The X-Files Origins--Agent of Chaos

by Kami Garcia

  The jokes were strategic, a tactic to convince her that he had his emotions under control again—that he was thinking things through.

  He raised his hands in surrender. “You win. No more jokes.”

  She rolled her eyes. “I swear you have sarcasm running through your veins instead of blood.”

  “How about a compromise?” he asked. “We’ll drive out to Earl Roy’s place and take a look around. Maybe we’ll find something we can take to the sheriff’s office to convince the deputy that I was telling the truth.”

  “And if we don’t?”

  “We come up with Plan B. But I can’t do this without you, Phoebe.”

  She threw her arms up and sighed. “Fine. But only if you swear that you won’t do anything impulsive.”

  Mulder leaned over the top of the car door and whispered in her ear, “Kissing you was impulsive. Are you saying I shouldn’t have done that?” He didn’t know why he chose that moment to ask. But fear had the opposite effect on him than it had on most people. Instead of making Mulder hesitant, it gave him courage. The courage he should’ve had before.

  Phoebe’s gaze locked on his. “Maybe you should try kissing me on purpose sometime, unless you don’t want whatever this thing is between us to go anywhere.” She brought her mouth so close to his ear that he could feel the heat of her breath on his neck. “If that’s the case, just stick with the hit-and-run make-out sessions.”

  She turned away and circled around the front of the car and climbed into the passenger seat.

  “Phoebe…” Mulder wasn’t sure if she heard him. Following the trail of a psychopath didn’t scare him half as much as the thought of losing someone else he loved—even if that someone looked like she wanted to kill him herself.

  He got into the car and glanced in the rearview mirror. Gimble held the map up to the dome light.

  “Did you figure out where we’re going?” Mulder asked.

  “Keep heading north on 320A until you hit River Road. Then take a left.”

  Within minutes, the porch lights of Charlotte’s Diner disappeared behind them, and the road went from dark as hell to pitch-black. Mulder turned onto River Road, a narrow stretch of asphalt that didn’t even have a dividing line painted down the middle.

  Mulder leaned closer to the steering wheel, squinting. “I can barely see past the headlights.”

  “Maybe you should get glasses.” Phoebe couldn’t resist teasing him.

  “If I had glasses, I’d look too distinguished and handsome. Women would pass out wherever I went.”

  Phoebe groaned.

  “Are you sure we’re going the right way?” she asked, staring out the passenger-side window with her face an inch from the glass. “I haven’t seen a single house since we turned off 320A.”

  “I’m positive,” Gimble assured her. “The waitress said there are only a few houses out here, and they’re all on this side of the Patuxent River.”

  “Maybe we passed it.” Phoebe didn’t want to admit she was nervous. None of them did. Or they would have to acknowledge the kind of risk they were taking by driving out here.

  Gimble checked the map again. “I don’t—”

  “Wait!” Phoebe shouted, startling the crap out of Mulder. “Did you see that?”

  “Not unless I ran over it.” He couldn’t risk taking his eyes off the road.

  “Back up,” she said.

  “What was it?” Gimble asked.

  Phoebe shook her head. “I’m not sure, but it was something.”

  “Gimble, keep an eye out for headlights behind us.” Mulder threw the car in reverse.

  “We haven’t seen a car in fifteen minutes,” Gimble said. Then he caught a glimpse of Mulder’s tense expression in the rearview mirror, and he turned around and pretended to play lookout.

  Phoebe stared out the back window. “Hold on. Stop.”

  The moment the Gremlin stopped she jumped out, leaving the car door open. The extra illumination provided Mulder with enough light to see a dented mailbox nailed to a post. He got out and walked around to the passenger side of the car.

  Mulder bent down next to Phoebe and studied it. Letters were scratched into the metal on the side. ER and another letter that looked like a P.

  Earl Roy.

  Gimble stuck his head out the window. “Well?”

  Mulder swallowed hard. “This is his house.”

  The dirt driveway beside the mailbox snaked into the trees, not much more than tire tracks through the brush. If Mulder had been alone, he would’ve taken off and followed it. He stood at the spot where the shoulder of River Road and the tire-marked dirt met.

  Mulder and Phoebe got back into the car. Everyone stayed quiet as he turned and drove down the dirt path. He clutched the wheel with his sweaty palms as branches scraped against the sides of the Gremlin.

  “What if he sees the car?” Phoebe whispered, as if Earl Roy could hear her.

  “Pull up over there on the left.” Gimble pointed to a patch of grass off to the side of the driveway.

  “There’s a light up ahead,” Phoebe said. “See it?”

  “I want to take a closer look.” Mulder parked, killed the headlights, and opened the door to step out, but Phoebe caught his arm.

  “Are you sure about this? We could leave and go get the cops right now.”

  Because they’ve been so helpful up until now? Mulder thought.

  Going to the cops was the smartest and safest option for him, but what about for Sarah Lowe? What if she was in there right now and she was hurt? Mulder imagined getting closer to the house and hearing the little girl’s screams. He couldn’t fail her.

  And he couldn’t walk away if there was a chance that Earl Roy had information about Samantha.

  “I just want to take a look. What if the place is abandoned? Or he doesn’t live there anymore and we drag the cops all the way out here? And that’s assuming they’ll listen to us. We don’t have a lot to go on. I’ve already lost credibility with one police department.” Mulder got out and pulled the seat forward for Gimble to climb out.

  “So we’re really doing this?” he asked.

  “If you want to wait here, it’s okay,” Mulder told him.

  Gimble noticed Phoebe getting out and stood straighter. “I’m cool.”

  The three friends walked down the driveway together, following the dim yellow light as a beacon. Within a few yards, the house came into view. The porch light exposed bits and pieces of the dilapidated building. It resembled a shack more than a house.

  “It’s dark inside, and there aren’t any cars out front.” Secretly, Mulder felt relieved. “He’s probably not home. Stay here while I check it out.”

  “That wasn’t the deal,” Phoebe reminded him.

  “Look.” Mulder pointed at the darkened windows. “Nobody’s here. I just want to see what’s around back.”

  “This is a bad idea.” Gimble glanced over his shoulder. “What if the guy comes home?”

  “Whistle or something.”

  “Isn’t that kind of obvious?” Gimble asked.

  “Don’t worry.” Mulder turned around and walked toward the run-down house. He was wasting time. “I’ll be back in three minutes.”

  “Fox—” Phoebe pleaded.

  He cared about Phoebe more than anyone except his mom, but he couldn’t walk away from this, not even long enough to hunt down the backwoods police station in Craiger.

  He stayed close to the trees that bordered the driveway and the edge of the yard—if a dirt patch edged with brambles qualified as a yard. As he moved toward the house and his eyes adjusted to the darkness, disturbing details revealed its condition. The porch slanted dangerously to one side, and the wooden railings were long gone. The planks that formed the exterior walls were in various stages of rot. It was the kind of house that usually had a CONDEMNED sign nailed to the front door.

  The brush was thicker along the side of the house, and Mulder’s feet kept getting caught on tree roots and vines.
When he finally reached the backyard, what little illumination the dim porch light had offered was gone. A sliver of moonlight cut through the trees, casting a pale glow on a pile of scrap metal like you’d find in a junkyard.

  It was tall enough for Mulder to crouch behind, and it would offer him a clear view of the back door. He darted toward the scrap pile, hyperaware of how loud each step sounded. But inside, the house remained dark. He felt stupid for being scared of a run-down old house and creepy shrubbery.

  Why was he letting Phoebe and Gimble’s paranoia rub off on him?

  It was a straight shot to the back steps. It couldn’t hurt to take a peek through the window in the door. He probably wouldn’t see anything except an empty house and a dead end. Mulder moved around to the front of the scrap pile, and something hard jabbed his rib. He looked over, and it took him a second to realize what had poked him—the handlebar of a child’s bike.

  A chill traveled up his spine. He squinted, examining the mound of metal. Metallic strips of plastic glinted in the moonlight. Streamers hanging from a different set of handlebars. He reached out and ran his hands over the metal. Vinyl seats not much bigger than his palm. Little tires. The curves of multiple sets of handlebars.

  Dozens of tricycles and bikes—some old and rusty and others that looked brand-new—were haphazardly piled into a mountain of childhood memories.

  Who did they belong to? Where are these kids now?

  Billy Christian and Sarah Lowe hadn’t been riding their bikes when they were taken. Had that bastard kidnapped other kids who weren’t in the newspaper articles he’d found?

  An image flashed through his mind. A chopper-style metallic blue tricycle with a white seat and matching white handlebars, and two steps in the back. Samantha had picked it out herself when she four years old. In the toy store, she’d walked past the pink tricycles and stopped in front of the flashy blue trike. “This one,” she’d said. Mulder remembered feeling like he spent the whole summer with one foot on the back of that thing while Samantha yelled, “Push me, Fox!”

  A sudden wave of rage hit Mulder. He wanted to pull down every single one of the bikes and hurl them at Earl Roy’s decrepit house.

  Mulder crossed the yard, walked up a few steps to the back door, and peered through the dirty window. He made out the shapes of the refrigerator and the oven, and, down the hall, the pale glow from the porch light seeping in. He tried the door without thinking about it. The latch clicked, and it swung open.

  There are no coincidences.

  It had become Mulder’s mantra, and this cemented his belief.

  Fate had led him here.

  In his gut, he knew Samantha wasn’t in this house. But Earl Roy might have answers to the questions that had haunted him for 1,952 days.

  Was Samantha still alive? If she wasn’t, what had happened to her?

  It might be too late to save his sister, but if Sarah Lowe was inside—or information that might help the police find her—maybe he could save that eight-year-old little girl.

  He stepped over the threshold.

  Take it easy. You’ll be long gone before he comes home.

  Mulder took a deep breath and walked straight through the shotgun-style house to the front door. He wanted to let Gimble and Phoebe know why he was taking so long, even though she would kill him when she realized he’d gone inside.

  I’ll make it up to her. All of it.

  The tiny, outdated kitchen was surprisingly neat. In the hallway, black-and-white photos, in simple wooden frames, hung on the wall. The place seemed sort of normal until Mulder spotted an ornately carved gold sofa in the living room and six mismatched gold chairs in the dining room. The chairs were upholstered in velvet, each one in a different color, and they reminded him of the fancy furniture in his aunt’s sitting room that no butt had ever dented. They looked out of place in a house owned by a grown man.

  On a small table next to the front door, a single silver frame was proudly displayed.

  Mulder switched on the light and opened the front door to lean out. He waved, and Phoebe and Gimble emerged from the trees. Mulder couldn’t see Phoebe’s face, but he knew she was pissed.

  Their silhouettes moved in the darkness, as if they were walking toward the house. Mulder ducked back inside and picked up the silver frame on the table. A child smiled back at him. He stared at the image, his heart galloping in his chest.

  Then he caught a flash in his peripheral vision, and things happened in rapid succession, like falling dominoes.

  An arm slid around Mulder’s neck and jerked him off his feet—

  The silver frame slipped out of his hand and crashed to the floor—

  Mulder gasped, but he couldn’t get any air.

  A boy stared up at him from behind the spiderweb of broken glass in the frame.

  Billy Christian.

  The arm around Mulder’s neck tightened and dragged him out of the doorway. His vision blurred in and out of focus.

  A boot kicked the door.

  The last thing Mulder saw was the front door slamming shut.

  CHAPTER 20

  Earl Roy’s Residence

  9:27 P.M.

  X had trudged through the mud in his brand-new boots, following Mulder and his high-strung friends. He had sucked it up because the kid was smart, and there was a 90 percent chance that he was right about Earl Roy, a chaos magick fanatic who had gotten himself kicked out of the Illuminates of something-or-other, a club for new age weirdos.

  In a less-than-genius move, Mulder and his friends had parked a bright orange AMC Gremlin next to the dirt road that served as Earl Roy’s driveway. Anyone coming down the road would see the automotive eyesore from ten yards away.

  That was how X ended up slogging through the mud. He had to park off River Road and circle through the woods to catch up to the kids without being seen.

  Only, he wasn’t fast enough. By the time he reached the front of the run-down shack, Mulder’s friends were standing in the driveway, out in the open. Granted, X was wearing a pair of prototype night-vision goggles, but even without them, two blond teenagers weren’t hard to spot.

  Where the hell was Fox Mulder?

  A light switched on in the front room of the house, and X’s career flashed before his eyes—and if Mulder kept tempting fate, it would be a short one.

  Because he watched Mulder open the front door of the sad excuse for a house and wave at his friends. The idiot must have a hero complex of epic proportions. X pictured Earl Roy pulling up in his truck and seeing the teenager standing in his living room.

  Can this assignment get any worse?

  The moment the thought crystalized in X’s mind, he regretted letting himself think it. Things could always get worse, and in X’s experience, they always did.

  As he started to turn away, a hulking figure appeared behind Mulder and threw an arm around the teen’s neck. His friends froze in their tracks. They must have seen the guy grab Fox, too. What they couldn’t have seen without X’s night vision was so chilling that it made the hairs on his arms stand on end.

  The man behind Fox looked like he was wearing a white mask, like a psycho in a horror movie.

  Earl Roy turned to kick the front door with his boot, and X realized it wasn’t a mask.

  It was paint.

  X was ready to bolt for the door and go after the kid. But he couldn’t let Fox or his friends see him.

  “Get in the damn car,” he muttered to himself, waiting for the other two kids to react.

  But the girl recovered from the shock first and dragged the short kid toward the car. “That’s right,” X said. “Go get the cops.”

  He watched the Gremlin start up and swerve toward the main road.

  But the car turned left instead of right. X cursed under his breath. They were driving in the wrong direction.

  Did it really matter? The nearest sheriff’s office was thirty minutes away—maybe more—and that was if you were driving in the right direction.

&nb
sp; The second the Gremlin pulled away, X mobilized. He had to get Bill Mulder’s son out of that house without letting the kid get a look at him—a smart kid with a memory like Fox’s would recognize X from the DC police station for sure, and that wasn’t allowed.

  He went in through the front door and did a quick scan of the living room before moving on to the kitchen. It looked neat and clean at first glance, but he’d been in a house like this before—nondescript and too generic. X had grown up in one of these homes. The secrets were all there if you knew where to look.

  He opened the pantry, half expecting a body to fall out. Something moved, and X stumbled back. A black mass scurried toward him.

  A rat king.

  A writhing mass of rats—their tails knotted and twisted, transforming them into a monstrous creature.

  Some people believed that rat kings were bad omens, a phenomenon so rare that only a few specimens existed in natural history museums. But X knew better. The specimens existed all right, but there was nothing natural about them. X was eleven, maybe twelve, when he read about them in a book he brought home from the school library. One night, the book went missing. He found it in the living room. His father was sitting in his stained armchair, drunk as usual, with the book in his hand. “You know this nonsense isn’t real, don’t you?”

  X hadn’t moved.

  “In this book, they asked all kinds of fancy scientists, and none of them could explain it.” His father laughed, a spray of spit showering X and the book. “Bet they didn’t ask a janitor.”

  His father took a swig from the bottle in his hand. “Rats aren’t smart, but they’ll do anything to survive. You see this?” He pointed to the photo of a rat king specimen. Twenty rats, their tails tangled and intertwined in the center, with their heads facing outward. “If rats got twisted up like this in real life, you know what they’d do?” He took another swig. “They’d chew their own tails off to get themselves free.”

  He jabbed at the photo. “People did this. Tied the rats’ tails together so they couldn’t get loose. Nature doesn’t create monsters. Only men do that.”

  X watched the black mass of rats scurry into the living room, the pieces of string and yarn that Earl Roy had used to tie the animals together trailing after them.