*Thanks to anyone who reviewed! I like feedback a lot, positive or negative. Also, thanks for continuing to read, despite the terrible atrocities I have committed against the LaMontagne family. I promise that the gory part is over (mostly.)*

"This is high school math," the dark-haired lady said. She pursed her lips. "I learned it in Pre-Calculus in the tenth grade."

"So what?" Walker asked. He, Aaron Hotchner, and this new lady were all standing in the living room, examining the mathematical equations on the walls. The dark-haired lady had apparently come to replace the large African-American man he'd seen earlier; when he'd asked Agent Hotchner about the switch, he'd simply replied that she "compartmentalized" quite well.

"So," she said, "Reid knows math a hundred times more difficult than this."

"Maybe your friend isn't as smart as you think he is," Walker muttered. This earned him dirty looks from Aaron Hotchner as well as the dark-haired lady.

"What I meant is that he chose these equations for a reason," she said. "Like he's trying to tell us something."

Walker couldn't help rolling his eyes. Thankfully, neither of the FBI agents saw this.

"What would he be trying to tell us?" Hotchner prompted.

"Well," the dark-haired lady said, "They all have one thing in common." She paused. "None of them exist. Like, this one, for example. You can't divide by zero; so this doesn't exist. The answer to this one can't be negative, but it is; so it doesn't exist."

Agent Hotchner nodded. "You could be right."

Walker cleared his throat. "Or maybe he went crazy and forgot how to do math, and that's why none of the answers exist."

There was no mistaking the loathing in either of their expressions.

"Look," Walker began, voicing doubts he'd had since the beginning of the investigation. "I get that you two have your pre-conceived notions about this guy, because he was your colleague, or friend, or something, and that he used to be really smart and he used to be a wonderful person. But as far as I'm concerned, he's a psychotic that killed a four-year old boy. I don't think he's going to leave you some sort of special, coded message. We gave it a shot; we've been at it for hours; but we're coming up blank. These equations aren't getting us anywhere."

Agent Hotchner look a step forward; even though Walker was the taller of the two men, he still felt the need to lean back.

"These equations will provide us with a more accurate profile," he growled.

"I know," Walker said, annoyed. "I'm a profiler, too. But it's only a matter of time before this guy kills someone again. Isn't it a waste of-"

"There are police out looking for Reid," Aaron Hotchner snapped. "We're doing our job here. If you think that your efforts would be better spent somewhere else; be our guest." He then turned his back on Walker and began speaking with the lady in hushed tones.

Irritated, Walker turned and went back into the bedroom. He knew he had probably been out of line; they were federal officers, after all; but he was getting frustrated. He once again examined Camus' quote above the bed; Hotchner had dismissed it, as it looked like it had been written a long time ago; but something about it captured Walker's interest.

Suddenly, he started forward; he pushed the bed away from the wall to reveal a dozen or so new quotations; each looking faded, like the first one.

Nothing exists; even if something exists, nothing can be known about it; and even if something can be known about it, knowledge about it can't be communicated to others.

Gorgias

In the consciousness of the truth he has perceived, man now sees everywhere only the awfulness or the absurdity of existence and loathing seizes him.

Friedrich Nietzsche

There is no other world. Nor even this one. What, then, is there? The inner smile provoked in us by the patent nonexistence of both.

E.M. Cioran

Walker stared at the quotes, something dawning on him. He frowned, then slowly stood up and walked back into the living room, deep in thought.

"Agent Hotchner?" he inquired, after standing there for several moments.

Hotchner still look irritated when he turned around. "Yes?"

Walker blinked. "You say that none of the answers exist?"

Hotchner nodded, still eyeing him suspiciously.

Walker paused. "What if he's suffering from a nihilistic delusion?" Hotchner opened his mouth as if to rebut him immediately, but then closed it, frowning.

The dark haired lady turned around. "A what?" she asked.

"A nihilistic delusion," Agent Hotchner said, "Is the belief that nothing exists besides yourself."

"They convince themselves that nothing exists," Walker explained to her. "It can happen in schizophrenics; if they tell themselves enough times that the voices or hallucinations aren't real, they begin to wonder whether any of it exists…" he trailed off, as the dark-haired lady and Aaron Hotchner exchanged a significant look that he didn't understand. "They panic. They sometimes get violent. And the problem with a nihilistic delusion is that you can't disprove it."

The dark-haired lady was shaking her head. "Reid wouldn't do all this just because he wasn't sure he existed or not," she said.

"You'd be surprised," Walker replied, "At the terror that arises from feeling alone in the universe."

There was a long silence.

"That would explain his obsession with Nietzsche," Hotchner remarked. "At least half of the quotes here are by him."

"And Sartre," said the dark-haired lady, "And Beckett. And Albert Camus."

Hotchner looked like he was about to say something, but then his phone rang. He answered it quickly, and his expression darkened; any relief that he'd begun to show disappeared immediately.

"What is it?" Walker asked, although he had a pretty good guess.

"They just found two more bodies."