Chapter Text
The elevator doors slide open with a low chime that echoes through the near-empty floor. The bullpen is dark, except for one pool of light spilling from the tech office at the end of the hall.
“Baby Girl?” Morgan calls softly.
Garcia sits hunched over her desk, the glow of multiple monitors painting her tear-streaked face. She doesn’t look up. Her hands are still on the keyboard, but she isn’t typing.
“Hotch told me to pull security footage from JJ’s neighborhood. Track her phone records,” Garcia’s voice comes out small and cracked. “He asked me to analyze her 911 call.”
Garcia turns toward him, her eyes glassy and red. “I can’t, Derek. I can’t make myself press play on that call.”
Morgan’s chest tightens. He moves closer, careful and slow, until he's standing right beside her.
On one of the screens, the words “Incoming Emergency Call – Jennifer Jareau” are highlighted in red. The timestamp reads 00:48:22.
“Penelope,” Morgan says gently, lowering his voice. “You don’t have to listen to it.”
Garcia shakes her head, biting down on a sob. “She was alone, Derek. Someone broke into her house, her house, and tried to kill her. Our JJ.”
Morgan kneels beside her chair, taking her trembling hands in his. “Hey. Look at me.”
Garcia’s eyes flicker to his.
“She’s alive. She called for help. That means she fought, Garcia. You know our girl, she doesn’t go down easy, and now it’s our turn to fight for her.”
Garcia’s bottom lip trembles. “What if I mess it up? What if I miss something?”
“You won’t,” Morgan says firmly. “You’re the best there is. Nobody, and I mean nobody, finds ghosts in data like you do. You’re gonna pull that footage, and I’m gonna listen to that 911 call. We’ll find whoever did this. I promise you, Baby Girl, we won’t stop until we do.”
For a long moment, the room is quiet. Then Garcia takes a shaky breath, wipes her cheeks, and nods.
“Okay.” Garcia says, her voice small, but resolute. “Okay. Let’s catch this monster.”
Morgan gives her hand one last squeeze before standing. “That’s my girl.”
Garcia finally reaches forward and presses a key. The screens flicker to life again, street cameras, timestamps, signal traces, all spinning into motion.
Morgan understands why Garcia doesn’t want to listen to the 911 call. He doesn’t want to either. But he has to. If there’s even the slightest chance that JJ said something that could help them find the unsub, he can’t ignore it.
So he sits down at his desk, his fingers hovering above the keyboard, his chest tight. He exhales shakily and presses play.
“911, what’s your emergency?” the dispatcher says calmly.
There’s no immediate answer. Only silence, thick, heavy silence broken by the sound of uneven breathing. Morgan’s stomach twists. He knows that sound. He’s heard it at too many crime scenes. Ragged, shallow.
In his mind, he can see JJ, maybe dragging herself across the floor, blood soaking through her clothes, leaving a trail behind her. Fighting to stay conscious.
“I—I need,” JJ’s voice trembles, small and broken, barely above a whisper. “Uh, someone. They uh—”
Morgan shuts his eyes. God, she sounds nothing like herself. JJ, who always stands tall, who always finds the words when everyone else can’t, now struggling just to breathe, just to speak.
“I’m sorry, I’m having trouble hearing you?” the dispatcher says. “What’s your address?”
A beat passes. Morgan can hear the pain in JJ’s voice as she forces herself to answer, her breaths sharp and hitched between words. Every sound from her hits him like a punch.
“Help is already on its way,” the dispatcher reassures her gently. “What’s your name?”
“Jennifer,” JJ breathes out, the name shaky, barely coherent. “Jennifer Jareau.”
There’s a faint clicking of keys as the dispatcher types.
“Blood on my hands,” JJ says, detached, like she’s gone numb.
Morgan focuses on the background noises, something faintly metallic clattering, maybe JJ’s phone slipping from her bloodied hand.
“What happened?” the dispatcher asks.
Another silence. Morgan can hear her struggling to breathe, to stay conscious long enough to answer.
“Tried to kill me,” JJ whispers, then lets out a weak, bitter laugh that cracks halfway through. It’s the sound of someone too tired to cry. Morgan’s throat tightens.
“Did you recognize the person?” the dispatcher presses.
“No,” JJ murmurs, fading fast. “No, he uh—”
Morgan leans closer to the speaker, as if sheer willpower could pull the rest of the sentence out of her. C’mon, JJ. Say it. Please.
“Medics are five minutes out,” the dispatcher says, her tone steady but laced with urgency. “Just hang on a little longer, okay?”
There’s a long pause.
“It doesn’t even hurt anymore,” JJ says almost to herself.
Morgan’s stomach drops. That’s not a good sign. That’s her body shutting down. He drags a hand over his face, fighting to keep his own emotions in check. JJ is slipping away, and all he can do is listen.
“Jennifer, I need you to stay with me,” the dispatcher says.
A quiet rustle, a shaky breath. Then JJ’s voice again, thinner now, a whisper on the edge of nothing.
“Tell them—” JJ begins. “Already inside.”
“Tell who?” the dispatcher urges.
“BAU,” JJ murmurs. “Blood on my hands.”
Morgan’s chest clenches. She’s still thinking of them, still trying to help even as she bleeds out. That’s JJ, fighting for the team even when she can barely hold on.
The dispatcher continues talking to her to try and keep her conscious. But Morgan can hear it, the subtle fade in JJ’s responses, the way her breaths grow shorter, thinner.
Then he hears a wet rattle sound through the speakers. JJ gasps sharply then coughs. The sound has Morgan on edge as he recognizes it all too well.
On the recording, JJ chokes, breath sputtering. Another cough. Thick, gurgling. Morgan shuts his eyes, jaw locked, every part of him hates this. He hates hearing her pain, her struggle, her fear. Hates being powerless even in retrospect.
A long, unbearable silence that stretches until faint sirens wail in the distance. Then a click, the line disconnects.
Morgan just sits there. He can’t move. The room feels too small, too quiet. He rubs at his eyes, but it doesn’t help. Her voice still echoes in his head, small and shaking, saying it doesn’t even hurt anymore.
“Blood on my hands,” Morgan repeats under his breath, his voice rough. “That wasn’t her describing the scene. It sounds like payback, like someone wanted revenge.”
Morgan sits there for a long moment after the recording ends, just staring at the dark computer screen. The silence in the bullpen feels louder than the call ever did. He finally exhales, reaches for his phone, and dials Hotch’s number.
“I just went through the 911 call,” Morgan says, his voice low.
Hotch doesn’t speak right away, but Morgan can hear movement in the background. He’s no longer at JJ’s house. It sounds like the bullpen of a busy police station.
“Go ahead,” Hotch says, steady but tense.
Morgan rubs a hand over his face.
“She said the guy was already inside when it happened. That’s all she got out before she—” Morgan pauses, trying to find the words. “And there’s something else, it sounded like revenge. She said ‘blood on my hands.’ I don’t think she meant it literally. I think someone came after her for something that happened before.”
Hotch is quiet for a long moment, processing.
When he finally answers, his tone is clipped but heavy. “Reid and Prentiss are at the hospital. She’s still in surgery. The doctors said it’s bad, Morgan. They’re doing everything they can.”
Morgan leans forward, elbows on his knees. His throat tightens.
“She sounded, she sounded so broken.” Morgan forces out a shaky laugh that isn’t really a laugh at all. “JJ. The one who’s always calm under fire, right? But in that call. I’ve never heard her like that before. Not ever.”
Hotch doesn’t respond immediately. Morgan can hear him take a slow breath on the other end. When he does speak, his voice is lower, almost rough. “I know.”
There’s silence again. The kind of silence that sits heavy in the air because both men are trying too hard to keep it together.
“She was fighting to stay awake, Hotch,” Morgan says quietly. “Even then, she was thinking about us. Told the dispatcher to tell the BAU. She was still trying to give us a lead.”
“She always does,” Hotch murmurs. His voice falters for just a second, but he regains it quickly. “We’ll find whoever did this.”
“Yeah.” Morgan nods, even though Hotch can’t see it. “We will.”
The line goes quiet again before Hotch finally ends the call. Morgan sits there for a long time afterward, staring at the phone in his hand. Then he looks back at his screen, at the silent waveform of the 911 recording, and exhales through his nose.
“She’s gonna make it,” Morgan says under his breath, almost like a promise. “She has to.”