"It can only break you if you let it"
-PHRASED-

Over at the running track, Garcia and Reid are training to pass the field fitness test, which involves an 8-minute mile. Garcia comes to a stop and looks to Reid who is behind her. They meet halfway and both catch their breaths.

"We weren't even close" Garcia declares as the sun beams down on them, making it harder to breathe. "No- No way I'll be able to do this" Reid says as he starts to stumble backwards.

"Oh-" Someone shrieks before Reid groans in pain as his back hits the pavement. "Oh! Natalie!" Garcia calls out as she walks over and grabs ahold of Natalie's hand and helps her to her feet.

"Natalie? I think I'm becoming delusional" Reid states as Natalie shakes her head jokingly and bends down, helping Reid to his feet, allowing him to see her.

"It is you" Reid states breathlessly while Natalie knits her eyebrows in confusion and looks between Reid and Garcia who hold their chest tiredly. "Um, is everything okay?" Natalie asks, resting her hands on her hips before Garcia admires her body.

"You look so hot- I can see why you and Maya are sisters" Garcia states before she swallows harshly, changing the subject.

"We have a fitness test coming up and we have to run a mile- in a field- in 8 minutes" Reid states before falls out onto the ground, Garcia joining him shortly after. "Oh, and I'm guessing you guys haven't done it?" Natalie questions to which Reid and Garcia both put their thumbs' up, stating Natalie is right.

"What about Morgan? He looks like he works out" Natalie suggests. "He does work out and no, when Morgan teaches, he does this tough love thing, and he yells at you and says his grandmama can do better- it's stressful" Garcia rants as she wipes the sweat off of her forehead.

"What about you? You could help us" Reid says, pointing to Natalie who immediately starts shaking her head.

"No, no. I'm not good at giving orders and I already passed the test- multiple times" Natalie says, trying to get out of this situation. "Well, that describes both of us so, we can be innocent work out triplets together!" Garcia cheers and Natalie stammers over her words as she looks between Garcia and Reid before her and Garcia's phone rings.

Natalie immediately takes her phone out of her pocket and sees it's a text from Hotch, stating they have a case.

"Guess we should get going" Natalie states as she starts running in place. "Wha- You didn't answer-" Garcia stutters as she lifts her head from her phone, seeing that Natalie is already far away and, on her way, to go to her hotel, get a shower and get changed so she can head into work.

"Ugh, she's fast" Garcia mumbles as she and Reid stand to their feet, jogging out of the track side by side, Reid slightly behind.

_____

At the BAU, Natalie comes into the conference room and takes a seat before Garcia explains the newest case. Three bodies were found in the woods by a park ranger, two men and a woman, all showing signs that they'd been tied up for long periods of time before being murdered.

"Whoa, are those bite marks?" Natalie asks as she gets a closer look at the crime scene photos. "Yeah..." Garcia answers disturbingly.

"What, are those from the unsub?" JJ wonders to which Rossi sighs and shrugs, "Probably from critters out in the woods" Rossi declares before Reid notices he murdered the victims' months apart from each other but buried them all in the exact same spot so the disposal sites obviously important to him in some way.

_____

On the plane, Garcia has IDs for the two other bodies in the grave, Melvin Lewis and Rudy Hightower. One is a homeless guy, and the other is an unmarried truck driver, neither of whom were missed right away.

Could the killer have stalked them, or did he just get lucky?

Also, the victims were two men and one woman, two white and one black. What could his lack of preference mean?

_____

Natalie and Reid head over to the morgue to look at the bodies that have recently been discovered. Natalie notices Reid stretching out his arms and legs before they walk into the building.

"Is this your way of convincing me to help you and Garcia?" Natalie asks before Reid opens the door for her. "Is it working?" Reid asks nicely, making Natalie giggle at his question before she shrugs her shoulders jokingly, "We'll see."

They step inside where the doctor brings in the second body, Natalie immediately analyzing it. "What's the cause of death?" Natalie asks Reid who is reviewing the chart. "Cardiac arrest. What caused their hearts to stop?" Reid asks, looking over to the doctor who is shocked he knew that so fast considering he just got handed the chart.

"That's why we're sending the organ samples" The doctor answers before Natalie starts to question the bite marks on both victims. "This one is deep, it doesn't even look like it's from a human" Natalie says in disgust as she gets a better look at the bite, shaking her head disappointingly.

"Yeah, and about 90% of them are postmortem" The doctor adds, and Natalie widens her eyes slightly before knitting her eyebrows in confusion.

"Wait- You said 90%. What about the other 10?" Natalie wonders and the doctor sighs before stating the victims also had bite marks that happened before they were killed.

"The first victim. His were animal bites but the others-". "They were bitten by a human" Reid states, interrupting the doctor. "What?" Natalie questions, practically in shock.

_____

The team gathers in the conference room at the station and walk in on Reid stretching out his legs. "What's this kid doing?" Derek asks, leaning over to Natalie who sighs defeatedly and shrugs. "No idea" Natalie answers, crossing her arms over her chest before Reid suddenly stops what he's doing once he sees other people have start to enter the room.

Reid then starts to explain his geographical profile. The blue marks indicate where the victims were last seen, and the red marks are where they lived, except for Rudy Hightower, who was homeless.

"Something isn't adding up for me" JJ says as she enters the room with coffees in her hand, handing them out to everyone before stating her confusion with the cannibal theory.

"Why does he dispose of the bodies if he's a cannibal? Wouldn't he keep them?" JJ wonders.

"Well, some cannibals don't want to eat the whole body it's just certain body parts that they enjoy or eat only a certain amount. Maybe this unsub just doesn't need a large portion of flesh to satisfy him" Natalie declares and explains while JJ and Derek look to her with concern after her rant about cannibals.

"I watch a lot of documentaries" Natalie says softly before she sips her coffee, trying to take the attention off of her. "Yeah, and she's right. Most ritual cannibalism involves the consumption of particular organs as a means to commune with the deceased" Reid explains and Natalie gasps softly, "That's exactly what that guy said in the documentary about Jeffery Dahmer" Natalie states while Reid nods his head in agreement plus excitement.

"You remember that? That was made like years ago" Reid questions. "Uh, yeah! I watch it like every night. Keeps my brain active" Natalie states as Derek and JJ give each other the side eye before shaking their heads jokingly while Reid and Natalie rant about documentaries for a good amount of time.

"They deserve each other" JJ jokes, hitting her cup of coffee up against Derek's gently before they walk away.

_____

Later, Garcia calls the team about the first victim's backstory. Marvin only recently became a truck driver, before that he was an animal control specialist, dealing with dangerous wild animals.

Natalie and Reid look to each other with concern before Rossi sighs, "Come on, what is it?" Rossi asks, knowing Natalie and Reid have figured something out but they're doing that silence thinking thing which leaves the team on edge.

"It's a virus" Natalie and Reid say in unison as they look to Rossi and Derek standing in front of them. "Its not a fetish but a virus and the human bite marks are from infected humans" Natalie states before Derek knits his eyebrows in confusion, "Infected with what exactly?" Derek wonders.

"Rabies" Reid answers and can see the shock and disgust that spread across Rossi and Derek's face.

Time for the profile. The team believes they're looking for a white male who is in his mid 20's to late 30's. They just got word that each other victim have died from rabies so Natalie and Reid were right and the unsub is persuading biting attacks with his victims. And the team declares he's sadist who gets off on watching the attacks happen right in front of him. He may even record them...

The team has now figured out at least one of the next two victims, because only two people have been reported missing in a ten-mile radius of the hunting ground in the past month. One of them being a 42-year-old stay at home mom, Liz Foley and the other is a 21-year-old college student, Chris Blythewood.

_____

Later, the team was having no luck in finding the unsub. They got many options, but they all didn't fit the profile or just didn't seem like the killer type. Garcia then calls the team with some information about a little boy years ago. The little boy, Hunter Cunningham, got rabies fifteen years ago, but was checked out of the hospital and never had a death certificate filed.

"What about his family?" Natalie asks, waiting for an answer from Garcia on the other line. Garcia states that the father, Patrick, died 6 years ago from a massive heart attack and the mother, Wanda, works as a bartender at the tropicana hotel in Vegas. "Any siblings?" JJ wonders which Garcia confirms that Hunter has an older brother David Wade Cunningham.

"Any information about him?" Natalie asks as she adjusts herself in her seat. "Uh... ay chihuahua" Garcia states, making everyone knit their eyebrows in confusion before Garcia finishes her sentence.

"He works at Nasse pest control, which specializes in dangerous animal removal, and you don't even have to ask me. Home and work address is sent!" Garcia states and the team drops what they're doing and gets ready to head to his work and home.

The team busts into the killer's apartment, only to find it empty. "I think it's safe to say this guy is single" JJ jokes and Natalie scoffs as she looks around the home and how empty it is.

"You think?" Natalie questions before she meets the rest of the team in the hallway as they look around the apartment as well, trying to figure out how David spends his time and how he lives his life and it's obviously not that great.

"Look at this" Reid points out, the team hovering over him by a bookshelf that holds books about Rabies. "Whoa" Natalie says as she pulls more books off the bookshelf and every single book has the world rabies on them.

"I don't know, you think we got the right guy?" Derek sighs before Natalie sets the books back in their rightful place.

Hours later, the team continues to search David's apartment, along with a team of forensics and other officers. Derek explains that the killer was fired from his last two jobs in the pest control field. Possibly for stealing, since he's got plenty of work gear in his closet.

"This could be how he acquired his first sample of the rabies virus" Derek declares which Natalie nods her head in agreement, "On his job" Natalie agrees.

"The acquisition of the virus may have been the trigger itself" Reid states before JJ wanders to the with a box of items in her hand. They come across photographic evidence of the little brother dying of rabies at home, and an audio tape that David made of the dying process.

_____

Later on in the day, Hotch and Rossi talk about how the dump site was near where the killer's family camped during his youth-perhaps it was there that he was bitten by a bat. They then suggest that the little brother might even be buried out there. Them two and the rest of the team get word that a woman at a coffee shop is foaming at the mouth and attacking people at random.

The team drives in two separate cars and find out the women has now moved to a park. It seems Natalie, JJ, Reid and Derek were closer after leaving David's house and were making their way quickly.

They arrive at the park and hear children and parents screaming. They see a woman wandering around the park cluelessly with foam pouring out of her mouth. Natalie squints her eyes a bit before she gets a view of the womens face, "That's Liz Foley" Natalie recognizes before Derek stops the car and four of them quickly get out and rush through the park until they get to the women but keep their distance.

"Liz Foley! Stay right there!" Natalie shouts as JJ and Reid gather everyone out of the park. Liz continues to stop towards Natalie and Derek, despite them asking her multiple times to stop.

"Ma'am! Stay right where you are!" Derek shouts but it's as if Liz doesn't understand a single, they are saying and refuses to stop. She keeps asking about someone but since the team doesn't even understand her, she wasn't getting through to anyone.

Natalie and the rest of the team quickly pulled out their guns but with no intention to shoot. Natalie looked at Liz before scanning her eyes down to her leg. If she wasn't going to stop, someone had to make her stop.

Natalie pulled the trigger of her gun and watched Liz Foley fall to the ground. She shot Liz in the thigh and made sure to shoot her where it wouldn't do any permanent damage.

Natalie immediately requested for medics before her and JJ ran to Liz and tried there best to keep her calm and reassured before the paramedics arrived.

Natalie sighs as she looks at Liz being put into an ambulance, knowing she's not going to make it anyway. "You did the right thing" Reid reassures as he stands beside Natalie, gently patting her shoulder.

"Is there really nothing they can do for her?" Natalie asks, looking to Reid who shakes his head. "Besides keep her comfortable" Reid states as he watches Natalie watch the ambulance drive away.

He knew Natalie felt bad, but Natalie also knew there was no other way and at least the shot she sent to her leg didn't do any real damage. Maybe that's the only reassurance Natalie needed.

The team then figures Liz could have only walked a couple of miles in this state, which is pretty reasonable, so Garcia looks for large, isolated properties where the killer could be holding people. She finds an abandoned animal control facility, and the team is off.

_____

Over at the control facility, the team is outside, and they decide they can't wait five minutes for a SWAT team to arrive. Hotch breaks the team up into two groups and they proceed to make their way through the facility to try and find David. Natalie kicks open a door and looks around in the small storage room, finding nothing but cleaning supplies. She makes her way out of the room and into the hallway with Derek and JJ.

The three of them enter into a room seeing David and one of his victims. David makes a run for it and Derek fires two shots but with David turning a corner, he misses. "Come on!" Derek urges as he and Natalie run after him, guns in their hands. They lose him in a hallway and don't know which room he could be in.

"Just come out, we've got you surrounded" Derek calls out before Natalie checks one of the rooms and turns around and is immediately tackled to the ground.

Natalie fires two shots but misses since she had no line of sight. "Ugh!" Natalie groans as she hears David start up his electrical stick. Natalie's vision becomes clearer and she sees David has a helmet on his head and gear on his body so it was clear she wasn't going to get through that.
David placed his hand around Natalie's neck which gave Natalie the opportunity to bite his arm as hard as she can.

"Ah!" David shouted out before Natalie kneed him where the sun doesn't shine and roughly pushed David off of her and began crawl backwards towards her gun which had fallen out of her hands.

David went to attack Natalie again, but 4 shots fired and each one of them were from Natalie's gun. David had a vest on underneath his jumpsuit, but he was still able to get hit and become weak.

Derek and Reid rushed into the room, seeing David on the ground. Reid kicks away the electrical stick that was near David and looks down at him, his gun pointing at him.

Natalie catches her breath before Reid rushes over and helps her too her feet. David groans in pain, obviously not dead and Derek bends down and immediately places handcuffs around his wrist.

"Nice shot" Derek compliments, looking to Natalie who nods her head thankfully before clearing her throat roughly.

_____

The next day, Natalie runs out to the track where she sees Reid and Garcia stretching before their run. "Hey! I thought long and hard about helping you guys and I thought... why not?!" Natalie states and Garcia claps her hands before she and Reid stand up, excited to have Natalie helping them.

"Oh, but I brought a friend- you guys may know him" Natalie says as she jokingly nudges Garcia's arm. "What- who?" Garcia questions before a man with a hoodie on over his head starts walking out to meet them.

"Ugh, he just looks like a douche bag- I'm not friends with douche bags" Garcia voices before the hoodie comes off and it is revealed to be Derek. "Oh, no!" Reid shrieks while Natalie has a bright smile on her face.

"You know, I was just starting to like you" Garcia says as she shakes her head sadly. "Thought you guys could use some help!" Derek cheers as he claps his hands together jokingly while Garcia and Reid groan in annoyance.

Natalie looks to Derek and secretly gives him a high five before the entraining starts. Derek yells and works them to their last breath. Natalie helps a little bit even though she was having a bit of a laugh.

At the end of the training, Garcia and Reid seemed practically dead and could barely move a muscle. Natalie busted out laughing and shook her head, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry" Natalie says while Reid and Garcia look to her with confusion spread across their face.

"For what?" Reid asks breathlessly while shielding his eyes from the bright sun. "Okay, okay. I already got you guys excused from the fitness test, but Natalie had to be the one to tell me you guys needed help, so we came up with a plan to make you guys suffer" Derek admits while Garcia and Reid's jaws drop to the floor.

"How could you?!" Garcia shrieks as she stands to her feet, walking towards Natalie who holds her hands up in surrender.

"It- It was funny!" Natalie cheers before Garcia gently tackles her on the football field while Reid does the same to Derek. "You were supposed to be the good sister!" Garcia jokes and hits Natalie playfully while Reid does the same to Derek.

"May the flowers remind us why the rain was so necessary"
-Xan Oku-