A/N: This fic was DEFINITELY in some way prompted by this lil comic: owainigo's post on tumblr about Lance's realization that Keith was a conspiracy theorist and Keith's desert shack in the first episode in general. The plan is that I'll write this so even if you haven't seen the X-Files, you'll be able to enjoy this, as it's more about the dynamic than anything else.

Unexplained

Mulder: [Agent Scully knocks on his office door] Sorry, nobody down here but the FBI's most unwanted.

Scully: Agent Mulder? I'm Dana Scully. I've been assigned to work with you.

Mulder: Oh, isn't it nice to be suddenly so highly regarded. So, who did you tick off to get stuck with this detail, Scully?

Scully: Actually, I'm looking forward to working with you. I've heard a lot about you.

Mulder: Oh, really? I was under the impression that you were sent to spy on me.

1

Lance walked through the halls of the FBI headquarters, making sure to keep his shoulders back and his head held high, like he had been here before. He, of course, had not been, and he was about to meet with the assistant director to be assigned to his partner for the first time. The other agents at their desks, the analysts in the labs to the side of the building—they didn't need to know that. He just had to project his confidence. He was pretty sure that was what got him this job, anyway.

He arrived at the door he was looking for, knocked once, and waited until he was asked to come in. He did so, and closed the door behind him.

He was facing an imposing-looking man, sitting with his hands folded over his considerable stomach, his beard wild-looking and yet still, somehow, tamed in its own way. He nodded to the chair in front of his desk. Lance crossed the room toward it, holding his hand out to the man as he did. "Lance McClain, sir." The man took his hand and shook it, breaking off as Lance sat down.

"Assistant Director Ross," replied the man, picking up a file on his desk. "Mr. McClain, I have to say, it's very interesting that I find you here in my office today."

Lance raised an eyebrow in response, and Ross continued. "Considering your background, it seems like you would be better suited to a laboratory at NASA rather than looking for fieldwork with the bureau."

"Well, sir, I found my old line of work was getting all a little too…" He searched for the word, twisting his hand in the air in front of him as he did. "…theoretical. I wanted to discover new things, yeah, but I want facts."

"So you decided to become an investigator for the FBI."

"The next logical step."

"Hmm." The man turned his eyes down to skim over a bit more of Lance's file, and Lance felt a little sweat around his collar. He didn't think the assistant director was as impressed with him as he hoped he would be. He reminded himself to stay confident, and brought his smile back into full force. "I wasn't sure what exactly to do with a man of your background," he said, "at first, I mean. It isn't every day we get a former astrophysicist in our ranks. Doctors, lawyers, police officers—those types are more likely to apply to be agents."

"I live to defy stereotypes, sir," said Lance, wondering where his superior was going with this.

"The point is, I would hate to waste your prior experience. And I think we've found just the right spot for you."

"Oh?" Lance sat up a little bit straighter, ready to hear what came next. This is what he had been working for, training for, ever since he left the lab.

"You see, we have a small division that focuses mainly on unexplained phenomena." He seemed to reconsider what he said, and began again. "When I say small, I mean, as of late, one agent. But I would like to change that."

"You want me to do… what, exactly?"

"These cases, they're real cases, but the circumstances around them make them a little bit more… extraordinary than our normal caseload." Ross closed the folder and slid it across the desk to Lance. "You'll be working with Agent Keith Kogane, who currently heads this division. While you two will be partners, I hope to receive, personally, a detailed and scientific account of each case you two encounter."

"Wait, you mean the normal reports we'll file after each investigation?"

"No," said Ross, and Lance's brow furrowed. "While Agent Kogane is well known to be a great investigator and well-thought agent, sometimes his own fervor can… tamper with his ability to report the facts of a case in a straightforward way, without any bias." He took a breath, and his eyes focused on Lance's. "I trust that you can bring some scientific clarity to the cases you two will be assigned. And that your reports will be suitably unbiased and confidential. Am I clear."

"Crystal."

"Good. I'll have you meet Agent Kogane now, and just…" He pinched the bridge of his nose and looked to Lance. "I know Keith means well. Make sure he does well."

"Yes, thank you, sir." Lance stood and began to reach his hand out to shake Ross's hand, but stopped when he saw that his superior didn't stand, either. And Lance didn't want to play himself a fool on his first day. Instead, he nodded toward Ross and headed for the door.

2

He found Kogane's office in the basement of the building, and at first, he wasn't sure it was going to be an office at all—it seemed like it was the only door in the hallway that didn't lead to a janitorial closet or storage room. However, the nameplate on the door said "Keith Kogane," so Lance figured it was the only correct option. He knocked, and entered when he heard a "Come on in," from the other side.

He wasn't sure what he expected from his brief discussion with Ross, but he was sure that this was exactly it. To say that the room was cluttered was an understatement. There were piles of papers and files everywhere, and not a smidgeon of the wall was visible underneath the layers of posters and papers tacked to it, creating a web of words and headlines such as "MYSTERY EXPOSED" and "UNEXPLAINED?" that seemed just confusing to Lance.

A shaggy-haired young man in a white shirt with a loosened tie looked up to him from the file he was scanning through. "Hi," he said, squinting at Lance. "Who're you?"

"Oh, I'm…" Lance scrambled in his jacket pocket for his badge. When he was able to fish it out, he displayed it, upside-down. "I'm Agent Lance McClain."

"Well, Agent McClain," said Kogane with what Lance figured must have been fake respect, "What brings you all the way down to the dusty basement of the bureau?"

"Actually," said Lance, his eyes tracing over a few of the various stacks of paranoia periodicals and table near the door, "I'm your new partner."

This changed Kogane's tune a bit. He stood up and took a few steps toward Lance, sizing him up as he did. Once he seemed to be satisfied, he threw his hands up in defeat. "They just sent you here to spy on me. They think I'm crazy."

Lance stopped where he was, his hand stopping on the top of one of the stacks of magazines. Wasn't that, in a manner of speaking, what they had asked him to do? The private reports to Ross definitely seemed like it.

At the same time, it had been clear that Ross respected Kogane, that he wanted him to succeed. He just needed Lance, a hard-headed outsider, to help bring more legitimacy to the department.

"No," said Lance, smiling as he did. "I'm not here to spy on you." He decided that it was not technically typing, since Kogane would be submitting his own reports, as well, of all of the investigations they would complete. "Though I do think I have been put here to help bring some, uh, scientific reputability to your cases."

"Oh," said Kogane, settling back into his desk chair. "Great. You're not a spy. You're just my babysitter."

"Damn, you're narcissistic," snapped Lance. Keith's eyes snapped back up to his, flared. "I'm not here because of you." Lance threw his hands up and let out a frustrated huff. "I'm not going to bother with whatever complex you've given yourself. I'm just going to do my job."

He finished, and Keith simply stared at him for a moment, and Lance assumed this meant that the cogs were slowly working their way together under that mop of hair of his. Lance let his hands fall and leaned back against the doorframe. Then, Kogane finally spoke.

"So," he said, "do you believe in the possibility of the existence of extraterrestrial life?"

Lance now understood what Ross was worried about with this guy. He decided to tread carefully, spelling out his answers as accurately as he could, considering his scientific background. "I believe in the possibility of life forms forming in extraterrestrial situations, yes. With the vastness of the universe, paired with the possibility of non-carbon-based lifeforms…"

"That's the kind of answer I expected from you," said Kogane, scoffing. Lance slouched and raised an eyebrow. Keith continued. "You were what, a biologist before you came here?"

"Astrophysicist."

"That's rich," said Kogane, actually chuckling a bit as he did, leaning forward in his chair. "Of course you were. Of course they put you with me." He turned his attention from his own thoughts back to Lance. "You know that scientific progress is best achieved if you don't let your findings be tainted by preconceptions of what might be."

"Isn't that what a hypothesis is?" Lance let out a sigh of annoyance and crossed his arms.

"I'm just saying, you might have your assignment," said Kogane, his voice becoming more quiet as he did, "but this is my work, and I believe in it. If you have to scrutinize, do it, but take it seriously, and for the love of God, have an open mind."

Lance looked to his new partner and saw the way that red came to his cheeks, the way that his chest was heaving a little bit—this really was his life's work. And it might be ridiculous, but it was what he was passionate about. And who was he to judge? People laughed when he left the astrophysics lab to become an investigator. People laughed when he left small-town living for astrophysics. When you want something more, people think it's stupid, and even if he was one of those people in this case, he could keep an open mind, he figured, or at least try. As long as Kogane decided not to be an abrasive asshole about it.

"So," said Lance, taking a step in from the doorframe and shoving some files off of an extra chair so he could sit down, "what sort of a case should we work on first? Bigfoot? Crop circles?"

Keith narrowed his eyes at Lance, and Lance would have been lying to himself if he didn't admit, internally, that he got a rise out of it. He bent down from his spot in his desk chair and picked up one of the files Lance had sent to the floor. He shuffled the papers back into working order and handed it to Lance. "Actually," he said, "we're dealing with a much more interesting case. Something real."

Lance stifled a laugh, trying to keep an open mind, and took the file, opening it up in his lap. It was thick, and the front page was a title page. "Undocumented File #84: CLASSIFIED" was printed on it, and Lance wondered if this department took itself too seriously. He flipped to the next page.

"You'll see the details in there," said Keith, "but recently there was a freak meteor shower—something out of the ordinary, according to the local astronomical and meteorological community, basically something that was wasn't supposed to happen. And if you flip ahead…" he reached over, half-standing and half-squatting from his chair to flip through the pages in Lance's hands, "…you'll see that there were meteorites that were discovered as a part of the shower." He withdrew his hand and Lance looked down at the picture, a high-def shot of a patch of desert littered with a series of dark spots, presumably where the meteorites had struck the earth.

"So?" Lance looked from the pictures to his new partner. "There are freak meteor showers—well, not frequently, but not infrequently enough to cause any sort of real irregularity…"

Keith's brow furrowed in something that resembled a pout as he reached forward again, thumbing through pages, upside-down to him, in Lance's hands. Lance watched as Keith brushed the hair out of his face that fell into his vision, never breaking his intense scrutiny of the pages as he did. "That picture you just saw was the one an amateur photographer snapped on a hike and sold to the local paper for a couple of bucks." He offered the file back toward Lance. "This is a photo sent to me by someone who is a bit more interested in extraterrestrial phenomena than the everyday bystander."

Lance diverted his attention from Kogane to the photograph. He raised an eyebrow. "What is this?"

"A meteorite discovered yesterday afternoon in the New Mexico desert."

"No, really, Keith." Lance looked to him, figuring he would break the fanatic ruse he had to be putting on. Maybe he thought there was a conspiracy behind the J.F.K. shooting and that there might be a creature akin to bigfoot in the woods, or a large fish in the Loch Ness, but that didn't mean that he legitimately believed this could have fallen from outer space, from an unidentified location—an alien location.

Keith didn't say anything, and Lance inspected the picture again. "But…" said Lance. "You're saying this came from space?" He squinted at the picture. "From RadioShack, maybe, but space?" He dropped the file into his lap. "Keith, my dude, this is fake."

Kogane pulled the file back from Lance, closing the folder over the picture of charred machinery, like a friend circuit board, in the sand. "It might be," he said, "but I'm not convinced, and neither is the guy in the photography lab upstairs. He says it's not a forged picture. I think it could be real."

"Seriously?"

"The higher-ups in the bureau said they'd only approve this investigation once my new partner was assigned," said Keith. He spun around and clicked a few things on this computer before spinning back around to face Lance again, a new webpage loading in the background. "I just booked our flight—we leave at seven o'clock tomorrow morning."

"What?"

"You're worried it's a hoax," said Keith, handing the file back to Lance, who closed his hand around it without even really thinking. "We're going to investigate this. Because I'm worried that it's not."

Special Agent Fox Mulder: [to Scully] Do you believe in the existence of extraterrestrials?