Disclaimer: They are not mine.

Spoilers: Emily Arc

A/N: I have a great desire to get justice for all the missing and exploited children of the world. This started when I was almost 11, when JonBenet Ramsey was murdered. When faced with the facts, I can only come to one reasonable conclusion as to who is responsible for her death, but I know that for that little girl, there may never be any justice. This chapter is dedicated to her.

Scully had never enjoyed interrogations. It wasn't that she was bad at them, or that she and Mulder didn't work well together. Maybe it wasn't even the interrogation as much as it was the confession. The details of a crime bothered her and stuck in her head for months.

Especially the details of a mother killing her child.

Several Days Earlier

Conventional cases were not all that common for them. A kidnapping seemed so mundane despite the horror of it, and she felt bad for thinking that way. To the parents, to the child, this was not mundane. This was their worst nightmare.

She glanced over at Mulder in the driver's seat, biting her lip as she tried to read his expression. Kidnapping cases were hard for him, especially when it involved little girls as this one did. She watched him for a moment, noting the tight grip he had on the steering wheel. It wasn't as tight as she had seen it before, but it was up there on the list.

"Read it to me again," he said finally.

She opened the file and took a deep breath before reading.

"Morgan Grace Steele, age 5. Blonde hair, blue eyes, 41 inches tall, 39 pounds. Her parent discovered her missing yesterday morning when they went in to wake her up. There was no sign of forced entry, no ransom note, nothing to indicate an intruder. Parents are Darren and Celia, both 32. Darren runs a counseling center and Celia is a homemaker. They have two older boys; Michael is nine and Andrew is eight. There have been no threats directed at them, no hang up phone calls, no one suspicious lurking around the house."

He nodded, trying to ignore the feelings of familiarity. He wasn't going to let that get in the way on this case though. He wasn't. He had to keep a level head for this little girl, Morgan.

"What are your initial feelings, Scully?"

"I think whoever did this knew the house, knew the family, and had been planning this for a while. They took her for themselves, not for money."

"Think she's alive?"

"I hope so."

They fell silent for the rest of the trip.

Scully poured a glass of water and pushed it across the wooden table to the younger woman, who was wringing her hands and biting her lip.

"Mrs. Steele?"

"I'm sorry."

"That's alright. Just take your time and tell me again about yesterday morning."

She took a deep breath and wiped her eyes before beginning.

"I woke up at 5. I was going to go shopping at the mall. They opened early for the after Thanksgiving sales. I got dressed and went to wake my daughter. She had insisted on coming with me the night before. We were going to have a girls day out."

She fell silent as a new batch of tears sprung to her eyes.

"Ma'am, I know this is hard, but we need to work quickly. Any details, no matter how insignificant they may seem to you might help Morgan. She needs you right now."

The slender woman nodded somewhat shakily.

"I went to her bedroom and opened the door. She likes to keep her bedroom door shut at night. The boys keep theirs open, but my daughter has always liked hers to be closed. She wasn't in her bed. I checked the bathroom, her closet, under the bed, even in her toybox. She loves to hide. I thought maybe she was playing a game. She wasn't sleeping in the boy's room on the floor, she wasn't in the living room. She just wasn't anywhere. I screamed for my husband, and then I don't remember anything."

"I know most of these questions you've already answered, but I want to ask them again. Have you received any suspicious phone calls in the last few months? Hang ups or otherwise?"

"No, none."

"Does Morgan play with any other kids? Older kids especially?"

"She has friends at school, but she doesn't really play with anyone but her brothers. There aren't very many kids in our neighborhood. Why?"

"Sometimes kids will meet people through a friend that their parents never know about."

"No. No, we know all of our children's friends and parents and most of their family members. They're all good people. I mean, Jenna Peterson's father just got out of jail, but that was for a DUI. Nothing violent. He'd never hurt anyone anyway, ever."

"Mrs. Steele, is there any chance Morgan ran away?"

"No. There would be no reason for her to run away. She's such a good girl. She never gets in trouble. Her brothers adored her. She wouldn't run away. She just wouldn't."

"Is there anything else you can think of that might help?"

"If I could think of anything, don't you think I would tell you?"

Scully just nodded.

"I'll be back in a while."

She stood from the chair and left the room, meeting Mulder in the dingy hallway.

"Well?" she asked, hoping his work had been more fruitful than her interview.

"Canvases haven't come up with much. They just sent out the dogs, so we might have a lead soon."

"Thoughts?"

"I talked to the father. He's kind of an absent dad. Works a lot. He wasn't able to tell me much, just that they put the kids to bed around 8, no one woke up in the night, and he heard his wife calling for him just before 7. How about the mom?"

"I can't get a good read on her. She didn't yield any information that we didn't have already. I think she needs to see her sons and her husband. Might help a little."

"Did she give you any names to go on?"

"Morgan's friend, Jenna Peterson. Her father just got out of jail, but she didn't seem to think he had anything to do with this. Basically, we've got nothing. If she was older I would put my money on her being a run-away."

"Let's go see if they got anything else on the canvas."

Scully took a sip of her semi-warm coffee and set the Styrofoam cup back on the table. Morgan had been missing for 40 hours now, and the cadaver dogs were still out, searching the river behind the Steele's house. Everyone feared the worst, but no one was saying anything.

She glanced at Morgan's picture again. The little girl smiled up at her, a front tooth missing, and a sparkle in her deep blue eyes.

Did she have any idea what would happen to her? Had she been stalked? Harassed? Was it someone she knew, or a total stranger? Did she wake up scared? Did she cry for her mother, or was she bound and gagged? And if she was still alive, what was she thinking now? Did she believe people were looking for her? Was she cold and alone, or was she being taken care of?

"Doin' okay, Scully?" Mulder asked as he came into the room.

"I'm alright. You?"

"I'm good."

He gave her shoulder a squeeze before sitting down next to her.

"Mulder, have you ever heard that idea that when a person dies, the last thing they see is imprinted on their retinas?"

"Yeah. Why?"

"I keep looking at this picture, at her eyes, hoping I can read something in them. Anything. I'm searching for a clue in a picture that has virtually nothing to do with the crime."

"You're desperate," he whispered. "You're doing to this picture what you would do to a witness or victim. You're studying it, trying to get to know her, to get inside her head. Maybe you're hoping that through this picture she'll speak to you."

"I don't know, Mulder. Maybe I am. But Morgan is the only one that knows what happened, and I intend to find out what that is."

"Me too."

He reached over and patted her hand gently.

"Anything new?" she asked after a moment of silence.

"There are 5 registered pedophiles in the neighborhood. They're tracking them down now. One of the neighbors said that the Mr. and Mrs. have been having money problems. His business isn't going well, and there's a lot of stress in the house. We interviewed both boys, and neither one woke up in the night. They haven't noticed any strangers around the house either."

"I want to talk to the mother again. There has to be something she hasn't said. A repairman, a delivery man, someone who came to the house in the last few weeks. Whoever this person is, they took Morgan selfishly. They want her and not money. Hopefully that means they'll keep her alive, but I don't want to think about what's she's going through if that's the case."

He nodded and kept his hand on hers for a moment.

"We'll find her, Scully. We always figure it out, and we never give up."

"I just don't want to be too late."

"I know. Let's go back to the hotel and get some sleep."

"I can't. I want to go over these crime scene photos again. Do you know when they'll let us get into the house? I really feel like I need to get in there, like there's something that everyone is missing that will blow this thing wide open."

"Scully, don't become me on this. We can't have both of us going off half cocked or without sleep."

"I know. I just need a little more time."

"Alright. I'm going to talk to the captain and then we'll get out of here. I'll meet you out front in 20 minutes."

"Alright."

He tucked a finger under her chin, turned her face away from the pictures and papers, and kissed her forehead.

"20 minutes, that's all."

"I'll be outside, I promise."

He nodded and left her alone.

She tossed and turned until 4 a.m. Sleep did not usually evade her so badly, and she finally had to stand up from the bed and stretch. She was almost certain that Mulder was having trouble sleeping too. She contemplated going over there, but on the off chance that he had managed to get some shut-eye, she didn't want to wake him.

She sat back down on the bed and rubbed her eyes, unable to get Morgan's face out of her mind. As rare as they were in the X-Files department, she had worked one or two kidnapping cases before. They were never easy, but this one was getting to her for some reason. Maybe it was too soon after Emily, or maybe her desensitization was wearing off.

She tried to think of something else, but all that came to mind was Morgan. She sighed and went into the bathroom to splash some cold water on her face. It wasn't meant to relax her or clear her mind- she figured it was best to just stay up at this point. They had a briefing at 8, and she knew that 3 hours or less of sleep would be more of a hindrance than a help.

Her door opened and she peeked out to find a disheveled Mulder flopping down on her bed.

"You too, huh?" she asked, sitting down next to him.

"Yep," he replied, tugging on her waist until she was lying down next to him. She marveled again at how touchy-feely sleepiness could make them, and how little either of them fought it.

"I hate this job," she muttered, running a hand through her tangled hair. He nodded and pulled a pillow under his head.

"But someone's gotta do it."

"It would be nice if everyone in the world would just grow up and quit breaking the law."

"Here's to dreamin' Lady."

"It sounds weird when you call me that."

"I know. But I'm going to keep doing it, no matter how much you hate it."

She sighed and rolled over to face him.

"Mulder, do you really think we'll find her?" she asked quietly, playing with one of the buttons on her shirt.

"I'm not going home until we find all the answers."

"Me neither."

"We'll do her justice, Scully. One way or another."

She nodded as he reached over to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear.

"Get some sleep."

"I can't."

"Try. Even if it's just a few minutes."

"I feel like I'm not doing everything I can. I feel like I should be at the house looking for something, or working with a search party, or doing anything other than just laying here. Sleeping doesn't make Morgan come home."

"You need rest to do this right, Scully. Just close your eyes."

She nodded and obeyed, and they breathed together for a while, trying to find some peace. She was just drifting off when the phone next to her bed let out a shrill ring. She sat up, looking around for the phone, only to find that Mulder had already answered it. He was listening intently, his face crestfallen.

"We'll be there as soon as we can," he said before putting the phone back in the cradle. She looked at him questioningly.

"They found her."

"She's not alive, is she?"

"No Scully. She's not."