Erik did not want a partner. He did not want to hear the soft crunch of her high heels against the dried leaves and twigs scattered between the trees. He did not want to hear the whistle of her breath, growing faster and faster as they approached their target, the hollowed out tree where he was sure some sign, some clue hid. He did not want to feel her over his shoulder, feel the fear and anxiety pulsing around her body, disturbing the calm, still air he needed to concentrate. A partner would only hold him back. A partner would ruin everything.

It was a cruel trick, he thought, for Kahn to assign this girl to the X-Files. A girl, certainly. At least ten years his junior, skilled in medicine, apparently, but certainly ill-equipped to cope with the dangers of the field. She'd already been so gentle with the pregnant girl. The good cop. Not that "bad" was a sufficient term for one such as him. Monster, freak, demon. These were more fitting, and he had heard them all since the moment he was conscious. And yet, Kahn had paired him up with a naïve, bright-eyed, beautiful girl.

He didn't mean to notice she was beautiful. But he was observant, and it was a fact.

He'd never seen a woman get dressed before.

He shook the thought from his mind. She'd been dressed, he reminded himself. She'd just buttoned her shirt. If that was enough to distract him, he was more pathetic than he realized. He would not let this girl disrupt his focus. Yes, in the car, he'd been surprised when she'd confronted him, yelled at him, criticized him for using his voice. He'd been almost impressed. Why wasn't she more afraid? But, if she continued to question him, he would have to humor her, and then do what needed to be done anyway. He'd spent his life honing his attention, building up the right walls until he had no way to go but forward, to the truth.

She would not get in his way.

The baby hadn't looked like him. But it had hardly looked like a member of the human race. There could still be an answer here.

"There's nothing here," the girl said, in what she probably thought was a whisper. Erik whipped around and brought his finger to his lips, accidentally tapping the lower edge of his mask. Gestures like this always made him acutely aware of the mask—its weight, the moisture of sweat and breath, the limits of his peripheral vision. He cursed inwardly.

"Agent Destler, this is a waste of time," she said, louder now.

And he heard the faintest click, muffled by the leaves, so quiet that he doubted Daaé could hear. His sense of hearing was just another one of his peculiarities. One was not supposed to hear the mechanisms of a hidden trap preparing to spring.

In the same moment, he saw that the field was not just a field. Further on, behind the hollowed out stump, the leaves were rustling, and he could see glimpse of metal. There was something large there, tucked in a hidden ditch, covered with leaves to look like just another part of the forest floor. And then he heard something snap.

But before he could alert her, they were already in motion—her, leaping to the side with astonishing grace and speed; him, jumping up, seizing the rope net springing up from the ground, swinging himself up and into the tree branches above. He had warned her he might disappear. And if there was a to be an ambush, he would have the element of surprise.

He looked down and saw, to his surprise, that Daaé hadn't fallen over or fumbled. She was standing upright, her gun aimed in her outstretched hand, pointed at a thick, disheveled stranger. It was a man. Erik cursed inwardly again. Of course it was a man. But that didn't explain the thing under the leaves. He had seen metal, certainly. Something silver.

But, now there was the problem of the man. And he doubted there would be just one. He scanned the ground below, frustrated by the foliage blocking his view. His best bet, he decided, would be to keep his eye on Daaé and intervene when the first man attacked or an accomplice appeared, whichever came first.

If he were being honest, he wanted to see what Daaé would do. Could do.

Not a very good partner, putting her to the test that way. But, he'd never asked for a partner, had he? This was on Kahn.

"It was a mistake to come out here all on your own, miss," the man said, his voice raspy and wet. "These woods aren't a place for lady detectives in heels."

"I'm a federal agent, and if you take one more step forward, I won't hesitate to shoot," Daaé said. Erik noted the steadiness of her voice, betrayed by a brief quiver on that final world. Had she ever shot someone, he wondered.

"Will you now? Shoot an unarmed citizen just out for a walk?"

Daaé didn't waver. "What have you done with Natalie?"
The man laughed. He took a step closer. "I don't know what you're talking about."

Daaé stepped backward. Erik sighed. How predictable. She'd just taught her enemy that she wouldn't follow through, that he had the upper hand in their dance around the clearing. Erik tensed. He reached into the lining of his suit jacket and found the tiny bump that marked his hiding place. He pulled the lasso slowly, careful not elbow the branches behind him.

"I'm not dumb, lady," the man snarled. "Where's your partner?"

"You're looking at it," she wiggled the gun. It looked clumsy, though Erik imagined she was going for tough. Still, he appreciated her quick, easy lie.

Then Erik heard threes noises simultaneously: the snap of the second trapped rigged beneath Daaé's feet, boots rushing through leaves, and a thick female moan seeping up from the metal something tucked in the ditch. At once, he knew that the man's accomplice had appeared, rushing full speed toward Daaé's back as netting appeared beneath her feet. Erik watched as Daaé dove to the side, her ankles grazing the netting, clearing the trap milliseconds before it swooped her into the air. As she dove, she shot, and the first man folded to the ground, screaming and clutching his shin. Moving with unexpected ferocity, she swung her arm back and smashed her gun into the second man's face, once twice.

Erik couldn't remember the last time he'd been so pleasantly surprised. As he watched her display of athleticism, he nearly chastised himself for his misjudgment. So the girl could take of herself. He would take care of the moan.

He made his silent way down the tree and to the ground. It didn't take long to feel the soil turn to metal under his feet, and he kicked the layers of leaves aside until he discovered a large, cloudy skylight.

So he'd come all this way to find a camping trailer hidden in the woods. A filthy, completely earthbound camping trailer. What a waste. Another humiliating waste.

The moaning grew loader as he leaned down. A heavy makeshift bolt locked the skylight from the outside. Scoffing, he pulled a thin leather satchel from the lining of his jacket and selected the most suitable pick. In less than a minute, he'd sprung the lock, pulled opened the skylight, and found his footing on the aluminum ladder that led into the dark, rank hole. He saw Natalie immediately, stretched out on a filthy cot, unconscious and groaning as she vomited into the bucket someone had so thoughtfully set beneath her. Just behind her, on the bottom level of the trailer's foldout bunk bed, he saw two other young females, their faces pallid and slack. Erik gritted his teeth and scanned the rest of the trailer, his feline eyes taking in the filth crammed in every corner—pill bottles, needles, beakers, and glass pipes. A junkie's pathetic approximation of a lab, and nothing more. He'd been sent here for nothing. Again and again, nothing, nothing, nothing. He wondered if the past two days had been Khan's idea of a joke.

He felt each girl's pulse. They would all survive. The color would return to their cheeks, and their families would forgive them, and they would once again find their places in the world above. He could already hear the ambulance sirens approaching. Stealing himself against the unbearable wailing, Erik climbed up the ladder and through the skylight alone, content to let someone else haul those wasted bodies up out of the dark.


Hours and yards of paperwork later, the agents drove back to D.C. in silence. Daaé leaned her head against the passenger window, her eyes closed as though she were asleep. All the better. Erik could indulge his bitter thoughts in peace.

When he'd returned to the clearing, he'd found both disheveled men handcuffed, slumped against a tree. The second man had been unconscious, his right temple and jaw swelling purple. Daaé had crouched over the first attacker, her blazer abandoned, one hand aiming her gun at this shoulder while the other tightened a makeshift tourniquet around his bleeding shin. The sleeve of her blouse, Erik had realized slowly. She'd stopped this scum's bleeding with the sleeve of her blouse.

"I don't know if you realize, but I can hear you grumbling to yourself."

Erik returned to the car, the road ahead.

"I thought you were sleeping."

"I was trying." She straightened, stretched her mismatched arms over the dash. "Your muttering kept leaking into my dreams."

"Next time, bring earplugs."

Erik felt her turn toward him, her eyes so close, so inescapable in the tight confines of the car. She must be mocking him, wondering how she'd found herself tied to this incompetent excuse for an agent, sent to do work the most bumbling police officer could accomplish. She'd been right from the start. It had just been people, just filthy, selfish people ruining lives as they always did, rotting their brains and bodies with chemicals. How could it have been anything but drugs. He'd been the excess baggage, not her. How disgusted she must be.

"I'm sorry you didn't find what you were looking for." Her voice was gentle. "But we saved those girls. And those horrible men are going to prison, and whatever awful cocktail they were trying to create will be off the streets."

Now she was coddling him. He had been right. She would be his babysitter, chasing him from place to place until he tired himself out and she could move on.

"You know, when she came too, Natalie confessed that she'd gone back on her own.

She wanted to go back to space, she said. She really believe those men could take her there."

"She's a fool."

"She was brainwashed." Daaé tapped her fingernails on the dash, sending tendons flickering through her bare forearm. "Abused. And so young."

Erik grunted. "For all we know, she was lying to protect them. This whole mess was a waste of our time."

"We didn't know that until we knew."

She was trying to console him. Why, Erik couldn't fathom.

A stretch of silence passed between them.

"You left me alone with those assholes," Daaé said softly.

"I was there," Erik said. "You didn't need my help."

Out of the corner of his eye, Erik watched her rub her bare arm.

"You did well today," he added.

She grinned. "Thank you."

"But I wouldn't have worked so hard to save him."

"I don't want to kill them. I want to bring them to justice."

She was so innocent it hurt. So she truly cared about the wellbeing of even these most repulsive members of the human race. He wondered what she would think of the lives he'd extinguished with his lasso alone.

She cleared her throat. "My whole life, I've had men doubting me, questioning my skills as a doctor, as an agent. So thank you…for trusting me today."

This was not the reaction he'd expected. Certainly she should be angry with him for disappearing as he had. He hadn't trusted her at all. At best, he'd taken a sick satisfaction in testing her.

Poor, simple, sweet girl. As though the habits of normal men had any sway over his behavior. As though he'd ever given anyone the benefit of the doubt. Still, as he let her thanks linger in the air, Erik felt an unfamiliar nagging at the pit of his stomach. But why tell her the truth? He didn't trust her and he would never trust her. He would never trust anyone, just as no one would ever trust him.

"And no jab in return!" Daaé chirped, smiling out the windshield. "Look at how far we've come."

Erik turned on the car stereo and strained to keep his grumbling firmly inside his head.