SUNNYDALE, CALIFORNIA 
12:41 AM 

Joe Fathers stood on the concrete deck, looking out at the pool and sipping a glass of red wine with what he hoped was some type of blasé class. A moment later he was dripping wine down the front of his white dress shirt. 

“Damn,” he muttered, turning with a grimace and entering the house through glass sliding doors. 

The house was a disaster, and he knew it. Clothes lay strewn throughout the hallway and into the living room, outnumbered just barely by the pop cans, TV dinner trays and taco chip bags cluttered even more profusely in the room. Joe kicked garbage out of his way as he made his way to the kitchen, thinking he should find some club soda or something. He glanced at the fridge, and felt guilty immediately as he reread the note tacked onto the gleaming white surface by a tacky pineapple fridge magnet: 

Before he could open the refrigerator, he was startled by a noise coming from behind him. With a mixture of wariness and excitement, he turned and made his way back to the pool doors, his wineglass still locked in his hand, but forgotten for the moment. 

A naked woman stood silhouetted in the darkened doorway to the backyard. As Joe approached her, he watched raptly as she struck a match, briefly illuminating dark eyes and red lips, lit a candle, and then blew out the match. 

When they were barely a breath apart, Joe gave her a look somewhere between guilt and arousal. “I want you to know I … I don't do this. 
I mean, I'm not one of those guys that when his folks are on vacation 
he—he--but when I saw you at the Bronze…” he stammered, feeling awkward and very much the teenager. 

The woman put her finger to his lips. “Shh,” she breathed. “It'll be worth it.  I'll do things with you no one's ever done.” 

Feeling more and more like Tom Cruise in Risky Business, Joe followed her out to the pool. There, she turned to him, giving him a three hundred and sixty degree look at her nude body, took the wine glass from his suddenly nerveless fingers, and leaned past him to turn on the hot tub. Joe was speechless, which wasn’t unusual for him, but the woman didn’t seem to mind, which was. 

In mere moments, the woman had him locked in a passionate embrace in the hot tub. Joe was feeling almost dizzy, and he didn’t know whether to attribute that to the wine, the heated water, or the soft press of the woman’s bare breasts against his chest. The woman slipped and slid over his body, very nearly sitting in his lap, and when she reached for his cock under the water, and latched onto his neck with her mouth, he cried out in a combination of pain and pleasure. 

The woman lifted her mouth from Joe’s neck, and he gasped at the sight of blood in a ring around her lips like garish clown lipstick. She smiled, and he tried to smile back, feeling sick. And then her hand squeezed him firmly, stroked hard several times, and he flopped about in the tub, groaning and nearly incoherent from the intense sensations. His eyes slipped closed, so he never saw the shadow looming over him, and barely registered it when a man yanked him up by the hair and drove a syringe into his neck. The woman was still stroking him, clutching him with her other hand and biting at his chest. He cried out once, a miserable damned scream, and then fell silent as the other two continued to ravage him. 

X-FILES OFFICE 
6:30 A.M. 

Agent Fox Mulder entered his office, dropped the single file folder he was carrying onto a box in the corner and sighed deeply. A quick pained look flashed across his face, making his already weary features look more haggard. And then it was gone, and he was striding across the room and pulling dusty plastic covers off of his desk, the file cabinets, even his chair. He glanced up and saw that whomever had been in charge of closing up his little corner of the Bureau hadn’t noticed the pencils stuck into the suspended ceiling, and that made him smile. 

He turned to the bulletin board on the far wall, and pulled down the calendar there. Barely giving the half naked girls on each page a glance, he flipped the pages until May became November. This made him sigh again as he replaced the calendar on the wall. Staring a moment, he reached into his shirt pocket, found a pen, and proceeded to draw horns and a moustache on Miss November. Another smile, this one a little sadder than the grin he’d given the pencils. 

He found the folder he’d brought in with him, and carried it over to the bank of filing cabinets. Selecting the drawer he wanted, he pawed through it until he came to a space in the files, and then he pulled a marked file out of the folder in his other hand. An X-File. 

Mulder gave the name on the file a haunted look, and tried to put the bleakest thoughts out of his mind as he slipped the file marked “Dana Scully 7 3317” into the cabinet. Once he couldn’t see her name, it seemed better, but only until he dipped his hand back into the original folder and pulled out more items. 

No paperwork this time. Instead, Scully’s badge and glasses. Flipping open the badge, he found his vision blurring just enough to put Scully’s face into soft focus, but not enough that he couldn’t easily grasp the gold necklace with the cross charm dangling from it, and pull it out of the badge holder. 

Moving on autopilot now, his heart thumping painfully in his chest, Mulder found a plastic evidence bag, dropped the badge and glasses into it, and placed that along side the X-File in the drawer. As he closed the file drawer, he fingered the fine gold cross gently, almost reverently. 

And nearly dropped it when the phone rang. Tucking the cross into his breast pocket, he reached eagerly for the phone, knowing that every step now was a step towards the truth he’d always been seeking, but now that truth included finding his partner. And he would. It would be a long strange journey, but he knew he’d make it, and so would Dana Scully. 

SUNNYDALE, CALIFORNIA 
4:24 pm 

Two detectives stood in front of the large white house. Sun shone brightly down on them, and they both looked hot and uncomfortable in their dark suits and tightly knotted ties. As they stood watching, a uniformed policeman unwound bright yellow crime scene tape and strung it across the front door of the house. 

“Let’s start upstairs,” suggested the first detective 

“Sure,” replied the second. As they walked back towards the house, he added, “We need to keep the media off this blood on the walls…” 

Once inside the house, the two detectives stood and regarded the feature wall in the house silently for a moment, trying to puzzle out the obvious clue. They both startled as a third man entered the room. 

Mulder was already pulling out his ID as the detectives hurried to his side to hold him at the door. 

Holding up a hand, the first detective said, “This is a restricted crime scene.” 

“I’m Agent Mulder, with the FBI.” Mulder replied, his eyes already scanning the room, seeing a million different things. His mind was just as quickly categorizing the information his eyes were giving him into evidence and not important. When he caught site of the living room wall, he moved towards it, completely ignoring the two detectives, who found themselves simply following the agent. 

“Nobody called the Bureau,” one of them complained, sounding just a little bitter. 

“They should have,” Mulder shot back smoothly, his focus still on the room and not on the officers on either side of him. He did manage to notice when one of the officers opened his mouth to protest, and he cut him off smoothly. 
“I don’t have time for rivalry—this isn’t a hockey game. I don’t care if you two want to jerk off on the reports when this goes down, but in the past year these killers have murdered six people in your state and mine, and by the end of the week, two more people will be dead, and they’ll be gone. So just let me do my job.” 

“Just how in the hell do you know that, Agent Mulder?” one of the men sneered. 

“I’ve studied the files…you do know what files are, right?” Mulder continued, mowing over the bristling of both men. “I’ve been waiting for them to resurface, and now I’ve found them.” 

The second officer seemed less inclined to fight with Mulder, and instead asked the obvious; “How can you be sure these are your killers?” 

“The wire reported a body was found drained of blood, bite marks on the exterior jugular and median cubital veins. Every mirror in the house was smashed.” 

The first, less impressed officer sounded snide and Mulder thought that if he was going to have any problems with anyone in this quaint little city with the innocuous name, it was going to be this fellow. He didn’t know how wrong he was. 

“Yeah, well, it's what the wire didn't report that distinguishes this scene.” The officer sounded like a schoolyard bully, and Mulder ignored the implied ‘my dad will beat up your dad’ tone and simply held his hands out, gesturing to the wall in front of all three of them. He didn’t have to state the obvious. Instead, he recited the bloody words written on the wall: 

“’He who eats of my flesh and drinks of my blood shall 
have eternal life and I will raise him up on the last day."  They have 
the same feeble literal grasp of the Bible as all those ‘higher the hair the closer to God’ preachers do.” 

All three men fell silent for a moment, and then Mulder said, “The victim—Joe Fathers, right?” 

“Yeah.” The officer sounded sad now. His partner turned as another policeman, this one in uniform, called to them. A moment later he was walking away, and the first man continued. “Only child. The parents have been notified.” 

As if reciting from a textbook, Mulder stated clearly, if a little woodenly: “In Memphis, they murdered James Ellis, 58, father of Ellis and Sons clothiers.  The second victim was a Korean woman--Linda Sun.  The third victim was a Jesuit Theologian.” He ticked off the victims on his fingers as he described them. “Then, in Washington, three months ago the first victim was a priest.  The second victim was the only son of a family of six children.  The last victim was the owner of a new age bookshop--The Holy Spirit. I believe that's how they perceive themselves, as a kind of 
Unholy Trinity. If my profile of the previous cases holds true, they've been living in the city and working near blood products for the past month. 

The detective, who had at first felt totally threatened by Mulder’s presence, now gave him an impressed look, and immediately apologized for being such an ass. “Sorry,” he said, “But in this town, it's really tough to trust anyone.  Truth is, I'd be happy to have you work on our investigation. Let me introduce you to—“ 

Mulder shook his head, and this time it was his turn to look sad. “I'm working alone” 

“An FBI Agent without a partner?” 

Before the officer could say anything more, a movement in the window caught Mulder’s attention. He glanced over and saw a young blonde girl peeking in through the half-open blinds. When she noticed his attention, she disappeared into the bushes as if she’d never been there. Mulder quickly moved to the front door and threw it open, while the officer watched him with concern and confusion. 

There was no one there. 

Mulder turned back to the officer. 

“I don’t need a partner,” he said, his grim expression almost daring the officer to comment. “I just need one thing from you.” 
 

SUNNYDALE BLOOD BANK 
8:20 p.m. 

Mulder watched the police push the young blonde man into the back of their car none too gently, nothing more on his face than a vague frown. Nothing to suggest that the perp was more than just that. A bad guy, a twisted psychopath with no connection to— 

He cut the thought off abruptly, and turned his bland expression on the detective that approached him, deciding silently that he had already seen too much of the man. Of course, so far the local officers had been pretty helpful, including the use of their resources, most of which Mulder had turned down, except for the phone book. It was all he had needed to get here. 

“Drinking bagged blood? I’ve seen a few sickos in my day, but—“ The detective shook his head incredulously. “Hell, around here, I’ve even seen some things like this. Still—“ 

“He was hungry,” Mulder replied with a shrug. As he watched the car, the man turned and looked out the back window at him. Mulder was close enough that he could see the blood still smeared on his lips as he licked them lecherously and smiled nastily. 

Turning away from the sight, Mulder told the detective, “John Jackson. They call him ‘the Son’.” 

“I can understand how you’d know to find him in a blood bank. I mean, if he’s not out killing, and he’s into blood—“ The detective gulped uneasily, feeling his supper wanting to make a reappearance. “—the way you say he is, this was the likely alternative. But how do you know—“ 

A rustling sound from behind them, and Mulder and the detective turned in unison, both pulling their weapons. 

For the second time in less than twenty-four hours, Mulder watched the blonde girl run off. This time Mulder pursued, calling back to the detective. “Keep the lights off in his cell, and call me if he says anything!” 

Then he was off and running, barely keeping the girl in his sights, and wishing briefly that he was in his running gear, and not a pair of tight Armani pants and his second best dress shoes. 

A few blocks later and seriously out of breath, Mulder watched the girl run into a large dark building. Pulling out his gun, which he had re-holstered when he’d given chase, Mulder mounted the steps of Sunnydale High School. 

He entered cautiously, peering down the gloomy front hallway, wondering about a girl so smitten with education that she would be taking night classes, dismissed the thought as foolish, then decided Scully would have been proud of that. 

The frown stayed on his face as he moved towards a light source at the end of the hall. 

‘The library police must be hell in this town,’ he thought as he stopped in front of double doors that announced the entrance to the school library with quiet authority in block letters above them. 

Taking a quick calming breath, remembering that discretion was the better part of valour, then tossing that platitude aside, Mulder kicked in the door and announced, “Freeze! FBI!” 

The group of people looked up at him with mixed expressions ranging from disbelief to annoyance, and he just had time to realize the girl was not alone, but instead keeping company with two other girls and three men—well, two boys and one man—and then they were all talking at once. 

“I swear, I only copied a video that one time, and I felt guilty every time I watched it!” exclaimed a young dark haired man. 

“FBI?” the other younger man, his hair an impossible shade of black, and the older man, who looked completely flabbergasted, exclaimed in unison. The older man added, “Good lord,” for emphasis, apparently. 

“Oh! Am I the only one seeing a gun here?” asked the redhead, seeming to be the most alarmed of the bunch. “A-a-a gun that, I might add, is pointed at us.” 

The dark haired girl, almost a woman, really, didn’t seem put off by his armed-status at all. In fact, her smile was almost welcoming, if a bit vacant, as she murmured, “Hello, Armani!” 

“Okay, whoa, this is getting almost too weird for me!” The blonde girl Mulder had chased here now stepped directly in front of him, her expression a mixture of contempt and confusion. “And that’s pretty weird, trust me,” she added almost confidentially to him. Then she held out her hand. “Give me the gun.” 

Mulder backed up a step, not sure why. Instead he lowered the gun slowly, although he didn’t re-holster it and said again, in a normal tone of voice, “FBI.” Quickly he added, “I can show you my ID.” 

“I think you’d better,” said the older man, stepping up to stand next to the girl. The move was almost protective, but Mulder sensed that the petite blonde was actually more of a threat to him than the slightly foppish albeit attractive man beside her. 

Moving carefully, his gestures slightly exaggerated, Mulder dipped into his pocket with his empty hand and came up with his leather badge holder, which he held out. The girl peered closely at it, then made a face. 

“Fox? You’ve got to be kidding.” 

Mulder remained stoic, not betraying any distress at this latest round of ‘what kind of dumb ass name is that?’ and simply said, “And you are--?” 

“Cordelia Chase,” the brunette said brightly, stepping in front of the other two and giving her hair a toss. Mulder ignored her, she pouted, and the blonde pushed her aside. 

“I think I should be asking the questions here, ‘Fox’,” replied the blonde, and the older man glared at her. 

“Buffy, I don’t think teen insolence or rudeness is in order right now.” 

“Buffy?” Now it was Mulder’s turn to scoff, and he was not unpleased to see a blush stain the pretty girl’s cheeks. Before the two of them could exchange any more name mockery, the older man was speaking again. 

“Everyone, why don’t we call it a night for now. Willow, I’ll see you here tomorrow for—“ 

“I know, net research, your favourite flavour,” replied the redhead. The black haired boy gave her a smile and nuzzled her hair, murmuring, “You’re my favourite flavour.” 

They left holding hands. 

Cordelia, quickly over Mulder’s initial rejection, slipped a paper into his coat pocket as she passed him, saying, “Call me--I think Fox is a beautiful name.” 

Buffy rolled her eyes, and Mulder did the same, and much of the tension in the room eased in their mutual contempt for the other girl. 

The other boy had pulled Mulder’s ID from the older man’s hands, and was inspecting it with a critical eye. Then he gave Mulder the same appraising look and said, “FBI for real? Shouldn’t you look, I dunno, more like the Untouchables, less like an Amway salesman?” 

“Xander!” the older man admonished and snatched the ID away from him. 

“Which video was that again?” Mulder deadpanned. 

“Here endeth the lesson,” muttered Xander, making a hasty exit. 

The older man handed Mulder back his ID. “Terribly sorry about that, Agent Mulder. I’m Giles—Rupert Giles, the—“ he paused, recovered and continued, “the librarian.” He held his hand out, and Mulder finally re-holstered his gun to shake; Giles grip was surprisingly firm.  They gave each other equally measuring looks, and something tugged at the back of Mulder’s mind. He had the feeling he should know this man somehow. 

They held hands a fraction of a second too long, and Mulder suddenly realized— 

“Why were you following me?” Buffy demanded, ending the moment. 

“Why were you stalking crime scenes?” Mulder shot back smoothly. “Mall closed early?” 

“Well, yeah, but—hey! My town, my interrogation!” Buffy stepped well into Mulder’s personal space, and might have violated it even more if Giles hadn’t put a restraining hand on her shoulder. 

“Remember your training, Buffy,” he said quietly. 

“Right,” she replied, “Overt antagonism is not sexy.” She attempted to stomp away coolly and wound up flouncing back to her chair at the large round table in the middle of the room. 

“Again, I apologize for Buffy’s manners.” 

Buffy bristled until Giles added, “Although she’s not altogether without justification. Perhaps you’d best explain what’s going on here.” 

Again a look passed between the two men, and Mulder felt himself relax fractionally. He didn’t know exactly what it was, but something about Giles made him feel suddenly as though he had a partner again. Perhaps it was the skeptical tilt of one brow that he was offering. Or it may have been something more. Unsure of exactly what he was feeling, but knowing that this was no ordinary librarian, Mulder nodded. 

“The Unholy Trio,” he said. Paused a moment, then added matter-of-factly, “Vampires.” 

The contemptuous laughter he was expecting never came. Instead, his cell phone rang shrilly, making all three of them jump. 

“Mulder,” he answered, listened a moment, frowned and said, “I’ll be right there.” Dropping the phone back into his pocket, he tossed one of his Bureau business cards onto the table and turned without another word. 

“Agent Mulder, where are you going?” Giles called out. 

“The Emo-shop called him, his new personality is ready,” Buffy muttered. 

POLICE INTERROGATION ROOM 
9:40 p.m. 

Mulder glared at the dishevelled blonde man sitting across from him, and the man gave him a fierce look right back. Then, with a dangerous smile, he bit into his own hand hard enough to draw blood and sucked feverishly for a moment, looking even more the ghoul in the semi darkness they were sitting in. 

Still smiling, he offered his hand to Mulder, who slapped it away in disgust. 

“Aren’t you glad I said I’d only talk to you?” 

“Lucky me,” replied Mulder, clearly feeling anything but lucky. For a moment his cool façade cracked, and he gave the man in front of him an anguished look. But John was intent on his own hand again, watching the bite heal itself with startling rapidity, and he missed it. And he was oblivious to the catch in Mulder’s voice as well when he said, “John, what are you?” 

As if reciting scripture, John replied in a monotone, ”He is the Father, 
I am the Son, and she is the Unholy Spirit.” 

“And the three of you killed Joe Fathers.” It wasn’t a question. “Your fingerprints were found at the crime scene.” 

While he wasn’t expecting a confession, Mulder couldn’t hide his surprise, or disgust, when John grinned again, showing a smear of blood on his teeth, and said “Do you wish you’d been there…Fox?” 

“Go to hell!” Mulder snapped, losing his composure. 

“Never gonna happen, Fox. It’s part of the deal. I get to live forever.” When Mulder didn’t reply, he added, “You envy me.” 

“Well, not if drawstring pants come back into style.” The comment was lame, and Mulder knew it, but he was more shaken to be confronting John than he had expected. Stiffening his shoulders more mentally than physically, he was about to demand the whereabouts of the other two vampires when he noticed a blue stain across the back of John’s hand. He clutched at it greedily, and the vampire beamed a smile of heavy lust at him. 

Mulder ignored it and read the almost worn ink stamp. 

“The Bronze.” He was still holding John’s hand as he demanded. “What is that? Is it a club?” 

“I miss you, Fox,” John suddenly looked young and sincere, and Mulder was surprised to find himself drawn into the look. He wondered about the hypnotic power of vampires for just a moment, and then was thrown back in his seat when the door to the room burst open and bright light flooded in. Whatever spell the young killer had been trying to weave was instantly broken, and a detective was peering into the room. 

“Agent Mulder, there’s been another one.” 

“But they only work in threes…” Mulder stood and gave John a look that was completely devoid of emotion. “Looks like you’ve been replaced again…son.” 

“Fuck you!” John exclaimed, leaping to his feet and lunging at Mulder. Cold hands wrapped themselves around his throat, and he pawed at them, remembering John’s strength and dreading it now. The policeman tried to intervene, and one hand came away from his neck to swat the man away like a bug. Mulder found his airway blocked for a moment as the hand returned, and his struggles grew more frantic. A moment later, though, there came a hissing sound, and a smell like burned pork invaded his nostrils as the hands fell away. 

Scully’s necklace, which he’d put on before coming to this strange little town, felt warm and heavy around his neck, and the cross at the end of it seemed to glow. 

John had backed away from him, growling and holding his still smoking hands. 

“No,” Mulder said to him, his voice rough from the unexpected assault, “You’ll never do that again.” 

PSEUDOSUN TANNING SALON 
11:00 pm 

“Oh brother,” Mulder muttered, rolling his eyes at the literal nature of his foes, and suddenly wondering if he should be checking that phone book again. If there was a ‘Holy Spirit Laundromat’ in there, they were in for a world of trouble. 

He brought himself out of his musings as he ducked under police tape again, hating it as much as he did every time. Now his thoughts became darker, more brooding and John-filled, and then his new best friend the detective was at his side, and leading him towards a row of tanning beds. Most of them were closed, but the nearest one was not only open, but obviously occupied. 

“The murderers cut off the power supply at some point, and the phone,” said the detective. “But they must have been inside when they did it to catch this poor bastard still fake and baking.” An older man with a bushy white moustache to match his hair walked up and the detective introduced him as “Dr. McCormick, our forensic dentist.” He gave Mulder a puzzled look. “Now, I know I’m no fibbie, but you wanna tell me what we need a dentist for? This guy’s not going to have to worry about cavities for, oh, ever.” 

The three men approached the body in the tanning bed. The man was pale and naked, although some thoughtful officer had draped a towel over his genitals and closed his eyes. A jagged hole was chewed into his throat, and there were several needle marks as well, on arms and legs. 

Mulder turned to the dentist and said, “I don’t want to bias your report, but I need a preliminary exam—I need to know if you see anything unusual here.” 

The dentist took a flashlight from the detective and shone it on the wound in the neck. It didn’t take him long to announce,” Well, the bites are not done by an animal.  These are human.  And, realize this is a cursory exam, but I'd say they were made by more than one person.” 

“Possibly three?” asked Mulder eagerly. 

“Possibly,” the dentist concurred carefully. “although as I say—“ 

“Thank you, doctor,” Mulder shook the man’s hand then walked away, the detective trailing behind him. 

“I thought you said that fellow in the lockup was one of your perps. If that’s true, and your m.o. is right—“ 

“Then that means they’ve found another third.” Mulder pulled out his cell phone and was halfway through dialling Scully’s number when he remembered. He shook off the fatigue that was making him feel sloppy and forgetful, and continued. “And they’re only one victim away from getting away again. This is our best shot to find them.” 

“Listen, Agent Mulder,” the detective gave him a worried glance, taking in the agent’s worn appearance. “You’ve been a great help so far, and I’m sure we’ll get to the bottom of this. It’s not the first wacko crime in this town, believe me. But you look like hell. Why don’t you go back to your hotel, grab a shower, maybe get some sleep. I’ll be sure to keep in touch if we get any breaks.” 

Mulder gave him a wholly exhausted and bleak grin. “I didn’t check into a hotel—I don’t sleep anymore.” Then he walked away. The detective watched him go silently, and wondered just who was more spooky, these apparent vampires, or the man trying to stop them. 

SUNNYDALE POLICE DEPARTMENT 
Dawn 

Mulder sat at one of the desks in the bullpen of the police department, swilling the worst coffee in the history of the world and wondering just how bad the headache he was feeling was going to get. As he watched the early crew milling about desks and starting their morning routine, he absently reached between two buttons on his shirt to touch the small gold cross lying quietly on his chest. 

Comforted, he drained his Styrofoam cup, thought they might be making the coffee from elephant toenails, and stood up, feeling his spine crackle from neck to ass as he did so, and not in any good way. 

Detective Parsons approached him, his face a cloud of bad news. 

“The body’s gone, isn’t it,” said Mulder. 

“You better start telling me what the hell you think is going on here, Agent Mulder.” 

While Mulder had been at the latest crime scene, someone, or something, had entered John Jackson’s cell and attempted to stab the man to death. No one was quite sure what had happened, and so far only a few rounds of ‘I thought you were watching him’ had been played, but the detective was pissed, and he was going to make sure that this new weirdness found a blame-home with the newest addition to his office. 

“Well, seems to me there’s one of two options here,” Mulder replied, finding his dry academic voice and using it to full advantage. His headache jacked up a notch or two, and he absently rubbed his forehead as he spoke. “Either he escaped, with or without help, completely undetected—“ The detective tried to interject but Mulder overrode his protest. “Or, he was staked by someone and, if one of the more popular myths about vampires prevails, he immediately turned to dust.” 

Detective Parsons looked skeptical at that, although not as unbelieving as Mulder would have expected him to, and sneered, “And which story do you believe, Agent Mulder?” 

Mulder gave him a sad half-grin. “The truth,” he said. “I believe the truth.” 

SUNNYDALE HIGH SCHOOL 
9:45 AM 

Mulder entered the library, aware of the squeak of his shoes on the floor, the quiet hum of air conditioning, and the complete absence of students. As one of the original homework geeks throughout his academic career, Mulder found himself feeling slightly dismayed that there weren’t more people here, more students seeking, well, the truth, he supposed. The logic of books. The strength of the well-stocked shelves seemed to loom over him for a moment, and he thought that this must be one of the most comprehensive high school libraries he’d ever seen before he softly laughed off the folly of his thoughts. 

“Buffy?” a voice called from the stacks. The owner of the voice followed out of the shelves a moment later. Librarian and special agent regarded one another silently for a moment. Then: 

“Not Buffy,” said Mulder. 

“I see that.” Another pause, and this time Giles gave Mulder a more appraising glance. Finally, Mulder broke the silence. 

“Rupert.” 

“Fox.” 

“What the hell are you doing in Southern California?” 

Giles smiled at that. “I might ask you the same thing,” he said, moving forward. Without speaking, they both closed in on the large round table in the middle of the room. Giles made a polite motion, and Mulder sat. Giles took a chair across from him and removed his glasses. 

“Working,” said Mulder. 

“Vampires?” Giles raised a skeptical eyebrow. “I didn’t know the Federal Bureau of Investigation took much truck with that sort of nonsense.” 

“You don’t believe in vampires?” 

Giles found a flawless white handkerchief in his pocket and began polishing the lenses of his glasses furiously. For a moment, Mulder was reminded of another man, another pair of wire rims, and the same sense of power that radiated from both of them. He willed away an unexpected flush of pleasure with an almost physical effort. If Giles noticed his sudden discomfort, he made no comment. Replacing the glasses he gave Mulder a somewhat uncomfortable look of his own. 

“I didn’t say that.” Another moment, another memory falling into place for both men. Giles noticed the cut of Mulder’s hair; short, almost painfully so, currently spiking up in directions that suggested the man had no time for such niceties as a comb when danger was afoot. And he remembered a younger man, with longer hair, hair that kept falling into eyes just as sad as the ones before him. He almost expected Mulder to push at an errant lock out of habit. 

Mulder could still see the strong rebel hiding under layers of tweed and corduroy. The power barely restrained, both physical and more than physical. The quiet but almost overwhelming aura of the man before him. And a sense of protectiveness that the years seemed to have augmented rather than faded. He expected to see another man walk in any moment now. And was glad when he didn’t. 

“Of course, there are many theories that could explain the case you’re currently working on,” said Giles, shaking the memory from himself and concentrating on the matter at hand. 

“You mean the one your teenage Charlie’s Angel has been lurking around?” Mulder didn’t quite understand how a mystical museum curator and all round bad-ass from his past had come to be in the middle of his case on the other side of the globe from Oxford; nor did he fully comprehend how said man had come to be in the company of a group of misfit teens who seemed to be only lacking a large talking dog from their organization. What he did know, though, was that a teen-age girl had no place nosing around a murder investigation, paranormal or otherwise. 

“I assure you, Buffy’s presence is in no way going to hinder your search for the culprits. In fact, you may even find her helpful—“ a thoughtful pause. “Well, not so much helpful as—She—“ He shrugged. “What makes you think it’s vampires you’re looking for?” Giles took on a scholarly posture and suggested, “There is a condition known as Gunther's Disease--congenital erythropoietic porphyria creating cutaneous photosensitivity—“ 

“I'm familiar with porphyria.  It's an affliction that causes 
lesions and blisters when skin is exposed to sunlight. Sufferers may also have a hema deficiency which can be supplemented by a small ingestion of blood, though not the kind of blood thirst this case suggests.” 

Giles was not to be out-researched. “It's probably ignorance of porphyria as a disease that led to the creation of vampire myths in Asia in the Middle Ages. Since then, modern science has dismissed the possibility of the actual existence of such creatures as myth.” 

“Well, myth or no, undead creature or just a few friends looking for a new kink, the fact is we—I’ve got two dead bodies, and a third on the way, and then these whatever-you-call-them are going to move on.” His eyes darkened just long enough for Giles to notice the colour. “And I’m going to stop them.” 

Giles regarded Mulder silently for another spell. He tried again to reconcile his memories of Fox at Oxford with this weary looking man who’s shoulders seemed to be holding more than just the burden of his Armani suit. He knew some of Mulder’s history, mostly anecdotes Ethan had chosen to share with him with pointed meanness over Black and Tans in their favourite pub. But there seemed to be more here than just a closeted young man with abandonment issues. Or maybe that’s all it was. Without thought, Giles found his gaze sweeping down Mulder’s chest, noting the slim strength suggested there under his shirt, and just as he was blushingly making his way back up to the man’s face, he found Mulder doing the exact same thing. 

Mulder turned away and Giles cleared his throat. When Mulder looked back at him, his expression was neutral again. 

“Is there something I—we can do to help you?” Giles asked. 

“Tell me what the Bronze is,” said Mulder.