Criminal minds reboot in 20 years:
(CW: covid-19, pseudo-psychology a la the show which actually has nothing to do with how people's brains actually work, serial killing mention)
Reid: Wait, hotch, look at this. You know how the victims hands and the area around their mouths we incredibly clean compared to the rest of the bodies? What does the area of clean skin around the mouth look like to you?
Hotch: A mask, Reid, but we already knew that.
Reid (gaining speed): Yes, but more specifically, a surgical mask. A bandanna or just a random cloth would have had a more irregular outline, more dirt would have gotten in around the sides-- combine that with the cotton fibers we found in the first victims hair, and the thread under her fingernails... hotch, I think the unsub is using a homemade tshirt mask
Reid: Guys, I think we profiled this all wrong. The unsub isn't trying to use forensic countermeasures or protect herself from the victims, i think she's trying to protect the victims themselves
Hotch: Yes her. Reid realized that the silhouette of the mask, combined with the cotton fibers and thread from the first victim, reveal the the unsub was using homemade tshirt masks
Rossi (realizing): The 2020 coronavirus outbreak
Prentiss (leaning forward, realizing): And it was primarily women making masks for families. Add that to the level of protective care she displays for the victims, and the unsub profiles as a woman.
Morgan: she probably lost someone during the outbreak. Maybe she feels guilty, maybe she brought the virus home, or thinks she did, and now she is trying to save that person over and over again.
Random head cop guy: do you know how many people aged 20-30 lost someone during that outbreak?
Rossi: wait a minute, I think we have this all wrong. We profiled that the unsub is around 40 because of the age of the victims, but if she is recreating an event from 20 years ago when she was in college, she would be attacking young adults. But who would have been particularly affected by the death of a 40 year old woman in her life during the coronavirus outbreak? To the point where habits formed at the time would become an all-encompassing compulsion?
Prentiss (closes her eyes): a child
Hotch: we're ready to give the profile.
Morgan: our unsub is a woman in her late twenties to early thirties who lost her mother during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic. We think she might have been responsible for her mother contracting the virus, or at least she believes she was.
Reid: the unsub is forcing her victims to wear homemade face masks and to wash their hands over and over, to the point where their hands are raw. She does this because she was around 8 or 9 during the pandemic, the age when we first start learning and forming long-lasting habits. She grew up in terror of the virus.
Rossi: Once the victim starts showing any signs of illness, coughing, difficulty breathing, fever, she kills them to prevent what she perceives as their suffering
Cop with brain cells (oxymoron, I know): but why would they start showing symptoms of COVID? It's not the season for it, and we have government mandated vaccines.
Prentiss: they aren't showing actual symptoms of covid. Wearing a mask that hardly ever gets changed? In a basement full of dust or mold? With little to no food and water because you have to keep the mask on? A cough or fever isn't unlikely.
Hotch: we believe that the recent COVID-19 documentary was the trigger.
CWBC: that was released several months ago. What would cause that delay?
Hotch: since the unsub is so young, we believe that they most likely streamed the documentary when it was released on Netflix two months ago, shortly before the first killings.
Morgan: You should look for women who recently and abruptly stopped going out with friends or to public gathering places, becoming hostile to any friends who try to invite her out. She's taken sudden time off work, possibly sick leave, but more likely she simply stopped showing up.
Rossi: also look at women who are a part of sewing circles or other practical skills groups. It's likely she strove to develop these skills in the event of another pandemic.
This was beamed directly into my brain and written in 30 min. Please excuse the lazy formatting!
