Annabel Lee ─ emily prentiss

thirty-three

This is a short one, but it's been a million years since I've updated so here u go.

★★★

THE week started so great. After months of home visits and interviews with social workers attending stupid classes and filling out paperwork, Emily officially had her foster license. She was officially Bel's foster parent. She and Bel went out to dinner to celebrate. Normally, Bel resisted going to really nice places because Emily didn't let her pay, and she didn't want Emily to spend a lot of money on her, but this time she let Emily twist her arm. They went to a fancy French restaurant.

"I've never been somewhere that actually serves escargot," Bel said as she scanned the small but expensive menu. Emily laughed.

"Do you wanna try it?"

"Why would I want to do that?"

They'd barely gotten their food when Emily's phone rang. It was Hotch, of course, because it seemed like a case always popped up at the worst times. But this wasn't just any case. The BAU was called to Agent Gideon's apartment, where Gideon's girlfriend had been slaughtered by an UnSub who slipped through their fingers a couple months ago. Emily paid the check, dropped Bel and their leftovers off at home, and joined the team at the crime scene for the case from hell.

When Emily got home yesterday, she felt horrible. The UnSub was gone, but not because they arrested him—he jumped in front of a train—and he killed someone else first. All that aside, her coworker lost his girlfriend in just about the most brutal way possible in his own apartment. Nothing could make that better.

"How was your case?" Bel, who was doing homework at the counter when Emily came in, looked up. She immediately knew something was off from the way Emily slumped forward. "Hey, what happened? You okay?"

Emily came over and wrapped her arms around Bel from behind. "Not really. Do you remember Agent Gideon?"

"I do, yeah." He was an interesting guy. Bel remembered him well, even though they only met briefly.

"The case I got called on? An UnSub who got away a couple months ago came back and killed Gideon's girlfriend in his apartment. He murdered someone else too, before we backed him into a corner. Then he killed himself by jumping in front of a train and took someone else with him."

Normally, Emily didn't share specific details of cases because it was against protocol, but this affected her personally.

"Oh shit." Bel turned her head to face Emily. "That's awful. How are you doing?"

"Bad," Emily admitted. "But happy to be home."

They responded to the situation like any other sane person would: by eating junk and rented a movie. They curled up together on the couch and rewatched But I'm A Cheerleader, because it was a far less awkward experience now that Bel wasn't having an existential crisis while watching it. Bel rested her head on Emily's shoulder, and Emily wrapped her arm around Bel's body. It dawned on Emily just how much better Bel was doing physically as well as mentally. When they met, Bel was basically skin and bones, severely underfed by her foster parents. Now she had filled out, her once sharp edges softened against Emily's body. She was still significantly underweight, but the improvement was massive. You could tell just by looking at her face how much healthier she was. She glowed.

With that case closed, Emily expected things to calm down. Obviously, there was no going back to normal after what happened to Gideon's Sarah, but Emily thought they would find at least a shred of normalcy when they went back to cases that weren't personal. But Strauss unfortunately had no intention of allowing that. She called Emily into her office.

"Sit," Strauss ordered, not bothering with artificial niceties. Emily sat in the chair across from Strauss' desk, feeling claustrophobic in this office. "I put you in the BAU. I knew how badly you wanted it. Everyone did. You were never exactly shy about letting us know. But there were those who didn't think assigning you to the BAU was a good idea. They thought you were too reckless. I believed in you, however. It's time to pay back the faith I had. Your team is in trouble. They've lost sight of the big picture. I believe they are reckless and at times out of control." Strauss sat in her own chair. "It's time for Agent Hotchner's career to come to an end. And if you want to stay in the BAU, Agent Prentiss, you're going to help me make that happen."

For a moment, all Emily could do was stare, her mouth half-open in surprise. The team had its issues, sure, but there was no questioning how effective they were, and Hotch was an important part of that. He wasn't perfect, but they needed him. She couldn't imagine the BAU without him. He was a good leader and a good man.

"Agent Prentiss," Strauss said sharply. Emily had been silent for too long. "I am not asking you, I'm telling you. If you want to keep your job, you will tell me what I want to know. If you refuse, you will be removed from the team and posted elsewhere. Do you understand?"

"I understand." Emily nodded. "I...I have to think about it."

She needed to buy herself time to figure out what her next step was, because it sure as hell wasn't going to be snitching on Hotch. As much as she liked it here, staying on the job was not worth selling Hotch out.

"There is no option here, Emily."

"I have to think about it," she repeated. Strauss narrowed her eyes.

"You have a week."

"I don't think I'm going to need that long." Emily stood. "I have to get back to my paperwork."

Over the next several days, she contemplated her next move. Emily supposed that with Bel to take care of now, leaving the FBI to work a 9 to 5 wasn't the worst idea. It was kind of the worst to be hundreds, if not thousands of miles away from Bel half the time, especially knowing how badly Bel needed stability. She put in applications for a couple civil service jobs with the state department in public affairs and foreign affairs. Her background gave her the perfect qualifications to work at the state department, and with civil service, she could do it domestically instead of being a diplomat like her mother. It was no FBI—it was far, far from her dream—but she would be good at it and she could see Bel every day. Not that she really had a choice. The BAU had been Emily's dream for a long, long time, but she wasn't going to compromise her morals and screw Hotch and the team over to keep it.

She helped with one last case, girls on a college campus being murdered. The day after they returned to D.C. Emily came into work and sat at her desk doing paperwork like nothing was about to change. Then she slipped away from her desk and made her way to Strauss' office. The door was opened just a crack, and Emily could see that Strauss was alone. She pushed the door open without knocking. Startled, Strauss opened her mouth, but Emily beat her to the punch.

"I'm officially resigning from the FBI." Emily placed her official letter of resignation, folded perfectly into thirds. "My resignation is effective immediately. Today will be my last day."

Strauss' mouth fell open, then closed, her expression somewhere between anger, shock, and disappointment. "You can't be serious."

"I am. I'm not interested in playing your game."

"You're making a terrible decision, Emily." She never called Emily by her first name. It was always Agent Prentiss. She was livid. "You've spent years working your way up through the FBI and could have your eye on top leadership, and you're throwing it away."

"My decision has been made," Emily replied, turning to leave.

"I thought you would do the right thing. Maybe you were too reckless for this job after all."

Emily turned her head and met Strauss' gaze, unwavering. "This is the right thing. If you'll excuse me, I have to go clean out my desk."

Before Strauss could get another word out, Emily strode out of the office. She felt kind of like all of her organs had been pulled out of her body and run over by an eighteen-wheeler, but she needed to do this. Besides, this could be the start of a good new chapter for her and Bel. Maybe leaving the FBI would be for the best.

★★★

There are three chapters of this story left. Holy shit.