Title: Sounds of Things to Come
Rating: PG-13
Fandom: Criminal Minds
Universe: Zombie Cantos
Characters/Pairing: Reid/OC
Genre: Horror/Drama
Summary: It's all about the little things.

Zombie Cantos: Sounds of Things to Come

* * *

But O! how oft,
How oft, at school, with most believing mind,
Presageful, have I gazed upon the bars,
To watch that fluttering stranger! and as oft
With unclosed lids, already had I dreamt
Of my sweet birth-place, and the old church-tower,
Whose bells, the poor man's only music, rang
From morn to evening, all the hot Fair-day,
So sweetly, that they stirred and haunted me
With a wild pleasure, falling on mine ear
Most like articulate sounds of things to come!
So gazed I, till the soothing things, I dreamt,
Lulled me to sleep, and sleep prolonged my dreams!

Frost at Midnight – Samuel Taylor Coleridge

*

The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed.

Carl Jung

* * *

One month after the Zombie Apocalypse

Reid checks the cages at the back of the truck; it's their first time doing this, and he really doesn't want it to end with the accidental zombification of everyone he knows. Everyone he knows that are left, he corrects himself. Most of the people that he knows are dead.

Everyone else?

Well, survival can be a pretty tough game to play, even without zombies. As it stands though, they don't really know much beyond "aim for the head," which means that they need to do a little bit of experimentation.

Jean had been far too excited at that prospect, stating, almost mournfully, 'They won't let me go on any of the raids, because apparently being the only person with medical training means you get treated with kid gloves.'

Morgan, Prentiss, Harrison and Bruty are going with them – the muscle, he thinks wryly. They'll corner the zombies and herd them into the back of the truck. Maybe muscle is the wrong word. Maybe they're just shepherds. Which makes Reid the one that's manning the slaughterhouse.

'Most people assume that being "treated with kid gloves" refers to a person's tendency to treat someone like a child, but actually, it's an allusion to gloves made from the skin of a young goat, the leather of which is softer than other kinds, and were thus a symbol of gentleness,' he says, almost offhand, because his mind is somewhere else.

She blinks and then grins. 'Okay.'

He's not entirely displeased about being squashed together in the back seat with her as they drive along the deserted highway. Any cars that had been abandoned, or their inhabitants turned, have long since been pushed off the road, their bodies starting to rust.

The town, too, seems empty when they pull to a stop, but Reid knows that there are zombies lurking in every corner. It's not the most infested of places – enough that they'll be able to capture half a dozen zombies in less than half an hour – but not so infested that they'll be overrun and torn to pieces.

'Remember,' Reid says, as they exit the truck and make sure that their weapons are in order. He's not sure why he's become the voice of authority instead of Morgan or even Prentiss, but it probably has something to do with the fact that of the team, he's the only one with an encyclopedic knowledge of zombie movies. 'Male between eighteen and thirty-five with no obvious physical impairments.'

'Is being a zombie considered a physical impairment these days?' Emily asks, with an eyebrow raised.

Reid doesn't answer the question, but acknowledges her statement with a small smile. 'We need our test subjects to be as similar as possible in order to provide standardized results.'

'And since we don't have time to survey them,' Jean continues, 'We're just going to have to do it by sight.'

The statement earns her a few half-hearted chuckles, but they don't have time to hang around discussing the finer points of zombie humor.

They all keep a watchful eye out as Morgan dons the HAZMAT suit that had been scavenged on a previous raid. Really, an NBC suit would be better, but there's not exactly an abundance of military bases around these parts. Even if there were, he's fairly sure they would have been the first to be raided, if they're not a safe haven from the apocalypse.

'You look like an astronaut,' Emily laughs as she adjusts the hood. 'Major Morgan, slipping the bonds of a crass and material world to journey beyond the stars.' Whatever reply Morgan has is muffled by the suit, but he gives a thumbs up, indicating that he's ready.

Because Morgan's the only one who'll be having actual physical contact with the zombies (if all goes to plan) the rest of them are only wearing thick, long-sleeved clothing. Rabid though they may be, the undead still have human teeth, which aren't really designed to tear through fabric.

After a nod from Reid, Harrison points his weapon skyward and fires. It's less than a minute before the walking corpses slowly amble from their hiding places. Groans fill the air where there had once been silence.

Harrison and Bruty are taking out any that don't fit their criteria from a distance, while Emily has a tightened grip on the tranquilizer gun, waiting for their chosen few to get close enough to take down. It'll do no good to take them down in the midst of the other zombies, because even with the HAZMAT suit, there's no way Morgan would be able to deal with the rest of them while trying to drag a tranquilized zombie back to the truck.

Reid watches the process with interest. His own weapon is out in front of him – just in case – but he knows better than anyone that once too many bullets start firing, some of those bullets are bound to hit the wrong people. His eyes transfix upon a toddler, crawling slowly, but groaning with that unmistakable zombie quality. Its head explodes as Harrison pulls the trigger. There's a long pause before he hears the next crack from the deputy's rifle.

Sometimes it's easy to forget that these things had been human once.

Once they've filled the cages and dispatched a good portion of the still lingering beasts, they load up, and let the wheels kick up dust. There's a cache of weapons at Reid's feet that will be used for testing purposes – the start of more stringent experimentation if things go well.

Who knows. Maybe one day they might even cure it.

Now though, in a beaten down truck with half an armory at his feet, and six unconscious zombies in the back, and five other people that had just spent the last hour herding up said zombies, normalcy seems that much further away.

They pull to a stop in the middle of nowhere. No zombies for miles and miles. Plenty of space to toss a grenade and not have every single creature within the sound radius come running, or at the very least, lurching.

'Can I have a go?' Jean asks as Reid swings the weapons case open. She's eying the shotgun almost dangerously.

'You sure?' Reid asks, frowning.

She sighs. 'It's been a month since the fricking zombie apocalypse, and I've been stuck in the morgue the entire time. I just want…I just want to shoot a fricking zombie, because it's the end of the world, and I'm really kind of pissed about it.' Her voice rises, and Reid notices the looks they're getting.

'No,' he says hastily, quickly attempting to fix the situation. 'I meant, are you sure you want to use the shotgun – I don't think buckshot will be as effective for killing zombies as popular media would have you think. The damage needs to be more concentrated, to the point where it's only useful for extremely close range, and one would imagine that if you're that close, then you're probably dead already.'

'You are an impossible man, Doctor Reid,' she says, shaking her head. 'I love that. But my sentiment remains. If there is to be some zombie-killing today, then I would like to be a part of it. Rule 32.'

Reid frowns. '"Be careful what you sell. It may do exactly what the customer expects"?' The Ferengi Rules of Acquisition don't exactly apply to the situation, so he's not entirely sure what she's talking about.

She laughs. 'Not Star Trek, Crusher. Zombieland. "Enjoy the little things."'

There's a long, awkward pause. 'Crusher? Really? I'm almost insulted. Wesley Crusher is consistently voted as the least popular Star Trek character. Even Wil Wheaton, the actor responsible for his portrayal, found him to be too much of a "Gary Stu."'

Jean raises an eyebrow. 'Fine. Other attractive nerds. How about I call you Peter Parker, then? Or maybe just Spiderman?' His ears only really catch on a single word of the sentence.

'Wait – attractive?'

She grins. 'Sure. You don't think I'm hanging around you all the time just because we're science buddies, right?'

He can't quite control the blush that spreads to his cheeks. In any case, Jean seems to find some amusement at his embarrassment. He's grown more confident over the years, transitioning from socially awkward genius to a somewhat competent field agent, but he doesn't think he'll ever quite get used to the idea of being flirted with.

A statistic about the fallibility of workplace relationships jumps into his mind, but he represses it. Most statistics aren't worth a thing here, at the end of the world. In any case, they're not colleagues so much as they are, in Jean's words, "science buddies." There's no workplace anymore. Just survival. The little bit of primal instinct inside of him thinks about the merits of survival – the kind of merits that usually involve fornication.

In lieu of any other option, he leans in, and kisses her full on the lips. She pulls back slightly, and he finds himself faltering.

'About frickin' time,' she mutters, and pulls him back towards her. The open weapons case has been ignored entirely, and he tries desperately to do the same to the cat calls that Morgan has started making.

And maybe normalcy doesn't matter. Maybe it's just the little things.

A/N: Complete and total fluff. Why, you might ask? Because as it stands, next chapter is going to be really fucking depressing. Seriously. Probably fairly long, too, so don't be surprised if there's actually a not horrifically depressing chapter posted next because I'm still busy with the other one.