Disclaimer: I don't own CBS's "Zoo". Everything belongs to whoever owns them, my wishful thinking aside.

Authors Note #1: Inspired by this prompt: "I skipped like four cycles of reincarnation and I know you're pissed at me for leaving you all those lifetimes but it wasn't my fault please- please will you take me back?" – Set 1x01 "First Blood," directly after they part ways after their meeting at the zoo pathology lab.

Warnings: reincarnation au, adult language, canon appropriate language, past lives, violence, character death (kinda), gun violence, angst, pre/established relationship.

Selcouth

Chapter One

"Excuse me, Mitch Morgan? I'm Jamie Campbell. We spoke on the phone?"

"Right. LA telegraph."

"Yeah, that's right."

"What can I do for you?"

"You're the animal coroner?"

"Veterinary pathologist."

"I'm sorry?"

"Pathologist, not coroner."

"I specialize in diagnosing animal disease through examination of their issues, bodily fluids, other stuff."

"Coroner suggests that they have to be dead to be of interest to me. They do not."

"You want to know what incited the lions to kill the zoo keeper?"

"And the men downtown. Yeah."

"Well, that makes two of us."


He drove home unsettled. Like the entire thing had been an itch he couldn't quite scratch as he pulled into his apartment building. For some reason he felt overly conscious of the security cameras in the underground parking as he locked his truck and forced one foot in front of the other until he was free of the uniform rows of concrete and cars. Swiping his fob so he could sidle into the awkward, semi-elegant lobby and collect his mail. Double checking the pile before walking over to the recycling bin and dumping the lot.

Junk mail. Fast food coupons. Real estate flyers. Blech.

He twisted the key in the lock and leaned into the door as he opened it. Dissipating any kinetic energy the action might have had in favor of making the entire thing harder on himself. Distracted as his brain worked it over. Rehashing bits and pieces of their conversation like there was some deeper meaning behind it.

There was something about it.

About her.

He was certain of it.

The way she'd made even the smallest, most innocuous expression into something that had weight. History. The way he'd taken to her like breathing. Easy and natural like they'd somehow done all this before even thought he knew it was impossible. He snorted at himself when the ridiculousness of the observation sunk in. Toeing off his shoes and letting them sling shot into a distant corner before he locked the door behind him.

Still, something about her had screamed.

Piping familiar.

Intimate.

Known.

And the truth was, he didn't know how to shake it.

He'd seen her before, he knew that, but where?

He'd tried to get to the bottom of it right then and there. Wondering of it had been her accent or the way she was dressed. He'd originally passed it off as small talk when he'd asked her where she was from. But that hadn't been it. There was something more. Something that was-

He crossed over to the fridge and snagged a beer. Twisting off the top and taking a long drag from the bottle before collapsing across the couch. Stretching out across the worn leather and inching off his socks as he considering the problem logically. Letting them drop behind the couch – probably never to be seen again – as he fiddled idly with the label.

This was a thing though, wasn't it?

Déjà vu or some sort of equivalent.

Something explainable.

Plausible.

One of those little mysteries that-

"I'm sorry I couldn't give you what you wanted, all right? Sometimes a mystery is just a mystery."

"Yeah, like missing cats in Brentwood."

"Okay. That's a saying."

"No. Apparently there's a rash of missing cats in Brentwood."

"Hmm. How do they know they're missing? Maybe they just couldn't get into a good private school?"

He sighed and levered himself off the couch, giving up on any semblance of relaxing. Pacing and restless as the general antiseptic mustiness of the labs wafted up from his clothes. He wrinkled his nose, unbuttoning his shirt as he padded over to the window and he set his beer on the sill. Peering out into the half-dark. Watching the wind rustle softly through the overly manicured trees and strategic shrubbery that made up the buildings narrow strip of decorative lawn.

It paled in comparison to the trees you used to see. Those big, old growth oaks that used to be dotted all over the place. The kind that took layers off you sharpening stone, a half dozen axe handles to chop your way through. The ones that created stumps that took more than seven years of rot and an entire trio of oxen to clear.

His body still remembered the firm of those calluses. The hard burn of the new world sun and the sway of a horse underneath him. The warm pride that kindled in his chest when he caught sight of her in front the house he'd built with his own two hands. One hand shaded over her eyes, blocking the glare of the sun. Waiting for him with a smile on her face as their son tugged insistently at her skirts.

He jerked away from the window, nearly upsetting his beer as he looked down at his hands. Blinking with unsteady double vision as his palms wavered between what he was used to seeing and something else. Familiar but altered. Tanned dark brown and streaked with the grime of a near permanent dirt. Working hands laced with spider-thin cuts, old scars and angry callouses from hard labor. But there were also softer ones. The ones that knew the glide of a woman's skin. The ones that'd helped birth his child when there'd been no doctor or mid-wife to call. The ones that had-

They'd been making a life for themselves there.

In that peaceful valley pocket of trees and slated stone.

Something that was purely their own.

Something that would be passed down.

A legacy.

He remembered the agony of it when he'd stumbled backward with a gut full of shot. The smell of burnt bread. A horse thief. His dog whimpering in a heap by the entrance to the barn. An outlaw. The baby was screaming. The harsh sound of unfamiliar boot spurs. He remembered his fingers curling into bone dry dirt. Pain lancing through every inch of him as he brought his shotgun up against his chest and aimed down the barrel. Shooting the son of a bitch square in the back as he advanced on the house. Killing him dead as the kick back thumped his head back against the parched earth.

He hadn't started off as a farmer.

He'd had other interests once.

Other gifts.

Other dreams.

But when he'd met her?

Christ, he would have stolen the moon from the stars just to see her.

He blinked and suddenly she was there. Hovering above him with those same stars for eyes. Or maybe they were tears. He didn't know. He couldn't tell for certain. Either way they glistened all the same. His Jamie - no, not Jamie. She'd had another name then. Another name but the same face. His world shifted and she was holding his head in her lap. Rocking him back and forth as their son - his son – curled himself into a ball on his other side. Pleading with messy brown curls and those wide green eyes of his. Pleading for him to stay.

Don't go, papa.

Don't go.

But he was cold.

So cold.

He opened his mouth, but her lips were already there.

"I will find you again," she murmured, whispering into his hair. Fingers carding through the long waves that brushed his shoulders. Kissing him with trembling, tear-stained lips as the weightlessness in his limbs hummed. A growing silence took the strength from her final words and rendered the world mute. Numb. He remembered keeping his eyes open for as long as he could. Memorizing the curves of her face. Every freckle. Every line. Every perfect imperfection that'd always made her his.

It wasn't the first time they'd been here, he realized distantly. They had a legacy that was all their own. Spanning as far off as he could remember. It had always been them. And it would always be them. They were the only constant. The only thing that was remade, time and time again.

But for some reason that'd been the last time, at least for him.

He'd been absent.

Missing.

Ever since the end of that life, feeling the warmth of his own red escaping through her fingers and the harsh sun trying to blind him from above, there'd only been blankness. He'd left her alone. Not simply then but every time she'd come back since. Until now. Until-

He came back to himself in mid-fall, toppling back against the arm of the loveseat as he tipped into the butter soft leather. Knees weak and rubbery as he breathed unsteadily -hard and fast and awfully close to hyperventilating as he knitted his fists together to step them from trembling. Trying to separate one reality from the other as the world spun off-centre around him.

What the hell was-

But by then the last puzzle piece clicked into place and he yanked himself upright with an angry sound. Nearly falling over again as he swayed in place. Fingers cutting half-moon grooves in the leather cushions as her face – Jamie – flashed. Face set with that familiar tic of determination he knew all too well. Absolutely committed to nailing Reiden Global to the wall and back as she'd peppered him questions about the lion attack.

She found him.

Just like she'd said she would.

The world had brought them back together and-

Oh.

Oh, shit.

She was going to be pissed.


A/N: Thank you for reading, please let me know what you think. – There will be one more chapter, stay tuned.

Reference:

"Selcouth": Rare, unusual, and wondrous, selcouth connotes an air of mystery and unfamiliar exquisiteness, which has been unexpectedly discovered. Strange, yet beautiful, selcouth should be reserved to describe the extraordinary.