Title: Tiuwak
Author: Ccile Laumonier
Originally Written in French in February 1999. Translated in English in July 1999.
Warnings: G
Category: S
Spoilers: Season 1 to 5
Keywords: Project Emily MSR
Disclaimer: The characters and the story developed in The X-Files are the exclusive property of Chris Carter and Ten Thirteen Productions. Copyright: Mr. Bight, Jeremy and the story entitled Tuiwak are, on the other hand, my exclusive property.
Archive: wherever you want if you tell me! :-)

Summary: When Scully finally discovers all the truth about her role in the Project...

Author's Note: Special thanks to Kafda, from Panama, for her wonderful help on the translation and to Stacia from the U.S.A. for her very useful lessons!

Somewhere on the Eastern Coast of the United States

"I don't accept that!"

The tone of the voice is firm, but all the anger, sadness, and concerns of a father can be heard in it. Leaving for a moment the empty look of his small blond son, looking away from the small blond boy who barely conscious on his hospital bed, a man of about forty-five or fifty years old with graying temples heads for the window of the small room, turning his back to the physician who has just told him the terrifying news. His child, Jeremy, five years old, will not survive the accident that deprived him of both kidneys if they can't find a donor kidney to transplant within the next six days. The physician walks toward the child and, while observing him, asks his father:

"Would you be willing to give your son one of your kidneys?"

The father turns around immediately, his look full of hope, and exclaims: "I would give my life to save him!"

"Remember, there's no certainty that you are compatible. First we need to run some tests. If there's no match, we will ask some other members of your family."

The father, trying to seem calm and collected, says, "Yes, yes, we are going to do that... That's what we're going to do and everything will be all right..."

A few days later the physician receives the father in his office. He seems disconcerted by the file in front of him, clumsily turning and returning the pages. Sitting across from him in an armchair, the poor boy's father understands that something is wrong and begins a monologue that only accentuates the physician's uneasiness.

'What's wrong, doctor? I'm not a match, am I? That's all right, though, my late wife's brother must be, or at least his daughter. What are the results of their tests? We should call them now!"

The physician hesitates a moment; then, with a low and constrained voice: "Mr. Bight, I don't know how to tell you, I don't even know myself how to accept what we discovered...."

"What? My God! Tell me!"

"Mr. Bight, you are not Jeremy's biological father, and your wife was not his mother...."

Mr. Bight is upset, caught between bursting into resonant laughter or terrifying tears. For a moment, he can't find the words, then suddenly angry, he shouts: "How incompetent is that hospital? We didn't adopt Jeremy, we conceived him in the most natural way and I was present at his birth. Your tests are wrong! Completely wrong ..."

He seems rather lost... The physician, still very uncomfortable, tries to calm him down with a voice that wants to be professional, but which betrays a deep confusion. "There is probably a very rational explanation to it, but the most important thing now is to find your son's real family... to save him... We don't have more than a few days; the dialysis isn't efficient anymore. Jeremy becomes weaker and weaker."

The father, with a hand in his hair, quickly stands up from the armchair, saying, "You're right! I'm going to call an old friend of mine. He has complete access to most of the databases in the world. If either of my son's parents has been DNA tested, we'll find them!"

A few hours later, at the Lone Gunmen's

Frohike is very busy on his computer touching up a clandestine photograph of Scully while Byers skims The National Enquirer. Langly is on the phone. Suddenly his face becomes very serious. He agrees to what his correspondent says then hangs up after saying, "Well, e-mail me the genetic map and I'll start on it right away. I think I should find something pretty quickly."

As soon as he hangs up, Langly connects to the Internet and waits a few seconds for the genetic map of Jeremy to appear on the screen. Frohike, intrigued, approaches.

"What's the matter?"

While manipulating the computer file, Langly explains the situation to his friends. When he mentions that he was planning to start a search of all available databases, Byers stops him and points to a detail of the regular spirals of Jeremy's DNA.

"Tell me, doesn't it remind you of anything, this sequence?"

The three men watch, perplexed.

One hour later, Mulder and Scully join the three partners and come to the same conclusion: this child's DNA is compatible with Scully's and it includes the famous hybridized sequence that appeared after Scully's abduction.

Mulder is perplexed and worried. "This child could be one of those born from some experimentation on your ova, Scully, like Emily was..."

Scully at first has no reaction then she decides suddenly."I want to see this child..."

Mulder doesn't seem to agree. The Lone Gunmen suddenly understand they should be elsewhere and leave the room. Byers must pull Frohike who doesn't seem to understand. "I tell you that it is definitely time to chat on the discoveries of Rocky on Mars... Come on!"

Scully is already heading for the door but Mulder stops her, holding one of her arms a little strongly. "What do you intend to do? Give him one of your kidneys then watch him die as you did with Emily? You said yourself that these children were not destined to live. I don't want to see you suffer every time your destiny crosses one of these beings..."

Scully, amazed, says, "One of these beings? One of these beings is dying in a hospital bed while I can save him. One of these beings is one of the only offspring that I will ever have. Yes, I would give one of my kidneys to save one of these *beings*."

And she leaves, slamming the door, leaving Mulder angry and concerned.

At noon the next day, Scully stands by the window in Jeremy's room with a blank stare and slumped shoulders. Mulder knocks on the door and pushes it open without waiting for an answer. He sees the empty bed and Scully looking out the window.

He calls her mildly. "Scully?"

Still no answer; he approaches cautiously, not knowing what to do exactly. Scully is the first to break the silence, without turning back. "He died last night... You see, I didn't have to waste one of my kidneys... You didn't need to fly all these miles to dissuade me. "

Her voice is bitter and sad at the same time. Mulder seems to share her pain but says smoothly, "I'm going to leave you alone... If you want to go back home with me, I'll wait outside..."

He begins to leave when Scully turns around suddenly, her eyes damp.

"No, stay ...stay here... I have something else to tell you...."

Seated next to each other on the little hospital bed, Mulder and Scully feel all the weight of unspoken words between them.

Scully, without watching his partner, begins, "When I learned that you had hidden from me what had happened to me during my abduction, I was hurt. Because I thought that our relationship thrived on the confidence that we had in each other... That's why, today, I am not going to hide from you what I learned last night, right before I left... "

She remains quiet a moment, searching for the right words. Mulder watches her, wondering what she wants to tell him. Scully sights deeply, then, "Recently, I haven't felt very well, so I had those routine tests... My physician called me last night to tell me that, against all scientific knowledge, my body was busy producing some ova all over again..."

She waits for a reaction from Mulder but he remains voiceless. He seems rightly terrified. He grips her hand as if she was to be taken from him, there, right now. She looks steadily at him; and then, she comments very seriously, "I know what it means...."

Some minutes pass while neither Mulder nor Scully can find the strength or the courage to move as if, for the first time, both of them realized that they would never be able to do anything to change their destiny. Since the beginning, their lives had been determined, without any loopholes. Like two trapped animals playing dead in order to escape, just maybe, their executioner, Mulder and Scully stop moving, almost stop breathing. They probably would want to end their lives this way, close to each other, alone.

Suddenly Scully lets a heavy sigh escape and Mulder grips her hand more tightly. Searching for Scully to look into his eyes, he decides to say something, recognizing the futility and impotence of his words, "I won't let them..."

Scully's face loses, for a second or two, the sad mask it had in order to let a small smile shine. She doesn't believe in it, nor did she believe in Emily's survival, or Jeremy's, but she pretends to believe, she wants to believe. This new lie, maybe, will lead to the truth...

Lost in their thoughts and in each other, Mulder and Scully don't hear Jeremy's father enter the room. His back is bent and his hands rest along his body, which seems on the verge of collapse. Mr. Bight watches Mulder and Scully with astonishment, barely managing to form the question to himself: who are these people and what are they doing sitting on the still-warm bed of my lost son?

"What?!"

The angry, instinctive passion of the soul supplants any mask of civility. Mulder and Scully stand up together and release each other's hands with regret. Scully is the first to realize what's going o,: "Please excuse the intrusion, sir, we know Mr. Langly. He told us about your misfortune and ... "

She can't go any farther, suddenly not finding the words any more, the words that, yesterday, had expressed her resolution with so much passion. Mulder watches her a moment, discerns her hesitation and finishes for her, "Doctor Scully possesses a DNA related to your son's. She had come to propose her help to you... We are sorry it's too late."

Scully turns around to watch Mulder, astonished to see that he included himself in her personal wish. Her look expresses her gratitude. Mr. Bight is confused.

He mumbles, before sitting down on the armchair which faces the bed, his face livid, "Yes, too late.... I don't understand... That accident first, then that problem of compatibility.... My son who is not really my son... It is an awful nightmare... A horrible nightmare..."

Scully, with compassion, says "Mr. Bight, I don't want to seem disrespectful of your grief, but will you allow me to perform an autopsy and some genetic tests on your child?"

Mr. Bight doesn't seem to react, but Mulder is very surprised by her question. He still remembers his partner's suffering during the autopsy of one of the quintuplets. How will she react this time? How does she master her pain? The look that he gives her is full of admiration, nearly of worship: this woman is extraordinary and he is lucky that destiny has placed her on his road. Even though destiny, he supposes, also has some other darker intentions...

Scully, in the absence of a reaction from Mr. Bight, adds, "It won't give your child back to you, but these exams may let me understand the origins of your son...." Scully hesitates a moment, then she says, "It could also let me understand why my daughter died last year..."

Mr. Bight suddenly looks at this little redhead woman with so pale a face but who irradiates such strength! She knows too, she knows that pain fills his heart, these torments that destroy him... He feels somewhat relieved to have found in her a soul able, maybe, to understand his pain. Mulder lowers his eyes and closes them, trying hopelessly to reject all the suffering he associates with the memory of poor Emily, that memory which has just assailed him. Scully, in an obvious effort to control her emotions in the face of Mr. Bight's grief, responds with a calm and scientific firmness:

"If my suspicions are justified, your son could be, as my daughter was, the fruit of genetic manipulations whose nature and the objective are as yet unknown, but that we may be able to discover by performing some exams."

Mr. Bight doesn't let her finish. He acquiesces. "Run all the tests that you think are necessary, but respect the body of my child. That's all I ask you. . ."

He exits the room, heavy steps and slow walk, leaving Mulder and Scully with this new, admittedly weak, but real hope of discovering the reason behind Emily's existence.

Two days later, in the same hospital.

Scully rushes down the hall, dressesd in scrubs and carrying an important file in her hand. She enters the room expectantly, looking impatiently for someone. Then she leaves the building and looks around the small square in front of the hospital. She sees Mulder on a bench studying a file. She heads for him with a hurried step. He doesn't seem to hear her approach and is startled at her sudden appearance. She says, a little breathlessly: "I found something incredible!"

Very quietly and almost sadly, he interrupts her in a barely audible voice, eyes never leaving the file that he holds tightly in his hands. "So did I . . ."

She is astonished, stares at him a moment; then sits down next to him and asks. "What is it?"

Mulder raises his head from the file and looks at Scully.

"No, you first!"

Scully hesitates one second before she opens her own file: "My DNA and Jeremy's are compatible because they have the same genetic mutation, but there's more. The accident didn't kill him. His kidneys were completely worn out; they couldn't eliminate a certain protein that I found in very large quantities in his blood. I analyzed this protein and discovered two amino acids that I've never seen before. That nobody's ever seen before in a terrestrial being. I also found the sequence of DNA that I share with Jeremy that codes for this protein."

Mulder is astonished. "What about you? Do you have that protein in your blood?"

"No, I think it means that sequence is inactive in my DNA, whereas it was active in Jeremy's. I can't figure out why this protein was synthesized . . ."

Mulder, sighing and tense, gives her the thick file he still holds in his hands and says: "I think we must discover the truth very quickly, Scully..."

Scully, thumbing the file. "What is it?"

The file folder contains a long list of names, each one accompanied by more information., including some photographs of small children.

Mulder comments, after a moment of hesitation, "Langly did a worldwide database search, the search Mr. Bight asked him to do to save Jeremy, and he discovered these names of children, all aged from 3 months to 4 years... You are the only adult listed in the databases who has this famous sequence of DNA..."

Scully says, suddenly livid, "That means..."

Mulder gives the evident conclusion. "That these hundreds of children were probably conceived from your ova..."

Scully watches as each photograph parade before her eyes, stopping sometimes on the image of a child with flaming hair, some with eyes bluer than others. She remains voiceless in front of all these children who are hers and at the same time are not.

Mulder, wanting to share her feelings but knowing that he cannot, stares at her. He hesitates. "Scully?"

She turns toward him, looking lost, without saying a word. He says, "This morning, I tried to find some of these children... and...."

Scully seems to understand that Mulder has something terrifying to tell her.

"I discovered the first one in this hospital. He's in a coma because of a vascular cerebral accident. When I found the parents of the second child I learned that he had died last night while sleeping. He was seven months old, Scully... His parents are terribly upset.... And, at one o'clock, I went to visit a third child. An ambulance was parked in front of the house. A man, a woman and two little girls were in tears. Jonah, three years old, had just died in the ambulance. According to the eldest sister, he collapsed suddenly while he was playing with the family dog... Scully... All these children are dying..."

Scully is very upset and stares down at the photographs...

Somewhere, in a comfortably furnished penthouse apartment, the Cigarette Smoking Man exhales a thick plume of smoke while speaking to someone on the phone: "There is nothing to fear. They won't go further. Any evidence they could have found is being destroyed. Soon there will be no proof that the project ever existed. This failure is already hurting us. It's not necessary that Mulder or Scully understand the connections that it hides. They are too valuable to us. They must never know. . . Yes, the second attempt is already underway. . . Yes, we just have to wait. . ."

He hangs up and looks pensively at a small metallic object he holds between his fingers. It is an implant . . .

Scully nervously rubs the back of her neck while Mulder, in his small motel room, busily packs their luggage. She seems angry and tense. Mulder continues to fold some skirts, some feminine jackets... It is Scully's outfit he arranges. Still packing, he explains to Scully, "I bought you a ticket on the first flight to Seattle. I used a cover name and paid cash. There's a motel room for you outside the city reserved under another name. Everything is planned. Byers will join you tomorrow evening. I know that you could do this alone, but I thought that. . . if you weren't feeling well. . ."

Scully, irritated, interrupts Mulder, grabbing one of his wrists: "Don't you think you should have told me about this? How am I going to find the role of that protein in some motel in the middle of nowhere?"

Mulder then answered very dryly, "I know! You'll ask Them yourself when They take you again. That's a plan! Why didn't I think of that?"

Scully turns and leaves the room, her eyes filled with sadness. She takes a few steps outside, then turns around, knowing that Mulder will be there. He watches her, then approaches:

"Scully, you know that I'm right. You know that they're going to try again. . . and this time, I may not be lucky enough to find you. Please, get away from anything connected to these children. Let me investigate this by myself. I'll ask Langly to set up an internet connection for us. . ."

Scully stares at him for a second, then says firmly, "No!"

Many hours later, in the outskirts of Seattle, lying on her back on a bed with sheets of doubtful cleanliness, Dana Scully scrutinizes the ceiling of the shabby motel room, thinking. She lets out a sad sigh, then rises slowly and heads toward her laptop computer. In two seconds, she connects to the internet and opens her mailbox.

"You have two messages."

She wearily clicks on the first message icon. The subject line makes her smile. "You asleep, princess?"

The body of the message has the same humor. Mulder, obviously, decided to soothe her. "So, princess, is your castle to your liking? I hope you are all right. The boys and I are trying to find the truth about each of the Tom Thumbs. Don't worry, we'll cover anything you would have done yourself. I had to lie to your mother this morning. I don't like it. Take care and be patient. Your favorite toad."

Unfortunately, Mulder's humor can't prevent Scully from being overwhelmed by a wave of despair. She tightens her arm around her body to try to warm herself then, with a tired gesture, clicks on the second message. Once again, the subject brings a smile to her lips: "Don't open for anyone except a small man with glasses."

Frohike!

"Did the Tall Guy ditch you again? Don't worry, I will make him pay. We all think about you. And don't forget: do not open to anyone, even to me... A secret admirer."

Keeping her eyes on the screen of her laptop, Scully suddenly feels very alone. She puts her left hand up to the back of her neck, trying to ease the pain of a sudden cramp. She slowly writes a response to Mulder, trying to reassure him that everything is all right. To adhere to their code, she must modify her message using a very - Frohikelike - logic. This time, it is "vacations are a pleasure" that she includes in her message before signing her initials. What an irony that code phrase is!

She has just sent the e-mail when she hears a terrifying crash against her door. After a massive blow against the very thin wood of the motel room door, a man bursts into the room. Scully has no time to react. The pain that began in the nape of her neck is now spreading throughout her body. She finds herself sinking to the ground, and the intruder is on her. Then, a total blank. . .

Two hours later, the room is empty. The door swings open and shut with the wind, the laptop is still on, and there are some traces of the struggle that took place a short time before, but nobody notices that something is amiss. Only the terrifying silence and the sound of wind can be heard. This is the sad scenario that awaits Byers when he arrives at the room. Immediately he understands and pulls out his cellular phone.

"Mulder, they did it again."

FBI Building, Washington DC

Mulder hangs up his phone and runs out of his office. He heads straight for Skinner's office and opens the door violently. Skinner is at his desk, head in his hands. In the ashtray a Morley cigarette is still smoking. Hearing Mulder, Skinner raises his eyes and gives him a look that is both anguished and miserable. Mulder stares back at him with deep disgust. Without saying a word, he leaves the room and dashes back to his basement office.

The parking lot is dark. Mulder's steps are heavy and loud. Behind him a shadow lurks but suddenly heads toward a car. Mulder pounces and, in a fraction of a second, he is on the man.

In the darkness of the damp basement, Fox Mulder aims his weapon at the Cigarette Smoking Man.

Impassive, the old man takes a last puff from his cigarette before crushing it quietly on the floor. "What can I do for you, Mr. Mulder?"

Mulder, fingers white from gripping his weapon so tightly, keeps his gun trained on his eternal enemy. His heart is filled with rage and he must search for his words.

"Where is she? Where is she?!!"

"Where is who, Mr. Mulder?"

The blow comes; the butt of the revolver hits the jaw of the old man, who staggers. Mulder shouts. "Where is agent Scully?!!!!!!!"

Then, the Man-With-A-Bleeding-Lip answers with a grin one could hardly define. "Agent Scully is where she is needed. Don't you understand? Wasn't she given back to you before? She will be given back to you again..."

Mulder's weapon stops on the heart of his enemy, "How dare you dispose of her like an object? How dare you create all these children, as you would make some objects? How?"

Although Mulder doesn't expect a real answer to these questions, the old man declares solemnly. "We need these children. We all need them. They are the only ones who will live in the new era. They are our only future... Yet, no one must know their existence before the Hour. When you found them, YOU are the one who condemned them to an immediate death..."

Mulder is deeply upset but fights to keep his determination. Taking advantage of his confusion, the Cigarett Smoking Man adds, "Mr. Mulder, there are, in the History of Men, circumstances when the life of one being is absolutely nothing before the survival of the species."

This time, it is Mulder's face that stays perfectly impassive, like death. His voice seems to come from nowhere when he answers with determination. "And there are some circumstances when one human could kill in order to save only one human...."

Mulder's finger gently and steadily pulls against the trigger. Creasing his eyes slightly, the Cigarette Smoking Man explains quietly, "There is something that I think you need to know, something that will change your way of thinking about the problem. You are. . ."

The man has no time to end this sentence which seemed so important. A bullet has just hit him in the heart...

Mulder, stunned, lowers his weapon. The shock is evident on his face. He checks his weapon; no, he is not the one who fired. Suddenly realizing he could be the next target, he turns quickly and hides behind a pillar. But there is nothing but silence...

Still stunned and quite upset, Mulder finally walks over to the body of the man that he had, in a way, considered immortal. The expression on the dead man's face disconcerts him; it's as if that man was suffering, even while dead, because of his inability to tell Mulder something very important. With a kind of respect, Mulder searches the man's clothing and finds an envelope. He opens it nervously and finds a very accurate map indicating where Scully is and, more important, the way to disengage her implant without harming her. Incredulous, Mulder realizes that this man who has just died wanted to save Scully.

Three months later, in a Washington park, Mulder and Scully sit next to each other on a bench. She is absorbed in studying a thick file; he, daydreaming, throws some sunflower seeds to the birds, eating one himself from time to time. Crunching a seed, Mulder turns his face toward his partner and stares at her in silence, with a mixture of tenderness and concern. Scully's features are drawn, proof of sleepless nights haunted by the torment of recent events about which, like the first abduction, she retains almost no memories. Sensing she is being watched, Scully turns toward her partner and can't keep from smiling.

Mulder, a little sheepish, looks down at his shoes. Then, he whispers, "I was right, thinking that you are the strongest person I know..."

Scully smiles and takes Mulder's hand in hers, "Do I have any choice? So many things depend on me now...."

Seeing Mulder's tormented face, she moves closer to him and says gently, "Try to forget, Mulder... Stop wondering what that man had to tell you... Let's stop watching behind us... Let's stop suffering... We have a future to prepare now. This vaccine that we have to work out for the survival of Mankind, I must search for it in myself and you will help me... "

A smile draws on her lips when she adds, bringing Mulder's hand on her belly, "And we have another future to defend... In myself too...."

And no passer-by or tourist suspects that there, on that bench in the park, while the spring begins to lend its voice to the birds, the destiny of Mankind has just been decided.

Tell me what you think of Tiuwak!!

And thanks for reading!

Ccile Laumonier ICQ : 46162110 Aux Frontires du Sens http://perso.wanadoo.fr/cecile.laumonier/