Darling wasn't sure when she woke up from the almost instant concussion induced knock out against the prison wall, but she figured it was somewhere in-between the guards all having their skin on and throats unslit and the blood bath she was staring at now as she watched Bone stand up from the guard who's eyeballs were now completely missing, wiping the blood off her face onto her top before looking back over to Darling.
But something was different to the monster Darling had just watched brutally murder three grown men with the experience and ease of an old butcher slaughtering a cow.
The look on her face wasn't just confusing because of the tears, but the accompanying fear that lived that as she took in what she did- something she hadn't done in over 25 years and hadn't ever wanted to do before.
But something had snapped in her just like it did that first time.
From the moment she heard Darling's terrified scream as she went to run down the corridor, a scream she recognised from herself many years ago- a scream that told her exactly what those guards were going to do to Darling.
A scream that made her snap.
Bone had every intention of doing what Darling said, of running and leaving her- after all, she was just a stranger, a stranger that was going to be her unwilling ticket out of here but a stranger none the less.
She had no attachment to her, quite frankly found her endless pleasantries annoying and hated how her pony tale always bounced whilst she walked with a permanent perk in her step.
She realised as she turned to Darling who sat against the wall- covered in blood and staring with that same fear at the men on the floor who she knew were dead, but the fear was still there- why she had turned back, why she threw herself against the door until it budged, why she would have tunnelled under the whole prison to get in and keep that girl from losing that obnoxious smile and perk in her step.
Because she reminded her of herself, a 'self' that she hadn't been in a long time, a 'self' that had been taken and beaten out by men until it was nothing but blood and a thirst to spill it.
But a 'self' that she wasn't going to let this stranger lose, even if it meant seeing that fear of herself reflected in her eyes as Darling's gaze left the dead men's bodies and met hers.
"Listen kid, I-" Bone went to speak, expecting Daring to sob in fear or call her a monster, hating that she felt that in herself too, hating that she was affected by someone seeing her as that again.
But to her surprise, Darling didn't have that look in her eyes.
"You... you saved me" Darling's words were barely a whisper, but the astonishment was there.
"What-" Bone went to quiz but before she could, Darling's body was thrown around her in what resembled a sort of desperate child-like hug.
Bone didn't say anything, she didn't reciprocate the hug for a moment as Darling clung on for dear life, feeling a sob threaten to escape before she pushed herself back and cleared her throat awkwardly.
"S-sorry, sorry that wasn't very 'prison-like' of me and I-" Darling's apology was interrupted by Bone yanking her back into the hug.
"I told you to fucking run" Bone's furious yelling contrasted her tight embrace on Darling.
"I-" Darling didn't know what to say, overwhelmed by this cold stranger who looked as cuddly as a hedgehog towards her seeming to be terrified that she could have gotten hurt.
It seemed Bone had a similar reaction, pulling herself from the hug and frowning before shaking her head and turning, "let's go."
"W-where?" Darling replied but automatically followed her.
"Do you always ask so many bloody questions?"
"O-only when I'm being hunted in prisons, yes" Darling tried to force herself to joke through the residue shaking in her body, looking back over her shoulder at the bodies they left as they left the room.
"So it happens often to you then?" Bone joked but Darling responded seriously.
"Surprisingly yes."
"What-" Bone went to turn and get her to elaborate before a shooting pain in her stomach sent her hurling over in agony, Darling rushing over and holding her up.
"Oh my god Bone- you're literally in labour!"
"I'm fine!" The woman who looked as if she chewed rocks for fun glared at Darling, letting out three quick breaths and standing up, immediately turning and continuing her stride through the guard's back corridors that had less chaos than the main prison- but still trails of blood that certainly suggested inmates had been this way before.
"W-where are we going?" Darling quizzed, eyes trying desperately not to drop towards the red covering her hands, particularly her thumbs that she could still feel pushing against his eyeballs.
"To find Greta and whoever the hell else is left in this place" Bone paused Darling before they could turn a corner, pushing her foot out just as a body ran past, tripping them up and immediately launching onto them.
"Bone! No!" Darling pulled her off the terrified looking woman before she could slit her throat, "don't just kill random people!"
"I'm not going to wait for her to kill us first!"
"She was just running away! Ask questions and then kill, you don't know what her situation is, she might not be- mother of fucking hell!" Darling tried to argue but an intense pain from her ankle made her look down at the woman on the floor whose mouth was clamped on her so hard it immediately drew blood.
"Still wanna ask questions about her character or..." Bone replied sarcastically.
"Would you stop being smug and get her the hell off me?!" Darling tried to shake the woman off of her who's teeth only sunk more into her ankle before Bone's shank went into her neck like a hot knife into butter and she pulled her off Darling who fell to the floor.
"Mother of all that is holy and buried with the bugs and the dirt pulled by hands from the earth!"
"Is that from the bible?" Bone quizzed.
"No, it's Hozier- so basically yes" Darling blinked deliriously through the pain as Bone instantly ripped off a part of her sleeve and wrapped it around Darling's ankle that had a intensely deep bite mark in it, still gushing blood even with the makeshift bandage as she forced herself to her feet.
"Let's go" Bone went to continue walking.
"Give me a damn minute! I can barely breathe, and I just got my god damn ankle chomped on like it was a leg of lamb at Christmas dinner, I need a second!" Darling yelled, placing a hand on the wall and trying to catch her breath but something else caught her eye down the end of the corridor.
"You've got the be kidding me?" She sighed at two of Rhoney's crew as they spotted her, motioning their fingers across their necks at her, Darling shaking her head and looking up at the ceiling "come on god, can I not just get a god damn break in here?"
"God doesn't tend to hand out breaks to people in here" Bone grabbed her hand and pulled her down the opposite corridor, running as fast as a heavily pregnant biker and limping fake imprisoned stripper could.
They got as far as past the next locked door before a fist flew into Darling's face, sending her flying to the floor, giving her no time to react before a body was hurled onto her.
"Get the hell away from my wife you southern bimbo-" Greta flew fist after fist down at Darling before Bone could pull her off to no avail.
"Would you please kindly stop punching me!?" Darling begged before getting fed up and somehow catching one of Greta's many blows to her face, twisting her arm and throwing her leg over so she would smash onto the floor with Darling straddling her, "and it's not nice to call people bimbos!"
"Let me go right now!"
"Not until you calm down and apologise!"
"This is the most pathetic fight I've ever seen" Bone rolled her eyes, pulling Darling off Greta and holding out her hand to stop them fighting, "Greta, sweetheart, that was an embarrassing ambush- you know you have to go in with the weapon first, not make a fool of yourself by punching her in the nose and not even breaking it."
"Why is she even breathing right now!? What took you so long to get back here?! Why is she still here?!" Greta grunted towards Darling.
"Because we need her to get out of here, now stop getting your panties in a twist and apologise to her before she has a hissy fit about your 'manners-' you saw what she did to Rhoney with the lunch tray when she didn't apologise."
"She couldn't hurt me if she tried" Greta spat at Darling's feet, pausing at her ankle and blood splattered over all over them, dried blood still on Darling's chin too, "what the hell happened there-"
"Did you just spit at me?! How dare you-" Darling went to yell, Bone holding up a hand and waving it to silence them both, "stop it, we've got to go before tweedle dumb and tweedle dumber get through that door."
Greta let out a frustrated sigh, holding out her hand for Darling reluctantly, spitting in her own palm.
"Truce, for now."
"Did you just spit in your hand?" Darling raised a grossed out eyebrow.
"Oh for fuck sakes just shake her hand" Bone rolled her eyes, clamping the two women's hands together before dragging them both after her down the corridor, using the card one more time to get into a dark room that Darling could now recognise as the infirmary office she had been dragged into just a few days ago and almost water boarded to death in.
"Please don't tell me you're going to shove my head into a bucket of water again? I've already had a bad day, I don't need that too" Darling sighed as Greta boarded up the door.
"Only if you promise to be shut up before I shove a sock in your mouth" she mocked, turning back to Bone who was finally letting herself feel the pain coursing through her body, breathing heavily as she clutched onto the back of a chair for dear life.
"How far apart are they?" Greta ran over to her side, rubbing her back tenderly and looking at her watch to time the contractions with a softness and care to her eyes that only appeared when she was looking at Bone.
"I'm fine, I'm fine- fuck!" Bone tried to say but was cut off by more intense pain.
"I don't mean to alarm anyone but there is blood coming out the bottom of your pants" Darling pointed out, rushing over with towels she didn't know how ended up in her arms as she went into immediate 'helper' mode, pushing the infirmary bed- which only the day before had been her tattoo torture station- over with her.
"How long has she been in labour?"
"Her water broke four hours ago- but she's not due for another month" Greta replied, not liking Darling being near Bone, especially given the fact they both looked like they had been in a fight she didn't understand where could have happened, but unable to hide the panic in her voice.
"Jesus Christ, okay, okay let me think" Darling paced back and forth, shaking her hands out as she tried to focus on anything- but there was too much going on in her mind;
The prison riot and flash backs of fear to being trapped in the male prison, the guard's in that room dead on the floor, the disgusting feeling of her thumbs pressing into his eyes, the even more disgusting feeling of his hands on her and marks he left behind, the fact Luke had supposedly tried to kill Rhoney, Candy's death that didn't make any sense and threw the whole case into a curveball, the fact that people were trying to kill her, the fact she had almost been assaulted again- and now that Bone was in labour, trapped in a room with Darling a month early with no medical professionals to be found.
Darling paused in her panic, somehow finding an ease to her overwhelming anxiety in her chest that had reached an extreme level since being dragged into the guard's break room in that thought;
Bone, baby, labour.
A baby was going to be born, a premature birth presumably brought on by the stress of the riot could be here any moment.
Nothing else mattered, she wasn't going to let herself process everything that had just happened and what could have happened which terrified her more than words could say- no, nothing else filled Darling with as terrifying of fear as that as she turned to Bone and Greta who stared at her, Darling having not realised she was 'thinking' all of that out loud in a ramble of consciousness.
"Okay" she nodded, and then once more to convince herself before turning fully to Greta, "what do we need to do?"
"What?"
"Well I mean, I, uh, assume you're her partner and have to do like classes or something to prep her on-"
"What kind of birthing classes do you think they provide lesbians in prison, idiot?" Greta rolled her eyes.
"Settle down" Bone breathed through the pain, "the kid's just trying to help."
"I don't get why you ran out to get this stupid girl, she's not a doctor, she's no help to us- in fact she's putting us in danger by being here- where have you been by the way? You're both covered in blood, your shank has guts on it, what happened? Did she get you in trouble? I knew I should have gone to kill her instead of you-" Greta tried to argue with Bone who shot an instantly terrifying glare at her.
"Baby, please" Greta sighed, "just tell me what to do to help you."
"She should know" Bone gestured to Darling who looked confused.
"What? Why me?"
"I don't know, I figured you could figure it out- you seem to think fast" Bone breathed through a contraction.
"You thought I could just 'figure out' childbirth?!" Darling exclaimed, "I-I've never even watched Greys anatomy! How the hell am I supposed to-"
"Please?!" Bone suddenly let out an almost heart-breaking cry that Darling did not expect from a woman like her as she stared at Darling desperately with sudden tears in her eyes before her voice turned to a desperate whisper that she was embarrassed of, "please... please don't let my baby die in here."
Darling thought she herself could burst into tears on the spot then, staring into Bone's eyes and finding the desperation that tore open her heart and made her automatically nod despite having no idea how to keep that promise.
Greta looked between her wife and the woman she had no fondness for- but she saw the way her wife looked at her, how she hadn't stopped trying to figure out what Darling's 'deal' was since she got there; an intrigue that was meant to lead to her murder tonight but turned into something else after speaking with her, after seeing her so terrified of the body slumped in front of her cell, a sudden need to protect, a motherly urge to keep this girl she had no attachment to.
And now, a hope that she had that same need for her.
And she did.
Darling couldn't explain it, she couldn't understand herself the need to help this woman who terrified her to her core.
"Water" Darling decided on a single word within the thousands of sentences rushing through her mind along with the flashes of hands touching her before shaking herself out of it and fully immersing herself, escaping, into the situation she was in now and turning to Greta.
"Get a bucket of warm water, sharp tools, towels and some sort of warm incubator replacement for the baby, I don't think it's so premature that it'll need one but I really don't know anything about babies-"
"How the hell am I meant to find an incubator?"
"Figure it out" Darling snapped, walking over to Bone and taking the towel to pat her head, "okay, I've got a plan- I'm not saying it's a good plan but it's a plan-"
"If it ends up with this baby out of me in one piece then I'm in."
"That's the goal-" Darling nodded, "we just need to get to a phone and call an ambulance, I'm honestly shocked no one has attempted to make contact with the guards in here yet from outside."
"The power is going down, the phone wires were cut before the riot even happened from what I've heard" Greta called out as she gathered towels from around the room, "no one on the outside knows this is happening."
Darling stopped in her tracks as she took off Bone's trousers with the towel placed over her, looking back at Greta, "what?"
"Yeah, didn't you think it was weird that no helicopters had arrived or anything? It's the middle of the night, no one will know anything's happening until the morning shift guards turn up at 11am tomorrow."
Darling felt a lump in her throat drop, stumbling back slightly as her eyes widened.
She was alone in here.
She knew she had been alone in here without the team since the beginning and especially since being thrown into solitary- but now she was really alone.
No one knew what was happening to her; Hotch didn't know she was learning more about the case in the last few hours than she had the entire time she had been there, Rossi and Reid didn't know she was going to have to get a woman in labour somehow out of there and into the hospital before she gave birth, Emily and Ashley didn't know she was terrified out of her mind, Garcia didn't know that all of the prison security camera's and power was slowly turning off as the generators died, Morgan was probably fast asleep thinking she was going to call him the next day to see how Christmas day went and check in-
"Oh my god-" Darling covered her mouth with that thought of Morgan waiting for her call that never came, finding herself turning and running to the sink before she threw up.
"Jesus Christ-" Greta rolled her eyes, "can you get a grip? My wife needs to get out of here-"
"Shut up Greta" Bone commanded, her eyes glued to Darling as she spotted tears streaming down her face and somehow knew something was instantly wrong, finding herself on her feet and walking over to Darling before she could stop herself.
"Hey- breathe" she placed a hand on her back, "it's okay."
"I-it's not okay-" Darling tried to say, wiping her mouth and letting it all come out, "I'm terrified!"
"I know-"
"N-no, no you don't, you have no idea how much you don't know!" Darling suddenly yelled as tears stormed her face.
"I know you're not a real prisoner" Bone spoke too casually for that sentence, Darling pausing with confusion, "and I know you're an FBI agent."
"What?!" Greta yelled, grabbing her shank but Bone held up her hand.
"Go get me water my love."
"Bone what the hell, she's a FBI agent?! You know what we do to-"
"I said; go get me water" Bone snapped her head to her with a glare that almost sent her toppling back before she shook her head with anger and stormed out, locking the door behind her.
Darling stared in shock and confusion as Bone sat back on the bed, gesturing for Darling to walk over, "don't worry yourself with looking for a weapon, I'm not gonna kill you for being an agent- I was going to, but now I've had a change of heart it seems- as annoying as that is."
"You were going to kill me?" Darling cautiously walked over and sat by Bone's bed, eyes still keeping a watch out for a possible escape route if she needed it- although Bone was pregnant Darling couldn't be sure the woman who skinned half a man within a minute could be stopped even when in labour.
"Yeah, that's why I went to your cell when the riot started- there's a person asking for you to be brought to them, hence how many people- including the guards it seems- are after you."
"And you... you were going to bring me to this person like the rest of them were trying to?"
"Yeah" Bone shrugged as if it was obvious, rolling her eyes at her, "oh don't look at me like that, they said they would get me and Greta out of here if we brought you to them."
"So you decided to take it a step further and, what? Kill me for them?" Darling shook her head in disbelief, "and to think I bit some guy's ear off to let you run away."
"Your mistake for being a good person, not mine" Bone chuckled before shaking her head, "I changed my mind by the way."
"What?"
"Killing you- I changed my mind, I'm not gonna do that."
"Gee thanks, what a privilege."
"Oi missy, cut the attitude or I'll change my mind again."
"You just told me you were going to kill me! I'm allowed to have a little bit of attitude" Darling crossed her arms in a huff, looking over at Bone's small chuckle before she sighed.
"You thought about her life."
"What?"
"That's how I knew you were an agent; when I watched you watch that crazy old bat get shot on my way to kill you outside your cell- you thought about her life, I could see it in your eyes, you were crushed you couldn't help her, and you don't seem to think twice before helping people" Bone explained, lying back on the bed with a groan of pain, "although I'm starting to think that may be a 'you' think instead of an agent thing, I haven't met many agents who would willingly get locked in a room with men trying to kill them to save a convict."
"Prisoners are people too" Darling said after a few moments of silence, "what you might have done to be put in here doesn't mean you deserve to die."
"You really believe that?" Bone said, unconvinced before seeing Darling's face and shaking her head, "I've killed men with my bare hands, I ripped out the tongue of my rapist and made him eat it, you saw what I did in that room to those men, I've done worse."
"That was survival" Darling replied simply, the words coming to her mouth automatically, "no one should be punished for surviving."
Bone looked at her with puzzlement of how she truly believed that, like a breath of fresh air mixed with intrigue.
"So, who's trying to kill me then?" Darling let out a sigh, attempting to rub off the blood on her hand onto the towel to no avail.
"I have no idea."
"What? But you said-"
"Yeah, yeah I was going to wrap you up in your bedsheets and deliver you to them but I've got no clue who it was- it was prison bounty, you just hear about it and bring the body to the spot."
Darling tilted her head as a thought hit her, "like Candy."
"What?"
"Candy, the one who's body started this riot- someone could have put out one of those 'prison bounty' things on her to avoid getting blamed, right?"
"I mean sure" Bone shrugged, "although I didn't hear of any so unless it was within the guards then-"
"Wait, the guards kill people for each other?!"
Bone raised an eyebrow at her in-between contractions, "you were just almost assaulted by three of them, you really think murder for prison money is where they draw the line?"
"But why would they need the money-"
"A lot of the prisoners in here have connections outside, guards too; deals have been made, secrets held, things like that" Bone explained before shaking her head, "did the fancy FBI not prep you on this before sending you in here?"
"I mean my boyfriend told me a little bit about what he knew about prison the night before when he made me stay up prepping but that was more about how to make a little shank out of a toothbrush and make snacks in my toilet- the fun parts" she shrugged, not noticing Bone smiling slightly before nodding.
"Your boyfriend, what's his name?"
"My what?" Darling tilted her head, not realising she had automatically said 'boyfriend' instead of 'best friend' like she had been used to saying at work.
"The guy making you learn how to make toilet wine before a FBI mission- what's his name?" Bone chuckled.
"Derek" Darling answered, a small smile automatically coming to her lips from just his name alone.
"Is he your person?" Bone asked, spotting that smile.
"My what?"
"Your person, your safety, your world- that sorta shit."
"Wow, very romantic" Darling laughed at her tone before Bone chuckled and nudged her arm.
"It's important to have your person; take Greta, she's my person despite the first time we met being me holding a gun to her neck in a robbery and she got herself thrown in prison to be with me."
"Love at first sight then?" Darling joked.
"Surprisingly, yes" Bone chuckled, "I thought she was batshit crazy if I'm honest, but then I realised her crazy matched my crazy, her batshit matched mine- you get the gist. Some people say we're the reflection of a collection of the people closest to us. She may be ridiculously protective, stupidly stubborn and quick to draw a blade in a church, but I'm glad I get to be a reflection of her, I'm glad I get even a glimpse of her in my mirror."
Darling couldn't help her genuine soft smile at how Bone stared off with a slight smile of her own thinking about her wife before she saw Darling's expression and laughed, "don't look at me like I'm a sap."
"Oh of course not- you're still a terrifying murderer who gives definitely infected tattoos in my eyes, don't worry" Darling joked.
"Good" Bone smiled before nudging her arm, "so go on then, tell me about this Derek of yours- what's so great about him then?"
"What?"
"Help me get my mind off the human trying to crawl its way out of my vagina will ya? Your annoying rambles seem to be doing good at distracting me."
"Thank you, I think?" Darling chuckled before fiddling with her hands as she let herself think about Morgan.
"Okay, what to say about Derek-" she thought for a moment, so many things rushing to the front of her mind, so many things she could say about him.
His smile; the way he could smile and make the most expensive art hanging on museum walls look incomplete and juvenile in comparison with just that smile of his.
His eyes; the way they lit up like a lighthouse drawing you in home, an ocean beckoning you to explore past it as it promised you safety and adventure all in one.
His laugh; a music box couldn't possibly capture it, the way his whole body moved, hands clutching his stomach as he threw back his head every time.
His touch; so soft yet certain, the potential and ability to be rough and overbearing but choosing delicacy, choosing care instead of the carnage it could bring.
His humour; how he was the only person who would make Darling laugh no matter what the situation, whether crying over SATs or being held captive by murderous twins- he could always find a moment to make her laugh.
Him, she let herself smile thinking of the thousands of things that made him him, the thousands of things that she loved.
"-He's... He's Derek- that's the best thing about him" Darling eventually spoke quietly after excitably rambling out everything she had thought, not caring if Bone was listening or not, letting herself get carried away in the memories of him, finding herself feel instantly safe.
"He's my best friend, he always has been- he's..." she let her smile take over the speckle of tears in her eyes, "he's my person- no that's not enough, he's the best person, I'm convinced that he's the best person in the whole world at this point."
"That's really sweet" Bone said with a genuine smile at Darling, listening to every word, "he's got a big dick, doesn't he?"
"What?" Darling burst into laughter.
"Come on, no one speaks about someone like that unless they're seriously good in the bedroom."
"Way too ruin a nice bonding moment there" Darling chuckled.
"Hey, you didn't deny it though" Bone chuckled back before nudging Darling's arm, "how'd he take the news of you coming in here?"
"About as well as a southerner in the snow" she sighed, "he kicked up quite the fuss, made it almost impossible to work the case I was meant to be working with his constant worries, got himself kicked off said case and then threatening my boss if he didn't let him back on so he could talk to me-"
"My kinda guy" Bone chuckled, "I've been meaning to ask you about your 'case' by the way, you said before that you were in here because someone was killed, a friend of yours, is that true?"
"Not a friend per say, but I did strip with her so I guess that does bring people close together."
"What?" Bone couldn't help her laughter that turned into a yelp of pain, Darling's hand automatically taking hers for her to squeeze.
She thought for a moment as she counted the seconds in-between the contractions that were getting dangerously close together.
The team wouldn't even know what was happening until the next day.
They wouldn't let medics in to help Bone in the middle of a riot.
The baby was on its way and fast, Darling didn't know too much about childbirth but she was certain that a baby wouldn't last too long in a prison without medical attention.
The internal phones were down, the lights all except the emergency ones down with it too, she had no way of reaching anyone with the power down-
A thought stopped her in her tracks.
A thought that brought her back to the walls of the prison where Morgan waited in the radio room for her.
A thought that brought her back to a time before that where she learnt to climb through prison walls in the first place.
A thought that brought a plan.
"You have 30 minutes" Darling stood up suddenly, looking around and grabbing the wire cutters from next across the room and a sharp shank that Greta had left- who of which was walking back in.
"What?" Bone quizzed with confusion.
"You have roughly 30 minutes until you're going to have to push" Darling looked around, nodding to herself as her mind raced, "it's going to take me 10 minutes to get down to the basement, 5ish minutes to get it up and running and another 5 minutes to get out to the yard and call my team on the separate circuit phone-"
"Your team? What the hell is happening-" Greta quizzed but Darling just paced back and forth, tapping along the walls as she went before finding a hollow part, grabbing a metal chair and holding it up.
"I'm going to get the power up, make that call-" Darling threw the chair with all her might until it broke through the drywall of the office, smiling over her shoulder with determination at a baffled Greta and shocked but impressed Bone, "-and get back before that baby learns what a shank is."