Cold alarm moves up my spine, and his face tells me more than I wish it did. This inconsequential find... it's far more than any of us had thought. Damned scientific curiosity! I'm forced to ask, to confirm.

"Jack, it's not an animal, is it?"

"No, Daniel. A child."

He appears cold and unaffected as he tenderly slips the object back into that bag of bones. The last earthly remains of a child, and every child is Charlie to him.

His abrupt departure leaves me feeling like a coward. Yet there is nothing I can do, nothing anyone can do.