Judas Kiss
Episode Four, Season One: Judas Kiss
Writer: Samantha Wil
Editor: mjade
Series Index
“Judas Kiss”
Grosse Pointe, Michigan
November 23, 2030
“I just don’t know what to do anymore,” a woman sobbed.
She stood outside of an observation room with a man dressed in a long white lab coat, watching a small boy busily write symbols onto an array of paper. It was computer paper, the standard kind that was printer ready and white as fresh snow, and they were taped neatly together across the floor. It spanned corner to corner, seemingly making some sort of uneven triangle. The symbols were drawn with care, the pink and fleshy bottom lip of the child slipping in-between his teeth. The crayon hovered over the paper, and the boy jumped up and rushed across to the other side of the room. Laying the tip of the green crayon down, he carefully continued a different set of symbols.
“He was missing for five days, Mrs. Parker. You’re very lucky to have him back, and I’m doing everything in my power to help him psychologically.”
“All he does is draw these symbols, Doctor Heron. What are they?”
The psychologist didn’t reply. Instead, mother and doctor watched the child scurry through a small opening in the papers up to the middle of the room to grab more paper to start a whole new row of symbols. Mrs. Parker let out a wail of a sob before dashing down the hallway as far away from the observation room as possible.
-
Doggett Residence
Fairfax, Virginia
November 24, 2030
Brody cut the engine of her sedan outside of the well-manicured home of John Doggett and Monica Reyes. Grabbing the envelope that contained the two pieces of paper about the Avian Influenza inoculations, she marched up the driveway with her head held high. She rapped her knuckles a few times on the wood before pushing the doorbell with her thumb. Rustling from inside the house could be heard, footfalls nearing, before the door opened to reveal Monica Reyes.
“Agent Brody,” she said amused.
“Did you send me this?” Brody shouted as she held up the envelope. “Why did you send me this? Why the hell isn’t Will returning my phone calls? What did you two do?”
“What is that?”
“Influenza inoculations from 2012! What do you want from me?”
“Come in, please.”
Cautiously, Brody stepped inside the house only because her gun was tucked away in its holster at her hip. Her eyes caught sight the fireplace mantel where an array of pictures littered the wood. In some of the photos, there was a small boy with blonde hair and blue eyes. Except, there seemed to be no progression of his life which allowed Brody to assume that this was John Doggett’s deceased son she read about in his file. The rest of the pictures showed the life of two girls with dark hair and bright eyes.
“We didn’t send you that information,” her calm voice broke Brody’s gaze.
“Then who did?”
“Someone who obviously trusts you enough to give you this information,” Reyes said with a smile. “You should feel honored.”
Brody forced a soft chuckle, suddenly feeling more at ease with the ex-FBI agent. She was a family woman, married to her last partner with two daughters. She had just been looking out for Will, and Brody believed there was no ill-intent when her and her husband attacked her nights previous.
“I fear for Will,” she whispered. “He won’t return my phone calls.”
“Did something happen between you two?”
“If it did, I’m in the dark. We just got back from this case in Desdemona. He believed the devil was collecting souls. We had to come back because we ran out of leads and there was no way to even begin solving the case. It looked just like animal attacks.”
“Black dogs.”
“What?”
Reyes smiled again, her eyes crinkling. She reminded Brody of Will - a more cheerful and easy-going Will at the very least.
“The folklore of selling one’s soul, well black dogs or hellhounds does the collecting.”
“You’re a believer?”
“Let’s just say I saw a lot of things in my lifetime that it’s impossible not to have an open mind.”
“Monica?” a male voice called from the second level. “Mon, have you seen my running shoes?”
The older woman rolled her eyes, her smirk growing even wider. Holding up a finger to Brody, she disappeared up the stairs. Faint voices floated through the ceiling. Things started to rustle from above. Brody suddenly felt very out of place. She wondered if it was how her parents behaved in an empty house.
Brody walked back to the long mantel. She felt drawn to the pictures - a seemingly happy family posing for birthday parties, holidays, graduations, fun activities. The Doggett sisters were close, always with huge smiles on their faces that resembled their mother and arms wrapped around each other. Then, there was one picture that seemed entirely out of place in the family album. Monica Reyes stood next to a short redhead who had a blue bundle in her arms. Reyes fawned over the child, her trademark smile gracing her face. Then, it plowed into Brody. It was Dana Scully and Will in the picture.
“Agent Brody,” Doggett called from the stairs, “you might want to get those papers checked at the bureau for traces of anything that could help us determine who sent it to you.”
In the new light, John Doggett didn’t seem so threatening. In fact, he looked softer, more domesticated, and older. His voice no longer held the roughness it had that one night when he pushed her to the ground. It was gentle, filled with concern akin to an uncle talking to his favorite niece.
“I’m afraid, Mr. Doggett, that I’m being watched very carefully. I was assigned to the X-Files to… deal with the issue in means that I saw fit. If I don’t act accordingly, I might as well kiss my sweet ass goodbye.”
“There’s someone you can trust in the bureau, a forensic pathologist at Quantico,” Reyes spoke up as she dug through the desk drawer for a pen and paper. “She’s our daughter, Kenley. She can get the information without putting you in jeopardy.”
The paper was folded and extended to Brody. She took it, stuffing it into her jacket pocket while making a mental note to visit Kenley Doggett in the morning. Part of her felt like she should thank them, spill out her life’s story and even ask them to join Sunday brunch. The way that Doggett and Reyes portrayed themselves was entirely different than their first encounter. They seemed like different people as though they were plucked off the earth and replaced with Stepford Wives.
“Thank you,” was all Brody could manage to say before lettering herself out.
-
Department of Defense
November 25, 2030
Everything starts with a catalyst - one single word, an action, a time, a day, an event. It seemed like life had ended when he was eleven, that he had been left to bleed to death only to raise from the ashes like a phoenix with a new lease on life. All of his childish preconceived ideas had been washed away with bitter acid, bubbling and sizzling at his skin. He felt like he couldn’t breathe, that he was just barely keeping his head above water. It felt like the tide was always close, always ready to wash him into a pit so dark that he’d never be able to find his way out. Then, he met her and she had become his lighthouse.
They met in VCU during one of the biggest, most violent serial killer cases that Will had ever been on. She had been a rookie, but he never even suspected it. She was silent, strong, brave. She had rushed forward full-force without thinking about the consequences. Blunt and determined, this woman had swept Will off his feet and made the darkness dim. Then the scandal had erupted.
They snuck around for nearly four years, dancing around each other in sleazy motel rooms and behind the locked door of the basement office. She had found the X-Files with him, had giggled in delighted joy to be investigating a completely unknown territory. He loved her more than anyone he had ever met. She was so full of life, energetic, smart, witty. The emotions and feelings she arose in him made him actually feel like a little kid and allowed him to breathe. Then, one day, it all changed.
She left him. She left the X-Files, left her apartment in favor of a new one, left him for a bigger and better job opportunity in the Department of Defense. She had been aloof, distant, as she said her goodbyes… as she had cleaned out her desk and walked out of the basement office without looking back. He hadn’t heard or seen her since until she left him a message on his answering machine about Riley Brody.
The ground seemed to shake, a bubbling earthquake at his feet. The walls seemed too small, narrow and menacing. The lights were blinding, bright fluorescence welded into the tiled ceiling. The people moved in slow-motion, gestures exaggerated and facial expressions seemingly frozen. The noises were soft, quaint, subtle.
He wondered what the hell he was doing there because it felt like he was walking to his execution. His mind was jumbled up with doubts and feelings that he couldn’t easily categorize in his mind. They were clawing at his chest, desperately scrapping wholeheartedly at his heart. There was only one other time in the recent years had he felt so helpless and confused - when she had left him.
He let his legs do the walking, leading him unconsciously to where she was. Out of his peripheral vision, he saw her name gleaming on a nameplate. Daphne Walsh - Special Liaison. His breath hitched in his throat, expanding and straining. Licking his dry lips, he walked into the room to see she had her own secretary - a fresh faced woman with bright sunshine hair. She seemed utterly out of place in his black cloud world.
“Can I help you?” a voice filled with molasses asked.
“Is she in?”
“Ms Walsh asked not to be-”
Except, William Van de Kamp stopped listening. Making a beeline for the door, the secretary jumped up and fruitlessly tried to stop him from entering. The knob felt cool to the touch, his fingers curling around the smooth metal. Pushing the door open, he saw her sitting at her desk. Curled, toffee hair pulled back in a clip, glasses sliding down her nose, her dark eyes reviewing an open file. Her suit was crisp on her thin body, a bottom too many undone in an office setting. He could imagine her long legs crossed at the knee, her too high stiletto making little figure eights in the air.
“Daph…”
She looked up, a stricken look of disbelief crossing her features. He watched as she sucked in a breath and waved her assistant out of the room. Gesturing towards the few chairs settled in front of her desk, Will took one.
“William, I didn’t expect to see you. It’s been… months now.”
“I was bitter.”
“I noticed.” She cleared her throat. “I didn’t leave the X-Files to hurt you contrary to popular belief.”
Nodding numbly, he allowed his eyes to drift towards the case file on the desk to see a familiar little boy’s picture. He couldn’t place the face, but he knew he had seen it before. The thought nagged in the back of his mind.
“Sure as hell felt like it though, Daph. You never called.”
“That’s a two-way street, William.”
“You mentioned you had information on Riley Brody.”
“Blunt and to the chase per usual, eh, Van?” When Will didn’t smile at the old nick-name, Daphne rushed on, “She’s not your friend.”
“You said as much,” Will snapped.
Really, he just wanted to cut the bullshit. All he ever got from people lately was bull. Lies and betrayals seemed to follow him around like a plague. You’re like a little dark storm cloud, Van, Daphne had said to him on more than one occasion. He pushed those thoughts to the back of his mind, tried to lock them away and bury the key. Those days were over.
“Monroe assigned her to you. You and I both know Monroe’s lifetime goal.”
Will snorted. Assistant Director Monroe was a man who was constantly trying to shut down the X-Files marking it was a waste of time, money, and bureau resources. Not to mention, in his little reports, he would divulge into how mentally unstable Will was - a danger to himself and to others.
“That’s all the evidence that you have that I shouldn’t trust her even with a ten-foot pole?”
“She’s a skeptic, William, I mean, honestly, she doesn’t believe what you and I believe.”
“She’s more open-minded than you might think,” snapped Will.
“Please, don’t tell me she has you wrapped around her little acrylic manicured nails.”
“Yeah, well, she’s in the basement office and you’re not.”
Daphne sighed, her eyes glancing anywhere but his face. Will gazed down at her desk, at the file that laid there neatly with Daphne’s small script in the margins. Peyton Olander was printed at the top of the page and everything immediately clicked in his brain. He saw the story on the nightly news for the past couple of days. He was the latest of a string of kids to disappear and then reappear days later acting anything but normal.
“How did you get this case?” he questioned.
Daphne looked at him, annoyance shining in her chocolate orbs. Her hand snapped the file shut and swiped it from the desk. She shoved it in a drawer to clearly make her point. She wasn’t going to tell him jack-shit.
“I’m late for work,” he announced with a sigh.
It was different. She was so different.
“You’re such a little dark storm cloud,” she replied.
“Don’t even, Daphne.”
Hoisting himself out of the comfy chair, he marched out of the office with little comfort and a little sadder than before.
-
FBI Academy
9:20 A.M.
Brody walked through the corridors that she had once studied in. It seemed different somehow, foreign and less daunting. Classes must have been in session, because there was an eerie calmness through the building. Her heels clicked on the tile floor as she looked at the different offices trying to find Kenley Doggett.
Several feet ahead, a double door of a morgue opened to reveal a brown-haired woman tugging an autopsy table with a body on top of it. She looked down the hallway and caught sight of Brody. Immediately, the woman froze and suddenly looked guilty as though she were caught with her hand in the cookie jar. Brody squinted and vaguely remembered the girl’s face from the pictures on the mantel in the Doggett residence.
“Doctor Kenley Doggett?”
“Depends on who’s asking.”
“Special Agent Riley Brody. I spoke with your parents.”
Kenley Doggett broke out into a grin, a sigh of relief escaping her lips. She started to tug the table once more, making her way across the hall to another morgue room. She called for Brody to follow her. Brody walked down the hallway, feeling like she should be looking behind her for spies or peering eyes.
Once inside the room, Brody noted that the doctor had already started to sift through the X-Rays, toxicology reports and other medical documents. The sheet was pulled down, a man laid on the table - still and so pale. Brody didn’t really want to walk in any farther knowing that an autopsy would be performed.
“What happened to him, Doctor Doggett?”
“Kenley, please. I don’t know quite yet. His brain just shut down.”
She pulled out a CT scan of what looked like the brain, but Brody couldn’t be sure from the angle. She didn’t really want to step any farther into the room if she didn’t need to.
“He was abducted from his home when he was a child. Less than a week after disappearing, he just showed up in a hospital. There was nothing wrong with him except, obviously, post-traumatic stress disorder. I mean, physically he was fine. There were no bumps or bruises or scraps. There were no broken bones or fractures. Psychologically, he shut down. He refused to talk, never talked again actually, and just started to draw symbols on pieces of paper.”
“Then what?”
“Well, it was odd. Slowly, areas in his brain just started to shut down. First, it was the Broca’s area and Wernicke’s area. Then the Brodmann areas started to shut down one by one. This is the end result - obviously.”
“Why did his brain shut down and why is he here?”
“Honestly, I have theories about why his brain started to slowly die, but I haven’t performed my own autopsy yet for conclusive evidence. Anyways, the case belongs to the Defense Department. Technically, I’m not supposed to have this body. I, uh, kinda stole it. Anyways, what happened to him about eighteen years ago… it’s happening again to other children. Call me crazy, but I think there’s a connection.”
“Eighteen years?”
Brody quickly did the math in her head. 2012. It was the same year that Will had been kidnapped, the same year he had somehow gotten away. She suddenly had a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. If Will hadn’t gotten away, would this had happen to him? Would he had been a mute child just drawing symbols until his brain shut down bit by bit? It was hard to imagine her brilliant, so full of life partner reduced to nothing.
“Long time, huh? He was the first eighteen years ago that this happened to. I’m expecting a whole bunch of bodies to come through here in the next couple of months.”
“Did they ever catch who did this?”
“Uh, really, it all depends on who you talk to. I mean, there was a cult that was arrested for it. I don’t think they did it though.”
“Then who?”
“Riley - can I call you Riley?” Brody nodded. “Okay, Riley, we just met. I mean, you seem like a really nice gal and all, and, hey, maybe we could be friends or something. Anyways, I don’t really feel comfortable telling you my thoughts, because my thoughts get me written up and put on probation.”
“I work on the X-Files.”
That simple statement made Kenley beam. Holding up a finger, she rushed towards the double doors of the morgue and secured them shut - bolt and all. She rushed towards the dead body, beaconing Brody to follow her. Digging through her lab coat pocket, she produced a small machine that she sat next to the toe-tagged foot.
“Okay, we’re safe to talk.”
“What is that?”
“Uh, a scrambler. It blocks microphones and such by scrambling the frequencies so no one can record what we’re saying.” She let out a chuckle. “Okay, so if you work on the X-Files then you gotta know about the Super Soldiers.”
“Your parents mentioned it. I’m not too clear on what they are.”
“Oh, man, lots of explaining. They’re, uh, humans who were turned into aliens. Alien-human hybrids. You know? Anyways, they’re indestructible, except for the fact that magnetite is their Achilles’ heel. I mean, they’ll pull a flying nun into a-a mountain made of magnetite. It’s the only thing that will kill them. Well, that we know of.”
“So… these Super Soldiers?”
“I, along with some close associates, believe that these children in… 2012ish were abducted by Super Soldiers and subjected to tests. These, uh, symbols that they drew? It’s like they’re working on something. Decoding or-or recording something for them. These kids that are disappearing now, we believe that the same thing is happening again. I mean, these kids disappear from their beds or on their way home from school and they turn up a week later different. I fear that these children are slowly dying like this man. There were, uh, brain disorders found in the kids from 2012. I mean, if these kids aren’t tested, they could end up here in eighteen years or so.”
“I have to go.”
The only thought in Brody’s mind was that Will was dying of some brain disorder like the others. He could have gone eighteen years undiagnosed. The thought scared her more than she was willing to admit. She knew she was being irrational, knew that jumping to conclusions was always her downfall, but she had never felt so strongly about something as this. She rushed out of the morgue, the Avian Influenza papers long forgotten in her jacket pocket.
-
FBI Headquarters
9:58 A.M.
Will let out a long sigh, his thoughts mounded up like a filthy pile at a landfill. Growing up, he was raised in a small town in Wyoming where everyone knew each other. It was easy to trust people because the grocer was brother to the neighbor and the dentist was married to the school teacher. Everyone knew each other’s names, everyone had connections. Will was raised to trust these people and the lessons learned as a child were hard habits to break.
When that van pulled up and those Super Solders grabbed him, his whole world crashed down around him. He no longer knew who to trust. The grocer seemed like a stranger, foreign and not so friendly anymore. The school teachers seemed like they were hiding things, treating him like some delicate flower to pull him into a false sense of security. Will went from trusting everyone to fearing everyone.
Except, those lessons of trust he learned as a child, still crept up on him. It was hard to deny his childish callings - to deny that perhaps his partner isn’t related to his friendly neighbor. Maybe, just maybe, she could be keeping secret hidden truths that he so desperately craved. Up was down and right was left. He had no one to trust, no one to believe except for himself. Even that, trusting himself, was a dangerous thing to do.
“Sorry I’m la-”
Will walked into the basement office and stopped dead in his tracks. Brody wasn’t there. Those feelings of doubt snuck up on him again, digging their poisonous teeth into his side. Letting out a long sigh, he shrugged off his jacket and threw it across the back of his chair.
“I know! I know! I’m late!”
The door burst open to reveal a frazzled Brody stumbling through the threshold. She rushed towards the desk, grabbing his coat and shoving it into his chest. Her hand found his and started to tug him towards the door like a little kid towing their parent somewhere of childish importance.
“I have a case for us - an X-Files even - but first we need to get you to the hospital to get an MRI or an EEG or an EKG or whatever brain scan you’ll need. I don’t know the difference.”
“Whoa, whoa, Brody, what’s up?”
Will slipped his hand out of hers, his feet rooted into the ground. She whirled around and gave him the most impatient glare he had ever received in his life.
“Okay, look, I know I don’t normally believe in mumbo jumbo alien, devil, ghost stories. I don’t - I’m not a believer. Except, I can’t deny patterns or facts. The facts and patterns in this matter are quiet clear. Children in 2012, who were around your age, were kidnapped and returned days later. They were different and they were dying. Now, they’re dropping like flies and a new patch of kids are going through the same thing. I don’t know what it means, and I’m not saying that Super Soldiers or anything like that is behind it, but as your partner I have to beg you to get a brain scan to see if you have a brain disease.”
Will just stood there in stunned silence unable to make his vocal cords form any intelligent words. So he did the only thing he could do. He stared at her as though she had two heads or was a martian from another planet. After a minute of pragmatic silence, Will managed to utter, “What?”
Brody groaned before launching into a long, detailed story about John Doggett, Monica Reyes, and their daughter Kenley. She talked of Super Soldiers supposedly abducting children, performing tests on them, making them different. She rambled about Avian Influenza vaccinations. She talked about 2012, connecting points of how everything seemed to be centered on that year. Will stood there, dumbfounded as he listened to his once rational partner talk about conspiracies and mysterious informants.
“You believe all of this?” he whispered.
“I don’t know what to believe, Will. All of my preconceived ideas are just quickly being thrown out the window and replace with absurd, crazy happenings.”
“That’s what happens when you work on the X-Files,” he said lightly.
A small chuckle escaped her ruby lips as she reached out and gripped his upper arm and squeezed. Slowly, a grin dazzled her features as her eyes intently sought out his.
“Let’s get to Grosse Pointe. I’ll see a doctor there,” suggested Will.
“Let’s go, Partner.”
Somehow, following Brody out of the corner basement office, it felt more natural than it ever did with Daphne. He couldn’t explain why he was slowly starting to put so much trust into Brody, but it just felt like the right thing to do. She had been more honest and true in the short amount of time he’s known her than anyone he had ever met.
-
Grosse Pointe, Michigan
St. Clare’s Pediatric Institute
Will walked next to Brody as they walked into the building where the abducted and then returned children were staying for psych evaluations. The children were from different cities across the United States, but a majority had all been put under the care of Doctor Heron. He had adamantly refused to go to the hospital before talking with Jonah Parker.
The walls of the psychiatric unit brought back terrible memories from when he was a pre-teen. He had sat in an observation room for hours at a time, psychologists just watching his every move. It had been a suffocating prison where the walls were painted a sickening yellow. He never liked the color yellow after that. They set him up with books, game consoles, seemingly normal things. Except, he couldn’t do anything but just sit in that room going over in his head all the things that had went wrong.
They had been permitted to see Jonah, an eight year old boy who had been missing for five days before returned, but were told they would be asked to leave immediately if the child began to get upset. Will followed Brody into the tiny pit of hell to see the eight year old Jonah Parker drawing on a piece of paper. Brody walked up to him, knelt down to his size and gave him the warmest smile she could have mustered.
“Hey, Jonah. My name is Riley, and this is my friend Will,” she spoke gently. “What are you drawing?”
Jonah ignored her and continued to scratch out the intricate symbols with great detail. Will took a step forward, his heart pounding wildly in his chest as flashbacks assaulted his mind. God, he hated these places. He knelt down next to Brody, forcing a fake smile.
“Jonah, Buddy?” questioned Will.
The boy looked up, his gaze looking into Will. The crayon slipped out of Jonah’s hand as the boy studied Will intently. Glancing over at Brody, he shrugged his shoulders lightly with a grimace clouding his features.
“Hi,” the boy whispered.
Will knew that the psychologists behind the glass were burning holes into him with their eyes. He could feel Brody next to him openly gaping. Will had no idea why this child decided to open up to him and no one else. Seriously, he didn’t know whether it was a curse or not.
“What are you drawing?” Will questioned as he plopped down on his butt and attempted to sit Indian style.
Jonah glanced over at Brody with suspicion clouded into his bright blue orbs. Will’s gaze flickered in her direction before he took a deep breath. Reaching out a hand, he gently rubbed a knuckle across the kid’s cheek to gain his attention. Jonah stared up at Will with fear shining in his features.
“Hey, it’s okay. Br-Riley and I are friends. She’s here to help you.”
“Why are you lying, Will?” Jonah’s voice cracked.
“I’m not, Buddy. Riley’s here to help you just like me.”
“Maybe. But she’s not your friend.”
Will froze at the words, dumbly blinking at the small child in front of him. His throat felt like it was closing up and his heart pounded fast in his chest.
“Of course, she’s my friend. Why would you say she wasn’t?”
“Because you don’t trust her,” Jonah reasoned, “but she trusts you.”
Glancing over at Brody, he gave her a soft and apologetic smile before returning his concentration on Jonah.
“Will, I’ll leave if you want,” Brody whispered.
“No, don’t. Jonah, Kid, listen to me. You can trust Riley and me. Tell us what happened.”
“What if she’s one of them?” Jonah pleaded.
“One of what?”
“The monsters with the bumps on their necks?”
He could feel Brody stiffen next to him. Out of the corner of his eye, he noted Brody brushing her brown locks off her neck. Will beaconed Jonah forward, taking the smaller hand into his own. Together, they traced the base of Brody’s smooth neck. Underneath his feather-like touch, he felt Brody shiver.
“She’s not a monster, see?”
Jonah nodded gravely before settling back onto the floor. His cheek concaved in, the flesh being chewed earnestly by his teeth. Will gave the most encouraging smile he could muster.
“The monsters said I wasn’t allowed to tell anyone who wasn’t one of us.”
“One of what, Jonah?” questioned Brody gently.
“Special, like Will.”
“Wh-what makes you and me so special, Buddy?”
“We’re magic.”
Children thought differently than adults. It was a universal fact. Will tried to put himself into the shoes of an eight year old boy, tried to remember what his childish reasoning was like. Except, for the life of him, Will couldn’t place himself in a child’s mind which was ironic due to the fact that the first half of his career at the FBI was putting himself into the shoes of serial killers and rapists.
“Magic how?” pressed Will.
“You know. Magic.”
Will nodded even though he didn’t quite understand. Magic. Was the magic he spoke of the fact that he’d hear an unbearable ringing in his ears whenever a Super Soldier was near? Was it the fact that he did extraordinary things when he was kidnapped?
“Will, please don’t let the monsters hurt me,” the kid pleaded with tears accumulating in the corner of his eyes.
“I promise you a thousand moons that no one will hurt you again.”
The words had slipped out of his mouth with ease, the familiar little saying gnawing at his insides. I promise you a thousand moons, his mother would say with some pledge attached onto the end.
“I’ll be by tomorrow, okay, Buddy?”
Jonah nodded, his pink bottom lip sucked into his mouth. The kid lurched forward, his skinny arms wrapping around Will’s neck as though his life depended on it. Slowly, Will slipped his arms around the kid’s middle and held the kid close to his chest.
“You’re gonna be okay,” whispered Will before pulling away.
Will stood up, Brody following. They walked out of the observation room in silence. Before the door closed, Will looked back to see Jonah continuing his work of symbol drawing. The psychologist, nurse and mother all rushed over to the pair with questions burning on their faces. Will shifted uncomfortably, his mouth suddenly like sandpaper.
“I want that child under twenty-four hour guard. No one besides Agent Brody, Mrs. Parker, Doctor Heron and myself are allowed access until we can establish that no one is going to harm Jonah,” Will explained.
“Agent Van de Kamp…” Mrs. Parker whispered, “thank you.”
Will forced a small smile before gently grabbing Brody by the elbow. He tugged her away from the peering eyes and down a corridor. The only thing that he wanted was to get the hell out of the psychiatric hospital.
“We need to get you to a doctor,” pressed Brody.
“I’m fine.”
“You could be dying without even knowing it, Will!”
She jerked her arm out of his grasp and turned to face him. Her eyes were pleading for him to stop, to think about what she was saying. Except, Will couldn’t check himself into a hospital when Jonah needed his help, when there were other children who needed him.
“I feel fine, Brody.”
“William,” she sighed.
“Look, if I don’t protect these kids then who will? Jonah trusts me, and I promised him I’d look out for him. I can’t just disappear to a hospital for medical tests and not live up to my obligations. I’m not that kind of guy.”
Brody groaned but said nothing. He knew she understood where he was coming from even though she didn’t agree. So, he forced a smile onto his face and lightly punched her in the arm to indicate that everything was all right.
-
Buy Back Games
3:48 P.M.
“No, no, no. Look at this, Man!”
A blonde ten year old pointed to the game console, his face alit with excitement. His friend ambled over to him, obviously disappointed in the choice. With a snort, he shook his head and gestured for his friend to follow him.
“Come on, Joshua, that’s weak. I hear they even discontinued making games for that piece of crap,” the kid said.
“Is not,” the blonde protested. “I heard the graphics were wicked!”
“Josh,” the kid groaned.
“Ugh, never mind. You just don’t understand.”
Joshua dug through his jeans pocket for his cell phone. Glancing down at the clock, he sighed loudly enough to catch his friend’s attention.
“My mom’ll flip if I’m not home by four. You know how she is.”
“Then get goin’. This weekend though, we’ll have to have our gaming day. Ben said we could have it at his house.”
“Yeah, okay. I’ll see you in school tomorrow.”
Joshua shoved his phone back into his pocket and rushed out of the gaming store. He had ten minutes to get home before his mother would ground him for the next two weeks. He wasn’t supposed to go places without adult supervision because, apparently, there were too many criminals and dangers in this day and age. Except, Joshua would laugh whenever his mom would warn him about such evils since nothing that bad ever happened in Grosse Pointe. Not to mention, he could take care of himself.
Those thoughts slowly started to wane when he felt the car tailing him. Gripping his backpack strap tightly, he picked up his pace. Joshua refused to look behind him, refused to acknowledge that he knew this car was following him. The wheels of the vehicle squeaked, a rush of air breezing past the boy. Joshua froze as the car road up onto the sidewalk. The door opened to reveal a bulky man who grabbed Joshua by the arms and hauled him into the car.
The kid struggled against the calloused hands that pinned him to the backseat. An intense ringing vibrated in his ears so loudly that he couldn’t hear the conversation that was going on between the men and women in the car. A hand touched his forehead, brushing aside his blonde locks. His eyes felt heavy and quickly sleep overtook him.
-
Conquistador Motel
10:23 P.M.
Brody lounged back onto the stiff motel bed, her heels discarded by the front door. Her jacket had been thrown on the back of a wooden chair, her blouse sleeves rolled up. On her lap was the police report on Jonah Parker’s disappearance and return. She read through the information as the muffled sound of water cascading in the shower drifted from the bathroom. Suddenly, the water ceased and rustling could be heard.
The door opened, a wave of steam filling the room, as Will appeared in nothing but a blue terrycloth. Brody averted her gaze from Will, her eyes burning as she stared at the blurry words in front of her. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed him bending over to dig through his suitcase for a change of clothes. The minutes seemed to tick by slowly, Brody’s eyes watering at her intense concentration of the nonsensical words.
Will plopped down across from her on the bed clad in jeans and a t-shirt. His dark hair was damp, locks sticking to his forehead. A smirk crossed his features as he plucked the police file from her lap and lazily flipped through it.
“Honestly, Brods, I’m not going to drop into a seizure mode from some horrible brain condition that I probably don’t even have,” he said lightheartedly. “In other words, you don’t need to baby sit me.”
“I, uh, don’t mind it. You know, I would just be over here every twenty minutes making sure you’re okay, and me just hanging around here is no biggie.”
“Right.”
Will collapsed backwards, barely just missing Brody’s feet. Raising the file over his face, Brody watched as he skimmed through the material as though he were merely reading a book for pure entertainment. Over the short time they had worked together, Brody was just beginning to comprehend Will’s odd ticks and ways of doing things.
“Remember how I was telling you about Kenley Doggett?”
“Yeah, what about her?” questioned Will as he tossed the file aside.
“I think you two would get along fabulously,” she replied as she drew her legs close to her body. “She’s very… quirky and open like you.”
“If I didn’t know any better, Agent Brody, I would think that you were trying to set me up with your newfound friend.”
Brody let out a small chuckle, a smirk working its way onto her face. Honestly, she just wanted to talk about anything at that moment because seeing a half-naked Will looking so nonchalant about it was unnerving to her.
“You know, I bet you’re the kind of gal who reads those sappy romance novels, aren’t you? You know, those Nicholas Sparks and that Tuesdays at Tiffany’s kind of… stuff.”
“It’s Breakfast at Tiffany’s. Plus, Nicholas Sparks wrote some great romantic tales and Capote’s story is timeless. I enjoy that kind of literature. I’m sorry that we can’t all like sci-fi.”
“I don’t read sci-fi.”
“Why don’t I believe that?” she teased.
“I hunt for aliens all day long. I don’t want to read fiction stories about it when I go home. Now, if it was a true story, then I would be inclined to read it.”
Brody leaned back and slowly became more comfortable in the setting. Snaking a foot forward, she poked him gently in the side with her big toe. A strangled noise emitted from Will’s lips as he turned to face his partner.
“What kind of literature do you like?” questioned Brody.
“Oh, I like the classics and the controversial pieces. You know, my parents were big on reading to me when I was a kid. Every week, after grocery shopping, my mom and I would go this small bookstore to buy a book or two that I wanted my parents to read to me. When I was six, I picked out Moby Dick and my parents were literally shocked when I enjoyed it. Seriously, I went through a Moby Dick phase where I renamed all of our farm animals after characters from the book. Spotty the dog turned into Ahab, Whiskers the cat was renamed Starbuck, Betsy the cow succumbed to Ishmael, and Oinks the pig was the second mate himself - Stubb.”
“You’re joking.”
“I sort of wish I was.” Will laughed. “I read Moby Dick once every couple of years. When I was in high school, I went through a Hemingway phase. In fact, for my literature class in tenth grade we had to pick a short story to read in front of the class and carry a discussion on the piece. I picked Hills like White Elephants and got Saturday detention. I went to this swanky Catholic private school that my grandparents paid for, and the nuns weren’t impressed with me choosing a book that centered around an idea that went against their very religion.”
Brody nudged Will in the thigh with her foot, a smile breaking out fully on her face. Will smirked right on back, a gleaming excitement captured in his green eyes.
“You know, I do enjoy Capote’s style - more so with In Cold Blood than Breakfast at Tiffany’s.”
“Why doesn’t that surprise me?”
Before Will could retort, there was a brisk knocking on the motel door. Will slid off the bed and ambled slowly towards the door. Brody craned her neck to see who was there only to see a vaguely familiar brunette female.
“What the hell do you think you’re playing at, William?” the woman yelled as she pushed her way into the room. “I mean, seriously, you think that you can ju-”
The woman stopped once she caught sight of Brody. An exasperated sigh escaped her lips as she rounded on Will, hands placed firmly on her hips. Brody shifted on the bed, feeling completely out of place and awkward.
“You know what, William, I don’t understand. Obviously, you don’t care about what I think or about my job.”
“Oh, don’t be overdramatic,” Will spoke in an annoyed tone.
“Overdramatic? I give you some friendly advice and you throw caution to the wind instead. I tell you stay away from my case and you get on the next plane out here. That’s not being overdramatic. It’s called being pissed off, William.”
“This case is an X-File. Therefore, my partner and I have jurisdiction to investigate,” he rationalized.
“This is a Defense Department matter, Agent Van de Kamp. Tomorrow morning, the first thing you’re going to do is get my partner and me clearance to speak with Jonah Parker.”
“Since when does the Defense Department deal with kidnapped children who were returned?”
The woman groaned, and Brody could tell her patience was thinning rapidly. Will stood there, cool as a cucumber. As though a flipped had been switched on, Brody placed the woman. She was in Monroe’s office when Brody was assigned to the X-Files.
“Don’t make me call Washington, Van.”
“Goodnight, Daphne.”
Will held the door to the motel open, making his wishes clear. The woman named Daphne gave him a long, hard look before storming out of the room. The door swung shut, softly clicking. Will turned to Brody with an unreadable expression painted across his face.
“Will…” Brody trailed off.
“It was nothing,” Will snapped.
Obviously, Will was thinking something entirely different than what Brody was thinking. She slid off the bed, her legs suddenly felt like rubber.
“I want you to trust me,” Brody started, “so I’m always going to tell you the truth even if you don’t want to hear it.”
“What?”
“That woman is not your friend. She was there when I was assigned to work with you. She was standing in the shadows, just… observing. I think she wants to shut you down.”
Instead of accepting her honesty and thanking her, Will just stood there with a look of utter disbelief plastered across his face. He just stood there, eyes narrowed with dumbstruck mask clouding his features. Brody slowly began to wonder if he would believe her.
“Will?”
“Funny. She said the same thing about you,” he whispered.
Brody froze, eyebrows knitted down in confusion and disbelief. This woman had been trying to place doubts into Will’s mind about her? It was then that Brody knew something was wrong, terribly wrong.
Next Week - Atonement: As the hunt for a missing child intensifies, Will and Brody part ways both in a professional and personal manner.
Feedback is greatly appreciated. Please take the extra minute to write a short, sweet review since it helps out an author more than you can imagine.
Writer: Samantha Wil
Editor: mjade
Series Index
“Judas Kiss”
Grosse Pointe, Michigan
November 23, 2030
“I just don’t know what to do anymore,” a woman sobbed.
She stood outside of an observation room with a man dressed in a long white lab coat, watching a small boy busily write symbols onto an array of paper. It was computer paper, the standard kind that was printer ready and white as fresh snow, and they were taped neatly together across the floor. It spanned corner to corner, seemingly making some sort of uneven triangle. The symbols were drawn with care, the pink and fleshy bottom lip of the child slipping in-between his teeth. The crayon hovered over the paper, and the boy jumped up and rushed across to the other side of the room. Laying the tip of the green crayon down, he carefully continued a different set of symbols.
“He was missing for five days, Mrs. Parker. You’re very lucky to have him back, and I’m doing everything in my power to help him psychologically.”
“All he does is draw these symbols, Doctor Heron. What are they?”
The psychologist didn’t reply. Instead, mother and doctor watched the child scurry through a small opening in the papers up to the middle of the room to grab more paper to start a whole new row of symbols. Mrs. Parker let out a wail of a sob before dashing down the hallway as far away from the observation room as possible.
-
Doggett Residence
Fairfax, Virginia
November 24, 2030
Brody cut the engine of her sedan outside of the well-manicured home of John Doggett and Monica Reyes. Grabbing the envelope that contained the two pieces of paper about the Avian Influenza inoculations, she marched up the driveway with her head held high. She rapped her knuckles a few times on the wood before pushing the doorbell with her thumb. Rustling from inside the house could be heard, footfalls nearing, before the door opened to reveal Monica Reyes.
“Agent Brody,” she said amused.
“Did you send me this?” Brody shouted as she held up the envelope. “Why did you send me this? Why the hell isn’t Will returning my phone calls? What did you two do?”
“What is that?”
“Influenza inoculations from 2012! What do you want from me?”
“Come in, please.”
Cautiously, Brody stepped inside the house only because her gun was tucked away in its holster at her hip. Her eyes caught sight the fireplace mantel where an array of pictures littered the wood. In some of the photos, there was a small boy with blonde hair and blue eyes. Except, there seemed to be no progression of his life which allowed Brody to assume that this was John Doggett’s deceased son she read about in his file. The rest of the pictures showed the life of two girls with dark hair and bright eyes.
“We didn’t send you that information,” her calm voice broke Brody’s gaze.
“Then who did?”
“Someone who obviously trusts you enough to give you this information,” Reyes said with a smile. “You should feel honored.”
Brody forced a soft chuckle, suddenly feeling more at ease with the ex-FBI agent. She was a family woman, married to her last partner with two daughters. She had just been looking out for Will, and Brody believed there was no ill-intent when her and her husband attacked her nights previous.
“I fear for Will,” she whispered. “He won’t return my phone calls.”
“Did something happen between you two?”
“If it did, I’m in the dark. We just got back from this case in Desdemona. He believed the devil was collecting souls. We had to come back because we ran out of leads and there was no way to even begin solving the case. It looked just like animal attacks.”
“Black dogs.”
“What?”
Reyes smiled again, her eyes crinkling. She reminded Brody of Will - a more cheerful and easy-going Will at the very least.
“The folklore of selling one’s soul, well black dogs or hellhounds does the collecting.”
“You’re a believer?”
“Let’s just say I saw a lot of things in my lifetime that it’s impossible not to have an open mind.”
“Monica?” a male voice called from the second level. “Mon, have you seen my running shoes?”
The older woman rolled her eyes, her smirk growing even wider. Holding up a finger to Brody, she disappeared up the stairs. Faint voices floated through the ceiling. Things started to rustle from above. Brody suddenly felt very out of place. She wondered if it was how her parents behaved in an empty house.
Brody walked back to the long mantel. She felt drawn to the pictures - a seemingly happy family posing for birthday parties, holidays, graduations, fun activities. The Doggett sisters were close, always with huge smiles on their faces that resembled their mother and arms wrapped around each other. Then, there was one picture that seemed entirely out of place in the family album. Monica Reyes stood next to a short redhead who had a blue bundle in her arms. Reyes fawned over the child, her trademark smile gracing her face. Then, it plowed into Brody. It was Dana Scully and Will in the picture.
“Agent Brody,” Doggett called from the stairs, “you might want to get those papers checked at the bureau for traces of anything that could help us determine who sent it to you.”
In the new light, John Doggett didn’t seem so threatening. In fact, he looked softer, more domesticated, and older. His voice no longer held the roughness it had that one night when he pushed her to the ground. It was gentle, filled with concern akin to an uncle talking to his favorite niece.
“I’m afraid, Mr. Doggett, that I’m being watched very carefully. I was assigned to the X-Files to… deal with the issue in means that I saw fit. If I don’t act accordingly, I might as well kiss my sweet ass goodbye.”
“There’s someone you can trust in the bureau, a forensic pathologist at Quantico,” Reyes spoke up as she dug through the desk drawer for a pen and paper. “She’s our daughter, Kenley. She can get the information without putting you in jeopardy.”
The paper was folded and extended to Brody. She took it, stuffing it into her jacket pocket while making a mental note to visit Kenley Doggett in the morning. Part of her felt like she should thank them, spill out her life’s story and even ask them to join Sunday brunch. The way that Doggett and Reyes portrayed themselves was entirely different than their first encounter. They seemed like different people as though they were plucked off the earth and replaced with Stepford Wives.
“Thank you,” was all Brody could manage to say before lettering herself out.
-
Department of Defense
November 25, 2030
Everything starts with a catalyst - one single word, an action, a time, a day, an event. It seemed like life had ended when he was eleven, that he had been left to bleed to death only to raise from the ashes like a phoenix with a new lease on life. All of his childish preconceived ideas had been washed away with bitter acid, bubbling and sizzling at his skin. He felt like he couldn’t breathe, that he was just barely keeping his head above water. It felt like the tide was always close, always ready to wash him into a pit so dark that he’d never be able to find his way out. Then, he met her and she had become his lighthouse.
They met in VCU during one of the biggest, most violent serial killer cases that Will had ever been on. She had been a rookie, but he never even suspected it. She was silent, strong, brave. She had rushed forward full-force without thinking about the consequences. Blunt and determined, this woman had swept Will off his feet and made the darkness dim. Then the scandal had erupted.
They snuck around for nearly four years, dancing around each other in sleazy motel rooms and behind the locked door of the basement office. She had found the X-Files with him, had giggled in delighted joy to be investigating a completely unknown territory. He loved her more than anyone he had ever met. She was so full of life, energetic, smart, witty. The emotions and feelings she arose in him made him actually feel like a little kid and allowed him to breathe. Then, one day, it all changed.
She left him. She left the X-Files, left her apartment in favor of a new one, left him for a bigger and better job opportunity in the Department of Defense. She had been aloof, distant, as she said her goodbyes… as she had cleaned out her desk and walked out of the basement office without looking back. He hadn’t heard or seen her since until she left him a message on his answering machine about Riley Brody.
The ground seemed to shake, a bubbling earthquake at his feet. The walls seemed too small, narrow and menacing. The lights were blinding, bright fluorescence welded into the tiled ceiling. The people moved in slow-motion, gestures exaggerated and facial expressions seemingly frozen. The noises were soft, quaint, subtle.
He wondered what the hell he was doing there because it felt like he was walking to his execution. His mind was jumbled up with doubts and feelings that he couldn’t easily categorize in his mind. They were clawing at his chest, desperately scrapping wholeheartedly at his heart. There was only one other time in the recent years had he felt so helpless and confused - when she had left him.
He let his legs do the walking, leading him unconsciously to where she was. Out of his peripheral vision, he saw her name gleaming on a nameplate. Daphne Walsh - Special Liaison. His breath hitched in his throat, expanding and straining. Licking his dry lips, he walked into the room to see she had her own secretary - a fresh faced woman with bright sunshine hair. She seemed utterly out of place in his black cloud world.
“Can I help you?” a voice filled with molasses asked.
“Is she in?”
“Ms Walsh asked not to be-”
Except, William Van de Kamp stopped listening. Making a beeline for the door, the secretary jumped up and fruitlessly tried to stop him from entering. The knob felt cool to the touch, his fingers curling around the smooth metal. Pushing the door open, he saw her sitting at her desk. Curled, toffee hair pulled back in a clip, glasses sliding down her nose, her dark eyes reviewing an open file. Her suit was crisp on her thin body, a bottom too many undone in an office setting. He could imagine her long legs crossed at the knee, her too high stiletto making little figure eights in the air.
“Daph…”
She looked up, a stricken look of disbelief crossing her features. He watched as she sucked in a breath and waved her assistant out of the room. Gesturing towards the few chairs settled in front of her desk, Will took one.
“William, I didn’t expect to see you. It’s been… months now.”
“I was bitter.”
“I noticed.” She cleared her throat. “I didn’t leave the X-Files to hurt you contrary to popular belief.”
Nodding numbly, he allowed his eyes to drift towards the case file on the desk to see a familiar little boy’s picture. He couldn’t place the face, but he knew he had seen it before. The thought nagged in the back of his mind.
“Sure as hell felt like it though, Daph. You never called.”
“That’s a two-way street, William.”
“You mentioned you had information on Riley Brody.”
“Blunt and to the chase per usual, eh, Van?” When Will didn’t smile at the old nick-name, Daphne rushed on, “She’s not your friend.”
“You said as much,” Will snapped.
Really, he just wanted to cut the bullshit. All he ever got from people lately was bull. Lies and betrayals seemed to follow him around like a plague. You’re like a little dark storm cloud, Van, Daphne had said to him on more than one occasion. He pushed those thoughts to the back of his mind, tried to lock them away and bury the key. Those days were over.
“Monroe assigned her to you. You and I both know Monroe’s lifetime goal.”
Will snorted. Assistant Director Monroe was a man who was constantly trying to shut down the X-Files marking it was a waste of time, money, and bureau resources. Not to mention, in his little reports, he would divulge into how mentally unstable Will was - a danger to himself and to others.
“That’s all the evidence that you have that I shouldn’t trust her even with a ten-foot pole?”
“She’s a skeptic, William, I mean, honestly, she doesn’t believe what you and I believe.”
“She’s more open-minded than you might think,” snapped Will.
“Please, don’t tell me she has you wrapped around her little acrylic manicured nails.”
“Yeah, well, she’s in the basement office and you’re not.”
Daphne sighed, her eyes glancing anywhere but his face. Will gazed down at her desk, at the file that laid there neatly with Daphne’s small script in the margins. Peyton Olander was printed at the top of the page and everything immediately clicked in his brain. He saw the story on the nightly news for the past couple of days. He was the latest of a string of kids to disappear and then reappear days later acting anything but normal.
“How did you get this case?” he questioned.
Daphne looked at him, annoyance shining in her chocolate orbs. Her hand snapped the file shut and swiped it from the desk. She shoved it in a drawer to clearly make her point. She wasn’t going to tell him jack-shit.
“I’m late for work,” he announced with a sigh.
It was different. She was so different.
“You’re such a little dark storm cloud,” she replied.
“Don’t even, Daphne.”
Hoisting himself out of the comfy chair, he marched out of the office with little comfort and a little sadder than before.
-
FBI Academy
9:20 A.M.
Brody walked through the corridors that she had once studied in. It seemed different somehow, foreign and less daunting. Classes must have been in session, because there was an eerie calmness through the building. Her heels clicked on the tile floor as she looked at the different offices trying to find Kenley Doggett.
Several feet ahead, a double door of a morgue opened to reveal a brown-haired woman tugging an autopsy table with a body on top of it. She looked down the hallway and caught sight of Brody. Immediately, the woman froze and suddenly looked guilty as though she were caught with her hand in the cookie jar. Brody squinted and vaguely remembered the girl’s face from the pictures on the mantel in the Doggett residence.
“Doctor Kenley Doggett?”
“Depends on who’s asking.”
“Special Agent Riley Brody. I spoke with your parents.”
Kenley Doggett broke out into a grin, a sigh of relief escaping her lips. She started to tug the table once more, making her way across the hall to another morgue room. She called for Brody to follow her. Brody walked down the hallway, feeling like she should be looking behind her for spies or peering eyes.
Once inside the room, Brody noted that the doctor had already started to sift through the X-Rays, toxicology reports and other medical documents. The sheet was pulled down, a man laid on the table - still and so pale. Brody didn’t really want to walk in any farther knowing that an autopsy would be performed.
“What happened to him, Doctor Doggett?”
“Kenley, please. I don’t know quite yet. His brain just shut down.”
She pulled out a CT scan of what looked like the brain, but Brody couldn’t be sure from the angle. She didn’t really want to step any farther into the room if she didn’t need to.
“He was abducted from his home when he was a child. Less than a week after disappearing, he just showed up in a hospital. There was nothing wrong with him except, obviously, post-traumatic stress disorder. I mean, physically he was fine. There were no bumps or bruises or scraps. There were no broken bones or fractures. Psychologically, he shut down. He refused to talk, never talked again actually, and just started to draw symbols on pieces of paper.”
“Then what?”
“Well, it was odd. Slowly, areas in his brain just started to shut down. First, it was the Broca’s area and Wernicke’s area. Then the Brodmann areas started to shut down one by one. This is the end result - obviously.”
“Why did his brain shut down and why is he here?”
“Honestly, I have theories about why his brain started to slowly die, but I haven’t performed my own autopsy yet for conclusive evidence. Anyways, the case belongs to the Defense Department. Technically, I’m not supposed to have this body. I, uh, kinda stole it. Anyways, what happened to him about eighteen years ago… it’s happening again to other children. Call me crazy, but I think there’s a connection.”
“Eighteen years?”
Brody quickly did the math in her head. 2012. It was the same year that Will had been kidnapped, the same year he had somehow gotten away. She suddenly had a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. If Will hadn’t gotten away, would this had happen to him? Would he had been a mute child just drawing symbols until his brain shut down bit by bit? It was hard to imagine her brilliant, so full of life partner reduced to nothing.
“Long time, huh? He was the first eighteen years ago that this happened to. I’m expecting a whole bunch of bodies to come through here in the next couple of months.”
“Did they ever catch who did this?”
“Uh, really, it all depends on who you talk to. I mean, there was a cult that was arrested for it. I don’t think they did it though.”
“Then who?”
“Riley - can I call you Riley?” Brody nodded. “Okay, Riley, we just met. I mean, you seem like a really nice gal and all, and, hey, maybe we could be friends or something. Anyways, I don’t really feel comfortable telling you my thoughts, because my thoughts get me written up and put on probation.”
“I work on the X-Files.”
That simple statement made Kenley beam. Holding up a finger, she rushed towards the double doors of the morgue and secured them shut - bolt and all. She rushed towards the dead body, beaconing Brody to follow her. Digging through her lab coat pocket, she produced a small machine that she sat next to the toe-tagged foot.
“Okay, we’re safe to talk.”
“What is that?”
“Uh, a scrambler. It blocks microphones and such by scrambling the frequencies so no one can record what we’re saying.” She let out a chuckle. “Okay, so if you work on the X-Files then you gotta know about the Super Soldiers.”
“Your parents mentioned it. I’m not too clear on what they are.”
“Oh, man, lots of explaining. They’re, uh, humans who were turned into aliens. Alien-human hybrids. You know? Anyways, they’re indestructible, except for the fact that magnetite is their Achilles’ heel. I mean, they’ll pull a flying nun into a-a mountain made of magnetite. It’s the only thing that will kill them. Well, that we know of.”
“So… these Super Soldiers?”
“I, along with some close associates, believe that these children in… 2012ish were abducted by Super Soldiers and subjected to tests. These, uh, symbols that they drew? It’s like they’re working on something. Decoding or-or recording something for them. These kids that are disappearing now, we believe that the same thing is happening again. I mean, these kids disappear from their beds or on their way home from school and they turn up a week later different. I fear that these children are slowly dying like this man. There were, uh, brain disorders found in the kids from 2012. I mean, if these kids aren’t tested, they could end up here in eighteen years or so.”
“I have to go.”
The only thought in Brody’s mind was that Will was dying of some brain disorder like the others. He could have gone eighteen years undiagnosed. The thought scared her more than she was willing to admit. She knew she was being irrational, knew that jumping to conclusions was always her downfall, but she had never felt so strongly about something as this. She rushed out of the morgue, the Avian Influenza papers long forgotten in her jacket pocket.
-
FBI Headquarters
9:58 A.M.
Will let out a long sigh, his thoughts mounded up like a filthy pile at a landfill. Growing up, he was raised in a small town in Wyoming where everyone knew each other. It was easy to trust people because the grocer was brother to the neighbor and the dentist was married to the school teacher. Everyone knew each other’s names, everyone had connections. Will was raised to trust these people and the lessons learned as a child were hard habits to break.
When that van pulled up and those Super Solders grabbed him, his whole world crashed down around him. He no longer knew who to trust. The grocer seemed like a stranger, foreign and not so friendly anymore. The school teachers seemed like they were hiding things, treating him like some delicate flower to pull him into a false sense of security. Will went from trusting everyone to fearing everyone.
Except, those lessons of trust he learned as a child, still crept up on him. It was hard to deny his childish callings - to deny that perhaps his partner isn’t related to his friendly neighbor. Maybe, just maybe, she could be keeping secret hidden truths that he so desperately craved. Up was down and right was left. He had no one to trust, no one to believe except for himself. Even that, trusting himself, was a dangerous thing to do.
“Sorry I’m la-”
Will walked into the basement office and stopped dead in his tracks. Brody wasn’t there. Those feelings of doubt snuck up on him again, digging their poisonous teeth into his side. Letting out a long sigh, he shrugged off his jacket and threw it across the back of his chair.
“I know! I know! I’m late!”
The door burst open to reveal a frazzled Brody stumbling through the threshold. She rushed towards the desk, grabbing his coat and shoving it into his chest. Her hand found his and started to tug him towards the door like a little kid towing their parent somewhere of childish importance.
“I have a case for us - an X-Files even - but first we need to get you to the hospital to get an MRI or an EEG or an EKG or whatever brain scan you’ll need. I don’t know the difference.”
“Whoa, whoa, Brody, what’s up?”
Will slipped his hand out of hers, his feet rooted into the ground. She whirled around and gave him the most impatient glare he had ever received in his life.
“Okay, look, I know I don’t normally believe in mumbo jumbo alien, devil, ghost stories. I don’t - I’m not a believer. Except, I can’t deny patterns or facts. The facts and patterns in this matter are quiet clear. Children in 2012, who were around your age, were kidnapped and returned days later. They were different and they were dying. Now, they’re dropping like flies and a new patch of kids are going through the same thing. I don’t know what it means, and I’m not saying that Super Soldiers or anything like that is behind it, but as your partner I have to beg you to get a brain scan to see if you have a brain disease.”
Will just stood there in stunned silence unable to make his vocal cords form any intelligent words. So he did the only thing he could do. He stared at her as though she had two heads or was a martian from another planet. After a minute of pragmatic silence, Will managed to utter, “What?”
Brody groaned before launching into a long, detailed story about John Doggett, Monica Reyes, and their daughter Kenley. She talked of Super Soldiers supposedly abducting children, performing tests on them, making them different. She rambled about Avian Influenza vaccinations. She talked about 2012, connecting points of how everything seemed to be centered on that year. Will stood there, dumbfounded as he listened to his once rational partner talk about conspiracies and mysterious informants.
“You believe all of this?” he whispered.
“I don’t know what to believe, Will. All of my preconceived ideas are just quickly being thrown out the window and replace with absurd, crazy happenings.”
“That’s what happens when you work on the X-Files,” he said lightly.
A small chuckle escaped her ruby lips as she reached out and gripped his upper arm and squeezed. Slowly, a grin dazzled her features as her eyes intently sought out his.
“Let’s get to Grosse Pointe. I’ll see a doctor there,” suggested Will.
“Let’s go, Partner.”
Somehow, following Brody out of the corner basement office, it felt more natural than it ever did with Daphne. He couldn’t explain why he was slowly starting to put so much trust into Brody, but it just felt like the right thing to do. She had been more honest and true in the short amount of time he’s known her than anyone he had ever met.
-
Grosse Pointe, Michigan
St. Clare’s Pediatric Institute
Will walked next to Brody as they walked into the building where the abducted and then returned children were staying for psych evaluations. The children were from different cities across the United States, but a majority had all been put under the care of Doctor Heron. He had adamantly refused to go to the hospital before talking with Jonah Parker.
The walls of the psychiatric unit brought back terrible memories from when he was a pre-teen. He had sat in an observation room for hours at a time, psychologists just watching his every move. It had been a suffocating prison where the walls were painted a sickening yellow. He never liked the color yellow after that. They set him up with books, game consoles, seemingly normal things. Except, he couldn’t do anything but just sit in that room going over in his head all the things that had went wrong.
They had been permitted to see Jonah, an eight year old boy who had been missing for five days before returned, but were told they would be asked to leave immediately if the child began to get upset. Will followed Brody into the tiny pit of hell to see the eight year old Jonah Parker drawing on a piece of paper. Brody walked up to him, knelt down to his size and gave him the warmest smile she could have mustered.
“Hey, Jonah. My name is Riley, and this is my friend Will,” she spoke gently. “What are you drawing?”
Jonah ignored her and continued to scratch out the intricate symbols with great detail. Will took a step forward, his heart pounding wildly in his chest as flashbacks assaulted his mind. God, he hated these places. He knelt down next to Brody, forcing a fake smile.
“Jonah, Buddy?” questioned Will.
The boy looked up, his gaze looking into Will. The crayon slipped out of Jonah’s hand as the boy studied Will intently. Glancing over at Brody, he shrugged his shoulders lightly with a grimace clouding his features.
“Hi,” the boy whispered.
Will knew that the psychologists behind the glass were burning holes into him with their eyes. He could feel Brody next to him openly gaping. Will had no idea why this child decided to open up to him and no one else. Seriously, he didn’t know whether it was a curse or not.
“What are you drawing?” Will questioned as he plopped down on his butt and attempted to sit Indian style.
Jonah glanced over at Brody with suspicion clouded into his bright blue orbs. Will’s gaze flickered in her direction before he took a deep breath. Reaching out a hand, he gently rubbed a knuckle across the kid’s cheek to gain his attention. Jonah stared up at Will with fear shining in his features.
“Hey, it’s okay. Br-Riley and I are friends. She’s here to help you.”
“Why are you lying, Will?” Jonah’s voice cracked.
“I’m not, Buddy. Riley’s here to help you just like me.”
“Maybe. But she’s not your friend.”
Will froze at the words, dumbly blinking at the small child in front of him. His throat felt like it was closing up and his heart pounded fast in his chest.
“Of course, she’s my friend. Why would you say she wasn’t?”
“Because you don’t trust her,” Jonah reasoned, “but she trusts you.”
Glancing over at Brody, he gave her a soft and apologetic smile before returning his concentration on Jonah.
“Will, I’ll leave if you want,” Brody whispered.
“No, don’t. Jonah, Kid, listen to me. You can trust Riley and me. Tell us what happened.”
“What if she’s one of them?” Jonah pleaded.
“One of what?”
“The monsters with the bumps on their necks?”
He could feel Brody stiffen next to him. Out of the corner of his eye, he noted Brody brushing her brown locks off her neck. Will beaconed Jonah forward, taking the smaller hand into his own. Together, they traced the base of Brody’s smooth neck. Underneath his feather-like touch, he felt Brody shiver.
“She’s not a monster, see?”
Jonah nodded gravely before settling back onto the floor. His cheek concaved in, the flesh being chewed earnestly by his teeth. Will gave the most encouraging smile he could muster.
“The monsters said I wasn’t allowed to tell anyone who wasn’t one of us.”
“One of what, Jonah?” questioned Brody gently.
“Special, like Will.”
“Wh-what makes you and me so special, Buddy?”
“We’re magic.”
Children thought differently than adults. It was a universal fact. Will tried to put himself into the shoes of an eight year old boy, tried to remember what his childish reasoning was like. Except, for the life of him, Will couldn’t place himself in a child’s mind which was ironic due to the fact that the first half of his career at the FBI was putting himself into the shoes of serial killers and rapists.
“Magic how?” pressed Will.
“You know. Magic.”
Will nodded even though he didn’t quite understand. Magic. Was the magic he spoke of the fact that he’d hear an unbearable ringing in his ears whenever a Super Soldier was near? Was it the fact that he did extraordinary things when he was kidnapped?
“Will, please don’t let the monsters hurt me,” the kid pleaded with tears accumulating in the corner of his eyes.
“I promise you a thousand moons that no one will hurt you again.”
The words had slipped out of his mouth with ease, the familiar little saying gnawing at his insides. I promise you a thousand moons, his mother would say with some pledge attached onto the end.
“I’ll be by tomorrow, okay, Buddy?”
Jonah nodded, his pink bottom lip sucked into his mouth. The kid lurched forward, his skinny arms wrapping around Will’s neck as though his life depended on it. Slowly, Will slipped his arms around the kid’s middle and held the kid close to his chest.
“You’re gonna be okay,” whispered Will before pulling away.
Will stood up, Brody following. They walked out of the observation room in silence. Before the door closed, Will looked back to see Jonah continuing his work of symbol drawing. The psychologist, nurse and mother all rushed over to the pair with questions burning on their faces. Will shifted uncomfortably, his mouth suddenly like sandpaper.
“I want that child under twenty-four hour guard. No one besides Agent Brody, Mrs. Parker, Doctor Heron and myself are allowed access until we can establish that no one is going to harm Jonah,” Will explained.
“Agent Van de Kamp…” Mrs. Parker whispered, “thank you.”
Will forced a small smile before gently grabbing Brody by the elbow. He tugged her away from the peering eyes and down a corridor. The only thing that he wanted was to get the hell out of the psychiatric hospital.
“We need to get you to a doctor,” pressed Brody.
“I’m fine.”
“You could be dying without even knowing it, Will!”
She jerked her arm out of his grasp and turned to face him. Her eyes were pleading for him to stop, to think about what she was saying. Except, Will couldn’t check himself into a hospital when Jonah needed his help, when there were other children who needed him.
“I feel fine, Brody.”
“William,” she sighed.
“Look, if I don’t protect these kids then who will? Jonah trusts me, and I promised him I’d look out for him. I can’t just disappear to a hospital for medical tests and not live up to my obligations. I’m not that kind of guy.”
Brody groaned but said nothing. He knew she understood where he was coming from even though she didn’t agree. So, he forced a smile onto his face and lightly punched her in the arm to indicate that everything was all right.
-
Buy Back Games
3:48 P.M.
“No, no, no. Look at this, Man!”
A blonde ten year old pointed to the game console, his face alit with excitement. His friend ambled over to him, obviously disappointed in the choice. With a snort, he shook his head and gestured for his friend to follow him.
“Come on, Joshua, that’s weak. I hear they even discontinued making games for that piece of crap,” the kid said.
“Is not,” the blonde protested. “I heard the graphics were wicked!”
“Josh,” the kid groaned.
“Ugh, never mind. You just don’t understand.”
Joshua dug through his jeans pocket for his cell phone. Glancing down at the clock, he sighed loudly enough to catch his friend’s attention.
“My mom’ll flip if I’m not home by four. You know how she is.”
“Then get goin’. This weekend though, we’ll have to have our gaming day. Ben said we could have it at his house.”
“Yeah, okay. I’ll see you in school tomorrow.”
Joshua shoved his phone back into his pocket and rushed out of the gaming store. He had ten minutes to get home before his mother would ground him for the next two weeks. He wasn’t supposed to go places without adult supervision because, apparently, there were too many criminals and dangers in this day and age. Except, Joshua would laugh whenever his mom would warn him about such evils since nothing that bad ever happened in Grosse Pointe. Not to mention, he could take care of himself.
Those thoughts slowly started to wane when he felt the car tailing him. Gripping his backpack strap tightly, he picked up his pace. Joshua refused to look behind him, refused to acknowledge that he knew this car was following him. The wheels of the vehicle squeaked, a rush of air breezing past the boy. Joshua froze as the car road up onto the sidewalk. The door opened to reveal a bulky man who grabbed Joshua by the arms and hauled him into the car.
The kid struggled against the calloused hands that pinned him to the backseat. An intense ringing vibrated in his ears so loudly that he couldn’t hear the conversation that was going on between the men and women in the car. A hand touched his forehead, brushing aside his blonde locks. His eyes felt heavy and quickly sleep overtook him.
-
Conquistador Motel
10:23 P.M.
Brody lounged back onto the stiff motel bed, her heels discarded by the front door. Her jacket had been thrown on the back of a wooden chair, her blouse sleeves rolled up. On her lap was the police report on Jonah Parker’s disappearance and return. She read through the information as the muffled sound of water cascading in the shower drifted from the bathroom. Suddenly, the water ceased and rustling could be heard.
The door opened, a wave of steam filling the room, as Will appeared in nothing but a blue terrycloth. Brody averted her gaze from Will, her eyes burning as she stared at the blurry words in front of her. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed him bending over to dig through his suitcase for a change of clothes. The minutes seemed to tick by slowly, Brody’s eyes watering at her intense concentration of the nonsensical words.
Will plopped down across from her on the bed clad in jeans and a t-shirt. His dark hair was damp, locks sticking to his forehead. A smirk crossed his features as he plucked the police file from her lap and lazily flipped through it.
“Honestly, Brods, I’m not going to drop into a seizure mode from some horrible brain condition that I probably don’t even have,” he said lightheartedly. “In other words, you don’t need to baby sit me.”
“I, uh, don’t mind it. You know, I would just be over here every twenty minutes making sure you’re okay, and me just hanging around here is no biggie.”
“Right.”
Will collapsed backwards, barely just missing Brody’s feet. Raising the file over his face, Brody watched as he skimmed through the material as though he were merely reading a book for pure entertainment. Over the short time they had worked together, Brody was just beginning to comprehend Will’s odd ticks and ways of doing things.
“Remember how I was telling you about Kenley Doggett?”
“Yeah, what about her?” questioned Will as he tossed the file aside.
“I think you two would get along fabulously,” she replied as she drew her legs close to her body. “She’s very… quirky and open like you.”
“If I didn’t know any better, Agent Brody, I would think that you were trying to set me up with your newfound friend.”
Brody let out a small chuckle, a smirk working its way onto her face. Honestly, she just wanted to talk about anything at that moment because seeing a half-naked Will looking so nonchalant about it was unnerving to her.
“You know, I bet you’re the kind of gal who reads those sappy romance novels, aren’t you? You know, those Nicholas Sparks and that Tuesdays at Tiffany’s kind of… stuff.”
“It’s Breakfast at Tiffany’s. Plus, Nicholas Sparks wrote some great romantic tales and Capote’s story is timeless. I enjoy that kind of literature. I’m sorry that we can’t all like sci-fi.”
“I don’t read sci-fi.”
“Why don’t I believe that?” she teased.
“I hunt for aliens all day long. I don’t want to read fiction stories about it when I go home. Now, if it was a true story, then I would be inclined to read it.”
Brody leaned back and slowly became more comfortable in the setting. Snaking a foot forward, she poked him gently in the side with her big toe. A strangled noise emitted from Will’s lips as he turned to face his partner.
“What kind of literature do you like?” questioned Brody.
“Oh, I like the classics and the controversial pieces. You know, my parents were big on reading to me when I was a kid. Every week, after grocery shopping, my mom and I would go this small bookstore to buy a book or two that I wanted my parents to read to me. When I was six, I picked out Moby Dick and my parents were literally shocked when I enjoyed it. Seriously, I went through a Moby Dick phase where I renamed all of our farm animals after characters from the book. Spotty the dog turned into Ahab, Whiskers the cat was renamed Starbuck, Betsy the cow succumbed to Ishmael, and Oinks the pig was the second mate himself - Stubb.”
“You’re joking.”
“I sort of wish I was.” Will laughed. “I read Moby Dick once every couple of years. When I was in high school, I went through a Hemingway phase. In fact, for my literature class in tenth grade we had to pick a short story to read in front of the class and carry a discussion on the piece. I picked Hills like White Elephants and got Saturday detention. I went to this swanky Catholic private school that my grandparents paid for, and the nuns weren’t impressed with me choosing a book that centered around an idea that went against their very religion.”
Brody nudged Will in the thigh with her foot, a smile breaking out fully on her face. Will smirked right on back, a gleaming excitement captured in his green eyes.
“You know, I do enjoy Capote’s style - more so with In Cold Blood than Breakfast at Tiffany’s.”
“Why doesn’t that surprise me?”
Before Will could retort, there was a brisk knocking on the motel door. Will slid off the bed and ambled slowly towards the door. Brody craned her neck to see who was there only to see a vaguely familiar brunette female.
“What the hell do you think you’re playing at, William?” the woman yelled as she pushed her way into the room. “I mean, seriously, you think that you can ju-”
The woman stopped once she caught sight of Brody. An exasperated sigh escaped her lips as she rounded on Will, hands placed firmly on her hips. Brody shifted on the bed, feeling completely out of place and awkward.
“You know what, William, I don’t understand. Obviously, you don’t care about what I think or about my job.”
“Oh, don’t be overdramatic,” Will spoke in an annoyed tone.
“Overdramatic? I give you some friendly advice and you throw caution to the wind instead. I tell you stay away from my case and you get on the next plane out here. That’s not being overdramatic. It’s called being pissed off, William.”
“This case is an X-File. Therefore, my partner and I have jurisdiction to investigate,” he rationalized.
“This is a Defense Department matter, Agent Van de Kamp. Tomorrow morning, the first thing you’re going to do is get my partner and me clearance to speak with Jonah Parker.”
“Since when does the Defense Department deal with kidnapped children who were returned?”
The woman groaned, and Brody could tell her patience was thinning rapidly. Will stood there, cool as a cucumber. As though a flipped had been switched on, Brody placed the woman. She was in Monroe’s office when Brody was assigned to the X-Files.
“Don’t make me call Washington, Van.”
“Goodnight, Daphne.”
Will held the door to the motel open, making his wishes clear. The woman named Daphne gave him a long, hard look before storming out of the room. The door swung shut, softly clicking. Will turned to Brody with an unreadable expression painted across his face.
“Will…” Brody trailed off.
“It was nothing,” Will snapped.
Obviously, Will was thinking something entirely different than what Brody was thinking. She slid off the bed, her legs suddenly felt like rubber.
“I want you to trust me,” Brody started, “so I’m always going to tell you the truth even if you don’t want to hear it.”
“What?”
“That woman is not your friend. She was there when I was assigned to work with you. She was standing in the shadows, just… observing. I think she wants to shut you down.”
Instead of accepting her honesty and thanking her, Will just stood there with a look of utter disbelief plastered across his face. He just stood there, eyes narrowed with dumbstruck mask clouding his features. Brody slowly began to wonder if he would believe her.
“Will?”
“Funny. She said the same thing about you,” he whispered.
Brody froze, eyebrows knitted down in confusion and disbelief. This woman had been trying to place doubts into Will’s mind about her? It was then that Brody knew something was wrong, terribly wrong.
Next Week - Atonement: As the hunt for a missing child intensifies, Will and Brody part ways both in a professional and personal manner.
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