Summary: This is in response to a challenge on the Topica list: JTS, one year on.

RESURRECTION by Alison
Email: xalison@excite.com
Category: Response to challenge
Disclaimer: Not mine, etc
Archive: Wherever you like!
Summary: This is in response to a challenge on the Topica list: JTS, one year on.



Arlington Cemetery
Sunday, April 20, 2003


AGENT REYES:

Arlington Cemetery is quiet and still, this early in the morning.
I've never been here this early; the sun has only just risen
and the mist is still lying in pale drifts across the peaceful
green field, making the rows of identical white stones seem
as insubstantial as mist themselves. I stand at the top of the
hill, looking down the view I have come to know well in the
last year. The cemetery is deserted now, but later it will be
crowded; today is Easter Sunday, and many people will come
today, this day of all days, to spend a little time at the grave
of friends or sons, brothers, fathers, husbands; time to
remember, to grieve, and perhaps to draw comfort from
their faith, and hope.

The graves I have been helping to tend the last few months
lie a little way away along the path, and I begin to walk
in that direction, in search of the man I have come to meet.

I see him from a long way away, his back turned to me,
a dark shape gradually resolving itself through the mist.
His head is bowed, and I don't need to see his face to
know that he is crying. His shoulders are shaking, his
hand going frequently to his face to wipe away tears.

I stand behind him, reluctant to interrupt. Reluctant too
to alarm him; he's been in hiding for the last year, and
only agreed to meet me here after much persuasion.
It took us a long while to track him down; me and Yves
and Kimmy; then to win his trust to the point where he
would agree to meet me. Maybe he feels that he has
nothing more to lose.

If so, I have a surprise for him.

Eventually he straightens his shoulders and looks up,
a heavy sigh escaping him, and looks around for the
first time, his head turning as his gaze drifts over the
view and the many, many graves.

I judge the time is right, and clear my throat in a quiet
cough. He spins round, startled, and I see his face
for the first time.

Bertram Byers. There's not much resemblance to his
son; similar height, but this man is heavily built and
muscular. His eyes are brown, not blue, deepset,
and betray nothing but suspicion. I guess John must
take after his mother.

I smile and extend my hand to him. "Mr ... Fitzgerald?
I'm Monica Reyes. Thank you for coming to meet me."

He nods briefly, a muscle in his cheek twitching. He's
not as composed as he thinks he is. He looks me up
and down, still suspicious. "Agent Reyes."

His voice is nothing like John's, either; deeper in register
and harsh. But perhaps he's entitled to be, after what
he's been through in the last year.
I move up beside him
and we stand together, looking down at the grave and the
simple marker bearing his son's name. I stoop and place
my spray of white roses at the foot of the marker.
I've
brought flowers every month or so; all of us, Yves, Kimmy,
Jimmy, John Doggett and I, and Scully before she
disappeared, make sure all three graves are well tended.
Appearances must be kept up, after all.

As I straighten up I hear a muffled sob, and he wipes his
hands over his eyes again. He turns his back and steps
a couple of paces away, standing there with his back to me.
I hear a broken whisper "Sorry ..."

So I wait, and in a few minutes he's regained his composure
and turns back to me, but his eyes are drawn downwards
again to the stone. He tries to speak again. "Sorry ...
today is the first time ... this is the first time I've been here
since ..." He breaks off again, swallowing hard.

I nod with partly feigned sympathy. Now is not the right
time to betray my knowledge of him and the troubled
relationship between father and son. Nor to betray my
opinion of a man who could drive his son away and refuse
to see him for ten years, then greet him with a blow to the
face when they met again. But then, I remind myself, I'm
not here today for Bertram Byers' sake, but for his son's.
I stand quietly aside, and in a while he speaks again, not
looking at me but letting his gaze wander over the peaceful
field dotted with graves.

"You were here, weren't you? You came to the funeral."

"Yes, I was here."

He turns to face me. "I didn't even do that for him.
Didn't even come to my own son's funeral."

"I understand why it wasn't possible. And I think John
understood .... would have understood it too."

He laughs humourlessly. "You have no idea .... No, I'm sorry.
That was uncalled for. But how well did you know John?"

"I wouldn't say we were close friends, but I got to know all
three of them fairly well the last year. They helped me and
my partner a lot."

He looks at me in silence. His eyes are reddened. "You
still probably knew him better in that time than I did in the
whole of the last ten years. Did he tell you about him and me?"

"No, he never talked about you. But Frohike told me what happened
last time they saw you."

He breathes deeply. "Did he tell you I refused to see John for
ten years ... that the first time I saw him after that, I hit him in
the
face? That even after that, when it was proved to me he'd been
right all along, I still didn't have the guts to stand up alongside
him
for the truth? That I let him down again, ran away to save my
own skin?

"I don't think he believed that for a minute."

He shakes his head. "You don't know .... you can't know. After
the way I treated him, the things I said ... not just last year, but
for years, even before we fought. I don't think I ever told him
how proud I was of him. My son, my bright, successful, handsome
son ... he was going to do so much. I had such hopes for him.
And then he threw it all away. I couldn't forgive him. It never
crossed my mind that he was right. All I could think of was that
he'd let me down, thrown everything away, all his opportunities,
a promising career, the start I'd given him ...." He trails off.
"I couldn't forgive him."

I move closer and put a hand on his arm. "Mr Byers, I do know
that John didn't blame you for a minute. I know it hurt him that
you didn't believe him, and he did feel he'd let you down. But
he never stopped being proud of being your son."

He shakes his head again. "I wish I could believe that."

That sounds like a good cue for my next move. I tug gently on
his arm. "Will you walk with me?"

He shoots me a puzzled look - I still haven't given him a clue as
to why I asked him to come here - but moves slowly after me,
casting one last regretful look back at the stone. He mutters
something under his breath. It sounds like "I never told him I
loved him."

I squeeze his arm, and we walk for a few minutes in silence.
He's not a stupid man, and soon he will start to wonder why
I asked to meet him here.

We walk together down the path towards the parking lot where
John Doggett is waiting for me. The mist is clearing, and it's
going to be a warm day.

The parking lot is still almost deserted, except for John Doggett's
car and another battered saloon a few yards away. Doggett gets
out of the car as he sees us approach, lifting a hand in greeting.
I introduce them, and they shake hands. Doggett winks at me when
he thinks Mr Byers isn't watching. None of us pay any attention
to the other car, a dingy old Chevy.

The preliminaries over, Mr Byers looks from one of us to the
other.
"Agents .. I must confess I don't know why you've asked to see me
today. Except that it's a year since ... since John died. Is there
something I can do for you?"

Doggett takes over. "Not exactly, Mr Byers ... it's more the other
way about. It's more what we can do for you."

He shrugs. "What can you do? My son is dead and nothing is
going to change that. Unless ..." He looks from one of us to the
other as a thought strikes him. "You can tell me about him.
Tell me everything you remember. Everything he said, everything
he did ... I missed ten years of his life. I want to know
everything
you can tell me."

Doggett catches my eye. "There's no need."

He frowns, confused and angered. "What?"

I look beyond him to the tall figure getting out of the back of
the Chevy. "Ask him yourself."

Bertram Byers looks over his shoulder to see what I'm looking at;
I can't see his face but I see the reaction shake his whole body
as he recognises the man walking towards him. It must be like
looking back twenty years; John Byers looks like he must have
as a young man fresh out of college, clean shaven and baby
faced with untidy collar length hair, in jeans and a teeshirt and
sweater. And he's smiling at his father in a way I've never seen
him smile before. "Dad."

Mr Byers cries out in disbelief and joy, and reaches out his arms
for his son. John grabs him in a tight hug and they embrace
wordlessly, hard, faces buried in each other's shoulders. Silently
at first; then I hear harsh sobs, and see John Byers stroke his
hands comfortingly over his father's shoulders. His father is
calling his name again and again, brokenly, all the pent up feeling
of so many years released as he holds his son for the first time
after so long.

John looks at me over his father's shoulder; there are tears
on his face too. He smiles at me and mouths a silent "Thank you"
before hugging his father tight again.

I tear my eyes away, not wanting to intrude on such a private
moment,
and find Doggett looking at me with a grin on his face. This has
touched him too, and he's not ashamed to let me see. For all his
tough-guy exterior, he's one of the kindest men I know. He's also
one of the most practical, and his eyes are roaming over the
parking
lot and beyond. We were pretty sure we weren't followed, and that
no-one else knew we were meeting here, but you can never be too
paranoid - as the guys have always told us. He signals to Byers,
who straightens up, nodding. "Dad .... we have to get out of here."

Bertram Byers blinks, confused. Shock and deep emotion have
made him slow. "What ... where ..."

His son smiles at him affectionately. "You're coming with me,
of course. We have a safe house, and now that I've found you
again, I'm not going to let you go."

"We ...?"

"Me and Langly and Frohike, of course. Come on."

"Oh, yes ..... my God, John, I've got so many questions.
What happened? How did you escape? Where have you
been .. " He breaks off, staring at his son in wonder.
"God, John, I can't believe it ... you're alive!"

John Byers looks at his father with love and concern shining
out of his eyes. It's like a complete role reversal of father and
son;
he slips his arm round his father's shoulders and leads him gently
towards the car. "Come on Dad, we can talk later. I've got
a lot to tell you."

I hope his father has a few things to tell him, too.

Bertram Byers is still confused, and I can't blame him.
He follows his son obediently back to the car and gets
into the passenger seat beside him, still unable to take his eyes
off John. He's temporarily dumbstruck, all his questions
forgotten as he begins to realise that, today of all days, his
only son has been given back to him from the dead.

END