magnetic ◊ criminal minds

xxiv.

xxiv. ...and back
( season four, episode twenty-six )

HOTCH, Reid, JJ and Hightower had found someone, the owner of the house. Mason Turner. He was completely bedridden, paralyzed from the neck down. Which meant someone else was doing the killing on this property. And he was insisting they had no right to be on his property.

While searching the area with Morgan and Prentiss, Lyra heard a scream. Prentiss heard it too. "Did you hear that?"

Morgan joined the women in the direction they were walking. "What?"

"Someone screamed," Lyra signed. It was nearly impossible to see in the dark. Their flashlights were not much help. It was nothing but wilderness.

"Anything?" Morgan asked.

"I- I don't even know what direction it came from," Prentiss stammered.

"That's another reason to hate these damn woods. It messes with the sound." It was futile to look at the moment, not until they could get the lay of the land. Morgan walked up to a box that was beside the pigs. "What's this thing?" he asked.

"I don't know as much about pig farms as you might think," Prentiss responded.

Morgan walked around it until he stopped, spotting a red handprint. "Prentiss, Lehnsherr, that's a handprint. It looks like blood."

Prentiss winced. She opened the box. The three took a look inside. Prentiss gasped. Lyra took a step back. "Oh, my god," Morgan murmured. Inside were what looked like hundreds of shoes, all in different states, all of different sizes.

Lyra shook her head. "Get Hotch," she instructed.

Morgan did not waste a second. He ran up to the house. "Hotch, there's a box next to the pigs. It's like a garbage bin or something. It's full of nothing but bloody shoes. All different sizes, male and female," he explained, panting. "We said we were looking for ten missings? There's got to be over a hundred pairs of shoes in that thing."

Morgan soon returned with most of the others - Hotch, Rossi and Bedwell. Reid quietly joined them as well. Mason Turner was not going anywhere, after all. They peered inside the box. "These are..." Bedwell started, unable to form the words. "They belong to victims?"

"Possibly," Prentiss said.

"Well, he's definitely not a shoe collector," Lyra signed.

"Why just the shoes? Where are the bodies?" Bedwell asked, barely able to stand straight.

"I don't think there's going to be any bodies, guys," Reid said, looking at the pig pen. Lyra did not have to look over to know what he was thinking. "Pigs are omnivores. They'll eat anything. By anything, I mean anything."

♢

"Is Bedwell alright?" Hotch asked once Rossi returned from talking to the man in question. Prentiss was uncuffing Hightower, it was clear he was not the culprit here.

"He will be," Rossi replied. "He has every available cop in Ontario on the way here."

"You find anyone in the house?" Morgan asked.

"Mason Turner," Hotch stated.

"Is he in custody?"

"Not exactly."

"But he's not going anywhere," Rossi said. Lyra furrowed her eyebrows.

"He's quadriplegic," Hotch explained.