Archive of Our Own ^beta

     FREMONT COUNTY, WYOMING
     JUNE 18, 2005
8:27 A.M.

     The little boy plays on the screen porch of a shabby two-story house, reaching across a small pile of toys, engrossed in a game of play-pretend. From inside the house, he can hear his mom washing the breakfast dishes—the sounds of splashing water and her humming along with the radio assure him everything is right with the world. It’s a bright, beautiful spring day, and in this, the last moment of true peace in his life, he wants for nothing.

     He’s pretending his cars are monster-trucks-turned-robots, like in that cartoon, Transformers. His mom won’t let him watch it, she says it’s too violent, but one time she fell asleep and left the TV on, and he saw a few minutes. He wasn’t scared, though. He’s a big boy now, he doesn’t get scared; that’s baby stuff.

     The robot cars engage in a battle against mutant dinosaur invaders; the target, a well-loved green T-Rex. His yellow Matchbox truck is Bumblebee, a fierce protector of good, and the small metal toy thrums along the porch floor, aided by the boy’s soft engine noises. The T-Rex roars ferociously, bringing terror down on Manhattan. The boy doesn’t know what “Manhattan” is, but he’s heard about it on the news, and it sounds important.

     A shadow crosses his face. He lets go of the toys, becoming quiet and still, unnaturally so for a boy of three. He focuses on the truck, and as he does so, the toy begins to quiver. His eyes—a deep, crystal blue—bear down on the toy with startling intensity. A frown of concentration creases his small face as the car moves seemingly of its own volition, plastic wheels creaking along the rough porch floor, gathering speed until it slams into the side of the dinosaur toy, knocking it over.

     A fleeting moment passes, and the shadow is gone. The boy sits back on his heels, surveying his work, pleased. The robot cars win; good prevails.

     The screen door slams behind him as his father rushes out, late for work. The little boy brightens and runs after him, down the steps, leaping into his arms, laughing.

     “Daddy! Wanna come!”

     The man smiles and swoops his son into a hug. The boy buries his face in his daddy’s warm flannel shirt; it smells of smoke from the old stove in their kitchen, and in later years, he will take comfort from the scent of a wood fire, unconsciously associating it with his father’s love.

     But the moment is fleeting. His daddy gently but firmly unwraps the boy’s arms from around his neck, puts him back down.

     “Not this time, buddy. Daddy’s late. I’ll see you when I get home.”

     He steps into the cab of the truck and closes the door with a final thunk. The boy begins to cry and fuss with the kind of visceral anger known only to small children—he stomps his foot on the ground, fists curled into tight balls, yelling, “Nooooo!! Dada! I want Dada!” His mama calls it “baby talk,” and he’s a big boy now, too big for baby talk, but he doesn’t care.

     The tantrum continues in fits of sobbing and stomping as his dad’s truck backs slowly down the driveway, brakes creaking as it pauses at the mouth, ready to pull onto the gravel road.

     An idea presents itself. Some part of him knows this is a Bad Idea, a Very Bad Idea, but curiosity wins out over common sense. He focuses on the red Chevy through hot tears, stifling hiccups. He concentrates again, but harder this time, hard enough to make his small head ache, holding his breath until his lungs scream for air. He’s too young to articulate it, but there is a powerful shift in the energy around him; he’s drawing it into himself, gathering it, using his small body like a magnifying glass to direct the rays of the sun. His eyes narrow into slits as he sends the energy outward.

     Maybe, just maybe…maybe he can control his father’s truck the same way he controls his toys.

     Maybe I can make him stay.

     His father, oblivious to the boy’s intent gaze, backs into the road and waves a last, cheerful goodbye, and the boy’s shoulders slump forward as his daddy pulls away. 

     Dumb trick didn’t work.

     He kicks at the dirt with the toe of his scuffed Keds, sending up a puff of dust as he turns to make his way back to the house.

     From the corner of his eye, he sees the cab of the departing truck erupt in flames.

     His head turns, eyes widening in curious, terrified awe, tears already drying in salty rivulets on his cheeks. He wills himself to run, but his feet remain frozen to the ground. The flames rise up, up, up, dancing, drawing him in.

     A distant scream jolts him out of his reverie.

     That’s my daddy. My Daddy is screaming.

     This terrifies him, the thought of his father surrounded by angry flames, and he runs for the house, yelling, “MA! Mama!” She meets him at the door, confused, unaware her husband is moments from his last breath.

     “Mama! The truck…Daddy’s in…FIRE,” he chokes out between sobs, but his mother doesn’t understand.

     Fire? She thinks. What fire? John just left for work, how could—

     There’s a sickeningly loud explosion as the gas tank ignites.

     She runs out to the porch and down the steps, stumbling at the bottom in a panic, but catching herself before she can fall, just in time to see her husband’s truck go up in a fireball. The house shakes from the blast, windows cracking with the shockwave, debris scattering itself across their neatly mowed lawn. A piece of the truck’s cab door flies into the air and descends with a faint whistling noise before embedding itself in their push mower.

     I told him not to leave that out, she thinks, before reality sinks its cold, dead fingers into her consciousness.

     The boy stands in the doorway, tears streaming down his cheeks as his mother falls to her knees on the earth, hands clutched in her hair, keening.

     This is how he knows his father is dead.

     OUR LADY OF SORROWS HOSPITAL
11:37 P.M.

     She walks the narrow hallway, the gentle click-click-click of her heels echoing on the faded green tiles. The patient rooms emit a faint blue glow, shadows dancing on the walls from televisions and monitors, LED lights flickering and beeping dutiful rhythms.

     She rounds a corner, makes her way through two large swinging doors at the end of the hall, and steps up to the nurse’s station, distracted by the file she holds in her hand—a young woman, not quite twenty, recently diagnosed with renal failure, cause unknown. Her mind is churning away at possible causes—an untreated UTI, possibly a tumor—when the head night nurse greets her, startling her out of her thoughts.

     “Evenin’, Dr. Scully. You working late again?”

     “Hi, Lola. Yes,” says Dana Scully, holding up a thick brown file folder, “…paperwork.”

     Lola is familiar with Scully’s unusual office hours as of late. The nurse scowls in mock disapproval. “Shame, shame…pretty lady like you, cooped up in this dreary ol’ place. Don’t you have a handsome young man to tuck you in tonight?”

     Scully is pushing fifty, and tonight she feels every year of it, but she smiles. “Young, he’s not…but he’s not missing me.”

     “Well, he should miss you, doctor lady. Don’t waste a good man. You go home and give him a big ol’ sloppy kiss for me,” the nurse howls at her own private joke, the laughter following Scully down the hall and around the next corner, through the lobby, and into the crisp autumn air.

     Fox Mulder is the last thing she wants to think about right now, if she’s being honest with herself. Her enigmatic partner, friend, and lover—their relationship an intense battle of wills. He, the restless explorer, and she, always trying to reel him in. Lately it was more exhausting than fulfilling, this dance of theirs, and she wonders if they will ever find their rhythm.

     She stops outside the door for a moment, taking a deep breath, letting the stillness of night settle around her. She’s been on call since morning, and a warm bath is calling her name, but the day isn’t over. She heads for the office building across the hospital campus’ grassy lawn, fall leaves swirling at her ankles.

     The offices are empty at this hour. Even her most ambitious colleagues have gone home to their families, the unlucky ones left to sleep in the hospital’s uncomfortable bunk, awakened periodically to deal with the handful of cases that will come through the ER tonight.

     But she remains of her own volition, not with a mind to prove herself, or advance her career. She’s past the point of climbing that proverbial ladder. No, work has always been a convenient escape. It was true at Quantico, it was true working with Mulder on the X-Files, and now it was true here, at the hospital. Some things never change.

     But what was she trying to escape? That point had yet to make itself clear.

     The building is dark. Her key turns easily in the lock, and the familiar scents of printer ink and antiseptic greet her as she opens the large oak doors that lead to the physicians’ private suites. She climbs a flight of stairs to where her office waits at the end of a long, dark hallway.

     The door latches behind her with a soft click. Her heels, as offensive to her feet as they are attractive to her petite stature, are the first to go, followed shortly by her lab coat. She collapses into her chair, letting her head loll against the uncomfortable headrest, rolling it back and forth on her shoulders in a futile attempt to ease the tension there.

     It’s going to take more than a hot bath to untie these knots, she thinks, wincing. 

     She gathers herself, assessing the thick stack of papers in front of her. The brown file she’s been carrying joins its brothers and sisters on her desk, which is lost in a sea of identical brown folders, crumpled napkins, and empty styrofoam coffee cups.

     The mess is easy to ignore once she starts reading through the files, losing herself in the work. She’s no stranger to less-than-ideal working environments; the cluttered corner of a certain basement office at the J. Edgar Hoover building comes to mind. This office, with its glossy oak panels and soothing blue-gray walls, is a big step up from her past life as an FBI investigator—even if the state of her desk doesn’t agree.

     She works her way methodically through lab sheets and notes from her daily rounds, copying them into the hospital’s digital records. It’s tedious work, typically reserved for medical clerks and interns, but mind-numbing data entry is a welcome respite from what has otherwise been a horrible week. The swift and decisive motion of her fingers on the keyboard is comfortable, familiar. She pauses here and there, trying to decipher the notes scribbled hastily in the narrow margins of each file, cross-referencing each patient’s history with the new additions and filing everything away in the cabinets behind her desk.

     As she works, she happens upon the file that’s given her so much grief this week. Amelia, a young girl of four, diagnosed with a rare blood disorder not three weeks ago. Scully’s proposed treatment plan was aggressive, pushing the limits of the hospital administration’s recommendations, but she was hopeful. The girl stood a chance.

     A chance, she thinks, staring sadly at the little girl’s preschool picture—all pigtails and rosy cheeks.

     Two days ago, Amelia fell ill with pneumonia. The combination of the disease, the treatment, and the infection were too much, and she lapsed into a coma, passing away hours later. Scully recalls sitting at the girl’s bedside at the start of her treatment, telling her everything would be OK, she would feel better soon.

     And that was a goddamned lie.

     The memory leaves an acidic taste in the back of her throat. The file falls onto the desk as she places her head in her hands, fatigue and defeat washing over her. She lets her mind wander, ambling over the events of the week until exhaustion wins, and she drifts off.

#

     She’s sitting in a strange bed in a small, dark room, alone. No…not alone. There’s something in her arms, something heavy, moving, wrapped in blankets. She turns her head as though pushed by an unseen hand, finds herself drawn to the writhing bundle, yet paralyzed with fear.

     The blankets fall open slightly, revealing a small, pink fist, and sweet relief floods her.

     A baby. Her baby. William. Emotion wells, her throat tightening.

     Relief turns to revulsion as the small pink hand morphs, turning dark gray and brittle and sharp like a claw, reaching for her. There’s a wail, but it is alien, a horrible, screeching, gnawing sound.

     She tries to scream but she can’t get enough air—all she can do is let out a strangled screech, recoiling, dropping the squirming bundle onto her lap.

     Unable to stop herself, curiosity mixed with horror, she unfolds the corner of the blanket. The gray, withered fingers slash wildly, angrily at empty air. She lets out a strangled moan, “No, no,” and the eyes that gaze up at her are huge and black and empty. Not human. Not…

#

     Scully’s head slips from her hands, slamming painfully into the desk.

     Shit!

     She winces and gasps, rubbing the tender spot on her scalp with growing unease, but memories of the dark dream are already fading. There had been a baby…William? But no, something was wrong…

     Before she can recall the dream, there’s movement in her peripheral vision, followed by what she thinks is a soft footfall outside the door. Her head snaps up, alert, waiting. Night security? But something about it feels off…the last vestiges of her nightmare lurk in the shadows, leaving her edgy, paranoid.

     “Who’s there?”

     No response; only the rhythmic thud of her heartbeat in her ears.

     She shifts uneasily, fear mounting. Is that a shadow? She reaches for the first plausible weapon, sliding open her desk drawer to reveal a small letter opener, wishing it had the comforting heft of her old SIG Sauer.

     Yes, there was definitely a faint shadow under the doorway. Then another footfall, backing away at the sound of her voice.

     “Who is it?” Scully demands, fear giving way to ire. The footsteps retreat down the hall as she stands, back and shoulders protesting as she approaches the door. She eases it open, a surge of adrenaline coursing through her as she crosses the threshold and into the darkened hallway, the letter opener clenched in her fist.

     There’s a faint shadow at the end of the hall, the shape of a man standing just beyond the glow of the Exit sign. She squints, eyes adjusting to the dim light.

     “Hey!”

     The shadow hesitates for a second before darting around the corner toward the exit. She runs, exiting the fire doors into the stairwell in pursuit, stocking feet slipping precariously on the waxed tiles. Below her, she can hear the strange figure’s hasty retreat, the echoing thud of his footsteps on the concrete risers; he’s already on the first floor.

     By the time Scully reaches the exit, the intruder is gone. There’s only the trees, the wind, the leaves rattling against the building. She whirls around, breathing hard, but no amount of staring into the darkness beyond the building produces a human form. She groans, fuming, annoyed that she’s let this encounter spook her.

     Jumping at shadows again, aren’t you Dana? It’s probably just kids sneaking around, looking for cheap thrills and drugs.

     Exhaustion catches up to her. She’ll call security to let them know to keep an eye out for suspicious activity, then grab her things and get away from this place; it’s too cold, too sterile. The paperwork can wait.

     Maybe I’ll take that bath after all.

     She broods, lost in thought as she makes her way up the stairs, so much so that she almost doesn’t notice the folder beside the door. It’s difficult to see in the shadowy hallway, but the light from her office falls on its corner. She frowns. I dropped a file…but no, this is different. It’s black. Thin.

     She picks up the folder, suspicious, carrying it into her office. The letter opener, still gripped in her right hand, makes quick work of the seal. She doesn’t realize she’s holding her breath until the sound of the knife slicing through the thick paper makes her jump.

     Jesus. Shake it off, Dana.

     She taps the folder’s edge, shaking out a piece of paper the size of an index card. Printed on one side is a mailing address she doesn’t recognize. 

     776 East Park Way
     Riverton, WY. 82501

     Puzzled, she turns it over, and the words on the other side of the card make her mouth go dry. In the same neat, unassuming type, she reads:

     He needs help, Mama.

     An involuntary shudder runs through her, the fleeting memory of her earlier dream flooding her with irrational fear.

     He needs help, Mama.

     She rushes from the office, forgetting her belongings, and heads for the car.

     WYOMING

     11 A.M.

     “How are we supposed to find him? There have to be at least 200 kids at this school.”

     “I dunno, Scully, this is your show. We can’t exactly waltz into the principal’s office and ask if we can speak to someone else’s child.”

     He’s restless, irritated. The rental car floor is littered with the dry husks of sunflower seeds.

     She arches an eyebrow. “You spent enough time in the principal’s office as a kid. I’m sure you could figure it out.”

     Another husk flies from his lips in a wide arc, this one landing on the dashboard in front of her. She wrinkles her nose, brushing it away in mock disgust. “Mulder, this is a rental…they’re going to think I let a squirrel move in.”

     “You’re squirrel, I’m moose, remember?” he fires back, a wry smirk on his lips, but she’s frowning at something outside, not looking at him. They’re waiting outside the large concrete building, although what they’re waiting for remains unclear.

     If William is here, how would we recognize him? Scully wonders. She hasn’t seen him since he was ten months old, and Mulder’s time with their son could be more accurately measured in hours, not days or months.

     A bell rings; there’s the telltale sound of young voices growing louder, shouting in glee as they leave the building in a flood.

     Ahh. Recess.

     “Maybe we don’t have to go in,” she murmurs, reaching for the door handle. 

     They head toward the source of the commotion, a playground off to one side of the school. Children are running, laughing, most of them little balls of barely contained energy. The monitor, a young teacher, already has her hands full trying to break up a fight.

     Scully notices the boy almost immediately; it’s impossible not to. He sits apart from his rowdy classmates, his back to a wooded area on the far side of the yard, absorbed in a book.

     The resemblance to her partner is unmistakable. Lanky frame, tousled brown hair that probably hasn’t seen a brush in weeks, black t-shirt, jeans. The shape and intensity of his eyes, his jaw…she could be looking at a picture of Mulder as a teenager. Her knees go weak and she stumbles, sagging against a nearby tree for support.

     “Scully…?”

     “It’s him,” she whispers, eyes riveted to the quiet child with the moody, focused expression.Mulder follows her gaze, but she can tell by the cool detachment in his eyes that her partner isn’t convinced.

     “You think—”

     He doesn’t get to finish; at that moment a dark figure comes out of the woods behind the boy, and they watch in confused horror as gloved hands wrap themselves around the boy’s face, covering his mouth. She’s close enough to see the surprise in his eyes as he’s yanked upward and backward, dragged into the woods kicking and struggling.

     “Mulder!”

     He’s already making his way toward the woods at the back of the school, shouting over his shoulder, “I’m on it—call the police!”

     He doesn’t think, just runs, fueled by adrenaline. He doesn’t know if this is really William, but it doesn’t matter; whoever it is, the kid’s in trouble. No one else could have seen the boy’s abduction, it happened too fast.

     Kid would have disappeared if we hadn’t been watching.

     It’s not lost on Mulder that the timing is too convenient, but he can’t think about that now. There’s a show of black fabric ahead, a glimpse of the boy’s arm through the trees. Branches whip by, scratching Mulder’s face, tearing at his clothes. He can see the figure and the boy clearly now, he’s gaining on them, closing the gap. Twenty yards…fifteen…

     Keep fighting, kid, you’re slowing him down. I’m coming.

     Someone yells in the distance, and the world suddenly goes white. Blinded, Mulder loses his footing, landing hard, air rushing from his lungs in a violent spasm that leaves him breathless.

     That’s going to bruise.

     Then Scully is behind him, calling his name as she steps out of the thick growth. She stops short at the sight of her partner, now rolling onto his back with a painful groan, but he waves her onward.

     “They’re…that way, go! Go, I’m fine!”

     She continues through the thick brush, but there’s no sign of the boy or his attacker, no sound to guide her.

     “Mulder, I’ve lost them…damnit!” She spins on her heel, breathing hard, scanning the forest.

     Wait…

     There’s a scuffling to her left, and Scully lurches toward the sound.

     The man dressed in black is lying face down on the ground, motionless. She spots the boy crouched beyond the body, pale and afraid, but alive, and his name escapes her lips in a relieved rush.

     “William!”

     The boy is confused, panicked, backing away. “Get away from me!” he screams. “I…I’ll…”

     “Scully, where—”

     Mulder limps into the clearing, stopping short when he sees the man on the ground. Looking from the man to the boy and back, his mind races as he tries to put the pieces together.

     “Hey, kid, it’s OK, we’re…we’re friends,” he begins, addressing the child, keeping his voice low.

     Kid looks like he’ll bolt. Can’t say I blame him.

     “What happened here?”

     “Who are you?!” The boy is close to tears, blind terror shining in the depths of his eyes. “What do you want from me?!”

     Scully steps forward, trying to reassure him, to keep her voice calm even though she’s shaking. “We saw this man take you. We’re not going to hurt you, we just want to make sure you’re OK.”

     Without warning, the body of the man on the ground begins to…sizzle? Yes, sizzle, thinks Scully in revulsion, like a steak on a hot grill.

     A popping, fizzling sound erupts as the flesh dissolves. Moments later, there is nothing but a sticky pile of black soot in its place.

     They watch this gruesome production in fascinated horror. Without thinking, Scully bends to examine the remains, although the man is obviously beyond help, but Mulder’s cry of alarm stops her.

     “Don’t touch it! Don’t touch that thing. We don’t know what it is.”

     She withdraws her hand, looking up at her partner in confusion. There’s the sound of distant voices.

     Ahh, the cavalry arrives right on time, as always, Mulder thinks, shaking his head in frustration.

     “Who…who are you?” The boy speaks, this time more curious than afraid.

     “I’m Dana Scully, I’m a doctor. We—” but Mulder stops her with a quick shake of his head.

     No time for introductions.

     It dawns on her that he’s right. Two random strangers hanging out by a school playground, in the right place at the right time to witness the abduction of a student, and now there’s a dead body—if you could call that thing a body, she shudders. It was too convenient, too unbelievable, and no cop who was halfway decent at his job would buy it.

     Mulder speaks quietly, so as to not draw the attention of the approaching police. “What’s your name, kid?”

     “Isaac. I’m Isaac.”

     Scully can’t hide her shock. I called him William. They must have renamed him…

     “Look, Isaac…when you tell the police your story, tell them you may be in danger. This isn’t the end, do you understand? Tell them you need protection. Tell them—”

     Isaac shakes his head in visible distress. “Why?!? Why would someone…I don’t understand—”

     “Freeze! Police! Hands in the air!” A male voice calls out from behind them. “Step away from the kid, put your hands up!”

     Mulder shoots a knowing look at Scully, hands rising above his head as she does the same. “We’re unarmed,” he mutters, rolling his eyes.

     Scully turns to one of the officers, to explain, “We saw the attacker, we tried to help. We’re former FBI agents. I can give you our badge numbers.”

     The man ignores her, his eyes trained on what once was the corpse of the attacker. “What the hell happened here?” He reaches down to touch the body, but Mulder interjects.

     “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

     The cop glances up, sneers, “Yeah? Who made you the expert, buddy?” Still, he withdraws his hand.

     “If you only knew,” mutters Mulder under his breath.

     Knowing her partner will do their case more harm than good if she lets him continue, Scully steps in.

     “Call Deputy Director Walter Skinner, FBI. Phone number 555-3347. We’re former FBI agents,” she repeats. “I’m Dana Scully, this is Fox Mulder. We saw the attack, we’re unarmed, we’re going to cooperate.”

     Isaac, almost forgotten in the commotion, speaks up in a small voice. “She’s right. They…they were trying to help.”

     “Well, they did a hell of a job of that,” the officer sniffs, looking at the body on the ground. He shakes his head in disbelief and indicates for the other officer to holster her weapon.

     “I’m going to need all three of you to come down to the station. Holly? Get C.S.I. out here. Detective’s going to want a full forensic work-up on this…uhh, whatever this is.” He gestures to the human puddle on the ground, grumbling to himself, “Why do the crazies always come out on my shift?”

     5:49 P.M.

     “I don’t know about you, Scully, but I don’t think the P.D.‘s free coffee was worth the price of the plane ticket,” Mulder cracks, stretching as he leaves the interrogation room.

     Scully can’t help but smile at his familiar, cocky stride as she stands to greet her partner with a sympathetic ear. She’d suffered a particularly tedious interrogation herself, burnt coffee included.

     By some miracle of miracles, the police got through to Skinner’s secretary, who reluctantly confirmed their identities. Scully could only imagine what the woman told them about “Spooky” Mulder and his former partner; whatever it was, the police remained suspicious, and it showed—they’d been at the station for hours, fielding inane questions. She had a feeling they were more concerned with how the body disappeared into thin air, and how the boy got away without a scratch.

     Scully is bothered by this, too. She’s thought about little else as she waits for the police to let Mulder go. There’s no way the twelve-year-old could have overpowered a full-grown man, let alone melted him.

     Unless…

     Last night’s dream nags at her consciousness, and she shudders in the hard plastic seat.

     “Have they released Isaac yet?”

     “No, I haven’t seen him…they were waiting for his—”

     A door bursts open, revealing an intense-looking woman with light brown hair, a pale complexion, and rage in her dark blue eyes.

     “—parents,” Scully finishes, momentarily stunned by the woman’s ferocity.

     The woman’s shrill voice carries down the narrow hallway. “He’s my son, he’s done nothing wrong, and I won’t have you asking him any more questions!”

     Thinking fast, Mulder steps up, blocking her exit. “Hi, Mrs…?”

     The woman’s nostrils flare a warning, reminiscent of a bear protecting her cub. “Mrs. Van de Kamp. And you are?”

     “Mulder, Fox Mulder. We witnessed your son’s abduction.” He doesn’t miss a beat, talking fast, not giving her a chance to argue. “Listen, Mrs. Van de Kamp, I don’t mean to alarm you, but your son could be in danger. I don’t think this was an isolated incident, it’s going to happen again. Do you have somewhere you can go? Somewhere safe you could take him?”

     Scully watches as the woman’s eyes narrow at Mulder, sizing him up, taking in his rumpled appearance, the dark circles under his eyes.

     “Mr. Mulder,” she spits, “I don’t know who you think you are, but unless my son is under arrest, you’re going to let us go.” Her words are icy, and she pushes past him without a backward glance. The boy’s eyes meet Scully’s for a fleeting moment, and if she didn’t know better, she’d think he was pleading with her. His mother blazes an angry path down the corridor and out the door with her clearly embarrassed son trailing behind.

     The partners follow them down the hall to the desk at the front of the station. Mulder rubs at the back of his neck. “Can’t say we didn’t try.”

     Scully shoots him a pained look. “You saw what happened back there. We can’t just leave him!” They make their way outside and into the chilly evening air. 

     “So we’ll call Skinner, ask him to put someone from the local branch on detail; the mom doesn’t have to know. Between the interrogation and…whatever that was,” he gestures to the boy’s mother, now storming across the parking lot, “I’d say our help isn’t welcome.”

     “That’s never stopped you before.” She’s on fire tonight, her red hair catching the last rays of the setting sun.

     “Yeah, well, things change. I’ve changed,” he shrugs, keeps walking, tucks his head low. “We have a life to get back to; you have work, I have my book…”

     This stops Scully in her tracks, face flushed. “Mulder, I’m not going to go home and call it a day! He’s our son,” she hisses, “he needs our help.”

     “He didn’t seem all that helpless to me. Between him and Mr. Black back there, the boy wasn’t the one that went the way of the wicked witch.” His tone is mild, but he can’t hide the edge of petulance in his voice. “And you don’t know he’s our son. For all we know, he’s just a kid who had a bad day.”

     “Mulder…” Scully tries and fails to keep up with his long, determined strides before reaching out and grabbing his jacket at the elbow, forcing him to turn. “Why do you refuse to see it? It’s him! I know his face because it’s your face, Mulder. He’s both of us. I know my own child.”

     Her blue eyes burn into his, momentarily startling him with their intensity, as beautiful as it is disarming. He studies her face, so familiar…and yet not. He hasn’t seen this kind of determination since they left the FBI, determination driven by fear; he knows it too well. For a moment he sees the fierce young agent who walked into his office and turned his life upside down, not the wizened woman who’s shared his bed for the last twelve years. It leaves him feeling unsettled and nostalgic.

     It’s out of love for her that he stays, but his frustration lingers. He wonders how far she’ll be drawn in, and what heartbreak lies in the aftermath.

     He opens his mouth, wishing he could find a way to say it, but what comes out is a resigned sigh. “OK. I don’t see it, but we’ll stay. At least until we’ve figured out why the kid’s in trouble.” He reaches out, takes her hand lightly in his own. “That work? We good?”

     Scully looks troubled, but forces a tight nod. “Yeah…good.”

     “Let’s do some research, get more information about this kid—family history, medical records, report cards…there must be something.”

     She nods, swallowing hard, not trusting herself to speak. The tears threaten to come, and she can’t break down. Not now. Not yet.

     “Mr. Molder? Mrs. Scully?” The young voice startles the agents, and they turn to find the boy, Isaac, approaching them. Once again, Scully is struck by his features, and up close she can see his eyes—a deep crystal blue, the same color as her own.

     “I have to go before she notices I’m gone,” he speaks quickly, quietly, gesturing over his shoulder to his mother, leaning into her blue Toyota. “I tried to tell the cops, but they didn’t believe me. Can you meet me tomorrow? In the morning? There’s a place about a block from my school…a park.” He speaks to the ground, pretending to study his shoes, scuffing his toe on the blacktop.

     Mulder and Scully exchange looks, but before they can respond, his mother calls to him from across the parking lot.

     “Isaac! Come here right now!”

     “I have to go, see you tomorrow,” the boy says, breathless (Ihavetogoseeyoutomorrow).

     And with that, he’s gone again.

     Mulder blinks, narrowing his eyes at the kid’s back. “Scully, you may be right about this kid. He has a taste for the clandestine.”

     She ignores him, her eyes following the Toyota as it pulls out of the parking lot. “What was that about, do you think?”

     “I dunno. Guess we’ll find out soon enough.”

     Her lips press into a thin, worried line. “Mmm. Mulder…I don’t think he should be alone tonight. If the police don’t believe them…”

     “What are you suggesting, Scully?”

     “I’ll drop you at the hotel…you can do some research, see what you find. I’ll tail them.”

     She hasn’t finished her sentence, and Mulder is already shaking his head. “No. You shouldn’t be alone out here. We’re not agents, you don’t carry a weapon—”

     She cocks an eyebrow, all too familiar with his over-protective concern, finding it both endearing and annoying. “Mulder, how many times have you left me to pore over microfiche in a stuffy library in the middle of nowhere? I’ll do the fieldwork for a change. I’ll keep my cell on, promise to call if anything happens. And you,” she finishes, placing her hand lightly on his chest, smiling a wry smile, “can consult our good friend, Special Agent Google.”

     RIVERTON, WYOMING
10:45 P.M.

     He’s hunched over the cheap hotel desk, back protesting the ergonomics, or lack thereof, with his laptop glowing in the darkness.

     A family history reveals nothing out of the ordinary—as far as Mulder can tell the child has little family, save for his parents. The first thing he finds is a record of live birth—Isaac Van de Kamp, born March 31, 2002, to Mr. and Mrs. John Van de Kamp—further confirming Mulder’s belief that Scully’s mystery visitor has led her astray.

     Beyond that, there’s no indication the boy is remarkable in any way, save for the mysterious attack a few hours earlier.

     Mulder sits back, checks the clock, sighs. He’s been at this since Scully dropped him off, that was hours ago. The motel is dark and quiet, the glow of the screen makes his head ache. He knows his partner is perfectly capable of taking care of herself, but still, he worries.

     We’ve been away from this too long.

     The cell phone rings, a harsh trill in the deep silence, and he jumps for it. “Scully?”

     “What the hell do you two think you’re doing?”

     Not Scully. It takes Mulder a moment to place it, but he doesn’t skip a beat. “Nice to hear your voice again, too, sir.”

     Deputy Director Walter Skinner doesn’t return the greeting. Mulder imagines the token vein popping out from his former superior’s forehead as he speaks. “My secretary got a call from the Fremont County P.D. this afternoon, claiming you two knuckleheads are snooping around elementary schools, chasing after kids. I don’t give a damn what you do in your retirement, Mulder, but I don’t appreciate you using my name as a Get Out of Jail Free card.”

     Mulder ignores this, accustomed to being the subject of Skinner’s ire. Usually it means he’s on the right track. “Actually, sir, I have a few questions for you about the Van de Kamps—that name ring any bells?”

     Skinner is caught off guard. “No, I…even if it did, Mulder, I can’t give you information. You know that.”

     “See, that’s just it, sir. There’s nothing on this kid, Isaac Van de Kamp, that explains why anyone would have it out for him. And yet, this morning Scully and I watched a man in black drag the kid into the woods…right before the guy melted into the ground.” His tone goes dark. “Sound like the work of anyone we know, Walter?”

     There’s a pause; he can hear heavy breathing on the other end of the line. Mulder knows he’s overstepped his bounds; copping an attitude with the one person who can help is a bad idea, but the headache makes him irritable, quick-tempered, and he can’t help thinking Skinner knows more about the Van de Kamp boy than he’s letting on.

     “Mulder,” Skinner’s words are slow and clipped, “the next time the police call me and mention your name, I’m going to tell them to arrest you. I’m warning you: Step off. Go home. That goes for Scully, too.”

     There’s a soft click as the line goes dead.

     Mulder tosses the phone on the bed in frustration. Damnit. What next?

     He paces the floor before picking up his cell again. The voice on the other end answers on the first ring, surprising given the late hour; deep, wary, and vaguely electronic. “Lay residence, Glen speaking.”

     “Drop the act, it’s me. I need help.” There’s a pause. A click, the sound of static, then silence.

     “OK, we’re clear. Mulder, long time no talk,” the deep masculine robot voice changes to Langly’s unmistakable nasal drone.

     “Kinda hard to talk to someone who’s supposed to be dead, my friend.”

     “There’s that,” Langly agrees cheerfully.

     “I don’t have much time for small talk. Are the guys there?”

     “In the flesh, G-man.”

     “I don’t wanna know about ‘the flesh,’ Langly, but I do need some information. I need you to hack into the FBI personal records database, I’m looking for a boy, Isaac Van de Kamp. Anything you can find—”

     “Got it. Gimme a minute.” The sound of fingers flying across a keyboard, followed by muffled arguing. “Put it on speaker! No, you moron, it’s that one.” Mulder picks out Frohicke’s deep rumbling monotone in the background. “Is Dana there?”

     He smiles. Some things never change, even in death.

     “Whaddya got, guys.”

     “Mulder,” it’s Byers this time. “You sure this is a kid you’re looking for? His dossier is huge, several gigs.”

     Mulder lifts his eyes, “Yeah, definitely a kid. Eleven or twelve years old.”

     “That’s him alright. It looks like…has he been sick? Lots of tests. Blood work. His medical record alone is massive.”

     “I dunno, possibly.” He pauses, unsure how to continue, “Scully thinks this boy might be her son.”

     There’s silence on the end of the line, save for muted typing. “According to this, she may be right. His file references another case number…an X-File. X-0576324B. That points back to one ‘William Scully,’ deceased.”

     For a rare moment, Mulder is rendered speechless. He has to sit down on the bed to keep his legs from giving way. The steady throbbing in his head increases.

     She was right. I didn’t see it.

     “Mulder, you there?”

     “Yeah, here, sorry. Are you sure?”

     “‘Course we’re sure,” Frohicke growls from over Byers’ shoulder. “This ain’t no two-bit hack show.”

     “Alright, calm down little man,” Mulder mutters, closing his eyes. “Looks like I owe someone flowers if I don’t want to spend the next decade sleeping in the doghouse,” he sighs. “Send me the dossier?”

     “I can try,” Byers says. “Like I said, it’s huge. There’s no guarantee they won’t find this back door and shut it down before we can download it all—“

     “—but maybe we can reroute through our offshore servers, buy it some time,” Frohicke interrupts amidst the frenetic tick-tack-tick of keys.

     “Get what you can,” Mulder cuts him off, too tired to follow the techno-speak. “If nothing else, get the medical records.”

     “Will do…and Mulder? She’d prefer chocolate.” Click.

     He hangs his head, pinching the bridge of his nose.

     Their son. His son.

     Was he blinded to the truth because it wasn’t obvious, or because he hadn’t wanted to see it?

     He dials Scully’s cell, relieved when she picks up.

     “Hey,” he says, biting his lip. “How’re you holding up?”

     “Oh, fine. Just—” she yawns, “—keeping an eye on things.”

     He does the math; she hasn’t slept in over 36 hours, save for a catnap on the plane. I should never have let her go.

     “They’re out pretty far; maybe thirty, forty miles. Nothing to see for miles. It’s quiet.”

     “Scully, you should come back. I don’t think you’re going to find anything tonight.” He continues, “I think this little incident caught them off guard. Whatever these people want, they won’t stay away for long, but I don’t think he’s as helpless as we want to believe.”

     A pause as she considers this.

     “Anyway, the guys found something. I think you’ll want to hear it for yourself.”

     Silence on the other end. Mulder is about to ask if she’s still there, but Scully’s voice comes through, tired and familiar. “I’ll be there soon.”

     “Drive safe.”

#

     She’s barely crossed the threshold before she’s standing in front of him, eyes on fire. “What did you find?”

     “Why don’t you get ready for bed first; we’ll talk.”

     “Mulder,” her tone a warning, “don’t coddle me. Tell me what you found.”

     He nods, wishing he could protect her, realizing she won’t let him. “Will you at least sit down?”

     She does. He sits, too, leaning forward on his knees, keeping his expression neutral.

     “The boy…you were right. He’s your son.”

     The fatigue from a few moments ago is replaced with restless, wide-eyed excitement. “I knew it! I knew it, Mulder, he had to be—”

     Mulder ignores the interruption, eyes downcast, wishing he didn’t have to share what comes next. “He has an extensive government file, the size of which rivals anyone on the Most Wanted list. They’ve been keeping detailed medical records on him since he was adopted. Testing him, looks like, although we won’t know for sure until Byers sends the full dossier.”

     Her face falls as it dawns on her what this means, a silent, unspoken fear etched in the line of her brow. “The adoption was supposed to protect him! No one was supposed to know…”

     Mulder raises his eyes to meet hers, watery and lined. “Someone didn’t keep their promise.”

     She doesn’t respond, but her sorrow is evident in the slump of her shoulders.

     He leans back, closing his eyes in tired defeat. “Byers is sending the files as soon as he can, we won’t have it ‘til morning. We should get some rest.”

     She can feel his gaze on her, radiating concern, but she can’t look at him. He stands, approaching her, his hand warm and familiar on her shoulder. “Hey.”

     She looks up, eyes filled with disappointment. “He was supposed to be safe.”

     “You did everything you could,” he murmurs, arms moving around her to stroke her hair, attempting to pull her into an embrace, but she refuses the comfort, wooden and unyielding in his arms.

     Confused, he pulls away, swallowing hurt at her rejection.

     It’s been a long day…she’s tired, Fox, give her some space.

     He reaches past her, turns down the covers. “C’mon. Sleep. We’ll figure it out in the morning.”

#

     She wakes to the sound of a deadbolt, Mulder’s key in the door; he enters, balancing a cardboard tray with two styrofoam cups and a greasy paper bag of something that smells divine, and greets her with an exaggerated back-country drawl.

     “Mornin’, sleepyhead.”

     She blinks, wipes the sleep from her eyes. “Where’d you go?”

     “Just a run, had to clear my head. Found a bakery down the street, brought your favorite.”

      She takes in the sight of him as he strips off his T-shirt; hair mussed, face bright, a fine sheen of sweat across his muscular shoulders. As conflicted as she feels about him, about them, she can’t deny the lingering attraction.

     He disappears into the bathroom; there’s the sound of running water as he starts the shower. She peeks in the bag to find doughnuts, three of them, still warm. Her mouth waters; she’s ravenous, having skipped dinner the night before, and she’s halfway through her second when Mulder steps out of the shower, a towel loosely wrapped around his waist.

     “Leave any for me?”

     “Mmmhmm…ere’s one,” she says, speaking through a mouthful of crumbs. He hands her one of the cups from the cardboard tray; she savors it, basking in the aroma, anticipating the caffeine buzz.

     He watches this with quiet amusement, head cocked to one side, taking a seat at the edge of the bed. “You slept well,” he says finally, sipping his coffee. “I was worried I’d wake you.”

     “I think you were right, I needed rest. I feel better.” As she says this, she decides “better” is not entirely accurate. Fear gnaws at her when she thinks about yesterday’s encounter with Isaac, the attack, and his haunted past. But she feels stronger, more capable…ready to get to work.

     “Good,” Mulder says, as if reading her mind, “because I’m going to need your medical expertise on this.”

     He fetches his laptop from the desk, and she looks up in surprise. “Byers sent the file? Have you read it yet?”

     “I figured we should do this together.”

     The Gunmen pulled a significant portion of Isaac’s record before their connection was cut, but what Mulder and Scully see is enough to tell them what they’d already suspected: Isaac is not an ordinary child, not by far.

     But you already knew that, Dana, whispers a nagging voice at the back of her mind.

     They review his history with growing horror—hundreds of tests and scans conducted over the span of the last eleven years, under the guise of routine treatment for a…“rare congenital heart defect,” Scully whispers, shaking her head. “There was nothing wrong with William’s heart.”

     “‘Isaac’ was a veritable lab rat,” Mulder grimaces.

     “Look, here,” Scully points, “these codes…they’re vaccination codes. Hundreds of them. But no one receives this many vaccines, not over the course of their entire life.”

     “How much do you want to bet those weren’t vaccines?”

     “It doesn’t make sense. If they wanted him for these procedures, why didn’t they take him? Like your sister? Or Spender? Or any of us…”

     “I don’t know. The record is incomplete, but it looks like they stopped testing him back in…” he searches through the records again, “…in January. Right before his twelfth birthday. Why spend all that time poking and prodding the kid, just to stop?”

     “Maybe the heart defect corrected itself?” Scully posits, but there’s little hope in her voice.

     “You’re a doctor, Scully. How many birth defects with such severity as to warrant constant monitoring have miraculously cured themselves in your career?”

     She slumps back in the bed, conceding the point. “None.” She wishes she hadn’t eaten; her stomach churns, sloshing sugar and coffee.

     “That’s what I thought,” he mutters, checking the clock. “But we have a date to keep. Maybe this kid can tell us why the government is so interested in his health.”

    RIVERTON, WYOMING
9:07 A.M.

     The park is deserted except for the occasional jogger and a mother with her children, who scamper in and around the slides and tunnels with raucous shouts of glee. Their laughter carries in the unseasonably warm October air, and Scully watches them for a few minutes, marveling at their oblivious merriment, their innocence. 

     Did Isaac ever have that? she wonders sadly.

     Mulder, sensing her disquiet, brushes against her shoulder with a gentle nudge. “See him?”

     She blinks, squints, scanning the park. “No, I was just thinking—wait…yes, there he is.”

     He’s standing at the edge of the playground in the shade of a large oak, fidgeting, eyes downcast. As they approach, Mulder finds it hard to believe he didn’t see the resemblance.

     “Isaac?” Scully is the first to speak. The boy’s head snaps up, eyes wide, tense, and for a moment they’re sure he’s going to run.

     “Umm…hi. You’re, uh, Mrs. Scully, right?”

     She nods, smiling a little. “It’s just Scully. Dana Scully. This is my partner, Fox Mulder.”

     “You wanted to talk to us?” Mulder prods.

     Isaac nods. “I…I needed to ask you something. Yesterday, back there…that man. He…” The boy’s brow furrows, trying to find the words to describe what they’d seen, “…he melted, but you weren’t surprised. Why?”

     Mulder and Scully share a look. “We’ve seen a few things,” she hedges. “Why do you ask?”

     The boy looks down again, shuffling his feet. “I think I know why he came after me,” he says.

     “Why, Isaac?” 

     He hesitates, visibly frightened, so she presses, “We want to help you, but we have to know what happened.”

     He takes a deep breath, eyes shifting. “Promise you won’t freak out?”

     Mulder smiles. “Promise.”

     The boy looks back and forth between the partners, hesitant. They can tell by the shift in his gaze and his guarded stance that he’s unsure if he can trust them, but there’s also a gleam in his eye that gives away his desperation, and desperation wins out.

     He relents. “K. Watch this.” He raises his hand, indicating a point in the distance.

     Scully and Mulder follow his gaze to an empty merry-go-round across the park. They watch as the wheel begins to turn of its own volition, slow at first, then gathering speed, as if pushed by the wind.

     But…there’s no wind.

     Scully’s expression changes from one of skepticism to alarm as the giant metal wheel whirls faster than any breeze could carry it. Across the park, the playing children look up in confusion as the wheel squeaks and groans in protest, rattling angrily against its foundation.

     The memory flashes before her eyes with painful clarity; the mobile above his crib, spinning and spinning, the soft creak of metal on metal, the constant, burning fear that it would all be taken from her.

     And it was.

     As the boy drops his eyes, the wheel slows.

     “Psychokinesis,” Mulder murmurs, still fixated on the merry-go-round. She should be shocked, surprised, but all she can manage is stunned silence, her worst fears confirmed.

     The mobile never stopped spinning.

     Scully is the first to clear her throat, to whisper a question to which she already knows the answer. “How long have you been able to do that?”

     Isaac shrugs. “Since I was little, I guess.”

     Mulder kneels down, eyes burning with an intensity Scully recognizes all too well—this is no longer a simple conversation with a kid in a park. This is a case, and this case just got interesting. “Isaac…what else you can do?”

     The boy narrows his eyes and shies away.

     Scully steps in, barely disguising a tremble in her voice. “You asked us here, Isaac…you said you had reason to believe someone was after you. Because you have this…this power? Or is there something else?”

     The boy’s expression is almost embarrassed. “I can read people’s thoughts. Sometimes. Not very well.”

     Scully’s eyes meet Mulder’s again, this time sharing a thought. Gibson Praise.

     “What am I thinking, Isaac?” Scully asks.

     He squints, thinking. “You love him,” he nods toward Mulder, and Scully’s lips twitch upward in a half smile. “But you’re mad at him, too.”

     Bemused, Mulder glances at Scully, whose cheeks have gone pink. Oh, really?

     “You…have a child?” Isaac continues. “You miss her. Or him? It’s…it’s hard to tell.”

     Scully’s breath catches in her throat, she doesn’t know what to say. She has the uncomfortable feeling of being laid bare, exposed, raw.

     Mulder, seeing the alarm on her face, intervenes. “How about me, Isaac? Can you read my mind, too?”

     Isaac turns to Mulder, eyebrow arched. “Your…favorite baseball team…the Yankees? Really?” The boy wrinkles his nose.

     “Hey, don’t judge,” Mulder grins. “Can you tell me how you do it? Do you see a picture in your mind? Hear voices?”

     “Thoughts are voices, mostly. Sometimes feelings, if they’re strong. Like I said, I’m not very good. It…fades in and out.”

     Scully, still flushed, recovers her voice. “Do your…parents…know about your abilities, Isaac?”

     Something flickers across the boy’s face; he withdraws, biting his lip. “My dad’s dead. My mom…she knows, but she doesn’t want to believe it…so she doesn’t.”

     “Isaac…how do you…I mean, how powerful is it? This ability?”

     He shrugs, “I dunno. I don’t do…that…very often,” he gestures to the merry-go-round. “It used to be a game…making toys move, y’know, baby stuff. But I don’t do it much anymore.”

     “That’s how you escaped yesterday.” Mulder asks, already knowing the answer.

     “Yeah.” The boy lowers his voice. “I…I got scared. It’s stronger when I get scared. I didn’t mean to…I mean, I was defending myself.” He looks up at them, wide-eyed and self-conscious. “Please, don’t tell anyone. Please. My mom’ll kill me.”

     Something nags at the corner of Scully’s consciousness. He’s not telling us everything.

     Mulder can tell, too, but keeps his tone casual. “We won’t say anything; you have our word. But—”

     “—but you need protection, Isaac,” Scully finishes her partner’s thought. “Whoever wants to kidnap you already knows what you can do. You’ll be protected if we can persuade your mother to take you somewhere safe. We have connections to make that happen, but it’s going to require your mom’s cooperation.”

     He shakes his head fervently. “She won’t go for it. She’s…she doesn’t understand.”

     “Maybe your mom will listen to us?”

     Scully shoots her partner a dubious look, thinking of his encounter with the frazzled, angry woman at the police station, just as Isaac raises an eyebrow in equal skepticism. “Maybe, but…I dunno.” He sighs, looking over his shoulder. “I need to go. My teachers’ll be ticked.”

     “You skipped school to meet with us?” Scully tries to sound disapproving, but can’t hide a faint smile.

     Only twelve and he’s already a pro at ignoring the rules. Remind you of anyone, Dana?

     He shrugs. “Yeah, it’s no big deal. I already know most of the stuff, anyway.”

     Mulder gives him a wry smile, tries to sound reassuring. “You go back to school. We’ll find your mom, talk to her. She at home?”

     Isaac nods. “Yeah, she doesn’t work today.”

     “K. Be careful, kid.”

     “I will.”

#

     “He’s smart, Scully. Poor taste in sports teams, though,” Mulder sounds more cavalier than he feels as he climbs into the driver’s seat.

     “Yeah.” But she’s not listening, lost in thought, and Mulder feels a pang of resentment at being brushed off.

     But you’re mad at him, too.

     He tries to keep his tone neutral. “Kid read you like an open book back there. Anything you wanna talk about?”

     She presses her lips together in a thin line. “Not now.”

     “Mmm. Might wanna guard yourself around him…unless you feel like airing your dirty laundry.” He smirks, but there’s no trace of genuine humor in his eyes.

     She tenses, changing the subject. “How are we going to convince his mother to pack up and leave with her son on short notice when we have no proof the kid’s in danger?”

     The distant look in Mulder’s eyes suggests he’s already forming a theory. “The real question is why. The government has had access to him for years, why not abduct him when he was most vulnerable?” He gestures toward the glove compartment, which holds the printout of the boy’s FBI file. “It doesn’t add up.”

     “They tried,” she murmurs. “They tried, which is why I arranged the adoption. I told you before, Spender attacked him because of…because of what he was.”

     He bites his lip, frowning at the memory of darker times.

     “Maybe they were waiting for something. I think he’s only shown us a fraction of what he’s capable of, Scully. Remember? ‘It’s stronger’ when he’s scared…which reminds me…” he reaches across her, unlocking the glove compartment, pulling out the sheaf of papers.

     “What, Mulder?”

     “The kid said his father was dead…” Mulder doesn’t finish his thought, just continues leafing through the stack.

     “Mulder?” No response. She shifts impatiently in her seat, waiting for him to let her in on the secret. She should be accustomed to this, but his train of thought has always seemed miles ahead of hers.

     “Here. John Van de Kamp, died in a car accident, 2005. Isaac would have been about three.”

     “That’s sad, but not unusual, Mulder. People die in car accidents all the time.”

     “Yeah, but not like this. The father’s truck spontaneously combusted. Then it exploded.”

     She rolls her eyes. “Does it actually say ‘spontaneously combusted’?”

     He can’t help but grin at his partner’s dutiful skepticism. “Not in so many words, but stay with me for a sec. Isaac possesses the ability to direct large amounts of energy with his mind. Psychokinesis isn’t much different from pyrokinesis—it’s all energy. Thing is, I don’t think he has control over it…or at least, he didn’t when he was three.”

     “I see where you’re going with this, but why would Isaac kill his own father?”

     “The emotions of a three-year-old are volatile, Scully. Like Isaac said, his power gets stronger when he’s scared. I bet the same goes for anger. Little kids get angry over small stuff all the time. Maybe it wasn’t intentional.”

     “So…you think he got upset, had a pyrokinetic episode, and the result…”

     “Dead ‘Dada’,” Mulder finishes. “Kid must have thrown one hell of a tantrum.”

     “Regardless of how it happened…that’s a horrible thing to live through. And if he was responsible…”

     “That’s if he remembers it,” he murmurs, thinking of his lost sister and the years it took to recover his memories of her abduction; even then, they came back warped, malformed, another layer of lies painted over the truth. He starts the car; they pull away from the park.

     Scully wonders what it might have been like to know Isaac—William, she corrects herself, but it’s too hard to see the adolescent stranger, with his drawn face and quiet demeanor, as a rosy-cheeked baby, an unsteady toddler, a wide-eyed preschooler. So much has happened in the last eleven years.

     She wanted to believe she made the right choice, but this new knowledge of the boy’s history points to a darker, more sinister childhood.

     The life I didn’t want for him.

     So many medical tests and procedures. Followed by government forces. Carrying the burden of his father’s death on his slight young shoulders. A mother who refused to acknowledge her son’s unique gifts. Bearing these secrets with no one to turn to or confide in.

     No wonder he’d come to Mulder and Scully the moment he sensed their acceptance of the unnatural…the boy was lonely.

     Heartbroken, her tears finally come, hot and furious. She turns her head, pretending to be engrossed in a distant point in the rural landscape outside her window, trying in vain to blink them back. Mulder, lost in his own thoughts, doesn’t notice.

     They drive in silence.

LANDER, WYOMING
12:23 P.M.

     They pull up outside the modest two-story home, located deep in the Wyoming countryside. Just as the boy said, his mother is home; her Toyota is parked in the drive.

     “Sure you’re up for this?” Mulder tries to sound casual, but he’s looking at Scully with concern.

     “I’m sure.”

     “K. I’ll let you do the talking this time.” He smiles. “I must have lost my edge; maybe you’ll have better luck getting through to her.”

     They walk up the steps of the rundown front porch, sidestepping a baseball glove that’s seen better days and a weathered toy car; faded remnants from the past that strike Scully as sinister under the circumstances. There’s a sinking feeling in her stomach. She shoves it down, steeling herself, and raps on the door.

     The woman answers on the second knock, eyes guarded.

     “Yes?”

     “Mrs. Van de Kamp? I’m Dana Scully, this is Fox Mulder. We met yesterday at the police station.”

     “I remember,” the woman responds coolly, folding her arms. She doesn’t step aside, doesn’t invite them in. “What do you want?”

     “We believe your son could be in danger. We’re former FBI agents.”

     “The police said it was a random assault; I was told the man who attacked Isaac died. Look, this has been difficult enough without—”

     Mulder interjects. “You don’t think it’s odd that the man in question failed to overpower a boy half his size? Or that of all the kids at the school yesterday, your son was the target? Almost too convenient, given what he’s capable of, wouldn’t you say?”

     Scully frowns at him, a warning. So much for letting me do the talking.

     Mrs. Van de Kamp isn’t a tall woman, but she straightens at Mulder’s verbal assault, the hardness in her face making up for what she lacks in stature. “Mr.…what was it? ‘Molder?’ You say you’re FBI, I want to see a badge.”

     “It’s ‘Mulder’, Mrs. Van de Kamp, and we’re former FBI. We’re retired. But that’s not—”

     “Then you’re here on personal business?”

     “You could say that.”

     “Well, then, Mr. Mulder, Ms. Scully—I don’t see any reason to continue this conversation. I’m not interested in whatever crackpot theories you’re selling. Goodbye.” She moves to close the door, but Scully reaches out, blocking it with her arm in a last-ditch effort to get through.

     “Mrs. Van de Kamp, it’s important you listen to us. Please, for the sake of your son’s well being, and possibly your own. Is there somewhere you can stay? We’d be happy to put you up in a hotel—”

     The door slams before Scully can finish her sentence. She jerks her hand back just in time to avoid her wrist being crushed in the frame.

     There’s a long, dumbfounded pause. They hear the deadbolt lock with a confident thud.

     “That went well,” Mulder quips. “Guess I’m not the only one who’s lost my edge.”

     She frowns as they trudge back to their car. “I’ll case the house again tonight.”

     He opens the driver’s side door, stepping aside to let her drive. “I’ll join you.”

     “No. I can handle it, Mulder.”

     “I know you can handle it, Scully, but I’d feel better knowing you weren’t out in the middle of nowhere, alone. Humor me, alright?”

     “I won’t be alone; four bars, even out here in Nowhere, Wyoming.” She waggles her cell phone at him, proving the point.

     “OK, fine,” he shoots back. “Do me a favor, though, and tell me why you’re so eager to get away from me.”

     Her mouth drops open; he’s touched a nerve. She steps into the car without a word, settling behind the steering wheel, pointedly ignoring his expectant expression. He wants an explanation, and she can’t think of one that won’t hurt.

     “I’m not trying to get away from you, Mulder, I’m just…it’s been a rough week,” she mutters, gritting her teeth against the lie.

     “So…let me help,” he narrows his eyes. “You don’t have to do this alone.”

     She huffs, opens her mouth as if to protest, but decides against it. “Fine. If it makes you feel better, we’ll do this one together. OK?”

     He relaxes. “It would. Y’know…we could make a date of it. Take-out sandwiches, sweet tea, coffee…maybe after, we can drive up to the local make-out spot. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t hoping for a little second-base, under-the-shirt action.” He waggles his eyebrows, leaning in with a boyish leer.

     She bats him away, failing to suppress a laugh. Only Mulder could consider spending the night in a car a date.

     He sits back, happy to have tempered the tension, at least for now. “Seriously, though…when was the last time we got to hang out like this?”

     “I’ll agree to it, but on one condition.”

     “Oh? What’s that?”

     “No second base. And,” she smiles a little, starting the car and shifting it into gear, “bring your own iced tea.”

     LANDER, WYOMING

     7:47 P.M.

     They arrive at the boy’s house at dusk, headlights off, fumbling with sandwiches and steaming cups of black coffee in the fading light. It’s not until the food is gone that the silence grows too heavy to comfortably ignore.

     Mulder is the first to break it. “You know…I was thinking. About William. Do you remember those first few days, after he was born…before I left?”

     “Mmhmm.” It’s not something she could forget, their brief time together as a family. She sips her coffee and welcomes the way it scalds her tongue, her throat.

     “I remember…one of those nights, he woke up crying, and I took him into the other room so you could rest. He’d kept you up—”

     “Colic. He didn’t sleep for weeks.” She smiles forlornly; memories of her first weeks with William are hazy shadows tinged with fatigue and, in the absence of her partner, longing.

     “Yeah. He screamed and screamed,” Mulder continues. “I patted his back, walked around…tried to change him, but I’m pretty sure I put the diaper on backwards.”

     She chuckles softly. “I wondered about that.”

     He returns her smile, although the effect is somber rather than cheerful. “I was clueless, Scully. No, actually…I was terrified.” He swallows. “For all my training, all the cases we worked, profiling some of the most horrific criminal minds…but the thing that scares ‘Spooky’ Fox Mulder is a newborn baby with an upset stomach.”

     Scully blinks, absorbing this sudden shift in their conversation. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

     He shrugs, picking at the rim of his empty styrofoam cup. “You had enough on your mind.”

     “But we’ve had years. All this time…?”

     The cup falls, scattering white flakes of styrofoam across his lap. He brings his fist down on his knee. “What do you want me to say?” he asks her hollowly. “That loving our son scared me? That part of me was relieved to run because I knew the further I got, the better off he’d be? Face it, I’d have made a terrible father, Scully.” He flinches slightly at his own words, the truth hard on his tongue. “I was a terrible father. I left him. I left you.”

     “You didn’t have a choice.”

     “Did I?” His voice softens, resigned, biting his lip the way he does when he’s troubled.

     She stares off into the distance, solemn, sharing his fatigue. “I guess we’ll never know.”

     They’re quiet again. Mulder leans back in the uncomfortable seat, stretching his long legs, knees bumping against the dash. Scully hears the repetitive crackling of sunflower seeds.

     “Just like old times, Scully. You, me, deep discussion and bad coffee, crammed into a compact. Remind me why we didn’t get the deluxe model?”

     She rolls her eyes. “Mulder, when you’re paying the bills, you can get whatever car you want.”

     “Is that what this is about? Money?”

     It takes her moment to realize he’s not talking about the rental car.

     “I showed you mine,” he says, nudging her arm gently with his own. “Now you show me yours. No more dodging the question–what’s up?”

     She purses her lips, closes her eyes. “It’s not about money, Mulder. It’s…”

     How can she explain? She’s followed him for 20 years, case after case, hunch after hunch, wild theory after wild theory. She’s lost much in his quest for the truth—her health, her daughter, her family, her fertility, her son.

     Looking back, she wonders if she’s living in the wake of his life, rather than living her own.

     “Still with me, Scully?”

     She looks at him, studying his face—so familiar, so safe.

     “Mulder,” she begins, measuring her words. “I love you. But don’t you feel like we’re…different? Since we left the FBI, we’ve settled. I suppose that’s normal, but it’s also…” she struggles to find the right words, to make him understand. “It feels wrong,” she finishes.

     He frowns at his lap, picking at a crease in his jeans. “I’m not following.”

     “I mean, are you really happy, Mulder? Hiding out in your office all day with your paper clippings and your internet research and…and your porn collection? Is this how you want to spend the rest of your life?” She realizes she’s clenching her jaw, there’s anger welling in her throat.

     He winces. “Ouch, Scully, cheap shot.”

     “You’re right,” she sighs, frustrated, siting back in the seat. “You’re right, I’m sorry.”

     “To answer your question…yeah, I’m happy enough.”

     “‘Happy enough’? Is that where you want to leave it?”

     “You were the one who wanted the ‘darkness’ to go away. Remember?” He shakes his head in disbelief. “Honestly, it sounds like you’re the one who’s not happy.”

     She swallows, searching for the right words. “I…think you may be right.”

     There’s a long pause as she tries to gather her thoughts, to express everything she’s held back. He’s looking at her with concern, waiting for her to explain.

     He waited for years, she reminds herself. He’s always waited, Dana. You’ve built a life together. Is it worth this?

     When she finally continues, her voice is thick. “I don’t know who I am anymore, Mulder. I’m tired of being the guardian of the sick, when I’m not strong enough to fight for myself. The hospital administration, the bureaucracy, it’s worse than the FBI. And every loss…it’s like I’ve lost him all over again.”

     “I don’t understand. People live because of you, Dana. Don’t forget that. You’re a good doctor, those glorified penguins are lucky to have you. And I fail to see what this has to do with my happiness…or my porn collection,” he says, lips cocked in a sly smile, but she doesn’t acknowledge his levity.

     Her voice goes hollow, she ducks her head. “I lost a patient this week, Mulder. A little girl. She was only four. I can’t…I can’t do it anymore.”

     “Then don’t,” he says softly. “Hand in your resignation, walk away. We’ll figure it out. You’ve given enough—”

     She turns to him, willing him to understand. “It’s never enough. It will never be enough, because it’s not my work that’s the problem. It’s…I feel lost, Mulder. My life’s accomplishment is your search for truth, but where’s my truth? I don’t know who I am without you…and I hate myself for it.” She’s surprised at the venom that comes with this admission. He recoils, stung, but the words continue to pour out of her in an uncontrollable flood.

     “I think…maybe we both need some time to figure out what it is we want, whether that’s together…or apart.” She swallows hard, head down, unable to meet his gaze.

     The reality of what she’s said sinks in, the incredulity in his voice is heartbreaking. “Are you…leaving?”

     “No…no, not exactly, I just…” She reaches for him, but he turns away, hurt.

     “So…what, you had a bad week, and that’s grounds to call this off? After everything we’ve been through, just like that, we’re done?”

     “You’re making it sound a lot simpler than it—”

     “It sounds simple enough to me,” he frowns. “You want out? Fine. But none of this ‘maybe we will, maybe we won’t’ crap. Tell me what you want…and that’s it.”

     “Fox…don’t make me do this.”

     The unexpected use of his first name registers like a slap to the face. He stares at her as if he doesn’t recognize her, as though she were a stranger.

     It takes a moment for the shadow to register in her peripheral vision. A flicker of light draws her attention to a point just behind Mulder’s ear. There’s a faint glow in the upstairs window, probably a nightlight of some kind, but…no, there it is again, a shadow.

     “Mulder…someone’s in the house,” her mouth goes dry as the shadow morphs, changing into that of a broad-shouldered man.

     “What?”

     “Someone’s in the house—there’s a man—in the window.” She fumbles for the door, not taking her eyes off the house.

     Exasperated, he turns to look; she’s already outside, crossing the lawn toward the front door.

     “Scully!” he hisses, trying to get her attention, to call her back, but as he looks up at the window again, he sees the figure for himself, a chill slipping rapidly up his spine.

     Too big to be a boy, or a woman. Another attack…

     He follows Scully’s path across the lawn to where she’s standing on the porch, wide-eyed, waiting for back-up.

     What the hell are we going to do? We don’t have a weapon between us. He scans the rundown deck, finds a baseball bat leaning against the side of the house. It’ll do.

     Before they can decide how to proceed, there’s a scream, followed by a brilliant flash of light from the windows above. Scully tries the front door.

     Shit, locked.

     Acting on instinct, Mulder slams his shoulder into the door, splintering the frame. They enter the small, dark kitchen just as a scuffle begins upstairs. Isaac’s mother is shouting, but there’s no sound from Isaac himself.

     Where is he? Scully looks around, trying to get her bearings in the dim light. Mulder gestures toward the doorway across the room, indicating for her to follow.

     They creep through the house, up the stairs. They can hear Mrs. Van de Kamp now, keening, “Oh, no. Oh oh God,” but still no audible sign of the boy. The brief commotion has settled, the house is silent, save for the woman’s dark moans.

     Panic rises like bile in Scully’s throat, but she forces it back, focusing on the next step, and the next, until they reach the second floor.

     Mulder nods toward the end of the hall, toward the sound of the boy’s mother. They approach carefully, listening for any sign of the intruder, any indication Isaac is OK. 

     Mrs. Van de Kamp is standing in a bedroom with her back to the door. Mulder enters first, bat at the ready, but his second step causes the old wood floor to groan in protest, and the woman wheels on him, panicked.

     “Oh gahhAHHHHHH,” her moan becomes a frightened screech, but Mulder immediately shakes his head, bringing a finger to his lips in silent command. Be quiet. His eyes scan the room, looking for the boy…there. He’s curled on the floor in the corner, head on his knees.

     “It’s clear, Scully. I’ll check the floor.”

     She brushes past him, her voice tight with fear. “Isaac? Are you—”

     “I’m fine,” he mumbles, but his voice has the hollow quality of someone who isn’t fully present.

     He’s in shock.

     “What happ—” but then she sees it, the body. A dark hand lying on the floor, on the other side of the boy’s bed. It doesn’t move…but that doesn’t mean anything, she thinks, still on edge.

     “Mulder!” Her cry of alarm brings him running back to the room. “Think we’ve found our guy.” Her fingers reach down to the man’s neck, fleshy and cold, searching for a pulse.

     “Yeah…he’s gone.”

     The boy’s mother emits a terrified squeak, but Scully ignores her, moving around the bed to kneel next to Isaac, still curled in the corner, trembling. 

     “He OK?” Mulder asks.

     Scully nods, resting her hand lightly on the boy’s back, brimming with a fierce, protective intensity she normally reserves for her patients, and looks up at his mother. “Hand me that blanket. He’s in shock.”

     The woman does as she’s told, grabbing a blue afghan from the bed and tossing it toward Scully, who wraps the boy. She looks over her shoulder at Mulder, wondering what to do next, but his bewildered expression tells her he is as lost as she.

     “What…what did you do to my son?” All her former bravado has disappeared, replaced with timidity and fear.

     “Let’s get out of here,” Mulder says, ignoring her, taking a step back from the man on the floor. “I don’t think we want to stick around for the grand finale.”

     Already there’s the faint odor of burning flesh, a distinctly sour-sharp chemical tang to the air. The floor around the body has turned black at the edges, dissolving the white painted wood, tendrils of smoke drifting upward. The sizzling sound is back. Soon there will be a man-shaped hole in the floor.

     Like a Wile E. Coyote cartoon, Mulder thinks, but not funny. Not funny at all.

     Scully leads Mrs. Van de Kamp, still confused and stammering, out to the hall, while Mulder picks up Isaac. The boy doesn’t protest, doesn’t speak at all, just lays unnaturally still in Mulder’s arms. He’s warm, slender, surprisingly light.

     They move downstairs to the living room, Isaac curled into the couch, his mother perched next to him on the edge of the seat like a pale gargoyle. There’s a fireplace, a stone hearth lined with framed family photos, and Scully scans them absently, realizing this may be as close as she gets to seeing the boy’s childhood…when her eyes fall on one frame, a photo she recognizes as being taken by her, shortly before William was adopted. It must have been sent to the Van de Kamps along with the paperwork.

     She’d taken it when he was sleeping, pudgy fists raised above his head, long brown lashes closed—the picture of peaceful slumber, oblivious to the great changes that await him.

     She has to force herself to look away when Mrs. Van de Kamp finally speaks.

     “What…what happened? What did you do to my boy?”

     “You’ll have to tell us,” Mulder says, neutral, looking at the woman intently. “What did you see?”

     “I…I was sleeping, I heard a noise…,” she begins, rubbing the boy’s back in slow, soothing circles. “Then Isaac was yelling for me, I ran to his room, saw that…that man…” she’s dazed, her words grow faint.

     “What did he look like?” Scully prompts.

     “He…it was dark…but at first…” the woman hesitates, unsure how to describe what she’s seen, “…he looked like he was cut out from the space around him.” She says. “Like he was…empty. Then the light. He flew, flew across the room, like he’d been thrown.”

     The woman lifts her gaze to Scully’s, staring blankly, then looks back to her son. “Isaac…he was just sitting there. He was so still…” Her brow furrows. “I thought he was…,” she can’t finish the thought, but goes quiet, still rubbing the boy’s back.

     Scully and Mulder exchange a look, an indication they both know what the other is thinking without having to say it aloud. One attack could be brushed off as a random coincidence…but they both know this is no coincidence. They’ve known it all along.

     “I’ll get him some water,” Scully murmurs, leaving the woman to her thoughts as Mulder gestures for her to join him in the kitchen. She finds him standing against the counter, arms folded.

     “Everything suggests the boy used his power to defend himself,” he says in a low voice.

     “I’d say you’re probably right about that.” She opens a cupboard, searching for a glass, one eye trained on the living room door.

     “I don’t think he can control it. And given his current state, I don’t think he can withstand another attack…not soon, anyway.” He nods toward the living room, where Mrs. Van de Kamp is holding her son on the couch. “He’s damn near comatose.”

     There’s a pause as Scully fills the glass at the sink. “We can’t stay here,” he continues. “Whoever this is, they’re not going to stop until they get to the kid. They’ll come back. They’ll be stronger next time, prepared. We need to get Isaac and his mom somewhere protected, somewhere remote.”

     She turns to face him, arches one perfect brow. “We can’t get much more remote than this.”

     Mulder snorts in bitter agreement. “Sure picked a hell of a place for a romantic retreat, Scully.” 

     Ahh. There it is.

     She’d nearly forgotten their earlier conversation, but obviously he hasn’t.

     He ignores her pained expression, pulling his phone from his pocket. “I’ll call Skinner. He can set them up at a temporary safe house.”

     “Skinner told us to drop it, Mulder; what makes you think he’ll help?”

     “He may be a hard-ass, but the guy has a soft spot for me.” A hollow smile turns up the corners of his mouth. “Besides, I don’t think he’ll let the kid suffer. Especially when I tell him who it is.”

     She considers this, skeptical. “Skinner’s too close to the top, they’ll be watching him.”

     “We have to take that chance, Scully. I don’t see any other choice—do you?” His eyes are a challenge, cloudy and dark, looking for a fight.

     She doesn’t. She turns back to the living room, where their new charges have yet to move from the couch. The boy’s mother takes the glass of water without comment.

     “Mrs. Van de Kamp, we’re going to take you and Isaac to a safe house.”

     The woman blinks, shock creeping across her face. “I don’t understand. You still haven’t told me what you’re doing here.”

     They can hear Mulder on the phone in the kitchen, speaking quietly, making arrangements. Scully continues, “As I told you, we used to work for the FBI. We investigated strange cases, unusual happenings…events like what happened tonight. We had a feeling yesterday’s attack was not an isolated event, so we were watching your house for suspicious activity. I saw what looked like a man in the window, heard a struggle…that’s why we’re here,” she finishes.

     Mrs. Van de Kamp remains mute, eyes wide and owlish in her narrow face.

     “I don’t mean to alarm you, Mrs. Van de Kamp, but your son…”

     The woman turns toward Isaac, her face softening with affection. “I’ve always known he was different. I told him, ‘God’s burdens for each person are what—’”

     The boy interrupts her, speaking for the first time since the attack, his voice hoarse, but firm. “God didn’t do this to me, Mom. If there is a God, He doesn’t care about me.”

     The woman’s lips tighten to a thin line; it’s obvious to Scully that mother and son have had this discussion—this argument—many times. She fingers the small gold cross around her neck, a symbol of her own religious upbringing, but she can’t remember the last time she attended mass, or spoke with her priest. Working in a Catholic hospital has done nothing to restore her faith; if anything, it pushed her away from the church.

     Mrs. Van de Kamp turns back to Scully, expression dark and steely. She’s regained some of her composure. “What do they want from him?”

     “We don’t know,” Scully says, honestly, “but we can’t wait around to find out.”

     “But…but where would we go?”

     Mulder interjects, entering from the kitchen. “We have a contact at the FBI. He’s setting us up about 300 miles north of here, outside Lewistown, Montana.”

     “Montana? But…but I have work, Isaac has school, he can’t miss any time or he’ll…” the woman doesn’t finish. She looks around, helpless, hands twisting in her lap.

     “Right now, our main concern is getting you to safety,” Scully explains. Mrs. Van de Kamp ducks her head in silent assent. “Pack some clothes, only the essentials. We’ll take our rental, hopefully that will throw them off, buy us time.”

     Mulder leans against the hearth, arms folded, face grave.  “Skinner will have an unmarked car waiting for us at the halfway point, in Billings.” He’s talking to Scully, but doesn’t make eye contact.

     She waits for him to look at her, to give her some indication that they’re still partners in this, despite their earlier conversation, but he remains stoic, unresponsive.

     “Why should we trust you?” asks Mrs. Van de Kamp, a hint of rancor in her voice.

     “Because,” Mulder answers flatly, “you don’t have anyone else to trust.”

#

     Twenty minutes later, they’ve fled the Van de Kamps’ home, crammed into the compact with their hastily packed luggage. Scully drives while Mulder stretches out in the passenger seat and faces the window, pretending to rest, making it clear he doesn’t want to chat.

     Scully glances in the rearview; Isaac and Mrs. Van de Kamp sit in the back, the boy laid across the seat, head in his mother’s lap as she strokes his hair.

     They stick to back roads, Mulder navigating with the map spread over his knees, occasionally stirring to direct Scully to take a right or a left. The rental has GPS, but Mulder disconnected it before they left the house.

     “They could trace us.”

     Under normal circumstances she might chide him for being suspicious, but tonight she’s thankful for his paranoia.

     It’s well past midnight when they pull into the dimly lit parking lot of the Chesapeake, Montana BusiMart, where a nondescript white Ford is waiting for them, keys tucked under the driver’s seat. 

     “The plates are fake, it’s unregistered,” Mulder says. “If we get stopped…well…don’t get stopped.” He makes a point of looking at Scully, and she bites her tongue to keep from reminding him that she’s not the one in their floundering relationship with the lead foot.

     He reaches into the car and unlocks the glove compartment, revealing a gun. “There’s only one,” he glances at Scully, questioning.

     “You take it,” she says coldly. “I’d be tempted to use it.”

     She can hear the grinding of his teeth as he tucks the weapon into his belt and slams the door shut, leaving Scully to regret what’s she’s said.

     We don’t have time for this.

     She helps Isaac and Mrs. Van de Kamp throw their belongings in the Ford while Mulder drives off with the compact, intending to hide the car in the woods. They’ll pick him up about three miles outside the city center at a designated meeting point. If all goes according to plan, it will be several days before the authorities find the rental, and by then…hopefully by then we’ll actually have a plan, Scully thinks.

     She stretches, her muscles already protesting the long hours ahead. She’s exhausted, but too keyed up to sleep, unable to see their next move through the haze of fatigue. She wishes Mulder would talk to her. The thought makes her sad, so she pushes it away, turning her attention to the boy and his mother instead.

     “How is he?”

     Mrs. Van de Kamp’s face mirrors Scully’s exhaustion and worry, dark circles under troubled eyes. “He’s fine, sleeping,” she says, voice dull and expressionless. “Feels a bit warm.”

     Scully nods. “That’s normal, it’s the shock. Let me know if he has any unusual symptoms…headaches, vision problems. I’m a doctor,” she explains.

     “Well, isn’t that convenient,” the woman says, her words thick with cynicism. “Maybe you can tell me why he’s like this, since you’re such an expert, then.”

     Scully’s temper flares; she opens her mouth, ready to give the woman hell.

     I could tell you things that would turn your narrow-minded little world on its head. I could tell you about extraterrestrial viruses and population control and abductions that leave women barren and men dead. I could tell you your son is a pawn in a game we’ve been playing since well before he was born. I could tell you what he looked like the moment he left my body and took his first breath, and how it felt to have my heart ripped out when I gave him away…

     This is the thought that douses the flames of her anger, leaving her empty. The woman is scared for her child. They want the same thing. Fighting will only make it worse…and she’s not ready to reveal the nature of her biological relationship to Isaac. Not yet.

     “Unfortunately that’s not something I can answer right now,” she says, the words sounding hollow to her ears. It’s not entirely the truth, but not a lie, either.

     Mrs. Van de Kamp snorts, doesn’t respond, and Scully presses her lips together tightly in an effort to control the animosity that roils at the back of her tongue. “We should get on the road. He’ll be waiting.”

     They find him at the appointed meeting spot, an abandoned rest stop off the highway. He climbs into the passenger seat without a word, and he’s snoring before they’ve reached the first turnoff.

     “Not bad for an insomniac,” Scully mutters under her breath.

     If he hears her, he gives no indication.

     LEWISTOWN, MONTANA

     3:13 A.M.

     Daylight grazes the edge of morning as they reach the safe house, each of them thoroughly exhausted. Mulder leaves them in the car, muttering something about checking the house first, indicating they should wait for his all clear.

     Scully wants nothing more than a hot shower, then to crawl into bed and sleep, to wake and find this was all a terrible dream. Not likely, she sighs to herself as she leans back in the seat, letting her eyelids flutter shut. Just need a few minutes to rest.

     She sits in a dark room, an interrogation area deep within the bowels of a nameless government building. The Pentagon? Hoover? It’s impossible to say. 

     “Hello?” Her voice falls flat and hollow in the tiny room.

     She squints, letting her eyes adjust to the dim green light. She realizes she can see through the two-way mirror into an identical gray room, in which there sits a man. Or no…the shadow of a man. Like a cardboard cutout, painted black.

     There’s a flicker from the fluorescent lights overhead, they dim, brighten, dim again. She looks up, but the glow hurts her eyes. When she looks back to the mirror, her partner sits where the shadow man had been.

     “Mulder!”

     His lips move in response, but she can’t hear him. She leans forward, reaching for him, fingertips grazing the cold glass barrier.

     “Mulder, I can’t hear you!”

     His eyes look past her, dull and lifeless, his mouth moving. The silence is unnerving, the hair on the back of her neck stands taut.

     There’s flickering again, bright, dark, bright, dark. She looks around wildly, searching for an exit, but the walls are a flat expanse of gray, not so much as an air vent or a seam.

     This isn’t an interrogation room, it’s a prison cell.

     She looks back at the mirror, but Mulder is gone; and now Isaac sits in the small gray room. He’s crying for help, reaching for her, pounding his fists desperately against the glass over and over, and her heart lurches.

     From within the chamber comes a sound, a deep humming buzz, and she thinks of the bee colonies, the corn fields in Texas, the giant glowing half-globes against the night sky.

     As if brought to life by her thoughts, suddenly there are hundreds of bees behind the glass, swarming, lashing at Isaac through his clothes. His silent screams are a mask of terror, and she watches in a helpless panic as he continues to pound fretfully against the glass, his hands bruised and bloody.

     She knows instinctively these are no ordinary bees; they’ll carry a virus, he’ll be infected. Oh, if only she could get to him!

     Mulder raps at the car window, making her gasp, launching her out of the nightmare and back to reality.

     Reality doesn’t look much better on this side of the glass, she thinks, still reeling.

     “It’s clear,” Mulder says; his muted voice through the window nags at the edge of her memory, something about seeing him through the glass makes her heart quicken with unease. She grabs for the door handle, relieved to escape the confines of the vehicle for the first time in hours.

     The house is small, sparse, and livable, if not dusty and damp. It’s obvious the place hasn’t been used in several years. There’s an eat-in kitchen at the back, a living room to their right, stairs to the left.

     “I’ll, uhh…I’ll take that room,” Mulder mutters, nodding toward the living area off the entrance, in which sits a shabby, overstuffed monstrosity of a couch. He walks over to it, tossing his bag down, then stands with his eyes closed, rubbing the bridge of his nose.

     Though unsurprised, Scully can’t help but feel stung at the implicit separation.

     “So, what’s next?” asks Mrs. Van de Kamp, arms crossed, demanding. “You call someone? Perform a voodoo ritual to make the bogeyman go away?” She barks hostile laughter into their solemn circle, but Isaac remains silent.

     “The only thing we’re going to do is sleep,” Scully says, struggling to keep her eyes open even as she speaks. “We’ll talk when everyone’s had a chance to rest.”

     The woman’s lips tighten into a thin line; she turns on her heel, stalking up the stairs, Isaac trudging behind.

     Mulder mumbles something about getting food, walking over to hand the shared weapon to Scully. “Safety’s on, make sure you—”

     “I know how to use a gun, Mulder,” she snaps.

     He blinks at her, swallows. “Right. Fine. Don’t forget to lock up.” He leaves before she can respond, the rusty screen door slamming behind him.

     Mrs. Van de Kamp and Isaac have already retreated to one of the upstairs bedrooms. Scully locks the front door, then checks the windows and draws the blinds before ascending the stairs herself, to the open room at the end of the hall. Like the rest of the house, it’s worn but livable. There’s a bed, a chair, a dresser, and a small attached bathroom.

     With a shower…oh, thank God.

     She strips, stepping into the narrow glass enclosure. It’s mildewed, but the water runs hot and welcome over the knotted muscles of her back and shoulders. She stands under the stream until it turns cold, until her fingertips are wrinkled and tender. By the time she steps out of the shower, the bedroom windows are cloudy with steam.

     Wrapping herself in a thin cotton robe, Scully collapses into bed, eyelids closing of their own volition before she can pull up the covers. She falls into a deep, dreamless sleep, cheek pressed into the damp circle of her hair on the pillow.

#

     7:05 A.M.

     While Scully’s sleep is restful, Isaac’s is anything but. He tosses and turns on the narrow mattress in the room he shares with his mother.

     She’s screaming.

     She’s standing not five feet in front of him, her face a mask of terror, calling for him, crying out for help.

     “Mom? I’m here!”

     Her eyes remain unfocused, blinded with fear; she sees beyond him to some dark, unimaginable thing. He turns, searching for an assailant, for the source of her fear, but there is nothing but darkness, a darkness that shifts and consumes, a darkness that burns his retinas in its all-encompassing intensity.

     Her screams become gibbering, high-pitched wails, unintelligible. She’s slipping away, slipping into nothing. He reaches out to grab her, to touch her hand, but his fingers pass through her body as though she were a ghost. She fades, melding with the shadows around them, her outline shimmering against the dark until she’s gone.

     “Mom?! MOM!”

     At once, he feels her wrist solidify under his grip, his hand closing around firm flesh as he pulls her toward him.

     But what comes out of the shadow is no longer his mother. 

     Her face is melting, the skin dripping and falling off, revealing part of her skull, the bones of her jaw fixed in a silent grimace. Her wrist slips out of his hand leaving an oily, pulpy residue (her skin it’s her SKIN), and he gags as the acrid smell of burning hair and flesh overtake him.

     Isaac recoils, the shock propelling him backward, and he stumbles, falling, falling, forever falling as she descends upon him, swooping down to bring him back into the darkness…

     He jerks awake, gagging, he can still smell the…

     The what?

     Nothing. It was a dream, and now it’s gone, leaving him shivering and frightened. He can hear his mother breathing softly in the other twin bed, and he moves to her side, touching her hand. She doesn’t wake, but her presence is a rare comfort.

     Solid, he thinks, a fleeting thought that holds no meaning.

     He creeps from the bedroom, making his way carefully down the stairs, surprised to find the man, Mulder, sitting in the dimly lit kitchen, feet propped up on the table, dozing with his chin to his chest. He rouses when Isaac enters.

     “Hey. Figured you’d sleep longer,” Mulder greets him, sits up, rubbing his face with his hands.

     Isaac shrugs in response. “Bad dreams.”

     “Ahh. I’ve had a few of those myself.” Mulder nods toward the fridge. “There’s food if you’re hungry.”

     “Uhh…thanks.” He is hungry, actually; his stomach growls at the sight of bread, a jar of peanut butter, a bag of apples. He can feel the man watching him as he grabs a box of cereal from the counter, a bowl from the cupboard, and sits down to the table with his meal.

     “Feeling better? You were out of it for a while there.”

     “Yeah, I guess.” Isaac pauses, wondering if he should ask the question that’s been bothering him since he woke up. “Mr. Mulder?”

     “Yeah?”

     “When we were at the park…she said you’ve seen…things. What did she mean? What things?”

     Mulder nods as though he’d expected this, but from the man’s expression, Isaac understands he won’t get an answer. Not yet.

     “That’s a long story, kid. A past life for another time, maybe.” He sighs, a defeated sound that makes Isaac’s confidence wane. “Eat up, and get some more rest, k?”

     Mulder is out of the room before Isaac can choke down his last bite, leaving the boy to his unanswered questions.

     Scully wakes in the unfamiliar room, disoriented and cold. It takes a moment to register the previous night’s events, the attack, the long drive, the house. She rolls her stiff, aching body over and stares at the water-stained ceiling, letting it sink in.

     Mulder leans in the doorway, watching her wake, smiling a little despite himself. Her robe has fallen open slightly, revealing the familiar curve of her breast beneath the thin fabric. He has the urge to go to her, wrap his arms around her trim waist, and pretend last night’s conversation didn’t happen, but it’s a physical hunger more than a desire for reconciliation. The set of his jaw and the cold flecks of doubt in his gaze reveal hurt that goes deeper than a simple embrace could soothe.

     “Wakey wakey,” he says drily, rapping on the doorframe; she startles, turning around.

     “Jesus, Mulder, you scared me.” She tucks the robe around her body, unusually self conscious. “How, uhh…how long have I been out?”

     “Long enough. The natives are restless,” he says, tilting his head back toward the stairs.

     “I’ll be right down.”

     “K.” He lingers in the doorway for a moment, as though he wants to say more. The air is charged with yesterday’s emotions, so much unresolved tension. Just as Scully opens her mouth, not knowing what she’ll say but unwilling to suffer the uncomfortable quiet between them, he turns his back and is gone.

#

     “She’ll be another minute.”

     Mrs. Van de Kamp is sitting at the kitchen table, fretting with the paper napkin beneath an untouched bagel. Isaac is munching away at his second bowl of cereal, something that appears to be more food coloring than food, with a surprisingly healthy appetite under the circumstances.

     True to Mulder’s word, Scully joins them after a short time, having traded her robe for a blouse and faded jeans, her gold-red hair pulled back in a loose knot at the base of her neck. Mulder hands her a steaming mug of coffee, prepared the way she likes—two creams, one sugar—a peace offering? she wonders, although his eyes regard her with cool detachment.

     Mrs. Van de Kamp breaks the uncomfortable silence. “What do we do now? You said we should rest; we’re rested. Now I want some answers.” She glares at the former agents.

     Scully sits at the table, takes a sip of her coffee, letting the hot ceramic warm her hands. “We need to figure out who’s after Isaac, Mrs. Van de Kamp. Did you see anything odd before the attacks? Anyone following you?”

     The woman shakes her head, tightlipped. “Nothing. No one. We’re small-town people, we live a simple life.”

     Yeah, and your kid can set a truck on fire by looking at it funny, thinks Mulder. A regular June and Wally Cleaver.

     He glances at Scully; there’s color rising in her cheeks, visibly agitated by the woman’s lack of cooperation. Mulder shoots her a look in silent commiseration, a holdover from their FBI days. Let’s try a different approach.

     “Look, Mrs. Van de Kamp…can I call you Gwen?” He smiles, taking a seat so he can look the woman in the eye, but also so he’s less imposing, more approachable—Scully recognizes it immediately, a classic “good cop” interrogation tactic.

     The woman sniffs, but nods. “Gwen, we need to do some research. We have some time. Not much, but some. We need space to do our jobs, so we can get you and Isaac out of this alive,” he stresses the last word, trying to convey the full weight of their situation. “To do that, we need your help. Think about it for a while, k? The sooner we figure this out, the sooner we can all go home.”

     He smiles again, this time a warm, earnest, almost boyish grin Scully knows too well; he’s used it on her a few times, though it’s less effective. She sits back in the kitchen chair and can’t help but smile herself, watching her partner turn on the charm; those damn puppy-dog eyes could melt the iciest of ice queens, Gwenyth Van de Kamp included. She can see the woman’s resistance crumbling as he covers her hand with his in a reassuring gesture of compassion.

     Oh, brother, thinks Scully, forcing herself to smile wider instead of rolling her eyes. To Mulder’s credit, Mrs. Van de Kamp doesn’t resist.

     “I…I’ll think about it,” she says, finally.

     “Great. That’s great, Gwen, thank you. Will you excuse us for a minute?” He motions for Scully to join him in the entryway.

     “Nice performance in there. Maybe you haven’t lost your touch after all, Mulder.”

     He shrugs, the warmth gone from his face, hands stuffed in the pockets of his jeans.

     “So, any idea where we start?” she asks, keeping her voice confidential.

     He shakes his head. “I’ve got nothing. Even if we do manage to figure out who’s after him…”

     “…how are we supposed to protect him?” she finishes her partner’s thought. “I’ll start looking through the records again. Maybe there’s a clue, something we missed.”

     “Good idea. I’ll talk to the kid, maybe he’ll remember something.”

#

     He turns back to the kitchen, approaching the table with the same affable charm. His earlier words with Mrs. Van de Kamp haven’t done much to melt her hostile exterior, but he’s decided she’s more bark than bite.

     “Gwenyth, is it OK if Isaac and I talk privately? I’d like to ask him some questions.”

     She bristles. “Anything you say to him can be said in front of—”

     “Mom, I’m fine.” Isaac is already up, walking out of the kitchen and through the front door.

     Mrs. Van de Kamp glares at Mulder, giving him a thin-lipped grimace, a terse nod in assent. He tips his head in sympathy as if to say, Kids these days. What can you do? before following Isaac out to the screen porch.

     “Hey.”

     The boy snorts. “Hey. Sorry about my mom.”

     “S’OK. She’s protecting you…it’s what moms do.”

     “I guess. She doesn’t get it.” The boy thinks for a moment. “Do you have kids Mr. Mulder?”

     Mulder smiles a little. For a few days, I had William. “No. Not in the traditional sense.”

     “But you had a son. William?” Apologetic, the boy looks at his shoes. “Sorry. I can hear you thinking.”

     Mulder swallows. Have to keep my guard up around this one. “Yeah, I did, once. That was a long time ago.”

     “Did he die?”

     “Not exactly.”

     “Oh.” They sit in silence for a moment. “So…what do you want to talk about?” The boy is suspicious. “You already know everything about me. You have a file. She said so.” He tilts his head back toward the house, referring to Scully.

     “That’s true, but in my line of work, I’ve found personal accounts can be more helpful than official records.”

     “What do you do for work?” The boy is looking at him intently, and Mulder finds himself staring back into Scully’s bright blue eyes.

     It really is William, he thinks, momentarily taken aback, cursing himself for letting his thoughts slip again. “I uhh…I worked on what were called the X-Files—unsolved cases, unexplained phenomenon…”

     “Like me?”

     “Psychokinesis and telepathy fall into that category, yes.” He pauses. “I met another boy, like you, once. He could read minds, too.”

     Isaac’s eyes light up. “Really?”

     “Really. He’s grown now.”

     “Did he…could he move stuff, too?”

     “No, but he was in danger because of his abilities. Agent Scully and I helped to protect him…the same way we want to help you, and your mom.” He pauses. “Isaac, do you think you can tell me about your father?”

     Isaac’s face falls; he tries to conceal it, but the emotion is too raw. “He…he died when I was three. Car accident.”

     Mulder nods, “That must have been difficult. For your mom, too.”

     “Yeah. I dunno.” The boy shifts in his seat, fidgeting.

     “Isaac…what we’re trying to determine is whether your father’s death and these attacks are connected somehow.”

     The boy looks up, shakes his head. “No. No, I…I don’t think so.”

     “What makes you say that?”

     The boy shifts uncomfortably. “I just…he…he wasn’t like that, I guess.”

     Did your power have something to do with his death? Mulder thinks, trying to find the words to ask the difficult question without outright asking it, but the boy’s head snaps up, eyes shining.

     Mulder realizes what’s happened; Isaac’s anxious silence says it all. “You read my mind, didn’t you?” He tips his head down, nodding to himself. “You were a baby holding the equivalent of a loaded gun. You couldn’t control it.”

     The boy’s eyes widen in fear at hearing his secret spoken aloud. “Please…don’t tell my mom. She…she thinks it was a faulty fuel valve. That’s what the police said.”

     “Your mom doesn’t know?”

     The boy swallows. “No. I couldn’t tell her. I couldn’t remember what happened for a long time, I was too little. Then, when I did…I…I couldn’t…” He turns away, wiping furiously at his eyes.

     Mulder pretends to be interested in a point somewhere in the distance, giving the boy some space.

     After a moment, Isaac speaks again, his voice a hollow whisper. “It was my fault. But she was so sad after Dad died, I couldn’t…I couldn’t tell her. I didn’t want her to hate me more than she already does.”

     Mulder winces a little in sympathy. He remembers his childhood after Samantha’s abduction…the cold chill that surrounded his father and mother…the immeasurable guilt at not being able to repair his broken family. His sister’s disappearance became his life’s work, and some part of him has always known it wasn’t entirely about finding her, but about restoring his parents’ love and affection.

     And what good had it done? For all his flailing about at the Bureau, his parents are long gone, buried under the weight of their secrets, and his sister was found but never returned.

     At least I had Scully, he thinks, but now…well, he doesn’t know what he has, exactly.

     He realizes he’s been silent, lost in his thoughts. Isaac is looking at him, waiting, worried Mulder will spill the proverbial beans to his mother.

     “Look, Isaac…I’m not going to say anything. That’s your business, not mine. But…I do know your father’s death wasn’t your fault. For what it’s worth,” he continues gently, “I think you should tell her. Your dad wouldn’t want you to carry this for the rest of your life, and it’s obvious your mom cares about you, or we wouldn’t be here right now.”

     Isaac doesn’t respond, just stares at the floor, the toe of his sneaker dragging across the porch, scraping at the peeling blue paint. They sit quietly like this for a while, oddly comfortable in each other’s company.

     And why not? Mulder thinks. We’re both genetically programmed to brood.

     “Mr. Mulder?”

     “It’s just Mulder, Mr. Mulder was my dad,” he smiles.

     “Uh, OK. Mulder…I’ve been having weird dreams. Is that…is that normal? For people like me?”

     “Well…everyone’s different,” Mulder says, hedging. “What kind of dreams?”

     “That man…who attacked me? I’ve seen him before. He’s been in my dreams…more like nightmares, I guess.”

     “It’s not unusual to have nightmares during times of stress—”

     “No, not like that,” the boy interrupts, struggling to find the words. “I mean…I dreamt what happened…before it happened. And now I keep having these dreams where I’m outside, I think in the woods? And there’s a light…” The fear on the kid’s face is so earnest it makes Mulder’s stomach clench. “Do you think it has anything to do with the attacks?”

     Mulder finds himself at a loss for comforting words. What the boy had seen over the course of his lifetime was infinitely worse than the imaginary monsters that lurked under the bed. He suspects this journey of theirs, whatever the outcome, will get much, much worse before it gets better.

     “Isaac…I wish I could tell you it doesn’t. The truth is, I don’t know. I do know that even normal people have dreams that feel precognitive, and most of the time it’s the subconscious speaking more clearly than usual.” He pauses. “But…follow your gut. If you have more of these dreams, write them down. Tell me about them, if you want,” he says, “but you’re a smart kid, Isaac. Trust your instincts.”

     They sit a while longer in comfortable silence. Isaac pulls a paperback novel from his jacket pocket, something by Stephen King, and begins to read. A sideways glance at the cover makes Mulder smile.

     Ahh. The Shining. Of course.

     Mulder realizes after some thought that this conversation is probably the closest he will ever get to doling out fatherly advice. He glances over at the boy, feeling an unexpected surge of affection. 

     Maybe I wouldn’t have been so terrible at this after all.

     Age three, diagnosed with asymptomatic cardiomyopathy. This is the first time they conduct blood tests, DNA sequencing.

     Age four, overnight hospital stay; a series of injections meant to strengthen the heart muscles. More tests.

     Age four, two week hospital stay, surgery.

     Age five, the child is deemed strong enough to attend public school, but not without a barrage of preventive measures in the form of vaccinations. He spent more time in the hospital than he did in his kindergarden classroom.

     And on, and on. 

     Scully winces, wondering how all this was justified to the boy’s mother, wondering if Scully herself would have fallen victim to the same lies given her medical training.

     That’s not fair; she’s done the best she can, and you were the one who gave up the right to protect him, Dana.

     An hour passes, then two. She’s drawn into the boy’s history, reading between the lines to imagine his childhood. She sees a young boy in a hospital bed, perhaps clutching a favorite toy, scared, but stubborn and resolute. She sees him at school, forced to sit on the sidelines while the other kids run and kick up dirt, playing t-ball or basketball. She sees him sitting on the floor in front of the TV, eating cereal and watching Saturday morning cartoons, his arms covered in Band-Aids from the injections.

     She sits back, rubbing her brow in an effort to stave off a budding headache. She hadn’t realized this would be so difficult…or painful. 

     Of course it’s difficult; it’s personal.

     She couldn’t deny that she felt responsible for everything she read. Each test, each injection, each hospital overnight is another chink in her carefully constructed armor. Such armor was years in the making, but not strong enough to withstand a single shameful thought: She’d effectively sentenced him to this life when she signed the adoption papers.

     “A little light reading, huh?”

     She looks over her shoulder to find Mulder standing in the doorway. “Something like that. Did you talk to him?”

     “Yeah. My hunch was right; kid killed his father by accident. His mom still doesn’t know.”

     Scully grimaces, as if this causes her physical pain.

     Mulder continues, “Y’know…we should come clean. Tell them why we’re here.”

     Scully looks up, surprised at the suggestion. “They know why we’re here,” she hedges.

     “Does Isaac, though? The kid can read minds, Scully, but he’s smart enough without that.” Mulder smiles faintly. “He nearly had me down there. He knows about ‘William’. Thankfully I was able to cut him off before he made the connection. That’s not going to last, though.”

     Scully shakes her head vehemently. “No. Not yet. I can’t…” but she doesn’t finish the thought, withdrawing into tense silence.

     Mulder pauses, lips set in a thin line. “OK. Fine. I think it’s a bad idea, but I’ll take your lead. But know this: The kid’s perceptive. He’s…he’s fragile, Scully. As powerful as he is, he’s still just a kid, and he’s been through enough. Don’t destroy any shred of trust he might have by letting him find out on his own. If nothing else, we need to tell his mother, so she can make the decision for him.”

     She swallows, knowing Mulder is right, unable to admit it. “I get the feeling he doesn’t know he’s adopted.”

     “Yeah, that doesn’t surprise me.” There’s an uncomfortable pause. “How about you—find anything interesting?”

     Scully breathes a quiet sigh of relief, grateful for the change of subject. “Lots, but nothing I can pinpoint to a source. I mean, look at this,” she says, picking up a sheet. “It’s a map of the boy’s genome. Whatever government agency is responsible for these tests ran regular DNA analysis on Isaac, from age three.”

     “Why?”

     “Well…it’s abnormal. There’s no doubt this is compromised DNA,” her voice is low. “Just like with Gibson, there are many active ‘junk’ genes, genes that in an otherwise normal human being would be switched off. The primary difference is, there’s a lot more active DNA here…”

     “…which might explain why Isaac’s abilities surpass Gibson’s.”

     “In some sense, yes. If I’m reading this right, more and more has been switched on over the last several years. But look here, Mulder. This section.”

     He leans over her shoulder, she’s pointing at an indecipherable blot on the paper. “What am I looking at?”

     “It’s a mutation. Any mutation of this gene in a normal human fetus typically indicates severe growth retardation in utero—best case scenario, severe birth defects; worst case, spontaneous abortion—miscarriage.”

     “Kid’s looking pretty good for a dead person, Scully.”

     “Exactly.”

     “What does this mean for our little Einstein?”

     “Well…nothing. I’m no closer to figuring this out,” she sighs. “The ‘why’ is obvious—what government in the world wouldn’t want Isaac’s power? But the ‘who’…”

     “Maybe the ‘who’ doesn’t matter as much as we think.”

     “What do you mean?”

     Mulder considers for a moment. “What do we know about these attacks so far?”

     Scully shakes her head. “Whatever it is isn’t human…”

     “They always happen when we’re watching. Have you noticed that? It’s like they’re waiting for us. And the other thing…they’re weak. I mean, look at what this kid can do, how much pain he can inflict. Anyone who knows what he’s capable of should know they’d need someone…something…equally superhuman to stop him. Sending a single, faceless drone to do the job of an army? It doesn’t make sense.”

     “So…these attacks…you’re saying they’re decoys after all.”

     He mulls this over, a sunflower seed between his teeth. “They’re drawing us out, Scully.”

     “Us?”

     “You…and me.”

     “But why go to all the trouble?”

     “That’s the real question we should be asking, isn’t it? It’s too convenient. You’re left a mysterious note, they dangle your son in front of you like a long lost carrot, and…we’re off.”

     Her eyes tighten in skepticism, hating the defensive edge to her voice. “That’s paranoid even for you, Mulder. You don’t think the FBI…?”

     “If the Bureau is responsible, they’re taking the long way around,” he agrees. “No, I’d guess it’s military. DOD, maybe.”

     She sighs in frustration. “That leaves us back at square one.”

     “Looks that way.”

     She looks down at the files, studying them, when she feels his hand come to rest on her shoulder. It’s a reflexive gesture born out of habit, something he’s done countless times before, but today the unexpected contact makes her look up in surprise. At the same time, he jerks his hand away, as though he’s touched a hot pan.

     He straightens, moving to leave, avoiding her eyes. “We should take shifts. I don’t think they’ll come tonight, but soon. I’ll take the first.”

     “Mulder…”

     He looks up at the pleading note in her voice, and Scully takes in the sight of him—rumpled T-shirt, three-day stubble, tired eyes.

     Not tired, Dana…wounded.

     “Mulder, we should talk.”

     He blinks. “Yeah…yeah, I guess we should. Not now, though…later. Little pitchers have big, telepathic ears.”

     She snorts. “Fair enough. Goodnight, Mulder.”

     “Night, Scully.”

     Mulder lays on the couch in the early morning hours, hands behind his head, staring up at the ceiling. He’s supposed to wake Scully for her shift soon, but decides against it. He won’t be able to sleep anyway, might as well let her rest.

     He’s considered calling the whole thing off, letting the FBI take the kid into protective custody…not like they did a great job in the first place. If they had, we wouldn’t be here.

     Scully won’t have it, though. She’s found William, she’s not going to let this go. Not going to let him go.

     Scully. He closes his eyes. The thought of her is usually a comfort, but tonight it creates an uncomfortable unraveling within him. She’s shut him out, locked herself away in a proverbial room and thrown away the key.

     He misses her. Not only in a physical sense (although there’s that, too), but in a spiritual one. He missed her long before their anonymous friend dropped a tip at her office door. He’d been too stupid and blind to admit that she’d pulled away from him a long time ago.

     He wanted to believe they could have a normal life together.

     He wanted to believe he was enough for her.

     The truth is out there…and sometimes, the truth fucking hurts.

     He drapes an arm over his eyes, letting his thoughts wander at random, in the way it does when he’s trying to solve a case, putting the pieces together, processing the last few hours.

     Skinner isn’t telling them everything, but that’s not unusual. He’s put himself in a precarious position, handing Bureau resources to non-agents; he’s covering his ass, business as usual.

     And who sent Scully the note? Whoever it was had to have some connection with the FBI, familiarity with their son. It was the kind of thing Spender and his ilk might have tried, if the Cancer Man was still alive.

     Unlikely…but not impossible. Nothing is impossible, Fox.

     More and more, he’s convinced this is some kind of trap.

     But why now? The FBI has had access to us for years.

     He’s still pondering this when he hears a soft knocking, so quiet he almost writes it off as nothing—the settling of the floorboards, maybe a radiator kicking on. But it comes again, a soft, stealthy tapping from behind him.

     Someone’s at the door.

     He’s instantly alert, heart thrumming in his ears. Rising from the couch, he draws the gun from his belt, quickly but quietly pressing his back against the wall, moving toward the entrance. He can make out a shadow, the faint outline of a person behind the curtain in the dim light. Whoever it is tries the door, finding it locked—Mulder watches the knob shift back and forth in rapid, jerky movements. Then comes another knock, louder, more insistent.

     Mulder slides carefully along the wall until he gets to the front window; peering out, he can see the form of a long dark coat, black shoes. Government, probably male, judging by the size, but the face is in shadow.

     Did Skinner send someone from the Bureau to check on us?

     No, he would have called to let them know.

     There’s the audible creak of a stair on the other side of the room; he whips around, begins to draw the gun, but finds only Scully.

     “Mulder? I heard a…”

     He moves a finger to his lips. Don’t talk. He points to the door, mouthing “outside.”

     She freezes, nods slightly, hand tightening on the banister. He gestures toward the landing where she stands and jerks his thumb upward, but she already knows what to do.

     Go. Keep them upstairs.

     Taking a deep breath, gun at the ready, Mulder walks over to the door. “Who’s there?”

     No response, but the figure doesn’t move.

     He tightens his grip, preparing to aim through the glass. “Who is it?”

     “Don’t shoot,” a voice speaks, muffled but familiar, from the other side. “I’m a friend. That you, Mulder?”

     “Who are you?” Mulder repeats, heart racing, finger hovering over the trigger.

     “It’s John Doggett, from the FBI.”

     This gives Mulder pause, but he doesn’t relax his grip. “How do I know you are who you say you are?”

     “I know the boy who’s with you, Agent Mulder…he’s your son.”

     Mulder shakes his head, thinking of Isaac’s FBI file, stashed in Scully’s bedroom. Anyone with access to the Bureau’s records could have made that connection. “Seems that’s not news to anyone lately. Try again.”

     The man on the other side of the door sighs, frustrated. “Until recently, you were a fugitive. We haven’t spoken since New Mexico. Remember New Mexico, Agent Mulder? Got my ass chased out of there by black helicopters. You’re not going to find that in the FBI records, though. They redacted most of my report when they shut down the X-files.”

     Mulder hesitates. “Did Skinner send you?”

     “Not exactly, but he pointed me in your direction. I’ve been following you. I want to help.”

     There’s another long pause before Mulder responds. “I’m going to open the door. Put your weapon on the ground, I want your hands up where I can see them,” he instructs. “I want to see your badge.” Holding the gun to the edge of the doorway, he slips the deadbolt out of the latch and eases the door open.

     Doggett stands on the porch, irritated but otherwise compliant. He holds up his badge in one hand, while his weapon lies on the floor, kicked to the side. Mulder’s shoulders relax the tiniest bit, but he doesn’t relinquish his hold on the gun.

     “What do you want, Doggett?”

     “Nice to see you, too, Agent Mulder.” Agent Mulduh.

     “You can drop the ‘Agent’, it’s just Mulder.”

     “Whatever you say. You’re the one with the gun,” Doggett replies, nodding at the weapon still trained at his head. His eyes shift to a point beyond Mulder’s shoulder, where Scully is descending the stairs a second time, now dressed in a T-shirt and sweats. “Hey, Dana, long time no see. Mind calling off your dog?”

     “Mulder, put down the gun. It’s him.”

     He shoots her an icy look, but reluctantly lowers the weapon.

     “Gonna invite me in?” Doggett asks, a smirk pulling up the corners of his mouth.

     Mulder steps aside, but barely, forcing Scully’s former partner to enter sideways. They stand for a moment, face to face, sizing each other up. Scully watches, suppressing the urge to roll her eyes at the unnecessary display of machismo. “They’re still sleeping,” she says, referring to the Van de Kamps, in an effort to draw Mulder’s attention away.

     “I see you’re just as paranoid as ever, Mulder,” says Doggett.

     “Yeah, how does it go? ‘It’s not paranoia if they’re actually out to get you.’ I’ll ask again—what do you want, Doggett?”

     “It’s a bit of a story. Mind if I sit?” He doesn’t wait for an answer, walking over to the couch and lowering himself onto the seat with a tired grunt. Mulder and Scully follow, but neither joins Doggett; Scully stands in the archway, Mulder paces the floor.

     “After the X-files were shut down, they reassigned me to Violent Crimes. I’ve done alright, kept my nose clean. Agent Reyes was reassigned, too, but we lost touch a few years back. She resigned, couldn’t take the bureaucracy, I guess.” He leans forward, face lined with fatigue.

     “I’ve been working a case for the last few months. It’s a strange one, Agent…I mean, Mulder. You’d probably appreciate it—rampant pyromania, but it looks like spontaneous human combustion. I’m talkin’ temperatures that melt bones, there’s no trace evidence to be found. Honestly, I dunno why they don’t reopen the X-files, save themselves the trouble of putting good agents on cases like this. Damn near impossible.” He’s gruff, and Scully detects a hint of bitterness. He’s a tough man, Doggett, but his career hasn’t been kind to him.

     Mulder fidgets, annoyed at the man’s choice of words. “Good agents” meant agents who followed the book, played by the rules; Mulder had never been one of them. “What does your case have to do with us?”

     “In my research, I came across this other case, a man from Wyoming killed in an explosion a few years back. It fits the profile of this pyro we’ve been tracking, so I looked into it. Turns out it’s a coincidence, the two cases weren’t related…but the old case referenced an X-File, which caught my attention, as you can imagine.”

     He sighs, weary. “I wouldn’t bother, except we’re running on empty, I’m jumping at every lead I can get my hands on. So…I jumped again. And there he was, ‘William Scully.’ Brought back memories. I got curious, started digging…didn’t like what I found.”

     “You left the note,” Scully interrupts, understanding.

     “Yeah. Yeah, I did. I thought…if it was my kid, I’d want to know.”

     His face is sympathetic, but Scully crosses her arms, vexed. “Why the cloak and dagger routine? Why not come to us directly?”

     He nods, acknowledging her anger. “The more I found, the more I realized this goes deep. Like I told ya, I’ve kept my nose clean. I’m up for a promotion soon. Unearthing something like this, making too much noise…I could lose more than just a rung on the ladder, if you get my drift.”

     “But you’re here,” Mulder mutters. “That can’t be good for your career, Agent Doggett.”

     “You think I don’t know that?” Doggett glares at him, then back to the floor, lowering his voice. “Conscience got the better of me, I guess. I heard how things went down the other night, Skinner hinted at trouble. Since I’m partly responsible for your being out here, I thought you could use a hand.”

     Scully considers this. It was true, they could probably use the help. If nothing else, it was one more trained weapon, one more pair of eyes. Mulder doesn’t say anything, looking at Scully as if to say, Your game, your decision. What do you want?

     That question is as loaded as the gun he still holds in his hand.

     “You said this goes deep,” Mulder continues. “How deep? What does that mean?”

     Doggett looks at Scully, then back to Mulder. “Have you ever heard of Project Ultimam?”

     They haven’t. Doggett continues, “I hadn’t either, ’til a few days ago. It’s military. From what I can tell, it’s some kind of genetic experimentation, a cloning program, conducted under the guise of pharmaceutical testing,” he shakes his head. “You’d be proud of me, guys…ten years ago if you’d told me there was a government-sanctioned program for human cloning I’d have said you were crazy. But after everything…I read the files, didn’t even blink.”

     “What does this have to do with Isaac?”

     “The kid? Imagine what they could do with someone like him. Or multiple someones like him.”

     Scully considers this; the extensive genetic studies begin to make sense. “They want to clone him.”

     Doggett nods. “From my investigation of the X-files, it’s not the first time we’ve met with something like this. But I think…I think this time is different. This time, they have the perfect human-alien hybrid.”

     “But why go to all this trouble?” Mulder retorts. “They’ve had access to him since he was little. Why pull us into it?”

     Doggett shoots him a pointed look. “I couldn’t say. Conspiracy theories are your area of expertise, Mulder. I’m just the messenger.”

     There’s a creak from behind as they realize they’re not alone; Isaac has been watching from the stair landing, and now he speaks up, “What’s going on? Who’s that?”

     Scully whips around, gaping at the unexpected intrusion.

     How long has he been standing there?

     There’s a tense pause as she tries to recover. “He’s a friend, Isaac. An old friend, from the FBI. He’s here to help,” she says, casting a sideways glance at Doggett, silently confirming his place in their group.

     The boy looks perplexed, maybe even suspicious, but doesn’t say anything. Scully realizes her heart is racing, her pulse frantic against the taut skin of her wrist.

     What did he hear? What does he know?

     They haven’t been quiet, but that’s less concerning than what he might have heard with his mind. She turns to find Mulder staring at her, silently asking the same questions.

     Mulder nods at the boy, forcing a smile that looks more like a grimace, an unconvincing nothing-to-see-here gesture. “You should get back to bed, kid. It’s late.”

     Isaac shrugs. “I don’t sleep much.” But he turns and walks back upstairs without argument.

     They wait, listening for the click of the bedroom door before Mulder turns to Scully, his voice low. “We can’t keep this up. We have to tell them.”

     Doggett observes them with growing disbelief. “Wait…he doesn’t know?”

     Scully crosses her arms and looks at the floor in response.

     “Ouch,” Doggett whistles under his breath.

     “I’ll take this shift,” Scully murmurs coldly. “I’ll talk to his mother in the morning.”

     She walks to Mulder but doesn’t make eye contact, holding out her hand for the gun. He relinquishes the weapon in stony silence before she storms out to the porch; he winces as the door slams behind her.

     Doggett cocks an eyebrow. “I was going to ask how you two lovebirds were getting on, but…I think I know the answer.”

     Mulder snorts, but doesn’t take the bait. Fatigue hits him hard and sudden, the events of the day catching up with him, and he doesn’t have the energy to answer Doggett’s questions, to field the other man’s snide remarks about his deteriorating partnership.

     “You can have the couch,” he mutters drily, turning toward the kitchen. “I’m not going to need it.”

     “You mean he doesn’t know?”

     Doesn’t know what? Isaac wonders, closing his eyes, trying to listen with his mind. He can usually tell when adults are lying to him—strong emotions are easier to read, and this house is full of them. Whatever they’re trying to keep from him sounds like white noise, static.

     He likes Mulder. He’s not sure about the doctor, though she seems nice. He can tell his mother doesn’t like either of them, which makes the former FBI agents that much more interesting.

     His mother…

     He feels a fluttery pang of guilt, but shoves it back without much thought. It’s a sentiment he’s carried for most of his life. She can’t understand him, can’t understand why he prefers to be alone, why he doesn’t have friends, why he escapes into books—horror novels, mostly.

     “How can you read that filthy stuff?” she’ll nag, wrinkling her nose.

     How does he explain that it’s only half as terrifying as what he might hear?

     Like Mr. Elmer, his fifth-period teacher, who spends study hall imagining what his male classmates look like undressed.

     Or Mrs. Frank, their elderly neighbor, who smothered her baby girl in her sleep, but tells everyone it was crib death.

     Or the quiet, mousy-looking kid he passed in the hall the other day, whose singular thought could be heard over the crowd of noisy middle school students with terrifying clarity: Kill them, kill them all, kill them all…

     For all the gore in his books, it’s nothing compared to the real world. He can close a book, secure in the knowledge that the monsters within are works of fiction.

     It’s the monsters on the outside you have to watch for.

     If anything, he envies his mother. He wishes he had her blind, trusting faith…that he could chalk everything up to God’s will and feel confident in her higher power’s love and guidance, but if there is anything he believes without question, it is this: No god would have made someone—something—as awful as him. No god would have allowed his father to die at the hands of his three-year-old son.

     Over the last few years, Isaac has begun to suspect that his knowledge surpasses that of his mother, and this scares her. His intelligence is a threat to her beliefs, a black mark on her otherwise simple, devoted life, rather than something to be proud of.

     He’s an anomaly. A glitch. A mistake.

     Which is why these FBI agents are so intriguing. They’re not afraid of him. If anything, his presence makes them curious. It’s the first time in many years he’s felt worthy of consideration, rather than a freak.

     Isaac sits at the top of the stairs for a few more minutes, fingers tracing thoughtful circles in the dust on the step, but it seems there’s nothing more to hear. The adults have gone their separate ways. It doesn’t take telepathy to know that the two agents are fighting about something, something to do with him, but the details are fuzzy.

     He tiptoes back to his room, crawling onto the twin mattress, pulling the blanket up to his chin. He wonders if he’ll sleep tonight.

     The dreams. As if it wasn’t unsettling enough being on the run, he’s plagued by nightmares. Nothing he can remember clearly, but over time the dream’s imprint grows stronger, like worn tracks in the carpet. He’s running through a forest, there’s a bright light, the shadowy shape of something standing in the center. There’s a giant gray mass hovering over him like some kind of metallic cloud. There are monsters with long, leathery fingers, monsters that hide in shadows and suck the light from everything around them.

     His mother, a melting corpse, pulling him headlong into darkness…

     He shivers. While these images, these dreams, are fleeting and often gone by morning, it’s the feelings they create—a growing dread, a black certainty, like a vise across his chest, tightening little by little—that stay with him long after he’s opened his eyes. He wakes tangled in the sheets, dripping with cold sweat.

     In those first minutes after he wakes, there is nothing but his labored breathing and the chilling certainty that he is the last person on Earth.

     He’s had these vivid dreams since he was five. He spent a lot of time in hospitals back then, shuttled between clinics and specialists, his mother presiding over his illness as though it were a symphony, and she, the conductor.

     He tried to tell her about the nightmares once, but he didn’t have the vocabulary to describe their significance. She’d brushed them off as a product of his illness (in her mind, everything was a product of his illness) and he gave up trying to explain. He knows they mean something, something big, but it’s better to keep the peace by pretending they don’t exist.

     As he slips toward sleep tonight he wonders, not for the first time in his life, when he can stop pretending.

     But her partner doesn’t materialize, the house behind her remains silent, and she’s left alone with her thoughts.

     As a doctor and scientist, she’s good at setting aside her emotions to get to the facts, keeping a logical distance between herself and the problem at hand. That’s proving impossible to do with this boy, or with her partner, for that matter. She’s floundering, unable to see beyond the despair and doubt that cloud her judgment, and the one person she would normally confide in is barely speaking with her.

     His words come to her, rolling over in her mind, an ongoing torment with no resolution except the obvious.

     We have to tell them soon.

     She closes her eyes to the memory, feeling every emotion she’s denied, bottled, and locked away over the years hit her at once. So much time spent burying her past to have it unearthed in a single moment, the wound that never healed ripped open without so much as a tissue to stop the bleeding.

     #

     She returns from her spot on the steps to find Gwenyth Van de Kamp sipping coffee in the dim morning light of the kitchen. She’s been replaying the impending conversation in her head for several hours, but in truth, she has no idea where or how to begin, or how the woman will react. A deep breath does little to slow the frantic beating of her heart.

     “Mrs. Van de Kamp? Can we talk?”

     The woman looks up, surprised, crossing her arms. “I hope you and Mr. Mulder have a plan,” she sniffs. “How much longer do we have to stay here? When can we go home?”

     “We’re still working on that.” Scully takes a seat at the table. “Look…I feel like we got off to a rough start, and I wanted to apologize. If I were in your position, I’d be suspicious, too.”

     She gives a brusque nod. “I only want what’s best for my son.”

     “I know. You’re a good mother,” Scully says, surprising herself when she realizes the sentiment is genuine. Mrs. Van de Kamp is a woman hardened by her past, but it’s clear she loves Isaac.

     “You’ve had good reason to be skeptical. We haven’t been completely honest with you.”

     The woman’s eyes widen, nostrils flaring, incensed. “I knew it! I knew you weren’t telling us everything—”

     “Mrs. Van de Kamp—has Isaac been ill?”

     The frank interruption throws her, shocked curiosity winning over indignation. “How…how did you know that?”

     “Isaac has a record at the FBI…we read that he had a heart condition?”

     “Yes…but they said it’s better now, it healed on its own a few months back.”

     “While he was being treated, did you notice anything unusual? Suspicious?”

     The woman shakes her head in confusion. “What do you mean? His doctors took excellent care of him…said they’d never seen anyone respond so well to the treatments—”

     “Who was his doctor?”

     “Dr. Baray…he’s a specialist, renowned in his field,” she says, once again baring her defensive edge. “He took good care of my son. What does this have to do with these attacks? What aren’t you telling me?”

     “We’re looking for patterns in Isaac’s history, in hopes it will lead us to the people responsible.” She pauses. There’s no easy way to say what comes next, no way to paint a forgiving picture.

     “Mrs. Van de Kamp…you know Isaac is special. We think the doctors were…testing him. Studying his abilities…telling you it was a problem with his heart, so they could continue their tests without resistance.”

     The boy’s mother narrows her eyes, shaking her head. “No. No, that’s not possible. I don’t believe it. He was a sick boy…his doctor said—”

     “We also know Isaac isn’t your biological son. The records indicated he was adopted shortly after he was born.”

     The woman’s lips fall open in a soft gasp. She lowers her voice to a rough whisper. “Does he…did you say anything to Isaac?”

     “No,” Scully continues, “based on what he’s said to us, I don’t think he knows he was adopted. I don’t think you’ve told him.” She raises an eyebrow, questioning, hoping to impart a calm she doesn’t feel.

     “And he shouldn’t know,” the woman retorts, mollified. “He was so young when he came to us, my husband and I agreed to raise him as though he weren’t…you know. He was our son, and we loved him. His history…wasn’t important.”

     “It may be more important than you think,” Scully murmurs. “Mrs. Van de Kamp, what did the adoption agency tell you about him?”

     “He…nothing. He had a different name then. They just said his mother couldn’t take care of him. I assumed she was an addict…maybe she was too young,” she sighs, looking down at her coffee cup, absently running her fingers along the curve of the porcelain handle. “We’d been trying for a baby for years, but God didn’t see fit to bless us. Until Isaac. He was a miracle.”

     Scully’s eyes well with unexpected tears. She’d spoken the same words about the same child so long ago.

     He was supposed to be my miracle.

     “I… I gave a baby up for adoption in 2002. Eleven years ago. His name was William.”

     As the reality of what she’s said slowly dawns on Mrs. Van de Kamp’s face, Scully’s voice grows thick as she tries to collect herself, to speak the difficult truth. “I didn’t want to overwhelm you, given the circumstances. I should have said something before, but…we believe Isaac is my biological son.”

     The woman’s turns slowly from side to side. “That’s not…how? How can you be sure?”

     “His adoption records reference a case file that belonged to my son.” She takes a deep breath. “But I knew. Even before we made the connection on paper, I knew it was him.”

     Mrs. Van de Kamp’s face has gone ashen, her voice thready. “Are you…are you going to take him? Is that what this is about? You…want to take him away?”

     “No, that’s not why we came to you,” Scully assures her. “I received a tip, a note, it said Isaac was in trouble. I…I had to know he was OK.” She talks to a point on the surface of the cracked Formica table, unable to meet the other woman’s stricken face.

     Mrs. Van de Kamp doesn’t speak for several moments. “Why?” she asks, finally.

     Scully arches a perfect brow, puzzled. “Why…?”

     “Why did you give him up?”

     She’d expected anger, denial, or perhaps cold silence, but in the absence of a reaction, there is only this simple, softly-spoken question. It’s a fair one, though it catches Scully off guard. She clears her throat.

     “We…my job at the Bureau was…dangerous. And there came a point when I realized William…Isaac,” she corrects, “would be safer if he lived with another family. We arranged a protective adoption through the FBI.”

     Mrs. Van de Kamp considers this with sad eyes. “I always thought we got lucky, somehow. The social worker told us it would take six to eight months, minimum…but…we put in our application…and Isaac came to us two weeks later.”

     Scully nods mutely; she doesn’t trust herself to speak, and is surprised when Gwenyth breaks the silence instead.

     “I can’t imagine how difficult that must have been,” the woman whispers in an unusual gesture of sympathy. “He was less than a year when he came to us. Just a baby.”

     Scully wipes at her eyes. “Yeah,” is all she can manage for the moment, the heaviness in her chest threatens to crush her. She fights it, taking a deep, shaky breath. “I’m telling you this because I think it’s necessary for Isaac to hear it from you. He knows more than most kids his age. We…I don’t want him to find out the hard way that his origins are not what they seem. That kind of news…it should come from someone he trusts.”

     The woman is distant now, withdrawn and thoughtful. The confession seems to have dissipated what hostility existed between them, but has left Scully drained. She wants nothing more than to be at home, in her own bed, with a hot cup of tea. That life seems incredibly far away.

     “Mrs. Scully?”

     “Dana. It’s Dana,” Scully replies.

     “Dana,” Mrs. Van de Kamp continues, tentative. “I want to say…thank you.”

     Scully considers this, unsure whether she means the fact that she opened up, or the fact that she gave up her child. She decides it doesn’t matter. “I can’t tell you how to raise your son,” she says, the words falling off her tongue like cold stones, “but I think you should tell him. Soon.”

     She rises and leaves, finding she doesn’t have the strength to walk up the twelve steps to her room. She sags against the wall and sinks to her knees, head in her hands, overcome.

     Doggett joins them for a game here or there, but Mulder and Isaac make for impossible opponents. Like father, like son, the agent thinks, tossing yet another losing hand on the table in defeat.

     When they’re not playing cards, the boy reads on the porch, long legs flung over the arm of the uncomfortable wicker bench. He’s already burned through two novels in their short time at the house, but Mulder gets the feeling this behavior is not unusual.

     The kid’s spent most of his life alone, at least in spirit. Remind you of anyone, Spooky?

     Mulder has to admit, he enjoys the boy’s company. Isaac is clever, with a sharp mind and an eye for details. As Mulder returns his cards to the table, shuffling the deck to begin another round of Diplomat, he feels a vague tug of regret. He never questioned his partner’s decision to give up their son, but now he better understands her uncertainty, and has begun to see more clearly what they might have had if things had been different.

     No point in going there, Fox. You’ve seen where that road leads.

     Meanwhile, Scully remains in her room. She hasn’t said more than ten words to him since she stormed out of the house the other night, and he knows better than to intrude on her personal space when she gets like this. He also knows she’s talked to Gwenyth Van de Kamp, and although neither woman has said anything directly, he senses the conversation went about as well as could be expected; Mrs. Van de Kamp has also sequestered herself in her room.

     But has anyone told Isaac? he wonders. If so, the boy gives no indication.

     The unexpected trill of a phone interrupts the comfortable silence, and Mulder’s head snaps up. Doggett grabs for the cell, a throw-away phone to which only Skinner has the number. Doggett explained this to Mulder his first day at the house.

     “If there’s any news from the Bureau, Skinner’ll be able to reach us. They can’t trace the number, it’s blocked.”

     Doggett strides out the door, seeking privacy, though Mulder can tell by looking at Isaac that the agent may not get it. The boy looks over his shoulder, trying to listen, before Mulder nudges him on the arm. “Hey,” he says, shaking his head in gentle admonishment. No.

     The murmuring outside is too low for Mulder to hear, but the increasingly pale expression on the boy’s face says it all. 

     Something’s wrong.

     “Kid,” Mulder says, thinking fast, gathering the deck and dealing cards onto the table in an effort to distract them from Doggett’s conversation. “What’s the count?”

     The boy looks dully at the table, no longer interested in the game, but responds, “One.”

     Mulder nods, looking Isaac in the eye, dealing another card. “Now?”

     The boy glares at Mulder, rolling his eyes, jaw set. “This is stupid.” The camaraderie of the game is all but forgotten as Isaac rushes from the kitchen, hearts and diamonds scattering to the floor in his wake.

#

     Compromised…not safe…

     Isaac can make out only a few thoughts from Agent Doggett’s conversation, but he knows what this means. They’ll have to run again. The frustration that wells within him is frightening in its ferocity.

     Why? he rails against himself, an internal monologue of vitriol. Why do you have to be such a fucking freak?

     His feet pound at the treads, and he barely notices when he passes Scully on the landing. His only thought is to get to his room, someplace he can be alone. The worn wooden door slams behind him with a gratifying bang.

     Mom’ll be pissed about that.

     A twinge of disquiet fills him at this thought. His mother…where is she? He hasn’t seen her since breakfast, and that was hours ago. She’s not in the room; her bed is tidy, made up in her meticulous, fussy way, the covers folded back and tucked under the mattress.

     He can hear Doggett outside the second story window; lifting the curtain, Isaac watches the man pace back and forth as he talks, gesturing indignantly.

     Compromised…we’ve been compromised.

     But the forbidden exchange no longer holds its former allure; something else nags at the back of his mind. He takes another look around the room, and notices the the bathroom door is open a crack.

     “Mom?”

     No response. Isaac realizes his heart is racing. He has a vision, like a still from a horror movie—he’ll find her in a bathtub full of blood, gutted, filleted like a fish. The picture is so clear, he can almost smell the blood; thoughts of the warm liquid oozing over the edge of the tub, the drops of bright red staining the while tile, make him nauseous.

     Stop being a dork, Isaac. This dump doesn’t have a tub.

     He swallows, finding his tongue has gone dry, rough like sandpaper. He clears his throat. “Mom…you there?”

     His fingertips graze the rough surface of the door, questioning…but still, he hesitates. He can’t shake the image of her lifeless body, limbs bloated and floating in a thick soup of death…

     She’s already dead, Isaac.

     He closes his eyes, trying to shake the image from his mind.

     Don’t be an idiot! Just open the damn door.

     His breath is shallow, his chest heavy as he steels himself, giving the door a push…

     The bathroom is empty. Everything is where they left it this morning; his damp towel on the floor, a washcloth hanging over the side of the shower.

     No tub, no blood.

     No mom, either.

     “Isaac?”

     A startled shriek escapes his lips as he whirls around to find her standing in the doorway of their room.

     “Jesus! Mom, you scared me,” he whispers, trying to recover his breath, to slow his rapid-fire heartbeat. “We have to go. That guy, Doggett, he said…they found us, they’re coming.”

     His mother looks confused, her face stony and blank. “Honey?” The word comes out in a gravelly whisper that makes the hair on the back of his neck stand up.

     Calm down, you’re such a fucking baby.

     She stares at him, and all at once she…shimmers. As though he’s seeing her through a haze, at a great distance on a hot day.

     He blinks, clearing his eyes. You’re tired…the light’s playing tricks.

     “Mom? You OK? We have to go,” he says, unwilling to acknowledge the fear that pricks insistently at the back of his mind.

     She continues to stare, unresponsive, shuffling forward in a daze. Confused, Isaac reaches out to her, probing at her thoughts, seeking…

     Gooseflesh pops out along his arms, a cold chill crawling up his spine. His mother’s mind is engulfed in white noise.

     …it’s empty.

     No, not empty.

     She’s screaming, he thinks wildly. I can hear her screaming in there.

     Beyond the hollow, grating static is a faint, far away screech, as though his mother is calling from the bottom of a deep well. Her image flickers again, this time her eyes go black, dark and oily, her body fading into shadow, then snapping back into vicious color.

     No…no…

     Isaac shrinks back, mouth agape, as she advances with the same unnatural, shuffling gait. He tries to scream, but finds he can’t breathe; he can only manage a soft croak.

     He stumbles as the back of his foot hits a chair, losing his balance, landing hard on the wood floor. The sharp click of his teeth against the tender flesh of his tongue brings the salty, coppery taste of blood to the back of his throat, and he’s swept with a terrible sense of déjà vu.

     His mother—or what used to be my mother, he thinks—continues to advance, the static in his head growing louder, blocking out rational thought.

     “Noooooo,” a moan escapes him. “Mom, please, no…”

     He hears a different voice in his mind now; it rises above the static, a wild, wavering pitch that makes his head ache, speaking a language he doesn’t recognize. In the distance, he can hear someone calling his name, a man yelling.

     He falls back against the floor, hands outstretched, wild energy pulsing at his palms, fingertips burning, heart caught in his throat.

     but it’s mom mama motherrrrr

     No, not his mother, not now. She’s a monster, black emptiness eaten by negative space.

     No no nono please noNO!

     His last conscious thought is sucked into the void of his own power as his head hits the floor, and the world goes dark.

     “What…?”

     The boy’s angry footsteps echo in the narrow hall as he brushes past, scowling.

     She enters the kitchen to find Mulder, picking up cards and throwing them into a careless pile on the table.

     “What was that about?”

     “Doggett’s talking to Skinner. Kid heard something he didn’t like.”

     Scully blinks, folding her arms. “What did he hear?”

     Mulder shrugs. “We’ll find out soon enough.” He leans forward, about to say something else, but they’re interrupted by Doggett, who stands in the doorway, red-faced and fuming.

     “Where’s the boy?” he demands.

     “Upstairs,” Mulder says. “What did Skinner say?”

     “He said we’ve been compromised. We need to clear out.”

     Scully’s eyes widen. “What? How?”

     Doggett lowers his gaze but doesn’t say anything.

     Mulder rises slowly from his chair. “You brought them down on us, didn’t you?”

     “Skinner was bugged, they followed me. Whoever’s responsible has someone on the inside.”

     Mulder looks at Scully, jaw clenched, but she’s already headed for the stairs. “Let’s go. We can be on the road in…”

     There’s a sudden thud from upstairs, a stifled cry. 

     She stops on the second step, alarmed. “Isaac? Gwen?”

     No response. A moan, this time louder. “No…mom, no…”

     She pulls the gun from her back pocket, taking the steps two at a time, not waiting for Doggett or Mulder to follow.

     “Isaac!”

     Still no response. The boy’s bedroom is closed, but thankfully not locked. The gun is warm and ready in her hands as she opens the door.

     There’s a shape standing about five feet in front of her, a black mass that shifts and moves like nothing Scully has ever seen.

     Nothing human, at least.

     For a moment, there’s a flicker of light and she thinks she sees Mrs. Van de Kamp.

     No, that can’t be right…she’s…where is she?

     The boy is across the room, keening on the floor, hands held in front of his face, babbling a steady chorus of pleas and terrified whimpers.

     Instead of going to him, Scully finds her eyes drawn to the flickering shadow. It dances like a flame, hypnotic, suggestive. She hesitates, lowering the gun, lulled by its movements.

     She vaguely understands that Doggett and Mulder are yelling behind her, but the black shadow flame is too enticing, too soothing; she can’t pull her eyes away. She’s sinking into a dark place, her mind emptying itself of rational thought. The space around her fades to black, she realizes this was a trick, a horrible trick, but she’s paralyzed, no longer in control…

     Mulder’s voice breaks through the shadow’s reverie, yelling, “Scully, out of the way! GET OUTTA THERE!”

     What? Out of the way of what?

     The panic in his voice startles her, bringing her back from the precipice. The room comes back into focus, her eyes widen as sickening reality falls around her.

     That thing! What the hell…

     She feels someone jerk her back into the hallway by the collar of her shirt, hard enough to make her head snap forward. The door to the bedroom slams shut behind her as a searing white light bursts forth.

     She comes to on the floor of the hallway, dazed and coughing. Her face and arms tingle painfully, the skin papery and dry, as if burned by the sun.

     Mulder and Doggett are crouched on the floor beside her; she feels Mulder reach out, grasping at her shoulder. “You OK?”

     She sits up painfully, still dazed. “Yeah…yeah, I think, I’m…” her eyes widen as she comes to.

     Oh God, no, Isaac…

     “Where is he?!? We have to get in, we have to get to him! We have to—”

     Panic rises in her throat. Frantic, she scrambles for the door, but Mulder grabs her by the shoulders, spinning her around. “Don’t, Scully, don’t go in there.”

     “That thing is in there! We have to get—”

     “Scully, listen to me!”

     But she’s blind with panic, all she can think about is getting to Isaac. Her hand finds the bedroom doorknob but she jerks it away with a strangled cry, “Ow, shit!” The palm comes back bright red and blistering.

     “He’s fine, Scully, he’s…fine. He…he did it again. You’re lucky you didn’t get hit—”

     She ignores Mulder, whirls around, searching for something, anything in which to wrap her hands. Doggett tosses her a sweatshirt, and she winces at the sensation of rough fabric against her tender skin before trying the door again.

     In what has become an all-too-familiar scene, the entity is lying on the floor, with Isaac just beyond. Scully rushes to him, kneeling down.

     “He’s…still breathing,” she says, her fingers moving to the boy’s neck, checking his pulse. “He’s alive!”

     “That makes one of them.”

     “What do you—”

     Mulder nods toward the shadow on the floor…except as Scully looks closer, it’s no longer a shadow.

     Oh…oh, no…

     Relief is replaced by a deep twist in her gut as she stares at the body of Gwenyth Van de Kamp.

     “Looks like they found us,” Doggett mutters, his face lined with darkness.

     Mulder doesn’t hesitate. Stepping past the body, he leans down to pick up Isaac; the boy shifts slightly in his arms and moans, but doesn’t wake.

     “We have to go.”

     Scully and Doggett follow them downstairs as the woman’s corpse begins to disintegrate into the floor, melting like the others.

     Mulder places the boy on the couch, storms over to his bag and begins to stuff what few possessions he’s brought—a sweatshirt, undershirt, his laptop—into the duffel, talking as he works. “Whatever this…this thing is, it used her to get to her son. That shows planning, a certain level of intelligence…they’ve been watching. Any one of us is a potential target.”

     Scully barely hears Mulder’s words. She moves to check on the boy; he’s unconscious but fitful, his limbs twitching and jerking, eyes moving fretfully behind closed lids. She brushes a strand of hair from his forehead.

     My God, he’s burning up.

     Mulder continues, persistent, “We can’t stay here. These attacks aren’t going to stop, and I don’t want to wait around for one of us to be next.”

     Scully stands, crossing her arms in exasperation, though in her heart lies dread, the cold certainty that her partner is not wrong. “We can’t just run away with him, Mulder! We need a plan, we need…we need backup.”

     “Scully, the kid just lost his mother. He shouldn’t wake up to that,” he gestures upstairs, where they can hear the poor woman’s body sizzling. “We’ll head north, cross the border…lay low until we can figure out what to do.”

     “How are we supposed to cross? The authorities will have a watch on our car,” she protests, hating the whining, helpless tenor of her own voice.

     “We’ll avoid the border posts…hike up through the woods. Camp out.”

     “And then what? How long do we have to run before…before…,” but she can’t finish, temporarily recalling the dark place, a black landscape of nothing unfurling before her, forever lost in its depths.

     “He’s right,” Doggett interrupts, startling them both. “Go. I’ll cover for you, tell ‘em you’d already left by the time I got here, point ‘em in the other direction. It’ll give you some time.”

     Mulder glances at Doggett, his voice tempered in an unusual show of gratitude. “I need to use your phone.”

     Scully doesn’t speak, doesn’t move, just stares at Isaac in sadness.

     William. Oh, what have we done to you?

     “Oh, I know what it is; we’ve been following it for months…the military’s latest foray into human cloning, creation of supersoldiers from human DNA. Same story, new tricks. But Mulder, I don’t know if we can hack this; they’ve heightened security, they know we got into the Bureau—”

     Mulder groans to himself. “Just do it, OK? Send me what you can. I’ll try to get to a computer in—” he looks at the map, “—in Bonners Ferry, Idaho.”

     There’s a pause on the other end of the line.

     “Byers?”

     “Yeah, Project Ultimam, got it. I’ll see what I can do.” Click.

     Mulder walks outside, into the crisp night air. They’re not going to have long before it becomes too cold to hide out in the woods.

     Then what?

     Scully’s right. He’s always followed his instincts, they’ve served him well in the past…but he’s out of practice, they can’t keep this up. He can tell it’s wearing on Scully, too—there’s a hollow, desperate fear in her eyes he hasn’t seen since some of their worst cases.

     That we’re barely on speaking terms isn’t helping…but she’s still here. That must mean something.

     Then there’s the kid. Mulder tried to remain detached, treating this as though it were any other case, but his cool exterior is crumbling. He watches Scully tend to Isaac and finds he has to clear his throat, swallowing emotion. The magnitude of the boy’s situation hits too close to home, and empathy washes over him.

     He’s lost everything.

     Mulder and Scully had sacrificed much, but that had been a conscious choice; to pursue the darkness willingly, at any cost, the price they’d paid was often dear, but purposeful. Scully had her family, and Mulder had Scully, and what they had together was worth the fight.

     But this child hadn’t been given a choice, brought into the world by two lonely people with a dark past and good intentions…

     …and now he has nothing.

     Mulder’s childhood hadn’t been the greatest, but he’d had his parents. If they weren’t exactly the warmest people he could have asked for, if their marriage wasn’t the happiest…at the end of the day, he knew they loved him in their own dysfunctional way.

     As broken as his family was after the loss of his sister, it pales in comparison to what the boy faces now.

     Scully interrupts his thoughts, tossing Mulder the keys. “You’re driving. I want to keep an eye on him, make sure someone’s with him when he wakes up.”

     She’s made the boy comfortable in the back seat of the car, wrapped in a faded blue wool blanket she found in the upstairs closet. Isaac stirs, tossing and turning, moaning softly.

     Doggett stands next to the car, hands Mulder a wad of bills. “It’s not much, but you’re going to need supplies, gas. Keep to the back roads and don’t stop for anything. I’ll hold ‘em off as long as I can.”

     Mulder accepts the money, acknowledging the favor with a terse, “Thanks.”

     Doggett nods. “Good luck.”

     They pull out of the drive, riding in silence for a few minutes. Isaac wakes up shortly after they cross the town line, coming out of unconsciousness with a gasp, bolting upright. He looks at Scully, grimacing. “My…stomach…think I’m gonna…”

     Anticipating this, she hands him a bucket and turns her face to the window so he can have some privacy. He retches, but not much comes up.

     He leans back in the seat, closes his eyes. “My mom…she’s…”

     “Gone,” Scully says, softly. “I’m so sorry, Isaac. We’re taking you somewhere.”

     Isaac snorts but doesn’t respond, turns his head away, curling in on himself in the seat, wrapping his lean shoulders in the rough blanket.

     Scully’s eyes meet Mulder’s in the rear-view mirror, and for one brief and painful moment, he can read the story of the last few days on her face. She eventually looks away, exhausted, and leans her forehead on the cool glass of the window.

     He sets his jaw, turning his attention to the long road ahead.

     The only forensic analyst even remotely qualified to examine that mess up there just left the scene.

     He peeks at the woman’s remains, but the term is too generous to describe what awaits in the dark room at the top of the stairs. His stomach turns, any grim fascination leaving him in a final glance at the angry black pool of bubbling flesh. He turns away, reaching into his pocket to pull out the cell phone.

     “Yeah, this is Special Agent John Doggett, badge number GHT0342032. I have a possible homicide at a local safe house; get a team out here as soon as you can.”

     He gives the dispatch officer the address, and it’s several hours before two young FBI agents, a man and a woman, pull up in a rented Chevy.

     They’re rookies judging by looks alone, barely out of the Academy. The man’s face is smooth, he probably doesn’t shave more than once a week. The woman wears heels that make Doggett think she doesn’t spend much time in this part of the country.

     Since when did the FBI start hiring college kids? he wonders, folding his arms as they approach.

     “Agent Doggett?”

     “That’s me.”

     “I’m Agent Henderson, Federal Bureau…”

     “Yeah, I figured as much, put the damn badge away. You got the call, I take it?”

     The young man, taken aback by the senior agent’s unexpected animosity, tries to recover. “Sir, we have reason to believe that two former FBI agents were recently housed at this location without official authorization. Do you know anything about that?”

     Doggett narrows his eyes, but doesn’t flinch. “I might.”

     The young man looks over at his partner nervously, and she steps in. “They were said to be accompanied by a young boy and his mother.”

     “Mother’s dead, the body’s upstairs,” Doggett retorts. The shock on their faces would be priceless if he weren’t so preoccupied in covering for Mulder and Scully. “I arrived before they escaped with the boy. We were attacked. That’s why I called.”

     “Uh…,” the young agent falters, “I…”

     “Attacked? By what?”

     The woman’s sharper than she looks, thinks Doggett. She might make a decent agent some day.

     He snorts. “Fucked if I know.” This is the truth. He still has no idea how to explain the smoldering body of Mrs. Van de Kamp, which has almost completely melted into the upstairs floorboards.

     “Fox Mulder and Dana Scully took the boy and the car no less than half an hour before your lazy asses got here. They’re headed south. Why don’t you two have yourselves a wild goose chase and leave me to the body? I’ve already called C.S.I., they’ll be here any minute.”

     The two agents exchange looks again, clearly unsure how to deal with the bossier, more experienced ex-cop standing before them.

     “Sir, with all due respect…”

     “What I can’t figure out,” Doggett interrupts, raising his voice, “is why you’re both still standin' here. Am I going to have to tell your superiors that you let two former FBI agents, one of them an ex-fugitive, flee a crime scene with a young boy? ‘Cause lemme tell ya, I don’t know how they do this out here in East Bumfuck, Montana, but back in D.C. that’s a fast track to early retirement.”

     To Doggett’s surprise, his intimidation tactic works. The man, Henderson, takes a step back, visibly disarmed. For a moment it looks as though the woman will stand her ground, but then she, too, retreats, shooting Doggett a cold look. “C’mon, Henderson. Let’s go. Agent Doggett, did you…”

     “I put out at APB on the car twenty minutes ago. Think I can handle this.”

     That was almost too easy, he thinks as he watches the Chevy tear off in the wrong direction.

     He has called for an investigation, he’d been truthful about that point, though he knows the team won’t be able to explain what they find any more than he could.

     But that’s the least of his problems. He’ll have to answer to Skinner when he returns to D.C., and likely face a panel of higher-ups about why he let two former FBI agents escape with a child whose mother lies dead in a Montana safe house.

     He’d been truthful about another point, too. What had he told the younger agents? “A fast-track to early retirement.”

     Yeah, he thinks morosely, that just about sums it up.

     Mulder and Scully don’t talk, either. Whatever passed between them earlier have been temporarily put aside; the events of the last day have dulled their anger, but the tension remains.

     “What will happen to him?” Scully asks out of the blue, somewhere around mile 700. Isaac is sleeping deeply; he’s calmed down, no more tossing and turning, she’s moved to the front to give him space.

     Mulder looks over, surprised to hear her voice. “If we get out of this, you mean? Don’t know…he’ll probably become a ward of the state. There’s foster care.”

     She considers this. “I wonder if the Van de Kamps have other family. An aunt or cousin…someone who could take him.”

     “I didn’t see any mention of extended family in his file,” Mulder continues. “Anyway…we have to figure out how to stop these attacks first.”

     Scully nods, sighs, resting her head back against her seat and turning away.

     Mulder glances at her, desperate to continue this conversation—anything is better than the cold, heavy silence. “How’s the hand?”

     She looks down at her wrapped right palm. “Hurts like a bitch, now that you mention it.” She unwraps it slowly, grimacing at the painful red blisters on her palm. “Second degree, not big. We should find a first aid kit, though.” She re-wraps it in the scrap of sweatshirt, drawing in a sharp breath at the contact.

     “You’re lucky it wasn’t more than just your hand back there.” He glances in the rear view where Isaac is sleeping soundly…now’s his chance.

     “Hey,” he continues. “Maybe we could have that talk.”

     “Mmmm?”

     “Provided we get out of this alive…do I have a home to come back to?”

     “You always have a place with me. You know that…” But she’s still looking away.

     “Do I? Sounded like one of us was headed out the door, last I checked. And your name’s on the mortgage.”

     Her jaw tightens, but she doesn’t respond.

     “What do you want, Scully? This isn’t one of those marriage things, is it? Is your mom still harping on us for living in sin?”

     She barks a laugh, rolling her eyes. “Jesus, no. No. I…no. My mother’s opinion of our marital status is not even on the radar right now.”

     “Well, good, ‘cause we’re kind of beyond me making an honest woman out of you,” he smiles, prodding her gently. “So you gonna tell me?”

     “I don’t know,” she whispers after a long pause. “I’ve spent most of my life chasing monsters and demons. Pursuing the truth. Your truth. I thought, when we left the FBI…I thought I would find myself again, in my work at the hospital. And I do, I love healing, but…I can’t help but feel like there’s something I’m missing. Some vital part.”

     Mulder nods, letting this sink in, but they both know what they’ve left mostly unspoken in their last several years together.

     “Maybe I’ve resented you for…for already having your answers,” she continues. “For throwing myself so deeply into your truth that I’ve neglected my own. Or because you didn’t seem to experience the loss so…acutely.”

     Her last confession catches him off guard. “It’s not that I didn’t think about him, Scully. I did.” He glances in the rear view, where Isaac remains sound asleep. “But maybe I didn’t talk about it enough,” he admits. “Maybe I blocked it off.”

     She looks at him then, considering this, but he can’t read her expression in the dim light of the dash.

     “Look,” he continues, “I’m sorry if I made you think you were the only one of us who felt William’s absence. I told myself I didn’t want to make things more painful for you…but I couldn’t handle another loss, Scully. We’d already given so much…I couldn’t face losing him, too.”

     He reaches across the console to take her unbandaged hand. She looks up, surprised at the contact, but doesn’t let go.

     “You’ve found your truth.”

     “Perhaps,” she says, gently pulling from his grip, distant again. “It isn’t exactly what I’d hoped for.”

     He nods, returning his eyes to the road. “Yeah. It rarely is.”

     They pull into the small town on the outskirts of the Canadian border, aching from the long hours in the car.

     “Isaac?” Scully tries to rouse the boy, reaching over to touch his shoulder; he comes awake with a start. “It’s OK, it’s…it’s just me, Dana,” she soothes. “We’re stopping to pick up supplies.”

     “Supplies…for what?” His voice is hoarse.

     “We’re going camping,” Mulder chimes in from outside the car.

     The boy doesn’t react at first, staring mutely at Scully before unwrapping himself from the blanket and easing out of the back seat. He stumbles on the curb, Mulder reaches out to steady him. “Take it easy.” Isaac shakes him off, but his legs are trembling.

     “You’re weak,” Scully says, coming up beside him. “You were vomiting, you’ve lost fluids, electrolytes. You need to eat.” She glances over at the market across the street, the sporting shop next door. “We’ll get started there. Mulder?”

     He’s looking down the street, toward the town square. “I need to find a computer…an internet caf é , something. I’ll meet you back here in thirty. Only buy what we can carry,” he finishes, looking at Scully. “Think warm, but pack light.”

     She makes as if to answer, but he’s already jogging down the street.

     Scully sighs and purses her lips, but her partner’s sudden disappearance is nothing new, the irritation is fleeting. She turns to Isaac. “Can you walk?” He jerks his head in a tight nod. “Good. I’m going to need your help.” She holds up her crudely wrapped hand, still throbbing. “You can push the cart. But first…you need food. Think you can keep down juice?” She eyes a coffee shop on the corner, and the boy nods again.

     A few minutes later, Isaac sips an apple juice as they walk through the camping store. They’ve hit the jackpot, considering the size of this town; its proximity to the national park works in their favor, the selection is better than she would have expected.

     At least something is working for us, Scully thinks.

     She’s eyeing the dehydrated foods without enthusiasm when Isaac speaks. “Scully? Err…Dana?”

     “Either, or,” she responds, arching an eyebrow in the boy’s direction.

     “Dana,” he says, settling on her first name. “Did you…did you talk to my mom? Before she…”

     “Yes…I did.” Her heart quickens, wondering if this is it, if she’ll have to explain everything under the sickly green fluorescent lights of the department store. What did she tell him?

     He nods, looks down at his feet. “I hoped…I wondered if maybe…maybe she said something to you. About me.”

     “Ah.” She remembers how she’d asked her own mother a similar question after her father passed away, many years ago now. She’d been in her thirties, new to the X-files, but her father’s approval was always paramount. She supposes the pain of losing a parent doesn’t discriminate by age. Looking down, she can see the boy is close to tears, though trying hard to hide it.

     “She did, actually,” Scully replies at last. “She told me…you were a miracle.” She smiles faintly. He’d been a miracle to both of them, for different reasons. “Isaac, your mom loved you, very much. She gave me no reason to doubt that. Neither should you.”

     He sniffs. “I guess.”

     They’re quiet. Scully picks through the selection, but she’s not really paying attention.

     “Fish or chicken?” she says, holding up two unappetizing packets in her good hand.

     The boy wrinkles his nose. “Uh. Do we have to?”

     “Unfortunately, yes, if we want to eat.” She throws both packets into the cart, alongside a carton of oatmeal and the rest of their gear.

     He grimaces. “So…what’s the plan, anyway? Aside from stupid camping,” he scoffs, wiping at his nose, trying to recover some of his former indifference.

     “We’ll hike north, across the border into British Columbia; after that…I don’t know,” she says honestly. “We need to find out how to stop these attacks and make sure you’re safe before you can go home.”

     “I don’t have a home now,” he mumbles.

     She nods, remembering her earlier conversation with Mulder. “Do you have other family, Isaac? Maybe…family friends? It’s possible your parents left a will.”

     The boy shakes his head. “I dunno. I don’t think so.”

     “Well…we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” she sighs. Now is not the time to mention foster care or social workers. “Look, Isaac…I know this is hard. But we’re going to do our best to look out for you. You can trust us.”

     The corner of his mouth turns up in a sneer. “I’m not a little kid. I can fend for myself.”

     “You’ve shown us that much,” Scully agrees.

     “So…what do you care?”

     She pauses, searching for the best answer, hoping her apprehension doesn’t show on her face. “We have our reasons, Isaac,” she says, ashamed at her own weakness, her inability to admit the simple but painful truth.

     The boy snorts but doesn’t say anything.

     “Let’s go. Mulder should be back by now.”

#

     Mulder’s search finds him at a print shop about a quarter mile from where Scully and Isaac are shopping.

     “Can I…help you?” The cashier at the counter looks nervous, causing Mulder to take stock of his appearance, glancing at his reflection in the shop window. What was once two-day stubble is fast becoming a scruffy beard, his white t-shirt is stained with coffee and dust, and ripped from their earlier encounter with the safe house’s floor. He hasn’t slept in 48 hours, and the bags under his eyes show it.

     He looks more like an escaped convict than a former FBI agent.

     “Uhh, hi.” He glances at the man’s name tag. “Dan. Hi Dan. You wouldn’t happen to have a computer, would you? I’m camping with the family. Need to tie up some loose ends at work…check my email, maybe print something…for work,” he repeats, hoping he sounds more professional than he looks.

     The cashier’s eyebrows knit together in suspicion, but business must be slow; he points to the back of the store. “Internet’s back there. 5 bucks an hour, ten cents a page.”

     “Thanks,” Mulder hands him a ten and heads toward the computer workstations.

     After hearing about Doggett’s investigation, Mulder is certain the answers to their questions lie within the Project Ultimam files. Hopefully Byers, Langly, and Frohicke were able to get something.

     Mulder checks his email—he keeps multiple random accounts, rarely using the same address for more than a month at a time—and on the third, he finds the message, not from Byers, but Frohicke. The note is simple, straightforward:

     M,

     See attached. It’s encrypted. Check your other account for the key.

     Give D my love.

     P.S. If you get your fool ass killed this time, I’ll take good care of her.

     He smirks at the postscript, downloads the first attachment, then checks his other accounts for the encryption key; he almost doesn’t find it in the first email account, it’s flagged as spam—an unlabeled message with a text attachment.

     Bingo, he thinks, glancing over his shoulder, where the cashier makes no effort to hide his distrust. He’s watching Mulder like a hawk.

     Hope he doesn’t get it in his head to call someone.

     The last page of the document is still warm from the printer when Mulder flies past the front counter and out of the shop.

     “Hey! You forgot your change,” calls the cashier, who jogs out to the street, brandishing the leftover bills, but his suspicious-looking customer is already gone.

     “What file?”

     “Project Ultimam. Everything’s in there, Scully; it has to be.” There’s a gleam in his eye, an energy about him she hasn’t seen in a long time.

     Scully glances over at Isaac, who looks appropriately confused. “What’s Project Ultimam?” he asks.

     Mulder hesitates, trading looks with Scully, who simply shrugs her shoulders. Tell him.

     “It’s a cloning program. A government-ordained cloning program, designed to create indestructible human beings from extraterrestrial DNA for use by our military. Supersoldiers,” Mulder finishes, keeping his tone clinical.

     There’s a pregnant pause as Mulder gauges the boy’s reaction, watching his eyes widen. “What…what does it have to do with me?”

     “You know how you can do what you do? There are people, bad people, who want to take what you have. I think they used you, Isaac, without your consent, or your mother’s. I think this may be the reason you’re being attacked, and the answer is in those files.”

     Isaac’s brow furrows. “You said ‘extraterrestrial’. That means…aliens, right?”

     “Technically it means ‘beyond Earth’…but yeah, something like that.”

     “But…but I’m not an alien! I’m a kid!”

     Mulder looks up at Scully, a silent plea for help, but she arches a brow in tired defeat. Little green men are your specialty, not mine.

     “I know,” he continues carefully. “You’re as human as me. But I can’t move playground equipment with my mind…or tell you what you’re thinking. Your DNA is…different.”

     Scully takes pity on her partner, interrupting before Isaac can ask further questions.

     “We have everything but the kitchen sink here, Mulder. What’s the plan?”

     “We drive up to the border, hike in. Try to stay off the trails, use the woods for cover.” Mulder stands, gesturing to the files in the front seat. “Figure this out.”

     She presses her lips in a thin line, and for a moment, he thinks she’s going to argue with him. But instead, she says, “Alright then…let’s go.”

     They park on the border of the national preserve about 30 minutes outside town, leaving the car on a side road, stopping to load up their packs with supplies and equipment. While Scully re-wraps her hand, replacing the torn shirt scrap with a clean piece of gauze, Mulder grabs Isaac’s FBI dossier and the Project Ultimam files and tucks them securely into his pack.

     “We should cover at least ten miles before nightfall,” he says, squinting doubtfully into the afternoon sky, silently assessing their group: Isaac is feeling better, but still weak; he’ll be slow. Scully will probably fare the best of all of them, but her burn is hurting; she hasn’t said anything, but her expression tells him she’s in more pain than she’s letting on. Mulder himself is fatigued, making him slow, clumsy; his vision is starting to double, his head throbs.

     None of us are in any shape to be trekking through the wilderness. If this thing doesn’t get us, Mother Nature will.

     As expected, their progress is slow-going, the hike arduous. Avoiding the main trails means the terrain around them is unpredictable, rocky, leaving Mulder unsteady on his feet. Twice they have to double back and re-map their route upon encountering high cliffs, sheer walls of rock too dangerous to climb.

     Scully takes the lead, followed by Isaac, with Mulder bringing up the rear. Two hours pass, then three. At this rate, we’ll be lucky if we get five miles in, let alone ten, he realizes, dully.

     After hour four, they stop to rest and refill their canteens at a spring. Mulder rubs his eyes; the world swims in his vision. He can hear Scully talking, but she sounds far away.

     “Let’s follow this outlet,” she says, studying the map. “I think it’s a tributary, connected to this river,” she points to a winding blue line on the creased paper. “We’ll want to camp near a water source.” No response. “Mulder?”

     “Huh? Sorry. Dozed off.” He shrugs off her annoyed glare, too tired to argue.

     “How’re you holding up?” she sighs, turning to Isaac.

     “Feet hurt, but I’m OK,” he says; brave words, but his voice wavers. Mulder suspects Scully is not the only one in pain, Isaac having lost his mother less than twenty-four hours prior.

     “Feel any new abilities coming on, kid?” Mulder stretches, trying to wake his sore muscles. “Teleportation would come in pretty handy right about now.”

     This earns him a small, wry smile. “Nope,” says the boy, “I’m afraid not.”

     Scully checks the map again. “I think if we head northwest, about three more miles, we’ll have made good progress. It’s close to a lake, will make for a good camp site if the map is correct. Think you’re up for that?” She looks pointedly at Mulder, annoyance melting in favor of concern.

     He grimaces. “Yeah. C’mon.”

     Scully forges ahead, with Isaac and Mulder trailing behind. Mulder focuses on the boy’s back, step after step, trying to ignore the way the world twists and weaves in front of him.

     Eventually they stop at the base of a large cluster of rocks, a steep incline surrounded by brush, topped by a small cliff.

     “No way around this…but I think…” Scully steps into a narrow foothold, testing her weight, “I think we can get up to that ledge.”

     Mulder looks up. There might have been a time he’d scale a wall like this without looking down, fueled by adrenaline and passion. But he’s older now, more cautious, and their collective condition doesn’t inspire confidence.

     On the other hand, backtracking means another hour of precious daylight lost.

     He’s still weighing these two options when he sees Isaac out of the corner of his eye; the boy approaches the incline and begins climbing, hand over foot, with a confidence and daring known only to adolescent boys…or thirty-year-old men on a mission, Mulder thinks, cringing as he watches him struggle for purchase on the rocky cliffside.

     “Hey! Be careful…” Scully calls, alarmed, but Isaac is already closing in on the ledge.

     All this fuss over the kid getting attacked, and wouldn’t it be ironic if it’s a thirty-foot drop that kills him, Mulder thinks, watching the production with his heart in his throat.

     But Isaac doesn’t fall; he pulls himself onto the ledge after a couple minutes. “No sweat! Easy,” he calls down.

     “Yeah, Scully. ‘Easy,’” Mulder snorts, earning him a half-hearted smile. “You go next, I’ll spot you,” he nods toward her injured hand, “Just…take it slow, alright?”

     She nods uncertainly, wishing she’d thought to grab some rudimentary climbing gear; at the very least, some rope would have been useful. She begins to climb, following the same pattern as Isaac, but more slowly—step up, pull up, step up, pull up. Mulder watches as she wedges the fingers of her bandaged hand into a tight crevice, pulling up, she’s close to the top. He doesn’t realize he’s been holding his breath until he sees her standing next to Isaac.

     “Not too bad, I’m OK,” she calls down, but she’s favoring her hand. “Your turn, Mulder. Be careful. If you die, we’re burying you here. I’m not carrying your body down this mountain.”

     “Good to know where we stand, Scully,” he calls back, fully aware she’s only half joking. He takes a deep breath and approaches, testing his weight against each foothold, carefully examining the surface of the rock until his fingers find purchase within its narrow crevices, and begins his climb. It’s not as bad as it looks, but it’s not easy, either. About halfway up, his right hand slips, scattering a shower of pebbles to the ground below, and he scrambles for a new hold, heart racing.

     One wrong move, and you’re looking at a broken neck.

     The thought is sobering. Relief floods him as his fingers find the ledge, and he pulls himself to safety with an exhausted groan.

     “How you doing, old man?” Scully teases. “C’mon,” she extends her good hand, and he takes it gratefully; she’s small but strong, and helps to pull him to his feet.

     Isaac is fidgeting, eager to go on, but Scully pulls the map from the back pocket of her jeans. “I think we need to go this way,” she says, turning somewhat, stepping to the left. “Yeah, this way. If we keep on this route, we’ll—”

     She’s not paying attention. Her foot steps backward slightly, too close to the edge, and the unstable shale slides out from under her, cascading down onto the rocks below. Mulder sees the surprise on her face, the terrified “o” of her lips as her feet slide down, down, and then she’s falling.

     Mulder lunges out, ignoring a painful snapping sensation in his knee, grabbing for her. “Scully!” He falls to the ground, hard, but he has her by one wrist…barely. She’s looking up at him, eyes wide and terrified. Her feet scrabble against the surface of the rock, finding nothing. She grasps for a handhold, it’s mere inches away, but her injured hand will not support her weight; she screams in pain at the contact, slipping further out of Mulder’s grasp.

     “Can’t…hang…on…,” she gasps.

     Isaac drops down to his belly beside Mulder, dangling his hands over the cliff, eyes wide, “Give me your wrist!” 

     She reaches for the boy, but it’s too far. Even if he can grab hold, he’s not strong enough to pull her up, Mulder thinks. She swings her free arm up in an arc, but her injured hand slips out of the boy’s grasp, and she hisses with pain. Mulder can feel his arms going numb up to his shoulder, his own palms are slick with sweat.

     “No, no no no, don’t let go, damnit, don’t you dare let go,” he growls, unsure if he’s talking to Scully or himself.

     He looks over at Isaac, whose eyes are now closed, hands still extended as though to reach for her. What is he doing? Mulder can’t think about it now, forcing himself to focus on maintaining his grip on her wrist.

     C’mon, Scully, don’t let go…please…

     He feels the pressure on his arm yield ever so slightly…as though Scully is becoming lighter. Oh god, she’s gone, he thinks wildly…but no, she’s still there.

     Her body is moving, rising slowly toward them. Mulder looks back at Isaac, whose eyes remain shut, concentrating. He can see the rise and fall of the boy’s chest as he breathes, see his body trembling slightly while his hands remain eerily still.

     Mulder watches this, stunned, until Scully’s panicked voice snaps him back to attention.

     “Mulder!”

     He turns to her, realizing this is his opportunity; he tightens his grip on her wrist, moving his other hand down her arm below the elbow, giving a hard pull. She slides up with relative ease, he wraps one arm around her torso and pulls again, sliding back, depositing both of them safely on solid ground.

     “Scully! You OK?”

     “Yeah…I’m…OK. Just…bruised,” she sits up slowly, wincing, cradling her burnt and now bloodied hand. From where he’s laying, he can see the blisters have torn open, they’re leaking, the palm itself is badly scraped…no, shredded, Mulder thinks. Her hand looks like raw hamburger.

     “You OK, Mulder?”

     His arms are numb from the shoulders down, but there’s probably no damage; he can already feel an uncomfortable tingling sensation in his fingertips as the blood rushes back to his hands.

     His knee, however, is a different story. He flexes it slightly, feeling the telltale stabbing pain of a bad sprain. Tore something there.

     “Hurt my leg, not sure if I can walk,” he mutters.

     “Isaac?” Scully asks.

     “I’m fine,” he says, but his eyes remain closed, his voice weak.

     “Did you…” she begins, dazed, but doesn’t finish this thought.

     “Yeah,” Isaac says, answering the question she doesn’t know how to ask.

     “You controlled it? You…lifted her?” Mulder says.

     “I guess,” Isaac mutters, sitting up, squinting against the fading daylight. His head aches.

     “That was…that was impressive,” Mulder says, reaching out to touch the boy’s shoulder. Isaac flinches away.

     “Yes, thank you,” Scully says, her voice shaking. “I…I thought I wasn’t going to make it there for a minute.” She’s trying to brush it off, to sound tough, but he sees through her brave face and shoots her an incredulous look.

     ‘For a minute?’ You weren’t going to make it at all.

     The boy shrugs, doesn’t respond.

     After a moment, Scully speaks up, this time with more confidence. “I don’t think we’re going to get much further now,” she glances over at Mulder, who’s massaging the back of his knee, wincing. “Mulder, can you walk?”

     He slowly makes his way to a standing position, testing his hurt leg. “I can put some weight on it…not much.” He hobbles a few steps to prove his point.

     She watches this, uncertain, but they’re losing daylight. “We’ll head to the tree line over that ridge,” she says, pointing. “At least we’ll have cover there.” She looks up at the sky, squinting into the fading light, trying to shake the feeling of dread in the pit of her stomach.

     Isaac retreats to his tent as soon as it’s ready. “Gonna read,” he mumbles, ducking under the flap without waiting for a response, leaving Mulder and Scully to their injuries.

     “Not much for small talk, is he?” Mulder quips, easing himself down next to the fire with a grunt.

     Scully smirks. “Were you excited to hang out with the ‘grown-ups’ when you were twelve, Mulder?”

     “I couldn’t get my parents to look at me for more than two seconds when I was twelve. But I may have been a special case.”

     She raises an eyebrow. “You’re still a special case.”

     He nods amicably, tilting his chin up to her, indicating for her to sit down.

     “You first,” Mulder says, holding out his hand. “Lemme see.”

     “Always the gentleman,” she murmurs, offering her palm. He pulls back the bandage she hastily reapplied after her fall; it’s soaked with blood.

     “Jesus, Scully,” he whispers, inadvertently pulling back. The first layer of skin has all but come off; her palm is red, blistering, and now bleeding.

     “Just needs antibiotics,” she says, but she’s pale.

     “You need a doctor,” he mutters, reaching across her for the first aid kit.

     “Guess I’m in luck, then,” she snaps, grabbing the first aid kit from him, pulling her hand away. She applies ointment to the wounds herself. He watches, bemused, as she struggles to secure the gauze one-handed.

     “Here,” he says finally, warm fingers gentle at her wrist as he re-wraps the gauze, taping it tight, topping it off with a dose of admonishment. “You’re too damn stubborn, you know that?”

     “Funny, I could say the same thing about you,” she challenges, meeting his gaze. “Your turn, Mulder.”

     “Couldn’t wait to get my pants off, could you?” This earns him an exasperated stare. “Alright, alright. Fine.” He winces as his jeans slide over his hips, giving her access to examine his knee.

     “There’s some swelling—”

     “I’m just really happy to see you, Scully.”

     That damned boyish smirk is back.

     “—but it doesn’t look like anything’s bruised,” she continues, feeling around the leg for tender spots, “…or broken. Just a sprain.”

     “So what’s the good news, doc?”

     She sits back with a sigh. “You’ll be walking again in a couple days. Four, tops, but you need to take it easy if it’s going to heal. Guess we should make ourselves comfortable.”

     “Glad the kid’s not the only one who brought reading material, then,” Mulder says, leaning back and pulling a sheaf of papers from the pack behind him.

     Given the events of the day, she’d forgotten about the files.

     “Here,” he hands over the papers. “I need your medical expertise on this one.”

     “I’m a doctor, Mulder, not a geneticist.”

     “You’re the closest thing we’ve got,” he smiles, “and you’re more than enough for me.” He waggles his eyebrows in a careful innuendo.

     Their eyes meet, and his shoulder bumps against hers, nudging her gently. A familiar fluttering tension signals its presence within her, an old friend, but she suppresses it, breaking his gaze. “You should get some rest. You haven’t slept.”

     He nods. “Gonna be cold tonight. You know, Scully, someone once told me that the best way to regenerate body heat is to—”

     “I’ve heard it before, Mulder. Go to bed.”

     “You’re no fun, Scully, but I love you anyway.” He plants a chaste kiss on her cheek. “Goodnight. Stay safe.”

     She’s lost in thought. “Mmm. Check on Isaac?”

     “Yeah, I will.”

     She hears the zip of the tent door, soft voices as Mulder and the boy exchange words, then silence. Within minutes, her partner is snoring lightly.

     She settles into her thoughts, the day’s events unraveling before her like a spool of black thread. She had hoped she’d reached a point in her life where near-death experiences were not a regular occurrence, but apparently God had other plans.

     Anger rises within her. Well, screw God and his plans, she thinks. God hasn’t done Isaac any favors.

     Her hand burns, but it’s nothing compared to the ache she feels for the young boy sitting a few feet away.

     Maybe it’s not the boy you’re hurting for, Dana.

     She knows now that giving up her son was a mistake. There can be no other explanation for what he’s been through. The power of this certainty is enough to double her over, make her physically ill.

     For his part, Mulder is pushing her, trying to get her to open up. He’s persistent, too—he waited seven years for her to come around to the idea that their relationship could be more than a platonic partnership. Even now, after nearly twenty years together, she’s surprised at his unwavering devotion.

     But how can he live with what she’s done? How can he forgive her when she can’t forgive herself?

     This is my fault. No wonder my life felt fake.

     She thought she could pursue her career as a doctor and never look back. She thought being with Mulder would be enough.

     It’s become clear that the last few years have been a facade for emotions as raw and ragged as the open blisters on her palm. Her son is an orphan, wrestling with burdens no child should have to bear.

     She pulls her jacket tightly around her neck and shoulders, shivering. The campfire’s flames dance with each other, licking and twisting with hypnotic grace, reminding her of the black shadow creature, the way it moved, undeniably inhuman…

     It’s not Mulder you’re mad at, Dana.

     It’s yourself.

     She shudders again, this time not from the cold, and her hand seeks out the warm, comforting weight of the gun in her pocket. Leaning back, she closes her eyes, and lets the darkness swallow her whole.

     WASHINGTON, D.C.

     10:07 P.M.

     Deputy Director Walter Skinner doesn’t have much patience for nostalgia.

     Former Special Agent Fox Mulder is incorrect about one thing—Skinner doesn’t have a soft spot for the guy. A hardened military veteran, his soft spots have long grown callouses, a measure of protection against men who would take pleasure in tearing him to shreds.

     He’s a man of justice. Accountability. He’s worked his way up from the depths of hell to get here, and the D.D. position suits him. It’s no secret that life at the Bureau is quieter without the likes of Fox Mulder storming into his office, ranting about conspiracy theories and aliens and God knows what else.

     And then there’s Dana Scully, Mulder’s partner. A bright young agent with a good head on her shoulders, she’d had promise as a future director herself, but she’d thrown that future away the moment she walked into Mulder’s basement office. Most agents would have turned tail and walked right back out, and frankly none of her superiors would have been surprised or disappointed if she had.

     But she’d stayed.

     And thank God for that, Skinner thinks. Mulder spent enough time in Skinner’s office as it was; without Scully, it would have been twice that, easily…at least until the man got his ass kicked out of the Bureau for good.

     That Scully had originally been assigned to the X-files to debunk Mulder’s wild theories—it was the greatest of ironies. She, who was meant to be used as a weapon against him, who was his opposite in every respect, became one of Mulder’s greatest assets—she gave him someone to trust, something to fight for. She tempered his craziness with strict rationality, smoothed his rough edges, brought him back to Earth when he was floating off to other galaxies.

     Rumors about their relationship abounded, but gossip was worthless to Skinner. What the agents chose to do behind closed doors was none of his business; fraternization was a slap-on-the-wrist offense, and he had his hands full trying to keep them from larger charges, while trying to maintain some semblance of a career for himself.

     As big a pain in the ass as Mulder was, the cards were stacked against him. The dark men whose company Skinner was forced to keep told him as much—they preyed on Mulder, toyed with him, and paid no mind to the destruction left in their wake.

     Being a man of hard-earned integrity, such casual disregard for basic humanity left a bad taste in Skinner’s mouth.

     He sits back in his intimidating leather chair, a finger pressed to his lips. No, he doesn’t have a soft spot for Mulder, but he respects the man, which is why he’s sitting in his office at this late hour, letting the past absorb him.

     When the Rendezvous County Sheriff’s department called, saying they were holding two people who claimed to be former federal agents (“kinda tall, big nose, brown hair, doofy-lookin’, an’ his girlfriend’s a bossy little red-head,” was how the officer so kindly described them) Skinner had no doubt about who was behind this.

     Mulder and Scully had been out of the Bureau for years—they had no business using his name or their retired badge numbers to garner favors from local law enforcement. He confirmed their identities, making a mental note to give Mulder hell (because surely he was the brains behind this—Scully wouldn’t be so foolish) and try to forget the whole thing.

     If looking the other way were a marketable skill, Skinner has the equivalent of a Ph.D.

     But upon learning the former agents’ son was involved…that gives him pause. Mulder and Scully paid for their work on the X-files, and William was the ultimate price. There had been no justice for the agents’ countless losses, the boy among them.

     And isn’t that what Skinner fought for? Could he ignore the evidence before him because it was inconvenient to his career, a black mark on his fast-approaching retirement?

     Not in good conscience, he couldn’t.

     Skinner knew the past had come back to haunt him when John Doggett showed up at his door, demanding to speak with him about something called Project Ultimam, a top secret cloning project that sounded more like the premise for a bad sci-fi film than a military initiative. It was exactly the kind of thing Mulder would have brought to him had he still been with the Bureau.

     Skinner had no authority to put Doggett on the case—because it wasn’t an official FBI matter—but he couldn’t tell the man how to spend his vacation time.

     He thought he’d been careful, but too many years at the top have made him complacent. Someone got wind of Doggett’s plans, his whereabouts, and suddenly Skinner is getting calls from the Director, demanding to know why two former FBI agents, one of them an ex-fugitive, are running around Montana brandishing Bureau resources.

     He sighs, the events of the last few hours weighing heavily on his mind. He’s beginning to think sending them to the safe house was a grave mistake. Mulder and Scully can handle themselves, but now he sees what they’re up against, and wonders if he should have ordered a formal investigation.

     As if on cue, the phone rings. It’s his private line, one that bypasses his secretary, used only by Bureau employees with high-level clearance. He picks up, expecting it to be one of a handful of people, but the voice on the other end is unfamiliar.

     “Is this Deputy Director Walter Skinner?”

     “Yes. Who is this?”

     “I can’t tell you that.”

     “How did you get this number?” Skinner demands, rising from his chair.

     “I can’t tell you that, either, sir.”

     “I don’t know who the hell you think you are, but…”

     “I’m a friend of Fox Mulder’s.”

     Of course you are. He picks up the other line, hesitating, wondering if he should have the call traced.

     “Sir, are you there?”

     “I want to know who you are and how you got this number,” Skinner growls.

     “Sorry, Deputy Director, it’s not in my best interests to say. But I’m calling because I believe Mulder needs your help.”

     “What are you talking about?”

     “We’ve heard reports of activity over northern Idaho—increased radiation levels, strange lights. Mulder said he was headed to Bonners Ferry, a few miles south of the Canadian border. I’m afraid that’s more than a coincidence.”

     “Look, I don’t have time for whatever games you’re…”

     “With all due respect, sir, you need to make time, unless you want the weight of their deaths on your conscience.”

     Skinner pauses, sets his jaw, but before he can speak again, the line goes dead.

     He dials Doggett’s cell, but it rings through to voicemail.

     If he was smart, they’ve already split up. Damnit. What have those two uncovered up there?

     He slams the phone back into its cradle, a familiar vein throbbing at his temple.

     What would you have done ten years ago, Walter?

     He picks up the phone again, index finger stabbing at the keypad. “Special Agent Markel? I have a situation here. I need you on the next flight to British Columbia. Yes, right away. I’ll brief you when we get to the airport.”

     1:35 A.M.

     Isaac lays awake long after his tent-mate starts snoring.

     He’s already read the paperback novel he brought twice, and, for lack of anything better to do, he opens it a third time, but closes it again after a few pages. The story no longer holds his attention. He tosses the book down, wishing he had thought to bring his iPod.

     They probably wouldn’t let me keep it, anyway, he thinks, glum. They’d take it away and hand me a tinfoil hat.

     Without anything else to distract him, the black thoughts come flooding in.

     My mom is dead.

     The words are mere syllables, lacking coherence or meaning in the midst of denial. He repeats the phrase over and over again in his mind, trying to make it make sense, until it becomes a dark, sing-song chant, like a nursery rhyme turned foul.

     Just one more test, sweetie. They need one more test. Then you can go home.

     She didn’t understand him, and they didn’t get along most of the time…but in a moment of clarity that is strikingly adult, he realizes none of that mattered. She was still his mom. She’d been the only person he could count on.

     Isaac, take your medicine. You’re mama’s brave boy, you need your medicine.

     He remembers how she cared for him when he was sick—and he’d been so sick, sometimes he thought he’d never know life outside the confines of a hospital room. The tests were the worst. His doctors assured him he would feel better, but the tests made him hurt, made him tired and weak.

     Just one more. Just one more shot, then we’ll get ice cream.

     His mother was always there, fussing over him, arguing with his doctors in her shrill, overbearing way. He hated it, hated how she fought and never won; her life was a constant battle, but she died without a victory to her name.

     …and now she’s gone.

     I killed her.

     My mom is dead, and I killed her.

     Shame rips through him, tearing at his insides, curling him into a fetal position in his sleeping bag. What kind of monster is he?

     An alien monster, his mind chimes in, cruelly. An alien freak.

     He turns, wrapping his slight arms around his body, trying to get warm, but the cold goes deeper than skin or bone.

     If you’re such a monster, Isaac, why did you save that woman today?

     It’s his father’s voice, so clear that he can’t help but sit up, head snapping back and forth in the small, dark tent. No spectral figures, no ghosts hovering…just himself and Mulder, still snoring.

     He settles back against the thin bedroll, ignoring the rocks jammed under his shoulder blades, listening to the sound of his blood moving through him like poisoned tar, the ungrateful churning of his heart against his ribs.

     He knows the FBI agents are keeping secrets, but he can’t focus enough to read their thoughts; truthfully, he can’t bring himself to care. He doesn’t understand why they seem to care, either.

     He knows what happens to orphans, especially older kids like him. He’ll spend the next six years shuffled along from one family to another, to one school after the next, until they set him free at eighteen to…to do what? Did they have a checkbox for “Extraterrestrial” between “Caucasian” and “Other” on the college application form?

     Even if they made it out of this alive, he has nothing to return to.

     No future. No hope.

     He tries to picture her face, but already the details are slipping away; all he sees is the darkness swallowing her, replacing her features with a black, angry mass. He can’t even bring himself to cry, to mourn the loss of the only person in the world who gave a damn about his sorry excuse for an existence.

     Because you’re a monster, Isaac.

     He curls in on himself with his hands tucked under his chin, the way he used to when he was small, and falls asleep to the inner echo of his own self-punishment.

     A monster.

     Mulder awakens before sunrise, shivering under three layers of clothing and a sleeping bag. Ice crystals have formed on the surface of the tent’s blue dome, intricate patterns that sparkle in the early morning light; Mulder’s breath escapes him in a thick, white fog.

     He reaches his arms above his head to stretch, pain settling into his limbs. His shoulders throb, his arms feel like dead wood. His lower back is holding a formal protest after a night spent on the ground. His leg hurts, but that’s to be expected with the sprain. The rest of him is one giant, aching muscle.

     There was a time when he could hike for ten miles and then some without feeling the strain, but those days are over. He’ll turn 52 this year.

     ‘Old man’ is right, he thinks grudgingly, recalling Scully’s gentle teasing the day before.

     Right before she damn near killed herself.

     He closes his eyes at the memory, the uncomfortable quickening of his pulse. How many times has he sat next to her hospital bed? How many times has she brushed lips with death, only to turn away from the kiss at the last second?

     Come to think of it, how many times has he?

     He suddenly wishes she were here. Her feet would be freezing; she always came to bed with cold toes. She’d tuck them between his calves under the pretense of warming them, though he’s pretty sure she only does it to make him yelp in surprise. But the rest of her would be soft, welcoming. Her skin always smelled so good, like cinnamon and vanilla, her breath warm against his neck…

     Better stop it right there unless you want to have another kind of sore muscle.

     Isaac appears to be asleep, curled deep within his sleeping bag, though as Mulder stirs, so does the boy, moaning softly. With some effort, Mulder slides out of his own bag, unzips it, and tosses it over Isaac, an extra layer of protection against the cold, then crawls out of the tent and into the dim morning light.

     Last night’s fire has gone cold, and Scully is nowhere in sight. He limps the ten feet to her tent, whispering her name. “Scully?”

     No response. Fear prickles at the back of his neck.

     “Scully? I’m coming in…”

     He unzips the door, but her tent is untouched; her sleeping mat is still rolled and tied, sitting unused in the corner. She hasn’t been here.

     Shit. His heart races. Where did she…

     “Mulder?”

     He turns to find her coming out of the trees a few yards away, and the relief he feels at the sight of her is palpable.

     “I found a spring nearby, we needed water.” She holds up their canteens in her good hand. “Check your pack, there’s coffee—”

     “Coffee?” Mulder perks up at the promise of caffeine. “You may be right, Scully.”

     “About what?”

     “There really is a God.”

     Her smile is tired but genuine, and it warms him.

     “You build the fire; I’ll ‘just add water’, she says, wrinkling her nose, retrieving a suspicious looking foil packet from the depths of her pack.

     Mulder nods, happy to have something to do…happier still that they’re on speaking terms.

     “How’s your hand?”

     “Hurts,” she says simply. “Nothing a little ibuprofen can’t fix. How’s the knee?”

     He shrugs. “Could be worse. I think we can get outta here tomorrow. Keep north. Makes me nervous, sitting out here,” he says, looking around, “We should keep moving.”

     “And Isaac?”

     “Still sleeping, though I dunno how he can. This cold, it’s brutal.” He rubs his hands together, breathing on them for emphasis.

     She nods, her face going blank at the thought of Isaac. “He’s tired…he’s been through a lot…” she drifts off.

     And he’s not the only one, Mulder thinks. He can almost see the dark clouds rolling in over her face. Guess we’re not out of the proverbial woods yet. He bites his lip, approaching her, suddenly determined to knock down the wall she’s put between them.

     “Hey, Scully, can we—”

     “Anyway,” she interrupts, “I’m glad you’re up, I wanted to talk with you. I read through the project files this morning.”

     “You did?”

     “Yeah, I found something interesting. Not sure if it helps us, though.”

     He eases his aching body down next to her, thoughts of reconciliation temporarily forgotten.

     “Isaac was definitely part of Project Ultimam,” she begins, “though it’s likely his doctors didn’t know exactly what they were working on. The program was shrouded in secrecy.”

     “How so?” He leans forward, elbows to knees.

     “Mrs. Van de Kamp told me the name of Isaac’s doctor—Baray—he’s listed here. But these records indicate he never had direct contact with other members of the project. Everyone worked in isolation. Presumably someone at the top had the complete picture, but—”

     “—but that person’s name is nowhere to be found,” Mulder finishes with a cynical smirk. The characters might be different, but it was the same old story.

     “You got it. Remember that mutated gene I told you about? They noted it…here.” Her finger points to an indecipherable notation on the paper in front of them; what looks to Mulder like a jumble of letters, numbers, and blobs on the page is actually a complex gene structure map, and she reads it like a book.

     “What about it?”

     “Well, it’s exceptional in that none of the other subjects had it. And from what I can tell, it’s the reason Isaac was removed from the program several months ago.”

     “Why?”

     “‘Failure to develop.’ The boy’s DNA wouldn’t produce a viable embryo.”

     “Because of this gene?”

     She nods. “I have a theory. It’s an oversimplification, but…you know how computer media has protective code to prevent copying?”

     “Yeah…” he squints, processing this. “Are you saying this kid has this…protection…written into his DNA? Like, DRM, but for people?”

     “This is way out of my area of expertise, Mulder, but yes…it appears that way.”

     He purses his lips, thoughtful. “You said there were other subjects?”

     “Dozens of them. Why?”

     “What do we know about them?”

     “Almost nothing. None of the subjects’ names are used, just initials. Isaac was easier to find because of his rejection from the trial. Without a dossier on every single patient…” she trails off, offering a small shrug.

     “Do you think this is the same experimentation my sister was subjected to? Or you?”

     “It’s similar in some respects, but…” she pauses. “The tests, the procedures, were done in plain sight, under the guise of treating rare, long-term, debilitating diseases. There were no abductions here as far as I can tell. But it’s almost more sinister this way…doctors take an oath to protect their patients, to do no harm. These doctors violated that oath in every way imaginable, Mulder.”

     “Malpractice insurance is expensive. How much you want to bet they made bank for taking test subjects under the table?”

     Scully shakes her head, her expression goes dark, and he knows she’s thinking about the young girl she lost this week. “Whatever their motives, we need to tell someone, ensure these…men…are locked away. They can’t get away with this.”

     He cocks an eyebrow. Given her natural inclination to rationality, his partner’s occasional fits of idealism never fail to surprise him. “You really think the FBI will pony up resources to convict some of the nation’s best and brightest medical professionals based on nothing but stolen information and the word of a couple ex-agents?”

     Her brow furrows. “What about our connections at the Bureau? You could—”

     “I’m a consultant, not an employee. It’s not what you’d call a mutually beneficial relationship,” he scoffs.

     “But I thought—”

     “They call me when they can’t figure it out, I give them my professional opinion, and they nod and smile politely and send me a check. They’re using me, Scully. They get to keep an eye on Spooky Fox, say they’ve done their best to solve the case, I get the occasional paycheck, and the truth stays buried.” He’s calm, but there’s a sharp, bitter edge to his voice that cuts her.

     What else don’t I know? she wonders, recalling their earlier conversation about William as a baby.

     I knew the further I got, the better off he’d be.

     All this time, she’s mistaken his stoic silence for complacency, but now she realizes with some dismay that he’s anything but complacent. 

     But he has a point, and she knows it. They have no power at the FBI…they never had much to begin with. If anything is to be done about the men and women who did this to Isaac, Mulder and Scully will have to figure it out on their own.

     But for the moment, there are more pressing matters. Scully pinches the bridge of her nose, trying to bring her thoughts into focus, to attack the problem as a doctor rather than a mother.

     “My guess is they’re trying to cover their tracks. Isaac is no longer useful to the project, he needs to be…dealt with.”

     Mulder frowns. “We know this kid is the real thing, Scully, and so do they. They’re not going to give up on him just like that. Doesn’t make sense.”

     “But Mulder, there are records indicating the first experiments failed to gestate as far back as nine years ago. Nine years of attempts and nothing to show for it? It’s a wonder they didn’t kick him out sooner.”

     “Scully…what if this goes back further than that? What if his abilities are the product of two mutated genetic anomalies? You and I both had…experiences prior to William’s conception that could have affected our genetic makeup.”

     “Mulder, I was abducted long before we…you know,” she says, uncomfortable with this turn in the conversation, a flush creeping into her cheeks. “To say that we were genetically altered months or years before the fact, then brought together to produce a child for the purpose of…of what? Even if it were true…it’s…we have no way of proving something like that.”

     He shakes his head, thinking aloud. “No, I’m not saying they planned for it, Scully. I think it was a…a happy accident.”

     She blinks, eyes tightening. “Happy for who?”

     But Mulder isn’t paying attention, too excited at the prospect of a theory, a lead. “They finally have access to a telekinetic whose abilities are astounding in their complexity, but they didn’t count on his DNA being programmed with some kind of genetic failsafe, a mutation that prevents him from being cloned. So…they go after the next best thing.”

     “What…us?” she balks.

     “Biologically speaking, they’re back to the drawing board. We’re the drawing board.”

     “But Mulder, we could have ten more children, and none of them would be genetically identical to…to William.” She glances at the blue tent behind them, as if speaking their son’s name might summon Isaac from slumber. “It doesn’t work that way.”

     “Ten more, Scully? I didn’t know you wanted a big family.” He raises an eyebrow, leaning in, his breath soft against her cheek. She wills herself not to smack him. 

     “Even if they could produce a viable embryo, there’s no guarantee they’d get a child with the same abilities.”

     “Scully, they have a complete genetic map right here.” He taps on the file, eyes shining as his mind works. She can almost hear the click of the proverbial tumblers and gears falling into place. “Who says they couldn’t recreate it?”

     “Mulder, this is a stretch, even for you.” But the look in her eyes tells him she’s not as skeptical as she’s letting on.

     “I always knew we had chemistry, Scully—I just didn’t realize it was of the ‘test tube and lab coat’ variety.” He grins at his own joke, but she doesn’t respond in kind. Quite the opposite; she’s looking at him with growing horror.

     “Do you really believe that, Mulder? That we’ve been used? Like…like lab rats?”

     “It makes sense, doesn’t it? What if Doggett was put on his current case knowing he would eventually make the connection to William, and reach out to you with this information, Scully? They put the kid’s life in jeopardy, knowing we’d run, they practically drive us into the middle of nowhere…” He trails off, looking around, as if suddenly realizing just how isolated they are out here.

     Her face falls before Mulder realizes he’s gotten carried away. This wasn’t an X-file—this was their life, and the idea that her son—their son—could be the byproduct of a conspiracy to arm the world against extraterrestrial forces…well, it certainly took the romance out of the equation, didn’t it? In her eyes, he sees confirmation of her deepest, darkest fears.

     He reaches for her hand, an attempt to bridge the gap between them, but she recoils.

     “Mulder, if this is true…we were used. We were…manipulated.” She stops, struggling to control her emotions, and failing. “It means that child, our child, was never a miracle at all…but a mistake.”

     He shakes his head. “No, that’s not—”

     But she’s standing up, pacing, unable to contain herself. “What would you have me believe, Mulder? That we brought a child into this world to…to suffer? To become a human guinea pig? An extraterrestrial pincushion? Look what he’s been through! No child…no child deserves this.” Her voice is strong, but there’s a tremor in the curve of her jaw.

     “Jesus, Scully, think about what you’re saying. My childhood wasn’t perfect, either. Was I a mistake, too?”

     “No,” she says, turning away, arms wrapped protectively around herself, “but if we’d known…if we’d stopped to think about the consequences…”

     “C’mon, Scully. We didn’t think you could conceive. It’s not like we planned—”

     When she speaks again, her voice is so soft, he wonders if he’s imagining it.

     “Maybe we were the mistake.”

     He stares at her back in disbelief. Her words hang between them, heavy and laced with finality.

     “Do you mean that?” he asks, though he’s not sure he wants to know the answer. He wishes he could see her face…he struggles to stand, trying to cross the distance between them. It’s only a few feet, but it feels like miles.

     The seconds tick off, one by one. The silence is suffocating.

     Rage bubbles up inside him, angry words scalding the back of his throat. He swallows them back. Let her drown in self-pity. He turns, begins limping in the direction of the tent.

     “Mulder? Where are you going?”

     He wheels on her, jaw set, eyes blazing. “I’m done here. You let me know when you’re ready to let me back in, Scully. Maybe, if we’re lucky, I’ll still be here when that time comes.”

     “Mulder…”

     He raises a hand and drops it, dismissing her without looking back, and limps off into the woods.

     He’s running through trees, hair catching on branches that scratch and cut his face and arms as he blindly stumbles past, breathing hard. There’s a scream, a woman’s voice yelling…

     Mom?

     He runs faster, crashing through the thick underbrush. His feet are wet, his sneakers soaked through. The ground is soggy with leaves and black, foul-smelling muck; his foot catches in a thick, putrid pool, and the suction pulls the shoe off. He stumbles, almost falls, pushing at the muddy earth with hands as numb and useless as blocks of wood.

     The yelling is clearer, ringing out against the dark, and now there’s a man’s voice, too. His father’s voice. Isaac’s heart leaps at the sound; he’s alive! But he needs to find them. Where are they?

     Up ahead, closer, they’re calling his name. He tries to cry out, to tell them he’s here, but the air is thin, he’s out of breath, and he needs to conserve energy. He can’t stop running. Their cries for help grow more panicked, more desperate with each passing second.

     There’s a break in the trees ahead, a clearing, a crop of rocks too thick for life to grow. That’s where they are, he’s certain of it. So close.

     Dad! Mom! I’m here!

     He bursts into the clearing, skittering to a stop at an outcropping of jagged rocks.

     The sky is dark, but there’s no rain; only a dry, hot wind and the tang of burnt ozone.

     His parents stand a few yards ahead, they’ve gone quiet. His father looks exactly as he remembers him from photos—tall, handsome, with gentle eyes. His arms are wrapped around his mother’s shoulders in a stiff embrace. They’re staring up at something in the sky, looks of stunned dread on their faces.

     Mom! Dad!

     They don’t respond, don’t give any indication they’ve heard him. His eyes travel upward, tracing the line of his mother’s gaze, and his jaw goes slack.

     What he thought were storm clouds is a gray-black metallic mass. It hovers above them, above the clearing…

     …no, not just above us. Everywhere. It’s massive, he realizes with dread and wonder, heart caught in his throat. The darkness extends for miles in all directions, blocking the soft light of the October moon.

     With great effort, he tears his gaze away from the thing in the sky, ready to call to his parents again, to tell them to run; they all need to run, to get far away, but the words die on his tongue.

     It’s not his parents standing in the clearing at all…it’s the agents. The woman’s hair is red, a deep fiery red, not brown and curly like his mother’s. The man has a full head of hair, graying at the temples, and what his mother would have called a ‘distinguished profile.’

     The agents cling to each other, from this distance he can see she’s gripping his arm, her knuckles white…there’s blood on his sleeve. Mulder’s eyes meet Isaac’s, wide and fearful, but also resigned.

     Isaac has time to read the man’s one last, clear thought, spoken oddly in his father’s voice, before a blinding, angry light envelops them, obliterating the world.

    Save them.

     #

     He wakes with a start, gasping for breath, trying to recall what it was the man, Mulder, or was it his father? What had he said?

     But he blinks once, twice, and the nightmare fades back into the recesses of his subconscious, leaving him cold, with a hollow ache beneath his breastbone.

     He misses his mom and dad terribly, the images of their upturned faces linger at the back of his mind, but his sorrow is short-lived; there are angry voices outside the tent…the agents are arguing.

     “Maybe, if we’re lucky, I’ll still be here when that time comes.”

     “Mulder…”

     There’s the crunch of leaves and rocks as someone, it sounds like Mulder, walks away.

     Then heavy silence.

     Isaac reaches out with his mind, tentative, and finds himself overwhelmed by Scully’s sadness, a deep, aching despair. He stops after a moment, closing the connection, feeling vaguely ashamed at the intrusion, as though he’d peeked behind a curtain to find her undressing.

     He has a vague recollection of her from the nightmare, something about her hands—what had she been doing?

     White, blood red.

     Useless fragments come to him, but they carry no weight, no meaning without context. He grits his teeth, fists balled in frustration. Mulder told him to write the dreams down, but there’s nothing to write; nothing concrete, nothing he can hold on to.

     What use are these stupid dreams if I can’t remember them?

     Suddenly the tent is too small, closed in, suffocating. Craving solitude, yet afraid to be alone with his thoughts, he hesitates, listening. There’s nothing except the muffled sounds of Scully moving about. He’ll suffer her company if it means a distraction from the dreams.

     He tosses off his sleeping bag, ignoring the cold, and steps out of the tent.

     Scully can count on one hand the number of times Mulder has walked away from her during a fight. Usually he’s the one to pull them back together, the first to apologize, the first to reach for her…his faith in them has always been stronger than hers, almost blind in its reverence.

     She sits next to the fire pit, but the fire has long since died out; he never had a chance to build it, too focused on the case, on their conversation.

     What an apt metaphor, she thinks dully, staring at the dried husk of a log amidst the ruins.

     She regrets her words from the moment they leave her lips, spilling out from some deep, self-destructive part of herself. The part that rebels against Mulder’s over-protectiveness and his unyielding faith despite the odds; the part that’s responsible for the tattoo on her lower back, her mark of rebellion like a brand against her skin; the part that drew her to a career in forensics against her father’s wishes, and stubbornly kept her at the X-files when the rational part of her knew it was a losing game.

     It’s a part she hasn’t given enough attention in recent years.

     And it’s finally come back to bite me in the ass.

     She hadn’t meant to imply her relationship with Mulder was a regret, but isn’t that exactly what she’d said, when it came down to it?

     Yes. Maybe we were the mistake.

     She stares blankly at the charred logs as the ashes from last night’s fire skitter around, swirling, dissipating into the sharp, bitter air.

     You can’t take this one back, Dana.

     But she can’t capitulate. Not only because she’s stubborn, but because there’s a fine, hard grain of truth to what she’s said, as much as neither of them want to hear it. She’s always been good at voicing the ugly truths, fouling up Mulder’s pretty theories.

     As much as she loves him, there are times when she looks at him, and all she can see are the losses.

     If they’d stayed friends, if they hadn’t taken that last step…hell, if one of us had thought to grab a box of condoms before jumping into bed together like a couple of horny, sex-starved teenagers…realizing as she thinks this how coarse and unfair it is, given their history. The physical relationship was an afterthought, but somehow, that makes this even harder.

     The muffled zip of a tent flap interrupts her thoughts; Isaac must be awake. She wipes at her eyes reflexively, though her tears have long since dried, and looks up to see the boy standing there. For a moment they stare at each other in awkward silence—her eyes red-rimmed, his untrusting, both waiting for the other to speak.

     “I’m, uhh…I was cold,” he says finally, shifting from one foot to the other, hands rubbing at his shoulders.

     “Oh! Grab a blanket from the tent, wrap yourself. I’ll get a fire going.”

     “Where’d he go?”

     Scully busies herself with the fire, avoiding the boy’s eyes. “Mulder? He…ah…he’s out for a walk.”

     Isaac doesn’t believe this, and she doesn’t blame him. Given the shape Mulder’s knee is in, any walk would be short and painful. But the boy does her a kindness by not pushing the issue.

     “You should have something,” she says, trying to regain her composure. “How do you feel about instant oatmeal?”

     He shrugs, noncommittal, and she takes this to mean he’ll eat. She goes about stoking the fire, adding water to the foil bowl, nestling it deep in the coals. The movement of her hands gives her purpose, confidence. Mulder may have walked away, but she can still do this; prepare a fire, prepare food, look after another with care.

     They eat from the foil bowl with plastic spoons. The hot cereal warms her, though her appetite wanes after a few bites. She’s pleased when Isaac shyly asks if he can finish the rest.

     While he’s distracted, eating, she lets herself look at him more closely. His hair is tousled from sleep, it hangs in his eyes, and she resists the urge to reach out and brush it back. He definitely got Mulder’s nose, she thinks, smiling a little to herself, but it suits him. She recognizes her own eyes, their blue color, startling in its depth, behind long, dark lashes. But more distinctive is their wisdom, the knowledge within is that of a time-weary adult, not a boy of twelve.

     As she gazes at him, she realizes with a heavy heart that she could never wish him out of being. That for all the suffering, he is here now, and that is an upside-down blessing.

     “What?” He’s caught her watching, and she ducks her head, a flush creeping across her face.

     “Sorry, Isaac. I’ve…I’m worried about you,” she confesses, truthfully. “About how you’re holding up, after your mom.”

     He goes rigid at the mention of her, and his spoon drops into the last of the oatmeal, forgotten. The remainder forms a thick, tasteless paste on his tongue as guilt turns his stomach, and he struggles to keep the food down, remembering her blackened figure advancing, clawing her way toward him, pulling him down, down, down…

     Scully is talking, asking him questions, but her voice is muted background noise. He’s locked in a waking nightmare of memory.

     “…is there anything you want to talk about?”

     He surfaces, breaking free from the memory’s grasp, giving his head a terse shake. No.

     She nods reluctantly. “OK. Well…” she pauses, making a show of wiping her hands on her jeans in carefully masked disappointment, “if you need anything, I’ll be in my tent. I’m going to rest.” She puts a hand on the boy’s shoulder, surprised and inwardly hopeful when he doesn’t flinch away.

     She moves to leave, but he stops her. “What did you find out? About me? There were those files, Mulder said…Project Ultimam? I heard you talking. I…I want to know.”

     She hesitates, feeling even more out of her element than she thought possible. Isaac may be her son by birth, but she doesn’t know him, doesn’t know how he’ll take this, how much to tell him, how much to hold back. There are no right answers, no logical path to guide her.

     It calls up memories of those first weeks after he was born, how every day was built on instinct and prayer, a foundation as delicate as the newborn child she cradled in her arms.

     Fragile foundations had always been Mulder’s territory.

     She takes a seat beside Isaac again, narrowing her eyes. “Isaac…there are some things you can’t un-learn once you know them. You can’t…take it back,” she says, thinking of her earlier conversation with Mulder. “Can you understand that? I’ll tell you, if you really want…but I need you to show me you understand the implications.”

     He nods, eyes burning with an intensity she knows all too well.

     He comes by it honestly…

     Scully takes a deep breath. “Isaac, you were told you were sick as a child. But you weren’t born with a heart condition. That’s something the doctors made up. Your doctor was part of this project.”

     She continues, telling the boy about his genetic anomalies, the other test subjects, carefully maneuvering around his biological origins; she’s beginning to think that particular fact may not have to come out. After all, she rationalizes, he’s been through enough.

     He listens to her with rapt attention. “We think,” she finishes, “that your participation in the project was discontinued due to your unique genetics, and now they’re trying to cover it up. They sent that thing to attack you; when it couldn’t get to you directly, it tried to go through your mother,” she says, watching the boy’s face, gauging his reaction.

     When he finally speaks, it’s to ask a question she doesn’t expect. “So…it’s not my fault? That she’s dead?”

     Her brow furrows. How could he think he was responsible?

     “She just kept coming at me, she wouldn’t talk to me, and she…and then—” he’s rambling, frantic, the pitch of his voice wavering higher with each syllable.

     “No! Isaac…no, it wasn’t your fault. I saw…well, I don’t know what I saw, but it wasn’t your mom,” she says with sincerity. “That was something pretending to be your mom, but it wasn’t her. You didn’t kill her, Isaac, she was…she was already gone.”

     There’s a flicker of relief in his eyes. “They sent it to kill me?”

     “We don’t know that for sure. But that’s what I think happened, yes.”

     “What does he think?” the boy asks, referring to Mulder.

     Scully smiles in spite of herself. “Mulder and I don’t always agree. He has his own theories…”

     Isaac goes quiet again, though his face suggests his thoughts are anything but. Anger radiates outward from his slender body, a fine heat against the damp morning chill.

     “Isaac…I understand what you’re feeling right now…and it’s normal to be angry, you’ve suffered a major trauma, a loss—”

     The line of his jaw tightens, his eyes narrow. “How?” he spits. “How could you know?”

     She softens. How odd, that the life she’d once carried inside her, the baby for whom she’d had hopes and dreams, could be so drastically changed by a single decision, a signature on a piece of paper. He has no way of knowing what was taken from her, the anger it created within her so similar to his own.

     As much as he is a stranger to her, she is an equal stranger to him.

     “I know more than you’d think, Isaac. I lost my sister, a daughter. I lost…many things.” She pauses. “The men who did this to you, the men who killed your mother…they need to be brought to justice. And I need you to trust us so we can make that happen.”

     He doesn’t answer, but he doesn’t need to; the look in his eyes, the set of his jaw tells her everything. She watches the fire in front of her without seeing it, too focused on the boy who sits next to her, his own inner fire burning with a newfound rage.

     Mulder doesn’t know where he’s going, and it occurs to him that wandering into the woods by himself without so much as a compass or a piece of string to mark his trail is a dumb idea.

     Wouldn’t be the first, Spooky.

     He’s walked a great deal, and his bum knee is making its presence known. The ground is squelchy here, there must be a lake or a swamp nearby, but he can’t see water. Just thick trees, brush, and the occasional boulder.

     It’s not the first time Scully has locked him out, but it’s the first time she’s taken it this far. They’ve come close, but he’s never doubted her partnership.

     Until now.

     The distance between them the last few months had been too easy to brush off as the ebb and flow of their relationship. The late work hours, the lack of conversation, the faraway look in her eyes when they were together; he told himself she’d come out of it with time. They’d weathered much worse.

     Or have we? he wonders, still stinging from her words. She’s obviously been thinking about this for a while. Thinking, but not talking.

     He’s good at reading people, getting into their heads, understanding how they tick; he’d built a career around his talent for profiling, and would probably still be at it if he hadn’t thrown himself wholeheartedly into the X-files.

     But he’d failed to read the one person he thought he knew completely. 

     You didn’t see it because you didn’t want to see it, Fox.

     Their conversation from the car comes back, a slap to the face.

     …maybe we both need some time…

     This stops him, filling him with a renewed sense of despair, his knee throbbing in angry sympathy. He sags against the nearest tree, fists clenched.

     He pictures a small black box with two rings, simple gold bands, bought on a whim during a trip to D.C. He’d been consulting on a case, had wandered downtown, visiting old haunts, trying and failing to remember a time when he’d felt at home in the city. The jewelry store on the corner caught his eye, and for no particular reason, he’d walked in.

     It was a running joke between them that Scully’s Catholic upbringing made their living arrangements amoral, much to her mother’s chagrin. They never had a traditional relationship; marriage seemed an unnecessary formality in the face of everything else.

     But he’d bought the rings anyway, in a momentary flight of romantic nostalgia, unsure even at the time if he would ever open the box again. He’d tucked it away for safekeeping, thinking maybe one day he’d work up the nerve to give one to her.

     Too late now.

     He shouldn’t have walked away. How many of his own demons has he faced, always with her by his side? Now she’s struggling, and he runs away with his goddamn tail between his legs.

     But I can’t face losing her.

     It’s a coward’s excuse, but it’s the simple truth. She’s going to walk away, and he will lose the foundation on which his life is built.

     What had he told her once? You were my constant. My touchstone.

     And now she can’t even look me in the eye.

     He sits on the hard earth, ignoring his aching body’s protests, staring blankly, seeing nothing, letting his thoughts spiral into the black. He stays long enough for his ass to fall asleep, for the morning’s damp chill to dissipate. The sun burns off the fog, shining down through the trees, warming him. 

     It’s so bright.

     The cover here should be thick, lots of old forest, the terrain too rough even for loggers. It should be dark under the canopy of all these trees, with all the old growth.

     He looks up, squinting at the sunlight, at a blue sky so piercing it makes his eyes water…

     Is that…what is that?

     The tops of the trees are black.

     He stands, blinks, shielding his eyes with his palm. It must be a trick of the light.

     No, those trees are scorched. Where have you seen that before?

     His first inclination is to run back to the camp, to bring Scully here so she can see it for herself, get her scientific opinion. He thinks better, clearer, when she pushes him, his own personal devil’s advocate, but he wants to be certain. He doesn’t think he could take it if she threw this back in his face.

     He sets off in a northward direction, looking for a break in the trees, a clearing, hoping to get a better view. Occasionally he stops along the way to rest his leg, all the while staring upward, shielding his eyes against the light, following the same strange black slash in the foliage.

     His theory is confirmed a mile later, in a large opening with stones and malnourished, gnarled trees. He walks a few paces from the tree line, turning around, but it’s as he suspected. There are none of the usual signs of a forest fire; no felled trees, no burned underbrush, no ash. Just the strange black line, starting about twenty-five feet up, as though something massive left a dirty black footprint on the forest’s canopy.

     As though something hovered there. Something large enough to span more than a mile, with enough heat to char a forest without burning it to the ground…

     He stares at the trees until his vision swims, heart racing, mouth dry. Sprained leg be damned, he needs to get back to the camp to warn Scully and Isaac.

     They’re not alone. They’re not safe here.

     A desperate thought occurs to him as he makes his way back through the desolate wilderness.

     We’re not safe anywhere.

     OCTOBER 30, 2013
9:45 A.M.

     Doggett steps off the plane, expecting a short layover before his flight to D.C. The investigation of Mrs. Van de Kamp’s body is underway, he’s having what’s left of the poor woman shipped back to Quantico, but he doesn’t expect anyone to be able to tell him what happened last night. 

     Until they re-open the X-files, they don’t stand a chance in hell at solving this one.

     He stops at a news stand, scanning the headlines, tossing a candy bar on the counter, as he reaches into his jacket pocket to check his phone. There’s a voicemail from Skinner.

     “Doggett, I don’t know where the hell you are, but when you get this message, you’d better book yourself on the first flight to Cranbrook, B.C. Something’s come up.”

     He frowns. Skinner, though technically his superior, wasn’t in the habit of throwing cases his way. Unless…

     Mulder said they were heading north. British Columbia isn’t far from Montana…

     “Dammit,” he mutters under his breath, startling the cashier. He flashes an apologetic smile that looks more like a grimace, and pays for the candy bar, no longer concerned with making his connection.

     Got a different plane to catch.

     There’s a sinking feeling in his gut as he approaches the ticketing agent, flashing his badge. “This is an emergency. I need a seat on the next flight to British Columbia.”

#

     It’s dark when he lands at Canadian Rockies International, a smattering of lights from the city blink up from the landscape as the plane descends toward the tiny airport. He’s spent the last four hours uncomfortable and cramped on the equally tiny plane, and, unable to sleep, his thoughts are drawn back to his encounter at the safe house.

     What had he seen? He goes over the events in his mind again; he remembers following Scully upstairs after the crash in the room above, the strange dark shape flickering, almost blinding in its darkness. Scully, paralyzed, in some kind of trance, and Mulder yelling at her from over Doggett’s shoulder. He’d reached out, grabbed her, drawing her back and away from the door just before the boy…

     Before he what? Exploded?

     He shifts in his seat, this time his discomfort is internal. The light had come from everywhere, white hot and burning. He could feel his skin tingling uncomfortably in the split second before his hand reached out to slam the door shut, the three of them nearly caught in the blast.

     Though his time at the X-files was brief, he’d come to know former agents Scully and Mulder as a formidable team. The things they’d done and seen during their careers at the FBI were the stuff of legend. He still heard whispers about them in the bullpen, rumors mostly, but Doggett had seen a number of X-files for himself, and within every rumor is a grain of truth.

     But that kid…

     He’s something else.

     The irony in this turn of phrase is not lost on him.

     Now he’s been called back to northwest, to a remote area of southern Canada, after informing Skinner of the attack via voicemail no less than twenty-four hours ago. He’s come to the conclusion this is either an elaborate plan to call him on the carpet for his actions, or there’s been trouble. Doggett isn’t sure which scenario to hope for.

     He departs the plane and cracks his neck, wincing at the ache along his back. The cell trills from within his pocket, revealing a second voicemail from Skinner, this one with instructions to rendezvous at the local police branch. He finds the place easily enough, unsurprised to find the small-town headquarters are little more than a hole in the wall, a real backwater operation.

     He finds Skinner and another unfamiliar agent, identifiable by the FBI tag clipped to his jacket pocket–he’s stout, bearded, unremarkable. They stand over a large map in a conference room that might pass for a closet in D.C.

     Or a basement office, if you’re really unlucky, thinks Doggett, suppressing a smirk.

     Skinner and the other agent are using pins to mark points on the map, creating boundaries, dividing the paper landscape into a rough grid. Doggett approaches, a faint, wry smile on his lips. “With all due respect, you picked a hell of a place to call a meeting, sir.”

     Skinner turns, greeting him with a curt nod; he doesn’t return the smile. “Agent Doggett, thanks for coming on such short notice. This is Special Agent Markel, International Operations. He’s agreed to assist in this…investigation.”

     “Investigation, sir?”

     Skinner pauses, narrows his eyes at Doggett. “I think you know what we’re doing here, agent, don’t play dumb. I have reason to believe Fox Mulder and Dana Scully fled north into the woods just outside Bonners Ferry, Idaho, yesterday afternoon. I have a source, someone who suggested there may be a…threat…in the vicinity. You were the last to see them, is that correct?”

     Doggett nods. “At the safe house. We were attacked. Just like I told ya on the phone.”

     Markel speaks, his voice low and grating. “Is the boy with them?”

     Doggett hesitates, thinking carefully about what to reveal. Skinner has proven himself a trustworthy ally in the past, but he’s unsure about Markel. If Skinner trusts him—and he must, because Markel knows about the boy—Doggett decides he has no choice but to do the same.

     “Agent Doggett?” There’s a menacing edge of impatience in Skinner’s voice. “Look, this isn’t a witch hunt. I can’t guarantee you’ll keep a spotless record, but right now my priority is to ensure everyone gets out of this alive. If you know something—”

     “Yeah. Yeah, they took the boy. His mother was killed in the attack. Her body’s being shipped back to D.C. as we speak, although I don’t think they’re going to find much.”

     He can tell Skinner expected this, but the Deputy Director flinches nonetheless. “We notified border control several hours ago, they have a patrol out, but we haven’t received word on Mulder and Scully’s position. I don’t think they’ve crossed into the country yet.” 

     If they haven’t made it this far by now, something must be wrong, thinks Doggett, keeping his expression neutral. “They planned to hike in, fly under the radar. That’s all I know.”

     Skinner nods. “Thanks to Agent Markel, we have full cooperation from the RCMP. I’ve asked them to provide us with a search team, including a helicopter. We’ll have a ground team with aerial assistance. There are several miles to cover, it’s rough terrain. This is a needle in a haystack situation, and we need all the help we can get.” He takes off his glasses, rubbing at tired eyes. “With that in mind, I suggest we begin our search at first light. We’ll meet back here at oh-six-hundred, regroup with the rest of the search team.”

     With that, the agents break, agreeing to rendezvous in a few hours to begin the manhunt. Markel mutters something about coffee and steps out the door, leaving Doggett to frown at the floor, hands stuffed into the pockets of his travel-rumpled slacks. Something about this investigation doesn’t sit well with him. 

     Skinner is preoccupied, shuffling papers into his briefcase, and Doggett seizes the opportunity to talk to the man alone.

     “Sir?”

     “Yes, Agent Doggett.”

     “If you don’t mind my askin’…who’s your source?”

     The man narrows his eyes, a look of consternation flashes across his face. “I’m afraid I can’t say.”

     “You can’t, or you won’t?”

     “Agent Doggett, we have work to do here. If you have something to say, have out with it, or stop wasting my—”

     “Does this have something to do with Project Ultimam, sir?”

     Skinner glances at the open door, shooting Doggett a warning look.

     “Agent, I suggest you focus on the task at hand.”

     “I’d like to, but it’s hard to do that without all the facts. Since when is a Deputy Director involved in a simple search and rescue?”

     Skinner’s face tightens, turning a faint shade of crimson. His next words are clipped, spoken through bared teeth. “Agent, leave it alone.”

     Doggett shakes his head, brushing this off. Skinner is an intimidating man, but many years in Violent Crimes has thickened Doggett’s skin. “All I’m sayin’ is, if you have information that could help with this investigation…information about this threat…I hope we have all the facts before we throw good men into the line of fire…sir.”

     Skinner approaches Doggett, coming within inches of his face, and for a moment he thinks the man intends to hit him. But instead Skinner lowers his voice, his tone confidential.

     “I received an anonymous tip from someone claiming to be a friend of Mulder’s. This friend suggested there might be greater forces at work here. Forces of an…unusual nature.” He narrows his eyes at Doggett meaningfully. “But I’d appreciate your discretion in this matter, Agent Doggett. I’m already walking a fine line with International Operations, Agent Markel is asking questions, not to mention I have the Director breathing down my neck…we can’t afford mistakes here.”

     Skinner grits his teeth, looks away. “To be honest, I don’t know what we’re going to find. I just hope it’s not three dead bodies.”

     Chastened, Doggett nods, thinking of the shadow figure at the safe house, the way the woman’s body had to be scraped off the white wood floor.

     “You an’ me both, sir.”

     It’s been hours since Mulder stormed off, with no sign of him since their argument  this morning.

     He can’t have gone far, his leg wouldn’t hold out.

     She tries to reassure herself, but Scully knows as soon as the thought crosses her mind that it isn’t true. Mulder is downright bull-headed when he’s angry. The sprain is relatively minor; it would take a full-fledged amputation to stop him.

     And even then, he’d probably tie the bloody stump to a stick and keep going. He’ll be lucky if he can walk tomorrow, she thinks, irritated at her partner’s untoward recklessness. But the irritation doesn’t last, only gives way to greater worry.

     A half hour passes. She finally gets up; rest eludes her, so she tends to the fire, stretches, examines and bandages her burnt hand again. It’s not healing fast, but it doesn’t appear infected. Ibuprofen takes the edge off.

     Another half hour.

     Shit.

     All the pacing and fretting won’t bring him back; it will be dark in a few hours.

     You’re wasting time.

     She doesn’t want to worry Isaac, but he can’t stay here alone. They’ll take the map and compass, head north, and hope their paths cross with Mulder’s before nightfall. She checks her pack, adding warm clothes and first aid supplies, then douses the fire.

     He won’t survive the night in these temperatures, she realizes, shuddering at the thought.

     “Isaac?” She approaches the boy’s tent. “Isaac, we need to find Mulder…I think he’s lost.”

     There’s a rustling from within as Isaac unzips the door.

     “How are we going to find him?” He wears a familiar and well-earned expression of skepticism. She doesn’t want to trek through the woods in the wee hours, calling for Mulder, potentially drawing attention to themselves in the event an unfriendly party is trying to find them.

     “I’m not sure yet, but…” Her eyes widen. 

     Why hadn’t she thought of it before? 

     “Isaac! Can you…do you think you can hear him? With your mind?”

     The boy crawls out of the tent, looking doubtful. “I dunno…don’t think I’ve ever read someone from a distance…”

     “But it’s worth a shot, right?”

     Isaac doesn’t have to read her mind to know her fear. He shrugs uneasily, sitting down next to the fire. “I can try.”

     “Would you?”

     He shifts, tilting his chin in quiet acknowledgment, eyes closing to focus, listening for Mulder’s presence.

     At first, all he can hear is Scully; she radiates fear so strong it drowns the world, and he struggles to move beyond it, beyond their camp, to avoid drowning with her.

     Several minutes pass, but there’s nothing but dead air. Dead air, and a vague sense of restless energy, which he attributes to Scully…or perhaps himself, it’s hard to tell.

     Scully watches the boy’s brow clench tight in frustration and he shakes his head, upset.

     “I can’t…” he says, crestfallen, acutely aware of her disappointment. “I’ve never done this before! I don’t know how…”

     She kneels down, placing her hands lightly on his shoulders, and narrows her gaze. “Isaac…can you try one more time…please? For me.”

     Isaac looks at her doubtfully, but the desperation in her voice threatens to consume him. Her fingers tremble against his shoulders, betraying her composed exterior. He takes a deep breath, exhales, this time picturing Mulder’s face in hopes it will trigger something, anything.

     There is no magic formula, no instruction manual for his gift; only intuition and blind hope.

     He remembers the first time he realized he could hear people’s thoughts; he couldn’t have been more than five. His mother was having an argument with a cashier at the grocery store; she’d been thinking the girl behind the counter looked like cheap white trash, a common streetwalker in a strappy tank top and cutoffs, and Isaac had innocently piped up in defense of his mother, voicing her forbidden thoughts word for word.

     His mother turned a deep shade of crimson and promptly turned on her heel, abandoning their full cart, leaving the girl with her mouth gaping open. She’d rushed them out of the store, maintaining a silent iron grip on his elbow.

     Only when they were in the car did it occur to him that she hadn’t spoken aloud. She didn’t scold him, in fact they never spoke of it again, the first of many incidents that left her to cast furtive backward glances at her son in the rear view mirror, as though she were afraid of him.

     Follow your gut. Trust your instincts.

     Mulder’s advice rings true; instinct is all Isaac has now, so he follows it, shifting his focus to the sound of Mulder’s voice, listening intently. There’s so much dead air, static, but then, faintly, an inner voice…

     His eyes fly open, turning his head toward the trees. “He’s here! Not close…but he’s out there…”

     Scully’s face brightens with relief, a hopeful smile pulling at the corners of her mouth. “Great,” she says in a voice almost too light, too airy to be believed. “Let’s start walking…can you guide us?”

     Isaac nods, trying to reflect her hope, but his heart is pounding.

     What he hears is definitely Mulder. The agent is in pain, but this isn’t what makes Isaac’s heart race. What the boy doesn’t tell Scully is the fear her partner feels at this moment; fear of some undefinable, unexplainable thing, fear unknowingly passed to Isaac, planting a cold seed of unease in the boy’s gut.

     He pulls on a sweatshirt, following in Scully’s dutiful footsteps, wishing they didn’t have to venture deeper into the woods tonight.

#

     “He’s close,” Isaac says, finally. “I can hear him.”

     Scully nods encouragingly, sweat on her brow. Isaac went quiet after they left the camp, she was starting to get nervous.

     “That’s good. Any sense of direction?”

     Isaac shakes his head.

     Scully considers this, then decides to risk it, the chance of finding her partner overshadowing the chance they might call attention to themselves.

     “Mulder!” She waits a moment, then tries again. And again. Desperate, she scans the trees around them for a glimpse of his jacket. Maybe he’s unconscious and can’t answer…

     “Mulder!” Isaac joins her, cupping his hands around his mouth, his voice carrying surprisingly well for someone so small.

     “Here,” a feeble voice finally speaks up, so faint Scully wonders if her ears are playing tricks, but she sees Isaac’s eyes widen in recognition and knows he’s heard it, too. It sounds like it’s coming from their right, and she veers in that direction, straining to hear over the rustling of the foliage around her.

     “Mulder! Keep talking so we can find you!”

     Silence. She stops, frustrated, but calls again, “Mulder! Talk to me!”

     “I’m over here,” he responds. He sounds weak, but they’re closing the distance. They find him seated on the ground behind a large boulder, resting with his back against the rock.

     “Oh, thank God,” Scully kneels down, her medical training kicking in as she reaches to examine him, but Mulder brushes her off.

     “I’m fine, Scully, I’m fine. Leg hurts, that’s all. I realized I was lost and sat down to rest. I knew you’d come.”

     She sits back on her knees, incredulous. “‘You knew we’d come?’ Jesus, Mulder, you’re lucky we found you at all. We’re at least two miles from camp, the brush out here is so thick…you could have been anywhere!” she explodes, the pent-up anxiety of the last several hours finding an outlet at last.

     “I don’t need a lecture, Scully. I’m a grown man, I can take care of myself,” he growls through gritted teeth.

     She blinks at him. “Of course you are. I didn’t mean to imply…I was worried…”

     “What, worried you might have made another mistake?” he snaps, dealing a swift low blow.

     She swallows, making a show of brushing herself off, standing, trying not to let the hurt show on her face.

     It dawns on Mulder that Isaac is standing behind her, hands shoved deep in his pockets, staring uncomfortably at the ground. It reminds him of the weeks leading up to his parents’ divorce, so many harsh words exchanged as a young Fox looked on, weary from the constant bickering. He feels a pang of guilt; the kid doesn’t need to be party to their relationship’s messy end.

     Scully’s pointed stare conveys a similar message, and he offers a terse nod, suddenly contrite. We need to put this away for now.

     “Scully, I found something out here I think you need to see.”

     “Yeah? The only thing I want to see is the inside of my tent. Let’s go.”

     He brushes her off mulishly. “It’s out that way, probably another mile, at least. I’m not leaving until you see it.”

     She sighs, turning her face to the sky in frustration. Sometimes dealing with her partner is like negotiating with a defiant toddler. “Mulder, can you even walk?”

     “I can if you help. It’s important, trust me.”

     This gives her pause. Trust him. After all that’s changed between them, does she trust him? The answer that comes to her is undeniably “yes,” which is why she knows they won’t be heading back to camp yet.

     “Help me up,” Mulder says, raising his arms above his head. She obliges, grasping him by the wrists, acting as a counterweight, pulling him to his feet. He steadies himself with one hand on her shoulder, surprised when he feels Isaac come around to his other side; the boy’s found a branch, sturdy enough to act as a makeshift crutch.

     “This might help,” he mumbles, handing it to Mulder, who looks over at Scully, brow raised.

     “Alright. It’s this way. Watch out, the ground is soft.”

OCTOBER 31, 2013
3:03 P.M.

     Doggett squints off into the distance. Thick ground fog gave way to sun about an hour ago, but it hasn’t done much to help their search.

     They found the unregistered Ford parked outside the forest boundary, where Mulder and Scully presumably left it prior to entering the park. Doggett’s assignment is to lead a team to try to find the agents and the boy, working south to north, but so far, all they’ve turned up are trees, rocks, and more of the same.

     He stumbles on a root, swears. He’s used to chasing criminals down paved streets and back alleys—the closest he’s come to this kind of wilderness in the last ten years is the occasional jog through Anacostia park. The guys from the RCMP loaned him some gear, but the thick boots make him clumsy, the wool shirt itches at the collar.

     He’s had no contact with Skinner since they started the ground search several hours ago. Cell phones are out of the question—they lost reception outside Bonners Ferry—but about two miles in, their radios and walkie-talkies gave out, too. Not just one, but all of them, which only contributes to Doggett’s growing feelings of unease.

     Some kind of interference, the tech guy said, which makes no sense, because there’s nothing out here but trees and rocks.

     The helicopter passes overhead, circling around for the fourth or fifth time. He glances up and can barely make out the outline of Skinner in the passenger’s seat.

     Even if they spot them, where the hell are they going to land that thing?

     Doggett has yet to see a single piece of this godforsaken mountain not covered by rocks or half-dead trees. The landscape is harsh, unforgiving. No place for a couple of forty-somethings and a kid, for sure.

     We’ll be lucky if we don’t find them dead, he thinks, scanning the bleak horizon.

     Without radios, they’re left to yell through the trees to keep track of their team of five. It’s a piss-poor number for the vast expanse they’re expected to cover; they’ve wasted precious time backtracking due to one officer, wet behind the ears, who wandered a bit too far off their assigned course and nearly got lost herself.

     The other officers are nervous, skittish, and Doggett can’t blame them. They have no personal investment in this search. He can sense their disquiet, knowing it won’t be long before they turn back, before Markel’s contact at the RCMP offers polite condolences for their loss and invites the two Americans to excuse themselves from the country.

     So far there’s been no sign of the agents or the boy, no clues as to their whereabouts, save for the car left in the forest.

#

     Meanwhile, in the air, Skinner is wrestling with a more basic, biological problem.He’s spent his fair share of time in helicopters over the course of his military and FBI careers, but they always make him queasy. The bobbing and weaving coupled with strong mountain gusts are unkind to his stomach, and he wills himself to keep down the single cup of black coffee he drank for breakfast as he scans the ground below, searching for his lost charges.

     They shouldn’t be in the air right now; communications in the chopper are scrambled. The internal radio is barely working, interrupted by long bursts of static, and they have no contact with the team on the ground or the nearby base. But when the young RCMP pilot made to turn the aircraft around, muttering something about faulty equipment, Skinner rested his hand firmly on the officer’s upper arm and squeezed, speaking into the headset in what he hoped was a threatening voice.

     “We’re going to keep this thing in the air until we find my agents; do you understand me?”

     It came out, “We’re going…keep…in air…find my agents…do under…me?”

     The pilot hadn’t responded, but he didn’t turn the helicopter around, either.

     That was four hours ago. They’re going to have to return to base to refuel soon, and Skinner knows he’ll catch hell from the RCMP if they find out he strong-armed a foreign officer into ignoring protocol. It’s likely he’ll lose what tentative support he has, which isn’t much.

     Between this knowledge and his increasingly green complexion, he’s not feeling well. Until…

     He scrambles for the mic controls, presses the button to talk, glares at the pilot.

     “What…that?” he yells, interrupted by static.

     “Sir?”

     “That…” Skinner reaches out, points, touching the glass of the chopper’s windshield, indicating a black smudge in his field of vision. He’d thought it was an imperfection in the glass, but it’s fixed in the distance, part of the landscape…

     Far off, he can see a dark black line on the horizon.

     It looks like a hole. Like a goddamned black hole.

     “Take us there,” he commands the pilot, pulse quickening, intuition telling him whatever he’s found will lead them to his former colleagues.

     He points ahead, “There.”

     Scully and the boy squint up into the trees, giving their eyes a moment to adjust to the sunlight above.

     “So the trees were burned. Doesn’t look recent, forest fires aren’t exactly—”

     Mulder shakes his head, cutting her off. “What kind of fire only burns off the top of the tree, Scully?”

     She closes her eyes, takes a deep breath. “You know, Mulder, there’s been an infestation of mountain pine beetles in this area—I read it in one of the local newspapers while we were in town. Maybe they’ve been spraying, some types of pesticides can discolor bark, it’s possible the beetles damaged this area significantly before they could contain it.”

     He glares at her in tired disbelief. “Tree beetles? Really, Scully?”

     She purses her lips in irritation, folds her arms in a familiar defensive stance. “Alright. What’s your expert theory, then?”

     “I think you already know,” he sniffs, turning to the boy. “Isaac…you any good at climbing trees?”

     “Sure.”

     “Wait…you’re not going to make him climb up there?” She looks at Mulder, incredulous. “Not after what happened yesterday…”

     Mulder shrugs. “If I recall, he wasn’t the one dangling from the cliff, Scully. And only if he wants to.” He turns back to Isaac. “Sure you’re up for it, kid?”

     “It’s cool,” Isaac chimes in; he’s already walking toward the affected trees, looking for one with low-hanging branches.

     “See if you can get a sample of the bark; we can bag it, test it for residue.” He ignores Scully, who’s off to the side with her mouth hanging open, seconds away from stamping her foot in protest.

     “‘Test it for residue,’ Mulder? With what? Where?” she gestures around them. “I don’t see any facilities here, and surprise, I couldn’t smuggle a laboratory setup in my pack.”

     “I can have the guys test it as soon we’re out of here.” Mulder says mildly, glancing over his shoulder, adding, “Kid could probably use a spotter.”

     Her eyes blaze at the cavalier brush-off, but she moves to the base of the tree; Isaac is already several feet up, getting close to the charred area. She watches the boy, all slender limbs and determination, scaling the tree with the same ease and grace with which he climbed the cliff yesterday.

     And look how that turned out, Scully thinks.

     The damaged bark flakes off easily, and within moments Isaac has shimmied down the tree and drops to the ground, looking pleased and a little bit smug. He hands a chunk of the scorched tree to Mulder, who examines it, sniffs it, before holding it out to Scully.

     “This look like the work of a beetle to you?” The bark crumbles slightly under his fingers, leaving a black, sticky residue.

     She folds her arms across her chest, ignoring the offering.

     He continues, tucking the sample into his pocket for safekeeping. “This extends about two miles that way, and well beyond that point, from what I can tell. This is common in abductions and UFO sightings, where a vast craft hovers over a particular section of forest, emitting radiation and heat that burns or stains the surrounding foliage. If we had an aerial view, we’d see this as a large, black circle—like a crop circle.” He’s speaking for Isaac’s benefit…and, if he has to admit it, to needle Scully.

     She opens her mouth, closes it, opens it again, but nothing comes out.

     Mulder continues, voice dripping with sarcasm. “What a coincidence, huh, Scully? That we pick the forest with the big-ass spaceship hovering over it?”

     She ignores him, turning on her heel, ready to march back to camp. Leave him to his goddamned crop circles.

     “What is wrong with you?” Isaac’s frightened voice startles them. In the midst of their petty power struggle, they’d almost forgotten he was here.

     “You’re supposed to be helping me, but you’re fighting like a couple of stupid kids! And don’t lie, I can hear it, and you’re both thinking the same things.” The boy sneers, turning his eyes on Mulder. “Why are we out here? What the hell does this even mean? Are we going to get…abducted or something?”

     Mulder stares at Isaac, mollified, surprised by the strength in the boy’s voice. Scully’s looking at the ground. 

     He’s right. We’re acting like a couple of first-class idiots. 

     “Tell me! What’s going to happen to me?” continues Isaac, looking back and forth between them, fuming.

     “It…I don’t know what it means,” Mulder admits, hand absently rubbing at the back of his neck. “But we’re not safe here.”

     Scully stares at Mulder, heart sinking like a lead weight in her chest. “He’s right, Isaac. Whatever this is, it’s not good. Someone…or something…has been here,” she murmurs, “which means we’re not alone.”

     “Then…then what are we going to do? What about…where are we going to go now?”

     Scully swallows hard, a lump forming in the back of her throat as the boy’s desperation tugs at her spirit. “I don’t know. I’m sorry I can’t give you a better answer, Isaac. I’m sorry we dragged you out here. I thought…” but she can’t finish.

     We’ve failed him. I’ve failed him. Again.

     “If anyone’s to blame, it should be me,” Mulder follows. “It was my idea to come here, but I should have known…should have seen it…” he trails off, dazed, thinking but not sharing his thoughts. “Isaac, we need to take you back.”

     The boy’s head snaps up. “Home? But what if they come after me again?”

     “No, not back to Wyoming. To D.C. You need protection…but a couple of retired agents with a gun isn’t going to cut it. Our former boss—”

     “Skinner?”

     “Yeah, Skinner. He’ll keep a guard on you, put you in protective custody. You’ll be safe.”

     “But that didn’t work before…”

     “He’ll take good care of you.” Mulder offers a forced smile. “He’s one of the best.”

     Scully interjects, “You’re safer without us, Isaac. I can’t explain, but you need to understand…it’s better this way.” It takes great effort to keep her voice level as she speaks the words she whispered to her baby son years ago when she signed his adoption papers.

     “I don’t get it,” Isaac says, accusation in his words. “You said you wanted to help me.”

     “We do. We will help you, by finding people who can protect you.”

     The boy’s face falls, but he doesn’t ask questions, just turns away, leaving Scully to wish she could turn the tables and read his mind, to know what he’s thinking. 

     Mulder’s expression is equally mollified. He leans against his makeshift brace with a rough grimace, anticipating the long walk back, and the even longer and more uncertain path ahead.

     They return to camp well after sunset. Isaac crawls into the tent without a word, leaving Mulder and Scully to stand by the fire in moody silence.

     “So, what do we do?” Scully whispers, voice laden with exhaustion.

     “I dunno,” Mulder responds, rubbing his face with both hands. “Leave, I guess. Turn ourselves in.”

     “What will happen to us, do you think?”

     “Skinner will find a way to exonerate us given the circumstances. We’ll be fine.”

     “What about Isaac?”

     He stares up at the sky as if searching for something. The stars are shimmering pins of light in the crisp night air.

     She can remember a particularly difficult time when the stars had reminded her of Mulder, when the thought of their distant light traveling miles through space was a comfort. 

     Tonight they look cold, sharp, and unforgiving.

     “I think…no matter what happens…he has a difficult road ahead of him,” Mulder whispers.

     She goes quiet, knowing her partner is right, knowing there’s little they can do for the boy once he’s been surrendered to the authorities.

     “What if I adopted him?” 

     Mulder looks at her sharply, but she sits, pretends to busy herself with the fire, which is already roaring. Her abrupt suggestion hangs between them, awkward and fumbling.

     “I’m pretty sure no jury would grant you or I custody of the kid, Scully,” he finally replies, keeping his voice low so as not to disturb Isaac. “We don’t have an exemplary parental track record. At this point, I’m not sure what we have,” he pauses, letting this sink in. She ducks her head, unable to meet his gaze.

     “Anyway,” he continues, “we still don’t know for sure if his adoptive parents had a will.”

     “I know,” she sighs. “I thought…I don’t know what I thought. I just don’t know what to tell him.”

     He considers this carefully, studying her face, the telltale signs of distress in the pinch of her mouth, the furrows in her brow.

     He looks over his shoulder at the tent; he can just make out the boy’s shadow in the soft glow of a lantern. “Let’s start by telling him the truth.”

     “No.” 

     “Scully, I get that you’re scared…but we can’t hide this from him. It’s not right, and you know it.”

     She looks at him in disbelief, eyes shining, the tremor in her voice betraying the strength of her words. “Mulder, we can’t…what good would it do? It can’t change the past.”

     “No, Scully, but it could change his future. Give him a foundation. We can at least leave him with that much.”

     She tries to speak, to protest, to defend herself, but the tears pour out of her like a horrible flood, weakness and regret spilling down her cheeks.

     Her emotion only provokes him. “Dammit, Scully. I know you. You’re stronger than this. I can’t watch you lie to him…or to yourself.” He kneels with some difficulty, taking her by the arms, holding them tight, not letting her pull away.

     “I fell in love with you because nothing could break you. Not cancer, not losing your daughter, or our son…not even your arrogant jackass of a partner. Don’t let this be the thing that breaks you, the way Samantha almost broke me.”

     He lets this linger in the vast space between them, a bridge to bring her back.

     Her voice is a whisper. “Mulder…I can’t…” She attempts to wrest herself from his grasp, standing and nearly falling with the effort, but he meets her, maintaining his grip.

     “What, Scully? Tell me,” his words are ragged, a desperate challenge.

     She opens her mouth, the words fall out of their own accord.

     “I’m sorry.”

     “What for?”

     “For giving up our son. For putting us here. I risked our lives, his life…and at what cost?” She wipes at her eyes. “We’re no closer to finding the people responsible, and he’s lost so much…”

     Mulder’s grip softens as he begins to understand the weight of her regret. He hooks a finger under her chin, gently tilting her face upward. “Scully, this boy doesn’t need your self-pity. He needs someone he can trust. He needs you. And I…I need you, too…more than anything. I always have, and I always will.”

     She shakes her head, closing her eyes, unable to speak. He brushes fresh tears away, willing her to accept this small comfort.

     “You have nothing to apologize for, Scully. Nothing.” 

     The silence settles around them. Mulder feels his pulse at his fingertips, the warm skin of her throat under his hand, hears the soft whisper of her breath.

     Please, please don’t let her pull away…

     “Scully…look at me,” his voice cracks, pleading.

     Her eyes open to him, always to him.

     “Did you mean it when you said we were a mistake? Because if you did…I’ll walk away. No questions asked. But you have to be able to look me in the eye and tell me you believe it.”

     His request is so honest, so vulnerable, it takes her breath.

     She studies his face, familiar after so many years together. The lines around his eyes have deepened, the creases in his brow more pronounced, his temples peppered with gray. He’s weathered, scarred, but still handsome…and still hers.

     “No,” she says, softly. “I didn’t mean it, Mulder.”

     She reaches out to touch him, her fingers drawn to his brow, across to the scar at his temple, down to the corner of his lips. His eyes close at this simple, intimate gesture as her hand comes around to rest lightly on his cheek. The stubble at his jaw is rough, scratching her palm. He reaches behind her to cup her neck, pulling her close. Their lips touch lightly, and for a moment he fears she’ll turn away.

     She doesn’t. The kiss is light, sweet, heartbreaking, making her stomach clench with a warm, pleasurable heat.

     His hand comes down to rest on her hip, sliding over it, downward…but then he jerks away, looking down, brow furrowed.

     She pulls back in alarm. “What…?”

     “Scully…where’s the gun?”

     She blinks, her brain foggy from the kiss. Gun?

     “Oh! It was here…” she checks the back pocket of her jeans, then the other, but they’re both empty. She looks down and around their feet, around the fire, maybe it fell…

     Shit! How could she be so careless?

     Mulder’s staring at her, concerned, an uneasy realization setting in. She meets his eyes, but she already knows what he’s thinking.

     Isaac.

     Mulder stands as quickly as he can, walks over to the tent. “Isaac? You there buddy?”

     No response. Scully’s heart beats wildly against her ribs in a panicked throb, the blood in her veins turns to ice.

     “Isaac? Coming in…” Mulder says, unzipping the tent flap, but it’s clear the boy isn’t here.

     He turns back to his partner, eyes wide. “Do you think he…”

     “He heard us,” she says, weakly, confirming their shared fear.

     There’s no time to waste. He reaches into the tent to grab the flashlights, tossing one to Scully. “He won’t get far. Come on.”

     Isaac lays in the tent, trying without success to ignore the sinking feeling in his stomach. Something is wrong. The agents are talking quietly, but he can’t make out specifics.

     It’s about me, though. Always about the freak.

     There’s something they haven’t told him. They’re arguing about it now, the same back and forth bickering he’s heard since they woke up this morning. He considers listening in, reading their thoughts, but something holds him back. Something she said to him before…

     …there are some things you can’t un-learn…

     He shifts, turning on his side, restless. What had Mulder said about aliens? Spaceships? Jesus, what a nutcase.

     He feels the same cold chill as if waking up from one of his nightmares, sees a brief flash of the trees with their blackened tops, the strange voices he’d heard when they were searching for Mulder…

     And now they’re going to abandon him, surrender him to the FBI. He doesn’t want to admit to himself the hurt he feels at being left.

     Screw it, he thinks. I need to know.

     His mind opens, searching, listening. Fragments come to him, powerful emotions, sorrow and angst.

     They’re thinking about William again.

     …shouldn’t have given him up…couldn’t keep him safe…

     Isaac listens more intently now, trying to tease apart their thoughts, to focus. Why did they give William up? Was he special, like me?

     “What if I adopted him?”

     Isaac blinks, concentration broken, unsure if she’s speaking or if he’s heard her thoughts, they’re too deeply entwined.

     Adopt me? Why would she adopt me?

     It makes no sense.

     …can’t hide the truth…can’t change the past…

     Hide what truth? Change what past? He’s desperate, grasping at the edges of some greater understanding, so close to the answers, so focused his head aches with the effort.

     He needs to know he’s our son.

     Mulder’s thought is so clear, it’s as though the man is speaking in his ear. Isaac’s eyes snap open, staring wide.

     No, that’s not possible…

     But it begins to make sense. His head spins as the final pieces click neatly into place. How they found him, why they care, how they seem to know so much about him…

     They think I’m William.

     He opens the tent flap a crack, pressing his face to the opening, trying to see them. He catches bits and pieces of their thoughts mixed with spoken conversation.

     “I’m sorry…for giving up our son…”

     She’s distraught, Isaac can feel her panic rising like a high tide, but they’re talking about something else, their thoughts have turned back to each other.

     Blood rushes in his ears, his cheeks flush in anger.

     They lied to me. They’ve been lying to me all along. They don’t care about me. If they did, they wouldn’t give me to the FBI. They wouldn’t leave me. My parents never would have left me. My mom would have told me…

     His mind fumbles. Should he run? Should he confront them? What if they’re trying to kidnap him? What if they’re part of the project?

     As if in answer to some dark, unspoken prayer, his eyes fall upon the gun, which lays on the ground in front of him, not five feet from the tent.

     They must have dropped it…

     Without thinking, he reaches for it. The agents are standing, facing each other, they don’t see him.

     I’ll take the gun and…and what? Shoot them?

     Not like you need a weapon, Isaac, a cold voice answers back. He pictures his mother advancing on him with shadowy persistence, her hands flickering in the dark, reaching out to close around his throat, his own hands reaching back, pulsing with energy…

     Don’t shoot them, the cold voice whispers, throaty and hypnotic. You’re the freak, Isaac. You’re the one they’re after. Remove yourself and remove the problem. No more accidents, no more cares, no more monsters.

     He swallows salt water and phlegm, and realizes he’s crying, the tears rolling silently down his cheeks. Wiping his hands across his face, he clutches the gun to his chest, stifling a sob.

     The former agents are absorbed in their argument. They don’t see Isaac crawl out of the tent and make his way back into the forest.

     “Isaac! Isaac, where are you?”

     They stop, listening, but there’s no response.

     He’ll freeze to death out here…if he doesn’t accidentally shoot himself first…

     Scully concentrates on the sounds around her, swallowing her fear, the beam of her flashlight penetrating the growing darkness ahead. Mulder is on her left, still clutching the walking stick for support, calling out to him over and over.

     “Isaac!”

     She hears a rustling, something crashing through the brush. “Mulder—there!” She swings the flashlight toward the sound, somewhere off to her left.

     “Go, Scully, I’ll catch up.” He leans down, grimacing in pain. “This goddamn knee…”

     She doesn’t stop, making her way as fast as she can through thick growth. It comes again, a crashing, followed by a muffled sob. She’s closer. The flashlight beam bobs wildly as she stops, breathing hard, searching through a shadowy cluster of twisted branches and rocks…

     There! She can see the faint outline of his shoulder, the blue of the boy’s jacket as he leans against a large tree.

     “Isaac? Talk to me, Isaac! Are you hurt?”

     “No! Get away from me!”

     He’s hoarse, but at least he’s no longer running. She can hear Mulder in the distance behind her.

     She approaches slowly, cautious, scanning for the gun. Not that he needs it, she thinks. He could take either of us if he wanted to…

     Suddenly it occurs to her how odd it is that he’s chosen this primitive weapon, given the power he wields.

     Unless…

     Fear grips her. “Isaac? Please, talk to me…are you OK?”

     “You lied to me!” the boy rages, breathing hard. “You…you…” he hiccups.

     “You’re right,” she says, moving slowly around the distraught boy in a wide arc, not wanting to startle him. “We should have told you the truth from the beginning.” She swallows with difficulty, her mouth full of cotton. She can almost see his face, and his head snaps around to look at her, eyes wide and terrified.

     She puts her hands up instinctively, even though he must know she’s unarmed. Her eyes dart down to find the gun dangling from his right hand, watches his grip on the butt tighten as she comes into view.

     “Please, Isaac. I…we’ll tell you anything you want to know. Please, put down the gun.”

     “I can’t trust you!” The words come out raw, all sharp edges.

     “I know. I know, and that’s my fault,” she whispers. She stops, standing less than ten feet away from the boy. From the corner of her eye she sees Mulder approaching with the same careful, calculated steps. “I didn’t mean to hurt you, Isaac, but I know I have…I don’t know what else to say, but I’m sorry.”

     “It’s not…it’s not true,” he whispers. “You’re not my…I wasn’t…”

     Scully swallows. “It’s true. I wish…I wish this were easier, I do.”

     “My mom wouldn’t lie to me! She never lied! Not like you! She’s…she…” but he’s sobbing, unable to continue.

     Scully feels her heart crack. “She didn’t know how to tell you. She didn’t mean to hurt you, she only wanted you to feel…loved. To give you a home. Your parents adopted you when you were ten months old.”

     “I don’t believe you!” The boy brings the gun upward, hands shaking; the barrel wavers back and forth, it’s obvious he doesn’t know how to handle it…which only makes this more dangerous.

     Mulder limps out of the trees to stand beside Scully, breathing hard with the effort, keeping his focus on Isaac. “It’s true, Isaac. I have proof, I can show you…if you’ll put the gun down.”

     Isaac considers this, still trembling, eyes shifting rapidly back and forth between the two agents.

     Scully glances over at her partner, confused. Proof?

     “I’m going to get my wallet. Nothing funny, just need to show you something…OK?” Mulder says, in the same even cadence she remembers from hostage negotiations, slowly raising his hands in the air, maintaining eye contact. He turns to the side so Isaac can see, and reaches into his back pocket. Scully feels herself grow faint, realizes she’s been holding her breath; it escapes from her lips in a nervous rush.

     Mulder flips open the faded leather wallet, digging into the recesses past old receipts and a crumpled five dollar bill that falls to the ground, until he pulls out a folded piece of paper Scully doesn’t recognize. It crinkles as he opens it, aged and torn along the creases.

     “I saved this, Isaac…I’ve kept it for years,” he says, unsteady. “I want you to see it.”

     He holds it out to the boy. Scully cranes her neck, but she can’t see Mulder’s offering, can’t imagine what it might be.

     What the hell is he doing?

     Isaac sets his jaw, defiant, but uncertain. “I’ll look…but I’m not letting go of the gun.”

     Mulder nods, eyes downcast, still holding out the ragged paper. Isaac steps forward carefully, enough to reach for the paper before snatching it out of Mulder’s grasp and retreating back against the tree, unfolding the scrap with tentative, shaking fingers.

     They watch the boy’s face as he holds it, stares at it for several seconds.

     Mulder clears his throat. “Scully sent me that picture…of you…when we were apart. Do you recognize it?”

     She looks at Mulder, lips parting in surprise as she catches a glimpse of the photo from a distance. She remembers sending Mulder a handful of pictures of William via email during their forced separation, but she had no idea he’d kept one. 

     It’s a tattered copy of the one she saw in the boy’s home, the framed photo on the hearth.

     She knew Mulder grieved for their son in his own way, but he’d been so stoic; this unexpected sentimentality is both bewildering and touching. She stares at her partner in shock.

     Isaac looks at the photo, then at Mulder, then back at the photo. “You…you could have gotten this anywhere…it doesn’t prove anything…” but they can tell by his expression that his determination is wavering.

     We’re getting through, she realizes, faint hope filling her chest. 

     “Your birthday was March 13th, 11:07 p.m.” Scully hears herself speak, but her voice sounds distant. “You weighed 7 pounds, 10 ounces. You had…you had light brown hair, but it got darker. Your eyes were gray, but they changed when you were six months old…now they’re blue,” she swallows, “like mine.”

     She can picture him vividly, remembering how he looked when he was first born, the glow of the lanterns in the abandoned cabin filling the room with warm light, the sweat dripping from her face, the pain already fading to a haze as Agent Reyes places the sweet, squalling bundle in her arms.

     She wills him to read her mind at this moment, to see for himself the image she sees, to feel what she feels, fear and joy tightly entwined, emotion so powerful she can’t describe it in words.

     You were mine, once.

     He’s staring at her. “You could have…I mean, you have a file on me, any of that information could be there already…” he whispers, but the gun has dropped back to his side, his eyes are glistening.

     “Your name was William,” she continues. “William Scully. You were named after your grandfather. Both grandfathers, actually,” she whispers, her throat raw. She feels Mulder reach out, touching her shoulder in support.

     There’s a weighty pause, but the gun remains clutched in the boy’s hand. In the other he holds the photo, the paper crumpled into a sweaty palm, proof of his past.

     “Isaac,” says Mulder. “It’s not worth this. We’ll tell you whatever you want to know. We’ll take you home, if that’s what you want. No more secrets. Just…put it on the ground.”

     He’s not going to do it, it’s too much, he won’t do it. Scully’s mind races, but nothing useful surfaces; only this frantic, powerless panic. A panic of waiting.

     His knuckles go white as his hand tightens around the weapon, relaxes, and tightens again; a nervous spasm. Part of him is frightened, cornered, and wants to run. The other part, the part that knows he is different, and has always been different, is curious.

     He can hear them in his mind; the partners don’t realize it, but they’re thinking the same thing.

     Please let it go. Let it go.

     So he does.

     Scully feels her knees go weak with relief as Isaac bends down, rests the gun gingerly on the damp earth, and takes a shaky step back. There are tears shining on his cheeks but his voice is strong. “I…I want to know everything. From the beginning.”

     “Everything,” she agrees without hesitation. “We’ll go back, we’ll make a fire. We’ll talk. Everything. OK?”

     Isaac doesn’t respond, just walks away, plodding toward camp with all the enthusiasm of a prisoner facing execution. Scully watches this with a mixture of relief and uncertainty, hoping that what they offer will bring him peace and not anguish.

     “You did good,” Mulder says under his breath, squeezing her shoulder. His face reveals similar worries, though, and his attempt to reassure her falls flat.

     She looks to where Isaac is already making his way back. “Did I? God, I hope so,” she whispers. She moves over to the tree where the boy stood only moments before, threatening his very life, and picks up the gun with a shaking hand.

     “He’ll come around. The truth can be hard to swallow…and we just handed him a horse pill.”

     She purses her lips but doesn’t reply, only holds out her arm, letting Mulder lean against her as they make their way through the darkness, following Isaac’s lead.

     He watches as she goes for the first aid kit, shakes out four ibuprofen, placing them in his palm. He pops the pills in his mouth, crunching them to a fine, bitter powder.

     “I wish we had ice to take the swelling down,” she frets, grabbing her sleeping bag, unrolling it, wrapping it around Mulder’s shoulders.

     “I’ll be fine, Scully. We have other things to worry about,” he murmurs, tilting his head toward the boy, who sits across from him. The intensity in his eyes is as familiar as Mulder’s own reflection, his pale skin translucent in the cold light of a camp lantern. Scully grabs another blanket, unfolding it for him, but he rejects the comfort with a terse shake of his head. 

     She turns her attention to the fire pit, nursing the abandoned flames back to life, before finally taking a seat next to Mulder.

     “So what do you want to know?”

     The first question tumbles from his lips without hesitation. “How do I know you’re telling the truth?”

     “You don’t,” Scully replies, the best answer she can give. “We’ve shown you everything we have. I have memories…you could read them if you wanted, if it would help.”

     If this intrigues him, it doesn’t show. He’s not so easily distracted. “Are you from the project?”

     “No! No, nothing like that,” she pauses. “As FBI agents, we uncovered conspiracies like Project Ultimam. We worked to expose them and the men responsible, to bring justice…to find the truth,” She looks at Mulder, but he’s staring into the firelight, dazed. “But I don’t know that we were successful.”

     “So what do you want from me, then? Why did you bring me out here?” The boy’s hands are clenched into fists on his knees, trembling slightly. She wishes he’d take the blanket that sits at his feet.

     “We want to protect you, Isaac. That’s all I’ve ever wanted.”

     “You don’t want to…to take me?”

     She shakes her head. “We wouldn’t try to take you from your family—because they were your family, Isaac. We’re just the…the genetic material,” she whispers. It’s true, as much as it hurts to say it. “I don’t want to replace your mother, or Mulder your father. You have to believe that we had your best interests at heart. We only wanted to make sure you were safe.”

     “Why didn’t you tell me before?”

     Scully presses her lips together. “I didn’t want to burden you, given everything you’d been through…with the attacks, your mother…but I know now that was a mistake. I should have told you.” She looks him in the eye. “And there’s no excuse, no apology I can offer that would make that right. But I’m sorry.”

     He glares at her, the quiet between them stretched taut. “My mom…did she know?”

     Scully nods. “I told her who we were shortly before she passed. I hoped she would tell you, but she didn’t have the chance. I think she would have, in time.”

     His eyes go cloudy and he looks down, hiding tears, the grief for his lost mother palpable. She wants to reach out to him and hold him, but it would be wrong.

     “Why did you give me up?”

     Mulder speaks, surprising them both. “Because we were afraid for your life. Our jobs were dangerous, the secrets we uncovered were well-guarded…secrets that were never meant to see the light of day.” His voice rumbles in a soothing monotone. “Things got out of control shortly after you were born. I went into hiding. You were attacked. You were at risk, so Dana made the decision to give you up for protective adoption while I was in hiding.” He looks over at her, swallows. “It was the right decision.”

     Isaac frowns. “But I still don’t understand. Why? Why did they come for me?”

     Mulder opens his mouth, closes it again, looks at Scully, who’s staring at her hands. Her voice is low and strained when she speaks. “You’ve had your powers since you were born, Isaac. They made you a target. Why you were born this way…that’s harder to explain. I don’t honestly know if I can. But…I can tell you what I know.

     “Early on in my career, I was abducted, had experiments and tests performed on me against my will. I was left barren. Do you know what that means?” She looks up at the boy.

     “It means you couldn’t have a baby…right?”

     She nods, tries to keep her tone clinical and scientific. “They placed a microchip in the back of my neck,” she reaches back, absently fingering the small metal chip just under the skin. “They harvested my ova…used them to create children without my knowledge…genetically altered clones.”

     His eyes widen. “Clones…you mean like Project Ultimam?”

     “An earlier incarnation of the project,” she agrees. “They were efficient at covering their tracks, burying the evidence. I had a daughter…she would have been your half-sister…but…she didn’t survive.”

     Scully ducks her head, and Mulder feels a surreal shift as he watches his partner relive what he knows to be one of her most painful memories. The past is flooding in and they’re powerless to stop it.

     She regains her composure after only a few seconds; the onslaught in recent days has left her dry, her reserves have been all but used up.

     “Several years later, we investigated a series of abductions. Former abductees were being taken up, and there was concern I would be, too. But Mulder was abducted instead,” she pauses, swallows, finds it difficult to continue. They don’t talk about those days, the darkest ones of all; the months of searching, only to have Mulder returned to her a corpse. She can still recall the feel of cold earth in her hands, the hollow pattering as it fell on his casket after they lowered him into the ground. 

     “I discovered I was pregnant with you the day he was taken,” her voice drops to a whisper. “It was the best and worst day of my life.”

     Mulder places his hand on the small of her back, tracing gentle, reassuring circles.

     She continues with a slight smile. “You were a miracle, Isaac. Which made it that much harder to give you up.”

     The boy studies her, absorbing what she’s said with an unnatural stoicism. “Is that…is that why I’m…why I can do what I do?”

     Mulder clears his throat. “We think…at least I think…that your abilities stem from a combination of genetic mutations, the result of our experiences. We’ve been exposed to a number of unexplainable things, the most damaging of which was a…a virus. An alien virus. We know very little about what it did to us…or to you.”

     “Isaac, I don’t want you to think that…that you weren’t wanted,” Scully interjects. “Because you were. And you were loved.”

     Her partner nods in silent confirmation, staring at the worn photograph still clutched in Isaac’s hand.

     “Had I known what they did…how they used you…” but she can’t finish this thought.

     What’s done is done.

     Isaac sits, rigid and stone-faced, the silence spiraling out from the core of their small group like a snake choking the life from its prey. Mulder finds himself wishing the boy would speak, even if it’s to scream, to curse at them and tell them how much he hates their guts; anything but silence.

     When he finally speaks, it’s without any acknowledgment of what has transpired. “So, uh, what do we do now?”

     “We’ll head out at first light. We’ll go to the nearest Bureau branch, turn ourselves in.” A weight feels like it’s lifted off her shoulders at these words.

     No more running.

     “What will they do to you? Won’t they, you know, arrest you or something?” Isaac asks.

     Scully thinks of Skinner and Doggett. “I think our contacts can help us avoid any extreme consequences. Don’t worry about us, though, OK?”

     He nods, looks down.

     “We’ll stay with you, if you want. But…you’ll be better off in the Bureau’s care.”

     If she thought the boy looked mature for his age before, he looks ten years older now. 

     But at least he knows the truth. I hope that’s enough.

     He nods, fidgets, bites at his lip. “Hey, is it OK if I have some, uh, privacy? I need some time…to think.”

     Mulder and Scully exchange a look; his hand slides to her back, checking for the gun, reassured to find it tucked into her belt. “Yeah, sure kid. I don’t think Scully will mind if I share her tent tonight. We’ll be here if you need us.”

     “K. Well…g’night,” says Isaac without fanfare, already retreating.

     “Think he’ll be OK?” Scully whispers, watching the boy’s shadow from the soft glow of the blue tent.

     “Kids are resilient, or so I’ve heard,” Mulder replies, putting his arm around her. “I’m not sure ‘finding out your bio-parents gave you telepathy’ is a common milestone, but it can’t be worse than puberty.”

     She snorts. They sit in comfortable silence for a few moments, huddled against the air’s bitter chill. The wind has picked up, perhaps signaling an oncoming storm, but Mulder’s arm is warm and solid. She senses a shift, a lightening, as though a dark cloud has lifted.

     Maybe the worst is behind us.

     Something niggles at the back of her mind, but they’ve been running too long, her thoughts are fuzzy.

     “Mulder?”

     “Yeah?”

     “I didn’t know you kept that photo.” There’s no accusation in her words, but a certain expectation lingers. She’s probing for an explanation.

     “Yeah. Well.” He sucks in an icy breath, exhales. “Didn’t want to make things harder for you.”

     “Since when?” she shoots back, a half smile on her lips. “You’ve spent the last twenty years making life difficult for me, Mulder.”

     His smile is broad, then sad; a bulb burning brightly in its last second of life. “I’ve done a lot of things I’m not proud of, Scully…you’ve witnessed a lot of those things,” he pauses, drawing a breath. “But…I could look at him, look at our son, and know that if the rest of the world went to hell today, if I left nothing else behind, I had two things I could be proud of: You…and him.”

     She feels her throat close up; maybe her reserves are not completely dry after all. He hugs her to his side until her deep sigh ends their brief reverie.

     “It’s late. I’m going to bed.”

     “Speaking of sleeping arrangements, kid has my sleeping bag,” Mulder says good-naturedly. “Guess we’ll have to share.”

     She cocks an eyebrow. “Why do I get the feeling you aren’t disappointed about that?”

     He grins as they make their way to her tent. It’s a tight fit, jackets and all, but soon they’re squeezed into her sleeping bag, limbs entwined. His body is warm against hers, and for the first time in several months, she feels at ease.

     Well, somewhat at ease.

     They still have to get out of here…and there’s that something, that nagging worry…but it will wait ‘til tomorrow. She snuggles deeper into the covers, letting the rhythm of Mulder’s pulse soothe her. How long has it been since they’ve been this close? Too long. She pulls up her legs slightly, tucking them around his tall frame, eliciting an abrupt yelp from her partner.

     “…eeeAHHH! Scully, cold feet! God, woman, it’s a wonder you can walk around on those things.”

     She giggles, and it’s the most cheerful sound he’s heard all week, like music, lilting and melodic. She doesn’t pull away.

     “I have socks on!”

     “Oh, really? Then why does it feel like I have ten little toe-shaped ice cubes between my knees?”

     She smirks against his chest, drowsy. “Dunno, Mulder, maybe you need to grow a thicker skin.”

     “Evolutionarily speaking, you might be right. Y’know, some cavemen were covered in thick, coarse body hair to protect their skin from sub-zero temperatures. Maybe I need to grow a pelt…”

     She snorts against his chest, but she’s used to this, his strange variation on pillow talk. “Gross.”

     He smiles. His hand searches for hers under the cover, finds it, entangles their fingers.

     “Hey, Scully?”

     “Mmmyeah?” She’s groggy, almost asleep, his lips tickle at her ear.

     “It didn’t rain sleeping bags…and I still got lucky.”

     “Goodnight, Mulder.”

     Her partner quiets, as does she, and her mind begins its long, spiraling loop into sleep. She’s drifting, lulled by the sound of Mulder’s soft breathing mingled with her own, and the whistle and clack of branches as the trees sway in the wind.

     The trees, something about the trees…

     She gasps and jerks awake as the nag bleeds through her subconscious and bursts forth.

     The trees! The burns, that residue. We’re not alone…they’re watching…

     Her mouth goes dry, remembering the piece of charred black bark, still tucked in Mulder’s jacket pocket, now pressed between them, a grim souvenir. Between Isaac’s disappearance and their emotionally fraught conversation, she’d forgotten about Mulder’s discovery in the woods, but now the memory won’t let her sleep. And while the rational part of her, the part she clings to like a life raft in times of duress, tells her it could well be lightning or a fire or even tree beetles, her subconscious knows better.

     She believes, because she has seen too many unbelievable things not to.

     One night. We just have to make it through one night, and we’ll leave this godforsaken place tomorrow.

     This does little to calm her nerves, but she forces herself to relax, to slow her breath and steady her heart, and eventually sleep takes her.

     Isaac lays with his hands behind his head, staring at the ceiling of his tent as though he might burn a hole through it. Given the speed at which his mind is churning, that’s not outside the realm of possibility tonight.

     He swallows, feeling a dry click in the back of his throat, listening but no longer hearing. Mulder and Scully retired to the smaller pup tent some time ago; he could hear them talking, but he realized with some detachment that he’s no longer interested in what they have to say. The secret is out; the rest is white noise.

     There’s too much to process, too many new facts to reconcile with his old life, which now seems unreal, like something that happened in a dream. Less than a week ago his biggest problem was making it through the halls of his crummy middle school without being noticed.

     Tonight he is a new person.

     He believes what they’ve told him is true…but he doesn’t know what it means yet; for him, or his future. Youth has the inherent disadvantage of being unable to look forward, and for all his genius and ability, Isaac finds himself rooted firmly in the present.

     He’s convinced he won’t be able to sleep now, not after tonight, but biology cares little for matters of the spirit, and he’s been without rest for too long. When he finally allows his eyes to slip shut, they stay closed, and soon he’s breathing deeply.

     He dreams.

     He’s running again, through woods all too familiar, but now it’s night. The black, soggy mud pulls at his feet, pulling him down, down, slowing him, each step takes enormous effort.

     He can hear yelling up ahead, he needs to get to them, to the agents this time; he needs to save them. He’s coming up on the clearing and knows instinctively this is where they will be, the rocky expanse with the giant gray mass overhead.

     A foreign tongue licks at his mind, uttering a language he doesn’t understand, making his head hurt. He tries to block it, but he’s a body invaded, overpowered, he’s disoriented; his movements too slow and clumsy, he’s not going to make it in time.

     But he does, finally, stumbling into the clearing, onto his hands and knees, scraping his palms on the rock. It, too, dissolves beneath him, revealing a lake of black oil…but the oil moves of its own volition, like tentacles snaking their way up his legs, his arms, engulfing him.

     “NO!” he screams, falling backwards, scrabbling for purchase on the uneven ground. Ahead he can see the agents standing in their solemn circle of light, staring up at the vast gray sky above them, waiting. Isaac stands, stepping away from the strange oily lake, screaming their names until his throat is raw with the effort.

     The man finally looks toward him, but it’s her hand, her stark white hand like a claw clutching at the man’s bicep, that sends Isaac into a panic.

     Now they’re going to…oh god please no…

     Blinding light floods the clearing, eating everything in sight; he can hear them screaming, the terrified sounds mingling with the tongues in his head, a symphony of agony.

     He falls back to his knees, clutching his skull, his mouth open as if to scream.

     This is when I wake up, I’ll wake up now and everything will be OK, I’ll wake up now, wake up, WAKE UP, WAKE UP GODDAMN IT

     But he doesn’t wake, he’s watching the agents as their bodies rise up, up, up, lifted into the air by an unseen force, mouths wide open in a grimace of horror. Shadows dance at the edges of his peripheral vision, creatures closing in, forming a circle around him. He can see Mulder and Scully frozen in mid-air, only to disappear, obliterated in the light.

     No…no…

     Hopeless, Isaac falls to his knees as the gray mass disappears in a hot wind, leaving only the shadows to consume him, eating him, one bite after another, ripping and tearing at his tender flesh with sharp teeth and claws.

     He wakes, trembling and feeling like he might vomit. His body is slick with sweat, cold air against his damp skin.

     This time is different. This time he can remember each vivid, gruesome detail—the teeth, the burning of tearing flesh, the grating crunch of bone and tendon separating…

     He shudders, wrapping his arms around himself, teeth chattering. He wishes he hadn’t requested to sleep alone tonight; even Mulder’s snoring would be better than suffering the aftermath of this wretched dream alone. 

     He reaches out with his mind, searching for them, seeking the comfort of another’s presence, but there’s only dead air.

     Where are they?

     He listens, casting a wider mental net, but finds nothing.

     No, wait…there’s something. A gravelly whisper, not a language he recognizes…he remembers his dream, the rasping of shadows against his skin, their insistent, pattering tongue filling his head. A terrible fear creeps up his spine, cold fingers settling at the back of his neck.

     There’s something out there.

     Ignoring the chill in the air, he throws off the sleeping bag, scrambling out of the tent. As he’d feared, the door to the other tent is wide open and snapping angrily in the wind; the fire is dead, the agents are nowhere in sight.

     But he can hear them in his mind. So faint, so distant…

     Like Mom.

     His heart races, the nightmares rushing back in a flood of gruesome horror as he feels his feet taking him north. He runs, the ground beneath him wet, the air sour with the smell of tar mixed with burning flesh.

     The stars from earlier this evening are gone, replaced by a flat expanse of gray-black. But he doesn’t dare stop to look up, to think too carefully about what might explain the strange matte sky. If he does, he might lose what little grasp on sanity he has left.

     This is a dream, just another horrible dream. I’ll wake up in my tent, and tomorrow we’ll go home. Home…

     He wants to believe this so badly, this oasis of thought in a desert of terror, that he stops running, leans against the trunk of a tree, gasping for breath.

     There’s the steadily increasing buzz of voices mewling in his head now, blocking out rational thought, making him fuzzy, disoriented. He reaches down, pinching his forearm, letting the fingernails dig into the flesh hard enough to bring blood.

     This isn’t real. You’re dreaming. Wake up! WAKE UP!

     A scream interrupts his reverie, a shrill, piercing wail. Scully’s voice is calling his name, calling for help. They’re much closer.

     It’s real, Isaac. You have to save them.

     Now it’s his father’s voice—his adoptive father, he reminds himself, an uncomfortable twist in his gut.

     He uses his mind again, reaching out, concentrating…there. He takes off, following a northwestern path through the brush, in pursuit of their screams.

     His foot wedges itself into the earth, catching beneath a root, and his left sneaker slides off with a rough tug. He stumbles, hands planted in the muck of rotting leaves and stained earth, feeling the slick, black slime oozing between his fingers, shuddering at an overpowering wave of déjà vu.

     No time, keep going!

     There’s a faint glow ahead, and he knows instinctively what he’ll find—the clearing of rocks, the shadows waiting, the agents standing in the center, gazing upward at the mass above them, as if in worship. He pushes off the ground, back to his feet.

     He can feel their panic rising as he approaches, their shouts and cries joining the mad chorus in his head. There’s a stabbing pain above his right temple. He hesitates, remembering the nightmare, remembering the feeling of flickering shadows on his flesh, his death is imminent…

     Leave them! Leave them, they lied to you anyway, what do you care? Get the hell out of here!

     Instinct is callous, apathetic. It cares only for the being it inhabits, for the body’s survival, and now it takes all of Isaac’s will to ignore it. The thought is tempting, so tempting; he swallows, gasping and heaving.

     They’re the key to his past, these two strangers, but some deep part of him knows they are also the key to his future.

     The last few days have reduced him to nothing—no family, no home, no expectation of safety. But these two people are here, and they can guide him.

     If he believed in such things, he might call it fate. 

     They can teach him. He’s certain of that now.

     They can…but they must survive, Isaac.

     His father’s voice again, rising above the din, a balm to his aching head.

     Courage, son. You have everything you need at your fingertips. You can control it.

     Taking a deep breath, Isaac pushes ahead, prepared to defend his future by protecting his past.

     Next to him, Scully is also walking. He can sense her in his peripheral vision, the dull glow of her hair in the faint light. They’re in the forest, and the terrain looks strangely familiar.

     So real…

     He tries to turn his head, but can’t. He’s trapped, his body lumbering along against its will. His knee is killing him, twisting at an odd angle with each painful step…but he can’t stop, can’t will himself to turn around. Fear rises within him, clawing at the back of his throat.

     What’s happening to me?

     He tries to look at Scully, catches a brief glimpse of her face, sees the same hazy fear in her eyes. She’s moving with jerky steps, eyelids heavy.

     Dear God let me wake up now…

     He doesn’t like it, doesn’t like it one bit, the sensation of being present in mind but out of control of his body. It takes the sharp pain in his knee growing stronger for him to realize he’s not dreaming at all, this is happening, and in a laughable sort of panic he tries to remember the protocol for an abduction scenario.

     Calm down. Look around. Figure out why.

     Unfortunately his training didn’t teach him how to negotiate an invisible captor with full motor control over its victim.

     Must have missed that course at Quantico.

     He glances around for landmarks, hoping to get a sense of where they’re headed (where we’re being taken) but every craggy tree looks the same, every rock could be familiar if looked at from a certain angle in the right light. He concentrates, trying to force his mouth to form words, but all he can manage is a zombie-like grunt.

     Damnit.

     He stumbles, the knee twisting again, but this time there’s a dull popping sensation, followed by agony, rippling and clawing mercilessly at his leg. He screams soundlessly, lips pulled back from his teeth in a snarl, and the world goes dark again.

#

     She wakes to damp cloth against her skin, the sting of sweat on her brow, and bitter, angry cold. She squints against the light, mind fuzzy from sleep.

     Damnit, Mulder, you stole the blanket again…

     But there are no blankets, no cozy bed, no tent. She’s standing in the midst of a great rocky expanse, in nothing but ripped sweats and a t-shirt, freezing, her skin slick with dirt and mud. Her eyes open wider in growing alarm.

     How did we get here? Where’s Isaac?

     Mulder is standing in front of her, staring at her, dazed, but he doesn’t speak.

     Mulder? Mulder!

     She tries to call his name, but finds she can’t speak, either; her lips won’t move. She’s frozen in place, her fingers clutched onto his arm, but she can only manage a tiny squeeze. His arms tremble violently under her hand, his skin as icy as her own. Mulder’s eyes meet hers, lids heavy, his face a deep ashen blue-gray. There’s a pained groan from his lips, barely discernible above the rushing white noise of their surroundings. She registers his growing terror as he comes to, realizing where they are. From the corner of her eye, she can see his leg is grotesque, swollen and bloody, dangling at an odd angle below the knee. Her mind falls back to medicine, rattling off each useless diagnosis even as the rational part of her knows it makes no difference.

     Torn ACL, possible fracture. Hypothermia. Exposure.

     The cold is the least of their problems now.

     Oh God, what’s happening to us?

     Her eyes are wild, seeking the source of power that holds her in its grasp, controlling her, but all she finds are shadows. They dance, merging in and out around them, near and far, an ever-shifting wall of gray against the deep ebony of the forest.

     Shadows, flickering…like black flames…

     Increasing panic overtakes her as she begins to scream, her mind beating itself against the prison of her body like a fledgling bird in its cage. She flashes back to another time, so distant and yet so similar, in a bleak white place where strange faces hover and inflict pain without mercy.

     No! Not again!

     Her head turns upward without assent, eyes registering the underside of some great metallic gray mass; it beckons to them from above, drawing them closer, closer. She feels her feet lifting, rising above the ground, dangling uselessly from her body as she clings to Mulder, who shrinks from the bright light that surrounds them as they rise higher and higher over the clearing.

     Oh God please not again, please no no

     She can’t move, can’t run, can’t do anything but scream inside herself, silence meeting silence.

     Isaac! Where’s Isaac?

     He’s not with them; she can’t see him, can’t turn her head to look around. Maybe he’s already been taken. But maybe…just maybe…

     She can’t control her body, but she can still control her mind. She calls for the boy, directing her thoughts outward, praying he’ll hear her cries for help before it’s too late.

     The shadows are many, bodies of negative space that shift and morph like flames in a wide circle around the rocky expanse. He sees Scully and Mulder in the distance, heads upturned toward the massive craft. Her hand clutches at Mulder’s arm, the fingers ghostly white, images from his dream flooding back to collide with reality.

     White. Blood red.

     The voices in his head are thick, making it difficult to see, to concentrate. He loses his footing, falls, feels his head split neatly open at the temple, blood gushing onto the stones in a red-black river.

     Closer, Isaac, you need to get closer.

     But I’ll kill them! I can’t—

     You can control it, his father’s voice repeats, so still, so calm. You have to try, son.

     His hands burn with it, and he writhes on the ground, a ticking bomb. The shadows are closing in, reaching for him, drawing on his strength, his energy; he feels himself go limp.

     Isaac!

     The boy grunts, squinting, looking upward, her shape familiar against the night sky; she’s screaming, forever screaming into the night wind. Mulder’s body is lifeless now, his head lolls forward, unconscious.

     Light floods the clearing like an explosion from the sky. The agents’ black, shadowy outlines imprint themselves on his retinas as he shuts his eyes against a sea of never-ending white.

     “NO!” He can feel Mulder and Scully begin to dissolve into the light like fading pixels on a screen. Darkness threatens to overtake him as the voices in his mind reach a shattering crescendo.

     Isaac rolls onto his back, groans, fighting the forces that consume him. The shadows brush against his body, their feathery arms of death prickling his skin like cold, unearthly fire.

     He calls up a memory that does not belong to him; a glowing room in a strange cabin, the woman holding a baby, cradling him, the warm, slick weight against her chest. He can sense her fear…but there is also joy, so much joy. The feeling spreads, fills him with determination; this is his memory now, too.

     Can’t…stop…

     He struggles to his feet, weaving unsteadily as he tries to bring his vision into focus. His hands move outward as he concentrates, ignoring the awful pain, the voices, and he utters a silent prayer to a god he doesn’t believe in.

     This is for my father, my mother. This is for the two who brought me into this world. For my future.

     He feels the energy pulsing through him, feels the shadows recoil as it moves around him, surrounding and protecting his body like a shield. He harnesses it, channelling it outward. Like the merry-go-round the park, rusty at the hinges but gradually gaining speed, momentum carries him; he struggles to contain his rising alarm at the force of his own strength.

     They’ll burn—

     No, they won’t.

     He takes a deep, shaking breath and sends the energy outward to Mulder and Scully, hovering in the sky like puppets on an invisible string, and pushes them away from the light. Suddenly they’re airborne, flying backward, then falling, falling, landing just out of sight. His heart hammers in his chest, hope flickering.

     But you’re not done yet, Isaac. Focus.

     He turns and closes his eyes, directing the energy at the shadows with greater force. The cacophony of shrieks in his head become indignant, their screams of agony rising above everything else, threatening to block out his thoughts, break his concentration.

     It’s working! Don’t…stop…

     The thought gives him hope, and he channels every last bit of strength outward until he is empty, drained, a shell. His vision goes dark, his body collapsing on the ground as his mind slips into blissful silence at last.

     No, not this again, I can’t I can’t go back to that place no no no NO NO…

     Something jolts her out of the trance. Her body jackknifes inward as an invisible force hits her in the stomach, her hands leave Mulder, and she’s flying, falling…

     She feels the crack of her ribs as they’re crushed against the rock, a piercing thud resonates deep within her chest. The pain is immediate and cruel, her vision goes dark.

     When she comes to, she can’t take a deep breath. Her ribs scream at the effort, there’s a dull whistling in her chest. She tries to shift her weight onto her elbow to sit up, but can’t move for the pain.

     Fractured ribs, probably a punctured lung, she thinks dully, stepping outside the pain to take stock, diagnose her crumbling body as though she were her own patient, all the while gasping in shallow, labored hiccups. She can see Mulder a few yards away. He’s on his side, bloody and unconscious…

     Is he really unconscious, Dana? Look…

     Through the haze of her own pain she watches his chest for the telltale signs of breath, but his body is unmoving…so frighteningly still.

     No…

     She can’t get enough air to speak, but utters a guttural moan of helplessness.

     No, he can’t be…please God…

     Small, twinkling lights bob to and fro in the darkness beyond Mulder’s lifeless body, she hears a voice calling her name.

     Isaac?

     She tries to bring her hand up to signal to the boy, but this incites fresh, raw fire within her chest; the arm falls uselessly to her side as she sobs in dry, aching hiccups.

     He’s dead, he’s dead, and I can’t even get to him…

     The voices grow closer, not Isaac’s, but deeper, a man’s voice. “Hey! Over here! Think we found ‘em!”

     Dark shapes surround Mulder’s body, and for a moment she thinks the shadow creatures have returned. Panic sets in, gripping her heart and squeezing with cold fingers.

     She manages a dry, rattling whisper, “No…no…”

     “Scully? That you?”

     She squints toward the familiar voice, barely able to make out Agent Doggett’s face, backlit by a sea of high beams.

     She tries to whisper Mulder’s name, to tell Doggett to take care of her partner, that he’s dying, but her lungs don’t have the strength.

     “Don’t try to talk, Dana, we got ya. Mulder’s…gonna be fine,” he mutters, glancing over his shoulder at the man’s crumpled body. Doggett stands, calls back to the rescue team. “Get a medic over here! NOW!”

     She sees more faces leaning over Mulder, working on him, watches them apply a mask, start chest compressions. She feels another mask being placed over her face, and breathes in short gasps of pure, sweet oxygen. Someone, probably Doggett, covers her with a heavy coat. She’s trembling violently, each spasm makes her chest ache, wave upon wave of pain crashing in on her, the world around her draped in gray as she struggles for consciousness.

     There’s shouting in the distance, cries of “We’ve got the boy!” but the rest of this exchange is lost as her body finally gives in to the shock, and her eyes slip shut.

3:35 P.M.

     When she wakes, it’s to a bright, warm light in a sunny hospital room, but her first waking thought is less than sunny.

     Mouth tastes like a dead animal.

     She gags, stomach churning, trying to get the thick, greasy taste of dried spit off her tongue.

     Where the hell am I?

     She tries to sit up, and everything comes back to her in a rush of miserable pain; the ship above them, the white light, the explosion that pushed her out of the sky, and Mulder’s dead body…

     “Whoa, easy does it, Doc.”

     Her heart leaps to hear her partner’s voice at her ear. She turns her head to find him sitting at her bedside, and in her drug-induced fog she wonders if she’s speaking to a ghost.

     “You…you were…”

     “Dead? Yeah, so I’m told,” he replies. “Pulled through, though. And not nearly as bad off as you,” he teases gently.

     “What…happened?”

     “Four broken ribs and a collapsed left lung. They had to open your chest. The doctor said you looked like a broken wind-up toy in there. I hope you don’t intend to take any professional advice from the guy about bedside manner, Scully,” he winces, shaking his head.

     “You were on a ventilator for a bit, but they took you off this morning, said you were breathing on your own. It’s really good to hear your voice,” he smiles, reaches out to take her hand.

     “And…you?” she whispers, throat raw, gesturing weakly for the thermos at her bedside. Mulder holds it up so she can sip the sweet, cool water.

     “Me? I’m just peachy.” 

     She shoots him a look, letting him know without words that he can’t dodge the question so easily.

     “Yeah, alright. My heart gave out after the fall, but they gave it a jumpstart. I have a torn right ACL, a busted forearm,” he holds up the cast, cradled in a sling, “and a bad back from sleeping in this damn hospital chair. Could be worse.”

     Leave it to Mulder to make light of heart failure.

     “Shouldn’t…you be in…bed?”

     “What, and miss you waking up all dopey on painkillers? Never.”

     She pinches her eyes shut in frustration; she’ll never understand how he can be so cavalier at times like this, how he can look over the precipice of death’s cliff and come back from the edge laughing.

     Mistaking her grimace for pain, he continues, “Speaking of painkillers, you’re due for another round of morphine. I’ll page the nurse.”

     She winces, shakes her head. No.

     “How…did they…”

     Mulder leans forward, finishing her sentence, and she’s grateful—it hurts to speak, she’s out of breath. “How did they find us? The Gunmen tipped off Skinner about reported UFO activity around Bonners Ferry. Skinner and Doggett strong-armed their way into the RCMP, sent a search team for us. Apparently the giant glowing light in the sky gave us away,” he finishes with a smirk. “Next time, I get to pick the camp site, k?”

     She fixes him with a narrow stare. “No…more…camping. Ever.”

     His grin widens, eyes liquid. “I’ll agree to that.”

     Something nags at the back of her mind, but it takes her drug-addled brain a moment to grasp it.

     “Oh! Isaac!” she gasps. “Where…?”

     Mulder sobers a bit at the mention of the boy’s name, lowering his voice. “Skinner took him. They’re going to place him in foster care, probably. They wouldn’t let me talk to him after I woke up, said they had to have all the evidence in place before they let us have contact with him again…if ever,” he finishes.

     The news hurts, but is not surprising. “He’s…safe?”

     Mulder nods. “Mostly unharmed. I think he’s going to be OK, Scully.”

     Their eyes meet, and she knows Mulder’s cheerful exterior is a facade, a face he’s putting on to protect her, to hide the distress that comes with losing their son again.

     “Mulder…” she wants to reach for him, to hold him, but doesn’t dare move for the tightness in her ribs, her stitches pulling taut around the sensitive skin. She settles for squeezing his hand.

     “He saved us, you know. Kid should have run screaming in the other direction, but…he came for us. Knocked us out of the sky, kept the darkness at bay until the Feds got there. And he covered for us when they brought him in for questioning, told them we were only trying to keep him alive. Whatever he is…whatever he thought…he saved us,” Mulder repeats, his face drawn.

     She’s quiet. Mulder’s fingers squeeze hers, watching her face for a reaction that doesn’t come. Eventually he sighs and stretches. “You should rest, you’re going to be here a while. All this talk is getting in the way of my flirting with the nurses,” he smiles, but the joke lacks his former enthusiasm. The circles under his eyes tell her he hasn’t left her side since she came out of surgery.

     Already she’s being pulled under by sleep and morphine, her mind drifting in a pillowy fog. She feels Mulder place a kiss on her forehead, hears him murmur “sleep tight” against her cheek.

     Scully pulls the beige afghan around her shoulders, shivering against the pile of pillows that surround her on their sofa. Winter came early this year and the house is drafty; not yet Christmas, and already there’s a thick layer of snow on the ground.

     Probably for the best, being stuck on the couch…who’d want to be out in this miserable weather, anyway?

     Truth is, she’d go out in a heartbeat if she could. Being laid up has given her plenty of time to think, and all the navel-gazing makes her moody.

     She thinks about Isaac, mostly…wondering if he’s OK, if he’s been placed with a family, if they’ll get to see him again.

     Skinner covered for them, citing extenuating circumstances as the reason for taking the boy north, insisting the whole affair was a miscommunication on his part, an undercover protective measure gone wrong. No charges were pressed, but they haven’t been allowed to see or speak with Isaac since Idaho. Doggett calls with semi-regular updates, and though it’s good to know he’s keeping an eye on the kid, it’s not enough.

     She’s seen for herself what she’s missed, had a glimpse of the life they might have had.

     You can’t go back.

     Mulder’s outrage comes in the form of dry humor as they discussed this over breakfast in the hospital cafeteria; he’d been released only a few days after the attack, but her recovery and physical therapy kept her in the hospital an additional week.

     “He’s been taken underground, Scully. They don’t want us to have access, we know too much. They’ll have the whole thing tied up with a pretty red bow in time for Christmas.” He picks at his toast without interest.

     Scully can’t help but think he’s right. Unsurprisingly, their copies of the Project Ultimam files, along with Mulder’s laptop, were nowhere to be found after the search team cleaned out their camp site. The digital copies have mysteriously disappeared from Mulder’s email accounts. She doesn’t know how the government found them, but it makes her think they’ve been watched more closely than either of them assumed.

     Mulder tosses his spoon down on the brown plastic tray, disgusted. “Funny how they’re so anal retentive about evidence until the evidence in question works against them, huh?”

     “Not like we haven’t been here before.”

     He sighs, pouts. “Yeah, but this time it’s different. We have no influence at the Bureau. Skinner can only get us so far, and we’ve cashed in any favors he might have tossed our way. We’ll be lucky if he takes our calls after this.”

     “So what are you thinking, Mulder?”

     He shrugs. “I dunno, Scully, just…venting.”

     She smiles into her coffee cup. Venting. They’d been doing more of that. She hadn’t realized how much hadn’t been said until they started talking.

     She ponders the many paths that led them here, to this table. She considers the forlorn look on her partner’s face as he stirs his coffee; for the first time they share in the same pain.

     She’d questioned her decision to give William up, but had she not, he might never have had a chance to cultivate his abilities. He might have been too weak, too young to save them…or himself.

     The adoption wasn’t perfect, but it bought him time.

     “Maybe we were never meant to have closure, Mulder. Maybe he came back into our lives for a different reason. He saved us…but he brought us together, too,” she whispers. “He reminded us why we’re together. That counts for something.”

     Mulder smiles a little, but without conviction. “Nice thought, I guess.”

     They sit in silence for a few minutes, the buzz of the cafeteria cloaking them in white noise.

     One of the things they haven’t talked about is them. Whatever deterioration of their relationship happened back in the woods has been lightly patched up, leaving them bent but not broken; soon it will be just another scar among many.

     “Mulder?”

     “Mmm.”

     “After what happened back there…who says they won’t come looking for us?”

     He nods as though he’s been waiting for this. “Nothing, really. We’re even more vulnerable, considering…but…”

     “But you don’t think they will.”

     “I think…I think they’re waiting for something bigger than us.” His face goes dark, the words heavy with unrest, but he doesn’t elaborate.

     She realizes, as a chill creeps lightly up her spine, that she doesn’t want to know.

     She sighs, restless, forcing herself back to the present, shifting against the pillows; it’s impossible to get comfortable. Worse, it’s impossible to escape her own thoughts.

     She reflects on the events of last month as though it were a dream, the details, with their sharp edges, clipped down to dull recollections. If her memory were a book, there would be ink smudges throughout, but she remembers enough to keep her awake at night.

     She can hear Mulder mulling about in his office, papers rustling, the occasional thunk of his leg brace on the rough pine floor, and she feels a rush of affection and annoyance in colliding waves.

     It had been an unspoken rule in their relationship to leave William in the past. Why had they carried the same burden for so many years, but grieved alone? And where had it brought them? To a place of resentment, stony silence, unable to move forward. So mired in the past that their future was murky at best.

     If this experience teaches her anything, it’s that the truth is not a destination, but a winding path, forever unfolding in front of them. The thought should give her peace, but the scientist in her aches for a tangible solution, a concrete end. They came so close; finding Isaac, learning about him, only to have him taken away.

     She’ll go back to work in a couple weeks, and it will be like none of this ever happened.

     Meanwhile, she’s left to sit on the couch while Mulder fusses about, treating her like a cracked porcelain doll, as though hers was the heart that stopped beating five weeks ago, not his. His recovery has been decidedly less dramatic, but that doesn’t stop her from waking in the night and struggling up the stairs to check for the steady rise and fall of his chest.

     She turns her attention to her partner; not hard to do, since he hasn’t left her side for more than fifteen minutes at a stretch. Save for sleep, the furthest he’s gone is to the end of their winding driveway, to check the mail and pick up the occasional delivery. 

     He’s accustomed to having the place to himself, but he seems all too pleased to share the couch she still, after so many years, thinks of as his. This is his retribution for all those times she practically had to pin him to his hospital bed after an injury—he’s obviously enjoying the turned tables.

     She, on the other hand, is not enjoying them at all. She hates not working, she hates that she can’t walk more than twenty steps without feeling winded, and more than anything, she hates being coddled.

     If he asks me if I need anything one more time, I’ll scream.

     As if on cue, Mulder hobbles into the living room, now her makeshift bedroom while her fractures heal.

     “Hey, Scully, how’s it going? Need anything?”

     He’s a dead man.

     “I’m fine, thanks,” she mutters, pretending to flip through a Woman’s Day magazine. The date on the cover suggests it’s been hiding on their bookshelf since 2006, which is appropriate; she can’t remember a time when she actually read this crap.

     He eyes the magazine, perched on the arm of the couch. “Hey, that’s a good issue. The article about ‘Seven new tricks for pleasing your man’ is particularly interesting,” he coughs. “I wouldn’t kick you out of bed for number four.”

     She takes a deep breath, willing herself not to chuck the magazine at him, opting instead to set it on the coffee table. She folds her hands in her lap so she won’t be tempted to find the next nearest weapon.

     “Mulder, why don’t you…go out? Get some groceries? I think we’re out of…uh…tomatoes.” She picks a type of produce at random, hoping they don’t have any in the fridge, realizing she hasn’t actually looked in their fridge in days. They’re living on take-out from the one pizza place that delivers, and the contents of their emergency pantry, which, thanks to Mulder’s paranoia, could last six more months. She’s eaten enough canned soup to be considered pickled.

     I hope whatever new lifeforms are growing in that refrigerator come in peace.

     “I told you, I set up automatic delivery. We’re getting a sweet deal on bagel chips,” he chirps drily.

     So much for that brilliant idea.

     “Yes…you did tell me…twice,” she sighs, “but you’re missing my point. Mulder, you’re—”

     She’s about to finish with driving me crazy, but there’s the crunch of gravel and ice under tires as a vehicle makes its way up the drive.

     Mulder’s eyes narrow as he moves toward the window, pulling aside the curtain.

     “Who is it? Delivery?”

     “No, they’d leave it at the gate. It’s not a truck, it’s a car…” he says with growing concern. “Wait here, k?” He’s out the door before she can respond.

     “Like hell,” she mutters, struggling to her feet, hissing at the tightness along her ribs.

     She finds Mulder on the porch, leaning against the railing at the top of the steps, hands in his pockets. Walter Skinner is standing outside the black car, looking stern as ever in his dark overcoat and tie. She makes to greet him before her eyes follow Mulder’s to the other side of the car…

     Isaac.

     Her heart leaps at the sight of the boy, who steps out of the car with his hands in his pockets, unconsciously mirroring her partner. He’s awkward and shy in Skinner’s commanding presence, but he’s clean, healthy; his face looks softer, less strained.

     “If I’d known we were expecting visitors, I would’ve cleaned up,” Mulder quips, but he can’t hide his pleasure at seeing Isaac for the first time in weeks.

     “Fox, Dana,” Skinner addresses them in a clipped monotone they know all too well. “May we come in?”

     Mulder nods, raising an eyebrow. “Don’t mind the mess; Scully’s recovering from surgery, and I’m not exactly Mr. Home-Ec.”

     Skinner steps up to the porch, nodding toward Scully. “I heard about that. Sorry I haven’t been in touch, I had my hands full, ensuring two of my former agents didn’t serve time for kidnapping,” he grumbles, though it’s obvious his irritation is for show; he may not have a soft spot for Mulder, but Scully is a different story.

     “It’s good to see you, too, sir,” she says with a wry smile, the honorific slipping from her lips without thought; old habits die hard.

     “So, what brings you out here?” asks Mulder, as they settle into the living room.

     “We’re here at Isaac’s request,” Skinner begins, glancing at the boy, who regards their surroundings in his solemn, wide-eyed way. “We’ve had a bit of a problem figuring out what to do with him. His parents didn’t leave a will…which isn’t to say one doesn’t exist, but the Bureau hasn’t been able to find it. In the absence of a formal document, I hesitate to let DHS place him, given this is a…special…situation.” Skinner clears his throat, looking uncomfortable.

     Mulder nods politely, but it’s Isaac he wants to talk to. “They treating you OK, kid?”

     Isaac nods. “I got to see the Hoover Building. Agent Doggett took me to the firing range, showed me how to shoot.” He grins, face brightening, and for a second he could be any twelve-year-old boy, excited about a field trip—no conspiracies, no tests, no dead parents.

     Scully returns his smile, warming at the thought of Doggett taking Isaac under his wing.

     Lighter. He looks lighter.

     “I’m going to get some fresh air,” Skinner interrupts. “Isaac can fill you in on the rest. I’ll be outside when you’re done.”

     Mulder and Scully exchange a look as their former superior walks out the door.

     “So, Isaac…why did you want to see us?” Her eyes narrow, trying to read his face, suddenly fearing the worst. She braces herself for the inevitable.

     They came back. The FBI is sending him away. We’ll never see him again.

     The boy shifts uncomfortably in his seat, looks down at his lap. “I want to stay with you.”

     It’s as though a bomb has dropped in the room. Scully blinks, trying and failing to hide her shock, while Mulder’s expression remains deceptively neutral.

     Of course they’d considered this. She’d even suggested it back in the woods, although at the time it had been an impulsive thought voiced out of exhaustion and fear; not the best time to consider such a decision.

     But now?

     Is it really an adoption when the kid is biologically yours? she wonders.

     “Isaac,” she begins carefully, “I don’t know if that’s possible. The adoption paperwork—”

     “He said I could if you said it was OK,” the boy counters without hesitation. “Skinner. He said they could fudge the paperwork. I’d have to change my name or something…but I don’t care.”

     She looks at her partner, silently pleading for backup, and notes the hint of a grin begin to surface on his face.

     He’s enjoying this, she realizes with dismay. He’s ready to go all in.

     Isaac interrupts again; he’s worked up, nervous, but his voice is strong and sure. Five minutes ago he was a normal kid, excited about a special trip to Hoover, and now he speaks with all the intensity of an adult. The abrupt shift is disarming, and Scully can do little but stare as he continues.

     “I don’t want to live with strangers. It’s not just that, though. You said you would help me. The people who killed my parents? The ones who did this to me? I want you to help me find them.”

     Scully swallows; so this is the reason. Her mouth is dry. “Isaac…I…you’ve been through so much,” she begins, keeping her tone gentle. “I don’t want you to think we don’t…I mean…I’m honored, that you trust us. But…this is a big decision—”

     “I know. I’ve thought about it. This is what I want.”

     He’s impatient and fierce, a volatile combination. A familiar combination.

     Mulder interjects. “What makes you think we’ll be able to help? Find the people responsible, I mean.”

     “You used to do this all the time, right? Investigate weird stuff? Catch the bad guys?”

     “The bad guys caught us more than we caught them,” Mulder says with a self-deprecating half-smile. “You saw that for yourself. We’re more than a little out of practice.”

     “Yeah, but you believe this stuff when no one else will! You know things. You said you’d help me,” he repeats, fixing Scully with an accusatory glare.

     She presses her lips together, remembering.

     The men who did this to you need to be brought to justice.

     “Yes…I did say that,” she admits, caught in the tangle of her own words. She glances at Mulder, who has the look of a man about to place a very large, very risky bet.

     And I can guess which way he’s betting, too. She can see him trying to get her attention out of the corner of his eye.

     “Isaac, I—”

     Mulder turns to the boy, cutting her off. “Hey, can we have a minute to talk? In private?”

     Isaac’s face falls, but he nods and slides off the couch without a word, shuffling outside to join Skinner on the porch. The door closes behind him with a soft thunk, and Scully feels a piece of her heart go with him.

     But we can’t!

     Mulder turns his gaze on her, dark eyes penetrating, pleading.

     “Scully, we can’t say no.”

     “Mulder, this is…too much! We don’t…our lives aren’t set up for this. I’m at the office 60 hours a week, and you’re—”

     “At home,” he finishes mildly. “With all the time in the world to make sure the kid doesn’t get into trouble. C’mon, it’s not like he’s a baby. I get the impression he’s pretty self-reliant.”

     “But…he wants…”

     “I know. I don’t blame him,” Mulder says quietly. “What if we could help, Scully? Nothing will make up for lost time, but…it’s something. Help him find some closure, make sense of what’s happened to him. Make sense of who he is.”

     She blinks at him, still clouded in a fog of disbelief. Mulder, in contrast, is glowing with excitement.

     “Scully, this is a gift. A second chance; you’ve said it yourself, you wish things had been different. For God’s sake, don’t turn it down. We’ll figure it out.”

     “Mulder—”

     “After liver-eating mutants and blood-sucking monsters, how hard can it be?” He grins.

     She snorts, but can’t suppress a small smile. Who can argue with that logic?

     “Mulder, he’s not a project. He’s not a…a case. He’s a child. We need to set rules, boundaries, we need to enforce them, to make sure he’s doing his homework, eating his vegetables…I still can’t get you to eat broccoli,” she gripes, fully aware she’s rambling. All the chatter in the world can’t ease the fluttering in her chest.

     It’s hope, she realizes dully; hope, and the fear of having it taken from her again.

     At some point during her rant, Mulder places his hands on her shoulders, facing her, an infuriatingly patient smile on his lips as he waits for her to quiet.

     “We don’t even have a room for him in this place…where would we put him?” she argues weakly; she’s running out of ammunition.

     Mulder doesn’t miss a beat. “I’ll move my office to the shed; I’ve been meaning to fix it up. We’ll put a window in there,” he nods toward the den. “You can do that…that decorating thing you do. It’ll work. He’ll be fine.”

     It’s all she can do to keep her jaw from coming unhinged. Mulder’s office is sacred territory; he grumbles if she so much as looks at one of the many crumpled scraps of paper that litter the floor. And yet, he’s willing—no, offering—to give it up so Isaac can have a bedroom.

     A home. With them.

     The fight has all but gone out of her, but she continues, her mind refusing to relinquish control over her heart. “He needs guidance, Mulder, he needs direction, he needs—”

     “In the words of one of the greatest English rock bands of all time, ‘All you need is love,’” Mulder counters, batting his lashes in an exaggerated come-hither expression.

     This earns him a gentle swat on the shoulder and the hint of a laugh. “Mulder, this is serious!”

     “We’ve had enough serious for a lifetime, Scully. For two lifetimes, even. Lighten up. We can’t fuck him up any more than we already have, right?”

     He may have a point.

     She shakes her head, but she’s grinning now, too; his elation is contagious.

     “C’mon, Scully,” he murmurs, taking her hands in his. “It’ll be good times.”

     She takes a deep breath, looking back and forth between the front door and her partner’s earnest face, her future and her past colliding in one endless, glorious moment.