said.

It was clear that the Emily and Derek were the two who should see JJ first. It was unspoken, but everyone could see that they needed to the most. Emily almost ran to where the doctor directed her, so desperate to be with JJ. She didn't know what she expected to feel when she saw JJ, but she was still so overwhelmed. JJ just looked so broken. The first thing Emily knew was the tears rolling down her face and Morgan's arms wrapping around her, pulling her into a hug as she sobbed into his chest.

Derek stood stoic, looking down at JJ. Having seen what had happened to her and knowing what could happen if she were to wake up, how much pain she would be in, he knew that he would never wish that upon anyone. Except maybe the man that did it to her. He thought back to being in that room, JJ suffering beside him, and remembered what she'd whispered into his ear.

"Let me die… please, let me die."

Maybe I should have let her.

The next morning, much to everyone's relief, JJ was still stable. It wasn't by much, but somehow everyone's hope for JJ grew a little bit.

Emily had stayed at the hospital all night, not once leaving JJ's side. She had tried to stay awake for as long as possible, not wanting to miss anything, but as morning came around, her exhaustion kicked in and she succumbed to sleep, still holding onto JJ's hand. As she slept, the team one by one made their way back to the hospital, all gathering outside her room.

"How is she, any change?" Morgan asked as he walked up to the rest of the team, the last one to arrive.

"No," Reid replied shortly.

"Well what do we do now?" Morgan asked.

"We keep working the case," Rossi suggested.

"How are we supposed to do that?" Reid asked, unhopeful. "We have no idea where Carter is, not to mention we're not even sure if he's our UnSub. The only way we can make any progress is if he kills again."

"Hey, kid, it's gonna be okay," Morgan tried to reassure him. "JJ's gonna wake up, we have to believe that. And when she does, we can use whatever she remembers about him."

"We don't know when JJ will wake up, and even if she does, there's no telling what she'll remember. Whoever this… this monster is has all the power," Reid said cynically. He was hurt, and it was too hard for him to see a way past the unwinnable situation they found themselves in. But they all knew he had a point.

"Okay so we all go back to JJ's office and we look for any clue as to who this guy is and where he's gone. There's gotta be something on the security cameras," Morgan said, looking for any way to help JJ.

Hotch nodded his head in agreement. He looked back at Emily. Even in sleep he could see she wasn't peaceful, and he knew there was no way he could let her keep working while JJ was still in a coma.

"I'm going to give Emily a few weeks off to stay with JJ. She's in no state to keep working the case, I know that much," Hotch told the team, and they all nodded in agreement, watching as Hotch walked into JJ's room and over to Emily.

As he did, they all looked at JJ, wishing so much that she would wake up and come back to them. They didn't realise it often, and as cliché as it was, JJ was like the glue that held the team together. Without her, they couldn't think straight, and not a single one of them knew what would happen if she didn't wake up.

Hotch gently squeezed Emily's shoulder to wake her up and she immediately turned to JJ, not taking her eyes off her. She simply shook her head as Hotch told her he was giving her a few weeks off, giving no objection.

Even knowing that they should get back to working the case, the team couldn't bring themselves to leave JJ. Even with no change, in some corner of their minds they still thought she might wake up and they didn't want to miss anything. And even though she wasn't awake they all wanted to be there just to comfort her at the very least. But then when reality set in and they knew she wouldn't wake up any time soon, they went back to work.

Four more days had passed, and Emily still had not moved. No matter how many times the team had suggested she go home and get some rest, that they would watch over JJ for a night, Emily kept refusing. She couldn't leave JJ alone, not again. She wouldn't be able to live with herself if something happened to JJ while she was gone. She had to protect her, and that meant she wasn't going to leave JJ's side until she woke up. And she had faith that she would. JJ was the strongest person she knew, she wouldn't give up without a fight. She had already fought so hard; just the fact that she was still breathing was proof of that. Emily wasn't leaving.

And so the team resorted to going to her house to get her a few spare changes of clothes, doing anything they could to help her and JJ. They would all come back and visit every day after work, their lives basically consisting of nothing but JJ and working the case. But they didn't care. Until they caught whoever hurt those girls, hurt their friend, they refused to think about anything else, they couldn't.

And Emily just sat with JJ, holding her hand, praying that she would just open her eyes. For the first three days she didn't say a word. She didn't feel strong. She didn't know if she could get through this, which was a rare, and very overwhelming feeling for her. She used to think she could survive anything. With all the things she'd seen, she knew she could. But she'd never expected to go through anything like this. The thought of losing JJ was debilitating. She couldn't even muster up the strength to utter a single word to JJ. The rest of the team came in and were doing everything they could to try and wake JJ up, telling her abut their days, telling her they wouldn't stop until they caught the man that did this to her. Emily didn't think she had the right. How could she say something to comfort JJ when nothing would even comfort her? She couldn't talk about it like she knew everything would get better, or like when JJ woke up everything would just go back to normal?

But sitting silently next to her girlfriend while she was unconscious in a hospital bed didn't really bode well with Emily either. It wasn't like her to just shut down and hide from her problems, she was stronger than that. So on the fifth day, Emily spoke to JJ. At first, she just opened her mouth, but when no words came out, sighed and then closed it. She did it once more before waiting five more minutes, mentally wrestling with herself about what to say before getting fed up and blurting out, "JJ…"

Oh God, she thought. What now?

"JJ I have to say something. God, this is so hard. I just… you need to know… JJ I am so sorry. For everything. I'm sorry for not backing you up, and I'm sorry for leaving after you asked me not to," Emily blurted out. "I'm sorry for not believing in you, and I'm sorry for leaving you alone, and, and I… I'm sorry that I'm the reason you're in this mess, I'm so sorry," she began to cry. All of the guilt that had been locked up inside of her came rushing out all at once, bringing all of those emotions to the surface that she had been trying so hard not to feel. She rested JJ's hand in her own, being so careful and delicate.

Emily was struggling so hard to string together the right words to tell JJ exactly what she was feeling, but the problem was that Emily couldn't even describe it to herself. Just as she was about to give up and revert back to her silent state, she felt the slightest movement of JJ's hand in her own.

Meanwhile, the team had been back to work. They'd worked non-stop for the four days since JJ had been admitted into the hospital. they hadn't taken any new cases, they couldn't even think about anything else let alone work another case. Not when JJ's life was at stake. Some of them had barely slept, and when they did, most of them had slept at the office. They couldn't go home and lie in their own beds and relax when the man who hurt JJ was still at large. They had to find him, and they wouldn't stop until they did.

The team minus Emily had all been working tirelessly to try and find the UnSub, but they hadn't found much. They got a few reports of people saying they'd seen Sheriff Carter, but they'd all been dead ends. But the team refused to give up. They were doing this for JJ.

It was around 8pm and as Hotch was asking Reid to do something, Strauss came in and interrupted the team.

"Agents," she said, announcing herself as she entered the room. "I'm afraid I have bad news for you. I have gotten requests from the director to keep you moving with other cases, and I'm afraid that means I have to take you off this case."

The team were outraged. All at once they put up a fight, yelling that they couldn't be taken off the case, that they knew everything about the case and were the only ones that could solve it. But Strauss wouldn't budge.

"I'm sorry, but you're too close to this now. I'm afraid your judgement may be clouded and we can't risk letting your emotions interfere with this case. I'm handing it over to another team. I really am sorry, but there are so many other cases you could be working on that I feel will be a better use of your time."

She waited a few moments and looked around at all of their stunned faces, and when no one said another word, she gave them one last sad look and left the room. The team just sat in disbelief. For a few moments non one knew what to say. It was Morgan who finally spoke up.

"So that's it? We're just gonna drop this?" he asked, incredulous. Hotch appeared to be fighting a battle inside his head as he pressed his hands against his temples. But he was far from finished with this case,

"Of course not. We'll keep working the case in secret. For now just go home and I'll figure something out." The team looked slightly uneasy, but they knew it was the only thing they could do. They couldn't let JJ down. Not again.

What they hadn't noticed was Reid. As soon as Strauss had left the room, Reid had gotten a phone call. They all loked to him as he turned around with a wild, uneasy look in his eye.

"Guys, that was Emily. JJ's awake."

A/N: Sorry for the cliffhanger! I promise I will try to upload the next chapter this week, I think I've finally gotten back into this story so it's coming out a lot easier now. Please review!