Title: The Family G-Man
Authors: Neoxphile and FelineFemme
Feedback: Feedback: neoxphile@aol.com, be8opcat1013@yahoo.com
Rating: mostly R with NC-17 moments
Spoilers: Seasons 1-9
Category: Alternate Reality, Snark, Family Fic, plus a dollop Angst
for the beginning (and despite what chapter one leads you to believe,
this is *not* a character death story)
Disclaimer: So yeah, we're going to be borrowing CC's characters, and
the idea behind "The Family Man," which put a twist on "It's a Wonderful Life" 
which blatantly copied "A Christmas Carol." We hope the print doesn't get
blurry from being a copy of a copy of...

Website: with pictures! http://www.mulderscreek.com/familygman.html

Summary: In season five Mulder discovers that a child he doesn't think 
should exist in this timeline does, and it changes everyone's lives.

~*~*~
Season Five - chapters 49-63
~*~*~

Chapter Forty-Nine

August 1997

It's a hot summer day on the outskirts of DC, and the Lone Gunmen
are feeling the heat more than usual. The cause could be the
different environs and company they keep, a large mansion-like home
and three small children, that's causing their armpits to sweat more
than normal and tempers to flare. Even the normally-affable Byers has
gotten to the point where he'd rather sweep the Mulder house for
surveillance devices than spend another minute with his friends or
Mulder's kids. Frohike has sought refuge in the kitchen doing
repairs, which leaves Langly with munchkin duty. Finally, even he
gives in as he runs into the kitchen.

"Dude, one more second with that stupid purple dinosaur and I'm gonna
blow my brains out!" he exclaims to a pair of legs poking out from
under the sink.

"I thought you said you could handle it," Frohike's muffled voice
comes eerily through the pipes.

"Yeah, but Barney's no Cap'n Toby," the long-haired blond man scowls.

"Come on, I'll fix the pipes, you can listen to some inane dude in a
costume sing."

"No, thanks," Frohike replies, "I don't want the lovely Scully to
blame me if the sink suddenly turns on when she starts the
microwave."

"It was just that one time!" Langly sputters, his forthcoming
argument cut short by a new arrival. "Oh, you."

Byers ignores the venom dripping from his compatriot's words or
glare. "Top to bottom, there are no bugs," he says briskly, "at least
surveillance-wise." Due to the heat, his jacket is draped on his arm,
but he is still clad in his trademark buttoned-up shirt, tie and
dress slacks.

"Greaaaaaaat," Langly drawls, "it's your turn to look after the
rugrats."

The bearded man looks shocked when he sees Frohike's legs from under
the sink. "If we're all in here, who's looking after the children?"

Frohike bangs his head as he gets out of the sink. "What? You guys!"
he yells when April starts crying.

The three men look at each other. "Not me!" they all chorus. Then
they point at each other, "You do it!"

~*~*~

"Fine, fine," Frohike mumbles, giving up trying to decipher Mulder's
messy handwritten instructions, "I swear decrypting top secret
documents is easier than reading that chicken scratch." Still, he
must've done something right, because April is finally quiet, sucking
noisily away at a bottle, her diaper fresh and clean.

"You two look good together," Langly says in the calm following the
storm, "even if you guys aren't related."

"She could've been," Frohike says, as he carries the littlest one
with her bald head and dark brown eyes. "April's got my eyes." He
beams down at her proudly as if he had a hand in her creation.

"You better not let Mulder hear you say that," Langly smirks, until
Sammy smears some baby food on his shirt. "Ugh, gross," he says,
making a face as he wipes it off, making Page and Sammy laugh. "I
can't believe the one day they decide to take a little 'me-time' is
the same one their babysitter does the same."

"Nannies are people, too," Byers says, unperturbed when Page grabs
the remote to turn on the TV. He frowns when the remote doesn't turn
the set on, then walks over to manually press the power button.
Nothing. He checks in the back to see if everything's hooked up
properly, and they are. Having already checked the set for bugs, he
realizes it's not the fault of some shadowy third party, but rather
an internal problem. "I think it's broken," he says finally.

Page's face crumples, and it isn't long before the house is filled
with the sound of wailing. Not just from the three Mulder and Scully
children, but also at least one Gunman.

~*~*~

Frohike's panicked mind thinks of a number of solutions to the
problem, all of which would result in their getting jailed, or at
least, on the FBI's most wanted. Bitterly, he puts aside thoughts of
rope and duct tape, multi-purpose childcare machines, and simple
abandonment, looking desperately at his friends. Okay, so it's his
fault that he got them into this mess, but does it always have to be
him to get them out? "Byers," he pleads under the incessant crying.
How is it possible for such little kids to have such big lungs?

Even Byers is looking panicky, which isn't good. But the sight of
Langly losing it with the kids has caused something within the
suit-and-tie man to snap, and in a tone rarely heard from the
normally-sanguine man, he says sharply, "All of you, QUIET!"
Startled, Page subsides with a startled hiccup, Sammy's mouth hangs
open, and Langly freezes. "Langly, I want you to go into the kitchen
and get snacks and drinks. Page, I want you to be a big girl and put
the toys away. Sammy, stay there. And Frohike," he pauses.

"Yeah?" the balding man asks uneasily, shifting the baby girl in his
arms as he rocks her.

"You've got storytelling detail." 

Frohike's bulging eyes behind his glasses make him resemble a comical
frog. "What?" 

"There's no brewskis, so everybody gets fruit juice," the blond man
comes strolling in with colorful sippy cups and a box of donuts.
"Hey, are donuts cool?" he looks speculatively at the little
redheaded boy. In reply, Sammy grabs a donut and promptly powders his
face with the white sugar. "I'll take that as a yes," Langly notes,
handing out drinks and donuts.

Frohike's wracking his brains for something suitable to talk about,
although most of what comes to mind are conspiracy theories, which
would probably go over the kids' heads, or hot chicks, which would
get him in trouble with the luscious and unfortunately-married
Scully. He looks at Byers, who shrugs, and an evil thought comes to
mind. "Okay, boys and girls," he says in a storytelling voice, and
everyone perks up, "Uncle Frohike's gonna tell you about how we saved
a pretty lady called Susanne, met your father, and saved the world."

"Oh, no," Byers sighs, while Langly grins, "Oh, yeah." 

"You saved the world?" Page asks.

"Of course," Frohike beams, but his smile droops when he sees Byers
glare. "Well, maybe just Baltimore," he amends, and is about to go on when
the blonde girl interrupts again.

"Who's Susanne?" Page wonders.

The Lone Gunmen look at each other. "Once upon a time, well, about
eight years ago, on a lovely May afternoon, Uncle Byers met a
beautiful blonde lady named Susanne," Frohike says, ignoring the fact
that he's drinking from a sippy cup, "at a computer convention in
nearby Baltimore. All sorts of people were there, but somehow, your
straightlaced Uncle Byers managed to catch the attention of the
damsel in distress."

"I didn't know that yet," Byers corrects him, and Frohike shoves a
donut into his mouth.

~*~*~

"Anyways," Frohike ignores the interruption, "Uncle Byers followed
the lady with the sunglasses all the way to where the dashing and
debonair Uncle Frohike, that's yours truly," he makes a little bow,
"was working hard at his cable company booth." He ignores his
compatriot's coughing and goes on. "Unfortunately, Uncle Langly was
in the next booth, trying to sell Susanne a terrible version of
cable, which was very, very bad."

"Very, very bad," Page repeats, and Sammy mumbles "Bad bad." 

"Hey!" Langly yelps. "You were the one who was selling crappy coax
cable-"

"When Uncle Langly butted in, we both lost a sale," Frohike glares at
him behind his glasses, holding up a fist, "and Uncle Byers kept
following Susanne like a stalker. Susanne let him bump into her and
she dropped her purse. Because he's actually got some manners, he
said sorry and saw a picture of a little girl fall out of her purse."

"Susanne was a mommy?" 

Frohike makes a face. "Well, that's what she wanted ol' Uncle Byers
to think. So she told Uncle Byers about some crazy and very, very bad
ex-boyfriend who stole her little girl named Susanne."

"Susanne and Susanne!" Page laughs, delighted.

"Not quite," Frohike says as Byers sighs, "she told Uncle Byers her
name was Holly." 

"Like sugar?" Sammy asks, reaching for another donut.

"Like the sugar," Frohike agrees, wondering how the little boy knows
the brand name.

"Who was the bad man?" Page asks.

~*~*~

The Lone Gunmen exchange glances. "We're getting there," Frohike
says. "Anyways, Susanne-who-called-herself-Holly said she needed help 
with computer stuff that would help her find her fake-daughter-called-Susanne, 
so they went back to where Uncle Byers was working. And you know what?"

"What?" Sammy falls for the prompt.

The short man has an evil grin on his face. "It was the first time Uncle
Byers hacked into a system! Aren't you proud?" 

"Yay, Uncle!" the children cheer, while Byers puts a hand over his
face and Langly shares an evil grin with Frohike.

"It wasn't like that," Byers says half-heartedly.

"Hey, take the kudos while you can," Frohike says blithely, "so anyway, 
Uncle Byers found Susanne's file and printed it out. Unfortunately,
it was encrypted, which means that it was in a special computer
language."

The little girl blinks. "Co'puters can talk?" 

"Of course." Frohike nods. "Anything smart can talk. Just when Uncle
Byers realized he needed help turning this computer language into
English, Susanne saw her scary ex-boyfriend."

"Oh no!" 

"That's right," the short man says with relish. "And they realized
they needed more help than ever, so they went to the man with the
plan, the hero when you're zero, senor numero uno." He pats his
leather-vested chest. "Uncle Frohike!"

"Yaaaaaayyyyyyy!!!!" 

~*~*~

"Really," Byers says, rolling his eyes.

"Hey, I call 'em like I see 'em," Frohike says, enjoying the
adulation from the mini-Mulders. "So anyways, I was ready to do the
hero thing and beat the guy up so we could save the little girl, but
Susanne said the bad guy was not only bad, he was dangerous, so we
had to be very, very careful."

Both kids are nodding, and Byers, wishing his friend would skip over
this part, says, "Frohike, could you check on April?"

"Sure," the balding man says, holding up the baby girl and takes a
careful sniff near the general direction of her diapers. "All clear,"
he says, not bothering to hide his relief. "So anyways, me and Uncle
Byers decide to check out the scary boyfriend, just in case, see what
he's like. Problem was, it's hard to do the secret agent thing with
Mr. Boy Scout here," and Byers purses his lips, "so the bad guy saw
us."

"Run away!" Sammy yells, as if he could change past events.

"In a way, it was a good thing," Frohike says, inadvertently putting
both feet in his mouth, "because the bad guy turned out to be your
father."

"NOOOOOOO!!! My daddy's good!" Page promptly starts crying, her
siblings following suit for at least the second time that day.

~*~*~

"Hey, hey, hey," Frohike panics, handing April and her bottle over to
Byers and hugging the little girl, "Page, you're right, you're right,
your daddy's a good guy. But back then, we didn't know, okay? We
didn't know him, and that why we thought he wasn't."

"Uncles are dum-dums," Page sniffles. It takes a little while longer,
but Sammy and April calm down as well, much to the Gunmen's relief.

"Yeah, well, like the man said, we didn't know," Frohike continues in
a placating tone. "But he didn't know Susanne was our friend first
and said he was the bad guy. So we said we were lost and were looking
for the bathroom," and is relieved when the girl giggles at the word.
"So he told us where it was, then showed us his FBI badge, and then
he showed us a picture of Susanne."

"Uh-oh," Page says. "Susanne bad girl." 

"You said it," Frohike agrees, overriding Byers' indignant "Hey!" "So
we went back to the booth to talk to Susanne, but when we got there,
they were arresting Uncle Byers' friend."

"They got the bad lady?" Page asks.

"Uh, not quite," Frohike says, "they got his coworker, Ken. Susanne
was already gone."

''Uh-oh," Sammy says, and Page agrees. They notice that their
sometimes-invisible friends have joined them, but none of the
grownups see extra children wander in the room. All the Gunmen can
sense is that the room has gotten slightly, but thankfully, cooler,
and Byers feels comfortable donning his suit jacket again.

"Yeah, and Uncle Byers was about to make another dumb move and turn
himself in." Frohike pauses and adopts a teacherly tone. "Hackers
never, ever turn themselves in. Got that?"

"Got it." Page nods solemnly, and so does Sammy.

"I don't think we should be telling them that," Byers argues, but
Langly kicks his leg. "Ow," he frowns, glad the children are paying
attention to Frohike than to himself.

"Anyway, that's when I suggested that we hack into the FBI database
to do a little checkup on Susanne and your daddy. Uncle Byers didn't
want to at first, but then he saw the light. And that's when he
officially became a hacker."

"Yay, Uncle Byers!" 

~*~*~

"So, even though your Uncle Frohike's kung foo is pretty good, I
figured we needed someone else to cover our bases, just in case,"
Frohike goes on, "and that's where Uncle Langly comes in." The short
man smirks as he does a mock Vanna White-like wave at the blond
hacker, who bows. "Me and Uncle Byers saved him from a mind-numbing
D&D game to get into a class hack."

"Hey!" Langly protests. "You ladies came asking for *my* help, even
though I was on a hot streak, got it? Hey, you even had to tell me my
kung foo was the best."

"Anyways," Frohike says, clearly disgruntled, "we didn't have the
cool digs we do now, so we rented a hotel room to hide all of
Langly's questionable equipment in."

"Watch it," Langly growls.

"Ooh, I'm scared," Frohike says, mocking him, and Page laughs. "But
the scary part's yet to come. So we look up your daddy, and what do
we find? That not only is he FBI, but he's a really smart good guy,
and that the person he's chasing down is Holly, whose real name is
Susanne Modeski. According to the computer, it said Susanne was
crazy, killed lots of people and lied a lot, too."

"Ohhhhhhh," Page says. "Susanne's a bad girl." 

"Got that right," Langly says, only to be elbowed by Byers. "Hey!" 

"And that's when Susanne walked into the room." 

"Uh-oh." 

~*~*~

"Okay, so there we were," Frohike says, and they're all practically
touching foreheads, they're leaning so close to hear his words, "we
just found out that Susanne was a bad guy, and she walks into the
room. We planned on playing it cool, but she reached into her purse,
and a gun fell out!"

"How come she had a gun?" Sammy asks.

"She had it for her own protection against the real villains," Byers
explains.

"Hey, who's telling the story, you or me?" the short man glares, and
his friend subsides. "So Susanne was waving the gun around, saying
she's innocent, that she's being framed and people are following her,
and you know what happened next?"

"What?" 

"She said people knew where she was through her teeth!" Frohike's
eyes are huge. "So she grabbed some pliers, ran into the bathroom,
and pulled her tooth out without any medicine!"

"Owie!" Page puts her hand to her mouth. The other day Sammy ran into
her and her front teeth hit the floor. She can't imagine anyone
wanting to pull their teeth out on purpose.

"But you know what? There was a little radio transmitter inside her
tooth, kinda what you'd find in there," he points to the stereo
system, "and so we flushed it down the toilet so the bad guys
wouldn't find us."

"Susanne not the bad guy?" Sammy is confused now, along with his
older sister.

"Nope," Frohike shrugs, earning another glower from his suited
friend. "There were bad guys who made her cook up some crazy gas that
wanted to spray it on innocent Americans. So we decided to help her
and go to the warehouse where the real bad guys put the real weapon.
We tracked it down to a bunch of boxes full of asthma inhalers and we
were ready to share the story with the world. And then the bad guys
showed up."

~*~*~

The leftover donuts are forgotten now that Frohike's rolling towards
the end of the story. "The bad guys grabbed Susanne and pointed their
guns at us. And then your dad showed up."

"Daddyyyyyyyyyy!" the kids crow, bouncing up and down on the couch.

"Whoa, whoa," Frohike says, wanting to keep the baby in his arms on
the quiet level, "okay, so yeah, your dad came in with his own gun.
Unfortunately, the bad guys started shooting, he shot back, everybody
was shooting, and so, being smart, we got out of the way."

"Okay, and now we sound like chickens," Langly drawls.

"Shut up, Langly," the short man mutters, "we were making a tactical
rendezvous, that's all."

"Like the kids know what that means." The blond man rolls his eyes.

"ANYways," Frohike plows on, "everybody was shooting, boxes were
being ripped apart, everything was crazy, and then one of the boxes
with the secret weapon got shot open and sprayed your daddy with the
gas! He started screaming and tearing off his clothes, the gas was
too much for him!"

"Oh, no!" Sammy's eyes are wide.

"Oh, yes!" Frohike shouts, forgetting about the baby in his arms. As
he absently rocks her, he says, "So your father was down for the
count, and the bad guys had us surrounded. They were just about to
shoot us, but they got shot instead." He pauses, looking at Byers.
"Susanne saved us."

"Yay, Susanne!" the kids yell, forgetful of the fact that only ten
minutes ago, she was the bad guy.

"Uh, yeah," the leather-vested man says, bouncing the baby in his
arms to keep her happy. "So, uh, she got out of there, because it
wasn't safe, and your uncles thought we'd grab some bottles of the
secret weapon for evidence, you know, but more bad guys came in. The
bad guys cleaned up most of the mess, took out the first set of bad
guys, and were about to shoot your daddy-"

"NO!" 

"Whoa," Langly rushes in to calm the older kids, "look, your dad's
alive, and you guys are here. That means there's gonna be a happy
ending soon, right?"

Frohike's relieved when Page doesn't fuss anymore, and goes on.
"Yeah, so this tall black guy with a beard and moustache tells his
goons not to shoot your dad. So your dad was a little nuts with the
gas, but he was alive. Bad news, the black dude saw us, lined us up
to kill us, and pulled the trigger." The kids are silent, wide-eyed.
"Good news, even though your Uncle Byers had a big mouth, the black
guy was cool enough to let us live, even gave us our nickname. The
Lone Gunmen."

"He was cool?" Byers frowns.

Frohike rolls his eyes. "All the evidence was gone, cleaned up by the
bad guys, but we were alive. Our luck went down again, because the
cops came in and arrested us. We spent a loooooooong night in the
stinking joint, but luckily, your dad sprang us the next morning. And
we've been friends ever since. The End."

"What about Susanne?" Page asks.

Byers pauses before he answers. "We don't know," he says honestly,
"we saw her not long after we left the police station, but the black
man took her away in a black car. She's probably still working for
the bad guys, against her will, maybe planning another escape from
the wicked men as we speak." He doesn't look at anyone, his gaze
drifting out the window, the sky darkening to a rich orange as the
sun sets. Behind him, ghostly children of another time fade away, and
the temperature warms, but only slightly.

~*~*~

Later that night, Scully is trying to put her still-excitable
children to bed. She's fairly certain that, despite her instructions,
Mulder had forgotten to put "no sugary snacks or drinks" on the list
they gave the Gunmen. "Uncles saved the world," Page insists
sleepily, even as her mother struggles to pull her nightgown over her
head.

"Of course," Scully says in a placating tone, freeing her daughter's
blonde hair from the neckline.

"And Daddy's not a bad guy, he's a good guy," she argues, her face a
miniature of her mother's when debating with her father.

"What have the Gun-, I mean, what have your uncles been telling you?"
Scully frowns, sitting next to her daughter.

"There was guns, an' bad guys, an' a lady los' her toot', an' Daddy,
an' uncles," Sammy says breathlessly, at the same time trying to free
himself from the hot nightclothes.

Scully sighs, re-clothing her squirmy little boy. "What lady lost her
tooth?" she asks.

"Susanne," Page answers, as if the answer is obvious. "Uncle Byers'
girlfriend."

"Really?" Scully's jaw drops.

"Uncle Langly said so," the little blonde girl says, oblivious to any
bomb-dropping she may have caused to her mother's perception of the
Gunmen. "'Cause she's smart and pretty."

The redhead smiles, noting the order of the compliment. "Well, Uncle
Byers is a smart man," she says, "so when can we meet her?"

"Susanne not here," Sammy says, kicking his feet as if that would
free his legs from the cotton pajama pants. "Bad guys got her."

"Oh," Scully says, absently hitting the button for the ceiling fan.
"That's sad."

"Uh-huh," Page agrees. She's under her thin sheet, her body still as
if ready for sleep, but her eyes are wide open. "Mommy, I wanna be a
hacker when I grow up," she says, her hands holding the blanket under
her chin.

"Why?" her startled mother asks.

"So I can talk to co'puters and rescue Susanne," the blonde girl says
practically.

"Me, too!" Sammy echoes, also diving under his sheet. If his sister's
going to sleep, he doesn't want her to beat him.

I may not understand them sometimes, Scully thinks, but I know
they've got good hearts. "Good night." She smiles and kisses her
daughter's forehead, who exhales peacefully. "Goooooood night," she
tells Sammy, who's still a squirmy worm under the sheet, holding his
forehead in place so she can kiss it. He giggles, still squirming,
but squeezes his eyes tightly shut as if to hasten sleep.

"Sweet dreams," she says softly, clicking off the overhead light, but
leaving the plug-in light on. She's going to ask Mulder about this
"Susanne," and what on earth happened that the Gunmen supposedly
saved the world, but weren't able to save their friend.

~*~*~

Chapter Fifty

 August 10th, 1997

There's a horrible yelp from downstairs, and Mulder nearly drops
April in shock. His older daughter looks at him with wide eyes,
seeming a little frightened too. "Daddy, what's that?"

Mulder pats her on the head with his free hand, as much to reassure
himself as her. "I'm not sure, I'm going to go see. Here, I'm putting
April in her crib, you keep an eye on her, okay?"

"Okay!" She seems pleased by the responsibility, not realizing that
her sister is way too young to get out on her own.

He misses a couple of steps on his way down the stairs and nearly
breaks his ankle. When he skitters to a stop in the living room,
ready to come to Scully's aide against whatever's attacking her, he
pauses in confusion.

Scully is alone except for Sammy, without an adversary, and she's
just on the phone. Her face is all smiles. Sammy doesn't even look up
from playing with his wooden blocks.

"I love you too, Bill." She hangs up with a happy sigh.

"What's going on? Page and I heard you scream..."

"It's finally happened, Mulder. Tara's going to have a baby around
Christmas."

"Wow, that's great," he says in a daze. ::Bill as a father. That's
scary every time you think of it:: "That's not too long from now,
though."

"They wanted to wait until it was safe before they got everyone's
hopes up," Scully tells him. "Bill said they found out today that
it's going to be a boy."

He nods, thinking about the "until it was safe" part. When she'd been
carrying William, had she waited to tell people, too? He didn't know,
because he hadn't been around, and she'd never said. "Your brother
must be thrilled."

"Oh, they both are. They've wanted a baby for so long..." Scully sighs.
"Thank god we've never had that problem."

She doesn't notice when he winces. "Your sister better watch out,
now. She's the only one who hasn't given your mother a grandchild.
Maggie will buy her a clock now."

"A clock?" Scully looks puzzled.

"Since she doesn't have a biological clock of her own." 

"Bad joke, Mulder." Even so, she smiles. "I can't believe I'm going
to have another nephew."

"And maybe this one won't be obsessed with movies about barnyard
animals."

"One can only hope." 

~*~*~

August 14th, 1997
8 a.m.

"Hey Page, wake up." Mulder gently pulls the sheet off of his
daughter.

She rubs her eyes and gives him a sleepy smile. "Hi, Daddy! Where's
Mommy?"

"Mommy and April are sleeping. Here, let's dress you in this first."
Mulder shows her a purple bathing suit; purple is currently her
favorite color. "Then we'll put on your coveralls and t-shirt on."

"How come?" 

"It's a surprise." 

Once she's dressed, Mulder heads for Sammy's bed. Since the
two-year-old isn't quite potty-trained, Mulder puts him in the new
disposable swim trunks for toddlers, then dresses him in coveralls
and a t-shirt too.

When he hands them buckets and shovels, Page figures out their
destination. "Going to beach, Daddy?"

"Yup." 

A huge smile breaks out on Sammy's face, and he runs for the closet
and tries to open the door. Curious as to what he wants, Mulder opens
it for him. After peering in for a moment, Sammy grabs something on a
hanger and tugs it.

It's the wet suit that he'd bought during the last Max case. His son
gives him an expectant look. "Daddy wear it."

The idea of wearing a wetsuit to the beach for no apparent reason
strikes him as silly and slightly embarrassing both, but it's easier
to give in than to disappoint his little boy. "Okay. I'll put it on
when we get there."

 Sammy tilts his head. "How come?" 

"Daddy can't drive if he wears it in the car." 

"Oh!" 

Mulder quickly scrawls a note for Scully - Took the kids to the
beach, be back in two or three hours. Love ya - gathers the wetsuit
under one arm, and opens the front door.

He shepherds the two children out the door, taking a moment to notice
again that Page is just a few inches taller than her brother despite
being nearly a year older. It seems as though she'll be petite like
their mother. And Sammy won't.

*

Once he lifts a rock, a small armored creature scurries out. Sammy
yells in surprise and lands on his bottom in the sand, giggling.
Page, on the other hand is nearly as inquisitive as her mother, so
she squats down and looks closely at the little creature in the tide
pool. "Whatzit called?"

"It's a crab," Mulder informs her.

Puzzlement fills her face. "Don't look like Nanna," she mumbles.

"What?" 

"Mommy says Nanna a crab," she explains while raking the sand next to
her with a seashell.

In spite of himself, he laughs. "She told you that, huh? And after
I've had nothing but nice things to say about your Grandma."

Page nods sagely. "You has different mommies." 

"That's an understatement." 

By this point Sammy has regained his courage and peers into the pool
on hands and knees. "My birthdee, Daddy?"

Smiling down at him, Mulder ruffles his son's coppery hair. "That's
right, Big guy. Today you're two."

Sammy looks somber for a moment. "Where cake?" 

"I think it's time to go home," Mulder announces. "I'm pretty sure
that there will be cake when we get there."

"Yay!" 

~*~*~

When they get back to the house Mulder finds Scully nursing the baby
in their bedroom. She gives him a sleepy smile. "How was the beach?"

Standing there he remembers the sound of ocean waves as Sammy's boat
floated on them, the squeal of both children as they chased after the
bouncing beach ball and away from him as the three of them pretended
that he was a wetsuit-clad monster...

"Great. They really seemed to enjoy it. And I brought you something."
He holds a Polaroid picture out to her. "I conned a kind soul into
taking it."

"You're right, it's clear that they had a good time. But why are you
wearing a wetsuit in the picture?"

He just smiles broadly. "I think there's a little boy downstairs
who'll give you that information if you deluge the location of his
cake."

"This ought to be good." She hands him the now fed baby to burp, and
goes to find her answer.

Mulder looks down at his youngest. "You know, what Mommy doesn't know
is that your brother didn't tell me why he wanted me to wear it, so I
couldn't answer her even if I wanted to."

April, for one, seems bored of the idea and closes her dark eyes
before they get downstairs to sing Happy Birthday to Sammy.

~*~*~

Route 43 Leon County 
North Florida 
October 1997

Mulder stares out the window as they drive down the lonely road,
wondering what he'd done to make God angry enough to subject him to
this for the second time. Maybe he ought to have learned his lesson
this time around and not have blown off the opportunities to do other
seminars, but he really thought that diaper rash on three kids was a
real good excuse to sway Skinner. Apparently the AD has never
considered the heartbreak that uncomfortable children suffer when
parted from their loving parents. Or maybe someone narc'd on them,
mentioning Scully's pride at Page being dry over night now.

Never one to waste a captive audience, Agent Kinsley blathers on and
on about past seminars. "Last year was something of a personal
revelation. We were doing an exercise called team builders? Where we
were given two minutes to build a tower out of ordinary office
furniture."

Not to be outdone, Agent Stonecypher concludes, "When I stood on
Mike's shoulders and I put that electric pencil sharpener on top of
the pile, we both knew, we could never have done it alone."

Mulder leans over and whispers in his wife's ear. "Kill me now." He
can tell that she's trying not to smile, so he pouts.

"You ever been to one of these team seminars, Agent Scully?" Kinsley
asks.

"Ummm...I think I went to a constructive problem solving course when
I first joined the Bureau."

This seems to excite Stonecypher for reasons Mulder can't fathom.
"Oh, did you play that game where, um, you can't use any negative
words?"

"I couldn't believe how hard it was not to use the word 'but.'"
Kinsley confesses.

"I'm having that same problem right now," Mulder says, causing Scully
to turn red from the effort of not cracking a smile.

"Have you ever been to a team seminar, Agent Mulder?" Stonecypher now
wants to know.

"No, you know unfortunately around this time of year I always develop
a severe hemorrhoidal condition," he replies, ducking out of Scully's
reach.

"Well, it builds muscles you didn't even know you had," Kinsley tells
him.

"Communication. That's the key," Stonecypher adds.

Mulder nods gamely, but says, "I find that communication doesn't take
that much effort when you're engaged in a carnal relationship with
your partner." Scully's eyes widen at his daring, so he quickly adds.
"Once you're married, I mean. What about you two, you're both single
aren't you? Maybe you ought to give a relationship a shot."

Interestingly enough, both agents turn red and can't seem to get any
words out, so he wonders if he's hit on something he hadn't suspected
about the seemingly straight-laced pair. Before either of them can
think of a way to respond, the car rolls up to a familiar looking
road block.

The officer who approaches the car gives them a mild look. "Sorry,
folks, it'll be a few minutes."

Kinsley looks desperately pleased at the change of topic. "What's
going on, officer?"

"Got a little situation is all." 

Before anyone can stop him, Mulder opens car door and gets out
quickly. "Free at last, free at last." The others watch him from the
car, but no one makes a move to get out.

As Mulder's stretching his cramped legs, he's approached by Mrs.
Asekoff. "Oh, excuse me. Are you from search and rescue?"

"No, I'm sorry, I'm not. I'm just stretching my legs." 

"They said they'd have word for us about what happened to my husband.
I need somebody to tell me what's going on." The woman looks like
she's about to cry.

"Just slow down," Mulder says soothingly. "I - I don't know what
you're talking about."

"My husband, Michael, he was teaching our son to shoot, and he said
the dog got spooked and then he heard gunshots and now he's said
they've found a jacket with blood on it, but they won't tell me
anything about my husband..."

"I'll try to find out who's in charge, all right?" 

"Oh, thank you." She looks so grateful he almost tears up himself.

 ~*~*~

Scully scrambles out of the car when she spots Mulder heading for the
woods. The other agents get out too, but get distracted by a tree, so
she leaves them behind. He's in the middle of explaining to officer
Michele Fazekas that he's with the FBI when Scully catches up to him.

"FBI? Who called you guys out?" 

Mulder puts his badge back into his pocket. "Nobody. We just got
stopped at your roadblock. It sounds like you had a shooting."

"Shots were reported, but we have no evidence of anyone being shot." 

"Well, what do you have evidence of?" Mulder asks, trying not to
catch his impatient wife's eye, so he can ignore the "we've got to
go" signal she's trying to send him.

"A survey team working these woods didn't report in last night We
found one man's bloody jacket pretty torn up. And this morning, a boy
got separated from his father."

"Separated by what?" 

"It looks, maybe, like some kind of animal attack." 

"What kind of animal?" 

"I'm not sure yet. I followed good tracks for the two surveyors but
the trails became confused as they moved into the brush. There was a
third set of tracks leading away. I...I couldn't identify." Michelle
says reluctantly.

"Couldn't identify as the surveyors'?" 

"As man or animal." 

"Mulder?" Scully asks.

"Oh, just, uh..." She gives him "come on" look." "Hold on a
second...What about the boy's father?"

"I tracked him all the way down to where he fired the shots. The
ground's rocky, but from the depressions in the underlying soil, I
can tell you that he entered the bushes from over there where I pick
up another set of tracks - two distinctly different sets of tracks
that from the way the ground's upset that is probably where the man
was attacked."

"But no other sign of him? Do you have panther in these woods?" 

"There's panther. Bear, too." 

"But these tracks look like neither of those." 

"No, sir." 

"You know of a good motel in the area?" She's about to protest when
he smoothly continues. "My partner and I have worked on several wild
animal cases in the past, so if you could use a couple extra sets of
eyes..."

To his surprise, Michelle doesn't bristle this time. "You're not the
agents who dealt with that thing they called the 'Flukeman' are you?
Even the news stations out her covered that. And the tabloids of
course."

Scully shudders. "This better not be another flukeman, one was
enough."

"So it was you!" Michelle gives them an admiring look. "If you could
spare the time, I'd love to have your help."

"I think-" Mulder begins.

His reply is interrupted when Scully pulls him out of earshot. "What
gives, Mulder? We've got this conference. They're waiting."

"Yeah. How do I say this without using any negative words, Scully?" 

"You want me to tell them that we're not going to make it to this
year's teamwork seminar."

"Yeah, you see that?" He puts his hands on her arms. "We don't need
that conference. We have communication like that, unspoken. You know
what I'm thinking."

She shakes her head and starts to walk off, but he calls to her.
"Besides, I think that Kinsley and Stonecypher would be happier if
they had the rest of the trip to be alone."

"You don't know that," Scully protests.

He taps the side of his head. "Call it ESP." 

~*~*~

Hotel

Mulder is looking at websites about predators when Scully returns to
their room carrying a tray of cheese and mini bottle of wine. "You're
the one who cut the cheese?" he asks with an immature grin.

"Since we won't be making it to the conference for the wine and
cheese reception..."

"Partaaayyy!" he crows, making her laugh. "And unlike our esteemed
traveling companions we don't even have to worry about that Tailhook
crap. See? There are some advantages to being married to your
partner."

"Sure are..." Scully says, climbing onto the bed next to him.

"Pop quiz. What animal will attack the strongest leaving the weakest
to escape? The answer is none. Not one of the over 4,000 species
native to North America will attack the strongest when the weak is
vulnerable."

"Well, what does that have to do with anything?" 

"It makes me think that what we're dealing with here is no ordinary
predator."

"I thought this was just a ploy to get out of the conference." 

"I think what we stumbled upon here is something more than what local
authorities realize. The scenario described by that boy sounds to me
like a primitive culling technique."

"Mulder, we're in Western Florida. The closest thing to primitive
down here is living in a beachfront retirement condo."

"Funny, I thought you'd be more sympathetic to a child in anguish,"
He chides, and she doesn't look contrite. "Those woods are as old as
anything in the south and there's 800 square miles of them. There's
no telling what's alive out there." He stands up.

"Where are you going?" 

"I've got to check something out." 

"You know, Mulder, sometimes I think some work on your communication
skills wouldn't be such a bad idea," Scully says with a smirk.

"I'll be back soon, and we can build a tower of furniture. 'Kay?" He
smiles at her.

"Nope." She slides of the bed too. "I'm coming too." 

He shrugs. "That works, too." 

~*~*~

 Asekoff House
Early Morning

Scully takes the tape of the classic Invisible Man film out of the
VCR in Louis' room.
"How's the boy?" she asks as she rejoins him in the living room.

"He's still freaked out." 

"I think I might have some insight into this invisible creature he
said was chasing him." She hands him the video tape.

"The Invisible Man was invisible," he protests.

"Right." 

"Yeah, he said he was chased by a creature with glowing red eyes."
Scully rolls her own eyes. "Let me show you something." They go to
the door. "Mrs. Asekoff said she went outside with the dog, right?"

"Mm hmm." 

"But when she came back, the door was locked from the inside." 

"And?" 

"Look at this. We got some tracks here." 

"Where?" 

"Here, and here..." He points at the floor. "Dried mud against the
tile, tracked in from the outside."

"That could have been brought in by the dog." 

"No, no. You see, uh, the ball of the foot here? A large foot and I
count five toes."

"Wait a minute. I thought you said it wasn't human." 

"Well, I'm not saying it is. The weight distribution is all wrong.
People walk heel to toe. Whatever this thing is it walks on the ball
of its foot."

"You're putting me on." 

"No. My dad and I were Indian Guides. I know these things." 

"So, if it's not man and it's not animal, what the hell is it?" 

Michelle enters just as he shrugs. "Guess I'm a little late to this
dance." She remarks.

"I found some tracks - right here." 

"Same as I saw before," Michelle confirms.

"Where was that?" Scully asks.

"In the woods. Weight distribution's strange. They appear to be
human, but whoever left these uses the balls of his feet more like an
animal." Scully glares at his triumphant look.

"Well, whatever it is, it's attacked three grown men, presumably in
broad daylight disposing of its prey without detection. And it wasn't
shy last night about coming out of the woods to try again. What we've
got here is a predator with low visibility and a high degree of
motivation. And it's got one advantage we don't have - the entire
Apilachacola National Forest," Mulder says.

"Then how do you stop it?" Michelle asks.

"By identifying it. Finding it before it finds somebody else." 

~*~*~

Mulder balks when the women indicate that they'd like to get going
quickly. "These things are dangerous. There's a possibility that we
could end up here overnight like the missing men - assuming they're
still alive. We need to bring warm clothes and sleeping bags if we're
to have a chance of survival in that case."

"Agent Mulder, we don't want to be carrying that sort of extra weight
with us," Michelle protests, and Scully nods her agreement.

"We won't carry it then, but better safe than sorry. Look, I saw a
documentary recently in which having the proper equipment might have
allowed the three missing people to survive -"Realizing that he's
beginning to describe the plot to the Blair Witch Project, which
won't be out for another two years, he opts for vagueness. "I just
don't want it to be us, okay?"

They grumble, but do spare the twenty minutes at a sporting goods
store to buy what he wants before they go and meet the other member
of the team in the woods.
 
~*~*~

On The Edge of The Woods

Jeff Glaser the tech expert Michelle called in shows them how the
heat sensor's camera and monitor reveals the presence of warm bodies.
"It's called FLIR for Forward Looking InfraRed. It was developed for
chopper pilots in Vietnam. Detects body heat at 300 yards."

"That's pretty sophisticated for government issue," Mulder remarks.

"Some people prefer searching with dogs, I prefer an extra pair of
hands if I get in trouble." Michelle explains. "Are we ready to go,
here? Once we start in, you can put away your cell phones. The only
communication in these woods is with short-wave radios. So stay
close, maintain visual contact. If you get lost, initiate oral
contact. That means holler. If nobody responds, sit down - don't
move. I will find you. Don't go looking for me. I know it sounds
obvious, but folks still get lost."

Scully hangs up her phone, which is just as well, because the signal
is fading out. "Local PD has all their resources looking out for a
transient, a drifter who's wanted for a double homicide in Gasden,
Alabama. They were amused when I told them what we were doing."

"I don't think it's a drifter, Scully, and we may be looking for two
individuals."

"Why do you say that?" 

"Well, that thing lured that woman out of the house last night to
separate her from her son."

"But for what purpose?" 

"Divide and conquer. If your enemy has greater numbers than you, you
divide and conquer it to diminish those numbers."

"What enemy would that be?" 

"Humans invading their niche. Encroaching development. That's what I
suspected when I went to check on Louis and his mother."

"You think this is about a housing tract?" 

"That survey team was staking out a new 100,000 acre plot.
Civilization is pushing very hard into these woods. Maybe something
in these woods is pushing back."

"Anything?" Scully asks, looking over Jeff's shoulder at the blank
monitor.

"No. No, nothing at all. Not even wildlife." 

"Isn't that a little strange?" 

"Yeah. This forest is usually alive with sound. I'm not like an
expert, but I've never seen it like this before."

"Well, it sure is beautiful, though." 

"That's what happens. People get to looking around, next thing they
know, something eats 'em."

"What do you think killed those men?" 

"Nature is populated by creatures either trying to kill something
they need to survive, or trying to avoid being killed by something
that needs them to survive. If we become blinded by the beauty of
nature, we may fail to see its cruelty and violence."

"Walt Whitman?" Scully guesses.

"No. When Animals Attack on the Fox Network." 

~*~*~

Despite Michelle's caution, two hours later they're again minus one
police officer. Once she disappears Jeff becomes semi-hysterical, and
Mulder gives in to his demands that he lead the way only to keep him
from cracking up.

Jeff walks ahead, holding the device like it's their salvation.

Hanging back a bit, Scully speaks to her husband. "I don't have much
faith that this device will do us any good."

"So far all it's done is split us up." 

"Whatever it is that we were chasing did show up on the screen at
first."

"What does that tell you?" 

"Nothing," Scully concedes.

"Mm hmm." 

"Except that we're going in the right direction." 

"Maybe it can regulate its temperature. Do you know of any animal
that can?"

"Ticks. I've heard that they can halt their metabolism for up to 18
years, essentially going into suspended animation until something
warm-blooded comes along."

"That's interesting." 

"Why is that interesting?" 

"Thirty years ago, the, uh, the town of Point Pleasant, West Virginia
was terrorized for over a year by something - killing livestock and
terrorizing the people. Witnesses described them as primitive looking
men with red piercing eyes. Became known as the 'moth men.' I've got
an X-File dating back to 1952 on it."

"What would that be filed next to...'The Cockroach That Ate
Cincinnati?'"

"No, 'The Cockroach That Ate Cincinnati' is in the C's. 'Moth Men's
over in the M's."

Jeff interrupts their conversation to inform them that they must have
gotten off the trail.

Scully sees movement in the trees. "Everybody stand still. There's
something out there."

She and Mulder pull their guns out. "Where?" 

"About 40 or 50 yards out." 

They give chase for a while and Scully fires at it, hitting nothing.

"Don't fire again unless you're sure you're gonna hit it. It may be
trying to spend our advantage," Mulder warns her after she admits she
only has one clip.

She's shaken. "What the hell is it, Mulder?" 

"I don't know. But what ever it is, it's smarter than us - at least
out here." No sooner have the woods left his mouth is he pulled out
of Scully's view.

Running towards where he was, she screams his name until she hears
his pain-filled voice. As she nears she sees him wresting with a
creature that keeps wandering in and out of her sight. She fires
several shots at it, missing each time but driving it off. Mulder is
bleeding from a deep shoulder laceration when she finally reaches
him.

"You okay?" she asks breathlessly. 

Mulder winces and nods weakly. "Jeff's gone now too." 

Whirling on her heel she sees that he's right. They're alone in the
quiet woods.

~*~*~

The Forest
 After Dark

Since Michelle isn't around to scold them, they wander in the woods a
bit trying to locate where they dropped the sleeping bags.
Unfortunately, they don't stumble across them.

When they eventually give up, Mulder huddles up against a log while
Scully tries to start a fire with rocks.

"You were an Indian Guide. Help me out here." 

"Indian Guide says maybe you should run to the store and get some
matches."

"I would, but I left my wallet in the car. Wherever we left that..."
She sits next to him and picks up her gun.

"What are you doing?" Mulder asks listlessly. 

"Trying to open my gun. If I can separate the shell from the casing
maybe I can get the powder to ignite."

"Oh. And maybe it'll start raining weenies and marshmallows." 

"Do I detect a hint of negativity?" 

"No. Yes...actually. Yeah. And I'm more concerned about being able to
shoot at that thing if necessary, than about an unlikely fire."

"Mulder, you need to keep warm," she protests. "Your body's still in
shock."

He looks over his shoulder at something she can't see before saying,
"I was told once that the best way to regenerate body heat was to
crawl naked into a sleeping bag with somebody else who's already
naked."

"Well, maybe if it rains sleeping bags, you'll get lucky." 

He flips one of the sleeping bags that she hadn't noticed until then
up in the air, making her laugh. "Do I get lucky now?"

"It's worse than I thought. Not only are you in shock, you're
delirious." He snorts. "Have you thought seriously about dying?"

"Yeah, once, when I was at the Ice Capades." 

"When my dad died unexpectedly like that, I was angry at the
injustice of it and its meaninglessness. And then I realized that
that was the struggle - to give it meaning. To make sense of it. It's
like life."

"I think Nature is supremely indifferent to whether we live or die. I
mean, if you're lucky you get 75 years. If you're really lucky you
get 80 years. And if you're extraordinarily lucky, you get to have 50
of those years with a decent head of hair."

"I guess it's like Las Vegas. The house always wins." 

"Hey, who did you identify with when you were a kid? Wilma or Betty?"


"I identified with Betty's bustline," Scully tells him as she unzips
the sleeping bag.

"Yes! I did, too." He stares at her chest. "At least one of us
outgrew the likeness."

"Could never have been married to Barney, though. The kids were
cute."

"But where are they today?" Mulder asks. "And our kids are way
cuter."

"Moth Men? Really?" 

He nods. "Yeah. But there seem to be only two of them." Scully tries
to pull him onto her lap. "I don't wanna wrestle."

"Get over here. I'm going to try and keep you warm." Mulder complies
but she accidentally rubs his wounded shoulder. It makes him hiss in
pain. "Sorry."

"One of us has got to stay awake, Scully," he protests as she wraps
the sleeping bag around them both.

"You sleep, Mulder." 

"If you get tired, you wake me." 

"I'm not going to get tired." 

"Why don't you sing something." 

"No...Mulder." 

"You sing to the kids." He pouts. "I've heard you. Well, if you sing
something, I'll know you're awake."

"Mulder, you don't want me to sing. I can't carry a tune." 

"It doesn't matter. Just sing anything." 

Scully looks around, making sure there are no other witnesses, and
then begins to sing slightly off key and without enthusiasm.
"Jeremiah was a bull frog..."Her voice wavers when his eyes pop open
"...was a good friend of mine. Never understood a single word he
said. but I helped him drink his wine." She pauses.

"Chorus," he demands

"Joy...to the world. All the boys and girls. Joy to the fishes in the
deep blue sea. Joy to you and me." She looks down at him. "I...I can't
sing any more. Were you serious about wanting to get lucky?" After a
moment of investigation under the sleeping bag her eyes widen. "Ah,
you were."

"I was." 

"Well, that'll keep me awake for a while..."

"And you're better at *that* than singing," he agrees, knowing that
she hasn't the heart to hit him. For now. Instead of smacking him she
laughs and pulls the sleeping bag over their heads, figuring the
noise will scare away any less than voyeuristic animal.

~*~*~

Morning

Mulder wakes up slightly panicked when he realizes he's alone.
"Scully?!"

"Mmmm...over here." She's about 20 yards away, apparently eating
something.

"What are you doing?" 

"I'm looking for food. I found some wild berries." 

"That sounds like a good way to get the wild runs," he tells her.
"Please don't go far."

"Mulder, you never left my sight," she reassures him, right before
disappearing from sight.

"Scully?" He gets up painfully and goes to where she was. "Scully?
Scully! Scully!?"

A voice near his feet says, "I'm down here".

"Where?" 

"I fell down a hole." 

He looks and sees her getting to her feet at the bottom of a hole ten
feet deep. "You all right?"

"Yeah, I landed on soft dirt . kind of." 

"What's down there?" 

"I don't know. It's pretty dark." Scully steps out of view. "Oh!" 

"Scully, what's going on? Are you okay?" 

"I found Michelle." 

"Is she alive?" 

"Not for much longer. Mulder, we have to get her out of here." 

"Is there a way out?" 

"I don't know. I . I'm in some kind of a chamber. There's, there's
like some kind of network. Mulder..."

"Yeah?" 

"I'm not alone. I don't have my weapon. Mulder!?" 

"Hold on, I'm going to drop my gun down." 

He drops gun, then hears rustling behind him. As Scully bends to pick
up his gun, Mulder dives into the hole too. "Jeez!! Mulder, are you
okay?"

Groaning, he holds his shoulder, and ground in pain. "Don't mind me."


The creature begins to move towards them, and he shouts a warning.
"Scully!"

Scully fires three or four shots and it drops to the ground,
seemingly dead. They look at creature's body. It looks like a person
carved out of wood.

"Mulder, look. There has to be a scientific explanation for this." 

~*~*~

Mulder looks up at Scully as they work to stack bodies of long-dead
victims up under the hole. "Too bad we don't have any office
furniture."

"If they could see us now." 

"Go, team. Twenty more bodies and we'll win the Honey-Baked Ham."

A familiar voice calls out, "Agent Mulder?" 

"We're down here!" 

Agent Kinsley peers down at them. "What're you doing down there?" 

To Mulder's surprise, it's Scully who has the smart remark. "Seemed
like a good place for our second honeymoon."

"We've got injured people down here," Mulder tells Kinsley.

"We need a ladder," Scully adds, waving with her hand to indicate
they're too deep under ground to climb out.

"Right away." 

~*~*~

Ambulances load Michelle, Jeff and Mr. Asekoff, while another EMT
bandages Mulder's injured shoulder.

As soon as Mulder is released, Kinsley comes over to him. "Well, we
just got all the thanks when you did all the work."

"No, on the contrary, Agent Kinsley, we would never have gotten
involved in this if not for you."

"Really?" 

Mulder points at a tab on the crosscut - 1521 Ponce De Leon Lands
Looking for Fountain of Youth. "Yeah, you see this?"

"Oh, yeah. I pointed that out to Agent Stonecypher on the drive
down."

"There was something in the cave that Scully fell into, an
inscription - Ad Noctum."

"That's, uh -"

"It means 'into darkness'. The Spanish Conquistadors used to carve it
on the posts that they would lash the natives to as a warning,"
Mulder explains.

"So who're you saying wrote this?" 

"Ponce De Leon came here 450 years ago looking for the Fountain of
Youth."

"You mean you think that these...that - that - that- that body the
one that Agent Scully shot? No -"

"After 400 years in the woods don't you think they might have adapted
perfectly to their environment?"

"You're just making this up." 

"Why do you say that?" 

The other agent laughs uncomfortably. "'Cause, you work on the
X-Files, and you just want to write off your motel." He looks over
his shoulder quickly before adding. "And earlier? You were right."

"About what?" Mulder asks blankly.

"About us giving the couple thing a shot." Kinsley blushes when they
see Stonecypher approaching.

"Search and Rescue are still unable to find one of the surveyors or
the second predator that you reported," she tells them.

"I wouldn't be surprised if they couldn't find either one of them,"
Mulder replies.

"Agent Mulder, I'm confused about one thing. Why would they come
after the boy in the house that night?"

"These predators have been in these woods for a long, long time. They
would have perceived any encroachment on their territory as an enemy,
even a little kid like that."

"But that would mean that they'd come after any one of us that had
gone into the woods, wouldn't it?"

He nods, then looks around. "Where's Scully?" 

"Oh, she got a lift back to the motel to pack up both your things,"
Stonecypher says.

"She did? Excuse me." Before either agent can protest, he hops into
their car and drives off.

~*~*~

Motel

"Scully!? Scully!!!??" 

Scully leans out of the bathroom. "Mulder, what's going on?" 

"Let's get out of here," he says, picking up his suitcase and bumping
gently against her until she gets moving.

"'Kay," she says, picking up the other suitcase.

"You pack everything?" 

"Yeah." 

As he closes the door he catches a glimpse of red eyes under the bed.
Scully thinks he's shivering from pain, and wraps her arm around his
waist, having no idea that he's praying that the manager doesn't rent
out the room in the next few hours.

~*~*~

Chapter Fifty-One

 Halloween 1997

Although agent Brandywine doesn't have children, his sick partner
Jerry Stone does, so he's not terribly surprised to find himself
roped into chaperoning. This isn't his ideal way to spend the day,
because as much as he dislikes his partner, he dislikes his kids even
more. Luckily, only the youngest goes to the preschool.

On the other hand, it's only a few minutes after he gets there that
he's got little Reese demanding his attention - just like his father.

"Uncle Bobby!" Reese whines, tugging on his sleeve. Brandywine tries
not to shudder; he really hates being called Bobby, and is still
pissed that his partner encourages his kids to. "Tell Page that she's
a liar!"

A small blonde girl scowls at Reese. "Am not." 

"Uh huh!" the little boy insists, quickly sticking his tongue out at
the little girl. "Page says her daddy and mommy work with monsters."

"They do!" the girl insists.

Sighing, Brandywine looks down at the girl. Her parents are almost
certainly FBI agents, but he can't think of any blonde agents off the
top of his head that would refer to criminals as monsters. Not that
the parents need to be blondes. "What's your name?"

"Page." 

"Page what?" 

"Page Nicole Mulder," the child chirps.

"Oh..." Brandywine can't help but smile. The child's parents were
being literal, if they told her about who they've been involved with.
"Your mom and dad are agents Mulder and Scully, aren't they?"

"Yup." 

The agent looks down at his partner's son. "Page isn't lying, Reese.
Her parents do work with monsters."

Reese's eyes widen in shock. "Mommy and Daddy say monsters ain't
real!"

"That's because your parents are narrow-minded and over protective,"
Brandywine explains.

"Daddy!" The little girl runs towards a tall smiling man.

His partner's brat is still staring at Brandywine with a dumbfounded
expression on his face, making the agent feel a bit self-satisfied.
Maybe when the little brat tattles his father will request a new
partner and he'd be able to wash his hands of the whole family.

~*~*~

At first Page was very excited that her Daddy is going to be at
school, but now she's not so sure. Not everyone's parents are there,
so she has to share her Daddy with three other kids. Megan is a
witch, Hannah - who has the same name as her parents' friend's little
girl - is a kitten, and Hunter is Batman. Page is a princess, and
Daddy says that she's one even when she's not all dressed up. But
he's silly like that.

"So," Her Daddy says, looking at the four of them. "Are you guys
ready to go to the haunted house?"

"Yeah!" they all scream, but Page thinks that Hannah is a scardy-cat,
'cause she doesn't look as happy as the rest of them.

"Looks like it's time to get on the bus," Daddy notes before ushering
them out to the line. Page is very careful to tell him where the best
seats are, and they're real lucky to get to them first before Reese
and his friend do. Daddy tells them all to sit down safely, and they
do.

The drive doesn't take too long, but Page wishes it was longer. That
way she could make more faces at Reese, who is pouting with his arms
crossed, and not listening to anything the grown up friend of his is
saying.

"Let's go," Daddy says. "We're going to have lots of fun today,
right?"

"Yeah!" they say again, but Page looks at her three friends. She has
no idea what a haunted house is, and she wonders if any of them do.

~*~*~

As far as Mulder is concerned, this is the best Halloween ever. At
least the best one since he was a little kid, anyway. His parents
didn't believe in letting kids go trick o treating as teenagers - not
that he really wanted to after Samantha disappeared. Before then
there were some good Halloweens, but they're bittersweet to remember,
so he usually tries not to.

This is better. His little girl and her three remarkably well-behaved
classmates are completely wide-eyed as they begin to go into the
haunted house. He has the sense that no one told any of the kids what
a haunted house was, given that they seem perpetually surprised by
what's going on.

**

"Hannah and Hunter, you come back now," he demands, beginning to
become exasperated by his duty as kid-herder. The two kids squeal and
run back to where he's standing with Page and Megan.

If this is the "less scary" version of the haunted house like the
preschool claimed, he's really glad that they didn't choose to go to
the scarier version late in the day. The kids are getting a bit less
well-behaved because they're scared. It's not as though he can blame
them, he knows his own behavior goes to pot when he's got a scary
case. Although to be honest, his cases are considerably scarier than
the things that fall or jump out at the kids.

He scarcely has gotten those two back when Page and Megan take off.
Before he quite knows it, the only one still near him is Hannah.
"Hey, Hannah, why don't we go catch up with the rest of them," he
says cheerfully.

Before they do he hears a familiar little voice shout. "Ah, it's a
monster! Daddy, come kill it!"

Rounding the corner he almost screams himself...with laughter. Three
tiny people have cornered a much larger one, and they're swinging the
plastic sacks full of candy from the trick-o-treating back at the
preschool at the poor cowering figure.

"Page's Daddy kills monsters. You gonna be in trouble," Hunter says
in what is probably supposed to be a warning tone.

"You three, here, now," Mulder demands sternly.

His tone of voice doesn't have quite the desired effect, because
instead of being contrite, three little faces look up him
expectantly. "Kill the monster."

"Yeah, kill it!" 

Across the room the figure struggles to its feet, and it's impossible
to tell if he or she is alarmed because his or her face is covered by
a hideous mask. It reminds Mulder a bit of the Flukeman, but greener.

"That's not a monster," Mulder tells them.

"Is too!" 
"Yeah huh!" 

Trying not to roll his eyes, Mulder raises his voice instead. "Would
you mind taking off your mask, please, and showing them you're not a
monster?"

"I'm not supposed to," is the muffled reply.

Mulder looks down at the knee-high but bloodthirsty quartet. "Are you
sure you want them to continue thinking you're a monster?"

The "Monster" seems to consider this for a moment, then peals off the
mask, revealing a woman around eighteen or so.

The kids look a bit disappointed, and scowl when Mulder tells them,
"Now apologize for hitting the nice lady and calling her a monster."

"We're sorry," they chorus, then Page walks over to her and holds out
a Snickers bar, which Mulder knows is her favorite. "Want some
candy?"

The woman takes it and they soon leave her behind. No one else is hit
the rest of the day.

~*~*~

December 1997 
 
A family is driving through the deep heartland of America, taking an
all-American trip in an All-American Taurus, looking for all the
world like a car commercial in motion. "Mommy, where are we going?" a
plaintive voice from the back asks.
 
"Read 'em the letter, Scully," Mulder says as his wife glares daggers
at him.
 
"Sure. Fine. Whatever," the redhead digs through her work purse,
designated as such so that nobody stuffs Cheerios into it. It doesn't
stop Mulder from putting discarded sunflower shells into it, however,
she grimaces as she pulls the envelope from among the said shells.
"Dear Special Agent Mulder," she twists somewhat in her seat to face
her inquisitive little girl, squirming boy and sleeping baby, "I'm
writing to you for help. Several years ago I had an experience I
could not explain. I was lying in my bed when I felt a presence in
the room. Though I was awake, I felt that something had taken control
over my body. I don't remember much else but I woke up three days
later pregnant with my son, Izzy."
 
"Izzy!" Page laughs, and Sammy repeats the name several times before
Scully can continue reading.
 
"That was 18 years ago, but now it happened again. I was in bed and
could swear I heard Cher singing... The one who was married to Sonny."
Scully indulges herself in an eyeroll as Mulder smirks behind the
wheel. "Then the room got all smoky, and I saw some kind of monster.
He had a really gross face with lumps all over his head. I was too
scared to scream. Then I got all groggy and conked out fro three
days. Guess what happened when I woke up? I got your name off the TV.
Some lady on the Jerry Springer show who had a werewolf baby said you
came to her house." She pauses. "You did what?"
 
Mulder is careful to keep his eyes on the road. "Just a consulting
job, you do that sometimes, don't you, honey?"
 
"Sure, poopyhead," she shakes her head, then looks at her kids.
"Don't repeat that." As they blink, she finishes the letter quickly.
"Well, I got her story beat by a mile so maybe you'll want to come
see me, too. Sincerely, Shaineh Berkowitz." Hurriedly, she stuffs the
letter back into her purse. "You brought us all the way out here
for," she's waving her hands, unsure of how best to describe it
without using negative words her children will repeat later,
"*this*?"
 
He glances at her, then grins widely. "With our casefiles, *we* got
Springer beat by a mile. You think we should get a show together and
make some real money?"
 
She smiles a fuck-you smile, then looks at her sweet babies. "Daddy's
silly, isn't he?"
 
As their children giggle, Mulder shakes his head. "No, no, Daddy's
*brilliant*," he argues, but knows it's a losing battle.
 
~*~*~ 
 
As Mulder and Scully walk through the Berkowitz home, Mulder's
careful to hoist his wall-climbing son on his shoulders and carry the
diaper bag, while Scully has April strapped to her front and holding
on to goggle-eyed Page. Mrs. Berkowitz looked at them oddly at first,
but let them in, explaining, "Sorry, I thought you were them
preachin' people at first. Well, until you showed my your badges
instead of Bibles."
 
"Uh, yeah," Scully says, wrestling with balance between her two
daughters. "I understand you reported both the intruders' break-in
and the union to the police."
 
"Well, I don't know about no union, but I sure woke up in a
condition." The heavyset woman nods.
 
"And what did the police report say?" Scully asks, both to Mrs.
Berkowitz and Mulder.
 
"Uh, nothin'," Mrs. Berkowitz replies, "nobody here ever locks their
doors, and it took me a month or two to figure it out...I mean, that
I was pregnant, you know?" She raises her eyebrows at Scully, mother
to mother.
 
Yeah, I should talk, if it wasn't for that FBI-mandated exam, I
wouldn't've known I was pregnant as early as I did, either, Scully
reluctantly nods. "So, you're pregnant now?" she says.
 
The curly-haired woman nods, "Uh-huh, but as I told Agent Mulder,
that's what takes the cake."
 
"Figure of speech, she doesn't have cake," Mulder cuts off his
children's whining before it starts, and to his wife, "she had a
tubal ligation two years ago."
 
"You can't plant a seed in a barren field," Mrs. Berkowitz delivers
this with a pragmatism learned and leads them to her kitchen, where
the two older children still hold out hope for cake. She holds up a
frying pan, then hands it over to Scully. "They were cooking
something on the range. Took me two days of scrubbin' to clean the
skillet." She watches the red-haired woman inspect the pan, then
glance at her husband before setting the skillet down. "I don't know
how many of them there were. I only saw the one, but they ate almost
a whole damn jar of peanut butter." She holds aloft the empty jar,
then hands it over when Sammy starts reaching for it.
 
Mulder smothers a smile at both his son and his wife as she tries to
salvage what she believes is a complete waste of their time. "You
were gone for three days but nobody noticed?"
 
Mrs. Berkowitz crosses her arms. "I know what you're thinkin'." 
 
Always straightforward when she has to be, Scully asks, "Do you
drink, Mrs. Berkowitz?"
 
"No," Mrs. Berkowitz replies in the same tone, "but I'm not so sure
my intruders, as you call them, didn't have a few." She walks over
and points to two ring-shaped watermarks on an old cabinet. "Somebody
set a tumbler here and didn't use no coaster." She notes Scully's
look and adds, "And don't you think my boy did that. He don't have
much brains, but he does value his life." She waves at an open door.
"That pigsty there is his room."
 
Page laughs. "That's what Mommy calls Daddy's office." 
 
"Page," Scully sighs as Mrs. Berkowitz chuckles and Mulder gives his
wife a mock-outraged look. She doesn't hear her husband's muttered
conversation with the woman, since Page has picked up a comic book.
"Page, you shouldn't touch other people's things," she says, but then
frowns at the cover. "Honey? Mommy wants to look at that," she says,
taking it from her daughter. Besides, she'd rather flip through the
black-and-white funnybook than go through the well-described pigsty.
"Mrs. Berkowitz? You gave a description of the intruder. You said
that he had a gross face and lumps on his head?"
 
Mrs. Berkowitz nods enthusiastically. "And two mouths. I don't know
if I mentioned that."
 
Scully almost takes it in stride. "Funny. Sounds just like this." She
holds up the comic book. Mulder joins her and peers at the familiar
comic book, making sure his son's peanut butter-stained hands don't
touch the evidence.
 
"Oh, that?" The curly-haired woman blinks, then explains, "That's the
Great Mutato." In a proud voice, she adds, "That's a comic book
character my kid Izzy created."
 
They all turn when they hear the door slam. "What's going on?" a
heavyset young man with a blank expression asks.
 
His mother gives him a scolding look about the door, then explains,
"These are agents Mulder and Scully from the FBI. They brought their
kids."
 
"The Federal Bureau of Investigation?" Izzy asks, less blank but no
less confused as to how a perfectly normal-looking family is standing
in his house.
 
"We were wondering how this suspect in your mother's case looks
exactly like this?" Scully asks, then nudges her husband.
 
Mulder closes the comic book and holds it up. "The Great Mutato." 
 
"Because I," the young man says hesitantly, "I've seen him, too." 
 
"You've seen the Great Mutato?" Scully says the name in the same tone
she reserves for aliens, Elvis, and Big Blue sightings.
 
"Yeah, a lot of people around here have," he says, more eager now. 
 
The redhead is trying not to scream. It wouldn't look very good for
her kids or the FBI, and she's long given up on Mulder. "Has it
crossed neither of your minds that what you say you saw that night
fits perfectly with this creature that your son created?"
 
Now the curly-haired woman is somewhat defensive. "Well, yeah. But,"
she looks at each of them, "that don't mean it didn't happen."
 
Mulder and Scully share a look, but each with their own thoughts. 
 
~*~*~ 
 
Later that night, after they have tucked their kids in the motel bed
for the umpteenth time, Scully looks at Mulder. "Okay, what the hell
is this?" she asks, careful to keep her voice down just in case.
 
Mulder looks up, then looks back down at the casefile he's hastily
assembled and spread out on their bed. "What's what?" he asks back.
 
She sits on the bed, then leans in so he can't avoid looking at her.
"Why the hell are we out here?" she asks. "It's a classic rape case,
with a neighborhood scientist in the area, nothing unusual or
paranormal about it."
 
"But doesn't Doctor Pollidori scream 'Frankenstein' to you?" Mulder
really looks at her. "And what about that creature we saw in the
woods? You saw it, didn't you?" he frowns.
 
"I saw," she sighs loudly, "something. But it could've been a normal
person taking two quick bites, not a monster," she adds quickly.
 
He grins, then sobers, his eyes crinkling with his forehead. "I also
think Shaineh Berkowitz deserves to know who raped her, don't you?"
 
His wife nods. "Then that's for the local police to investigate,"
Scully kisses her mildly insane husband's forehead. "Not an FBI
matter," she tries to put the papers away.
 
He shakes his head. "No, there's something more here," he insists,
brushing away her hands, knowing that saying "Because we've lived
through this before and there is a monster and a Frankenstein" won't
help his case.
 
"Mulder, stop," she says, putting her hands on his, "please. There's
nothing for us here."
 
"There is," he repeats, but the sight of Scully unbuttoning her
FBI-approved blouse has him mildly distracted. "Really, there is," he
tries again, but his hands are unfastening her bra while she kisses
and fondles him. "Scully."
 
"Shut up, Mulder," she whispers in his ear, wriggling out of her
pants, "the kids are asleep and I'm fuckin' horny."
 
"Isn't 'fuckin' horny' repetitive?" Mulder asks, giving in to both
their lusts, lying against the wall and trying like hell to get his
fly undone.
 
She smirks and promptly unzips him with an aplomb that will never
cease to amaze him. "If you don't want repetitive, I guess it'll be
just a one-orgasm night," she says, mock-regretfully as she pulls off
his pants.
 
"Hell, no," Mulder hugs her to him, and she giggles. "We're gonna
have as much fun as we can until somebody wakes up."
 
Her hand on his crotch, Scully grins wickedly. "Somebody's up, I
guess it's over," she says, reaching for her blouse.
 
She giggles again when he grabs her wrist and blocks her with his
leg. "I do believe there was a fuckin' horny woman, and I'll be
damned if I'm gonna disappoint her," he says, grinning back, taking
off his shirt.
 
They spend the rest of the night repeating some very pleasurable acts
and positions, and managing, by some miracle, not to wake their
children while indulging in the original process of procreation.
 
~*~*~ 
 
The FBI couple pull up to JJ's Country Diner, absently rubbing each
other's shoulders. They've still got a bit of an afterglow, which
their children have unfairly taken advantage of, so they've got to a
bit of a late start. "Coffee?" Scully asks as she opens the back door
to unbuckle their kids.
 
"Two sugars, no cream," he says, and she gives him a relieved smile
before he walks inside. And this time, he welcomes the massive spread
the waitress sets before him, since it'll save him time ordering for
the kids. He half-grins as the strange woman rattles off the large
repast, including the "monster grapefruits." If she only knew, he
thinks, and yawns briefly before asking, "Excuse me, could I have
some coffee? We'd appreciate it."
 
"Sure." The waitress nods, deftly filling a coffee mug, "on the
house. Compliments of JJ." Mulder nods as JJ calls out, "That's with
two Js!" Then the woman blinks. "Did you say we?"
 
No, I was speaking French, Mulder's about to say as he dumps two
sugars in the cup, when his family troops in, settles around him and
helps themselves to the food. "Another cup of coffee," he says,
pushing the first filled mug to his wife.
 
"Thanks." Scully smiles, sipping her coffee. Despite the bustle that
a small family brings, surprisingly nobody seems to pay them too much
attention. "Guess what," she says, handing over the newspaper while
keeping an eye on the kids and feeding April. "Amazingly, last
night's entire conversation is front page news."
 
~*~*~ 
 
After Shaineh Berkowitz reams out her son Izzy for recording and
giving the conversation over to the newspaper, Mulder and Scully step
out of the Berkowitz house, children in tow. "Where are we going
now?" Scully asks, shifting April on her hip.
 
Mulder holds up the tape. "To messenger this to the Bureau. I want
special audio to filter the tracks and ten I want to go back to see
the professor."
 
"Mulder, it's just some stupid hoax," Scully argues, then bounces
April onto her shoulder when she starts fussing. "Shhhh, shhhh, it's
okay, Daddy's got another wild goose chase," she coos.
 
"What goose?" Page asks. "I don't see goose." She and her brother
start peering back at the neighbors who are watching them.
 
"Figure of speech, Page," Mulder says by rote. "And something
recorded its voice on this, Scully."
 
His wife shoots him a wry look. "And you think Doctor Pollidori has
something to do with it?"
 
He grins and squats down to his older children's height, but still
towers over them. "When Victor Frankenstein asks himself, 'Whence did
the principle of life proceed?' and then as a gratifying summit to
his toils creates a hideous phantasm of a man, he prefigures the
Postmodern Prometheus. The genetic engineer whose power to reanimate
matter - genes into life - is only as limited as his imagination is."
Then he takes Sammy's chubby little wrists and waves them around in a
parody of a monster, making the boy rock back and forth rather than
walk. "Loiiiife," he cackles in a horrible Boris Karloff imitation,
"I have created liiiiiiife."
 
Two of the Scully girls laugh while the third is drooling on her
mother's shoulder. The eldest Scully shakes her head and adjusts the
towel on her shoulder. "I can't believe you'd reduce this man to a
literary stereotype, a mad scientist."
 
Still playing monster with his boy, Mulder replies, "Who else would
go to such trouble to impregnate Shaineh Berkowitz?" Grinning at his
oldest daughter, he adds, "Bwuhahahahaha!" and makes as if Sammy the
Monster is going to attack.
 
Page squeals and laughs as Scully rolls her eyes. Honestly, he may
quote classic literature, but will he never grow up? As Sammy growls
and roars along with his father, she sighs. Never mind.
 
~*~*~ 
 
The trip to the hospital was complicated only by the fact that the
obstetrician thought they were coming in for themselves rather than
for Mrs. Berkowitz. Once they had that miscommunication straightened
out, Scully got her hot little hands on the subject's file and never
took her eyes off it. That left Mulder to shepherd the kids into the
backseat and buckle them in, while his partner peaceable peruses the
contents of the folder. Driving down the road of this somewhat bland
neighborhood, he glances at his wife, then his kids. Strange to think
we're actually the most normal people in this town, he thinks, and
smiles, returning his eyes to the road.
 
"I have to admit, Mulder, everything looks in order. Mrs. Berkowitz
had a tubal ligation in 1993 and two months ago, she had two
pregnancy tests both with positive results."
 
When he sees the tented house, Mulder formulates a plan of action. He
stops the car and reverses it, with amazingly no cars to hit either
way.
 
"What are you doing?" Scully frowns as the scenery goes by backwards.

 
"Mrs. Berkowitz said in her letter that when she saw her intruder,
there was a gaseous white cloud and then when she woke up three days
later, nobody knew that she'd been gone."
 
Scully's staring at her husband like he's lost his mind. Not a new
expression, but still. "Yeah. So?"
 
He pulls up to the Pollidori house, covered in a bug extermination
tent. "So," he says, unbuckling himself, "if I'm not out in fifteen
minutes, call an ambulance. I don't want you or the kids inhaling any
of that stuff."
 
She shoots him an indignant look and unlocks her seatbelt. "What
about you inhaling that stuff? What about backup?"
 
He kisses her on the forehead and puts his hand on her shoulder,
keeping her in her seat. "Fifteen minutes," he says, unholstering his
gun and running towards the house.
 
She exhales, then looks at her kids. "He's right, but it's still
stupid to run in there without backup," she tells them.
 
Page nods. "Silly Daddy." 
 
Scully nods back. "Exactly." 
 
~*~*~ 
 
Exactly eighteen minutes later, paramedics are dragging out not only
a seemingly hung over Mulder, but also a thin, unconscious woman,
while an unmarked car releases a birdlike woman with glasses onto the
scene. Scully grabs April and flashes her badge. The paramedics dump
her husband in the back seat of their rental, giving Scully a small
oxygen canister with a plastic mask attached to it while they attend
the thin woman.
 
"Mulder," Scully says, forcing her medical side to take over as she
fastens the mask to his face, saving him the trouble of holding it
himself. Her children, however, have no compunction about throwing
themselves at their red-eyed, coughing, and rather smelly father.
 
Weakly, he puts his arms around his children and leans against the
carseat. "How is she?" he asks in a muffled voice behind the mask.
 
She watches as the ambulance pulls out and the birdlike woman joins
them. "Mrs. Pollidori is unconscious, but fine," the woman with the
glasses replies. "I do believe she'll be treated for that nasty gas
inhalation and put under observation."
 
"Who are you?" Scully asks, and now the kids look up at the strange
lady.
 
The woman pushes up her glasses nervously. "I'm with the newspaper,"
she says, her large eyes darting at the adults and children with the
same nervous glance.
 
"We gotta go back in," Mulder mutters, taking off the oxygen mask and
lurching out of the car, only to be caught by his wife.
 
"We aren't going anywhere but to a hospital," Scully says firmly
while their kids grab his jacket.
 
He rolls his bleary eyes at his beloved, heavenly wife. "You say the
sexiest things, G-Woman," he says, closing his eyes.
 
Scully rolls her eyes heavenward, then looks at the reporter. "This
is all off-the-record, understand?" she says, buckling April back
into her car seat. "That was Mrs. Pollidori?"
 
The reporter nods jerkily. "Yes, her husband is out of town for a
conference. It's a good thing you got here when you did, that poor
woman might be dead otherwise. How did you know?"
 
"A hunch," Scully mutters, finally wrestling her too-tall husband
into the backseat. "I'm sorry, your name is?"
 
"Here's my card," the reporter says, proffering a small rectangle,
and the distracted FBI agent pockets it while reseating Page in the
front passenger seat. "Give me a call when you find anything."
 
"Likewise," Scully says, locking her door. 
 
As the redhead speeds off, putting some serious distance between
themselves and the tented house, Mulder mumbles, "Pans're violated."
 
"What?" 
 
"She's pregnant," Mulder says, his eyes still closed with his head
drooping forward, "th' pans is violated."
 
"Mulder," Scully says in a no-nonsense voice, "put on the mask, lie
back, and shut up."
 
"Ooh, Mommy said shut up," Page says, her eyes wide. 
 
"Shut up, shut up, shut up!" Sammy crows, bouncing in his own car
seat.
 
"Samuel Taylor Scully Mulder, not another word," his mother says with
steel in her voice.
 
Nobody says a thing for the rest of the trip to the hospital. 
 
~*~*~ 
 
The next day, Scully and her children are in Mrs. Pollidori's room,
the children being given an exemption as long as they stay by the
door. "How old are they?" Mrs. Pollidori asks, smiling in spite of
her weariness.
 
"Page is three, Sammy's two, and April is nine months," Scully says,
shifting her youngest daughter on her shoulder.
 
"You're so lucky." The thin woman smiles, and the FBI agent finds
herself smiling back. "I've always wanted children."
 
"It may be your lucky day," Mulder's voice drawls from the doorway,
"according to the doctors, you are with child."
 
"Mulder, aren't you supposed to be in bed?" Scully whips around,
missing Mrs. Pollidori's ecstatic smile.
 
He's dressed in his FBI suit and tie, but that was only due to great
effort and concentration. "I was, but I got bored," he says, sitting
on his haunches to be close to his kids and to give his unsteady legs
a break. "Are you two being good to Mommy?"
 
"Uh-huh," they chorus, pretending not to notice their mother's
watchful eyes.
 
"I see," he says, grinning up at his wife. "We need to get back to
the house to look for clues."
 
"Are you in any condition to do that?" Scully looks at him more
carefully.
 
"The cops are airing out the house right now," he says, as much to
his partner as to the woman in the bed, "and if they've inhaled
anything, they might miss something."
 
"Mrs. Pollidori, did you see anything?" Scully turns around to face
the now-pale woman.
 
The thin woman's eyes have gotten larger in the space of a couple of
seconds. "The thi-, he, he had this face with these hideous tumors,
and," she shudders, her eyes staring at nothing in particular, "and
two mouths, not just one."
 
"I see," Mulder says, rising too fast and lurching against the
doorframe. "Well, we better get going. Daylight's burning."
 
"Not so fast," Scully says, walking over and pinning her husband to
the doorway. "You stay here. I'll go and check it out."
 
"No, we all go together," Mulder says, using Page and Sammy as
giggling leg braces, "strength in numbers."
 
"Right," Scully sighs, then turns around. "Thank you, Mrs.
Pollidori."
 
The thin woman shakes her head. "No, thank you." A smile lights up
her drawn features. "I'm going to be a mother!"
 
~*~*~ 
 
At the Pollidori house, they are greeted by an irate scientist and
some rattled policemen. "What are you doing in my house?" Doctor
Pollidori thunders as the local PD scatters while the FBI agents and
their children head to the kitchen.
 
Mulder and Scully flash their badges, Mulder less smoothly than
Scully. "Doctor Pollidori, is there something you'd like to tell us?"
the tall agent asks, glaring at the doctor glaring at his kids.
 
"Are you accusing me of knowing something about this, this mess?" the
white-haired man throws his hands dramatically at the fingerprint
dust coating almost every other surface in the kitchen.
 
"I'm accusing you that your wife may have been impregnated." 
 
"How? By whom?" the scientist looks genuinely baffled. 
 
"Oh, I think you know," Mulder says, attempting to lean forward
menacingly, but managing only to lurch forward like a drunk and catch
himself on the counter.
 
"This could all be part of an elaborate hoax," Scully offers, then
grabs Sammy's hand before he puts it into his mouth. "No, it's not
sugar," she says, dusting off his hands as best she can.
 
"A hoax?" Doctor Pollidori frowns. 
 
"Doctor Pollidori," Mulder says, holding up the frying pan with some
whitish, non-fingerprint dust residue. "The other victims had their
frying pans... violated." He puts the pan down before he falls over,
stumbling and catching himself on the counter again. "Do you know
what that is?"
 
The scientist purses his lips. "No, I don't." 
 
Mulder staggers over to the trashcan and pulls out a large,
partially-emptied peanut butter jar. "I think we have our smoking
gun," he declaims, setting it on the table and sitting himself on a
chair. "We must've interrupted the intruder before he could finish it
off."
 
"Of course," Doctor Pollidori says in a smug, indulgent tone. "But it
does rather sound more like an elaborate hoax than anything, yes?" He
raises his eyebrows to include Scully. "In the meantime, please have
this place cleaned up while I visit my wife. Elizabeth is in a very
delicate state right now, and if I were to bring her home to this,
she may have a relapse." He strides out the door, slamming it
decisively shut behind him.
 
"She's in a delicate state, all right," Mulder mutters, then looks at
his family. "What?"
 
"Mulder, I thought you'd behave," Scully says, "or at least sit down
sooner than you did."
 
"Hey, I was fine," he protests. "It's Doctor Frankenstein there that has
a problem."
 
"He may be an insensitive, egotistical pompous jerk, but that doesn't
necessarily mean he's the culprit," Scully grunts, helping her
husband to his feet. "Otherwise, you'd've been a bad guy a long time
ago."
 
"Hey!" Mulder says, pouting even as Page and Sammy resume their role
of leg braces. "I was never that bad!"
 
"Uh-huh," Scully says, leading the march back to the car. 
 
~*~*~ 
 
Fortunately, there was never a headline with the FBI declaring the
Great Mutato to be a hoax, but the postman still fanned the flames of
distrust when he showed Izzy Berkowitz off as a false representative
of his comic book creation. Still, Mulder's uneasy about the fate of
the elder Mr. Pollidori as they research the origins of the frying
pan residue. He tries not to snap impatiently as he asks, "Is there
someone registered locally?"
 
As expected, his wife nods, and he strides towards the car.
Unfortunately, his legs are still a bit on the wobbly side, and
Scully grabs the keys. "Until you stop weaving like a drunken sailor,
I'm driving," she says, and buckles everyone in with a firmness that
forbids argument.
 
Once they reach the barn, Mulder's got a sinking feeling in his
stomach, and he's sure it's not from the anesthetic gas. They uncover
not only the freshly-dug grave, but also the birdlike reporter. What
is up with this lady? Mulder thinks as they try to escort her from
the premises, but instead she joins them into the kitchen. There,
they find the photo album, and behind the shorter women and the small
children peering at the photos, the tall agent's face shows a sadness
rarely seen by even his wife as they flip through pictures of a
shared life with father and son, however hideous the son may look.
 
"That's it," the reporter finally says, her head bobbing with a
jerk-like motion, "that's the thing that buried the old man in the
barn."
 
"How sweet is the affection of others to such a wretch as I am,"
Mulder mutters as the birdlike reporter leaves to scribble furiously
and privately.
 
"Who said that?" Scully turns around to look up at her husband. 
 
"Justine Moritz, an innocent woman who died for the sins of a
madman," he replies, "at least in the book."
 
"Frankenstein?" she asks. "I must've missed that." 
 
He shrugs a little, a half-grin on his face. "Yeah, well, your
literary appreciation's incomplete with only Moby Dick," he says.
 
She draws herself up to her full height, which is still not very
tall. "That which is in Melville's classic is the sum of what
literature has to offer," she says in stentorian tones, "all else is
superfluous."
 
"And you passed your undergraduate how?" he asks, only to be swatted
by his partner. "Ow."
 
"What's that?" Scully frowns as sounds of a large crowd and sights of
torches lighting up the night begin to fill the farm grounds.
 
"Oh, no," Mulder says, unconsciously holding his family to him.
"They're here."
 
~*~*~ 
 
As before, the FBI couple tries to calm the worked-up crowd, but Doctor
Pollidori plays them like a fiddle, and Mulder and Scully are forced
to retreat back to the house for their children's safety while the
townspeople unwisely go through the wooden barn with torches. Mulder
hates that his kids should have to see the dark side of human
behavior before they even hit kindergarten. Not to say that preschool
isn't an education in the dark side, but anyways...
 
"Daddy, are they mad at us?" Page asks. 
 
"No, sweetie," Mulder picks her up, keeping an eye on the barn.
"They're scared."
 
"Why?" Sammy asks. 
 
"Because they think being ugly means being bad," he says, squatting
down to his son. "And we know that's not true."
 
"It's not?" Scully raises an eyebrow. 
 
He looks up at her. "Hey, the Lone Gunmen aren't the prettiest people
on the planet, but they're definitely the good guys," he says, then
grins.
 
"I don't know about that Frohike," she mutters, but grins back
anyways. Then she hugs April to herself. "Besides, the only way
Pollidori could've seen the monster was if he was out here himself."
As she muses, she notes Page waving. "What is it, honey?"
 
"It's a ghost!" Page smiles as the cellar doors close. "See, gone
now."
 
"I don't think so," Mulder says, putting her down to pull out a
flashlight while Scully pulls out her gun. "Let's go check it out."
 
And check it out they do, with Mulder leading and Scully and the kids
hanging behind. They find the Great Mutato, and it's the kids, rather
than the agents, who coax him out of hiding, to Mulder's surprise. He
would've thought Mutato would be less inclined to scare little kids,
but apparently, his kids are harder to scare than others. And as
before, the thoughtless crowd burns down the barn, even as the small
family tries to make their escape quietly this time. Again, they
retreat into the cellar, and Page screams as people break the cellar
windows with pitchforks and rocks. He picks her up and holds Sammy to
his leg, while Scully holds onto both April and the Great Mutato, his
jaw working as his children bury their faces into his clothes. He's
pretty sure that if he weren't an FBI agent, he'd shoot every last
one of those idiots scaring his children, laws be damned.
 
As the hysterical crowd force their way into the cellar, Mulder and
Scully stand in front of the Great Mutato protectively, and they lock
eyes as well as hands before facing the crowd. Here we go, the tall
man thinks, as Doctor Pollidori swaggers to the forefront.
 
~*~*~ 
 
If this man even touches my kids, there'll be a bloodbath tonight,
Mulder thinks as Doctor Pollidori, Shaineh Berkowitz, and the crowd
demand to have a look at the "monster." Reluctantly, the agents do
so, but only because they really have no other choice. The so-called
monster acquits himself quite well once he's allowed to speak, and
finally says in his hoarse voice, "Suffice it to say, his experiments
failed and... my father is dead. I am alone... and miserable. But as one
deformed and horrible as myself would not deny herself to me." He
looks pleadingly at the monster who created him, "If this being you
can create, then I will take blame as the murderer."
 
The scientist, true to form, sneers as he says, "I don't know how to
recreate you. You were a mistake!"
 
Mulder forces himself not to punch the guy out, and is pretty sure
his molars will be dust by the way he's grinding his teeth. "What we
did was wrong," the Great Mutato hangs his head, "but in our
trespasses we gave you a loving son and in your homes I went places
I'd never dreamed of. With your books, and your records and home
media centers, I learned of the world and of a mother's love that
I'll never know." He smiles sadly, and Mulder's almost shocked to see
he can recognize that expression on such a warped face. "Cher loved
that boy so much."
 
As Page reaches out to pat the deformed man's shoulder, Izzy
Berkowitz looks at the crowd. "Hey, he's no monster," he says, and
the crowd murmurs.
 
His piece said, the Great Mutato nods at the little girl before
holding out his wrists. "Arrest me, then, as you will."
 
"No!" Sammy shouts, peeling himself off his father's leg and
attaching himself to the deformed man's. "Not bad guy!"
 
Scully blinks at her son, then at her husband, then at the crowd. And
somehow, she's not surprised to find Mulder and herself beaming at
their boy, nor the crowd wearing similar expressions, save for Doctor
Pollidori. But she is surprised when the Great Mutato smiles on both
faces and bends down, hugging the boy back. "Thank you," he says in
his soft voice, clumsily patting the small child's back.
 
Now what do we do, she thinks, looking up only to find Mulder with
the same look on his face.
 
~*~*~ 
 
"Saw the ghost of Elvis 
On Union Avenue 
Followed him up to the gates of Graceland 
Then I watched him walk right through 
Now security they did not see him 
They just hovered 'round his tomb 
But there's a pretty little thing 
Waiting for the King 
Down in the Jungle Room"
 
As Cher belts out the chorus of "Walking in Memphis" to the crowded
nightclub, Mulder's again amazed at what a little FBI finagling can
do, as he, his family, and the Great Mutato are sitting in the front
row. That, and the fact that most of the people who were ready to
kill the poor man less than a couple hours ago are now sitting behind
him and enjoying the show. He shakes his head, then laughs as the
Great Mutato is all but spazzing in the chair, then high-fives the
crazy guy. Sammy is standing on his lap and bouncing as energetically
as Mutato, making Mulder a little careful about his boy falling off.
When Cher steps down and takes the two-faced man by the hand, Mulder
gives him a helpful push and Scully smiles while Page dances between
her parents' legs and April's lying peaceably in her mother's arms,
thanks to earplugs.
 
"They've got catfish on the table 
They've got gospel in the air 
And Reverend Green be glad to see you 
When you haven't got a prayer"
 
"Dance with me, Daddy, dance!" Page says, tugging at her father's
pants leg.
 
He shrugs, then puts Sammy on his chair before picking up Page and
joining Cher and the Great Mutato on the dance floor. Both Mutato's
faces are grinning from ear to ear, and Mulder smiles back. Then he
spins back to his wife, sitting next to a jumping little boy with a
dozing baby in her arms. He puts out a free hand to her, and she
raises an eyebrow.
 
"My hands are full," she says, shrugging helplessly. 
 
"So are mine," he says, pulling her up by the elbow. "Come on." 
 
"Fine," she says, gingerly shifting April to accommodate not only
Mulder, but Page in his arms. "You are a silly man."
 
"And you love me, don't you?" He grins, and she grins back as they
slowly balance their daughters between them, allowing Sammy full
reign of their chairs to jump all over.
 
"And I'm walking in Memphis 
Walking with my feet ten feet off of Beale 
Walking in Memphis 
But do I really feel the way I feel?" 
 
"Yes." Scully smiles, and leans against her husband. 
 
"Yes?" He blinks as the song winds down. 
 
"Yes," she repeats, "I really feel like my feet are ten feet off of
Beale."
 
"Does that mean we're going to Graceland next?" 
 
She snorts. "When it starts raining sleeping bags." Then she looks
up, half-expecting an unseasonal shower of camping equipment, then
laughs when he looks up, too. "Keep dreaming."
 
"I already am," Mulder says, pulling his family close to him. 
 
* 
"Walking in Memphis" by Marc Cohn. ~*~*~

~*~*~

Chapter Fifty-Two

 Bill Scully's House 
US Naval Station 
 San Diego, Ca 
 December 21st, 1997 

Tara looks up from arranging the crèche on the mantle when she hears
voices outside. Before she can leave the living room, the front door
opens.

"Hello? Merry Christmas!" Scully calls from the entryway.

"Hello!" Tara cries. "Is that my niece and nephew behind Dana?"
Playing shy, Sammy and Page hide behind their mother.

Before they run to throw their arms around Tara's legs. "We tricked
you!" Page tells her. "We're not shy."

"That's for sure," Scully tells Tara with a smirk as she works to
herd the children into a corner where she can remove their coats.

Maggie Scully comes in too and looks thrilled to see Tara. "Oh, my
God. Look at you." She hugs her very pregnant sister-in-law.

"Can you believe it?" Tara asks with a happy grin. 

"How am I going to get my arms around you?" 

"Sammy, where are you going?" Scully asks as he bolts with his
snowsuit still hanging off him.

"Gettin' the door," Sammy explains as he pulls it open for Mulder and
Bill. Bill has suitcases, and Mulder's arms are full with April and
the children's belongings.

"Thanks, Buddy," Bill tells his nephew.

After dropping the bags onto the floor near the stairs, Bill turns to
his mother. "Sorry about the digs, Mom. I know you hoped like hell
you didn't have to spend another night in base housing."

"Are you kidding? This is wonderful."

Scully looks up in wonder. "This is the exact same layout as our old
house."

"That's the Navy for ya."

"Yeah. Bill tells me, Mom, that you'll be staying in your old room.
And the nursery is going to be in Dana and Melissa's room."

Bill nods. "That's right. Dana and Fox will have 'my' room and the
little ones will be in what would be Charlie's."

"Let's bring these bags up stairs, Bill. So no one trips over them,"
Tara says pointedly. Scully doesn't blame her, because her brother's
wife probably can't see her own feet.

"Aye, captain." He gives her a mock solute before grabbing up all the
heavy bags, leaving her the baby bags. "Fox, why don't I show you the
rooms?" Bill adds, and Mulder suppresses a wince. He's going to be
Fox all week, he can tell.

"Sure, thanks. Come on, Brats, let's see where we're sleeping." 

"We're not brats," Page complains, but she and her brother beat
Mulder up the stairs.

Still in the living room, Scully catches Maggie looks at the tree
with a wistful look.

"Mom? You okay?" 

"Oh, yeah. I was just thinking about your Dad...and Melissa...and how
much I miss them." She gives a bitter little shake of her head. "I
couldn't even get a hold of Missy."

She walks past Scully to the stairs. Scully is about to follow her
when the phone rings. She looks upstairs.

"Bill?" Scully calls, unsure if she should answer. When there's no
response, she picks it up. "Scully residence..."

"Dana?" a familiar male voice asks. 

"Yes, sorry, who is this?" 

"Dana...she needs your help. She needs you, Dana. Go to her." 

"Who...who is this?" 

Giving the receiver a puzzled look, Scully hangs up and calls a
number. "FBI, San Diego."

"This is Special Agent, Dana Scully. My badge number is 2317616. Can
you transfer me to your sound agent, please? I would like to trace
the last number that was dialed into this phone."

"Who was that?" Mulder asks as he climbs down the stairs.

"I don't know. Feel like going for a ride?" 

"Sure, just let me ask your Mom to keep an eye on the kids." 

~*~*~ 

The Sims Residence
30 Minutes Later

There are people mingling and an ambulance parked outside when Scully
and Mulder arrive. Taking in the crowd, she asks Mulder to wait in
the car, which he agrees to with a shrug. Scully shows her badge to a
cop and walks into the house. A photographer is taking pictures of a
phone off the hook. She goes past the photographer up to the bathroom
where there are policemen.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Who are you?" Officer Kresge asks irritably.

"Agent Scully, FBI. Can you tell me what's going on here?" 

"Well, no offense, Scully, FBI, but what's it to you?" 

"I received a phone call from this address. It was an older man's
voice. He said that somebody here needed help."

"When was this?" 

"About 20 minutes ago." 

"I've been here 30 minutes. Guarantee you no one's called out to you
or anyone else. Phone's off the hook."

Scully is confused. She looks to the bathroom. "Please, can you tell
me what happened here?" Kresge brings her into the bathroom. A
photographer is taking pictures of the crime scene. Kresge allows
Scully take a look at the body. A woman naked in a bathtub. Wrists
slashed, blood pooled on the floor and staining the water pink in the
tub.

"This is Mrs. Roberta Sims. Age 40. Suicide. She's been dead at least
three hours."

"I guess she's beyond help now," Scully agrees.

"What's going on in there?" Mulder asks as she comes to the passenger
side window.

"A suicide from the looks of it." 

"Why are we here?" Mulder asks. ::I thought that this wouldn't
happen. Scully was never abducted, so how could Emily exist?:: His
forehead creases as he tries to puzzle it out.

"A man called and told me that a 'she' here needed my help." Scully
pauses. "And I'm pretty sure the man calling was my father."

He blinks in surprise. "You got a call from 1-800-the great beyond?" 

"Don't joke, Mulder. This is serious." 

Mulder stares out the window at the police cruisers. He's not sure he
that he was joking.

~*~*~

When Scully goes back into the house a few minutes later, she brings
Mulder with her. They stop in the hallway to wait for officer Kresge,
and Mulder notices something in the kitchen that makes his belly feel
like it's full of lead. Emily.

Neither Scully nor the officer notices his stricken look, but instead
tall about the call Scully got. "I don't know what to tell you. Pac
Bell confirms that a call came in from this address to your brother's
house, but from this end, they show no outgoing call. Plus they
confirm that the phone here had been off the hook for the last three
hours."

"What was their explanation?" Scully asks.

::Your dead father called to tell you that you need to help a child
who shouldn't even exist in this reality.:: Mulder thinks, and it
takes all of his self-control not to release the insane laugh that's
bubbling just below the surface. ::Get a hold of yourself, Mulder.
There's some other explanation, because that kid isn't Scully's. It's
not possible.::

"Records mix-up, software glitch. It was obviously some kind of
mistake. Anyway, I've got to wrap this up. Talk with the husband.
Listen, weird phone calls aside, this is looking pretty
straightforward. A lot of people check themselves out around
Christmas time."

Kresge goes to talk to Marshal Sims, and Mulder stares until the
officer swings the door closed. "Mulder, what were you looking at?"
Scully asks.

"The little girl. She reminds me of Page." 

"It must be because they're the same age, since they don't look
alike." Mulder nods, but he's not really inclined to agree. True,
Page's hair is platinum and halfway down her back while Emily's is
sandy and short, but they both have the same ocean blue eyes that are
common to Scully's family. Strangers might think they were sisters.

~*~*~ 

Scully misses dinner that night, because she and officer Kresge
discover that the dead woman was drugged before she died. This leaves
Mulder alone in what he considers hostile territory. It isn't as bad
as before when Bill Jr. laid a number of sins at his feet, but he and
his brother-in-law are anything but close, so Mulder spends the
entire dinner huddled near Maggie and saying nothing other than
things that'll encourage his two older children to eat.

Needless to say, he's completely exhausted by the time Scully finally
gets back. She doesn't seem to notice. "Mulder, look at this." Scully
shoves a picture at him.

It's Emily. "How'd you get this?" 

"Officer Kresge let me have it." 

He's afraid to ask, but he does. "Why did you want it?" 

"I thought about you saying that the little girl reminds you of
Page."

::crap::

Scully goes over to a bookshelf and pulls out a photo album. "I think
you're right. She does look a little like Page. But she looks more
like Missy did at that age. Take a look at this. This was taken when
my dad was stationed in Japan. Missy was three." She places Emily's
picture next to it. "They're identical."

"What does that prove?" Mulder asks reasonably. 

"That there's something I'm missing. Did you bring your laptop?" 

"Do you really need to ask that?" 

Mulder leaves the room long enough to put the kids to bed, and when
he comes back in, Scully has an excited look on her face.

"Look, Mulder. Emily's adopted." 

"And?" he asks, already knowing what's coming next.

"And she might be Missy's daughter." 

"That's a long shot," he objects.

"Since when are you one to scoff at long shots?" she asks. "Dial
Danny for me, would you?"

He wants to refuse the request, and hope that she forgets, but he
decides that it wouldn't be fair to the little girl, so he pulls out
his cell phone and punches in the numbers before handing it to her.
::I hope this doesn't end as badly as it did the last time.:: he can
already feel himself becoming depressed.

"Hi Danny, it's me, Dana...Yeah, Merry Christmas to you, too...I, ah,
I'm wondering if you can do me a favor...Back when I was in med
school my sister volunteered to be part of a genetics project I was
conducting, so I ran a set of PCRs. Do you think you could get a hold
of a copy for me? If you can, I need you to send them to the San
Diego field office. As soon as possible. Ok. Thanks, Danny."

~*~*~

The Next Night

Most of Scully's day is spent doing an autopsy of Roberta Sims.
Mulder has yet again stayed behind, and seemed to her to be fairly
eager not to get involved with the case.

The house is dark when she gets in. a cursory peek upstairs tells her
that her husband and children are asleep, so she doesn't feel guilty
about her intention to do more work since they don't need her
attention at the moment. There's a manila envelope on the table. She
opens it and sits down. She takes the PCR screen of Melissa out of
the report and matches it to Emily's PCR results from the lab, and
she's on the verge of crying when she sees they match.

"Dana? Are you alright?" Maggie asks, startling her by approaching
from behind." It's two o'clock in the morning. Where have you been
all day? We were expecting you at lunch." From her mother's
reproachful tone, Scully senses that the kids were not happy.
Mulder's probably been miserable too. "Your husband went to bed two
hours ago, not that you can blame him since for all he knew he'd be
the only one who'd be getting up with the baby tonight."

It's on the tip of Scully's tongue to point out that April has been
sleeping through the night for two months, but it's not the
discussion she's interesting in having. "Mom...sit down." Giving her
daughter a wary look, Maggie does. "The woman who committed suicide
has an adopted daughter, a three-year-old named Emily. I got a sample
of Emily's blood and I had the lab run a test on her DNA. It's called
a PCR test. This..." She hands her one of the screens "is Emily's."
She hands over the other one. "And this, is Melissa's which we ran
for that experiment I did in college. They match."

"What does it mean, they match?" 

"It means, that this little girl Emily...is Melissa's daughter."

Scully finds the pictures and shows them to her mother, sure that
she'll concede to the truth when she sees the resemblance.

Maggie shakes her head. "It's impossible." 

"You can't deny that there is a remarkable resemblance." 

"Melissa was three years old when this picture was taken. She was
practically a baby. All kids can look the same at that age."

"Mom, it's uncanny. Emily looked exactly like Melissa. That's why I
ordered the PCR test. Because her face may change, but her DNA
can't."

"And the test is accurate?" 

"There's a 60% chance that Melissa is Emily's mother. I'll order a
more comprehensive test, a RFLP. It'll take a couple of days, then
we'll be sure. "

"Well, I'm already sure your sister did not have a baby. She would
have told me."

"Mom, remember about four years ago and Melissa took off? She
traveled up and down the west coast, we didn't know where she was
half the time."

"You're saying she was pregnant and she didn't want us to know?" 

"That was 1994. Emily was born that November. She could have given it
up for adoption and none of us would have ever known."

"I don't know..." Maggie sounds highly doubtful.

"Mom. Page was four months old before Missy bothered to meet her.
Haven't you ever wondered about that?" Maggie nods reluctantly. "If
you were planning to give up your baby, wouldn't it make you not want
to meet a niece? At least until the baby was old enough that it
wouldn't look like the one you gave away?"

Maggie sighed deeply. "Maybe." 

~*~*~

Even though it's painful, Mulder spends most of Christmas Eve
trailing after his wife. First to visit doctor Calderon to discuss
Emily's treatment and find out that the drugs in Roberta's system
were at easy access to Marshal Sims; then to assist in the arrest of
Marshal Sims on suspicion of murder, then to see Scully fall in love
with Emily as she's taken away to the childen's home, and last to go
and frown over Marshal Sims' murder, which happens despite Mulder's
insistence that he be closely guarded on suicide watch.

Since Scully never told him about her long ago conversation with
Bill, he didn't know that it was going to happen, and went up to take
a nap before Bill and Tara's party.
 
Tara and Maggie are putting final touches on the tree while Scully
watches listlessly - at least until Bill taps her on the shoulder."
Ah, Dana, could you give me a hand in the kitchen?"

She looks around and doesn't see anything that needs to be done, so
she suspects that he was luring her away for another agenda. "What's
up?"

"I need you to tell me what's going on." 

"What do you mean?" 

"You're not here, you're a million miles away. I thought you came to
see the family."

"I did." 

"I'm not sure you did. My brother-in-law and nieces and nephew have
been here for the holidays, but not you. I thought this other thing
was resolved. I thought you caught the guy that murdered that woman."

"We did." She frowns. 

"Then it's about that little girl, isn't it? Mom told me. You really
think Melissa had a baby?"

"Yes, I do." 

"Dad called you from beyond the grave to tell you that? Sounds like
something your husband would say, and even he's been saner than that
lately."

"It does not matter where that phone call came from. What matters is
that there is a little girl who needs my help."

"This isn't about any little girl, Dana. This is about you. It's
about some...maternal instinct gone haywire. You have kids, so now
you think you need to save every one you encounter."

Scully mentally winces, thinking fleetingly of Kevin Kryder. "Bill, I
don't expect you to understand but I am not going to stand here and
justify my motive."

"Dana, I have to show you something." 

Bill opens a drawer and takes out a picture. He hands it to Scully.
It's a picture of Melissa. "Look at the date on the back." Scully
turns it and it says October 7th, 1994. "Does Melissa look pregnant
to you in that picture? It's about four weeks before the girl was
born."

"Bill, that doesn't prove anything. All that date is when the film
was developed. You know as well as I do that mom herself held onto
film for as long as a year before finally dropping it off. Even if
the date is accurate, Melissa didn't have to be pregnant to have a
baby. There's...there's invitro fertilization, there's surrogate
motherhood."

"Dana, listen to yourself. You're creating this whole scenario to
fulfill a dream."

"What dream?" 

Bill shrugs with a frustrated look. "You tell me. If you want another
kid, make one. But don't try to make this child our flesh and blood
when she isn't."

Scully bites back a scathing remark and stomps upstairs. 

~*~*~

Mulder wakes from a nap when he feels Scully sit down on the bed.
"What's up?" he mumbles sleepily, struggling to sit up. She thwarts
his attempt by pushing him back down on the pillow.

He wonders why she did it until she puts her thumbs into the
waistband of his boxer shorts and yanks them down. Once she strips
over her own clothes with the same lack of care and settles onto his
waist, he doesn't wonder about much else, except the fact that she's
making no attempt whatsoever to keep quiet, as if she would be happy
for people down stairs to know what they were doing. Even that
concern is lost under a wave of sensation as she grinds her hips into
him.

 ~*~*~

December 25th, 1997
6:30 a.m.
 
Maggie Scully looks happy as she plays with her three very excited
grandchildren while the rest of the sleepy adults lounge around the
room.

Bill yawns a little, then gives the kids a smile. "Did Santa come?" 

"Yes!!" To their surprise it's Sammy who is the most vocal about it,
and Mulder puts his hands out to keep the boy from tumbling into the
fireplace when he attempts to tackle a brightly wrapped package.

"Your mom always was the first downstairs at Christmas. Couldn't wait
to get those presents."

"That one has my name on it," Page says confidentially as she points
to a package.

"She can't really read that, can she?" Tara asks, attempting to look
down where the child is pointing.

"She can really read it." Scully assures her. "And several other
words as well."

"Three years old, and already reading. What a smart kid." 

Bill hugs his wife from behind. "It's the Scully genes," he says
smugly, looking at Mulder as he says it. Mulder just smiles.

They're helping the kids open their gifts when the doorbell rings.
"Excuse me. I'll be right back." Bill says, earning a grateful look
from Mulder whose hands are full of baby April and wrapping paper.

The visitor's voice drifts towards them. "FBI Courier. Package for
Agent Dana Scully."

"I bet that one's not from Santa," Mulder whispers to Maggie, who
just raises an eyebrow.

"I'll sign for it," Bill says. 

"No, no. I need Agent Scully's signature, sir." 

"Oh, all right. Dana?" Scully goes to the door, and shivers when a
cold blast of air hits her pajamas.

"I need you to sign for this," the courier says, holding out a
clipboard to Scully. "Merry Christmas."

"Merry Christmas." She opens the package, skims the contents and
stumbles to the living room. The others look at her. Mulder stands up
and goes to her side, because he's suddenly sure she's going to
faint.

"What is it?" Maggie asks. 

"It's the DNA test on Emily Sims' blood." 

"What does it say?" Bill demands to know. 

"It says, definitely, that Melissa is Emily's mother." Her face is as
pale as milk.

Mulder gives Scully a searching look. "There's more. I can tell from
the look in your eyes."

Scully nods, and tries to clear her throat. "The person who did the
test thought it had a lot in common with another sample he'd recently
looked at, so he did another test. They matched."

"Who was the other sample from?" ::Please God, don't let her say me.
I know I was missing those nine minutes, and who knows what they did
to me at Ellens airbase years ago...::

His fear mounts when Scully refuses to look up at him until he lifts
her chin. "Alex Krycek."

::It fits:: Stunned, Mulder sits heavily in a chair and doesn't
answer Bill and Maggie's alarmed questions.

~*~*~

Chapter Fifty-Three

"Answer me!" Maggie cries. "I can tell from your reaction that this
is horrible. I need to know why. Why would you look that way when you
learned who my grandchild's father is?"

Mulder shakes his head, but Scully answers in a husky voice. "He's
not a good person, Mom."

"Not a good person how?" 

"He used to work with us, but he was a double agent. People, innocent
people, have died because of the men he's mixed up with."

Maggie covers her mouth to suppress a gasp. "Oh God." 

"We need to find Melissa," Mulder says quietly. "Find out what her
side of the story is." He shoots Scully a look - find out if she
knows what she's done.

"I couldn't get in touch with her to ask her to come today," Maggie
frets.

"Leave it to me," Mulder says grimly. "I know people who can find her
for us."

~*~*~

Nine Hours Later

Sitting in Mulder's parked rental car, Missy's face is bewildered as
she looks from her sister to her brother-in-law. "I never had a baby,
Dana. Look, you could examine me if you want to, and you'll just find
that I've never been pregnant."

Scully shakes her head. "The DNA tests prove that this little girl is
yours, Missy. How do you explain that?"

"The test is wrong." 

"It's not, I had them run it twice." 

A look of horror crosses Missy's face suddenly. "How old did you say
the kid is?"

"Three. She's just a couple of months younger than Page." 

"I know how this happened..." Missy moans, wrapping her arms around
herself.

Mulder steels himself for her confession that she's an alien
abductee, but that's not what comes out of her mouth. "It was in one
of the university papers out in California, and it seemed like a good
idea."

"What was?" Scully asks, confused.

"An ad begging women to donate eggs to science. They have trouble
freezing them, you know, but one of the cutting edge science schools
was working on a method that would be more successful than previous
attempts. I thought of all the women like Tara who wanted babies but
couldn't have them...how could I not help?" Missy's eyes were teary.

"It was just to experiment with freezing them, not to use them for
anything. There weren't supposed to be any babies. How could they do
this?"

"There are a lot of ruthless people in the world," Mulder says
gently.

To his surprise, Scully looks relieved. "So you didn't knowingly have
a child with Alex Krycek?"

Missy's head whips up. "What does this have to do with Alex?" 

"You know him??" 

"He's my...um..." Missy looks like she's unsure of what to say. "We know
each other."

Scully and Mulder look at her like she has two heads. "Oh
Missy..."Scully groans, "I always knew you had horrible taste in men,
but this takes the cake."

"Alex Krycek is probably working for the people who used your eggs,
Missy," Mulder tells her.

"No." 

Scully shakes her head, as if to clear it. "That aside, we need to
figure out what to do with Emily. She doesn't have anyone right now,
and you're her mother. The ball's in your court."

"Do you want to go with us to meet her?" Mulder asks.

He expects her to decline, but she nods wordlessly, her lips
compressed into a thin line. Saying nothing else, he starts the car
and heads towards their destination.

~*~*~

 San Diego County Children's Center 
An Hour Later
 
The three of them are pointed in the direction of the playroom, which
is where they find the child. Emily sits on the floor, coloring.

Scully decides to make introductions, since of the three of them, the
girl has met her before. "Emily? I'd like you to meet my husband and
my sister. His name is Mulder and hers is Missy."

 Emily doesn't look up at them. "Uh hum." 

"She's a little shy," Scully says, and looks at her sister. Missy is
shy and silent too.

"What are you coloring?" Mulder asks.

"A potato." 

"Have you ever seen Mr. Potato Head? He looks like this." He gives a
pretty goofy impersonation of Mr. Potato Head that never fails to
make his children laugh. "Doesn't it?" Emily nods.

::My niece.:: Mulder thinks. ::If she lives, she'll be my children's
cousin, my wife's niece....::

The three of them watch Emily color a little longer, until Mulder
gets a phone call and excuses himself. He's frowning when he comes
back in.

"I'll be right back," Scully tells her sister and her niece. Missy's
eyes look panicked, but she doesn't say anything as they walk away.
Out of earshot, Scully asks, "Something's wrong, isn't it?"

"I've found Emily's surrogate mother. I had Frohike hack into the
California Social Services Adoption database."

"You got a name?" 

"Yeah, her mother of record is one Anna Fugazzi." 

"Fugazzi?" 

"Yeah, as in slang term for fake." 

"I don't understand. Why create a false record?" 

"Because there are no true records. Emily didn't come into this world
through any system that keeps them."

"How did she come into this world?"

"Have you asked yourself that?" 

"Well, she was born to someone, she...she has to belong to someone
other than Missy, who has only just learned she exists."

"Someone, who's proven that they'll do anything to protect her or
their interest in her."

"Our family can protect her too." 

"Yeah, but who's going to protect you? Emily's adoptive parents are
both dead, by no accident."

"I know...I've considered that, but I've also considered that there's
only one right thing to do." She looks over to her sister, who is
still staring at Emily without making an attempt to interact with
her. "If Missy is strong enough to do it."

"And if she isn't?" Mulder presses.

"Then we'll think of another way." The far away look in her eyes
promises that the 'other way' is something she's thought through and
is going to discuss with him later.

Another woman comes into the room then to talk to the girl, and they
know it's their cue to leave, so they go and get Missy.

"Good-bye, Emily," Missy whispers, speaking to her daughter for the
first time.

 ~*~*~

 Bill Scully Residence 
10:16 p.m. 

Mulder is lying on the bed feeding April a bottle when Scully climbs
up next to them.

"It takes two of us just to get Tara into bed these days," she tells
him with a tired smile.

"When's she due?" 

"Two weeks ago. I guess I ought to thank my lucky stars that none of
our babies have ever been overdue." There's a long pause as they both
watch April rub her fingers over the side of the bottle. "What
happens to Emily if Missy doesn't want her?"

Mulder shrugs. "I don't know." 

"She has family, Mulder. We shouldn't just send her away to people
who aren't even blood relations." She shivers a little. "And I sure
as hell don't want her to end up in Krycek's hands - and don't you
dare use the 'but he's her father' line," she warns him.

"Wouldn't dream of it." 

"If Missy doesn't want her, do we?" Scully gives him a questioning
look.

"I...I think we need to find out what Missy wants before we start
making contingency plans," Mulder says evasively.

The phone rings. ::Saved by the bell.::

 Scully answers it and speaks to someone who sounds confused. "That's
the children's center. Emily's sick."

~*~*~

 San Diego County Children's Center 

To Scully's dismay, Missy doesn't go with them when they go to check
on Emily. It upsets Mulder too, because he's hoping that his
sister-in-law will surprise them by showing some responsibility, and
this doesn't bode well for that.

A worker lets them in and they go upstairs. Scully goes to the girls'
dormitory. She opens the door and Emily is in her bed sleeping with
the other girls. Scully sits on the edge of her bed and turns on the
light. Scully touches her forehead.

"She's burning up." 

"I'll call 911." Scully lifts the covers and Mulder picks her up.

"Scully? There's something on her neck. "

Scully lowers the back of Emily's nightgown and pushes her hair
aside, revealing a patch of green." Oh, my God."

~*~*~

 Hospital 

In a room with a window to the hall, two doctors hover over Emily who
is lying in bed. The doctor is talking softly to Emily about what
he's going to do. Scully looks up when a doctor comes out to talk to
her.

"How is she?" 

"Well, we've put her on a saline drip to rehydrate her. She's running
a fever of about 102. It's a good thing you got her here when you
did. "

"Do you know what's causing it?" 

"Some kind of infection, probably related to the cyst on her neck." 

"Do you know what that is?" 

"No. I'm having it biopsied. I'll get it off to the lab right away.
Now, are you two the parents?"

"I'm her aunt." 

"Oh, okay. Can you give me any history that might help?" 

Mulder looks in the window to watch Emily and the female doctor
preparing for the biopsy. If he speaks up too soon they'll ignore him
or think he's nuts, but if he waits too long to intervene...

"I know that she was being treated for anemia." 

"You know what type?" 

"I was told that it was some kind of auto immune hemolytic anemia.
Her treatment was experimental."

"Who's her doctor?" 

"His name is Calderon." 

"I don't know him." 

Inside the room, the female doctor bends to Emily." I'm just going to
roll you onto your side, Sweetie."

::Let's see if I can help this doctor.:: Mulder watches as she
reaches for an alcohol swab, then pounds on the window.

"Wait! Stop!" The doctor ignores Mulder and puts the needle in, Emily
flinches. "Move away from her! Get away from her! At least cover your
eyes!"

The only part of Mulder's warning that the woman heeds is to cover
her eyes as the cyst explodes and green blood flows out. Coughing,
she makes her way to the door and lets herself out. Emily sits up in
bed to see what's happening, with a stream of green blood flowing
down her back.

~*~*~

Quarantine Ward 
7:31 a.m.

Missy tears down the hallway, and skitters to a stop outside the
quarantine ward, where Mulder has been waiting for Scully to come
back with information on the child's condition.

"Fox, can I go in there?" 

"I don't know." He taps on the glass to get Scully's attention,
which makes her look up and see them. She waves them in.

"She's still sleeping?" Mulder notes with surprise, since Scully and
the Doctor's bodies had blocked their view of the girl up until then.

"They have her under a mild sedative." 

"The ER doctor is doing okay now," Mulder tells her. "She heard me
and didn't get any in her eyes, so it's not as bad as it could be."

"How did you know?" Scully whispers, before realizing that her sister
isn't paying attention to their conversation.

"If Emily was someone's creation, then it occurred to me that she
might share the same body chemistry that we've seen before. So I had
them put the ER doctor in a cooling bath like you did when I was
exposed to this."

"So what now? She's still just a little girl. You say I can't protect
her, but I can't let this be her life. Just a few days ago she was
fine."

"She was also being treated." 

Missy looks up at them, fear plain on her face. "I want to keep her.
We have to get her better."

Mulder feels a twinge in his stomach as he remembers how hard it was
for Scully to prove she was a fit parent. "We'll do what we can to
help you get custody."

"It won't be hard," Missy says, leaning down to stroke Emily's hair.

"It won't?" He fails to keep the surprise from his voice.

"We're going to call the police in a few minutes and report a
kidnapping with a happy ending," Missy tells him. "My baby was stolen
from me and now that her kidnappers have died, we've been
miraculously reunited. The police were so derelict of duty that they
never even filed a kidnapping report, but DNA proves that the child
is mine. Since they don't want me to sue the station, they'll fall
over themselves to help me find a judge willing to grant an immediate
custody order." Missy wears a calculating expression. "You've got
friends who can produce a birth certificate, don't you?"

"Yeah, sure." Mulder blinks in surprise. Missy's plan would probably
work. Unlike Scully, who has been anchored in DC for years, Missy's
flightiness works in her favor since there are few people who could
come forward and say with certainty that she hadn't had a child
that'd been kidnapped.

"I'll help you work on Bill and Mom," Scully tells her, putting her
hand over her sister's. "They'll be upset that you never told them
you 'had a baby' but they'll get over it."

~*~*~

A Doctor enters a half hour later wearing a worried frown. "Um, I
just need some advice. With everything that's happening here, I'm a
little at sea. This Doctor Calderon you say is Emily's physician? He's
refusing to transfer her medical records."

"He can't do that. He's endangering her life."

"He said Emily was in his care, and if you're the one who's stopping
that, then you're the one endangering her."

"It's an ethical violation." 

"He said she was part of a double blind medical trial and that he's
spoken to you about it. He also says you have no authority over this
child."

"Well, authority or not, I'm not leaving her side." 

"It's beyond me, I'm afraid."

"Yeah, but it's not beyond Doctor Calderon," Mulder replies.

~*~*~

A couple of minutes later they're thrown out of the room while a
nurse takes Emily's vitals and changes her bedding. Missy, Scully,
and Mulder stand in a silent line and look at Emily through a window
in the ICU. Even from that distance, they can see how much the child
is sweating.

When the nurse leaves Mulder gives Scully a hug. "I need to talk to
your sister, so why don't you go keep Emily company?" he invites. She
frowns a little, but goes into the girl's room, and turns to watch
their unheard conversation.

"Fox?" Missy's voice is uncertain.

"I have something important you have to make a decision about, and
you have to do it quickly, so listen carefully."

"Okay." 

"Emily's been receiving a treatment that has kept her going - or she
was up until her adoptive parents died. If you want me to, I'm fairly
certain that I can get her back on the treatment. Doing so will mean
that you'll have to have an association with unsavory characters from
now until Emily is old enough to deal with them on her own."

"And if she's not on the treatment?" 

"She will die," he says grimly. "I met another child with this
disease, who was taken off the treatment. She died within weeks. It
wasn't an easy death."

"Then you have to get them to put her back on the treatment." 

Mulder puts a gentle hand on her arm. "If I do this, I'm serious
about being involved with unsavory characters. And you might have to
live near the clinic from now on," he adds, thinking of her
wanderlust.

A look of grim determination is on Missy's face. "I understand. Do
what you have to do to make her well."

Scully pokes her head out of the door. "What were you talking about?"


"Just making sure we were on the same page about what we want to
happen next," he says blandly. "The gunmen said they can have the
birth certificate couriered here within a couple of hours, so be
ready to call the police when it arrives."

Scully picks up on his unsaid message. "What will you be doing,
Mulder?"

"Attempting to reason with Doctor Calderon." 

~*~*~

 Transgen Pharmaceuticals

Doctor Calderon sits behind his desk, and gives Mulder a sad smile. 

"I'd like to say right up front that I know Emily Sims as your
partner probably told you. My God, I...never met a sweeter,
courageous little girl. I'm so sorry to hear about her downturn. My
hope is these custody matters can be resolved so she may resume her
treatment here. I'm afraid I can't release any information that
relates to our company's experimental drug trials."

"What can I say to convince you?" 

Calderon chuckles "It's really not about convincing me. This is
something that I - well, we...simply cannot do. It's purely a
business reality. It has to do with Transgen's exposure to litigation
and of course, our need to protect our research which frankly,
represents a significant dollar investment."

Mulder steeples his fingers. "My sister-in-law is keen to cooperate
with you. She's willing to do whatever is necessary to get Emily
healthy again."

"She's aware that the treatment will probably have to continue on a
monthly basis throughout Emily's childhood?"

Mulder nods. "She's working on the custody arrangement as we speak so
she'll be able to ensure that Emily can come here as often as
necessary."

"Actually, she doesn't have to come here," Calderon corrects.

"She doesn't?" 

"No. We have several children in our study group throughout the
country. We have five clinics, and if it's not possible for the
parents to travel to one of them for treatment, we can make home
visits as well."

"And they say doctors no longer make house calls." Mulder smiles a
little. He's making a deal with a devil, but it's with the blessing
of the child's mother, and he knows the alternative, so he's not
ashamed to. "You wouldn't happen to have a clinic in the DC area,
would you?"

"Yes, why?" 

"If I know my wife and mother-in-law half as well as I think I do,
they're going to lobby for Missy and Emily to move back east to be
closer to family."

"I see. Please tell Emily's mother that I'll make a visit to the
hospital tonight to administer treatment."

Mulder puts out his hand, which Calderon shakes. "I'll do that." 

 ~*~*~

Mulder's cell phone rings as he gets back into his car. "Mulder." 

"Hey Mulder, it's Frohike." 

"What's up?" 

"We did a little research about those kids you asked us to look
into...there were seven of them, but none of the others were a match."

Mulder wipes his forehead with the back of his hand. "You're
positive?"

"One hundred percent. This is a good thing, right? There being no
matches?"

"Yeah. Thanks for getting information for me." 

"No problem. Any idea why they'd of DNA tested a whole bunch of kids
like that, though?"

"I think they were looking for genetic markers." 

"Oh, that makes sense." 

"Frohike, you didn't congratulate me." 

"For what?" 

"I have a new niece. Thirty-six inches, thirty pounds." 

"Either this kid is going to be in the weekly world news for 'world's
heaviest newborn' or you're not talking about the kid Scully's
brother was expecting."

Mulder laughs. "Nope, Bill's kid is still overdue. Missy has a
three-year-old no one knew about, not even her."

"Wish her luck for me. Three-year-olds are rough. Say Mulder, she's
not married yet, is she? I've never wanted children of my own, but
being a step-parent isn't too bad a deal if you skip the diaper
stage."

"Good-bye Frohike." 

~*~*~

An Hour Later
 Emily's Room 

Doctor Calderon comes into the room while Missy is talking to the
police. Scully is about to say something to the man since he doesn't
have an ID tag on, but then she feels a hand on her shoulder. "I see
that doctor Calderon beat me here."

Scully relaxes a little. "You've agreed to treat Emily." 

"Yes." Calderon nods. "I interrupted your sister's conversation with
the officers and confirmed that your husband's assessment of her
willingness to treat Emily was as he stated."

Once he withdraws the needle from Emily's flesh, he pats her arm.
"You should begin to feel better soon, my dear."

 "Thank you," Emily whispers back. "I don't like bein' sick." 

"No one does," Mulder tells her, thinking for some reason of when
Scully had cancer during another life. "Your mom is going to make
sure you get to the doctor's when you need to so you don't get sick
like this again."

"Good." 

Missy returns with a wide smile. "They're going to get a judge to
issue the custody agreement tonight. They said the DNA evidence makes
it a slam dunk case."

"Oh, thank God," Scully breathes, pulling her sister into a hug. "I
know this is all a big shock to you, but you're going to be a great
Mom."

~*~*~

December 31st, 1997

"Oh! Isn't he a doll?" Maggie gushes as she holds April up to see her
new baby cousin. April is far more interested in playing with her
grandmother's necklace, but her eyes do wander across the blue
blanketed bundle that the nursery worker is holding up for them to
see. Although all that can really be seen is a tuff of dark hair
peaking out over the blanket.

Page and Sammy, who are being held up by their parents, seem slightly
more interested. "Our baby?" Sammy asks, giving them a puzzled look.

Mulder laughs and shakes his head. "Not this time. This is Uncle Bill
and Aunt Tara's baby. He's going to live with them."

"Okay," Sammy says, not looking at all disappointed. 

"Mommy, what's his name?" Page asks, leaning in closer, so her
forehead touches the glass.

"They named him Matthew." 

"Matt?" 

Scully's eyes widen in surprise. "Yup, they'll probably call him
Matt."

"Like Sammy's a trick name?" 

"Nickname, Page." 

"Who's Nick?" she asks, puzzled.

"I'm not sure who he was," Mulder admits.

"We have two new cousins, right?" Page asks.

"Yes you do." 

"When we see the uther one?" 

"Tomorrow," Scully tells her. "Daddy and I are going to bring Missy
to get her tomorrow, after we wake up."

"Good!" 

~*~*~

January 1st, 1998

Melissa picks up a plastic bag of Emily's belongings, and looks
around the room. She doesn't see anything else that needs to be
gathered up, so she walks through the door. A nurse is waiting for
her in the hallway, her hands on a wheelchair.

"Looks like Mom is all set, sweetie, so let's take a ride." 

Emily looks up at her with a curious look. "I can walk." 

"Nope, today you get to ride. It's hospital policy." 

Mulder has his arm around Scully's waist as they stand by their car.
They're both watching as the nurse and Melissa walk down the hallway.
"You know, Scully, we're witnessing a miracle." Mulder murmurs.

"I know," Scully tells him, leaning back into him. 

::Oh, you have no idea. And I'm so glad you never will:: he thinks. 

"Hey there, Emily!" Mulder calls as soon as the hospital doors slide
open. "Your chariot awaits."

"Like a princess?" she asks as she scrambles out of the chair with
Missy's help.

"You're definitely a princess," Mulder tells her with a nod. "Your
cousins Page and April are princesses, so you must be one too." He
takes a step back to allow her mother to put her in Page's car seat.

"Can I play wit my cousins?" Emily asks as soon as all the car doors
are shut.

"Sure." 

"Every day?" 

Scully looks back over the seat. "That's up to your mommy," she says
pointedly. As Mulder predicted, the two have spent hours debating the
pros and cons of Missy relocating.

Missy rolls her eyes. "Yes, every day," she says at length. "But your
auntie and grandmother have to help me find a house if I'm moving to
DC."

"Oh, we will!" 

~*~*~

January, 4th, 1998
8 p.m.

"Scully, door, please?" Mulder begs. April is sleeping on his right
shoulder, and Sammy on his left. She's only got one sleeping child to
deal with, so he thinks it's fair that she's the one dealing with the
keys.

"Hold your horses," she mutters then lets them in. They remove the
kids' coats and boots down stairs, then carry them up to their rooms
to dress them for bed. All told, it takes fifteen minutes before all
three little bodies are dressed in PJs and tucked into bed.

Then Mulder and Scully collapse onto their beds, still in their own
winter gear. Rolling over with a groan, Mulder can't resist the urge
to kiss her on the forehead. "We need to talk."

"About?" Scully asks, attempting to sit up until Mulder pins her to
the mattress, which makes her giggle.

He sits up, letting her go. "Your sister and Emily." 

"I'm listening." 

"What happens if Krycek comes looking for Emily?" The thought has
been on his mind ever since Scully told him who Emily's father was.

"He won't." 

"How do you know?" Mulder presses.

"Mulder, what would a man like that want with a little girl? He's too
self-centered to want to be a father." Her shoes fall to the floor
with a thump. "Don't borrow troubles."

::You're not thinking broadly enough, Scully. He doesn't want to be a
dad, I'm sure, but if that kid could ever be used as a bargaining
chip, he wouldn't hesitate for a second to use her.::

"Let's just hope he never finds out who she is." 

~*~*~

Chapter Fifty-Four

Washington, DC
Last week of January, 1998

As Mulder watches, Scully's hand closes on a glossy full-color
brochure. Although her fingers are half-covering the words, he knows
that it says "Westport Island, Maine" on the front of it.

"I can't believe we're finally going on a real vacation." Scully
sighs happily. "I mean, it was nice to see Bill over Christmas, but a
real vacation is different."

Mulder grins at her. "I think we deserve one after all the monster
slaying."

"We can visit Wildwood Art Gallery, spend time on the beach-" 

"Not have to change any diapers or look under rocks for mutants-" 

"There's a nature preserve close by, and we can go into Freeport to
go shopping-"

"We can see if there are any ghost ships passing Pemaquid Point
Lighthouse-"

Ignoring that, Scully concludes "And the Squire Tarbox Inn looks so
peaceful."

"More peaceful than DC," Mulder agrees. "We'll have to pack as soon
as we get home. I'm so glad that your mom has agreed to come spend
the week at our house."

"It should be okay, because Rachel will still be coming over every
day, so she can get out of the house and won't suffer from
'grandchildren overload'."

He shrugs. "She doesn't seem to be suffering from seeing Emily every
day."

"Missy is closing on that house this week, so she and Emily will be
moving out very soon," Scully tells him. Her mother convinced Missy
to move to DC as Mulder suspected, and she and Emily have been living
at Maggie's while Missy arranges for other housing.

"I don't Maggie think is too anxious to have her house to herself, is
all I'm saying. Otherwise, she'd of said no and sent them to stay
with us." It puzzles him that no one suggested that, given their
house has ten bedrooms. All he can figure is that Scully and Maggie
didn't want Missy and Emily alone all day at first.

"Come on, let's go give this report to Skinner and get out of here."
The eager look on her face makes Mulder smile.

~*~*~ 

A bucket of cold water is dumped on Mulder expectations when he sees
the grim look on the nanny's face. Before she even opens her mouth,
he feels his hopes for a vacation slipping away.

Rachel wrings her hands. "I'm afraid that the kids are sick." 

When he gets into the living room he sees what she means. All three
kids are sitting listlessly on the couch, leaning on each other. Each
one of them is covered in red spots.

"Itchy, Daddy," Sammy informs him.

Scully comes in right behind him, and is soon exclaiming over her
poka-dotted children. He leaves her to that and goes to hunt for
clues.

When he returns, he holds a piece of paper in his hand. "Hey, uh, I
just found something in Page's bag. A note dated yesterday that
explains that the kids have been exposed to chicken pox."

"Damn. By the time the kid became symptomatic, he'd already given it
to the entire class." Her face suddenly falls. "Oh no, Emily."

He shudders a little, thinking for the first time of his niece's
fragile health. Which isn't surprising since he's still having
trouble thinking of her as his niece. He knows that his wife worries
because Emily is in Page's preschool class now that Missy is serious
about permanently relocating in DC.

She's already on the phone, so he listens to the exchange.

"Hi Missy, it's Dana...Is Emily feeling okay? Yeah, the chicken pox
thing...She is, and she brought it home to her brother and
sister...well, keep an eye on her and let her doctor know if she runs
a fever or gets any spots...Okay, take care, love you both."

"She's not sick?" Mulder asks.

"So far, so good." Then she sighs. "But we still have to deal with
these three. Good-bye vacation."

"Go without me." 

"What? No, I can't leave you alone with you with three sick kids." 

"Yes you can. You've been looking forward to this for a long time,
and we'll be fine here."

"Mulder-" 

"We paid for the room already, and it's not refundable," Mulder
reasons. "I'd like at least one of us to enjoy the room we're
reserved."

"I don't know..."

"Rachel can still come every day and give me a break instead of your
mom." He hopes the nanny has already had the chicken pox. "This
doesn't seem like a good time for the kids to get sick, but hey, I
already took the week off, so it couldn't come at a better time as
far as work is concerned."

"Are you sure you'd want me to go alone?" she asks in a tone that
suggests that she's warming to the idea.

"Oh, sure. I'll need you to buy a few things for me before you go,
though..."

~*~*~

An Hour Later

After she reads his list, she shakes her head. Some of the items on
it make sense, like pedialyte, several canisters of oatmeal, boxes of
baking soda and diapers, but others...she's afraid to even guess what
he wants 18 pairs of stretchy mittens and three floor tarps for.
Still, she throws everything into the cart because she promised him
that she'd make sure he had everything needed before she leaves. And
now that Page speaks pretty well, she knows that she can get her
daughter to squeal later if Mulder himself doesn't confess as to what
he's done in her absence.

~*~*~

King's Crossing, Maine
Gas station
The Next Day

Scully is putting gas into her rented convertible when she feels her
phone vibrating in the right hip pocket of her jeans. She pulls it
out and takes a second to adjust her sunglasses before flipping the
phone open.

"Scully." 

"Hey, Scully, it's me." She hears the sound of a door shutting, and
from the second of squeaking she guesses that it's April's.

"How are the kids?" 

"Sleeping. All three of them. It's very quiet in Casa Mulder right
now."

"I'm glad they're sleeping instead of itching and crying." 

"Hey, me too. What's it like up there? And do you miss me?" 

"The weather is clear. I *do* miss you, but I'm looking forward to
hitting the road and breathing in some of this fine New England air."

"I don't know...the air is supposed to be pretty polluted up that way.
Not from factories in New Hampshire or Maine, mind you, but from
pollution being blown in from western states. Should be a colorful
sunset, though."

Scully gives the phone a dubious smile. "I'll be sure to keep an eye
out for the sunset, then."

"You didn't rent a convertible, did you?" 

"Why?" 

"Are you aware of the statistics of decapitation?" 

"Mulder, I'm hanging up. I need to get to the hotel before check-in
time ends. Love you."

"Love you too, but you shouldn't talk and drive at the same time,
either. Are you aware of the statistics-" Before he can finish his
sentence, she's hung up on him. She tells herself that if he
complains she'll claim it was accidental.

She drives the car into the grocery store lot, almost hitting a car
that is speeding away. After she catches sight of a small figure in
the cat she feels disgusted by the parent's recklessness. Then she
sees an old man staggering out of the store with bloody eyes. She
gets out of the car and runs towards him.

"Sir... Sir, what happened?" 

The old man seems disoriented. "I...I think we need a doctor." 

She becomes alarmed when she hears him say "we" and bursts into the
store. What she sees takes her breath away. People are moaning and
crying and have horribly scratched eyes.

Eventually she finds the store manager and startles him when she
bends to examine him. "Who are you?" He demands to know.

"My name is Dana Scully. I'm an FBI agent. What happened to you?" 

"I don't know. But Dave, the butcher...I think he's dead." 

When she goes around to the back she sees Dave lying on the floor
with a knife sticking out of one eye socket.

~*~*~

Washington, DC

"Daddy, whatcha doing?" The voice alerts him that naptime is over
sooner than he expected, for at least one of the kids.

Letting the tarp he's spreading out fall to the floor, Mulder turns
to address his oldest daughter. "I was thinking we could go
swimming."

The little blonde scowls at him. "Not funny. We're sick. It's
winter-"

He ruffles her hair. "Don't you dare say 'mommy wouldn't like it'." 

"Wouldn't," she insists, looking up when his hand grabs her wrist
right before she scratches at one of the blisters on her arm.

"Don't scratch, you'll scar. We're going to swim in the house." 

He almost laughs when he sees Scully's patented "you're nuts, Mulder"
look on his child's face. Before he can explain, they're interrupted
by the ringing of the phone. Page wanders off after giving the tarps
a distrustful look.

"Mulder, it's me." 

"I thought you said you were on your way to check in at the hotel." 

"I am. I'm already up in Maine." 

"So why are you on the phone with me, then? Not that I don't like to
hear from you, just surprised it was this soon. What's going on?"

"I, uh ... I'm at a market here. I'm just trying to give the local PD a
handle here."

"A handle on what?" 

"Well, I'm not quite sure how to describe it, Mulder. I didn't
witness it myself but there seems to be some kind of an outbreak of
people acting in a violent, involuntary way."

"Towards who?" 

"Toward themselves." 

"Themselves?" 

"Yeah. Beating at their faces, clawing at their eyes. One man is
dead."

"Dead? How?" 

"Self-inflicted, it appears." 

"Huh ... it sounds to me like that's witchcraft or maybe some sorcery
that you're looking for there."

"No, I don't think it's witchcraft, Mulder, or sorcery. I've had a
look around and I don't see any evidence that warrants that kind of
suspicion."

"Maybe you don't know what you're looking for." 

"Like evidence of conjury or the black arts or shamanism, divination,
Wicca or any kind of pagan or neo-Pagan practice. Charms, cards
...familiars, bloodstones, or hex signs or any of the ritual tableaux
associated with the occult, Santeria, Voudoun, Macumba, or any high
or low magic?"

"I always knew you were the right woman to marry." 

"I was hoping for something a little more helpful." 

"Well, you know, short of looking for a lady wearing a pointy hat
riding a broomstick, I think you pretty much got it covered there."

"Thanks anyway. Kiss my babies for me." 

"Uh uh. If you want to kiss the scabby little monkeys, that's your
business, but I ain't gonna." He teases. "But I'll tell them Mommy
says she loves them."

~*~*~

By the time Mulder comes back upstairs from the cellar, Sammy is out
of bed too. "What's that?" Sammy's wide blue eyes are on what's in
Mulder's hands.

"Like I told your sister, who doesn't believe me, we're going to have
swimming."

"In the house?!" 

Mulder drops the hard plastic wading pool with a thump. "Too cold
outside, isn't it?"

"Yes..." both children say, but they give the pool doubtful looks.

"This is going to be a special pool. It's going to do something
magical."

"What?" they demand to know.

"It's going to make three itchy little kids feel better," he tells
them.

"Us," Sammy says. "He means us!" 

"Do you mean us, Daddy?" Page wants to know.

"What other itchy kids do you know?" 

"None!" 

His son looks pleased, but Page gives him a suspicious look. "How can
a pool make us not itch?"

"A very good question. First I add water, then the magic
ingredients."

"Oh, magic," Page says as if that explains everything, for once
reminding him more of himself than Scully.

"You two sit on the couch until I say so." 

"TV?" Sammy asks with a hopeful look.

He considers it for a moment, then decides that what his wife doesn't
know won't hurt them. "Okay, sure."

"Yay!" 

After putting on nickelodeon, he brings two buckets into the bathroom
to fill with warm water. It'll take several trips, but he thought it
would be worth it to dunk all three kids at once, unlike in the
bathtub.

Once the wading pool is full, he wakes up April. He expects her to
cry, but she's cheerful enough. Back in the living room he pours four
canisters of oatmeal into the pool, while his older children watch
with interest.

"Okay, off with your clothes," Mulder tells them as he begins to
undress the baby.

"You too, Daddy?" Sammy asks.

"Nope, I'm not itchy." 

Page is able to get in herself, but he needs to lift the younger kids
in. April squeals with surprise, and breaks into a big smile. The
older kids begin to smile too when they realize that they do feel
better.

Crouching down next to April, Mulder tells the older ones, "You know,
your Nana might not seem like she likes kids, but when I was a little
boy and had chicken pox, she dunked me in an oatmeal bath too, and I
felt much better."

"Oatmeal!?" Page looks down at the uncooked oats floating in the
water. "But that's breakfast!"

"Only if you cook it," Mulder tells her. "And I don't have a fire
handy to cook you three."

"Good," Sammy mumbles around his thumb. "We yucky." 

~*~*~

Meanwhile...
King's Crossing

Officer Buddy Riggs comes over to watch the tape with Scully. She
points at the video screen. "Who's that woman right there?"

"Melissa Turner." 

"She's the only one I've seen who looks unaffected." 

"What's your point?" 

"You might want to talk to her." 

When Scully leaves the store office captain Jack Bonsaint follows
her.

The captain gives her a friendly smile. "Ms. Scully ... you staying in
town?"

She decides to overlook the incorrect form of address to see where
he's going with his question. "Yes. I'm on vacation. Why?"

"Well, what you said back there about Melissa Turner kind of put a
spin on this whole business here today."

"How's that?" 

"Well, Melissa's caused some stir. People here say she's a witch." 

"Well, that's not the first time for that accusation in these parts."


"Ayuh." 

"Look, to be honest with you, Captain Bonsaint, um, I'm not much of a
believer in witchcraft. My husband has me beat in spades in that
area."

As she suspects, his smile fades when she mentions her marital
status. He shrugs in off quickly. "Well, you know, I'm not either. I
used to just think it's 'cause Melissa was pretty and single.
Threatening, you know?"

"But now you're not convinced?" 

"Well, you know, I appreciate the trouble you went to, and I sure do
hope there's a reasonable explanation like you said - just this one
thing going to make it hard to persuade folks to your thinking."

"What one thing is that?" 

"Who she's been carrying on with." 

"Who she's been carrying on with?" 

"Ayuh. With Dave, the butcher." 

~*~*~

Melissa Turner Residence
2:08 p.m.

Bonsaint and Scully drive up in a patrol car and get out. Undeterred
by the sight of the empty driveway, Bonsaint knocks on front door.
There's no answer. Scully looks in through a side window.

"Back door's wide open," Scully tells him, then they walk around the
house.

"Melissa!" Bonsaint calls before turning to Scully. "The sheets are
still wet."

Scully enters house, and searches the first floor before going up to
Polly's room. She stops to look at the windows. Both are nailed shut.

"Chief? Take a look at this." 

"What the devil's this for?" 

"It looks like she was afraid of something." 

"Whatever it is, she's run off in a hurry. Laundry's out. Door's
unlocked. Beats me."

"You know her?" 

"Melissy Turner?" 

Scully turns her face so he can't see her reaction to the dumb
nickname. "Mm-hmm."

"About as local as you can get. Born and raised here. Married a
fisherman. Widowed last year after a boating accident. Don't know if
the little girl, Polly, ever really understood." He taps a temple
with one finger. "Toys in the attic."

"The daughter's autistic?" Scully guesses.

"That's what they say. There was the incident last year over at the
daycare center? Proprietor slapped Polly across the face."

"Slapped her? What for?" 

"Well, she said Polly threw a tantrum so fierce there was nothing
else she could do. Next thing she knew, she's on the ground. Little
girl knocked her silly."

"The little girl did?" 

"Well, that's her story. Polly never touched her, far as I could
figure. Oh, it was a real drama, though. The lady who ran the school
lost her license. People calling the kid all manner of names saying
Melissa's a witch. Polly never went back to school a day since".

"This ah, this affair that the mother was having with the butcher...?" 

"Dave. Oh, I might have given you the wrong impression. That wasn't
really an affair. Although Dave did make quite a fool of himself and
his wife."

Scully presses the issue. "So, it was unrequited." 

"You could say that." 

"To the extent that she'd have to nail her windows shut?" 

"Oh, he wasn't that big a fool. You know, maybe she wasn't afraid of
something getting in. Maybe she's afraid of something getting out."

"Like what?" 

He shrugs. "It was just a thought." 

~*~*~

Jane Froelich's House 

When Scully and Jack reach the steps, Jane looks through door window
suspiciously. Pulling back a couple inches of curtain, she puts her
face close to the window. "Is that you, Jack?"

"Uh, yeah, it's me, Jane. Can we come in?" 

"Who've you got with you?" Jane's voice drips hostility.

"Miss Froelich, my name's Dana Scully. I'm with the FBI. I just
happen to be here on vacation, and uh..."

"So?" 

"So, I just am helping out the chief here." 

"You talked to her?" 

"Who?" 

"Oh, please." Jane rolls her eyes. "Melissa Turner. That whore's a
witch sure as I'm standing here. She's descended from the Hawthornes
in Salem and the Englishes, too. She comes from a cursed lineage and
now she's passing it on to the whelp. God save that little girl if
somebody don't do something. Lord knows I tried."

"Jane, if we could just come in for a few minutes and talk." 

"I found out last year how much good talking to you does, Jack
Bonsaint. I explained everything and the city closed me down anyway.
Our great-great-grandfathers knew how to treat witches. They would
have driven the demon out of that little girl and given that slattern
of a mother just what she's got coming!" Jane slams the door in their
face.

"New England hospitality. Heard about it my whole life. Finally got a
chance to experience it for myself," Scully says calmly as they walk
away from the house. She glances back, noticing that Jane is watching
them.

"Well, you see what I'm up against here, public sentiment and all." 

"This family tree of Melissa Turner's..." 

"Ayuh..."

"It's all talk, isn't it?" 

"Oh, I never really asked. Why?" 

"Well, I think you need to bring her in to straighten this out." 

"Under what pretext?" 

"That she might know something." 

"About what?" 

Scully resists rolling her eyes, thinking that Jack is as dumb as a
box of hammers, or really good at playing like he is. "Well, about
what I'm sure is a perfectly reasonable
explanation for all of this." 

"Ayuh." 

"Well, I wish I could help you out. You know, I'm just...on vacation."
She smiles ruefully. "This was supposed to be a weekend away for my
husband and I, but all three kids got chicken pox, so I'm here
alone."

"I guess if he was here, you wouldn't be helping us." 

"Are you kidding? He'd love to work on this case." 

"Sounds like you're married to quite a character." 

"You don't know the half of it." 

~*~*~

Washington, DC
8 p.m.

"Hold out your hands, Sammy." Mulder waits for the toddler to comply,
then slips a pair of mittens over the child's hands when he does.
Sammy gives the mittens a dubious look, but doesn't say anything.

"You next, Page." 

"Uh uh." She pulls her hands behind her back. "How come we're puttin'
on mittens? We're not going out in the snow."

Mulder lifts the edge of his shirt and points at a scar on his side.
"See that?"

"Yup." 

"If you scratch at those itchy spots you can make a scar like that." 

"But we won't scratch!" Page quickly promises.

Mulder shakes his head. "I know that you've both been very good while
you're awake, but people scratch in their sleep too. The mittens will
keep you from doing that...I didn't scratch when I was awake, either."

"What about April?" Page asks.

"She already wears mits on her hands when she sleeps, remember?"
April developed a tendency to scratch her ears in her sleep, often
causing them to bleed, so they adopted this solution weeks ago while
they wait to see if she needs tubes in her ears since scratching is a
common symptom.

"Oh yeah." 

Giggling, Sammy opens and closes his mittened hands. "Funny." 

Reaching down to ruffle his son's hair, Mulder tells him, "It'll keep
you warm if you dream about snowmen."

~*~*~

King's Crossing, Maine
8 a.m.

Coroners are wheeling Jane's body out of her house when Bonsaint and
Scully drive up.

"Looks like she died by her own hand. A big slice under the chin
opened up the artery," Bonsaint tells Scully once they're inside.

"With what?" 

"Buddy, show her the thing." 

As officer Riggs shows her a plastic bag with a bloody piece of
record in it, a phone begins to ring.

"Jack Bonsaint.... Ayuh. ... Who? ... Oh, okay. Put him through." He looks
up at Scully, "It's for you."

She gives Jack a surprised look as she takes the phone. "Hello?" 

"Hey, morning, Sunshine," Mulder crones, making her smile.

"Morning, Mulder. I didn't expect to hear from you this early." 

"Yeah, everyone else is still sleeping, so it seemed like a good time
to call. And I was a little worried about you. I was wondering if you
needed my help up there."

"Needed your help on what?" 

"I left you a message at the motel. You didn't get it?" 

"I was up and out this morning. Mulder?" 

"Yeah?" 

"How are the kids?" 

"On the mend, I think. Less crabby, anyway. They miss you, but not to
the point of tears. Anyway, I was thinking about this case. You know,
maybe it's not witchcraft after all. Maybe there's a scientific
explanation."

"A scientific explanation?" 
 
"Yeah, a medical cause. Something called chorea." 

"Dancing sickness." 

"Yeah, St. Vitus's dance." 

"Yeah, and hasn't been diagnosed since the Middle Ages." 

"Oh. You're obviously not a fan of American Bandstand, Scully." 

"Mulder?" 

"Yeah?" 

"Thanks for the help. Talk to you later." 


"That your..." Bonsaint hesitates. "Husband?" 

"Yep." 

"I'm sorry for eavesdropping but has he maybe got some insight on
this?"

Her voice is firm. "No." 

"I see." 

Riggs briefly plays the record that's in the player - the Hokey
Pokey- but then turns it off without explaining why he'd played in
the first place.

"You know, Chief Bonsaint, I've been thinking that maybe ... maybe we
need to explore other possibilities."

"I'm not sure I understand." 

"Well, maybe we need to keep our minds open to ... extreme
possibilities."

"Okay, but aren't you on vacation?" 

She nods then looks away.

~*~*~ 

Not a fan of lobster, Scully is less than thrilled when Bonsaint
insists they have lunch at a seafood place. He's delighted with his
meal, but she finds herself wishing that she could order a Caesar
salad.

"You said you had some other directions you were looking at?"
Bonsaint asks between bites.

"I've been thinking about Melissa Turner. Now, you said that her
husband died in a boating accident?"

"Ayuh." 

"Well, was there anything strange about that? About the way that it
happened?"

"It was never quite explained to anyone's satisfaction, actually." 

"How's that?" 

Before answering Bonsaint rips another hunk off of the lobster,
reminding her of the cockroach case Mulder had. "How the man got a
grappling hook poked clean through his skull."

"Was Melissa ever questioned about that?" 

"Melissa? No. I don't see how she'd be involved. The boat he died on
is right over there if you're at all wondering."

They look out window and see the old man on a small fishing boat,
named "Working Girl."

"I saw that man at the market," Scully says in surprise. She watches
as he throws water overboard.

~*~*~

The old man allows them onto the boat that night, not unwilling to
tell him his version of events. The three of them sit together while
he spins his tale.

"What happened? You ask that question around here, you get as many
stories as ... as fishermen."

"You were on board the night that he died. What do you think?" Scully
asks.

"I told my story to the Chief." 

"People's stories change," Scully tells him.

"Folks blame the widow." 

"Who do you blame?" 

"He was wild for her. He worked very hard to build that little house
for her and when that daughter came, you'd need a mop to wipe that
smile off his face. We'd set out to sea on the girl's last birthday.
He was counting the hours before he'd be home again. Found a doll in
the ocean, said it was a gift for Polly from Davey Jones. Three days
later, he was dead."

"And you know what killed him," Scully suggests.

"The eyes play tricks at night, water up against the hull making
noises. He woke me up, all het up....it sounded like the doll was
talking to him right before he got speared in the head. Like I said,
the eyes play tricks."

"But you saw something in that grocery store. That little girl and
her dolly."

"Moment I saw them, I knew." 

~*~*~

Scully's cell phone rings as she and Bonsaint head for the car.

She flips it open, saying, "Scully." 

"Hey, I had a new thought about this case you're on. There's a viral
infection that's spread by simple touch ..."

"Mulder, are there any references in occult literature to objects
that have the power to direct human behavior?" She ignores the
strange look Bonsaint gives her.

"What types of objects?" 

"Um, like a doll, for instance." 

"You mean like Chuckie?" 

"Yeah, kind of like that," she agrees.

"Sure, the talking doll myth is well established in literature,
especially in New England. The-the fetish or Juju is believed to pass
on magical powers onto its possessor. Some of the early witches were
condemned for little more than proclaiming that these objects
existed. The supposed witch having premonitory visions and things...Why
do you ask?"

"I was just curious." 

"You didn't find a talking doll, did you, Scully?" 

"No, no. Of course not." 

"I would suggest that you check the back of the doll for a - a
plastic ring with a string on it. In any case, don't bring it home to
the kids-" Mulder's voice fades out when Scully closes her phone.

Turning back to Bonsaint, she says, "Let's go talk to Melissa
Turner."

~*~*~

Melissa Turner Residence
8 p.m.

Bonsaint pulls into the driveway, and they notice a car parked there
already.

"That's Buddy's car." Turning towards the house, he yells. "Melissa!"


Walking up to the house, looks in a window.

"You see anything?" 

"No." 

They hear noises coming from the inside, and redouble their efforts
to get into the house before it's too late. Scully pounds on the door
while Bonsaint looks for another way in. "Melissa? Melissa?
Bonsaint!" He runs back to her side of the house. "She's got the door
nailed shut. She's trying to kill herself."

Bonsaint begins breaking down the door, while Scully knocks at a
window. After Bonsaint kicks it, the door finally crashes open, and
they run into the kitchen. Melissa is holding the hammer in front of
her face.

"Get away from me!" Melissa demands.

"Put it down, Melissa," Scully tells her.

From Polly's arms comes the doll's eerie voice. "I don't like you
anymore."

Melissa hits herself on the forehead with the hammer. Bonsaint yelps
in surprise.

Scully, now sure of what's going on, kneels next to the little girl.
"Give me the doll, Polly." Polly shakes her head, and refuses to hand
over the doll.

"I want to play," The doll says right as Melissa hits herself with
the hammer again, bloodying her face.

"Polly, give me the doll," Scully demands as the doll speaks again.

Horrorstricken by her mother's appearance, Polly lets the doll go,
and Scully grabs it. It continues to say it wants to play right up
until Scully shoves it into the microwave. The voice is muffled by
the door, and Scully turns the appliance on. The doll catches on
fire.

All three adults watch as it incinerates. 

~*~*~

Four Days Later
Westport Island, Maine

The Tar Box Inn does turn out to be very nice, much nicer than the
Super 8 motel Scully spent the night in at King's Crossing. The thing
she immediately decided as she drove away from the microwaved doll is
that if she never spends another minute in King's Crossing, it'd
still be too much.

Finally in Westport, she's taken tons of pictures, spent time
shopping, visited the local attractions, and only called Mulder twice
a day. Each day she's relieved to hear that Emily is still showing no
signs of the illness her cousins have. It makes her wonder if perhaps
Emily's adopted parents had gotten her that new Chicken Pox
vaccination that the HMO she and Mulder have will not cover.

As she puts her suitcases in the trunk of the rental car, Scully
reflects on how well rested she feels, and it makes her feel a little
bit guilty, because she's sure that despite her husband's complete
lack of complaints on the phone, he's none so relaxed with three sick
children to look after.

This in mind, she stops off at a grocery store shortly before the end
of a very long drive. Unlike her shopping a week before, this visit
requires a shorter list. Sunflower seeds, steak, a chocolate cake,
some ice tea, diapers...

But as she is about to by-pass the feminine hygiene isle, something
occurs to her that makes her come to a dead stop. It's not until an
irritated old woman tries to get by that she starts moving again.

~*~*~

Washington, DC
9 p.m.

Scully enters the house quietly, fairly certain that the kids will be
sleeping. Mulder creeps up on her, with a finger raised to his lips,
confirming her suspicion. She nods and goes to put the food she
bought away in the kitchen, then follows him up to their room.

"The kids are better," Mulder tells her. "No more itchiness, very few
spots. I think they'll sleep through the night, though, so you'll
have to wait until morning to see for yourself."

"I'm glad they're feeling better." 

"Did you bring home any creepy dolls?" Mulder asks cheerfully as he
drops her luggage on their bed.

"No." She unzips the outer pouch of one bag and pulls out a small
rectangular box. "But I did bring home this."

He looks at it for a second, and it seems like he's trying to decide
whether or not to smile. "Did you use it yet?"

"I haven't. It didn't even occur to me until I was on the way home." 

"You have to wait until tomorrow then, huh? Because of the pee in the
morning thing."

 "That, and I think I'm about to fall asleep," Scully tells him with
a yawn as she lies on the bed. "I bought your dinner, it's down in
the kitchen, but I'm afraid you'll have to cook it yourself."

"No problem," he tells her. "I've been cooking a lot lately, and I'm
getting good at it."

Before he can go on to confess as to why they have a brand new frying
pan, and the fate of the last one, he notices that she's already
asleep. He shrugs, pulls of her shoes and covers her up, deciding
that she can undress if she wakes up later.

On the way out of the room he eyes the box on her nightstand, and
wonders what the results of the test will be.

~*~*~

Chapter Fifty-Five

The Next Morning

The sounds of small feet wake Mulder up. He yawns and rubs his eyes,
then notices that Scully is coming through the doorway. "What's going
on?"

"Missy dropped Emily off to play, and the kids need supervision if
I'm going to..." She trails off and nods in the direction of the box on
the nightstand.

"Okay, yeah. Let me get dressed and I'll get the kids out of your
hair. There are some things I need to pick up at the store so I'll
take them along."

"April's still asleep, so you've only got the three of them to cope
with."

"Cope? You make it sound it's hard to look after three little kids
while shopping. It's Saturday, how many shoppers could there be?"

"Good luck, Mulder." 

~*~*~

How many turns out to be lots and lots of shoppers. They're
everywhere, and he's tempted to put all three kids into his cart, but
wouldn't have room for what he wants, so he spends forty-five minutes
telling the kids to "put that down and come back here!" while he
gathers everything on his mental list.

Even so, things are going pretty well until... "Oh, they're so cute!" a
voice over his shoulder coos. "Are they twins?"

Mulder blinks a few times, then it dawns on him that the woman is
staring at Page and Emily. "No, they're cousins, actually. My
daughter is two months older than my niece."

The woman looks faintly disappointed, but says, "Their moms must look
a lot alike."

"They do. They're both redheads, like Sammy here-" He looks over to
where Sammy last was, and sees nothing. "Girls, where's Sammy?"

Both little girls shrug, and the woman offers an apologetic look.

"Oh crap," Mulder says, and sees Page's eyes widen. "If you tell Mom,
I'm eating your desert."

Unsurprisingly, his daughter says nothing.

~*~*~

When Sammy looks around, he's surprised to see no one he knows. All
he sees is a bunch of grown ups he doesn't know.

"Daddy?" He takes a few uncertain steps and looks around before
calling for his father in a slightly louder voice.

"Who are you looking for?" 

Sammy looks up at the woman and frowns a little. "My daddy." 

"My name is Carol and I work for this store. Why don't we go up front
and have someone call your dad to meet us?"

After a moment of serious contemplation Sammy takes her hand. "Okay."


~*~*~

Sammy thinks it's pretty cool that the man at the customer service
desk lets him sit on the counter, but he's still is anxious about not
knowing where Daddy is.

The man smiles at him. "What's your name?" 

"Sammy." 

"That's a nice name. What's your Daddy's name?" 

"Mulder." 

"Mulder what?" 

Sammy gives him a puzzled stare.

The man tries again. "What does Mommy call your Daddy?" 

"Mulder!" 

"Okay, what do Daddy's friends call him?" 

Sammy grins; this is a question he knows the answer to. "Spooky." 

The man turns to Carol. "That can't be his real name." 

Carol shrugs. "One of the kids in my grandson's kindergarten's class
is named Stormy and another is named Blaze. It could be his real
name."

~*~*~

Having spent the past ten minutes looking under clothing racks to see
if his son is hiding, Mulder is about to lose it when he suddenly
hears it.

"Would Spooky Mulder please come to the custom service desk. Spooky
Mulder please come to the custom service desk, your son is waiting."

He mutters to himself and grabs the girls by the hand, then almost
stumbles when Emily stops short and looks up at him. "What Emily?" he
asks.

"Uncle Fox, why is your face all red?" 

"Nevermind." He sighs and both girls giggle.

"There you are!" Mulder says sounding relieved as he claims his son
from the customer service people.

"Hi Daddy. I look at a toy, then you gone!" Sammy explains with wide
eyes.

"Well, I'm here now," he tells him as the little boy half-strangles
him in the attempt to get off the counter.

"Sir...is your name really Spooky?" Carol blurts out.

"Yeah," Mulder tells her, then steers the girls in the direction of
the checkout lanes.

~*~*~

As soon as they're through the door the kids run off in the direction
of the playroom, leaving Mulder behind as he hauls in all his bags.
Feeling unambitious, he drops them onto the floor and notices that
April is awake in the playpen. "Hey sweetie," he greets her, ruffling
her hair.

"Mulder?" Scully asks behind him. "How did shopping go?" 

Shaking his head slightly he puts an arm around her. "Do you know
what our son thinks my first name is?"

"No." 

"Spooky. I learned this when I was paged over the PA system-" 

"You lost him?" 

He gives her a guilty look. "Only for a few minutes." 

"I lost him in the grocery store last week. We should really consider
getting another of those leash things we had for Page."

"What, and let him cut this one to pieces too?" Mulder asks, faking
horror.

"I told you not to leave scissors around..."

"So, what's the verdict?" he asks, suddenly serious.

Her smile is bright. "Positive." 

"You know, they're going to out-number us two to one now." 

"That's okay, we're bigger and smarter than they are." She laughs.

"Bigger, yes, smarter, I'm not so sure," He admits wryly. "Anyway, I
guess this means that I shouldn't ask you to help load my trunk,
though."

"Load it with what?" 

"X-Files. You didn't notice that they're in the coat closet?" 

"Why are there X-Files in our coat closet?" 

"I was bored this week so while Rachel was here this week I went to
the office a couple of times and got them."

"How many? And why??" she asks with a puzzled look.

"All of them," he admits. "I wanted to scan them with my new scanner.
The kids slept a lot and it didn't take nearly as long as I thought
it would."

Scully stands on her tip toes to kiss his cheek. "I love you, Mulder.
But I hope none of our kids grow up to be as strange as you."

"Oh, thanks a lot," he complains, but he's whistling by the time he's
dragged the first box of files out to his car.

~*~*~ 

February 1998 
2:45 a.m.

As they trade barbs and information in the bullet-shattered diner,
Mulder wonders what the outcome of this case will be. Not that he
won't be busting his hump any less, but he wonders if that goth chick
would still try to join her dead lover in the digital beyond. Then he
wonders what sort of heaven that would be, and is on the verge of
trying to match other religions and philosophies to that sort of
afterlife when his lovely and startling awake wife asks, "What would
these lowlifes be doing here?" 

He blinks, then grins. "Maybe it was for the pie." 

She gives him a "fuck you" look, and not in a good way. 
"Mulder, not to sound like a broken record, but what the hell
are we doing here at this godforsaken hour?" 

He nods, then pulls back the white sheet like a magician. "Donald 
Gelman." 

Now it's her turn to blink. "Who?" 

"Donald Gelman - Silicon Valley software pioneer. He's been missing 
since 1979." 

She gives him that lovely eyebrow arch before pursing her lips briefly. "And 
you recognize him?" she says, clearly in skeptic mode. 

As the words come out of his mouth by rote, he's reminded of Al Gore's 
similar claim years later and smothers a smirk, "He invented the internet." 
Another skeptical look. Yep, this is gonna be fun. "Okay, well, he didn't
quite invent it, but he's a Silicon Valley folk hero. He was writing
internet software even before there was an internet." 

Now her arms are crossed. Better and better. "Why have I never heard 
of him?" 

He pulls the sheet back up to hide the dead man's face and swipes the
laptop as he does so. Yeah, having an amateur magician for an uncle
does have it's pluses. "On the eve of the deal that was going to set
him up as another Bill Gates, he went hiking in the Sierras and said
he'd think about it. Never came back." 

Scully frowns, looking at the cops and crime techs swarming the area. 
"I still don't see the connection." 

Mulder smiles briefly, readjusting the laptop under
his coat while no one's looking. "Maybe that's the point." 

She frowns, heading out the door. "Okay, Mr. Mysterious, why was Gelman
in there?" 

"You know you can call me Mulder," he flirts, grinning when that twitch in 
her jaw reveals how much she wants to hit him, "I think it's obvious 
someone wanted him dead." 

"Why put a hit on him? It's just as obvious the man was dying, why go 
through the trouble of such an elaborate execution?" She gets in the 
driver's seat, since she drove the way over here. 

He shrugs before getting into the passenger's side and locks the door. 
"Guess the killer couldn't wait when it came to Gelman, since his mind 
was more likely the threat." He slips the laptop out from his coat and 
opens it, his face bathed in a mild electronic glow. 

Scully's eyes are the same size as her mouth. "Mulder, that's evidence." 

Okay, maybe she hasn't loosened up entirely, he grins. "Gee, I hope so," 
he says, popping a CD out from the laptop and putting it into the car stereo. 
On cue, the car lights start blinking and the Platters' "Twilight Time" plays. 
As he smiles at her, Scully reluctantly smiles back. They lean towards each
other and kiss, as if in a mini-prom trapped in a car's body. 

Then Scully says in a low voice, her eyes still closed but her hands on
his tie, "Shouldn't we take the CD out before we attract attention?"

Mulder chuckles. "Too late for that." Before she can retort or pull
away, he draws her in for another kiss. 

~*~*~ 

A Few Hours Later

They're at the Lone Gunman's warehouse in Takoma Park, and as before,
the odd trio praise and salute their fallen hero. While the so-called
"Twilight Time" CD plays, Scully reads the latest issue of the Lone
Gunmen, the headline reading "Infrared Technology." Her eyes narrow
when it dissects the role of heat-sensing FLIR, or Forward-Looking
Infrared, in the Waco massacre. Originally designed to detect enemy
tanks in the Gulf War, it's now being used as a form of night vision
technology. According to the conspiracy theorists' paper, however,
FLIR cameras documented the FBI running towards the compound,
charging forward in front of tanks to shoot at civilians burning
inside. Her forehead wrinkles as she wonders at the ludicrous notion
of using what would be targets for Davidians as the frontline
shooters when they had tanks. She may not have a mind for military
strategy like her father, but even she can see the idiocy of that
kind of formation. 

Just as she's about to verbally drill several holes into the article, the 
long-haired blond of the trio speaks up. "We're up against 64-bit encryption 
- a password that's a random sequence of ttwelve symbols. Gelman's 
locked up this baby tight," he says, with as much admiration as frustration. 

Scully walks over while Byers chimes in, "This CD has some kind of 
enhanced background data. Lots of code. Maybe a programming design." 

"Cool," Mulder says, half-wishing the old man was alive to break it down for 
the boys in person. "What for?" 

From behind the men, Scully asks,"Anyone think to check his mail?" 

They look at each other sheepishly before shaking their heads, and Langly 
quickly taps on an icon and a couple of tabs. Byers reads aloud, "David 
missing, fear the worst, the hunted has become the hunter." 

"'Invisigoth'?" Scully raises both eyebrows. 

"Could be an address," the suit-and-tie man suggests. 

"Seven digits," Frohike puts his two cents in, "an alpha numeric string of 
four." 

"Standard ID," Mulder corrects him, "shipping container." 

The short man makes a face when Scully looks at Mulder like she's 
impressed with his kung foo. Damn, Frohike thinks, she's hot. 

~*~*~ 

Once again, Esther Nairn zaps him with the mini-Taser. And once again, 
Scully saves his ass and takes the goth chick down. And once again, the 
damn AI locks on their location and blasts the ever-living heck out of Nairn's 
former steel-box residence. Although he has to admit, even the second time
around, watching it go "boom" just like in the movies was pretty damn
cool. The kids are gonna have a heckuva story when we get home, he
thinks, even though he knows the danger level is still high and
there's always a chance he could really screw up and die the second
time around. 

Don't get cocky, he tells himself as Scully tells the woman in the backseat, 
"No more screwing around. We need a name. Your real name." 

Mulder would tell her, but that would make both women
very suspicious in different ways. Besides, he likes seeing Scully in
her tough G-woman mode. 

"Invisigoth," the handcuffed woman in the back sneers, in spite of her black 
makeup smearing and fading. "My address? It's T-O-A-S-T." 

Mulder decides to add to the interrogation rather than the catfight he's 
half-hoping for. "When you said 'it' was targeting us back there, you meant an 
artificial intelligence. Donald Gelman was trying to create a sentient AI." He
twists around slightly to see her face. "He succeeded, didn't he?"

Nairn almost looks impressed, then looks out the window. "Donald
wrote an interlocked sequence of viruses 15 years ago. It got loose
on the net." 

"Whoa, what do you mean, 'got loose'?" Mulder says, already knowing 
the damn thing's out there, up there. Man, it's a good thing it's not on the 
aliens' side, he muses, things could get really bad in a James Cameron-kinda 
way. 

"He let it loose," Nairn says in a tone of voice usually reserved for talking down 
to small children, "so it could evolve in its natural environment. Urschleim in 
silicon."

"Digital primordial ooze?" Scully asks. 

The goth nods, a little surprised that the woman managed to put two and two 
together. "Except this time, Donald was the one pushing it to walk on land, 
achieving the equivalent of Copernicus, Magellan and Darwin." 

Scully's stopped being surprised by the worship the dead man obviously
inspired. "And what was your role in this? Bass player?" 

Nairn gives her a look Mulder recognizes from encounters Scully's had with
others who doubted her credentials. "Automata theory, MIT '95. Post
doc the Santa Fe Institute. Headhunted to Kobayashi my junior year.
Then Donald showed up in Tokyo and made me a better offer." 

"A better offer to do what?" 

The woman with the pale blonde hair and kohl-outlined eyes sniffs. "You 
wouldn't understand." 

"Give me a small break," Scully mutters, veering off the road sharply before
parking it and jumping out. 

~*~*~ 

Mulder runs out after her, knowing his fiery redheaded wife would dearly love 
to punch the blonde. Scully spins around, her stance defiant. "You believe this 
crap?" she asks fiercely. 

He puts his hands up, wondering again if a catfight wouldn't make everyone, himself 
included, feel better. Hey, it works for guys, he reasons, but knows she wouldn't go 
for it. "You saw what happened back there, Scully. You saw that container blow." 

She gives him a pitying look. "She could have rigged an explosive charge. There 
are no weapons platforms, there is no such Department of Defense satellite." 

"What about Star Wars?" he argues. "Brilliant Pebbles?"


Her blue eyes flash. "They were never built, remember? Contrary to what 
sci-fi movies proclaim, we don't even have that kind of technology! I mean, 
even if an AI was targeting us," and her eyes narrow, "and I'm saying 'if', with 
an armed satellite, why isn't it frying us right now?" 

"Because it doesn't know where we are," the blonde prisoner says, her thin 
wrists still in cuffs. "If I so much as made a phone call right now, it would nuke 
us right where we're standing." 

"How?" Scully is practically challenging her.

"Recognizes my voice, monitors all communication," Nairn says with
a grudging respect. "I haven't used a phone in over a month." 

"Then how did it know to target the container?" Mulder asks. 

She looks at the both of them. "All I can think of is that some idiot got on
Donald's computer and tried to contact me over the net. Only Donald
knew where I was. And David." 

"Who's David?" Mulder perks up.

"David Markham," the blonde says with a studied indifference
shading her now-standard cockiness. "He was hardware. Donald and I
were software. We'd been caring for the AI, weaning it. Then Donald
warned us that the system started to display more than consciousness.
It started to display intention. But before we could stop it, it was
gone." 

"Where?" Mulder asks the question Scully won't. 

Nairn shrugs. "I don't know. Once day David was on the system and it
wouldn't come, it wouldn't come when we called it. We knew it was out
there somewhere on the net, but it wouldn't answer, and Donald was
just getting sicker." 

You thought it was a simple puppy, but it turned into Cujo, Mulder thinks. 
"And you can't find it," he says.

She nods. "It's not just a program anymore," she says, "it's
wildlife loose on the net. And either we kill it..."and now she notices
there's a crucial person missing in this conversation, now that
either the adrenaline or massive suspicion has worn off slightly.
"Where's Donald?" 

"He's dead," Mulder says bluntly, "killed in a café in what looks like 
a hit." 

Some of the spunk leaves the woman. "That's the Ai protecting itself," 
she finally says. "It'll find David and... me. It's only a matter of time. Donald 
was writing a concatenation of viruses designed to find and immobilize the 
rogue system. The file name was 'Kill Switch.' Without it, nobody can catch
it." 

"We have Donald's computer," he offers. 

"No," she shakes her head, "he'd never leave it on hard drive." 

"Well, we have this," Mulder holds up the CD. "'Twilight Time'." 

Nairn's eyes light up. "That's it. That's the Kill Switch." 

Scully looks at them both as if they've both left sanity and headed for a sci-fi 
version of Wonderland. 

~*~*~ 

Watching the Gunmen practically fall over themselves over Nairn was priceless 
this time around, too, Mulder smothers the grin on his face. Watching Scully 
look almost arch when she discovers Nairn's real name was just fun, too. After 
he recuffs the blonde to the desk, however, his usually straight laced wife
surprises by murmuring in his ear, "I wouldn't mind if you'd lock me up sometime, 
too." He almost falls over and she doesn't bother to hide her grin. 

Nairn looks at them suspiciously before snapping, "Gimme the Kill Switch." 

Scully loses her grin while her eyebrow shoots up. "Aren't you worried it's going 
to track you, Esther?" she says, not bothering to hide her perverse pleasure at 
needling the girl with her real name. "Hunt you down with a particle beam?"

Mulder puts himself as a temporary barrier between the two, handing
the CD over to the hacker. "Not unless someone else makes another
boneheaded internet connection," the blonde shoots back, causing the
conspiracy trio to look guilty, even though it was Scully's idea in
the first place. 

"What's this?" Mulder asks, pointing to a diagram Nairn pulled up. 

"That's the sharp end of the stick," she answers, "Donald probably tried 
to feed this sector over the net, but it took too long, so the system was 
able to take countermeasures." 

"Why didn't it just zap him, too?" Scully frowns. 

"Its creator?" Nairn almost looks shocked. "No, it needed to impress Donald. 
Particle beam would've been overkill." 

"Unlike a dozen crack dealers." The redhead rolls her eyes. 

"No, that's its sense of humor." Nairn smiles thinly. 

"Yeah, right," Mulder says. "But if you load the Kill Switch, what's it to stop 
it from playing another funny joke on us?"

Now her collegiate background is showing. "Well, obviously we can't
inject Kill Switch over the net. We have to find its home nod and
physically feed it the poisoned apple." 

"Why?" 

Another patient look. "It knows it can't hide in the net forever, so it's gotta 
have a physical nexus of hardware, a safe house, if you will. David went
looking for it." 

"Did he find it?" This time Frohike's quicker than Mulder on the uptake. 

She shrugs. "There's no way to know."

Scully frowns. "Why don't you just call him?" Everyone looks at
her, and then she throws up her hands. "Oh, yeah, death from above."

Now the Gunmen jump in, eager to be part of the solution. "It would
need bandwidth," Langly says. 

Nairn agrees. "It's a pig for bandwidth." 

"It would need a T3, at least," Byers suggests. 

"T3?" Scully asks, wishing she didn't feel so out of her depth. Ordinarily,
she wouldn't mind, but there's just something about that girl that's
just putting her back up and making her hate every time she doesn't
get something. 

"A hard line," Frohike is happy to explain, "45 megs a second." 

"Major research labs and internet service providers use them," Byers 
adds. 

Langly spins around in his seat. "But the government keeps those records 
secret for fear of sabotage," he says in his nasal voice. 

Nairn looks at them as if, well, as if she's a blonde. "Gee, you guys know 
anyone that works for the government?"

They all look at the FBI couple. 

~*~*~ 

This time around, Mulder would like to switch places with Scully, but doesn't 
dare place their unborn child in danger of those hallucinogenic drugs the AI's 
got, so he reluctantly climbs out of bed, hops in the car, and heads over to
Fairfax County in nearby Virginia, knowing Scully's safer with Nairn
than with the AI's needle-happy BattleBots. 

And hey, maybe this time he won't even get caught, he thinks as he talks to 
a for-now hostage Scully. When Nairn hangs up on him, he thinks, Well, 
here's to a more stealthier approach. This time, he's got some funky
poaching equipment from the Gunmen that should buy him a little time,
but there's no getting around the fact that sooner or later, he's
gonna have to go inside that trailer. With the handheld monitor, he
sees various sensors around the trailer, and finds with the overlap,
he'll end up tripping at least one of them anyways. Great. Well, if
two chicks could avoid getting punctured, so can he, Mulder thinks
grimly, and proceeds towards the trailer in almost military fashion.

He starts by moving swiftly from tree to tree until he reaches the
edge of the clearing, shoots a couple of the sensors as well as the
damn siren, then rolls towards the trailer, and finally breaks down
the door with a billy stick, not bothering to go in the stealthy way
like last time. His face is covered by a ski mask and his clothes
hide both kevlar and some tough leather long johns he stole from
Langly. Then he pulls down the night goggles onto his eyes so he can
see better, and finds the same mess of hardware inside. Try and get
me this time, you bastard, he thinks savagely, stomping and beating
on the wheeled drone until it falls to pieces. 

Then he sees the badly electrocuted body in the harness, its face covered 
by VR goggles. He doesn't have to lift the visor to know it's David
Markham, and keeps his eyes open for any more surprises, like, say, a
floating harness of doom similar to the one holding the dead man.

~*~*~ 

Scully and Nairn come to what used to be David Markham's home,
which is now a charred mess. When the blonde woman steps out to
wander among the ruins, Scully unlocks the handcuffs, loosely putting
it back together when Nairn gets back in. Putting the gun on the
dashboard, the younger woman bursts into tears, and Scully sees her
chance. 

Then Nairn grabs the gun and points it at Scully. "Go ahead! Do it! I know 
you've been wanting to, dammit!" Her black makeup is now running down 
her face, but she honestly doesn't give a damn at this point about 
appearances. 

Scully sighs, takes the gun,and finds herself patting the thin woman's shoulder. 

It isn't long before they're standing in the midst of the debris, and the blonde
woman inhales sharply against a chill that's not entirely due to the wintry 
breeze. "I lied to you," she says dully, her eyes on the remains of the house. 
"I wasn't working with Donald. I mean, I was, and then he found out about us." 

"About you and who?" 

"David." She sniffles. "About our plans." 

Now Scully's curious. "What plans did he find out?" 

"Uploading." Now the blonde woman looks at the redhead. "Transfer of memory, 
of consciousness to the distributed system maintained by the AI. Imagine being 
mingled so completely with another, you no longer need your physical self - you're 
one." 

Oh my God, Scully thinks. "So you were going to -" 

Nairn nods. "Enter the AI. Give up our inefficient bodies so that our 
consciousness could live together forever." 

I remember being that desperately in love once, the agent thinks, but that was 
completely wrong. But with Mulder, I don't want to be of the same mind, or same 
body. I love the way he both challenges and respects me, the fact that we have 
the same job that tests us mentally and physically, the home and even
ghosts we share, and of course, our three, soon to be four, lovely children. And 
I love having everything, a job, a man, a family, a home, a mind, and a heart, 
all of which continue to surprise me with the fact that I have more to learn, more 
to give, more to love. Love isn't selfish, she wants to tell Nairn, love would open 
itself to extreme possibilities in this present life rather than delusions similar to 
the Heaven's Gate cult, but I know she'd be as open to the advice as I was when 
I was with Daniel. "But Gelman forbade it," is what she says quietly. 

Nairn smiles bleakly. "He was afraid of his creation. He was afraid of what would 
happen if other people followed us." She squats down and picks up a partly-burned 
photo of herself and David. "I loved him so much." 

It's too early to tell, but from what the redhead can see, there's no sign of any 
human remains. Unless he was standing at ground zero, it doesn't seem to 
appear that Markham was even home. She doesn't want to give false hope, 
but then, she's not entirely unsympathetic to Nairn's plight. "Maybe he wasn't
here when this happened," she says, her words bolstering her own belief. If 
Nairn could survive an attack, it's possible Markham has, too. "Maybe he's 
somewhere else." 

~*~*~ 

He's beating down a second BattleBot when a thought occurs to him. Why 
not take down the whole damn thing and save everyone the trouble? It's too 
bad he didn't make a copy of the Kill Switch, as he was busy preparing to save 
his own hide. So he takes out his gun and starts shooting at the monitors,
and when his bullets run out, he gets a firm grip on the billy club and starts 
whacking away at various machines, tearing out wires and basically going 
medieval in the cramped trailer. 

So busy is he wreaking havoc, however, that he doesn't notice the harness until
 the restraints bind him and a visor clamps down on his head. "NO!" he yells, vaguely 
aware during his struggles that it's taking longer this time, probably because of the 
body armor. All that protection is just making him hotter, and electricity sparks off 
his sweat, making him scream. "Scul-laaaaaaaaaaay!!!" 

~*~*~ 

When he wakes up, his eyes fly open. If Nurse Nancy shows up, she's dead, 
Mulder thinks, and is pleasantly surprised to find Scully bending over him. "Thank 
God," she says, holding his hand. She stops him when he tries to sit up,
her hand on his shoulder. "Don't. You just gave us a terrible scare."

He smiles weakly. "Sorry about that. I'm just glad you got to me before I 
turned into a crispy critter." 

She nods. "I know. But not everyone was so lucky. Esther Nairn, for one." 

His mouth hangs open. "What?" 

Her eyes drop. "She tried using the Kill Switch, but they got her." 

His mind reels. "How?" he says in a dry voice. 

"I think it tracked us through my cell phone," she says. She holds his
hand up to her cheek. "Fortunately, you managed to damage most of the
equipment in the trailer, so by the time I got there, the AI wasn't
able to completely hurt you." 

"What do you mean, 'completely'," he asks, "what's wrong with me?" 

"Mulder, don't," Scully says, but it's too late. 

He sits up and finds second- and third-degree burns over a large part of 
his body. As shock ripples through him, an orderly comes in and snaps, 
"I'm afraid you'll have to leave now, Ms. Scully. His pain medication's wearing 
off." 

As Scully is hustled out the door, she shoots an agonized glance at him. 
"I'll be okay," he says weakly when the orderly returns to inject him with 
something that's fast-acting. Damn, that's strong, he thinks, slipping into
unconsciousness. 

~*~*~ 

A shell-shocked Nairn and shaken Scully stand slowly from their crouched 
positions on the bridge. "Okay, that was too damn close," Scully mutters, 
seeing the last of the computer fizzle into the river below. "I'm not about to 
lose my unborn child over some ghost in the machine." Vaguely, she recalls 
one of her early cases with Mulder involving a homicidal machine at the 
Eurisko building that killed off his glory-seeking ex-coworker. 

"You're pregnant?" Nairn asks, interrupting her thoughts. 

Scully smiles a little. "Our fourth," she says, then rotates her neck. It's been a
long day, and it looks like it's going to get longer. "Thank goodness Mulder's 
into large families." 

"He's your husband?" The techie is fairly goggling now. 

"Yeah," the redhead says, "partners in all the right ways." 

"Well, I guessed you were close, but," Nairn shrugs, "wow. Four kids. 
How do you manage that on top of this job?" 

"It helps to have a nanny," Scully says dryly, thankful she's still got
the keys. Walking on now-sturdy legs, she adds, "Coming?" 

The blonde woman nods as the gate hauls itself up, as if the AI's
satisfied the danger's over. "But you guys are always yelling at each
other." 

Scully smiles as they buckle up. "At the end of the day, the best part is 
being able to kiss and make up. Or beat the crap out of some sewage-dwelling 
mutant, but don't tell him that," she adds, and finds some small satisfaction in 
seeing the other woman smile.

"I don't know about the mutant part, but I think that's what I loved, *love*, about 
David," Nairn says quietly as Scully drives over the bridge. "Just being with him 
at the end of the day. Especially when Donald was getting more and more 
spooked about the AI, it was just so good to come home to David and, I dunno, 
talk. Sit. You know what I mean?" 

"You'll have more of those times, I'm sure," Scully says, her foot unconsciously 
pressing harder on the gas to reach Mulder. They spend a couple of miles in 
silence, until Scully grabs onto the train of thought that eluded her earlier. "Have 
you heard of Brad Wilczek? He used to work at Eurisko." 

Nairn nods. "I heard the CIA kidnapped him to rebuild a similar prototype." Then 
her eyes narrow. "How do you know him?" 

"Mulder and I worked that case," the redhead says, her eyes on the road. "I 
never was quite sure what happened to him, if he was kidnapped, as you say, 
or incarcerated in some mental institution, or even killed. It seems strange things
happen when the government takes an interest in AI, Esther," she finishes quietly. 

In a voice just as quiet, the blonde woman says, "Which was why Donald took 
the utmost precautions when he picked David and I. He didn't want to take the 
chance that what happened to Wilczek would happen to any of us." 

"And yet, it's the AI hunting you down, not the government," Scully says. 

Nairn smiles. "You and your husband work for the government, right?" Then 
she looks out the window, her cynical face reasserting itself. "It's only a matter of
time before others add things up. By then, we should be long gone."

Scully's about to ask her what she means by that, but they've
reached the chicken farm and her heart's in her throat when she sees
Mulder's empty car. 

~*~*~ 

The next time Mulder wakes up, someone is massaging cool, soothing lotion 
all over his body. "Don't stop," he says, smiling at his wife. 

Scully smiles back. "You're awake. Good." Her hands work slowly down his 
torso until they rub small circles around his groin. She licks her lips when he gets 
bigger. "Very awake." 

"You have no idea," he groans, thankful that's one of the few parts of his body that 
hasn't been charbroiled. "Oh, Scully, oh my go..." His eyes roll back, and for a while, 
he's incapable of speech, much less thought, as she gives him the best blowjob of his
life. It isn't long before he explodes in her mouth, and she licks him off like ice cream 
off a stick. When she licks her lips again, he moans, unable to stop blood rushing 
through his penis for the second time. 

"Mmm, Mulder," she groans, "I wish we could do more." 

"Me, too," he agrees, both heads in agreement. 

"I talked to the doctor, and he says he can speed the healing process along with skin 
grafts," Scully says. "But he needs your help." 

"How?" he wonders. "I don't have much unburned skin to work with." 

She smiles. "It's not that. It's information you have on this case." 

"Like what?" 

"The Kill Switch," she says, idly playing with his penis. 

"I thought Nairn had it," he says in a hoarse voice, trying his damndest to think
straight. 

"We thought so, too, but she didn't," she says, and he's hypnotized by the way her 
thumb strokes him into the third stiffie of the day. 

"That's too bad," he moans, breathing shallowly when her other fingers join in to 
bring him to fullness. 

"Do you have it?" she asks. 

He blinks at her dazedly. "Do I have what?" 

"The Kill Switch," she says insistently, stroking him harder. 

I can't believe I fell for it a second time! he thinks angrily. And I can't believe I
came for an AI! How sick is that? "Duh," he says, twisting his hips and kicking 
her in the head. As she slams into the wall, everything starts to blur and pixellate. 

As he struggles into awareness, the machine plunges another needle into his 
neck. "Scully," he whispers, his head slumping forward, even as the visor and 
clamps hold it hostage. 

~*~*~ 

As they emerge from the forest, they can see a trailer with its door missing. "Scully," 
the women hear a groan coming from inside the trailer. Cautiously, they make their 
way towards the violated opening. 

"Dammit," the agent sighs, pulling out her gun and running in, her flashlight sweeping 
through the cramped space. "Mulder? Mulder, can you hear me?" she calls out,
squinting her eyes for a sign of him, or maybe a light switch. It's obvious he did some 
damage before he went down, unless those monitors were supposed to be smashed 
in. 

"Brilliant," Nairn mutters, looking for a serviceable console and keyboard that hasn't 
been destroyed. As she spins her flashlight around, she sees two bodies hanging 
from harnesses. She flips up one visor and screams. "David! Oh, God!"

Scully joins the other woman and flips up the other visor. "Mulder! Mulder, come on, 
talk to me," she says, trying in vain to free him. A whirring sound catches their attention, 
and Scully draws her gun at what turns out to be an opened CD-ROM drive. 

"It wants the Kill Switch," Nairn says woodenly. 

"Well, we don't have it. You threw it in the water," Scully sighs, half-wishing she had 
a Swiss Army knife to cut these damn restraints. Her eyes widen when Nairn pulls 
out a CD. "That's going to kill it, right?" she says hopefully. 

"Not if it can learn the program and vaccinate itself against it," the blonde
woman says grimly, staring at the disk in her hand. 

Suddenly, Mulder twitches, and Scully jumps back as electricity surges through
his body. "Just give it what it wants!" she shouts, not daring to touch the man she 
loves for fear she'll be knocked out, but hating that she can't even comfort him in his 
pain. "Please, Esther!" she screams, pain tearing at her voice. 

The lone intact computer starts beeping, and its screen is filled with aerial maps 
that are quickly zooming in on their area. "It's targeting us," Nairn turns away 
from both the painful sight of a tortured couple and her own dead love. If
she can't be with David alive, she'd rather be dead. 

Scully, however, doesn't share the same sentiment, and, grabbing the CD,
shoves it into the drive. As the Platters sing a song Scully's really
starting to hate, the restraints break and Mulder slumps in the harness. 
Relieved more than words can say, she runs back to him and takes the visor off 
his head. "Stay with me," the redhead says, "you're going to be okay." 

Nairn watches them, then starts typing as Scully supports Mulder. Tears roll 
down her face, and she sniffles just once as her fingers fly over the keyboard, 
inputting commands she never thought she'd use in real life until years later. I 
was looking forward to sharing the rest of our lives together, she thinks, guess 
this adventure's going to have to online, my love.

"What are you doing?" Scully asks, pausing in the escape. 

"Get out!" Nairn snarls. "I got it!" 

The agent, thinking it's some kind of payback, doesn't argue, but continues to 
half-carry her husband out the door as the music continues to insanely play on. 
Once she's satisfied Mulder's out of harm's way, she goes back to get Nairn, but
doesn't see the blonde woman at the console. "Esther?" 

"You don't listen, do you?" Nairn's voice may be muffled by the clutter and
electricity, but not her anger. 

Scully swings her flashlight around. "Where are you?" 

"I said, get out!" the other woman screams, and the computer beeps ominously, 
as if to underscore the point. 

Dammit, Scully thinks, grabbing Mulder and hauling ass. And just in time, because, 
for the third time during this crazy case, a targeting system from above strikes and 
blows the trailer to smithereens. 

~*~*~ 

The next night, having finished up and filed in their report, thanked and paid their 
nanny, and tucked their sweet babies in bed, Mulder and Scully plop exhaustedly 
on their bed. "I gotta say, virtual reality's got nothing on real life," Mulder says,
his eyes taking in the sight of his wife yawning and stretching next to him in a faded 
Quantico shirt. 

"So what exactly did you see when you were drugged?" Scully asks, snuggling up 
to him. She's rather curious as to why his report is, for some reason, rather 
abbreviated during that part of his experience for once. 

He thinks of the cyber Scully and shudders. "It was a nightmare," he says 
honestly. "I'm just glad it's over." 

She's about to press him further, but stops. "Me, too," she says, thankful that, 
according to the blood tests, the drugs would soon dissipate from his system. "I 
wonder if she's happy now," she muses. 

"Who?" Mulder squints. 

She looks up at him. "Esther. In some ways, she reminded me of me. She was so 
young and talented, but so unlucky in love." 

"You regret marrying me?" He pouts, and she swats him playfully. 

"No, silly. I mean, the project brought them together, but at the end, because of 
Donald's paranoia and the AI's psychosis, they were forced to be apart. I wonder 
why sentient AI's end up like Hal in that '2001' movie," she muses. 

I won't let anything tear us apart, a Neanderthal part of him mentally pounds his 
chest, not our jobs, not the conspiracy, and not us. "Ah, so you *do* believe there 
are such things as sentient AI's," he teases her. 

She makes a face. "After three near-misses on this case and numerous attacks 
by that Eurisko thing, I'd have to say, yeah, I do. But that doesn't mean I'll believe 
any cockamamie theory coming out of your mouth." 

"I thought you loved my cockamamie theories." Mulder pouts. 

Scully laughs, closing her eyes as she leans on him again. "Esther wondered how on 
earth we stayed together when we fight so much. I told her at the end of the day, it 
was nice to kiss and make up." 

"Or make out," he leers. 

"Shut up, Mulder," she nudges him. "I'm making a point." 

"Sorry," he murmurs. 

"You're forgiven," she says lightly, hugging him. "I'm just saying, whether it's in a 
spiritual or digital afterlife, I hope Esther's happy. And that David's with her." 

Before the shock of agreeing with her wears off, he nods. "Me, too," he 
says, enjoying the feel of his wife in his arms. After a moment, he says, 
"Hey, can we get to the 'kiss and make out' part?" 

She swats him again, but giggles and kisses him. "No making out, you've still got 
drugs in your system," she says, but her voice is regretful. "Good night." 

He sighs. "Yeah," he mutters, more regretful than she is, "good night." Stupid AI, 
he thinks, not for the first time. 

~*~*~

Chapter Fifty-Six

X Files Office 
Washington, DC 
February 11th, 1998 

::I thought I was going to behave this time. How could I be this
stupid again? Oh, I know why, I needed to let Ronnie drug me rather
than her, but still...:: Mulder has his eyes closed as he leans back in
his chair, but he opens them when he hears his wife returning from
the ladies room.

"Mulder-" 

"Don't. Don't even start with me." He hopes his aim with crumpled
paper will have improved, but it hasn't, so he misses entirely,
again. It makes him feel a little better when he kicks the hell out
of the can. Scully just watches, waiting for him to be through with
abusing their office equipment. "I know what I saw."

"Skinner wants our report in one hour. What are you going to tell
him?" Scully finally asks.

"What do you mean what am I going to tell him? I'm going to tell him
exactly what I saw. What are you going to tell him?"

"I'll tell him exactly what...I saw." 

"Now, how is that different?" She gives him a look that's mildly
exasperated. "Look, Scully, I'm the one who may wind up going to
prison here. I got to know if you're going to back me up or what."

"First of all, if the family of Ronnie Strickland does indeed decide
to sue the FBI for - I think the figure is $446 million - then you
and I both will most certainly be co-defendants and second of all...I
don't even have a second of all, Mulder. $446 million. I'm in this as
deep as you are and I'm not even the one that overreacted. I didn't
do the..."She makes a stabbing motion. "with the thing. If we go to
jail I can only hope my Mom will look after the ki-"

"I did not overreact. Ronnie Strickland was a vampire," Mulder
insists.

"Where is your proof?" 

"You're my proof. You were there." She loosens a huge sigh. "OK, now
you're scaring me. I wanna know exactly what you're gonna tell
Skinner."

"Oh, you want our stories straight." Mulder's not sure, but he thinks
she looks a little relieved.

"No, no, no, I didn't say that. I just want to hear it the way you
saw it."

"I don't feel comfortable with that." 

"Prison, Scully. Your cell mate's nickname is going to be Large
Marge. She's going to read a lot of Gertrude Stein. Think of how
you'll explain her to our kids when we get out of the clink."

She smiles in spite of herself. "All right." 

"All right, start at the beginning." 

"The very beginning?" Scully asks as Mulder returns to his desk and
takes a micro tape recorder from the drawer and turns it on. "Fine."
Yesterday morning I brought Page to preschool because they were
having a fieldtrip, which neither of us were roped into chaperoning
this time. When I got here, you were, uh...characteristically
exuberant."


X Files Office 
February 10th, 1998
Yesterday 

Mulder slaps a plane ticket on the desk. "Hope you brought your
cowboy boots."

"You want us to go to Dallas?" she asks, looking at the ticket.

"Yee-haw! Actually, a town called Chaney, about 50 miles south of
there, population 361...by all accounts, very rustic and charming,
but as of late, ground zero the locus for a series of mysterious
nocturnal exsanguinations."

"Exsanguinations? Of whom?" 

Mulder turns on a slide projector. "How does that grab ya?" He
gestures towards the screen, and the slide shows a dead cow on its
right side, left feet in the air.

"Is it a...?" 

"Dead cow! Exactly. Specifically, a dead 900-pound Holstein. Its body
drained of blood as was this one...this one, this one, this one, and
so on. Six, all in all -approximately one a week over the past six
weeks."

"Is there any sign of -?" 

"Two small puncture wounds on the neck?" 

"I wasn't asking that." 

"Too bad. We got 'em. Check it out." He clicks to the next slide.
It's a close up picture of two puncture marks on the side of a cow's
neck.

"Well, these may be syringe marks. Their placement meant to emulate
fangs. Such ritualistic blood-letting points towards cultists of some
sort, in which case...What?" Scully trails off noticing his amused
look.

He laughs. "Yeah, that's probably it, satanic cultists. Come on,
Scully."

"You're not gonna tell me you think it's that Mexican goat sucker
thing."

"El Chupacabra? No, they got four fangs, not two, and they suck
goats, hence the name. Besides, I don't think Coyotes would bring
them across the boarder."

"So, instead, this would be..." 

"Classic vampirism."

"Of a bunch of cows." 

"And one dead human last night - a vacationer from New Jersey. Come
on, we got to go."

"Why the hell didn't you tell me that from the beginning?" 

"I already called Rachel to tell her we won't be home until tomorrow.
Lock the door on your way out."

Scully sighs heavily, and follows Mulder out of the office.

~*~*~

Peaceful Slumbers Funeral 
Chaney, Texas

The sheriff meets them in a room filled with coffins, and one
mortician.

"Lucius Hartwell. You the FBI agents?" 

"Yes. I'm agent Mulder and this is my wife, agent Dana Scully. What
do you say we go take a look at your victim."

"Yeah, by all means. After you." 

~*~*~

 Examination Room 

They all look at the body. Hartwell gestures down at it. "Here we
go."

"Nice threads." The corpse is wearing a Hawaiian shirt. Scully snaps
on latex gloves and comes up behind Mulder to look at the victim.
"Hey Scully, does this make you want to go to Hawaii our next
vacation?"

Assuming the question is rhetorical, she speaks to the sheriff
instead. "No exam has been done?"

"No, ma'am. He's just like we found him in the motel room. Once I
heard you folks were interested I figured we'd best leave it up to
the experts."

"Your satanic cultists have some sharp little teeth." Mulder asks,
earning a puzzled look from Hartwell.

"What satanic cultists?" 

"Go ahead, tell him your, uh," He makes quotes with his fingers.
"theory."

"Well, my theory has evolved. Basically, I think that we're looking
for someone who has seen one too many Bela Lugosi movies. He believes
he is a vampire, therefore..."

"They act like one. Yeah. Yeah. That makes a whole lot of sense. I
think she's right." Hartwell agrees.

"What about the fang marks?" Mulder asks. 

Scully has an answer. "Well, someone so obsessed might well file down
their incisors. I think that a moulage casting should help us make an
identification."

Hartwell nods. "Moulage casting, that's a good idea. Now...now, isn't
there some kind of disease that makes a person think that they're a
vampire?"

"Well, there is a psychological fixation called hematodipsia which
causes the sufferer to gain erotic satisfaction from consuming human
blood."

"Erotic. That's plausible." 

"Mmm. There are also genetic afflictions which cause a heightened
sensitivity to light, uh, to garlic - porphyria, xeroderma
pigmentosum."

"You really know your stuff, agent Scully." 


X Files Office 
February 11th, 1998 

"Agent Scully? He never once was that formal, Da-na," he mocks how
Hartwell said her name.

"You're gonna interrupt me or what?" 

"No. Go ahead ... Agent Scully." 

"Anyway...that's when you had your big...breakthrough...whatever." 

~*~*~

Examination Room 
February 10th, 1998 

"Dana, you really know your stuff." 

Beside him, Mulder bristles a little. Not that Hartwell notices.
"Sheriff, you say this man is exactly as you found him?"

"Yes, sir, to the letter." 

"Have you noticed that this man's shoes are untied?" 

"Yeah, they sure are." 

"Mulder, what's your point?" 

"This means something. Sheriff, do you have an old cemetery in town
off the beaten path, the creepier the better?"

"Uh, yeah." 

"Take me there now." He snaps his fingers at the sheriff.

"Mulder..." 

"Scully, we're going to need a complete autopsy on this man, the
sooner the better."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. What am I even looking for?" She walks to
Mulder, who puts his hands on her shoulders and pulls her close.

"I don't know." He kisses her on the cheek. "But I'm sure you'll find
it."

Washington, DC 
February 11th, 1998 

"After I finished my examination, which was made even more unpleasant
by my heighten sense of smell-"

"Your what now? You've got spidy powers?" Mulder blinks. "Sammy is
going to think you're so cool."

"Ha. Many women have an increased sensitivity to smells while
pregnant."

"You never mentioned that before." 

"Yeah, well, that's one reason I was reluctant to do that elephant
autopsy while pregnant with Sammy."

"I thought you just didn't want elephant guts on you." 

"That too. Anyway, I determined that the deceased's last meal had
been pizza, I check into our room at the Davey Crockett Motor Court.
"

"The name of it was actually the Sam Houston Motor Lodge." 

~*~*~

Sam Houston Motor Lodge 
February 10th, 1998 

Scully puts money in the "Magic Fingers" box, causing the bed to
begin vibrating, she lays back, in heaven. She kicks off her shoes.
Mulder opens the door and looks at her.

"Chloral hydrate," she says in a vibrating voice.

"What?" 

"What the hell happened to you?" She sits up on the bed. The whole
front of his jacket and pants is full of mud.

"Nothing. Chloral hydrate?" 

"Yeah. That thing that you didn't know that you were looking for -
chloral hydrate - more colorfully known as knockout drops. I found it
in abundance when I sent the tox screen in on our murder victim. Now,
seriously, Mulder. What happened to you?"

"Nothing. Who slipped him the mickey?" 

"My..." She makes her fingers into quotation marks. "'theory?' Your
vampire. He found it necessary to dope poor Mr. Funt to the gills
before he was able to extract his blood...Probably did it to the
cows, too."

"What kind of vampire would do that?" 

"Exactly." 

"We got another dead tourist. You've got to do another autopsy." 

"Tonight? I just put money in the magic fingers!" 

"I won't let it go to waste." 

"Mulder. Don't get mud everywhere." She casts a longing look at the
bed.

"Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. "

The pizza guy stops her on the way out. "Excuse me, ma'am, did you
order a pizza?"

"Yeah. The guy in there'll pay for it." Ronnie nods and goes into the
room.


Washington, DC
February 11th, 1998 

"Foregoing both dinner and sleep, I was soon back at the funeral home
examining one Mr. Paul Lombardo from Naples, Florida. As with the
previous victim, it appears that the subject was most likely
incapacitated with chloral hydrate, and then exsanguinated. The drug
was either injected or ingested. I wasn't sure which. Stomach
contents included pizza... it was then I realized that you might be in
danger."

~*~*~

Sam Houston Motor Lodge
February 10th, 1998 

The door is locked, so Scully kick it open. She doesn't see Mulder
anywhere.

"Mulder?" 

The half eaten pizza vibrates off the bed. She sees Mulder's feet on
the floor on the other side of the bed. Ronnie comes out from the
side of the bed and hisses. Scully fires at him. He leaps over the
bed and across the room, nearly knocking her down. He runs outside.
She runs to the door and fires into the night.


X Files Office 
February 11th, 1998 

Mulder has his head on the desk. "That's it?" 

"Well, luckily, I'd gotten there in time. I mean, though you were
drugged, you were...more or less unharmed."


Sam Houston Motor Lodge
February 10th, 1998 

Scully walks to the other side of the bed. Mulder's on the floor.
"Mulder? Are you okay?" She turns his face to her and softly slaps it
to wake him up.

He wakes up and sings. "Who's the black private dick who's a sex
machine with all the chicks? Shaft! Can you dig it? They say this cat
Shaft is a bad mother...Shut your mouth! Talkin' 'bout Shaft."


X Files Office 
February 11th, 1998 

Mulder bolts out of his chair. "I did not!" 

Scully gives him a hard stare, then goes on. "Long story short.
Though my first four shots obviously missed Ronnie Strickland
entirely, with my fifth I was able to shoot out a tire on his car,
forcing him to escape on foot. I left you behind and I entered the
woods in pursuit. I assumed that you were incapacitated. Then I heard
screaming. When I arrived in the clearing, I found that you had
caught up with him first and had...over reacted. And that his vampire
teeth were fake."

"That's what you're going to tell Skinner?" 

"Well, I'm going to argue that we caught a killer - an utterly
non-supernatural killer, but a killer nonetheless. And that your zeal
to catch up with him was augmented by the chloral hydrate you were
given."

"You are afraid to tell the truth." He points his finger at her.

"Excuse me?" 

"That's not the way it happened at all. I mean, what are you afraid
of? That if you tell it the way it really happened, that you'll look
like an idiot, like me?"

"Mulder? Why don't you tell me the way you think it happened?
Starting at the beginning."

"You're damn right. Yesterday morning began like any other morning.
After dropping off Page, you arrived at the office characteristically
less than exuberant. I thought you were going to bite my head off
when I told you about our case. Things did not improve when we got to
Texas..."

~*~*~

X-Files Office
February 10th, 1998 

"I hope you brought your cowboy boots."

"Why are we going to Dallas?" Scully asks petulantly. "Why are you
dragging me away from our kids this time? And I'm pregnant, you know
- cowboy boots would be hell on my feet."

"I do know that, of course, Dear. I was just attempting a joke, not
demanding that you wear uncomfortable shoes. Actually, we're not
going to Dallas. It's a little town just south of there called
Chaney, Texas. They've had some incidents down there recently, which
I think you'll agree, are pretty unusual. "

"Like what?" 

"Well, I-I brought some slides with which to better illustrate. Here
we go." He turns to the first slide.

She rolls her eyes. "It's a dead cow." 

"It's actually six dead cows. And here's the really interesting
thing..."

"Why am I looking at six dead cows? You're trying to make me throw
up, aren't you."

"Of course not. We're looking at them because um, well, because of
the manner in which they died. All six were mysteriously
exsanguinated."

"And?" 

"And two little puncture marks right here on the neck. Look, I got a
slide of that. And, um, one dead human victim. Last night - a
vacationer from New Jersey. His body completely drained of blood and
two little puncture wounds on his neck. Okay, look, Scully I-I don't
want to jump to any hasty conclusions, but on the strength of the
evidence that we have here, I think that what we *may* be looking at
is what *appears* to be a series of vampire or *vampire-like* acts."

"On what do you base that?!" 

"Uh...well, on the corpses drained of blood and the fang marks on the
neck. But, as always, I'm very eager to hear your opinion."

"Well, it's obviously not a vampire." 

"Well, why not?" 

It bothers him when his wife openly smirks at him. "Because they
don't exist?

"Well...that's...one opinion, and I respect that. Nonetheless, I'm
thinking a murder has been committed here and we can go down there
and help bring a killer to justice in whatever form - mortal
or...immortal he may take."

"It's not that Mexican goat sucker, either." 

~*~*~

X-Files Office
February 11th, 1998 

"Then once we got there the sheriff hit on you, which I must say I
didn't appreciate, and you both basically ignored my theories-"

"He wasn't hitting on me!" 

"Of course he was. He was all 'I'd sure love to watch you do an
autopsy, Da-na.' It was obvious he was hot for you."

"Maybe he just wanted to see an autopsy." 

"And maybe he called me 'Agent Mulder' and you 'Da-na' because he
wasn't at all interested in you."

"Mulder, I think you're over-reacting. He was just being nice." 

"I'd rather he been rude. Anyway, while you stayed behind to do the
autopsy, the Sheriff drove me to the town cemetery. We ran into
Ronnie there, and he suggested that maybe it would be better if you
did that night's stakeout with him-"

"He did?" 

"Yeah. I suggested that you'd probably want a break after spending
hours on your feet playing with bits of dead guy-"

"Oh, God, Mulder, don't put it that way." Scully groans.

"Sorry. He reluctantly agreed to go with me instead. So we staked out
the cemetery..."


Cemetery 
February 10th, 1998 

Mulder is spreading sunflower seeds around the cemetery before he
gets into Sheriff's car. "Sunflower seed?" He accidentally drops
some. "Sorry."

"No, thanks. Do you mind..." Hartwell picks up a seed that fell from
Mulder's bag and tosses it. "Do you mind me asking you what you were
doing?"

"Historically, certain types of seeds were thought to fascinate
vampires. Chiefly oats and millet, but you make do with what you
have. Remember when I said before that we didn't know what type of
vampire we were looking for?"

"Yeah," Hartwell says, surprising Mulder given that he essentially
ignored the lecture before to moon over Scully.

"Well, oddly enough, there seems to be one obscure fact which in all
the stories told by the different cultures is exactly the same, and
that's that vampires are really, really obsessive-compulsive. Yeah,
you toss a handful of seeds at one, no matter what he's doing he's
got to stop and pick it up. If he sees a knotted rope, he's got to
untie it. It's in his nature. In fact, that's why I'm guessing that
our victim's shoelaces were untied."

"Yeah, obsessive...Like Rain Man. It's like when that old boy dropped
them matchsticks, he had to pick them all up. Same thing, right?"

"Well, he didn't actually pick them up. He counted them." 

"Oh, yeah. 247 Right off the top of your head." 

"Well, if he had picked them up he would have been a vampire," Mulder
jokes.

Hartwell grins. "Yeah. I'll tell you what. I know I'm in law
enforcement, but I'd like to take him to Vegas myself. Am I right?"

"Well, that would be illegal, right?" Mulder says. "Anyway, I think
vampires are more obsessive in the way my oldest daughter is, she
freaks out if her hands get sticky. The vampires freak out if there
are seeds on the ground."

"That makes them sound a little kooky," Hartwell comments.

"Three-year-olds and vampires are both a bit kooky," Mulder agrees.


X Files Office 
February 11th, 1998 
 
"Then we investigated a disturbance at an RV park." 

"How did you get all muddy, though?" she asks.

"Um...I tripped while trying to shoot out a tire," he says evasively.
"Tired, frustrated and lacking a solid lead, I just wanted to get
cleaned up. I had the sheriff drop me at the motel, which is where I
ran into you."


Sam Houston Motor Lodge
February 10th, 1998 

"What do you mean you want me to do another autopsy?! And why do I
have to do it right now?! I just spent hours on my feet doing an
autopsy, all for you. I do it all for you, Mulder. Even while
carrying your unborn child. You know, I haven't eaten since 6:00 this
morning when your kids woke me up, and all that was, was a half a
cream cheese bagel, and it wasn't even real cream cheese, it was
light cream cheese. And now you want me to run off and do another
autopsy?" She notices the mud. "What the hell happened to you?"
Scully gets up and walks out the door.

She pauses and looks over her shoulder at her dripping husband.
"Don't you touch that bed."

Mulder is still wet from cleaning up the best he can when a voice at
the door catches him by surprise. "Hello? Hello? Ah, hey, again. The
lady outside, she said that, um, you'd pay for this."

"She ordered a pizza from you? Excellent. How much?" 

"$12.98 "

 "Okay, there's $13." 

"Okay, then. Enjoy." 


X Files Office 
February 11th, 1998 

"So then I ate you dinner, got drugged, got yelled at by the vampire
for dropping stuff he had to pick up, then you rescued me and shot
Ronnie twice," Mulder explains

"You're saying that I actually hit him two times?" 

"Square in the chest. No effect." 

"And then he sort of flew at me like a flying squirrel?" She makes a
throwing motion with her half curled fingers.

"Well, I don't think I'll use the phrase 'flying squirrel' when I
talk to Skinner, but...yeah, that's what happened."

"You checked on me, then left to pursue Ronnie Strickland into the
woods. Once I recovered I knew what I had to do," he says grimly.

Scully sighs deeply. "Mulder, it's not just me. Nobody in their right
mind will ever believe that story."

"Well, they'll have to, once they examine Ronnie Strickland's body." 

~*~*~

 AD Skinner's Reception Area 
Twenty Minutes Later

Kimberly, the secretary is at her desk. Mulder and Scully are sitting
on the couch, waiting for the principle. Scully leans over to
straighten Mulder's tie. He pushes her hands away.

Scully leans over to whisper to Mulder. "Mulder, please just keep
reminding him you were drugged."

"Would you stop that?" 

"It wouldn't hurt," she insists. 

"Stop it." 

Skinner opens his door and sticks his head out. "Scully, Mulder..." 

Both stand quickly, and Mulder blurts out, "I was drugged!" 

Skinner merely gives him a puzzled frown. "I want you back in Texas.
Ronnie Strickland's body has disappeared from the morgue. Apparently
in conjunction with this, a coroner's been attacked...his throat
was...bitten."

"The coroner's dead?" 

"No, his...throat was bitten. It was sort of...gnawed on. Daylight's
burning, agents."

After he leaves Scully turns to Mulder with a shocked look. "But...he
was dead."

"I noticed that." 

"With a stake through his heart."

"I noticed that, too." 


Cemetery 
Night 

They shine their flashlights as they talk. 

"So we should find Ronnie out here because...?" Scully asks. 

"Because tradition states that a vampire needs to sleep in his native
soil."

"Oh. Like how April won't sleep anywhere but her own crib." 

"Yeah." 

"But Mulder, he had fake fangs. Why would a real vampire need fake
fangs? I mean, for the sake of argument."

"Fangs are very rarely mentioned in the folklore. Real vampires
aren't actually thought to have them. It's more an invention of Bram
Stoker's. I think maybe you were right before when you said that this
is just a guy who's watched too many Dracula movies. He just happens
to be a real vampire."

"Well, so where the hell is he?" Scully asks, looking around. 

"That's the sheriff." Mulder points to a car. 

"Evening, agents. I heard y'all were back in town. Thought I might be
of some assistance."

::Hmm, Scully says here with Hartwell, or comes with me. Tough
choice, but...:: "Yeah, actually you can. You can stay behind here with
Agent Scully and keep an eye on things while I check something out."

"Where are you going?" Scully asks. 

"Where might you be living if your mail came general delivery around
here?"

"The RV park." 

"You're good," Mulder says as he leaves.

~*~*~

In his car Hartwell pours coffee for Scully.

She declines the mug. "Thanks for the thought, but I can't." 

"Why not?" Hartwell's voice is overly upset.

His weird reaction worries her a little, and she thinks about
Mulder's insistence that he was hitting on her. It makes her wonder
if the drink is drugged with a roofie or something of that nature.
"Pregnant women aren't supposed to drink coffee."

"Oh. You're sure you can't have any?" he asks anxiously.

"I'm sure," she says firmly.

"So what do you think about vampires?" 

"You mean aside from the fact that I don't believe in them?" 

"Yeah, aside from that." 

"Well...they're supposed to be extremely charming. Seductive. No, I
mean...even if they did really exist, who's to say they'd actually be
like that? As my husband says, there are many different kinds of
vampires."

Hartwell looks away. "Yup. Sure are. I really need to apologize to
you about Ronnie. He makes us all look bad. He's just not who we are
anymore. I mean, we pay taxes, we're good neighbors. Old Ronnie, he
just...he can't quite seem to grasp the concept of...low profile. But
though he may be a moron, he is one of our own. I really wish you'd
of had the coffee."

 He turns back to her and his eyes are glow in the dark green.

"You're got to be kidding me," Scully says, scooting towards the
door.

"What?" 

"You tried to drug me with the coffee, and now you're planning to
bite me!"

Hartwell shrugs. "Have to, it's what vampires do." He opens his
mouth, revealing sharp teeth.

Without missing a beat Scully dumps the hot coffee all over him.
Hartwell howls and dives back.

"What did you do that for?" 

"I don't feel like being bitten?" Scully asks, as if it's obvious.
She reaches down along the door and the seat and comes up with a
half-full bag of sunflower seeds - the kind her husband eats - and
throws them out the open drivers' side window.

"What did you do that for?" Hartwell complains. "Now I have to go and
pick them up!"

Two minutes after he gets out of the car to gather the seeds, he
looks up to see Scully driving off in his vehicle.

Motor Home
Five Minutes Later

Mulder's attempts to arrest Ronnie have come to their predictable
end, and he's got arms up to shield his face when a noise startles
him into dropping them. It's a car engine.

"Come on, get in!" Scully shouts out the window, seeming unsurprised
to see that he's in the middle of a pack of vampires.

"How did you?" Mulder asks numbly as he hops in.

"Hartwell's a vampire. This whole town is full of them," Scully
explains, then she shouts out the window again. "If you don't move
I'm going to run your vampiric asses over!"

The vampires seem to take her at her word, and shuffle off without
giving chase.


Skinner's Office 
February 11th, 1998 

Skinner doesn't look amused. "So, that's it? They simply disappeared
without a trace. And that's exactly the way it happened from start to
finish?"

"Well, I can neither confirm nor deny agent Mulder's version of
events which occurred outside my presence."

"And I can neither confirm nor deny agent Scully's version of events,
but, um..."

"Anyway...he was drugged." 

"That is...essentially, exactly the way it happened," Mulder tells
him.

"Essentially," Scully agrees.

Neither of them look their boss in the eye.

~*~*~

Chapter Fifty-Seven


Massachusetts Institute Visiting Lecturers' Forum
February/March
1998

Mulder is idly doodling in his notepad, almost hoping the
conference is over, and at the same time, hoping that it will stretch
on for eternity for the same reason. Cassandra Spender. "Before the
exploration of space," he writes, "of the moon and the planets, man
hailed that the heavens were the home and province of powerful gods
who controlled not just the vast firmament, but the earthly fate of
man himself and that the pantheon of powerful, warring deities, was
the cause and reason for the human condition, for the past and the
future, and for which great monuments would be created on earth as in
heaven. But in time man replaced these gods with new gods and new
religions that provided no more certain or greater answers than those
worshipped by his Greek or Roman or Egyptian ancestors. And while
we've chosen now our monolithic and benevolent gods and found our
certainties in science, believers all, we wait for a sign, a
revelation. Our eyes turn skyward ready to accept the truly
incredible to find out destiny written in the stars. But how do we
best look to see? With new eyes or old?" 

Scully is sitting in the audience, watching the boredom quotient in her 
husband's eyes grow exponentially. Half the time, she's actually paying 
attention to the discussions, but mostly, she's keeping an eye on her 
mobile kids, who are playing with little aliens and UFOs, even as she's 
making sure April stays quiet. But now, as Mulder is putting in his 
controversial two cents, she sits up and pays attention. What is it 
about this older woman, her smiling image frozen onscreen, that 
catches his notice? The redhead frowns slightly, trying to figure out if the
woman is anyone she or Mulder knows. Nope, doesn't ring a bell.

Mulder, however, believes even more strongly than he did the last
time around, with good reason. And therefore, he doesn't argue
against Cassandra Spender's, that is, Patient X's, testimony, but
rather, against her naïve ideology. "I believe that not only are
there aliens involved in Patient X's case, but also clandestine
military and government complicity, men which, while they believe
they have earth's best interests at heart, ultimately doom all of
humanity, themselves included, by allowing people like Patient X to
spread a delusional message of intergalactic goodwill, which is naïve
and misguided at best, and downright dangerous at worst." 

Scully blinks as the conference erupts. You sure know how to stick to the
man, Mulder, she thinks, amused, even if you agree with him 99.9% of
the time. But once the Jerry Springer action dies down somewhat, she
doesn't feel the need to clutch her children to her side quite so
tightly, and they resume making a nuisance of themselves among those
she has mentally termed rather delusional. Once the conference
actually wraps up, she and Mulder make their way to each other, but
their trajectory is intercepted by Doctor Heitz Werber. 

"Doctor Werber?" Mulder looks almost startled as he shakes the older man's 
hand. 

The doctor seems similarly startled when he sees the red-haired wife and
their three children. "Yes, it's been some time," he says. 

"Almost five years." Mulder nods. He looks down at his wife and smiles, and
she smiles back. 

"I came down expecting to hear how your work had progressed. I'm," the good 
doctor pauses as Page and Sammy chase each other around his legs, 
"surprised, to say the least." 

You and me both, the tall agent thinks, but aloud, he says, always the master 
of understatement, "A lot has changed." 

Doctor Werber nods. "Actually, I came to talk to you about one of your more 
interesting theories. On Patient X, that is. I think you should meet her." 

Perhaps it's just her imagination, but for a split second there, Scully could 
almost swear her husband looked panicked. But she can't get a better look just 
yet because he's grabbing Page and Sammy by their hoods, and when he looks 
back up, he looks, well, fine. Just my imagination, the song plays in her head, 
running away with me. 

~*~*~ 

A small crowd gathers in the sterile hospital room, and for what seems to the 
kids the hundred-teenth time, they are shushed and told not to touch anything. "I 
know." Page scowls up at the nurse, "I'm a good girl."


"Of course you are, dear." The woman in the wheelchair smiles, and the blonde 
little girl smiles back. The nurse purses her lips, but leaves, seeing that there's 
a doctor in the room. "Hi, I'm Cassandra," she says in a nicotine-hoarsened 
voice. 

Page goggles at the frail woman in the chair, then looks at her mother. "Can I 
call her by a real name?" she asks, still not understanding that surnames are 
"real names" too. 

Scully smiles and nods a little. "If she wants you to." She walks over and proffers 
her hand, shifting April on her hip. "I'm Dana, but I'm guessing the person you want 
to talk to is my husband." She meets the other woman's firm handshake with her 
own, and steps back, somehow trusting this would-be abductee more than, say, 
her own mother-in-law. 

Cassandra's eyes twinkle as her smile widens when the tall man shakes her 
hand. "You are a very lucky man, Mulder." 

"You have no idea," he says, smiling back. How this woman ever had a 
dour-faced son like Jeffrey is still beyond him, but he knows from personal 
experience how offspring can differ from their parents. 

"I'm so glad to finally meet you," she says, then laughs as the kids clamber over 
the bed. "You're a hero of mine." The middle-aged woman waves off his stammers, 
"I read about you in the news, how you helped that man, that, um, Duane Barry.
How you were the only one who believed him." Cassandra looks back at Scully 
and beams. "It's nice to see a man with his priorities straight." 

Scully manages to keep a straight face as Mulder joins their kids on the bed, 
raising up one of the bars so that they won't fall over the edge. "Yes, it is." 
She smiles indulgently, when her husband tackles their energetic little boy, who 
squeals, before returning his attention to Mrs. Spender. 

Cassandra looks like she's about to squeal as well, practically about to jump 
out of her wheelchair. "I just wanted to let you know that that story saved my
life, Mr. Mulder. For thirty years, I was being abducted, but was too afraid to 
ask for help. It was only until I read about you that I came to meet Doctor Werber." 
She turns to Scully, who looks interested. "Doctor Werber told me your husband 
had gone through hypnotic regression, that that's how he remembered his 
sister being abducted."


"I see," Scully says faintly. Then the doctor side of her takes over, along with 
a strange, almost familial sense. "Why exactly did you want to speak with 
Mulder?" 

It's Doctor Werber who answers, startling everyone. "Cassandra is experiencing 
the sensation that she's about to be called." 

"Called?" Scully's left eyebrow goes up. "Who's calling you?" 

Cassandra smiles brightly and clasps her hands together. "Now is a time of war 
and stress among the alien nations. The," she pauses, gathering her thoughts, 
"the different races, they're in upheaval. I will be summoned to a place, just like 
Duane Barry." 

Even as she looks at her husband, Scully has to fight the shiver of fear crawling 
up her spine. It was only because she was pregnant with Page that her life was 
spared from this madman, this man that this poor delusional woman believes her 
life mirrors. She has to force herself not to transmit any fear to April, who has been 
an angel so far, and takes a deep breath, covering it with a shift of her baby. "Mr. 
Barry died because of those beliefs," she says in a deliberately steady voice, 
"while in custody of men we believe were part of a larger conspiracy, mostly likely 
military or a clandestine government within a government." 

Mulder struggles to keep his eyebrows from rising. You're my hero, Scully, he thinks, 
never mind me chasing little gray guys and their human conspirators. Then his
attention is diverted when Page attempts to clamber over the bed bar. He almost 
misses hearing Cassandra say, "I'm sure the government's involved. They just don't 
want us to know about it." 

Scully says, in a more quiet voice, "I know." She can remember Barry's desperation, 
his fear, and most of all, his intense belief that impersonal beings from outer space 
could be bargained with, a life for a life. She's never really thought about what might've 
happened if he hadn't changed his mind, if he had taken her and sacrificed her
to some insane ideals, if she had lost her family and her life, all because of Duane 
Barry. This is the closest she's come to dancing on the insane edge of what-ifs and 
she really, really doesn't like it here, dragging herself from the edge with some effort. 
"But are you certain about being called?" Even now, she has to force herself not
to pause, not to show a shred of skepticism. It's what her husband would do, it's 
what April needs to feel, and it's what Cassandra needs to see. 

The shining faith on the other woman's face is almost painful to behold. It reminds her 
of her mother, no, of Melissa. "As certain as I'm sitting here," Cassandra says. "I 
know what I've experienced. I, I've been through the terror and the tests more times
than I can count. I have had an unborn fetus taken from me," and she looks at the red-
headed boy and blonde girl scrambling over their tall father's frame and smiles sadly. 
"There are other forces at work. They're going to be calling me." Now she looks directly 
at Mulder. "And you, of all people, need to know about this because you're the one who 
can do something." Then she smiles again, and turns back to Scully. "You're a very lucky 
woman," she says, clasping the redhead's elbow. "Yes, I know you two can do 
something." 

~*~*~ 

The next day, Scully is walking down the halls of the FBI HQ when a tall, thin
young man stops her. She blinks, and is about to snap at him, when he speaks first. 
"Agent Scully, my name is Jeffrey Spender. Special Agent Spender," he adds, as 
if it's a new title for him. 

Uh, yeah. "Is there something I can help you with, Agent Spender?" she says, in
a tone clearly saying that he needs help of some kind. 

"I feel kind of funny approaching you like this. I just haven't been able to reach
Agent Mulder." 

That's because it's his day to be at home with the kids, she wants to snap at this boy. 
Honestly, who the hell are they letting into the bureau these days? "About what?" she 
says politely, regaining her momentum down the hall. 

"About," he pauses, finding he actually can walk his normal stride with this short, but 
fiery woman, "about somebody he's been talking to. Somebody who claims to be an 
abductee, who I'd really prefer he weren't talking to." 

She hits the elevator button and looks at him. "You're going to tell me who this is?" 
she says in a voice that's less a question than a command. 

The thin man looks up and down the hallway nervously. "This is gonna sound weird, 
but," he pauses again, looking around, "it's my mother." 

Scully's eyebrows go up. "Your mother?" 

His expression is furtive, even though his voice is terse. "It's a long story," he says, 
as if regretting even saying that much. "She, she's an exceptional person, but for 
reasons that are probably obvious I'd rather this didn't get out. Appearances being 
what they are." 

Too late, the redheaded agent thinks, both Mulder and I have talked to her, and yes, 
she *is* an exceptional woman. "I see," she says, her expression calm as she waits 
for the damn elevator, not making any promises. 

The young agent looks even more nervous, if that's possible. "Look, she just called me 
and," he lowers his voice as other agents pass by, "she's a very disturbed woman. This 
is something that caused a lot of pain twenty years ago. I'm just trying to save myself 
any extra humiliation. I'd like to build a reputation here, not be given one." 

Scully nods. "I think I understand," she says, just as the elevator dings open. Thank you, 
God, she murmurs inwardly as the doors slide shut between herself and the man who
seems to mirror her own doubts about being attached to someone crazy, but that 
you're crazy in love with. 

~*~*~ 

Scully signs out the last of her reports, rotates her neck, and leans back in Mulder's chair.
Odd, how, even after all these years, she still thinks of it as his chair, even though they've 
pretty much been sharing it for the last how many years. Her head snaps up, however, 
when the phone rings. "Mulder." She smiles, "I was just thinking about you." 

"Dirty thoughts, I hope," he leers, then dodges his son's dough-covered hands. 
"Speaking of dirty, will you forgive the kids if things aren't quite as spotless as 
you left them?" 

"Mulder," her tone now becomes a warning, "what are you doing there?" 

"Nothing," he says, crossing his fingers behind his back, even though she can't see 
him, "just hangin' with our beloved offspring, the fruit of our loins, the products of our 
loooove, the-" 

"I get it, I get it." Scully rolls her eyes, "speaking of offspring-" 

"What, something happened to our baby?" Mulder starts to panic. 

"No," Scully says, almost seeing as well as hearing his sigh of relief, "I just met 
Cassandra Spender's offspring in the hallway earlier. Apparently he's an FBI 
agent and would like you not to talk about this with anyone." 

"Uh-huh," he says, trying to wipe Sammy's hands with the towel while keeping the
cordless phone balance between his ear and his shoulder at the same time. I can't 
wait for hands-free technology to come around, he thinks, God bless the inventors 
of that stuff. "But he never said anything about you, did he?" 

"I'm sorry, Mulder, was that a loophole I just heard? Because you know we never 
operate according to such things," his wife smirks. 

"Loopholes? Us? Never!" he imitates righteous indignation, and is gratified to hear 
her laugh. 

"All right, well, loopholes may not apply to you, but apparently, being photogenic 
does." She smiles, looking at the newspaper on the desk. "There's a very lovely 
headline with your face beneath it, something about, hm, government conspiracies 
from a government man. Very catchy." 

"Is it my left side, or my right? Because I think my left side makes me look more like 
a young Harrison Ford." 

Now she sputters into a heartfelt guffaw, and he scowls. She doesn't have to
laugh that hard, he pouts. "Hey!" he finally interrupts her. 

She's wiping her eyes, still wheezing a little as she attempts to regain her composure. 
"I'm sorry, you're right," she says in a less-than-sincere voice. "I'll bring the paper 
home so you can see."

Darn tooting right, he thinks, lifting his chin and inflating his chest in a Tim-the-Tool-
Man kind of way. "Was Skinner happy that we actually turned in our reports on time?" 
he asks. 

"Um, I haven't given them to him yet," she says, making a face when he yelps. "Don't
worry, I've got time. I was just looking through Cassandra Spender's medical records, 
that's all. She, she was taken to Skyland Mountain, where you arrested Duane Barry. 
And she's got an implant at the base of her neck, not unlike other abductees we've 
met." 

"Scully," he tries to sound sexy over the phone, which is a bit difficult when April 
starts to fuss in her chair, "you're starting to believe in aliens, aren't you?" 

"Shut up, Mulder." Scully stands, putting the reports in one neat stack and placing 
Cassandra's medical records in her purse, "and feed April." 

"You're good, Scully," he says, taking the bottle from the pot of boiling water and 
wiping it free of droplets with a hand towel, "reeeeal good." 

"You say that now," Scully smirks, taking her keys out, "wait 'til I get home." 

As she hangs up, Mulder shakes his head and hits the off button before unkinking 
his shoulder and feeding April. Damn, I'm a lucky man, he thinks, not for the first 
time, and  smiles. The smile fades when Page runs into the kitchen, followed by her 
brother. Both their hands are dirty, but only Page holds them out, whining "Sticky, 
Daddy!" ::Here we go again::, he thinks, taking the wet hand towel and wiping off 
her hands. 

~*~*~ 

While Cassandra Spender is tracing out a constellation on her hospital room 
window, Krycek rubs the back of his neck irritably. He's got a vaccine for Emily, 
a hostage to deal with for the Consortium, and maybe a little free time to spend 
with the mother of his child as well as his little girl. My little girl, he thinks, looking
 at the scared and blinded boy in the holding room of the Uroff-Koltoff Star of 
Russia. I will do anything for her, he thinks, strengthening his resolve. Hell, if I'm 
able to screw over these global bastards for myself, I should be able to squeeze 
them out for a good cause, for once. 

In Russian, the one-armed man tells the teenager, *"Sit up. Drink. We're going 
to have a long wait."* 

The boy nods, his hands blindly reaching out for the bowl. Once in his hands, the 
boy's fingers curl around it and he starts slurping unashamedly. Then he pauses, 
as if lost in thought. 

He is unaware that his captor is similarly spellbound, his dark green eyes practically 
black as they gaze at a series of rust marks similar to the constellation a woman in 
a wheelchair miles away is making on her window. It is only when a strong wave 
knocks the steel hulk of the ship against the dock that Krycek returns to himself 
and  stomps out of the cell. 

When he gets to "his room," he slams the door shut, his nostrils flared as he strides 
through this dank, rusty, barren hole. "Those stupid-ass motherfuckers better not 
be wasting my time, dammit," he growls, grabbing a beer from the cooler and using 
his fake hand to pop the cap off. He closes his eyes as he drinks, but it won't take 
away the smell of the sea, nor the slight rocking of the ship, nor the rust and decay 
that seems to mark his life as much as it does this hulk of a boat. "Lost an arm, lost 
my health, nearly lost my mind, what the fuck else can go wrong?" he murmurs 
before emptying the beer bottle down his throat. 

He doesn't notice he's spaced out for at least a couple of hours until the bottle 
drops from his hand, and he curses angrily, kicking the glass shards to the
side. 

~*~*~ 
 
The next morning, Mulder and Scully are on Skyland Mountain, and from the 
smell and look of things, they're both glad the kids are with Rachel. They're 
both grimacing from the charred flesh at their feet, but only Mulder is consumed 
with as much guilt as the bodies were consumed by an unearthly fire. I could 
have prevented this, he thinks, over and over as they pass one body bag
after another, I could have stopped this. 

"It appears they all came by car," Scully's voice cuts through his self-flagellation. 
"Most of the dead are congregated in a wooded area a short distance from 
the road." 

"Self-immolation?" he asks woodenly. 

She gives him a sharp look, but answers in her earlier, professional tone of 
voice, "There's no evidence of that right now. According to arson, there's
no accelerants, no incendiary device." 

"Why is this happening?" he asks, just stopping himself from adding "again." 

Now Scully stops and looks up at him. "Mulder, what's wrong?" 

The answer, "I'm fine," is on his lips, but he realizes he'd be bullshitting 
the only two people who don't need it. "I could've stopped this," he says
quietly. 

"How?" Scully asks. "This came out of nowhere, Mulder, a tragedy, yes, 
but nothing you could've done. There was no way to save them." 

There's always a way, he thinks, squatting down next to one of the bodies. 
"This is Skyland Mountain, Scully," he says, and looks up at her. "There's 
something about this place that attracts," he pauses, his eyes dropping down 
to the hideously burned and twisted corpse in front of him, "that attracts 
aliens, if not outright inhumanity." 

"Mulder," Scully puts a hand on his shoulder when his cell phone rings, 
startling them both. 

~*~*~ 

"Why is this happening?" Cassandra Spender asks, echoing Mulder's earlier 
cry, her blue eyes rimmed with tears, when they walk into her hospital room.
"I knew these people." 

"You knew them?" Scully asks, a frown creasing her forehead as she crosses 
the room. 

"They were friends of mine," the bedridden woman says, waving at the screen 
with names and horrific imagery. 

"Friends from where?" the redhead asks, rubbing Cassandra's shoulder in a 
reassuring fashion. She's not sure why, but there's a comfortable familiarity 
about this woman that almost makes her believe in past lives. 

"From a long time ago. Please, you've got to stop this," the blonde woman 
begs them tearfully, clasping Scully's hands in her own. 

"How?" Mulder asks, his own face looking almost as tortured as 
Cassandra's. "Do you know who's doing this?" 

Tears are freely falling from the older woman's eyes. "I don't know," she 
says, and Scully digs out tissue paper from her purse. Her lips form a silent 
"O" when she sees her son in the doorway, and the two agents make their 
exit. 

The young man looks like he's ready to have a conniption. "Agent Mulder? 
My name's Jeffrey Spender." 

I really wish we could've met under better circumstances, half-bro, Mulder 
thinks, guess it was never meant to be. I wish I could ask you about Samantha, 
what growing up with her was like, if she was even happy once while she was 
with you and your mom before your dad practically killed her off. I wish I could 
ask you if you even cared about your cigarette-smoking, conspiracy-ridden
father, or if taking over the X-Files was merely your way of pissing me off. 
Instead,  he says a deadpan, "Nice to meet you," and wonders when, if ever, 
Jeffrey will  get that stick out of his ass. 

Even before the last syllable is out of his mouth, Spender's already turned to 
Scully. "I asked you to leave her alone," he says in a voice about as tight as 
his lips, glaring her down. 

Scully, however, has never been one to let tall men's glares scare her, and
certainly not a wet-behind-the-ears agent. "Your mother called us about the 
incident in Virginia," she says, her voice dangerously even. "She said she 
knew some of the dead." 

"Of course she did," the young agent says dismissively, "they were in the 
same ridiculous cult that she used to be." 

Both the redhead's eyebrows go up. Wow, a two-fer. "She was in a cult?" 

Spender nods tersely. "A UFO cult believed they were going to be carried 
to immortality in some kind of flying motherwheel." 

Boy, Heaven's Gate never gets old when it comes to true believers, Mulder 
muses, even though the kid's completely off where his mother's beliefs are 
concerned, which isn't surprising. "I'm sorry, we won't be bothering you or 
your mother," he says, steering a surprised Scully out of the hallway, while 
Spender walks over to the doctor's office. None of them notice, however, 
the cap-wearing custodian who walks to Cassandra's room with a quiet,
almost distracted purpose. 

~*~*~ 

Back at the office, Mulder and Scully go over the forensic and pathology 
reports, finding evidence of what and who the victims were, not cult members 
but MUFON members, and that they all had implants, anxiety, and beliefs 
that they would be called and abducted again by aliens. "It's gotta be the 
implants," he says, "they triggered some kind of homing device to lead them 
to Skyland Mountain, for some kind of mass abduction." 

"But why?" Scully frowns, peering at one of the files and flipping through it.
"It doesn't make sense, since they were killed, not abducted. Why lead them 
to their deaths?" 

"Who knows what the hell aliens think?" Mulder mutters, looking at the 
post-autopsy view of one of the victims. The phone rings, startling them 
both. "Mulder," he answers.

"This is Marita Covarrubias," a familiar voice says, "is this a secure 
line we're on?" 

"Yes," he says as Scully mouths "Who?"

"You were at Skyland Mountain. Are you aware of a UN report on a
similar incident in the former Soviet Union?" 

I am now, he thinks, answering, "No," while writing on a scratch pad, 
"Covarrubias." 

As Scully nods, the assistant to the SRSG continues, "I was in
Kazakhstan, Agent Mulder. There is a connection. I have someone who
knows it. I have him with me now." 

Ohshitohshitohshitohshitohshit, he thinks, wondering how he's gonna pull 
this off. "Did someone follow you?" he asks, hoping to keep her alert. 

"No," she says, "I know how to shake off pursuers, Agent Mulder. Meet 
me at a pay phone on Skodal Road, just off the I-90 - Oh!" 

"Hello? Hello!" Mulder tries, then slams the phone. 

"What happened?" Scully asks. 

"I think whoever got to those people at Skyland Mountain got to
Covarrubias," Mulder says, grabbing the keys and Scully's wrist
before slamming the door shut. 

~*~*~ 

As before, Mulder comes to an empty pay phone booth, with black oil 
smears inside and out. Although he's glad that Scully's with him this time 
around, he's careful that she doesn't get too close while investigating 
even this "dead" version of black oil. There's no way he's gonna let some 
alien lifeforce goop infect his wife and unborn child, dammit. When his
phone rings, they both immediately look at the hanging receiver
before he remembers his cell and digs it out of his pocket. "Mulder."

"This is Special Agent Spender," a semi-strangled voice at the
other end says. "Do you have her?" 

"Have who?" Mulder asks, getting a sinking feeling in his stomach. 

"My mother," Spender says, "she had your number, and I thought 
she'd be with you." 

"Well, she's not," Mulder says, stopping Scully from attempting to 
take a sample of the oil. "Try another number." 

As Scully glares at him, Mulder shakes his head, his eyes conveying 
his fear even as Spender spits back, "There *is* no other number! 
I've looked everywhere, but she's gone. She's got nowhere to go." 

When Mulder hangs up, he sighs, "Ah, shit." 

"Mulder?" Scully frowns, concerned. 

He runs a hand through his hair. "Cassandra's gone, Agent Spender 
just called." Then he looks at the phone booth. "And don't even think 
of touching that black stuff unless you're in a hazmat suit," he adds, 
"it's the same stuff we found on Doctor Sacks, Gauthier, and the others." 
His wife leaps back at least ten feet, and to his surprise, he finds 
himself chuckling. 

Meanwhile, on a bridge fronting a gorgeous waterfall, hundreds of 
people are gathered, milling about. One of them happens to be the 
Russian boy, his eyes and lips unsewn like a horrific scarecrow. 
Another happens to be Cassandra Spender, her face lit up like a kid 
on Christmas. And the man pushing her wheelchair is the custodian, 
or rather, Krycek in a cap and uniform, with the same air of expectation 
as the others, if only a little hungrier. 

As people look up at the sky, lights from an unknown craft floods the bridge,
illuminating their faces, with gasps of wonder and pointed fingers at
proof of their membership in a very unique club flying overhead. Then
a burning man staggers and runs blindly into their midst, followed by
two faceless men holding what appears to be wands. As the crowd
screams, Cassandra's look of awe is replaced by fear, and Krycek's is
that of resignation, his eyes only on the faceless aliens.

~*~*~

Chapter Fifty-Eight

March 1998

Krycek wakes up slowly, reluctantly, but the familiar scent more than 
anything else tells him that it's a welcome face to wake up to. "Hey," he 
says, cracking open his bleary eyes.

"Alex." Melissa Scully smiles, stroking his real arm, "someone special's
here to see you." She's wearing her crystal pendant on a choker, a
gypsy-colored peasant blouse and a long black skirt, her makeup as
dramatic as her deep-red hair. She turns around, and now the
bedridden man sees a round-faced little girl with short blonde hair
and a cautious face that's more like his own than Missy's, sitting
with a doll. "Emily, your daddy's awake." 

Emily slides off the chair and toddles over, her blue eyes large as she 
looks at her mostly-absent father. "Hello," she says, as if talking to a 
perfect stranger.

"Hey," he says again, and struggles to sit up. As Melissa hits the button 
that raises the bed, he coughs a little and looks around him, assessing 
his situation. "Why am I here?" 

"You were airlifted here in vasogenic shock," the tall redhead says, her 
hand wrapping around her daughter's as Emily seeks reassurance.

Krycek frowns. "Vasogenic shock? You mean there was a fire?" He tries 
to concentrate, but there's nothing in his recent memory he can recall,
certainly no fires.

Melissa nods. "You've got some first-degree burns and scorching on your 
hand and face," she says, waving her free hand at him.

Tentatively, he touches his face and winces. What the hell? His eyes catch 
sight of the TV bolted to the ceiling, the volume down and the closed 
captioning saying something about a second cult suicide in southwestern 
Pennsylvania. The scene is the same as that of Kazakhstan and Skyland 
Mountain. The hell??? He's starting to put two and two together as he 
turns his face back to his lover and their child. "I was there, wasn't I?" 
he asks, and is somewhat relieved to find Emily's face losing its distrust 
as she sees he's experiencing what she's familiar with - disorientation.
"What was I doing there?" 

Melissa shakes her head. "I got a call from an Agent Spender telling me 
you  were here, and if you or I knew anything about his mother." 

"Why would I know this Spender's guy's mom?" Krycek frowns. "And how'd 
he  get your number?" 

Now the redhead smirks. "Lucky for you, you had my number written on 
an unburned pocket of your jacket. Maybe some good karma is finally
coming your way." 

He smiles, but it hurts. "Nope, it must be yours rubbing off on me," he 
replies, but it's then that a nurse comes in to scold Melissa for bringing 
Emily. As he sticks his tongue out at the nurse, the little girl giggles, 
and they share a conspiratorial smile before Melissa and Emily are 
hustled  out.

~*~*~

"Scully," Scully answers her cell, cradling it between her ear and shoulder 
as she changes April's diaper.

"This is Agent Spender," a man's semi-strangled voice says at the other 
end.   "A friend of your sister's was at the Ruskin Dam. I was wondering if he 
had anything to do with my mother's disappearance." 

"I doubt it," Scully says,frowning. Well, she doesn't doubt that one of 
Missy's friends were at the burn site, it's just that she doubts any of 
Missy's friends would intersect with Mrs. Spender. Then again, it's a small 
world, but she doesn't think that would encourage Agent Spender
much.

"Perhaps it was Agent Mulder's doing," Agent Spender goes on
doggedly.

"Before you go accusing everyone, why don't you tell me the facts, Agent 
Spender?" Scully grits her teeth.

"You know my mom's a cripple," he says, "she hasn't driven a car for, I 
don't know how long. They found her wheelchair a hundred and thirty 
miles from the hospital, where I'm told your sister's friend checked her
out-" 

"Agent Spender," Scully starts, but is rudely interrupted.

"Look, she's my mother, not some stupid case file or test subject of 
you and  your husband's crazy department, okay?"

Even April can hear the man shouting on the other end and starts to
cry. I hate you, Agent Spender, Scully scowls, scooping up her
freshly-changed  daughter and attempting to soothe her by gently
bouncing her on her  shoulder. "Your mother will be found," she tries
to reassure the  high-strung agent, even as she reassures her
daughter.

"All I want from you two is to leave it alone. Is that too much to ask?" 

He hangs up before she can formulate a decent retort minus any 
swear words.  "April, Agent Spender is a stinky-poo," she says when 
Page walks in, followed by Sammy.

"Who's Agent Spender?" Page asks, opening the fridge.

"A stinky-poo," Scully repeats dryly before adding, "And don't you 
dare  think of taking out the soda, that's for dinner tonight." 

"We got soda for dinner?" Page obediently takes out a small apple 
juice  carton as her eyes light up.

"No, it's just part of the recipe," the redhead tells her daughter and 
her cell phone rings. "Who is it now?" Switching the cell to her other 
shoulder, she says, "Scully." 

"Dana, it's me," her sister says. "You got a moment?" 

"Yeah," Scully lies as she shoos Sammy away from the fridge with 
her foot.

"Do you know an Agent Spender? He called me this morning and told 
me my friend, who was found at that Ruskin Dam, was in the hospital. I 
just wanted to get his number to thank him." 

You must be the only one on the planet, Scully thinks. "I know of him, 
yes," she says, "generally speaking." 

Hearing Missy's warm chuckle makes Scully smile involuntarily. "I take it 
you two aren't on very good terms," she says. "But I also wanted to pass on 
my best wishes that he finds his mother. Do you think he'd like a Tibetan 
charm or a spell to Obeah?"

She can't help it, the thought of the uptight Agent Spender getting all 
voodoo to find his mother gives Scully a giggling fit. Her sister waits 
patiently until she subsides and says, "I'm sure your heart is in the right 
place, Missy, but I don't think he's into that stuff." 

"Really? That's too bad," her older sister says, unruffled. "Well, if you 
get his number, let me know." 

"Oh, how's your friend?" Scully asks.

"Aside from some minor burns, okay," Melissa answers. "Emily, would 
you like to say hi to your Aunt Dana?"

There's a pause before a soft voice says, "Hi." 

Another pause, and Melissa asks, "Dana?" 

"Yeah," Scully says.

"Do you think Fox knows the name of a good hypnotherapist? It's, it's not 
just burns, there's something like amnesia that the doctors can't explain."

"Well, if she's been through something traumatic, especially if it was 
anything like what Mulder and I have been investigating, I'd say
it just takes time, not hypnosis," Scully suggests gently.

Melissa doesn't bother to correct her sister. "I don't think time is what 
we have," she says, "my friend's kinda freaked out." 

"I see," Scully says, then reluctantly answers, "Doctor Heitz Werber, he's in 
Silver Springs." 

"Thank you, Dana." Melissa smiles and hangs up.

"What's wrong, Mommy?" Page asks while Sammy shoves an unpeeled 
banana into his mouth.

As Scully quickly pulls the fruit from her little boy's mouth to peel it, 
she replies, "I think your daddy would be gloating if he knew what I did." 

~*~*~

On the way to the doctor's office, Krycek's mind is spinning. How the hell 
did this random agent get involved? Who the hell was Cassandra Spender? 
And how was it that, despite missing an arm, they still managed to stick 
more implants into him? Damn the Syndicate, he thinks savagely, they screw 
with me, I'm gonna screw 'em back double. And as soon as this quack
hypnosis guy shakes the memories outta my head, I'll have the ammo I
need.

He twists around to see Emily sleeping in the back seat, and his normally 
sharp eyes soften. Emily, he thinks to himself, Daddy's gonna have to do 
more bad things before I see you again. But first, let's get this over 
with. As Melissa parks the car, Krycek thinks cynically that the good 
doctor must be screwing a lot more people than he is to be holed up in such 
a nice building. He gets out and carefully carries out his sleeping 
daughter in his arms, making sure to shut the car doors softly but firmly so 
as not to wake her.

They sign the paperwork, Krycek putting down false information as usual,
and for once, the wait isn't long before they're ushered into Werber's office. 
Maybe business is slow, for once, the one-armed man thinks. He listens with 
half an ear as Werber tells him about his "new and improved" hypnotic 
method. Yeah, yeah, yeah, the traitorous agent groans inwardly, just hurry 
up and get it over with. You and the Smoking Man would get along great. "I 
don't think this is working," he says before he's out for the count, and 
he's sucked back to that bridge in front of the Ruskin Dam.

"Holy shit!" he says, and Melissa belatedly covers her daughter's ears.

"Where are you?" Doctor Werber asks.
 
"I'm," Krycek's eyes are closed, but his face is transfixed as if he's 
staring up at a year's worth of fireworks. "I'm with the others." 

"On the bridge?" the doctor prods.

"Yeah," Krycek replies, and proceeds to tell them about a UFO that 
hovered over Cassandra Spender, then flew off. "Oh fuck, there's
more."

"More UFOs?" Werber frowns.

"No, you stupid fuck, more aliens," the younger man snaps, which causes 
the redhead to look at him sharply. Is he really under, or is he faking, as 
he's been known to b.s. even her sometimes. Then she realizes that the Alex 
she knows would never knowingly swear in front of their daughter, and she
unconsciously tightens her embrace around Emily until the little girl 
squirms in her arms. "Oh shit, oh shit, they're on fire - Move, you 
fuckin' idiots, move!" 

"What's happening, who's on fire?" Werber casts a worried glance at 
Melissa, then at Emily, who's staring at the man sweating and swearing 
in the chair.

"Come on, you stupid idiots, move! Lemme get a clear shot!" he yells, 
thrashing around.

"Mister-!" The doctor and the female assistant try to hold him down, until 
he suddenly slumps in their arms before they can inject a sedative.

"Great, there's more," Krycek mutters morosely, his body projecting as 
much defeat as his voice.

"More?" Werber says, not sure whether or not to continue the session.

"Aliens, asshole," the hypnotized man replies, "except these scary
motherfuckers have no faces! They're surrounding us and all you
wanna do is  ask stupid questions! Did your mother drop you a lot as
a kid or what?" 

In spite of his bravado, Melissa can tell he's insecure and scoots over on 
the couch, grabbing his real hand and squeezing. She gives the doctor a 
look to continue, and the older man nervously clears his throat.

"No, she didn't," Werber replies, any sarcasm smothered by a genuine sense 
of fear around this man who still manages to hold onto himself while in a 
trance.

"Well, shit, there's another ship," Krycek says, but he actually sounds 
relieved, for once. A lazy smile crosses his face. "Smoke those faceless
motherfuckers. Heh, nice to see the pyros get torched." 

"The UFO is burning the faceless aliens?" Werber is looking more and more
boggled by the second.

"Duh," the one-armed man replies, and Emily giggles. He smiles, and now his 
voice gets dreamy. "Damn, that's beautiful." 

"What is?" the doctor leans forward, as if he could see what the hypnotized 
man sees.

"Those fuckin' aliens are pulling this old lady out of her wheelchair up 
into their ship in slow motion with some kinda bright lights or tractor 
beam," he says, his voice still tinged with an awestruck wonder that Mulder 
would've been hard-put to believe if he were there, "but that ain't the cool
part. The cool part is that the snow isn't falling, it's floating. I've never seen 
such beautiful snow." His gloved false hand reaches out as if to touch it, and 
his mouth is slightly open. "It's weird, there's a bunch of smoking bodies lying 
not too far away, and everyone's eyes are still on the ship that flew off, but all 
I see is snow floating up." 

"We're going to stop now," Werber says in a soothing, but relieved, voice. 
"I want you to open your eyes."

"Fuck you," Krycek says, his voice still hoarse with awe.

The doctor looks at the redhead, who is inexplicably smiling at him. "Come 
on," Werber gently cajoles him, "come back to us and open your eyes." 

Krycek blinks his eyes rapidly, and sees both Melissa and Emily smiling at 
him. Guess I didn't spill about the Russian boy, he thinks, somewhat 
relieved as he returns a shaky smile. "How come you're smiling, honey?" 
he  asks the little blonde girl.

Still smiling, Emily says in a soft voice, "I like snow, too." 

~*~*~

Even though he knows Cassandra Spender is relatively safe for the time
being, or at least, there's no earthly way he can retrieve her, Mulder's content 
to  let things sit for a while, thankful that he's not running afoul of Spender 
more than he has to. To keep himself busy and under a certain Consortium's 
radar, he gets more info on more victims, and touches base with more 
survivors, running some serious mileage on the car. It's weird to still be 
a believer this time around, he thinks, but thank Elsbeth or whoever that 
I've got no reason to be a skeptic. He's about to call up Scully after his
last interview when his cell phone rings, and answers, "Mulder."

"Mulder, it's me," Scully says.

"I was just thinking of you." He smiles, making a left turn, "must be love." 

"Must be fate," Scully retorts, "I was wondering if you were making any 
progress on the Skyland Mountain-Ruskin Dam case." 

"Nobody remembers a thing," Mulder groans, "short of hypnosis, I have no 
way  of wrapping up this case before Christmas." 

"Well, one of Missy's friends was there," she goes on, "and I sent her to 
Doctor Werber."  

"You did?" Mulder goggles. "I guess I can leave all gyro-pyro, levitating 
alien abduction cases to you now!" 

"Shut up, Mulder," Scully makes a face. "Missy was desperate, so I thought 
I'd help her out. I'm guessing you didn't talk to her yet." 

"No, no, I didn't," Mulder frowns, flipping through various files in his 
mind. "Do you know her name?" 

"I didn't ask," she says, and almost sounds apologetic. "But Missy wanted 
to thank Agent Spender for alerting her to her friend's state. Apparently 
he was at the dam looking for his mother and found Missy's friend." 

"I see," Mulder says, wishing he didn't have a reason to bump into Spender. 
He knows it's not the guy's fault, but he also holds a grudge against the 
kid for taking over his division. Besides, the green agent's still way too 
emotional now that his mom's out of the picture for reasons he doesn't dare 
admit, and Mulder even talking to the kid would just set him off. "I'm 
about to send my findings over to Skinner, but things are still pretty
sketchy at this point. Guess I'll hunt down Agent Spender afterwards." 

"You want some flame-retardant gear, or will an asbestos apron suffice?" 
Scully asks.

Mulder grins. "I was thinking more along the lines of a ten-foot pole, but 
those are good, too," he replies.

"So what are you going to tell Skinner?" Scully asks, curious.

Mulder parks the car in the Hoover building garage before answering. "I'm 
leaning towards an initial mass alien abduction, interrupted by the 
appearance of acetylene torch-wielding unfriendlies." 

"'Unfriendlies'? Have you been talking to my brother Bill?"

It's a good thing the car's off, or I would've driven through the wall, he 
thinks. "Does 'God forbid' answer your question?" 

She laughs, and says, "Before I forget, Missy offered either a Tibetan
charm or Obeah spell to find his mother. I have no idea what that
means, but I'm pretty sure Agent Spender would be less inclined to
use them than myself." 

Mulder grins, thinking of sending Spender through the roof, then tries to 
chastise himself for wanting to piss off his currently-unacknowledged 
half-bro. "Obeah, huh? He must've been pretty desperate-sounding, then." 

"Probably," Scully agrees, not sounding sorry about that fact. "Oh yeah, 
and I got a call from him before Missy's. He wants us to stay far away from 
linking his mother to this case." 

"Too late," Mulder says lightly, hanging up. An evil smile crosses his 
face. What the hell. Being family's never stopped him from pissing people 
off, why stop now? 

~*~*~

It isn't long before Krycek is back in New York, sneaking onto the 
Uroff-Koltoff Star of Russia to see if anyone's discovered the vial
of  vaccine. If the stupid Port Authority got their hands on it, they
might send it over to either the cop's lab or CDC, but if the Syndicate 
managed to get it, the game's over. God knows he wasted
enough time looking for the whereabouts of the Russian witness, only
to find he was one of the charcoal victims at the dam. So much for
extra leverage, he thinks, landing with a dull thud onto the metal
floor of what he's privately termed the prisoner's floor.

Unfortunately, he's not the only one here, and comes face to
face with a gun. "Wow," he smirks at the gun holder, holding his
hands up, "they actually have you do your own dirty work." 

"Not necessarily," the Well-Manicured Man says in his clipped British
accent. His gaze slides over, and Krycek feels rather than sees two
men grab him and shove him against the rusty metal wall, one of them
pushing a gun into his back. "Unfortunately for you, one of our
associates, Ms. Covarrubias, grabbed your prisoner." 

"Why is that unfortunate?" Krycek hisses as a meaty hand presses him 
firmly into the corroded metal.

"Unfortunate because your prisoner infected her before escaping," the 
British man answers, his mouth a small wrinkled line. "You were clever 
enough to infect the boy, but not clever enough to hide the implications." 

"What, that you've got people stupid enough to steal what I rightfully 
stole?" Krycek scoffs, only to be kidney punched by one thug and the gun 
now unsafetied by the other. Damn, he hisses in pain, wincing against
his will.   "If you wanna make any deals, deal with me, got it?"

The old man chuckles. "You presume to be in a position of power at
gunpoint?" he sneers. "We know you have a Russian vaccine," he says,
his  eyes never leaving the other man's face even as he pockets his
gun. "Give it to us." 

"Fuck you," the younger man spits.

One of the thugs grabs his head and slams it against the metal wall, making
Krycek see brilliant flashes of light. Even as he's blinking against the 
pain and a threatening wave of unconsciousness, he hears the
Well-Manicured Man say in a more strident voice, "Where is the
vaccine?" 

Emily, he thinks as his fight to stay coherent brings him to the edge of 
nausea, this is for Emily. "Pay me," he says hoarsely, and his pretty face 
takes a bone-crushing punch. Spitting blood, he coughs, "Dead men don't 
talk."  

The old man stares dispassionately at the bleeding traitor. "Pity," he 
says, then nods at the two goons, who loosen their grip only slightly. "If
Covarrubias dies, then so do you. If you live, so does she. Is that
enough of a reward?" 

I hate rhetorical questions, Krycek glares at the wrinkled old man. "Wow, 
boning blondes does make you young." He smiles, taking the old man's 
bitch slap in stride. Then he spits blood before smiling again. Yeah, he'll make 
the old man drag him along, that way he'll find out what the group of old 
men are up to, and if they've got any clues about the faceless aliens, 
stupid old farts.

~*~*~

A red-haired woman is sitting at a wooden table, watching various people 
step through the sliding doors, her daughter peaceably flipping through a 
picture book beside her. A tall young man walks through, and even if he 
hadn't given his description over the phone, she would've pegged him as an 
FBI agent. She stands and waves him over, watching with some amusement 
at  his stiff-legged gait. "Agent Spender? Thank you for meeting with me." She 
smiles, holding out her hand. "I'm Melissa Scully." 

Spender looks somewhat taken aback, even as he shakes her hand. "You're 
Agent Scully's sister?" he asks, taking in her dramatic, yet feminine, 
outfit.

The tall redhead nods, as if accustomed to comparisons with her younger,
more straight-laced sister. "And this is my daughter Emily. Emily, say hi 
to Agent Spender." 

The little blonde girl, rather than standing to shake his hand, ducks behind 
her mother's skirt, one eye peeking out shyly. "It's all right," he says, 
"I was pretty shy at her age, too." 

Probably not for the same reasons, Melissa thinks, sitting down gracefully. 
"I'm sorry my friend isn't here to answer your questions. But we've just 
gone through a regression session with Doctor Werber, and I think it would 
help."  

His small dark eyes look like they're about to pop out of his head, making 
her think it's a good idea he's sitting down, too. "Doctor Werber?" he 
repeats, sounding a little strangled.

Melissa nods. "Yes, do you know him?"

He nods back slowly. "He's, I mean, he *was*, my mother's doctor."

"Then you know how helpful he is," she says in a friendly tone. "My
friend  said he saw an old woman in a wheelchair there, being taken
aboard a flying saucer." She nods when Spender's transparent face
lets her know she's on the right track. "I thought so. Your mother."

He scowls. "I don't think that hypnosis is a valid way of finding
the truth, Ms. Scully. Are you certain your friend didn't just bump
into her at some UFO cult convention?" 

Melissa laughs, and other library patrons shush her. She doesn't look at 
all repentant as she smiles at them before returning to face the somewhat
constipated-looking young agent. Too bad Fox's sister is missing, she 
muses, if marrying Fox did wonders for Dana, I'm pretty sure this agent 
would loosen up with a female Mulder. "No, he's not into that sort of 
thing," she says, "besides, he never met your mother before that night." 

"Are you sure about that?" Spender presses.

She nods. "I'm certain your mother, on top of being wheelchair-bound, is a 
very good woman with a beautiful spirit, which is probably why my friend 
would never have met her." 

Now he narrows his already small eyes at her. "Are you sure *you've* 
never met her?" 

Melissa gives him an indulgent smile, the very opposite of her glaring 
younger sister. "No, but from your devotion to her, as well as Dana's 
description, she sounds like a very lovely person I would have liked to have 
met. I can see your aura is pink with love for your mother, as well as 
sulfuric because of your worry, but I believe Dana would say I'm a just a 
really good guesser."  

He shakes his head. Earlier, he wondered why Agent Mulder left a 
message on his phone giving him this woman's number, and now he 
knows why. Sadistic bastard. He's surprised the man known as Spooky 
Mulder married Agent Scully rather than her sister, but then again,
nobody's really sure what goes on in the basement. "Ms. Scully,
whatever your personal beliefs are, I would ask that you reexamine
other options for your friend's temporary amnesia," he says. "I
believe Doctor Werber's methods are not only unsound, but dangerous,
and I suggest you both should question whatever came out of that
session." 

Melissa puts a hand on his, not caring that he stiffens automatically. 
"Agent Spender, I'm sorry if your mother had a bad experience with 
Doctor Werber, but-" 

"The problem is that she believed she had a great experience," he says 
sourly, jerking his hand away from her, "but Werber merely indulged and 
infantilized my mother for his own purposes, touting her as some UFO 
witness  for his traveling freak show masquerading as a lecture circuit." 
He stands up, his back ramrod straight. "I believe your friend's being set 
up as the next freak, Ms. Scully. If you truly care about him, don't
let him be used." 

The redhead also stands, her face solemn. "I'm sorry you feel that way, 
Agent Spender," she says, holding out her hand. "I'm sorry that you had a 
regrettable regression," and she isn't surprised that she hit home for the 
third time, "but I truly and honestly hope you find your mother safe and 
sound." His hand still in hers, she uses her free hand to put a small charm 
into it before releasing him.

He doesn't bother looking at it before shoving it into his pocket, his stiff 
legs taking him through the sliding glass doors.

Melissa Scully sits down, only to face her daughter's questioning eyes. 
"Yes?" 

Emily opens her mouth, but it takes a moment for the words to come. 
"Why was he mad?" 

She shakes her head reassuringly. "His mommy is lost, and he's scared. 
Sometimes people get mad when they're scared," she says, putting her 
hand on her daughter's shoulder.

"What was the thing?" is the blonde girl's next question.

Thing? Oh, the charm. She smiles, knowing Dana would get a kick out 
of it.   "A St. Jude pendant. He's the saint of lost causes." 

~*~*~

That night, as Mulder's taking out the trash, Krycek pounces on him 
from behind, knocking the other man down. "Married life's making you 
soft," he says, one arm wrapped around Mulder's neck, the other 
pushing a gun into his back, "I could beat you with one hand." 

Sonofabitch, Mulder groans inwardly, I was gonna sneak off to 
Wiekamp anyways when the kids were asleep. Aloud, he says,
"Isn't that how you like to beat yourself?" He grins as the gun digs
in deeper, "If those are my last words, I can do better." 

"Dammit, Mulder, I'm here to help you, not kill you," Krycek hisses, 
his legs and false arm still pinning the other man down, even as he 
unlocks the  safety.

"Great," Mulder mumbles into the grass, "sure, I believe you. All my 
friends want to kick my ass before helping me, too." 

Krycek backhands him, hating that this asshole knows how to
push his buttons, and fairly sure that if the guy wasn't FBI or
stronger than them, his friends *would* kick his ass. When he's
reasonably sure he hasn't knocked the idiot out, he continues in his
low, terse tone, "Just shut up and listen, dammit. The shit that went
down in Kazakhstan, Skyland Mountain, Rustan Dam, they're all
lighthouses where the colonization will begin, but now there's a
battle being waged. A struggle for heaven and earth. Where there is
one law: Fight or die. And one rule: Resist or serve." 

Way to keep the dramatic tension, Mulder thinks, even as an old 
Nine Inch Nails song plays in his head about bowing down to the 
one you serve. "Alex, you're a lying, self-serving bastard, why the 
hell should I believe you?? "his muffled voice asks.

Krycek stands up, his gun still pointed down even as Mulder rolls 
over to face his sort-of brother-in-law. The only thing keeping him 
from completely killing this idiot and going after the alien rebel 
himself is the thought that Missy would kill him, not the Syndicate. "I 
was sent by a man," he says, his gun trained on the prone man, "a 
man who knows that resistance is in our grasp, and in yours. The 
mass incinerations were strikes by an alien rebellion to upset plans 
for occupation. One of those rebels is being held captive. And if he 
dies, so does the resistance." He tosses a crumpled wad of paper 
a foot away from Mulder's hand and leaves, his eyes still on the 
FBI agent as he does so. 
 
When Krycek is out of sight, Mulder rises and picks up the
paper and frowns at the block letters spelling out Wiekamp AFB.
::Well, at least that landing-challenged alien ended up at the same
place::, he thinks before crumpling it up again and shoving it into
his pocket. Dusting himself off, he's relieved that Krycek didn't
kiss him this time, although he's always wondered about that. He's
guessing it was some kind of Russian custom, although he's fairly
sure there was something a little gay there, too. 
 
As he pushes the back door open, he rolls his head from side to 
side, knowing it's an exercise in futility, but who knows, maybe this 
time they'll take home a real live alien rebel. Or monkeys could fly 
from his butt, whichever. "Hey Scully," he says, "call Missy." 
 
His wife walks in, and she frowns when she sees the grass and dirt 
stains on his face and clothes. "What's wrong?" 
 
"Someone needs to watch the kids while we're on base chasing an 
alien rebel," he says as her frown deepens, "and it's too late to call Rachel 
or your mom." A part of him perversely wants to get back at Krycek, but 
the closest he'll get is depriving his sister-in-law of her sleep. Childish, yes, 
but he's yet to deeply analyze familial relationships in the midst of alien
hunting. 

~*~*~

Nearly three in the morning, after Mulder and Scully return from their 
fruitless chase after an alien bounty hunter that stole an alien rebel from 
an Air Force Base, Melissa Scully brings her still-sleeping daughter back 
home, yawning before she unlocks the door. She still isn't sure what an 
alien rebel has to do with Alex's amnesia or Spender's mother's 
disappearance, but her sister's aid there was some kind of connection. 
She'd  simply nodded, too tired to make sense of anything at this time.

The redhead stiffens when she senses someone else in the house, her 
fears  mollified when the person turns on the light. "Alex," she breathes, 
smiling. 

"Hey." He smiles back, taking the dead weight of the sleeping girl out of 
her arms and kisses her briefly. "Lemme get her to bed, and I'll join you
in yours." 

Melissa nods, a part of her marveling at how easily this man has become 
so  domesticated. Or perhaps he's like a cat, able to slip into both feral and 
tame natures when the situation calls for it, and wandering in and out of 
her life as casually as those four-legged creatures. Wearily, she goes to 
her room and slips off her coat, then the hair fastener, then her skirt, 
leaving only Alex's t-shirt and her underwear and socks on before absently
brushing her teeth and crawling into bed.

She isn't surprised when he joins her, fully clothed, under the covers. 
"Mm," she says, not opening her eyes, "I'm sorry, I'm too tired." 

"S'okay," Krycek murmurs, brushing her hair from her face in the same 
gentle  way he did their daughter's minutes earlier, "go to sleep." As he 
watches Melissa slip quickly into unconsciousness, he reaches over 
and turns off the light, he kisses her on the cheek and closes his own 
eyes. It's not long before they are joined in peaceful slumber, their two
heads touching, red and black, unmindful of any alien conspiracies,
rebels, vaccines, hypnosis, incinerations or abductions.

~*~*~

Chapter Fifty-Nine

"Daddy, what's this?" 

Today, Mulder is watching the kids while Scully is off at a doctor's
appointment. Of course, he neglected to tell his lovely wife that he
took the kids to work, and Sammy discovered the X-Files - literally,
by papering the floor with every file he could get his chubby little
hands on. It was during this time that Page found a very special
X-File, and she held up the worn and tattered file carefully.

His face had brightened, seeing the old file number X-525652
emblazoned on the front. "That's the first X-File I saw, eight years
ago," he said reverently. Then his excitement dulled, and he put the
file away, locking it with the others. "I'll tell you about it later." 

"It's sad, huh?" his blonde daughter guessed, and he nodded. More
than she can imagine. "What's this?" and she nearly toppled over the
bookshelf to reach the guts floating in a jar on the top shelf.

"Whoa!" he yelled, then steadied the shelf and held back the
thousands of items housed on it by a sheer miracle more than ability
or strength. "I think I figured out why 'Take Your Kids to Work Day'
doesn't really fly in certain jobs," he muttered.

Or maybe the basement office is just ground zero for childish
behavior that would cause even an ordinary mortal to lose his job, so
Mulder decided to haul his kids off to a somewhat more safer place.
That, and answer a few childlike questions of his own, questions the
old file had unearthed.

~*~*~

"Dad, what happened?" 

Mulder's sitting with his father at his apartment, April sitting
peacefully on the couch, Sammy and Page playing with toys Mulder
brought in bags, and the two men sitting in opposing chairs. The
elder Mulder looked somewhat at a loss when the small family began 
its invasion, and he looks even more so now.

"What do you mean?" Bill Mulder replies. He'd been so good at holding
off on the drink, but for some reason, seeing his son, seeing his
grandkids, seeing them all together in a friendly fashion, it just
makes him want to hit the bottle again.

"June 1952." The younger Mulder's eyes flicker to his kids, then to
his father. "File X-525652," he says quietly. "The first X-File I
ever laid eyes on. The file that drew me in because Skur said my
name. Our name."

The older man's eyes widen slightly at the single-syllable name.
"What about it," he says warily.

Mulder sighs. He knew it wouldn't be easy. He just hoped the presence
of the kids would keep them both on their best behavior, sort of a
precautionary measure against homicide, perhaps. "I ended up talking
to Arthur Dales about it when I got wind of it in late November
1990," he says. "We weren't getting along, and I sure as hell
wouldn't stoop to asking you about it. Especially since I was just
starting out and doing good as a profiler. And then some old guy with
a body husk in his bathtub repeats my name over and over as his last
words...." He rests his chin in his hands, looking at Sammy and Page, 
since it seems safer than looking at his father.

"And you've gotta be wondering what the hell is going on." Bill
Mulder nods. "Yeah." His baggy eyes, too, are on his grandchildren,
and he wonders if they will ever look on him with as much contempt as
his son does. Perhaps. Perhaps even more so. They have more than
enough reason to. "Those were strange days," he says.

Mulder snorts. "You think? Imagine what I thought when I was watching
old tapes of the McCarthy hearings and seeing you sitting with the
big shots. That was pretty," he starts to swear, and remembering the
kids, thinks better of it, "freaking bizarre."

His father chuckles. "Imagine living it. All this hullabaloo these
days, celebrity schlock, that's nothing compared to nationwide
hysteria, 'The Red Scare'. FDR's declaration of 'nothing to fear but
fear itself' turned on this country, and everyone was pointing fingers, 
naming names." He sighs. "But you know all about diversionary tactics, 
don't you?" he says, and would be sarcastic if he wasn't so damn tired 
of putting up a front.

His son nods. "Got a beer? 'Cause I could use one," he says, and is
somewhat saddened to see the surprised, then relieved look on his
father's face as the older man gets up to grab a couple of cold ones.

~*~*~

"Why Dales? And why Skur?" 

"Why anything?" Bill Mulder retorts. "They just happened to be the
pieces at the time. As you know, I worked for the State Department,
the same as Skur." His eyes gaze off to a point that isn't quite here
nor there. "The same as Gissing and Oberman, for that matter." He
pauses to take a swig from his bottle. "I don't like lotteries. I
don't like gambling, period. But it seems that those three men were
dealt an unlucky hand, and all three of them made their choices." He
doesn't look at his son. "Two of them chose to end their lives rather 
than continue being homicidal guinea pigs. That's understandable. 
Some people like to think that, when push comes to shove, that they'll 
be able to fight, but sometimes, you have to take yourself out of the 
game in order to win."

Mulder's forearms are propped on his thighs, having leaned forward to
hear the man's low conversation. "Is that what you did?"

The older man chuckles, but it's a lifeless parody. "If I had even
half the courage of Oberman or Gissing, I would have done it their
way," he admits, staring at his bottle. "But I was young. I had a
career. I had your mother. I had," he sighs, putting the bottle down,
"power. All those things kept me in the game, kept me going, until it
wasn't enough. Eventually, pragmatism wins out over youth, reality
rules over careers, disillusionment comes to wives, and entropy wins
over power." His tired eyes finally look at his son. "You didn't come
here to hear excuses or explanations, but that's all I have."

Mulder squints, wondering what really happened to this man, this
stranger he thought he knew and could easily categorize as a coward
and traitor. "No, it's not," he says. "I want to know," he pauses,
feeling an unfamiliar lump in his throat. "I want to know, why Skur
said your name. Why not Dales?"

~*~*~

"Why not?" 

The old man's eyes may be baggy and tired, but there's an honesty
shining through that's almost painful to see. "I think we were
kindred spirits," he says quietly.

"How?" Mulder wonders. It's not like his father was forced into some
experimental nightmare, or lived out his days killing people. It was
more the opposite, the man chose to condemn his daughter to the
aliens, and chose to hide from the world and everything, numbing
himself with alcohol and who knows what else.

Bill Mulder shakes his head. "The monster you have become, you cannot
uncreate," he says, glancing at his grandchildren, then wincing as if
even the sight of them hurt him. "I think you'd better go now."

Mulder nods, then stands and walks over to pick up April, already
asleep, in her carrier. "Come on, guys, time to go," he says, calmly
scooping their toys into their bags. Understandably, they grumble,
but their good-byes are muted when they see how sad and withdrawn 
their grandfather is, and they leave more quietly than they arrived.

"Why is Bumpa sad?" Sammy asks when they're in the car.

"Stuff that happened a long time ago," Mulder replies, but it's in a
tone less sharp than he thought. "Sometimes it makes me sad, too."

"Oh," the redheaded boy says.

Page opens her mouth to ask something, but seeing the expression on
her father's face resembling her Bumpa's, she decides to keep quiet
for now.

~*~*~

"Mulder, what's wrong?" 

Sitting on the bed, Mulder starts, then puts down the book he's been
pretending to read and looks at his wife. "I talked to Dad about an
X-File," he says.

She raises her eyebrows. "Oh?" 

"It was the first X-File that got my attention," he explains. "Mainly
because the guy in the casefile was saying Dad's name over and over
as his
last words." 

"Your father was in an X-File?" his wife's eyebrows nearly reach the
crown of her red hair.

"Considering the kind of work he was in, I'm surprised he's not in
more," Mulder replies. "But yeah. It was during the McCarthy
hearings, and this guy, Skur, was supposedly a communist. It turns
out this guy was a World War II vet and they did xenotransplantation
via the Nazis to turn him into a superweapon." He nods at his wife's
horrified look. "Yeah, well, not only was my father involved in this
whole operation, he turns the guy loose. Skur had been living for
about 36 years in relative obscurity until he got killed, and according to 
the file, the agent in charge was Arthur Dales."

"Wasn't he the first agent to work on the X-Files?" Scully frowns.

Mulder nods. "Yeah. The guy's a little cryptic, but maybe that's a
side effect on working on the X-Files after a while."

"You have yet to be cryptic," Scully says, pulling the sheet over
herself. "Infuriatingly stingy with pertinent details, perhaps, but
not cryptic."

"See, I knew there was a reason you loved me." He grins, only to get
elbowed. "Ow."

"So what made you decide to talk to your father about it now?" she
asks, coming unerringly back to the subject.

Damn. "Well, Page found it, and I thought, what the hell," he
answers.

She shakes her head. "How did Page fi - You brought them to work?" 

"Hey, Skinner was cool with it," he says, then wilts a little under
her glare. "Hey, when they allow the Gunmen to do weekly sweeps of
the daycare center, I'll consider leaving our precious little ones
with them," he says.

Scully rolls her eyes, then yawns. "Was your father helpful?" 

Mulder actually has to stop and think about this one. This man, who
sacrificed his daughter, betrayed his son, sent hundreds into
horrifying tests, and did God knows what else, actually tried to warn
Dales, in spite of his best interests not to. He recalls Dales, a man
still very healthy in a surprising old age considering the mortality
rate in the X-Files, in 1990 telling him, "I even thought that
maybe...maybe some poor innocent bastard-somebody with a
conscience-might have let him go."

He'd asked, "Why would anyone do that? Why let a killer go free?" 

"In the hope that by letting him live, the truth of the crimes that
were committed against him and the others might someday...be
exposed."

"He was," Mulder says, and turns off the light.

~*~*~

April 1998

"See you tomorrow!" Mulder waves as Rachel leaves. She has a
last-minute hot date, and Mulder feels quite generous about having
given her the night off. This nanny he likes.

Still whistling cheerfully to himself as he checks on the kids, he
feels a buzz at his hip. His cell phone ringer makes April cry, so
he's been keeping it on vibrate, even though it makes him feel like
he's got a large insect trapped in his pocket.

"Mulder." 

"Mulder, you need to come to my doctor's office, right now." 

"I just gave Rachel the night off, so I guess I could see if my mom-"

"Just bring them with you. The office closes in 45 minutes, and the
doctor needs to speak to you today."

"Is there something wrong?" 

"We'll explain when you get here." 

"Scu-" The dial tone rings in his ear.

Being nervous doesn't help him quickly get three small children ready
to go outside, but they're on their way less than ten minutes later.

Maybe they're picking up on his mood, but the kids are not very
cooperative once Mulder manages to get them in the building. He
wishes he hand three hands- one for each of the older kids and one to
carry April's baby seat. As it is, he has to make do with just the
two he was born with.

"Page! I said to hold Sammy's hand," Mulder barks when his oldest
daughter seems to be ready to wander off. She pouts, but takes her
brother's hand. Whining all the way, they finally reach the floor
Scully's doctor is on.

"Hi, my wife Dana Scully called and said that it was important that I
come for the rest of her appointment," Mulder says nervously.

 Sammy and Page are still acting up, much to Mulder's embarrassment.
The receptionist gives him a knowing smile that just makes him feel
worse. "I'll let the doctor know that you're here. Why don't you
leave these two here? There are some toys in the children's waiting
room right over there-" she points to a glass-faced room off of the
reception desk. "-that they can play with while you're in with the
doctor."

"If you don't mind..."

"It's part of my job. Many of the expectant mothers have older kids."


While he brings Sammy and Page into the waiting room, and tells them
to behave, the receptionist has already told the doctor he is there,
so it's only a matter of hauling April's carrier to the room that
Scully's in.

"Mister Mulder, I'm glad we were able to reach you at the last
minute," the doctor tells him with a smile. It doesn't put Mulder at
ease, so he tries to distract himself by taking a minute to get his
daughter out of the carrier and into his arms. He'd die before he'd
admit it, but sometimes holding one of the kids helps calm him in
stressful situations.

"Um, yeah. Is there something wrong? With Scully or the baby?" 

Mulder can see that there's a tense look on Scully's face, and that
doesn't make him hopeful.

"I thought you should see this ultrasound," the doctor tells him, and
Mulder finally realizes that Scully has goo all over her bare belly.
"This-" The doctor points to a blob on the screen. "Is your son."
Before Mulder can ask him what's wrong with him, the doctor moves his
hand to another section of the screen. "And this is your son as
well."

"He's in two pieces?" Mulder's horrorstricken eyes look at the
doctor.

Who laughs at him. "Twins, sir. Two healthy babies, each in one
piece."

"Oh. I knew that's what you meant." It's clear that no one believes
him.

After an awkward pause, Scully speaks to him. "What are you thinking,
Mulder?"

"That I shouldn't have made so many evil twin jokes." He smiles
wryly.

"You're...okay with this?" 

::It's a little late to have objections now, isn't it?:: "Sure. Just
as long as the three of you are healthy."

"Mom and babies are doing great," the doctor reassures them.

"Speaking of Moms... I bet yours is going to be even more glad we have
a nanny now," Mulder says solemnly.

~*~*~

Ten minutes later, Sammy and Page pull at Mulder's coat when he goes
to get them.

"Is Mommy all done?" 

"We goin' home?" 

"Mommy will be out in just a minute. I want to talk to you guys while
we wait."

"'k." they agree.

"Remember how Mommy and I told you that you're going to have a new
brother or sister?" Both small heads nod. "Well the doctor just told
us that there are going to be two new babies."

"Two babies?" Page looks surprised. "How do two babies get in Mommy's
tummy?"

"The same way as one," Mulder tells her, patting her on the head.
This is not the place for a "where do babies come from?" lecture.
Fortunately, Page doesn't seem to notice his evasive answer.

Sammy gives April and Page a glance, then looks up at Mulder.
"Brothers?" he asks in a hopeful tone.

"I think so," Mulder replies. The doctor might have said boys, but he
knows that it's sometimes hard to tell this early.

As soon as Scully finds them, Sammy throws himself at her legs. "Two
babies!"

"They're taking this well," Scully remarks.

"Somehow, I don't think they're as surprised as we are." Mulder
grins. "After all, they're small children. Strange things must happen
every day in their worlds."

"And they don't in ours?" Scully asks, looking as though she's trying
not to laugh.

~*~*~

The next morning they purposely don't wake the kids up before they go
to work. This seems to surprise Rachel a little when she arrives.

"Are the kids sick?" she asks, looking a bit nervous about the
prospect of dealing with three cranky little ones.

"They're fine. We didn't want to wake them because we need to talk to
you, and it'd be better to do with without them underfoot."

"Oh." Rachel says as she slumps into a chair. "Are you upset with me
for some reason?"

"What?" Scully gives her a puzzled look. "No, we're not. We need to
talk to you about my doctor's appointment yesterday."

Rachel's eyes widen. "Is something wrong?" 

"See, Scully? It's not just me you freak out by saying something like
that," Mulder says.

Scully ignores him. "No, nothing's wrong. We found out yesterday that
it's going to be a boy. Actually boys. Twins."

"Twins," Rachel repeats, and Mulder is sure he can hear her swallow.
"Wow."

"We wanted to tell you as soon as possible, in case you would rather
not be a nanny for five kids."

"It'll be fine," Rachel says quickly. But Mulder notices that she
looks awfully pale.

~*~*~

Chapter Sixty

St. John's Church
Alexandria, Virginia
April 19th, 1998

"Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It's been over a month since my last
confession," Scully says, once she's ducked into the confessional.

The priest, partially hidden from view, nods slightly. "You have a sin 
to confess?" 

"Father, I'm an FBI agent. I've taken it as my code and purpose to 
uphold the law ... to save lives." It sounds trite, but it's less a truth 
than an excuse, at least to her.

"And now your work has come in conflict with your faith," the priest
comments.

Maybe, maybe not. At this point, Scully's really not sure.

"In a way. I was here for Easter services last week and Father McCue
approached me for my help." 

"Why did he come to you?" 

Scully looks down. She started this, might as well finish it. "Because there
was a family that he felt needed my help. But it was more than that."
Her eyes fill with tears, feeling doubly convicted as a Catholic and
as a mother, not to mention being an FBI agent and doctor. All of
which were good reasons why her heart is breaking. "Father, I told
you that I had a sin to confess ... But the sin of which I'm guilty ...
I'm not sure if you can offer forgiveness." 

"What is the sin?" the priest asks gently.

Her tears choke her throat, but she doesn't care. "An innocent girl is dead 
because of me. I could've saved her life, but I let her die." 

~*~*~

Easter Sunday
One week earlier

Scully and the kids were dressed in their Easter Sunday best, looking like 
human versions of pastel Easter goodies. She felt bad that Mulder didn't 
join them, excusing himself by saying, "It would be kinda weird, even if I'm 
not exactly an orthodox Jew."


"Since when has weird ever stopped you?" she'd asked, but she
understood the  sentiment and let him watch sports at home with the
godfathers, that is, the Lone Gunmen. She was still wondering
whether it was a good idea to let them  be her children's godparents
when Father McCue called out to her.

"Dana ... Do you have a moment? I'd like to speak with you in private," 
he  waved her and her brood over.

Later, in Father McCue's office, the priest beamed, "I must
say, Dana, it's been nice seeing you at mass again. I've almost
started getting used to it." 

"I've been trying to make an effort to come more often," she nodded 
at her children, who were staring up at the stained glass windows.

"I don't mean to take advantage of your attendance, but I've become 
involved in a difficult situation with a couple that are also members here. 
Do you know the Kernofs?"

The redhead shook her head slowly. "No, I'm afraid I don't." 

The father sighed. "Recently, they lost their daughter, Dara. You may
have heard about the situation?" he raises his eyebrows slightly.

She blinked, trying to remember if there were any prayers
brought up on their behalf and came up with nothing. "No, I didn't."


The corners of his mouth turned down. "The circumstances of the
girl's death were sudden and I'm afraid the police haven't been able
to tell them much." 

"Are you asking for my help?" Scully asked.

Father McCue nodded briefly. "The Kernofs are devout but their faith
is giving them little comfort. I thought with your background your
words might carry a certain weight. Can I tell them you'll be
visiting?" 

~*~*~

Scully dropped the kids off at home, and while Mulder and the Gunmen 
were glad to have more of a crowd to enjoy the game with, she'd tossed 
Mulder a lame excuse about why she couldn't join the party. Mulder bought 
it, mainly  because he knew she wouldn't enjoy herself as much, and partly 
because he remembered that this is the case-that-wasn't-a-case that 
Scully got involved in around this time.

Since Emily isn't theirs and is still alive, he figured it'll be safe
for her to check it out and waved her off with a beer in one hand and
Sammy in the other. Relieved, Scully headed over to the Kernof house,
only to sit with Mrs. Kernof in the living room while Mr. Kernof
stood in another room staring out the window.

Mrs. Kernof showed Scully a picture of her adopted daughter, a young teen 
with long dark hair staring blankly to a point away from the camera. "That's 
Dara on her 16th birthday. We couldn't have children of our own. I 
persuaded Lance six years ago to adopt. At first he was reluctant to 
accept a special needs child, but he became so attached to her. Then this
happens. You make the choice never imagining something like this or
how vulnerable you are. Dara had just been baptized. I know in my
heart she's gone to a better place, but Lance is angry," she glanced
into the other room where her husband stood, silent and alone. "Angry
at God. They say time heals," she added, parroting the cliché but
obviously not believing it.

Scully also looked over at Mr. Kernof, hating to imagine the kind of
pain he and his wife were going through. "Oh, Father McCue said that,
uh, that you've been having trouble getting much information about
what might have happened to her," she said awkwardly.

Mrs. Kernof nodded, looking at the picture of her daughter. "They say now 
she may have been struck by lightening but no one seems to know for sure. 
How she even got out of the house onto the street is a mystery." 

"What do you mean?" Scully frowned.

The thin woman looked at the redhead. "Dara suffered from congenital spinal 
deformities," she said, as if that should've been on the police report. "She's 
been wheelchair bound her whole life." 

Scully felt a chill, a remembrance of something she'd forgotten, but shouldn't 
have. "Could somebody have taken her out of her room?" she asked, and tried 
to push the feeling away.

Mrs. Kernof shook her head. "Lance said he saw her walking and
that when he found her she was on her knees, praying. I think that's
the hardest part for my husband. He'll never understand how God could
... forsake the life of an innocent girl. How God, in His mercy could
let this happen to our Dara," she said quietly.

~*~*~

In the morgue, Scully got the report firsthand from the coroner herself. "If 
you want me to stand by my report, I will, but I have to say it's not
exactly open and shut on the cause of death," the blonde woman said.

"You think it was lightning?" Scully's eyes were on the report she was flipping 
through.

"I'm guessing it was lightning," the coroner corrected her. "The way her eyes 
were burned suggests the bolt may have gone to ground right through the top of 
her head. Funny thing is there was no other sign of arcing except for the face."

"Her mother said that she was found in a kneeling position," Scully
said. Again, she tried to ignore the bad feeling, but no luck.

"Genuflecting," the blonde woman nodded. "Are you a religious person?" 

As she was in medical school and the academy, Scully was wary. "Why 
do you ask?" 

The coroner didn't take offense, and walked around the agent. "I haven't been 
to church since I was a kid, but I went last Sunday. I'm going to show you 
something." She showed the agent pictures of Dara's body, the young woman 
staring sightlessly with her hands and face lifted up in a gruesome approximation 
of prayer. "Her body was rigored such that I had to do my examination in
the position she was found. I've never seen anything like it." 

One of the close-up pictures show a scar on the outside of Dara's hand
and Scully took note of it. "Looks like there was surgery done on her
hands."

"She was polydactyl," the coroner nodded again. "Same with her feet.
I haven't asked her parents yet. Haven't had the heart to, but I assume 
they had the extra fingers removed." 

"What's the connection?" Scully raised an eyebrow.

The coroner shook her head. "I found no other evidence of any other tissue 
damage of electrical burns or any other serious trauma. It's as if God Himself 
struck her down," she said, somewhat baffled.

"Dara Kernof was adopted. I don't suppose that you've requested any 
information about the birth mother." 

The coroner quickly shook her head, but then added, "I can do
that if you like." 

"No, that's okay," the agent said, and shook her head. "I, uh ... 
I have someone I can ask. Somebody I'd like to confer with, actually." 

~*~*~

Scully drove aimlessly through the rain. She felt somehow guilty for being 
able to go home to a loving husband and family, while the Kernofs grieve for 
their daughter. She'd never felt this kind of connection to a case before that 
didn't involve immediate family, but there's something about it that just tore at
her. She supposed it's something like what Mulder feels whenever there's an 
abduction case, although she can't explain any personal connection, aside from 
being Catholic, that she can think of to dispel this strange pull. Her cell phone 
rang, and she blinked, and quickly answered it before sliding through a yellow-
then-red light. "Hello?" 

Mulder's worried, of course, since his wife hasn't called back since midway 
through the first game, but it translated to  impatience. "Hey, Scully, the kids 
are wondering what happened to you." 

Which just happened to be the wrong thing to say in her state of mind. "Hi...uh, 
something's come up. I was, uh, hoping that you could do me a favor," Scully said, 
sounding distracted.

"Why?" he frowned, readjusting April on his hip. "What's going on?" 

"This isn't official FBI business so I was hoping that we could keep it
outside of work," she said tersely.

Oh boy. "Hey, look, I'm, uh..." Mulder's distracted by the crowd starting to surge 
into the theater doors, "I'm kind of rushed, so, uh ..." Through the window of the 
phone booth, a huge neon mouse winked, and he sighed.

"I need some birth and adoptive records on a Dara Kernof." 

"Who?" he asked, and wondered if he looks as suspicious as other parents seem 
to think he does, what with his black leather jacket, dark t-shirt and jeans with three 
small children huddled in a phone booth.

"Dara Kernof, D-A-R-A K-E-R-N-O-F. I can't tell you much more than that, Mulder. 
I'm sorry." 

So am I, but not for the reasons you think, Mulder groused inwardly. "You want to give 
me a hint? Anything?" he wheedled.

Scully smiled a little for the first time since this morning. "Not until you get me those 
records." 

"All right, I'll talk to you later," he said, then hung up.

"Daddy, we're gonna be late," Page whined as he grabbed the baby bag.

"Not if I can help it," Mulder said, and hauled his kids to the ticket booth. The marquee 
above read "A Decade of Disney Movies" and he couldn't help  but wonder what's got 
his wife so tied up in this that she forgot the family outing for the evening.

~*~*~

State Psychiatric Hospital
Mount
Lebanon, Virginia

The next day found Scully watch coroners first cover Paula's dead body on a 
gurney, then wheel her out of the room. Like her sister, Paula's eyes were 
burned out. The former occupant having left the room, Scully scanned the 
rest of the Spartan room and saw an upside-down cross pendant hung on the 
wall. It isn't long before her husband walked in and said, "Scully? Aren't you the 
secret squirrel." 

She raised her eyebrows slightly. "What so you mean?"

He shot her a look of disbelief. "Just got a look at that body they wheeled out of 
here." Then he grinned. "You've been holding out on me." 

Scully sighed, not a good sign. "Mulder, it's not what you think. I - I didn't want to 
involve you. I got asked to look into this as a favor for a family." 

"Dara Kernof's family?" he asked, then started to wander around the room.

"You found Dara's records?" she asked hopefully.

He shook his head, distracted. After he'd called Rachel and got the cats fed, he'd 
broken the speed limit getting to the hospital. One of the few times he's ever rushed 
*to* a psych ward, not away from it, but then, nobody in a white coat was waiting for 
him. "No, those are her birth records. The adoption records have been sealed." 

"I think one of my questions has already been answered. Dara was a twin," she 
said  pensively.

Mulder made his way over to the late Paula Koklos' bed, and debated whether he 
should suss his wife out now or later, deliberately not looking at her so as not to reveal 
his overwhelming curiosity. "No. Actually she was a quadruplet - one of four girls. Was 
this, uh ... cross found like this?" 

Scully looks over and frowned. "Uh, yes, as far as I know. Why?" 

He handled it gently, having knowledge of how far the person who hung it would go to 
protect innocent girls. "It's inverted, upside down," he said, turning to face her. "That's 
a protest, a sacrilege against the church." 

Her eyebrows went up again. "Put there by whom?" 

Like I'm telling, he thought mutinously. "It's your case, remember, Scully? Do you have 
any suspects?" 

She looked dodgy. "Not as of this time," she says, looking away.

Curioser and curioser, he thought, clearly piqued. "Could the, uh, the victim have
placed it?" he walked around so he can see her face.

"Uh, it's doubtful," she replied, and avoided the burning curiosity in her husband's eyes. 
"Paula Koklos was severely impaired - physically and mentally - as was Dara Kernof." 

Guess we're gonna play cat-and-mouse here, too, he sighed inwardly. "And they both 
died the same way?" he prompted.

"It appears that their eyes were burnt out, their bodies frozen in a position of prayer." 

"Their physical deformities could account for that," he said, taking the rarely
traveled oh-so-reasonable side of the road, for once.

"They might," she nodded, still not looking at him.

Argh. What the hell was going through her head? "Look, Scully. I know you don't really 
want my help on this, but can I offer you my professional opinion?" Scully nodded,
and finally faced him head on. "You've got a bona-fide, super-crazy, religious wacko 
on your hands," he said succinctly, just to see if what made her all touchy was the 
religious aspect of the case. 

Her jaw set, and she looked him squarely in the eye. Okay, looked like religion could be
 part of the equation. "What makes you so sure?"

"The mote in the eye, the eyes as windows to the soul, an eye for an eye," he rambled, 
even as he tried to search Scully's eyes for a window into her soul, "he's working from 
ancient scripture ... ancient text ... Maybe even the Bible. He may even think he's doing 
God's work." 

A tall, business-like red-headed man entered, and Mulder had to force himself not to 
shudder or drag his wife from the room. He may not believe exactly everything Scully 
does, but it doesn't mean he has to like the devil. "Did you find anything?" he asked, 
and shook both their hands. "My name is Aaron Starkey. I'm the social worker assigned 
to Paula Koklos. This is so tragic. I just hope you catch whoever did this."

Scully, oblivious to the newcomer's true identity or her husband's creeped-out factor, 
asked, "Mr. Starkey, do you happen to know if that cross over there belonged to Paula?" 

The tall redhead glanced over and frowned. "I don't remember seeing it before. I'm sure 
it didn't," he said quickly. Mulder thought, Liar, liar, pants on fire. He mentally amended 
that, And the rest of you on fire, too, you evil bastard.

"Did she have any visitors or anybody who might have left it behind?" his wife continued.

"Well, she had no family. No friends, really," he said tersely. "I don't know if you knew 
this, but... Paula was about to be adopted." 

Scully's eyebrows just about reached her hairline. "By who?" 

~*~*~

On the way over to The Church of St. Peter the Sinner, Mulder and Scully stewed with 
their  thoughts, neither willing to share what they know, but each for entirely different 
reasons.  Just like the cross over Paula's bed, the name of the church is prefaced by an 
upside down cross. They entered the church, which looked like a dingy old warehouse, 
with folding chairs set up as pews and large windows being the only illumination for the 
building. 

Mulder picked up a plainly bound book, "The Book of St. Peter the Sinner" with an 
upside-down cross. He turned the book upside down, looks at the cross, then turned it 
right-side up. He figured the X-Files looked about as crazy as this homemade bible of 
non-canonical texts. "Scully, look at this," he said, flipping through it. "The Gnostic 
Gospels,  Book of Enoch ... Book of J ... Apocrypha ... I'm surprised there's nothing here 
from 'Jesus  Christ Superstar'."


"What kind of church is this?" she asked, clearly ignoring his sarcasm and stared around 
the plain building with a bafflement born of being a middle-class American Christian.

"There's no telling," Mulder replied, not telling.

A short, youthful man in black walked in, his expression of the helpful variety. "Can I help 
you?"

"Father Gregory?" Scully turned around.

"Yes?" the man answered.

"I'm Dana Scully," she said, and displayed her badge, "We're here about the death of 
Paula Koklos." 

The father looked like someone socked him in the stomach. "Oh ..."

Scully frowned, concerned. "Are you all right, Father?" 

Father Gregory pulled himself together. "I was trying to adopt  Paula. I'm sure you 
knew that." 

"Why adopt her?" Mulder asked belligerently, not because he's as antagonistic as 
before, but because he knew Scully's not gonna press the guy like she normally 
would.

The man of the cloth looked mildly horrified. "I - I was trying to protect her. I knew 
her mother." 

"Do you know where she is?" Scully asked.

"Yes." The priest nodded.

"We were looking for her name. It's not listed on the girls' birth 
records," she said, concerned.

"Why would you want it?" Father Gregory asked, suspicious of  them.

"The other two girls may be in danger," Scully replied, and tried to 
keep the frustration from her voice, but didn't do very well. "We're 
hoping that she might be able to help is find them." 

"Their mother died in childbirth," he said evasively.

Scully looked at Mulder, who said nothing. Thanks a lot, she thought, 
but I guess I deserve that. "Can you give us a name?" she pleaded.

"When I was a priest in the Roman Church, before I founded my 
own, I was her  confessor. Divulging her name would violate the code 
of my faith," and then the priest saw Scully's cross necklace, "and 
yours, I see." 

He may trump Scully with that, but not me, Mulder thought mulishly. 
"You said you wanted to protect Paula. From what?" 

The father gazed at him with a patient, forgiving look. "Whatever your 
intentions ... your secular prejudices blind you from seeing what's really 
happening here. Two girls are dead ... not by the hand of Man. Unless 
you accept the truth of God's teachings that there is a struggle between 
good and evil for All Souls and that we are losing that struggle, you're but 
fools rushing in. You put your own lives in danger as well as the lives of 
the Messengers. I have nothing more to say." 

~*~*~

When Mulder and Scully came out of Father Gregory's church, Mulder 
decided  to needle her further, "All that crap about the fight for All Souls, 
the literature we saw in there, the performance we just witnessed - it all 
fits. He thinks he's doing God's laundry." 

Her eyebrow quirked up. "I think you're a little extreme in your judgment, 
don't you, Mulder?" When he mumbled, she added, "Well, he said this 
wasn't done by the hand of man. Do you think he believes that, too?" 

He looked at her. "If he does, he's even more dangerous than he 
appears. Even if he's not your killer, he is hiding something." 

"What?" she asked, looking like her old self.

He decided to prompt her rather than piss her off. "Well, he says 
he knew the mother, but won't give up her name. Maybe she's still 
alive. I think you have enough to bring him in for questioning if not 
make an arrest." 

She looked at him, not sure whether or not he's humoring her. "But, 
basically, you're ruling out any element of the supernatural?" 

"What ... do ... you... mean?" he said slowly. Did he somehow give away 
the fact  that he knows more than he does? Or did she automatically 
assume that he'll go chasing after the paranormal on every case? Yeah, 
maybe that's it....

"Well, Dara Kernof was baptized on the day of her death. She was
sanctified by the ritual sacrament ... submerged in the spirit," she
explained. "Like our children earlier this year." 

"Are you worried that some wackos are gonna go after our kids next?" he 
asked, half-joking. "Look, Scully, some sicko, for some half-baked 
religious 'reason'," he maked quote marks in the air with his fingers, "is
targeting four girls. Whatever his beliefs, they aren't benign.
Besides, people have used religion since the dawn of time to justify
some of the most horrible acts in history." He added quietly, "I
never did like the idea of God allowing bad things to happen to good
people." 

"I was raised to believe that God has His reasons, however
mysterious," Scully said, and wondered briefly if her mother told
Mulder about Patience.

"He may well have His reasons, but He seems to use a lot of
psychotics to carry out His job orders," but it's less a sarcastic
than resigned comment. Mulder gave in, since it's plain to see he'll
get nowhere with her. "You want to find out who did this? I suggest
you autopsy the body of Paula Koklos before it's interred, before the
man who killed her has a chance to find her sisters."

He slid into the driver's side of the car, then popped the lock open
on the passenger door for his wife. And they call me driven, he
thought, as she stared forward in her seat.

~*~*~

In the autopsy bay, Scully began her dictation. "The victim is Paula 
Koklos, age 16, cause of death unknown. I'll begin with the external 
examination." She pulled back the white sheet to reveal Paula's burned 
eyes and extra fingers on her hands. "Victim has signs of congenital 
physical defects including four supernumerary digits. The only indications 
of external trauma are the burning ... by means unknown, of both globes 
of the eyes." She frowned, then felt a lump on the shoulder.

 "I'm noting something on the shoulder - a bony process of some kind,
possibly a tumorous mass. No, no indication of surgical procedure."
She looked up at the x-ray sheets and amended her comment. "The
mass appears on both the right and left clavicle."

When Scully looked back at the table, she saw a long-gone childhood
friend lying on the autopsy table, looking up at her. Scully closed her eyes 
and took a deep breath. When she opened them again she saw Paula's 
eyeless orbs stare back at her. "Oh, God," she said quietly, and turned away. 
Please, please let it be just pregnancy hallucinations, she prayed, please. 
Bad enough she's seen enough insanity while not pregnant, but this was just 
too much.

"Dana?" a small girl's lisping voice interrupted her prayers. Scully turned in
shock and saw a little girl with dark hair and painfully deformed arms speak to 
her. "Dana, please," the girl lisped, her large dark eyes solemn, lying patiently 
on the table as if waiting for the woman to tuck her into bed.

When tears threaten to spill over, Scully grabbed at the cassette recorder 
and shut it off violently before she managed to turn away. When she looked 
back, the teenaged Paula was on the table as she should be. Her breathing 
became quick and shallow, and the redheaded woman grabbed the countertop, 
and stayed upright despite the weakness in her legs.

~*~*~

While Scully was in the lab looking at autopsy results, her cell phone rang 
and she answered it absentmindedly.

"Hey, Scully, it's me," Mulder said, his voice fading slightly when he made 
a turn, "I did a little more digging on those adoption records." 

"What do you mean?" 

Shades perched on his face, Mulder answered, "I think I got a lead on that
third sister." 

"Where?" 

"She was under county care ten years ago. Apparently, she wandered into 
a teen crisis center here in DC last week, homeless. That guy over at, uh, 
social services, Starkey - he's helping me canvas the area," he said, and 
stopped the car. He was somewhat disappointed to see that the so-called 
social services guy caught up, but if he ditched him too early, he might've 
tipped his hand. Hopefully, he'll be able to shake him like last time.

"Well, Mulder, if she shares anything with her sisters, she wouldn't be
walking anywhere far," Scully said over the phone.

"What did you find?" he asked, hoping the creepy redhead won't overhear.

Scully stared at the x-rays, not sure how to phrase it. "There's evidence of
a progressive degenerative bone disease and, uh, I know you're going
to think that I'm crazy ... but I swear I found evidence of something
winglike."

Mulder looked into a silver Cutlass Ciera that has an upside down
cross hanging from the rearview mirror. Bingo. "Well, then, maybe she
flew here, Scully," he remarked.

"Mulder, there's something else..."

"Why don't you hold that thought and tell it to me and Father
Gregory when you see us?" he cut her off when Starkey went into a
fenced off area.

When he entered the building, he found no sign of Starkey, which
could be a good or a bad thing. His handy-dandy flashlight on, Mulder
charged into the darkness and saw a figure at the end of a hall. He
pulled out his gun and wished he had his bullets blessed or
something. "Stop right there! Move into the light. Move into the
light. Hands where I can see them!" 

To his relief, it was Father Gregory who steps into the shaft of light and 
held his hands up. "We're too late." 

Please, let it be the freaky angel guy and not Starkey, Mulder prayed, 
but pinned the father to the wall. "Where's the girl?" 

"She's dead," Father Gregory said quietly.

"Where is she?" Mulder asked, and he didn't have to fake his concern.

"In there," the shorter man pointed, then slumped to the floor after
Mulder released him.

Mulder slowly pushed the door open and walked in, both flashlight and 
gun ready. The girl sat in a position of prayer. Her eyes were burned 
out. Thank God, the agent breathed a sigh of relief, which would be 
inappropriate if anyone saw his face. A bird startled him as it flew up 
and out through a grate in the roof, and he stared up after it. Maybe 
we were all touched by an angel and didn't realize it, he thought, feeling 
sorrow for his ignorant past self and strained his eyes until all he could 
no longer see the flight of wings.

~*~*~

As before, Mulder and Scully interrogated Father Gregory at the 
police station, they got a tip from a cop about Roberta Dyer's 
whereabouts, and they still left the father alone in the room. Mulder 
left the door open, since the guard was sitting there, just to make 
sure nobody sneaked in without being seen. Scully didn't confess to 
seeing Emily, which was a relief, but she didn't confess to seeing 
anything else, which was a worry. Still, he decided to play things out 
and follow the tip, while Scully checked on the father.

Thankfully, Roberta was still missing, since her adoptive father was 
still the selfish bastard that he was, so Mulder wasn't too surprised to 
find the ratty, homeless-type setup in the basement that would've been 
more fitting under a bridge rather than inside a home. He nearly 
strangled the guy for his neglect of the girl, but it was Starkey, oddly 
enough, who pulled him off the man. Nice acting job, Mulder thought, 
when he shook off the man's hands and straightened his black jacket.

Good thing Rachel's into overtime pay, he murmured inwardly, even as 
he drove Mr. Dyer off to be processed, then hung, by the social 
services department. Maybe it's fitting that the devil pretends to work 
here, Mulder thought as he encountered round after endless round of 
bureaucracy that rivaled even the best of FBI and military red tape. He 
guessed everything's okay since he hadn't heard from either Scully or 
Rachel, and hoped it stays okay.

~*~*~

District Police Station
9:52 p.m.

Scully tried to unlock her car, but the damn key didn't work. Figured. 
As she went through her keys, her phone rang and she picked 
up. "Hello?" 

"Hey, Scully. It's me," her husband's voice came through.

Scully resumed flipping through her keys. "He's dead, Mulder."

"Who?" he asked, then signed off on yet another sheet of paper
shifting blame on some other department. Stupid CYA forms, he
thought, even as his stomach sank.

"Father Gregory," she replied. "They found him alone in the interrogation 
room. No one can figure it out. There was a guard sitting right outside 
the room." She dropped her keys, then groaned. Exhaling, she bent down 
to pick them up, thankful that she's had previous experience with searching 
blindly while trying to accommodate her body around her huge stomach.

It still didn't make her feel better, especially since the apocryphal
priest was dead, as well as three teenaged girls. Her eyes widen when
she spotted, not her keys, but a pair of legs in dark slacks and
patent leather shoes. Oh, no.

"We didn't find her," Mulder went on, distracted by even more forms. 
He gave up trying to partly ignore the secretary and ended up shoving 
the cell phone between his shoulder and ear to actually read through 
papers that required more than just a signature. "The fourth girl - she 
was at Dyer's place."


Meanwhile, Scully was looking up slowly to see a man's smiling
face, backlit by a very bright light that didn't come from the
parking lot. She didn't recognize him, which made her fumble around
her coat pocket for her gun. What made her really freak out is when
the man's head started turning, and different animal faces replaced
the man's, in a sort of horrific version of her children's segmented
books, which did the same thing, except that was on colorful
cardboard and this was real life. Her eyes opened until they felt
like they were about to fall out, her mouth opened and closed, but no
sound escaped.

"Hey, Scully. Scully, you there? Answer me. Scully?" he asked, now 
very worried. Never mind the devil, what if some freak got his pregnant 
wife! "Scully!" 

Scully, for her part, dropped the phone and sat down hard on the 
ground, her eyes never leaving the strange creature. Her mouth 
was still flapping when the light intensified, and she had to shield 
her eyes from the incredible glare.

~*~*~

The next morning, Scully ditched her husband and kids to
talk to Father McCue. It's not like I wanted to, she told herself as
she walked into the father's office. Mulder wouldn't understand and
the little ones couldn't understand. It seemed for the first time,
she noticed that the windows bore stained-glass angels, and took that
to be a good sign. "Father," she said.

"Come in, Dana," the priest smiled warmly. "I understand you found the 
man responsible for the death of those girls. I'm sure the Kernofs will be 
relieved." 

"I'm not sure if they should be, Father," she said quietly.

"Why not?" Father McCue frowned slightly.

The redhead paused. "I've seen things," she confessed. "Things 
that have made me question if there aren't ... larger forces at work 
here." 

The priest's tone dropped to a more confidential level. "What have 
you seen?" 

Scully tightened her lips before she spoke. "Visions... of a 
crippled childhood friend who died when she was young." 

Father McCue nodded. "I think that's understandable. I'm sure you 
identified with the loss." 

"I considered that, um... but then I saw something last night, which I ...
Which I can't explain," she stammered nervously. She's faced mutants,
aliens, even guns, and yet she's never been this flustered. Then
again, she never expected anything like last night. "I saw a man ... in
dark clothes ... but he had four faces. They weren't human." 

Father McCue, instead of answering, went to a bookshelf and retrieved an 
old book. He opened it before handing it to Scully. Inside was a drawing
of a figure with four animal faces and four human figures below it.
The priest asked, "Is this what you saw?" When she nodded, he went
on. "It's a Seraphim. An angel ... with four faces ... Those of a man, a
lion, an eagle, and a bull." His voice took on a sermonizing tone.
"In the story, the angel descends from heaven and fathers four
children with a mortal woman. Their offspring are the Nephilim -
meaning, 'The Fallen Ones.' They have the souls of angels but they
weren't meant to be. They're deformed, tormented. So the Lord sends
the Seraphim to Earth to bring back the souls of the Nephilim to keep
the Devil from claiming them as his own." 

Her eyes were still on the woodcut illustrations in the book. "How did 
he bring back their souls?" 

"They were smote with the brightness of his countenance. To
look upon the Seraphim in all his glory is to give up one's soul to
heaven," he recited, as if from a long-lost seminary lecture's
notes.

Scully finally looked up from the old book. "Do you think that's what I 
saw?" 

He shook his head, in a kindly, grandfatherly sort of fashion. "No. I 
think what you saw is a half-remembered story from your childhood 
that surfaced because of this case." He smiled slightly. "Besides, if it 
were the case, you wouldn't be sitting here before me, but in the morgue." 

She understood his skepticism, God knew she had more than enough. 
But this, this was completely different. "But I saw it, Father," she 
argued, vaguely feeling like she was butting heads with her own late 
father.

Obviously, having a husband like hers has occurred to the man, and 
he tried to correct her. "Dana, the Nephilim is a story. The text in 
which it appears isn't even recognized by the Church." 

She saw she wouldn't get anywhere with him, but at least she knew what  
she saw. "Father, do you believe that ... God has His reasons?" 

Father McCue finally smiled. "Yes, I'm certain of it. It's how He rewards 
our faith."

~*~*~

Starkey intercepted Scully outside her church and drove her
over to Father Gregory's church. Scully walked in, her eyes slowly
readjusting themselves to the dimness. Starkey stood in the doorway,
as if he were waiting for the others.

"There's no one here," Scully said, hating to be Captain Obvious.

"They must be on their way," the social services worker says. He 
didn't notice the horns in his shadow that she did and continued on. 
"You don't see her in there? She's here. I know it." He squinted to 
follow the redheaded agent's progress, but didn't step inside the 
church himself. "Agent Scully? Did you find her? Agent Scully?" 

Scully, having seen the face through the steps, walked down and 
opened door under the stairs. The girl, looking identical to other 
three girls, cowered in the corner. Scully's heart broke, and said 
quietly, "My name is Dana. I'm going to get you out of there, okay? 
I'm not going to hurt you."

She held out her hand and was relieved when Roberta tentatively took
it and allowed Scully to lead her out. "I'm going to take you someplace 
safe," Scully continued. The agent began walking Roberta to front of 
the church, away from Starkey.

Starkey's started to realize the jig is up. "Where are you going?
Where are you taking her?" 

"Everything's going to be fine," Scully murmurs to the girl, wanting to 
believe it herself. A bright flash of light from the front of the church 
startled both Scully and Roberta.

Pissed does not begin to describe the redheaded man, whose voice 
has started  to sound really, well evil. "Bring her to me! Bring her here! 
Bring me the girl!" 

Like hell, Scully thought, even as the girl started moving toward the light. 
Scully tried to hold her back, holding on to Roberta's shoulder as well as 
her hand. "No, it's okay," she pleaded, as if to herself as much as to the 
girl, "it's all right. Stay here. It's okay. Please, stay ... Just stay here! It's
going to be okay." 

"Bring her out to me," Starkey intoned in a forbidding voice. Scully 
looked back at the man who truly looked demonic, and wondered how 
she and Mulder could have missed this.

"Dana?" a little girl's lisping voice said. Scully turned around and
saw it was the hand of another, younger crippled girl she's holding.
"Dana, let me go. Dana, please let me go." 

Tears welled up in Scully's eyes, and her throat choked. "Patience," she 
said, and held on even tighter.

"Agent Scully, get her out of there!" Starkey bellowed, to no avail.

"Dana, please," the little girl begs. Scully slowly released Patience's twisted 
little hand and watched her walk into the light.

"Patience?" she breathed, and watched in amazement as the little girl who 
needed respirators and a wheelchair walk away. "Patience! Oh, God," she 
gasped when the light faded and all that was left was Roberta's dead body 
kneeling, her hands raised in prayer and eyes burned out. A quick glance 
backward revealed that Starkey was gone. Heavily, Scully sat down on one 
of chairs, put her face in her hands, and cried.

~*~*~

April 19th, 1998

Things had become a little strained in the Mulder and Scully household 
after that strange Easter non-case, so Scully went to the confessional. 
Talking to the priest made her feel a little better, but his advice to her,  
rather than reciting a few Hail Marys and Our Fathers, would take more 
effort. But maybe that's also part of faith, she thinks, driving home, that
Mulder would allow me my beliefs as much as I do his. For the most
part, she adds silently, when she walks into a quiet house.

"Where's the kids?" she asks, seeing Mulder on the couch with the two 
cats on his lap and no other discernable noisemakers.

"At your mother's place," he answers, "I thought it would be a good idea 
for your mom to spoil them rotten." 

She nods at the unstated purpose and joins him on the couch. "I'm sorry 
I've been acting a little," she pauses when he puts an arm around her, 
"like you." 

"Thanks," he makes a face, but doesn't remove his arm. "So what 
started it?" 

Heartened that he's not acting like an ogre just yet, Scully snuggles into 
his arm. "When I was young, we moved to a neighborhood that had its 
own monster, so to speak. Missy was called on to baby-sit, and it turned
out the 'monster' was a girl named Patience with spinal muscular
atrophy. She couldn't move without someone pushing her wheelchair,
she could barely talk without a respirator, but she was a lovely girl
and she was my best friend."

 She stroked Teliko's fur absentmindedly, not looking at him. "One
day she got pneumonia, but because of her condition, she wasn't able
to fight it off. Her parents, devout Catholics, were expecting
another child at the time, but when they found out the baby might
develop SMA, they aborted it. Soon after, they got transferred to
another base." 

"I see," Mulder says, stroking his wife's hair. Even without Emily, this 
would've set her off, and he resolves not to be such an asshole when 
it comes to his wife's religion.

"It was because of Patience that I became a doctor," Scully says after 
a beat. "And it was because of her that I let Roberta Dyer die."

"What do you mean?" he frowns.

She tells him everything she's seen and heard over the past week, 
the visions and visitation, as well as Father McCue's explanations. 
Finally, she shakes her head. "I was inclined to believe it was childhood 
fantasy compounded by my hormones, but I," her voice breaks, "I don't 
want to believe Roberta died because of those stupid reasons." 

Mulder hugs her tightly. "You didn't," he says. "You saved her." 

"Did I?" she asks, tears running down her face. "I mean, what if one of 
our children developd some kind of disease, or disability? Would I be 
strong enough to raise them, or give up like Patience's parents?" 

Oh, God, he thinks,  is that why she gave up William? There were all 
those kidnappings, but still! "You are the strongest person I know," he 
tells her truthfully, and stares into her eyes as if trying to imprint them
into her mind, "and you are the most loving person I will ever meet.
Besides, you're not alone. You're stuck with me, and your mom, and
your brothers and sister, and the Gunmen-" 

"Oh, brother," she laughs, but it comes out like a cough, and she pulls 
out a tissue to wipe her face. "I still can't believe they're our children's
godparents," she hugs him back.

"Me, neither." Mulder grins, even as the cats yowl in dismay when his 
comfy  lap is disturbed when he readjusts his body to get closer to hers. 
"So, how  does it feel to walk on the wild side and believe in angels and 
demons and  Nephilim?"

Her eyebrow goes up. "I've always believed in those," she says,
then closes her eyes, "it's everything else that seems to require
more faith." 

~*~*~

A few days later, Mulder is fairly sure he hears giggling when he and
Scully arrive home one night around six. By the time he quietly
swings the door open, he's completely sure of it. When he and Scully
reach the living room it's dark, so he switches on the light.

And hears a horrified gasp.

Blinking, he realizes two things almost at once: Rachel isn't alone
in the living room and her shirt is unbuttoned all the way to her
navel.

"Oh, um..." the nanny sputters helplessly, "Kids are in bed." 

"I see," Scully says, but she's not looking at Rachel. "We didn't
expect you, Sean."

"Ah, I guess you wouldn't," Pendrell says, his cheeks a red as
Rachel's. "Rach, you're going to have to tell them now."

She looks up from buttoning her shirt to voice a protest. "But I was
going to practice what I said first!"

"Little late for that now," he mumbles, and is unable to meet Mulder
or Scully's eyes.

Sighing, Rachel gives them a weak smile. "I can't do this any more.
Don't worry, I know a great nanny-"

"You're quitting?" Scully asks.

"Yeah. I'm so sorry. But I thought a lot about it, and I'm not the
type of person you want looking after newborn twins. I love your
kids, but two more of them?" She shakes her head sadly.

"And," Pendrell prompts, giving her a look.

Suddenly smiling, Rachel holds out her hand. "Sean and I are getting
married. Soon."

"With all the nannying, Rachel will be a great Mom someday," Sean
says happily. "And Hopefully I'll make a good Dad too."

"Some time soon?" Scully asks, giving them a searching glance.

"Not too soon," Rachel mumbles. "We want to wait at least a year
before we try."

"How novel," Mulder remarks, earning a smirk from his wife.

"And I really mean it, I know the perfect person for you. I went to
college with her. Her name is Michelle, and she's looking for a
live-in position."

"Live-in?" 

"Well, I figure with five kids, and you not quitting your job,
right?" Scully nods. "You're going to want someone who is around 24
hours a day."

"That is a good idea," Mulder says, but then notices Scully's look.
"We'll have to discuss it and take it under consideration."

"When I said I was getting married soon, I mean in two weeks," Rachel
confessed.

"Wow." 

~*~*~

Later that night, Mulder notices that Scully is moping. "What's the
matter?"

"I can't believe we're losing another nanny." 

"Yeah... I liked Rachel too." 

"It's great that she and Sean are getting married, but..."

"You know, I did think of one good thing about this whole situation,"
Mulder tells her while rubbing her back.

"What's that?" 

"Teliko and Piper both display an extreme disdain for the great
outdoors. So whoever our next nanny is, at least she'll never run
over one of our pets."

"You really know how to cheer a girl up, don't you," Scully tells him
with a reluctant smile.

"If you accompany me up to bed, I can show you another way to get
your mind of things..." He leers suggestively, "And like Rachel said,
the kids are asleep. Again."

Her laugher trails him up the stairs. 

~*~*~

 Chapter Sixty-One 

The Following Week

Scully fidgets with a ribbon on her maternity top while they wait for
the potential replacement nanny to arrive. Unable to watch any more,
Mulder gently takes her hand to stop her.

She stops, giving him a rueful smile. "I hate the fact that they put
ribbons, bows and teddy bears on so much of the clothes designed for
pregnant women. And it's twice as bad if you need stuff that makes it
obvious that you're having twins. It's like the psychotic designers
think we're the babies. It's either dignified work stuff or this
silly stuff. Why can't they make dignified casual maternity wear?"

"If you're that uncomfortable, why don't you put on a t-shirt?"
Having heard this rant before, Mulder had bought her several t-shirts
made with fat men in mind. Until now he thought that she liked them.

"Mulder! We're meeting someone for the first time. We need to make a
good impression. I can't be dressed like a slob when she gets here."

"But you can afterwards," Mulder tells her, rubbing her shoulder.

"You better believe it," she says fiercely, and Mulder has to kill a
smile. There are times to make jokes, but while dealing with an
unhappy woman six months pregnant with your twins is not one of them.

He's saved by a knock on the door. "I'll get it." When he does, a
friendly looking young woman with short brown hair smiles at him.
"Hi, I'm Fox Mulder. You must be Michelle."

"That's right," she says, extending her hand.

"Come in," Mulder invites. "My wife, Dana, is in the living room."

After the women exchange greetings, Michelle becomes business-like.
"So, Rachel tells me that you have three kids and twins on the way."

"That's right," Scully agrees. "The twins are due in September, and
our 'older' kids are a daughter just turned one, a son almost three
and a daughter almost four. Page, the oldest, attends preschool three
hours a morning and Sammy will as well in the fall."

Mulder grins. "Unfortunately April won't be old enough to go with
them for a couple more years. She already seems to realize that they
can do things she's too small to."

"Sure," Scully says rolling her eyes a little. "You'll have to excuse
my husband. He enjoys trying to convince people all our children are
geniuses."

"They are!" Mulder protests.

"I know, but we don't have to tell everyone the second you meet
them," Scully says fondly. "Speaking of meeting, would you like to
meet the kids now?"

"Definitely."

Mulder is on his feet before Scully even looks in his direction.
He'll never tell her, but it's quicker to get their brood himself
than to help her struggle to rise from the too squishy loveseat she
sat on without remembering the trouble the last time she chose that
seat.

When he returns he has a just woken up April in his arms, and Sammy
toddles ahead of him while Page needs to be reminded not to run. To
his relief, the young woman doesn't seem scared off by the kids'
enthusiasm for meeting someone new, or April's crankiness over a
cut-short nap.

By time Michelle is ready to leave, all parties seem pleased by the
prospect of her being the new nanny. A move-in date is scheduled for
the day before Rachel plans to leave.

~*~*~

May 1998 

When Mulder enters the office and finds Skinner there, thumbing
through folders, he does his best to feign surprise. "Wow, you know
you're going places in the Bureau when the Assistant Director tidies
up your office for you. What's up?"

"I was just, uh ... looking." 

"For anything special?" 

"I came down to ask you something. I, uh, I guess I was nosing around
- wondering about you - your, uh, long-terrm plans."

"My long term plans? Besides being a good father and husband, you got
them right there in your hands." He takes the folders from Skinner
and begins to put them back into a filing cabinet when Skinner makes
no objections.

"What do you hope to find? I mean, in the end," Skinner asks.

"Whatever I hope to find is in here. And maybe I'll know it when I
find it. Is that what you came to ask me?"

"No. There's a case - nothing I'd send you normally - a murder ... an
assassination of a Russian chess player. The shooter is former
National Security Agency ... one of ours. It's got a lot of people
upset. This kid, Jeffery Spender - Special Agent Spender - he's been
given the case. He's running it."

Mulder does his best not to react when he hears his half brother's
name. "You give it to him?"

"No. It came as an order from somewhere outside the Bureau. His
team's assembled upstairs right now. He was very specific that you be
excluded."

Mulder slowly grins mischievously when Skinner pointedly leads the
way.

~*~*~

Walking towards the Hoover building, Diana Fowley notices a young
woman with three small children, the oldest a blonde, the younger two
with bright red hair. They're cute and she likes to think that she's
good with kids, so she approaches them with a friendly expression.

"Your children are adorable." 

"Oh thank you," The young woman replies. "I can't take credit for it,
though, I'm their nanny."

Fowley nods, and looks down at the middle child, a little boy. He's
clutching a book in both small hands. "What are you reading?"

He grins at her, revealing baby teeth. "It's a book 'bout spooky
pants. It's scary."

"By doctor Seus. I read that when I was a little girl," Fowley tells
him.

The oldest child gives her a disbelieving look, confirming her
suspicion that kids think adults spring from the Earth fully formed.
"He can't really read yet. But I can."

Given that the child looks three or four Fowley has her doubts until
the nanny speaks up, "Yes you can. That's why we're to the library
once your mommy gets here."

"Is their mother an age-" 

"Agent Fowley?" a voice calls impatiently. It's then that she
realizes that she's lost track of time.

"Bye, nice meeting you." 

~*~*~

Two minutes later Scully hurries out to meet Michelle. "Michelle,
thank you so much for bringing April. It saves so much time."

"No problem. I'm going to take Sammy and Page to story-time at the
library."

"Mommy, do you gots to have shots when you go to the doctor's?" Page
asks, wide-eyed.

"Not me, but your sister does." 

"Poor April." 

"Don't worry, she's a brave little girl," Scully tells her. "See you
tonight."

~*~*~

Diana Fowley smiles as she approaches Mulder in the hallway, and it
takes him effort not to grimace. Apparently his efforts are
successful, since she doesn't sound unhappy when she's close enough
to speak. "Fox, you haven't changed a bit since I last saw you."

He smirks a little. "Oh, you'd be surprised how different I am." 

She seems to think he's joking. "Seven years later and you're still
on the X-Files. Are you still married to your work, too?"

"No. Bigamy is against the law in DC." 

Her happy expression fades to one of puzzledness until comprehension
blooms in her eyes. "You're married?"

"Since Valentines in 1994. My wife is agent Scully, my partner on the
X-Files. You might have noticed her leaving the building before the
meeting, pretty little redhead?"

"I must have missed her. Do you have children?" she asks, her voice
suddenly small.

Mulder can't resist the urge to boast, especially since it'll make
her squirm. "Two girls and a boy. Page is three and a half, Sammy two
and a half, and April is one."

"Wow," she says faintly. Then an interesting emotion flashes across
her face, one he thinks looks a lot like recognition, although he
can't imagine why.

"That's what everyone says." Mulder grins. "Especially since we have
twins on the way too. What can I say? After such a lonely childhood a
big family is wonderful."

"Sammy...did you name your son for your sister?" 

"It was my wife's idea, one for which I'm thankful, because I
wouldn't have thought of it on my own."

"Have you found her? Your sister." 

The search continues," he says with a rueful shake of his head. He
hasn't told Scully about what he knows, so he'll be damned if he'll
tell Fowley.

Before they have a chance to say anything else Skinner comes out of
the men's room and joins them. The three of them enter Spender's
meeting without announcing themselves.

~*~*~
 
Inside the briefing room Spender is showing people a video of the
Russian chess player being shot.

"Using a weapon registered to a US intelligence agency, the shooter
fired one kill shot at Anatole Klebanow before being captured without
incident a short distance from the scene. No motive has been
established nor has the shooter offered up a statement or
accomplice." His voice trails off when he realizes who has come in.

"Please continue," Mulder invites him. He, Skinner and Fowley take
their seats.

The younger agent frowns, but picks up where he left off. "The
trajectory of the kill shot suggests the shooter acted alone, but we
cannot yet rule out an accomplice or conspiracy. A single bullet was
fired from a catwalk at a steep angle striking the target just right
of the solar plexus."

"I'm ... sorry, can you rewind the tape?" Mulder asks, not sorry to be
irritating Spender. "Please. I'll tell you where. Just take it back?"

"Let me get through this. If you have any questions, we can talk
later."

"I don't have any questions. No. I just think you're wrong. I don't
think the Russian was the target. I think it was his opponent."

"His opponent, Agent Mulder, was a twelve-year-old boy," Spender says
icily.

"And a good chess player. Here, let me show you his best move, if
you'll just take it back." Mulder waves his hand towards the monitor.
Frowning, Spender obliges. "Okay, stop it there. Look what the kid
does right here, right before the kill shot. Play. Do you see what he
does? He just pushes back. You see that?"

"He just completed a checkmate. He's pushing back because the game's
over."

"You described a steep trajectory for the kill shot. If the kid
doesn't push back at that precise moment he catches the bullet in the
back of the neck, not the Russian."

"May we move on here?" Spender asks irritably.

Fowley speaks up from the back of the room. "I think Agent Mulder is
right. Looks like the boy sensed the shooter precognitively. If you
rewind the tape you'll see it."

Mulder gives her a surprised look, and wonders if she's only bring up
ESP to discredit him.

The tall thin agent shakes his head. "There's no way. It's
impossible."

"Just rewind the tape so we can all see for ourselves," Skinner
suggests.

Once Spender does, it become clear to them all that Mulder's theory
has merit.

~*~*~

"I think we need to speak to the boy," Fowley says when the three of
them linger in the hallway after the meeting has concluded.

Mulder looks to Skinner for approval, just in time to see Spender
walk out and give them all a dark look. Since Spender passes behind
him, Skinner doesn't notice. "If you two, and agent Scully, want to
go and interview the boy, it might be useful."

::Oh yeah, I really want my wife and my ex-girlfriend in the same
car.:: Mulder thinks irritably. "Um, let me call Scully and see how
long she thinks she'll be at her appointment."

Fowley and Skinner don't attempt to make it obvious that they're
listening to his end of the conversation, but Mulder tries to
concentrate on the call instead of reacting to the eavesdropping.
"Hi, Skinner wants us to interview a kid - yeah, really a kid.
Twelve. Someone might have tried to shoot him but he seemed to sense
it - well, that's why Skinner wants us to talk to him - no, I don't
think interviewing him will be dangerous, why? - Really? You wouldn't
rather bring her home? - Oh, I guess that would take a while. Okay,
see you both in half an hour."

They're giving him expectant looks, even though he knows they heard
every word. "Scully will meet us back here in a little bit."

Skinner turns to Fowley. "I'm glad that agent Scully can go with you,
you'll like her."

::Guess Skinner doesn't read minds.:: Mulder thinks sourly.

~*~*~

An Hour Later
Mulder's Car

::Stop me if you've heard this one. A man, his pregnant wife, their
youngest daughter and his ex-girlfriend walk into a bar...:: he blinks
when he hears Scully ask Fowley a question.

"How long have you been with the Bureau, Agent Fowley?" 

"Since '91. I took an assignment in Europe after the wall came down
when the director stepped up foreign terrorism concerns," Fowley says
from the backseat. She's sitting next to April. It had taken Mulder
ten minutes to unhook Sammy's car seat so there was room for an extra
adult, and the experience did nothing to brighten his mood.

"And they brought you on this because of a terrorism angle?" Scully
asks.

"No. I, uh, I requested a reassignment. There were things at home I
decided I wanted to get back to."

"1991." Scully muses, then turns to her husband. "That's about when
you started work on the X-Files."

"More or less, yeah." 

~*~*~

Inget Murray Psychiatric Hospital 
Gaithersburg, Maryland 

Mulder leads the group into Gibson's room, with April on his hip. The
young boy looks up at them, and flashes the baby a quick smile before
looking more dour.

"Hi. My name is Fox. This is Dana and Diana, and my daughter April.
How are you doing?"

"I don't mind it here. They get all the good TV shows. Where I live,
in the Philippines all we get is Baywatch."

"What's wrong with Baywatch?" 

Gibson looks closely at him. "You've got a dirty mind." 

Mulder flashes Scully a guilty look, and she suppresses a smile.
"Your parents are going to pick you up on Friday, Gibson, to take you
back home," she says.

"I don't want to play any chess," Gibson says to Mulder.

"How do you know I want to?" 

"'Cause you got that cheapo chess computer in your hand. Or at least
you did," Gibson adds when April knocks it out of his hand. Luckily,
it lands on the bed instead of the floor.

"It's the best chess board petty cash will buy. Don't you want to see
how fast you can beat it?"

"No." 

"Maybe because you can't," Mulder says, turning off the TV.

Gibson just looks at him.

"I'm right, aren't I? You know what I'm talking about. You knew the
moment I came in. That's how you win, isn't it ... how you know what
your opponent's going to do? You get inside his head. You read his
thoughts. That's how you knew that man was going to shoot you ... isn't
it?"

"I know what's on your mind," Gibson announces. 

"Oh?" Mulder asks, shifting April so she can't reach the board again.

"You're thinking that it's a miracle that your wife and the other one
don't hate each other yet. But you're sure they're going to."

"That's not..." Mulder trails off, and looks away from the women. "This
kid's going to need round-the-clock protection." He leaves the room
quickly, ignoring Scully and Fowley's surprised looks.

Fowley stays in the room to talk to Gibson, but Scully follows Mulder
into the hall. "Mulder, what was that all about?"

"The kid's no chess master. Under controlled conditions, I could
probably beat him."

"Mulder, he's recognized internationally as a prodigy. He's beaten
Grand Masters."

"With the most unfair advantage. What he's doing amounts to a kind of
parlor magic trick. "

"Mulder, he was goofing on you. He was playing along. You're positing
that this kid can read minds."

"We've seen a number of these cases before, Scully." 

"We have seen cases, Mulder, of fakers and lucky guessers but no one
that has ever been able to stand up to any kind of rigorous testing."

"He did it just then, Scully," Mulder says quietly as he looks back
towards the room. "He read exactly what was on my mind."

"What?" 

"We'll talk about that later. But the fact remains he did do it." 

She gives him a doubtful look. "Even if he did, no one has gone so
far as to claim that they can zero in on the mind of one person in a
crowd of thousands."

"Maybe that's why they want him dead," Mulder says as Fowley walks
towards them.

"Who? Who are you talking about?" 

"I don't know, I'm not the mind reader." 

"Say that what you're suggesting were even possible, who would want
to kill a kid whose abilities would offer you the ultimate advantage
... I mean in business, in war, in anything?"

"Maybe somebody whose business is in keeping secrets," Fowley
suggests.

"Well, let's test him. I think the kid will stand up. Let's run a
brain scan and a psych evaluation on him. You know what to do,
Diana," Mulder says, shifting April in his arms. "April's tired, I'm
going to bring her out to the car."

Scully and Fowley watch him walk down the hall, then Scully speaks to
the other woman. "So, you two know each other?"

"It was a long time ago," Diana says. "I'll ask for those evaluations
and meet you outside."

*

April is in fact sleeping when Scully opens the front passenger door.
"She'll be a few minutes. So tell me about Gibson reading your mind."

He sighs and leans his head on the headrest. "Fowley and I dated
years ago, back when I first got out of the academy. Now I wonder
what I ever saw in her, but back then...She has a para-science
background and was there when I discovered the X-Files. Those things
seemed significant."

"It was something in common," Scully agrees calmly.

"But the only things. It didn't work out and she took a position in
Berlin of all places. If you want to put some distance between you
and an ex-boyfriend, that's a good place to go. Hell, until she
walked into that meeting today, I couldn't have even said for sure
that she was still alive."

"And Gibson realized that you thought I'd be jealous?" she asks.

"No. He realized that I thought Diana might be jealous." Mulder
reaches for her hand and squeezes it. "You're not jealous, are you?"

"I'm the one who has you, what do I have to be jealous about?" 

The rear passenger door opens, startling them a bit. "They're going
to do the evaluations tomorrow." Fowley announces.

"We're done here, then," Mulder says, shifting the car into drive.

~*~*~
 
Inget Murray Psychiatric Hospital

Gibson holds Scully's hand like a much younger child as they walk
through a door and down a hall.

"How you doing?" Scully asks.

Gibson looks up at her. "You know you're the only one who asks that?
I think it's because you're a mom... Anyway, I didn't like those tests.
I didn't like being in the machine."

"Hmm ... They're a little scary, aren't they?" Scully asks. "My niece,
Emily, thought they were scary too."

"But she's only little," Gibson says confidently, surprising Scully a
little. "You're wondering, aren't you?

"About what? About you?" 

"About that other girl." 

"She's wondering about you, too," Gibson says then smiles. "He's not
wondering, though."

~*~*~

While Gibson wows the doctors by reading their minds, Scully and
Fowley watch through an observation window in another room.

"It's amazing. It's hard to believe," Scully admits.

"I've witnessed clairvoyants who were over 90% accurate and seen
telepathy being demonstrated but I don't know I've ever witnessed
anything quite like this."

"Where'd you see that?" 

"Agent Mulder and I spent some time in psychiatric hospitals-" 

"Funny, Mulder never mentioned that he'd been committed," Scully says
with a mischievous grin.

Fowley doesn't look very amused. "There were some patients serving
criminal sentences who we felt had been misdiagnosed, so we went to
observe them."

"Must be strange, doing things like that all over again," Scully
offers.

"You'd be surprised how much has changed. I am, anyway," Fowley says
before going to speak to the doctor who's telling them what Gibson
just did.

~*~*~

A Couple Hours Later

"Sorry I'm late. How's little Karnac doing?" Mulder asks Fowley, who
is sitting near a two-way mirror watching Gibson.

"Put a TV in front of him and he turns right into a normal kid. He's
the real deal, Fox. We tested him with Zener cards, random numbers, a
variety of ESP tasking. He's got ability to not just focus on a
thought, but a multitude of thoughts at once."

"There's something else. There's something we're missing here." 

"That was a good catch on the videotape. I was impressed." 

"Oh, you would have caught it eventually," Mulder demurs.

"No. I've been too many years trying to get inside the head of too
many Arab terrorists. I'm out of practice with this stuff. But you
seem at the top of your game."

"That's all I do. That's all I've been doing for the last five years.
This work and my family, that's my whole life."

"Sometimes I hear about you...about the work you're doing. And I
think how it might have been if I'd stayed." There's something hungry
in her look that makes Mulder look away, uncomfortable.

He tries for a joke. "Ah, we'd all be blown up by some terrorist
bomb, no doubt, huh?"

"I sense you could have used an ally, though - someone who thinks
like you, with some background," Fowley says rather pointedly.

"Oh, you mean Scully?" 

"She's not what I would call an open mind on the subject." 

"She's a, uh...she's a scientist. She just makes me work for
everything. Sometimes she's even right."

"Yes, but I'm...I'm sure there were times when two like minds on a
case would have been advantageous."

"I don't think so," Mulder disagrees. "Thinking alike just means two
chances for being wrong."

"Well..."

"I've done okay without you," he adds quietly. 

"Hey...I'm on your side." When she reaches for his hand, he pulls
away from her.

"That implies that you think Scully isn't. And it's not true. You
left seven years ago. She's the one who has been by my side for the
past six years. Don't make light of that again."

The look on her face suggests that she's been taken aback by his
honest statement. "Message received."

"Good. You and I can work together, and can work together well. But
not if you try to put yourself between me and my wife. You're my
friend, but she's much more to me than that."

"Mulder." 

He spins on his heel, surprised to see that Scully is standing behind
them. To his chagrin she's got her poker face on, and he can't how
much of their conversation that she heard. "Hey."

"I've got something to show you both and Skinner, and I think you're
both going to be surprised. Very surprised. We're going to meet him
in his office in half an hour."

~*~*~

Skinner's Office

Mulder, Scully, Fowley, Spender and a few other agents sit around
Skinner's desk.

Skinner sits and gives Scully an expectant look. "You're here to tell
me a story."

She looks a little uncomfortable, but speaks. "I've conducted some
tests on Gibson Praise and have come up with some rather unexpected
conclusions: ones which I myself have difficulty reconciling with
what I know."

"These are?" Skinner asks.

"Neurological tests. Mapping of brain functions using a very high
resolution EEG."

"What did you find out?" 

"The tests revealed something peculiar in an area of the brain that
we are only beginning to understand. An area of the temporal lobe
that neurophysicists are calling the 'God module.'"

Skinner sighs loudly. "I hope I'm not going to hear that this kid is
the next Christ child."

::No, that would be William, at least according to the aliens.::
Mulder thinks, but doesn't say aloud.

"All of the boy's brain processes are showing extraordinary activity
in exactly this part of the brain. Which is not just abnormal or
anomalous, but from what I know absolutely unheard of."

"There are corollaries, individuals who have been responsible for
great leaps forward in understanding in science. Newton, Galileo,
Einstein, Stephen Hawking. All these men exhibited modes of thinking
that are suggestive of access to special brain centers." Mulder
interjects.

"All right. So this kid is a human oddity. Would somebody please tell
me why anyone would go to such great lengths as to kill him?" Skinner
wants to know.

"This kid may be the key not just to all human potential, but to all
spiritual unexplained paranormal phenomena. The key to everything in
the X-Files. It's possible he has the answer to every question that
has kept people up at night for centuries."

"Let me get this right -- We're supposed to believe that this boy was
going to be killed because of the X-Files?" Skinner asks.

"No, it's bigger than that." 

"Uh-huh," Spender says dubiously. "Explain it to me. To us." 

"I can't. But the shooter can. The assassin that you have locked
up...in exchange for immunity from prosecution."

"You want to give a murderer a free ride for the secrets to the
pyramids? This is crazy. It's nuts." Spender is obviously annoyed.

"You mischaracterize what I've said," Scully says. "This would be
quantifiable scientific proof of everything that Agent Mulder and I
have investigated over the past six years."

"How do you quantify the spiritual?" Fowley asks. "It can't be done.
You ask for immunity for a killer on that basis, the Attorney
General's gonna go off. You're allowed to investigate the X-Files as
an indulgence. But draw the wrong kind of attention and they'll close
you down. Put an end to all your work. Something I happen to have an
interest in myself."

"Let's everyone step out in the hall," Skinner announces, and
everyone but him stands.

"Agent Mulder, you stay put," Skinner says, and Mulder sighs as
everyone leaves.

"Fowley is right, you know. The risk you're taking, the long-term
plans that you and I talked about..."

"If what Agent Scully's found is true and I have every reason to
believe that it is, then the answers I might have spent a lifetime
searching for may fall together like a million puzzle pieces."

"You'd risk the X-Files?" Skinner asks, incredulous. 

"If we have found the truth and willfully decide not to investigate
it, what's the point of keeping the X-Files open? So yes, I'm willing
to risk them. How soon can you call the Attorney General?"

~*~*~

Federal Prison
Night

The gunmen is sleeping in his cell when Mulder and Spender enter,
startling him away.

"The Attorney General's heard my request for immunity," Mulder tells
the yawning man.

"Heard it? You ... Oh ... You said that you could get it." 

"She needs something more. Something to convince her that you're not
just playing games. Something that I can corroborate. I need answers
from you."

"The kid is a missing link," the gunman says dully.

"To what?" Mulder asks, looking the man in the eye. They both ignore
Spender. "He's genetic proof, isn't he?"

The gunmen nods slightly.

"Genetic proof of what?" Spender asks. "Tell me what you're talking
about."

"The kid's not superhuman. He's just more human than human," Mulder
says.

"What? Like that Rob Zombie song?" Spender asks, startling Mulder
with his taste in music. They walk out of the cell, leaving the
gunman behind.

"Uh, I don't know that song. What I mean is most of us have genes we
don't use. They lie there dormant, turned off. Science doesn't know
what they're for, why they're there or where they came from."

"Right and you think this has something to do with that?" 

"There's a long-held but unpopular theory tied to prehistoric
evidence of alien astronauts."

"You're not going to go out there and say the kid's part alien. You
won't have any more credibility than my poor mother."

Mulder looks him in the eye, and says nothing as they continue to
walk. Spender's not through, though, and continues to needle him.
"You think that's what you heard? You led them, Agent Mulder. Now
you're letting yourself be led."

Ignoring him, Mulder walks away.

~*~*~

Centerville, Virginia

As Fowley arrives at the motel, Scully and Gibson sit. The boy is
watching King Of The Hill.

"Gibson? I'd like to ask you something." He turns his face from the
TV and gives her an expectant look. "How do you do it?"

It doesn't surprise Scully that Gibson doesn't need a definition of
"it." "I just hear you thinking ... like on a radio. And sometimes
there are lots of radios. And I want to shut them off and watch some
TV."

"Is that why you like chess? 'Cause it's just one thought that you
hear?"

"Yeah, but that's not why I like it all the time." 

"Why else do you like it?" 

"Because there's no talking. Just thinking. It's nothing like real
life where people think one thing but they say something else."

She laughs softly. "Is that what people do?" 

"Yeah, except for babies like the one you brought earlier - but I
think that's only because they don't talk much. Older folks are
worried about what other people are thinking when the people they're
worrying about are worried about the same thing. It makes me laugh."

"Why?" 

"They make up all this stuff to believe but it's all made up. Some
people try to be good people but some people just don't care. Like
you."

"You think I don't care?" 

"No, you don't care what people think." 

Fowley knocks and comes in.

"I'm here to relieve you," she tells Scully.

"Thanks," Scully replies, then puts her hand on Gibson's shoulder.
"Well, we'll talk about this later, okay?"

"They want to kill me, you know," Gibson says as she begins to walk
away.

"Nobody's going to do anything to you, Gibson. I promise." 

"I know you do." His voice is hollow.

~*~*~

11 p.m.

::She's going to kill me. She'll understand why I'm doing this, but
she's still going to kill me.:: Mulder thinks as he drives to
Centerville.

Even though he realizes that he's courting his wife's wrath, he can't
stand by and let them do barbaric brain surgery on Gibson again. He
just hopes that nothing goes wrong once he gets his plan in motion.

Mulder parks around the back of the hotel and leaves his flashlight
off as he sneaks towards a car in the parking lot. The sniper is too
busy staring at Gibson's shadow at the window to realize that
Mulder's there until it's much too late. A fist through the open
window catches the man at the temple, and he slumps over the steering
wheel, unconscious. ::Diana, you owe me.:: After checking his
victim's pulse, Mulder hurries towards the hotel.

He doesn't even have to knock, because Gibson eerily knows he's
there. Given this, he doesn't bother to hold a finger up to his mouth
like he planned to. Without being asked the boy gathers a change of
clothes and his shoes, then waits by the door while Mulder tapes a
note to the room's one mirror.

Diana is still asleep when Mulder closes the door behind him; and the
sniper is still slumped over his steering wheel. Neither Mulder nor
Gibson, say a word until after the child has scrambled into the
backseat of the car and hastily changes into the clothes he's
brought. Gibson looks up from tying his shoes and asks, "Do you
really think this is a good idea? You're going to get into trouble."

After Mulder shifts the car into drive, he glances over his shoulder.
"There are worse things that can happen than getting into trouble."

"You think someone would get hurt if you didn't move me. Why are you
so sure?"

"Call it ESP," Mulder mutters. Sensing that the agent doesn't want to
discuss what he knows about that sort of thing, Gibson rolls up his
pajamas and uses them as a pillow to cushion his face against the
hardness of the glass. He spends the entire ride to the airport
looking out the window.

On the plane to Louisiana, they both sleep. Gibson more soundly than
Mulder, who wakes every few minutes to glance warily at fellow
passengers. Each time he decides that there's no one there who is a
threat, and lets his eyes close once again.

~*~*~

Washington, DC
Meanwhile

An insistent knock at the door drags Scully out of sleep, and the
twins wake up and kick her insides immediately afterwards. Thrusting
an arm out, she intends to poke Mulder until he's awake and get him
to answer the door, but all her hand finds is an empty side of the
bed where Mulder is. She sits up too suddenly, making the world
lurch, and finds a note on the other pillow. All it says is "Got to
bring Gibson somewhere safe. Be back tomorrow. Love you."

She'd like to spend more time trying to figure out ways of punishing
her husband for going off in the middle of the night, but the
knocking at the door hasn't stopped, so she struggles into a robe
that barely fits around her waist and goes to deal with whoever it is
that's come to bother them at that hour. It's only as she reaches the
door that her sleepy mind wonders if there's a connection between the
visitor and Mulder's flight, and the thought sends a shiver of fear
down her spine.

The figure on the steps looks more pissed than worried, so Scully's
fear evaporates. "Diana."

"Is Fox here?" Diana's voice is frosty.

"No. I thought you went with him," she admits to the conclusion she'd
immediately drawn.

"Went with him where?" Diana's voice is sharp on the last word." I
woke up and Gibson was gone. All there was a note saying that he was
taking Gibson-"

"-Somewhere safe," Scully finishes for her, then reluctantly hands
over the note she's still holding. "Wherever 'safe' is, it's not
here. It looks like he didn't want either of us to know where he was
going."

"You seem to be taking this well." 

Scully decides to ignore the snippiness of the other woman's tone.
"I'm sure he'll have a good explanation for us both when he gets
back."

"No doubt." Diana's eyes drop to Scully's waist, and Scully isn't
sure how to interpret the woman's expression. Resentment? Envy? Pity?
Maybe a mixture of all three. "If you don't know anything more than I
do, I suppose I should let you get back to bed. I'm sure you need
your rest."

The condescension raises Scully's hackles, but she doesn't let it
show. "I'm sure he'll call you when he gets back. Good night, Diana."

Before the other agent can respond, Scully firmly shuts the door.

~*~*~

New Orleans
5 a.m.

It bothers Mulder a little that Gibson doesn't ask many questions.
The only thing he's asked since the plane landed a half an hour ago
is if they could go one of the airport's restaurants and have
breakfast. His own stomach had been growling too, so he immediately
agreed. Now, as Gibson drinks his orange juice and finishes off his
bacon, egg and cheese biscuit, Mulder glances over at him and wonders
if he doesn't need to ask questions because he's reading his mind for
the answers, or if he just doesn't want the answers. Either way, the
boy says nothing as Mulder pulls a slip of paper out of his pocket
and rereads the address he wrote there earlier in the day before
returning his attention to the website he's pulled up on one of the
café's computers. He worries a little about the reception they'll
receive, but at least he knows that the address is current because
he'd charmed it out of someone at Human Resources.

**

The sky is beginning to lighten when they arrive at Monica Reyes'
apartment building. It's just then that the foolishness of what he's
done strikes Mulder like a blow. If she's agreeable to the plan than
things might go well, but if not... if not he has no idea what he's
going to do with the little boy in the back of his car. He can't
bring him home to DC, because even if Scully would welcome a
temporary foster child, they would know where to find the child,
which would endanger not only the boy himself, but their children as
well.

This in mind, it makes it hard to force himself to knock on the door.
When a sleep tousled Reyes answers she looks very surprised, and he
doesn't blame her. "Agent..." She trails off for a moment. "Mulder,
isn't it?"

He nods. "I'm sorry to show up unexpectedly like this, but I have a
problem that I'd like to discuss with you."

A minute later she shows him and Gibson into her home. "Why don't you
watch some TV?" she suggests to Gibson. This earns her a sleepy smile
of gratitude, and it's only a moment before he's happily scanning
channels on her TV.

In the kitchen she and Mulder sit and discuss the matter. "The boy
looking for cartoons in your living room is Gibson Praise. He's
twelve, a chess champion, and has a contract out on him. There has
already been one attempt on his life."

"My God." Reyes gives him a horrified look. "Who would want to harm a
little boy?"

The smile Mulder gives her is sickly at best. "I decided that you'd
be the best agent to come to for assistance not only because you're a
good agent and far removed from the men who are against this boy, but
because you exhibited an unusual open-mindedness when we met you two
years ago-"

"You picked me because I believe in the paranormal?" 

"In short, yes. Gibson exhibits a talent for reading minds that has
been verified by a body of impartial judges. It's this unique talent
that has powerful men wanting to kill him, or to capture him to
examine his brain."

"Examine how, like CAT scans?" 

"More like exploratory brain surgery." 

The agent looks ill, but to her credit doesn't let her upset color
her tone. "Then you're hoping to hide him from these people."

"Yes. As much as I'd like to bring him home, I'm sure it would be
unwise. Although my wife would probably be willing to take him in,
they'd quickly find out where he was. They don't like us much either,
so they keep close tabs on our house. That, coupled with the fact
that she's pregnant, makes it all the more unlikely that we could
fend off an attack if it came at an unexpected time." He smiles
ruefully. "She's still a good shot, but slower and more ungainly than
usual."

"I'd imagine," Reyes murmurs.

"So it seemed wiser to send the boy away, so it'd be more difficult
for them to find him."

"Are you sure they won't know you've come here?" 

"I didn't call you so there's no number to trace. I paid cash for our
plane tickets and the car rental so there's no paper trail there. I
also used my credit card to book a flight for two to Washington
State. When I get there I'm going to call one of them and
'accidentally' be on the line long enough for the call to be
traced...I'm hoping that will lead them astray."

"The plan to muddy the trail seems foolproof. But what happens here?
I don't have room for a child-"

Mulder takes a piece of paper out of his pocket and hands it to her.
"I went to an internet café in the airport this morning and did some
research. This is a good catholic boarding school about three hours
from here. I was hoping that you and I could go there today and
enroll our orphaned cousin. They'll probably accept him as a charity
case, but if not I can get his tuition paid for by going through some
murky channels."

"Could you really afford that?" Reyes looks a little surprised.

"I was left a nice inheritance by a relative, and I can't think of a
better way to use some of the money. The thing is, though, if they do
accept him for enrollment, it might be a few days before he can move
in, so that's why I've involved you at all..."

"If he doesn't mind the couch for a few nights, he's welcome to stay.
But what about summers?"

"It's a good Catholic boarding school with a year-round residency
program."

"Okay. It sounds like a good plan to me, but how with Gibson feel
about-"

"I don't mind." The child's voice startles them both, so they turn to
see him standing in the doorway. "Those men won't find me, so how
could I complain?"

"What about your family?" Reyes asks.

"I won't see them again, no matter what." His voice is emotionless.

"You can't know that." 

"But I do." 

~*~*~

Washington, DC
11 p.m.

Two flights later, Mulder arrives home, dead on his feet. The school
readily agreed to take Gibson as a charity case, and he can't help
but wonder if it has something to do with the boy's status as a
minority. Even so, he's thankful that there will be no tuition bill
that has to be paid in a round about way. The boy will be starting at
the school in three days, and Mulder has left money with Reyes to buy
him the things he needs like uniforms and books. After he left them
he flew to Settle, made an outraged call to a member of a syndicate
accusing them of attempted murder, then flew home.

Letting himself into the house, he wonders if being confronted by his
wife or by Diana will be more painful.

It turns out to be neither, because to his utter shock, Jeffery
Spender is sitting on the couch, looking up at him with an accusing
stare.

"Spender, what are you doing here?" 

"Waiting for you to get home so you can tell me what the hell you've
done." Spender tells him. "Fortunately for you, your wife has
cooperated so far, so you're not in as much trouble as you'd be if
I'd had to have you arrested to speak to you."

"Arrested? That's a little much," Mulder protests.

"Where is Gibson Praise?" Spender demands to know.

"In a safe house. He called me last night and told me that someone
had gotten to his parents." Mulder decides to take a gamble on what
he suspects is true. "They're dead, aren't they?"

Spender's grim look confirms his suspicions about why Gibson was
never reunited with his family in their past life. "Yes. We only
learned of that about six hours ago. You're saying he already knew?"

"He said that he was afraid that he was next." 

His brother nods slightly. "That collaborates with what Agent Scully
said he told her - that they were coming to kill him."

"There was a sniper," Mulder says quietly. "He was aiming at the
hotel room when I was able to incapacitate him."

"Maybe you didn't over-react then," Spender admits. He looks up as
Scully comes in and joins him on the couch. "Even so, there's already
a plan in motion to shut down the X-Files."
 
"We knew there were risks going to the Attorney General," Scully
says.

"They're calling for your resignation," Spender tells them, and he
looks a little smug.

"Whose?" Mulder asks, although he knows the answer.

"Yours and Agent Scully's." 

"So they'll really shut us down," Mulder says heavily. He knew it was
coming, but he can't help but feel devastated anyway.

"You took the risk, knowing the possible outcome." There's no pity in
Spender's voice.

"This was all strategized - every move. I just couldn't see it. It
was all of a plan."

Scully looks sad and tired. "Mulder, whatever you may believe, this
time they may have won."

The phone attached to Spender's belt begins to ring, and he excuses
himself. When he returns he looks even grimmer. "Agent Scully said
your nanny isn't here tonight. You need to get someone over here to
baby-sit. Now. We have to go."

::Here comes the final blow.:: Mulder thinks as he dials Maggie's
phone number.

~*~*~

Hoover Building
25 Minutes Later

Skinner is talking to someone in the hallway when Mulder and Scully
walk in around a fire hose. He gives them a look like he wants to
talk, and Scully stops to hear what he has to say.

On the other hand, Mulder ignores him and heads towards the basement
office.

The "I Want To Believe" poster is blackened, and the words are nearly
impossible to make out, and it's the least damaged thing in the room.
Water drips from the walls, and he runs a hand over his melted
nameplate. It's still warm.

When Scully comes in, she looks nearly as devastated as he does. She
lays her head on his chest, hugging him. "I'm so sorry, Mulder."

"It's okay," he says stoically. When she looks up at him with a
confused expression, he gives her a sickly smile. "Good thing I got
bored when the kids were sick, huh? Otherwise we would have lost all
the files, too."

"Where do we go from here?" she whispers.

"Home. We'll wait for the dust to settle, then regroup." 

Arms around each other's waists, it's hard to tell who is supporting
who as they walk out of their ruined office.

~*~*~
~*~*~

Chapter Sixty-Two

Dallas, Texas 
August 1998

Scully isn't sure if it's the heat, the hormones, or the husband that dragged 
her here that's making her crazy. She's on the rooftop of a building facing 
the federal building, just across the street from where the actual bomb 
threat was placed, and now she's got a stupid variant of "Fiddler on the
Roof" stuck in her head. Oh well, it's not like anyone can hear her.
Mopping her forehead, she sings under her breath and off-key, "If he
were a sane man, Ya ha deedle deedle, bubba bubba deedle deedle dum,
All day long been looking for a bomb, But he is an insane man..."
Making a face, the heavy redhead pulls out her cell phone and dials.
"Mulder, it's me." 

His voice crackles slightly, sounding as if he's miles away, rather than in 
the same godforsaken part of Texas. "Where are you, Scully?" 

"I'm on the roof," she replies, her tone just this side of homicidal.

"Did you find anything?" he asks, as if it's normal for a pregnant woman to 
be climbing stairs in the wrong building.

"No, I haven't," she answers, not bothering to hide her
irritation. In a way, she's disappointed, because that means there's
nothing to throw at her husband for making her suffer like
this.

"What's wrong?" he continues obliviously.

Where shall I start, O idiot partner and husband of mine? "Well, I just 
climbed up 12 floors, which did wonders for my swollen feet and the twins
bouncing in my belly, I'm hot, I'm thirsty, and to be honest, I'm
wondering what the fuck I'm doing up here." Clear enough for you? She
wants to scream, except that would take too much energy. If the
ground wasn't so damn hot and irritating, she'd take her shoes off,
but settles for leaning against the wall sheltering the stairwell.

"You're looking for a bomb." 

She can feel her jaw working, even as she struggles not to strangle the 
cell phone as if it were her husband's neck. "Yes, I know that, but the threat 
was called in to the federal building across the street." 

Mulder, the master of obvious, replies, "I think they have that covered."


Scully hits the back of her head against the wall until it actually hurts. 
"Mulder, when a terrorist bomb threat is called in, the rational purpose 
of providing that information is to allow us to find the bomb. The rational 
object of terrorism is to promote terror. If you'd study the statistics, you'd 
find the model behavioral pattern for virtually every case where a threat 
has turned up an explosive device; and if we don't act in accordance 
with that data, if you ignore it as we have done, the chances are great 
that if there actually is a bomb, we might not find it. Lives could be
lost...Mulder. Mulder?" 

"Boom," says a voice next to her.

Scully nearly drops her phone as she staggers, "Jesus, Mulder! I almost  
peed my pants!" 

Unrepentant, Mulder chuckles while helping her up, even
as she glares at him. "Whatever happened to playing a hunch, Scully?
The element of surprise, random acts of unpredictability? If we fail
to anticipate the unforeseen or expect the unexpected in a universe
of infinite possibilities, we may find ourselves at the mercy of
anyone or anything that cannot be programmed, categorized or easily
referenced." He squints across the street as he pops a sunflower seed
into his mouth. "What are we doing up here, Scully? It's hotter than
hell." 

"Duh," she says, earning her a grin. Her tone becomes more
serious as she adds, "I know you're bored in this assignment, Mulder,
but unconventional thinking is only gonna get you in trouble now."


"What makes you think I'm bored?" he asks, seemingly flippant.

She gives him a look borne of years living with him, both on and off the
job, and it never fails to brighten his mood. "Don't give me that bullshit," 
she says, closing her eyes as she stretches and twists to ease her back 
and belly. When she opens them, she continues, "They've closed the
 X-files. There's procedure to be followed now...protocol," she stresses 
the "p" words as if they're foreign to her husband. Maybe they are.

He's grinning, and she figures she might as well throw in the towel on 
procedure and protocol. "Maybe we should call in a bomb threat to 
Houston. I think it's free beer night at the Astrodome." Then he grimaces 
slightly in apology. "Maybe they'll give you free tickets for upcoming games." 

Scully shakes her head, then turns to open the door, when she doubles 
over. "Oof," she mutters, her hand going to her stomach.

His eyes widen, and he immediately regrets making her walk up all those 
stairs. ::Idiot,:: he chastises himself as he puts his hand to her stomach.

"So much for anticipating the unforeseen," she grunts, closing her eyes. As 
he reaches into his pants pocket for his phone, Scully smiles. "Gotcha,"
she says.

He tries to keep a pout off his face and from his voice. "No, you didn't," 
he says, despite the fact that, yes, she did.

The smile on her face is ear to ear, and if he didn't know better, he'd
think she was enjoying her triumph with such a cheap trick. "Oh,
yeah. I had you big time." 

"You had nothing," he argues as he opens the door to the stairwell. "Come 
on, I know the boys aren't due for weeks." 

She's still got a freakin' huge smirk on her face as they exit, passing by 
a group of kids on a tour. "I saw your face, Mulder. There was a definite 
moment of panic." 

He brushes her off, hating how easily she got him, both this and last 
time. "You've never seen me panic. When I panic, I make this face," 
and proceeds to put on his most blank, emotionless face.

Scully snorts. "That was the face," she says, obviously not buying his 
non-panic.

"You didn't see that face," he counters.

"You're right." She smiles sweetly, "It was more like this." And makes the 
hugest "shocked" expression seen outside of a sitcom. When her face 
snaps back into a smirk, she adds, "You're buyin'." 

There's a resigned look on her face as he asks, "What? Coke, Pepsi, 
saline IV?" 

Scully's still smirking when she answers, "The kids seem to have a 
sweet tooth before they've got teeth."


"Guess I'll be adding digitalis to that," he smirks when his wife's
disappears into a glower.

~*~*~

Maybe it won't be here, Mulder thinks as he walks into the vending 
machine room, but if that's true, our asses are fragged. He checked 
this place earlier while Scully went to the roof, but no dice. Maybe the 
nutcase put it in later. He puts his change into the machine, pushes 
a button, then another, then all of them, but nothing comes out. "Oh, 
crap," he murmurs under his breath, then whacks the side of it before 
shaking the machine.

Crouching down, he looks beside it and notices that the machine is
unplugged. "Oh, fuck," he revises his comment, then tries to open the
door. Same as before, it's locked. "Sonufabitch," he mutters, calling
Scully on her cell phone. "She's gonna love this." 

"Scully," she answers, pulling on the other sleeve of her dark FBI jacket 
now that her body finally registers the air conditioning.

"Scully, I found the bomb," he says, knowing she's not going to believe 
him right off the bat, especially since he fell for her fake contractions.

"You're funny." She smiles. "Where are you, Mulder?" 

"I'm in the vending room." 

It continues to play out the same as it did last time, even though 
Mulder wanted Michaud to prove him wrong, to defuse the bomb.
He and Michaud end up in a shouting match, but that only makes the
older man irritated enough to physically haul his ass out of the
building. It was the one time Mulder actually wanted to follow
protocol, and should have, except that would've meant staying in the
building, which would mean Scully would want to stay with him, and he
honestly couldn't risk her or their babies, so he stays out.

He hesitates before getting in the police car, though, and Scully
practically bites his head off as she orders him in, practically
wrestling him while doing so, and he decides to avoid the complete
indignity of being manhandled by a pregnant woman in front of a cop
and allows himself to be shut in. They both twist around to look at
the building as the car drives off, the cop not bothering to hide his
"oh, brother" expression at the two troublesome FBI agents. "Please,"
Mulder prays under his breath, hoping for the best.

The bomb explodes, and Mulder gets another glimpse of hell as the 
building is destroyed, the bottom of the edifice expelling a huge ball of 
fire like spew from the mouth of a mad demon eating itself alive. They
both scream as cars are sent flying and their car windows explode
while it rocks from the blast.

Holding his wife, he knows he's mirroring her horrified expression,
and it doesn't fade when they turn around to find the police officer
slumped over in the driver's seat bleeding from a concussion. Scully
checks the man's pulse, then calls for an ambulance before applying a
mere band-aid to his wound.

They get out of the car slowly and look at the damage. Scully stiffens 
a little when his arms surround her, but as she looks up, she realizes 
it's a partly reflexive gesture when she sees his eyes unfocus slightly, 
watching papers flying like so much confetti out of the suddenly-exposed 
offices, the ragged edges of the building burning like a gruesome 
parody of a lopsided birthday cake. "Mulder?" she asks, putting her 
hands on his.

He starts when she touches him, then relaxes, but chills still run up
and down his skin. He can't, won't tell her what's on his mind, about
the other buildings that burn, that this isn't the last of the madness, 
but just the beginning. "Yeah?" he says in a shaky voice.

Her hold on him tightens, and she says quietly, "You're making that 
face again." 

Mulder nods, then hugs her fiercely, wondering not for the first time 
how in the hell he got to be so lucky. And if his luck will hold, now that 
she's pregnant.

~*~*~

Office of Professional Review
FBI Headquarters
Washington, DC 
 

Try as he might, he couldn't get to the meeting on time, since he 
promised Scully he'd make sure to check on the kids before 
heading to the Office of Professional Review. He had, 
unfortunately, underestimated the evility of side-street traffic, 
and arrived much later than his wife, who was sitting in the office 
before the review board by the time he got there.

 At least one of us got here on time, he thinks, doubting they'd cut
him any slack this time around because of their kids, and it turns
out he's right. Again, he's scolded out of the room, and he morosely
chews sunflower seeds, shells and all, while waiting for the Skin
Man, that is, his boss, to make an appearance. Like clockwork, he
shows up and gives him the oh-so-good news. Joy. Almost makes him
want to burst out in song, except Skinner might want to shoot him for
the good of humanity.

When Scully comes out, her expression is deliberately blank, her eyes 
flickering slightly as both men stand. She tells Skinner they're expecting 
him, and he leaves, and she slowly turns to face Mulder.

He puts his hands on her shoulders. "Whatever you told them in there, 
Scully, you don't have to protect me," he says, feeling oddly more 
vulnerable, even though she's the obviously pregnant one.

She shakes her head slightly. "All I told them was the truth." 

"They're trying to divide us on this and we can't let them," he says, 
although less desperately than the first time he's said this. This time 
around, if there's any division, it would only be at work, rather than 
home. He hopes. There's no way the FBI would be evil enough to split
a family, would they? Hm, maybe he'd better not take any chances.

"Mulder." She smiles a little, "I'll be seeing you at home, remember?" 
Her words mirror his thoughts, reassuring him somewhat, but it 
doesn't make it any easier.

He frowns. "You won't be with the X-Files any more, will you." 

She holds his hands, shrugging a little. "I have a meeting with OPR 
day after tomorrow for remediation and reassignment." 

"But they're the ones who put us together," he argues, but not
surprised.

"Because they wanted me to invalidate your investigations
into the paranormal." She nods. "But I think this goes deeper than
that now." 

"This is not about you, Scully," he wants to make her believe, "it's 
something bigger than us." 

"But I don't know if it's bigger than this," she says, patting her stomach, 
"pun intended." Scully pauses, the thoughts gathering in her head since
the building blew up making themselves heard now. "Mulder, I left
behind a career in medicine because I thought that I could make a
difference at the FBI. But it hasn't turned out that way."

She smiles down at her stomach and holds her husband's left hand.
"It's become something more. And I don't know if I could if I could
go back to work as usual, not just because of what I've seen and
done, but because of our family." She inhales before going on. "There
may be something bigger, Mulder, global conspiracies or
what-have-you, but I'm not going to jeopardize our family the next
time a building blows up and we're not out in time." 

"You're quitting," he says quietly. There'd always been a part of him 
afraid of this, a part that was insecure and curled up in his heart, a part
that never wanted her to leave him, for either personal or
professional reasons. And this time, it was both, and neither, which,
for some reason, makes sense to him, and he doesn't blame her, but he
still doesn't like it.

"Maybe you should ask yourself if your heart's still in it, too," she says, 
still not looking at him.

At that point, when Mulder feels like he's been sucker-punched, Skinner
walks out and tells them, "Agent Mulder, you're up." And so is the
X-Files, Mulder thinks morosely, turning slowly away from his
partner.

"Mulder," she hands him his jacket, "see you at home." 

He doesn't answer her, and her lower lip droops a little as he walks
away. Then the redhead takes a deep breath before heading for the
elevator. She'd like to think once she gets home and sees her
children, everything will be all right, but she knows it's not the
case. "Home," she murmurs, and for some reason, the simple word has a
note of finality about it.

~*~*~

The Mulder/Scully Residence 

"Mom, it's okay, you don't have to stay," Scully tells her mother after a
quick hug.

"I'm just glad the two of you are all right," Maggie Scully tells her daughter, 
not wanting to tell her how her grandchildren clung to their father's legs 
that morning, unwilling to let go. She knows Sammy and Page are bright, 
it's just that, after watching the explosion in Dallas on the news and her 
own scream of "Dana!" , the little ones put two and two together. When 
Dana called her to tell her they were fine, she stayed up all night reassuring
them before their parents came home. Even now, she's not sure what to
tell her daughter, or how soon the little ones will voice their fears.

"We're fine, Mom," Scully reiterates, hugging her again. She
looks tired, but whether it's jetlag, the pregnancy, getting called
up before a board, or maybe all of the above, she really doesn't
care. "Is Sammy behaving himself?" 

Maggie smiles indulgently. "He's an angel," she says, deciding not to 
bring up how he tried to "help" her in the kitchen earlier. "Did the 
review go well?" 

The redhead groans and sinks onto the couch. Her eyes closed, she 
grumbles, "What Dad said about administrators is true, it seems all 
they do is kill time by killing other people's careers to get ahead in their 
own."

"That's not nice, Dana," her mother says reproachfully, smiling
anyways. "By the way, I've noticed that Page and Sammy can be little
chatterboxes at times, but April hasn't said a word. I don't think
it's because she's shy..."

Scully groans again, but opens her eyes. "I was hoping you wouldn't 
notice," she says guiltily.

"Not notice? These are my grandchildren, of course I'd notice," Maggie 
retorts. Then her expression softens to that of worry. "She's, she's not... 
slow, is she?" 

Scully smiles a tired smile. "No, Mom, she's not. She understands spoken 
words and sign language, it's just that it seems she's taking her time actually 
talking back." Then she shakes her head. "Or so Mulder says. He's leaning 
toward the Einstein theory."

"Einstein had a theory about children, too?" Maggie sits next to her daughter, 
thankful the kids are napping so she could have some uninterupted time with 
Dana.

"No, Mulder has a theory about Einstein as a child," Scully replies. 
"Apparently, good ol' Albert Einstein didn't speak for many years, and even 
then, his classmates called him stupid." Her tired smile widens into a genuine 
one. "Guess he showed them."

Maggie hugs her daughter. "He certainly did." Stroking her daughter's red hair, 
she muses, "Aren't children a wonder?Einstein surprised his parents, as well as 
the rest of the world, going far beyond their expectations. And you certainly go 
beyond mine." 

"Mom," Scully's voice catches in her throat.

"Shhhhh," her mother continues to stroke her daughter's hair, then inhales and
stands. "I'd better make you some tea, that'll help you rest easier."

"It's okay, Mom," Scully rises slowly to her feet and yawns. "I'm so tired, I could 
sleep standing up." 

Maggie nods. "Get some rest, I'll be up until Fox gets home." 

Scully smiles sleepily at the casual use of her husband's first name, nods back, 
and trudges up the stairs. Maybe we should install an elevator, she thinks, not 
for the first time, and makes her way to the bedroom. Numbly, she takes off 
her clothes and tosses them onto a chair, then absently pulls the large nightgown 
over her head before crawling under the sheet. Just before the oblivion of sleep 
takes her, however, the thought that her children will change the future in ways 
Einstein could never dream of comes to mind, and she goes to sleep with a 
smile on her face.

~*~*~

Casey's Bar 
Southeast Washington, DC

Later that night, Mulder's hanging out at the bar, because it's close enough 
to home, but far away enough so that he doesn't have to face his family right
now as he's getting stinking drunk. Considering how assholic both he and the 
OPR have been to each other, he'd say they could just call it even, or they 
could call him fired, whichever came first.

In a way, he almost welcomes being fired, that way he could stay
home with the kids, do the X-Files and maybe write freelance, and
Scully could do her super-scientist thing at the FBI without his
presence besmirching her rep. And that way, he won't have to face
another day of leaving home with his children crying and clinging to
him because they're afraid they won't see him again. Maybe Scully's
right, if his heart's not in it, he should just walk away.

But that would mean the Smoking Man and all those other evil bastards
win, the aliens take over without a fight, and everyone, including
his family, dies. Dammit, it's a no-win situation, he groans
inwardly, reaching for a full shot.

"I'd say this just about exceeds your minimum daily requirement," the 
bartender remarks dryly, filling a glass.

Hell, no, Mulder thinks as he empties the glass. Setting it
down, he knocks over some of the many other glasses on the
bar.

"Whoa, you've gotta train for that kind of heavy lifting. Poopy day?" 
she asks.

In a fuzzy way, she reminds Mulder of his seventh grade teacher who 
seemed like the only decent grownup when Samantha was taken. Nope, 
better than his fifth grade teacher, since he doubts Mrs. Kinghorn would 
serve him alcohol, even if he's now very legal. He points his two index 
fingers at the bartender, then points one finger on the bar as a sign that 
he wants another. The bartender clears away all the empty glasses and 
places one on the bar to be filled. While he waits, Mulder looks over his 
shoulder and notices a man at the bar watching him. Damn, Kurtzweil, 
he groans inwardly, can it get any better?

"So, whaddya do?" the bartender asks innocently.

"What do I do?" he repeats. When she nods, he launches
into his spiel, guaranteed to win the hearts and minds of children
the world over. Or something like that. "I'm the key figure in an
on-going government charade, the plot to conceal the truth about the
existence of extraterrestrials. It's a global conspiracy, actually,
with key players in the highest levels of power, that reaches down
into the lives of every man, woman, and child on this planet." Mulder
laughs, thinking of his own wife and kids. Damn straight. "So, of
course, no one believes me. I'm an annoyance to my superiors, a joke
to my peers, and a burden on my wife. They call me Spooky. Spooky
Mulder, whose sister was abducted by aliens when he was just a kid
and who now chases after little green men with a badge and a gun,
shouting to the heavens or to anyone who will listen that the fix is
in, that the sky is falling and when it hits, it's gonna be the
shit-storm of all time." 

She seems to take it well, no screaming,no fainting, and best of all, no eye 
rolling. "Well. I would say that about does it, Spooky", and takes the drink 
away from him. Dammit. "Looks like eighty-six is your lucky number." 

He takes some bills out of his wallet and declares, "You know, one is the 
loneliest number."

Mulder looks over his shoulder again and sees the man is no longer at
the bar. Oh well, time to drain the lizard and meet up with another.
He forgoes the fruitless enterprise of trying the bathrooms, and
heads out into the alley. While he's trying to aim at the UFO on the
poster, Doctor Alvin Kurtzweil accosts him.

They go through the same song and dance as before, although this time, 
Mulder knows the crazy old guy isn't just yanking his chain, but is just 
grazing the tip of the iceberg. And now that I'm mixing my internal metaphors, 
I know it's time to go home, the laconic man thinks, sliding behind  the wheel of 
his car. It's a bad idea to drive, he knows, but since Scully left the car for him 
to use after the OPR, he decides he might as well make the most of  it, and 
leaves Kurtzweil behind.

~*~*~

The Mulder/Scully Residence

As he drives, he debates whether or not to bring Scully along. After all, she's 
way pregnant, and coming into contact with even dead alien goop might hurt 
her and the babies. Or he could do the thing solo, like he'll have to do the X-Files 
for the rest of his life, and Scully would have to bail his sorry ass out of a military 
jail for trying to transport a messy body. 

Neither of the options sound good, but he finds himself driving home rather than 
towards the base, and he guesses the steering wheel made his mind up for him. 
Unfortunately, he crashes the damn thing into the mailbox just as he's parking it. 
"Thank God for insurance," he mumbles, stumbling out of the car and fumbling 
for the house keys.

The door flies open and his lovely, pregnant wife stands before him like a Titian 
goddess in a pink bathrobe. "Mulder, what," Scully's worries die on her lips as she 
smells him. Then she looks at the car, or what's left of it, then drags him inside. 
"You're drunk!" she hisses, not sure whether to shake him, slap him, or sober him 
up by less violent means.

"Awww, I woke you," he stumbles before landing on the couch, "did I wake you?" 

"No, but you're going to wake Mom and the kids if you don't lower your voice," 
she scolds him, starting to take his shoes off.

"No, get dressed," he tells her, pulling his feet back.

"What are you doing?" she frowns when his eyes light up with an unholy fervor. 
She  really, really doesn't trust that look, drunk or sober. It usually precedes some 
kind of  insanity, like chasing mutants or other ooginess in the dead of night.

"Just get dressed, I'll explain on the way," he says, propelling her toward
the bedroom with a sudden alertness and coordination belying his inebriated 
condition, "good thing your mom's here." 

~*~*~

Montgomery
County, Maryland

At the Bethesda Naval Hospital, Mulder bluffs the clerk as quickly and efficiently 
as he did the last time. He and Scully walk down the hallway, both looking very 
professional, although she doesn't appear pregnant but rather heavyweight. She'd
argued with him about this particular trenchcoat, but he'd said he'd rather have the 
military think she's a heavy redhead than deny her into the morgue because of her 
pregnancy. Sullenly, she accepted it, but he knows it's only a temporary victory, 
especially since he's the one who smashed a headlight and did God knows what 
else to their car.

They arrive in a room full of bodies on gurneys, wrapped up with sheets and tied 
with ropes. Mulder stops at one of them and looks at its toe tag.

"This is one of the firemen who died in Dallas?" she asks, joining him next to the 
body.

"According to the toe tag," he replies, carefully untying it because this time, he 
actually knows what's under the sheet, and it's definitely not a hot chick.

"And you're looking for...?" Scully prompts, not stopping him because a perverse
part of her is just as curious.

"Cause of death," Mulder says simply, still undoing knots. He wonders if Sammy 
has been working part-time here, the knots are just as bad and unfortunately he
doesn't have a pair of scissors on hand.

Scully smirks. "I can tell you that without even looking at him," she says, picking up 
a piece of paper near the body's head and reads aloud. "'Concussive organ failure 
due to proximal exposure to source and flying debris.' Mulder, this man's
already been autopsied, you can tell by the way he's been wrapped and
dressed." 

Mulder pulls back the covering sheet, thinking, Ewwwwwwwww, I can see why Page 
thinks 'sticky' is gross. "Does this fit the description you just read me?" he asks, 
the  slimy sheet almost keeping its open shape, and he suppresses a shudder. 
Damn, I'm sober now, he sighs inwardly.

Scully walks around to join Mulder on the other side of the gurney, looks down and 
she's very, very thankful she's over her morning sickness part of the pregnancy.
However, it doesn't mean her sense of smell is dead, and she covers her nose and 
mouth as she comments, "Oh my God. This man's tissue, Mulder..." 

"It's like jelly," he says, and immediately regrets it. Aw man, it's gonna take months to 
enjoy pb&j again.

"There's been some kind of cellular breakdown," she says, still staring at the
body, oblivious to his uncharacteristic squeamishness. She snaps on a pair of 
latex gloves, slides and pushes her fingers gently along the body, professional curiosity 
overwhelming her own queasiness. "It's completely edematous. There's been no 
autopsy performed here, no Y-incision, no internal exam," she frowns, realizing 
something is seriously wrong here, and not just the way this man died.

"You're telling me the cause of death on that report is false?" Mulder asks,
grateful to drop the sheet. "That this man didn't die from an explosion or from flying 
debris?" 

Scully's frown disappears as she looks up at him. "Mulder, I can't tell you what killed 
this man. I'm not sure anybody else could claim to either," she says, an echo of
Harrison Ford's "I've got a very bad feeling about this" going through her mind.

It isn't long before they wheel the body into the lab, and Scully voices her suspicions 
about her husband's knowledge as well as her concerns over getting discovered 
autopsying the body. Mulder understands, but figures if she didn't get caught last time,
this time there's no worry, but aloud tells her they should figure out what's really to 
blame for the fireman's death and clear their own names. With that, he leaves his 
pregnant wife in the company of a gelatinous corpse and heads off to the dubious 
company of Doctor Kurtzweil.

~*~*~

Dupont Circle
Washington, DC
4:50 a.m.

Not that the Dupont Circle is the nicest of places in the daytime, but at night, it's 
positively seedy, and Doctor Kurtzweil's residence, surrounding by cop cars 
with flashing lights, is no different. He pops into the apartment, which is swarming 
with cops, and picks up a couple of staid-looking ob-gyn mags before the New 
York-accented detective notices him and tells him about the kiddie porn charges. 
Even though he knows it's a false accusation, there's something in Mulder's gut
that just roils at the thought. The FBI agent glances at the two Kurtzweil apocalyptic 
books, then back at the detective and hands him the odd comment about a pelvic 
exam appointment.

He really didn't need to step inside, but he knows Kurtzweil is watching and would 
be suspicious if he didn't show some curiosity. Then he walks out, sees Kurtzweil, 
and has a lovely chat about false accusations, the Hanta virus, and FEMA's real 
purpose.

"When we were young men in the military, your father and I were recruited for a
project. They told us it was biological warfare, a virus," the passionate doctor says, 
his large eyes getting bigger with intensity.

"What killed those men?" Mulder asks impatiently, already itching to call his wife and 
check on her safety.

"What killed them I won't even write about!" Kurtzweil becomes the embodiment of all
the paranoia Mulder's sources have been known for, but with good reason. "We have 
no context for what killed those men, or any appreciation of the scale at which it will be 
unleashed in the future." 

"A plague?" 

"The plague to end all plagues, Agent Mulder," the old man declares. "A silent weapon 
for a quiet war. The systematic release of an indiscriminant organism for which the 
men who will bring it on still have no cure! They've been working on this for fifty years! 
While the rest of the world have been fighting gooks and commies, these men have 
been secretly negotiating a  planned Armageddon!" 

The FBI agent feels a deep sorrow for the man he hardly knows, who seems to have 
had his finger in as many dubious pies as the Smoking Man. His biological father, he
thinks bitterly. "Negotiating  with whom?" 

"I think you know," Kurtzweil hedges, his eyes shining with a knowing glint. "The timetable 
has been set. It will happen on a holiday, when people are away from their homes. The 
president will declare a state of emergency, at which time all government, all federal 
agencies, will come under the power of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
FEMA, the secret government." 

"And they call me paranoid," Mulder murmurs.

Kurtzweil doesn't care if the agent seems to be laughing at him, he knows what's at stake, 
or at least has a very disturbing glimpse of it. "Go back to Dallas, Agent Mulder, and dig. 
Or we're gonna find out along with the rest of the country, when it's too late." 

~*~*~

Meanwhile, back at the morgue, Scully is conducting the autopsy. She cuts out a piece 
of the ribcage and holds it up to look  at it. This is definitely not normal, she thinks, as 
she stares at a chunk which should, by all rights, by opaque and off-white, not clear
like ice.

The thing that really gets her heart pumping, however, is when she hears footsteps and 
sees three men silhouetted in the frosted window of the autopsy room. She may be 
pregnant with twins, but it's amazing how fast she can hustle if her life depends on it, 
and pulls the sheet over the body before rushing into the refrigeration room, closing 
the door behind her.

Breathing quickly and shallowly, she removes her mask and gloves. Her cell phone 
rings, and either because of the room construction or her perilous situation, the damn 
thing sounds twice as loud as it should and she hits the answer button as quickly as 
she can.

"Hey, Scully, it's me," Mulder says, calling from a payphone, as Kurtzweil's paranoia 
catches up to him.

Perfect timing, honey, the redhead thinks. "Yeah?" she whispers.

"Why are you whispering?" he frowns.

"Mulder, I can't really talk right now," she hisses. He wonders why, then remembers 
the last time, she was hiding in the meat locker section of the morgue. Oops. Crash 
the car, and now this. Scully's really gonna kill me now.

"What did you find?" he asks, hoping to make it a fast conversation for her sake.

"Evidence of a massive infection." 

"What kind of infection?" 

"I don't know," she says, both frustrated and yet exhilarated by this new discovery 
that has yet to be fully comprehended.

"All right, listen to me. I'm going home and then I'm booking myself on a flight to 
Dallas. I'm going to get you a ticket too." 

"Mulder..." she whines.

"I need you there with me," he whines back. "I need your expertise."

"Mulder, I have a hearing tomorrow..." she tries to be a voice of reason, albeit 
quietly. Damn, if he didn't get her stuck here in a fridge full of bodies, he's off 
dragging her all the way back to Dallas when she's over eight months pregnant! 
Bad enough the first time was for official duty, but then the building blows up 
anyway and the FBI is pointing fingers at them! What the hell is he
thinking???

"I can get you back in time for that hearing, maybe with evidence that will blow 
it away," he urges her.

"Mulder, I can't!" she hunches over, as if to muffle the sound and her 
husband's insanity over the phone. "I'm way past the point of common sense
here." 

"This has nothing to do with common sense," he tells her, and she thinks, 
Amen to that, and hangs up on him, hearing approaching footsteps.

Mulder, however, thinks that payphone connections are overrated when he 
pushes the metal thingamajigger impatiently to restore communication. "Scully? 
Are you there? Scully?" 

By this time, she's hiding on the floor under one of the gurneys, doing her damndest 
to make her large body small without hurting her babies. A substance drips down 
from above, and she grimaces in disgust. I am going to kick your ass but good, 
Mulder, she thinks, praying to the good Lord and all the saints that those
soldiers hustle their asses out of their ASAP so she can get home and wring 
her husband's neck.

~*~*~

FBI Field Office
Dallas, Texas
11:21 a.m.
 
"I'm afraid what you're looking for amounts to a needle in a haystack," the field 
agent drawls. "This explosion was so devastating there hasn't been much that 
we've been able to put together just yet." The agent's winding his way around 
tables covered in specimen and men in white lab coats working on them, not 
looking behind him to see if the out-of-town agent is following.

Mulder's really working his light blue shirt, dark-striped tie and black suit 
ensemble, mainly because he hasn't changed since, what, yesterday. "Well, 
I'm looking for anything out of the ordinary really," he says, sounding and 
appearing at the top of his game, despite being drunk off his ass less than a 
few hours ago and not having any sleep since yesterday morning. Was it that 
long ago? Thank goodness for deodorant and forgiving taxi drivers. "Maybe 
something from the FEMA offices where those bodies where found?" 

"Well, we weren't expecting to find those remains, of course, and we sent 'em 
off to Washington," the agent replies.

Mulder sounds both optimistic and a touch desperate, since, well, both his and 
Scully's jobs are still on the line. Besides, he hasn't seen or heard from his wife 
since the morgue, and it's quite possible that she's back home, changing the 
locks and maybe getting a good deal of rest, for once. "Well, anything from those 
offices  that you haven't send off to DC yet?" 

Now the field agent stops and turns to Mulder. "Some bone fragments turned up 
in the sift this morning. We thought we had another fatality but we found out 
FEMA recovered them from an archeological site out of town." 

"Have you examined them?" Mulder asks, trying to keep his attention on this man 
rather than stop and call his wife.

The agent with the helmet hair shakes his head briefly. "No, they're just fossils, as 
far as we know." 

And, like a ray of sunshine, Mulder sees Scully standing by the doorway. He wishes 
they had some kind of telepathy to tell her how happy and relieved and astounded 
he is, but instead points at her and says to the field agent, "I'd like you to let this 
person take a look at them, if you don't mind." 

The field agent turns around, sees Scully and turns back to Mulder, then sighs,
as if wishing he didn't have to deal with odd requests from DC "Just let me see if 
I can lay my hands on what you're looking for," and walks off.

When Scully walks over to join him, Mulder says quietly, "I thought you said you 
weren't coming." And he honestly wasn't expecting her this time around, especially 
with the twosome in her tummy to give her more than a good enough reason to 
stay home.

"I wasn't planning on it," Scully's mouth quirks up slightly as if reading his mind. 
"Particularly not after spending a half an hour in cold storage this morning. But I 
got a better look at the blood and tissue samples I took from the fireman." 

You can take the scientist out of the X-Files, but you can't take the X-Files out of 
the scientist, he thinks, knowing if he says this aloud, she'll kill him. "And what did 
you find?" 

"Something I couldn't show to anybody else. Not without causing the kind of 
attention I'd just as soon avoid right now," she ducks her head and lowers her voice, 
her eyes scanning the area for any unwanted eavesdroppers. Then she checks on
the field agent's whereabouts before continuing. "But what those men were infected 
with contains a protein code that I've never seen before. What it did to them, it did 
extremely fast." Her eyes bore into him, and again he's reminded of how sharp her 
mind is, that even the usually infamous pregnancy hormones that would distract 
other women don't stand a chance with Scully's will and wit.

"How was it contracted?" he bends down slightly, his voice also lowered.

Her sharp blue eyes dull slightly when she admits, "That I don't know.  But, unless 
it can respond to conventional treatment, it could be a serious health threat." 

The field agent returns with the fossils with a less-than-optimistic look on his 
face. "Like I said, these are just fossils, but they weren't near the blast center 
so they're not going to tell you much." 

Mulder nods briskly, handing Scully a vial containing some bone fragments. "Right, 
okay, why don't you check this out." Without a word, Scully looks through the 
microscope, then looks up at Mulder, her eyes wide in disbelief. What the hell is
going on? she wants to yell, but it's best to show a united front with others, dammit. 
As if her look confirms his suspicions, Mulder turns to the field agent. "You said 
you knew the location where these were found?" 

"Show you right on the map," the field agent does his version of a business smile 
before walking away to get the map for them.

~*~*~

Blackwood, Texas

They're in the middle of a small, dusty Texas town, with neat houses surrounding 
them. "If this is an archeological or dig site," Scully brushes off the hair blowing in
her face, "then I'm Indiana Jones." She's feeling somewhat better since she took 
a nap on the ride over, added to the nap on the flight from DC to Dallas. Not to 
mention the horrible sound of Mulder singing to their kids over the phone and 
mangling Elvis' "The Yellow Rose of Texas" waking her up as they arrived in 
Blackwood. Her mother laughing hard in the background, however, that was just
priceless.

Mulder grins at her, just waiting until he can deliver the punchline. "This is where 
he marked on the map. Where he said those fossils were unearthed." He squints 
at her when the dusty wind blows grit into his face. "You're sure those fossils were 
infected with the same virus you saw at the morgue?" 

She nods, "Both sets of bones were porous, as if the virus or the causative 
microbe were decomposing it." 

"And you've never seen that virus before," he probes.

"No." 

His squint drops down, then to the side, and he brightens up. "Look at that." They 
walk over to what appears to be an anomaly in the desert, a brand new playground. 
He glances back at his wife, who is already comparing the size of the area to 
parks back home and grins. "That look like new grass to you?" 

"Looks pretty green for this climate," she agrees, half-wishing she could kick off
her shoes and walk barefoot in this somewhat surreal oasis.

When they reach the playground, Mulder bends down and picks up a piece of the 
sod. "Ground's dry about an inch down," he says before dropping the new turf. 
"This was laid recently." 

"The equipment looks brand new, too," Scully says longingly.

Mulder shakes his head, hoping the Syndicate will never figure out the way to buy 
off his wife would be a new playground set. "No irrigation system. Somebody's 
covering  their tracks."

Turning around slowly to look for any clues to maybe fall from the sky, Mulder mentally 
counts to five and sees three kids riding towards them on bikes. "Hey! Hey!" he calls 
out as he and Scully walk towards the kids. Fortunately, the three boys stop their bikes.

"Do you boys live around here?" Scully asks, thankful she doesn't sound as out of breath 
as she feels. It's rare that she feels shorter than her husband, but when his long legs 
stretch unencumbered by a large belly, that's when she starts resenting, even briefly, 
Mulder's height.

"Yeah," the middle boy drawls in a somewhat deep voice.

Mulder nods towards the playground. "You see anybody diggin' over there?" 

"We're not supposed to talk about it," the boy says, and it appears he's their 
leader.

Scully looks somewhat amused. "You're not supposed to talk about it? Who told 
you that?"

"Nobody," the shorter boy replies quickly.

Yeah, like I'll buy it this time, Mulder smirks. "Nobody? The same nobody that built 
that playground? Nobody buy you those new bikes, too?" 

"I think you better tell us," Scully says in a motherly but gently scolding voice.

"We don't even know you," the first boy says defiantly.

Ooh, way to score points, kid, Scully thinks. "Well, we're FBI Agents."

"You're not FBI Agents," he scoffs.

Mulder grins, he can't help it. "How do you know?" 

"Cause ya'll look like them Mormons," he laughs, and Scully ducks her head 
briefly  to hide her own smile.

If we brought the kids along, we'd have no comeback, Mulder thinks as he
pulls out his badge. "Hey, you wanna buy a badge?" 

The boys stare at his badge and then spill. "They left about an hour ago, 
going that way," the tall boy points, then the other two kids point in the same
direction.

"Looks like we're off that way, Indiana." He grins at his wife, who rolls her 
eyes even as the boys give him a mystified glance before biking in the 
opposite direction.
 
~*~*~

Chapter Sixty-Three

Texas 
en route

There's no traffic around, so Mulder stops at an intersection so they
can decide which way to go. Or pretend to decide, anyway.

"Unmarked tanker trucks. What are archeologists hauling out in tanker
trucks?"

"I don't know, Mulder." 

"And where are they going with it?" 

"That's the first question to answer if we're ever going to find
them."

"What are my choices?" he asks, peering over her shoulder at the map.

"About a hundred miles of nothing in each direction. We've got two
choices. One of them is wrong."

"I think they went left." 

"I don't know why, but I think they went right." 

Mulder shrugs, then goes straight. "Six years together, Scully. How
many times I been wrong? Never. About driving anyway."

It starts to get dark, and Mulder gives her a sheepish look since he
knows that she should expect one. "I was right about the bomb, wasn't
I?"

"This is great, this is fitting." 

"What is?" 

"I have to be in Washington in eleven hours for a hearing that may
affect one of the greatest decisions in my life-"

"Your life? I'd say it affects both our lives." 

"Fine, our lives. And I'm in the middle of nowhere Texas chasing
phantom tanker trucks!"

"We're not chasing trucks. We're chasing evidence. Only Scooby Doo
would be chasing phantom trucks anyway."

She chooses to ignore the last comment. "Evidence of what exactly?" 

"That bomb in Dallas was allowed to go off, to hide bodies infected
with a virus. A virus you yourself detected."

"They haul gas in tanker trucks, they haul oil in tanker trucks, they
don't haul viruses in tanker trucks."

"Well, maybe they do in these tanker trucks." 

"What aren't you telling me here? Mulder?" 

"The virus may be extraterrestrial." 

"I don't believe this...I don't..." she sputters, then Mulder points.
There is a train, with the bodies of tanker trucks strapped to it.

They get out of the car and chase after it, as fast as they can given
Scully's ungainliness. Eventually they reach a set of cornfields,
surrounded by desert.

"This is weird," Scully remarks. 

"Very weird." 

"Any thoughts on why anybody'd be growing corn in the middle of the
desert?"

"Not unless those are giant Jiffy Pop Poppers." He points at the
rounded structures in the distance.

"They remind me more of nursing bras," Scully says with a shrug.

After ten or fifteen minutes of walking, they reach the doors and
find that they are not being guarded, so they go in.

"Cool in here. Temperature's being regulated," Scully remarks.

"For the purpose of what?" 

"I think we're on top of a larger structure here..." 

"Hey Scully, why don't you wait here near the doors, in case we need
to make a quick exit."

"Mulder..."

"Please?" He turns puppy dog eyes on her, so she sighs and steps back
towards the doorway.

"You hear that?" Mulder calls.

"I hear a humming...Like electricity, high voltage maybe..." He bends
down to listen. "Maybe...Maybe not."

The sound of the vents opening makes him look up.

"Scully?" 

"Yeah?" 

"Get out! Get out!" 

Scully quickly does as she's told, and looks back through to see him
running from bees. He pauses long enough to let the blowers remove
the bees.

"Did you get stung?" he asks quickly. "I didn't." 

"The bees didn't make it to me," she tells him. "Hold still," ahe
demands, then reaches into her jacket pulling out a small container.
Just as he's about to ask her why, she plucks something off his coat.
"You had a hitch-hiker."

"Hold onto that, Scully. It might be evidence." 

A light grows over the corn, and they both know it's not dawn, so
they run into the corn only moments before a pair of Black
Helicopters appears above them.

To his dismay he loses track of Scully. "Scully! Talk to me, Scully!
Dammit! Scully!"

"Over here, Mulder!" Her voice is almost lost over the sounds of the
copters, but he does find her crouched down amongst the corn stalks.
Then they begin to run towards their car, and the copters fly off.

"Where'd they go?" Scully asks.

Mulder shakes his head. "I don't know, I'm just glad that they're
gone.

~*~*~

 OPR Hearing 
Washington, DC
August 27th, 1998

Scully slips into the room two minutes after the review was scheduled
to begin. "I apologize for making you wait. I have new evidence.
These are bone fragments recovered from the bomb site."

A.DCassidy gives her a disproving look. "You went back to Dallas?" 

"Yes." 

*

Casey's Bar
Meanwhile

"Did you find anything?" Kurtzweil asks eagerly. 

"Yeah." 

"What did it look like?" 

"Bees, corn crops." 

* 

OPR Hearing 

"And you have conclusive evidence of this?" A.D. Cassidy asks.

"Well, not exactly conclusive. We're working on gathering conclusive
evidence."

"Working with who?" The AD's voice is sharp. 

Scully hesitates. "With Agent Mulder." 

*

Casey's Bar

"What do you think they're for?" Mulder asks.

"What do you think?" 

"A transportation system. The crops polygenically altered, to carry a
virus."

"That would be my guess." 

"Your guess?! I thought you said you had answers?" 

"Yeah, well. I don't have them all." 

Mulder gives him a disgusted look. "You didn't know my father." 

"Look, like I said, your father and I were old friends." 

"You've been using me to get information for your god-damned books!" 

"Lower your voice!" Kurtzweil admonishes, leaves through the back
exit.

Mulder follows him. "Kurtzweil? Kurtzweil!" 

"Listen, you'd be shit out of luck if it wasn't for me. I'm putting
my ass on the line."

"Your ass? I just got chased through Texas by two unmarked
helicopters! And so did my pregnant wife!"

"And why do you think you're here talking to me today? These people
don't make mistakes! They could have killed you, your wife, and your
unborn offspring last night if they wanted to. Don't you get it?"

~*~*~

Washington, DC
Late Afternoon

Mulder is sitting in his office a family picture album open as he
stares at a young version of Kurtzweil at a family picnic. His
family's picnic. Scully comes in, looking quite morose.

"What's wrong?" he asks her. "What did they say?"

"Quantico, teaching autopsy technique. Transfer effective
immediately. I already gave Skinner my letter of resignation."

"You can't quit now, Scully," Mulder insists.

"I can, Mulder. I already have. The only reason I'm working at all is
because I thought what we were doing was necessary and worthwhile. If
not for that, why would I leave my children if we can afford it if I
didn't? I told you that I can't teach, not now..."

"I mean the X-Files, that's what you can't quit. We are close to
something here! We are on the verge!"

"You're on the verge, Mulder. Please don't make this harder on me." 

"After what you saw last night, after all you've seen, you can just
walk away?"

"I have, I did, it's done." 

"I need you on this, Scully." 

"You don't need me, Mulder. You never have. I've just held you back.
I have to go to my appointment, we'll talk when I get back."

Scully goes out into the hall and Mulder follows her.

"You wanna tell yourself that so you can quit with a clear
conscience, you can, but you're wrong."

"Why did they assign me to you in the first place, Mulder? To debunk
your work, to rein you in, to shut you down."

"But you saved me. As difficult and as frustrating as it's been
sometimes, your goddamned strict rationalism and science have saved
me a thousand times over. You've kept me honest...made me a whole
person. I owe you everything, Scully, and you owe me nothing...I
don't know if I want to do this alone...I don't even know if I
can...and if I quit now, they win."

"I know." She reaches up and kisses him. "When I get home we'll work
on trying to think of a way of convincing them that they need the
X-Files to stay open."

After he lets her go, she looks out the window. "My cab's here," she
tells him and he winces a bit, obviously feeling guilty that her car
is in the shop. It's occurred to him several times that a slightly
banged up car is a blessing compared to what could have happened.

"Love you," Mulder tells her.

He walks to the doorway and watches her get in the waiting cab.

~*~*~

"Thanks for coming so quickly," Scully tells the driver as she shuts
the door. "I need to go to Waldon's Medical building. It's on Eighth
Street."

The driver nods a little, but says nothing.

Scully looks around frantically for a few seconds. "Dammit, I forgot
my purse. I'll be right back." To her surprise, the door won't open.
"I need to get out-"

The man ignores her, and starts to pull away from the curb. "No, I
need-"

To her relief the window does roll down. "Mulder!" she shouts to her
husband who is still standing in the doorway. "Mulder, I need help!"

He's running towards her, but the driver hits the gas and heads in a
direction that will not take her to Eight Street.

"Scully?" Mulder shouts and nearly catches up to the cab for a
fleeting moment. Just as he's about to the driver sticks a gun out
the window, and fires.

Scully screams as she watches her husband fall to the ground.

His prone figure fades away quickly as the driver guns the engine.
"Where are you taking me? You bastard! Where the hell are you taking
me?!"

~*~*~

An Apartment Just Outside of DC

When the driver tries to get Scully out of the car, she does the best
to fight him. Eventually, however, he's able to overpower her and
drag her up the stairs. When they reach a door, he knocks.

An annoyed looking woman gives them a look of disbelief. "This is who
they wanted? You've got to be kidding me. Well, go on, bring her in."

The driver swears when Scully drags her feet, not wanting to go into
the apartment. Although she's not completely shocked, Scully is
horrified to discover that she's being left in the care of Agent
Fowley. She's roughly pushed onto a couch, and the snarling driver
leaves the two women alone.

"What's going on?" Scully demands to know.

Agent Fowley shrugs. "All I know is that I was asked to baby-sit
someone that was going to take part in an experiment. I had no idea
it was going to be you."

"Do you care?" Scully asks bleakly.

Fowley frowns a little. "I don't think that this was thought through
very well. Even if they think this is going to teach Fox a lesson,
using you in an experiment that is sure to kill your babies is only
going to evoke his wrath."

"What do you mean, kill our babies?" Scully asks, before the truth
dawns on her. "Those things! They're going to infect me with one of
those things that eats people from the inside out!"

"That's the general idea. The 'thing' is a virus, though." 

Scully wraps her arms around her belly, and moans, "no no no no..."

"It is a shame to kill three people when I'm fairly sure that they
only really want to eliminate you. Too bad they decided to act now,
instead of after your children are born."

To her surprise, Scully thinks she detects a genuine note of regret
in the woman's voice and seizes on it. "You can't let them do this."
she pleads. "Even if I've done something to deserve this, my babies
haven't."

"I know, but I can't just let you go. They'd kill me for defying
them."

"But-" 

Fowley gives her belly a calculated look. "Dana, how far along are
you?"

Scully forces herself not to react to the familiar use of her first
name. "Almost thirty-six weeks."

The brunette nods, then bends to rummage through a bag. "That's good.
We can work with that." When Scully looks up, she's holding a small
glass bottle and a syringe in her hands. "I'm supposed to give the
old bastard this stuff for his ulcers, but I've heard that it will do
the job we want it to as well."

Before Scully can say anything to protest, the plunger depresses and
the liquid races into her vein.

"What did you do to me?" she hisses as the other woman calmly places
the syringe on the bedside table.

"The only thing I could to keep them from taking all three of you."
Fowley smiles a little. "That's what you wanted, isn't it?"

"What do you- Ohhh!" Scully curls up when the first contraction hits
her.

"I realize this isn't a perfect solution, but it's the only thing I
can come up with," Diana tells her as she pulls on latex gloves. "I'm
sure that Fox will be able to gain custody of the babies later
today."

"But they'll be early," she gasps.

"I know. With luck I'll be able to get them to a hospital before they
come for you."

~*~*~

Some Time Later

Thanks to the drug, Scully's labor is hard and fast. She scarcely has
time to wonder if Fowley is capable of delivering a baby before the
dark-haired woman has delivered two.

"They look good, Dana. On the small side, but they're breathing
well." Fowley's voice is surprisingly reassuring.

"I want to hold them." She reaches out with trembling hands. 

Fowley shakes her head. "You're really weak-" Scully gets ready to
scream at her that they're her babies, give them to her, but Fowley's
next words calm her. "I'll tuck them up against you while I clean
up." She bends and places one infant on either side of her.

"Thank you," Scully mumbles, already intent on examining the babies.
Fowley is right, they're perfect.

"I'll have to take them soon," Fowley warns. "Or there might not be
time to get them to Fox."

Scully wants to protest when Fowley reaches out and takes the babies
from her, but she doesn't. Better that they be with Mulder than along
for whatever horrifying adventure she's in for.

After her babies are carried out of the room, Scully finds that she
can barely keep her eyes open. Tired of fighting for the moment, she
lets them close.

~*~*~

"What the hell is going on here?" an angry voice shouts, waking
Scully up. Someone pokes her. "What happened?"

"Don't remember..." she lies in a sleepy voice.

"Where's Diana?" 

"Isn't she here?" 

The man continues to swear, and tells someone else that "they're not
going to like this at all."

"Pick her up and put her in the car." 

"We're still taking her?" a second voice wants to know.

"I don't see what choice we have." 

~*~*~

Fowley jumps out of the car and pulls the basket off the backseat,
praying that neither baby will start crying. The doors near the
emergency room are blissfully deserted, which makes her sigh with
relief as she pushes a note under the blanket covering the sleeping
babies.

"Someone will find you in a minute or two," she whispers as she sets
the basket on the ground in front of the doors.

She glances around and sees no one as she drives off, but ten minutes
later she realizes that she's being followed. It's on her mind to
keep driving, but a gun out the window makes her change her mind.

Before she quite realizes it, she's being forced into the back of a
van where Scully and the smoking man are already sitting. "What did
you do?" the smoking man asks her, sounding almost casual.

"Me? I didn't do anything." 

"The fact that Agent Scully is no longer pregnant, nor are there any
babies anywhere we can find suggests that you're lying."

"Oh. She went into labor. I didn't think you wanted the babies for
anything, so I dropped them off at the hospital where agent Mulder
is."

"You didn't think we wanted them..." he mutters, giving her an
incredulous look. "We know she didn't just go into labor. What did
you give her?"

"Nothing." 

"What did you give her?!" he thunders.

"Your ulcer medicine, Cytotec," Fowley admits.

"You didn't think it would interfere with the gestation of the
virus?"

"I didn't think about that." 

"You should have," The smoking man says grimly. "You're going to wish
you had."

Scully and Fowley exchange worried looks, wondering what these men
have planned for them.

~*~*~

That Night

A fog swirls around Mulder's head, but he thinks that he hears
something, voices.

"What are you looking at?" 

"His charts." 

"Put it down." 

"I'll put it down when I'm ready to put it down." 

Mulder cracks an eye and thinks he sees blond hair before closing it
again.

"He's waking up!" 

"Mulder?" 

The three gunmen are standing around his bed, looking down at him.
"Oh god. Scarecrow, Cowardly lion. Toto. What happened?" Mulder asks
thickly. His mouth feels like a desert.

"Some guys from a cab company found you lying on the road. Someone
shot at you and grazed your temple."

"A few centimeters to the left and we'd all be playing harps right
now," Frohike remarks.

It all comes back to him like a dash of cold water, and he struggles
to sit up. "Someone took Scully! Where is she?"

"Your boss, Skinner, he's got people looking for her right now,"
Byers tells him.

Mulder swings his legs over the edge of the bed. "I've go get her.
Gotta get her and our babies back."

To his surprise, Skinner comes in and tries to keep him in bed. "Easy
now, Mulder. Easy. Tell me where she is, I'll go get her."

"I don't know where she is. But I know someone who might," Mulder
insists.

"Mulder..." Byers speaks up hesitantly. "You don't need to look for the
babies."

"What are you talking about?" He feels his heart in his throat when
he swallows.

Byers throws him a frightened look, and Skinner sighs deeply, then
gives him the news. "Three hours ago a pair of newborns were
abandoned here at the hospital. The note with them instructed doctors
to contact their father - Fox Mulder."

"What? The babies aren't due for a month," Mulder says feeling
stupid. How could his sons be here and not Scully?

"They're both okay," Skinner tells him. "A little small, but they're
breathing on their own. Their doctor said you could see them as soon
as you woke up."

"I'll let a nurse know you're awake, so they can bring them down."
Frohike hurries out of the room towards the nurses' station.

"How do you know they're who the note said they are?" To Mulder's
embarrassment, he wobbles a bit as he gets to his feet.

"Maggie Scully brought Page in, and they did a preliminary blood test
to see if they're related. It's no where near as conclusive as a DNA
full test, but it does seem to indicate that in all probability they
are your boys."

Mulder winces, thinking of how much Page hates needles. "All the more
reason for me to go find their mother for them."

"How far do you think you can make it out there? How far do you think
they'll let you make it, because they'll know the second you walk out
that door," Skinner reminds him.

Venting a frustrated sigh, Mulder sits back down on the bed. 

A cheerful looking nurse pushing a cart comes into the room. "Oh
good, Dad's awake! Your little boys have been waiting to meet you."

"Oh." As Mulder peers down at the two infants he feels a sense of
awe. These babies are the smallest of all the newborns that have ever
been in his family, and they're the only ones who have had his hair.
It's light and sparse, but definitely brown. They have Scully's ears,
though, and her nose...

"You're looking a little pale, Dad," The nurse says, sounding
concerned. "I think we should make this a short visit. You can see
them again whenever you like."

"Thank you." As soon as she's gone he looks up at his friends with
heavy grief in his eyes. "They need their mother, not just me. Can't
you understand that?"

"What can we do to help?" Langly asks.

"You can strip Byers naked." 

"What?" squeaks Byers.

"I need your clothes." 

"I..." Byers looks miserable. "At least all of you look away." 

"Oh, for God's sake," Frohike says what they're all thinking, but
they all turn around while Byers and Mulder change clothes.

As soon as he escapes with Frohike and Langly, Mulder pulls out his
cell phone. "Kurtzweil? It's Mulder. I need to meet you in the usual
place."

~*~*~

Casey's Bar
Southeast Washington, DC 
The Alley 

I doesn't surprise Mulder to see the Well Dressed Man staring at him
instead of Kurtzweil, but it does make him a bit sad.

"Mr. Mulder." 

"What happened to Kurtzweil?" 

"He's come and gone." 

"Yeah, I'll bet. I want to know where Scully is." 

"The location of Agent Scully and the means to save her life.
Please..." The Well Dressed Man motions Mulder into his car, and they
both trade wary glances as they take their seats.

A minute later Mulder finds himself looking down at a familiar vial
of liquid and a piece of paper with coordinates.

"A weak vaccine against the virus Agent Scully has by now been
infected with. It must be administered within 96 hours. That leaves
you little time to get to those coordinates."

"You're lying." 

"No. But I have no means of proving otherwise. They've taken your
wife to give her the virus, and I assume that they've done so...it's
rather fortunate that your infant sons are free from the possibility
of infection, since it'd surely kill them both. As for the virus is
extraterrestrial. We know very little about it except that it was the
original inhabitant of this planet."

"A virus..."

"What is a virus, but a colonizing force that cannot be defeated?
Living in a cave, underground, until it mutates-and attacks."

"This is what you've been conspiring to conceal? A disease?" 

"No. For God's sake, you've got it all backwards! AIDS, the Ebola
virus, on the evolutionary scale they are newborns. This virus walked
the planet long before the dinosaurs."

"What do you mean walked?" 

"Your aliens, Agent Mulder. Your little green men who arrived here
millions of years ago. Those that remained have been lying dormant,
underground since the last ice age in the form of an evolved
pathogen, waiting to be reconstituted by the alien race when it comes
to colonize our planet - using us as hosts. Against this we have no
defense, nothing but a weak vaccine. Do you see why it was kept
secret? Why even the best men, men like your father, could not let
the truth be known. Until Dallas we believed that the virus would
simply control us, that mass infection would make us a slave race.
Imagine our surprise when they began to gestate."

"Why are you telling me this?" 

"For the sake of my children. Once it's learned what I have told you,
my life will be over." The Well Dressed Man looks at his driver. "If
I can't save them, I must give someone else the means to save their
lives, as well as the lives of countless others." He pauses. "Such as
the lives of your children."

"Where's Kurtzweil?" The other man says nothing. "I'd like to get out
of the car now. Stop the car!"

"Driver." The driver pulls over. "The men I work with will stop at
nothing to clear the way for what they believe is their stake in the
inevitable. I was ordered to kill Doctor Kurtzweil, as I was ordered to
kill you." Without missing a beat the Well Manicured Man shoots the
Limo Driver in the back of the head.

"Trust no one, Mr. Mulder. Get out of the car." 

"Why? The upholstery is already ruined." 

"Get out of the car!" Mulder does so. "You have precious little time,
Mr. Mulder. What I've given you the alien colonists don't yet know
exists. The vaccine you hold is the only defense against the virus.
Its introduction into an alien environment may have the power to
destroy the delicate plans we have so assiduously protected for the
last 50 years. "

"What do you mean, may have?" 

"Find Agent Scully. Only then will you realize the scope and grandeur
of the project. Go. Go now!" The Well Dressed Man walks back to his
car. "Good luck." He adds softly.

Flames shoot up merrily, as soon as the car door slams. Mulder walks
away, his shoulders hunched with determination.

~*~*~

Late That Night
Hospital

"Daddy!" Emily shrieks when she sees Krycek walking towards her. He
holds a finger up to his lips, and looks around. Fortunately the girl
seems to be the only one in the hallway. She holds up her arms, and
he obligingly picks her up.

"Hey," he whispers into her ears. "You're not supposed to call me
that when your auntie, uncle, or Grandma are around," he reminds her.
As part of a "game" he and Missy have taught her not to talk about
him when disapproving relatives can hear. Krycek supposes they'll
slip up sometime and he'll be around his lover and their daughter
when one of them is around at some point, but so far it's worked.

"I know. I'm sorry," she says contritely, then smiles. "They're not
here, though. Grammy is wit my cusins and I don't know where Auntie
Dana or Uncle Fox is."

"Are," he corrects absent-mindedly. "I know they're not. You and
Mommy are going to go to Grandma's so you can make your cousins feel
better though, right?"

"Yup. Hey, I gots new cousins too!" Emily informs him.

"Boys or girls?" Krycek asks, playing along.

Emily wrinkles her nose. "Boys. They don't have names yet." 

"Alex." a voice calls.

He grins when Missy comes out of a nearby ladies' room. "Hi Babe." 

Missy glares down at their daughter. "I thought you promised me if I
let you use a different stall you wouldn't come out of the bathroom
before me."

"I forgot," Emily says cheerfully.

Krycek sets her on her feet. "Where are they babies?" 

"They're keeping them in the nursery for now, since they're not
exactly sick, and my sister isn't here..." Missy trails off, her eyes
suddenly shiny with tears. "We don't even know where they took her."

"If anyone can find her, it'll be Mulder. I've never met a more
tenacious ba-" He looks down at Emily. "Badge holder."

Missy tries to smile, but doesn't quite pull it of. "I'm supposed to
go to my Mom's, so..."

"I'll be here." When she looks surprised, he goes on. "These little
boys are your nephews, Emily's cousins... nothing is going to happen to
them. At least, nothing worse than already has happened," he amends.
"Not to mention I sort of owe him one - and no I won't explain why. I
just do."

"God I love you," Missy says fiercely, hugging him quickly.

He kisses her...until a little voice says, "eeeww." 

Later, after they leave, he goes over to the nursery window. Many
hospitals no longer have old-fashion nurseries, but this one does. It
reminds Krycek of the polar bear exhibit at the zoo. Except instead
of holding bears that will eat him if given half a chance, his two
almost-nephews are behind the glass. He stares at the small
brown-haired newborns and decides that not all Mulders are bad.

~*~*~

Wilkes Land Antarctica
 48 Hours Later 

Mulder is driving a Sno-Cat and the gas gauge keeps flipping down to
indicate the tank is empty. Unfortunately, he's had no more luck
finding gas for the thing this time around than last. He taps it with
his finger a few times, hoping that it's just frozen, but each time
the gauge returns to empty.

"Oh shit!" He forces the Sno-Cat to go a little farther, and finally
crests a hill that allows him to see the group of pretend igloos.

As soon as he gets out of the vehicle, he grabs the coat he brought
for Scully and races to the station through the heavy snow. Just
before he reaches the domes, he falls through the ice as it collapses
beneath his feet and he drops into a deep crevice. He lands on a
metallic surface or structure covered in the snow with a vent blowing
out hot air and forming a pocket in the ice.

There's a cylindrical tunnel there, and he pushes on, skidding along
at some points, almost running at others. He passes a corridor and
comes face to face with a prehistoric man encased in ice.

 Eventually he finds the place he's had nightmares about for years -
the room filled with frozen dead people who served as incubators for
the alien virus. His hands are shaking when he finds the right pod,
and brushes the frost from its surface.

Diana Fowley's face stares up at him with a look of horror. Surprise
makes him stumble back a couple of steps.

"Mulder!" a hissed whisper catches his attention, and he spins to see
Scully. Although she looks exhausted, she's in much better shape than
he ever expected.

"Oh my God, Scully. Are you okay? What am I saying, of course you're
not, but you're not infected with the virus." He passes her the coat
since she's shivering.

"No. Something in the stuff she gave me to induce labor interferes
with the...virus. They infected her instead." Scully suddenly shudders.
"They said those...things are going to be hungry when they're born, so
it's good that I'm here."

"Jesus, Scully. Nothing like implying to a person that they're here
for monster food."

Scully nods a little, but stares at Fowley's face behind the thick
green glass, or whatever it is covering the front of the case. "We've
got to get her out of there, Mulder."

"You've become friends?" he asks, bemused.

"Not really. But she's here because she defied them by delivering the
babies and getting them to safety. They're okay, aren't they?" she
asks anxiously.

"Both fine. They're being guarded by law and family." 

"Good." She looks at Fowley and shivers. "This is what they do to
punish people who are on their side."

Mulder finds a canister on a pod that isn't too tightly held and rips
it off. Using it as a hammer, he smashes at the glass until it
cracks, releasing a flood of greenish liquid, that flows out
revealing Fowley's nude body.

"Mulder, is she..."

He shakes his head, and pulls out the vaccine vial and syringe and
hurriedly injects the vaccine into his former friend. Fowley begins
to gag when he pulls the shriveling tube out of her mouth.

"You've got to breathe, Fowley," Mulder tells her, and she begins to
gasp in air. "Scully? Any advice?"

"We've got to wrap her up, and get the hell out of here before
someone comes back."
 
"My coat will do," he says, shucking it off, and thinking if he had
to do this all a third time, he'd being half a dozen coats so he'd be
sure not to get hypothermia. Not that he wants to ever do it again.

"You'll freeze, Mulder." 

"I'll live," he says grimly, as he wraps Fowley up. Then he notices
that she's not making much of an effort to move air. "Breathe! Can
you breathe?" He rolls her on her side and pounds on her back until
she coughs up green slime.

"I'm so cold," Fowley says in a whisper.

"It's okay, we're going to get you out of here." Mulder gives Scully
a worried glance. "Are you going to be okay? It's only been a few
days since you delivered..."

"I can hold my own if you can hold her," Scully tells him as she
watches him hoist Fowley into a fireman's hold.

The two of them make their way out as quickly as they can, but pain
slows Scully down, and Mulder's burdened by carrying the unconscious
woman. Ice begins to dissolve in the other pods, and they see
movement now and then, wishing they didn't.

"We've got to keep moving," Mulder pants.

They finally reach the vent. "Fowley reach up and-" 

"Mulder! She's not breathing!" 

::Same damn spot. Must be something hinky here about the air
pressure.:: Mulder thinks drearily as he lowers Fowley to the ground.

Fortunately, Scully knows CPR much better than he does, and has
Fowley breathing again quickly.

"You first, Scully," he tells her. She begins to pull at the vent,
and gets herself up it.

As Mulder is pushing Fowley's limp body up to Scully something fights
its way through the ice and begins to swat at his feet.

"Mulder!" Scully looks down at him anxiously, still holding onto
Fowley.

"Pull her away from the vent so I can come up!" 

Mulder kicks the seeking claws away and pulls himself up. It doesn't
take very long for them to get out of the tunnel, but once they get
onto snow, Mulder runs into trouble. He keeps stumbling as he tries
not to drop Fowley.

Fowley is waking up a bit, so Scully shouts. "Let me help you!" 

He hesitates until he realizes that Fowley is strong enough to put
her arms around their necks and help herself a little. They don't get
very far before the ice is cracking behind them, and they soon are
overtaken by the hole that forms under them.

A moment later the three of them fall back to the ground in a rain of
snow that falls off the spaceship they've just escaped from.

Even though he's seen it before, Mulder is still in awe. "Scully, you
must see this!"

"I see it, Mulder. I don't know what it is, but I see it." 

She expects him to argue, but she realizes that he's even more
unconscious than Fowley is. All she can do is huddle by the two prone
figures and watch the ship shoot off into the horizon.

~*~*~

Early Morning

While doctors fuss over Fowley, and another doctor examines Scully,
Mulder runs up to check on his newborn sons. They're sleeping
peacefully, and fortunately a doctor is looking at them so he doesn't
have to hunt for one.

"Mister Mulder." The doctor smiles at him. "I heard that you found
your wife."

"News travels fast," Mulder replies in surprise.

"They called me as soon as word came in that she was here. I expect
she'll want to come and see them soon."

"Very soon," he agrees, thinking about the argument his wife had
minutes before with the doctor trying to examine her before she ran
off. "How soon before we can bring them home?"

"Given that they're three days old and both weigh more than five
pounds, I'd say they can be discharged as soon as possible. Will your
wife be staying over night?"

"I really don't think so. She's letting them examine her, but she's
in far better shape than the other agent who was taken too. We never
would have gotten away if she wasn't okay."

"In that case-" 

"Mulder!" Before he can even turn his head, Scully is by his side,
looking down at their sons. "Oh my God, they're so beautiful."

"You're looking well, considering what I've heard of your ordeal,"
the doctor tells her. "I was just telling your husband that you can
discharge the babies as soon as you'd like, since they're doing very
well."

"Tonight, Mulder?" she asks him anxiously.

"Unless you'd rather get a good night's sleep first-" 

"No, tonight." 

"Sure." 

"There is one thing before you take them home-" They look up at the
doctor. "It's easier on you if you fill out their birth certificates
before you leave the hospital. Less paperwork than it would be to
file them later."

"Oh..." Mulder says, "We weren't really expecting to have to make a
final decision until next month." He fails to mention that they've
never pre-named one of their children yet.

"I understand, a lot of parents of early babies haven't picked names.
If you decide on them, let a nurse know. I'll be back later."

Mulder drags a chair over and gets Scully to sit. She picks up one of
her sons, and cradles the infant in her arms. "I was thinking about
the woman who called herself Invisigoth-"

"Invisigoth Mulder, I like it." 

She swats him, but smiles. "- and how much she loved David. Did you
know that the name even means 'beloved'?"

"David Mulder isn't as cool as Invisigoth, but it's pretty good." He
peers at the infant in her arms. "What do you say, kid, would you
like to be David?" The baby flails an arm. "I think he volunteered."

"You know it's just a reflex." 

"I don't think so. Our babies have a history of being brilliant, so
I'm sure he was responding to the question." She doesn't argue with
him, so he reaches down and picks up the other newborn. "How about
you, what do we call you?"

"We're not calling him Invisigoth either," Scully warns.

"I was actually thinking of Jared. It goes well with David." 

"It does. Do you know anyone named Jared?" 

He doesn't want to admit that he got the idea from the show The
Pretender. "No, I just like the name."

"Me too," Scully says. "David and Jared, are you ready to go home?" 

"Are we ready?" Mulder asks, trying not to laugh.

"We've got to be." 

~*~*~

Melissa Scully's
Washington, DC
Two Days Later

Melissa watches as Alex carries their sleeping daughter into her
bedroom. After a couple of minutes he comes back, looking pleased
with himself.

"She wants to see her cousins tomorrow," Missy tells him. "I told her
that it depends on how her auntie is feeling."

"A lot better than they intended her to feel," Krycek says as he sits
on the couch and pulls her near him.

"This Fowley woman, why did she do it?" Missy kisses his neck. "It's
not that I'm not grateful, but nothing Dana or Fox ever said about
her leads me to believe that she's their friend."

"That's because she isn't. My theory is that she never expected
Scully to live through the experience, and was shocked to find out
she'd be given the virus instead because of her role in getting your
nephews to safety."

"I'm not sure I understand." 

"Anyone can see the looks she gives Mulder. It would have suited her
just find to swoop in and take Scully's place if he was suddenly left
a grieving widower and father."

"That's awful," Missy comments before burying her face in his neck.
He uses his good hand to rub her back.

"It didn't happen that way, so don't worry about it. Your sister's
fine, your nephews are fine-"

"That's something we need to talk about," Missy says after pulling
away. "We've got to tell them about us, sooner or later."

"Can't it be later?" Alex asks plaintively. "After we've gotten
married and had a couple more kids so your brother-in-law won't shoot
me. Not that I'm afraid of him." He adds. "I just don't think you or
Scully want us dueling."

"Oh Alex." Missy shakes her head but lets the conversation drop. For
now.

~*~*~

Washington, DC OPR 
A Week Later

AD Cassidy's voice is crisp. "In light report on these findings and
in light of the narrative I am now hearing, my official report is
incomplete-pending these new facts I'm being asked to reconcile.
Agent Scully, though there is now direct evidence that a federal
agent MAY have been involved in the bombing, the other events you've
laid down here are too incredible on their own, and quite frankly
implausible in their connections."

"What is it you find incredible?" Scully asks impatiently.

"Well, where would you like me to start? So many of the events
described in your report defy belief. Antarctica is a LONG way from
Dallas, Texas, Agent Scully. I- I can't very well submit a report to
the Attorney General that alleges the links you've made here. Bees
and corn crops do not quite fit under the rubric of domestic
terrorism."

"No, they don't." 

"Most of what I find in here is lacking a coherent picture of ANY
organization with an attributable motive. What happened to you, your
sons and Agent Fowley is regrettable, but there is no clear culprit.
I realize that the ordeal you've endured has clearly affected you,
and Agent Fowley has yet to be able to give us her own account. But
the holes in your account leave this panel no choice but to delete
these references to our final report to the Justice Department-until
which time hard evidence becomes available that would give us cause
to pursue such an investigation."

Instead of seething at the lumping of hers and Fowley's experiences,
Scully walks over to her and hands her the vial containing the bee
she took off of Mulder. "I don't believe the FBI currently has an
investigative unit qualified to pursue the evidence in hand."

~*~*~

 The Capital Mall

Once she walks outside, she finds Mulder sitting on a bench by the
reflecting pool reading a newspaper.

He points at an article. "There's an interesting work of fiction on
page 24. Mysteriously, our names have been omitted. They're burying
this thing, Scully. They're just going to dig a new hole and cover it
up."

"I told OPR everything I know. What I experienced, the virus, how
it's spread by the bees from pollen in transgenic crops."

"You're wasting your time, Scully. They'll never believe you, not
unless your story can be programmed, categorized, or easily
referenced."

"Then we'll go over their heads." 

"No. No. How many times have we been here before, Scully? Right here.
So close to the truth and now with what we've seen and what we know
to be right back at the beginning with nothing."

"This is different, Mulder." 

"No it isn't. You were right to want to quit. Stay home with the
kids, and don't keep sacrificing yourself for a hollow personal cause
of mine. I thought we lost you, I can't keep letting that happen to
you, or to them. Just look after them full time like you want to."

"I don't think I can, Mulder. Not anymore. The kids need us both, but
so does the rest of the world. That virus that Fowley was exposed to,
whatever it is, it has a cure. You held it in your hand. How many
other lives can we save? Look. If I quit now, they win."

He stands slowly, taking her hand, and they walk away.


~*~*~

end five of ten

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