Note: OK, I really went overboard this time. I am taking everyone completely out of character. I have to. There have been certain scenes in my head that I have been wanting to use, and this was the only way I could use them. This series is, for the most part, nuts and flakes. Don’t look for any redeeming value in this series. This is pure silliness which I will blame on Spring and the wonderful Seattle weather. –Batela.

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

"Hey, you going to spend the night in there?" Skinner stood in the doorway. Mulder was in the bathtub, reading a report. He absently pushed his glasses up.

"Hmmmm?"

"You’ve been in there for half an hour, are you pruned yet?"

A small body pushed past Skinner, shoving his hips to one side. The bathroom and the doorway were small, the house having been built around the turn of the century when everything was smaller. Skinner’s broad shoulders almost filled the width of the door. The boy lifted the lid of the toilet and Skinner quickly reached down to re-adjust the child. He knew it had to be Pavel; Ivan had better aim. The men still couldn’t tell the two apart by looking at them, but they did learn that although Pavel was a little quicker mentally, Ivan had better hand-eye coordination.

Mulder glanced up and then turned a page.

"I’m almost done." He shot a glance at the child’s back and shook his head.

Pavel finished and turned toward the tub, his eyes barely open, his face swollen from sleep. His dark hair stood on end, wildly poking up in different directions.

"...mmb..lm...late," he mumbled a reprimand as he rubbed at his small pointed nose, the very tip slightly upturned.

"I know I was late tonight, I’m sorry." Mulder had to work late, not getting home until after 10. Pavel leaned down for his goodnights and went back to bed. Skinner followed him out, tucking him back in and making sure that Ivan and Adam were alright, straightening their covers. He smoothed their hair, giving each a kiss. He could smell the bath water on them in combination with their unique little boy smells. He never thought that he could love a child, but he did; with three of them. It was easy to love Adam, he being Mulder’s; but the twins, clones actually, of Alex Krycek... Skinner looked at the boys, Alex Krycek at approximately 4 years old. It was surreal enough to begin with, but he reluctantly began to love them, too. Mulder had been right, the boys each had their own personality, despite their genetic structure. Skinner found it amusing that Krycek himself could be felled by one look from these two.

When he returned to the bathroom, Mulder had a head full of soap. He pointed a soapy hand toward the folder on the counter before dunking. Skinner picked up the folder and sat on the floor to read it, his back up against the counter. It was an update of the search for Rhonda’s family. The bottom line was –negative results. Skinner frowned and re-read the report. He could find no fault with it, Mulder had been keeping his agents on their toes with his insistence to details.

"This smells," he warned. Mulder unplugged the drain and stood up, grabbing the towel off the rack. Skinner stood and got out of the way.

"I know. I even called in a favor at WP; if she was in Witness Protection, it’s deep. No records with the DMV or at Vital Statistics. Rhonda Montgomery never existed." Skinner followed him to their bedroom.

"Last resort; in the morning, I’m calling Krycek," Mulder informed him. The men had Krycek’s cell phone and pager numbers, but they avoided using it unless it was an extreme emergency. It was bad enough that the man showed up at unexpected moments, they last thing they wanted was to willingly invite him, but for the second time in two weeks, they were going to do exactly that.

With no records of Rhonda anywhere, Krycek was the last resort in trailing her family’s whereabouts. His pointed ferret nose had a gift at sniffing out things that wanted to stay hidden.

"Did you still want to go to the picnic tomorrow?" Skinner asked as Mulder retrieved a fresh pair of pajama bottoms, dressed and got into bed.

"Yes, of course. I’m team captain, I have to be there for the game." Mulder curled up against Skinner’s back, too tired to do much of anything else.

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

It was a sunny day, blue skies held only a smattering of clouds. The temperature wasn’t overly hot, about 80 degrees. Perfect for a company picnic. The FBI held their annual picnic inside the local football stadium with guards at all entrances for obvious reasons; wouldn’t want some pissed off ex-con to sit in a tree taking pot-shots at all the agents with their families all in one place. They also didn’t have to worry about bringing in port-o-potties. The stadium was noisy with kids running everywhere, getting underfoot and into everyone’s hair. Those that had hair. Frisbees whizzed overhead and into the macaroni salad. The main attraction, at the moment, was the baseball game.

The various departments at HQ split up into 4 teams. Two games went on in the morning, and the two winners would play in the afternoon. The winners of the play-offs received an extra vacation day.

Godley’s Saints verses Mulder Madness were about to finish the morning round. It was the bottom of the 9^th, 2^nd strike. Dawson stepped up to the plate, dug in, wiggled his butt, raised his bat, and glared at the pitcher who completely ignored him. The pitcher shook off the first code from the catcher, but took the second. The ball fired down the mound and hit the catcher’s glove with a resounding snap.

"Strike 3, yer OUT!" cried the umpire. Dawson threw the bat and stomped off the field as Mulder Madness tossed their gloves in the air and jumped around, hootin’ and hollerin’ like a bunch of yokels. They rushed the pitcher’s mound and slapped and hugged his royal Madness with enough force that he would swear that he’d have bruises in the morning. A smaller body forced his way through the men and wrapped his arms around Mulder’s waist. Mulder lifted Adam up onto his back.

"Alright! At 3, we cream the Profilers!" Mulder yelled. The men howled their agreement and left to find food and their families. Adam stole Mulder’s baseball hat as they made their way back to Scully’s picnic blanket.

"Look! There’s Pavel and Ivan!" Adam pointed to a group of children with a soccer ball.

"I hope that means that Walter brought them and that they didn’t decide to drive themselves." Mulder wouldn’t put it past them to buddy up on driving a car; one steering and the other working the pedals.

"Daaad," Adam reprimanded him.

"Yeah yeah, be nice, I know." Mulder dropped the boy onto the blanket. Skinner was sitting talking with Scully. Mulder looked Skinner over with a leer; he was wearing raggity jeans and a sleeveless t-shirt. Mulder thought that it was a good thing that Skinner wasn’t wearing his cut-offs or he’s be fighting off the vultures with a stick.

"Are you picking on the twins again?" Skinner asked with an accusing frown.

"And why are you late?" Mulder asked instead.

"We had a flat. The boys took the time to ask about car maintenance."

"Oh, God, no!" Mulder and Scully looked at Skinner in horror. He was about to snap at them when he saw the gleam in their eyes.

"Very funny." He dug his own hat out of a bag and adjusted it on his head. Sunburn on a bare scalp was not a nice thing.

Adam had spotted a pair of binoculars in the bag and took them out for a look around.

"Look, Dad, that man on the stage singing looks just like Alex!" Adam exclaimed. In a panic, Mulder took the glasses. Scully looked at a copy of the day’s events.

"Says the group is Nick’s Mounties. I wonder what American patriot thought to hire a Canadian band for an FBI event?" she mused.

"Looks a lot like him. A hell of a lot," Mulder muttered as he studied the dark-haired man in the red maple leaf t-shirt with the guitar who was jumping around the stage and belting out a rock song for the teens and young adults who were dancing on the grass.

"He isn’t Alex, Alex can’t sing. I heard him when Pavel and Ivan wanted to hear the dragon song. The kittens ran from the room," Adam informed them.

"What dragon song?" Mulder asked, putting the glasses down. He missed Skinner's wince.

"You know, the one that Uncle Walter sings to them, about Puff."

Mulder and Scully craned their heads around to look at Skinner.

"Reeeaallly?" they crowed.

"I do not sing," Skinner growled, refusing to look at them. Adam reached over and patted him on the arm.

"Don’t be shy, Uncle Walter, I think you sing good," he said reassuringly. Before the others could gang up on Skinner, a frisbee landed a couple of feet in front of their blanket. A man ran over and stopped to tie his sneakers before picking up the disk.

"Psst. Mulder," The man hissed under his breath.

"Hey, Jacobs, what’s up?" The three adults on the blanket looked at him curiously. Adam waved at him, remembering him from helping with his rescue from the crazy man.

"There’s a bet goin’ down that I think you should know about," he whispered.

"Yeah? On the ball game?"

"No, well yeah, but this isn’t about that one. Someone blabbed to the Profilers about you guys. You know. Not that it’s a secret, but still.. the Profilers don’t believe it so a new bet got started. Get proof by the end of the day; yes and the kitty goes to us. No and the kitty goes to the Profilers. Last time I checked, the pot was up to $735. No one from our office is saying much of anything to confirm or deny."

Mulder leaned back toward Scully and smiled with a slow grin. Skinner swore under his breath.

"Foooxxx..." he warned.

"Place your bet, Jacobs. We party major on the Profiler’s dime after the Madness wins the play-offs." Mulder blew a bubble with his gum and let it pop. Jacobs grinned and was off with his frisbee.

Skinner glared at Mulder.

"Aw, come on, Walter, the Profilers deserve to be taken for a ride. They’re Profiler’s for God’s sake, and they can’t even see what’s in front of them. We have the same address, do they think we’re sharing a house to raise three motherless boys together? Besides, you owe me; you cornered me in the bullpen." Mulder leaned back further, his hair brushing Scully’s thigh. She looked down at him with a crooked eyebrow.

"As A.D., I’m in denial over what I just heard. What do you think you’re doing?" she asked.

"Stealing more Profiler money for the good of the Cause." He reached up and gave a gentle tug on a red lock. Several yards away, two Profilers rushed to put more money in the pot.

Skinner could see that this was turning into one hell of a day. He should have stayed in bed. So far, he’d endured a call from Krycek, one of the kittens being shaved -it was complaining of the heat according to the twins, and cleaning up a science experiment in mold that he discovered –the twins had discovered chemistry. Skinner then found himself trying to explain to Adam that Playboy was not on their reading list no matter what his father said about the quality of the articles. Thankfully, Adam was still too young to understand the pictures; he thought that they were anatomy lessons and wanted Skinner to name the different parts. Flushed, Skinner told him the proper names of the various parts of the female anatomy and silently swore revenge on Mulder for being out on a run. He would wait until later to reprimand Mulder for leaving the magazine where Adam could find it. He put it back in the master bedroom for later reading. He was bi, not gay.

This was all before 9am, before he left the house. Skinner needed to run over to the station house for an hour, so Mulder took Adam to the picnic in his car, needing to get to the field early for warm-up. He couldn’t look after the twins and play in the morning game, so he left the twins for Skinner to bring with him later. Midway into the city, they had a blowout. As Skinner was changing the tire, the twins became interested in the underside of the van. They would only get back into the van when he promised a lesson in automobiles when they got home.

Skinner’s attention was brought back to the present by the twins ran up and presented him with a frisbee printed with FBI on the top.

"Uncle Walter, teach us how to play with this," they insisted.

"Please," he prompted.

"Please?" they wheedled. Skinner took them off to a more open area.

"Great, just what they need, to start target practice." Scully bemoaned. She noticed Adam looking strangely at her, studying her as though he had never seen her before. For some reason, she felt herself turning red.

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

The annual picnic was being held at the local stadium, which was enclosed with locking gates. Guards remained at the gates, only allowing in people with FBI badges or special permits. A couple hundred agents in one place at one time would be too tempting a target for an enterprising sniper. Using the stadium was also cost effective in the sense that there were bathrooms, a kitchen and health department approved concession stands for the food.

The baseball nuts in the crowd were being entertained by members of the Orioles, the national team from Baltimore who were holding batting practice for anyone who wanted to try it, while music was at the opposite end of the field. Skinner walked around the field with the twins scampering out in front of him, playing tag around peoples’ legs. They had quickly grown bored with the frisbee, finding the aerodynamics too much of a variable to deal with.

"Boys!" Skinner called them over. "Don’t play around people like that, you’ll trip someone." They ok’d him and demanded money for cotton candy.

"The last thing you two need is sugar. You may have popcorn." They grumbled but agreed and shared a soda along with the popcorn. Skinner had forgotten about the sugar in the soda, but at least it was minute compared to the candy.

While they walked, Skinner found himself greeted by people from the office, agents that had worked under him. Most were uneasy with him, mostly because they were unused to seeing him out of a suit; a few because they didn’t trust him, no matter what the U.N. tribunal had judged, and felt that he should have been in jail at the least.

"Your sons?" Starks asked, nodding toward the boys who were watching a man in front of them. Skinner was on the alert, the boys were paying too much attention.

"No, it’s complicated, just think of them as my nephews." His true relationship to them could fill a book.

"What are they doing?"

The boys had begun to follow the man on silent feet, dodging behind people. Skinner rubbed his temples; he felt a headache coming on.

"They’re practicing their skulking skills." Starks gave a surprised laugh and Skinner shook his head. "Don’t ask. Just pray that they use their powers for good." He shook Starks’ hand and went to fetch the boys. Starks laughed again. Skinner followed the boys with resolution. He caught up with them and grabbed them by the scruff of their necks.

"Alright, boys, enough of that. Uncle Fox’s game is about to start so let’s get over to the playing field."

"But, Uncle Walter, that man keeps taking things from people." Ivan protested. "We want to watch him."

Skinner knelt down to eye-level with them.

"Are you sure?" he asked them. They nodded sincerely. Skinner stood and motioned to Agent Parker, who was nearby with a group of agents. He knew Parker.

"See that man? My nephews say they’ve watched him taking things. Keep an eye on him, will you?" He was out of his jurisdiction. He could arrest the man and turn him over to locals, but not on the say-so of two small children.

"Yes, Sir." Force of habit made the agent snap to Skinner’s unspoken order. Parker unobtrusively made his way through the crowd, watching the suspect.

On the way to the playing field, Skinner tried to keep a tight grip on the boys. SAC Gallagher stopped Skinner to shake his hand and say a few words. Gallagher was one of the many instant promotions that occurred a couple of years earlier. He introduced his wife to Skinner. The woman was very pregnant. The boys were fascinated by pregnancy. They stared at her large belly as if trying to see the baby inside. Pavel gave her a gentle poke.

"Pavel!" Skinner was aghast that the boy would do such a thing. He began to stutter an apology but Marina Gallagher laughed and ruffled Pavel’s hair.

"No harm done, Mr. Skinner. Children are naturally curious." She took Pavel’s hand and laid it against her belly. Not to be left out, Ivan placed his next to Pavel’s. They waited a moment and suddenly pulled away, startled. Skinner would swear that if they were cats, their hair would be on end, ears pricked forward and whiskers twitching.

"How’d it get in there? How do you get it out? Why does it have to grow in your belly? Is it a boy or a girl? Is there only one? How big is it? What...?" the boys both began asking questions as fast as they could.

"I’ll answer all your questions when we get home." Skinner promised them, his face flushed with embarrassment. The Gallaghers both laughed. Skinner decided to get the boys away before they asked something he would really regret. This was Mulder’s fault for encouraging them to ask questions.

Skinner got them about fifty yards before the next incident. They walked close to a family, parents doing their best not to be humiliated by their son’s hair done up in a yellow and orange rooster’s comb. The twins stopped dead in their tracks, their eyes wide in amazement. They tugged on Skinner’s hands and he squatted down to their level.

"Tell Uncle Fox that aliens are here." Pavel whispered. Skinner choked back a laugh and promised to tell Mulder. Yes, he certainly would tell Mulder about this one.

They stopped for a bottle of water and a bag of popcorn to take to the game. While they stood in line, the boys noticed another teenager, this one with his pants hanging halfway down his butt. The boys whispered to each other. Before Skinner could stop him, Ivan went up to the boy and tugged on his shirt to get his attention.

"What?" the teenager said rudely.

"How old are you?" Ivan asked, hands behind his back as he studied the older boy.

"What?? 17, why?"

"Well, we were wondering. We’re 4 and we can pull up our pants. Maybe you can ask your parents to teach you. It’s really easy," he said helpfully. Pavel nodded and gave his own pants a hike up in demonstration. The older boy took a step toward Ivan in anger. Skinner straightened his shoulders and puffed out his chest. The teenager took notice and stomped out of line. Skinner got their water and popcorn, and hurried the boys to the stands as fast as he could, hoping that nothing else attracted their attention.

They reached the stands at the bottom of the second inning. He found Scully and Adam and sat the boys down.

"What’s with you?" Scully asked, noticing his harried expression.

"Let’s just say I need a vacation from all of my recent vacations."

"Uncle Walter."

"Yes?" Oh, no, what was Pavel looking at?

"That boy over there looks like Mr. Grady’s bull."

Skinner and Scully both looked. Scully laughed. Another teenager, this one with a nose-ring and shaggy brown hair. The teenager was overweight, making his overall appearance rather bullish.

"Just watch Uncle Fox, please. It isn’t nice to comment on people, it’s rude." He gave Scully a look.

Thankfully, the twins were happy to stand on the sidelines with Adam to cheer on the Madness. Skinner wasn’t sure that the twins understood what was going on, but they copied the reactions of the crowd and Adam, yelling and cheering, booing and hissing, when everyone else did. Skinner cheered along with everyone else, all the while wondering if he could get Mulder to wear his uniform to bed.

By the bottom of the nine inning, the Madness were at bat. The game was tied, 12 to 12, with only 1 out. First base had a man on it and Mulder stepped up to bat. He struck out twice and stepped back to swing his bat and stomp off his irritation. He suddenly called a time-out.

"What’s the matter, Mulder? Wimping out? I’ll accept the towel," Moore shouted from the pitcher’s mound.

"Up yours, Moore," Mulder shouted back. "Even if I get Eastman home, we still win." He pointed his bat to his runner on first. "I just need some luck. Be right back." He jogged over to the stands, put one knee next to Skinner, and dipped the man backwards, kissing him hard. Skinner was brought to his senses by a roar of catcalls and whistles. The boys thought it was funny, and were also laughing.

Mulder stepped jauntily up to bat again. In shock, Moore threw the ball directly over the base. Mulder swung, hitting the ball deep into right field. Eastman was off like a jackrabbit, with Mulder close behind. Eastman made it over home base as Mulder got stuck on third. Moore threw his glove down as the crowd erupted in cheers.

Wives and kids ran out onto the field to hug their heroes while Jacobs chased down the money holder. Mulder slapped hands with his team-mates before hugging the boys and Scully. He put his arms around Skinner and held on tight.

"Thank you. Love you," Mulder whispered to him.

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

They put the boys down to sleep on Scully’s floor, washed up, and went to a pub down the street from the Hoover. Before they left, Skinner called a hotel and made a reservation for that evening, and then whispered a suggestion to the twins. Maybe Aunt Dana could explain babies to them, after all, she is a doctor. The men beat a retreat out the door, just as the boys marched into the kitchen to confront her on Uncle Walter’s excellent suggestion. The men heard a scream just as they shut the door,

"SKINNER, get back here!!"

End pt 6