AS ACCUSTOMED TO WAKING UP AT ODD HOURS AS SPENCER AND KATHARINE WERE, this was entirely new. In fact, Katharine couldn't remember the last time that someone had physically come to their door at three in the morning.

Though, it wasn't like Katharine was sleeping when Bucky Barnes swung by. She'd been up, her sleep having been plagued by nightmares of the alien kind. In fact, she'd just been playing with Spencer's hair as she contemplated "what if the aliens had torn me apart?" when their doorbell rang.

Cautiously, Katharine got out of bed. She grabbed the gun she kept hidden behind the television in their room and made her way to the front door. She didn't turn on any of the lights and kept her footsteps light, passing the kitchen and finally arriving at the door. She turned the knob and opened it slightly.

Upon realizing that it was her friend Bucky Barnes who stood in front of her and not some random assassin sent to kill her, she tucked her weapon into the band of her sweatpants and invited him in. Still suspicious, as always, Katharine did a quick street check before closing the door. She'd have to invest in a new security system soon. Most likely one that included a camera by her front door.

"Not that I don't love having you over, Buck," she said, locking the front door, "but you couldn't have come at a more socially appropriate time? When the sun was up, maybe?"

She flicked on the living room light, inviting him to sit on a couch while she disappeared into the kitchen to grab him a water bottle. Katharine also poured a glass of strawberry juice for herself, having made a pitcher upon returning from their last case at Spencer's insistence. Something about the immune system and helping the baby.

"Sorry," he apologized, taking the water bottle from her. Katharine settled herself into the armchair facing him, pulling the knitted blanket over her frame. "But it was either now or never. Sam and I are leaving at five for Romania."

Katharine furrowed her brows. Romania...? Why would they be going there? She voiced her concerns, asking why they would be going so far away for training.

He avoided her eyes, instead, taking a sip of water and allowing the silence between them to stew. "We're not going there for training," he revealed to her, twisting the bottle between his hands. "There's been a lead on Nina and we were going to follow it."

Katharine blinked. There was a lead on Nina, and they were just going to follow it without telling her? She took a sip of her juice, biting the inside of her cheek as she tried to think about what to say back to him.

"We didn't want to tell you at first because we didn't want to get your hopes up," he explained. "But I thought you deserved to know."

"That and you didn't want me tagging along with you guys, right?" she accused. She searched his eyes and realized that what she had said was the truth. Sam and Bucky didn't want her to help search for Nina with them. The truth hurt a bit before she realized they most likely had her best interests at heart. She shouldn't really be running around Europe with a baby on the way, seeing her run around the United States was already enough to give Spencer a heart attack.

There was movement in the back of the house, Bucky's response freezing in the back of his throat as they listened to Spencer leaving Katharine and his shared bedroom. The duo sat in silence as her husband came into the living room, squinting due to the lighting difference. His hair was sticking up from when she had been playing with it, defying gravity as it often did. He also had his glasses on, which made Katharine's heart do loops. She had to admit, her husband in glasses did something to her.

"Babe, are you coming back to--" he stopped in his tracks, noticing that they had company-- "Oh, hey, Bucky. Didn't know you decided to stop by. Do you guys want me to...?"

He pointed back to their bedroom behind him. Katharine shook her head, standing from the armchair and draping the blanket back over the seat. She kept her juice clasped between her hands, a tight-lipped smile on her face.

"No," she said, looking at Bucky pointedly. She looked between him and the door. "It's okay. Buck was just leaving."

Thankfully, he understood what she was trying to do and stood from the couch. He waved at Spencer, crossing over to their front door.

"Sorry, again, for popping in so late," Bucky said, already halfway out the door. He looked at Katharine, who had redirected her attention to the red liquid in her cup. "I'll see you later, певунья."

He closed the door, leaving the married couple alone in their house. Without speaking, Katharine finished her juice before moving into the kitchen to wash the glass. She emerged a moment later, drying her hands on a towel.

"What was that about?" Spencer asked, taking the towel from her and dropping it on the granite countertop. His eyes searched her face for anything that could possibly tell him about what they were just talking about.

Katharine shrugged, pushing her hair back and out of her face. "It was nothing," she assured him. "Just him letting me know that he and Sam were flying out of the country tomorrow and that we'd have to reschedule brunch for next week."

Technically, what she had just told him wasn't a lie. They did have to reschedule brunch now which put a bigger damper on Katharine's mood than she thought it would. She had been looking forward to having brunch with Bucky and Peter again. She was hoping they'd be able to drag an elderly Steve Rogers out for a nice meal as well.

But still, she crossed her fingers that Spencer would just let it go. It wasn't really a big deal. As Bucky said, they didn't know if it was Nina for certain. There was no need to get anyone's hopes up if the trail ended up cold.

"Let's go back to bed," she suggested, shutting the living room lights off. Spencer complied, allowing her to pull him back toward their room.

"But you'd tell me if it was something I'd need to worry about, right?"

Katharine didn't hesitate before nodding. If Nina did end up being alive and well in Romania, she wasn't about to keep that a secret. After all, Spencer and Nina had become friends. Not to mention she was to be the godmother of their child regardless of if she was alive or not.

Spencer closed the door behind them as Katharine took the gun out of her waistband and tucked it back behind the television. She crawled into bed, pushing herself under the covers as Spencer took his glasses back off and shut his bedside light off. He joined her not too long after, hands already searching for her figure to hold her close. She allowed him to pull her in, reveling in the fact that the warmth he gave off combated the cold she felt without him.

"If you need to worry about it, you'll be the first to know," Katharine assured him, drawing shapes into his chest. She enjoyed the way he relaxed into her touch, eyes already drooping as she leaned forward to press a kiss right over his heart. He was out by the time she uttered her next words.

"I promise."

KATHARINE ROUNDED THE CORNER WITH HER GUN RAISED, keeping silent as she listened for even the slightest bit of movement from anywhere in her vicinity. After all the training SHIELD put her through, the FBI training they had their agents go through felt like child play.

She saw a wooden cutout, a generic-looking clown, shoot up from the floor on her right, her gun leading the way as she put a bullet through the middle of the faux unsub's forehead. She whirled around as another wooden cutout, this time a cartoonish-looking robber, popped up from the hallway she had just come down.

Without hesitation, she shot through the cutout's chest. If she hadn't chosen the path of law enforcement, she'd say that the FBI would have had a huge problem on their hands. She finished the rest of the training quickly, taking down targets as soon as they came up and "rescuing" the hostage at the end.

She holstered her gun as the lights came back up, a test proctor coming through one of the maintenance doors on the side. Katharine took one last glance at the wooden seven-year-old boy, watching unimpressed as it lowered back into the ground.

"A perfect score, Agent Reid," the proctor, Maria Bower, informed her. She marked a few more boxes off, the red ink leaving its approval on the white paper. Bower flipped the page, signing the bottom before handing the sheet off to Katharine. "Just get this to your Unit Chief and we'll get in contact about the rest of your weapons training soon."

Katharine accepted the paper, reading it over quickly before folding it in half. She slid the protective glasses off her face and handed them back to Agent Bower.

"Fifteen weapons and counting," Bower commented, side-eyeing the experienced agent. Katharine just nodded awkwardly, her fingers fiddling with the edge of the paper her proctor had just given her. Bower looked up from her FBI file. "What'd you do before the FBI again?"

Katharine tried not to let her irritation show. "SHIELD," she said shortly. She didn't know why it was any of Bower's business, seeing as all she did was oversee all of Katharine's training and weapon clearances.

"Right," Bower responded, closing her file. She handed that back to Katharine as well, trusting that she'd deliver it straight to Emily. "Well, I'll see you next week then."

Katharine thanked the agent before leaving in a hurry, wanting to get out of the awkward situation. Normally, Bower would give her the score and award her clearance. The extra comment and question were new and Katharine didn't know how to navigate the territory the woman was trying to breach into.

She made her way back to the BAU's floor, beelining for Emily's office and knocking twice before being allowed in. Katharine entered quickly, closing the door behind her. She gave Emily both the certification form and her file back, watching as Emily read the confirmation sheet over.

"This is, what, your third handgun?" Emily asked. Despite the question, there was no judgment behind her words. Only light teasing and a hint of suggestiveness. Katharine shrugged, she liked being prepared. "What's next? A rocket launcher?"

"Do they actually give clearance for those?" Katharine mused, a small smile appearing on her lips. She held up her wrists, showcasing the metal bracelets Tony had designed for her all those years ago. "I'm trying to get these cleared for the field."

It was a shame that it was only upon her return from death had she noticed that the name, Songbird, had been engraved into the metal, which made her cry for three days straight after.

Emily looked at her wrists, a mixture of sadness, and the most minuscule amount of pity showing on her face. She knew the story behind the bracelets, as did the rest of the original team. Katharine had shared the tale over dinner at Rossi's after a bit too much to drink and a very dangerous demonstration that included a week-old lemon and a fire extinguisher. Rossi then banned her from alcohol for the rest of the night, which was fair of him to do.

"Good luck with that," Emily smirked, obviously remembering the same night she was. Katharine felt her cheeks heat up, suddenly very thankful that blush didn't exactly show up on her skin. "I'd love to see how that'd pan out with taking down an unsub."

"For distraction and intimidation only," Katharine stressed. She'd seen what the beams of energy would do against skin, albeit alien skin, but skin just the same. The image of dead alien corpses with their skin still bubbling flashed through her mind, causing her stomach to churn. She held her hand to her mouth, swaying slightly as her eyes closed and a wave of nausea rolled over her.

"Woah," Emily was quick to help her into a chair, "You good there?"

Katharine nodded, keeping her eyes closed as the nausea subsided. She swallowed, grimacing at the feel of her stomach acid making its way back down her throat.

"Yeah," she said, hand falling away from her mouth. "Just--unpleasant thoughts."

Katharine didn't need to say anything else. While most of the details of the second Battle for Earth were confidential to the public, a vast majority of the information was available to government agents based on their status--mostly--and their connection to Katharine herself. She didn't want to seem vain or egotistical, but the only way most people knew the exact details was because of her. Without her voluntary firsthand account, they'd know just as much as the average civilian.

Emily looked her up and down warily, analyzing the way she sat. Katharine made the conscious choice not to put her hand atop her stomach, instead, wrapping an arm around her midsection. Only once her nausea fully subsided did she stand from the seat, assuring Emily that she could make the trip back to her desk without passing out.

Katharine left the office, silently making her way back to her desk. She settled into her seat, elbows propped up on the desk while her hands were buried into her hair. She looked down at the empty desktop, taking a few stabilizing breaths before altering her body language. She tried to go for something that would read as nothing was wrong, but she figured it was useless considering the fact that she worked with a bunch of profilers.

She sighed, reaching over for a folder in her To-Be-Completed pile. Katharine opened it, skimmed through the text before haphazardly throwing her signature onto the end. It wasn't anything she hadn't signed before. Standard post-case forms that just needed her approval. She'd written up most of her report on the plane ride back which left her barely anything left to do for that day.

She looked at the photo of Peter and Morgan she had displayed on her desk, wondering what they were each doing now. Peter was still on his trip to Europe, which Katharine was already anxious about, and Morgan would most likely be at home with her latest nanny.

Her eyes drifted over the photo of MJ she had been given as a joke. The memory of the young woman calling her the older sister she never had surfaced, lingering at the forefront of her mind. It was MJ's senior photo, which looked almost identical to her own, except for the fashion. MJ was wearing a plain grey T-shirt and jeans while Katharine had been wearing her navy-blue-and-white uniform.

"Who's that?"

A hand appeared in her vision, pointing at the photo of Peter and Morgan she had just been admiring.

Katharine turned her head, looking up at Luke Alvez. He had a coffee in one hand and a file in the other, his eyes trained on Peter's features.

"That's Peter, he's a close friend of mine," Katharine explained, pulling the photo off the bulletin board. Peter was honestly one of her closest friends, which was weird to think about. However, considering everything they went through, she couldn't find it in herself to care what Alvez thought of their friendship. She then pointed at Morgan, already missing the small child. "And that's Morgan. The sweetest girl you'll ever meet, even got Bucky Barnes to sit in at one of her tea parties."

She figured he knew who Bucky was. After all, he'd spent a big chunk of his life on a wanted list. But now that he was a free man, he was just known as a historical figure that kids learned about in their history lessons.

"And..." Alvez pointed at the photo of MJ, "is that you, in high school?"

Katharine laughed, tacking Peter and Morgan's photo back up in exchange for MJ's. "No. This is MJ. She's a friend of Peter's."

Alvez shook his head, not believing a single word she said. "Nuh-uh. You can't fool me. This girl looks exactly like you."

Katharine held up MJ's photo to the light as Spencer returned to his seat. She turned it over so he could see it.

"Spencer," she said, gaining his attention. "Who is this?"

"That's MJ," he replied without hesitation. "She goes to Midtown High with Peter. Believe me, I was skeptical at first, too. When she brought MJ to the BAU with the rest of her class, I thought someone had cloned them."

Katharine gave Alvez an I-told-you-so look, pinning MJ's photo back up. Her eyes drifted over to the last photo she had on her board. It was the same photo that used to occupy the upper left corner of her mirror when she still lived in her shitty apartment in DC. The one that she had housed Spencer's phone number under, which eventually led to where she was today.

It was the one of her and Nina. The two were laughing in the photo, Katharine had on a kevlar vest and Nina wore a floor-length ball gown. She made the same observation she made every time she looked at that photo--they looked so out of place next to each other but at the same time, they just fit.

"And who's that?" Alvez asked, pointing to the same photo she was staring at. Carefully, she took the photo off the board.

"This is Nina," Katharine said fondly. "She went missing after the Blip. A few of my friends are looking for her but... if she doesn't want to be found, she won't be."

Alvez was silent, for once. Katharine ran her finger along the edge of the photo, admiring the red color of Nina's ball gown. She wondered if her friend still owned the dress, especially after she had begged Fury to let her keep it.

"I'm sorry," Alvez finally said, arms drooping slightly as he realized the damper he'd introduced into the bullpen. Spencer watched Katharine's reactions over the desk dividers. He knew that Nina was missing, having been the second person Katharine had confided in about the disappearance.

Katharine pinned Nina's photo back up. "It's fine, that's the life of an ex-SHIELD operative I guess. You either move onto the CIA or the FBI... or disappear."

"Disappear?" Alvez asked curiously.

Katharine nodded. "We actually had a case a long time ago where twenty-eight ex-SHIELD operatives were killed and no one knew they were even dead until the unsub confessed to it."

Spencer looked up from his paperwork. He knew the exact case she was talking about. It was the case she had gotten shot during, resulting in a two-month reprieve from being out in the field. 

From then on out, Katharine swore to never again let a bullet take her out of the field for longer than a week.

"You're worried about your friend," Alvez analyzed her. Normally, she would have been annoyed at the persistent questioning but it felt nice to be able to tell someone other than Spencer things.

Katharine shrugged. "Nina had the same basic training I did so I'm not too concerned. That stuff kicks in like second nature no matter what. You should have Penny dig up the old video of her taking down four grown men in an ice cream parlor. Oh!--" Katharine interrupted herself-- "You should ask PG about the takedown cams. I think within my first few months here, she pulled some of her favorite 'badass moments' and made a few compilations of them."

"How long is it?" he asked, amused.

Katharine thought for a moment, counting off the numbers on her fingers. "Considering she compiled at least thirty minutes for each member, I think the entire thing is four hours long. She also managed to get ahold of some of my old SHIELD training clips, too, which I don't even want to know how she got ahold of."

"So, what?" Alvez raised an eyebrow. "We do a movie night?"

Katharine grinned, looking over at Spencer. "I mean, we do have that projector we never got to use."

Spencer shook his head. "No. The last time we had any semblance of a movie night at ours, Morgan thought he could bench more than you and we had to go to the ER."

Katharine pouted, leaning forward in her seat and propped her chin upon her fists. "Please, baby? It's been so long since we've done anything fun with our coworkers at our house. We can't keep letting Rossi have all the fun."

"Maybe next week," he entertained the thought. "We still have to unpack the rest of your things from storage."

That was a boldfaced lie. They had unpacked all of Katharine's things within the first week of her being back. Not that she had many things in the first place. Living with SHIELD for most of her life meant she learned to decorate scarcely. She never knew when she would just need to pack up and disappear.

Alvez chuckled. "I get that feeling. I feel like it took me ages to move into my new place when it really only took a little more than a month to finally settle back in."

"Right," Katharine smiled weakly, shooting a look at Spencer. He pretended he didn't see her look and went back to filling out his latest report.

The action made her so irrationally angry, the urge to punch him causing her hands to twitch slightly. But, of course, Katharine wasn't about to start a public fight with Spencer. They were adults, after all. The only time Katharine had decided to pick a fight with him was at a gala Tony had invited them to. It was over something so stupid that she couldn't really remember what it was about.

After that, they had all their arguments in the safety of their home. Katharine was just glad the neighbors hadn't called in a noise complaint about how they made up afterward.

"Do you think we'll actually get the whole weekend?" Katharine asked absently. Alvez had left her desk in favor of his own by that point. "I want to go see my nephew."

And to tell her cousin that she was pregnant, but she couldn't say that out loud just yet.

"The odds of us getting a full weekend are infinitesimal," Spencer said, though it wasn't the answer she was looking for. She huffed lightly, flipping the page of the file in front of her. All her concentration had flown out the window, the words barely registering in her mind anymore.

She signed her name at the end of the file, closing it and dropping it on her finished pile. She grabbed another incomplete report, reading the same words that were in the previous case. This one was pertaining to a different case, however, which didn't exactly add to the excitement of paperwork.

She let her mind drift as she worked. Or at least tried to work.

Since coming back from the dead, Katharine was facing a difficult choice. Coming back to work seemed right upon her return. She saw the BAU as a way to return to normal but now, almost a month back in the field, she wasn't too sure that that was what she wanted her normal to look like anymore.

Sure, she loved the job. She loved knowing that she made the world that much safer but it was never-ending. Day in and day out, the pile of cases waiting at their door never lessened. Every day, new evils came about for them to fight. Maybe Katharine didn't want to keep fighting.

And to add to that, she had a family on the way now. With Spencer and her finally settling into what a married couple would look like and a baby on the way, maybe it was time for her to settle.

At least for a while. Maybe she'd pull a Rossi and come out of retirement in ten or so years. She let her hands rest atop her stomach, caressing the still barely noticeable baby bump there. She was ten weeks along now, their baby the size of a kumquat. They had eight more weeks until they'd find out the gender of the baby, which was around the time they decided that they'd tell their friends.

Tony had also left her a sizable amount, enough to put her and Rossi on the same level of wealth. If she wanted to, she would never have to work another day in her life and neither would Spencer. Though, she'd never ask him to do that for her.

She looked over at him, watching as his eyebrows furrowed with concentration. To him, the FBI was his entire lifework. He really didn't know a life outside of the endless cases and their home, which Katharine had tried countless times before to encourage him out of. It was strange really, for a man that traveled so much to be contained to only two permanent locations.

In some ways, Katharine felt like a failure. She had dreams once. Dreams that grew and died with SHIELD. But somewhere along the way, her dreams changed and morphed into something that could accommodate a family and a life outside of work.

Maybe this was a sign. Katharine signed her name at the end of the report she had, yet again, been barely paying attention to. She pulled another file from the pile, opening it on the desk in front of her and skimming through its contents. Maybe she had run her course with the FBI and was finally ready to settle down.

Her stomach rumbled and she looked down in betrayal. Or maybe she was just hungry. She looked over at the corner of her computer screen and read the time, realizing that they could have gone home thirty minutes ago.

She looked back at Spencer, who was still doing his work like a good agent, and threw a balled-up piece of scrap paper at his head. Slowly, he raised his head to look at her.

She feigned innocence, pretending as if she didn't just throw something at his head. "Can we go home?"

Spencer looked over at his own computer screen and read the time. It was sixty-thirty-two at night and though they both usually stayed much longer it had been a long day for Katharine and she was ready to go home. Taking note of the look of pure exhaustion on her face, he gave in.

"Let me just finish this and then we can go, okay?"

Katharine hummed, already logging out of her account and scribbling her signature onto the last file of the day. She had managed to get a fair amount of work before her qualifications earlier that day, the exam having been right after lunch. Her to-be-completed pile didn't look any smaller, though her finish pile looked significantly larger.

She did her best, she concluded, putting her things away. Katharine waited five more minutes before Spencer was ready to go as well. She watched as he shut his computer off and put various things away before leaving his desk.

He made his way to Katharine's side of the desks, holding a hand out for her. She gladly took it, slinging her bag over her opposite shoulder. She squeezed slightly, bringing their intertwined hands to her lips so that she could press a kiss to his knuckles.

"I love you," she reminded him, swinging their arms slightly as they made their way out of the bullpen and into the hallway. By some miracle, the corridors were clear of people, allowing the rare moment alone together at work.

Spencer took the chance, leaning down to kiss her lips as they waited for the elevator to stop on their floor. Katharine reciprocated letting go of his hand so that she could wrap her arms around his neck. His hands fell to her waist, one holding her back while the other rested right over her hidden baby bump.

Katharine grinned, pulling away just as the elevator dinged to let them know it had arrived. She felt her cheeks heat up as they separated, avoiding any and all eye contact with the people that had just come out of the metal box.

Once they were inside, Spencer giggled at her reaction, poking her side.

"Are you embarrassed?" he asked, not letting her too far from his grasp. She shook her head, a laugh bubbling off of her lips as Spencer tickled her sides in the elevator.

"You're so sleeping on the couch tonight, mister," she tried to be stern with him, failing as he kept attacking her sides. She squealed, twisting away from him as the elevator doors opened once more, letting them out into the garage.

They both knew that her threats were empty. Spencer helped her nightmares and she helped with his.

So, with an exaggerated eye roll, Spencer replied, "Yeah, sure. And I'd still wake up with you cuddled into my side."

Katharine scoffed, turning her nose up at his truthful comment. They were at the car now, Katharine getting into the passenger seat while Spencer took up the role as driver. She tossed her bag into the backseat.

"Fine," Katharine gave in, ending their mock argument. "You can sleep in the bed with me, I guess."

Spencer leaned over the center console, turning her head toward him as she dropped the fake pout she had been sporting. His eyes flickered down to her lips for a moment before returning to her eyes, Katharine's heart still beating just as fast as the first time she admitted her feelings for him. She leaned in at the same time as he did, lips melding together as she melted across the center console. Her hands wandered upward to his tie, pulling him in closer by the accessory as his hands tangled into her hair.

"You know," Spencer mumbled in between kisses, "when you kiss a person passionately," another kiss, "not only do you leave behind bacteria and mucus," Katharine pulled away fully, "you also leave your DNA in their mouth, which can linger for more than an hour."

Katharine looked at him dumbly, hands relaxing from their grip on his tie.

"And what if you don't kiss them passionately?"

"Well, no matter how fleeting the encounter, the DNA will stay for more than an hour," he told her. "But the method that Kamodyová used in her study to decipher DNA in a spit sample relied on finding the Y chromosome so it can only be used to determine a male's DNA in a woman's saliva. It's actually possible to get a full profile from just that DNA sample, which could be useful in criminal investigations to pinpoint the possible perpetrators among suspects or exclude those that are innocent."

Katharine felt her heart flutter as he talked, absorbing every word he said. She felt his hands move slightly as he talked, though he was aware of the fact that his hands were still tangled in her hair.

"How about you take me home and you can tell me all the facts your heart desires while you fuck me into our mattress?" she asked, innocently batting her eyelashes up at him.

It was like a flip switched, his hand moving from the back of her head to her neck, pressing her into the car seat. She stopped herself from letting out a moan as his grip tightened ever so slightly, thighs squeezing tightly together before he let go so he could pull out of the FBI garage.

His hand came to rest on her thigh and she practically buzzed with anticipation, seeing him watch her out of the corner of her eye. She licked her lips, grinning as his grip on her thigh tightened. She couldn't wait to get home.