Author's Note: I was "researching" by watching a marathon of Criminal Minds season 1 episodes. The pilot caught my attention when, near the end of the episode, Reid is going through a huge collection of CDs to find the password to Vogel's creeper laptop. The CD that he discovers is in the laptop's drive is a Metallica CD. Morgan wonders aloud what song might be the password, and I watched in shock and awe as Reid mentally goes through the different songs on the album. He looked familiar with the music. So I decided that somewhere along the line, Dean had educated him on the subject. ;)

Now, the funny thing about this story is that I was planning to have a quick drabble. I was going to write the scene out, so readers would know what I was referring to, then write a short and cute phone call from Reid to Dean, letting him know that Metallica had saved some girl's life.

Then this freakin' huge story just poured out of nowhere onto my computer! I was sitting on my couch with wide eyes as the tiny little drabble turned into this huge honkin' story of angst and family and just... It exploded into a huge and surprising story.

It started with an explanation about Reid's house that amused and surprised me. Then turned into a phone call with Dean that simply would not follow what I was trying to make it do. Dean kept ranting and changing the direction of the conversation, because he really needed to talk to somebody, and Reid was the first person to contact him in several days. Then it just led right into the pilot episode of Supernatural, and I nearly cried.

I hope you will enjoy it though. I found it rather enlightening... I feel like I learned things about both Reid and Dean that I hadn't known before. Hopefully it'll show through a little bit in the writing.

This takes place just after the Criminal Minds episode, and right before Supernatural's pilot. Spoilers to both pilots. The first and last chapters are short, but the middle is nice and long. ;)

Disclaimer: I've been trying to keep my 'verse as absolutely cannon-friendly as I can. If you notice anything that's not cannon-esque, then it's probably my fault. Also, the opening scene of this fic is taken directly from the pilot episode of Criminal Minds. I do not own any form of rights towards that episode or either of these shows! I own nothing except the tear-drenched sleeves of the shirt I'm wearing...

Warning...! The end of this story is a bit of a sob fest. I ended with spoilers for the end of the Supernatural pilot. You all know what happened, but for the first time, I realized how Reid would react.

Reid was sitting on the bed, flipping a CD in his hand as he considered the CD collection that lay scattered around him. They needed the password, and it had to be on one of these CDs. Nothing else made sense.

He tuned out Morgan's pacing and ranting about needing a password from across the attic room.

A thought occurred to him, and Reid reached into his pocket for one of the three paperclips he always carried on his person. He bent it quickly, fiddling with it absently as he got off the bed and avoided the piles of CDs that were on the floor. He spun the paperclip as he stood up from the bed. He was fiddling with it partially because he thought he had just figured the mystery out and the paperclip would be a necessary tool. He was also fiddling with it partially because these CDs were reminding him of Dean, and Dean had been the one to first teach him how to pick locks with a paperclip.

Reid crossed the room from the bed covered with CDs and now-empty cases, to the other side of the room where Morgan was working by the computer.

"I've been thinking about the CDs," Reid commented, kneeling down by the short table Morgan had set the laptop on.

"Oh come on, Reid," Morgan said in tired exasperation. "We've tried the CDs. We've searched, sifted, and sorted through every one of this guy's head-banging heavy metal collection. We've gotta find something, or this girl is dead."

Reid was already fiddling with the CD slide on the laptop, poking the paperclip inside to tug it open. "I think we may have missed the obvious," he explained.

"What are you doing?" Morgan asked barely a second before the CD slide opened.

Reid and Morgan both stared at the CD inside, then looked at each other.

Morgan grabbed for it. "Reid, what made you think of this?"

He didn't want to say that it was the only disk he hadn't been able to find anywhere in the room, though the case was out in the open, and that it only made sense the CD was in the computer. He didn't want to explain that he knew every song on the album or even that he recognized the music. So he held up the case and said simply, "It was the only empty case."

Morgan took the case, compared it to the CD that Reid had already recognized as belonging to it. Metallica's "Some Kind Of Monster" documentary soundtrack.

Morgan seemed impressed, but immediately turned back to their problem at hand. "All right, I'm an insomniac who listens to Metallica to go to sleep at night. What song could possibly speak to me?" he wondered, looking at Reid.

Reid was already mentally flipping through every song Metallica had recorded, starting with this album first. He knew every song, thanks to Dean, so it didn't take him long. "Enter Sandman."

Morgan stared at him for a second, either surprised by the quick answer, or by the fact that Reid had found a song that actually fit their expectations of a password. Then he typed in the information on the password program.

Both mean leaned in when the password went through and the laptop was unlocked.

AN: The next chapter will be the actual meat of the story I wanted to write! Reid will call Dean. :) Sorry this chapter was short. I don't like how the chapter breaks ended up, but I really didn't want this scene and the last scene to be attached to the whole phone call, and I couldn't break up the phone call. So c'est la vie. It is what it is. Enjoy it or point at me and laugh. *shrug* It's your prerogative...