Chapter Text
The only thing Spencer could do was kiss him, take Tobias’s face in his hands and kiss him like the world was ending. Because it was.
Tobias saved his life. Tobias fought against years of conditioning from his father to save a man he’d just met, because it was the right thing to do, and in that moment, Spencer *needed* to kiss him.
Tobias momentarily froze in shock, but kissed him back, hands in his hair.
Spencer should have thought about Derek, stuck somewhere in Georgia worried sick about his welfare. He *should* have remembered that the camera was still streaming back to the Hankel house.
But he didn’t do any of that, so when clothes started coming off, it was broadcasted straight to Tobias’s home computer, and Penelope Garcia’s heart lept into her throat.
“Gideon? Get in here.”
—
The last thing on Spencer’s mind was thinking about if the camera was on, instead focusing on hauling Tobias in by the collar and kissing him, again and again.
“Should we be doing this,” Tobias broke away and whispered against his mouth, “if my father finds out—“
“He won’t,” Spencer whispered back, cradling Tobias’s head in his hands, “he doesn’t have to know anything. Tell me where we are, and we’ll both be free.”
“He always finds me.” Tobias’s voice was soft and broken—he’d resigned himself to this life a long time ago.
“Then kiss me again. Kiss me as many times as you can before he comes back."
—
By the time Garcia returned with Gideon, Spencer and Tobias had stripped their shirts off, and Spencer was working on Tobias’s belt.
It was clear now that this wasn’t the potentially traumatic situation she’d been concerned about, and all her worry for Reid was replaced with annoyance. How could he do this, when he knew they were watching?
Gideon seemed to reach the same conclusion, because his face twisted as he leaned over to whisper to Hotch. “Keep Morgan from seeing this.”
“Keep me from seeing *what*?” They all jumped at Morgan’s voice from the door, “whatever this sicko is doing to him, I want to know, is that clear?”
Gideon and Hotch were still blocking the monitor, and Derek tried to shove them both aside. “*He’s* the one being tortured. I don’t know why you all seem to think I can’t handle—“
He managed to move them, and that’s when he saw it. Spencer and Tobias on the monitor, naked and intertwined on the floor of wherever Spencer was being held.
“Hon—“ Garcia reached out for his shoulder, but he was already storming back out, smacking his hand against a wall on his way.
—
The turmoil at the Hankel house wasn’t even a glimmer in Spencer’s eye as he and Tobias kissed.
Tobias’s hands were soft and loving on his face, and it proved to Spencer once and for all that these weren’t the same palms that had tortured him, whipped him. That was Charles, and Charles would never be here again if Spencer had any say.
“Gonna assume you haven’t done this before,” Spencer whispered into Tobias’s neck, not willing to move more than an inch away from him.
“No,” Tobias admitted, putting his head down in shame.
“That’s okay. I’ll show you.”
Smiling up at him, legs wrapped around his waist and arms strung around his neck for balance, Spencer had to fight the urge to blush, or giggle. A rush of fondness went through him at Tobias’s wide-eyed innocence.
“Grab the oil.”
-
“Can’t you stop the video?” JJ was asking, as Spencer and Tobias’s tryst played out on screen.
Garcia started to work her tech genius muscles, but from the back of the room, through gritted teeth, they heard “No. We need to watch this.”
Derek had come back, the earlier tears gone and replaced with a stony expression.
“I don’t think we do, Derek,” Hotch tried to comfort him, but was shoved off.
“What if he leaves us a clue, and we miss it?” If anyone doubted Derek’s true motivation, they didn’t speak up.
“I…don’t think he’s thinking along those lines, right now,” Gideon muttered from the other side of the room, “he…looks busy.”
Derek would have forgotten all the respect he had for Gideon and punched him right there, but one look at him showed he wasn’t trying to make light, or crack jokes. It was a genuine observation—Spencer was so happily distracted with kissing Tobias Hankel, that he was no longer thinking about how to escape. And *that* cut at the deepest recesses of Derek’s heart.
He wondered if Spencer was thinking about him at all. The way he was looking at Hankel on the video suggested the answer was no.
—
Objectively, the shack was cold and damp, but Spencer had never felt so warm as when he and Tobias were laid out on the floor.
For someone raised with almost no knowledge of sex, and *absolutely* no knowledge of sex between two men (Spencer could imagine any self-discovery Tobias may have had in his youth would have been effectively shut down by Charles’s hateful rhetoric), Tobias was a *remarkably* quick study. The oil ended up being dried up, so they had to use spit, but Tobias was being so soft and gentle that Spencer didn’t feel any pain, exhaling in little pleasure breaths.
Tobias kissed his neck and he pressed in and out, and Spencer was strangely grateful they were in the secluded shack, so he could moan as loud as he felt like without fear of being heard.
“Spencer, *damn*,” Tobias murmured into his ear, “I had no idea—"
Spencer leaned up to kiss his cheek, with a matching smile on his face. "Yeah."
God, he hadn’t felt like this since his first time with Derek—*Derek*!
The guilt he expected didn’t come—maybe a combination of the lingering effects of the drugs and the sheer bliss he felt in Tobias’s arms. Tracing his finger gently down Tobias’s bare chest, he couldn’t find a part of himself willing to regret this, regret them, even if he was distantly aware that he was hurting the man he loved in the process.
—
Derek hadn’t been able to tear his eyes off the screen. He was a profiler, and more than that, he knew Spencer Reid. He could see the tenderness between him and Hankel oozing through the monitor as they fucked, soft and sweet. Spencer had a look in his eyes that had previously only been reserved for *him*.
He would never wish that Spencer was in pain, but seeing Spencer so affection with his kidnapper was somehow worse than anything Derek could have imagined was happening to him in that shack.
Everyone else had left the room, so Derek took his brief moment of solitude to let the tears he’d been holding back fall. Maybe Penelope was right, and he should turn the monitor off, but he couldn’t look away. It was proof that, whatever else, Spencer was alive.
“How could you, baby?” he whispered, stroking a hand down the monitor.
-
Unfortunately for Spencer, Derek’s reaction was being streamed back to the house. No sound, but his devastated expression and teary eyes were being broadcast for them both to see.
The guilt hit Spencer hard and fast, and Tobias just frowned.
“Your team is worried about you. What…are they doing anything? To find you?”
“I don’t know. I’m not with them, I’m with you.”
“I wish there was something more I could do,” Tobias sighed, “but my father always wins,” he cast his eyes back to the monitor, where Derek’s tear-stained face was still visible, “you’re lucky. To have people so worried about you.”
Spencer doubted Derek was *worried* about him right now, if he’d seen what happened through the camera. Spencer was smart enough to know the odds that he *didn’t* were slim to none.
Derek was still watching the monitor, and Spencer realized that sound *was* streaming from the shack to the house, and he would have heard the whole conversation. Maybe he could still save the situation if he was honest.
Truthfully, he didn’t like the feeling that he’d lied to Tobias either. Someone who’d already had so much betrayal and abandonment in his life. It was slowly occurring to him that someone with a moral code as strong as Tobias’s would be disgusted at his infidelity.
They were still laying on the shack floor, Spencer’s head in Tobias’s neck, and he leaned up to kiss him one more time before sighing.
“The agent, on the screen…that’s Derek. He’s, um, he’s…” Spencer Reid had never stumbled over words before, but this was nervewracking. And he usually *loved* telling people he was dating Derek, “he’s my boyfriend.”
Spencer couldn’t look at Tobias’s face for the reaction he’d surely see there, the inevitable heartbreak at finding out that the man who he’d just shared such a deep experience with was a cheater.
But he’d never find out how Tobias would have reacted. He could feel the change as it happened, as Dr. Jekyll became Mr. Hyde. His stomach muscles tensed, the arms around him became harsh, and when he looked up, it was into the cold, unfeeling eyes of Charles Hankel.
“Get back on the chair."
As if what Spencer had done wasn’t bad enough, Derek mused, now he’d pissed off the unsub.
Watching Spencer betray him had hurt, but watching Charles tie up and beat him was absolutely excruciating. He’d take Spencer looking at Tobias like he hung the moon any day.
—
”You saw how Jezebel got her comuppeance, Dr. Reid,” Charles was waving a revolver at him, “And yet you still flaunt your adultery right under my nose, corrupt my son, make him accessory to your *sin*. Wasn’t enough to destroy yourself, had to make him your *whore*.”
“No!” Spencer protested, because he wouldn’t stand for Charles talking about his son like that. Tobias was good, and kind, and absolutely *not* at fault. He couldn’t stand the implication that he was just some *fuck* Spencer didn’t care for
"You’re an adulterer, just like she was. And you’ll meet the same fate. Unless—“ Charles loomed over him, nothing of Tobias in his harsh glare. Spencer hoped in vain that Tobias, *his* Tobias might fight back, break free, “you choose someone else to die.”
“I won’t choose who gets slaughtered, and watch you dispose of their remains like a poacher—"
“Oh, it’s a very simple choice. You were unfaithful, so either I kill you, or you tell me to kill Agent Morgan."
A hush fell over the house, and Spencer’s heart dropped into his stomach. He didn’t want to give Charles the satisfaction of begging for his own death, but there was just no way he could allow Derek to be dragged into this.
Derek smashed his fist into one of the house’s flimsy walls. “I swear, I’m gonna put this guy’s head on a stick,” he growled, though his voice was shaky with tears.
“I won’t do that,” Spencer argued on the video, and Charles pointed his revolver. A twisted game of roulette.
“Choose. You, or him.”
“No.”
Another click. Everyone winced, but no bullet came out. Yet.
“Choose.”
“Kill me!” Spencer squeaked, “I deserve it. I’m a sinner. Genesis 23:4, “thou shalt not commit adultery”. “
He’d never get the chance to apologize to Derek in person, but laying down his life for him should be a fair substitute.
Charles’s face twisted into a facsimile of a smile, as if he knew this would be the end result all along.
“A good choice.”
Watching Hankel wrap his hands around Spencer’s throat, Derek felt truly useless for the first time in his life. He didn’t know what to do—Charles was killing him, right in front of them, and he couldn’t do anything about it. There was one part of him, a dark, twisted part that he didn’t like to acknowledge, that whispered that Spencer was right. He deserved this. He’d cheated with a damn *unsub*, knowing it was being streamed back to the house.
But right now, Spencer was *dying*, and Derek forced that part of him to keep quiet. His love’s lifeless face was in full view of the camera, and Derek stopped breathing himself when the feed cut out.
To all appearances, Spencer Reid was dead. And Derek had no idea where to begin searching for his corpse, or if he even wanted to.
-
Tobias Hankel became conscious again, just as Spencer’s lifeless body hit the floor of the cabin.
It was his father, it had to be. He must have heard what they had done, taken out his anger at his son on Spencer.
His feelings about Spencer were complicated at best, right now, but in an instant he was on the ground, checking the man’s pulse only to find nothing.
He couldn’t say how long Spencer had been like this, and, although neither of them knew it, his feelings were the same as Derek’s. Desperation to save him.
But while the BAU sat around at the Hankel house, mourning what they believed to be Reid’s death, Tobias had an idea. He could bring Spencer back.
”How? By breathing a killer’s breath into an adulterer’s body?”
He forced his father’s voice to be silent, kneeling on the ground and starting CPR, praying he wasn’t too late. It was a cruel imitation of their earlier kissing, but finally, *finally*, Spencer sat up and coughed.
Realizing he’d survived, that he’d once again been saved from Charles’s cruelty, he looked up at with shining, loving eyes at the man who’d saved his life.
“*Tobias*” he breathed, more relieved than he’d ever been. “You saved my life.”
“I’m sorry,” Tobias responded, looking away.
“Why?” Spencer’s tone was similar to how you would talk to a spoked baby animal, as he reached for Tobias’s hand.
“He killed you because of me, because of us. It was my fault. And he’ll win, in the end."
“He killed me, but *you* saved me. He’s the reason I died, but you’re the reason I’m alive, it’s *not* your fault. I need to know something important—are we in a cemetery?"
“Yea. Marshall. I used to come here to get high, no one knows about it.”
Another pang of pain through Spencer’s heart at that, but on the inside he smiled. He’d been right, now he just had to hope someone had been able to interpret his clue.
“Thank you,” Spencer grabbed Tobias’s hand again, holding it to his face, “thank you. They’ll come. They’ll save us both.”
“We can’t be saved, Spencer."
—
Derek had slumped into a chair, unresponsive and staring into thin air. He’d watched the life leave the body of the man he loved, right after he’d experienced the worst emotional blow he could imagine. He knew that Spencer would never have told Hankel to kill *him*, but he couldn’t help but be upset that Spencer had chosen himself to die. They’d talked about this, about Spencer’s disregard for his own life, valuing it less than others.
(Hankel had a revolver to him. Spencer would have died either way. The only way out was to tell the unsub to kill Derek.)
Hotch, meanwhile, was frantically grabbing one of the hundreds of Bibles in the house, and opening it to the verse Spencer had cited.
“‘Thou shalt not commit adultery’ is the sixth commandment. The commandments are in *Exodus*, and Reid would know that. He wouldn’t get it wrong unless it was on purpose!”
“Hotch, he’s under a lot of stress—“ all of Gideon’s hope had left him.
“Genesis 23:4 talks about a place to bury your dead,” Hotch wasn’t listening, “he’s telling us something, he’s in a cemetery!”
Derek didn’t know why it mattered where he was. They’d seen him die, even if they found him now, it would be to bury him.
“No cemeteries in the area, boss.” Garcia was already checking it out.
“Wait, he said something about a poacher. Check if there are any reports of poaching in the surrounding areas.”
A few keystrokes later, and Garcia had discovered Marshall Parish.
“Tobias wrote in his journals about keeping clean and staying away from Marshall,” just as Emily called out, Garcia found the cemetery that was on the property.
“Let’s go,” when Hotch saw Derek get up to join them, he held up a hand, “Derek, you don’t have to come—“
“Hotch, if you think there’s any world in which I stay behind, you’re so far removed from reality—“
“Alright, alright. Come on.”
However mad he was right now, Derek couldn’t miss his only chance to say goodbye to Spencer. He knew he’d only regret it, months or years from now, when he was reflecting on his lost love.
A tiny part of him wondered if they might find Spencer alive, but he tamped it down. Even if they did, things couldn’t be the same.
—
Tobias may have given him CPR, but Charles wasn’t content to let Spencer Reid live.
“Dig,” he growled at Spencer over the shovel, “I should bury you alive, make you think about what you did.”
Spencer would prefer that, actually. It would give his team more time to find him alive. If they were even looking.
“I’m not strong enough,” Spencer whimpered, which only earned him another blow from Charles’s fist. “Tobias, help me!”
“He can’t help you, he’s weak too. Now *dig*.” Charles punctuated the command by smacking Spencer with the shovel, but suddenly, blessedly, he heard sirens on the horizon.
Charles had heard them too, and clearly planned to go down shooting, because he charged Spencer with his gun.
And the only thing Spencer could do was grab it from him, and shoot him first.
The sound of the gunshot had attracted the team’s attention, and Spencer saw them coming over the ridge, calling his name. But he only had a second to feel relief before the visage of Charles Hankel melted away, and it was Tobias who he’d just put a bullet in.
Everything else was background noise as Spencer dropped to his knees.
Tobias didn’t look scared, only relieved as Spencer reached out for him. “You killed him.” he whispered, in the same tone as Spencer had used to thank Tobias for saving his life. In killing him, he’d freed him from his father.
But Spencer was crying anyway, watching the good, sweet man he’d come to care for so much die by his hand. “Tobias, I’m so sorry."
As if he wasn’t the one shot and bleeding, Tobias reached up to wipe his tears away.
“Do you think I’ll see my mom again?”
Spencer could hear the team approaching them, getting closer, and part of him knew he should get up and go to them, to Derek. But he couldn’t let Tobias die like this, cold and alone.
“Yea,” Spencer cradled Tobias’s face in his hands, feeling the other man’s pulse slowing. And maybe he shouldn’t have done it, but he leaned down to press their lips together in a final kiss. To say goodbye.
(He could feel Derek watching, and it crushed him.)
A minute later, Tobias and Charles Hankel were both dead, and Spencer was collapsing into Hotch’s arms.
“I knew you’d understand."
They pulled away from their hug, and Spencer finally turned to look at Derek, who in turn looked like he was going to sob.
Spencer didn’t know if he should speak, or if there was anything he could say, before he was being crushed in Derek’s arms.
“You’re alive, kid. You’re alive.”
In truth, watching Spencer say goodbye to Tobias like star-crossed Shakespearean lovers had hurt more than seeing them on the shack floor.
Eventually, they would learn about the drugging, and how precarious Reid’s survival had been. Derek would offer him every benefit of the doubt, every chance to capitalize on any number of excuses for why he hadn’t meant it, why he’d done what he had to do to escape alive.
But Spencer would refuse. Tobias Hankel would already be remembered as a murderer, and Spencer couldn’t justify further tarnishing his memory for his own gain. The only reason it was even a possibility was that Tobias was dead, because Spencer had killed him.
No matter what, Spencer would never forget watching him bleed out in that cemetery, and he’d never admit how much he could have loved him.