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Gideon feels his heart actually skip a beat as soon as he hears the gunshot. He freezes on the spot at the sound of it, before he snaps out of it and starts sprinting towards the train. Awful images of what might've taken place flash through his mind, making his soul rot a little more and his heart ache.
When he enters the train, the heavy smell of blood attacks his nose, but Gideon doesn't stop there. He scans the whole scene before him, which isn't all that different from what he gathered before through the cameras. There's the bleeding professor on the ground along with the four civillians; then there's their unsub with a bullethole in his temple, and–
Oh, Christ.
"Did you know... just ten percent of the people who sustain gunshot wounds over their abdomen don't survive? It's crazy how the medical field has improved in that way. Only a decade ago, that number was five times higher."
Exactly in front of their dead unsub is Reid laying with his back against a train seat, with a huge red stain over his white shirt. Elle's there with him, with her hands putting pressure over the gunshot wound.
"Good thing you won't be in that group, then," Elle tells Reid with a strained smile, which vanishes upon making eye-contact with Gideon. There it is, raw fear. Gideon has always hated to find it in his agents' eyes.
(He hates it even more so when he, ocassionally, finds it in the man looking at him in the mirror in the morning.)
His phone practically materializes in Gideon's hand and Hotch's number soon shows up. The other agent instantly answers. "Unsub's dead. We need another ambulance, Reid's been shot."
"Got it." Hotch replies and the call ends. As soon as he hears that, Gideon pockets his cellphone and kneels next to both of his agents.
"Don't worry," Gideon says, without specifying to which one of them he's talking to. "You'll be fine, kid, just stay awake, alright?" Gideon moves his hands to replace Elle's shaking ones and cover the wound.
Licking his dry lips, Gideon forces a confident smile to his face, ignoring how pale and out of it Reid seems. "Any other curious facts in your mind? Tell us all about them."
It's on moments like these that Reid shows just how young he is, and, consequently, makes Gideon regret admitting him on a team instead of saving him from the horrors their job brought. "I..." Reid blinks at him, frowning in thought for a second, before his face relaxes again. "Surprisingly enough... I don't have any in mind, sir."
Gideon tenses as soon as he sees Reid's head dropping forward, and he cups his cheek to bring his head up again. "Hey, stay awake, Reid," he gently pats his cheek with his free hand, "that's an order, son."
"You also ordered me to do... the magic trick and get out," Reid opens his eyes again, looking at him with a guilty look, which confuses Gideon for a second– before he remembers.
"Do not stay there with him. That’s an order."
"I'm not mad at you, you saved everyone," Gideon assures him, softly squeezing his shoulder. "You prevented a massacre, you saved the day. Now we just need to get you to the hospital, alright?"
What happens after that is a blur to Gideon. Just after the doctors arrive and take Reid and the other doctor who was shot too, he remembers following them along with Elle. He remembers Morgan telling him he was leaving with Reid and Hotch entering the other ambulance, while he stayed with Elle, who was being checked over by a paramedic.
"Stand down," Hotch commands the snipers before he stands up, right after two gunshots go off inside the train. Without focusing on the possibility of his worst fears becoming true inside that train, Hotch decides to go and inspect by himself. He meets Morgan in the way, who looks just as tense as he feels.
Hotch doesn't let go of his gun when his phone starts vibrating in his pocket, answering the call with his free hand while he's holding the gun up with the other.
"Unsub's dead. We need another ambulance, Reid's been shot."
Damn it.
"Got it," Hotch tells Gideon, returning his gun to its holster and dialing 911 once again to ask for a second ambulance. He doesn't even want to dwell on Reid's condition. Gideon didn't say he was fatal or worse, so Hotch chooses to think it wasn't a lethal shot. Perhaps it was on his leg or arm. Hopefully.
"What happened?" Morgan asks him, lowering his gun when Hotch does.
"Unsub's dead, but we've got an agent down."
"An agent down?" Morgan repeats, flashing Hotch a pointed look.
"I don’t have too many details, so prepare yourself," Hotch warns, knowing it's useless. Nothing ever prepares you to find someone you care about hurt. Even worse if there's been a gunshot involved: it could've hit anywhere. "It was Reid."
"Shit!" Morgan lowers his gun and follows Hotch inside the train, hot on his heel.
"Let's get the people out and take care of the injured as we wait for the paramedics," Hotch instructs, wanting to see how Reid is too, almost as badly as Morgan does, but knowing there's work to do too.
"Copy that," Morgan mutters under his breath before he enters the train. "F.B.I.!" He then announces.
"Morgan," Reid suddenly speaks. Of course, it makes both Hotch and the agent being called snap theirs heads to meet Reid. He's looking worse for wear, Hotch thinks, with his eyes wandering – without his permission – around the mess of blood that's become Spencer's white shirt.
"Reid," Morgan says, and it sounds like the two agents haven't seen each other in months– when, in reality, they saw each other less than an hour ago while they were giving Reid any and every instruction to prevent this exact kind of situation.
"I'll be with you in a minute, man, I promise," Morgan swears, before he gets to the task at hand: ensuring the civillians' safety.
Only after exchanging one knowing look with Gideon, Hotch speaks to everyone else on the train. "Is anyone else hurt? If not, slowly, make your way out of the train, the police is waiting outside for further questions."
"Can you tell me your name?" Hotch then kneels before the doctor on the ground, already putting his hands against the wound in her side. She was shot earlier, but given the location of the wound is more to the side, perhaps they're lucky and the bullet has missed her organs. Hotch hopes it has.
"Linda," the woman weakly answers, looking too pale for comfort. "Linda Deaton. Is he...?" Linda trails off, glancing at her pacient.
"I'm sorry," Hotch tells her, fully placing himself in her field of vision to cover the sight of her dead pacient.
"I should've never brought him here..." Linda lamented, closing her eyes and leaning her head back.
"Hey, Linda," Hotch calls her again, aiming to keep her awake until the ambulances–
"Finally," Morgan comments when the multiple paramedics enter the train.
"Make some room," Hotch tells him, already removing himself out of the way. He's blantantly ignoring the blood in his hands for the sake of staying calm.
In a moment, the paramedics have Dr. Deaton out of the train, and, in the next, Reid's out too.
"I'll go with Reid," Morgan says, and he doesn't stay to get a reply.
"I'll go with the doctor." Before Hotch leaves, however, he glances at the two agents still on the ground and with Reid's blood in their hands. Gideon looks only slightly less out of it than Elle. "Are you two okay?"
"We are," Gideon answers with the tiniest of smiles, and Hotch considers it good enough.
Morgan tries his best not to spiral, but he finds himself unable. Perhaps he should've followed the ambulance with his car– no, he'd stay here with Reid no matter what. The doctors are saying many things about him but Morgan only understands half of it, and none of it sounds too good.
Reid would make sense of this. Kid knows a little bit– scrap that, he's well educated in almost every topic in the world.
Soon enough, they reach the nearest hospital and the doctors get Reid down in a hurry, getting him inside the building in a second. Knowing he'd only disturb their work, Morgan chooses that time as the perfect one to call the others and let them know what's happened.
"Hello sugar, what do you have–"
Morgan cuts her off, and perhaps even feels bad about telling her the news with no warning at all. "Reid's been shot, Garcia."
"Oh my God." There's a beat of silence before someone speaks again and it's not Penelope; it's JJ. "How is he?"
"They've just got him to the hospital, but he looked bad. The others came out unharmed, though. I need to go now."
"Okay... please take care and keep us posted," Garcia says.
"Will do."
Even if Gideon would like to be at the hospital with the others, checking up on Reid, he knows he's needed somewhere else: beside Elle, who happens to have called him "dad" twice today. For no particular reason, too.
"It should've been me," Elle whispers, while they're getting the blood off her hands. Gideon purses his lips into a thin line, grabbing more liquid soap and dropping it onto the palm of her left hand, where there was a red spot that doesn't seem to wash away as easily as the rest of the blood.
(Gideon is trying with all his might to ignore it's Reid's blood they're getting off of their hands.)
"Reid wouldn't like to hear you say that, you know this," Gideon assures Elle, who looks at the verge of tears. Well, she's been at the verge of tears most of the day, but who can blame her? Considering the earlier events, of course.
"I was on that train, it was my fault that it escalated that far," Elle weakly argues, but doesn't meet Gideon's eyes. Once they dry their – now clean – hands, Gideon softly leads Elle's face upwards by the chin.
"If you want to blame anyone, blame the one who fired the shot. And he's dead."
That seems to make a click in Elle's head. She lets out a long sigh, leaning against the sink and nodding at him. At least she's not at the verge of tears anymore, Gideon notices with a smile and places his hand on her shoulder.
"Reid will pull through, he's strong," he tells her, before he steps towards the door of the bathroom. "Come on, let's go see him, alright?"
"I'd like that," Elle smiles back and follows him to the exit.
Slowly but surely, his senses come back to him. Reid takes a deep breath, moving each one of his limbs and taking stock of how everything feels. At the end of his short test, nothing appears broken, but his whole middle section does feel very sore.
"There he is."
Reid snaps his eyes open at the voice suddenly coming from beside him, immediately recognizing it. "Gideon?"
When Reid's eyes fall on him, Gideon gently smiles at him. Now that he's finally opened his eyes, Reid can see he appears to be laying on a hospital bed. And by how tired Gideon looks, he must've been here for a while. "What happened?"
However, before Gideon can answer his question, Reid frowns, as memories flood back into his mind. "Wait, where's the unsub?"
When Gideon notices Reid makes a move to sit up, he stands up and places a hand on his chest, pushing him back down. "That's been dealt with, kid, rest easy," Gideon assures him with a court nod. Obviously, that answer doesn't fully satisfy Reid, and he must show it on his face, because Gideon then adds: "He's dead."
"Oh," Reid exhales, relaxing further into the bed.
But Gideon doesn't sit down again, and, instead, moves towards the exit. "Wait, I think I should go call Elle and the rest of the team to let them know you're awake."
"Elle..." Reid thinks out loud, making Gideon stop walking, right after opening the door to leave. "How is she?" Reid asks, taking advantage of having caught the man's attention once again.
"Worried for you, very much so," Gideon lets out a sigh, but he looks glad Reid's awake– which spreads a certain warmth around the younger man's chest. "It'll be fine once she sees you safe and sound... Morgan and Hotch were worried too, and the girls... well, let's say no one likes seeing you get hurt, that's all–"
Just then, Gideon gets interrupted by Elle, who's practically pushing him out of the way to enter to the room. "Reid!" She announces her presence with a bright smile.
"Elle," Reid finds himself smiling back, before he gestures to the chair Gideon used before– speaking of the man in question, he's just left the room.
"How are you feeling?" Elle gladly takes the offered chair and is quick to grab his hand to hold it with both of her own.
"Like I got shot," Reid comments with a shrug. It really is a miracle that he doesn't feel any of the pain he should be feeling– the morphine levels must be high, then. He figures it couldn't have been that long after all, and that he’d probably been in surgery just earlier.
"Smartass," Elle huffs, but she's visibly biting back a laugh. Then, the smile drops from her face. "We were all very worried," she says, softly squeezing his hand.
"I've heard as much," Reid says, but he isn't joking anymore, after having noticed the obvious change of mood in the room.
"Reid... you probably saved my life over there," Elle tells him, with such a vulnerable look that makes Reid panick for a second. Her hand holding his, however – for some reason that escapes him –, manages to ground him.
"I totally saved your life," Reid then says with a smirk, winking at Elle. That does get to finally make the woman laugh.
"That being said... don't ever do that again," Elle gives him a sharp look, before sighing and leaning her back against the chair.
"No promises," Reid says, against his better judgment, instead of giving her any false reassurance. "I wouldn't have liked it if it had been you that got shot, so I don't regret entering. Besides, my magic trick worked, didn’t it?"
"Yeah," Elle confesses with a chuckle, "it was a wonderful show you pulled back there. I didn't know you were a magician," she cocks one eyebrow up at him, sitting up and leaning forward again.
"I am full of surprises–"
In that exact moment, Garcia deems Elle's visit time over and interrupts them, slamming the door open, with both Morgan and JJ behind her. "Are you two lovebirds done?"
"Garcia!"