Disclaimer: I do not own Criminal Minds or any of its characters.
Author's Note: Sorry about the lapse in updates yesterday.
Officer James Walden pushed open the doors to the break room. His friend, Officer Daniel Thomas, was already there, eating a very late lunch.
Walden went straight to the fridge, looking for something edible. He pulled out some macaroni and popped it in the microwave.
Thomas was wolfing down a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. He had another sandwich, potato chips, two peaches, a bag of jelly beans, and a whole bunch of other stuff in his lunch bags. Walden shook his head. Thomas always amazed him with the amount he could eat. Thomas was the skinniest twig of a guy he had ever met, but could eat for breakfast enough for an army three times over.
Thomas swallowed. "Did Bunny Lady call today?"
"Yeah," Walden said. "Polly said it might be important this time."
Polly was one of their two dispatchers. Janice had gone on vacation the day before.
"No kidding?" Thomas looked surprised. "What is it this time, more tornadoes?"
A week previously, Bunny Lady had called the police to alert them of a tornado in the neighborhood. It turned out that she had left the washing machine running and mistook the noise for a natural disaster.
"Nah, a little girl screaming." The microwave dinged. Walden extracted his macaroni. He opened the nearest cabinet, looking for silverware.
"Oh. Think it might be real?" Thomas began working on his second sandwich.
"I don't know," Walden replied. He looked through the cabinet.
The cabinet contained paper plates, napkins, and a package of plastic sporks. Recently, the Break Room Committee had decided to invest in sporks rather than keep the place stocked with both spoons and forks. Their decision was partly based upon the relative cheapness of sporks, but mostly it was because the Committee members just liked to say the word 'spork'. Walden hated the damn sporks. They were useless as forks, due to the flimsiness that couldn't stab anything well. The tines of the fork part extended just far enough into the spoon part so as to render it useless as a spoon, as well.
He pulled out the package of sporks and tossed it into the garbage.
"Hey!" Thomas objected. "I like sporks!"
Walden glared at him. "I'd rather use a straw than a damn spork." True to his word, Walden grabbed a straw from the next cabinet and began stabbing his macaroni with it.
They ate in silence for a few minutes. When Walden was finished, he washed up the macaroni container and put it next to the sink. Thomas was still working on his potato chips.
"Want to go do a drive-by and check it out?" Walden asked.
"Check what out?"
"The screams."
"Yeah, just let me finish eating." Thomas gestured at his lunch spread.
"Come on, that's going to take you all day!" Walden complained. "Just bring it in the car."
Thomas stood up and crammed his food back into his three lunch bags. "Let's go."
As they walked out of the break room, Thomas dropped a spork down the back of Walden's shirt.
Meanwhile, at the park, Will and Kevin watched in horror. Children these days were downright bloodthirsty.
"Hurry up!" yelled Jack. He shifted from foot to foot.
"How come we're doing this?" Henry asked. They both were standing in the middle of the grassy recreation area.
"Good question," muttered Will.
Jack sighed dramatically. "Well, you can't be my most esteemed loyal servant if you don't know how to joust!"
Kevin turned to Will on the park bench they sat on. "Do you think we should stop them?"
"Probably," Will replied.
Neither of them moved.
Henry shuffled his feet. "Most esteemed?" he checked.
"Most esteemed," Jack assured him.
"I want a pay raise," Henry sniffed.
"Sure, you got it," Jack said.
"And some gummy bears."
"Well… I'll see what I can do," Jack replied. "Okay?"
"Yeah, I guess," Henry said.
Jack had stolen two trash can lids from the park's trash cans. One he had kept, and one he had given to Henry. They were to be used as shields. The jousting lances were just two really big sticks that Jack had found.
"So what do we do?" Henry asked.
"We charge at each other. If you knock the other person down with your lance, you win. You block with your shield," Jack explained.
"Aren't we supposed to have horses?" Henry pointed out.
Jack narrowed his eyes. Henry was smarter than he appeared to be. Jack would have to accommodate that in his universal domination plans.
"Yeah, but we don't have horses," Jack told him.
Kevin grinned.
"What?" asked Will.
Kevin shook his head. "Nothing. Just something Penelope had in her bags, that's all."
Will frowned. "Sure. Shouldn't they have helmets, too?"
Kevin made a face. "Penelope would kill me if she knew I let her 'Mini Prince Charmings' joust without helmets."
"JJ would flip out, too. I don't think she'd kill me, though. She needs me for free babysitting," Will said.
"Not if the baby in question got a lance through his skull," Kevin pointed out.
"We don't have any helmets with us," Will reasoned. "Therefore, there is nothing we can do."
"We could stop them from jousting altogether," Kevin suggested.
"I don't know. I kind of want to see how this turns out," Will said.
"Well, I hope that neither one of them gets a trip to the emergency room," Kevin said. "Penelope would kill me for that too, and then JJ would start in."
Will shrugged. "What they don't know won't hurt them."
Kevin grinned. "I like your philosophy."
They sat in silence for a moment, watching the boys walk to opposite ends of the green space.
"I love how responsible we are," Kevin observed.
"Go Henry! Knock his socks off!" yelled Will. Henry smiled and waved.
Jack looked pointedly at Kevin.
"Go Jack! Smash his head in! Except don't really!" yelled Kevin.
Jack grinned and bowed.
Both boys picked up their lances and pointed them at each other.
"Ready?" Jack called to Henry.
"Yeah!" Henry replied.
"Let's GO!" Jack screeched.
Jack and Henry charged each other.
The jousting match of the century had begun.