Title: Finding a Family, Part 1
Rating: PG (a few curse words, what're you gonna do?)
Genre: Angst... there's the possibility of an additional genre later on... I'm not sure yet..
Disclaimers: Any characters who don't belong to Chris Carter, 1013 and FOX, are my creations.(Kalina, the Section Chief, and Alyse Baxter) Take them and die!!!! ::wink wink:: Oh and by the way, no copyright infringement intended. Please don't sue me.
Summary: Set 23 years from the present, the story centers around William's entering the FBI and being assigned to the X-Files, and his search for the family he lost once.
Feedback: YES PLEASE!! If you don't like it, flame me, and I'll take it in stride because I respect your opinions... :oP
Author's Notes: I've been toying with this idea for a while. Let me know what you think. I know this kind of fic has been done before, but give this a chance, please.

J. Edgar Hoover FBI Building
April 17, 2026

"You'd think that in the year 2019, they'd have the technology to save anyone from anything. Maybe we aren't as advanced as we once thought. I lost my mom and dad, well, the two people I knew as my mom and dad, in a car accident. A car accident of all god damn things. The paramedics rushed them to the hospital, but the doctors couldn't save them. They said that there was 'nothing they could do.'

Another family, lost. My mom and dad, well, the people who adopted me, had the last name Van de Kamp. I had a mom and dad before them too, supposedly. Well, I guess I had more of a mom than a dad. Because from my what Mark and Sandra, my parents, told me, my birthmother was single, and she needed to do what was best for me. Or at least that was the load of horseshit the social workers handed her.

They told me all of this when they told me I was adopted, about a week after my twelfth birthday, when I started noticing that I looked nothing like them. At the time, I had no interest in learning of my birthmother, or my birthfather. I was content to live my life as William Van de Kamp, son of Mark and Sandra Van de Kamp, their only child. My content didn't last long, however. It was only weeks after this when the dreams started up again. I hadn't been having dreams since I was eight, but when they came that summer after my twelfth birthday, they came every night. I soon became afraid to sleep, because I didn't want to dream. Although, when I knew that sleep was inevitable, I would hope, and wish and pray for the one "nice" dream to occur.

In this dream, it's as if I'm floating around watching the scene that unfolds below me. I'm in a bedroom, a woman's bedroom. The walls and carpet are cream colored, there is a large feather bed with a pastel comforter on it, and the room is.. pretty. Simple, but pretty. There is a woman sitting on the bed, holding a bundle of blankets with a baby inside. She's singing a lullaby to her child. At the time I had the dream, the woman's face was etched into my memory, but as time has worn on, the minor details have faded from my memory. The woman's face is often replaced by faces of women I know as I struggle to remember what she looks like. But when I see her, I can still see her red hair, which came down to about her chin. She's wearing satin pajamas and a bathrobe and slippers. She sits on her bed, holding the baby, still singing to it. She has visitors, three odd looking men. They seem like a mismatched set, but they travel together. After they put their gifts on a table, and leave, a man enters the room. He's tall, much taller than the red-haired woman, and he smiles at her, and she smiles at him. He asks her, 'How's everybody doing?' Smiling, she stands and walks to him, responding, 'We're doing just fine.' She hands him the baby, and as he looks at the baby, all he can say is a breathless, 'Hi.' He asks the red-haired woman, 'What're you going to call him?' The woman looks up at him, and quietly responds, 'William. After your father.' The man looks at her, and the two look lovingly at one another for a long time. By this point in the dream, several things were evident to me. The baby is the child of this man and this woman, the child is a boy, and the child's name is William. I still find it odd that I dream of a child named William. Maybe it was because I so longed to find my real family that I dreamt up such a scenario with such a family." William asked of the FBI counselor he had begun having sessions twice a week with since he had officially became an Agent just over a year ago. The woman, who was new to the position of Counselor, nodded, making notes as William continued.

"Then the man jokingly says to the woman, but with a definite tone of affection in his voice, 'Well, I don't know. He's... he's got your coloring and your eyes. But he looks suspiciously like Assistant Director Skinner'." At this remark, the counselor, Alyse Baxter, looks at William with a hint of surprise. He notices her expression, and says,

"What is it?" William asks, before continuing with the tale of his dream. Baxter shakes her head, saying,

"Nothing, really. It's just odd that you dreamt of an Assistant Director, Skinner in particular. You've told me previously that at that age, you knew nothing about the FBI other than its name because you had seen the government provided warning on the videos you watched, and yet the people in your dream, mentioned an Assistant Director. Did you know what an AD was at the time? Had you ever heard the term?" William shook his head,

"No. I hadn't a clue. Even my mom and dad weren't sure of what one was." Baxter nodded, taking note of this mentally. "You seemed surprised when I gave him the name Skinner, why?"

"Well, my mom used to be an Assistant to one of the Assistant Directors, and coincidentally, his name was Skinner. But it's a common name; anyone could have assigned it to a person in his dream." She motioned to William, saying, "Continue with your dream, William."

"Well, after that it gets a little fuzzy," he said, closing his eyes to remember better. "The woman says something to the man, something like, 'I don't understand. They came to take him from us, but why didn't they?' and she called the man something. She said his name. It-it wasn't his first name, it sounded too odd to be a first name. It started with an 'M', but, I can't remember what it was. I don't know who this 'they' is either. Then he says something to the effect of, 'I don't quite understand that either. Except that maybe he isn't what they thought he was. That doesn't make him any less of a miracle though, does it?' She says something next about 'fearing the truth', and he says something about, 'fearing the possibilities, the truth we both know'. But when the woman questions him, he doesn't respond, he only kisses her."

"But the man never calls the woman by name?" Baxter asked, growing more and more intrigued. 'Twelve year olds don't just create this sort of things in their minds...' she though to herself. 'There's got to be some basis in reality here.' William shook his head.

"Nope. He never once says her name in that entire dream." William had something more to say, but he paused, seeming unsure if he wanted to reveal it. Alyse Baxter took note of this and said,

"William? Is there something more?" William looked at his hands clasped in his lap. He lifted his head, and said,

"I know this sounds crazy, I mean, the ability of a person to experience a premonition, or a vision has never really been confirmed. But, what if.... what if, these are real people I've been seeing? They're not only in that dream, after all. They show up in almost all my dreams, related or not. What if my dreams are trying to tell me something?" William stopped himself, laughing and shaking his head. "No, now I sound crazy. Preaching all this 'premonition' mumbojumbo." He sat back, and sighed, running his fingers through his brown hair, which, though he didn't know it, was unruly just like his father's had always been.

"What about the dreams which aren't so nice?" Baxter asked, "The ones you've said that you dread when you're falling asleep?"

"Next time," he said, simply because he could. "We'll talk about those next time."

He walked down the hall, and to the elevator, heading for his third floor office. Just as he pushed the down button on the elevator, his cell phone rang.

"Van de Kamp," he answered, making the three syllables sound as one.

"Agent Van de Kamp? This is Section Chief Morison's office. We tried your office, but your partner said you were out. I apologize for calling you on your cell phone; I hope I'm not interrupting anything?" Asked the unidentified caller, most likely the Section Chief's assistant.

"Nope. I was just on my way back to my office. Should I come down to the Section Chief's office?" he said, holding open the door of the empty elevator, awaiting instruction.

"Yes, come right down please." William was about to assure the caller that he would be there in a few minutes when he heard a click. He shook his head, stepping into the elevator and pushing the button for the second floor. Pocketing his cell phone, William was worried. The Section Chief was not someone who called Agents in for friendly conversation and tea. She was the epitome of Ice Queen. William straightened his tie and brushed off his suit before knocking on the door of Morison's office. He was greeted by an unfriendly looking man who did not return his warm grin, or move to shake Will's hand as he ushered him inside. He sat in a chair across the desk from that of Section Chief Elena Morison. Will felt his heart beating quickly in his chest and he clasped his hands in hopes of hiding his sweaty palms. S.C. Morison removed her glasses, and looked up from the open folder which sat on her desk, to look at William.

"Agent Van de Kamp, good afternoon."

"Good afternoon, ma'am," Will said, while thinking, 'Get on with it already, you're freaking me out here.'

"Agent Van de Kamp, I see here that you've been with us for just over a year. How is it that you came to be with us in the FBI? Especially here in D.C. I see that you were raised in Wyoming... Why such a big move?" Morison said, clasping her hands on her desk and leaning forward, eager for William's response.

"Well, after high school, I wanted a change of scenery, and an east coast school, it seemed, would provide that. Well, that and I felt that I could make a difference in the FBI. I, I guess I've just always felt strangely drawn to the FBI," he said, stopping himself before he questioned the Section Chief's reason for asking. He'd been told long ago, that asking too many questions can get you into hot water. Well, he wasn't sure if he had been told, but, 'Common sense tells you not to question your superiors' he thought to himself. The Section Chief nodded, and made her mouth move smile-ward, something Will was not accustomed to seeing her do.

"Well, the reason we've called you here today..." 'Finally!' Will thought. "....is to inform you of your new assignment." William's heart dropped. What had he done to deserve reassignment? What was he being demoted to? The Department of Paper-Pushing? If he had known his mother, he would have known how much like her original assignment his would be. She had been called to the same office, seated in front of the same desk, and given word of her assignment. The Section Chief continued, "First of all, I just wanted to inform you, that this is not a punishment in any way. In fact, it is because we have been so impressed by your work and your strong scientific background that we have chosen you for this assignment. Are you familiar with an area of the FBI called the "X-Files", or Agent Kalina Doggett?"

"I've heard of the X-Files; they're infamous and talked about all the time in the Academy, but I am not familiar with Agent Doggett," William said, feeling his heart sink at the prospect of being put on the X-Files. It was, from what he had heard, a garbage dump for the cases that the other departments didn't feel a need to pursue. It was the laughing stock of the Bureau, as were any Agents "blessed" enough to be assigned to it.

"You'll be working with Agent Doggett, and our hopes are that you can do what only one other Agent before you has attempted to do. We want you to use your science to prove to Agent Doggett that there is no need to call these cases X-Files. We want you to invalidate all paranormal aspects of the X-Files, which Agent Scully, the Agent assigned before you failed to do before her leaving the FBI," Section Chief Morison said, rising. William did the same, and shook her hand. He left the office in silence, and went to his third floor office and packed his things. After bidding good bye to his current partner, who had already been spoken to, AND assigned a new partner as well, he headed for the dreaded basement office. He stepped into the elevator and as it began to sink, so did his hopes. They were shunning him, by putting him in that basement office; they were hiding him. William was lost in his own thoughts when he heard the voice of the woman from his dreams.

-"I'm just constantly amazed by you.. you're working down here in the basement, sifting through files and transmissions that any other agent would just throw away in the garbage." Startled, he continued to listen, fixated, as the male voice responded,

-"Well that's why I'm in the basement Scully." The red haired woman's name was Scully! She responded to his comment,

-"You're in the basement because they're afraid of you, of your relentlessness and because they know that they could drop you in the middle of the desert, and tell you the truth is out there, and you would ask them for a shovel!" - William shook his head, terrified and excited at the same time. He wanted the voices to go away, but he now knew the name of the red-haired woman... but what good would it do him? Of what significance to him was her existence? Besides, he didn't know if she was even still alive. Morison had said that Scully had "left the Bureau". William shook his head again, and put the thought out of his mind.

He knocked on and then opened the door to the basement office, where the nameplate on the door read "Kalina Doggett". Sitting at the desk, facing the door, was William's new partner. She looked up at him, and smiled. William noticed immediately how attractive she was. She stood about 5'6" with some gigantic shoes on, and had straight brown hair which brushed her collar bones. She had a delicate facial structure, and amazingly blue eyes. As soon as William managed to pick his chin up off the floor, he extended his hand.

"H-hi. I'm William Van de Kamp, you're new partner." She stepped around the desk, and removed her glasses, extending her hand as well, saying,

"Nice to meet you, Agent Van de Kamp. I'm Kalina Doggett, welcome to the X-Files."