Re: Derek/John
John smiled and shook his head. "I didn't say you saw me that way, but that you're responsible for making me feel that way. And, whether you see me that way or not, I'm taking that role now because someone has to look after you and I'm not the same fifteen year old kid you took for ice cream. Not that I wasn't taking care of you then, either." He had his own demons. Maybe they weren't the kind to trap him in the past the way Derek's had and maybe they weren't as bad. But, Derek bleeding out on his kitchen table was always going to be one of John's demons. "See, it doesn't work that way. I'm not going to just stop worrying. I'm always going to worry about you. I'm going to worry when you go out on a mission, be that here or at home, and I'm going to worry when you're upset and I'm going to worry when things like this happen."
Shifting around, John moved so he could sit side by side with Derek. He bumped shoulders with him. "I love you, too, Derek. And I'm not letting you go on like this. You can't just brush this off. You can't...you can't just shrug and say 'you'll either live or you'll get killed'. It sounds like you don't even care. And there are things that can be done. I don't know what, exactly, but we have access to things here we wouldn't at home. I can talk to Mike. He was BAU like Morgan and Emily. Maybe he knows something we can do.
"And, if you won't consider it for yourself, consider it for your team. I'm not...I"m not going to be who I was supposed to be. Too much has changed and, maybe that's for the better, I don't know. We're working without a blueprint now. No prior knowledge to mess with our heads, just good old-fashioned willpower. But, I think I do know a little something about a team after all this time. And, you need their trust if they're going to follow you. You followed him because he saved your brother, you felt you owed him. But, I don't think you really trusted him. If you did, you wouldn't have taken matters into your own hands with Andy Goode. You felt you owed him, but in a way, he betrayed you, betrayed that trust by taking her in.
"I know this was an accident. You didn't mean to hurt Travis. And maybe Connor didn't mean to hurt you, looking further ahead than anyone could see. But, you shot a member of your team. You can't just go on as if nothing happened, not now when their trust in you is shaken. If you don't do something, don't at least try to find a way to lessen the flashbacks, you're going to lose some of them. You told me once the people were waiting for Connor to be human. That applies here, too. They need to see that you care, that you recognize what happened and are doing your best to keep it from happening again."