[Criminal Minds] years before love

"Hello, Sullivan."

The person in the interrogation room who kept his head down gave him a blank look, then continued to stare at the table. Hotch hesitated for a moment, obviously his peers had taken turns to greet him, he looked pretty bad and desperate, if it wasn't for his acting skills or being very difficult to deal with, then he probably really didn't know the truth.

"Sullivan, you have to cooperate. The evidence is against you now. I have no doubt that any prosecutor can crucify you - if you don't say anything, no one can help you."

"As I said, I don't know! I don't know why it matched the bullet at the scene, and I don't know who killed it!" Sullivan murmured wearily, "But I didn't kill someone, I didn't."

Hotch stared at him for a moment, then pulled out his chair and sat down, "The SSG3000 is not a gun that ordinary people would buy, why don't you tell me why you bought this first."

"..." The other party finally raised his head in surprise, clenched his fingers, and finally said after a while, "That's a memorial."

"What about your military career?"

"Not mine." Sullivan tensed. "A friend."

"Sounds like a story." Hotch opened a can of beer and handed it over, "Would you mind telling me?"

"It saved me."

"It, or him?"

Sullivan turned his gaze back to the table in front of him again, staring at the foam of the beer, "Why do you care?"

"I don't know." Hotch slowly pushed the photo of the gun over. "Maybe it tells me why you have a gun like this and you almost never go to the range."

Sullivan swallowed, "I didn't kill anyone."

"I'm trying to trust you."

"He's not my friend." Sullivan finally made up his mind and took a sip of beer. "He's our best sniper, but he doesn't fit in very well. When we were in the army, we fought against each other, fought, quarreled, and had a bottle of water. Splashing on each other's quilts... Anyway, they are not friends."

Hotch frowned, but said nothing.

Sullivan was silent for a while, and squeezed the jar tightly in his hand, "Well, we were bullying him. But he saved me... The enemy suddenly appeared in front of me from the bunker, I panicked and thought I was dead, And then I just watched him go down...he didn't say it, but I knew it was him. I thought, one day off the field, I wish I could apologize to him, but you know, in that environment , I am tense every day, and I always have to... do something."

Hotch is noncommittal. "Bullying in the military has always been a big problem, and at least you know it's not right. But it seems like you missed your chance."

"He's dead." Sullivan shook his head. "After a firefight. We searched the rubble three times and found no one alive. In that case, he can only be considered dead."

"There are no bodies."

"Detective, you don't understand the battlefield." Sullivan glanced at him, "Bullets, artillery fire, landmines, collapsed construction works... What you see after a war is often just a bloody mess, not everyone can find the body. "

"Sorry." Hotch pursed his lips and said softly.

"So after I left the battlefield, I almost didn't want to touch the gun. Those memories are really... terrible." Sullivan buried his face in his hands.

"So, why did you have a gun in your hand when the FBI found you?" Hotch stood up, leaning over him.

"That's it." Sullivan became excited, "Whoever it is, he turned this city into a battlefield, and those people fell beside me! I have to protect myself!"

"Calm down." Hotch waited for him to sit up panting. "Sullivan, let me see your hands."

The dazed suspect held out his hands, and Hotch touched his fingers, "One last question, for all you know, who else could touch your gun?"

"I don't know." Sullivan looked at his hands inexplicably. "I locked it in the bedside table, but to be honest, I haven't checked it much."

Hotch patted him on the shoulder, turned and walked out.

Gideon was on the other side of the one-way glass, leaning against the table, frowning.

"It sounds like he might not know about it." He didn't mention the content of the call just now, but just pointed to the people sitting in the interrogation room.

"I'm not sure if he knew." Hotch said softly, "but I'm sure he didn't have much firearms training, and his marksmanship test wasn't outstanding. He probably wasn't the murderer. We're back to square one."

"He has no children, his wife has been ruled out, the murder weapon is locked in his bedside cabinet, and there is no trace of intrusion." Gideon sighed and turned around, "Aaron, you know that to the court, this means that he is the murderer .”