Chapter 47

I had a delicious, kind of angsty idea just before this. I think I can make a good point while having a fantastic Rossi and Spencer moment. It won't come for a little bit.

Hermione rested her cup of decaf on her round stomach. The delegates had been welcoming each other for over an hour now. Thankfully, Kingsley had arranged for her to have a seat during the social hour. It was driving her a little crazy that she couldn't enter a conversation without it revolving around the pregnancy. Her stomach literally protruded into every conversation. She had wanted to make a close enough acquaintance with one of the witches or wizards from the Kenyan delegation that she could ask polite questions about learning spell casting wandlessly. Hermione had been reading up on it and was interested in starting the twins on basic protective and daily spells using hand magic. She was decent at it, but she had to work at it; it wasn't intuitive to her though. Maybe she could get a tutor….

Was she academically nesting? She had happily mocked Spencer for the now overflowing matching bookshelves, but how was what she was doing any different?

Hermione shuffled through the cards in her purse again. The presentation was already etched into her memory. The facts were on her side and they had a new angle. The third time Hermione had insisted on rehearsing the presentation for Kingsley, he had brought up and interesting point.

("You were once accused of starting a child army, Ms. Granger." Kingsley had leaned back in his chair and crossed his legs. Whenever he was impressed with her, he called her Ms. Granger. "Do you suspect that you will be accused of that a second time?"

Hermione stopped in her tracks for a moment, confused. She looked from her visual aid to Kingsley and back. "You think the Federation will see us training the country's youth as an act of aggression?"

"Not aggression, but it will increase our number of battle-trained and united wizarding population astronomically. The fact that you went to our most populous allies first with this would support that. The Colony Coalition is already the most powerful by a debatable margin, this will almost mandate that the other nations need to employ this practice lest they become irrelevant."

"That isn't sound logic. A few mighty men can destroy a troupe of a hundred averages."

"Strength in numbers is instinct." Kingsley countered. "As for a few mighty, when was the last time Spencer's Security Council consulted Singapore?"

"For the thousandth time, please stop referring to all Muggle things as property of my husband." Hermione said absent mindedly. She was staring back at her board, thinking about how to emphasize that point that she hadn't considered. "How far towards threatening would you advise going here?"

"Well, Potter is still pretty well in your pocket and is internationally regarded as the most gifted dueler to this day, even if you and I know that the title may go to his wife or mother-in-law if a competition was held. It wouldn't be implausible to suggest that he may guest teach in upper level classes."

Hermione grinned. She should suggest that. Harry had always adored school, honestly maybe more than she had. He might be inclined to do just what Kingsley was suggesting she imply.)

Eventually Kingsley escorted her to their seats in the International Federation Sanctuary and she was allowed to temporarily sit in a different seat. She was trying hard not to be completely overwhelmed by where she was. Not only was she attending a meeting of the International Federation as Kingsley's Deputy (and he was only allowed one), but though they were being polite, people were staring at her. Maybe they were staring at her belly, the theory that power increased with pregnancies was global, or maybe it was because of what Kingsley had said weeks earlier: they thought she, who granted was a former rebellion leader, may be planning on increasing Britain's influence further.

Hermione was reassured by six different delegates that she could sit to give her presentation when the time came, but she managed to swat them and all of their offered chairs away. Just like Spencer had told her to, she gave the presentation to Kingsley in the first row just as she had done five times before. At the very end, after the predictable questions were fielded, Hermione let herself look around her and marvel in the gravity of what she was doing. There were over six hundred recognized sovereign nations in the global wizarding community. The more relevant nations were seated on the ground floor, the stories of tables and seats stretching ten stories high, nearly all around her. And they were nervous. Even the Russian sub sects were wiggling in their seats. Hermione couldn't help but feel like a prodigious child again. People weren't as impressed by her feats anymore now that she was an adult, but every so often, there was a change in the air when she performed advanced magic or came to a conclusion, the change when someone acknowledged that this might be beyond what people normally meant by 'smart'.

Spencer hadn't been able to identify the change when she had mentioned it, but they had come to the conclusion had it happened to him so often that he actually felt the inverse with Hermione, Blake, and some experts he had met: a warmness of appreciation from someone who could keep up.

It was certainly not warm here. No one would believe that she had only recently considered that this would strengthen Wizarding Britain as a military power. Given the size of her belly, some may have even taken that as reason to be wary. It was global knowledge that she was already powerful and now pregnant with twins, which could be seen as a personal grab for an increase in magical power. For just a moment, Hermione was alright with people thinking she was after world domination if the nations present began educating all of their children to hold her off.

After the presentation, people weren't staring at her belly. They were glancing at her face, wondering what the caption or epithet would be underneath her photograph in history textbooks.

Hermione was still on a success high when she arrived back at Ginny's house to get ready for the reception later that day. She wasn't sure why she was nervous. They weren't saying vows or making any kind of toast. Maybe this is how she would have felt before if she had a traditional, big, formal wedding.

Hermione had known she would be heavily pregnant at the reception, so she had picked a dress with a waistline halfway up her ribs with a flowing skirt draping down over her stomach. She had gone back and forth on wearing a white dress since it would be obvious the symbol of virginity would be a contradiction to her body, but she had decided that even if people found it ironic, she did look good in white.

Spencer fiddled with his bow tie. He wondered if Hermione was feeling oddly nervous as well. She had called his just to say the presentation had been received as she had hoped, but it had been a quick call. He thought it likely Ginny had hung up the phone for her. Spencer was a little nervous about the 'first dance', but it was hard to look stupid slow dancing with a woman who was so pregnant. No one would expect much more than swaying.

Between Rossi, Mrs. Weasley, and Ginny, the happy couple had done almost none of the planning themselves. As promised, the party was in the garden of Rossi's mansion. The wizarding folk had been put under the strictest, most urgent instruction to refrain from using magic, to which they had all begrudgingly agreed. Despite that, Hermione noticed that the purple vining flowers Mrs. Weasley had picked to lay over the tables and string over the dance floor were a magical mutation of Wysteria. Their pollen that moved through the air, just a shade too yellow, was known to cause giddiness instead of sneezing and runny eyes.

Without ceremony, Hermione and Spencer met in Rossi's foyer. All of their friends and family were waiting for them outside besides Harry, who was hovering at the back door, waiting to announce them. Hermione couldn't recall if she had ever seen Spencer dressed this well. She might have to find more places to take him where the dress code was black tie.

That may have been the third trimester libido push talking. Oh the irony that the first time she had really felt like sex in eight months she was almost to big to logistically do anything about it.

Spencer realized he might have forgotten how lucky he was when he saw Hermione in her dress. She looked like a Greco-Roman goddess in the flowing white dress. Between the cravings and the obsessive nesting, he had gotten desensitized to the privilege it was to be the one who had put Hermione in this position and to be the one who got to help her through it.

"Wow."

"Right back at you."

Together they walked outside to a small, cheering crowd of loved ones. They swayed to an old wizarding song that was much more about love for hundreds of years than anything magically revealing. Spencer had come to love the song because it solidified the concept that he may be able to live three lifetimes by Hermione's side. He was vaguely aware of Luna buzzing around the perimeter of the dance floor, taking photographs. At the final swell of the song, Spencer bent way, way down and grabbed Hermione around her thighs before hoisting her up in the air, so high that his head only came even with her sternum. He had to lean back to balance with her belly, but he could lean forward to plant a kiss on her stomach. He heard her laugh and felt one of her hands bracing against his arm, the other on his head. From behind his closed eyes, he could see the flash of green light that was Luna's strange camera.

The rest of the night was exactly what everyone there had hoped it would be. That is, except for Mrs. Weasley, who had still hoped that she could wriggle the Wizarding Wedding vows out of the couple.

Spencer had gotten grief all week for the large photo Luna had snapped at the wedding reception that now lived on his desk, but every time he just buckled down and insisted that they were just jealous. He had already had to launch an investigation of who kept leaving greasy fingerprints on the glass, but Prentiss had stopped him from fingerprinting everyone in the office. He had gotten the prints of the other BAU agents, which meant that it had to be Bill, Melvina, or one of the other filing assistants or interns. Bill had fled the room and Melvina had gone scarlet at the implication that they were picking up his picture and getting it dirty because they had a crush on him or on his wife.

Three more copies of the picture were scattered throughout the couple's lives: an equally large picture in Hermione's office, a tiny copy next to a tiny ultrasound in Spencer's wallet, and a more dramatically lit version hung over the fireplace of the house, now ready for the twins. It was a light, sometimes the only light he got all day, within the creeping darkness that came with the case material at the BAU.

It was a simple, straight forward light until the team got off the elevator after a case. Then it got to be a much more complicated, confusing light.

Simmons and Alvez were the first ones off the elevator and they both noticed two things immediately: first, Bill was pushing through the glass doors and went completely white when he saw them and two, he was badly hiding a thin box or a file under his coat. Their tactical training kicked in at the same moment and cornered the willowy twenty-something.

"What do you have there, Bill?" Alvez asked with a casualness that didn't match his posture.

"Nothing, I really need to get going, I have er-" Bill tried to unsuccessfully to slip between Alvez and Simmons who both stopped him. That was by far enough time for the rest of the team to realize their was a situation and as they crowded around the two agents now restraining the intern, Spencer's new framed wedding photo slipped out of his jacket to have the glass shatter on the floor. Spencer's mind froze for a second before both of the thin long haired men jumped into action.

Bill let himself fall as dead weight to slip through the agents' arms and sweep the photo off the floor from among the glass shards. Spencer lunged at where Bill had just been and took off after Bill as he went to the stairs faster than he looked capable of. JJ and Emily went after Spencer, but the door of the stairs slammed shut after him and seemed to stick. The women yanked and yanked at the door, but all the could do was watch through the window as Reid launched himself off the top of the first flight of stairs to the first landing below them. The whole team heard the sounds of bodies colliding and rolling around.

The team had the most impatient elevator ride down to the lower floor the team had ever had. They rushed to the stairs entrance in the Sex Crimes unit and managed to all crowd up the landing closest to their floor, guns drawn. The guns didn't do much good when they reached the pair, still mostly wrestling on the floor, the photo dropped a few stairs up. Emily was the first there and the first to understand the whole situation.

She had known Reid for more than a decade but with both of the tall, thin men rolling around, both wearing black suits and Bill's brown curly hair pulled out of the trademark knot, she couldn't tell who was who. She looked for Spencer's watch on a wrist only to find that both men were wearing identical watches.

From the solid mass of black suit material, Emily could make out Spencer growling to Bill about getting near Hermione or who sent him and Bill telling him he didn't mean anything and yelling to let him go. The staircase wasn't wide enough for more than Emily and JJ to see the situation clearly. As JJ was about to get on the floor with them when Reid got the upperhand, pinning Bill under him and slugging him once across the face.

"Wait, wait," Bill said through the blood in his mouth. "My name isn't Bill."

"I guessed that you bastard." Reid hit him across the jaw again.

"Well I know I'm not that." 'Bill' quipped. "Just stop for one, one second and ask me my name." His smart mouth was showing off.

Spencer didn't ask him, but he paused with his fist cocked back again. Slowly 'Bill' went for a chain around his neck as he spoke matter of factly. "Sebastian Spencer William Reid." He had produced what Spencer recognized as a time turner in his hand that had the Gemini tattoo on it.

Reid and Prentiss, who was close enough to hear, froze for a moment while the processors in their brains worked. It was enough of a gap for Sebastian to kick his father off of him into JJ and Emily and grab the picture again. "We lost this in an accident, Mom is kinda a mess, I just need this, I know you have copies." He made it up the stairs and through the doorway.

Even disoriented, Spencer knew it was true. He couldn't help but see how similar Bill, no Sebastian looked to him now when he took the illusioned watch off. The kid was telling the truth. Spencer also knew that there was probably no chance that Simmons and Rossi, rushing after him, would be able to find a trace of him. Sure enough, they shut down the elevator and swept the BAU to come up with nothing.

He had tried not to drink once Hermione couldn't, but he let Emily serve him something at her apartment that night.

Hey…it's been a little while. Still the longest I've gone between updates. I;m going to try to finish this relatively soon, but I'm already back at university and this takes time. Between a sport, 2 jobs, running 2 clubs, a bf, and having female friends, I don't have much free time for this. Please don't be shocked if updates are much shorter or much much farther between from now on. I think three months of relative consistency is respectable.