STOLEN PUMPKINS AND ORANGE HAY, OH MY!

Christmas is a time for family, they say. Valentine's Day doesn't warrant a full celebration, they say. Well, it's Halloween and he doesn't care what they say, not this time. Walter Bishop is going to have the best Halloween ever and no one is going to deprive him – or Gene – of that. So there.

Christmas

"Walter, what are you doing?!"

"Why, putting up mistletoe, of course."

"In Gene's pen?" His son questions incredulously. Walter huffs and shakily makes his way down from the ladder. Peter moves to help him. He skips down from the third step, landing on his wobbly feet before Peter can reach out. He is completely capable of using a ladder, thank you very much.

"Even Gene needs love, Peter! And festive cheer!" Peter, arms crossed, merely stares at him.

"Oh, and eggnog!" He nearly squeals, rushing off to check on the boiling beakers filled with his secret recipe.

Peter follows and reaches over his shoulder to turn off the Bunsen burners. After instructing his father to dispose of the spiked eggnog immediately, he proceeds to walk around the lab methodically taking down mistletoe. Once that's done with, he declares there will be no Bishop's Merry Lab of Christmas Cheer.

Walter spends the rest of the day sulking and blasting his old records.

Valentine's

"Umm… Walter?"

"Olivia, dear! Oh, you're here. How wonderful. Come, come and try my newest concoction." He waves the blonde over and pushes a test tube with slightly pink-tinged liquid into her hands.

"'Livia, don't." Peter mumbles distractedly, not even looking up from whatever it is he's doing at his station. It's just a reflex, anyway; Olivia wasn't planning on downing the mystery blend.

"Walter," She returns the test tube to its rightful place, a rack holding various other tubes filled with liquids tinged varying shades of pink, red and purple. "What are you up to?"

"Why, it's almost Valentine's Day, dear. You of all people should be well aware, seeing as how you are in a romantic relationship with my son." Peter lets out a long-suffering groan as Olivia ducks and averts her eyes somewhere else awkwardly. She clears her throat and looks back to give Walter a questioning look, one eyebrow raised.

Walter stares at her blankly for three seconds. "Oh! Oh, yes! These," He announces grandly. "Are love potions!"

The lab is silent but for the scrape of Peter's chair against the lab floor as he wordlessly gets up, gingerly picks up the test tubes and walks them over to a sink, draining each and every single one down the drain.

Walter snaps something about 'kids these days' and 'no appreciation for the sentimental' and takes off to complain to Gene.

Halloween

"Oh, this is most exciting, Gene, dear." He affectionately pats her nose as he decorates her stall with season-appropriate streamers. "Peter and Olivia and Asterisk will absolutely love this surprise, I just know it."

"Umm, no. They won't."

Walter turns around to find a slack-jawed, wide-eyed Peter and Olivia, seemingly shocked into silence. Ostrich hovers just behind them, dangerously close to losing her grip on the box of doughnuts Walter had sent her out to fetch.

"This is why you sent me out to that bakery an hour away…" She mutters to herself.

"Ah, son! You're here! Splendid! What do you think?" Walter questions excitedly, arms waving wildly to show off all of his hard work.

And it was hard work indeed, to set up the wonderful, autumnal display of pumpkins and gourds on one table, to hang up those delightful fake ghosts and ghouls, to calculate the correct ratio of streamers vs. festive pumpkin lights.

But well worth every single second, he thinks, studying the silent looks of admiration on his team's faces. Well, he hopes it is admiration. Astroturf looks a little out of sorts, Olivia's lips are twitching and Peter… oh, Peter is wearily rubbing his temples.

Walter's smile falls.

"Don't… don't you like it?" He hesitantly questions in a small voice.

Olivia smiles brightly. "Oh, Walter, it's amazing." She tells him, pointing out the pumpkins and gourds. "It's just… where did you get those?"

"Oh, these!" Walter perks up. At least Olivia seems to enjoy the Halloween spirit. "Why, I found them on campus! They were just sitting around the doorway. I assumed the students had very generously carved some pumpkins and left them out for everyone to use. Wonderful, yes? I had first pick, too!"

A groan draws his attention to Peter, who has now positioned his palm against his forehead. Walter vaguely recognizes this as a sign of frustration.

"Peter… is something the matter?"

"No, no, Walter," His son reassures him. "It's just… those are the pumpkins the students carved for Harvard. We have to give them back. And then we can work on taking all of this down, okay?"

Peter moves for the pumpkins but Walter snaps into action.

"Give them back? Take these down? No!"

"Walter…"

"Don't Walter me, son! It's Halloween and I fully intend to celebrate this spiritual happening. You have denied me Christmas and Valentine's. I shall not be denied again and that is it!"

He crosses his arms for good measure. It makes him feel a tiny bit intimidating. And it must work because after eyeing him for less than a minute, Peter groans and stalks off to the office he now shares with Olivia. Olivia looks at Walter, then Astronomer before shrugging helplessly and following Peter.

Acid eyes him from her spot near the entrance. "You're really serious about this Halloween thing, huh?"

"As a shape-shifter attack," Walter nods, arms still crossed.

Anemia smiles a tiny smile. "And you're not backing down?"

"Never!" He declares. The Junior Agent sighs, then nods and steps forward. She places the box of sugary treats on the pumpkin table before heading for her station. "Okay, then."

Walter eyes her incredulously, shocked by his own victory. He waits for her to turn around and focus on her work before he dances a victory jiggle the way a boy in Chinatown had once taught him.

His triumph is short-lived.

"Walter, is this goo?!" Astrid shrieks not a moment later.

Oh, she must have discovered the thin layer of green goo he had smeared on every surface…

"Walter!"

His name, shouted, screamed, shrieked or bellowed, has become the most common mantra today. In fact, he's already been summoned precisely seventeen times. All to explain his decorative choices, of course.

First Asinine had discovered the goo. Then Olivia had found her coffee replaced with pumpkin tea. Really, it was for her own good. And that grandchild of his that she was carrying. She hadn't seemed appreciative, but she had calmed down once he had explained his reasons for the swap.

The women had been fairly reasonable and tolerating. His son, however…

Peter did not appreciate the plastic bats Walter had put up in the tiny office, hanging from varying lengths of rope. All hung low enough to be appreciated, of course. Appreciated in the right, Halloween-appropriate way: via bumping into them. And occasionally getting entangled in them, the way Peter seemed prone to do.

His son did not appreciate the talking (yet anatomically incorrect) skeleton Walter had placed near his station, either. The one that alternatively howled and cackled each time one set off the motion detector contained within.

Neither did he approve of treating Gene to a wide variety of Halloween beverages. Well, what was a scientist to do when he had no test subjects willing to try his concoctions? The bovine's reactions were as easily comprehensible as his team's…

And now it was the bowl of particularly realistic and gory looking jelly limbs he had set out for Olivia. The poor dear had been craving a fine amount of sugar lately and Walter thought he would kindly help her, with some holiday-themed treats.

"Walter, what the heck?!" Peter points out the bowl of bloody gummies.

"Oh, they're for Olivia, of course."

Peter sighs. Really, Walter had just been trying to be nice… "It looks like a bowl of sick zombie pudding. Olivia felt sick just looking at it."

Walter stares blankly at his son. Agent Dunham has never been quite squeamish… "Oh. Oh." Of course, with pregnancy and hormonal changes came… well, changes.

"Oh, I'll get rid of them at once! And I'll replace them with something more common, of course." He hastily adds. Olivia needs her sugar. "I just purchased the most realistic-looking gummy eyes…"

Peter throws his hands up – in joy, perhaps? Realistic-looking gummy eyes are quite hard to find… - and stalks off, presumably in search of Olivia to share the wonderful news with her.

Since nobody seems quite appreciative of his kind gestures and hard work to spread the Halloween spirit, Walter takes to Gene's pen and starts a conversation about her hay.

"Oh, it is wonderful hay, to be certain. Only the best, Gene. But it isn't very festive, don't you think?" He questions his friend. She lets out a moo before chomping down more of the plain-looking hay.

"No, this will not do at all."

Walter starts muttering to himself, pacing back and forth as Gene downs more and more of the increasingly offensive hay.

Then it comes to him. He comes to an abrupt stop and snaps his fingers, calling out for Abrasive. Gene looks up, curious.

"Asprey! I require orange food dye! Pumpkin, to be exact! And lots of it!"

Two hours later, Gene is contentedly chomping down her hay, dyed a very Halloween-appropriate shade of pumpkin.

Strangely, it doesn't seem to make her any happier than the plain hay. But perhaps she isn't one for sharing her joy.

Cows. Such wonderful yet puzzling creatures.

Later that day, Walter makes his way to the pumpkin table, where he proceeds to rip open bags and bags of candy and places them in hollowed out pumpkins. Once all seven pumpkins are filled to the brim with a variety of treats, he claps his hands, rings some pretty little bells he's quite certain are meant for Christmas, sets off a Jack-in-the-box and cheerfully calls out for everyone.

"Trick or treat! Smell Gene's feet! Come have something sweet to eat!" He finds his modifications to the children's chant quite ingenious. Very original, certainly.

As predicted, all three members of the team slowly come around to investigate his display. Peter blanches at the huge, impressive amount of candy. Asteroid wonders out loud where he had gotten all of it. Olivia merely helps herself to a little bit of everything, thanking him with a genuine smile.

And later on, as she downs treat after sugary treat, she even lets him feel his granddaughter happily kicking around.

All good things must come to an end.

Walter recognizes this with great sorrow in his heart. Eventually, the minutes tick by and the hours pass until it is 12:01 in the morning on the first of November.

Halloween is officially over.

He mopes around the lab, pulling down all sorts of decorations, making quite a racket. Peter and Olivia, who'd stayed late for some reason or another, come out to check on him.

"What's wrong, Walter?" Peter calls out, careful to avoid the cackling skeleton as he makes his way to his father.

"It's over," Walter mumbles, pulling down streamers. "Halloween is over."

Peter seems to grow very still.

Then a huge grin adorns his face as he turns to face Olivia.

"We did it!" He cheers. "We survived Halloween!"

Olivia laughs at the palpable relief in his tone, a hint of disbelief thrown in. Walter cracks a smile at his son's exaggerated actions.

"It's over!" Peter breathes, pretending to wipe non-existent sweat from his brow. Olivia laughs again, shakes her head in amusement and returns to her office, wordlessly scooping up a handful of candy as she passes the pumpkins.

Peter stays to help his father clear out the remnants of his celebration. They work in companionable silence save for the occasional cackle from some decoration or another.

Finally, after they carry the last of the boxes holding orange-and-black themed streamers into the storage room, Peter smiles at his father.

"It was a great Halloween, Walter. The best in a long while."

Walter beams.

"I assure you this was nothing, son. I shall top myself next year, with your little one around! I have already ordered the most adorable bovine costume."

Peter lets out a strangled groan. Surely he'd meant to thank his father and had choked.

~ HAPPY HALLOWEEN! ~

Hello, my lovely Fringies. Long time no see. My bad. I've had writer's block for the better part of this year. All of this year, actually, with the exception of the two pieces I wrote for this fandom a few months ago.

Anyway, I'm out of practice. This feels disjointed and pointless and plotless and amateur-ish, really. But it's Halloween. I figure we can do with a bit of that, yeah? Especially in light of recent events… speaking of which, I'll be starting two post 5x04 fics soon. Multi-chap, both very different. I hope to get to work on them as soon as I finish up the Halloween specials.

In the meantime, treat for a Fringie? I accept candy, virtual cookies and reviews. Oh, and I might have another Fringe Halloween special or two up my sleeves…

E Salvatore,

October 2012.