Title:  Western Blaze III: William

Author: Jade  (CmdrJade@aol.com)

Rating: PG

Spoilers: This is the third installment of a series.  You'll need to have 
read the first two.

Archive: You can take this anywhere, just let me know first :)

Disclaimer: Not mine.  Not making any money off of it.

Summary:  William looks back at his life.

Feedback:  All kinds are appreciated!

****************************

Careful to close the back door quietly, I set out across my backyard.  I stop 
halfway and pick a few roses out of my mother's garden.

Soon I reach the two white stones that indicate the graves of people I never 
knew.  Kneeling down, I put the roses against the stones and begin to pray 
for them.  It's my fault they're dead.  They're my parents.

Sort of.

I never met them.  They're my other set of parents.

I was always told I was a special child by my parents, my "other" other set 
of parents.  My birth parents.  A miracle baby.  I just thought my parents 
were trying to make me feel loved.

But then I was told the story of how I was born from a mother who was never 
supposed to give birth.  They meant a *real* miracle.

Then my dad started getting into alien abductions and super soldiers and 
about how that year was the worst year they'd ever had.  I was their only 
hope that year.

But somehow, things got more complicated.  My dad had been gone for almost 
the entire year after my birth and my mom felt she couldn't protect me from 
those who were out to get me.  Apparently, for a while, I wasn't a normal 
boy.

I never pretended to understand it, the whole conspiracy.  Frankly, I don't 
know if my parents completely understood it themselves.

But, my mother felt she had no choice.  She put me up for adoption.  For my 
own safety.  I don't resent it.  I know it was hard for her.

As fate would have it, my parents were put back together, but not without 
sacrifices.

The people they had been fighting against thought they were dead.  So they 
upheld that belief and went into hiding, giving up everything they had, 
except each other.  Soon afterwards, they found me, outside of a burning 
house.  My adoptive parents were dead.  My birth parents took me and raised 
me.

We remained on the run for a long time.  For most of my childhood I lived out 
of cars and hotels.  My parents schooled me during the day and worked during 
the night, when they thought I was asleep.  

It was something top secret.  My dad knew a date.  A date on which the fate 
of the world depended.  Aliens were a frequent topic.  He thought they could 
save the world.

Personally, I always thought my dad was kinda off.

But the day came when my parent's work paid off.  They saved the world, saved 
human kind from extinction.  And didn't get any credit.  But that never 
bothered them.

Early the next year, we all settled down into a house in Denver.  That school 
year I entered into the sixth grade and was finally allowed to call myself 
William Mulder.  My parents finally started using their real names with 
everyone.  

Friends from their FBI days started to visit and suddenly I had a grandmother 
and uncles and cousins.  We took vacations and looked through old photo 
albums.  My parents told stories from their childhood and I had a family 
history.  We played games and had Christmas parties.  I became a Cleveland 
Indians fan, from Uncle Charlie's influence, and argued with Dad all the time 
about baseball.

I played in the high school marching band and was captain of the basketball 
team.  I picked a college and a tentative major with help from my parents, 
which resulted in a discussion of the X-Files and how they first met and how 
it all led up to that moment.

I had a normal life with a happy family.

I sit here now, my last weeks here before I move, and cry for my other 
parents.  The parents I never knew, never saw, and never had any pictures of. 
 The other set that loved me just as much, but for a shorter amount of time.  
The set that died because they adopted me.

I don't know how long I sit here, crying for them, feeling guilty.  I feel a 
hand on my back and I look up.  Dad kneels down next to me and squeezes my 
shoulder.

"C'mon, Will.  Let's go have breakfast."

We stand up together and Dad puts an arm around my shoulder.  "No use in 
feeling guilty, Will.  You'll see them one day.  We all will."

I smile up at him.  It's strange how he always knows what goes on in my head. 
 "Y'know, Dad...that's kinda spooky."

He grins at that and seems at a loss for words.  "Well...yeah."

As he trails off into a story of the FBI and his alleged spookiness, I send 
up another prayer for my other parents.  They're in good hands.

***********************

The End

Thanks for everyone who's supported these stories!  This is the last of them, 
though.  It was fun :)