Title: Harbinger
Author: MissAnnThropic
E-Mail: miss_annthropic@yahoo.com
Spoilers: pre-X Files
Summary: That day, twelve-year-old Fox ceased to be a child and became what would become of the man.
Disclaimer: I own nasing! Really, I don't. All you see here (that you recognize, anyway) is the creation of someone else. I take no credit.



There are moments in life that change a person for the rest of their life. Events that alter one's thinking entirely... that casts upon the world an entirely new, shadowed light. A harbinger to distance the ignorance of childhood to the harsh truths of life in adulthood. The form these transitions take, the means by which they come to pass, can be large and cataclysmic to a child's small world, but just as often it is the seemingly inconsequential events that alter the course of a person's thinking and actions in life from there on in.

Fox Mulder had two... a succession of harbingers. He left childhood behind forever when he was twelve years old.

And his harbingers took the form of both types, the huge and the small.

November 27, 1973 came the big one... his little sister Samantha Ann Mulder was kidnapped, taken from their home right in front of him. Fox Mulder's own psyche, his defense systems, knew before the young boy even had time to process it that witnessing that event was too much for a child so young. Almost before the blinding light had completely faded from the Mulder's household living room, his mind suppressed it. By the time his parents came home to find their daughter gone, Fox did not remember anything.

But he remembered the terror... the horror and helplessness. Even if he could not recall the exact events, the responses it elicited stayed with him. And maybe, in a way, that was even harder than remembering it. He felt the guilt and loss and fear, but he could not place with it a memory.

Forever afterwards, never could he enjoy childhood as a twelve year old boy should, for in the back of his mind was the wound of having unknowingly seen his sister ripped from him. Even then his dreams started, vague visions and realistic screams as Samantha called his name.

His second harbinger, in a cruel quick-fire style, came only a week after his sister was taken. It came in the form of his father... a shape that had so long before been a gray area for the young boy. Fox knew something was different about his dad. Other kids' dads played with them, took them hiking... his dad gloomed in the dark corners of the house. Fox would have felt ashamed to admit it then, but sometimes when he conjured up images of the dreaded bogeyman late at night, that creature looked amazingly like his father.

William Mulder was always a recluse, a look in his eye that he always knew of so much more going on, and that this knowledge was enough to make him bitter. He was a man trapped in a world of shadows.

But he was still Fox's father... his dad. The young boy saw him as a protector, as dark and mysterious as he may have been to his own family. Fox wanted to feel safe with his dad; wanted to believe that he would make everything okay. For weren't fathers supposed to make everything okay?

The day of the harbinger, Fox had been out on his bike, going around the neighborhood and through the Massachusetts woods and parks. He was asking neighbors and people on the streets if they'd seen Samantha. Things were so comfortable in that close-knit town (Chilmark was not as large then as it was to later become), and everyone Fox stopped knew him. They had the heart to frown sadly and express sorrow and sympathy for the boy when they told him they'd seen not hide nor hair of his lost sister.

Then Fox went around the parks, the woods, all the secret hiding places him and Sam liked to go exploring in, places to escape their parents and find the true exultation of childhood in the antics of each other outside their somber home. He kept hoping Samantha had somehow escaped whatever dark evil he retained only a sense of and that she had taken up hiding in one of their spots. He found nothing and was forced to return home, once again, empty handed.

When Fox came back into the house, dejected, he saw his father sitting at his desk. He looked like he was reading some papers, engrossed in them in his quiet, begrudged way.

And Fox got angry. His father had done next to nothing to find Samantha after she was taken... he did not press the search to locate her. He acted like he didn't expect her to ever come back... like he'd lost all hope that she'd come home.

And in that moment, it made Fox angry. How could his father just sit there, doing nothing? How could he not look for her?

Fox, fuming, had headed toward his father's office.

His mother seemed to appear from nowhere, as if she'd been hovering in the shadows and emerged only to guard him. Teena Mulder had stepped quickly and silently to her son, grabbing his arm and halting him.

Fox knew he wasn't supposed to go into Dad's office, but right now he didn't care. Samantha was more important than house rules, but his father was acting like she was no more important than those stupid papers he was looking at. Unable to bite back his anger, young Fox looked up at his mother questioningly and somewhat impatiently.

Teena, face harrowed and sad (her visage had been like that, even before Sam was taken... there was always something tragic and sad about his mother), shook her head. She loosened her grip on her son's arm, then whispered, "Don't, Fox... don't disturb your father."

Fox felt like crying, but he didn't. He wouldn't shed tears when he needed to be strong... needed to be strong in order to find his sister. He turned his sadness into anger, and he wrenched his arm from his mother's hand and retorted in a harsh whisper, "He's not even trying, Mom! He's not even trying to find Samantha!"

Teena's face grew taunt and pained. For a minute, Fox's steam was lost in seeing his mother so distraught, though his anger resurfaced not long afterward. Teena sighed tensely, then said, "Fox... there are things you don't understand."

Fox didn't want to hear it... not now. He didn't want to hear it and he didn't want to understand. All he needed to know was that his own father was making no efforts to locate Samantha. The father, who was supposed to defend and protect his children, was making no efforts to even find a missing daughter.

And that was something young Fox Mulder could not reconcile. There was no excuse... not to his twelve year old eyes. His father was acting as if Samantha was dead... treating her disappearance with that level of finality. And that infuriated Fox. He would not even allow himself to think for a minute that his sister was dead... that would be giving up on her. But William Mulder, in all his hostile brooding, had seemingly done just that. He'd given up... and Fox was furious at him for it.

Fox broke from his mother, paying her hushed beckoning after him no heed. He moved quickly into his father's office, habit and ingrained apprehension pausing him at the doorway. He hesitated but a moment, looking at his father sitting darkly at his desk.

William Mulder caught the movement out of the corner of his eye and looked up, finding his son standing at the doorway, looking directly at him.

William glowered but voice kept in check, "Go away, Fox... I'm working."

Fox found his courage and stepped into the office.

William pierced him with a glare, "Fox, you know I don't allow you in here."

Fox set his jaw in defiance, refusing to step back and retreat as his father ordered.

William shoved the papers he'd been looking at underneath a manila file on the desktop, looking coldly at his son but making no move to go to him.

The stand-off lasted only a moment, for the twelve year old boy did not have the stamina to outlast his father in such a battle of wits. Instead, Fox strode up to his father.

William was angry, it was undeniable, but he sat still as his son stepped right up to him.

Fox, tears threatening, finally asked, "Why are you just sitting here? You... you're not even trying to find Samantha!"

William's eyes hardened and he warned, "Don't push me, Fox."

Fox was too angry, and too sad and scared, to listen. He continued hotly, boyish voice trembling faintly, "You're just going to let her be gone? You don't want to look for her? You don't care?"

William was growing impatient... "Fox..." was his only warning, and it was the most chilling warning the boy had ever heard.

But one last comment slipped Fox's lips, "Do you WANT her gone?"

William Mulder acted before Fox even had time to respond. Even if he'd had a few seconds, he still would not have been prepared for it.

William's hand came up, the back of his hand laying heavily across Fox's face.

Fox staggered, stunned, then processed what had happened and stepped quickly away from his father. His cheek burned from the strike, his eyes watering from the force of his father's hand on his face.

Fox blinked, looking at his dad. The man still sat at his desk, looking back at his son. His eyes were washed a moment in something, maybe almost regret, but he quickly turned away, his attention once more on his desk as though nothing had happened.

Fox could only stand there a moment, gawking at his father. William Mulder had always been a dark, moody character; a man who did not express well or been emotionally available for his children... but he'd never hit them before.

Fox had never been struck before, by either of his parents. They got temperamental, sure... but they never crossed the line of hitting him or Sam. Fox stared a long time at his father. For the first time, Fox was almost glad Samantha was gone... that she didn't have to see this side of their dad. So she didn't have to see that their father didn't just LOOK like the bogeyman... he WAS the bogeyman.

And that was Fox's second harbinger. For a child, their parents are always the guardians... the protectors. They keep from harm, not inflict it. That day, standing in the aftermath of the short attack, twelve year old Fox ceased to be a child and became what would become of the man.

The last truth to leave a child's mind, that there was something pure and noble about their parents, left him that day. He discovered that he'd been erroneous in his thinking for years. He'd allowed himself to believe that he could trust his parents... he knew now that that was not true. They were no better than any other person he came across... no more noble or right than the strangers his mother always told him to avoid.

Fox had silently left the room. His mother, who had watched the event unfold but did not try to interfere, attempted to reach out to him as he emerged from the office. Fox shrugged off her hand, moving up to his room without a word.

William never hit Fox again, but that day changed everything forever. Fox never again trusted his parents... neither one. Every other argument he had with his father he remembered the time it had ended with a hand across his face... every time his mother tried to console him and be a dutiful mother, he remembered how she'd stood back and not tried to help Fox when he'd been struck.

The distance between the boy and his parents started to grow by leaps and bounds that day when he was twelve. It took him only a few days to reach the conclusion of dejected maturity.

Before he was thirteen years of age, he knew he was alone.



END