Annie Danzi, thirty, was home alone with her young son when the unsub struck. He left the son alive and didn't harm him physically. The news is all over this even when you get to Annie's house. They're concerned that since this is the second home invasion since the blackouts started, it's connected to the homicides. JJ didn't confirm, obviously, but that's not going to stop them from speculating that it is.
You walk to the front door and sigh. Adam is waiting for you by the door while Matt is inside with Annie's son, Carter.
"This has all the same tricks as the last one."
"Was there forced entry?"
"No."
"Were there rolling blackouts last summer?"
"Just about every year. Crime always goes up when it gets hot and dark but nothing like this has ever happened."
"Hunting in the dark is definitely a part of his signature." Hotch takes out his phone and calls Pen. "Garcia. I need you to check if there were any clusters of home invasions in previous summers during rolling blackouts in California. Look statewide."
"He left a message this time."
You walk inside the bedroom and immediately look away from the bed. It's bloody and missing a body but you can see her as if she's real and right in front of you. On the wall written in her blood is "HELLO THER". Why he didn't finish the word 'there' is beyond you. You turn away from the bed only to come face to face with the unsub. You gasp and stare into his sickly green eyes that have loads of bags under them. Some parts of his face are blurry but he's a big son of a bitch.
"Are you okay?"
You blink once and the unsub is gone.
"Yeah," you whisper. "Do you think he's welcoming us?"
"Who knows? At least he's telling us more with each crime scene. He's uneducated, angry, and sadistic, and he trashes the place even though there's not much to steal. He chooses to hunt and kill in the dark. He doesn't want to be seen. Why?"
"Maybe he's ashamed of something?" Emily asks. She picks up the photos on the nightstand of Annie and her son. "He certainly didn't have to knock these over."
"He doesn't want eyes on him except for the child. He wanted him to see everything."
You look at the bed and wince when you see Annie is still there. You leave the bedroom and join Matt and Derek who are sitting with Carter in the kitchen. He's playing with something on the table, and you look over his shoulder to see a clay monster.
"What do you have there? Is that a robot?"
"It's a monster," he says in a quiet voice.
"Monster, huh? What's it doing?" Derek asks.
"It's protecting you, isn't it?"
"It's gonna make the man stay away."
"Did you happen to get a look at that man?--"
"Derek," you whisper but he ignores you.
"He moved me to the closet. My mom told me to close my eyes."
"Would you mind showing me how you did that?" Carter puts both hands over his eyes so they are completely covered. "That's good, kid. That's really, really good. So, you didn't see him at all?" He shakes his head. "Once that man left, what did you do? Did you get back under the bed?"
"I didn't want to leave her," he sniffles.
"Hey, Carter, do you have, like, a really cool backpack you could throw some things in to take over to your cousin's house?"
"It's in my room. Will you come with me?"
"You bet," Matt smiles.
Carter takes his clay monster with him but Derek stops Matt before he can follow.
"Look, I'm really glad the kid didn't see anything, but it could have been helpful."
"Covering his eyes like that means he couldn't cover his ears."
"I'm going to head back to the station."
"Okay," Derek nods.
That kid has been through enough so you decide to leave him alone. It doesn't take a genius to figure out the profile for this guy so it's best to announce it to LAPD now so you can start to look for this man.
"Forcing a child to witness this is clearly sadistic. He destroyed the boy's innocence and took away his childhood. This probably mirrors the unsub's own experience," Hotch starts.
"That's an excuse for what he's doing?" an officer scoffs.
"There's no excuse for what he's doing. We're not justifying anything. Everything he says and everything he does tells us what makes him tick, that's all. The message that he left us was misspelled which says that he is not well-educated."
"Why did he leave one now?" Adam asks.
"We don't know," you answer. "Just because his recent attacks are in Los Angeles doesn't mean he's from here. Killing in the dark is a must for him. We believe that's why he's come to LA. His willingness to kill random people tells us that he's an opportunistic offender, and these types are incredibly difficult to predict."
"As you all know, the rolling blackouts have been announced so residents can prepare for the few hours they'll be in darkness. Unfortunately, that also tells the killer whose windows will be open and whose alarms will be disarmed," JJ says.
"The dark is his signature. It's a habit, and we'll find that he's always killed this way."
"Because he's a coward," an officer scoffs.
"To some degree, yes. He also has intimacy issues. He even turns photographs away from himself. It's unlikely that a man like this has been in any kind of relationship. There's also a good chance that he has some type of shortcoming, whether real or perceived. He's obviously self-conscious about something."
"Like what?" Adam asks.
"It could be like a physical deformity. It might be something really small to us but means everything to him," Spencer answers. "Having one thing that sets him apart from the norm could be what led him into the extreme solitude of a violent schizoid personality. He takes his victims' power away, literally and figuratively, and he feeds off of making them powerless."
"We had rolling blackouts all last summer, and this guy wasn't around," Adam points out.
"Well, he is now, and based on the vicious nature of his crimes, the press has named him the Prince of Darkness," JJ sighs. "He's gonna be all over the news."
"Yeah, that will do nothing for his ego," you say sarcastically.
"Once we unravel his need for darkness, we'll find him."
You call Derek once the profile briefing is done and he answers on the second ring.
"Yeah, Y/N? What's the plan?"
"Rolling blackouts are still scheduled for tonight."
"How is LAPD gonna patrol it?"
"With the number of calls they've been getting, they're stretched thin already. I don't know."
"They gotta cancel it."
"That's the battle. If they do that, the whole city could go dark if the power grid gets overwhelmed."
"Yeah, you're right. That's not gonna work. LAPD's outnumbered ten thousand to one. Keep me posted."
Matt doesn't want to question Carter again but Derek is persistent that they do. With the cognitive interviews you give, Carter might remember something he doesn't realize he knows. You hate it and you wish you could keep Carter from it but Derek's right. If it will help catch the man, you have to try anything. Matt is so against it because he, too, lost both his parents when he was young to a drunk driver. Matt wasn't in the car but he replays that over and over in his head and blames himself because he was sick and they were racing to come get him from his friend's house. He thinks Carter is going to do the same.
Derek lost his father when he was nine. He was shot and killed right in front of him. Like Matt and Carter, there was nothing he could have done. The difference between Matt and Derek is that Derek looks at it like this: some people in our lives are bad and good but they all shape us. That's why he and Matt wear badges. They do good because of the bad.
"How's Carter?" you ask when Derek and Matt return.
"He's quiet."
"Is it too soon for an interview?"
"Yeah, I want to find this guy before we have to put the kid through it," Matt answers.
"Guys, Garcia has something," Emily says. You gather in the conference room where Pen is on speakerphone from the desk phone. "Go ahead."
"Everybody needs to sit down because I'm about to rock your world, and not in the way I like to do it. I have scoured and searched, and you were totally right. This unsub has been doing it forever. There is nowhere he hasn't been in the last twenty-six years. Honestly. Every single state. He is the worst I've ever seen, and we have all seen some things."
"How did you connect him?" Hotch asks.
"Everything you said. He's drawn to the dark. He shows up during a blackout. He robs. He kills. He leaves a witness. The reason why he's been getting away with this is because he never hits the same city twice except Los Angeles. I'm sending everything your way, and you better load up that printer because it looks like he started in Southern California way back in the summer of 1984."
"Thank God the press hasn't connected this," JJ sighs.
"The summer Olympics were in Los Angeles that year," Derek says.
"So was Richard Ramirez." He was the original Night Stalker. "That's the year he started."
"It appears our unsub started that summer during a blackout in San Diego. From there, he went to Orange County. After that, he ended up in Los Angeles and worked his way up the coast."
"Why did he come back and why now?" you ask.
This guy does not give himself a break. Right after dusk and before the rolling blackouts, there is news of another murder. This time, the unsub left behind an infant to witness the horrors. You pray and hope that this doesn't leave lasting effects on the child as she grows up. Matt and Adam left for the crime scene while you hung back with your team.
"Everyone will have power tonight," Hotch announces.
"They called off the blackouts?"
"After what happened, we can't give him that again."
"Great. I'll tell the press," JJ says.
"I can't believe this," you scoff. "We're talking over two hundred houses in twenty-six years."
"When he started in San Diego, it was all about the robberies. By the time he got to Orange County, he robbed and assaulted his victims. The first murder was in Long Beach, and he left a witness."
"He got away with it for twenty-six years. Why did he come back?"
"The media coverage actually helped. Neighbors were hypervigilant. As soon as they heard the gun, they called the police."
Adam and Matt come back with solemn looks on their faces.
"Did he leave a message this time?" Rossi asks.
"He actually left a baby in the closet. There's got to be some kind of message in that," Adam answers.
"He's taunting us. He's leaving behind witnesses that are too little to help," Matt groans in frustration.
"Okay, why them? Why now? He killed the first two women before the rolling blackouts. What is it about them? He killed them in a busy, well-lit area. It was nothing like the others," you say.
"That's Newton for you. People hear gunshots all the time down there. He probably fit right in."
"It was in your division," you say to Matt.
"He had to start somewhere, right?"
"Do you think that's a coincidence?"
"Say it's not. What does that mean? Did he want our attention?"
"He certainly has it."
"Are you sure you never worked anything like this before?" Derek asks Matt and Adam.
"We'd know if we did. Trust me, this guy makes an impression."
"He started his career twenty-six years ago," Hotch says.
"That's the same as me. Do you think this is because of me? That all these people are dead because of that?" Adam asks.
"Two women were killed in your division with no survivors. Then a couple, leaving the wife as a witness. Then a mother, leaving the son. Now two parents, but a baby survives."
"If there's some kind of pattern, I've never seen it before," Adam shrugs.
"He circled back to LA for a reason. The first two murders in LA were close by. Long Beach is on the cusp of LA and Orange County."
"Let's look into that one," Rossi says.
Spencer grabs the file and reads it.
"This one is a home invasion. The husband was shot and the wife was left alive."
"What's the next one?"
Derke grabs a file and starts to read it.
"After Long Beach, he went to Santa Monica." He pauses and looks at Matt. "Wait a minute. Spicer, do you have family out there?"
"Yeah, that's where I grew up."
"This is a home invasion robbery, double homicide. Joe and Sylvia Spicer were killed."
That immediately catches Matt's attention.
"Those are my parents. It doesn't make any sense. Let me see that." He takes the file from Derek and reads it to himself. "No, they died in a car accident by a drunk driver."
"Who told you that?" you ask.
"My grandparents. I remember my grandfather waking me up. I was sick the night they died. I had a fever. How would I not remember that happening to them?"
"Maybe your grandparents never told you, Matt. They were trying to protect you," Adam says.
"They lied?" he whispers emotionally.
"You were the first child this unsub left alive. You've been all over the news. He knows exactly who you are."