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Disclaimer: I do not own the X-Files. Chris Carter, 1013, and Fox, however, do, and are just going to let me play with their characters for a little bit.

A/N: So here is the next chapter, things will start to become clear soon I promise! Also, I would like to point out that when I wrote this I pictured Detective Rales as Detective Kevin Ryan from "Castle", and Seiko the journalist as Dichen Lachman from "Dollhouse". If you don't know who they are you should look them up. Thanks the reviews, and thank you for your favorites, and follows! I'm excited this story has gotten some traffic! Please keep your reviews coming!

Part 1

Chapter 2

Mulder kept his eyes on the road, and let his hands keep a steady beat on the steering wheel as they drove through the middle of nowhere. It had been a long day of traveling for the both of them, and as the sun was beginning to set on the horizon. Mulder's stomach loudly growled remind him once again that they did not get to eat lunch. He shot his partner a glare over the center console when he heard her snicker at his body's obvious distress, but she didn't break her gaze from the window. He continued his monotonous rhythm on the steering wheel, not really keeping in time with the country station, which was the only thing that they had picked up out here.

Red Cloud: 15 miles

Mulder let out a thankful breath. He didn't mind driving; in normal circumstances he usually enjoyed its calming presence it had for him. However, after 3 plane rides, the last one being on a dinky airplane to the dinky airport in a city that was still a little over an hour away from their destination, Fox Mulder was done for the day. They had called Detective Rales once they had landed in Grand Island, Nebraska to let him know that they were finally on the driving leg of the journey. He directed them to a diner in town that they could meet at and discuss the case over dinner.

"Mulder, we are almost there, you can stop your fidgeting." His partner pointed out, finally turning to face the road ahead of them instead of looking at the scenery pass by them.

"Sorry, Scully. I just feel like I've been cooped up all day, and I'm starving. You know me well enough that those two are a very bad combination." He joked with her.

She just shook her head, and gave a little smile to her partner to let him know that she was only kidding.

Mulder finally saw the exit for Red Cloud, and turned off the highway, and headed on a smaller two-lane road, and it wasn't long before they were driving through the small city.

Red Cloud was mainly a farming community, but it did have an antique downtown area, complete with brick roads, and picturesque storefronts. After following the directions, they pulled up their Ford Taurus in front of the town's novel diner.

A man stepped away from the building, he appeared to be in his mid thirties, light brown hair that was a little longer than Mulder's, and all combed over to the side.

"Agents?" The man asked as Mulder and Scully made their way to the sidewalk.

"Yes, you must be Detective Rales." Scully spoke first, and stuck her hand out to shake his. When he grabbed it she continued. "I'm Special Agent Dana Scully, and this is my partner Special Agent Fox Mulder."

Mulder shook the blue eyed, baby-faced detectives' hand as well giving him a nod.

"Lets go inside, and take a seat. Maybe get you guys something to eat." The Detective suggested, and opened the door to the diner for them.

Once the three sat down in a booth by the window, a young waitress, who couldn't have been more than sixteen or seventeen came to take their drink order, and came back shortly with their three coffee's. Mulder was still trying to decide what to eat, while Scully ordered one of her salads. But thankfully Detective Rales suggested that he tried the special, and Mulder couldn't say no.

"Lets get started Agents. I know that you are maybe more used to life threatening cases, but I've got a whole town that is becoming scared." Detective Rales started.

"Any cases where there are claims of body possessions have the capability to become life threatening." Mulder told him honestly.

Detective Rales looked skeptical for a second before continuing. "I got your information from a buddy of mine up in Omaha, he said that you guys dealt with 'special' circumstances such as these."

When both of the Agents nodded he continued.

"All of this started about a couple of weeks ago. We had one of the high school kids take his parents car, fill it up and just drove. He was supposed to show up at a friend's house, and finally they got worried and talked to his parents. By the end of the day he called, and was clear across the state, with no memory of how he got there. Once we got him home, he said that he was starting to remember a few things, but it was like something had just taken over his body, and he was watching, but couldn't do anything about it. Now while the boy, and his parents seemed pretty freaked out, down at the station we didn't really buy that, seeing as he and his buddies have been caught a few times with some substances that are known to do a little mind altering."

"Did you test for drugs?" Scully asked.

Detective Rales nodded at her. "Negative." He paused for a moment before continuing. "A couple of days later, my wife of all people, got caught trying to shop lift out of the grocery store. Once she was caught she was mortified. Gave the exact same description that the boy did. We took some more blood work on her, and it also came back negative for toxins, drugs, and alcohol. My wife is the last person that would ever do anything like that, and the town knows that, so people have become a little more alert, and cautious."

"Did your wife say that it was more like someone told her to do something, or did she say it really felt like someone had taken over her body?" Mulder asked curious. Deep down he started to get nervous that they would be dealing with another pusher type situation.

"After a couple of hours some of the fog around her brain began to clear, and she said it was more like someone had taken over her body. She just felt helpless, and couldn't do anything about it."

The waitress came and interrupted with their food, and after everyone had a couple of bites Detective Rales continued.

"That was last week. This week I had two more cases. One was another teenager, a girl this time. She started terrorizing her family, saying that she was a vampire, and spent the evening chasing them. After that my buddy up in Omaha gave me your information and said to call you, but I didn't until yesterday when our Sheriff came out in the middle of town square, stripped himself down to his birthday suit, and began acting like a chicken. It took two deputies to catch him, and he hasn't come out of his house since."

Once the Detective was finished Mulder and Scully took a moment to process this information before Mulder began talking.

"I believe whatever this entity is, it is showing you that it is powerful, it can force you to do things that you would never dream of doing. However, the fact that it hasn't done anything that threatens the lives of the people that it takes over could mean that there is some kind of bond with them. It could be someone in your town doing this."

"How do you figure that?"

"I have a theory that one of your towns people have discovered that they have a unique body walking ability, only they don't wish to do harm, they just want to have a little fun."

"Agent, let me tell you a little something about Red Cloud. I barely have a population of 1,000. We truly do have one of those towns where everybody knows everybody, everyone works out at their family farm, and we have kindergarten through twelfth grade all in one building. We have a sense of camaraderie here that most towns can't say that they have. And every one of the people here are terrified that they are going to be next to do something humiliating. And to make things even better I have an investigative reporter that showed up from Lincoln to get the story about the town, and she is convinced that we are drugging our water. And by the blood work we have taken of the victims that is clearly not the case!"

"Detective, we are not implying anything." Scully started, trying to calm down the obviously frustrated Detective. "Why don't you let us take the files to our motel and look them over tonight, and we will meet you at the station in the morning."

Detective Rales hung his head. "I apologize Agents. It has just been a stressful couple of weeks. Our police force is small, hell I'm the only Detective that the town has, my Sheriff is still in hiding from his embarrassing situation yesterday, and the rest of the force has been going out to investigate any little call where people have even forgotten where they left their keys. It has just been a long couple of weeks."

"We understand. Lets just try this again in the morning. Agent Mulder and myself will be fully caught up with the case by then."

"Thank you for coming out here. Least I can do is pick up the bill." He offered.

Shortly after the agents were back in the car, and one the road again to their motel.

"What are you thinking Mulder?" Scully asked him because she was very curious about what he thought on this case.

"I think we have some type of body walker. I think that this person has the ability to take over another persons mind, and body. I still think that because there have been no serious predicaments that it is one of the towns people. After the deal with the Sheriff I would go so far as to suggest that it was possibly a teenaged boy." Mulder finished pulling into a parking spot in front of their motel.

"Don't you think that they would have been able to remember who it was?"

"Not necessarily, Scully. This person could have the ability to become a noncoporeal entity, so they wouldn't see them anyway. Or if they do see their attacker, and the person has to use physical touch to initiate the process, I would think that it would follow the route of most other possessions in that people don't tend to remember what they did anyway. What about you, Scully?"

"I don't know, Mulder. It is kind of hard to explain that from a scientific standpoint. In a case like this I would maybe have to side with the reporter. Maybe not the towns water supply, but there could be something has been laced with some kind of psychotic drug."

"Maybe your right. Maybe the government has decided to pick this town for some type of testing. I mean they could have falsified the blood work results to cover up their tests."

"I wouldn't go that far." Scully told him.

It didn't take long for the agents to get checked in. Mulder fished some sunflower seeds out of his over night bed, and flopped onto the bed. He started scanning through the TV channels when he heard a knock on his door.

"It's open!" He yelled, already knowing who was on the other side.

Scully came in and sat down on the bed next to him, and placed one of the files that she had been looking at on his lap.

"I was reading through some of the witness statements, and found something interesting. It seems that not only were these people's memories affected while they were possessed, but some of their memory leading up to the event was missing as well."

Mulder read through the statements of the victims for a moment before coming to his own conclusion.

"I would say that since it happened to all of them, and not just one, or just the girls or the boys, it could be some type of side affect."

"That is what I was thinking." Scully agreed with her partner, and started to look over some more of the files that Detective Rales had given them.

She let a small smile come across her face at how nice and relaxed this seemed with the both of them unwinding after their long day.

"I think that we just need to start interviewing the victims in the morning again, and go from there." She suggested to Mulder who just nodded his agreement with her. "I'm going to go down to the vending machine to get something to drink. Would you like something?"

"Sure. Surprise me."

"Scully got down from the bed, and exited Mulder's room to head to the vending machine at the end of the building. She crossed her arms to protect her body from the cold wind that was blowing through. At least they had made it through a majority of winter, and the temperatures were starting to rise again, but the wind tonight was definitely not helping matters.

She inserted some coins into the machine, and retrieved a beverage for her, and then repeated the process for Mulder. As she turned around to head back to Mulder's room she saw a woman jogging toward her in the parking lot waving her down.

"Excuse me!" The young woman caught up with her at the buildings sidewalk, and brushed some of her caramel colored hair out of her face. "Are you one of the FBI agents that are in town?" The woman asked curiously.

"I'm sorry what is this about?"

"Oh sorry, where are my manners? My name is Seiko Peterfield. I am a journalist for The Lincoln Journal Star, and I am doing a story about the events going on here in Red Cloud. Would you like to make a statement?"

Scully looked the young woman over. She was very petite, dressed in dark skinny jeans, black heels, and a red flowy shirt with a black blazer over it. There was something about her exotic appearance that put Scully on edge It was almost as if something in the woman's eyes that seemed to bore into her very soul.

"I'm afraid, Ms. Peterfield that any inquiries you have to the investigation will have to be directed through the Red Cloud Sherriff's office." Scully told the woman politely before turning to head back to Mulder's room.

The reporter grabbed a hold of Scully's arm, and when Scully turned back to yank it from her grasp she became immobile when she locked eyes with the other woman.

"Perfect." Seiko mumbled before letting go of Scullys arm, and immediately placing both of her hands flat on either side of the Agent's head, coming almost nose to nose with her. The connection lasted less than a minute before Seiko let go and gave Scully a nod before watching her walk back to her motel room.