HEGIRA
Kristel S. Oxley-Johns
Kjohns@chaos.x-philes.com

Rating: PG (Chapter Seven - R)
Classification: XRA
Archive: Yes. (redistribute with permission only)
Spoilers: Anything through "Requiem" is fair game
Keywords: Mulder/Scully Romance
Summary: The knowledge that Samantha Mulder is not actually dead leads 
Mulder and Scully to some truths they never imagined.

DISCLAIMER: Fox Mulder, Dana Scully, et al, and The X-Files do not 
belong to me.  They are the property of Chris Carter, Ten-Thirteen 
Productions, and Fox Broadcasting.  No infringement is intended, no 
money is being made, sic your lawyers on someone else.

FEEDBACK: Yes, please.  Be patient, it may take a while for me to 
respond.  If you would just like to comment, please let me know you do 
not require a response.  Otherwise, I'll feel guilty.  Send to: 
kjohns@chaos.x-philes.com

AUTHOR'S NOTES

HEGIRA (as defined at www.m-w.com):
Etymology: the Hegira, flight of Muhammad from Mecca in 
A.D. 622, from Medieval Latin, from Arabic hijrah, 
literally, flight
Date: 1753
: a journey especially when undertaken to escape from a 
dangerous or undesirable situation : EXODUS 


A NOTE OF IRONY:

Four years ago, when I conceived the idea which this story was loosely 
based upon, it was titled "Requiem."  I had intended to use that title 
up until I learned what the title of the Season Seven finale would be.  
At that time, I realized there were going to be dozens of "Requiem" 
themed fanfics, and I didn't want this story to get lost in the melee.


A FEW THANKS:

Heather:  Thank you for the long confabs over the phone where you 
painstakingly helped me iron out the little details that enabled me to 
mesh my ideas with the established mythology.  Thank you also for the 
title.

Beth:  A better nitpicker and lifelong friend one could never hope to 
find.

Tiff:  Many of your insights into characterization and plot points in 
the early chapters really helped set the framework upon which the story 
was actually built.  Thank you also for the dust jacket and animated gif.
Best of luck with your new baby.

Shelba:  Honorable mention here for my official humor consultant.  
Being somewhat comically impaired myself, most of the banter in the 
story (especially in Chapter Six) was written by Shelba and then very 
generously given to me to work into the story.  Thank you also for all 
the medical advice.

Nancy: Thanks for all the wonderful feedback on Chapter 7.


WARNINGS:

If you're a stickler for mythology canon, be warned that I basically 
push the Big Red Reset Button on "Closure" and resolve the Samantha-arc 
*my* way.  I consider it a public service to right the wrong committed 
in that episode.

If you're of the weepy or sentimental persuasion, grab a box of tissues 
before going into Chapters 9 and 10.  This is your first and only 
warning.


THE TIMELINE:

Chapter One takes place immediately following "Closure."  

Chapters Two through Ten occur immediately after "En Ami."

The Epilogue takes place post-"Requiem," however it is not required to 
read the Epilogue.  You can consider the story resolved in Chapter Ten.


THE RATIONALIZATION:

I was offended by the way the Samantha-arc ended.  It wasn't that she 
was dead, so much as it was the fact that ultimately, her death had no 
meaning.  And after pondering "Closure" for a while, it occurred to me 
that anyone seeing dead children as starlight sprites romping in the 
moonlight has to be on some serious drugs.  And it started me 
thinkin'...



CHAPTER ONE - Succor

It was just before dawn when Mulder finally fell asleep on the sofa.  
Scully watched over him tirelessly, unmindful of the fact that she 
herself had gotten precious little sleep in the last couple days.

The flight back from California had been spent in quiet conversation as 
Mulder had related to her what he had seen in the woods.

"I just wish Harold could have seen what I saw," he had sighed.  "Maybe 
then he could come to terms with his own loss."

The words had twisted their way deep into Scully's chest, leaving an 
empty, raw ache.  Her partner's eyes, for one of the rare moments in 
the seven years they had known each other, had been placid, glowing 
with an inner contentment.  He had finally found an answer he could 
live with.  The sister he had spent his adult life looking for was 
dead.  She had died peacefully and painlessly, saved by a miracle from 
a fate that was incomprehensible in its scope and horror.  Never again 
would Mulder stare at the body of a dead child and see his sister in 
her face.

"It's over, Scully," Mulder had stated when they finally arrived back 
at his apartment.  He flung himself onto the sofa, pinching the bridge 
of his nose as he closed his eyes.  "That's what I wanted, wasn't it?"

She hadn't been able to answer him.  Yes, he'd confided in her that he 
had given up hoping his sister was alive, wishing only to find a final 
resolution to the unanswered question that had dominated the last 
twenty-seven years of his life.  But that didn't mean the loss was any 
less painful.

Tears, unwelcome and impatiently blinked back, pricked her eyelids as 
she studied his sleeping form in the light of the aquarium.  He was so 
very alone, and there was so very little she could do for him now but 
simply be here.

"You're the closest thing I have to family now."

His confession had been devastating.  The confirmation of his sister's 
death, so close on the heels of his mother's apparent suicide, meant he 
had lost his last familial tie.  Truthfully, Mulder had been a de facto 
orphan since the day his sister disappeared and his parents withdrew 
from him and each other and though over the years he had tried to 
pretend it didn't matter to him, Scully knew better.

And on this night of all nights, behind the serenity in his velveteen 
eyes had lurked something darker.  

Fear.

The search for Samantha had consumed him, defined him, for years.  
Without the search, who was he? Did he even know? Scully had read the 
uncertainty in his gaze with an ease developed of seven years of shared 
strife and turmoil.  What could she possibly tell him that would 
reassure Mulder that life went on, that there was still more out there 
for him, when she couldn't even entirely buy that herself?

He could finally pick up the pieces and move on.  She could help him do 
that.  There were more answers out there that they still needed to 
find.  The search for Samantha Mulder, abducted from her home at the 
age of eight, had over the years turned darker, more sinister, more 
treacherous.  It reached beyond the disappearance of a young girl, 
beloved sister and daughter.  Lives had been ruined; lives had been 
lost.  Scully's own life had been placed in danger more times than she 
could possibly recall.  Months had been stolen from her, her life 
threatened by a terminal brain tumor, her ability to conceive children 
destroyed, and perhaps the only child she would ever know had died a 
meaningless death in her arms.

She had her own demons to be exorcised, her own answers yet to be 
found.  Samantha Mulder may have been the start of the quest, but she 
was not the end of it.  Not for Scully, and not for Mulder either, 
really.  But if that were true, why did she feel this nagging sense of 
loss? She had always imagined she would be relieved when Mulder found 
the closure he needed, but instead, disappointment weighed heavily on 
her heart.

When Mulder's forehead had crumpled, Scully had wrapped her arms around 
him from where she sat beside him and pulled him close.  She'd leaned 
against the back of the sofa, pulling him with her, until he rested 
with his head upon her chest.  The sobs she had expected were not 
forthcoming, however.  His body had been tense, his breathing ragged, 
but the devastating display of grief she had anticipated was held in 
check.  She'd held him to her breast, stroking his hair softly, 
allowing him to draw comfort from her as long as he should need it.

And that was how he had fallen into a fitful sleep.  There had been no 
discussion of her going home.  Scully had wordlessly brought up her 
overnight bag from the car and Mulder had wordlessly accepted that she 
would stay with him until his mother's funeral in two days, that she 
wouldn't let him be alone.

It might have been moments or hours later when Scully finally 
disentangled herself and lowered him down onto the sofa.  She covered 
him with a blanket and watched him for a moment.  The distressed lines 
on his face had softened, leaving a look of child-like innocence as he 
slept.  The sight broke her heart all over again.  So much pain for one 
person to bear...She didn't like to consider what might have become of 
Mulder if he'd had to face these last years alone.

Sighing, she reassured herself that he was sleeping soundly and picked 
up her overnight bag, heading for the shower.

As the door closed she leaned wearily against the wall, covering her 
face in her hands.  

Mulder.  Though his mother's suicide had compounded the situation, his 
week's venture had been no different than dozens they had been through 
before.  A little girl disappeared and suddenly it was his sister he 
was searching for, the dividing lines between the past and the present 
blurred beyond recognition.  And now, at long last, he believed he had 
found resolution, but the price had been high.  In order to attain it, 
he'd had to give up hope.

Her science couldn't explain this one.  She couldn't rationalize, 
dissect, or quantify what Mulder had described to her tonight.  Right 
now, she wasn't sure it was all that important whether she could or 
couldn't.  What was important was that his tormented quest, fueled by 
guilt and loss and a desperate need to just understand *why*, had 
reached an end he could live with.  

She allowed herself the moment of personal grief she couldn't display 
before her partner.  She ached with sympathy and the need to comfort 
him.  Every healer's instinct within her screamed to make it better, 
make his pain go away.  Sooner or later, Mulder was bound to have a 
meltdown and she was going to have to be there to pull him through it, 
as she always did.  

An instant of doubt darkened her expression.  Her own grief at this 
most recent turn of events brought up some questions she hadn't been 
prepared for.  Right now she wasn't sure she was equal to the task of 
bearing the weight of his sorrow as well as her own.

Troubled, she disrobed and stepped beneath the soothing spray of the 
shower.

When she emerged from the bathroom in her nightclothes, toweling her 
hair dry, her face was composed.  No hint of her inner turmoil 
remained.  Whatever her own feelings and doubts, Mulder needed her.  
Her duty as his partner, his friend, the woman who loved him, was to 
provide him with the solace he required in times like these.

Scully's head emerged from the folds of the towel to find that his eyes 
were open.

"How long have I been asleep?" He asked groggily.

"Only a couple hours.  You should try to rest some more."

He subsided into a pensive silence, a frown etched on his brow.  In the 
pale pre-dawn light, his face looked stark and white.  A slight sheen 
of perspiration covered his skin and his eyes were glassy.  Scully 
wondered if he'd had a nightmare while she was in the shower.  His hand 
trembled slightly as he reached up to wipe his upper lip.

"Scully...do you believe what I saw?" he asked in the darkness, his 
voice weak, hovering somewhere between worry and defensiveness.  The 
tight, clenching pain in her chest returned with a vengeance.  She 
didn't know when it had happened, but at some point over their years 
together, he had begun caring whether what he believed gelled with what 
her science could explain.  He was certain she was going to reject what 
he had seen.  Perhaps he had a right to be defensive.  She certainly 
had needed to bite her tongue a dozen times while he had shared his 
tale with her earlier.   But she didn't feel she could or should argue 
with him, not this time.

"It doesn't matter what I believe, Mulder," she replied calmly, her 
expression thoughtful.  She seated herself on a chair and began to pull 
a comb through her damp hair.  "If you believe it, then right now 
that's enough for me."

He snorted.  "Seven years, and finally she says it."

"Yeah, well, count your blessings," she replied with a gentle smile.  
"It may be another seven years before you hear it again."

His lips opened in a valiant attempt at a jaunty grin.  "Well, if this 
is my last chance to see you so agreeable, maybe you should join me 
over here?" He slid over to make room on the sofa with a waggle of his 
eyebrows and a half- hearted leer.

"Do I have to get my gun?"

"Ooh, Scully, don't tease."

Chuckling in spite of herself, she shook her head ruefully.   "You're 
delirious.  Get some sleep."

Scully refused to meet his eyes as she finished combing her hair.  She 
knew what she would find there.  It was completely Mulder's style to 
mask his wounds behind teasing innuendo.  But in the face of this most 
recent and devastating tragedy in a life filled with losses, she 
couldn't really convince herself that her complex and mercurial partner 
was actually joking.  Not that he would proposition her in such a 
crass, off-hand manner, but his flirtation held a hint of a plea.

Make it go away.  Make me forget for a while.

Or perhaps it even went deeper than that, the manifestation of a 
phenomenon Scully had witnessed before.  In the face of death arose a 
very vital and primitive instinct to affirm one's own aliveness.  And 
what was more life- affirming than sex, the very heart of the creation 
of life?  She'd lost count of the number of times grief and tragedy had 
led her to a mere moment, the smallest of breaths, from reaching out to 
Mulder and taking him to her and making love to him.  Even if was for 
no other reason than to assure herself she was still alive, that the 
horror of death and loss had not claimed them.

It would be the simplest thing in the world tonight, to offer Mulder 
that physical reassurance in the lack of anything more effective.  She 
could invite him to Sunday dinner at her mother's house, offer him a 
surrogate family, over-rule her brother's blustering protests...

If she but reached out a hand to him, he would come to her.   Scully 
knew he would, would have a million times over in the last seven years.  
She could do it, *wanted* to do it, but she had the frustrating sense 
that it wouldn't be enough.  Comfort sex wasn't her thing and she 
couldn't replace his lost family with a lover.  There was something 
vitally and essentially wrong in the act that prevented it.   They 
couldn't bring this sort of emotional baggage with them when they 
finally made that last step.

They had been migrating in the direction of becoming lovers slowly and 
surely for years, especially since New Years.   All that remained was 
for her to make the final move.   Mulder was waiting for her play; he 
had already made the first overtures.  He had done so on New Year's Eve 
with that sweet, hesitant kiss that had brought back delicious memories 
of junior high school and boys under the bleachers.  He had done so a 
year ago in that moment in a hospital room when, groggy, waterlogged 
and sporting a head injury, he had nonetheless felt compelled to 
declare his love for her.  He had done it two years ago during the 
soul-shaking declaration he had made to her in the hallway outside his 
apartment when she had been ready to turn and walk away from it all 
rather than be forced to work without him.

It was odd and disturbing, Scully thought, how Mulder always seemed to 
make emotional declarations in the moments of great distress.  Love and 
pain were tragically and inextricably intertwined in his perception.  
She couldn't take that final step toward him while there remained even 
a hint of the suffering he had come to expect.

The daunting truth of the matter was that she was his final chance and 
she knew it.  She was the one who had to prove to him that there could 
be love without pain, without loss.   It was an awesome responsibility.

It was only a matter of time, of course, but the timing was never 
right.  This time, in particular, couldn't get any further from right.

A sharp gasp from her partner jerked Scully from her reverie, but 
before she could react, Mulder was bolting from the sofa and into the 
bathroom.  The door slammed shut and seconds later she heard the sound 
of violent retching.   Scully ran to the door and tried the handle to 
find it locked.

"Mulder," she called.  "Mulder, open the door!"

There was no response.  Interminable moments passed until the retching 
stopped.  The toilet was flushed, followed soon by the sound of water 
running in the sink.  Finally, she heard the click of the lock being 
released and pushed open the bathroom door to find her pale and 
trembling partner sliding down the wall until he was seated on the tile 
floor.  His head was thrown back as he gulped huge breaths of air.

"Mulder, here, lay down.  Let me take a look at you."

He shook his head.  "No, no...when I lay down the room starts spinning.  
I'll get sick again."

She took his hand to check his pulse and gasped.  "Oh God, Mulder, 
you're hands are like ice." She tested his forehead.  "You're running a 
fever, a high one.  Your heart-rate and respiration are accelerated."

"I'm cold," he whispered, his teeth chattering.

Scully ran from the room and returned with the blanket she had pulled 
from the sofa.  She wrapped it around him and picked up his hand again 
as it lay listlessly on the floor.   A flash of red caught her eye and 
she turned it over to examine his palm.

"Mulder, what's this?" she asked, indicating a vividly irritated patch 
of skin in the center of his palm.  A brief examination of the back of 
his hand showed the fainter, less severe red bumps of a skin rash.

"I don't know...It's been there since the day before yesterday.  It 
itches."

Suddenly he groaned and scrambled on his hands and knees toward the 
toilet.  Scully clasped him and held him steady as he heaved, the smell 
of bile from a stomach already emptied of its contents wafting through 
the room.  As the spasms subsided, she rose and filled a water-spotted 
glass sitting on the counter from the sink, grabbing some pink bismuth 
liquid from the medicine cabinet before she crouched beside him again.

"Here, drink this," she instructed him, handing him the water before 
she measured the bismuth into the cap on the bottle.  She handed the 
medicine to him and he obediently swallowed it, dropping the plastic 
cup when it was empty and sipping more of the water.  She pulled the 
blanket around him once more and pulled him close.  She wrapped herself 
around him, trying to infuse him with her own heat.

"I started to get the chills," he muttered as he leaned on her 
shoulder, knowing she would want the details of his malady.  "A few 
seconds later, I started to feel ill.  I'm so dizzy..." his voice 
trailed off as he breathed deeply, trying to control waves of nausea.  
He tucked his head down onto his chest then jerked upright as blood 
spewed from his nose onto the blanket in a torrent.  Bright red spots 
blossomed on his wrinkled shirt and her pajama top.

"Oh, God!" Scully whispered, grabbing a towel from the bar on the wall 
and pressing it to his face, holding his head back and the blood began 
to seep through the towel at an alarming rate.

"Mulder, hold on.  Tilt your head back.  I'm going to call an 
ambulance.  I'll be right back."

She sprinted through the apartment into the living room, where she 
grabbed her coat off the rack and carried it with her to the bathroom, 
digging for the cell phone in the pocket as she ran.  Finding it, she 
tossed the coat negligently into the bathtub and dialed 911.  She had 
an emergency dispatcher on the line by the time she knelt beside 
Mulder.

He began coughing and his head fell forward again.  The nosebleed had 
not stopped with tipping his head back.   Instead, the blood had begun 
running down his trachea, choking him.  Flecks of red spittle dotted 
the towel hanging before his face.

"This is Special Agent Dana Scully with the FBI," she spoke into the 
phone.  Mulder's breathing sped up as she spoke and he drew shallow, 
rasping breaths between choking coughs.  "I have an agent down, unknown 
illness.  He's vomiting, and has profuse nasal bleeding.  Pulse is 
rapid, maybe 120 or 140, and he's hyperventilating.  We need an 
ambulance at..."

As she began to give the address, Mulder's eyes rolled back in his head 
and he slumped over, unconscious.  The stained towel tumbled from his 
face and blood began to flow freely from his nostrils.  She grabbed 
another towel to replace the nearly saturated one and finished reciting 
his address.   She lifted an eyelid to find his pupils dilated.  "Oh, 
God, Mulder...come on, stay with me.  What?  No, no...he just lost 
consciousness...yes, of course I'll stay on the line..."

 *   *   *   *   *

The sky was entering the early stages of twilight as Mulder awoke.  His 
eyes searched the room, disoriented, until they came to rest on Scully, 
sitting beside the bed, holding his bandaged right hand.  An IV led 
from his other hand to a plastic bag of saline hanging on a hook 
overhead.  The all- too-familiar sounds of a hospital reached him, 
muffled by the closed door.

"So, Scully," he croaked, "Do I know how to show a girl staying over at 
my place a good time, or what?"

He heard her relieved sigh as she looked him over.  "How do you feel?"

"Fine.  What happened?" He asked, licking his parched lips.   Scully 
poured a cup of ice water from the plastic pitcher beside the bed and 
handed it to him.

"You became ill this morning and lost consciousness," she summarized.  
"You were brought here by ambulance."

"Ill from what?" Scully's eyes darkened and she frowned, looking away.

"As far as we can tell," she replied with carefully clinical 
moderation, "the primary culprit was a drug we found in your blood.  An 
hallucinogen, though not one you could buy anywhere on the street.  
It's a designer mix, an elaborate one, formulated to enter the 
bloodstream transdermally, rather than be injected, ingested, or 
inhaled.  The raw patch on your hand appears to be the point of entry."

Startled, Mulder raised his bandaged hand, studying it.

"That alone might not have been enough to cause your illness," Scully 
continued, "but you had taken the Ibuprofen I gave you for a headache 
on the flight home, remember? Ibuprofen is an anti-coagulant and a 
stomach irritant in and of itself.  Combined with the hallucinogen, 
your blood thinned, your BP shot up, and when you began vomiting, the 
blood vessels in your nasal passages ruptured, which is why you began 
hemorrhaging.  We had to insert a Foley catheter and inflate it to stop 
the bleeding..."

"Scully, please..." Mulder groaned, his stomach twisting queasily.  She 
fell silent, looking sheepish, until his squeamish nature was under 
control again.  He frowned thoughtfully at her.  "I take it that's not 
all?"

"No.  To top it all off, you had a mild allergic reaction, which is 
what caused the irritation on your hand." Scully grimaced.  "Seeing 
that gave us a pretty good idea where to begin looking for a cause for 
your illness.  I don't imagine you've noticed it yet, but you have a 
less severe rash over the rest of your body."

"Is *that* what itches?"

"Probably," she replied.  "I would hypothesize that this drug is 
something similar to the drug that was added to your water supply 
several years ago, around the time your father was killed.  The 
previous exposure would have been sufficient to set the stage for an 
histaminic reaction.  Or you simply could have been exposed multiple 
times in the past few days."

"How could I have been exposed? When?" Mulder asked, bewildered.

"Sometime in the last forty-eight hours," Scully scrubbed a hand over 
her face.  "We've been infusing fluids, and it was necessary to replace 
a couple pints of blood, but most of the drug is out of your system by 
now.  By tomorrow it should be completely gone." She paused, sighing.  
Mulder's mind spun as he tried to put together the pieces she had laid 
out for him.

Something was missing, he thought.  There was something Scully was 
hesitating to tell him.  The reluctance in her voice, the way her eyes 
skittered away from his when he sought her gaze...she was holding 
something back.

And then the full implications of what she was telling him settled in.

"So what you're saying," his voice was barely louder than a murmur, "is 
that nothing I have seen in the past forty- eight hours can be 
considered credible."

"I'm sorry, Mulder."

He rubbed his eyes, shutting out sight while he struggled to reconcile 
himself to what she was saying.  He drew a deep breath and slowly 
exhaled it, then repeated the process.

He wanted to ask her if there was a chance she had made a mistake, that 
she might be wrong.  The instinct to reject what she was saying reared 
up in his thoughts like a stallion, huge and blacker than hell.  He 
stared up at the ceiling, counting the tiles as his mind reeled.  His 
free hand opened and closed, twisting brutally in a piece of blanket as 
he grasped desperately for some other explanation.  He gave up; there 
wasn't any other explanation.  Scully wouldn't even be saying this to 
him if she didn't have the science to back it up.

"Harold," he said woodenly.  "Harold Pillar held my right hand.  That 
must have been when..."

"Yes, I believe so," Scully confirmed.  "I can only assume that Pillar 
must have been a plant, for the purpose of confirming Ms.  Tencate's 
story about Walk-ins, to make you believe something similar had 
happened to Samantha."

"Someone to get close to me with a kindred tale of tragedy," Mulder 
muttered.  "Create a situation where physical contact was necessary to 
give me the drug, to make me believe.  But...why do it if it was going 
to result in an illness that made the drug obvious and thus negate all 
I had seen, or thought I had seen?"

"Normally," she answered, "you would never have known.  You had a 
severe reaction no one could possibly have predicted.   If that hadn't 
happened, it would have gone just the way they planned it."

Mulder pulled his hand from hers, staring at the bandage covering the 
raw patch of skin in the middle of his palm.   He could feel his heart 
pounding in his chest, emptiness drowning out the resignation and 
acceptance won so dearly just hours ago.

"Why?" Mulder wasn't sure if he was directing the question to Scully or 
just wondering aloud.  "Why would it be so important to make me believe 
Samantha was dead that they had to go through all this? The obvious 
answer would be that she's still living, wouldn't it?" Mulder reasoned.   
"But if so, if they want to hide that fact, why go to such extreme 
measures that ultimately could give up the game?  After all, I never 
more than half expected her to be alive anyway."

"I don't know, Mulder," Scully sighed, her posture proclaiming her 
weariness.  "I don't have any answers for you."

He could barely make out her silhouette in the twilight- darkened room.  
His jaw clenched and unclenched, his teeth grinding as he fought for 
control.

"Scully," he began, his voice assuming a calm completely at odds with 
the emotions roiling within him.  "If you don't mind, I really need to 
be alone right now."

The tiniest hint of hurt at this rejection flickered behind her eyes, 
but Mulder was beyond concern for whatever she might feel at this 
moment, so long as she got out of the room before he lost it 
completely.  He'd already put her through too much these last few days.

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah.  Go home, get some sleep.  It's a long drive to Connecticut 
tomorrow."

Scully sighed with resignation and stood.  "Okay.  If you need 
anything..."

"I'll call," he assented and stared at the wall as she gathered up her 
coat and walked silently out of the room.

He sat unmoving, frozen in place in the encroaching darkness.  Shadows 
lengthened across the floor from chair and table and IV stand.  A nurse 
arrived to check his vitals, informing him that his dinner would arrive 
shortly, and that if he kept the meal down, they'd remove his IV.   At 
his muttered request, the nurse turned the lights off again as she 
left.  The darkness felt right, the perfect accompaniment to the bleak 
desolation overwhelming his heart.

As the last of the outside light faded, shapes became ghostly and 
unreal.  For nothing, he thought darkly.  It had all been for nothing.  
All he had put himself through, all he had put Scully through.  All for 
nothing.  Again.

He pressed his clenched fists to his face, his whitened knuckles 
digging into his eye sockets as he trembled with futile rage and 
hopeless disappointment.

How many times had Scully danced this particular dance with him? How 
many times had she followed determinedly after him, giving him the 
occasional gentle push to keep him on the right track and pulling him 
back when he teetered on the precipice of danger? How many times had 
she picked up the pieces when he ran into a brick wall and shattered 
all over again?

The pain, the anger, the disappointment...He was so damned tired of it 
all.  He felt the way his father had looked in those moments before an 
assassin's bullet had ended his life.  Hurt, exhausted, old...depleted 
of his last ounce of strength or willpower.

How must Scully feel, then, after years of watching him fall apart and 
helping him pull it all back together? How many times was he going to 
drag her through this same tired and futile routine? 

He shuddered as he recalled the expression on her face while she told 
him the news.  Beneath the hard-won clinical calm had lain pain and 
outrage.  She was hurting for him.   She was hurting *because* of him.  
She loved him enough to ache when he ached.  Had her plea the other day 
for him to stop chasing after Samantha been as much to ease her own 
pain as well as his?

Samantha had been his goal for so long he wasn't sure there was 
anything else.  In times when he had lost his way, lost sight of 
everything, searching for Samantha had brought him back to the 
beginning, where he could begin picking his way through the maze of 
obfuscation and deceit all over again, regaining sight of the prize.

Then Scully had come along and in some incredible way, she had 
transplanted his sister as the most important thing in his life.  Where 
the quest might have destroyed him, Scully strengthened him.  That 
moment seven years ago when he had told her that nothing else but 
finding the truth about Samantha mattered had long since been belied.  
Scully mattered.  She mattered more than anything else in his life.  He 
had discovered for the first time these last few days that he could 
live with never finding Samantha.  He had made peace with the idea.  
But he could never live without Scully.

Scully loved him deeply enough to hurt for him and he loved her too 
much to allow her to continue hurting for him.   Theirs was a 
partnership, a true melding of minds and methods and purposes.  And he 
had jeopardized their solidarity countless times in his blind 
determination to see his quest through.  How could he consider asking 
her to go through this with him again, and again, and again?  There had 
to be an end.

He'd had enough.

Give up the search for Samantha? A distant part of his brain gasped in 
horror.  It was unthinkable.  He shuddered at the thought and clenched 
his fingers in the hair at his temples in helpless fury.  The idea 
didn't even bear consideration.

But it did.  If he continued on this quixotic ride through hell, 
eventually he was going to lose Scully.  He was going to get her killed 
or he was going to drive her off.  He was going to lose the sole 
important thing in his life that was tangible, real, unwavering.

His temples throbbed with pain and twin tears of rage washed down his 
face.  How much had Scully sacrificed for him? Her career? Her 
credibility? Her safety? Her sister? How many times had she crawled 
through the mud and blood and danger beside him, protecting him at the 
risk of her own life, stabilizing him when he lost his balance?

It wasn't worth it.  He couldn't continue doing that to her.  He 
couldn't continue doing that to them.  He could do this.  He could give 
something back.  He could make a sacrifice.  He could let Samantha go 
and be the partner Scully needed.  He could show Scully the same 
dedication and devotion he had bestowed upon his lost sister for years.

He stared at the sliver of light creeping across the black floor of the 
hospital room from the corridor and let resolution settle into his 
heart.  It was finished.  He was done.  

A single moment of mourning for what was lost faded; a single tear of 
sorrow dried and was gone.  

He was ready to move on.

 *   *   *   *   *

At six AM the next morning, Mulder crawled out of the hospital bed and 
padded through the darkened room toward the shower.

He stood for long time under the torrent, leaning heavily against the 
tiled wall, letting the hot water lash him.   Every bone of his body 
hurt, every muscle ached with weariness.  It had been late when he had 
finally drifted into a fitful sleep.  The peace he had found with his 
resolve the night before had darkened in the face of the trial yet to 
come.  He would have to face his mother's funeral tomorrow.  He would 
have to let his mother go with the knowledge in his mind that he was 
never again going to try to bring her daughter home.  He wanted to curl 
up and close his eyes until this had all passed him by.  But he wasn't 
that kind of coward.  He would look at his mother's smiling picture on 
that altar, next to that oh-so tasteful urn, and accept his own mental 
flagellation as his did so.   But it was the last time he ever would.

He stepped out of the bathroom with a towel wrapped around his waist to 
find the lights had been turned on.  Scully sat in the chair she had 
inhabited the night before, flipping through a medical journal.  A pile 
of clothing lay neatly folded on the bed with his travel accessories 
bag perched atop it.  On the bed tray a steaming cup of coffee 
beckoned.

He rolled his eyes in a paroxysm of gratitude at Scully and went for 
the coffee.

"Good morning," she greeted him.  Her voice had not yet lost that 
husky, groggy tone that usually disappeared after her morning cup of 
coffee.  He bit his lip hard.  He would never admit it, but he really 
liked that voice.  "How are you feeling?"

"Better, now that there's caffeine in the room," he responded, sitting 
on the bed and uncapping the coffee cup.   Checking that his towel was 
still securely in place, he took a long sip, breathing a sigh of 
contentment.  "Thank you."

"It's getting late," she hinted, raising a meaningful eyebrow at his 
towel-clad form.  "Clothes are on the bed.   I grabbed your black suit 
for the service tomorrow, and I confirmed our reservations at the motel 
for tonight."

He nodded, his expression falling.  In the ecstasy of that first sip of 
coffee, he had almost, *almost*, forgotten.

"I'll be ready to go in ten," he promised.  Balancing the coffee in one 
hand, he gathered up the clothes and toiletries with the other and went 
back into the bathroom.   He barely kicked the door closed before his 
towel slipped off.

 *  *   *   *   *

 Mulder watched Scully's profile as she merged onto the highway.  Her 
face could have been carved from marble for all the emotion it 
revealed, but her fingers gripped the steering wheel with white-
knuckled intensity.

"You've decided to stop searching for Samantha?" She repeated in 
disbelief.  A long silence filled the space between them as she chewed 
on the corner of her bottom lip in thought.

"You don't mean that," she said at last, with certainty.

"Scully," he kept his voice low, reasonable.  "I do mean it.  I've had 
it.  It's over."

"Why?" The single word was sharp and cold in the darkness of the car.

"Believe me," he muttered, his tone filled with bitter self-mockery, 
"my motives are purely selfish.  I'm tired of being a puppet," he 
recited his prepared argument.  He could never tell Scully he was doing 
this for her.  She would never accept it.  "Every time someone dangles 
the carrot of Samantha in front of me, I go chasing after it and damn 
the consequences.  I'm tired of being a fool."

"You're not a fool, Mulder," she said tiredly.  "So you're just going 
to give it up, just like that?"

"'Just like that?'" He repeated incredulously.  "How many times do I 
have to hit the same brick wall before I'm justified in calling it 
quits? The wall ain't movin', so maybe I should."

Scully scowled, her jaw jutting forward with her tension.   "No, 
Mulder.  You can't do it."

"What?" He stared at her profile, angry and perplexed.   "Scully, 
you've been telling me for years to let it go, and you were right.  
It's time to move on."

"I wasn't right, Mulder.  It would be wrong--"

"Dammit, Scully! Where is this coming from? Why the huge change of 
heart all of a sudden?"

"I was wrong.  I didn't realize that until yesterday morning, when we 
returned from California.  Mulder, in the years I've known you, through 
everything we've experienced, never once had I seen you at peace.  Not 
until yesterday."

"Scully--"

"No, Mulder, listen to me!" She turned her head briefly to glance at 
him.  "I realized something, something I'd never understood before.  
You're never going to be able to move on, *truly* move on, until you 
know, once and for all.   Sure, you can live without knowing, you can 
carry on.  But you'll never know that kind of peace you felt yesterday, 
thinking you had found your answer, if you don't carry this through."

Mulder grimaced.  Damn it, he was doing this for her, because he didn't 
want to drag her through what she'd been through these last few days 
all over again.  He had to end it.  Scully drew a deep breath.  "I'll 
help you.  I realized for the first time that I've never really done 
that before.   I've always tried to convince you to stop.  Maybe if we 
do this together, look for her together, then we'll be more effective.  
I won't be holding you back any longer."

"It's not worth it, Scully," Mulder stated bleakly.  He stared out the 
window at the dark shapes of trees and buildings flashing past in the 
pre-dawn darkness.  A lighted window here, a still-dark one there; 
people awakening to begin their day, or sleeping in late on a Sunday 
morning.  

Not one of them even remotely aware that just a few yards away, a 
tempest raged inside his head.

His attention was drawn back to Scully, whose solemn expression was 
rendered almost ghoulish in the LED lights of the dash.

"I realized something else," she continued as though he hadn't spoken.  
"Something I never knew about myself.  I *want* to find Samantha, 
Mulder.  I want a chance to meet her if I can.  I figure she must be 
pretty special for you to have been as dedicated to her as you have all 
these years.

The bottom of Mulder's gut dropped out, leaving him feeling hollow and 
vaguely nauseated.  He closed his eyes against a burgeoning headache.  
"I'm sorry, Scully," he whispered.   "I wish I could give you that.  
But I can't say I'm willing to go through this all over again.  I've 
had enough.   *We've* had enough."

Scully's nostrils flared with annoyance.  "Don't presume to tell me 
what I have and haven't had enough of, Mulder." She lapsed into a moody 
silence.

Mulder's head fell back against the headrest of the seat.   Unsure of 
what he could possibly say to her, he closed his eyes, retreating from 
her disappointment and censure into the dubious sanctuary of his own 
thoughts.  

Images of Samantha as he remembered her sprang readily to mind.  He had 
vague recollections of his mother's pregnancy, of her letting him lay 
his head on her abdomen and feel the baby kick.  Every time it did, 
he'd gasp in shock and raise wide, wondering eyes to his mother's and 
she would laugh with him, caress his face and hair, tell him all about 
the new baby brother or sister he would be getting soon.  He'd fall 
asleep there, tingling with anticipation, darkened as it was with no 
little insecurity that the new baby would disturb his exalted place in 
his mother's affections.

He'd been bitterly disappointed when the baby arrived.  It was just a 
useless, squirming bundle that smelled funny and made a lot of noise, 
especially when he was trying to sleep.  She had been no fun at all, 
until the day he had reached through the wooden slats of the crib while 
she slept, to touch her tiny hand with its perfect miniature fingers.  
Her fist had closed fiercely around his index finger, filling him with 
wonder that she knew he was there, wanted him to be there.  On that 
day, he had become completely enamored of his little sister.

She soon began crawling around, getting into everything, messing with 
his toys and she'd become a bother again.  Not long after, she was 
toddling, following after him, tripping over her own clumsy feet.  She 
developed an irrational attachment to him, calling him "Fak" and crying 
when he left her behind to go out and play with his friends.  She was 
much happier when he sat on the sofa and read Little Golden Books to 
her.  He eventually began hiding her favorite book du jour when he 
couldn't stand to read it anymore, forcing her to choose another one.

Samantha had experienced a great deal of disappointment and frustration 
learning to ride a two-wheel bike.  Their father had spent endless 
hours with her, holding her upright until she gained momentum and 
letting go only to watch her wobble and fall the second she realized 
she was riding solo.  Then one sunny Saturday morning, when he had 
awakened early to play outdoors, she came out to join him.   Their 
parents were still soundly asleep, but she had dragged her bicycle from 
its position leaning against the side of the house and called out,

"Fox, watch me!"

Then she hopped on the bike and nonchalantly rode it to the end of the 
block with no help at all.  She rode back, but found herself unable to 
stop the bike as easily as she had gotten it started.  He'd had to 
catch her in motion and they'd both landed in a tangle on the dewy 
grass, the bike crashing to the ground next to them.  They had dusted 
themselves off as he soundly chastised Samantha for endangering his 
life (though he hadn't been terribly concerned about hers; he would 
have caught her regardless) and gone inside to tell their parents about 
her success.

Not long thereafter, around the time Samantha was six, their father had 
started coming home later and later from work, silent, withdrawn, 
cranky.  He drank more and argued more with their mother.  Samantha and 
he had retreated into their own little world and shut out the turmoil 
and confusion the adults were creating.  He would take her to the 
playground and stay there with her for entire afternoons, someplace 
where they didn't have to worry about what was going on at home.  He'd 
push her on the swings, hold her as she crossed the monkey bars, and 
spin her on the merry-go-round.

One day in their back yard, she had fallen off a rope swing and broken 
her collarbone.  He'd only walked away for a moment to watch a game of 
basketball some teenaged boys in the house next door were playing in 
their driveway.  He'd come running at her bloodcurdling screams, his 
heart pounding wildly with fear, while their mother called an 
ambulance.  He'd received a stern scolding from both his parents for 
not watching Samantha and had willingly accepted the month's grounding 
that accompanied it.   Nothing compared to his own remorse over letting 
harm come to his sister.  Samantha had merely smiled at him with sad 
eyes and apologized for getting him into trouble.

Samantha with her arm in a sling...  Samantha flying in the air on a 
swing with her pigtails streaming behind her...  Samantha pulling the 
blankets up over her head when their parents argued downstairs...  
Samantha making an irritated face at him when he teased her...  
Samantha screaming in pain beneath the tree the swing had been tied 
to...  Samantha glowering in exasperation with him over the Stratego 
board...  Samantha crying out to him for help as he watched, useless, 
while she disappeared from his sight for the last time...

Mulder's eyes sprang open as his own violent gasp jerked him out of 
sleep.  His eyes sought Scully to find her still there, exactly where 
she had been when he had drifted off.   He took a deep, steadying 
breath as she glanced over at him.

"Are you all right?" she asked, her voice soft with concern.

"Yeah," he answered, craning his neck to the left and the right to 
stretch muscles gone stiff from sleeping upright.   "Just ducky."

Scully snorted a chuckle and flipped on the turn signal, pulling onto 
an exit ramp.  "We just passed Philadelphia.   It's time for lunch, so 
I thought I'd pull off and stop at a deli.  Want any?"

Mulder's stomach rumbled at the mention of food, and he smiled 
sheepishly.  "Um, that would be a 'yes.'"

Her lips quirked and Mulder felt the tension in his gut ease.  The 
anger of the early morning had blown over and they could pass the rest 
of the trip peacefully.  He wouldn't have to deal with the outraged 
hurt he had seen on Scully's face this morning.

She'd saved his life yesterday...again.  How many times did that make 
now? He'd lost count.  But if he had sent Scully home yesterday 
morning, if she hadn't decided to stay with him, he would have died.  
He owed her something for that, didn't he? Owed it to her not to give 
up on something that had become as important to her as it had once been 
to him.   But he couldn't do it, couldn't expose her or himself that 
way again.  He needed to make a clean break for them both.

This way was better, he told himself firmly.  He could focus more on 
Scully, work better to meet her needs, no longer blinded by his 
obsession.  Maybe for once he could actually consider himself worth her 
irrational devotion to him.

"Stop it, Mulder," Scully's short command interrupted his thoughts.

"What?"

She sighed, giving him a knowing look out of the corner of her eye.  "I 
don't think this weekend is a good time for either of us to be making 
any lasting decisions."

He nodded, conceding the point.  "Yeah, I guess you're right."

"Let's just give it some time and thought, okay?"

"Okay, Scully, sounds good," he answered, mentally rebelling at the 
thought that with time and consideration, he might change his mind.  
Not this time.

"Good," Scully made a turn and slid the car into an empty parking space 
in front of a deli.  "Let's eat."

 *   *   *   *   *

Scully watched the steep steps of the chapel carefully as she and 
Mulder mounted the stairs the following morning.  A thin dusting of 
snow had covered already icy surfaces during the night and patches 
remained on the steps despite the custodian's shovel.

Mulder, not wearing three-inch heels, didn't seem to notice much.

"So my father was a second-generation non-practicing Jew and my mother 
was a first-generation non-practicing Episcopalian," he explained.  
"One of her girlhood friends did most of the legwork for the memorial, 
someone she had met in Sunday school years ago.  Thus, the church."

Scully smiled slightly.  Mulder seemed to feel the need to excuse his 
mother's memorial being held in a church in the face of his own 
religious indifference.

"So, you're a heathen on both sides," she observed in a teasing murmur.

"At least I come by it honestly," his response was low and quiet next 
to her ear, his hand coming to rest at the small of her back as they 
entered the old stone building.   Inside, it was everything a 150-year-
old chapel should be.   Winter light filtered through grandiose stained 
glass windows in warm tones.  Skillful masonry had provided artful 
arches and moldings.  Their footsteps on the marble floor echoed off 
the hard marble and granite walls.  The soft sound of organ music 
wafted from the sanctuary into the vestibule.  Scully sighed in 
pleasure at the beauty.

"It's lovely in here, Mulder.  I'm sure your mother would appreciate 
it."

He nodded silently, coming to a stop in the atrium as he was greeted by 
the minister and his mother's longtime friend, Lacey Winters.  He 
quietly accepted their murmured condolences and introduced Scully to 
them.

"Teena mentioned you to me on several occasions, Ms.  Scully," Mrs.  
Winters said, shaking her hand warmly.  The woman was everything a 
perfectly bred and groomed Martha's Vineyard matron should be.  Those 
had been Mulder's mother's roots and she hadn't moved away from them 
until she had separated from her husband in the mid-1970's.   Sometimes 
Scully had a hard time envisioning her often outrageous partner in such 
conservative surroundings.

"She thought very highly of you," Mrs.  Winters continued, unaware of 
Scully's musings.  "She was glad you were watching out for Fox down 
there in Washington."

Scully inclined her head solemnly.  "I appreciate that, Mrs.  Winters.  
Thank you." The woman released her hand and turned to greet another 
guest and Scully stepped away to rejoin Mulder, who had finished his 
conversation with the minister.

"How are you holding up?" she asked him as he stood dutifully in the 
atrium, accepting the condolences of guests as they began filing in 
from the cold outdoors.

"I can't say I wouldn't rather be somewhere else, but other than that, 
I'm fine," he replied in a hushed murmur.  He greeted another guest 
with grave courtesy, accepted another round of platitudes, and glanced 
at Scully when the guest had walked away.

She patted his shoulder and stood beside him as she was introduced 
repeatedly to longtime, distant acquaintances.   Standing next to 
Mulder as she was, it appeared as though she was a part of the family.  
And she was, she supposed.   Not family to Teena Mulder, but certainly 
to her son, by his own admission.

The number of incoming mourners was tapering off when Scully felt 
Mulder stiffen beside her.  Before she could do more than turn to look 
at him, he was striding rapidly toward the door, his fists clenched at 
his sides.

When the door opened Scully saw what his height advantage had allowed 
him to see first through the small panes of glass in the heavily carved 
wooden panels.  Her eyes widened with alarm as she ran after her 
partner.

"Leave," she heard Mulder's dangerous growl as she caught up with him 
on the slick steps before the church.

"Mulder, calm down..." she cautioned, throwing a glare at the man 
Mulder stood nose to nose with.  The newcomer tossed his cigarette butt 
down and stepped on it.

"I'm perfectly calm, Scully," Mulder responded in a deceptively low 
murmur.

"I am here to pay my respects, Agent Mulder," the man replied in his 
cultured, mellow voice.  Scully imagined the serpent in Eden had spoken 
with such a voice.

"Son of a...!" Mulder lunged at the man and grabbed a handful of his 
collar, belying his claim to calm.  

"Your respects?" her enraged partner sneered.  "Where was your respect 
when you stole Samantha right out of our mother's arms? Where was your 
respect when you had my father gunned down? You don't 'respect' 
anything.  All you know how to do is kill."

Mulder stopped, collecting himself.  He released the man's collar with 
a push, and looked around to make sure no one had seen the display.  
"Go away," he muttered.  "You're not wanted here."

"Your mother once meant a great deal to me," the man replied evenly.  
"I have a right to be here."

"You have no rights here," Mulder snarled, careful to keep his voice 
down.  "My mother is dead, thanks in no small part to what you did to 
our family.  Tell me, how does it feel to be a walking pestilence? To 
destroy everything you touch, or claim to care about?"

The man studied Mulder calmly, unblinking.  "Be careful, Agent 
Mulder...you're about to create a scene," he cautioned, inclining his 
head to a woman making her way up the stairs to the church.

"You have no idea what I'm capable of creating," Mulder seethed.  "If 
you try to walk through those doors, I'll break your neck before you 
make it halfway in.  Don't fuck with me today, old man."

A small cry of amazement sounded behind them, and Scully turned to see 
Lacey Winters flying down the steps in their direction.

"Oh, my goodness!" The woman gasped, her teary eyes wide.   She pushed 
past Mulder and Scully to embrace the man.   "However did you know to 
be here? I tried to reach you, but I didn't know where you had gone!" 
Scully met Mulder's eyes with alarm.  His nostrils flared with 
irritation and he glowered at the man over the elderly woman's head.

"I'm sorry, Lacey dear, but I really can't stay.  I just wanted to stop 
by," the man said kindly to Mrs.  Winters, extricating himself from her 
hug and clasping her hand between both of his.  "I have an important 
meeting in half an hour."

"Are you certain?" she asked, crestfallen.  "You never change, always 
rushing off somewhere, never staying to visit.  You should be ashamed," 
she scolded.  "You didn't even make it to Bill's funeral and now you're 
missing Teena's as well?"

"My apologies," he said, patting the woman's hand fondly and letting 
go.  "It's been wonderful seeing you again, Lacey.  Could I have a 
moment with Fox alone?"

"Oh, of course," Lacey stepped away patting Mulder's arm.   Mulder 
flinched almost imperceptibly from her touch as though it were 
contaminated.  "Fox," she said solemnly, "I'll be back inside when 
you're finished.  You'd best hurry; the service is about to begin."

Mulder waited until the woman was out earshot before turning back to 
the man.

"I'm not staying, Agent Mulder," the man said finally.  "I just want to 
extend my condolences for your loss," he nodded graciously at Mulder.  
Mulder, for his part, looked ready to chew glass.

After a tense, silent moment, Mulder spun and stalked away without 
another word.  Scully cast a venomous glare at the man as he lit 
another cigarette.  "Just leave!" she hissed angrily and followed her 
seething partner back into the church.  She glanced over her shoulder a 
moment later to note with relief that the man had turned away and was 
walking down the stairs.  A stream of cigarette smoke trailed behind 
him.

As they prepared to enter the chapel, she could feel Mulder quivering 
with rage.  She was escorted in beside him, walking slowly down the 
center aisle, looking over the small gathering of mourners.  In the 
rear-most pew, a single woman in a black dress sat alone.  Scully 
wasn't sure why she noticed the woman, except that she wore a black hat 
with a veil.  Though it was still considered proper decorum in New 
England for women to wear hats to church, that sort of dramatic 
headwear might have been appropriate on a widow, but not on a solitary 
young woman in the back pew.

Then they were past the woman and Scully could not continue to study 
the guest without conspicuously craning her neck.   She faced forward 
and continued beside Mulder to the front pew.  Soon the service began.  
She bowed her head for the opening prayer but she found her thoughts 
wandering.

I don't belong here, she thought sadly.  She wasn't here to mourn the 
deceased; she was here for Mulder.  She grieved for him but not with 
him.  She had met Teena Mulder only a handful of times, barely enough 
to form an impression, really.  And each of those occasions had been in 
circumstances where concern for Mulder had been foremost in her 
thoughts.  If she was brutally honest with herself, she had never 
completely overcome an instinctive distaste for a woman who had been so 
caught up in her own grief and loss that she had turned away from a son 
who desperately needed her.

And now that woman was gone and Scully had never had the opportunity to 
know her or get past those perceptions of her.  Even in dying, she had 
abandoned her son, taking her own life with no regard for how it might 
affect him.   Scully was not surprised to notice she was angry for that 
and becoming angrier.  It was an emotion she had experienced many times 
since the day she'd had to tell her partner his mother was dead.  She 
sighed softly and refocused her thoughts on Mulder.

Glancing up at him, she found her partner staring forward, 
expressionless, lost in thoughts of his own.  Occasionally, he would 
pinch the bridge of his nose, or blink rapidly and take a deep breath 
to steady himself once more.  Bidding his final farewell to his last 
link to the childhood he had lost so long ago.

He looked down and met her gaze with glassy eyes.  His hand fumbled 
across the space between them on the pew, taking hers and squeezing 
tightly.  She returned to grip, stroking his fingers soothingly.  He 
held her hand between them, close to his thigh and looked back at the 
minister.

Samantha, Scully thought sadly.  It always came back to Samantha.  
Mulder had been all but destroyed in his early years because of his 
sister's disappearance.  Her recovery had been his personal Grail his 
entire adult life.  But now he was ready to give it up.

Once upon a time, even as recently as last week, she might have been 
glad for that.  When she had first met Mulder, she had felt he would be 
best served by letting go of the past and moving on.  He was a 
brilliant agent, once the Bureau's fair-haired child, but his 
reputation had been quickly tarnished by his ability to embrace extreme 
possibilities.  He'd been written off, tagged with the derisive label 
of "Spooky" and forgotten in his basement room.

Until, that was, he stirred up enough trouble to merit attention, then 
she had been called upon to rein him in.   Instead she had saddled up 
and ridden beside him.  No one had counted on that.  She had given his 
work something it had never had: credibility.  Between the two of them, 
they had turned the punch line of the Bureau into something greater and 
more important than it was ever thought to be.   His work became her 
work, too.  They had pursued it with diligence and determination, 
coming at it from different sides to meet in the middle with enormous 
success.

The price had been high.  It hurt to recall all they had lost upon the 
way, the long nights of pain and despair they had each experienced and 
the loved ones who had been stolen from them.  They had fought their 
way side by side through tempest after tempest, had clung tightly to 
one another when one threatened to be swept away.  And here they were, 
both still standing, and relatively sound and whole.  Bruised, but not 
broken.

At least, they hadn't been.  This time, it seemed Mulder might have 
actually reached that breaking point.  Her mind had gone into a 
tailspin when he had announced he wanted to stop searching for 
Samantha.  Never had she dreamed he might ever consider doing that.  
Never had she dreamed that she would be so adamantly opposed to it.  
She didn't want him to quit.  *She* didn't want to quit.  Too much had 
been taken from them.  If they were to stop trying to claim back what 
little they could, what was left for them?

This weekend's episode had confirmed one thing; there was a strong 
possibility that Samantha was alive.  To give up now would be like 
quitting a race with the finish line just coming into sight.  And that 
was simply not Mulder's way.   To him, the ultimate failure was to not 
try.

Whatever she had said in the car, she had made a decision: she would 
continue to search for Samantha, whether Mulder wanted to or not.  It 
wasn't just his quest anymore and she had no intention of giving it up 
so easily.  She would find Samantha for both Mulder and herself.

She sighed and looked up to realize the pastor was about to give the 
benediction.  The doors at the back of the sanctuary opened and Scully 
turned to see the woman she had espied earlier in the back hurrying out 
of the room.  She had to fight a strong impulse to run after her, to 
see if she could figure out just what it was about the woman that had 
drawn her notice, but she couldn't.  Mulder was still beside her, 
holding her hand like a life-preserver.  Her place was with him until 
this ordeal was finally over.

She bowed her head as the final prayer was spoken, fervently seeking 
blessing on each of them in what was to come.

 *   *   *   *   *

After the short reception at the end of the memorial, she and Mulder 
returned to the hotel they had checked into the previous afternoon.  It 
had been through silent, tacit agreement that they had decided not to 
stay at his mother's house.  Better to be on neutral ground, where the 
ghosts of the past did not inhabit every room and object.  They carried 
enough ghosts with them as it was.

Mulder flung himself down on the bed, covering his face with his hands.  
Her eyes were soft and concerned as she approached slowly, sitting 
beside him, leaning against the headboard, careful not to touch him 
until he invited her to.  After a long, silent moment, he scrubbed his 
hands over his face and brought them down, folding them across his 
chest to study her with bright eyes.

"Well, that's over."

Scully nodded.  "I'm sorry, Mulder," she said softly, "I wish it hadn't 
happened this way.  You and your mother deserved a better chance than 
this."

One corner of his mouth lifted in a half-hearted smile.   "Thanks," he 
replied, rolling to his side and bracing himself on an elbow to face 
her.  "You know," he said after several long, silent moments, "I spend 
so much time remembering the events after everything went bad that I 
forget how much good there was before all that.  I think about the way 
she walked me to school my first day and helped me with my homework 
when Dad worked late.  How she'd sing along with the radio while she 
made dinner...I...I miss that, Scully."

Twin tears splashed onto the pillow beneath his head.  "And I really 
miss that I didn't think of them before now.   Maybe if I had, I 
wouldn't feel like I had lost so much."

He lay there silently for a moment, his jaw clenching spasmodically, 
and then he fell forward, curling his body beside her outstretched legs 
as he laid his head in her lap.

"It's okay," Scully whispered, blinking back her own tears.   She 
stroked his face and hair as he began to shake.  "It's okay...."
 



CHAPTER TWO - Visitation


"Far be it for me to borrow a cliche," Scully commented as she fell 
wearily into a chair, her tone touched with irony, "but I feel so 
used."

Mulder, emerging from the kitchen bearing two mugs of coffee, handed 
one to her and sat on the sofa.  He gave her a wry glance.  "Welcome to 
my life."

Scully huffed a humorless chortle and sipped her coffee, her eyes 
staring past his shoulder at the wall.  A troubled frown still wrinkled 
her brow.

She had appeared at his door early that morning, her eyes filled with 
barely suppressed eagerness.  Mulder had practically had to beat 
Langly, Frohike, and Byers back from the door just to let her enter.  
She hadn't had time to speak to Mulder about where she had been and 
what she had been doing.  She had simply pulled a disk out of her coat 
pocket and asked the Gunmen if they could decode the contents, then 
perched expectantly on the sofa while the boys puttered at their 
computers.  

Mulder had forced himself to check the questions that were roiling 
inside him.  He wasn't sure he trusted himself to speak.  Anger, the 
inevitable by-product of fear, was seeping through his system like a 
slow-working poison.  He wasn't angry with Scully for leaving without 
telling him where she was going or why.  He had done that to her 
countless times and they had both accepted it as something their jobs 
sometimes required.  He was angry for the fear and dread he had felt 
those missing three days.  So he had lurked silently in the archway to 
the living room, distancing himself from her mind and body until he had 
a chance to sort himself out.

The three days she had been gone had been a sojourn in hell for Mulder.  
The moment he had learned the identity of her companion, terror had 
torn at his gut with razor-sharp claws.  The Gunmen had appeared at his 
door with information and then had never left, trying to trace where 
she might have gone, what she might be doing and ultimately producing 
nothing, despite their best efforts.  Tense silence, punctuated only by 
the occasional pacing, the click of a keyboard, had filled the 
apartment.  The Gunmen had studied him warily, as if afraid he might go 
ballistic at any moment.  Until the knock at the door had come...

The disillusionment in Scully's eyes when they were told the disk she 
had brought back was blank had been heart-rending to watch.  Mulder had 
sent the Gunmen home, thanking them for their help, and left to go to 
the building where Scully had met with the smoking man in his office, 
only to find it empty and abandoned.  Mulder had tried to comfort her, 
drawing upon his own vast experience at being duped, but his words had 
rung hollow even in his own ears.  She had seen a man die for that 
disk, she told him.  How could it possibly be that the disk was blank, 
that the man had died for absolutely nothing?

After three interminably long days, Mulder was almost numb from lack of 
sleep, and his muscles had that rubbery feel that came from repeated 
surges of fear-drenched adrenaline.  There was, he mused, something 
almost surreal about the normalcy of just sitting in his living room, 
drinking coffee and trying to figure it all out.

"What I don't understand," Mulder spoke tensely, his anger still 
simmering beneath the surface, mingled with his relief, "is what that 
man could have possibly said to get you to go with him."

"It wasn't what he said, so much as the opportunity he presented," 
Scully explained, sighing.  "C.G.B. Spender has always underestimated 
me.  That's why I was assigned to work with you in the first place.  
And since then, I've never had a chance to go head to head with him.  
You have, but I haven't.  I figured that if he underestimated me that 
completely, maybe I could get him to reveal more than he intended."

Mulder's breath left him in an explosive exhalation.  "Jesus, Scully, 
you've got to know by now that's a good way to wind up dead."

"I didn't think so," Scully reasoned.  "He didn't want me dead; he had 
an angle, something he needed me alive for.  My mistake," she 
confessed, "was in over-estimating myself.  He was so convincing, 
Mulder.  I fell for it!" she wiped a hand down her face, her other fist 
clutching her coffee cup on her knee.  "After the things he showed me, 
he had me.  Hook, line and sinker.  That wasn't how I had intended it 
to go.  I lost sight of my goal, became distracted."

"What were you hoping to find?" Mulder leaned forward, his elbows on 
his knees, studying her intently.

She took a long time to respond, looking away.  "Answers."

"Answers to what?"

"I was curious," she admitted at last.  "He's played such an active 
role in all that has happened to us...I had to know what he was about."  
She sighed, biting her bottom lip.  Her frown indicated disgust at her 
own naivete.  Finally, she turned back to him, her eyes frank.  "I had 
to know why, Mulder.  I had to know why he's the manipulator he is.  I 
don't understand what drives a man like that, to the point where people 
are no more than pieces on his own personal chessboard.  I thought that 
maybe I could get a look inside his head.  Maybe then I could make some 
sense of what happened to me...and what happened to Samantha," she 
placed a slight emphasis on the last word, removing all doubt as to 
what her primary motivation had been.

He drew a deep breath.  "Scully, I thought we decided not to..."

"No, Mulder, you decided, I didn't," she interrupted.  "And frankly 
that's not a decision you have the right to make for me."

"I've let it go," he told her, his eyes troubled.  "We need to put it 
behind us and move on.  We've got other things to focus on."

"I haven't let it go.  I can't.  I won't," she replied.  "Not when I 
know there's still a chance."

"Damn it, Scully!" he exclaimed, his coffee mug slamming onto the table 
before him as he shot to his feet.  "So what do you plan on doing?  
Keep chasing after that son of a bitch until he decides to cut you 
down, on the off chance that he might let something drop?"  He glared 
at her, his hands braced on his hips.  "When did all this happen?  Why 
is this suddenly so important to you?"

Her tone of determined calm only served to infuriate him more.  
"Mulder, I know this is difficult for you.  It's been difficult for me 
too.  But if we let it go now, what have the last seven years been 
about?  Yes, I know I'm coming late to the party, but 
Mulder...Everything that has happened, everything that we have done, 
everything that's been done *to us*...what's it all for?  I don't know 
about you, Mulder, but all that I've been through...it means too much 
to just give it all up."

"It's not worth it, Scully," Mulder faced her, running his fingers 
through his hair, raising it in wild spikes about his head.

"Mulder, I was wrong.  And I'm trying to change that, because I finally 
see how important this is," she stated with a solemn gaze.  "I need to 
see this through.  And maybe I'm being a little presumptuous, but I 
think you do too.  Look at yourself!  In all the years I've known you 
I've never seen you back down from anything.  You ask me 'why now?'  
Maybe that's what I should be asking you."

She paused, her eyes bright with the fervor of her resolution.  She 
strove for a more reasoned tone, leaving Mulder with the unpleasant 
feeling he was being patronized.  "There are so many things that we'll 
never have answers for, Mulder.  If we can find one here, then it's 
worth the chance.  I'm not going to quit.  I *will* do this."

A long, tense silence settled over the apartment as Mulder paced to the 
window and stared out, his expression thunderous. The alley beyond his 
window was gray and deserted except for a stray cat perched on the edge 
of a dumpster.  Mulder felt an odd kinship for the animal's fruitless 
search for food.  Hadn't he done the same thing over the years, diving 
into the government's cesspools in search of something he'd never find?

Worry, rage, fear, gratitude, and affection all whirled within him in a 
maelstrom.  His pulse pounded in his temples as he considered what 
could have happened to Scully this week.  She thought she was doing 
this for him, that he would never be complete without the answers.  But 
she was wrong.  He would never be complete without her, and if they 
kept heading on this course, that was what would end up happening.  How 
could she possibly expect him to keep doing it?

Some part of his brain argued that he owed it to her, for all she had 
been through for him.  He choked the thought brutally.  Damn it, they 
were not keeping score!  They had both made sacrifices, had each put 
themselves on the line for one another.  He was not going to let some 
misplaced sense of obligation pressure him into defying his better 
judgment.  For once, he would stand firm.

At last he turned, his eyes meeting Scully's.  She watched him 
expectantly, as though waiting for him to yield.  God knew he did so 
often enough.  More often than not, she was right.  But not this time.  
She didn't realize he was doing this for her.  He was doing it so 
neither of them would have to spend another weekend as he had spent 
this one.  He wasn't going to back down.  He couldn't.

But he wasn't going to fight with her about it either.  After the panic 
of the weekend, he wasn't sure he trusted himself to handle any sort of 
in-depth discussion well.  Best to let go of it for now.

"I have to go up north again tomorrow to take care of some issues with 
the estate," he said finally, changing the subject.  "I've been putting 
it off for weeks.  Now is probably as good a time as any.  I might be 
gone up to a week.  I'll let Skinner know."

She snorted lightly, turning her head away.  Mulder's eyes narrowed as 
he watched her.  She seemed almost disappointed he wasn't going to 
pursue the argument.  She set her cup of cold coffee on the table and 
rose.  "Then I'd better get home," she replied, her lips pressed 
together.  "I need some sleep."

He followed her to the door, his hand closing firmly over her upper arm 
just before she stepped out.  "Scully, do me a favor?"

"What?"

"Just leave it alone until I get back, would you?"

She shook her head, a brusque, brief movement of negation.  "I can't 
promise that, Mulder.  If I have the chance to get some answers, I'm 
going to take it."

She tugged her arm from his grasp and walked out without another word.

The door closed behind her and Mulder leaned against it, his forehead 
resting on the cool wood.  This was his fault.  He had brought her to 
this point, where the goals that had once been his alone now meant more 
to her than they ever should.  If he hadn't been so fixated on finding 
Samantha all those years, she would never have adopted his crusade as 
her own.  

And Scully was prepared to do it without him.  Despite his best 
intentions, he wasn't sure he could let his partner go in without 
backup.  That wasn't the way they did things.  Scully had followed his 
lead more often than he could remember, supporting him even when she 
had her misgivings.  She might tell him he was out of his fool head in 
private, but they had always counted on one another to present a 
unified front.

He owed it to her to back her play, didn't he?  Wasn't that his duty, 
to cover her back, as it was hers to cover his?  If he didn't go with 
her, could they ever count on one another with that same absolute trust 
they held now, or would there always be a fear between them that they 
couldn't be sure the other would be there when they needed them most?

He squeezed his eyes tightly shut, fighting the urge to chase after 
her, tell her it was all right, that he was in all the way with her. He 
wouldn't, damn it, he *wouldn't*.  There had to be an end -- for both 
of them.

The sound of his fist crashing into the solid wood door exploded in the 
silent apartment.

*     *     *     *     *

Scully tapped her fingers impatiently on the desk as the phone at the 
other end of the line rang in her ear.  After the third ring, a 
breathless female voice answered.  "Hello?"

"Hello, Mrs. Winters?  This is Dana Scully.  We met at Mrs. Mulder's 
memorial."

"Oh, yes, yes!"  The voice took on a cheerful tone that Scully 
suspected was as natural to her as breathing.

"Is this a good time?" she asked.

"Of course, Miss Scully.  What can I do for you?"

"Well, Mrs. Winters, I'm trying to help my partner--um, Fox--find out 
some things about the time preceding his mother's...death," she 
explained, prevaricating only slightly.  "I thought that since you were 
close to Mrs. Mulder, perhaps you might be able to shed some light on 
what happened to her those final weeks."

The woman sighed sadly.  "I wish I could help, dear, but Teena didn't 
speak to me at all for several months before...Well, anyway, she fell 
out of contact.  I never understood why, until I learned how she had 
died.  Now, I wish I had done more, tried to be there more.  I suppose 
everyone who loses someone close to them in such a way feels much the 
same."

Scully bit her lip, thinking of her partner, who needed no prompting to 
assume guilt for all the terrible things of the world.  He hadn't said 
as much, but she could tell the fact that his mother had tried to call 
him twice in the days preceding her suicide and that he had never 
returned her calls, weighed heavily on his conscience.  "Yes, Mrs. 
Winters.  I suppose they would."

A moment of silence passed before Scully spoke again.  "How was she, 
before she fell out of contact with you, Mrs. Winters?"

"Well," the woman paused as she thought for a moment, "I suppose she 
was the same she's always been, at least for the last twenty-seven 
years.  Melancholy at times, but still carrying on.  Of course before, 
well..."

"Before her daughter was taken?" Scully prompted.

"Yes," Mrs. Winters sighed with relief.  "I wasn't sure if you knew, 
and it wasn't really my place, you know.  But since you're already 
aware of what happened, I can tell you that before that, Teena was a 
much different person.  She was always such a happy person, always 
smiling and full of energy.  That changed.  She always seemed to blame 
herself, no matter how hard we tried to make her see there was nothing 
she could have done to prevent such a thing.  She remained quite 
convinced, up through the very end, that it was indeed her fault."

Guilt, apparently, was a Mulder family trait, Scully thought grimly.  
"Do you have any idea why she felt responsible?"

She could hear the elderly woman shrug, the phone scratching and 
rustling against the clothes on Mrs. Winters shoulders.  "Who knows?" 
she replied.  "Perhaps she felt that she and Bill shouldn't have left 
the house that night.  There's no logic for when you're feeling that 
way."

No, there wasn't.  Scully knew that first hand.  "Do you know anyone 
else Mrs. Mulder might have been close to?" She asked.

"No, not really.  Most of our old friends have either moved away or 
passed on by now," Mrs. Winters sighed again.  "The only one I know of 
still remaining is the man you met at her memorial, the tall gentleman 
with the unfortunate smoking habit, but he hasn't been around for 
years."

Scully bared her teeth in a grimace of bitter triumph.  This was it.  
"Oh, yes," she said with false enthusiasm.  "I remember!  
Mr....Mr....his name escapes me."

"Burke, dear, his name is Charles Burke.  He graduated high school with 
Teena.  Aside from myself, I think he's the one who knew Teena the 
longest, even before she met Bill.  He was sort of a beau, you see," 
Mrs. Winters explained conspiratorially.  "He and Bill served together 
in the Army, and Teena met Bill while visiting Charles.  I'm afraid he 
was quite upset when she stopped seeing him to go with Bill, but 
eventually, those things fade, you know, and they all became fast 
friends.  He was like an honorary uncle to Fox and Samantha."

Never underestimate the human need for gossip.  Scully's lips pulled in 
a tight frown.  At least now she had a name.  "I see.  Well, I suppose 
if he's been away for years, he wouldn't be able to shed any light on 
what happened to Mrs. Mulder before she died, would he?"

"No, I'm afraid not, Miss Scully.  I'm sorry, dear, but I really need 
to go.  I am expecting someone to lunch soon."

"Of course, Mrs. Winters.  Thank you for taking the time to talk with 
me," Scully replied.  She made her good-byes and hung up the phone.

Scully rose from her desk and crossed to the other side of the office, 
pacing restlessly.  Her call to Teena Mulder's girlhood friend had been 
a stab in the dark, based on the precept that the smoking man, whom 
they had known only as C.G.B. Spender, was indisputably involved in the 
disappearance of Samantha Mulder.  If Lacey Winters knew him, then 
perhaps she knew something about him that Scully and Mulder had never 
found.

Like his real name, for example.

Spender, Burke, whatever his name, was the key to finding Mulder's 
sister.  Scully was utterly sure of it.  The obvious answer for why he 
would try to con Mulder into believing his sister was dead because the 
re-appearance of Samantha Mulder would reveal information he wanted to 
keep hidden.  Which meant that something they had been doing at that 
time might have brought them closer to finding Samantha.

What might that information have been?

She sighed.  It was only too apparent to her that she was going into 
this whole thing with a severe handicap.  Not only did she lack her 
partner's personal connection to Samantha, she lacked his sense of 
empathy, that indefinable *something* that enabled him to get inside a 
case so easily.  She wasn't going to be able to find Samantha on logic 
and reason alone.  She was going to have to do what Mulder did every 
day.  She had to open herself up to it, embrace it...believe.

It was a daunting prospect.  Did she have that in her? Was her belief 
that she could actually continue the search for Samantha fuelled by 
hubris?

*Help me, Scully* the whisper from the past pleaded in her ear.  It was 
Mulder's gasping voice, as he hunched over a shallow grave in the brush 
next to a large stone with the words "Mad Hat" chalked on it, shoveling 
aside dirt with his bare hands, scraping his fingers on the hard soil 
and sharp rocks.  His face had been twisted in torment and dread, 
knowing there was a chance that the young girl buried there was 
Samantha.  He'd been close to his breaking point, on the edge of 
hysterics.  The plea had been so powerful, so desperate, that despite 
her better judgment, she had gotten down beside him and helped him dig.

She had helped him, yes, but she could now see that she had also 
hindered him. How many times had she told him to stop chasing after his 
sister?  They had worked on dozens of missing children cases in the 
last eight years and each time Mulder had seen his sister's face on the 
child they were searching for, she had called him down, pulled him 
back.  It had torn her apart to see him torture himself by envisioning 
Samantha in each case file.

And now she had to do the very thing she had pleaded with him time and 
again to stop.  She had to take active ownership of the search that 
before she had been only observed from a safe distance.  In this one 
pursuit alone had they never been truly unified.

And if she were to see this through, she would have to open herself up 
to the pain and agony and failure Mulder had experienced so often.  She 
was going to have to love Samantha the way he loved Samantha.  It was 
frightening and exhilarating all at the same time. If she was going to 
do this, this time there was no stopping, no compromising.  She was in 
it all the way, to the end of the line, until she had the answer Mulder 
needed, or knew beyond a doubt that there was no answer to be had.

Setting her chin stubbornly, she stalked back to the desk and sat at 
the computer.  She had a name to go on now, one which could yield more 
information about the man than any of his many aliases they had already 
investigated.  Her fears and doubts were irrelevant.  She had work to 
do.

*     *     *     *     *

Mulder stood in the cold outside the house in Chilmark, lashed by the 
freezing, wet northeastern wind.  How could it possibly be that this 
house had remained untouched by time?  At a distance, it didn't seem to 
have changed in the intervening years.  The yard, which no child had 
played in since Samantha's disappearance, had been mowed and the hedges 
trimmed.  His mother had kept on the caretaker his father had hired 
after moving to West Tisbury.  Certainly neither of them had ever gone 
back to it themselves.

Neither had they sold it.  The Chilmark house, which his mother's 
parents had left her, had remained unoccupied for almost twenty-seven 
years, a shrine to the destruction of their family.  A year and a half 
after Samantha's disappearance, his mother had decided she no longer 
wanted to be near the ghosts inhabiting Martha's Vineyard.  She had 
filed for divorce and moved to Connecticut.  His father had purchased a 
house in West Tisbury and lived there until his death.  But the idea of 
parting with the house in Chilmark never appeared to have been 
discussed by either of them.

And now it was up to him.  Amazingly, he was the inheritor of a virtual 
fortune in real estate.  The two houses on Martha's Vineyard could sell 
quickly and painlessly for a million dollars each.  The house in 
Greenwich would add a little under another million to the pot, and the 
cabin in Rhode Island half a million more.  Firm believers in the value 
of real estate were his parents.  His father had once told him, 
"They're not making any more land, Fox."  He was looking at a rough 
$3.5 million when all was said and done.

He didn't want a fucking dime of it.

He blinked rapidly, surprised by the vehemence of his rage.  The houses 
and the proceeds from the houses couldn't give him what he truly 
wanted.  He wanted his family back.  He wanted his childhood back.  He 
wanted a chance to live without the pain and guilt and regret.  He 
didn't want these damned monuments to what was lost forever.

He squashed the anger.  It was a comforting shield against his fear, 
but he would get through this without the usual histrionics, thank you 
very much.  He had spent the last several days steadily working through 
the contents of the other houses.  Only this one remained.  He couldn't 
avoid it any longer.

Mulder took a deep breath, mentally bracing himself for what was to 
come and strode toward the house.  It was time to get this over with 
and put it behind him forever.

He pushed his way through the gate, which creaked in annoyance at being 
disturbed and closed grudgingly behind him as he stood before the steps 
of the porch, staring up at the front door he had been scolded 
countless times for slamming on his way in or out.  Trying to strangle 
his mounting trepidation before it took root, he lifted one foot and 
placed it gingerly on the bottom step.  The next step was easier to 
make.  And the one after that was easier still.  Soon he was standing 
on the porch, with its peeling white railing and supports.  His heart 
thrummed wildly in his chest, his mind screamed for him to get as far 
away from this place as he possibly could.  His hand reached inexorably 
for the doorknob and inserted the key that had been in his mother's 
possession until her death.

"Hullo!" a voice called from behind him.  Mulder jumped, his heart 
pounding, and spun around to see a friendly-looking gnome of a man 
hurrying toward him up the front walk.

"Mr. Swanson?" Mulder asked as the old man hobbled up the steps.

"Yah," the man replied with a hint of an accent.  Swedish?  Not 
surprising...a great many of the elderly on the East Coast were second 
generation immigrants.  This man had probably made the voyage across 
the Atlantic Ocean with his parents when he was just a child.  "The 
lawyer told me you'd be coming.  You'll be vanting to look around?"

Mulder nodded, studying the caretaker.  His cheerful, wrinkled face 
seemed incongruous with the gloom of the old house.  It seemed that a 
house in this man's hands for the better part of thirty years would 
reflect more of effervescent good humor.  It didn't.

Mulder realized the man was speaking to him and brought his attention 
back to the present.  "I run the heat in the vinter, open it and air it 
out in the nice veather.  I keep yard tended.  I recommend someone to 
come and clean inside, but the Mrs. Mulder, she said no, not necessary.  
So it is not really as nice as you should be seeing."

Mulder waved a dismissing hand.  "No, it doesn't matter.  I just need 
to look around and make sure there's nothing here I want to keep."

"You need me to show you?" he asked kindly.

"No, no," Mulder shook his head, distracted.  "That's okay.  I, uh...I 
think I'll just look around by myself, if you don't mind.  You don't 
need to stay."

The man's head bobbed up and down rapidly.  "Yah, I've got other homes 
I take care of in the vinter," he explained.  "I'll go.  I can check 
back later and help if you need anything."

"Sounds good," Mulder agreed and watched as the old man turned around 
and trotted back down the walk.  Sighing, he looked back at the door, 
reaching for the handle.

The wooden panel was stubborn, swollen with age and humidity.  He hoped 
for a moment that it wasn't going to open.  At the insistence of his 
shoulder, however, it gave way, swinging wide as he stumbled into the 
foyer.

His startled curse bounced off the empty walls and his breath left him 
in a rush, frosting in the air before his face.  The heat was only run 
enough to keep the pipes from freezing and bursting.  Inside, the house 
was cold as a tomb.

The thought was as gruesome as it was appropriate.  Mulder quickly 
dismissed it.

The rooms echoed eerily as he shut the front door behind him.  Dust 
coated every surface.  Layer upon layer of footprints marked a pathway 
from the door, each one left by the caretaker over the years.  This 
house, which had once been filled with so much love and joy, had become 
a palace of sorrow, abandoned in the attempt to leave behind the grief 
that haunted it.  Neither love nor joy had inhabited this house for 
twenty-seven years.

He walked slowly forward, into the main hallway.  To one side, an 
archway led to the dining room and the kitchen beyond that.  To the 
other side, an identical archway led to the family room.  Down the hall 
was the first story bathroom and the bedroom his parents had occupied.  
At the far end of the family room, a stair ascended to the dormer on 
the upper floor, leading to the rooms he and Samantha had inhabited.  
He entered the dining room and made a slow circuit through the rooms.

Dust covers shrouded everything--the dining room table, the small 
chandelier above it, the sofa and chairs in the family room, resembling 
the ghosts he always associated with this house. Oriental rugs had been 
rolled up and left against the walls, leaving the rich hardwood floors 
bare to the ravages of time and neglect.  He felt that if he drew too 
deep a breath, he would drown in dust and decay.

He wasn't sure he could pass through that family room.  It was on that 
floor where he had sat with Samantha playing Stratego when she had been 
taken.  It had been on that floor that he crouched, frozen, unable to 
reach her or save her, helpless while she disappeared into the night.

He put a steadying hand on the wall as his head spun dizzily.  The 
knots in his stomach left him feeling vaguely nauseated.  He closed his 
eyes, willing the memories to be gone, and slowly walked across the 
family room.  Looking neither left nor right, he began to climb the 
stairs.

With each step, the knot of dread in his stomach grew heavier; his 
breath came with more effort and less results.  He felt as though he 
were ascending into the high reaches of the atmosphere, where the air 
was thin and rarified, rather than climbing a simple flight of stairs.  
By the time he reached the top, he was breathless and he clung to the 
balustrade with a white-knuckled grip.

A short hall ended at a small bathroom.  On opposite sides, identical 
solid wood doors faced one another.  He released his grip on the 
banister, barely noticing the gray grime that covered his clammy palm 
and stepped slowly into the hall.  Bracing himself, he went first to 
the room that had been his own private sanctuary.

His initial thought was one of surprise at how low the ceiling was, 
sloping steeply toward the outer wall of the room.  As a child, he had 
only needed to duck starting two feet from the wall.  Now he could 
barely make it into the room before he was in eminent danger of bumping 
his head.  

A model of a space rocket perched like a prize atop a tall chest of 
drawers.  Posters of astronauts and basketball idols disintegrated on 
the walls.  A twin bed, neatly made beneath its dust cloth, sat in the 
corner.  Beneath it was a roll-out trundle where his friends had slept 
when they stayed the night, and where Samantha had lain when she was 
afraid to sleep in her own room.

The feeling of panic ebbed and his breath returned to normal.  In this 
room, he felt safe.  In this room, the demons did not clutch at him so 
fiercely.  He crossed to the bed and sat on the edge, unmindful of the 
dust liberally coating the back of his long black trench coat.

He wasn't sure how long he sat there.  It could have been minutes or 
hours while his heart rate slowed and his fear abated.  Girding 
himself, he stood and walked back out into the hallway, facing the door 
that lay directly across from his.  His hand clutched the crystal knob 
and turned it slowly.  The door slid silently open.

A white wicker bed, its once-pink canopy now a dingy brownish-gray, 
dominated the room, surrounded by a matching nightstand, chest of 
drawers, and desk.  Crayon art hung willy-nilly on the walls, each 
curling and cracking sheet of paper branded with an elaborate "S".  
Here, no footprints marred the layer of dust on the floor.  The room 
had lay virtually undisturbed since they had left this house behind 
them.

A record player sat on the nightstand, with a stack of 45 singles 
beside it.  Samantha had insisted on playing music every moment she 
spent in this room.  She had been gravely disappointed when she had 
been informed that the phonograph would not work if she tried to take 
it outside to listen to while she played, because there would be no 
place to plug it in.  The closet door was open, and Mulder could see 
the neatly organized row of dresses hanging therein.  On the bed, her 
three favorite dolls perched against the headboard, waiting patiently 
for a little girl who would never return.

"Sam..." the whisper transformed into a keening whimper.  Something 
burst within his chest and Mulder slid down the doorframe to the floor, 
sobbing.  He cried until his head ached and his eyes burned, and still 
he hunched there, his arms wrapped around his legs, his head on his 
knees, racked with uncontrollable, gasping shudders.  

How could he so cavalierly dismiss the past when it still had the power 
to shred him so completely?  How could he claim not to care whether he 
ever found Samantha when he sat here, bawling in the doorway to her 
room, unable to enter yet unable to leave, aching with every fiber of 
his being to see her again?  How could he propose to move on like this?

It felt like hours before he moved again, dragging himself upright by 
force of will.

Scully had realized how deeply this cut him long before he had, he 
mused as he closed the door with tender reverence and made his way down 
the stairs and out of the house.  She had known it about him all along.  
Perhaps that was why she was determined to carry on the search for 
Samantha with or without him.  She knew he could not come to her 
complete with this wound unhealed, with these questions unanswered.

He stopped at the curb to look back at the house one last time, for he 
would never come here again.  He would leave instructions for his 
mother's lawyer.  The house and all the furniture would be cleaned and 
sold and perhaps some other family could fill it with love and joy 
again.

He bid the house full of memories his final farewell and walked away.

*     *     *     *     *

The parking ramp was dark and very empty.  She had stayed too late, 
poring over the information she had on the smoking man and Samantha.  
The clerks and administrative staff who were lucky enough to work a 
normal eight-hour day were long gone, and her footsteps echoed across 
the concrete decking of the nearly empty garage as she made her way to 
her car.  Reaching it, she bent to unlock her the door.

A short, startled cry was wrenched from her as suddenly she was jerked 
backward by an arm across her chest.

"Don't make a move!" a familiar voice whispered authoritatively near 
her ear.  "I'm not here to hurt you."

The words didn't register as sheer survival instinct took over.  
Letting her knees buckle beneath her, Scully used her own weight to 
break the grip on her shoulders and as she sank down, delivered a solid 
blow with her elbow to the solar plexus of her attacker.  She spun 
quickly, still crouched low, and jabbed another punch into his abdomen, 
then stood, grabbing his head as he doubled over and pushing it down 
quickly to meet her rapidly rising knee.  A solid and satisfying crunch 
rewarded her efforts.

He was too close to allow her to draw her gun.  She raised her foot to 
push the man away while he was off balance, trying to give herself more 
space.  He caught her foot as it connected with his chest and used it 
to force her backward.  She fell to the decking, grunting as her 
shoulder took the weight of her fall, and tried to roll away.  Before 
she could rise, he had her pinned down with his knee on her chest and 
the hard bone of his forearm across her throat.

"Don't move, Scully," the man warned again, panting with exertion as 
blood seeped from his nose. "Krycek!" She hissed, glaring up at him.  
Her breath came in heavy pants of combined fear and anger.  "You son of 
a bitch!"

"I didn't come here to kill you, Scully, if that's what you're worried 
about," he said, shifting to rest more of his weight on the knee 
holding her down while he wiped at the blood dripping from his nose 
with his hand.

"Oh, of course not," she spat.  "It's not as though you haven't tried 
before."

He rolled his eyes impatiently at her.  "I don't have time for this," 
he whispered urgently.  "I've got a message for you and information you 
need.  I don't really give a shit whether you get it or not, Scully.  I 
was told to come, so I came."

She gave him a withering glare and fell silent, waiting for him to 
speak.

"I'm going to let you up now," he murmured, his face right next to 
hers.  "If you try anything, I'm out of here and you're on your own."

Slowly, he rose, fumbling through the logistics of lifting his weight 
with only one arm without crushing her rib cage.  Scully watched him 
warily as she would a poisonous viper, her eyes snapping with angry 
blue fire.

He disappeared from her field of vision and she sat up.  She began to 
rise when he reappeared, dropping an expensive leather attache case at 
her feet.

"Who's this from?  Burke?  Who's lackey are you today, Krycek?"

"Open it," he commanded tersely.

She studiously ignored the case. "Go back and tell that man that I want 
nothing he has to offer," she stated with barely leashed venom.  "The 
last time he wanted to give me 'information,' I nearly wound up 
floating face down in a lake with a bullet in me.  And in case you 
missed the news flash, I got absolutely nothing for my efforts.  Tell 
that bastard he can go to hell."

"You came home with more than you realize, Scully.  It just wasn't what 
you thought you would receive," Krycek replied cryptically.

She looked away, her jaw clenched stubbornly.  Krycek squatted down 
beside her, getting in her face once more.  "It's in your best interest 
to have this information.  You need to be aware," he paused for effect 
as she raised an inquisitive eyebrow, "that you're in danger.  The man 
who tried to kill you out on that lake worked for someone who would 
like nothing better than to see you dead and out of the way.  That 
someone is still gunning for you.  If you don't keep your head down and 
watch where you step, you're not going to make it through the weekend."

She stared at him coldly and finally rose, pushing him back and lifting 
the case.  She placed it on the trunk of her car and opened it, rifling 
through the contents between cautious glances in his direction.  
Finally realizing what the files inside the case were, she stared at 
him in amazement.  "But these are--"

Ignoring her astonishment, he walked slowly backward, away from her.  
When it was obvious she was not going to stop him, he turned and strode 
away from her, turning back as he reached the end of the row of the 
parking deck.

"If you want more information, Scully, I suggest you look at your own 
memories," he threw back over his shoulder and disappeared around the 
corner.

Unnerved, she snapped the briefcase shut and dropped it in the 
passenger side seat.  Then she slid into the driver's side and inserted 
the key into the ignition with a trembling hand.

*     *     *     *     *

Her heart had almost slowed to its normal pace by the time she had 
reached her apartment and tried to call Mulder.

"Hi, Scully," his voice reached her before she could identify herself, 
confident that she would be the person on the other end of the line.

She couldn't suppress a small smile.  "You'd be really embarrassed 
right now if it was Skinner calling," she admonished him.

"If Skinner has so little to do that he needs to call me on a Friday 
night, the man needs to be put out of his misery," Mulder replied, 
deadpan.

"I don't think you're in a position to talk, Mulder.  When's the last 
time you did something wild and exciting on a Friday night?"

She heard him chuckle over the line.  "Wild and exciting, huh?  It's 
not a long flight back to D.C., Scully.  What exactly are you 
proposing?"

Point, set, and match to Mulder, Scully thought, releasing her breath 
in relief.  She and Mulder were all right again.  They had each had 
time to process what had happened in his apartment that afternoon 
several days ago, and they would find a way to work it out.

Silence settled over the line, until she finally spoke again.  "How are 
you holding up?"

She could hear his snort through the phone.  "I'll be better when I can 
sign everything over to the damn lawyer and get the hell out of here.  
Have I ever mentioned to you how much I always hated this place?"

"I think it might have come up once or twice," she replied wryly.  She 
drew a long breath and said in a rush: "Mulder, I need you to come back 
to D.C."

His voice was sharp and alert as he asked, "What's up?  Is everything 
okay?"

"I don't know, Mulder," she replied with a shaky sigh.  "Something 
happened today.  I, um...I don't think we should discuss it over the 
phone, though."

A brief moment of silence traveled through the line, and then his 
reply.

"I'll be there first thing in the morning."

*     *     *     *     *

It was misting heavily when Scully entered Mulder's apartment building.  
His car was nowhere in evidence yet.  She shook her umbrella and 
collapsed it as she stepped into the elevator for the brief, tense ride 
to the fourth floor.   She didn't allow herself to consider the 
implications of seeking refuge at Mulder's apartment too closely or for 
very long.  All she knew was that she would feel safer there than in 
her own right now.She froze in front of his door, the hair rising on 
the back of her neck, a nervous knot taking twisted shape in her 
stomach.  She stared at the tarnished brass lock to his door, where 
lighter colored scratches around the keyhole had drawn her eye.  She 
ran her finger over the gouges and studied the metal shavings that 
clung to the digit.

Someone had picked Mulder's lock, recently by the looks of it.  It was 
far from being a professional job.  The scratches were the dead 
giveaway of an amateur lock-pick, using makeshift tools.  Her heart 
pounded in her chest and she wondered who had broken in and why.  Was 
the burglar still in there, lying in wait?

With silent caution, Scully set her umbrella on the floor and inserted 
her key.  She drew her gun from its holster at her waist, flipped off 
the safety, and held it up at her side, ready to aim in an instant.

The noise of the tumblers turning inside the lock was absurdly loud in 
the silent hallway, and Scully cringed at the cacophony.  The apartment 
was still mostly dark within.  If someone was in there, they'd get a 
damned good shot at her in silhouette in the doorway long before her 
eyes had a chance to adjust to the dark.  She pushed to door open and 
ducked behind the wall.  No shots came from the darkness inside.

Watching every inch of semi-darkness, Scully stepped through the door 
and shut it behind her, listening for the smallest sound, tensing as it 
closed with a resounding *snick*.  She crouched low in the corner 
behind the door, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the dim light.

Someone was definitely in the apartment, she concluded.  She could hear 
the slightest hint of breathing coming from the living room.  The 
living room was dimly illuminated by Mulder's aquarium, she noted, 
calculating her next move.  Good.  That gave her the advantage of being 
able to see without being seen.

God help me, Mulder, but if it's you in there, I may shoot you anyway.

She peered around the corner and quickly scanned the living room.  Her 
eyes came to rest on the sofa.  In the scant light filtering in through 
the drawn blinds, she could definitely make out a form lying there.  
She frowned, puzzled.  Why would someone pick Mulder's lock just to 
fall asleep on his sofa?  It definitely wasn't Mulder.  She'd seen him 
unconscious a few too many times to be unfamiliar with the way he 
breathed when asleep.  This breathing was shallow, light...a woman's 
breathing.

Confusion wrinkled her forehead for a moment, until her eyes surveyed 
the rest of the room.  On the coffee table, she could see the shape of 
a pistol lying within reach of the slumbering woman's hand.

In the same instant, the person on the sofa jerked awake, her hand 
going for the gun.

"Drop it!" Scully barked, rounding the corner to stand in the far end 
of the living room.  She heard a whimper escape the woman and her hand 
fell away from the pistol.  "I'm a federal agent and I'm armed," she 
announced.  "Don't make any sudden moves!"

"I won't," the woman's voice came quietly, barely more than a whisper.  
She held out her empty hands to the light of the fish tank, 
demonstrating that she was unarmed.

"Okay," Scully breathed.  "I'm going to turn the lights on now.  Stay 
exactly where you are.  If you make a move, I *will* fire."

"I'm not going anywhere," the voice replied.

Scully felt along the wall with her free hand, keeping her gun 
carefully trained on the shadowy figure across the room.  Finally, she 
found the light switch and flipped it on.

She was blinded for a split second by the sudden flood of light, but so 
was the woman on the sofa.  When her eyes focused once more, Scully 
found the intruder exactly as she had been before, her arms out-
stretched, her hands empty, her face turned away.

"Who are you and what are you doing in this apartment?" Scully 
demanded.

The woman turned slowly to face her and Scully's breath left her in a 
rush.  Her legs trembled and threatened to give out.

"Agent Scully?" The intruder queried, appraising her with frank gray-
green eyes.

The face was one she had seen only once in her life, on a body 
retrieved from a freezing river.  That body had dissolved into an 
unrecognizable substance in minutes, but it had been long enough for 
her to know the face to its finest detail.

The woman licked her lips nervously as Scully gaped at her.  "I'm 
Samantha, Fox's sister," the woman explained, obviously unaware that 
her face was burned indelibly in Scully's memory.  "I need your help, 
Agent Scully.  I need to see my brother immediately."

*     *     *     *     *

Mulder's hands gripped the steering wheel tightly as he navigated his 
way through the alleys and avenues of Washington's seedier side.  He 
chewed on his lip as his troubled thoughts replayed his most recent 
conversation with Scully.

He had left New England as soon as he could pack the belongings he 
wanted to bring back with him into the trunk of his car.  The rest 
would go into storage until he figured out what he wanted to do with it 
all.  It was well after midnight when he finally had gotten on the 
road.  At two o'clock, he had been stopped by two colossally ill timed 
flat tires and a cell-phone that took a swan dive into a mud puddle.

By the time he had called Scully from a pay phone outside of town, 
intending to ask her to meet him for breakfast, it was hours past the 
time he had intended to be back in D.C.

He hadn't been at all prepared for the way she had answered her phone.

"Scully."  Her voice had been tight, nervous.

"Hey, Scully, it's me."

"Mulder?" A pause. "Where are you?"

"It's a long and tragic tale of two tires, starring one waterlogged 
cell phone.  Believe me, Scully, you want to hear it less than I want 
to tell it," he had replied with a sigh.

"Sounds fascinating." This time her tone was casual, and only an 
undercurrent of tension remained.  "Why don't you regale me with it 
over coffee at Bernadino's?"

That stopped him in his tracks.  Bernadino's was a code they had 
arranged years ago for situations when they needed to meet in complete 
secrecy.  They had never actually used it before.  "Wouldn't that be a 
little crowded?"  Mulder had finally asked tentatively.

It was the proscribed response, to confirm that they were actually 
speaking to each other.  Mulder didn't even like to remember the 
incident that precipitated the introduction of that little clause.  The 
knowledge of the way she had been attacked, thrown across a room and 
kidnapped by an alien bounty hunter wearing his face was hard for him 
to deal with.

"No one makes a Mexican mocha like they do, Mulder.  I'll meet you 
there in twenty minutes?"

"Better make it thirty." I'll be there after you.

"Done." She disconnected before he had a chance to say anything else, 
and would be incommunicado until they met at the pre-arranged location.  
Her cell phone would be left behind to avoid anyone tracing the signal.

Still troubled, Mulder pulled into an alley behind a dingy all-night 
Mexican diner.  He could see Scully standing against the wall, watching 
his approach cautiously. He parallel parked behind her car and emerged 
to greet her.

"What's this all about, Scully?" He asked, taking in the tense lines 
around her mouth.

"I went to your place this morning, to wait for you to arrive," she 
explained.  His eyebrows lifted slightly, but he refrained from 
comment.  "When I got there, I found the lock had been picked.  Someone 
had broken in."

Mulder groaned, his heart sinking.  "Scully, if you tell me I'm going 
to spend the rest of the weekend cleaning a ransacked apartment, I'm 
going to cry."

She shook her head.  "No, it wasn't ransacked.  The person who had 
broken in was still inside, waiting for you."

His heart skipped a beat.  "Are you okay?  Did they go for you 
instead?"

"No, Mulder...I'm fine," she replied firmly, squeezing her eyes shut 
with a look of frustration.  "Look, I'm not saying this well.  The 
person who was inside...Mulder, she says she's Samantha."

Mulder froze, feeling his extremities go numb.  His mind shut down for 
an instant as he absorbed her words.

Scully sighed.  "She said she needed to see you, that it was urgent."

"It's not her, Scully.  It can't be."

"I don't know, Mulder," she shook her head in defeat.  "I'm not 
qualified to make that call."

He didn't answer, but studied her earnest, concerned face.  This 
couldn't be possible...it wasn't happening.

"We should go inside," Scully said finally.  "She's waiting for us."

She was right.  He drew a deep breath and released it slowly.  "Then 
let's go," he muttered and turned on his heel, preceding her into the 
diner.

She looked exactly the same as he remembered, he thought, studying the 
woman from the doorway.  Exactly the same as those other women, one of 
whom had claimed to be Samantha.  Exactly the same as the woman he had 
seen in another diner late at night, the one who had come in the 
company of the smoking man.  The one who had left and never contacted 
him again, the one who Cassandra Spender had told him was not his 
sister.

Her eyes, so familiar to him, widened when she looked up to see him 
there staring at her.  "Fox," she breathed in a voice that had haunted 
his dreams for years.  Her shoulders slumped with relief.

Only Scully's tug on his arm prompted him to move, to sit in the booth 
before he drew unwarranted notice.  Scully sat beside him, opposite the 
woman who wore his sister's face.

"Who are you?" he demanded, careful to keep his voice low.  He felt 
Scully's sharp glance bore holes in his profile, but his attention was 
focused on the stranger seated on the other side of the table.

Her familiar brow wrinkled in consternation.  "What are you talking 
about?"

"How do I know you're Samantha?  You're not the first person who has 
come along claiming to be her."

She shook her head.  "I don't understand... Fox, what are you saying?  
We met, just a couple years ago, in that diner, don't you remember?"

"I was told later on that the person I met that night wasn't my 
sister," Mulder stated.

The woman looked away, blinking back tears.  Her shoulders slumped as 
she shook her head slowly back and forth in confusion.  She leaned 
forward, bracing herself with an elbow on the table, rubbing her face 
wearily.  "Fox, I don't know what you want me to say.  I don't know 
what's happened to you all these years.  I didn't even know you were 
alive until that night.  I'm sorry.  I know it must have hurt you when 
I didn't try to contact you after that, but I was scared."

Mulder groped for a response, helpless as ever in the face of a tearful 
plea.  

As always, it was Scully who came to his rescue. "Mulder," she said 
softly from his side, "we can verify her identity later.  For now, 
let's hear what she has to say."

She turned her attention back to the woman across the table.  "You said 
you were afraid.  Why?"

Mulder took a steadying breath, silently thanking Scully for her 
rational presence.

"Things have happened since I saw you last, Fox.  Things I don't know 
how to explain," the woman stammered.  "I remembered a little bit about 
the time I was taken away before I encountered you, but 
afterwards...more memories came back.  Then these men...they started 
following me.  They seemed to be there every time I turned around," the 
woman's voice grew louder, her words coming faster, with more fear.  
"Then one day, I was walking to my car in a parking ramp and one of 
them cornered me.  He warned me to forget I ever met my brother, or 
there would be severe consequences.

"Even though I had been warned, I couldn't let go of the fact that you 
were alive.  I began to spend a lot of time online, looking for 
information.  It wasn't hard to find.  That's how I learned you were in 
the FBI.  You two are almost legendary in some crowds."

Mulder winced.  He had a fairly good idea which crowds those were.  
MUFON, NICAP, others.  The crackpot groups no one believed.

"That's how I learned you believed I had been abducted by aliens," she 
continued tremulously.  "I'm still not sure what I think of that idea 
myself, but I did begin to remember things I had put behind me about 
the time after I was taken from home.  I began to ask questions.  I had 
to know--I even found your home address.  Then I received another 
warning, this one more...forceful.  I began to be suspicious of 
everything...I couldn't even go to the police because I wasn't sure I 
could trust them.  So I tried to forget, like they told me to.  I tried 
to let it go and forget I ever met you."

Her eyes began to water and tears rolled down her cheeks as she 
continued.  "Then a couple months ago, I went to the library and looked 
in the Greenwich Sunday paper, like I have every week since I met you 
and you told me our mother was alive.  I saw Mom's obituary there.  I 
spent two days crying, unable to believe that I had let a few threats 
stop me from seeing her when I had the chance.  So I sent my kids to 
stay with their father and I went to the service."

"You were there?" Mulder asked in disbelief.

"Yes," she nodded.  "I sat in the back, with my face hidden.  I left 
before the service was over."

"It's true, Mulder," Scully spoke from beside him, touching his arm.  
"I saw her, or at least, I saw a woman in a veil in the back of the 
church.  I didn't put it together until today."

Samantha bit her lip, hesitating before she continued her story.  "I 
tried to be careful, not to let anyone know where I had gone, but 
somehow these men, whoever they are, found out.  I began to see them 
parked in the street across from my house.  One time, someone tried to 
run me off the road.  And then one day," her voice broke as she began 
crying again, "I saw one of the men talking with Danny!  That's, um, 
that's my son," she explained, sniffling.  "Whatever the man said, it 
upset him so badly he wouldn't even speak of it.  He began to have 
nightmares.  So I thought that if I could draw their attention away 
from my family...I didn't know what else to do," she cried, "but put as 
much distance between myself and my kids as possible so that whatever 
happened to me, at least my children would be safe."

She broke off, wiping frantically at her eyes, trying to regain 
control. Her rapid, hitching breaths slowed, and she continued more 
calmly.  "I sent them to stay with their father again and I came here.  
I had to be careful, because there were times I was sure they were 
about to find me.  But I had to get to you.  I thought if anyone could 
help me, Fox, it would be you.  Because you know the truth."

The truth?  Mulder shook his in sad irony.  He knew nothing of the 
sort.

"Who knows where you've gone?" he asked finally.

"No one," she answered.  "I told my ex-husband that I had some 
important business I needed to take care of and that I wasn't sure how 
long it would be until I returned.  He's the only person I spoke with 
and honestly, things are uncomfortable enough between us that he 
wouldn't be inclined to care much what I do."  She released a 
shuddering breath.  "I'm scared, Fox.  I don't know what would happen 
if they found me now."

He sought Scully's eyes like a lifeline, seeking her guidance.  He 
desperately wanted to simply reject this woman's claims out of hand and 
protect himself, but he couldn't do it.  It was too big a risk to take.

"We should take her someplace safe, someplace out of the way," Scully 
murmured.  "I don't think we can consider either of our apartments 
secure, and a federal safe house is not entirely impenetrable either."

"There's a place in Baltimore Frohike told me about," he replied.  "He 
knows the manager."

He rose from the booth and threw a bill on the table to cover the 
coffees.  "Let's go."

They stepped outside into the dreary mist and returned to their cars.  
"Go ahead and get in," Scully instructed the other woman.  "I'll be 
there in a minute."

When she was out of hearing range, Scully touched him lightly on the 
arm.  "You okay?" she asked softly.

"Yeah," he sighed.  "I don't know.  I'll figure it out later.  Gimme a 
while to process, okay?"

"Sure," Scully agreed.  He gave her the name of the Baltimore hotel 
they were to go to, and she left.  The woman in the passenger seat 
turned her head to stare at him as they drove away.  They disappeared 
from the alley, leaving him standing alone in the drizzle.

He couldn't think--his mind was shrouded in a fog of weariness and 
confusion.  After his conversation with Scully the previous evening, he 
had packed up everything he needed to bring with him from his parents' 
homes and driven all night to reach her.  Right now he just wanted to 
lay his head down and get some rest.  He did not want to proceed to the 
hotel where some stranger claiming to be his sister awaited.  He didn't 
want to face her, knowing that if she was Samantha, he had given up on 
her.

Releasing a long, weary breath, he unlocked his car and drove away.



END OF CHAPTER TWO

NOTE:  There was some discrepancy as to when Bill Mulder and CSM first 
got involved in the Project.  In "Apocrypha" it seemed they were firmly 
entrenched in it in the mid-1950s, but in "Musings of a CSM" CSM didn't 
get involved until 1963, the year Kennedy was assassinated.

Being the author, I reserve the right to pick and chose which facts 
suit my purposes when what is considered "canon" contradicts itself.  
And I feel that in the mid-1950s, even if they were born in the '30s, 
CSM and Bill Mulder would have been 20-something, which seems *awfully* 
young for the kind of responsibility they were being given.  So even 
though I pretty much thumb my nose at any other material established in 
"Musings," I did chose to use their time-frame for when CSM got 
involved in the Project.



CHAPTER THREE - Revelation


Mulder glanced cautiously over at the woman on the sofa.  She had not 
moved nor spoken for over an hour, since Scully had left after 
retrieving a sample of her blood.  She sat still, unconsciously rubbing 
the bandage on her arm and staring into space.  He poured a cup of 
coffee from the miniature pot supplied in the hotel room and offered it 
to her.  She accepted without comment.

Several times he opened his mouth to speak, then closed it again, 
unsure of what to say.  He had so many questions he needed to ask her, 
but no clear idea of where to begin.  What had she been doing all these 
years?  What were her children like?  What were her interests, her 
likes and dislikes?  What had she studied in school?  Where did she 
work?

He couldn't bring himself to ask her any of these things, though.  
Instead, he stared out the window in silent, awkward concentration.  It 
was a small consolation that the woman across the room appeared to be 
experiencing the same discomfort.  From time to time, he would hear her 
draw a breath as if in preparation to say something, then release it in 
a frustrated sigh.

If he were honest with himself, he could admit to a deeper motivation 
for his reluctance to open communications with her.  He could not shake 
the sense of wariness that had lead him to cease searching for her, the 
hesitation to open himself up once more to possible heartbreak.  To 
open himself and Scully up to more of the danger and frustration that 
always seemed to accompany his search for his sister.  Until he knew 
for certain that she was who she claimed to be, he wasn't sure he 
*could* reach out to her.  Doing so would only mean it would hurt all 
that much more when the disappointment came.

*     *     *     *     *

Their arrival at the hotel had been tense and charged.  Mulder had 
asked to speak with the manager, dropped Frohike's name, and gotten 
them checked into a suite with very little difficulty.  The hotel was 
one of those residence-type places that catered to traveling business 
people, which meant they had a kitchenette as well as a separate 
bedroom off the main area.

"Mulder?" 

Scully's voice touched the back of his thoughts as he stared unseeing 
out the window of the second-floor hotel room.  Their guest had headed 
for the restroom the moment they arrived, leaving them alone in the 
main room.  The morning's clouds had broken apart just after noon to 
reveal a crystalline blue spring sky.  He leaned his forehead against 
the glass, letting the chilly surface soothe him, closing his eyes 
against the light.

"Are you all right?" She asked with gentle concern.

"I don't know," he replied, leaning into the curtains against the 
window.  "I don't know how to feel about this."

"Do you think it's her?" Scully pitched her voice low.

"I don't know," Mulder repeated, his tone rife with frustration, 
shrugging helplessly.

He paced away from the window and flung himself into a chair.

"I can't help but ponder the irony," he told Scully, a self-mocking 
smile twisting his lips.  "I've spent my whole life looking for my 
sister, but whenever someone shows up with her face, I can't trust 
her."

"Mulder--"

"Maybe it would be different if I had actually found her," he added, 
frowning.  "Maybe then I could believe it."  He scrubbed his hands 
wearily over his face.

Scully, ever the voice of reason, pointed out that they couldn't make 
any assumptions.  "If we do that, we're likely to miss something.  And 
if what she says is true, that could be disastrous."

Mulder concurred unhappily, his fingers worrying a loose string in the 
upholstery on the arm of his chair.  "But if what she's saying isn't 
true, we could be placing ourselves in jeopardy," he muttered, chewing 
the inside of his cheek.

Scully's bright head nodded in reluctant agreement.  She had a valid 
point, but so did he.  There wasn't going to be a happy medium here.  
And their choice was already made by virtue of the simple fact that it 
was their job to protect those who couldn't protect themselves, even at 
personal risk.

"We should get a blood sample," Scully proposed, "and get the rest of 
her story.  If something doesn't gel, it should become apparent pretty 
quickly."

It was at that unfortunate moment that their guest chose to emerge from 
the restroom.

"What do you want to know?" She asked harshly from the doorway, 
startling them both.  Mulder stood, feeling himself stiffening, his 
posture defensive, when just seconds before he had been relatively 
relaxed.  He was appalled to realize he had actually taken a step back.

The woman claiming to be Samantha shook her head with bitter irony, her 
eyes focusing on Scully.  "I'm supposed to feel safe with you, but you 
don't believe me enough to accept who I am without a blood sample, 
right?" Her eyes darted accusingly in Mulder's direction as well, 
before returning to Scully.  "Well, here's one for you...how do I know 
I can trust *you*?  I don't know you, Agent Scully.  I took an enormous 
leap of faith going anywhere with you this morning, based only on what 
a group of UFO fanatics had to say about the work you do with my 
brother."

Mulder watched her blink back tears angrily as she faced them, her 
hands on her hips.  "Fox, of all the times...of all the times I've 
imagined what it would be like to finally find you again...this isn't 
anything like I thought it would be.  I feel as though I'm being 
punished for something I never did."  She pressed her lips tightly 
together for a moment, then she looked down at the floor, her 
expression defeated.  "Maybe that shouldn't surprise me as much as it 
does."

Damn, Mulder thought tiredly.  This was not the most auspicious of 
beginnings.  He particularly didn't care for the way she was glaring at 
Scully.

He drew a calming breath, trying to sound more rational than he felt.  
"Samantha--" the name fell off his tongue awkwardly, uncomfortably, "--
I'm sorry if this offends you, or hurts you, but you have to understand 
that Agent Scully and I have to protect ourselves.  The unfortunate 
fact is that we have very good reason to be leery.  What's more--" he 
drew another breath, "--if you cooperate with us, it could also end up 
helping us help you with your problem.  While we know about the 
abductions and the conspiracy around them, we have yet to find the hard 
and damning proof needed to see those responsible held accountable.  If 
we find that, we may be able to put an end to the threats you're 
receiving."

"If I'm telling the truth, you mean?"  She didn't wait for an answer.  
"Fine, you can have your blood sample, Agent Scully.  Just say when.  
Now, what else do you want from me?"

Mulder explained to her that they needed to know what she remembered, 
what had happened to her since she was eight years old.  She eyed them 
both with a sort of sad resentment until he finished speaking."First I 
want to know what you meant when you said there had been other people 
claiming to be me," she demanded.  "I think if my word is going to be 
doubted, I at least have the right to know why."

Mulder sighed and began to explain about the alien/human hybrids they 
had encountered, cloned of Samantha's genetic material.

By the time he was finished, she was staring at him in surprise, her 
eyes darting to Scully.  "You're not serious..."

Mulder didn't answer, and Scully sat back without protesting.  They 
each had their own separate theories on what exactly they had seen, but 
it wasn't a good time to go into it all.

Silence settled among them as Samantha digested what she had been told.  
After a moment, Mulder spoke again.

"Can you tell us what you remember?" he prompted, bringing them back to 
their original topic.

Falteringly, she began to speak, starting from the time she had come to 
live with her foster parents at the age of fourteen.

"I don't remember what happened before then.  I felt like I was running 
away, but I didn't know from what.  I had been ill for several weeks, 
they told me, after coming to live with them.  The doctor said that my 
prolonged illness might have induced amnesia.  There was also the 
possibility of psychological trauma.  I suffered anxiety attacks for 
many years after that time."

That would make sense, Mulder thought, if it was true that she had run 
away from where she had lived, or been held, on April Air Force Base in 
California.

She nodded. "I started to feel safe again," she continued, "to the 
point that I could begin to rebuild my life, until they took me to meet 
this man. They told me he was my father and I remembered him.  The 
moment I saw him, he was the most familiar thing in the world to me.  
And then I remembered you, Fox, and our parents, but not as much as I 
did him.  Back before I was taken, we used to call him Uncle Charlie."

"*Uncle* Charlie?"  Mulder stared at her, perplexed.

"You don't remember him?  He used to hang around with our family a lot 
when we were kids.  He said that was so he could be near us without 
revealing he was actually my father."

"No, I don't."  He glanced over at Scully.  "Think it's another alias?"

"No," Scully replied, shaking her head.  "I didn't have a chance to 
tell you, but I did some digging and found his full name.  Charles 
Geoffrey Burke."

"Hitler, Stalin, Manson, Burke..." Mulder chanted the names like a 
bitter litany.

One side of Scully's mouth lifted in acknowledgment and he turned his 
attention back to Samantha.

"What do you remember about the places and the people before your 
foster parents?"  Mulder asked.  "Where were you taken?  What did you 
see there?"

Her tale was identical to many they had heard before, filled with vague 
recollections of cold, white places or dark, terrifying rooms with 
strange shapes and tormentors she couldn't see.

"Mainly, I just remember the pain.  The tests.  I remember being 
treated like I was nothing but a cadaver to be dissected, and being 
helpless to stop them, or even protest.  I don't remember any aliens 
specifically, but in retrospect, I would guess that some of the 
technology I saw wasn't manufactured in Taiwan."

"Do you remember...that man, your father, being a part of that time?"

"No," she shook her head in denial.  "I had no idea he might have been 
involved until after I met you and you told me he had been lying to me.  
When I met him, when I was a teenager, he told me that I had been 
injured severely and had been very ill for several years.  He told me 
that you and our parents were gone, that he would take care of me, and 
that I must always trust him, no matter what anyone might say.  And so 
when he brought me to you and you said he had been lying all along...I 
didn't want to believe it."

Mulder frowned at the memory of the night he had met a woman he had 
believed to he his sister in an out of the way diner.  She had left him 
and never contacted him again.

"Fox, I'm sorry," the woman across from him said softly.  "I wanted to 
call you, I did, but he had told me you were in danger.  He told me 
that if I got involved with you, I might jeopardize myself or my 
family.  It didn't occur to me much later that he might have lied about 
that too, and by the time it did, the threats had started."

She pushed her hair back behind her ears and looked away, her hands 
fidgeting restlessly in her lap.  Her hostility of a while ago had 
faded, and all of a sudden, she simply looked defeated.  Mulder felt 
his heart clench in response.  Something within him, more likely than 
not relating directly to his sister's abduction, had a very difficult 
time dealing with women in need or distress in a detached manner.  The 
urge to offer comfort and protection and reassurance was simply too 
strong within him.  He was scared, so very scared of this woman, but 
her despair undermined his ability to separate himself from her.

She sighed, looking up at them with a weary expression.  "I'm tired," 
she murmured.  "Is there anything else you need from me?"

Scully looked back, studying the woman, though not without some 
sympathy.  "Actually, I do," she replied.  Mulder bit his lip, knowing 
what was coming next.  "If you don't mind, I need to take a look at the 
back of your neck."

She wanted to know why, and Mulder explained patiently about the 
implants commonly found in people who had been abducted.  Sighing, she 
leaned forward and allowed Scully to inspect her neck, and she looked 
at Mulder over Samantha's head and nodded solemnly.

"What do you see?" A hint of hysteria colored the woman's tone.  "Is 
something there?"

Mulder's grimace conveyed his reply.  Scully returned to her own chair, 
rubbing her hands unconsciously on her thighs.

"Can you remove it?"  Samantha's hand flew to the back of her neck, 
nervously touching the spot Scully had examined.

"No!" He and Scully spoke at the same time with identical expressions 
of alarm.

They rushed to explain to her the possible repercussions of removing 
the implant, the possible development of a terminal illness.  Samantha 
had fallen into a troubled silence when they were finished, and Scully 
had risen to leave.  She would need supplies to take the blood sample 
from Samantha.  She would retrieve what was needed, return to take the 
sample, and then head into the Bureau labs.  

Mulder rose and walked with her to the door, his hand resting 
intimately between her shoulder blades, touching her for no other 
reason than to comfort himself in the midst of his confusion.  Scully 
pulled her coat out of the closet and reached into the pocket to 
withdraw a small pistol.  "She had this in your apartment when I found 
her.  I think you should keep it...just in case."

He nodded and set the gun on the top shelf of the closet before 
stepping out into the hallway with her, closing the door gently behind 
them.  "How did you learn Cancerman's real name?" He asked.

"I spoke to Lacey Winters," she replied, "I thought I might be able to 
get more information on how far back she went with Spender...I mean 
Burke."

"Did you?"

She nodded.  "Um hmm.  Your mother went to high school with him."

"Frohike's going to be crushed," Mulder murmured.  "He thought the man 
grew up in the mid-west."

"Frohike also said that he pulled the trigger on JFK, so what did you 
expect?" she retorted.  She stroked his arm soothingly, her eyes 
concerned.  "Are you sure you can handle this, Mulder?"

"Yeah, yeah," he muttered.  "It's just disturbing.  I mean, how could I 
not remember that man being a part of our lives?  I thought it was only 
my memories of Samantha's disappearance that were gone, but now..."

She gave him a small smile, her eyes soft and sympathetic.  "We'll 
figure it out," she reassured him, reaching out to cup his jaw.  Her 
hand fell away and she pulled herself up, resuming her brisk demeanor.  
"Look, I've got to get going.  I'll be back when I can."

She had turned from Mulder's disconsolate expression and walked 
purposefully down the corridor.  Mulder watched her leave, his eyes 
troubled.  Only after she was gone did he remember he hadn't asked her 
why she had requested he come home the previous night.  Sighing, he 
turned back and unlocked the door with his key-card, entering the room 
where the stranger who claimed to be his sister awaited.

*     *     *     *     *

Mulder was startled out of his reverie when Samantha finally moved, 
rising and crossing to the closet where she had hung her coat when they 
had arrived.  He watched with interest as she fumbled in the pocket and 
pulled out a brown prescription bottle.  She took a pill from it and 
left the bottle on the counter, returning to her seat and swallowing 
the pill with a mouthful of coffee.

"Epilepsy," she told him, meeting his questioning stare.  "It's pretty 
minor, for the most part, and easily controlled with medication.  Once 
or twice, I've had a couple of bad seizures, but I haven't had one 
since...autumn of 1994, I believe.  Every time I stop the medication, 
though, they come back.  I'm going to need to eat soon.  I have to 
follow a pretty careful diet and eating schedule to avoid precipitating 
seizures and that's been hard to do since I ran away."

"I can run out and grab us something," he offered.  "I think it would 
be best for you to lay low, stay out of sight."

He walked to the closet and pulled out the pistol he had placed on the 
top shelf.  His own weapon was in his ankle holster.

"I'm going to give this back to you," he told her, holding it toward 
her by the barrel.  "If anyone walks through that door that's not me or 
Scully, don't take any chances.  Get out if you can, shoot if you must, 
got it?"

She nodded solemnly, her eyes wide.  He tried to give her a reassuring 
smile, which came out as an awkward grimace.  Then he turned and left 
before she could say anything else.

When he returned, she had taken the seat by the window, the pistol 
lying in her lap.  Her head leaned against the drapes, her eyes closed.  
She jerked upright as he opened the door, grasping instinctively for 
the pistol, which skittered out of her lap.  Mulder's relief that he 
had left the safety on the thing was short lived as, for the first time 
since she had arrived that morning, he actually looked at her and saw 
*her*.

That clenching sensation in his chest came back full force as he saw 
the dark rings around her eyes, the hollows of her cheeks, the way her 
breath came rapid and shallow and her eyes darted around the room in 
panic as she attempted to calm herself.  She hadn't been lying when she 
told him she hadn't slept in months, nor when she had told them she was 
afraid.  He doubted anyone was so good an actress as to simulate the 
fear he had seen on her face before she had realized he was the 
intruder.  He felt a softening within him, the hard walls he had 
constructed against her becoming just a little weaker than they had 
been moments before.

"I, uh...I got some food," he told her needlessly, setting the bag of 
submarine sandwiches on the counter as she stooped to retrieve the gun 
she had dropped.  She set it carefully on the coffee table and crossed 
the room to study the food he had brought.

"Thank you," she replied as she crossed the room to join him.  "I 
didn't stop for food much.  I felt I had to keep moving, or whoever was 
following me might catch up."

"We'll be safe here, I think," he reassured her.  "At least for a few 
days."

She nodded, her movements rushed and urgent as she unwrapped the 
sandwich and bit into it.  She opened one of the 20-oz. bottles of 
water he had grabbed and took a long gulp.  Sighing happily, she took 
her sandwich and beverage over to the sofa.

Mulder ate more slowly, watching her surreptitiously in the awkward 
silence.  Her attention was focused completely on the food, sparing him 
the necessity of speaking until their meal was over.

"So, Fox," she said conversationally, finishing the last of her 
sandwich, "are you planning to simply not speak to me until we find out 
how to stop the threats?  That could get rather awkward, don't you 
think?"  She gave him a shrewd glance.  For the first time he realized 
he recognized that expression as one their mother had often assessed 
them with.

"Sorry," he muttered, staring at a stain on the rug next to his chair.  
"I guess I'm still trying to get used to what's happened.  Give me some 
time."

"You're not even interested in what has happened in my life all these 
years?  I'm certainly interested in yours."

He shook his head.  "No, no...it's not like that.  It's just--" he 
paused, grimacing and angry with himself.  How did he go about gently 
explaining that he had written her off?  "Shortly after Mom died, 
someone tried to convince me to stop looking for you by making me 
believe you were dead.  I was nearly killed in the process.  If Scully 
hadn't been there, I would have died.  After that, I had to give some 
serious thought to the question of whether or not continuing my search 
was worth the risks to me...and to Scully."

"And what did you decide?"

He took a deep breath and forced himself to look her in the eyes.  
"That I wasn't going to jeopardize Scully or myself anymore, even if it 
meant giving up the search."

Stunned, she blew out her breath in a shaky exhalation.  "I see."

"I'm sorry, Samantha." For the first time, he found himself about to 
call her by his sister's name without thinking that it might be a lie.  
Perhaps it didn't matter who this woman was, so long as he made the 
confession.

Visibly disturbed, she gathered up their wrappers and napkins and 
walked into the kitchenette to dispose of them.  Then she walked toward 
the bedroom, announcing her intention to get some sleep.  In the 
doorway, she paused, looking back at him.  "Do you think we'll be all 
right?" she asked uncertainly.

"We'll take care of you, Samantha," he replied with equal gravity.  "I 
promise."

She nodded once, a short, jerky movement of acknowledgement, which in 
no way negated the worry in her eyes, and turned from him to disappear 
in the bedroom.

Mulder decided to take advantage of her absence to get some of the 
sleep he had missed the night before.  But despite his exhaustion, 
sleep was not soon in coming.  He lay on the sofa, staring at the 
ceiling, his thoughts spinning.  He hadn't had a moment alone to 
consider all that had happened in the last eight hours.  He'd been 
running on sheer gut reaction from the moment that he had entered that 
Mexican diner and saw her there.  Sometimes he envied Scully's ability 
to think rationally in the midst of chaos.

If Scully's test determined that the woman sleeping in the other room 
was Samantha, it was going to open up a whole can of worms he hadn't 
ever considered.  He had always thought that when he found her, he 
would be rescuing her, that once he found her, she would be safe.  For 
some reason, the idea that he might have to go on the lam to protect 
her had never occurred to him.  That wasn't what was supposed to happen 
in his little happy-ever-after fantasy.

The fact that he had given up on her was now a source of deep remorse 
for him. The guilt of being unable to act the night she had been taken 
from him had haunted him his entire life.  The guilt of the knowledge 
that he had *refused* to act while she might still be alive was 
something he wasn't sure he'd be able to bear.

He realized with some irony that looking for Samantha all these years 
had been the easy part.  Figuring out what to do with her once she was 
found was not nearly so simple.  Typical, he thought with a snort.

His thoughts turned inevitably to Scully, wondering what she was doing, 
what she was finding.  They were quite often required to work 
separately, to cover more ground than they could together, and they 
accepted that fact as part of what made them a team, a crucial element 
to why they worked so well together in the first place.  But to sit 
here, essentially useless, while Scully was out finding the answers was 
not something he accepted easily or gracefully.  

The arrival of Samantha had changed the way they were forced to 
operate, however.  As long as she remained in danger, either Scully or 
himself would remain grounded out of necessity, meeting the 
requirements of protecting her.  And it was logical that he should be 
that person.  She was, or might possibly be, his sister and he should 
welcome the opportunity to connect with her once more.  And perhaps he 
would, in a day, or a week, when the doubts had been laid to rest and 
the discomfort between he and Samantha abated.  But not now, not when 
she still made him so uneasy.

Troubled, he finally surrendered to the persistent heaviness of his 
eyelids and drifted into sleep.

*     *     *     *     *

Scully pulled out of the parking ramp to the J. Edgar Hoover building 
just as the sun was preparing to set.  Luckily it was a Saturday and 
she would not have to contend with commuter traffic on the way back to 
Baltimore.

Samantha's blood, which had thankfully been the normal red of a healthy 
human being, had turned up nothing alarming in her preliminary tests.  
The DNA test would take a while longer, but at this point Scully could 
find nothing unusual, and though far from conclusive, the woman did 
have the same blood-type as Mulder.

She anxiously scanned her rear-view mirror for any indication that she 
was being followed.  Taking a circuitous route, she returned first to 
her apartment to gather what would be needed for an overnight stay at 
the hotel.  Luckily, Mulder still had his travel bag from his trip 
north, so she wouldn't have to make a trip to his place.

She watched her mirror the entire drive, with no hint of a tail.  
Pulling onto the off-ramp, she headed for the Asian take-out restaurant 
she had called an order in to before leaving.  It wasn't in the best of 
neighborhoods, but she had been there once before and it did boast the 
best spring-rolls she had ever found.  Parking the car, she went inside 
to collect her food, passing a group of raucous youths loitering by the 
pay phone.  She emerged from the dive with a paper bag in each hand and 
set one on the hood of her car while she fumbled in her purse for her 
keys.

A car came careening around the corner, drawing her immediate 
attention.  It rode low to the ground with detailing in the shape of 
flames down the sides.  The darkly tinted window in the back of the 
passenger side rolled down and something shiny and black emerged.

"Get down!!!" She shouted at the teenagers hanging out nearby.  Scully 
dove for the ground, at the same time going for her weapon while the 
bullets started to fly.

It was over in an instant...a torrent of bullets accompanied by the 
shattering of windows and the ultra-sonic whine of ricocheting 
projectiles that stopped as abruptly as it had started, with the car 
screeching out of sight.  With her pulse drumming deafeningly in her 
ears, Scully rose to her knees, anxiously surveying the scene.

She had fortunately warned the teens in time.  Two were hit, but 
neither mortally.  The windows of the take-out joint had seen better 
days, but the only real casualty on the scene was her bags of food.

By the time the police arrived, Scully was already using towels 
obtained from the restaurant to tend to the two wounded boys.  She was 
grateful for the activity.  It kept her mind off what had nearly 
happened.  A full dozen bullet-holes riddled the wall she had been 
standing near before she saw the car come around the corner.

Numbly, she went through the standard routine of giving them her 
statement, telling them what she had seen and what details she could 
make out.  No, she didn't catch the license plate.  No, she couldn't 
see their faces.  It was well past sundown by the time she had 
finished, sitting in a booth across from the patrolman, with a small 
cup of tea before her.

"You need to get your head checked out," he commented, closing his 
pocket-sized notepad.  "Want me to call the paramedics or give you a 
lift to Emergency?"

"Hmm?" Distracted, Scully lifted her fingers to touch her scalp just 
above her temple and to her surprise felt the sting of salty skin 
against a fresh wound.  Her fingertips came away with brown flecks of 
dried blood on them.  Feeling slightly nauseous, she shook her head.  
"No, thanks, that's all right.  I've got a first aid kit in my car.  
It's just a scratch."

"You got lucky.  Gang related crime in this neighborhood has been on 
the rise for months."

"At least no one got killed," she murmured.  "I'd better get going.  
I've got people expecting me."

The restaurant was closed now, so there would be no food to replace 
what she had picked up earlier, she thought with a grimace.  She should 
just go back to the hotel and send Mulder out for something.  Or maybe 
order a pizza delivered...She was so hungry her hands were shaking.

Oh, God.  Her breath left her in a rush as she sat behind the steering 
wheel of her car, which had miraculously escaped unscathed.  Krycek's 
warning from the night before came back to haunt her.

*If you don't keep your head down and your eyes open, you're not going 
to make it through the weekend...*

It didn't mean anything, she thought firmly.  This shooting was a 
pretty open and shut case of gang violence.  The kids loitering outside 
the restaurant had been wearing colors and drive-by shootings were the 
calling card of the ever-more violent street gangs.  There was no 
reason to think it was anything other than pure coincidence.

Except the concentration of fire right where you were standing, Dana, 
she reminded herself.  Except for the fact that you were warned just 
twenty-four hours ago and are even now in possession of some extremely 
sensitive files.

Angrily, she started the car and sped from the parking lot before she 
had a chance to think about the ramifications too deeply.

*     *     *     *     *

At Scully's quiet request, Mulder opened the door and stood aside to 
allow her to enter.  She plodded into the suite with the leather 
attache case in one hand, an overnight bag thrown over her shoulder, 
and a gym-bag in the other hand.  Weighted down, she nudged her way 
past him to drop the two bags in the luggage nook, where his own travel 
case had already taken up residence.  She set the briefcase on the 
utilitarian writing desk against one wall and finally turned to face 
him.

"Jesus, Scully, what happened to you?" he asked, alarm ripping through 
his body.

"Just a friendly run-in with the neighborhood gang-bangers," she 
muttered, dropping into a chair.  "Order us a pizza, Mulder, would you?  
I'm starved and our take-out fell victim to random street violence."

He nodded, filling a glass of water in the small kitchenette area on 
one end of the main room and bringing it to Scully.  Using an assumed 
name, he then proceeded to order a pizza delivered to their room, half 
sausage and cheese, the other half pepperoni, onions and mushrooms.  
When he had finished, he looked back over at Scully to see her sitting 
still, her eyes half-closed.  As he approached, they opened the rest of 
the way.

"She asleep?" Scully asked, her voice tired.  He reached her chair and 
lifted her chin to take a good look at the gash on her temple.  It was 
covered in a great deal of dried blood, making an accurate assessment 
difficult.  He produced a wet cloth from the kitchenette and began to 
dab at it while Scully sat pliant under his ministrations.

"Yeah, she's been passed out for hours," he murmured.  "What happened?"

He listened carefully as she ran down the details of the drive-by 
shooting quickly and dispassionately.  A strong remnant of unease 
lingered in her eyes, a tiny frown drawing her finely arched brows 
together.

"Where's your first aid kit?" He asked when she had finished her 
recitation.  She hesitated and Mulder prepared himself for an argument 
over who got to disinfect and slap a bandage on her wound.  After a 
moment, though, she informed him that she had taken it out of her trunk 
and put it in the gym-bag she had brought.  Then she sat obediently 
still as he swabbed at the cut with alcohol, only a soft hiss escaping 
her lips at the first contact.  As he worked, Scully gestured to the 
attache case on the desk.

"Guess who gave me that?"

"Is it safe to assume it wasn't the Easter Bunny?"

"Krycek," she answered, her voice flat.  "He accosted me in the parking 
ramp last night."

"Krycek?" Mulder froze in the act of opening an adhesive bandage and 
stared at her with alarm.  Then he nodded in sudden understanding.  
"That's why you called me."

"He was sent to give me the files in that case.  Mulder," the gravity 
of Scully's tone drew his immediate and undivided attention, "they're 
Operation Paperclip files."

Mulder's breath left him in a rush.  He quickly completed his task of 
affixing the bandage to her temple to cross the room to open the 
briefcase and study the stack of files within.  "Your file is in here, 
Scully.  And Samantha's."

She nodded.  "And Betsy Hagopian's.  I've got the boys working on 
putting together any information they can dig up on everyone in there. 
With the exception of the file with my name on it, they all contain 
forms filled out when the subjects were children.  Samantha's file has 
forms dated during the mid-1970s, the timeframe of her abduction.  Age 
and sex vary from subject to subject.  The only other commonality I 
could find was that they were all treated as teenagers and young adults 
for anxiety, depression, and epilepsy."

"Max Fenig had epilepsy," Mulder stated, flipping absently through each 
file while he listened to her.  He was not the medical doctor and the 
amount of information he could glean from them was extremely limited.  
"So does Samantha."

"So I saw."

"But that's not a factor in all abductions," he pointed out.  "You're 
not epileptic."

"About seventy-five percent of epileptic seizures start in childhood," 
Scully replied.  "Three-quarters of all cases are idiomatic.  In 1996, 
researchers at Stanford discovered a link between specific types of 
epilepsy and certain genes.  But all told, only about twenty-eight 
percent of cases can be linked to a specific trauma or cause."

"Personally, I can't think of many things more traumatic than being 
abducted, Scully," Mulder said with a hint of irony.  "Do you think 
there's a correlation between child abductees and the subsequent 
development of epilepsy?"

"Well, we have no proof, but the fact that we were given these 
particular files seems suggestive," she answered thoughtfully.

"Why include your file?"

Scully shrugged.  "If I had to guess, I'd say it was to get my 
attention."

"Any idea why--?"

"None whatsoever."

Further conversation was disrupted by the arrival of their pizza.  
Mulder paid cash and tipped the driver generously.  Only a moment 
later, a yawning Samantha emerged from the bedroom, looking decidedly 
rumpled.

"Just in time," Mulder greeted her.  "Sausage or pepperoni?"

"Sausage," Samantha mumbled, rubbing her eyes.  Mulder nodded, meeting 
Scully's eyes in a significant glance.  The sausage was his part of the 
pizza, the pepperoni Scully's.  "Good evening, Agent Scully."

"Hello." He watched as Scully greeted Samantha with friendly reserve.  
Samantha's initial hostility toward her seemed to have abated this 
morning as she learned the depth and complexity of the issues they were 
dealing with, but she still regarded Scully with wary caution.  She 
wasn't much warmer to him yet either, Mulder thought wryly.  
Apparently, however, Scully had come to the same conclusion he had, 
that Samantha was going to need to trust them if they were to protect 
her, and so a gesture of goodwill seemed in order.  Which Scully made.

"I saw you didn't have any bags with you, Samantha, so I brought you 
some of my sister's clothes.  You're too tall for any of mine."

"Clean clothes?"  Any remaining reticence Samantha might have held 
toward Scully dissolved as she looked up from her pizza with 
undisguised pleasure.  "Oh, thank God.  Are you sure your sister won't 
mind?"

Scully cut her eyes briefly to Mulder, meeting his uncomfortable gaze 
before she answered.  

"My sister died four years ago," she replied softly.  "She was murdered 
by the same man we suspect killed your father.  I just never got around 
to giving some of her things to the thrift store."

"Oh."  Samantha blinked, stunned for a moment.  "I'm very sorry, Agent 
Scully.  I appreciate you allowing me to use her clothes."  She set her 
half-full plate on the coffee table and rose.  "I'll take care of the 
dishes," she offered, "so you can work on whatever you need to."

"Thank you, Samantha," Mulder murmured, allowing her to take his plate.  
She carried the dishes to the kitchenette and Mulder looked at Scully 
with concern.  "I'm sorry, Scully."

"Mulder, there's nothing to apologize for," she said calmly.  "I'm 
okay."

Sure there was something to apologize for.  Like that fact that if it 
weren't for Scully's involvement with him, Melissa might be alive and 
well today.  But he couldn't tell Scully that.  She would never allow 
him to accept the blame he knew was his.

Mulder leaned forward, narrowing the distance between them where they 
sat in their separate chairs and reached out, brushing a strand of hair 
back from her face.  His eyes flicked to the bandage on her forehead 
again.  "That was close," he whispered.

"Yeah," she replied.  "I know.  That's the second time a bullet's 
grazed my scalp."

"Really?  When was the other?"

"In your apartment, just before I shot you and took you to New Mexico."

He whistled, using levity to offset the chill fear that settled into 
his heart.  When he spoke, however, his voice was tight with the 
effort.  "Damn.  Living on the edge a little, aren't you?"

"Better hope the law of averages continues to be kind." Scully rose 
from her chair in an abrupt motion.  "I'm going to go take a shower," 
she announced, and grabbed her overnight bag and disappeared into the 
bathroom before he could say anything more.

Only when she had made it into the bathroom with the door shut firmly 
behind her did he lift a hand before his face, watching it shake.

*     *     *     *     *

"Agent Scully?" Samantha's voice broke hesitantly into her thoughts and 
she pulled herself out of her reverie to look up at the woman, who 
stood before her chair gnawing nervously on her bottom lip.  After 
Scully had emerged from the shower, Mulder had gone to the market to 
pick up some staples for them, so they would not be forced to survive 
on take-out until they could leave this place.  But not, however, 
before Samantha had extracted from him a promise to bring back a pint 
of Ben & Jerry's S'mores ice cream.

His absence meant that Scully and Samantha were left alone together in 
awkward silence.

"I, um...I just wanted to apologize for my behavior this morning," 
Samantha said as Scully waited for her to continue.  "It made me angry 
to hear I was being doubted after I had gone through so much to be 
here, but I was wrong.  I should have recognized that you and Fox were 
only trying to protect yourselves.  I came to you seeking protection, 
but I never realized that in doing so, I would be bringing my own 
danger to you."

"Samantha," the name felt odd and uncomfortable on her tongue, given 
the presence of her doubts, but Scully had to call her by some name, 
and the name of Mulder's sister was the only acceptable option for the 
time being.  "It's nothing personal, I promise you.  It's not even 
necessarily that I believe you might be deceiving us.  It could very 
well be that you aren't in control of what you are doing."

"The implant?" Samantha's hand reached up to rub the back of her neck, 
and Scully realized she had unconsciously done the same thing.

"Possibly," Scully answered, forcing herself to lower her hand.  She 
drew a deep breath and proceeded calmly, "I think you should be aware 
that I have one as well.  There has been at least one occasion where I 
have ended up doing something I would never consciously decide to do 
and didn't remember actually doing afterwards.  We don't completely 
understand what the implants are for and at this point, it would be 
foolish to underestimate what they are capable of.  When we tried to 
analyze mine, we ended up burning it out in the attempt, which limited 
how much data we could derive from it."

"You were abducted?"  Samantha's eyes widened with surprise and she 
sank down onto the sofa.

Scully nodded.  "Six years ago, about a year after I started working 
with Mulder.  I was missing for three months and shortly after I 
returned, I found the implant and had it removed."

"But you said if you removed them, you could die..." Samantha sat on 
the chair beside her, twisting a dishtowel in her hands.

"Yes, I know.  We didn't realize that at first.  The moment I saw it 
was there, I had it taken out.  Less than two years later, I developed 
a terminal brain tumor that only went into remission when another chip 
was implanted in my neck.  If we had been even a week later in 
discovering that, I would, in all likelihood, have been dead."

Samantha released a shaky breath.  "Well, if I wasn't afraid before, I 
certainly am now," she said.  "The idea that I might someday be 
compelled to do something without even knowing it...God, I'm not sure 
I'll ever be able to feel safe again."

Scully nodded in understanding.  "I know.  It's an idea that takes some 
adapting to."

Samantha lapsed into a troubled silence, and Scully closed her eyes 
against the persistent headache she'd had since she left the scene of 
the shooting that evening.  She was stunned to realize that, despite 
her reservations, she was already beginning to soften toward the woman 
claiming to be Mulder's sister.  There was something engaging about 
her; the fear and need for reassurance constantly lingering in her eyes 
brought forth every protective instinct Scully possessed and at this 
point, she herself was too emotionally involved with the search for 
Samantha Mulder to be immune to that.

She wanted this too badly, she realized with chagrin.  When she had 
taken Mulder's quest upon herself, she had assumed the same 
vulnerability he faced every day.  She had known that would have to be 
the case, thought she had prepared herself for it, but now...

There was only one option, then, she thought grimly.  She could not 
allow this to end badly.  The stakes were too high, the risks too 
great, for her to fail where Samantha was concerned.  It was the only 
way she could protect Mulder now.  The only way she could protect 
herself.

Mulder arrived just in time to rescue her from her own troubling 
ruminations.  He carried two grocery bags with him, setting them on the 
counter while Samantha, with a small sound of delight, began rooting 
through them for her ice cream.

"Anyone want any?" She offered with a winsome smile.

It was tempting, but Scully declined once she decided her stomach, 
abused as it was between the tension of the day and the greasy dinner, 
wasn't going to tolerate much more maltreatment.  Instead, she enjoyed 
the pleasure vicariously as Samantha indulged.

"My kids got me hooked on this stuff," she explained to Mulder while he 
put away the rest of the groceries, among which were generous 
quantities of fruit and some relatively fresh bagels.

Good boy, Scully thought with a secretive smile.

Once he completed his task, he settled on a chair across from Scully 
with a hardbound book in his lap.  She looked at it curiously.  "What 
are you reading?"

"Some journals my mother kept," he replied.  "I found them in a couple 
boxes in the attic of the Greenwich house.  After you told me about 
Cancerman going to school with my mother, I figured maybe they might 
give me some more insight into his involvement with our family.  Maybe 
I can find out what she wanted to tell me before she died.  Who knows?  
Maybe there won't be anything, but it's worth a shot."

"I remember," Samantha said wonderingly, approaching them.  "Mom taught 
me to keep a journal as soon as I could write."

Mulder nodded at her.  "You two used to sit down together every evening 
and make your entries together.  Actually, speaking of journals--"

He rose from his chair and crossed to the coat closet, removing from 
the pocket of his trench coat a small book.  Scully recognized it 
immediately.  She didn't believe it had left Mulder's possession for a 
moment since he had found it two months ago.  "Do you recognize this?"

He handed it to Samantha and she opened it, perusing the pages. "I 
don't think so..." she answered, frowning in concentration.  Her head 
lifted suddenly, her face full of surprise.  "This is my handwriting!" 
she gasped.  "I wrote this?"

He nodded.  "The date would indicate that you were fourteen at the 
time.  I wasn't sure if the book was genuine or not, though."

"I don't remember having a diary like this," she told him.  "But it 
must be mine.  This is definitely my penmanship."  She paused, stroking 
the cover.  "Where did you find it?"

"In a house on an Air Force base in California," he answered, watching 
her expression as she flipped through the pages, not reading, but 
scanning each as if unsure they were real.  "It could still be a 
forgery."

"But maybe not, right?"

"Right."

"Do you mind if I keep this, read it?  Maybe it might help me 
remember..." her voice trailed off uncertainly, her eyes worried and 
unsure.

"Yeah, go ahead," he said, shrugging awkwardly.  "It's um, your diary, 
I guess."

She nodded distractedly, turning to the first entry, her lips moving 
silently as she read.  Only moments later, she excused herself to take 
a bath, taking the journal with her.  Mulder stared thoughtfully after 
her, pinching his bottom lip.

"I'll make us some tea," he announced finally, rising in one fluid 
movement from where he had crouched on the floor while he gave Samantha 
the diary.  He banged around the kitchenette for a moment before 
producing a kettle from one of the lower cabinets.  He filled it with 
water and set it on the electric burner on the small stove, then 
returned to the living room, taking up a chair beside her as she 
scrutinized him.

"How are you holding up?" She asked finally.

"Good," he said, exhaling loudly.  "Better than I expected really.  I 
mean, I know I shouldn't get my hopes up, but the more I'm around her, 
the more familiar she seems to me."

"How so?"

"She's got a lot of my mom's mannerisms...gestures, facial expressions, 
chocolate addiction...learned behaviors children pick up from their 
parents in their earliest formative years," he explained, shrugging.  
"I don't know...maybe I'm just seeing what I want to see."

"There's nothing wrong with hoping, Mulder," Scully said soothingly.  
"I just think maybe we should be prepared for what it could mean for 
us, whether she turns out to be your sister or not.  Either way, there 
are going to be some big decisions that need to be made."

"I know...I know," Mulder nodded, biting his lip distractedly.  She 
watched his profile as his gaze wandered off into space for a long 
moment.  He stood abruptly and returned to the kitchenette, where the 
water he had set on the stove was beginning to boil.  Silently, Scully 
observed as he made two cups of tea, leaving the water to simmer in 
case Samantha should also want one, and brought them back to the sofa.

"For what it's worth," she began, gratefully accepting the mug he 
handed her, "my preliminary tests turned up nothing unusual in 
Samantha's blood-work.  She's even got your blood type.  We'll have a 
better picture of things when the DNA analysis gets back, but so far it 
looks pretty good."

Scully took a cautious sip and set her cup on the coffee table to allow 
it to cool.  Rising, she wove around the coffee and chairs to cross to 
the closet where a spare blanket and pillow were piled onto the top 
shelf.  Standing on tiptoe, she pulled them down, nearly toppling them 
over on her head before she managed to catch them.

Should've had Mulder do it, she thought wryly.  No doubt he considered 
it to be more than his life was worth to make the offer himself.

She blushed slightly as she heard him laugh softly behind her.  "You 
could've just asked, Scully," he taunted.

"If this is leading up to a little feet joke, Mulder, I'd advise you to 
start running now."  She cast him a narrow-eyed look of warning and he 
subsided, raising his hands in a warding-off gesture before him.

Tucking the pillow and blanket under one arm, she used her free hand to 
roughly tousle his hair as she passed by him once more.  He gave her a 
sly grin and unfolded his lean form, rising from the chair with feline 
grace.  He leaned over her shoulder as she spread the blanket out on 
the sofa.  "Can I read you a bedtime story?" he murmured close to her 
ear.  Too close.  A shiver slid over her skin and she closed her eyes 
and took a calming breath before turning to meet his twinkling eyes, 
her face mere inches from his.

"Which will it be, Mulder?" She intentionally dropped her voice to a 
husky murmur.  "Daniel Defoe or John Cleland?"

"D.H. Lawrence?" he supplied hopefully, but the teasing sparkle in his 
eyes had transformed into something a little less comfortable, and 
Scully licked her lips nervously.  His full lower lip was dangerously 
accessible, stationed just a little beneath his chin as she was.  
Something wild and reckless took off within her brain.  Maybe it was 
simply survivor's euphoria after her brush with death this evening, but 
at this very moment, she didn't much care for the carefully abided-by 
boundaries they had set for themselves.

He started it, by God, so why shouldn't she see how far he was willing 
to go with it?

Awareness of their surroundings and circumstances fled, if only for an 
instant.  It seemed such instants were the stuff their lives were made 
of, to be taken advantage of when they occurred.  She met his gaze 
steadily, cocking an eyebrow, daring him.

Come on, Mulder.  Show me what you're made of.  Are you all talk?

Her eyes silently challenged him as her hand slid up his neck to the 
side of his face, cupping his cheek.  Her thumb glided gently over his 
bottom lip.

He stared at her, transfixed, his eyes darkening to the warmest, 
richest brown.  His lips parted ever so slightly, kissing the pad of 
her thumb as she watched, mesmerized by the action.  She couldn't be 
certain, but she thought she felt the tip of his tongue touch her 
finger.  His breath warmed her skin as he rested his lips against the 
digit.

A hot knot of desire took up residence in the pit of Scully's stomach 
and she stared at him breathlessly, a little startled by the intensity 
of her own reaction.

A splash from the bathroom broke the spell and reality slowly settled 
back in.  Mulder's hand covered hers and pulled it away from his face, 
his fingers folding over hers as he held it up between them.  Her face 
flushed slightly with embarrassment at allowing herself to get carried 
away while they had other considerations.

"I've got guard duty," he said finally, his voice pitched much lower 
than his usual baritone as he released her hand.  He cleared his throat 
and backed away, but not before she had a pretty good idea of what her 
eyes might find if she chose to look down at that moment.  But his eyes 
had settled on her neck, and Scully realized he could see her pulse 
throbbing in the artery there.  Just inches lower, more blatant proof 
of her arousal strained against her blouse.

Good.  There was no misunderstanding here, then.  They both knew where 
the other stood.

Mulder picked up his mug and carried it to a chair on the other side of 
the room, near the window, as she turned back to finish preparing her 
bed on the sofa.  They fell silent, the charged tension of the moment 
still vibrating through the room.  When Scully looked over her shoulder 
at him, it was to find him watching her, his face mirroring her every 
thought.

It was a long, long time before she fell asleep.



CHAPTER FOUR - Exigency


His partner lay on the sofa, her bright head reclining on the pillow as 
Mulder sat by the window, pensively scanning the shadows of the parking 
lot below.  The soft sound of her breathing broke the pre-dawn silence 
of the room, smooth and even, peaceful and reassuring. The parking lot 
was maddeningly inactive, which left Mulder alone with his own 
thoughts. It wasn't exactly a state he cared to be in.  It meant he 
might have to actually think about Scully's close shave.

They both took risks.  It was part and parcel of who they were and what 
they did, and they went into the situation with their eyes fully open 
to the possibilities.  Collectively, they had dodged the proverbial 
bullet more times than he could count.  In some cosmically ironic way, 
it would be fitting that an act of random violence, in no way related 
to their work, should take one of them down.  But every time something 
like this happened to Scully, he felt himself go cold, shutting down 
thought and emotion for as long as it took for him to get used to the 
idea all over again.

Maybe he would he having a little easier time with last evening's near-
disaster if he didn't have the almost certain feeling that there was 
something Scully wasn't telling him.  Her expression had been carefully 
inscrutable as she told him about the drive-by shooting, but her eyes 
had continuously darted around the room, scanning every corner and 
shadow as if for some hidden threat.  Every muscle in her neck had been 
tight as a bowstring as he had tended her head wound.

He'd never survive it if something happened to her.  It wasn't 
romanticism or melodrama; it was just fact.  She was the best part of 
him and nothing else mattered to him but keeping her safe.  They had 
accepted that for now their journeys lay together, she perhaps more 
readily than he, but if he had one goal in his life now, it was to see 
Scully safely back upon the path she should have chosen long ago.  The 
path that led to a healthy, normal life.  The life she would never know 
with him.

And maybe, just maybe, he could join her in that life.  God knew he 
wanted it.  But he couldn't escape the idea that someday he would have 
to let go of her for her own good.  He couldn't allow her to lose 
anything more on his account.  But the thought that one day he would be 
required to let her go was enough to bring cold dread to his heart.

He had known a life of peace and happiness and normalcy and love, for 
too few brief years so long ago.  He'd basked in the affection of his 
parents and the reciprocated adoration of his little sister.  But on 
the day Samantha disappeared, all that had changed.

His parents had closed themselves off.  To each other, to him...there 
had been no way to breech the silence, the emptiness.  But what Mulder 
had never realized was that he had closed himself off too.  On the day 
he knew his parents' affections were withdrawn forever, he took a 
chapter from their book and shielded himself from pain by shielding 
himself from the very most basic emotions and needs of the rest of 
humanity.  He'd never loved anyone again.

Until Scully had come along, he'd never known how completely the love 
for one person could consume a soul.  There had been no way to keep 
Scully from penetrating the armor; she'd found a place within him and 
set up shop, resided there, day by day bringing him back from the 
depths of the emotionally dead.

Sadly, his eyes sought out the pale, slumbering form of his partner.  
Lying there asleep, blissfully unaware of the turmoil inside him, she 
looked almost angelic.  In the illumination of the parking lot outside, 
he could see the gentle curve of her lips, just this side of pouty.  
The sight stirred something within him and his mind, tired of the same 
old melancholy realities he'd accepted long ago, wandered back to what 
had transpired before she went to sleep.

He wanted her.  Beyond all the tenderness and devotion lay something 
more primal and instinctive.  As though what he felt for her couldn't 
be contained within his body and needed a physical outlet.  They had 
been moving slowly and steadily toward bridging that final gap between 
them for ages and tonight Scully had finally given him the sign that 
she was ready.

He didn't know what had changed, but he had watched it happen gradually 
since she had rescued him after he had been taken from the hospital 
during the illness that had almost killed him last autumn.  Day by day, 
he had witnessed her slowly opening up herself, like a flower 
unfurling.  He smiled in the darkness.  Hadn't she once said much the 
same thing to him?

It had happened when she stopped rejecting his theories out of hand.  
Her science was as much a defense mechanism as anything else.  Whenever 
Scully wasn't feeling secure, she resorted to it to close out the 
things that frightened her.  

It had happened when she had comforted him and grieved for him at his 
mother's death.  She had set her science and her rationalism aside to 
simply accept the truths he needed to know.  

It had happened when she opened herself up to the search for Samantha, 
taking up the standard he had allowed to fall.  For the first time in 
their seven year partnership, she had taken that mantle upon herself, 
knowing that however bizarre the facts she might encounter were, she 
had to find them, to find Samantha, for Mulder's sake.

It had happened tonight in this very room when she had touched him, 
when she had made a move that couldn't be construed as anything other 
than that of a lover slowly feeling her way.

If Samantha hadn't been in the hotel room with them, he would have made 
love to Scully tonight.  He would have lost himself in her softness and 
warmth and completed the final step on a journey that they had started 
unknowingly one morning seven years ago when a fresh-faced, much more 
innocent Scully had entered his office and firmly entrenched herself in 
his life and his heart.

Mulder stifled a sigh and leaned forward, laying his face against the 
cool glass of the window.  He'd be wiser not to consider this too long 
or hard.  That way lay madness...

He heard a sound behind him and turned from the comforting chill of the 
window to see Scully sitting up, her crystalline eyes reflecting the 
light from the parking lot.

"Good morning," he replied with a gentle smile at her.

"Mornin'." She yawned and nodded at him.  He wondered what had awakened 
her; it was still very early.

"Everything okay?  Your head--"

"It's fine, Mulder.  I'm okay."  She reached over to the end table to 
turn on the lamp.

"Then if you don't mind me asking, why are you awake?  It's still 
early."

She shrugged.  "I went to sleep early."

She looked adorably tousled; her hair just a little fluffier than he 
normally saw it, her eyes still half-lidded with sleep.  It wasn't a 
Scully he got to see very often.  Damned good thing, too, or he'd never 
be able to concentrate.  And after what had happened before she went to 
sleep, he was just a little too vulnerable to distraction...

"I had a dream."

The non sequitur brought him fully around to face her.  A troubled 
frown was etched across her forehead as she plucked restlessly at the 
blanket covering her lap.

"Is this leading up to a human-rights speech?" His attempt at levity 
merited a tiny smile gracing her lips.

"About my abduction."

He was out of his chair and crossing the room to her before he even 
realized what he was doing.  They sat facing each other, separated only 
by the distance of their legs between them.  The lamp behind her cast 
Scully in silhouette, making her features difficult to discern, and her 
hair glow like living fire as the light shone through it.

"What happened?" He asked softly.

She shook her head.  "I don't know.  It was...strange, Mulder.  More 
linear that what I usually experience.  I seemed to see and hear things 
in so much more detail than I normally can.  It was disturbing."

He studied her face intently as she looked away, searching for words.  
"I don't know," she sighed finally, bracing her elbow against the back 
of the sofa and leaning her head on her hand.  "Maybe it's just the by-
product of how much I've been thinking about Samantha lately, a 
subconscious projection of the things I have seen and heard about 
abductions, manifested in the form of dreams about my own experience."

Mulder gave her a lopsided grin.  "When'd you study psychology, 
Scully?"

She smiled back.  "I guess you're just rubbing off on me."

And speaking of distraction...

You've got a dirty mind, Fox Mulder.

He sought refuge from the images her statement invoked in self-
deprecating humor.  "Better go shower."

That earned him a small laugh, which drifted into silence as she turned 
introspective once more.  "Krycek said something I can't quite figure 
out," she told him, changing subjects.  "He said that the smoking man 
gave me much more than I realized when I went with him last week.  I 
don't know what that means."

"You can't think of anything he might have been referring to?"

She shook her head.  "No," she said finally.  A troubled frown drew her 
mouth downward.  "It doesn't matter, I guess.  It's not like Krycek is 
the most reliable of sources."

There it was again, that evasive, defensive look.  There was definitely 
something troubling her.  Something she wasn't sharing with him.  What 
wasn't she saying..?

He was still pondering how to broach the subject when Scully spoke 
again, breaking the silence.

"I never got to ask you how things went up north.  Did you get 
everything taken care of?"

Nice way to change the topic, Scully, he thought cynically.  But 
looking at her, he could read nothing in her eyes but genuine concern 
and interest.

"Yup."  He couldn't repress a look of gleeful satisfaction as he 
announced with relish, "I'm selling it all."

Scully whistled under her breath.  "You're not going to have to work 
for the FBI anymore once that check comes in."

"Yeah, well, don't start moving your things into my desk just yet.  
The, um, the plan has changed a little bit, in that the estate may have 
to be split in half now," he gestured to the bedroom where Samantha 
slept, "but my intentions are still the same.  After I pay the 
inheritance taxes, which, by the way, are not inconsiderable, I'm going 
to hook up with the boys to sock a portion of the proceeds away 
someplace untraceable, in case we ever lose contact with our resources 
here.  After that's done, the rest will be donated to the Center for 
Missing and Exploited Children."

Scully stared at him in astonishment, a sudden sparkle of tears 
touching her eyes.  "Mulder...that's wonderful."

He squirmed uncomfortably.  Her look was just a little too admiring for 
his taste.  "Well, it seemed appropriate."

They fell silent as they each considered the children they hadn't been 
able to save across the years.  Lucy Householder, a woman whose 
childhood had been stolen from her long before they ever encountered 
her.  Gibson Praise, still missing after two years, last seen in the 
company of a man who intended to see him returned to those who would do 
him harm.  Emily...

Mulder's mind skidded away from that one.  He had never been sure how 
to feel about Emily, a child conceived of Scully's ova, born and bred 
for an experiment, nothing more.  All he knew was that he had watched 
Scully's heart breaking for days and been completely unable to do 
anything about it.  He'd never felt more useless in his life and the 
knowledge that the tragedy had ever touched her only because he had 
become a part of Scully's life was a bitter pill for him to swallow.

Somehow, she never held it against him.  He was damned if he knew why 
not, but she didn't.  Not so himself, he recognized where the blame 
lay.  Scully's abduction, the death of her sister, her cancer, her 
infertility, her near-death of an alien virus, the discovery and 
subsequent loss of a daughter she had never known she had...all the 
responsibility lay on his shoulders.  Even her older brother knew it, 
but not Scully.  Or if she knew it, she never said as much.

There were a lot of things it seemed they never said.

*     *     *     *     *

"How's the search through Mom's journals going?" Samantha asked, 
lifting her head.

Agent Scully had gone to retrieve the results of the blood tests she 
had performed two days ago.  Samantha sat in a chair, her legs curled 
up beneath her, reading the journal she had allegedly written when she 
was fourteen.  Occasionally, something she found in the book brought 
back a childhood memory that she would discuss with Fox in a low voice. 
With fresh clothes and a couple healthy meals under her belt, she felt 
much less the hunted creature she had been two days ago when Agent 
Scully had first found her in Fox's apartment.

"I haven't found anything yet that I didn't already know," her brother 
shrugged.  "I started in 1954, when Mom graduated high school with um, 
that man, Burke, and have gotten through to 1958, the year she and Dad 
got married.  She jilted him for Dad, that much is sure, and not 
without some serious doubts about the decision, but so far I haven't 
come across anything mentioning his work for the government."

"Did you know he told me he worked for the IRS when I was young?" 
Samantha asked, unable to suppress the undercurrent of bitterness that 
colored her tone whenever she thought of all the lies her father had 
told her.  The Father of Lies, she thought cynically.  Fox and Agent 
Scully certainly appeared to hold him in league with the Devil.

"He's not quite that evil," Fox replied with a chuckle.  "Close, 
though."

"I'm still having a hard time wrapping my brain around the idea that 
he's responsible for all of it..." her voice trailed off sadly.  "I 
never even suspected."

She had spent most of the previous day playing question and answer with 
Fox and Agent Scully, learning from them what they knew of her 
abduction and the Project for which it had been carried out.  Learning 
of all the others who had suffered as much or worse than she had.

"There's no way you could have, Samantha," Fox reassured her.

"What was done to me is one thing," Samantha continued, her voice 
cracking with dismay.  "Maybe I could live with that, but to know it 
was done to so many others, done to innocent *children*...Knowing the 
way my life was nearly destroyed, all I went through before I could 
begin to heal...And now to learn that it's not even over!  I've got a 
neurological disorder that will never go away because of what he did.  
As long as I have to seek treatment for my epilepsy, I'll never be able 
to forget.  And neither will the other people abducted as children, not 
if what you and Agent Scully hypothesized is true."

Fox looked uncomfortable in the face of her distress, she realized.  
They had spent the last two days gradually feeling their way toward one 
another, but it was not unreasonable that Fox should not know how to 
comfort her just yet.  And really, she had no business unburdening 
herself on him at this time.

"Did you find anything about my abduction in Mom's journals?" She 
asked, changing the subject.

"The journals from 1973 aren't in here," Fox replied, picking through 
the stack.  "Here's one that ends in late 1972, but they don't pick up 
again until the end of '75."

"Which means that whatever Mom might have known about what happened to 
me is gone, right?"

"That's exactly what it means."  Fox sighed with disgust, tossing the 
book in his lap aside.

"Do you mind if I help?" Samantha asked her brother cautiously.  She 
didn't know why she felt looking at her mother's journals was a right 
reserved for Fox alone, but she still felt much the outsider, unsure of 
her place in his life and as his sister.

"Please," he replied, rolling his eyes in mock gratitude.  He shoved 
the stack he had brought up from the boxes in the trunk of his car 
toward her and she began sorting through them.  Perhaps if she started 
with her own childhood, she might regain more memories...

*     *     *     *     *

Morning slid its way into afternoon as Mulder sat with Samantha reading 
their mother's journals, awaiting Scully's return and the information 
she would bring.  The day had passed comfortably, as they continued to 
sift through the contents of their mother's journals.  They shared a 
light lunch, talking of inconsequential things.  There was still a lot 
of information he didn't have about Samantha's life over the last 
twenty-seven years, but they were gradually easing into a level of 
comfort at which they could begin discussing more personal issues.

Samantha had fallen silent after lunch, engrossed in her reading.  A 
troubled frown creased her forehead, but she said nothing.  It wasn't 
unlikely that she was still mulling over the issue of her father or 
possible father and his lies.  He'd be troubled too, if he'd had to 
absorb as much information as she'd had to these last couple days.

Mulder lifted his head from reading a journal chronicling his first 
year to peer out the window once more and froze.  The hair on the back 
of his neck prickled.  Two cars, unremarkable in any way, were 
approaching down the winding parkway leading to the hotel.  He had no 
reason to suspect anything, except that they both had government 
plates.  He didn't recognize the men within the vehicles.

He leapt to his feet, springing into action.

"Samantha, get our bags!  Hurry!"

She stared at him, startled, then scurried to retrieve their bags. 
Luckily, Scully had taken the Paperclip files with her, so they 
wouldn't need to worry about losing those, but leaving the journals 
behind was going to hurt.  Pausing in indecision, he grabbed the gym 
bag containing Samantha's clothing and picked up two stacks of journals 
he had pulled out of the boxes for closer scrutiny, cramming them into 
the bag.  Lastly, he grabbed the pistol Samantha had arrived with off 
the shelf in the closet.

At Samantha's frightened exclamation that the cars were pulling into 
the parking lot, he quickly re-zipped the bag and loaded it over his 
shoulder.  "Come on!" he commanded, grabbing her arm and pulling her 
behind him out of the room.

Just outside their room was the door to the second floor janitors' 
closet.  Mulder picked the lock, casting worried glances over his 
shoulder, and pushed Samantha into the room, closing the door behind 
him gently just as footsteps were heard on the stairs.

"Get down!" he hissed at Samantha, crouching low.  A shadow passed 
across the small window in the door, and Mulder slithered backwards, 
his weapon drawn, forcing Samantha deeper into the dark room.  She 
banged against a laundry cart with a surprised outcry, which she 
quickly stifled. 

Minutes wore on interminably as they listened to the thumping and 
crashing of the room they had occupied being ransacked.  He shook his 
head wryly.  These people really had no concept of subtlety when there 
was someone needing to be erased.

Mulder spared a second to mentally beg Scully's forgiveness that he 
hadn't been able to bring her belongings as well.  Gradually, the 
noises tapered off, and the only sound in the room was their rapid 
breathing, and the noise of his own heart thumping.

More shadows passed by the window and then one paused, testing the 
handle of the door.  Mulder slowly, steadily took aim, waiting for the 
door to open, but then that shadow, too, passed and he heard a low 
voice report, "They're not up here," to another unseen party.

He and Samantha sighed with relief in tandem, releasing their bated 
breaths.  "Fox, are they gone?" Samantha whispered urgently.

"Probably not," he replied as quietly as he could and still be 
coherent. "Most likely, they're going to search the premises for a 
while.  We'll hang out here until we know they're gone.  There's only 
four of them, so providing they don't all land on us at once, we have a 
good chance."

"How did they find us?" She demanded frantically.

"It doesn't matter...what we need to focus on now is a way to get out 
of here."

He crouched silently for several long minutes, watching the rectangle 
of light in the door intently.  No sound or movement reported from the 
hallway outside, and still he sat, watching and listening, as his legs 
began to tingle and his back ached.  He wasn't sure how much time had 
passed that they crouched there breathlessly.

"Don't move," he whispered to Samantha and began to scout the dark 
confines of the utility room.  By feel he navigated around carts of 
cleaning supplies and buckets and vacuum cleaners.  In the scant light 
that made its way in from the hall outside, he could see the shape of a 
doorway on the far end of the room.  A closer inspection revealed it to 
be an elevator.

"Damn," he muttered.

"What?" Samantha's whisper turned into a squeak of alarm.

"Nothing," he replied.  "Nothing to worry about."

There was no sense in telling her he may very well have gotten them 
trapped.  If someone came through that elevator, there was no place to 
go but the way they came, facing near-certain exposure.

He crawled back in Samantha's direction and sat on the floor beside 
her.  "We may be in for a wait," he murmured.  "There's an elevator 
over there that quite likely leads down to the basement or laundry 
room.  If we wait a few hours, we can go down and see if we can find a 
way out from there."

"How?" Samantha's voice hitched in panic.

"I don't know...maybe we can make contact with the hotel manager.  She 
knows some of my friends.  She might be able to help us, or at least 
get word to someone who can.  We'll just have to wait and see.

Silently, he and Samantha huddled near each other in the dark room, the 
smell of cleaning agents strong and pungent in the air.

"We'll be fine," he reassured her as she shuddered beside him.  
Overcoming his reticence, he reached over and patted her hand.

He sighed, realizing that it was futile trying to remain aloof in the 
face of her fear.  She wasn't like he and Scully.  She had never been 
chased through mountain caverns by black-ops troops, or hidden in 
cornfields while helicopters searched for her overhead.  She was a 
frightened woman torn from her peaceful and happy existence and thrown 
into an odyssey of fear and danger.  She needed him and ultimately, no 
matter whom she was or claimed to be that fact would be the end of his 
resolve to remain detached from her. She leaned her head against his 
shoulder and sighed, "I'm scared, Fox."  Her voice cracked.  "I try not 
to think about it, but I'm so afraid I may never have the chance to see 
my children again!"

"Samantha, listen to me," he turned and took her firmly by the 
shoulders, trying as best he could to look her in the eyes in the 
darkness of the room.  "That's not going to happen.  Scully and I won't 
let it happen.  We'll protect you until we can stop whoever is 
threatening you, and then we'll see you back safe with your family, do 
you hear me?"  He lifted a hand and stroked her hair gently.  "You'll 
be fine, I promise."

Is that a promise you're going to be able to keep, Fox?  His inner 
voice of doubt nagged him.  You were supposed to take care of her when 
she was eight and look what you allowed to happen...

No, he told himself stubbornly.  Not this time.  This time he would get 
it right.  This time he would protect her.

He placed his comforting fraternal arm around her shoulders and allowed 
her to lean her head against him again.

This is your chance, the thought echoed through his brain again and 
again.  Your final chance...

*     *     *     *     *

The darkness and silence had lulled him into a stupor and Mulder 
started at the sound of the utility elevator on the move hours later.  
Samantha gasped beside him, going rigid with tension.  Mulder aimed his 
gun carefully in the direction of the elevator.  It would be lit from 
inside, giving him the advantage of seeing his adversary first.  
Rattling and thumping, the utility elevator ground to a halt on their 
floor and the doors slowly slid open.

"Hold your fire, Mulder.  It's me," came the familiar voice from 
inside.  Releasing the breath he hadn't realized he had been holding, 
Mulder pulled back his weapon and turned the safety on as Frohike 
emerged from the elevator.

"The hotel manager, Claire, contacted me," Frohike explained in a rough 
whisper as they rose from the floor.  "She's an admirer of mine."

"So what's the situation out there, Casanova?"

"Two goons in a fleet sedan are out in the parking lot," the short man 
replied.  "The other two took off, according to Claire.  Your room was 
trashed, but it didn't appear that they took anything."

"They didn't take anything?"  Mulder's mouth pulled down in a frown.  
That meant whoever had sent the spooks was definitely after *someone*, 
rather than something.  Samantha?  Or Scully?

Jesus, if Scully came back unawares, she'd be walking right into a 
trap.

"Has someone called--"

"Byers is taking care of it.  We have a way to get you out of here and 
we have someplace you can go that's off the map."

"What about Scully?" Mulder insisted.

"We'll send her along to join you when it's safe," Frohike reassured 
him.  "We just have to make sure she isn't tailed first.  Don't worry, 
Mulder.  I'll comfort her while you're away."

"Try it and she'll put you down for the count," Mulder warned him.  
"Okay, what have you got?"

"A linen service van.  I'm even in uniform," the man replied.  "We can 
smuggle you out in back.  It's loaded with provisions already, so as 
soon as we're certain no one's following you, you can drop me off and 
head on out."

"Good.  Let's go."

Moments later, they were down in the laundry room.  Adjacent to that 
was a large storage room, which boasted a loading bay for deliveries.  
The bay was in an alley behind the building, while Frohike had told 
them the sedan was parked in the lot in front.  The linen van Frohike 
had spoken of was more of a minivan, perhaps slightly larger, 
customized to provide cargo room in back rather than additional 
seating.  Fortunately, it also lacked the surrounding windows that most 
family minivans had.  Frohike had conveniently backed the vehicle up to 
the building, leaving only a foot or so of a gap between the roll-up 
loading bay door and vehicle.

Glancing around to be sure no one was watching, Samantha leaped into 
the back of the van.  Before Mulder could follow her, Frohike grabbed 
his arm.

"Is that who I think it is?"

"Yeah," Mulder replied.  "Probably."

"She's hot."

Mulder clamped his lips against the impulse to warn the little man that 
if he didn't shut up, he'd be found days from here stuffed head-first 
into a laundry bag.  He discarded the effort of a retort and hopped 
into the back of the van, listening to Frohike's chuckle as the man 
slammed the doors closed behind him.  Moments later, the van swayed as 
he climbed into the driver's seat.

"Head's down," he warned them through the safety cage that prevented 
items in the back from flying forward and hitting the driver in the 
event of an accident.  With the number of crates and boxes stacked in 
the back of the vehicle, Mulder imagined that was a good thing.  His 
legs were already beginning to cramp in the confined space as the van 
lurched into motion.

*     *     *     *     *

"Agent Scully?"

Her eyes widened in surprise at the voice on the other end of the line.  
"Byers?"

She couldn't think of a single time any of the Gunmen had contacted her 
at the office.  Why in God's name would Byers be calling her?

"We need to see you right away," he stated gravely.  "Can you get 
here?"

"Yes, but--"

"We can't talk over the phone," he cut her off, his voice tense.  
"We'll wait for you at the office."

She frowned at the phone as the dial tone buzzed in her ear.  Sighing, 
she hung up and pushed her chair away from her desk, where she had been 
catching up on paper work to make herself appear industrious.  Skinner 
hadn't questioned her about Mulder, for which she was grateful.  He had 
long since gotten in the habit of not requiring them to file a 302 
before beginning an investigation, as long as they got it in within a 
couple days.  That gave them a little lead-time before announcing to 
the world they were on a case.  It prevented certain interested parties 
from mopping up the evidence before she and Mulder ever had a crack at 
it.

She'd had another reason for occupying herself with menial paperwork 
throughout the afternoon.  It took her mind off the information she had 
received that morning when picking her test results up from the lab.

"You're sure this is correct?" Scully had asked as she studied the 
results of the DNA comparison between Mulder and his sister.  And 
sister she definitely was, that much was certain.

"It certainly is anomalous," commented Dr. Palmental, the FBI 
geneticist helping her analyze the results of the test.  "They both 
have this same DNA sequence, but I've never seen it before."

"I have," Scully had muttered grimly, tucking the papers and films into 
the manila envelope she had pulled them from.  "I need you to run some 
more tests for me..."

Hours later, with everything sent off to the lab, Scully had returned 
to the basement office she shared with Mulder, taking her briefcase 
full of files and the results of Mulder and his sister's DNA tests with 
her.  With the door firmly closed, she pulled the records out of their 
sleeve once more and scowled at them.

Yes, she had seen that DNA sequence before.  In the form of a virus 
inhabiting chimera cells found in an ice-core sample in Alaska.  The 
same virus she had found in her own bloodstream, giving her irrefutable 
proof that the cancer which had nearly killed her was the result of a 
conspiracy designed to keep Mulder and her away from the truth.  
Whether that virus was actually extra-terrestrial in nature, or simply 
man-made, they had yet to determine.  They did know, however, that it 
was not the same black-oil virus that was undeniably of extra-
terrestrial origin which she and Mulder had both been infected with and 
vaccinated against on separate occasions.

Why had she never thought to check whether that virus still existed in 
her system after her cancer had gone into remission?  The idea had 
occurred to her as she and Dr. Palmental had been preparing the tests 
on the tissue samples provided in the files she had received, and so 
she had had her own blood drawn for a new analysis, with the same 
emphasis as the others.  Obviously, neither Mulder nor his sister had 
the illness that had almost ended her life and had definitely ended the 
lives of at least nineteen other women in Allentown, Pennsylvania.  
Could it be the virus was dormant and would only become active again if 
she removed the implant in her neck?  Samantha had a similar implant, 
which explained why she was not ill...but what of Mulder?

How could it be possible for a microchip to render a virus inactive?  
Limited as her understanding of the implant and its purpose was, that 
still seemed a stretch.  And yet, she had seen persuasive evidence that 
these implants did hold the key to eradicating at least some forms of 
cancer from the human body.  No matter how her scientific understanding 
rebelled against it, she could not deny the connection.

But there were other, deeper concerns attached to this whole issue.  
What the hell was the virus doing in Mulder's blood to begin with?  
He'd never been abducted.  What did it mean that he had this virus in 
his system?

It was at that point that her head had begun to hurt and she had set 
the test results aside to focus her thoughts on less confusing matters.  
There was nothing she could do until she knew for certain whether or 
not the virus was shared by all the abductees in the Paperclip files.  
So she had sought refuge in the tedious miscellany that littered the 
day to day life of an FBI agent.

Sighing in the aftermath of Byers' call, she began packing her 
materials away and left the office, turning off the lights behind her.

*     *     *     *     *

"There's been an incident at the hotel," Byers said grimly.  His voice 
was pitched low and Langly had activated the latest in eavesdropping 
prevention hardware upon her arrival.  Frohike, surprisingly, was no 
where in evidence.  She listened as he explained all that had happened, 
reciting the story that had reached them from the hotel manager via an 
information network complex enough to boggle the sharpest of minds.

"Mulder and his sister are headed someplace safe with Frohike," Langly 
picked up the tale, casting nervous glances around the room, as though 
expecting spies to come creeping out of the walls.  His voice dropped 
to a whisper.  "From there, we've given them directions to a safe-
house.  They're going to have to get there via indirect routes, so it 
may be several days until they arrive."

"How do I get there?" Scully asked, keeping a firm grip on the anxiety 
welling up within her.

Byers shook his head regretfully.  "Agent Scully, if someone is looking 
for Mulder, you're the first person they would follow to try to get to 
him.  If you go there too soon, you may jeopardize what security we've 
been able to provide."

Scully fell silent, her face drawn in tight, worried lines.  Byers was 
right, of course, but that didn't make the fact any more comforting.  
The idea of Mulder out there, hunted, without her to cover his back was 
as troublesome as it had ever been.  "How soon can I go?"

"We'd recommend waiting a few days," Langly said.  "Maybe even a week, 
until whoever might be tailing you to find Mulder is fairly confident 
that he isn't with you.  Then we may have the means to slip you out 
unnoticed and you can go to join them."

"Two days," she replied unyieldingly.  "Wednesday I'll be retrieving 
some important test results from the FBI labs.  I plan to be on the 
road that afternoon, no later.  Can you make it happen?"The two men 
exchanged concerned looks, and then agreed in unison, their faces 
sketched with identical expressions of pained resignation.

*     *     *     *     *

The nighttime late-March air was crisp.  Mulder and Samantha sat in the 
open rear hatch of the erstwhile linen van with sleeping bags were 
wrapped around their shoulders as they ate cold sandwiches. 

Frohike had driven for over twelve hours, heading inland and to the 
north.  When it was apparent no one had followed they dropped him off 
at a bus station in a relatively anonymous little town and proceeded on 
their own journey, watching for tails through the darkly tinted 
windows.  

Samantha had slept fitfully in the back while Mulder drove, 
occasionally consulting a map as he traveled southward.  The location 
of the mountain retreat was such a closely held secret that Frohike 
wouldn't even speak of it aloud.  He had handed Mulder the map and 
advised him to shred and/or burn it and the accompanying instructions 
as soon as he was confident he had memorized the route.

They had driven into the early morning hours, taking as many back roads 
as they possibly could, until they reached a secluded, wooded location 
in which to eat and grab a few hours of sleep.  Mulder's gun sat on the 
floor beside him for immediate access should he need it.  Samantha 
still held the pistol she had brought with her when she had first 
arrived.  Her eyes held the wary, tense look that he had seen in her 
the first day she had come to them, fear and distress etched deeply 
into the tightly knit brow and along her drawn mouth.  He longed to say 
something reassuring to her, but could not decide exactly what that 
should be.

The soggy sandwiches were washed down with stale bottled water and then 
Mulder spread out his sleeping bag on the floor of the back of the van 
with his head near the open hatch.  It would be cold leaving the 
tailgate open all night, but they could not allow for the possibility 
of someone sneaking up on them.  He spared a worried thought for 
Scully, offering up a silent entreaty to whatever fates might be paying 
attention that Byers had been able to get in touch with her in time to 
prevent her returning to the hotel.  She must be climbing the walls 
right about now with concern for them.  Until she joined them at the 
mountain retreat, they were both going to spend some restless nights 
wondering about how the other was faring.

"Thinking about Agent Scully?" Samantha asked out of the blue and 
Mulder realized he had sighed aloud.

He gave her a chagrined smile.  "She'll be worried about us."

"You two really do take care of each other, don't you?"

"Yeah, that's what we do."

"Good," Samantha gave a short, decisive nod.  "I wasn't too certain.  
Some of what I read about you two on the internet was ambivalent where 
she was concerned, because she isn't a believer."

Mulder frowned.  "She's a scientist, that's all.  And a damned good 
thing for me, too.  Scully...Scully's the one with her feet on the 
ground.  I'm not like that.  She's spent half our partnership digging 
my ass out of one kind of trouble or another."

"I doubt she sees it that way, Fox," Samantha commented softly.  "And 
I've seen enough in the last few days to know that you worry about her 
every bit as much as she does about you."

"The difference is, she needs it a lot less," he replied.  "She's been 
through a lot since we met, most of it relating back to our partnership 
and the X-Files.  I'd be dead if it weren't for her...several times 
over."

Samantha gave him a surprised glance.  "Seriously?"

"Um-hmm," he nodded, taking another sip of water and looking away 
uncomfortably.  Yeah, Scully was his savior, all right.  But if he 
didn't turn this conversation to other topics soon, he was going to end 
up spilling the whole sordid tale to Samantha, about his frequent and 
colossal fuck-ups and the tragedy and danger he had dragged Scully 
through because of them.  And right now, he really didn't want to go 
over all that again.

Apparently sensing his unwillingness to talk, Samantha changed the 
subject herself.  "I've been meaning to ask--how did Mom die?  Was my--
was *he* behind it?"

Mulder froze, licking his lips, and a tense moment stretched out in 
silence as he thought of how he might tell Samantha what had happened 
in a gentler manner than the truth actually allowed.  Failing that 
task, he sought refuge in stark honesty.

"He wasn't behind it.  She committed suicide," he admitted as 
delicately as he could, reaching out to pat her hand.  "I'm sorry."

"Is it...is it related to what happened when I was taken away?" she 
asked hesitantly, her voice tight with tears.

"Samantha..." his plea trailed off uselessly as he faltered for a way 
to convince her that she really didn't want to know what had happened 
to their family in the aftermath of her abduction.  Not now.  "She had 
a terminal form of breast cancer called Paget's carcinoma.  Scully did 
the autopsy, at my request.  She had a very good reason for not wanting 
to live."

"Fox, don't try to protect me from the truth," she told him sternly, a 
hint of iron in her tone.  "In the last two years, I have had to come 
to terms with the fact that my entire life has been a lie.  I deserve 
to know what really happened."

Closing his eyes against a burgeoning headache, he passionlessly began 
to recite the tale of the collapse of their parents' marriage and the 
paths of anger and denial their mother and father's lives had taken 
afterward.

"Mom always claimed she couldn't remember," he told her.  "The truth 
was she didn't want to remember.  That's why I thought the journals 
might help shed some light on the truth."

"And Dad?"

"He, um...I always felt that he blamed me for what happened to you, I 
guess.  I certainly blamed myself.  I always thought that there must 
have been some way I could have prevented what happened.  I could have 
acted more quickly, fought harder, shielded you somehow," he confessed, 
his voice hollow.

"Oh, Fox!" Tears choked Samantha's voice.  "You couldn't have--Jesus, 
Fox, you were just a kid yourself!"

"I guess I knew that," Mulder replied flatly.  "But I didn't know how 
else to explain why Mom and Dad stopped loving me.  I started looking 
for you after I joined the FBI, hoping that if I found you, or found 
the truth of what had happened to you, maybe I could make it all right 
again.  I would see Mom smile, and Dad would tell me everything was 
okay, that I was forgiven.

"The hell of it is," he continued, trying to repress a spark of anger 
kindling in his chest, "that I spent all those years trying to shoulder 
the blame for what happened, only to find out that it was Dad all 
along.  He and Charles Geoffrey Burke and the men he worked with who 
spearheaded the project for which you were abducted.  And he had spent 
all those years, hiding the truth from me, letting me carry the guilt 
that should have been his."

"Fox," Samantha whispered, "I'm so sorry..."

"No, Samantha...no," he sat up quickly and scooted over to where she 
sat, enveloping her in a comforting hug.  "Don't be sorry...you didn't 
have any control of what happened.  You were just a little girl."

"That doesn't seem to stop you from feeling guilty," she pointed out 
astutely, sniffling.

"I know.  And I've spent a lot of years trying to reconcile myself to 
the fact that I couldn't have done anything."

She buried her face against his chest, her tears dampening his t-shirt 
as she embraced him in return.  "I'm so sorry that I didn't come to you 
sooner after I found out you were alive," she told him, her voice 
muffled.  "I didn't know..."

"You couldn't have," he protested, resting his chin atop her head.  
"What I've done, Samantha...I've chosen to do.  There have been times 
when maybe my decisions weren't always the wisest or safest I could 
have made, but at any time, I could have walked away.  If anything, I 
should apologize to you.  I *did* try to walk away, in the end."

"What stopped you?" she lifted her head to look at him, sniffing 
loudly.

"Scully," he answered with a soft, affectionate chuckle.  "When I tried 
to give up, she refused to.  She said it would have been wrong, and she 
was right."

"Sounds like she's pretty special to you," Samantha observed, pulling 
away to tuck herself into a tight ball, her arms wrapped around her 
legs, her chin on her knees.  For a moment, she looked so much like the 
little girl of his memory that his chest ached with overwhelming joy.

"Yeah," he shrugged self-consciously.  He supposed it was as good a way 
as any to describe what he felt toward Scully.  He could talk for hours 
and still not convey to Samantha how truly remarkable a woman Scully 
was and what she meant to him.

Falling silent, Mulder stretched out once more in the back of the 
minivan.  The space, even with both rear seats removed, was too short 
and he imagined he would be a mass of aches and pains and banged-up 
shins if he had to spend too many nights here, but they couldn't chance 
another hotel.  Frohike had provided them with a good deal of cash, but 
that money would be quickly gone if they spent it on a room each night.  
Besides, the risk of exposure was too great.

"Try to get some sleep," he told Samantha as she remained seated where 
she was, hugging her legs.  To his own ears, his voice was getting 
groggier.  "We're going to have a long trip ahead of us."

She shook her head in brief negation.  "I'm not tired.  I slept while 
you drove tonight, so I think I'll stay up a while.  I'll wake you if I 
see anything."

Yawning, he accepted her proposal and laid his head on his bundled-up 
trench coat for a pillow, placing his weapon within easy reach.  He lay 
facing the rear of the car, where he could have a clear view of what 
was happening outside.  His last sight before he closed his eyes was 
his sister's hand resting next to her pistol, her fingers twisting 
nervously in the hem of her skirt.

*     *     *     *     *

Whiteness surrounded her.  Whiteness so stark and blinding she could 
barely stand to keep her eyes open against it.  Voices reached her 
ears, dim and muffled and distorted.  She existed in a haze of pain and 
confusion, unable to move in her agony, mere seconds away from 
retreating once more into the solace of unconsciousness.

"Now would be the best time to kill her and get her out of the way for 
good," a voice with a heavy German accent penetrated the fog 
enshrouding her conscious mind.

"If you kill her, Mulder will be unstoppable," another voice responded, 
this one colored with a crisp British accent.  This voice she knew.  
"Without her, he will have nothing left to lose...his estrangement from 
his mother and father is too complete.  She is the only tool we have 
left with which to hold him in check."

"Then we kill Mulder," the German replied with simple logic.  "You have 
coddled him too long.  You are responsible for allowing him to become 
the threat he is now."

"Killing Mulder is not an option," another voice, this one painfully 
and infuriatingly familiar joined the other two.  "Mulder serves a very 
useful purpose.  His credibility is non-existent and yet he provides a 
solid smokescreen for our activities with his very public antics.  If 
he should happen to stumble upon a fragment of truth here or there, it 
is of no consequence.  He only sees enough to make his own tales all 
the more incredible.  That is why we need him.  He poses no threat to 
our plans.  And when he gets out of line, we'll always have her to use 
to pull him back, now, won't we?"

"So you will risk exposure for convenience's sake?" The German snorted.

"There is no risk," the smooth, cultured tones of the smoking man 
replied.  "I'll handle Mulder, as I handled his father."

"I agree," the Englishman intoned.  "We keep both of them alive...the 
young lady may prove useful in the future."

"Then proceed, and I will know who to hold accountable if you do not 
fulfill your guarantees," the German promised direly.  The sound of 
footfalls on metal plating faded into the distance, and the smell of 
cigarette smoke wafted toward her from someone out of her field of 
vision.

"Is she suitable?" The Englishman asked.

"Yes, but she is far past the age where we'll see any direct results," 
the smoking man replied.  "The most we could possibly hope for is a 
second generation manifestation of the genetic enhancement."

"Then we must be assured that should any such offspring come along, 
they will be under our immediate control."  With those cryptic words, 
another set of footsteps echoed through the room and gradually faded.

Pain.  Cramping, excruciating pain tore through her abdomen, and she 
looked toward her feet to see the skin of her belly stretch upward, 
inflating like a balloon.  She screamed in agony...

Dawn was just barely beginning to lighten the sky as Scully bolted 
upright, gasping with fear.  The terror of the dream began to fade and 
she closed her eyes once more, willing her pounding heart to resume its 
normal pace once more.

By far this was the most vivid of the dreams she had experienced in the 
last week, she thought, wiping her damp palms on her bedclothes.  Every 
sound, every sight, every smell had registered with perfect clarity, an 
echo of a moment she never recalled experiencing.

"Look to your own memories..." Krycek had advised.  Was this what he 
had meant when he told her she had come away from her journey with the 
smoking man with more than she realized?

Nearly five years she had spent resigning herself to the loss of those 
three months of her life, to the idea that she would never hold the key 
to those memories in her hands.  Yet these dreams, these images... they 
were far too realistic and familiar to her to dismiss them as simple 
imaginings.

*Is she suitable?*  What did the Englishman mean by this?  *Second 
generation manifestation.*  That might be a reference to her harvested 
ova.  Had something been done to her prior to that procedure that would 
affect any possible offspring?  Was that why they had taken away her 
chance to have children?

Scully swore viciously and threw herself from the bed, striding angrily 
toward the bathroom.  Was that what this was about?  Maybe the idea 
that these dreams were just her imagination weren't so far fetched.  
The onset of her menses, as had happened yesterday, only served to 
remind her once a month of what she had lost.

The fuckers hadn't even had the courtesy to leave her in a state of 
menopause.  No, instead they zapped her with radiation until they'd 
gotten every viable ovum she could produce and what they left behind 
were too damaged by the procedure to ever be viable.  Only enough to 
initiate the hormonal process each month that had prevented her knowing 
what had been done to her for over two years.  Not until that day in 
the hospital in Allentown when a dying Penny Northern had told her 
about the infertility shared by the female abductees.  A story that 
Mulder had filled in the details for several months later.

You're shooting blanks, Dana, old girl, she thought bitterly as she 
dropped her robe and stepped into the claw-foot tub.

Why, goddammit, why?

Blinking back an unexpected rush of tears, she shook her head 
violently.  It didn't matter.  The whys were only excuses; they did 
nothing to alter the fact of what had actually happened.  What mattered 
was that she and Mulder find the proof needed to make the government 
own up to what had been done to her and countless others.  To make 
amends.

She showered and dressed mechanically as nagging worry settled in her 
stomach as her thoughts turned to the distance, far away with Mulder 
and Samantha.  She wondered where they had spent the night, or if they 
had driven through.  Had they been spotted, or had they made a clean 
getaway?  Were they safe?

With a heavy sigh, she braced her elbows on the small table where she 
sat eating a breakfast of cottage cheese and fruit, burying her face in 
her hands.  Surely she and Mulder had been in more dire situations than 
this.  The panic welling up within her was sheer gut reaction, in no 
way based on logic or reason.

They had looked for Samantha so long, and at such expense, that now 
that she was found, the danger to her seemed even more desperate than 
any they had faced before.  She had seen what had happened to Mulder 
the last time he thought he had found his sister, only to end up losing 
her in the end.  She couldn't allow that to happen again.  This time, 
it might destroy him, and she simply couldn't face that possibility.

Annoyed with herself, she dumped the breakfast she no longer had the 
stomach for down the disposal.  She wasn't going to accomplish anything 
sitting here going over the same useless fears and worries again and 
again.  Anger hung over her like a thundercloud as she gathered up her 
briefcase and coat, taking an instant to be thankful she had left the 
leather attache case with the Gunmen to store in their vault.  She was 
sick of dragging the damned thing around with her everywhere.

Outside, the late March morning was hazy and overcast, threatening 
rain.  The neighborhood was still and quiet.  Cars lined both sides of 
the road in rows, but it was a little earlier than most people left for 
work, so there was no one in evidence.  She inserted her key into the 
lock of the car and opened the door.

What made her look down at that moment, she would never know.  Her eyes 
traveled to the bottom of the open door frame, to the small gap between 
the driver's seat and the running board.  A tiny, pared down wire lead 
from under the seat to the spot where it was taped to the running 
board.  A trigger wire, she thought, recalling the bomb classes she and 
Mulder had attended during their stint in the Domestic Terrorism 
division, to initiate a detonation sequence on a car bomb.  How long?  
Fifteen seconds--thirty at most?  Long enough for her to be securely 
wedged in the driver's seat, right on top of the device?

The thoughts screamed through her brain in a single instant and in the 
next, she dropped her briefcase and began to run, her arms pumping 
desperately at her sides, waiting for the inevitable explosion behind 
her.

She had gained maybe fifty yards when it came, deafeningly loud.  It 
sent her sprawling forward onto the street.  A sharp pain sliced 
through her shoulder before she hit the ground, catching herself on one 
hand, and then the blackness descended.



CHAPTER FIVE - Deliverance


Her first instinct upon waking was to kill the bastard with the drums.

It was only after a moment of suffering that she realized the hellishly 
loud and painful pounding was inside her own skull.  Tiny demons with 
very large mallets had obviously taken up residence in her head.

Opening her eyes slowly, squinting against the light, she tried 
desperately to remember what she could possibly have done to deserve 
agony this great.  College and her single experience with a hangover 
were far behind her.

Recall came flooding mercilessly back and Scully bolted upright in 
alarm.  The bomb.  Jesus, had anyone been hurt?

She went for the nurse's call button to find her left hand in a split.  
It was badly sprained but not broken, she decided, assessing the 
injury.  Abrasions on the palm told her that she had probably caught 
herself on that hand when she went down.

At least it isn't my gun hand, she thought ironically.  That might come 
in handy if whoever had planted that car bomb decided to come back and 
finish the job.

The idea was an alarming one, and goose-flesh dotted her skin.

A burning pain prompted her to pull the hospital gown away to reveal 
large bandage on the back of her right shoulder.  Probably shrapnel, 
she deduced.  It would have to be on the opposite side of her sprained 
hand, and in a place that was going to make changing the dressing 
difficult, wouldn't it?  It was likely that the wound hadn't been 
stitched.  Shrapnel wounds were particularly nasty, with any manner of 
contaminants being driven into the wound upon impact.   Shrapnel from 
an exploding automobile was even more difficult, with all the various 
lubricants and chemicals that might have been coating the projectile 
that had hit her.  The wound would be left open in the case that they 
had not been able to cleanse it completely, so that it was less likely 
to fester within while the skin above it healed.

All this she observed with her doctor's eye.  The location of the 
wound, however, made her offer up a small prayer of thanksgiving.  An 
inch or two over, it would have sliced the carotid or taken her through 
the neck.  A small shudder racked her body. The resultant throbbing in 
her skull would make a concussion another likely addition to the tally 
of her injuries.

She scented him before she saw him, standing in the door with that sour 
odor unique to those who have just had a cigarette outdoors.  "I tried 
to warn you," he admonished, entering the room.  She quickly pulled the 
hospital gown back up over her shoulder, giving the man an icy stare.

"What do you want?" her voice was low and angry.

"I did try to warn you that you were in danger, did I not?" he asked 
archly.

"If you wanted me to give your warning any sort of serious attention, 
you might have chosen your errand boy more wisely," she replied 
stiffly.  She watched, annoyed, as he walked casually into the room, 
closing the door securely behind him, and sat on a nearby chair.  His 
face was, if anything, even paler and sicklier than the last time she 
had seen him.

"Was anyone hurt?" She reluctantly inquired.  The idea that she should 
need to ask anything of him was repugnant.

"Fortunately, no," he replied. "Surprising, really.  The bomb was 
powerful enough to damage cars and blow out windows up and down your 
entire block."

"Are you here to finish the job?"

An amused smile twisted his lips.  "Even after what I gave you, you 
still doubt me?"

"What have you given me?" she demanded.  "So we know there were other 
abductees.  That's not exactly revelation.  We know that you and the 
other cold-blooded bastards you work with carried out your experiments 
on countless innocent children.  No surprise there, either.  So what am 
I left with?"

"The files are only a fraction of the gift I gave you.  You're an 
intelligent woman, Agent Scully.  I thought surely you would have 
figured it out by now," he chided her.

"My memories are returning," she said carefully.  "Is that what you 
mean?"

"I knew I couldn't give you the disk Cobra carried," he explained, 
leaning back in his chair.  "I was serious when I said I was afraid the 
information would fall into the hands of those who would use it to do 
more harm than good.  And while I trust that you, Dana, are not such a 
person, your own hands are not as secure as I needed for that purpose.  
In exchange for your assistance in acquiring the disk, I instead gave 
you something more valuable."

"Why?"

"For exactly the reasons I told you before," he replied simply.  
"Everything I have worked for in my life is in ruins.  Now I want to 
make matters right."

"I don't believe you."

"Even though I have provided you with the means to get to the very 
heart of the Project I once worked for?  It's not over, Agent Scully," 
he cautioned.  "Not by a long shot.  You'd be foolish to think 
otherwise."

Crossing her arms over her chest, she stared at him, waiting for him to 
elaborate.  Finally, he spoke again.

"Men crave power, Dana.  They have sought it, fought for it, killed for 
it since the earliest recorded histories.  The men I worked with and 
myself; we had that power.  Absolute and untouchable.  That's not an 
easy thing to let go of.  One man in particular seeks to further his 
own ends now that the power structure of our organization is 
destroyed."

"Am I to assume this other party is the one who tried to blow me up 
today?"

"Indeed," he answered.  "He was an important figure in the group of men 
I worked with.  It was only the balance of the other members of our 
syndicate that kept him in check to any extent.  Now that the others 
are dead, only he and I remain.  And while I know how much you and 
Agent Mulder enjoy casting me as the villain," he gave her a chilly 
smile, "I assure you that he is much worse than I could ever be."

"So now we're pawns in this battle royale of yours, right?  You think 
you can use our work to further your own ends." She gave him a scathing 
look and he returned it calmly without answering.  She sighed 
impatiently.  "Why would he want to kill me?"

"Because without you, Mulder is rudderless," he explained.  "We 
underestimated you when we chose you to work with Mulder.  Instead of 
debunking his work, you threw your efforts into legitimizing it.  
Instead of blunting the fangs of Mulder's potential threat to our 
interests, you made him all the more dangerous."

"Wouldn't it be easier for him to go after Mulder directly?"  The 
question sounded crass even to her own ears, but it was a valid one.

"Mulder is important," his answer came with unhelpful simplicity.

"Why?"

He didn't answer, merely watching her as she looked upon him with 
distaste.  So there were limits to how far he would go to help her.  
There were questions he might answer, and questions he might not.  If 
she wanted to play the game effectively, she was going to have to find 
the right questions.

"Is this other party the one threatening Samantha Mulder as well?" She 
asked finally, not bothering to pretend this man didn't know she and 
Mulder had his sister in their custody.

"No.  I am."

She stared at him until he continued.  "I was trying to deter her from 
looking for her brother.  Look at all that has happened to you, Dana, 
since you threw in your lot with Mulder.  He attracts danger by the 
very virtue of who he is.  Do you think I would want my child anywhere 
near the man?  I have protected her these many years."  At her 
incredulous expression, he shrugged.  "I've protected Mulder as well, 
to the best of my ability.  His obstinacy has made the task more 
difficult than I would have preferred."

"Oh, you've protected him?" Scully's eyebrows arched in amazed 
disbelief.  "Is that what you call it?  Drugging him, shooting at him, 
trying to blow him up..."

"Had I wanted Mulder dead, he would have died long ago, Agent Scully," 
his eyes took on a cold, flinty gleam that sent a ripple of fear 
through her.  "Although, I have occasionally needed to use...forceful 
means to steer him away from that which would lead him to greater 
danger."

"Not to mention some pretty uncomfortable questions for yourself and 
your comrades."

He shrugged eloquently.  "I do what I have to do, nothing more."

"So why are you telling me this?" she demanded shortly.  The man was 
irritating her and the headache wasn't helping.  Better to get him to 
say what he had to say so he would get the hell out and leave her 
alone.

"As I told you before, I have come to have a great respect and 
affection for you, Dana."

She glared at him.  "Try again."

He rose from the chair, slightly unsteady as he got to his feet.  "I 
want you to let Samantha go."

"We're not holding her against her will.  She came to us for help."

"From a threat that doesn't actually exist," he argued.  "I tried to 
keep her away from Mulder to keep her out of the line of fire.  She was 
living a peaceful, relatively anonymous life up until now.  As long as 
she is with you and Mulder, Agent Scully, then she is truly in danger."

Scully's expression bespoke her incredulity.

"I was the one who orchestrated the raid on the hotel in Baltimore 
yesterday," he admitted.  "You were going to lead the men wanting to 
kill you right back to their location, so I had to drive them away.  I 
can protect Samantha if she's at home with her children.  They don't 
want her.  But I can't protect her when she's with you, especially not 
presently, not in light of the fact that you specifically, Dana, are 
the target right now.  Send her home, where she'll be safe."

"You know, your track record for credibility leaves something to be 
desired, Mr. Burke," she stated, her voice hard.  His eyes widened 
again at her use of his name.  "Especially recently."

"The man who shot at you when we went to meet Cobra was one I thought 
to be loyal to myself," he explained, his expression serious, "and yet 
he tried to kill you despite the fact that you were under my 
protection.  That is how long this man's reach is.  I couldn't protect 
you even if you would accept such an offer, which I assume you would 
not.  Samantha doesn't need to be a part of that danger.  She's not 
being threatened.  Let her go back home to her children, where she 
belongs, Agent Scully."

He walked silently from the room.  Scully, shocked and dumbfounded, her 
headache forgotten in the frantic workings of her brain, stared after 
him as he slipped out the door, nodding to a solidly built man standing 
at guard outside who then followed him out of sight.

Collecting herself, she reached over the side of the bed to retrieve 
the phone and began to dial.

*     *     *     *     *

"Tell me about your family," Mulder requested, glancing at Samantha out 
of the corner of his eye as they wound their way through narrow roads 
in the Allegheny Mountains of West Virginia.  She looked like something 
out of a bad spy flick, he thought with a smile, wearing a silk scarf 
wrapped around her head and sunglasses.

She smiled gently in memory as she stared out the window, watching the 
passing trees.  "I should have thought to bring pictures, except that I 
decided to leave my purse at home, so there would be no ID on me."

He gave an admiring nod.  For someone not accustomed to intrigue, she 
certainly had good instincts.  He waited patiently for her to continue.

"I have three children; two daughters and a son," she explained.  
"Jeanette's twelve years old, Daniel's nine, and Amanda just turned 
four.  They're, um...they're my pride and joy," she admitted with a 
smile.

"When my foster parents died, I inherited their ranch in Wyoming.  The 
proceeds were enough to enable me to stop working and stay at home with 
the kids.  I don't know, maybe I shouldn't have...they get annoyed with 
me sometimes, but it feels good to be with them.  The money also helped 
when I got divorced."

"What happened to your marriage?" he asked, concerned.  All his years 
of fantasizing about the peaceful and content life his sister led 
hadn't included a divorce.

"After I saw you that night in the diner, things started to fall 
apart," she told him sadly.  "Michael... he was a wonderful man and he 
understood that I had some issues that never quite went away, but when 
I learned that everything I had been told about my family had been a 
lie, I didn't know how to handle it.

"At first I withdrew, shut myself off from him.  I don't know why, 
except maybe that I was simply in denial and didn't want to turn around 
some day to find out that he was a lie, too.  And then, once I accepted 
the fact that my life was not what I thought it to be I began to look 
for answers.  It became an obsession with me; it consumed me...I 
couldn't let go of it.  Between that search and our kids, there was 
just no room left for Michael."  She drew a deep breath and admitted 
sadly, "He lived with it for a year and a half before he finally filed 
for divorce and moved out.  By that time, he had done everything he 
could.  He begged me to go to counseling, to seek help...I didn't have 
the time, or the desire.  The divorce was final six months ago."

"Samantha--"

"I know, it's horrible.  I realize that.  To sacrifice the very real 
and wonderful things in your life for an intangible ideal?  I hurt 
Michael and I endangered my kids because I couldn't stop...I had to 
know."

Mulder felt vaguely ill as she spoke.  He thought he might weep at the 
stark familiarity of her words.  She could have been describing his own 
actions over the years.  Hadn't he done exactly what she had?  Pushed 
personal considerations aside, endangered Scully time and again, shut 
himself off from everyone around him?  

"I'm ashamed of what I did," she confessed, "very ashamed.  And if I 
come out of this alive, I think I might go back and beg Michael's 
forgiveness.  But Fox...I found you.  I regained something I thought I 
had lost forever."

"It wasn't worth it, Samantha," he said bleakly, swallowing hard.

"How can you say that?"

"Because if you hadn't done what you did, you'd be sitting at home with 
your family right now," Mulder told her, his voice tight.  "You'd be 
with the man you love, the man who loves you, and while you might 
always feel you were missing something, it's never worth it to give up 
what you've got for something you might never have."

"Are you saying I shouldn't have found you?" she asked softly.

"No, Samantha...No," he stammered.  "I'm saying...I don't know what I'm 
saying, only that the idea of you sacrificing your well-being and peace 
of mind to find *me*...It's just not right.  It's not worth it.  You 
should have gone on with your life.  As much as I love you, Sam...as 
much as I've always wanted to find you again, that's what would have 
made me happiest."

He pressed his lips together, trying to put his thoughts together in a 
coherent sentence.  "I just always wanted you to be safe, Samantha.  
And happy.  That's all I've ever hoped for, and to find out that I'm 
the reason you're not...I'm sorry," he finished helplessly.

The sidewise glance she gave him was full of sad irony.  "Fox," she 
started, then paused, taking a deep breath, "if I understand the 
situation correctly, looking for me is the reason *you* haven't been 
safe or happy for years.  You're the poster boy for the UFO watch 
groups.  They all rave about your noble quest to find what happened to 
your sister, who was abducted by aliens, at the risk of life and limb.  
Don't you think that maybe I feel the same way about the things you've 
done?  That's a lot to feel responsible for.

"Maybe it wasn't worth the sacrifice," she sighed, watching him as he 
navigated a tight bend in the road.  "Maybe both of us could have kept 
things in a little more perspective.  But I found you, Fox.  That 
journal you found that I wrote...I mentioned the brother I could only 
half-recall time and again.  I went on and on about how much I hoped to 
see you someday.  I wanted to see you long before I even remembered 
you.  I can't regret that I finally fulfilled that dream."

"No," he murmured, giving her a tender glance.  Whatever had brought 
them to this point, they were together now, where he could see and 
touch Samantha and tell her all the things he'd wanted to say to her 
for twenty-seven years.  And the sheer joy of that knowledge, in spite 
of the chaos surrounding them, almost made up for what he had lost to 
be here.  Almost.  "I guess I can't either."

They both fell into silent contemplation.  Had the situation been less 
stressful, he might have admired the beauty of the surrounding scenery.  
There were times when the road would closely hug the side of the 
mountain and on the other side would be three thousand vertical feet of 
nothing.  The road itself was treacherous, driven only by those hardy 
souls who could stand to live two hours away from the nearest 
convenience store.  It offered a profuse canopy of trees to hide their 
passage, though the lack of maneuvering room in case of pursuit was 
somewhat alarming.

It was mid-afternoon when they pulled off the road to eat lunch and 
Samantha set the diary aside, declaring in frustration, "I hate this, 
Fox.  I've always hated it...the not knowing.  It's like I don't even 
really know who I am."

He could understand the feeling.  He always knew he had lost the 
memories of the time surrounding Samantha's disappearance, but now it 
seemed he was actually missing a great deal of his first ten years, or 
at least those dealing with "Uncle Charlie."  He shrugged awkwardly, 
unsure of what to say that might comfort her.

Samantha took advantage of the break in conversation to excuse herself 
and when she returned, began rummaging through her bag.  Emerging with 
her epilepsy medication, she opened the brown bottle and swallowed a 
pill with a sip of bottled water.

Curious, he held out a hand for the prescription bottle.  "May I see 
that, please?"

Bemused, Samantha handed it over, watching him as he scanned the label.  
The prescription was Dilantin, a common medication for the neurological 
disorder.  The pharmacy that filled it was a popular drug store chain.  
It was the name of the doctor who wrote the prescription that caught 
his attention.

"Samantha, how long have you been seeing this Dr. Andros?"  He asked, 
staring at the label, transfixed.

"Since I was twenty-six.  Why?"

"Because I've seen his name before," he handed the bottle back to her, 
disturbed.  "In the files that Scully and I were going over.  Several 
of the forms had his signature on them.  A lot of them were dated 
between 1973 and 1979."

She dropped the bottle as though it had suddenly become red-hot.  "Oh, 
my God.  Fox, are you sure?"

Nodding slowly, he bit his lip, his mind reeling.  He had someplace to 
begin looking now, a solid, tangible link between the child abductions 
and Samantha.  And Samantha knew where to find him.  Right where she 
lived, in Chalfont, Pennsylvania.

And he couldn't go there.

Shit.

His first duty was to see Samantha safe.  If it were just himself, he'd 
go, but with Samantha at risk, he couldn't take that chance.  There 
would be an opportunity for he and Scully to follow up on the 
information later, when it didn't mean jeopardizing Samantha.

"He was in on it?" Samantha asked in disbelief.  "Oh, God, Fox...how am 
I supposed to trust *anyone*?"

That sounds familiar, he thought with a pang.  Wasn't that what he had 
asked himself every day, year after year?  That had changed with 
Scully, though.

*Before I could only trust myself.  Now I can only trust you.*  His 
words, his sentiments, recorded on a tape Scully would never hear.  
What would have become of him between then and now if he hadn't allowed 
her in?

"Don't think that way, Samantha," he said, his voice firm.  "You can't 
live your life distrusting everything and everyone.  It doesn't work."

"Sounds like the voice of experience speaking," she commented.

"Just believe me.  It's no way to live."

"You've been alone a lot in your life, haven't you, Fox?" she asked 
gently.

"Nah," he mumbled uncomfortably.  "I've been all right."

"I didn't ask if you'd been all right.  I asked if you'd been alone."

"Well, yeah," he shrugged.  "But I chose to be that way.  What Scully 
and I do, it's dangerous, Samantha.  You bring anyone else into that 
mix, you run the danger of them catching the bullet with your name on 
it.  That's a lot of responsibility to carry."  He should know.  He'd 
had to watch Scully work through the fact that her sister had died by a 
bullet meant for Scully.  Since that day, Scully had worked extremely 
hard to keep the rest of her family as far away from her work as 
possible.

"I find that very sad, Fox," Samantha murmured.

"I'm not entirely alone, you know," he said defensively.  "Scully and I 
spend a lot of time together in the course of our work.  And I have 
friends."

"Okay," she replied in a tone that indicated she wasn't buying a word 
of it.

He gave her a scowl, realizing for the first time that having a little 
sister back might not be all it was cracked up to be.  Samantha gave 
him a knowing look, then discarded the remains of her lunch before 
climbing back into the van.

"You coming?" she asked archly, and with a low growl of annoyance, 
Mulder took up his station between the steering wheel and then they 
were on the road once more.

*     *     *     *     *

Never before had she realized just how savagely she hated hospitals, 
Scully mused.  Not a good sign for a doctor, she supposed, but she had 
simply spent too much time in them over the years, both as a patient 
and holding a bedside vigil for Mulder, to harbor any tender feelings 
toward them.

Of course in this case, her opinion might be just slightly colored by 
the fact that she really needed to get out of the damned hospital 
before whoever tried to blow her up came back for an encore.  A few 
hours after she had first regained consciousness, the doctor had 
visited and informed her that they would like to keep her the rest of 
the day and possibly overnight to assess the severity of her head 
injury.  Her medical training understood--she would have done the same-
-but she didn't much like being on the receiving end of it, the cliche 
about doctors making the worst patients not withstanding.

Luckily, it was unnecessary for a nurse to come by and wake her every 
hour.  The noises of the hospital were quite sufficient, if somewhat 
frustrating.  Lack of decent sleep was reaching epidemic proportions 
lately, she thought as she lay with her eyes open at five in the 
morning, processing the events of the previous day for the thirtieth 
time.

She hadn't taken the warning Krycek had given her very seriously.  Of 
course she was in danger--when was she not?  It was part and parcel of 
the lives she and Mulder led.  She would take an indication of danger 
to someone else's life with gravest caution, but as for her own...Was 
it possible she had skirted death just often enough to be a little 
over-confident?

This morning's attempt on her life put a swift and sure ending to that 
attitude.  Whoever had built that bomb had meant business.  A.D. 
Skinner had called to give her the preliminary forensics reports and it 
was glaringly obvious that a quarter of the explosive actually used 
would have been sufficient to kill someone sitting in the driver's 
seat.  Her would-be assassin was taking no chances.

She hadn't even told Skinner that she was on someone's hit list, hadn't 
told him it might be related to the matter she and Mulder were handling 
right now.  Instead, she had fobbed him off with the declaration that 
she had no idea why anyone would target her specifically and the 
hypothesis that the bombing might have been a random act of terrorism 
against any federal agent, and perhaps they should put all the local 
field offices on alert.  She hoped that would keep him busy a while.  
She was pretty sure he didn't believe her, but she had no other choice.  
If she had told Skinner the truth, he would have insisted on posting a 
guard to her and she couldn't allow that.  Knowing as she did that he 
was compromised, she simply couldn't trust him.  And even if she could, 
there was no guarantee that whomever he posted to guard her was clean.  
She was better off alone.

She didn't even allow herself to think of what Mulder might have to say 
about her refusing protection in these circumstances.  But the lack of 
a guard posted at her door didn't mean she was taking any chances, 
especially since she was a stationary target at this moment.  Her gun 
lay on the bed tray beside her, unholstered and within easy reach of 
her good right hand.  Next to her left was the nurse's call button.

The hospital seemed to get quieter with the encroaching dawn and she 
dozed lightly, weariness finally overcoming worry.  An hour later she 
roused as the door opened to admit the nurse coming to check her 
vitals.  Right on schedule.  She blinked sleepily at the figure 
silhouetted in the doorway.  A male nurse this time, she observed 
groggily.

He started toward the bed and a small alarm echoed through her sleep-
enshrouded brain as she realized he hadn't turned on the lights.  He 
was moving slowly and purposefully toward her, his hand emerging from 
his pocket bearing a syringe.

Her weapon was in her hand without her having any conscious memory of 
grabbing it as she bolted upright.  "Back off!" she barked, 
ostentatiously cocking the gun.  Her clumsy left hand fumbled for the 
call button, which had slid away when she moved.  The man stopped, but 
rather than backing away, he tensed, ready to spring.

"Put your hands up!" she shouted, her voice pitched higher with fear 
than she would have preferred, trying as she was for a firm, 
authoritative tone.  Her hand reached the call button and pressed it 
urgently as she held the gun on him, trying to foretell his next 
action.  A shadow appeared behind him, drawing Scully's eyes for a 
split second and that was when he made his move, launching himself at 
her.

A gunshot ripped through the air like thunder before Scully could 
squeeze the trigger and the man froze, spinning in an almost graceful 
half pirouette before crashing to the floor, a bloodstain blossoming 
over his breast.  The syringe rolled harmlessly from his dead hand.  
Gasping, Scully looked up to see the shadow in the doorway retreating, 
leaving her only a glimpse of the black leather jacket he wore before 
disappearing from sight.

*     *     *     *     *

By the time Skinner arrived, she had stopped shaking.  No sooner had 
her unknown rescuer gone than the nurse came running into the room.  
She had turned on the lights, taken one look at the body on the floor 
and the gun in Scully's hand and began screaming for help.  Hospital 
security arrived swiftly thereafter and by that time, Scully had set 
her gun aside and gotten out of the bed.  They were on the verge of 
pinning her against the wall and cuffing her before she had a chance to 
explain what had happened.  The police were the next to show up, by 
which time Scully had thankfully donned a thin hospital robe and was 
seated in a chair in the corner with a cup of coffee in her trembling 
hands.

She gave the police her statement, her voice dead with shock.  
Fortunately, the logistics of the crime scene worked in her favor.  The 
syringe was still on the floor as evidence and the wound in the man's 
chest was obviously an exit wound.  The bullet that had clearly been 
fired from the doorway was lodged in the far wall, and Scully's own 
weapon had not been discharged, so the possibility of her being the 
shooter was laid to rest with relative ease.  The body was being sealed 
in a bag and hauled away when Skinner appeared on the scene.

"What happened here, Agent Scully?" he demanded, plowing his way past 
policemen and medical examiners to get to her side, flashing his ID 
several times in the process.

She gave him a brief run-down of the situation.  "I'd be willing to bet 
that what was in that syringe wasn't meant to insure my continued good 
health," she concluded, her voice brittle.  The man's ID had indicated 
he was attached to the Tunisian embassy.  It wasn't the first time 
she'd had a run-in with someone from that quarter.  Filled with nervous 
energy, she rose and began collecting her belongings, pulling her 
clothes out of the closet with jerky, violent gestures.

"That's two incidents in less than twenty-four hours, Agent Scully," 
Skinner said, speaking to her back.  "Are you still going to claim that 
these are just random acts of terrorism?"  His tone spoke volumes on 
what he thought of *that* theory.

"No, I'm not," she said bluntly.  "Obviously I am being targeted."

"This time there's a body on the deck.  There's going to be an inquiry 
into this and I'm not going to be able to a damned thing to stop it," 
he advised her.

"Then don't.  It'll just have to proceed without me," she replied 
harshly over her shoulder, fear giving way to irrational and 
ungovernable anger.  "I don't plan to hang around long enough to see if 
three's a charm."

You can't walk out on a formal inquiry," Skinner stated firmly.  "Now 
we're going to leave here and put you directly in protective custody 
and then you're going to tell me everything you know about what's going 
down here."

"I can't."

"I didn't ask you whether or not you wanted to do it, Agent Scully.  
You don't have a choice."

"Is that an order to stay put, sir?" She whirled on him, pinning him 
with a baleful glare.

"Does it have to be, Agent?"

Suddenly Scully knew the meaning of the term "something snapped."

"If you try to keep me from leaving, you might as well be signing your 
name to my death warrant and you know it." Each enraged word flew from 
her mouth like a bullet.  "There's nothing you can do that will be 
sufficient to protect me, not against these kind of people.  This isn't 
terrorism, it's political assassination and it's being orchestrated by 
someone with a lot resources at his disposal.  So unless it's your 
intention to see me dead, I suggest you get out of my way.  Sir."

Skinner stood silently for a moment, his eyes intent on hers, his jaw 
flexing furiously.  Finally he looked away, asking from between 
clenched teeth.  "What do you need from me?"

"I need to get back to the Bureau to collect some things and then I 
need a car.  I've got the rest covered already," she answered, her 
shoulders losing some of their agonizing tension.

"Fine," he muttered.  "Get dressed and let's go."

She froze in place, her eyes wary and uncertain as she studied him.  
The sigh the assistant director released came out as a low growl of 
frustration.

"Agent Scully," he said tightly, drawing close to her, speaking under 
his breath.  "I may not be in a position to be trusted with certain 
sensitive information.  You know it, I know it, so let's not bullshit 
about it.  But I will die myself before I willingly or intentionally 
allow an agent under my supervision to come to harm.  Now, are you 
coming?"

All at once ashamed of her knee-jerk reaction, she nodded tensely and 
ducked into the bathroom to dress.

*     *     *     *     *

It was a long moment in the empty stairwell outside the Gunmen's 
second-story office, filled with anxious glances cast over her 
shoulder, before Frohike had all the bolts opened and she was allowed 
to enter.  Parked in the garage below was the FBI fleet car Skinner had 
personally acquired for her.  After collecting the test results she had 
ordered, not even taking the time to study them, she had driven 
straight here, heedless of the numerous speed limits she broke along 
the way.

"We heard on the police scanner what happened," Byers said, gesturing 
for her to take a seat.  "Are you all right?"

"I'm fine," she said shortly, not meeting his gentle, concerned eyes.  
The truth was she was still scared as hell, but she couldn't let these 
guys know that.

"We've got the goods on the people in those files you left for us," 
Frohike told her, handing her a stack of printouts.  Of the seventeen, 
not including Samantha and yourself, twelve are still alive. Of those, 
seven live on the East Coast."

"Thanks," she murmured, giving the forms a cursory glance.  The 
information wasn't going to do her a whole lot of good now.  She wasn't 
going to be around to follow up on it.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw he three men exchange looks and 
nods.  Motioning her to silence, they lead her down a narrow spiral 
staircase in the back of the room, which descended into a cellar two 
stories below.  She had only been to this cellar once, with Mulder, 
bringing copies of files too sensitive to leave anywhere else for fear 
they might disappear.

A cinderblock vault stood in the center of the cavernous basement.  
Inside the structure, the walls were lined with steel plating and 
layers of soundproofing.  File cabinets stood in four neat rows, twenty 
in all.  One of these was the one they had set aside for she and 
Mulder.  Instead of going into the vault, however, they went around it, 
deeper into the basement.

"We've got a way to get you out of here, Agent Scully," Byers said, 
"but you have to leave now, from here."

"We took the liberty of getting you some clothing and provisions," 
Frohike added with a grin.  Had her mind not been fixed on other 
matters, she might have taken a moment to wonder how they knew her 
size.  

"Mulder and Samantha should already have some supplies and cash, but 
just in case, there's some extra in your bag," Langly chimed in.

"Thank you," she murmured, sighing.  "So what's the plan?"

"Our secret bolt-hole," Langly replied.  "Not even Mulder has seen 
this."

They led her farther back into the room, where bare light-bulbs 
overhead broke the darkness at intervals.  Broken and obsolete 
computers and other devices for which Scully would be hard pressed to 
guess a purpose were stacked along the walls.  Between two such piles 
was a steel fire door.  They stopped before it.

Byers punched in a code on the electronic pad beside the door and it 
opened. He flipped on a light and Scully saw a tunnel, ancient and to 
all appearances ready to collapse at any given moment.  She gave the 
boys a questioning look.

"We chose this building for our offices for a very good reason, Agent 
Scully," Byers explained quietly.  "We believe this tunnel may 
originally have been intended for access to subterranean utilities, 
perhaps built as early as the 1920's, but it was never completed, most 
likely forgotten when the Depression hit.  We've been through all 
available city records and plans and it doesn't show up anywhere.  A 
lot of records have been lost or destroyed in fires over the last 
seventy years.  As far as the government is concerned, this tunnel 
doesn't even exist."

"It goes on for a couple miles," Frohike continued.  "But a ways down, 
there's another door like this.  Behind it is a stairway leading up to 
another garage like the one in this building, but two blocks over.  An 
associate of ours bought that bit of abandoned real estate at our 
request so that we would have access to the garage without it being 
traced back to us.  There's a car already waiting for you, with all 
your provisions in the trunk.  If you'll come with me?"  He bowed 
gallantly for her to proceed him into the tunnel.

She accepted the folded roadmap Byers held out to her and checking her 
files to make sure she had everything she would need, she drew a deep 
breath and nodded.  Frohike followed her as she stepped into the 
decrepit passage.  Once they were inside, Langly and Byers closed the 
steel door behind them and sealed it.

"This way," Frohike gestured.  Brushing cobwebs away from her face, she 
marched down the passage.  As promised, a steel door identical to the 
first one appeared.  The tunnel went much further beyond that but 
Scully really had no inclination to explore.  She was tired and sore 
and far too nervous for her own good.  All she wanted was to be as far 
away from Washington, D.C. as she could get as quickly as she possibly 
could go.

Frohike punched in another code and the door opened.  Silently, they 
climbed the narrow staircase to a third door.  Through that lay a large 
garage almost identical to the one she had parked in beneath the 
Gunmen's offices dozens of times.  A late model brown Cadillac was the 
single inhabitant, looking somehow expectant as it faced the door.

"She may not look like much," Frohike commented, "but she'll get you 
where you're going."

"Thank you," Scully murmured again.  Too brain-weary to check the 
impulse, she bent over and kissed the scruffy man on the cheek, giving 
him a tired smile.

Flustered, Frohike held out a baseball cap and sunglasses to her.  
"Um...some of your features make you easily identifiable," he muttered.

Nodding, Scully twisted her hair up and settled the cap over it.  Then 
she sighed and opened the driver's side door of the car, checking the 
floorboard reflexively for any signs of tampering.  She placed her 
files on the passenger seat, and warily scanned the interior of the 
car.  She wondered if Frohike would be offended if she looked under the 
driver's seat, then decided that if anyone would understand, it would 
be him.  Crouching, she felt carefully under both seats and then under 
the dash.  When she was satisfied nothing sinister lurked within the 
vehicle, she seated herself, looking nervously over at Frohike, pulled 
the door shut and started the ignition.

This was the moment of truth, she thought, her heart pounding in her 
ears.  If anyone did spot her coming out of this garage, it would soon 
be apparent.  If, however, she actually got away from here without 
being tailed, she might have a fighting chance of making it to the 
location drawn on the map Byers had handed her.  Frohike pushed a 
button and the garage door slowly opened, revealing the brightly-lit 
April day outside.  Oblivious to its beauty, she slid the sunglasses 
onto her face and, giving Frohike a nod, pulled out of the garage.

*     *     *     *     *

"I met Michael my sophomore year at Ball State.  I was studying 
psychology and he was in one of my classes."

Fox shook his head, his expression amazed.  "You studied psychology?"

Samantha nodded.  "Interesting coincidence, isn't it?"

"Yeah.  Go on."

"Michael was there on a sports scholarship--he played basketball--and 
sociology was just one more pain in the ass requirement he had to 
fulfill," Samantha smiled in fond remembrance.  "Until about two weeks 
before the final when he realized he didn't stand a snowball's chance 
in hell of passing if he didn't get his act together.  So I offered to 
help him."

Fox shot her a look out of the corner of his eye.  "He's not one of 
these dumb jock guys, is he?" He asked, his tone hinting at 
disapproval.

She narrowed her eyes in warning.  "Of course not!  Now do you want to 
hear the story or not?  Because I will remind you, you *did* ask..."

"Okay, okay..." her brother subsided and continued to wind his way 
along the twisty mountain roads.

"In his junior year, an injury put an end to his playing basketball, 
and so all of a sudden he had to become a scholar.  He looked me up 
again, and asked me out for coffee, and we started talking about his 
options.  I'm not quite sure why he sought me out instead of a guidance 
counselor, but there it was," she shrugged.  "He pretty much spent a 
year just trying to figure out what he wanted to do, and then he 
discovered he had a real knack for comprehending economics.  So even 
though it put him back a more than a year to make that his major, 
that's what he chose."

She paused to take a sip from a can of warm soda that had been found 
amongst their provisions.  "So anyhow, by the time it was all said and 
done, he was a year behind me and I really couldn't consider leaving 
him behind after I graduated, so rather than returning to Wyoming, I 
found a job in town and we got an apartment together.  We were planning 
our wedding a year later when I got pregnant with Jeanette."

"What does he do now?"  Fox asked, glancing at her out of the corner of 
his eye.

"He actually went back to get his Master's degree in economics and now 
he teaches at a local community college.  It actually took him a little 
while to get over the idea that he was indeed a dumb jock, but once 
that was settled, he really did very well."

Samantha gazed off into the distance, falling silent.  "I loved Michael 
so much, but I could never explain to him what happened to me as a 
child," she finally continued.  "What few fragments of memory I had 
didn't gel with the idea that our family had all died in a car 
accident.  I told him I was an orphan, and not even my foster parents 
knew any differently.  For that matter, neither did I.  What I thought 
I remembered could have just been a result of the trauma of the 
accident.  So I never told anyone...I thought I would sound crazy.  I 
thought that if he knew and didn't believe me, he'd stop loving me.  
It's not that I didn't trust him, but it just sounded *so* crazy, I 
didn't think he could possibly believe me.  I think that, more than 
anything else, is what caused me to shut him out when I began looking 
for you.  If I explained to him what I was doing and why I was doing 
it, I would have to explain to him what I thought had happened to me as 
a child.  I gave him too little credit.  I should have known he loved 
me enough to at least accept what I was saying and help me find the 
answers I needed, even if he didn't quite believe it."

"So what do you plan to do if you go back to him?" Fox asked gently.  
"You can't keep a secret like this to yourself forever.  You have to 
let him in eventually, even if you're afraid."

"I know," Samantha whispered, feeling the sting of tears beneath her 
eyelids.  "I think maybe now that I've at least found some confirmation 
of what I believed I remembered, maybe I'll have the courage to finally 
say it.  After all, I have the diary I wrote, and the implant.  Michael 
won't need them; I know that now.  But I think I need them to reassure 
myself I'm not crazy."

She took another drink of her soda and consulted the map.  "I think 
you're supposed to take a left on the next county road," she told him.  
Shortly thereafter, a gravel road appeared on the left and Mulder 
turned onto it.

"What about you, Fox?"  She asked, turning her attention to him.  "Any 
ex-Mrs. Mulders in the picture?"

"Nope," he replied honestly.  Any other women who had been in his life 
before Scully and the X-Files were either dead or long gone.  "I lead 
the supreme bachelor existence."

"I know," she quipped, amused.  "I saw your apartment.  With the money 
you say Mom and Dad left behind, maybe you could afford a cleaning 
service to come in once or twice a week?"

"It's everything I can do to keep strangers *out* of my apartment, 
Samantha," he said drolly.  "I don't think I'll be handing anyone else 
the key anytime soon."

"Agent Scully obviously has the key."

"Yeah, she feeds my fish while I'm gone."

"I see."

"What?" He demanded, frowning.

"Nothing, nothing," she waved her hand in the air in the ages old 
"never mind" motion.  "So why did you join the FBI?"

"Oh, that started back when I was getting my graduate degree in 
psychology at Oxford..."

He explained to her that a paper he had written on a convicted serial 
killer had caught the eye of a professor who had an acquaintance back 
in the States who knew someone at Quantico, and so forth.

"Just before I received my degree, I got a call from a Bureau recruiter 
asking me if I would like to come to Washington for an interview.  I 
didn't have any plans after graduation, and I sure as hell didn't want 
to return to the Vineyard, so I went."

He had known within moments of setting foot at the FBI Academy that he 
had found the place he was meant to be, he told her.

"They had me ear-marked for the Violent Crimes Unit from the start, 
because of the aptitude I displayed at getting inside the heads of 
sickos, psychos, and weirdos.  I guess it's probably a good thing the 
Bureau called me when they did.  Otherwise I probably would have 
started teaching and then whole classes full of impressionable youths 
would have been corrupted," he concluded with a smirk.

Samantha laughed.  "So you sacrificed yourself on the altar of J. Edgar 
Hoover to save the precious children of America.  The mother in me 
thanks you."

"Yeah, don't thank me yet.  I figure about the time your kids are in 
college the Bureau will have decided to finally kick me out and I'll 
end up teaching anyway."

"Just let me know where and I'll remember *not* to send my children 
there."

*     *     *     *     *

She reached her destination in the mid-afternoon of the third day after 
leaving Washington.  Three days filled with endless hours of driving, 
of doubling back and taking slower, less trafficked, indirect routes.  
Three days of infrequent meals and brief, unsatisfactory naps when she 
got so tired she couldn't continue to drive safely.  Now with her goal 
so near, she could only feel a weary sense of triumph.

Exactly where the directions said it would be, a two-track dirt logging 
road led deeper into the dense woods in the mountains on the North 
Carolina/Tennessee border.  A "Private Property" sign on a red and 
white wooden gate had been placed at the entrance.  Scully left the car 
nervously and quickly entered the combination she had been given on the 
padlock keeping it closed.  She took an extra moment to carefully brush 
away any tire tracks she may have left once she was through the gate.

The instructions had said she would have to drive five miles into the 
woods before she reached the end of the road, but there was every 
chance something unexpected, such as a fallen tree over the road, might 
wait for her between here and there.  As it was, the condition of the 
rutted road dictated that five miles an hour was the fastest she would 
be able to drive if she wanted to reach her destination alive.  So she 
progressed slowly, branches of the trees she passed scraping loudly 
against the sides of her car.

Dear God, she was tired.  Tired physically, tired mentally, tired 
emotionally.  Tired of bouncing all over these damned backwoods roads.  
She wanted to see Mulder and Samantha safe more than she wanted her 
next breath, but running a close second to that desire was wanting to 
sleep until this whole nightmare was but an unpleasant memory.  Maybe 
here she could feel safe enough to rest, with Mulder keeping watch over 
things.  If she didn't get some sleep soon, she would be beyond caring 
whether the people who wanted her dead located her or not.

The instructions tucked inside the map indicated she should look for a 
very specific landmark, a fallen tree on the right side of the road 
with one branch sticking up toward the sky, which would be spray-
painted orange.  It seemed like an eternity before she finally saw it 
and across the narrow dirt road, a gap between two large trees barely 
wide enough for a car to pass through.  She was to pull into the 
clearing beyond these trees and hide her car with the camouflage net 
lying nearby.

She had parked and was in the process of opening the trunk before her 
tired mind registered the fact that there was no other car present.

"Oh, God," she whispered, bracing herself against the trunk of her car.  
They'd had a thirty-six hour lead on her, which meant they'd had four 
days to reach this place.  There was no logical reason for Mulder and 
Samantha not to be here by now.  The only possible explanation was that 
something had happened.

Sitting on the ground, she drew her knees up and rested her head on 
them, trying to whip her sluggish, churning mind into action.  She had 
two options.  One was to stay here and keep herself safe, knowing that 
she could accomplish nothing for Mulder and Samantha should the parties 
that wanted her dead reach her before she reached them.  The other was 
to go back, knowing that she could do nothing to help Mulder and 
Samantha sitting out here in the middle of nowhere, even though it 
almost certainly meant that eventually her assassin would catch up to 
her.

The choice was already made, really.  Her job was to serve and protect 
and her duty to Mulder dictated she couldn't leave him flapping in the 
wind while she ran for safety.  She had to go back.

But not yet, she decided firmly.  Her first instinct was to climb back 
in the car and start driving but she resolutely refused to allow 
herself to do it.  If she didn't get some sleep, she wouldn't be of any 
use to Mulder and Samantha or herself.  She would end up driving off 
the side of a mountain, or into a tree, and save the man who wanted her 
dead the trouble of killing her himself.

She would sleep a while, then turn back, she decided.  Hopefully there 
would be some clue as to where Samantha and Mulder were last seen.  
Aching with weariness, she dragged herself into the driver's side seat 
more, locking the door as if that might somehow keep her safe.  She 
reclined the seat and shifted to get comfortable.  For a brief moment, 
she was certain she would be unable to rest, that her worry and fear 
would keep her awake.  It was the last conscious thought she had for 
two hours.

*     *     *     *     *

It was late afternoon by the time Mulder and Samantha finally reached 
the two-track dirt road blocked by the "Private Property" sign.  At 
last, the final leg of their journey.

It had been decided it would be best to take Frohike to a bus stop far 
in the opposite direction of their destination, which had added nearly 
a day to their journey, and in addition to that, they had taken fairly 
regular meal and rest breaks.  Mulder had been afraid that if they 
tried to push it too hard, they stood in danger of running into trouble 
on one of the many narrow, winding mountain roads they had traveled.  
There was no reason for them not to rest when one could keep watch 
while the other slept.

Mulder groaned with relief at the realization that they were within 
five miles of their destination and gave a small smile as Samantha 
echoed the sound.  His eyes were tired and he was certain he had the 
minivan equivalent of saddle sores.  He and Samantha had lacked 
sufficient water or opportunity to observe much in the way of personal 
hygiene and he was feeling rather rank.  He wanted out of this damned 
van and to a shower or whatever passed for one up here.

He wondered how long it would take Scully to reach this place.  How 
long would it be until she was able to leave Washington without being 
followed?  Was she safe?

These were questions he'd asked himself time and again over the last 
four days, but no answers were forthcoming.  He wasn't going to be able 
to rest easily until Scully had arrived safely.

What would he do if she didn't show up?  Would he have to take Samantha 
back to D.C. with him to find out what had happened to Scully, or would 
he leave his sister here and hope she was safe while he found his 
partner?  How long should he wait before making that decision?  What 
it--

Oh, shit...

He slammed on the brakes and threw the van into park, ignoring 
Samantha's gasp.  Before she had a chance to ask what he was doing, he 
was out of the car and running.  The late-model Cadillac sitting out in 
the open was not a good sign to begin with, but the sight of Scully in 
the front seat lying still as death made his heart stop.

OhGodnoPleasenoScullybeallrightohJesusScully...

He tried the car door handle to find it locked and rapped frantically 
at the window, calling her name.  The response was instantaneous and 
terrifying.  The still figure on the front seat screamed and scrambled 
over into the passenger seat, taking immediate aim with the gun that 
had been lying close at hand.  Her blue eyes were wide and panicked and 
she had the trigger half pulled by the time she actually saw who was at 
the window.

"Scully!  Open the door!"

"Mulder!" Her mouth moved inaudibly and she quickly crawled across the 
front seat once more to unlock and open the door, her gasping breaths 
painfully loud when he finally heard them.

Extending a hand he helped pull her from her clumsy position half-
kneeling on the driver's seat.  He held her shoulders while she got her 
feet under her and then while she swayed for an instant.  At last she 
looked up at him, and his heart stopped again...

Her lovely, delicate face was pale and gaunt, her eyes dark hollows 
over her prominent cheekbones.  They had the frightened look of a 
hunted animal and kept shifting restlessly around, never still for an 
instant.

"Jesus, Mulder...When you weren't here I thought something had happened 
to you," she scolded him breathlessly.  "I was about to turn back and 
head to D.C. again."

"Are you all right?" he asked, his voice low with concern as he brushed 
a stray lock of hair from her face.

"Yeah, I'm fine.  You just startled me," she reassured him, and 
smiling, he pulled her into a brief, welcoming hug.

He realized that while he had been checking on Scully, Samantha had 
parked the van and was industriously unloading boxes and crates from 
it.  His sister stopped and gave them a friendly wave before resuming 
her activity.

"You look like hell, Scully," Mulder commented, studying her face once 
more.

"Thank you, Mulder," she shot back acerbically, frowning in mild 
annoyance.  "When was the last time you shaved?"

Surrendering, he pulled away and surveyed the amount of stuff they 
would have to haul a mile through the woods to the compound.  He swore 
under his breath and looked over to see Scully nodding in agreement.

"I don't know about you, Mulder, but I'm beat," she stated bluntly.  
"It's been a long drive for all of us.  I say we take as much as we can 
carry or need to get by for tonight and worry about the rest tomorrow, 
when we've all had a chance to recover."

"That...sounds like...a plan," a panting Samantha approached them, 
bending over with her hands on her knees as she drew a deep breath.  
"Three kids...you'd think I'd be used to physical exertion by now."

"If we're doing this by committee, the motion is unanimously passed," 
Mulder agreed.  They set to work determining what they would need to 
take with them this first pass and left the rest in the cars before 
setting off on the hike to their destination.

The compound, as it had been referred to, was a cluster of five one-
room cabins in the spaces between trees, each ten by ten foot room 
containing a pair of bunk beds on one wall, a kerosene space heater, a 
hotplate and a small refrigerator.  Electricity was by generator and a 
shed housed what appeared to be a several month supply of gasoline and 
kerosene, as well as crates of canned, non-perishable foods and various 
other supplies.  Large twenty-gallon plastic barrels of water were 
lined up behind the shed, leaving Mulder to wonder how the hell the 
people building this place could get the containers, which easily must 
have weighed a hundred and fifty pounds each, a mile over rugged 
terrain to this location.

They made a cautious circuit of the place, inspecting each cabin 
carefully.  None looked any more or less comfortable than the others, 
and so they arbitrarily chose one in which to drop their gear.  Some 
distance from the compound was a smaller shack, mainly for use as an 
outhouse but also boasting a small, stainless-steel tub.  Leaving 
Samantha inside to organize things, Mulder and Scully went outdoors to 
start the generator and the intrusion alert system the written 
instructions had advised them was available before it got dark.

"These guys take no chances," Scully muttered as they trudged their way 
across the solid carpet of fallen leaves.  Thankfully, it was still too 
cold up in the mountains for mosquitoes just yet.

They found the generator outside the shed.  It looked to be fairly 
contemporary but God only knew the last time it had been fired up.  
Mulder was struggling with the recalcitrant piece of equipment when he 
finally spoke again, his tone carefully moderated. "What's with the 
wrist brace?"

Scully snorted from inside the shed, where she was studying the control 
panel for the laser fence that would sound an alarm if anyone broke the 
beams.  Bitter irony colored her tone as she answered.  "Suffice it to 
say that I'll be in the market for a new car when we get back to D.C."

Something in her voice set Mulder's nerves on alert.  He paused what he 
was doing to stand in the doorway of the shed.  "What happened?"

Scully looked away, her jaw tensing.  "I'm on someone's hit list, 
apparently," she announced dispassionately.  "That night Krycek 
approached me in the garage and gave me the files, he warned me someone 
wanted me dead, but I didn't listen."

He stared at her, anger and fear churning in his gut.  "You've known 
since the night you called me and asked me to come back to Washington 
and you didn't tell me?" He asked coldly.

"Yeah.  I did.  Once Samantha showed up, I didn't think it was that 
important.  I had no reason to believe Krycek's word could be 
considered reliable.  I thought maybe he was trying to divert my 
attention from something else."

Mulder swore beneath his breath, every instinct within him demanding 
that he tell her how foolhardy such a move was.  Judging by the 
uncomfortable expression on her face, he thought she might already have 
a good idea.

"Look, Mulder, I'm sorry.  In retrospect, I realize I put you and 
Samantha at risk by not telling you, but at the time I really didn't 
think it would come to anything."

Shaking his head in annoyed resignation, Mulder stalked outside and 
began struggling with the generator again.

"So what happened?  Someone ran you off the road?"  He called, trying 
to moderate the irritation in his tone.

"Nothing so subtle.  They tried to blow me off the map.  Half my 
neighborhood will be shopping for cars right alongside me," she sighed.  
"I'll be lucky if I don't return to find my belongings dumped on the 
curb by my landlord."

Mulder peered around the door to the shed once more, his heart thumping 
loudly in his ears.  "Are you all right?" 

"Yeah," she muttered flatly.

He returned to his efforts with the generator as she gave him a brief, 
emotionless run-down on what had happened while she was in D.C.  He had 
a hard time concentrating on what he was doing as he listened more to 
what she wasn't saying than what she was.

In complete monotone, she outlined her two near-brushes with death.  
Her face, when he looked in at her, was a perfect mask of indifference.  
She recited the facts as she would a case file, as though they had 
happened to someone else entirely.  Mulder's gut felt hollow as concern 
steadily over-rode anger.  On a mental checklist, he marked off the 
classic signs of disassociation.  She had completely retreated from the 
reality of what had almost happened to her.

He knew Scully had a tendency to deny and repress things--they both 
did, in their different ways--but what he had heard behind her words in 
that moment was on an entirely different level.  It scared the hell out 
of him and he was just a little too tired and a little too terrified by 
what had almost happened to her to retreat peacefully to one of the 
cabins and pretend it would get better if he gave her time.

He'd only seen her like this once or twice in the years they had known 
each other.  After her first run-in with Donnie Pfaster was a good 
example, but on a much smaller scale.  He'd been able to break through 
it pretty quickly that time, but only because the trauma had been fresh 
and she hadn't had time to build up the walls of detachment that would 
keep her from confronting what she was feeling.  This time, she'd had 
days, and he imagined the walls of Jericho had nothing on what he was 
up against.  He had to find a way to bring her back out of the detached 
fog she had enshrouded herself with. 

His attempts to start the generator finally met with success and soon 
it was buzzing contentedly along.  He leaned in the doorway of the shed 
as Scully flipped on the switch to the intrusion alarm system and rose, 
brushing her hands on her thighs.  Reaching out, he lifted her chin, 
inspecting her for any physical signs of trauma.  She jerked away 
almost immediately, her eyes shielded and her body tense.  She brushed 
past him to enter the murky, tree-shaded area in the midst of the 
cabins.  Evening was already beginning to fall and with the heavy 
canopy overhead, very little of the dusky sunlight filtered through to 
the ground below.

"I'm fine, Mulder," she said firmly.  "The wrist will heal and the 
concussion is not that bad.  I'll be okay."

He didn't answer.  When she looked back, he was still staring at her.  
"Quit it, would you?" she snapped.  Schooling his face into complete 
neutrality, he neither responded nor looked away.

"Damn it, Mulder, stop!  I'm fine."

"You always are," he said harshly.

That got her attention.  

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" She snarled.

"It means," he stalked toward her, getting in her face, "why don't you 
tell me how you really feel, Scully?  Tell me 'Fuck off, Mulder' or 
"Mind your own damn business, Mulder' or 'I don't need you, get the 
hell out of my way, Mulder'.  Just cut it with the 'I'm fine' crap, 
okay?  I'm not buying it."

She looked ready to slug him, her face flushing a vivid shade of red 
and her hands clenching spasmodically at her sides.  Good.  If she 
punched him, it'd probably shock her back to reality all the quicker.  
Every word he'd said was true.  What caught him flat-footed was the 
fact that it felt pretty damned good to say it finally.  God knew he'd 
been tempted in the past.

"Goddammit, Mulder, don't start pulling this with me.  If I tell you I 
can handle it then I expect you to respect that!"

"Why are you so defensive?" he shot back.  "I saw you back in that car, 
Scully.  You nearly blew a hole through me before you saw who I was.  I 
wouldn't consider that the calling card of someone who can 'handle 
it.'"

"Don't play psychologist with me, Mulder!  What do you want me to say?" 
she demanded angrily.  "That I was scared?  Hell, yes, I was scared!  
Someone out there wants me dead in a big way and I don't have the first 
damned clue how to stop it or protect myself.  So, yeah, Mulder, I'm 
scared.  I'm fucking terrified.  Is that what you want to hear?  Can we 
stop now?"

Growling with irritation, she turned on her heel and strode rapidly 
away from him.  After several paces, she stopped, her shoulders 
hunching over.  When she turned back around, her eyes were brimming 
with tears.  He approached her with all the caution he would a wild 
animal, reaching out to her in as non-threatening manner as he could 
manage, waiting to see if she would bolt.  Gently, his hands closed 
over her shoulders, rubbing lightly, feeling some of her ramrod-
straight tension ease.

She caught him by surprise with the sudden violence with which she 
wrapped herself around him, burying her face in his shoulder as she 
sniffled, her fingers digging into the muscles of his back.  He 
encircled her with his arms, murmuring into her hair as he softly 
stroked her spine.

"This isn't like any other time we've been under the gun, Mulder," she 
said, her voice muffled against his chest.  "This isn't some government 
goon shooting at us because we went somewhere we shouldn't.  It's not 
some sick bastard like Pfaster, who kills because he gets off on it.  
Someone has just decided I'm in an inconvenience and has simply decided 
to get rid of me.  I don't know how to defend myself against that."

The fear in her voice clutched at his heart, twisting, and his arms 
tightened around her, pulling her closer in obedience of the marrow-
deep instinct to protect and comfort her.

"I'm sorry, Scully," he said quietly, his fingers lightly caressing the 
side of her neck.  He wasn't sorry he'd provoked her, really, but he 
was sorry he had allowed his own feelings to color how he went about 
it.  "I shouldn't have pushed you like that.  I just...I've never seen 
you quite this way, and it has me worried."

"Never seen me what way?" she asked, her voice slightly choked, turning 
to face him with the pale tracks of tears lining her face.

"Hunted," he whispered, tenderly pushing her hair back from her face, 
stroking her wet cheek with the backs of his fingers.

She gave a small, uncontrollable, hysterical giggle at the choice of 
words.  "That's about as fitting as anything," she replied, her tone 
wavering, unsteady.  He acknowledged the humor in his choice of words 
with a gruff chuckle.

She laid her cheek against his chest again, sighing.  He didn't know 
how long they stood there before he pulled back out of the embrace, 
rubbing his hands over her shoulders.  He searched her eyes, trying to 
gauge the emotional climate there.  What he saw reassured him.

"Come on," he prompted, resting his hand between her shoulder blades.  
"It's getting dark, and I'm cold.  Let's get inside."

Nodding, she allowed him to guide her into the cabin.

*     *     *     *     *

Samantha was already curled up on the bottom bunk asleep when they 
entered the cabin they had made their headquarters.  "Uh-oh," Scully 
whispered, looking at Mulder with amusement.  "How do we get our things 
out of here and into the other cabins without waking her?"

Mulder cast a fond glance at his sister.  "Don't worry about it," he 
murmured.  "Samantha could sleep through an all-out alien invasion.  
She always could."

Silently, they gathered their belongings and set them outside.  Mulder 
paused to turn down the kerosene heater and cover Samantha up with the 
extra blanket from the top bunk to reduce the risk of fire and emerged 
to see Scully already unloading her things in the next cabin to the 
right.  He took the cabin beyond that, dropping his gear carelessly on 
the floor and returning to join Scully.

"Any self-respecting fire marshal would have a stroke at the sight of 
this place," she commented over her shoulder as she ignited her own 
heater.  A loud "whoosh" announced her success, and she turned on the 
electric fan in the unit.

Shrugging, he sat on the bottom bunk, taking a good look around the 
cabin.  A single dingy light bulb hung from the ceiling.  The lanterns 
were for backup apparently.  The heaters could still give off warmth 
even without the blower turned on, so they weren't entirely reliant on 
the generator.  It might not be a bad idea, actually, to use the thing 
as little as possible, conserving their resources.  There was no 
telling how long they might be up here.

"The DNA tests came back," Scully interrupted his thoughts, sitting 
beside him on the edge of the bunk.  "Samantha is definitely your 
sister."

He looked down at her as she studied him carefully, waiting for his 
reaction to the news.  He merely gave her a small smile and nod of 
acknowledgment.

"At this point, I'd be surprised if she weren't," he replied, scooting 
backward to lean against the wall, his legs sticking out across the 
bunk in front of him.  Scully looked at him quizzically.  "We've had a 
chance to get to know each other in the last few days, to reconnect.  
We got to see what's different and what's stayed the same.  She's just 
too familiar to me not to be the real thing."

"I didn't get to tell you who visited me while I was in the hospital," 
she started, looking uncomfortable.  Mulder listened, at once angry and 
concerned as she related the tale of the smoking man's visit.  "He said 
that Samantha wasn't in any real danger, that the threats had merely 
been attempts to keep her out of the line of fire.  He said he's 
protected her all these years."

"And you believe him?"

She sighed, sliding back to join him leaning against the wall, so they 
were sitting shoulder to shoulder, their legs stretched out 
companionably beside each other's.  "I don't know, Mulder.  Frankly, I 
haven't had time since the assassination attempts to give it much 
consideration.  He said he could protect her if she were at home with 
her family, but not while she was with us.  Especially me."

"I can't say I'm willing to consider sending her home just yet, when 
we've only got his word to go on," Mulder stated, frowning.

"Me neither," she replied.  She paused for a moment then Mulder felt 
the motion as she took a deep breath.

"There's another player out there that we didn't know about," she said 
finally, and Mulder felt a small shudder pass through her.

"Who?" Instantly alert, he straightened, twisting to look at her.

"I don't know his name," Scully answered.  "We know about Burke, and 
about the Englishman, and the other man who showed me that box car, but 
there's someone else, a man with a German accent who seemed to be 
pretty far up in the hierarchy."

"Seemed?  You sound like you've met the man, Scully."

"Not as such, no," she said, appearing decidedly uncomfortable.  "I 
remember him--from my abduction."

Mulder swallowed hard, staring at her.  "Are you sure?"

She nodded, not quite happily.  "Pretty much.  I'm remembering more 
each day.  I can recall a lot of the sounds and some of what happened 
around me, but I couldn't see much, really.  I couldn't move my head or 
look around.  But I do remember a conversation between Burke and the 
Englishman and this other man, something that happened outside my field 
of vision.  The man with the German accent wanted them to kill me 
during my abduction.  Burke told me that one other man remained after 
the destruction of their group and that he was the one trying to kill 
me.  I think it might be this man with the German accent I remember 
from my abduction."

"Do you remember anything else?" he asked, his brow wrinkled with 
concern as he watched her.  She shook her head, not meeting his gaze.

"Not really...nothing worth mentioning yet.  I can let you know more 
after I've had a chance to figure some things out."

It was a hedge.  He'd bet his Sylvia Kristel collection on it.  He 
considered pressing her, then changed his mind.  If Scully felt it was 
something they needed to discuss now, she'd say it.  If she wasn't 
saying it, she had her reasons, most likely that she wanted to have 
more information before making any declarations.  She wasn't like 
him...she didn't go off half-cocked.  If she said something, she had 
the proof to back it up, period.

He settled back in beside her and fell silent as he processed all she 
had told him.  He could see in the corner the briefcase full of files 
and papers she had brought with her from the car.  It looked like they 
still had a lot of work ahead of them.  They had come to this place 
seeking to protect Samantha, but it was the peril Scully was now in 
that dictated they remain.

His mind went back to the conversation he'd had with Samantha.  How 
many times over the years had he set Scully and her needs aside in 
favor of his own pursuits?  What right did he have to lecture Samantha 
on throwing away the chance for happiness in favor of something she 
might never have?  Hadn't he been doing the same thing for seven years?  
It was not a thing he ever realized he was doing at the time, but now, 
having heard it spoken aloud, he could not deny it.  Maybe he should 
take a page from his sister's book and work to rectify that mistake.  
It was past time to put Scully first.

Something touched his shoulder and he looked down to see her head 
resting lightly against his arm.  Her breathing, soft and even, warmed 
his skin even through the layers of his coat and the shirt beneath.  He 
would have to wake her in order to move and return to his own cabin.

Her small hand, palm turned upward, rested on his thigh.  The sight 
stirred something deep within him, the awareness of the perfect trust 
held between them.  Despite all that had happened, despite all she had 
been through, she felt safe enough with him to rest, to lean on him and 
let him support her a while.  His throat tightened with emotion.

He moved slowly, supporting her as he laid her as gently on the bunk as 
he could.  He started to rise just before he felt her hand close 
tightly over his.

He looked at her and found her eyes were open, though half-lidded with 
sleep.  Something in their sky-blue depths pleaded with him.

Stay with me.  Help me feel safe a while longer.

The imperative was too powerful, the need behind it too great, too 
ignore.  Nothing that happened in the last seven days seemed to matter 
anymore, he thought.  The rightness of finally being together again 
superceded the fear and frustration and danger.  Washington was far 
away, and for tonight at least they were safe.

He reached for the coarse acrylic blanket folded at the bottom of the 
bunk and pulled it over their legs, then slid down until he lay beside 
her.  She moved for a moment to settle in against his chest, laying her 
head upon him, and closed her eyes once more.

He thought he might not be able to breathe for a moment, so intense was 
the tenderness and beauty of that moment.  He looked at her for a while 
longer as her face relaxed into sleep, and then he closed his eyes and 
rested beside her.



CHAPTER SIX - Sanctuary

The first voice, with its mild Southern drawl, was unfamiliar to her.

"The procedure's almost complete," it announced with brisk efficiency.

"Good.  Has she responded well to the alterations?"  The second voice 
she would have known under any circumstances.  Alarmed, she tried to 
open her eyes, tried to move, but could do neither.

"She is weak.  I don't understand why this was necessary.  We learned 
thirty years ago that the risks outweigh the benefits for this sort of 
manipulation.  Why repeat their mistakes?" the first voice responded.

"Things are different now...we have refined their technique..."

"And we've still almost killed her.  We'll be extremely lucky if she 
survives the radiation," the Southerner explained.

"Your orders were to perform the procedure.  If you cannot see them 
through to their completion, we can make other arrangements."  She 
could barely hear the implied threat over the pounding of her own 
heart.  Why couldn't she see?

"She's too old," the first man persisted.  "We don't even know if the 
effects will show up in a second generation with the alterations being 
made at this late date."

"That is immaterial," came the calm reply.  "There are other reasons 
which you need not concern yourself with."  Footsteps on metal plating 
echoed and faded away into the distance.  She tried again to move, to 
get away while they were gone, but her muscles would not obey.

The first voice came from right above her, sad and bitter all at once.  
"One-hundred forty-eight dead children were not enough of a lesson, I 
guess..." it muttered.  A hand stroked her forehead tenderly and then 
was gone, leaving her alone in fear and darkness and pain...

Her eyes flew open in terror, at first seeing only a metal grid a few 
feet above her.  Her vision focused and recognition set in.  A bunk, 
she thought with a relieved sigh.  Only a bunk...

Clearing her mind of the fog of sleep, Scully turned her head to survey 
her surroundings.  The sight of the dingy wooden cabin brought memory 
flooding back to her.  She was lying curled on the bottom bunk of the 
bed, covered in a scratchy blanket.  On the other side of the small 
room, dust motes floated in the tiny beams of sunlight that made it 
past the trees and through her window.

The sounds of birds and the wind in the trees reached her through the 
thin walls.  Judging by the intensity of the light filtering in through 
the dingy window, it was already well into the morning.  How long had 
she been asleep?

Throwing the blanket back, she rose and sought out her shoes, which she 
didn't remember removing.  They were tucked neatly in a corner, next to 
the bag of clothes the Gunmen had procured for her.  Slipping them on, 
she stepped out into the late morning sunlight.

Mulder and his sister were nowhere to be seen.  Scully knocked at each 
of their cabins and received no reply.  Frowning, she scanned the 
compound, considering her next course of action.  A small pile of boxes 
and cartons next to one of the cabins gave a clear idea where they had 
gone.  No doubt they were making their second run to the cars while she 
was still sleeping the morning away.

Grabbing a plastic gallon-jug of water from the supplies, she returned 
to her cabin, washing up as best she could with chilly water, a small 
cloth and a sample-sized bar of soap.  Wet-naps and baby wipes had been 
about the extent of her hygiene while she had been on the road.  She 
looked wistfully at the small metal basin in the back corner of the 
cabin and scratched her scalp.  She'd sell her soul for the chance to 
wash her hair, but with her bum wrist and a limited supply of water, 
that possibility wasn't looking very likely at the moment.

When she emerged from her cabin in a pair of faded blue jeans which 
Frohike simply *must* have chosen, judging by their tight fit, Mulder 
and Samantha's heads were just becoming visible over a rise a small 
distance from the compound, their arms laden with cartons and bags.  
Snatches of their conversation were carried on the breeze to where 
Scully stood in the doorway to her cabin, becoming clearer as they 
neared.

"Danny was too young..." louder gusts of wind through the trees made 
parts of the discussion inaudible. "... an all-day bike-a-thon... seats 
on a nearby hill to watch ... Jeanette pedals over... telling us how 
tired she is... not going to raise any money... she jumps off her bike, 
sits down... tells us she'll ride when she feels better."  Now they 
were fully visible, and Scully started toward them as they approached 
the cabins, able to make out the rest of the conversation.  "Danny, 
seeing a golden opportunity, jumps on Jeanette's bike the moment her 
back is turned and takes off.  Jeannie made it her mission in life to 
make Daniel as miserable as possible once we told her it wasn't fair 
that she should collect the pledge money when he did all the work.  And 
to add insult to injury, it turned out that Danny won a prize for the 
number of pledges made."

As Samantha finished her story, Scully heard the lilting sound of her 
laughter, accompanied by the deeper rumble of Mulder's chuckle.

"So he swiped her bike and got rewarded, huh?" Mulder gave his sister a 
sidewise look.  "Imagine getting away with that."

Samantha shook her head in that ponderous, exasperated way reserved 
solely for mothers.  "Yeah.  For days she kept giving him this glare 
that said, 'Toast, kid.  You are *so* toast.'" 

"Some sisters just have no sense of humor.  The fraternal theft of 
bicycles is a time honored Mulder family tradition."

She aimed a pointed glance her brother's knees. "Well, at least Danny's 
legs weren't sticking up to his chin and he and the bike both emerged 
from the adventure unscathed."

"I didn't hurt your bike," Mulder protested.  "And the handle bar 
bruises faded in no time."

Samantha gave an incredulous snort.  "Oh, sure, it was only what, a 
month before you wore shorts again?"

"Yeah, by that time, they just looked a little smudged, so I could just 
get away with telling everyone that I must have knelt on something." 
"SMUDGED?" Samantha hooted.  "Dirty knees are more dignified than 
explaining that you absconded with your kid sister's two times too 
small bike because you were too lazy to patch a hole in your own bike's 
tire?" "I wasn't too lazy!" Mulder declared in a decent facsimile of 
outraged indignation.  "I was in a hurry."

Samantha gave him a pointed stare.

Squirming, Mulder shrugged. "What can I say, Sam? It's a guy thing."

Samantha was on the verge of a retort but stopped, smiling as she saw 
Scully approaching.  Mulder looked up at Scully and she staggered to a 
halt, her breath leaving her as she got a good look at his face.  It 
hit her like a physical blow, leaving a warm, bittersweet ache around 
her heart.

I've waited seven years for that smile, she thought as her throat 
tightened.  This is why I couldn't let go of Samantha even when he was 
ready to move on.  I would never have seen it...

Pulling herself together before her over-wrought state became apparent, 
Scully called out a good morning.

"Good morning, Agent Scully," Samantha replied brightly, while Mulder's 
greeting was a more muted, "Hi."

"Looks like you got a head start on me," she observed, reaching out to 
relieve Samantha of some of her burden.

"You were still asleep," Mulder explained as he reached the cabin and 
set his load carefully on the ground.  "I didn't want to wake you."

"So what's next?" Samantha queried while she and Scully dropped the 
things they carried beside his.  "Breakfast, or the last trip to the 
cars?"

"Breakfast!" Mulder squatted to open one of the boxes he had carried.  
"I believe we have some of those oatmeal cups that you just add hot 
water to in here somewhere.  The bagels, I think, aren't going to be 
good for much, unless someone wants to get a hockey game going later."

"Add some fruit to that oatmeal and I won't even tell anyone you play 
with your food, Mulder," Scully replied.

He was about to come back with a smart-ass reply when Samantha 
interrupted.   "All we've got is canned," she apologized.  "Fox and I 
blew through the fresh stuff on the drive here."

"Not a word, Scully." 

Scully didn't bother to justify his antics with a reply.  It would 
never do to encourage him.  In an instant of complete feminine 
solidarity, she and Samantha exchanged long-suffering looks.  Scully 
decided that she was entirely too hungry to be picky and deftly caught 
the paper cup full of oats Mulder tossed her, accepting Samantha's 
offering of a can of sliced peaches.

A propane grill was duly dragged from the shed and soon hosted a dented 
teakettle full of water.  The compound boasted no fire pit, which 
Scully imagined was most likely due to the fact that the smoke might 
draw unwanted attention.  After breakfast, they all made the mile long 
hike to the cars once more to collect the rest of their supplies.

"There's enough here to feed us for months," Scully commented, studying 
their supply of dry and canned goods.  "But I have to say that if Dinty 
Moore beef stew and Wolf brand chili are going to be our main staples 
indefinitely, I'm may take my chances back in Washington."

Early afternoon saw them settled in for the long haul.  Samantha 
excused herself with a second kettle of hot water and retreated to her 
cabin to wash up, an idea Scully wished she had been awake enough to 
consider earlier.  It certainly provided a possible solution to her 
hair-washing dilemma, if she could figure out the logistics.  Any 
attempts to function without the wrist brace yet had proven dauntingly 
painful.  She pushed a lank strand of hair back from her face and 
grimaced.

I guess I could always swipe Mulder's razor and go Hari Krishna, she 
thought with an ironic smile.

Scully gathered all the materials and lab results she had brought with 
her from Washington and spread a blanket on the ground in the middle of 
the compound.  Enjoying the sunshine, she began to go over the 
information the Gunmen had retrieved for her while she was running from 
bombs and strangers bearing lethal syringes.

Her attention was diverted sometime later by a loud curse, followed 
shortly by clanging noises emanating from Mulder's cabin.  Soon 
thereafter, he emerged with an armful of metal tubes, carrying them to 
the next empty cabin and dropping them inside with a raucous crash.  He 
repeated the trip twice more, and on his final return, brought with him 
one of the thin mattresses that had previously occupied a bunk in the 
empty cabin, carrying it into his own.  Surrendering to curiosity, 
Scully rose and crossed the compound to his cabin, leaning in the 
doorway.

"Do I want to ask?"

He turned and shrugged.  "The bunks were too short.  And too low," he 
added, bending over in front of her and spreading his hair to reveal a 
small knot just above his temple.

Scully made a small moue of sympathy, resisting the urge to kiss the 
injury.  With his uncanny gift for picking up on her thoughts, Mulder 
looked up with wide, innocent eyes that would have made a basset hound 
look intimidating.

"Aren't you going to kiss it and make it better?"

She chuckled.  "Be careful, Mulder, or I'll tell Frohike you tore up 
all the beds."

"ALL of them?" Mulder waggled his eyebrows.  "You must think highly of 
me.  He'll be jealous."

She gave him a playful shove and peered past his shoulder to see what 
his handiwork had produced.  The metal frames of the bunk beds had been 
dismantled and removed completely.  Two mattresses lay on the floor in 
the corner with a third lying perpendicular to bottom of the first two, 
creating a pallet twice as wide and a couple feet longer than the bunks 
had been.

"What, no sleeping bag, Mulder?"  She cocked an eyebrow at him.

"Oh, I've got one of those, too," he reassured her with a lecherous 
grin that would have done any B-movie villain proud.  It was a good 
thing she didn't hear *that* voice too often, she thought, suppressing 
a small shiver.

Shaking her head, she turned and walked away, tossing over her 
shoulder, "You know, Mulder, this is just what you get for being too 
tall." 

He followed her out to her blanket and stretched out on the ground 
beside her, propped up on one elbow with his long legs extending past 
the edge and into the leaves.

"You sure you want to go there, Scully?" He gave her a cocky grin.  
"Because if we're making height jokes, I feel it only fair to warn you 
that you might fall a little short."

God, he was in rare form today, wasn't he?  She groaned and gave him a 
shaming look.  Mulder hung his head in acknowledgement of the reproach 
and a glint in mischief lit her eyes as she considered how to exact 
revenge.  She took advantage of his momentary distraction to lean over, 
invading his personal space as he had hers so many times in the past.  
Mere inches from his face, she whispered, "We little people have little 
hands, too.  And you know what those are good for?"

He swallowed.  Hard.  His Adam's apple bobbed up and down at the 
movement and she watched the flight of possible responses cross his 
features in rapid succession.  His voice was slightly strangled as he 
finally settled on one.  "They do a mean slice and dice on a cadaver, I 
hear."

"Just one of my many talents." A sly smile parted her lips.  She 
couldn't contain a small gloat as she noticed his breath coming a 
little faster.

Understanding dawned in his eyes as he realized what she was doing, 
followed in rapid succession by a predatory gleam that made her 
reconsider the wisdom of having started this.  His hand slid around the 
back of her neck, lighting fires along the sensitive nerve endings 
there, drawing her closer, until they were only a breath apart.  His 
eyes searched hers, deep as the richest dark chocolate, his soft 
exhalation brushing her lips.  Waiting for her cue, enabling her to 
call the next move.  As he always did.

The urge to touch him was strong, but leaning from a sitting position 
as she was, moving her hands would mean toppling over onto him and no 
doubt precipitating some rather embarrassing injury.

A small giggle bubbled from her lips at the mental image the thought 
evoked and Mulder drew back an inch or so, perplexed by her amused 
reaction.  She bit her lips, hoping she hadn't offended him, but 
instead he smiled, an abashed expression crossing his face as his hand 
dropped away from her neck, leaving her skin chilled in the sudden 
absence of his warmth.

"Samantha's probably going to be out any second now," he murmured, 
rolling away from her as she pushed herself back up.  Mild frustration 
skirted around the edges of his laughing eyes.

She brutally stomped on her sense of disappointment and turned back to 
her papers. Arousal abated in agonizingly slow increments.

"What are you working on?" he asked, unaware of the sudden downswing in 
her humor.

"Some of the test results I ordered from the lab," she answered, 
frowning.  "I found something odd in your blood sample."

"Odd?"

"Yes.  The same DNA that inhabited the cancerous cells in my body, and 
the chimera cells found in the ice sample in Alaska, are also in your 
bloodstream."  She scowled in confusion.  "They're in Samantha's as 
well.  I would have expected that, but you weren't abducted, so I don't 
know how you could have been exposed."

"That's strange," Mulder mused.

"Yes, I know," Scully's voice rose with frustration.  "I ran the same 
test on the tissue samples from all the other abductees in the 
Paperclip files and they all have that same DNA in their system.  Not 
only is there the question of how you were exposed, but also how it is 
that you haven't developed the cancer I had.  You don't have an 
implant."

"The vaccine, maybe?" Mulder proposed.  "If that same DNA was in the 
vaccine that was used on me in the gulag in Russia, that might explain 
how it got in my system."

"I suppose," Scully replied, dubious.  "That still doesn't explain the 
lack of the cancer, though."

Scully blushed as she realized she sounded almost disappointed that he 
didn't have cancer and laughed.  "Sorry.  That didn't come out well," 
she excused, not meeting his amused eyes.

"If it will make you feel any better," he offered, "when we get back to 
Washington I'll be your pin cushion and let you run your little tests 
to your little heart's content."

"Oh, thank you very much."

"C'mon, Scully, admit it.  You just want to play doctor on me."

Rare form, indeed.

Mulder, if only you knew...

He spared her the necessity of groping for a comeback by rising from 
the blanket.  Looking at him, there was a charged energy surrounding 
him, as though if she touched him, she might receive a shock.  He was 
practically bouncing.

"I'm gonna go for a walk, get the lay of the land.  Wanna come?"

Mulder, you manly man, you.

"Thanks, but I've got work to do.  Don't get lost, okay?"

Thanks, but I think that if I enter these woods with you right now, 
I'll have you pinned to a tree trunk before we get out of sight of the 
compound.

Snap out of it, Dana.

"I'll stick to the trail like a good boy," he promised.  There were 
those basset hound eyes again.

Jesus, Mulder, just leave before I embarrass myself, okay?

"You do that."

"See ya," he called and jogged away down the path.

It took several moments of deep-breathing exercises before she could 
focus on the files once more.

*     *     *     *     *

Inside her cabin, Samantha lay on her bunk, staring at the book in 
front of her.  It slid slowly from her numbed hands as the blood 
drained from her face.  She blinked away a rush of tears to her eyes.

Just when she thought nothing else could shock her, something always 
did.

The book she had dropped was one of her mother's journals, started in 
1964 and ending in February 1965.  Fox had been just a toddler back 
then and Samantha herself not yet conceived.  She had thought that this 
particular journal might help her connect with the Fox she had once 
known, and perhaps even the mother she barely remembered.

Now she wished she had never read it.

Stunned and pale, she stumbled from her cabin to find Agent Scully 
sitting on a blanket in what Samantha had dubbed "The Courtyard."  File 
folders were stacked around her, which Samantha found amusing for the 
fact that she didn't recall seeing a moment since she first met Agent 
Scully when her brother's partner wasn't "on duty."  Even out here, in 
the middle of nowhere, she continued to work.

"Agent Scully?"

The pretty red-haired woman turned around and gave Samantha a reserved 
smile.

"Hello, Samantha.  Enjoy your bath?"

"Very much so.  Four days on the road makes one appreciative of the 
little amenities, I guess," Samantha pondered.  "May I join you?"

"Of course.  Please, sit down." Agent Scully moved a stack of her files 
aside to make room for Samantha.

"Thank you, Agent Scully."

"Dana."

"I'm sorry?"

"You can call me Dana."

"Oh." Samantha blushed, embarrassed.  "Of course.  Thank you, Dana."

She gave Samantha another kind smile, easing the discomfort.  Suddenly, 
Samantha had a pretty good idea why her brother thought as highly of 
this woman as he did.  Something about her just drew people, it seemed.

"What can I do for you?" Dana was asking, interrupting Samantha's 
thoughts.

"Well...nothing, really," Samantha replied, struggling with words.  
"It's just...you're an important part of Fox's life, and I've barely 
had a chance to talk to you."

"I know," the other woman murmured apologetically.  "It's been a 
difficult week for all of us, I guess."

Samantha nodded, gazing thoughtfully at the patches of sky peeking 
through the trees for a moment.

"Fox told me what you did, Dana," Samantha announced out of the blue, 
"the way you kept looking for me even after he was ready to quit.  I 
don't understand why, but--"

Dana groaned.  "He shouldn't have told you that," she protested in 
embarrassment.  "It wasn't like that, really.  He'd been through a 
pretty horrible experience and he made a decision that I knew that 
someday he would regret, so I just tried to keep the momentum going 
until he came to terms with what had happened.  He never gave up on 
you, Samantha."

"You've been with him for years," Samantha observed.  "You know him 
better than anyone, I think.  You've taken care of him.  I feel I need 
to thank you for that, for giving me the chance to know he's been with 
someone who's looked out for him all these years.  I get the feeling he 
hasn't had much of that."

"There's nothing to thank me for," she denied.  "We take care of each 
other.  What we've accomplished together has been the single most 
significant experience of my life.  He's a remarkable man, Samantha; 
I've never known anyone like him.  And what we've done working together 
has been important.  It's made an impact.  No matter what has happened, 
I can't regret that I've had the chance to be a part of that."

"You care for him."

It was an observation, but Samantha realized it was also a request.  If 
what she suspected was true, Fox was going to need all the support he 
could get.

"Of course," Dana responded placidly.  How, Samantha wondered, did her 
outrageous and off-the-wall brother and this very sedate and rational 
woman ever get on long enough to come to the sort of closeness they 
obviously shared?  She and Michael were practically two peas in a pod, 
but not so her brother and his partner.  How extraordinary.

"Tell me, Dana--has Fox ever told you much about his childhood?  I 
mean, when he was very young," Samantha asked hesitantly.

Dana considered the question for a moment.  "To be honest, Samantha, 
not really.  You've got to understand--Mulder was pretty traumatized by 
what happened to you.  His childhood isn't something he's very 
comfortable remembering, much less discussing."

"I can understand that," Samantha murmured bitterly.  "God knows our 
parents didn't help.  But--what about his really early childhood?  I 
know he has an eidetic memory, so he has to have a solid recall of his 
very young years.  Has he ever said anything about the time before I 
was born?"

Understanding dawned in Dana's eyes.  "You're wondering about your 
mother's relationship with Charles Burke?"

Unable to deny the woman's inquiry without revealing her true reason 
for asking, Samantha nodded silently.

"You would have to ask your brother," Dana said apologetically.  "I 
know what Mulder has been told, and what he suspects, but it's not my 
place to form an opinion.  I'm sorry."

"No, no...that's all right," Samantha waved the apology away.  "I 
understand.  I was just hoping maybe I could learn something more about 
Fox.  Sometimes you just need to hear things from another source, you 
know?"

They fell silent once more and finally Samantha rose, brushing bits of 
debris off her jeans.  "Well, I guess I'll leave you to your work," she 
murmured.  "I just wanted you to know how much I appreciate all you've 
done.  Do you know where Fox went?"

"He took a walk," Dana replied, studying the sky as its pale shade of 
blue began to deepen.  "He went back down the path, that way."

"Thanks," Samantha said again.  Without another word, she followed the 
path Agent Scully had indicated.  As she retreated, she felt the other 
woman's eyes upon her.

*     *     *     *     *

"Fox?"

The inquiry came from behind him, and he twisted to see Samantha 
standing some distance back.

"Agent Scully--I mean, Dana--told me you had gone for a walk.  Mind if 
I join you?"

"Sure."  Mulder patted a space on the fallen tree trunk he sat on 
invitingly.  He had been walking about an hour before he found this 
place in a quiet clearing where a fair amount of sunlight shone through 
the trees.  At this moment, on this day, he felt more peaceful and 
relaxed than he had in the last twenty-seven years of his life.  He 
wasn't sure he'd ever felt so happy.

"You look excited," Samantha commented, eyeing him sharply.

"No, not really," he replied.  "I just...There's something about this 
place that takes me away from everything that holds me down in 
Washington, you know?  I just want to enjoy it while I can, because I 
know it can't possibly last."

"I think I understand," Samantha replied, nodding.  "Lord knows I've 
had precious few of those days in the last couple years."

That was a sobering thought.  "That son-of-a-bitch should never have 
brought you to see me that night," he muttered.

"Fox, whether it was right or wrong, it's done.  There's no sense 
worrying about what should have been."

Mulder nodded reluctantly, turning his face up into the sunlight once 
more.  The early-spring air was still cool, but the light was warm and 
soothing.  He took an instant to wish he didn't have to leave this 
place someday soon.

He supposed he should feel guilty, leaving Scully back at the compound 
working while he left to bask in the beauty of nature, but in a way he 
was glad he'd had a while alone to absorb the events of the last week.  
The shock of the attempts on Scully's life had scarcely had a chance to 
fade when she told him what she found in the DNA tests she had run.

He had made light of the issue for Scully's sake, because he knew that 
she would fret over it until they got back to Washington and she had 
the ability to investigate her findings in more detail.  But the 
question still niggled at the back of his mind.

What did it mean?  What could he share in common with the abductees?

"Something on your mind?" Samantha asked, interrupting his musings.

Looking down at her where she sat next to his shoulder, he nodded.  
"Yeah."

He began to tell her what Scully had found, the matching DNA in his 
system as in those of the abductees.  Her face went pale almost the 
moment he started speaking, however, and she bit her lip nervously.

He stopped.  Obviously there were some realities about her abduction 
Samantha wasn't ready to face yet.  He supposed he couldn't blame her.  
Being abducted--it was the worst kind of violation.  He knew that from 
his second-hand experience of watching Scully slowly and painfully come 
to terms with what had happened to her.  The idea of being helpless, 
unable to control yourself or what was done to you...It was horrifying.

What was he doing talking this over with Samantha, anyway?  Shouldn't 
he be back at the compound, working it out with Scully?  Why had he 
left her just now?  What the hell was he doing sitting out here 
spinning his wheels?  Wasn't seven years long enough to realize that he 
could never accomplish alone even a fraction of what he and Scully did 
together day after day?

You're an idiot, Fox Mulder, he berated himself.

"It doesn't really change anything," he finally said with a negligent 
wave of his hand to reassure Samantha.  "I mean, I suppose we'll have 
to be on the lookout for any odd developments.  But besides that, 
nothing is really different."

Samantha licked her lips, looking uncomfortable.

"That's true," she said finally, "I've come to realize that life-
altering revelations aren't really all that life-altering after all.  
We each have a course we're set upon, and we have no choice but to go 
where we've been headed all along."

Mulder frowned at her, perplexed by the philosophical turn in her mood.  
"That sounds like the voice of experience speaking."  He used her own 
words.

"It is," she answered simply.  "When I first went to college, when I 
first had to confront myself as my own person away from everything that 
had become familiar and safe to me since I was fourteen, I went a 
little crazy.  I began partying a lot, drank a lot, got high a bit.  I 
didn't know what to think about myself or the world around me, so I 
just tried my damnedest to stop thinking, period.  Then I realized 
there comes a day in your life when the things that happened in the 
past are no longer a valid excuse; that no matter what shaped you 
initially, you take ownership of your own actions and your own 
identity."

Mulder stared at her, puzzled.  She looked unhappy, her expression 
troubled as she spoke.

"Samantha, are you all right?"

The question seemed to jerk her out of whatever pensive spell she was 
under. "Nothing," she announced brightly, slightly breathless.  
"Nothing at all.  I guess I just figured I've got almost thirty years 
of sisterly wisdom stored up by now.  Gotta get some of it out while I 
have the chance."

"Don't bother wasting it on me," he cautioned, staring into the trees.  
"Use it on your kids, who aren't quite so incorrigible."

"At least not yet.  I'll worry after they meet their Uncle Fox," she 
retorted.  "I'm still holding out hope that there's enough time between 
now and then to mend the error of your ways."

The idea made him irrationally happy, that someday he would actually 
get to meet her children and be a part of their lives.  That he'd have 
a family once more.  He basked in the feeling for a moment, until she 
spoke again.

"Okay," she began bluntly, "now I get to exercise my little sister's 
prerogative of nosiness.  What's going on between you and Dana?"

He gave her a blank stare, his expression deliberately obtuse. "What do 
you mean?"

"You know what I mean," she nudged him with a mischievous grin.  "Are 
you two...together?"

Giving her a narrow-eyed look, Mulder hopped down off the tree trunk 
without answering, heading back for the trail they had taken.

"I could always ask Dana," her voice floated to him from behind, and he 
slowly rounded on her to see her sitting on the log with her hands 
folded peacefully in her lap.  Her expression was one he'd been all too 
familiar with once upon a time, one that had driven him right up the 
wall.

"You barely know 'Dana,'" he pointed out, his tone sinking to an 
annoyed growl.

"What can I say, Fox?"  She shrugged, batting her eyes innocently as 
she threw his own words back at him.  "It's a girl thing."

Damn.  She could still catch him even after all these years.  Glowering 
dangerously, he stalked back to where she sat.

*     *     *     *     *

Surrendering to the oncoming darkness and the persistent chill in the 
early April air, Scully moved her materials indoors and continued 
working by the light of the single dim bulb in her cabin, warmed by the 
small kerosene heater.  Every so often, she would lift her head, 
listening for the return of Samantha and her brother.  A touch of 
concern marred her forehead as she wondered where they had gone and 
when they were coming back.  They didn't have flashlights, her mind 
nagged.  They might have gotten lost...

She shook her head at her worrisome bent.  They'd be fine.  They'd all 
be fine.

Her mind wandered back to the conversation she'd had with Samantha that 
afternoon.  Samantha Mulder shared with her brother a complete lack of 
pretension that was as engaging as it was refreshing, Scully realized.  
Like Mulder, his sister was unable to be anyone but who she was, no 
matter what the world might think of her.  Whatever reservations Scully 
might have had about Samantha when she'd first encountered her a week 
ago could not stand against the simple and honest concern and affection 
she saw between Mulder and his sister as they became more familiar with 
each other.

With some surprise and in spite of everything surrounding them at this 
moment, Scully realized she was happier than she had been in years.  
Watching them together this morning had been one of the most amazing 
experiences she'd ever had.  Whatever might happen from this point on, 
Scully had had a chance to witness this day, to see Mulder reunited 
with his sister, alive and healthy and happy.  It was the fulfillment 
of a dream that had always seemed intangible, impossible.

She heard the voices outside her cabin only seconds before a knock 
sounded at her door.  Mulder pushed it open, stepping inside, with 
Samantha standing behind him, wearing what could only be deemed a smug 
expression.  Wary curiosity overtook Scully's expression as she looked 
back and forth between brother and sister.  It might just be the chill 
in the air, but her partner's ears looked decidedly pink.

"I'm going to start dinner," Samantha announced without preamble, 
turning and walking away before anyone had a chance to say anything.  
Mulder shook his head with an exasperated sigh, allowing the door to 
swing shut behind him.

"What was that all about?" Scully asked as her partner leaned against 
the wall across from her.

"Nothing," he muttered as he looked at her, his face inscrutable.  She 
shifted uneasily.  Silence stretched out between them until she could 
take no more and finally spoke.

"Mulder, I think there is something you should know..."

His eyes, instantly alert, bored into her.  "What?"

"Now is probably not the best time to mention this," Scully said, 
clearing her throat, "but I think you should know it's looking very 
possible that the smoking man was telling the truth about Samantha not 
being in any danger."

"What do you mean?"

"I've got the information the boys dug up on Samantha while they were 
searching for the data I requested on the other people mentioned in the 
Paperclip files," she explained.  "Apparently, he's the one who 
orchestrated her escape when she was fourteen years old."

"Come again?"

"It's true.  The admitting nurse we spoke to in California lied to us.  
Samantha's foster parents happened to be her sister and brother in 
law."  Scully gave him a meaningful look.  "Guess who made a sizable 
deposit into her account the day after Samantha supposedly disappeared 
from her locked hospital room?"

"Damn," Mulder muttered.  "C.G.B. Spender?"

"One of his many aliases, actually, but yes," Scully replied.  "Guess 
who also pulled the ranch Samantha's foster parents ran out of near 
bankruptcy about the same time Samantha went to live with them?  And 
who continued to make contributions to her welfare from that time on?"

"Meaning he may actually have been telling something resembling the 
truth when he said he'd protected her all these years," he sighed in 
disgust.

"It certainly appears that way," Scully answered.  "Now, I'm every bit 
as unwilling to give him the benefit of the doubt as you, Mulder, but 
you can't deny there appears to be a strong chance he told the truth 
about this one."

"It still doesn't mean anything, Scully," he argued.  "We don't know 
why he helped her escape when she was fourteen.  Maybe it was just in 
his best interest to have her someplace else.  It doesn't mean she's 
not in danger now."

"That's possible," she said slowly, "but I think maybe we need to ask 
Samantha her opinion on the matter."

"What?  Scully, no... This is hard enough on her as it is without 
confusing the issue," Mulder protested, looking troubled and defensive 
all at once.  "You and I hardly know who or what to believe sometimes, 
so how could we expect that of her?"

"She knew the man for years, Mulder.  Maybe she has a better insight 
into him than we do."  Scully paused, letting her words sink in.  "It's 
possible that our opinions of the man are biased by what we know he's 
done."

"No.  I'm not going to do it," Mulder declared, pushing himself up from 
the floor and walking away.  "I can't believe you'd even consider it."

Scully rose and followed him as he marched out the door and toward his 
own cabin.  Oddly, Samantha was no where to be seen, despite her claims 
that she was going to begin preparing dinner.

Mulder turned to face her, his posture tense.  "The man gave the order 
that ended up killing your sister, Scully.  He gave the order that 
killed my father.  If you think I would consider trusting what he says 
or does for a moment, especially where my sister is concerned..."

"What you think, Mulder, or what I think isn't the issue here," she 
argued, trying to keep the frustration out of her voice.  "She has 
children she's been apart from for weeks now.  If there's a possibility 
that she can safely go home to them, we have to let her know."

"That's exactly why I *don't* want her to know!"  Mulder stalked away, 
running a hand through his hair.  When he looked back at her, anger had 
taken a foothold on his expression.  "You haven't been with her every 
moment of every day for the last week.  You haven't seen what happens 
to her every time she remembers her kids.  I have.  If you hold that 
possibility out in front of Samantha, she's going to jump at it for the 
chance to go back to them.  There's no way she can possibly judge the 
level of danger involved with any sort of objectivity."

"You can't make her choices for her, Mulder," Scully said firmly.  "And 
I think you need to step back for a moment and examine your motives for 
not wanting to tell her."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" He snapped.

"I think--" Scully made an effort to moderate her tone, knowing she was 
treading on dangerous ground. "I think that there's a possibility 
you're determined to reject the idea that Samantha might be safe to go 
home out of hand, not because it might be untrue, but because you don't 
want to let her go."  The words left her in a breathless rush as she 
watched him, her eyes wide.

He opened his mouth to unleash a furious retort.  His mouth worked as 
though it required a physical effort to stem whatever he was about to 
say.  Finally, he pivoted on his heel, stalking away into his cabin.  
The door closed firmly behind him, effectively ending the discussion.

Scully stood in the courtyard, staring at the closed portal for a long 
time.  The instinct to run after him waged with an undercurrent of 
frustration.  She couldn't force him to see this her way.  When he was 
ready to discuss it rationally, she'd be there, but she couldn't take 
him on with this sort of outrage running through him.

"Dana?"

Samantha stood behind her, startling Scully.  Scully whirled, her heart 
skipping a beat.

"I thought I heard Fox...is everything all right?" Samantha asked, her 
eyes wide with concern.

Well, if she wanted Samantha to know what she had found, this was her 
chance.  But she couldn't do it, couldn't circumvent Mulder that way.  
It would be a betrayal of their perfect trust, a trust which could only 
exist in the face of perfect honesty and respect.  It had to be his 
call.

"Everything's fine, Samantha," Scully said, forcing a smile.  "Can I 
help you with dinner?"

*     *     *     *     *

Mulder had emerged from his cabin to eat with them and then retreated 
again, leaving Scully irritated and Samantha perplexed.  Uncomfortable 
in the face of Samantha's confusion, Scully retired to her cabin.  It 
was sometime later when a light knock sounded at her door.

"Come in."

The door opened, admitting Mulder.  Scully watched him as he slid down 
to sit on the floor again, in the same spot he had occupied before 
their confrontation earlier.  A long moment of awkward silence filled 
the space between them.

"I told her," Mulder finally said, not meeting her eyes.

Scully nodded without answering.  What could she say?  God knows she 
wished she'd never had to hand the decision over to him to make in the 
first place.

"Are you all right?" She asked at last.

"Yeah, I'm okay," Mulder replied, his tone distracted.  His voice 
trailed off, and he looked up at her with very sad and fearful eyes.  
"I don't want to lose her, Scully."

Again, she didn't answer, waiting for him to continue.  After a moment, 
he did.

"You don't know what it's been like these last few days, Scully," he 
said.  "At first, I didn't know how to act, what to do.  But as we got 
comfortable around each other...it's like we've known each other the 
whole time.  As long as I keep her out here with me, I know that's not 
going to change."

Scully felt tears prick her lids as sympathy wrenched her heart.  "I 
think I understand, Mulder.  I... In the last days I felt that way 
about Emily.  I'd see her smile or hear her speak, and I could have 
sworn she'd been with me since the day she was born.  But for you it's 
different, Mulder.  Just because you let her go doesn't mean she's 
never coming back."

"I know," he whispered.  Then, again, the silence, this time less tense 
than it had been before.

"I owe you an apology," he announced after a moment, his voice muted 
and thoughtful.

Her eyes widened in amazement.  "What?  Mulder, no--"

"I shouldn't have taken off the way I did."  His face was determined, 
his jaw clenched with the effort of making the apology.

She frowned, perplexed by this sudden and unexpected turn in his mood.  
Never, in all the years they had worked together, had he felt the need 
to express remorse for his understandable, if sometimes extreme, 
reactions.

"I understood, Mulder," she said at last, licking her lips nervously.  
"You needed space.  I respect that."

"I didn't leave because I needed space, Scully."  He denied, scowling.  
"I ran off to sulk."

Scully stared at him in disbelief.  "Mulder--" she began, fumbling for 
words.  "The decision I put before you...it was a big deal.  If you 
needed time to process, that's understandable.  I certainly wouldn't 
call it 'sulking.'"

"What could I have processed out there that I couldn't have back here, 
working this thing out with you?" He demanded, frustration coloring his 
tone.  His eyes sought hers, something burning deep within his gaze. 
"After all that's happened to us, Scully, after everything we've shared 
and been through together, we push each other away when we need each 
other the most.  What the hell's up with that?"

Oh, God, she realized in astonishment, her breath trickling weakly from 
her lips.  That's what this is all about.  Why now?  Why this way?  How 
much of this is him speaking and how much of it is the hurt and 
confusion?  I know I swore I was ready for it, but please God, it's got 
to be for real or it's no good...

Scully rose from the bunk, agitated.  She paced to the far end of the 
room, a total of four paces, turning her back to him.  "I don't think 
this is the time to be discussing this, Mulder," she said evasively.  
"I think you've been through a lot today, and I think that you might 
want to be cautious about saying something in a moment of distress that 
you won't be so sure about when you've had a chance to work things 
out."

He snorted in disgust.  "Scully, if I don't say this now, I might never 
have the balls to.  And you know I'm right."

Of course he was right, or he would be under any other circumstances.  
But she couldn't run the risk of him committing to something in the 
midst of his confusion that he wasn't ready to handle when all the dust 
had settled.

She crossed her arms defensively over her chest, turning to face him.  
His expression was almost defiant, challenging her as she opened her 
mouth then shut it again.  And again.

What she finally settled on sounded pretty pathetic, even to her own 
ears.  "Mulder, we can't change who we are."

"Of course not," He ran his fingers through his hair in frustration.  
"Sometimes we have to do what we have to do.  But the fact is that I 
shouldn't have stormed out like that.  Last night I pushed you 
scratching and biting into discussing something you really didn't want 
to talk about.  It was something very personal, very private and I made 
you share that with me.  What right did I have to do that when I 
couldn't let you help me work through what you told me this evening?  
We trust each other to watch our backs and hold our secrets.  You're my 
closest friend and my cherished confidante and the one thing in this 
world I couldn't live without," he took a breath, refusing to 
relinquish his hold on her gaze. "But if we keep coming up with reasons 
why we shouldn't let each other in when it's important, what the hell 
good is the rest of it going to do us?"

Sweet merciful Jesus, her knees were trembling.  His timing was, as 
always, exquisite.  Right on the heels of several of the most trying 
days of her life, he chose to bring up the one subject that had gone 
unspoken between them for years, the one that had the power to change 
everything for them.  She had no defenses left, no way to distance or 
protect herself here.  She wanted to settle this once and for all more 
than she could remember wanting anything in her life, but oh God was 
she terrified.

She rallied the very last scraps of her self-control together for one 
final all-out attempt at making sure what he was saying was what he 
really meant. "It's fine to say that now, Mulder," she said in a tone 
that strove to be reasonable. She walked slowly and carefully across 
the room to crouch down in front of him.  "But what about when we get 
back to Washington?  Once we open that door, there's no closing it, not 
without doing some major damage.  And what makes a hell of a lot of 
sense out here in the middle of nowhere when everything that ties us 
down is hundreds of miles away might not work so well when we're back 
to reality."

He gave her an ironic half-smile, his eyes filled with infinite 
tenderness as they probed hers.  With his gift of cutting right to the 
heart of what she was thinking, he spoke.  

"Reports of my fractured emotional state have been highly exaggerated, 
Scully.  I know what I'm saying."

He did, she realized, staring breathlessly at him.  What had been 
building between them for years had finally come to a head, and time or 
place didn't matter.  All that remained now was for her to follow him, 
as she had some many times before, on pure and unquestioning trust.

A knock on the door caused them both to jump.  Scully fell off balance, 
holding a hand to her breast over the mad pounding of her heart.  
Mulder reached out, steadying her, his long hands closing over her 
upper arms with deceptively gentle strength.

"Hey, Fox, Dana?" Samantha called through the door.  "That little man, 
um, Frohike...he included some marshmallows for us.  I know a propane 
grill isn't the same as a campfire, but I'm feeling the need to regress 
a little here..."

"Thanks," Scully called back, horrified at the strangled pitch of her 
own voice.  Mulder couldn't suppress a small smirk, and she narrowed 
her eyes in warning.

"We'll be right out," Mulder said loudly.  Scully swore she heard 
Samantha chortling as she walked away from the door.

The second of humor passed and there were Mulder's eyes, questioning 
her once more.

Your move, Scully.  Are you ready?

Yes, she was.  She leaned forward, cupping his face in her hands, 
smiling tenderly at him.

This was the moment when she kissed him on the forehead and sent him on 
his way, she thought with a bittersweet pang.  He even lowered his head 
in expectation of the gesture.  Indecision fled, leaving Scully with no 
questions of what was right or wrong.  She knew exactly what to do.

As he had done the previous evening in the shed, she lifted his chin 
with her fingers, forcing his head up.  The pressure of her lips on his 
was unassuming, demanding as little as the kiss he'd given her at New 
Year's.  Not a kiss of passion--there would be a time and place for 
that later--but one of affirmation.  His lips softly stroked hers in 
response and then she pulled away, seeing her own sense of wonder 
reflected in his eyes.

"Let's go roast some marshmallows," she murmured with a grin, rising to 
her feet.  She reached out a hand and pulled him up and preceded him 
out the door to join Samantha.

*     *     *     *     *

Late in the night, after they had all retired to their cabins, after 
having watched Fox and Dana exchange awkward, reluctant glances before 
going their separate ways, Samantha lay awake in bed, her hot, dry eyes 
staring at the bunk above her.

That bastard.  That filthy, rotten, lying bastard.

Never before in her life had she known a truly murderous rage, but 
tonight, if the horrid son-of-a-bitch who might or might not be her 
father were there, she would kill him with her bare hands and not know 
a moment of regret.

All the fear and the agony of the last two years, all the misery she 
had endured since leaving her children to go on the run.  It was all 
his fault.  How could anyone do that to the daughter he claimed to 
love?

"I left my *children* because of what he did to me," she had exclaimed 
when Fox told her what Dana had discovered.  "It was all a *joke*?!  
Why in God's name would he do such a thing?"

"According to him," Fox had interjected sotto voce, "he was protecting 
you from exposure to me."

"That's bullshit, Fox!" Samantha had snarled.  "The very gall of the 
man to pretend to 'protect' me after what he's been responsible for is 
incomprehensible."

"Nevertheless, Samantha," Fox had replied, "he claims that you were 
never in any danger and that you can return home without fear for 
yourself or your children."

"That's a pretty big risk to take based only on his assurances," she 
had sneered.

But in the end, there was really no choice to be made.  She had left 
her children because she had felt she was protecting them by doing so.  
If that primary goal was no longer necessary, then she must return to 
them.

Besides, she thought bitterly, she had some unfinished business to 
attend to with Charles Geoffrey Burke.

*     *     *     *     *

Mulder stared at Samantha, nodding sadly even as he winced.

"Of course you have to go back."

Samantha's eyes were tearful as he met them.  "Fox..." she whispered.

"You belong with your family, Samantha," he said with difficulty.

"You're my family, too, Fox," she replied with a tremulous smile.  
Mulder looked hastily away, swallowing hard, unable to answer.

"I left my children because I thought that by doing so, I was 
protecting them," Samantha said, sniffling.  "I would never have done 
it if I hadn't believed with certainty that there was a real and 
immediate danger to them.  If that's not the case, I have to go back to 
them."

"I know."  Mulder's voice was deep and gruff, choked with emotion as he 
acknowledged the truth in her words.  He glanced over at Scully, his 
eyes clinging to her for support.

"Okay," he said at last, clearing his throat.  "I think it would 
probably be best if you took the van.  There's no need to take an 
indirect route, so you can be home in a day at most.  If you leave 
right away, you can do most of the driving while its light.  I'll give 
you a phone number to use to contact Byers once you're home to arrange 
for returning the car to them."

"Okay," she whispered.  "I'll, um...go get my things."

She rose and walked away from them, wiping at her face.  Mulder sat 
with his head thrown back, his hands covering his face.  Behind him, he 
heard Scully draw in a breath as if to speak to him, then release it 
again.  

She probably wanted to say something that would be comforting, he 
thought with a bittersweet smile.  Nothing would comfort him at this 
moment though.  Turning his head to look at her, he gave an 
understanding nod and she touched his shoulder in gentle support.

So focused on his distress was she that it came as a surprise for him 
to realize Scully was experiencing her own sense of loss for having to 
say good-bye to a woman she'd only just come to know.  He wondered at 
the way she had come to love Samantha as he did, not just for his sake, 
but for hers as well.

What a difference only a week made...Lives changed irrevocably in such 
a short span of time.  Neither he nor Scully would ever be the same 
after what had happened in the last seven days.

After a moment, Samantha emerged from her cabin with the gym bag Scully 
had brought her in one hand and the diary she had written when she was 
fourteen in the other.

"I just realized I don't have any things here," she announced, her eyes 
and nose red.  "Here are your sister's clothes, Dana...thank you for 
allowing me--"

"It's okay, Samantha.  You keep them," Scully murmured, her voice 
tight.  "They're, um...too long for me."

Samantha thanked her solemnly before turning back to Mulder.

"Fox, if you don't mind, I would like to keep the diary I wrote and 
also one of Mom's that I've been reading.  If you need it back, just 
let me know next time we see each other, okay?"

Mulder nodded, unable to speak lest his emotions betray him, his face 
carefully governed.  Only Scully would have recognized the flicker that 
crossed his features when Samantha said "next time."

"Okay," Samantha's voice was high and strained, her face pale and her 
eyes wide.  "I guess I'd better get going," she said breathlessly.

"Yeah," Mulder replied as he rose and placed his hand on his sister's 
shoulder.  "Let's go."

They were almost to the edge of the compound when Mulder looked back to 
see Scully standing where she had been all along.  No doubt she was 
debating whether she should join them or let them have this moment 
alone.  Mulder gave her a small nod and she began to walk toward them 
and followed he and Samantha down the trail to the vehicles.

The mile-long trek through the forest seemed to pass all too quickly, 
with a minimum of conversation between the three of them.  There was 
nothing left to say, he supposed.  Or maybe they were all too afraid of 
the intensity of their own sorrow right now to trust themselves to 
speak.  Almost without realizing it, they were already pulling the 
camouflage netting off the minivan.  Mulder handed Samantha the key and 
stepped back, stuffing his hands in his pockets.

Samantha stared at the key for a moment as though mesmerized.  Her 
forehead knit tightly in a frown as her throat worked, until finally 
she lifted her eyes to her brother.  Scully turned away, giving he and 
Samantha space as his sister flung herself into Mulder's arms and 
hugged him tightly, her face buried in his shoulder.  Mulder's arms 
closed around Samantha like steel bands, unwilling to release her, the 
silence punctuated only by her occasional sniffle.  His hands stroked 
her unruly hair, his eyes tightly closed.

Finally, Samantha drew back, stroking his face with her hand.  "We know 
how to find each other now, Fox," she whispered tearfully.  "I won't 
ever let anyone keep us apart again.  I'll call you, I swear."

Mulder gave a jerky nod, his eyes brimming.  Samantha rose to her toes 
and pressed a kiss to his cheek.  She hugged him again briefly, then 
turned to face Scully.

"Dana, thank you for all your help," she said.  Scully returned her 
brief, hard hug, nodding as Samantha whispered something in her ear.

Setting her shoulders, Samantha turned to the waiting minivan.  Before 
climbing in, she turned to Mulder once more.  "Fox," she murmured.  
"Remember what we talked about, okay?" She cut her eyes quickly to 
Scully in a significant glance.

Mulder nodded and closed the door behind her as she settled in the 
driver's seat.

Scully stepped forward, taking up station at Mulder's side, where he 
could feel her support.  The engine turned over and the minivan came to 
life.  With a final long glance at them through the window, Samantha 
bit her lip and pulled out onto the rutted two-track lane.  He felt 
Scully close her arms around his waist and they stood together, 
watching the car roll away.  It wasn't until the minivan was long since 
gone from their sight and the dust on the trail settled before they 
moved again, to return to the cabins.




CHAPTER SEVEN - Grace


"Did the boys give you any information on a Dr. Andros, Scully?"

"The one who signed all the exam forms?"  Scully flipped through the 
stack of files and pulled one folder out.  "Yeah, it's right here."  
She handed the form to Mulder.  "What's in there?"

"I don't know," Mulder replied, pinching his lower lip thoughtfully.  
"He's the doctor that prescribed the Dilantin Samantha takes for her 
epilepsy.  Makes me wonder where he comes from."

Scully watched as he perused the data, his brow knitting in 
concentration.  Without realizing it, she rubbed the back of her neck 
with one hand, running her fingers over the tiny scar there.  With 
everything that had happened lately, she seemed to be more aware of the 
chip that lay under the skin.  As conscious of it as she was, she could 
swear it practically tingled, not allowing her to forget the way she 
usually could this unwelcome object which she, by necessity, had to 
allow to stay within her body.

Mulder looked up at her and Scully realized what she was doing.  Self-
consciously, she dropped her hand, frowning.

"Something wrong, Scully?" He asked with gentle concern.

"No--no.  I just feel a little odd, kind of prickly, as though someone 
were watching me.  Just--everything that's happened lately has me 
weirded out."

He studied her for a long moment until she twitched uncomfortably 
beneath his keen gaze.  "You're sure?"

"Yeah, Mulder.  I'm--" She paused, clamping her lips against the word 
"fine."  "It's okay."

He nodded and returned his attention to the file and Scully's mind 
wandered again.

For the remainder of the morning and well into the afternoon after 
Samantha's departure, they had been parked on a blanket in the shady 
courtyard that lay in the midst of the cabins.  At first she had feared 
Mulder would retreat again, despite the discussion they'd had last 
night, but true to his word, after a silent, tense hike back to the 
cabins, he had sat down with her and refocused on their work.

"This is interesting," Mulder's voice broke through her musings, 
bringing her back to the present.  "Dr. Andros works for several 
medical clinics up and down the East Coast.  He's a prominent 
neurologist, and does a lot of consulting in various clinics."

"Let me guess," Scully made a small hum of consideration.  "The clinics 
he works out of can all be found in or around an abductee's hometown.  
Am I right?"

"Yeah," he muttered in reply.  "Now guess whose payroll he's on?"

"Roush?"

"Got it in one.  Do we have the file we put together on Roush?"

"Unfortunately no," she answered, looking through the stack again.

"Okay," he paused, contemplating.  "What all do we remember about 
Roush?  They're definitely involved in the vaccination project against 
the black-oil virus, right?"

"Well, possibly," Scully shrugged.  "We don't have any real evidence of 
that.  We do know it's a privately held corporation, and I'm trying to 
think of the names of the stockholders.  You're the one with the 
eidetic memory, Mulder.  Help me out."

"We didn't pay much attention to that part before.  None of the names 
rang a bell," he mumbled.  "Let's see... Davenport, Gregory... Jackson, 
Peter..." She watched as Mulder searched his memory for the list of 
names.  " Strughold, Conrad... Murray, William..."

"Whoa, back up," Scully said, and Mulder's voice trailed off 
accordingly while she tried to remember where she had heard that last 
name before.  "The mine we saw in West Virginia was the Strughold 
mine."

Mulder pulled a large portion of the stack of files in his lap and 
began sorting through it.  "There's no information on Strughold here, 
either," he sighed.  "The name of the mine might just be coincidental."

"Wasn't it you who once said 'If coincidences are just coincidences, 
why do they feel so contrived?'"  Mulder inclined his head, yielding 
the point.  Scully made a mental note to have the Gunmen dig for 
information on both the man and the mine.  "Strughold sounds German," 
she muttered, frowning in concentration.  "We know that Operation 
Paperclip was built around Nazi scientists given amnesty after World 
War II."

"Could just be a second or third generation immigrant," Mulder pointed 
out.

"True," she acceded, "but I can clearly remember a German from my 
abduction, someone high in the power structure of the Consortium, high 
enough that the Englishman and Burke had to handle him with kid 
gloves."

"Where are you going with this, Scully?" Mulder asked, watching her 
with avid interest.  She realized with a small hint of surprise that 
she was playing his normal role in throwing out the theories.  He was 
playing hers as well, by questioning them, making her consider what she 
was proposing more deeply.

"I'm not sure," she replied, shaking her head.  "But I think we're onto 
something.  The German scientists were working on what you believe was 
a human/alien hybridization project, right?  Now, whether their 
experiments involved extra-terrestrials or not, we know for certain 
that the abductees were their main source of genetic material."  

Chewing her bottom lip, she began ticking off points on her fingers.  
"The mine in West Virginia held medical files on practically everyone 
vaccinated for smallpox in the last fifty years.  But within the files 
for people who appear to have been abducted are forms dated during the 
timeframe of their abduction, proving that whomever is in possession of 
those files was related to the abductions.  Doctor Andros signed the 
forms in those specific files for those specific dates *and* continues 
to treat abductees to this day *and* takes his remuneration from Roush.  
Roush contracts to do research for the government."

"If you keep this up, Scully, I'm gonna need a cold shower."

Scully didn't hear him.  Her brow furrowed in concentration and 
watching her, Mulder yielded to the gravity of her tone.

"Mulder, if we can prove that Doctor Andros' work with the abductees is 
part of the work he does with Roush and that the work was commissioned 
by the government..."

"...we'll have a material chain of evidence linking the government to 
the abductions," Mulder concluded, stunned.

Scully nodded.  "And if we can link Strughold to the mine as well as 
Roush, we have a German high up in the Project whom we didn't know 
about previously with a strong motive for seeing me dead.  We'll know 
where to look to stop the assassination attempts."

Mulder's breath left him in a rush.  "Scully, this could be it.  This 
could be what we've been looking for the last seven years."

"Maybe," Scully qualified, striving for reason.  "We don't have any 
evidence yet, just a theory based on a couple loose suppositions."

"But if--"

"Mulder," she met his eyes, her own mirroring the excited shine she saw 
there.  "I know," she said solemnly.

The fell silent, each contemplating the ramifications of what they had 
stumbled upon.  Finally, Scully spoke again.

"I'll need to make a sworn deposition as soon as possible.  You'll have 
to witness it.  I have to write down what I remember, about my 
abduction, about what we've found in the course of our investigations, 
and about the assassination attempts.  I also need to make a voice 
recording, in case I don't make it back to Washington to testify.  Do 
you have the recorder you used back in the hotel in Baltimore when 
Samantha gave her statement?"

She saw Mulder bite back a grimace.  "Yeah, it's in my cabin," he 
replied, subdued.

She scrambled to her feet and realized at the same moment that she was 
trembling with excitement.  "Go get it.  We need to do this now, right 
now.  The longer we wait, the more chance there is of something 
happening to me before we get it done.  I'll be in my cabin working on 
my written statement."

*     *     *     *     *

They worked through the evening and late into the night.  Scully first 
assembled an outline of what she wanted to state on the recorder.  She 
addressed most of the questions she felt would be asked in a court 
hearing.

"I, Special Agent Dana Katherine Scully of the Federal Bureau of 
Investigation, do solemnly swear, aver, and avow that the statement I 
am about to give is true and accurate to the best of my knowledge..."

Mulder listened as she outlined her experiences with the X-Files and 
the events she had witnessed.

"...I can positively identify the files of Samantha Ann Mulder and 
myself as those I saw in the Strughold Mine in West Virginia in April 
of 1995.  My field-report on that investigation will provide more in 
depth data on the events I witnessed at that time.  I did not see the 
other files in the mine at that time.  However, there are a number of 
striking similarities between the other files and those for Samantha 
Mulder and myself.  A majority of the medical forms within the files, 
with the exception of my own, which was dated anywhere from twenty to 
twenty-seven years after the others, were all signed by the same 
doctor.  These similarities are suggestive..."

It had been nearly four o'clock in the morning when they finished with 
the verbal statement.  They had been required to take regular breaks 
for Scully to outline the next points she needed to make.  In the event 
of criminal charges being brought against certain parties, there might 
be some contest to the admissibility of the statement.  The fact that 
Scully was a federal agent of impeccable credibility worked in their 
favor, but the statement still needed to be as clean and accurate as 
they could possibly make it.

Mulder didn't allow his thoughts to linger too long on the reason the 
recorded statement was necessary.  Until they had their evidence in 
hand and presented it to the public Scully could not be considered safe 
for a moment.  She was the lynchpin for this whole case, between the 
events she had witnessed in the course of the X-Files investigations 
and her own newly reclaimed memories.  It was Scully's testimony that 
might make or break the case.  The only chance they had of protecting 
her was getting this information out before Strughold got to her.

Mulder didn't want to think what might happen if he failed in that 
objective.  This was going to be the final test of their partnership, 
he realized bleakly.  Could he keep Scully safe long enough to go 
public with the information she had put together?  God help him if he 
couldn't.

From a practical standpoint, as Scully would be the first to mention, 
it didn't matter if she lived to the hearings and the possible trials 
that might follow.  At this very moment, she was in her cabin beginning 
what was going to be the long and tedious process of writing out her 
testimony.  Between that and her verbal statement, they should have 
enough evidence one way or the other.

Frankly, he didn't really give a rat's ass about practical 
considerations, he thought as he sat in his cabin, rehashing the matter 
in his mind.  To lose Scully within sight of the finish line would 
render the whole endeavor pointless as far as Mulder was concerned.  He 
realized with no small amount of surprise that he no longer cared for 
exposing the truth if it meant losing Scully in the process.

"Mulder?"

He swiveled his head to look at her as she peered through his open 
door.  "Yeah, what's up?"

"I need your help."

She entered the cabin as he rose and held out to him a box of first aid 
supplies that had been stored in the shed.  "I have a wound on the back 
of my right shoulder that I can't tend very well."  She held up her 
splinted left hand to illustrate her difficulty.  "I think it's 
beginning to fester.  Would you help me dress it?"

"Sure," he replied with a humorous smile.  Sometimes getting Scully to 
ask for help was like pulling teeth and the hesitation with which she 
had made her request was so very typical of her he had to laugh.

Giving him a quelling look, she moved over to the basin in the corner, 
which drained via a pipe through the wall to the outside.  Mulder 
grabbed an unopened gallon of distilled water and followed her.

As he wet a clean cloth, Scully turned her back to him, facing the 
wall, and unbuttoned the oversized flannel shirt she wore hanging over 
her pale blue jeans to let it slide down her arms.  Mulder had to 
squelch a whole legion of inappropriate observations.  The idea that 
he'd be all over this-- if he could do so without appearing a cad for 
taking advantage of her request for help, that is-- refused to lay down 
and die entirely.  He noted the she was not wearing a bra, but he could 
see the difficulty in that regard given the placement of the clumsily 
applied bandage on her shoulder.  Scully folded her arms in front of 
her, with her shirt laid over them and bent her head forward to keep 
her hair out of his way.

Carefully, he pried loose the medical tape from her skin.  "You apply 
this bandage?" He murmured.

"Um hmm.  See what I mean?"

"I'm not laughing.  I doubt I'll be able to do much better with both 
hands and a clear view."

That got a soft chuckle from her.  The last bit of tape came loose, and 
he pulled up the sterile gauze.  It stuck slightly to the wound and he 
dribbled water on the point of contact to loosen the suppuration.  The 
gauze came away at his gentle insistence.

"There's a little inflammation," he told her, anticipating her next 
question.  "It's not bad, though."

"That's a relief," she sighed.  "Sanitary conditions since I left 
Washington have been somewhat lacking.  I'd pay gross amounts of money 
to be able to wash my hair right now."

"I could help you with that too," he offered with a wide grin that was 
completely wasted on the back of her head.

"Maybe later," she answered with a small laugh.  "I had to run from the 
hospital before I could get the antibiotics that would have been 
prescribed.  It wasn't until I was far out of Washington before I 
stopped at a convenience store in some tiny town in Virginia to grab 
some triple antibiotic ointment and some acetaminophen for the wrist.  
I was expecting it to be a lot worse."

"It's fine," he reassured her, dabbing softly at the dried blood, 
ointment and other matter in and around the wound.  "Shrapnel?"

"Um hmm."

"Looks like it was painful."

"I wouldn't know.  I was too busy running for my life to pay much 
attention.  Hurts like hell now, though."

"That's twice I've had to tend your injuries in a week, Scully.  You'd 
better not make a habit out of this."

"Believe me, I won't..."

Scully's statement was punctuated by a sharp, hissing intake of air as 
Mulder finished cleaning the wound and began to disinfect it.

"Sorry," he muttered, knowing that there was no kind way to go about 
applying alcohol to a gash like the one she sported and yet feeling 
horrid with every startled gasp she gave.

With relief, at long last he smeared the antibiotic ointment on her 
shoulder and bent to retrieve the sterile gauze pads and medical tape 
from the box of supplies on the floor.  He was helpless to prevent 
taking the opportunity to admire the slim and graceful contours of her 
back as he rose again.  Biting his lip hard, he refocused his attention 
on the matter at hand and began taping the bandage over the wound.

"All done," he announced with a sigh. He stepped back, rubbing his 
hands lightly over Scully's shoulders.  It was meant to be a reassuring 
gesture, but his hands lingered perhaps longer than they should have.  
Her cool skin was soft as silk beneath his touch.

Scully's shoulders tightened a moment, her skin rippled, but she didn't 
move away.  She stood frozen and he felt a tiny shiver run through her.  
He didn't remove his hands, however.  He couldn't have voluntarily 
broken that contact if his life had depended on it.

It occurred to him for the first time with startling clarity that they 
were alone out here, away from the chaos of their lives in D.C.  There 
was no place they needed to be, nothing they needed to do for a day or 
a week, however long it took them to get their ducks in a row to return 
to Washington.  If ever a perfect opportunity were to present itself, 
that time was now.

Mesmerized, he watched the subtle movements of Scully's muscles beneath 
her pale, perfect skin as she inhaled and turned to face him.

He was still pondering his next course of action when she dropped the 
shirt folded over her arms to slide them around his neck and rose tip-
toe, drawing his head down to meet her lips as she kissed him.

*     *     *     *     *

Scully wasn't quite sure how she ended up pinned against the rough 
wooden wall.  Mulder's mouth devoured hers.  His hands, those same 
long-fingered elegant hands that just a moment before had been touching 
her with such infinite tenderness, lifting her higher for easier access 
to her lips by a firm grip on her ass.  Her fingers dug desperately 
into the muscles of his shoulders, kneading and clawing as her tongue 
dueled with his.

A sharp gasp from her was met with a short, low groan from Mulder.  Her 
breasts ached where they pressed against his chest, needing to be 
touched.  Waves of heat spread through her body, emanating from the 
point where his pelvis ground into hers.  

He sucked hard on her lips, bit them gently, laved her mouth with his 
tongue.  Dismayed, she moaned when his mouth abandoned hers to press 
scalding kisses over her jaw and down the column of her throat.  His 
tongue dipped into the sensitive hollow where her clavicle dropped away 
from her neck, eliciting a whimper she didn't even recognize as being 
the product of her own voice.  She lowered her head and bit his 
shoulder through his shirt, sucking hard on the tendon curving up from 
his shoulder to his neck.  His earlobe was temptingly accessible and 
she nipped at it and gave it a firm yank with her teeth before she drew 
it into her mouth and soothed it with her tongue.

A particularly rough shift against the splintery planks of the wall 
elicited a small sound of protest from Scully.  Mulder drew back, 
pulling her with him by his hold on her buttocks.  He hitched her up 
and she wrapped her legs around his hips as he moved the few feet to 
the pallet he had created on the floor and sank to his knees, bearing 
her down with him.  

Their mouths met once more with a hunger that stopped just short of 
violence.  Scully ran her hands up under his shirt, stroking the 
rippling muscles of his back.  Her implacable insistence won out and he 
released her, lowering her to the mattress to draw back and allow her 
to pull the shirt up and over his head.  Her breath came in rapid pants 
and she met his smoldering eyes as her breasts rubbed against his warm, 
bare flesh.  Unable to resist the impulse, she took possession of his 
full lower lip, pulled it into her mouth, made love to it with her 
tongue.  Mulder's own tongue gently traced the outline of her upper lip 
until she released him and opened her mouth once more to invite him in.

The miniscule part of her brain that was still reserved for rational 
thought made note of the fact that she'd won the bet she made with 
herself aeons ago: Mulder was indeed a beyond-belief stellar kisser.

She leaned back, trusting him to support her as she reclined to the 
mattress.  The unyielding force of her arms around his shoulders 
brought Mulder forward with her, dragging him down above her.  His 
fingers threaded through her hair, his hands cupping the back of her 
skull as their mouths plundered each other.  She welcomed his weight 
upon her, the pressure of his arousal as it dug into her pelvis.  She 
arched against him, relishing the irritation of the light scattering of 
hair across his chest on her nipples.

She made a small moan of protest when he pulled abruptly away from her, 
lifting himself off her.  His eyes as they met hers were wild and 
febrile.  His breath came in loud, hitching rasps.

"What's wrong?" she gasped, amazed at the high, needy croon of her own 
voice.

"Nothing!" he exclaimed breathlessly and gave Scully a gentle smile 
before he closed his eyes, his head thrown back, and fought visibly for 
control over himself.  The effort it obviously cost him was enough to 
be gratifying.

"Nothing," he repeated, his eyes much calmer this time.  "Let's just 
slow down, okay?"

"Mulderrr," she moaned in frustration, her body shaking with desire.

"Please," he whispered tenderly as he reached out to touch her face.  
Watching his hand, she realized he was shaking too.  The backs of his 
knuckles stroked her cheek in a feather-light caress.  "I wanted this 
for so long, waited too long for it to be anything less than perfect.  
I don't want to miss a second in, oh, I don't know-- mindless animal 
lust?"

"There's a lot to be said for mindless animal lust," Scully replied 
with a watery chuckle.  There wasn't a cell in her body that wasn't 
throbbing with need.  She made a weak attempt to draw him back to her, 
knowing already that she wouldn't succeed.

The grin he gave her was the very essence of Mulder; filled with ironic 
humor and irrepressible wit and depthless affection.  "I didn't say it 
didn't have its place," he said as his fingers worked their way down 
her neck, his touch so light it might have been just a breath of air 
against her skin.  The tone of his voice did highly interesting things 
to her insides.  "Just not here.  Not now."

The sincerity in his voice brought stunned tears forth to prick her 
eyelids.  She licked her lips, watching him raptly as he knelt between 
her thighs.  His eyes made a slow, thorough survey of her body, taking 
in every detail, and he bent over to bestow the lightest of kisses upon 
her lips, the contact just this side of chaste.  When he finished, his 
hands began tracing the same route his eyes had taken.

Then again, maybe mindless animal lust is overrated, Scully thought 
with a shuddering sigh.  He started with his hands at her shoulders, 
his fingers splayed wide, and drew them slowly down her torso, inch by 
painstaking inch at a time in that same feather-light touch.  
Michelangelo had never caressed a sculpture so sensuously.  No artist's 
brush ever stroked a masterpiece with such reverence.  She could tell 
by the way he watched her that he was memorizing every reaction his 
touch invoked.

It seemed an eternity before he even reached her breasts where her 
nipples stood erect, begging for his attention.  A single finger glided 
over each, passing without taking any particular notice of them as they 
continued their journey.  

Every nerve ending he passed rose to attention and snapped off a smart 
salute.

Mulder's hand reached her belly and her skin rippled and twitched.  His 
touch was just the tiniest bit too light to be ticklish but it was 
close.  Had there been anything other than sheer wonder in his eyes, 
she might have called what he was doing to her calculating but as it 
was, it was simply Mulder being Mulder.  The results were devastating, 
leaving her shivering and breathless as he reached the waistband over 
her jeans and began the process in reverse, sliding his hands up her 
rib cage and then down her arms.

She shivered as chill-bumps rose over her body.  Her skin prickled as 
though every tiny hair had acquired a static electric charge.  He 
wasn't going for the obvious spots.  Oh, no, not her boy Mulder.  He 
always took the more challenging path.

Subtlety, Mulder be thy name...

He could have stripped them down and mounted her then and there and she 
would have reveled in every second of it.  But no, not Mulder.  He 
wasn't going to be happy until he slowly, thoroughly drove her right 
out of her fucking mind...

The throbbing in the pit of her belly was rapidly reaching crisis 
levels, the cramping ache of desire burgeoning as it drove her deeper 
toward insensibility.  She writhed beneath his touch.

Mulder reached her shoulders once more and began another pass, his 
touch firmer this time.  As he reached her breasts, his hands cupped 
them, his thumbs flicking tauntingly against her nipples, lingering 
there.  He weighed her flesh in his palms, molded it, traced 
maddeningly slow circles around her areolas.  He covered her breasts 
with his hands, his warm palms rough against her nipples, and leaned 
forward to kiss her again, that same gentle, reverent, almost-chaste 
kiss that said nothing of lust and everything of adoration.

Some measure of sanity was regained as his hands abandoned her breasts 
and he bent to the more practical task of opening the fly of her jeans.  
This she could handle.  His hands slid down her hips as Scully shifted 
to help him pull them down.  He scooted backward on his knees while his 
fingers hooked under the waistband of her panties, drawing them down 
her legs along with the jeans.  A goofy smile opened Mulder's lips when 
he realized her shoes were still on.

"Oops," he murmured, his eyes twinkling as Scully began to giggle.  
Unfazed, he plucked at the laces of the hiking boots.  He drew the 
pesky footwear off her feet and then her socks before returning to his 
primary objective of removing her jeans.  One by one the articles were 
tossed aside until she lay bare before him.

This was never a comfortable moment.  Not that she had any hang-ups 
about her body, but there was always something very vulnerable about 
being naked before someone for the first time, more on an emotional 
level than a physical one.  Scully's eyes scanned him for an anxious 
instant, reassured by the expression of awe on his face as he perused 
her.

Mulder lifted one leg and encircled it with the splayed fingers of both 
hands, the same way he had caressed her torso.  With firm pressure he 
dragged them down her calf from knee to ankle.  His thumbs began to 
massage the arch and pads of her foot while he lifted it and slowly 
placed a small kiss on the tip of each toe.  The tension in her womb 
increased exponentially as he repeated the process with the other foot.

His hands traveled up her legs, kneading her muscles.  He paused at her 
knee and drew one finger softly down the curve in back of it.  Scully 
twitched uncontrollably, lightning flashing through her veins and her 
eyes flew wide with surprise.  That was new.  Leave it to Mulder to 
find an erogenous zone she didn't even know she possessed on the first 
trip out.  His expression was ever so slightly on the smug side of 
knowing and Scully narrowed her eyes in warning at his thoughtful 
"Hmmm..."

Her look did not, however, deter Mulder from repeating the experiment 
on the other knee.  This time he grinned as it elicited the same 
reaction.  She was about to lunge at him to exact retribution when his 
hands landed on her belly and began working their way down, picking up 
where they had been impeded by the barrier of her jeans.  That feather-
light touch ran down over the ultra-sensitive skin of her groin, that 
tender bit of flesh where belly and thigh met, and suddenly her knees 
were the very last things on her mind.  Scully thought she might climax 
that very moment as the tips of his fingers stroked shallow concavity 
just above her pelvis.

Mulder was a sensualist, she realized, not surprised by the idea.  He 
was as tender and tactile as a child, enjoying touching her for the 
sake of touching her, with no goal beyond knowing every part of her.  
If she let him, he would do this for hours.  A discontented whimper 
rose from her at the idea.  Not that this wasn't pleasant--check that, 
exquisite--check that, utterly mind-blowing, but the hollow, throbbing 
ache between her legs refused to go unfulfilled.

Mulder must have picked up on her thoughts because at that moment his 
hands left her body and he crawled forward so that he was braced on his 
arms directly above her, his smoky eyes intent on hers.  His head 
dipped and he captured her lips, his tongue stroking lightly.  Scully 
lifted her arms to twine them around his neck but he slipped from her 
grasp, moving away again.

For the second time, that husky, needy groan.  "Mulderrr..."

And then she couldn't speak.  What had started as a skillful, 
purposeful reconnaissance by his hands became an all-out tactical 
assault on her senses by what she had always suspected to be a very 
talented mouth.  His lips closed over one turgid nipple, his breath 
scalding hot against her skin.  He drew it into his mouth, laved it 
with his tongue, sucked upon it with gentle force.  Scully whimpered 
uncontrollably, her hips shifting restlessly.  Her hands gripped his 
skull, holding him to her, arching against him.  Her eyes closed 
rapturously as he bestowed the same attention on the other nipple.  
Scully licked lips suddenly gone dry, her head rolling back on the 
mattress beneath her.  In that same instant, his fingers found her 
core.

She was drenched, she knew, had been from practically the first moment.  
Mulder's finger slid easily inside her, and then another, moving slowly 
in and out, his palm cupping her mons.  The brush of his thumb against 
her clitoris punctuating the gentle, rubbing pressure of his hand might 
have been accidental if it hadn't repeated at intervals.  As it was, 
limited contact with that particular spot was a good thing, she 
thought.  She was so hypersensitive that any concentrated effort in 
that regard would have been unbearable.  Low, desperate moans and gasps 
rose involuntarily from her throat.

Her orgasm took her by surprise with its suddenness and intensity.  Her 
body stiffened, her muscles clenched around his fingers like a vise and 
a moan that came near to being a howl escaped her lips.  She trembled 
and shuddered beneath him, rocked by the slowly subsiding spasms.

When she was able to think again, Mulder's head lay between her 
breasts, his soft hair brushing her skin as he pressed his ear over the 
pounding of her heart.

"Jesus, Mulder," she gasped with a soft chuckle of amazement.  Mulder's 
brand of foreplay deserved an X-Files designation all its own.

He lifted his head and his velvet gaze locked with hers.  "Gonna live?" 
He asked, grinning with delight.  His puppy-dog eyes sparkled with the 
tiniest hint of mischief.

"Yeah, just long enough to kick your ass if you keep grinning like 
that."

"You'll live," he affirmed, and his lips began sliding down her torso 
and over her abdomen.  Recognizing his intent, Scully didn't think her 
senses could handle much more.  She captured Mulder's head with her 
hands.

"No," she whispered.

A tiny wrinkle of concern creased his forehead as he looked up at her.  
The sight of his beautiful face resting with his chin on her belly, his 
shoulders framed by her thighs, was almost enough to make her 
reconsider.

"Next time," Scully reassured him with a smile, reaching out to rub 
away the worried frown.  "Come here."

Pushing herself up, she knelt before him and reached out, wrapping her 
arms around his torso.  She pulled him to her and kissed him hungrily.  
A tremor ran through him and then whatever superhuman control Mulder 
appeared to have possessed snapped.  His arms locked around her, 
crushing her against him; his kiss was desperate, seeking, craving and 
a thrill of power ran through Scully.  

This was for her.  It was *because* of her.  She had the ability to 
reduce him to a quivering mass of need.  It was a knowledge more 
profound and astonishing than any she had ever possessed before.

That he had a reciprocal ability wasn't the issue.  At least, not at 
the moment.

Scully slid her hand between them and cupped the erection straining 
against his jeans, rubbing firmly.  His hissing intake of breath and 
moaning exhalation was gratifying and the muscles of her groin 
tightened in response.  She began to tug insistently at his belt, 
fumbling with her clumsy splinted hand and he moved back to help her, 
extending his long legs before him.  A moment spent plucking at the row 
of buttons down his fly and then she slid her hand inside, stroking him 
in the limited space allowed by the cut of his jeans.

She remembered at the last moment to remove his shoes *first* and then 
the jeans and boxers were banished.  Mulder was nothing short of a work 
of art nude, she thought, sitting back a moment to asses him.  Lean and 
feline graceful, strong and powerful, muscular but with none of the 
ostentatious bulging sported by body builders.  They were bears to his 
panther, she thought.  She bit her bottom lip as she completed her 
frank survey.  And then she touched him.

She ran her hands down his ribs, savoring the warmth of his flesh, 
moving ever downward.  Her hands closed over his shaft as she leaned in 
to nibble on his neck, caressing him with slow, steady strokes.  Mulder 
quivered again, his head thrown back, his breathing hard and fast.  Low 
groans escaped him; she felt them vibrate along his larynx as she ran 
her tongue over his neck, growing louder and more needful with each 
stroke of her hands.  Her name slid from his lips in a manner that was 
half a prayer, half a plea.

Scully watched his reactions carefully, judging what felt best.  What 
brought him to the brink, what hauled him back?  How much was he going 
to be able to take before going over the edge?  For that matter, how 
much could she?

Not a lot, she decided, bending to suck on one tight, hard nipple, 
scraping lightly with her teeth.  The muscles of her own sex were 
clenching and releasing, aching to be filled.  Turn about being fair 
play and all, she thought she should really take the time to do the 
same mind-bending things to him that he had done to her, but that might 
just end up being cruel and unusual punishment for both of them.

Decisively, Scully pushed him back until he half-reclined against the 
wall, then she straddled his hips, guiding him inside her as she 
settled slowly upon him.  His hips unconsciously nudged hers in a tiny 
thrust, the cords of his neck taut while he fought to rein his body in.  
She bent forward to kiss him at the same moment she began slowly 
lifting and lowering herself over him.

Having Mulder inside her was beyond incredible, the tiny corner of her 
brain still capable of coherent thought concluded.  An irrepressible 
whimper of pleasure escaped her as her tight sheath slowly adjusted to 
an intrusion she hadn't felt in far too long.  With each movement, she 
loosened a little more, and he penetrated deeper.  His hips began to 
shift in tandem with hers, picking up the rhythm she set.  A mutual 
exclamation of rapture punctuated the moment when he was fully buried 
within her, her muscles clenching greedily around him.  Mulder's eyes, 
filled with a powerful combination of love and hunger and amazement 
locked with hers, refusing to let her gaze escape his as his hands 
closed over her breasts, rolling and pinching her nipples between his 
fingertips.  His jaw was clenched in concentration, his breathing 
ragged and something primal within her responded to the intensity of 
the need written on his face.

It wasn't the longest coupling in the history of mankind.  They were 
both too far gone and it had been too long for each of them.  Scully 
felt herself begin to slide over the edge and gasped his name.

"Mulder, now..."

Obeying the imperative, his fingers closed over her hips and began to 
move her even as she lost control of her own responses and fell 
forward, clinging to him.  He raised and lowered her more quickly, 
harder as he thrust forcefully into her, evoking a keening cry of 
pleasure.  The call was answered by an animal growl rumbling through 
Mulder.  He shuddered, his face buried in the curve of her neck, his 
fingers digging into the soft flesh of her hips.  A series of short, 
barking moans accompanied the violent spasms of his body and Scully 
rode it out with him until at last the madness subsided and peace 
descended.

*     *     *     *     *

"I've been thinking," Scully announced as she bent with her head over 
the basin in the corner.  Mulder stood behind her, his fingers working 
their way through her wet hair, creating a rich lather.  He gently 
kneaded her scalp with each stroke.

"Uh oh."

"About Strughold.  Assuming he is the one gunning for me, why?  I posed 
no threat to him until what we discovered today and we wouldn't have 
discovered that without the Paperclip files.  For him to come after me 
so quickly, he would have had to know Burke intended to give me the 
files."

Mulder frowned, pursing his lips in concentration.  It wasn't easy.  
The tempting curve of Scully's backside beneath her black bikini 
panties as she bent over the sink provided a rather powerful 
distraction.  "That's an interesting question... I hadn't thought of 
it."

"Then again," Scully reasoned, "it was supposedly his man who tried to 
shoot me two weeks ago when I was out on the lake while I was with 
Burke," she paused.  "I didn't have the files then."

Damn.  There went their supposed motive, he thought.  Realizing he had 
stopped massaging her scalp, he returned his attention to the task at 
hand while he pondered the question she had presented.

"So the files aren't his motive.  What is?"

"According to Burke, he wants me dead because of my work on the X-
Files."  Mulder noticed she was careful not to say her work with *him.*  
"But that's pretty flimsy.  Killing me doesn't necessarily mean putting 
an end to the X-Files.  If anything, I would *hope,*" she stressed the 
word pointedly, "that you would be more determined than ever to see 
this whole thing brought to light."

He could argue the point with her, but this wasn't the time.  Bending, 
he picked up the jug of water from the floor and began pouring it over 
her hair slowly, combing the suds out with his fingers.  "So what else 
then?"

"I would say its because Burke appears to find me useful somehow," 
Scully ventured.  "He lured me into the thing with the Cobra and the 
disk and now he's got us doing his legwork to bring Strughold down.  
Strughold gets rid of me, Burke loses his edge."

Mulder shook his head in disgust.  "Just like the son of a bitch to 
drag us into his shit, isn't it?" He asked moodily.  Deciding he'd 
eliminated the last of the shampoo from her hair, he grabbed a towel 
and draped it over her head.  "All done."

"Thanks."  Wiping excess moisture off her neck, Scully sat on the 
pallet on the floor and began toweling her hair dry.

"You know, we've always been there, Mulder," she pointed out, peering 
at him between the folds of the towel.  "Ever since the day I was 
called into Blevins' office and assigned to work with you.  Whatever 
the risks, and whatever Burke's motivations are here, the fact remains 
that we have the opportunity to do the very thing we set out to do.  We 
have to focus on that."

"And hope Burke doesn't use our distraction with Strughold to bite us 
in the ass."

"That, too," she conceded with a sigh.  She neatly folded the towel and 
set is aside and reached for a comb.  Mulder moved in to sit behind her 
and, taking the comb from her hand, began to slide it carefully through 
her wet tresses.  Her damp head rolled back, affording Mulder a glimpse 
of her face as she contemplated their options.

"The media will have to be our first stop," he stated, working with 
gentle persistence at a particularly nasty snarl.  "We can't go to the 
government."

"I agree.  Look what happened to the materials I handed over to the 
Senate subcommittee after you got back from Tunguska."

"We'll have to start making a list.  The major networks, the major 
newspapers, publications..."

She nodded against his shoulder.  "I think we should arrange for a 
pretty widespread private distribution of the data as well," she added.  
"Give it to the Gunmen, who can give it to their associates, who will 
in turn pass it on from there, and so forth.  We can't take a chance of 
every copy conveniently disappearing."

"And what happens from there?" Mulder murmured.

"What do you mean?  There will be investigations, of course.  Hearings, 
trials..."

"But what about the public?"  He asked insistently.  Giving one final 
pass, he set the comb aside and she turned to face him.  "You know, 
years ago Burke said something to me.  He said 'If the people knew what 
I know, it would all fall apart.'"

Scully's body went still as she considered the implications of the 
statement.  She pulled her knees defensively up to her bare chest, 
hugging them.

"Mistrust of the government is already at an all time high, Scully," he 
said.  "And with good reason.  But I'm afraid that we may be sending up 
the signal for the terrorists and militia groups to go on the 
offensive."  Mulder paused meaningfully.  "We could be facing another 
Oklahoma City in every above-middling sized town in the nation."

Scully exhaled explosively.  "Jesus, Mulder, you're right."

"You know, yesterday Samantha told me I was a revolutionary.  But I'm 
not; I'm a reformer.  I want to see what's wrong with our system of 
government fixed, but this has the potential to devolve into total 
anarchy."  Mulder sighed wearily.  "Are we prepared to open the 
floodgates for that?"

"Mulder, what else can we do?" Scully asked, staring at him earnestly.  
"We have an obligation to see that this information is given to the 
public."

"I know, I know," he replied, feeling tired all of a sudden.  He 
reclined onto the bed, propping himself up on one elbow.  "If we don't 
reveal what we know, we're no better than the people who started and 
perpetuated these crimes.  But damn, Scully, that's a lot to be 
responsible for."

Her face softened with sympathy and she shifted to lie on her side, 
facing him, their bodies mere inches apart.  She picked up his hand and 
laced her fingers through his tightly.

"If we don't accept that responsibility, Mulder, who will?" Scully 
asked, her voice muted.  "When Missy died, you told me that this wasn't 
about justice, it was about fate.  And if you accept that, then you 
have to accept that we were fated to hold this information in our 
hands, to be the ones to break the conspiracy of silence.  You said it 
yourself; we have no personal choice here.  We do what we have to do 
and then we weather out the consequences."  Her eyes were the palest of 
sapphires as she tilted her head to look up at him and Mulder thought 
he might drown in them.

"I know," he whispered, pulling her to him as he pressed a tender kiss 
on the tiny frown between her brows.

"You know," she said after a long moment, her voice lighter.  
"Discussing our plans to change the world is a pretty perverse form of 
afterglow."

He let out a surprised bark of laughter.  "I suppose you're right," he 
answered, chuckling.  "But kinda fitting, isn't it?"

"Only in limited quantities," she stated firmly.  "It'll probably be 
another seven years before we have another opportunity to be alone 
together like this.  I don't think we should waste it, do you?"

"Perish the thought," he replied in a husky murmur.  He slid down to 
lay beside her then rolled her beneath him, losing himself in her once 
more.

Making love to Scully was a more powerful and spiritual experience than 
he could ever have dreamed.  Once that final barrier fell, everything 
he had kept in check for so many years came rushing forth.  The need to 
know every part of her, to touch every inch of her flesh was an 
imperative too intense to deny.  He wanted to consume her and be 
consumed by her.  He wanted to hear every sound she could make, 
experience every sigh and whimper and gasp, to feel every quiver and 
shudder of her body.

He could fall into her and never emerge, Mulder thought wonderingly as 
he was buried inside her, rocking slowly, his heart pounding against 
hers as she gasped softly in his ear.  Scully's strong, deceptively 
small hands moved restlessly over his back, the tenderness of her touch 
and the glow of her eyes saying more of love than a thousand words ever 
could.  He clasped her to him and buried his face in her hair, so 
overwhelmed for a moment he thought he might weep.

This was the most perfect day of his life, he thought.  If they never 
experienced another quite like it, at least they'd had this.  He took 
her face between his hands and placed a tender, worshipful kiss on her 
lips.  Her eyes reflected back every thought and emotion he had at that 
moment and smiling at him, she urged him on until all thought fled and 
nothing else existed in his universe but Scully.

*     *     *     *     *

"Have you ever experienced a moment of grace, Mulder?"  Scully's voice 
was soft and contemplative as she asked the question. He sat with a 
pillow protecting his back from the scratchy wall and Scully sat 
between his thighs, her back pressed against his chest, the sleeping 
bag he had arrived with draped around them.  His arms were wrapped 
around her, the fingers of both hands intertwined with hers, resting on 
her chest.  His chin perched atop her slowly drying hair.

The question so reflected his earlier thoughts that it startled him.

She didn't appear to need his response before continuing.  "This 
moment, being together like this...this is it," she breathed.  "An 
instant where nothing wrong or harsh in the world can touch you and all 
you know is peace..."

Mulder tightened his arms around her.  "I'd say that's a pretty apt 
description of this moment," he replied, pressing a kiss to the top of 
her head.  He pressed another kiss to the shell of her ear and sighed 
in contentment.

"Yes, it is," Scully confirmed.  If she had a point to make beyond 
that, he didn't know what it was. She pulled his arms more securely 
about her, cuddling back against him, leaning her head back on his 
shoulder.  A comfortable, warm silence fell and Mulder closed his eyes, 
basking in it.

When he opened them again, she had tipped her head back and was 
watching him with her incandescent blue eyes.

"I love you," she whispered and closed her eyes once more.  Moved 
beyond the ability for speech, all he could do was gather her closer to 
him, pressing his lips to her temple.

*     *     *     *     *

They cooked dinner together, boiled rotini pasta with canned marinara 
sauce and canned greens.  Scully was profoundly grateful to have 
discovered the ingredients among their food supply, in which everything 
not in a jar or can was stored in large, sealed plastic cartons to 
discourage rodents.  They enjoyed the meal in companionable 
conversation as Mulder told her about all he and Samantha had discussed 
during their days on the road together.

They ate on the ubiquitous blanket outside the cabins, their legs 
stretched out before them as they made valiant efforts not to spill 
food over themselves.  A small dribble of marinara landed on Scully's 
denim-clad thigh and Mulder experienced another pang of regret that he 
had been unable to persuade her to forego the jeans and just wear the 
oversized flannel shirt over her panties.

It was the kind of moment they had seen all too rarely in the course of 
their partnership, where they could simply be together and have a 
conversation without fear of the world crashing down around their ears.  
They sat talking on the blanket long after the meal was over, until the 
persistent chill of the night drove them inside.  Then they huddled 
together under the sleeping bag with the comforting red glow of the 
kerosene heater warming them.

"It's amazing," Scully mused as Mulder's fingers glided languorously 
over her silken skin.  "In the midst of everything that's going on 
right now I feel perfectly safe here.  Mulder, I haven't felt like this 
in years."

He propped himself up on an elbow, leaning over her.  Dropping a kiss 
to her bare shoulder, he nodded slowly.  "Me, too."

"Too bad we have to leave tomorrow."

Mulder stiffened.  "No way, Scully."

"Mulder, we have to." She pushed away from him and sat up, turning to 
face him squarely.  "If Strughold doesn't already know we've got the 
Paperclip files, he's going to find out and when he does, the data 
linking him to the mine is going to disappear."

"You don't think I know that?" He asked, struggling for calm against 
the instantaneous panic that reared its ugly head the second she 
mentioned leaving.  "But you have to be protected at all costs.  
Scully, you're the key and if anything happens to you none of what we 
know or think we might know is going to mean a damn.  We need to be at 
the least relatively assured of your safety before you go back."

"For how long, Mulder?" Scully demanded, her jaw jutting out 
stubbornly.  "Yes, we're safe now and God knows I could stand a few 
more days like today, but we can't remain here forever."

Mulder cursed savagely, running his fingers through his hair.  His 
choices were brutally simple and ugly.  Scully was right; they couldn't 
remain here forever.  They had to get the final evidence of the 
connections they had made before it got buried forever.  They could go 
back together and risk exposing Scully to the threat they had fled, or 
he could go alone and leave her here.

If they went back together it would mean certainly endangering Scully.  
If he went back alone there was still a chance she might be free from 
discovery here until he could set the wheels in motion and return for 
her.

"I'll go," he said at last.  "By myself."

"No, Mulder.  No way in hell."

"Scully--"

"I said no!" She snapped.  "I'm not going to play sitting duck in the 
middle of nowhere indefinitely.  And you have no right to ask that of 
me."

"At least there's a chance you'll be safe here, which is more than I 
can say for the alternative."

Scully threw back the blanket and rose, picking her shirt up off the 
floor and pulling it over her shoulders in violent, jerky movements.  
Then she turned to face him, her arms folded across her chest.  
"Mulder," she began firmly, "I am a federal agent, just like you.  My 
duty is to the truth, even at the risk of my own life.  I can't perform 
that duty up here.  I came here because I thought I had reached a point 
where I could accomplish nothing more back in Washington, in which case 
it would be pointless for me to remain when I knew the people trying to 
kill me were eventually going to succeed.  I came here because this is 
where you and Samantha would be and helping you protect her was my 
duty.  Now all that has changed.  We have a specific objective to work 
toward and what danger may or may not be waiting for me back in D.C. is 
irrelevant.  We have a job to do, and that's all there is to it."

Mulder's jaw clenched with angry fear even as he recognized the 
rectitude of her words.  Denials flew through his brain one after the 
other, but none held up against the simple truths Scully had spoken.

Scully's anger seemed to abandon her as quickly as it had come.  Her 
shoulders slumped and she crossed back over to the mattress on the 
floor, crouching down before Mulder.

"You don't think I feel the same, Mulder?" She asked, her eyes wide and 
solemn.  "You don't think sometimes I just want to lock you away where 
I know you'll be safe?  It's a part of loving someone, this need to 
know they're all right, but you can't wrap me in cotton to protect me, 
Mulder.  If you try, then as much as what has happened between us today 
means to me, I'll go back to my cabin right now and try my best to 
carry on as though today never happened.  It will break my heart but I 
swear I'll do it, because we owe it to a hell of a lot more people than 
ourselves to see this played out to the end.  We owe it to the hundreds 
of abduction victims who died before they ever got the chance to tell 
their stories.  We owe it to your father, my sister, Emily, the 
nineteen women in Allentown..." her voice trailed off and she pursed 
her lips tensely.  After a long moment, she continued in a more 
moderated tone, the tiniest hint of moisture sparkling in her eyes.  
"If I could stay up here with you forever, Mulder, and still live with 
myself, I'd do it.  But I can't.  And neither can you."

Mulder closed his eyes, drawing a deep breath as he reconciled himself 
with what they had to do.  When he opened them again Scully was 
watching him intently, waiting for his decision.

"Okay.  We go," he sighed, his throat aching with the effort the words 
cost him.  He reached out for her and took her face between his hands, 
bringing her forward until their foreheads pressed against one another.

"You terrify me sometimes, Scully," he confessed in a whisper.  "You 
are the only person on this whole damned planet with the ability to 
completely destroy me and that frightens the hell out of me."

He was shocked to feel two tears splash onto his hands as they cradled 
her face and when she lifted her head to meet his gaze, the lashes 
rimming her shining eyes were wet and spiky.  Her arms slid around him, 
pulling him closer and buried her face against his shoulder.  It was a 
small eternity that they remained clasped like that until finally her 
lips sought out his frantically and he bore her down to the blanket 
with him.



CHAPTER EIGHT - Confession


"You son of a bitch!"

Samantha watched as the man who claimed to be her father lifted his 
head to look at her in startled surprise.  He sat in a worn leather 
chair in his office looking over some papers.  It occurred to her that 
she had never seen his home before, only this understated, somewhat 
shabby office.  When she had moved to the East Coast, he had given her 
this address.  How did the worst man to walk the face of the earth 
since Adolf Hitler live?  And while she was drawing comparisons to 
Hitler, precisely how many deaths had he been responsible for?  Surely 
it couldn't be anywhere close to six million, but a part of her 
wondered...

"Samantha--I wasn't expecting you."  He looked disconcerted.

Good.

She had driven all through the previous day and night after her 
departure from the cabins in the mountains, taking only the occasional 
brief stop to rest, and had come straight here.  Trembling with a rage 
she'd been suppressing for two days, Samantha stalked toward him as he 
rose unsteadily from his chair and walked around the desk to face her.  
He looked like hell.

Good.

"I know you weren't," she replied in an acid tone.  "I think I made it 
pretty clear how little I wanted to do with you a year and a half ago."

"Yes," he nodded sadly.  He started to light a cigarette then stopped, 
instinctively yielding to the plea she had made twenty years ago that 
he not smoke in her presence, due to the fact that the smell made her 
ill.  Some habits died hard.  "Why have you come, then?"

"Because you owe me some answers," she snarled, tossing two books at 
his feet, barely missing his toes.

Damn.

They were the journals Fox had allowed her to take, the one she had 
written and the one from her mother, written in 1964 and 1965.  He 
glanced down at them, but did not stoop to pick them up.

"You know," Samantha said almost conversationally, brushing past him to 
sit in the chair he had occupied only a moment before.  He staggered 
slightly, but did not fall.

Damn.

She leaned back with assumed casualness and continued her statement, 
"when I found out you had lied to me about Fox and about what had 
become of my family, I was hurt.  I couldn't stand to be near you 
because I can't stand liars and you do nothing except lie."

She paused, watching his face keenly.  He looked pale and frightened.

Good.

"Now, however, I find that no matter how repugnant the idea is to me, I 
can't stay away from you.  I need answers and you're the only one who 
can give them to me.  You see," again that pregnant pause.  If studying 
psychology had taught her nothing else, it certainly taught her how to 
play an audience, how to get inside their heads.  And who might be a 
better manipulator than the daughter of the master himself?  "I know 
now why you tried to keep me away from Fox.  You knew what he'd tell 
me.  You knew that I would learn the truth about what an evil man you 
are."

"I was trying to protect you--"

"YOU MADE ME LEAVE MY CHILDREN, YOU LYING BASTARD!"

Samantha shot to her feet, getting in his face, nose to nose as he 
slumped weakly against the edge of his desk.

"You made me...so afraid for my life..." her words came hard and heavy, 
punctuated by the deep, furious breaths she had to draw to avoid 
assaulting him. "...that I thought the only way to keep them safe was 
to leave."

Quivering with anger, she drew back to a safe distance, her fists 
clenched so tightly at her sides that her nails were cutting into her 
palms.

So what?

"I haven't seen them in almost three weeks," she said in that same 
tight tone.  "They have no idea where I've gone or why I left them.  
For all they know, I've abandoned them for good, because I couldn't run 
the risk of telling them where I was going and having someone find out.  
Do you have any idea what that did to me?  Or to them?  ANY idea at 
all?"

"I did what I had to do, Samantha, to protect you."  He appeared to be 
regaining some of his composure, overcoming the shock of her initial 
rage.  Fine, let him.  She couldn't get the answers she needed out of 
him if he couldn't speak.

"You did what you had to do to protect yourself," she replied coldly, 
crossing her arms over her chest.  "And now I want to know why."

"Why what?  Surely if you've been with your brother all this time he's 
told you everything he knows about the Project and what happened to 
you."

"I want to know why me.  And why Fox," she paused significantly, 
letting the import of her words sink in.  "Why, of all people, were 
*we* abducted as children?"

This time he did stagger.  His face, which hadn't looked all that well 
before, was positively ashen.  He braced himself against the desk.

"You were abducted, I admit that, but your brother--"

"NO!!" She screamed, clutching her fists at her temples.  "No more 
lies!  I want the truth!"

She stormed over and picked up her mother's diary from the floor.

"September 23, 1964," she returned to her chair and read from the pages 
she had flagged.  Her words came out rushed and breathless as she began 
to read.  "I can't sleep tonight.  Nothing can ease this crushing fear 
in my heart.  Fox has been missing since this afternoon, vanished 
without a trace...

September 29, 1964: The most amazing thing happened today.  Charles 
arrived out of nowhere. Lacey had called him, hoping he could come to 
help me since Bill is unreachable, with his unit overseas.  He says he 
will use his contacts within the government to investigate who has 
taken my son...

October 13, 1964: Today is Fox's third birthday and he's not even here 
to celebrate it.  I baked a cake as though that somehow would bring him 
back.  I was almost finished frosting it before I collapsed on the 
kitchen floor in hysterics.  Charles entered and picked me up and put 
me to bed.  He called the doctor, who gave me a sedative.  When I 
awoke, he was still there, holding my hand.  Now I remember why I once 
loved him..."

"Samantha--" the old man began, wheezing slightly.

"Incredible!  Absolutely unbelievable!" She exclaimed, closing the book 
with her finger marking the next passage.  "Not only did you steal my 
mother's son, but you used the opportunity to play knight in shining 
armor and seduce her!  The scope of your malevolence astounds me."

Without allowing him to reply, she opened the diary once more and 
continued reading.

"Thanksgiving, 1964: A miracle has occurred.  This morning we got a 
call from the hospital telling us that a little boy had turned up in 
their emergency room fitting Fox's description.  We went to identify 
him and it was indeed Fox.  I'm frightened, however.  He's in a coma 
and the doctors are not hopeful that he will awaken.  He's so painfully 
thin and pale!  What kind of monster could do such a thing to my sweet 
little boy?"

"What kind of monster, indeed," Samantha interjected scathingly before 
moving on to the next passage.

She didn't wait for him to reply.

"December 13, 1964: I am concerned about Fox.  Since waking from his 
coma he has been having these spells.  He'll stop in the middle of 
playing or eating or watching television and simply stare off into 
space for a moment or two, sometimes blinking his eyes rather rapidly.  
The doctors tell me this is a form of epilepsy, called a 'petit mal' 
seizure.  They assure me that it's a relatively common childhood 
ailment and that if he does not progress to having 'grand mal' 
seizures, he stands a good chance of outgrowing it..."

"Epilepsy, of course, being the calling card of childhood abductees," 
Samantha commented.  "But you knew that already, didn't you?  Of course 
you did.

"February 17, 1965: I got a call from Bill again today.  After 
returning from his leave last week, he received some important news: 
he's going to be discharged in June.  Now I have to break the news to 
Charles and tell him we can't continue this way.  I need to concentrate 
on rebuilding my family and I think it would just be best for him to go 
back to Washington and forget this affair ever happened.  How did I 
ever let things get so far out of control?"

"So," Samantha shut the journal with a snap and tucked it securely 
under her arm.  "It looks like the one truth you've ever told me in my 
entire life was that you're my father.  And knowing what you are, 
that's the most horrible truth of all."

Damn it!  Her rage was beginning to recede and tears were stinging her 
eyes.  Drawing a deep breath, she bolstered her anger once more and 
glared at him.  "Don't you have anything to say for yourself?  I'm 
quite curious, really.  Fox explained to me when I was taken and 
presumably why.  For this, um... hybridization project in 1973.  But 
why did you abduct Fox a full nine years earlier?  Is it just as simple 
as taking revenge for the fact that my mother dumped you to marry Bill 
Mulder, or did you have something more nefarious in mind?"

"I didn't abduct your brother."

"Jesus!  And still you lie!  Is it so natural to you now that you don't 
even know the truth anymore?"

"I'm telling you the truth, Samantha," he said bleakly, stumbling 
across the room to an empty chair.  "Neither myself nor anyone I worked 
with on the Project was behind Fox Mulder's abduction.  You see, 
Samantha...he was the first."

"The first what?"

"The first alien abductee."

"Oh, come on!"

"In the fall of 1964, not long after I began working for the 
government, one hundred fifty children between the ages of two and 
eight went missing from their homes across the country.  No one in any 
of the local law enforcement agencies knew anything about this mass 
abduction because they didn't have the view from the heights, so to 
speak.  Our task, at that point, was spin control.  We were to assure 
that no one put the disappearances together.  But we did not abduct 
him."

He fell silent, his eyes staring blankly at something beyond the wall 
behind Samantha, something only he could see.  If she had ever seen a 
genuine expression of sadness on his face, this was that moment.

"Only two of the one hundred fifty survived.  One was your brother.  
The other was a six-year-old girl from North Dakota named Arlene 
Avery."

Samantha gasped, staring at him in horror.  Anything else she might 
have been planning to ask of him disappeared in the face of that 
terrible statement.  "One hundred forty-eight children...dead, just 
like that?"

Trembling, she rose from her chair, her mind still reeling.  She 
thought she might be sick to her stomach.  "How--how could you let that 
happen?  How could you have let those people go on never knowing?  Damn 
you, HOW?!"

"We didn't know what was done to those children, Samantha, not then," 
he replied grimly.  "If we had told anyone what we knew, there would 
have been a panic.  Remember, this was not long after the McCarthy 
days.  Fox and Arlene might have suffered in the resulting paranoia."

"How could you let all those parents go without ever knowing?"

He looked at her with solemn eyes.  "There are those who would still do 
Fox harm if they ever knew.  I could not take that chance; I promised 
Bill Mulder I would protect him.  And that is why I must ask you to 
treat what you've found with utmost discretion."

"I have to tell Fox--"

"I would advise you to be careful, Samantha.  If the wrong person 
should overhear, or learn of what I've just told you, the results could 
be disastrous for him.  I've tried to protect him, as I tried to 
protect you, from those who would harm you for who you are and what 
you've been.  In fact, I would recommend you leave that journal here 
with me...for safekeeping."

"No," Samantha backed away from him, clutching the book defensively to 
her chest.  "This is all I have left of my mother.  You took away 
anything else I might have known about her.  You won't have this too!"

He stared at her silently, doing as he had always done in all the time 
she had known him.  He watched her with that parental authority that 
assumed she must yield eventually to his wisdom.  And for a moment, 
just for an instant, she thought she might.

Yes, Father.  Here's the book.  I forgive you.

But there was just enough rage amidst the confusion inside her to 
resist.

"I--I have to leave," she stammered.  She crossed the room and picked 
up her own journal from where it lay on the floor, her movements filled 
with nervous energy.  "I came straight here...I didn't even go to see 
my kids first.  They're at Michael's house...I need to get home to 
them."

He was still watching her as she took one last wondering look around 
and began to move toward the door.  There was something in his eyes she 
had never noticed before...a sorrowful regret that she thought maybe, 
just maybe, was for all he had done to her.

"Samantha," he caught her hand and held it as she passed him.  Dear 
Lord, he even felt frail!  He had always been so powerful and larger 
than life in the past... "Everything I have ever done in the last 
thirty-five years, since the day you were born, no matter how 
unspeakable it may seem, has been for you, to keep you safe.  
Everything.  And though I don't ever expect you to forgive me--you are 
too good and honest and gentle a person to ever absolve me of what I 
have done--I think it's important that you know that I loved you 
enough, as I loved your mother, to change the world for you."

Tears blurred her vision and she backed away from him, her face 
crumpling.  She couldn't speak past the choking knot of repressed sobs 
in her throat and ran from the room.

She barely made it to the nebulous safety of the linen van before she 
fell apart.

*     *     *     *     *

"You know, I remember Penny Northern now," Scully remarked the 
following afternoon as they made their way east through the mountains.  

"You do?"  Mulder had to rein his brain in to focus on what she was 
saying.  It was the first thing either of them had said since they got 
back on the road after stopping to eat.  He could feel a satisfied grin 
stretching his facial muscles.  Not an unreasonable response, he 
supposed, for the recent recipient of the most mind-bending fellatio in 
the history of sex.  

If Scully ever spoke the words "lunch-break" to him again, he doubted 
he'd be able to maintain his composure.  He might maintain *something,* 
but dignity certainly wouldn't be involved. 

"From my abduction, yeah."  He sobered at the solemn tone of her voice.  
He carefully navigated a particularly tight turn on the narrow dirt 
mountain road as she continued.  "When she and I were in the hospital 
together, she kept trying to tell me about what happened to us when we 
were taken, but I couldn't remember.  And now I do."

Not surprising, Mulder thought.  During their argument last night, 
she'd mentioned the nineteen women in Allentown.  Every single one of 
those women had died of the cancer that had nearly killed Scully 
herself.  As a result, she took their deaths very personally.  If her 
memories were indeed returning, and he had no reason to believe they 
weren't, then last night's mention of those women would be more than 
enough to evoke such a recollection.

He couldn't stand to think of the argument they'd had last night.  Here 
it was, three days since they had made their discovery, since Samantha 
had left.  Less than twenty-four hours since they had made love for 
that first earth-shattering time.

What a difference three days made.  If Scully had told him she wanted 
to leave with him the day Samantha had left, before they made the 
connections they had, he probably would not have protested, though he 
would have been highly uncomfortable with the prospect.  Now, however, 
knowing that Scully was the lynchpin to unraveling the conspiracy once 
and for all--knowing the sheer joy of her in his arms--there wasn't a 
minute that passed when he wasn't tempted to turn this damned land-
yacht of a Cadillac around and take her back to the compound.  The only 
thing that prevented him from doing it was the idea that if he left her 
alone up there, she would be trapped and relatively defenseless if 
someone should discover her location.  If he couldn't be there with 
her, then she needed to be someplace where someone else could.

"She was kind to me," Scully was saying.  "I think whatever was done to 
me was somehow different from what they did to the others.  I was ill 
in a way no one else seemed to be and Penny was allowed to take care of 
me," Scully swallowed hard, her throat tightening at the memory.  "When 
she was dying, she made me promise to live.  She told me I had to be 
the one to see the truth brought to light.  It looks as though we have 
a chance to accomplish that."

"Of course we do," Mulder replied with a confidence he didn't feel.  
The elation they had experienced that day they had made their discovery 
had faded in the face of other realities.  "You said it yesterday: it's 
fate."

"I miss her, Mulder," Scully said softly.  "I feel like this is the 
least we can do for her, since I couldn't share her memories when she 
was still alive."

If he didn't think he'd drive them over the edge of this damned 
mountain, he would have reached over to take her hand.  "I'm sure she 
understood."

"I know she did.  But I can't help wishing that all the information 
we've got now had fallen together while she was alive to see justice 
done."

"Scully," he said after a moment, cutting his eyes to her quickly 
before he returned them to the road, "there's one thing I'm worried 
about with all of this."

"What's that?"

"What we've got here only uncovers half the picture," he replied, 
frowning.  "We have the ability to link the abductions to the 
government, but we still don't have any proof of the size or scope of 
alien involvement."

A smile parted her lips.  "I thought that would come up eventually."

"I'm serious."

"I know you are, Mulder, and I'm sorry we haven't found the proof that 
you're looking for with regards to aliens yet, but what we have 
here...Mulder, it's a monumental accomplishment.  We can finally bring 
these bastards down," her words were loud, emphatic...triumphant.  "And 
maybe the rest of it will be explained after the first part has been 
revealed."

At least she wasn't qualifying the statement with things like "if they 
even exist at all..."

Oh, how far we've come in seven years, Scully...

"I'm not so sure," Mulder replied.  "Maybe it will just be buried that 
much deeper and covered by an apology of the government's involvement 
with the abductions.  You're the one who said that apology is policy 
with these people.  Admit part of the truth to take attention off the 
rest of it."

"Mulder," she sighed, "you can't possibly be disappointed with what 
we've found--"

"Not disappointed, Scully, just concerned."  Mulder grimaced, 
struggling to put into words the source of his unease.  "I just--I know 
what I've seen.  And whether or not you can prove it, you've seen it 
too.  I don't want that truth to get lost amidst the others.  It's too 
important."

Scully fell silent and Mulder let the topic go for now.  At least 
they'd gotten it out in the open to be dealt with at the appropriate 
time.  There was so much more to this whole thing than just putting the 
facts together and getting them out to the public....

Mulder watched the road carefully while Scully went over the Gunmen's 
files on the abduction victims.  Seven still alive and on the East 
Coast, he thought, recalling the data.  Five of those involved in MUFON 
or other UFO watch groups.  Four of those unable to hold a steady job 
because sooner or later their perceived instability for insisting on 
the truth drove them out of their employment.  Kooks, whackos, and now 
potential witnesses with an unprecedented chance at vindication.  With 
the facts he and Scully had collected, their statements would have 
something they'd never had before: credibility.  It was a satisfying 
thought.

If only they could find evidence of that one last elusive truth...

In that instant, he rounded a curve that lent him a clear view between 
the trees of the road ahead and below them.  His breath left him as he 
cursed softly.  Scully's head came up to stare at him instantly.

"What is it?"  Her voice was tight, tense.

"We've got company."

"What?" She craned her head, straining to see what had already 
disappeared from his own field of vision.

"Black sedan ahead, tinted windows.  Sound familiar?"  Some distant 
part of his brain gave a snort of laughter.  Couldn't the bastards 
drive something original?  Just once?

Scully released her breath in a shaky sigh.  "You're sure it's not a 
local?"

Yes, he was.  The houses and cabins he'd seen scattered up here didn't 
look as though the owners drove pristine black cars that couldn't 
possibly have more than ten thousand miles on the odometer yet.  It 
would take a much sturdier vehicle to last long in these mountains.

They'd have five minutes or so before they met the sedan if they 
continued forward.  Mulder's mind spun urgently, working out their 
options.  The oncoming car was a recent model, no doubt with a 
fiberglass body and a V6 under the hood.  The Caddy had a V8, giving 
them the staying power advantage.

"Turn around," Scully suggested and he shook her head.

"Where?" Mulder asked, indicating the road, which was barely wide 
enough for two cars, much less for allowing a mammoth like the Caddy to 
turn around.  "We can't outrun them anyway.  Our car's got more power, 
but theirs corners better, so it can take the curves faster.  It's only 
a matter of time until they catch up to us."

"What are you planning?"

"We're going to play chicken," he announced grimly.

Scully cast an alarmed glance out the window on Mulder's side of the 
car, where only a narrow lane and shoulder and a flimsy wooden 
guardrail lay between themselves and thousands of feet of nothing.  
Depending on whether the road was maintained by the state or the 
county, the quality up here varied greatly.  This section of the road 
was obviously one belonging to a county with a very low budget.

"Jesus, Mulder...you can't be serious."

"We don't have a choice, Scully.  They may have a nimbler car, but ours 
is heavier, more solid, and we've got the bigger engine," he said, not 
so much explaining the plan to Scully as working it out for himself.  
"We also have the inside lane.  It's possible that they don't know that 
the people in this car are their targets.  They're probably expecting 
to find us up at the compound.  Ideally, they'll pull over at one of 
the turnouts to allow us to pass.  You can put on your baseball cap and 
get down.  Hopefully they won't recognize me. Otherwise..." he let the 
sentence trail off meaningfully.

"Damn," Scully muttered softly.

Silently, Mulder agreed with her assessment.  The steering wheel grew 
slick under his sweating palms; his stomach was twisted into knots of 
tension.  This could get ugly, he realized bleakly.  Although he bore a 
faint hope that the occupants of the other vehicle would not recognize 
them, he had a strong suspicion that if they knew where he and Scully 
were, they also knew what kind of car he and Scully were driving.  
There was a good possibility that one car or the other was going over 
the side of the mountain.  And it wasn't going to be theirs.  He'd try 
his best to disable their car to deter pursuit, but if it came down to 
a choice, Scully's life preceded all else.

Scully dug in the glove compartment and emerged with a tattered 
baseball cap that she tucked her hair up in.

"Maybe you should climb in the back seat, get down on the floor-board," 
he suggested.  Scully nodded, her lips pressed together to the point of 
invisibility.  Unbuckling her seatbelt, she laid her seat back and 
crawled into the back seat.

Mulder drove carefully but determinedly, as fast as the Cadillac would 
allow without sliding off the side of the mountain.  He lowered the 
power windows so that they could listen for the other car around the 
blind curves of the road.  

He glanced in the mirror at Scully, who hadn't gotten her head down 
yet, drawn by the same macabre curiosity that made people gawk as 
travesties unfolded around them.  She watched the road ahead intently, 
her lips moving silently.  He didn't need to hear her to know what she 
was saying.

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee...

"A black sedan," Scully said out of nowhere, grimacing.  "I never 
thought I'd be grateful for a cliché.  If those bastards were driving 
an SUV or a beat-up pick-up, we'd never have spotted them..."

Mulder nodded in grim agreement.  Scully's lips began to move once 
more.

...Blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy 
womb, Jesus...

He rounded another curve and caught another chance glimpse of the 
enemy...

...Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners....

Any second now.  "Scully, get down."  He didn't particularly care if 
the recommendation came out sounding more like a command.

...now and at the hour of our deaths. Amen.

There.  A cloud of dust a little way ahead.  They were going to meet on 
a wide, gradual curve rather than a straight stretch of road.  That 
might work in their favor, given the fact that he had the inside lane.  
Mulder clung as close to the inside lane as he could, branches of the 
trees they brushed scraping against the car. 

There were no turnouts; he and the other vehicle were going to meet on 
the road.  If he got a good look at their license plate and it was 
local, he would just pass by harmlessly.  Otherwise... 

No chance, he thought as the black sedan rounded the next curve and he 
saw the plates on their car.  It wasn't a government plate, but it was 
Maryland.  He didn't think too many black sedans from Maryland made it 
up into the mountains of North Carolina.  These were definitely not 
local citizens. 

Damn.

There was still a chance they wouldn't recognize him.  The other car 
pulled into its own lane as far as possible, given how narrow the road 
was.  The two cars were within thirty yards of each other when he saw 
the passenger side window sliding down and an arm emerging, bearing a 
large handgun.  A BFR Maxine, he ID'ed the weapon in the back of his 
mind.  *Now* they'd been recognized.

Apparently, their earlier failures had made them consider Scully enough 
of a threat to prompt them to carry what amounted to a hand-held 
cannon...Shit, from what Scully had described of their earlier attempts 
to kill her, he knew subtlety wasn't their thing, but this seemed a tad 
excessive...

"Keep your head down, Scully.  They're about to start shooting."  With 
impeccable timing, his words were punctuated by a bullet hitting the 
windshield and pulverizing the top of the back passenger side seat, 
where Scully had been sitting only seconds before.

Christ, if she'd had been sitting up...As it was, that bullet must have 
passed just a few scant inches above her.

Then it was too late for thought.  At the last instant, Mulder gunned 
the engine and veered to the left, catching the other vehicle at a 
sharp angle on the front driver's side panel.  The flimsy fiberglass 
never stood a chance against their Detroit-made steel behemoth.  He 
broke the other car's forward momentum and pushed it toward the edge of 
the road.

He saw the driver's head strike the steel beam behind his door and 
bounce as the airbag deployed and winced.  If he wasn't dead, he was 
going to have a wicked head injury.  He threw the Cadillac into reverse 
to give himself space to determine what their next move would be.  The 
driver wasn't moving, he saw after the airbags deflated.  The passenger 
was struggling with his, coughing in the cloud of powder that 
accompanied the deployment of the safety restraint system.  His door 
was right on the edge of the drop-off, the black sedan hanging through 
the splintered guard railing, the front passenger wheel actually 
hanging off the cliff.

Mulder put the transmission in park and together he and Scully emerged 
from the Cadillac, their weapons drawn.  The motor of the other car was 
still running, miraculously, and they moved carefully toward the 
vehicle, intent on getting the occupants out and into custody.  If they 
could get some answers out of these guys...Scully hung back, keeping 
her gun trained on the passenger while Mulder cautiously approached the 
car.

He circled with his gun trained on the passenger, trying to determine 
if the man still held his weapon.  The man had stopped moving, perhaps 
falling unconscious.  Mulder moved closer and tried the front driver's 
side door to find it was stuck, the collapsed front panel pressing 
against it.  He struggled with it a moment, then turned his attention 
to the back door.  It was locked.  Shit.  The passenger side was 
obviously out of the question as a means of exodus from the vehicle.  
He would have to break the window.

Backing away from the car, he gestured to Scully to retrieve a pry-bar 
from the trunk of the Cadillac.  He turned his attention back to the 
driver's side door to see if he could force it open, shifting his eyes 
from the occupants of the car to the door and back again.

He looked down at the door once more when a movement in his peripheral 
vision drew his attention.

"Scully! Get DOWN!!"

Obeying the imperative without questions, she threw herself to the 
gravel surface of the road, skidding across the rocks.  He heard the 
passenger's weapon discharge just a split second before he squeezed off 
his own shot.

The driver's side window shattered, spraying glass all over.  Mulder 
threw his arms up to shield his face, then quickly lowered them to 
survey the situation.

All he got was a glimpse of blood smearing what was left of the 
passenger side window before all hell broke loose. 

"Mulder!  Get away from the car!" Scully screamed as the driver began 
to convulse.

The car lurched forward as the driver's foot hit the gas pedal, gravel 
spitting as the one front wheel still touching land began to spin.  It 
stopped, the driver's seizures subsiding, and Mulder approached once 
more, reaching inside with the intent of shutting off the ignition.  He 
felt the first jerk of another round of convulsions from the driver and 
flung himself backward, away from the car.  He slid on his backside 
across several feet across the gravel road.  Before he could look up 
again, the car was kicking up a stinging spray of dust and pebbles and 
was gone.

"Damn it!" Scully shouted angrily at no one in particular.  He looked 
over at her where she stood clenching the fingers in her left hand in 
the hair at her temples while she holstered her gun with the right.  
She turned from the sight of the gaping hole in the wooden railing as 
Mulder rose.  He brushed dust off the seat of his jeans and stared, 
stunned, at the empty space the car had occupied just seconds before. 
That the occupants of the car could have helped them get to the bottom 
of the attempts on her life all that much sooner was of secondary 
importance to the loss of human life.  The driver hadn't been dead and 
he wasn't sure his shot had killed the passenger.

As he walked toward her, she rubbed her neck tensely, her body taut and 
quivering with anger.  After a moment, she began to pace, placing her 
hands on her hips as she ground her teeth in sheer frustration and 
outrage.  Finally, she met Mulder's eyes.

"That's three people who have died so far trying to kill me," Scully 
said bleakly.  Then anger began to blaze behind her crystalline eyes.  
"Damn it, Mulder, how did they find us?"

The implant she had, maybe?  Their shared gaze spoke the possibility as 
clearly as words and Scully gingerly touched the back of her neck 
again, looking wretched.

He walked over to her, pulling her back against him by her shoulders, 
wrapping his arms around her from behind.  She stood stiff for a 
moment, her breathing hard and fast, before she slumped against him, 
letting him support her for a moment.  Mulder closed his eyes, offering 
a prayer of thanks to whatever diety might be listening that he had not 
left Scully up in those cabins.  If she had been there and he hadn't 
intercepted that car, he would be returning to retrieve her dead body.

He shuddered at the thought, clutching her closer.  Christ, how many 
times was he going to come within a hair's breadth of losing her?

"There's no way to be safe, is there, Mulder?"  Her voice was the 
softest of murmurs, nearly inaudible through the gusting breeze.  "I 
can't hide.  They'll always find me."

He felt her shoulders tighten.  "I guess all that's left to do is 
fight."

She pulled abruptly out of his arms and turned to face him, her eyes 
blazing with anger.  "Let's get the hell back to D.C. and finish this, 
Mulder.  Before anyone else dies."

*     *     *     *     *

"I know it's a great deal to ask, sir," Mulder said to Skinner, looking 
solemnly at him across the booth in the small cafe, "but you're the 
only person we can trust to protect her."

Beside him, he could hear Scully's small sigh of discontent.  He'd had 
to fight tooth and nail to get her to accept the fact that she simply 
had to have a bodyguard until they had done what they set out to do.  
And if Mulder couldn't be with her and they couldn't trust a stranger, 
then Skinner was the only person who would qualify.

"Mulder, you told me he's been compromised!" She had protested angrily.  
"He's said as much himself!"

"Yes, that's true, but it's Krycek who has him by the balls, and 
considering that Krycek brought you the files Burke sent, it's apparent 
who he's working for.  And Burke has a strong interest in keeping you 
alive, it seems.  Ergo, Skinner is the ONLY person we can trust to keep 
you safe."

"You're that sure?"

"Yes." He'd answered simply.  And he was.  Skinner had been unwillingly 
forced into a position where he had to provide Krycek with information 
on Mulder and Scully's activities, but he would never betray them when 
their lives were on the line.  "You told me yourself, he said he would 
die before intentionally allowing harm to come to you."

"Yes, but--"

"Scully," he interrupted her, his tone brooking no argument.  "Someone 
has to protect you.  I don't doubt that you can take care of yourself, 
but against something this big, it's better for you to have some help.  
You have to understand: you are too important in all this to risk 
having anything happen to you.  If you want to see this thing through, 
then you have to be alive at the end of it.  And if I can't be there, 
then I would feel a lot better if someone else was.  Please, just...do 
it to keep me sane, okay?"

She had reluctantly consented and they had called Skinner the moment 
they hit D.C.

The fact that they were being required to split up again scared the 
hell out of Mulder.  One of them had to remain in D.C. and get the 
goods on Strughold.  The other had to interview the other abductees 
listed in the Paperclip files before *they* started to disappear.  Once 
they had released the information they had gathered to the public, 
there was a good chance the witnesses were going to begin dropping off 
the face of the earth.  Since Scully would be a sitting target in D.C., 
it made sense for her to go out and get their statements and for him to 
stay behind.  She'd still be in danger on the road, but not as much.

Sure.  Made all the sense in the world.  Which irritated the hell out 
of him because in no way did he come close to liking it.

Luckily, it didn't take that much convincing to get Skinner to assent.  
It was his duty to see the agents under his protection safe, he told 
them, even if it meant he had to see to it personally.  And so it was 
that Skinner left them at the booth and went to the cashier to pay for 
their coffees, telling them he would meet them outside.

They sat silently for a long moment, unsure of what to say.  Mulder 
swallowed hard.  Thinking that one of them might not be coming back and 
that this would be their last moment together was just a little too 
much to handle right now.  If he concentrated too hard on it, he might 
never let Scully go.

"Don't take any unnecessary chances, Scully," he admonished her 
finally, squeezing her hands tightly.  "If things start getting dicey, 
get the hell out."

She nodded solemnly, and Mulder frowned. "I can still--"

"No," Scully shook her head, cutting him off.  "You need to get that 
evidence *now.*  Once you have that, it will be a hell of a lot safer 
for me to return home.  I'll be all right.  You have my recorded and 
written statements, so if anything happens..."

"I don't give a damn about the statements, Scully," he said tiredly, at 
once wearied and touched by her persistence in seeing the practical 
matters before the personal ones.  She had looked up at him sadly.

"I know, Mulder," she murmured.  "I'll be okay."

She lifted her face and he pressed a gentle kiss to her lips, then slid 
from the booth and reached out a hand to help her rise.  They reached 
the outer door and Scully began to move away from him.  Reluctantly, he 
released her hand and with a final look back over her shoulder at him, 
she exited to the crisp April morning.  From the doorway, he watched 
her climb into Skinner's car and disappear into traffic.

He had never realized that letting Scully go would be so hard, he 
thought bleakly.  He couldn't deal with that now, though.  If this 
entire exercise in terror was to have any meaning, he had to carry 
through on the plan he and Scully had laid out.   

The first order of business was to get the Paperclip files back to the 
Gunmen's vault as soon as possible, where they could be copied and 
distributed with the rest of the evidence he and Scully gathered.

Frohike's annoyance at the early-morning rousting, and their collective 
distress that their safe haven had been found out, was mitigated only 
by the news of Mulder and Scully's discovery and the theory it had 
produced.  Within minutes, the boys were on their computers and 
downloading what information they could on Conrad Strughold and the 
Strughold Mine.

"Got it!" Langly announced first.  "The mine closed during the 
depression and remained closed through the end of the Second World War.  
At that time the title was sold to a German bio-physicist by the name 
of Andreas Strughold.  Strughold wasn't a huge name in the midst of the 
Nazi butchers, which was lucky for him.  He wasn't high enough on the 
food chain to get caught in the Nuremburg net.  He made it into the 
U.S. in 1949 and set up shop working the coal mine."

"Exactly what business does a bio-physicist have running a mine?" 
Mulder pondered rhetorically.  "No mention of a Conrad?"

"I didn't say that," Langly replied.  "Andreas had a twelve year old 
son who remained in Germany with his mother.  The mother died in 1958 
and Conrad fled Germany for reasons unknown.  He turned up two years 
later in Tunisia, working as a clerk for the American embassy and 
gradually moving up the ladder, until he was executive assistant to the 
ambassador..."

"That's a pretty politically sensitive post for a German national to 
hold, especially back then," Mulder commented.

"No kidding," Langly agreed.  "In 1973 Andreas Strughold died and 
Conrad quit the embassy and began making regular trips to the U.S. to 
oversee his father's business interests, which included the mine and a 
little start-up bio-engineering firm called Roush."

"Conrad Strughold isn't a scientist," Byers added from his computer, 
where he was researching the link between Strughold and the Tunisian 
government, "but he is a businessman.  Evidence the success of Roush."

"Yeah, aided in no small part by the generous patronage of Big 
Brother," Frohike muttered.

"Strughold still lives in Tunisia and manages his business interests 
long-distance," Byers continued.  "Interpol has a bit of a dossier on 
him.  Apparently, he's gained some slight notoriety over there due to 
some issues that arose once with an agricultural engineering firm he 
was starting.  Apparently there was an accident and several employees 
died.  There were claims of hazardous working conditions that mainly 
got swept under the carpet.  Not long thereafter, Strughold began 
appearing at dinner parties and other functions with high-ranking 
Tunisian government officials."

"The man who tried to kill Scully in the hospital was attached to the 
Tunisian embassy.  So now he has both motive and means for killing 
Scully," Mulder mumbled, pinching his bottom lip thoughtfully.  "Now 
what about linking the work Andros does with the abductees to Roush?"

"That's easy," Frohike chimed in.  "Like most pharmaceutical companies, 
Roush is always looking to create and sell a better drug than the ones 
currently on the market.  They're running studies at all the clinics 
Andros works out of."

"These kinds of studies are often subsidized by the Department of 
Health and Human Services," Langly added.

"That could be said for any pharmaceutical company, though.  It's too 
damned big a coincidence for anyone but an idiot to overlook, but this 
is the judicial system we're talking about here.  As far as the lawyers 
are concerned, it's still going to be circumstantial," Mulder pointed 
out.  "We need something to tie the abductees to Roush not just in the 
present day, but in the past.  We need to tie *these,*" he indicated 
the stack of Operation Paperclip files within the briefcase, "back to 
Roush."

The room grew silent as Langly, Byers and Frohike turned back to their 
computers to see what they could find.  Scowling, Mulder began to thumb 
through the files again.  Medical forms...smallpox vaccination 
certificate...birth records...The label on each file listed name, 
birthday, and an ID number...

"These ID numbers," Mulder broke the silence, gesturing to a file.  
"They're on every medical form and the file label.  They're not Social 
Security numbers and they don't match the smallpox vaccination 
records."

"They could be case numbers," Byers suggested.  "We could try to hack 
into Roush's database, find their records on the participants for their 
studies and see if they match."

"Do it," Mulder said grimly.  As though magnetically drawn to the 
center of the room, the three men's chairs simultaneously rolled to 
meet.  While they put their heads together, Mulder braced his elbows on 
the table and covered his face with his hands, taking advantage of the 
moment of reprieve to rest.  This was the third night in a row he'd 
gotten very little sleep.

Scully was no doubt well on her way to visit the first of the five 
abductees she would be calling upon, hopefully with no one the wiser of 
her location or destination.

He should have gone with her...

"We're in!" Frohike's triumphant outcry brought Mulder back to the 
present, only to glance at the clock and realize an hour had passed 
with him dozing.  He rubbed his face wearily and turned an expectant 
gaze on the three as they huddled around a computer.

Mulder rose from the table and Byers stood to allow him a seat.

"As you can see," Byers explained, "the company runs literally 
thousands of drug-research studies.  We have complete listings of names 
and locations for their participants, but the computer ID numbers 
listed for them don't match the file numbers.  And Agent Scully's name 
isn't in their list of study participants."

Damn.

"She wouldn't be," Mulder replied absently.  In his mind, he heard 
Scully telling him that she suspected what had been done to her was not 
the same as anything done to the other abductees.  "At least, not in 
relation to Doctor Andros.  He never had anything to do with her file 
or subsequent medical care."

He took a moment to think, his tired brain struggling to grasp what all 
was still required to satisfy the letter of the law in regards to 
prosecuting Roush and the people within the government who had 
sanctioned the work Andros had done with the bio-engineering firm.

"How soon can we get the project funding histories?" He asked at last.

"That's going to take a while longer," Frohike replied.  "If there's 
one thing these companies guard even more closely than their research, 
it's their accounting, and it's time consuming to find this stuff on 
the government end."

"When you get it, we need to look at what projects the government 
subsidized for Roush in the 1970's and onward.  In the meantime, we're 
going to need a write-up of all the facts we've compiled so far to 
distribute to the media," Mulder said, grabbing his light spring 
jacket.  "Copies of all our documentation need to be spread out among 
some of your associates and then to some of their associates for 
safekeeping.  We may not have enough to make a court case yet, but we 
certainly have enough to get the public's attention.  With votes on the 
line, it's very possible that our esteemed elected officials will be 
sufficiently swayed by the evidence to open a deeper investigation."

"Where are you going to be?" Frohike asked when Mulder had finished.

"I'm going to link these files to Roush," he answered and left.

*     *     *     *     *

"How were they located?" Charles Burke's eyes were angry as he learned 
of the smashed fleet sedan that had been found over the edge of a 
mountain in North Carolina.

"We don't know.  We're the only ones with the proper code for tracking 
her," Alex Krycek spoke softly, as was his habit.  It diverted 
attention from what he was actually capable of.

"Then Strughold has the code."

"I don't think so.  If he had the ability to track her, wouldn't he 
have done so sooner?  It's been over a week since she disappeared from 
Washington."

"Then we have a leak."  The smoking man's voice was weak and tired.  
Krycek had to restrain himself from sneering at the fading old man who 
had once yielded such power and now was watching his own sunset.  In a 
few weeks, or months, the old man would be gone, and his legacy with 
him.

"It's likely," Krycek acknowledged.  "You've got spies all over 
Strughold, so why wouldn't he have them all over you?  If anything can 
be learned from what happened at the lake two weeks ago, it's that no 
one is quite as loyal as we might like to think."  Nice touch, that 
emphasis on the "we."

"Find the leak, Alex.  We cannot risk Dana Scully coming to harm due to 
a leak in our own inner circle."

Krycek nodded and turned to walk away.  Burke's voice stopped him.  The 
man sounded almost...remorseful.

"If we have a leak, then there is one other matter which must be 
attended to, an item we must secure, lest it fall into the wrong 
hands..."

*     *     *     *     *

Exhaustion, highway hypnosis, and lack of shower facilities seemed to 
be becoming a way of life for her, Scully thought, yawning.  Skinner 
sat silently behind the wheel, looking tense.  Were it not for his 
presence and the fact that they were in his car, she'd be changing the 
radio from station to station right now.  The rule of thumb between she 
and Mulder was that whomever was driving got to choose the music.  For 
Scully it was usually Motown, for Mulder, classic rock.  Right now, 
Motown just didn't seem like it would do the trick.  

Three nights now, she had gotten little to no sleep.  The night before 
last, she had stayed up all night recording and writing out her 
testimony.  The night after that...well, she supposed she and Mulder 
might have been a little more judicious, but it just hadn't seemed all 
that important at that particular moment.

Yawning again, she took a long sip of stale drive-thru window coffee.  
Some Zeppelin might do well at the moment...or Jethro Tull, maybe?

Their first stop was Havre de Grace, Maryland.  They would be calling 
upon the five abductees on the Seaboard in random order, rather than 
taking the chance that their direction might be predicted.  After this 
visit, they would be stopping in Leipsik, Delaware and from there, down 
to Virginia before heading north to visit the two abductees living in 
Pennsylvania.  There were actually three if Samantha Mulder was 
included in the tally, but Scully preferred to leave Samantha out of 
this.  She and Mulder already had a statement of sorts from her, so 
unless it became strictly necessary, they would stay at a distance from 
Mulder's sister until the crisis had passed.

Steven Farrow, she thought, as Skinner pulled onto a quiet residential 
street.  She went over the basic facts of his file in her head like a 
mental checklist.  Disappeared from his home for two weeks in 1977 at 
the age of six.  Living on disability because of the type and severity 
of his epilepsy and supposed mental illness.  A very vocal member of 
the local MUFON chapter.  He was sure to be a veritable wellspring of 
information if she could get him to talk to her despite the fact that 
she was an employee of the government he no longer trusted.

"There's the house," she broke the silence for the first time since she 
and Skinner had gotten into the car that morning.  There just really 
didn't seem to be all that much to say at the moment.  She and Mulder 
had explained what they had found and what they needed to find still 
and that was all there was to it.

He pulled the car over to park on the side of the street and glanced 
around the neighborhood uneasily.

"I'm going to wait outside the house," he said brusquely.  "That way I 
can keep an eye on things out here.  You've got your vest?"

"Yes, sir," Scully nodded.  The moment they had reached his car, he had 
opened the trunk and handed her the Kevlar vest without speaking a 
word.  Just as silently, she had donned it.  No muss, no fuss, no 
bother.  He was in charge of the show now.

Somehow, that thought comforted Scully.

She started for Steven Farrow's door and Skinner followed her, keeping 
a hawk's eye on the quiet neighborhood.  He took up position beside the 
door while she rang the bell.

She looked like hell, she was sure.  It had come to a choice between 
wearing the suit she'd had at the hospital with her after the car bomb, 
complete with grass stains and wrinkles from being stuffed in an 
overnight bag for a week, or jeans and a clean button-down shirt.  She 
had figured the latter was the lesser of the two evils.  But it 
certainly didn't portray the image she had worked hard to cultivate of 
an FBI agent.

The house was small and neatly kept, the yard tended with what was 
obviously loving care.  It was shortly after eight in the morning and 
most denizens of neighborhoods such as these had left for work.  Being 
unemployed, there was a good chance that Mr. Farrow was home.  A few 
minutes later, the door opened a crack.

"Yes?"

"Are you Steven Farrow?"

"Yes."

A man of few words, Scully thought.  "Mr. Farrow, my name is Dana 
Scully and I'm a special agent with the FBI." She held up her badge for 
his perusal.  "If it's not inconvenient for you, I would like a few 
moments of your time."

"Why would the FBI want to speak with me?" he asked, a hint of fear 
coloring his tone.

"The FBI doesn't, sir.  I do," Scully answered simply.  After a 
moment's pause, the chain lock was released and the door held open to 
allow her to enter.

For someone too mentally unstable to work, Farrow's house was 
immaculate, Scully thought as she surveyed the living room, which lay 
just beyond the entryway.  Silently, Farrow preceded her into the 
living room and gestured for Scully to have a seat.

"Thank you very much for taking the time to speak with me, Mr. Farrow," 
Scully said, perching on a chair.  Farrow was as neat as his house, she 
noted.  A reasonably handsome man in his late twenties, he looked like 
a young banker.  Actually, he reminded her of Byers, she realized.  
Scully smiled at the thought.

"Can I get you some coffee?" he offered.  "I just brewed a pot."

"That would be wonderful.  Thank you."

Within moments, a cup of strong French roast was delivered and her host 
sat on the sofa, eyeing her cautiously.

"If I may make an observation," he began, "you don't look much like a 
federal agent."

Scully sighed, nodding self-consciously.  "I apologize, Mr. Farrow.  
The reason for my appearance is actually part of what I needed to 
discuss with you.  I would like to know about your abduction 
experiences," she said bluntly.

The man shot to his feet, his face draining of color.  "How do you know 
about that?" He asked in an alarmed whisper.

"Please, Mr. Farrow--" Scully held out a soothing hand.  "I'm not here 
to harm you.  I just want to talk to you.  You're active in a local 
MUFON chapter, right?  Perhaps you've heard of Fox Mulder?"

Farrow's eyes darted around nervously.  "I've heard the name."

"I'm his partner," Scully told him, still trying to calm him.  "I work 
on a project within the Bureau called the X-Files, which deals with 
unexplained phenomena.  Needless to say, abductions such as yours often 
fall into that category."

Still watching her warily, Farrow sat down again.  "I'm listening."

"I'll be honest, Mr. Farrow, because I simply don't have the time to 
prevaricate," she said wearily.  "My partner and I have received some 
files, one of which has your name on it.  To summarize, it is a medical 
record containing forms filled out and dated during the two weeks you 
were missing as a child.  We have sufficient evidence to believe that 
these files are documentation of your abduction experiences and that we 
can directly link that abduction to the government via these files.  
Agent Mulder is trying to piece together the last of the evidence as we 
speak.  What I need from you, Mr. Farrow, is whatever information you 
can provide for me about Doctor Josef Andros."

"Dr. Andros?  He's my neurologist.  What has he got to do with it?"

"I'm sorry to tell you this, but it's important that you know Dr. 
Andros's name was on several of the forms in your file, forms that were 
dated on and around the time of your first abduction."

Farrow spilled his coffee.

"Jesus!" He whispered, wiping frantically at it.  Scully dashed to the 
kitchen and grabbed a towel off a bar on the wall for him.  A moment 
later the crisis was past and Farrow looked at her with stunned eyes.

"I'm s-sorry," he stuttered.  "I just didn't expect--"

"I know, Mr. Farrow," Scully said kindly.  Inside, she was wondering 
how she was going to get through four more interviews if they all 
started off like this one.  Farrow stared at the coffee stain on his 
slacks for a long moment, shaking his head.  Finally, he looked up at 
her, anger simmering in his eyes.

"What do you need to know?"

Scully drew a shaky breath.  "Mr. Farrow, there's one more thing you 
should know before we start.  This information my partner and I have 
found--when we go public with it, there are going to be a lot of 
attempts to suppress or deny what we've found.  Potential witnesses in 
a court case may begin...disappearing."

Farrow stared at her a moment, stunned.  Scully fell silent, allowing 
him a moment to process the implications of what she'd just said.

At last, he spoke.  "I'm a witness whether or not I give you my 
statement, correct?"

"Yes, it's likely you would be called upon, as your name is mentioned 
in the files."

"If I'm dead, I can't testify.  No one will ever hear my story.  But if 
I make the statement, then it won't matter if I die or not.  I will 
have told what I know."

It was the same dilemma she herself had faced in the mountains.  
Recording and writing the statements had seemed like a concession to 
the idea that she might be killed.  But the idea that if she didn't 
make them, she might be killed with no one ever benefiting from the 
truths she knew was intolerable.  She had to be heard, even if it was 
from her grave. 

Scully didn't respond, letting him work the problem out in his own 
mind.  He looked her squarely in the eye, drawing a deep breath.

"Got a tape recorder?"

*     *     *     *     *

Samantha stared at the journal in her hands, touching it tenderly, 
lovingly.  Her last link to her mother...She looked back and forth 
between the book and the fire she had built in the fireplace.

Was it true?  Was it true what her father told her?  Had Fox been the 
first?  What did that mean?

Outside, she heard the happy sounds of her children laughing and 
playing in the yard.  Occasionally the deeper rumble of their father's 
laughter would reach her as well.  

She had reached Michael's house late in the afternoon two days ago, 
after she had seen her father.  Her ex-husband had been guarded and 
aloof as she greeted her children, embracing them as though she would 
never release them.  Jeannie and Danny were too old to tolerate that 
for too long, but at least Amanda had let her mother cuddle her for a 
while.

Evening had descended, with Michael chafing at her failure to return to 
her own house.  She helped him prepare dinner, telling him it was vital 
she speak with him after the children went to bed.  Perplexed and 
annoyed, he had consented to allow her to remain, if for no other 
reason than to press her for an explanation as to where the hell she 
had been for nearly three weeks.

So she told him.  Told him about her brother, about the men and the 
threats and the danger she had perceived to the children that had 
prompted her to run away.

And then she told him about her abduction.

He hadn't believed her, of course.  Not right away.  So she showed him 
the journal she had written as a girl.  She showed him the scar on the 
back of her neck where the implant lay.  She told him about her 
neurologist and the file that Fox had shown her with her name on it and 
of the forms within, signed by Dr. Andros and dated during the time 
frame of six years she still couldn't remember.

And finally Samantha saw she was getting through to him.  He still had 
questions and reservations, but he was listening to her.  And so they 
had spoken late into the night about all she had seen and experienced.  
She had confessed all she had been feeling these last two years and 
explained why she had shut him out.  She had asked his forgiveness for 
the way she had hurt him.

When she had awakened the next morning, it had been in Michael's arms.

The only thing she hadn't told him, couldn't tell him, was what she had 
learned about Fox.  That was something that was hers alone to share 
with Fox, if she decided to do it.  No one else should know unless Fox 
decided so.

She wasn't sure she wanted to, or should, tell Fox.  She knew how she 
had felt as she learned the realities of her abduction.  She knew the 
fear and anger and confusion and uncertainty.  She felt 
violated...unclean.  Sometimes it was hard for her even to bring 
herself to touch her children, to touch Michael.  But she must move 
past that, put it behind her, learn to live with it.  Maybe, if she 
didn't tell Fox, he would never have to struggle with those same 
problems.  Maybe he could live his life in peaceful ignorance.

The day she had left the mountains, she hadn't dreamed she might keep 
this knowledge from Fox.  She had simply wanted to confront her father 
about it, get confirmation, first.  Now, however...now she wasn't sure.  
She knew Fox would insist on knowing the truth if he had a choice, but 
he didn't know what the truth did to you, the way it tore you up 
inside.  She could spare him that...

Where did it end? She wondered, sinking to her knees before the fire.  
How much could one person take and still remain sane?  These things she 
knew, what she had discovered, what had been done to her--she had never 
sought them.  She didn't want them.  But they were hers, her 
responsibility...her burden.

There's no happily ever after here, she realized with unspeakable 
sorrow.  As long as she possessed this knowledge, lived with it, she 
would never know peace of mind.  

And in a few words, she had the ability to destroy Fox's peace of mind 
as well.  He had been through so much since the time she was abducted, 
so much pain and loss.  Now, they had found each other and he could 
rebuild his life free from the demons that had haunted him.  He 
deserved that.  And she had the ability to give him that gift...but it 
meant withholding the truth, which Fox valued above all else.

So which is it going to be, Sam?

Tell Fox the truth and watch it do to him what it had done to her, or 
allow him to live with the peace of the unknowing and be guilty of the 
same lies of omission that had darkened each of their lives for so 
long.

She just didn't know.  She needed more time, needed to think.  Whatever 
she chose, the journal would have to go.  Aside from what the knowledge 
might do to Fox, this journal was physical proof of a truth that might 
lead to actual physical harm for him.  Maybe her father was lying, but 
she didn't think so.  She'd seen his face, seen the genuine fear and 
regret there.  She couldn't jeopardize her brother's life for the sake 
of sentimentality.  She held the journal out in a trembling hand, 
moving it slowly toward the flames, bidding her mother a farewell she'd 
never had the opportunity to speak.

She gasped as a pair of black shoes and jeans registered in her 
peripheral vision and stared up at the intruder in alarm.  She opened 
her mouth to scream.

"Don't do it," he warned in a rich, deceptively gentle voice.  "If you 
call your husband in here this is going to get ugly."

He opened his black leather jacket with one arm to reveal a handgun 
tucked in the waistband of his jeans.  "Give me the book."

Samantha swallowed hard, her mouth dry, her extremities gone numb and 
cold with fear.  She clutched the journal to her breast, staring up 
into his black eyes.  If there was a soul in there, she couldn't see 
it.

"Give me the book," he repeated, a little louder.

She couldn't let him have the journal, she thought, her heart racing as 
panic threatened to overtake her.  Even if it meant her life, she could 
not let him take it.  Too much hung in the balance.  With a shudder, 
knowing her next move might very well be her last, she drew a deep 
breath and threw the journal into the back of the fire.

The man cursed and lunged forward, knocking her roughly out of the way 
as he grabbed the iron poker and plunged it into the fire, rooting 
around in the coals.  Seconds later he pulled the journal out onto the 
hearth, stomping on it to extinguish the small flames dotting its cover 
and blackening the edges of the pages.

"No!!" Samantha shrieked, throwing herself at him, grasping for the 
book.  She got a grip on it and pulled her arm back to throw it back 
into the fire, only to find herself knocked back as he swung his arm 
wide.  She went down gasping, the air driven from her lungs by the 
force of the blow.  With a strangled sob, she watched as he bent to 
retrieve the book and tucked it inside his leather jacket.

When he was finished, he looked at her coldly, then turned on his heel 
and disappeared through the kitchen.  A moment later, she heard the 
driveway-side door slam shut.  Shaking and terrified, Samantha curled 
around herself on the floor and wept.


NOTES: Believe it or not, I did not pull the Mulder-abduction scenario 
out of nowhere.  Many thanks to Heather for clueing me in to the 
snippet of dialogue cut from "Demons" revealing that Mulder had 
epilepsy as a child and drawing the parallel to Max Fenig's epilepsy, 
which lead to the entire theory of child abductees developing the 
disorder.



CHAPTER NINE - Sacrifice


The worst bitch about the desert--and Mulder could think of several--
was that there was no place to hide.  Oddly, the cacti didn't seem to 
care for his company all that much and demonstrated their displeasure 
rather painfully.

Through the dusty lenses of his binoculars, he could see the Roush 
Pharmaceuticals main research campus in the distance.  A steady stream 
of cars and fleet commuter vans wound along the hardtack road, the 
afternoon sun making them shimmer in the heat  The vehicles had baked 
all day in the relentless sun and Mulder imagined that the cars, along 
with their owners, would breath a sigh of relief as the coolness of 
evening approached.

By now he knew the routine by heart, having spent the last two days 
baking in the Arizona sun surveying the place, roasting in the Arizona 
sun.  By seven o'clock anyone who was going to leave would be gone.  
Then the maintenance and housekeeping crews would arrive and supply 
deliveries would begin.  It was six thirty now and his pulse quickened, 
knowing that in approximately an hour, he would be making his move.

It had taken him two days, after he parted with Scully and A.D. 
Skinner, to make the necessary arrangements and book a flight out of 
D.C. to Denver, Colorado. The Gunmen had checked passenger manifests 
and flight schedules meticulously.  Mulder hadn't known which was going 
to snap his nerves first.  It was a toss-up between overbooked flights 
and the boys' overly suspicious natures.  When he had complained to 
Frohike about the latter, the gnome had just snorted and gone back to 
work, mutter something about the "poster-boy for paranoiacs."

Once he had safely arrived in Denver, he had hopped the Greyhouse to 
Phoenix, Arizona, where he had rented a car, paying cash and using and 
assumed name.  That made this day five of his journey, and he was 
feeling the pressure of the extended separation from Scully.  Five days 
of worrying.  Five days of wondering if she was safe.  Five days of 
gut-wrenching fear.  Five days of planning Skinner's gruesome and 
painful demise if Scully wasn't healthy and whole upon his return to 
Washington.

Mulder shook himself to keep his mind from traveling that particular 
path. If all had gone well, Scully would be finished with her 
interviews and headed back to Washington with Skinner to enter 
protective custody by this time.  He knew precisely what she thought 
about the concept of protective custody, and he was inclined to agree 
with her.  He could almost see the expression in those cool blue eyes 
as she considered the idea.  Mulder agreed that protective custody 
wasn't always as safe as they could desire, but hopefully with Skinner 
keeping personal watch over her, she'd be okay.  She had to be.

Keeping his head down, Mulder packed up his Gunmen-acquired floor-plans 
and exterior layouts and no fewer than eight twenty-ounce bottles that 
once upon a time had contained water.  They were just empty plastic 
now, but he would feel guilty leaving them behind.

His car was parked a full two miles away from the campus from where he 
sat now.  He would need to drop off his things and change clothes.  He 
currently wore a minimal pair of shorts and a light t-shirt, which left 
him reasonably cool but red as a boiled lobster after two days in the 
sun. In the car he had darker, warmer clothes for the dual purpose of 
camouflage and protection from the astoundingly cool desert night.

By seven thirty he was back, this time eschewing his hiding spot to 
cling to the tall stucco wall surrounding the campus.  Luckily, the 
owners of Roush Pharmaceuticals had been courteous enough to landscape 
the outer perimeter of the wall, leaving Mulder plenty of nooks and 
crannies to dodge into whenever a car passed or a surveillance camera 
swiveled in his direction.  There was no way to go over the wall; it 
was equipped with electrified wires and motion sensors.  He'd be found 
in an instant.  The only way he could get in was through the front 
gate, so that was exactly what he planned to do.

Mulder slipped closer to the main gate, moving then dodging behind a 
bush or a tree, until he was only a few paces away from the security 
booth covering the main entrance.

He had to admit that for a company doing classified government 
research, security was a tad on the lax side.  The boys had guffawed 
heartily when they discovered that there was no laser-beam fence 
guarding the base of the outside wall.  That little oversight was what 
allowed him to crouch undetected between two shrubs less than ten feet 
from the guard post.

What, no red carpet, guys?  Mulder thought as several cars and smaller 
supply vans passed him and gained entrance.  Those weren't what he 
wanted and Mulder waited patiently for the right opportunity to present 
itself, occasionally rubbing his damp palms on his black jeans as he 
listened to his own heart drumming in his ears, seemingly amplified by 
the eerie stillness of the nighttime desert.

One good thing he could say about the desert, he supposed, was that 
when the moon was out, flashlights were completely unnecessary.  He 
could see everything happening around him with perfect clarity.

Ah!  There it was.  Right on schedule.  A semi-truck from a well-known 
restaurant/industrial foods distributor, making a delivery for the 
cafeteria as the Gunmen had informed him it did twice a week at eight 
P.M.  For a company that made several glaring errors where security was 
concerned, Roush took no chances with the delivery people that went in 
and out on a daily basis.  The Gunmen had informed Mulder that all 
deliveries were made at night, because any and all sensitive or 
classified research got shut up and locked down at six o'clock sharp, 
to avoid the chance of anyone getting a glimpse of something they 
shouldn't.  

As the semi-truck rumbled past him and began to make a wide right-turn 
into the main drive, Mulder made his move.  Crouched low to the ground, 
he half-crawled forward, sticking close to the wall.  The truck stopped 
at the gate, blocking any view the guard post or surveillance camera 
might have had of him.  He was too close and too low for the camera 
directly above him to catch him.

He squatted on the truck's passenger side between the mammoth wheels 
and the wall.  When identification and authorization was confirmed, the 
gate swung open and the truck lurched forward.  Mulder kept pace with 
it's passage through the gate, then he ducked inside the wall.  
Slithering carefully along the interior of the wall, he used the rest 
of the long truck's passage to put as much distance between himself and 
the guard post as possible.When he was relatively assured he hadn't 
been detected, he paused in the shadow of a tree growing near the wall 
to take a breather and give his heart a chance to resume something more 
closely resembling its normal pace.

He pulled the pack he'd brought with him off his shoulder and dropped 
it on the ground.  Withdrawing a bottle of water, he took a long drink, 
considering his next move.  It was a good five hundred yards from the 
wall to the central building across long patches of wide-open space.  
He would look like something out of a cartoon, zig-zagging from tree to 
bush to tree, but there didn't seem to be any help for it.  Those same 
kind people who had failed to install a laser-beam fence outside the 
wall had also neglected to design into their perfectly manicured 
landscaping a convenient hedgerow that led up to the building.

Sealing the bottle of water once more, Mulder set it aside and withdrew 
the one other article he had brought in the backpack.  It was a little 
something the Gunmen had procured for him: a one-piece gray coverall, 
the universal outerwear of maintenance men around the world and de 
rigeur apparel for most Roush maintenance personnel.  Clipped to the 
lapel was a replica of a Roush ID badge.  How they had managed that 
little trick, he'd never know, but they assured him it was nearly 
perfect and would get him past all but an extremely observant security 
guard.  Judging from the complacency he had seen demonstrated in other 
areas, he hoped that everyone would assume that if he had gotten past 
the gate he was okay.  Otherwise, he was screwed.

He pulled the jumpsuit on over his black jeans and mock-turtleneck.  
Tucked cleverly into the front of the suit was a fluffy pad in the 
shape of a fledgling beer-gut that also served to disguise a large 
pouch where one could store papers, disks, and other contraband, if 
need be.

Sometimes, even after all these years, he found himself amazed at the 
resourcefulness of those guys, he thought, shaking his head before he 
donned the greasy baseball cap that completed the costume.

The backpack had been his own addition, and a good one at that.  It 
would have been cumbersome to try to sneak inside the perimeter 
carrying a bulky tool case, so he had paid a visit to a high-end 
hardware store.  There, he had proudly acquired the very latest in 
handyman gear: a padded black nylon pack that was carried on the 
shoulders like a backpack, but when the front panel was unzipped and 
spread open, revealed an impressive display of tools and other 
implements of the trade.  He did, however, take a moment to pity the 
poor maintenance personnel around the world who would shell out two 
hundred bucks for a woven nylon pack that would self-destruct within a 
year under even the lightest wear and tear.

His preparations finally complete, Mulder considered his best approach.  
Parking lots, most of them empty at this time of night, surrounded the 
cluster of buildings.  If he could get to the one where the janitorial 
staff parked, he could approach the central building from there.  The 
problem was, the exterior layout maps hadn't specified which parking 
lot served which purpose, so he was going to have to explore even to 
find the damned thing.

There was no help for that.  It was either explore or try to make a 
direct dash across the wide-open lawns and pray no one saw him.  
Somehow he suspected that he'd just about used up his quota of luck for 
the evening, so he wasn't willing to chance the second option.  
Exploring it was.

It took him nearly an hour, gliding along the wall, before he saw the 
lot he was looking for, with a small cluster of cheap imports gathered 
near the main building.  It was the only lot he had seen in use so far.  
Now was the time to dash for it.

By the time he reached the cars, he was panting more from fear than 
exertion.  He was fairly certain that he had bruises on his back that 
would take weeks to heal from the twice-damned tool pack banging 
against it.  He ducked behind a car and scanned the area.  
Miraculously, there were no cameras surveying the parking lot.  Was it 
possible they were *that* confident that no one could get past the 
perimeter?

That settled it.  He had *definitely* exhausted his allowance of luck 
for the night.  If he required any more, he'd be borrowing against next 
week.

Rising, he wiped the perspiration from his forehead with his sleeve and 
strolled casually from the midst of the cars toward the main entrance.

He unclipped his ID badge and ran the magnetic strip on the back 
through the scanner at the door.  Predictably, it didn't work.  The 
scanner beeped in reproach for the futile attempt.  He ran it through 
again, his expression one of deep consternation.  He tried a third 
time, then a fourth, each attempt drawing an annoyed beep from the 
scanner but yielding him no results.  He was still standing there 
trying to make the bogus ID badge work when a security guard emerged 
from an office near the entrance and approached the door from the 
inside.

Here we go, he thought anxiously.  This was where all those undercover 
training seminars came into play.

The guard pushed open the door and exited to face him on the landing.

"What seems to be the problem?" He asked in a tired, bored voice.

"My goddam badge won't work!" Mulder exclaimed, sprinkling his voice 
liberally with the heavy New England accents he'd grown up surrounded 
by and spent the rest of his life overcoming.

"It's my first night," he continued, feigning frustration.  "I'm 
running way late and I'm going to be in deep shit if I don't get in 
there and report to the maintenance supervisor, Martinez!"

"Take it easy, man," the guard said in a manner that indicated he was 
trying very hard not to be impatient.  Mulder wondered cynically what 
game he was watching in that office in there.  "Let me see your badge."

Mulder handed it over, his palms sweating.  This was the test.  
Langly's kung fu couldn't conjure him up an ID with a valid code in the 
magnetic strip, but he could hack into Roush's personnel database.

The guard pulled a cell phone from the waistband clip of his uniform 
and pressed the button that activated the two-way radio feature.  
"Central, this is Jamison at the main entrance."

"Go ahead, Jamison," crackled a coarse female voice over the speaker on 
the phone.

"I need to confirm hire and authorization for a new employee.  Redlum, 
Marty. R-E-D-L-U-M."

"Redlum?" the voice on the other end repeated.

"Affirmative."

Silence filled the airwaves between Jamison and the unknown woman at 
Central for a moment.  Then the radio beeped and Central's voice came 
back over the air.  Mulder held his breath.

"Confirmed, Jamison.  New hire, Marty Redlum.  Needs to report to 
Martinez in Maintenance.  Tell him to haul ass.  He's late."

"Affirmative.  Jamison out." Jamison replied and returned the phone to 
its clip at his waist.  The guard turned to Mulder and handed him back 
the bogus badge.

"You're all set," he said with a heavy sigh.  "Don't worry 'bout the 
scanner, happens all the time with new hires.  Some damn computer 
glitch or something like that.  Just tell Martinez your badge isn't 
working and he'll give you a temporary code to use until HR gets their 
fucking computers straightened out.  You might as well tell him that's 
why you're late as well, huh?"

"Hey, thanks, man," Mulder replied with an exaggerated sigh of relief 
as Jamison swiped his own ID through the scanner and the scanner 
bleeped cheerfully at him as the door obligingly buzzed a notice that 
it was now unlocked.  Once they were standing inside, Jamison provided 
him with directions.

"Take this hall, then the second left, the first right, the first left, 
and Maintenance is three doors down on the left.  Got it?"

"Yeah, I got it, man.  Thanks."  Mulder gave the security guard a 
distracted wave and took off down the hall at a jog, the goddamned 
tool-pack slamming against his abused shoulder and ribs once again.

*     *     *     *     *

Scully tossed uncomfortably in the narrow bed of her room in the 
maximum-security wing of a federal safe house.  Ironically, she now 
found herself back in Baltimore, where she and Mulder and Samantha had 
begun this crazed journey over two weeks ago.  Skinner was next door, 
accompanying the regular guard.

The interviews had gone surprisingly smoothly.  Only one of the five 
abductees had declined to give her statement, feeling her silence would 
best protect her.  She was actually amazed that there had been no run-
ins with her would-be assassins in those five days.  Was it possible 
that they actually hadn't been able to locate her, on the move as she 
was?

What she had learned from the interviews had enabled her to draw an 
interesting conclusion about childhood and life-long abductees and the 
epilepsy they developed.  The type and severity of the epilepsy each 
abductee experienced was directly proportionate to the number of 
abduction experiences they'd had.  That was why Samantha, for example, 
had a relatively mild condition and Steven Farrow, who had been 
abducted twelve times since he was six years old, suffered a much more 
severe form of the disorder.

True to his word, Skinner had taken every precaution to see her safe.  
The only sleep he'd had in the four days it took them to conduct the 
interviews had been in the car while she drove during the day.  When 
they had stopped for the night, which he had insisted on doing, he had 
remained awake, taking up position outside her motel room door while 
she rested within.

Now, on the fifth day since she'd left Mulder outside the coffee shop 
in D.C., she had a lot of reasons to be grateful to Skinner, and a lot 
of reasons to apologize for past doubts she'd entertained.  For the 
first time in seven years of working under his supervision she felt 
like she finally understood what the man was about.

"Why do you do it?" Scully had asked abruptly as he drove, looking up 
from the notes she was transcribing of the most recent interview she 
had conducted.

"Do what, Agent Scully?"

"Why do you back Mulder and I the way you do?  Why do you back the X-
Files?  I can't see that it's doing you any favors."

"Isn't it enough to say that I have an obligation as your superior to 
aid you in any way I can?" He asked.  "Within reason, of course."

"No, sir, I don't think it is.  You've gone above and beyond the call 
on several occasions.  Now, knowing as I do that you're in a 
compromised position," she saw his profile grimace as she made the 
statement, but he didn't deny the fact, "you'll forgive me if I don't 
feel quite secure until I know why you've done what you have."

"Fair enough," he agreed.  "Fine, I'll tell you, just between you and 
me, Agent Scully."

She gave a stilted nod of assent.

"You know I served in Vietnam, right?" He asked.  She nodded again.  "I 
went because I believed in the system, in the government and the public 
I served.  And what I saw over there--it not only killed all that 
faith, Agent Scully, it completely obliterated it.  But no matter how 
disillusioned I became, between Vietnam and the things I've seen since 
I was promoted to Assistant Director, I was and still am a patriot."

He paused for a moment, the prominent muscle in his jaw clenching as it 
always did when he was intent or annoyed.  She'd seen more of the 
latter over the years than the former, but that was another issue 
entirely.

"The fact of the matter is, Agent Scully, that you and Agent Mulder 
represent what was best about the system I lost faith in," he admitted.  
"You're idealists.  You're who I was when I boarded that Navy ship for 
Vietnam with the other Marines in my unit.  The difference is, somehow 
you two have managed not to become jaded or cynical by what you've seen 
and experienced.  You see what's wrong and corrupt in the system and 
you fight it.  And by supporting you, so do I, as best I can."

Scully stared at him, stunned.  Anything she might have intended to say 
to say to him fled in the surprise of his confession.

"Does that answer your question, Agent Scully?" He asked tightly after 
a long moment.

"Yes, sir," she murmured.  He nodded once and Scully had retreated back 
to her notes.

Now, remembering the conversation, she felt deeply ashamed of all the 
times she had questioned him over the years, suspecting him even as he 
had tried to help them.  Somehow, Mulder had known all along, but she 
had never guessed how important the X-Files might be to Skinner.  She 
made a promise to herself to have more faith in the future.  He would 
warn them when he was not in a position to be allowed to know the 
sensitive details of their work, and when he didn't give them such a 
warning, it meant they had nothing to fear from him.

Sighing, Scully rolled over onto her stomach, clutching her pillow to 
her as her thoughts turned inevitably toward Mulder.  She had hoped 
that he would be back in Washington by the time she had returned, but 
now, on her first night back, there was no word of him.  There wasn't a 
minute in the last five days that she hadn't wondered and worried about 
him.  He probably didn't realize just how earnest she had been that 
last night in the mountains when she told him that she sometimes wished 
she could lock him away to keep him from harm.  Who the hell was she to 
chastise him for being overprotective when she seemed to spend every 
minute of every day obsessing over his welfare?

The truth was, she needed to be with him right now.  Her place was with 
him, watching his back, backing his play.  Not waiting here, with 
nothing to do but worry over what might happen to him.  Stuck here, 
playing sitting duck rather than being by his side, was the stuff 
madness was made of.  She should be with him...

Sleep was not soon in coming.

*     *     *     *     *

As it turned out, Mulder never had the opportunity to find the filing 
room of Roush Pharmaceuticals.  But something almost as good fell into 
his lap.  Literally.

He had been sitting in the lunchroom at the pre-appointed break-time 
for all maintenance personnel.  He had spent the last several hours 
being shown around the building and informed of his duties.  By the 
time he'd been released for a break, he was firmly convinced that it 
was possible to develop an ulcer overnight.  The longer he lingered, 
the more chance there was of someone realizing he didn't really belong 
there in the first place.

It was at that moment Martinez, a tough-as-nails, grizzled old 
immigrant with a serious inclination toward a God-complex plunked a can 
of WD-40 down on the table in front of Mulder.  It promptly tipped over 
and rolled of the table and into Mulder's lap.

"Come with me, Redlum," Martinez commanded imperiously in his gravelly 
voice and stalked away without even looking back to see if Mulder was 
following.  Of course, "Redlum" was following. *He* was the all-mighty 
Martinez, bane of slacking maintenance workers everywhere, whereas 
Redlum was some wet behind the ears punk who'd better fly right after 
his shameful demonstration of arriving nearly an hour late for his 
shift.

"I'm going to personally kick the ass of whichever HR idiot scheduled 
you at nine rather than eight," Martinez had vowed direly in a voice 
that was only moderately accented.  "Maintenance *always* starts at 
eight, *no* exceptions.  I don't care what your fucking schedule says, 
tomorrow you better be here at eight sharp, got it?"

Mulder had nodded briskly, looking appropriately chastised and eager to 
make amends.  His assumed humility apparently mollified Martinez 
because the man had stopped bitching for the first time in the 
interminable hours since Mulder had arrived in his office.

If the cause had been only a little less noble, the morning shift might 
have found Martinez crammed headfirst in a mop-closet and "Redlum" no 
where to be found.

Scully, he thought, I'd kill or die for you, but dealing with this 
Napoleonic little bastard may bit a bit too much to ask...

"I don't got time to show you anything useful now, since you were so 
late, so this is what I got for you," Martinez explained as Mulder 
obediently trotted after him bearing the can of WD-40.  "You got 
wrenches in that stupid-ass case of yours?"

"Yeah."

"Good, because I don't like loaning out my tools.  Half of them never 
come back."

"I've got my own tools," Mulder reassured him, hoping his tone would be 
interpreted as respectful.

"Good.  Here's what you're gonna do," Martinez swiped his own ID card 
through a scanner on an interior door.  Behind the door lay a cavernous 
room lined floor to ceiling with bookshelves.  "This is the library," 
the man explained, "for our researchers.  The clerks have been pissin' 
and wailin' about some of the shelving brackets startin' to come loose 
and the drawers of the file cabinets stickin'.  No one else has the 
time, so you're gonna fix 'em."

Mulder nodded, biting the inside of his cheek.  Hard.  Not only was 
this short, balding, repugnant little man overbearing, and just an all-
out asshole, he reeked of cheap cigar smoke.  If he didn't shut the 
hell up and get out of here soon, Mulder was going to be physically 
ill.

"If it moves, grease it.  If it has a bolt, tighten it.  You clock out 
exactly after eight hours and not a moment later, because you aren't 
authorized for overtime.  I'll be gone by then, but don't think you can 
pull any shit and I won't hear about it, got it?"

"Got it."

Giving Mulder a scowl as though suspecting his easy acquiescence might 
not be intended in total earnest, Martinez turned on his heel and 
stalked out of the room, closing the door behind him.

"Thank you, sir, may I have another?" Mulder muttered irritably under 
his breath once Martinez was gone.  Sighing, he dropped the absurdly 
heavy tool-pack to a nearby reading table and began to look around.

He'd never get anywhere just browsing the stacks, Mulder soon decided.  
There were just too many of them and he'd already wasted too much time 
because Martinez hadn't seen fit to send him out on his own, in which 
case he probably would have found the file room and been gone already.  
He started scouting the room for anything else that might give him a 
clue as to their records-keeping methods.

In the far corner of the room, he found it.

A card catalogue.  The physical, old fashioned kind.

He *loved* card catalogues.  Whatever mood technology seemed to be in, 
a card catalogue would always be there to tell you where to go.  It was 
locked, but the lock was nothing he couldn't handle.  Within moments, 
he had the thing opened and at his disposal.

Mulder began to peruse the labels on the drawers, trying to determine 
the filing system.  It appeared to be alphabetic by subject and so he 
began to search for the abductees' names.

He went down the list of the Paperclip files in his head, pulling names 
out of his prodigious memory at random.

Farrow, Steven John.  Check.

Hagopian, Betsy Lynn.  Check

Davis, Cathleen Marie.  Check

Mulder, Samantha Ann.  Check

Mulder studied the cards carefully as he withdrew them from the file.  
They contained pretty general information on the abductees: name, place 
of residence, and project numbers.

Most importantly, in the upper right hand corner of each card was a 
six-digit code number he recognized.  It was the same file number as 
was listed on the Paperclip records.

Samantha, 378671.  Betsy, 664678.  Farrow, 369875...

This was it, then.  This was physical proof linking Roush to the 
abduction records.

He stopped as he flipped rapidly through the cards in the "Sc-" 
section.  Slowly, he went back over every card with the name "Scully" 
on it, about thirty or so in all.  Scully, Christen.  Scully, Colleen.  
Scully, Daniel...

No Dana.  He did one more search just to be sure it hadn't been filed 
out of alphabetical order.  It didn't make sense that she wouldn't be 
in the files--

*I think that what was done to me was somehow different than what was 
done to the others...*

His last search yielded no more results than his first had.  Her card 
simply wasn't in there.

Why the hell not?  He'd been sixteen for sixteen for finding the other 
abductees.  Why should Scully not be in here when all the others were, 
when her file had been in the Strughold mine right alongside all the 
others?

It was all well and good that he had the evidence to link Roush to the 
other abductions, but he needed to make the connection to Scully's 
abduction more than any of the others'.  For her sake, he needed to be 
able to bring down the people who had done what they had to her.  The 
ones who had dumped her in the hospital near-death when they had 
finished with her, the ones who had destroyed her ability to conceive 
children, the ones who had brought her to the brink of death a second 
time in the form of an incurable cancer.  He needed to see justice 
done, not on an ideological level, but simply because Scully deserved 
it.

He gave up the search, closing the drawer with a sigh of disgust.  A 
tiny suspicion niggled at the edge of his brain and he returned to the 
"Mu-" drawer.  His name had originally been on Samantha's file, with 
its own separate ID number.  Was it possible there was something in 
here about him?  He hadn't thought to check before.  He quickly scanned 
through the "Mulder" cards.  Adam, Angela, Bonnie, Christopher, 
Deborah, Everett, Frank...

No Fox.  He closed his eyes, sighing with relief.  No reference to a 
file number 292544.  Good.  He tucked the cards he had removed from the 
drawers into his pouch and returned to the stacks.  He occupied himself 
with trying to find records of the project numbers that had been listed 
on each abductee's card.  He didn't really need it--that was 
information the Gunmen could easily find with a little judicious 
hacking--but it would be nice to have some physical evidence from the 
scene of the crime, so to speak.  If nothing else, it kept him busy 
until five o'clock, after which time Martinez would be gone.

There were huge binders of line-printer pages detailing each study the 
corporation made, listing, among other things, the participants.  By 
the time a quarter after five rolled around, Mulder had managed to find 
and extract pages with abductees' names on them from five of these.  He 
shook his head ruefully.  He was going to catch five flavors of shit 
for this.

Warrant?  We doan' need no stinkin' warrant!

Whatever he had found here would be inadmissible in court.  He knew 
that.  If he was lucky, he might manage to avoid getting thrown in jail 
for this night's efforts.  But all he needed was enough to open the 
door for the media, so that they could run the story without getting 
slammed by libel lawsuits.  The rest would be dealt with in the ensuing 
investigation the public would demand.

Weary, he left the library with his tool-pack slung over his shoulder 
and the information he had gathered tucked in the pouch beneath his 
faux beer-belly.  It took him ten minutes of wandering to find his way 
back to the main entrance.  He exited the building to find the parking 
lot all but empty.

Damn.  How the hell was he supposed to waltz out of here on foot 
without someone taking notice?

"Shit!" He cursed loudly, making a show of pacing the parking lot 
angrily.  Within moments, Jamison the Main Entrance Sentry emerged from 
his office and joined him.

"Redlum, right?  What's your problem now?"

"My goddam ride took off without me!" He all but shouted.

"S.O.P., man," Jamison said.  "Maintenance leaves a five A.M. sharp.  
The day staff starts arriving at six and we can't have Maintenance 
hanging around once the joint opens for the day.  Security reasons, you 
know?"

Mulder was just tired enough that he almost started laughing at the 
irony of that statement.  "Yeah, I know," he muttered with mock 
resignation.  "Can I go back inside and call a cab?"

This amused Jamison greatly.  "A cab?" The security guard hooted.  
"Where the hell are you from?  Fuckin' New York City?  Look around you, 
man.  You're fifty miles past the middle of nowhere.  It's gonna run 
you fifty bucks just to get a cab to come out here, much less take you 
anywhere.  Besides," after a struggle, the guard's mirth subsided, "no 
unauthorized vehicles past the front gate.  A cab would never make it 
in.  You're S.O.L., Redlum.  You're gonna have to hoof it."

Mulder cursed colorfully, making a creative commentary on carpool pals 
who took off while one was in the john dealing with the cheap Mexican 
food one ate for dinner last night.

"Central, this is Jamison.  Come in," the security guard spoke into his 
radio/cell phone while Mulder continued to rant ostentatiously.

"Central.  Go ahead, Jamison."  This voice was male, not the gruff 
woman's voice of his arrival.

"I'm gonna need someone to cover the main entrance while I escort 
someone to the gate."

"Problems, Jamison?"

"Not for us," the guard snickered.  "Someone just didn't know when 
curfew was."

"I've got someone headed your way.  Central out."

Wordlessly, Mulder followed Jamison down the main drive to the gate he 
had slipped in through.  A brief question and answer session with the 
guards at the security post there, liberally punctuated by guffaws as 
Redlum's plight was explained, led to the opening of the front gate.

"There's a convenience store two miles down the road in that 
direction," Jamison pointed out.  Mulder already knew that.  His car 
was parked there.  "Maybe you can call a ride from the payphone."

"Yeah, I think I'll do that," he muttered reluctantly.  "Thanks for 
your help."

"No problem.  See you tomorrow night."  The security guard turned his 
back on Mulder and walked back down the drive, shaking his head and 
laughing to himself.  "A cab...Jesus Christ..."

When he was gone, Mulder heaved a sigh and, waving to the guards in the 
booth, began the hike back to his car.  His tool-pack, which he was now 
firmly convinced was the work of a truly diabolical mind, bounced 
agonizingly on his back with each step.

*     *     *     *     *

Samantha stared at the phone, willing it to ring.  It had been five 
days since her mother's journal had been stolen.  After she had 
recovered from the shock and fright of the actual burglary, she had 
called her father and told him what happened.  After she gave her 
description of the thief, he had assured her that he would take care of 
the matter and that she was not to worry.

She no longer had the faith to believe him.  She had spent a whole day 
agonizing over what to do, and Michael has picked up on her unease.  
She had been forced to tell him that a burglar had entered the house 
while he was outside with the children when he inquired.  He had made 
an attempt at comforting her and she let him believe that he had 
succeeded, unable to tell him the true cause of her distress.

When Samantha had awakened the next morning, she had reached a 
decision.  Fox had to be told.  If it was true that he would be in 
danger if someone knew about his abduction, then Fox had to know to 
guard himself.

With her resolve firmly set in her mind, she had made the first of an 
endless series of phone calls to his apartment, leaving messages on his 
machine that she had to speak with him.  It was possible he might still 
be in the mountains with Dana, but she didn't think so.  After all, 
once Fox and Dana no longer needed to guard her, why would they remain?  
No, Fox had to come back to Washington sooner or later.

Samantha just hoped for his sake it was sooner.

When a day had passed with no return call, she had looked up Dana's 
number as well and begun leaving messages there.  No response had been 
achieved from those attempts either.  The continued silence had turned 
her concern to worry and her worry into a full-fledged panic.

On the fourth day, in a moment of desperation, she had called the main 
FBI switchboard and told them she urgently needed to speak with whoever 
supervised Agents Mulder and Scully.  Perhaps if their boss knew where 
they were... She left several messages with the secretary for an 
Assistant Director named Walter Skinner, whom, she had been informed, 
was out of town on an official matter.

Yes, of course she would leave a message.

Her face drawn with worry, Samantha continued to stare at a phone that 
refused to ring.

*     *     *     *     *

"Has the matter been attended to?" Charles Geoffrey Burke asked the man 
at the other end of the line.

"Yes." Came the simple response.  "He has been detained at customs in 
Tunis.  He almost made it past us, but we managed to intercept him.  
The only place he will be going from here is a prison."

"And you are certain any interested parties will not learn of his 
mission or whereabouts?"  Burke asked.

"Yes.  Without the parcel, his claims are meaningless.  No one will 
give a lowly smuggler any heed, especially when his story is so 
outrageous."

"And what of the parcel?"

"It is already being sent back to you by way of a courier.  You should 
have it by this time tomorrow," the man on the other end of the line 
assured.

"Very well.  Keep me informed should any unexpected developments 
arise."

Burke hung up the phone and leaned back in his chair, his breath 
wheezing in his throat.  His health, which had been on a gradual 
decline since his surgery the previous autumn, had picked up its 
downward momentum.  He was doing worse by the day.

He buzzed the attendant outside his office.  The man entered quickly 
and stood awaiting Burke's orders.  Power was indeed a difficult thing 
to relinquish, he thought sadly.  But soon he would have no choice.  He 
would be dead but the work must go on.  He needed somebody he could 
trust to carry on the Project.  Alex...Alex had *almost* been that 
person.

It had been a simple matter to track Krycek down.  Burke had hoped his 
guess was wrong, that not even Krycek, mercenary though he was, would 
try to sell such dangerous information to Strughold.  But they couldn't 
take the chance, and so he had set his people in Tunisia on alert.  
Since Burke had a concentration of associates in Tunisia, it was easy 
to have Alex incarcerated there.  The Tunisian authorities, especially 
when prompted by the men loyal to Burke, took a dim view of smugglers.  
And since even Krycek knew better than to make a copy of such an 
important document as Teena Mulder's journal, the book would be safe in 
Burke's hands by this time tomorrow and Krycek would be conveniently 
out of the way in a Tunisian prison.  There he would learn a valuable 
and long overdue lesson on the folly of double-crossing Burke.

It didn't matter.  Burke didn't particularly care what Krycek's 
motivations were or how he had planned to carry his mission out.  All 
that mattered was that he had been stopped and the damage quickly and 
easily repaired.

Krycek's demands to see Conrad Strughold would be met with nothing but 
derision, an attitude that would be fostered by the men working for 
Burke.  No one would believe Strughold would have anything to do with a 
simple smuggler and therefore no one would tell Strughold.  And Alex 
Krycek would have very few resources left at his disposal by the time 
Burke's men in Tunisian customs got through with him.

It was a tidy solution to what had promised to be a very untidy 
problem.  Which was exactly the way Burke liked it.

Pulling himself out of his ruminations, he turned watery eyes to his 
attendant.

"There's someone I need you to find for me..."

*     *     *     *     *

Alex Krycek swore angrily in two languages as the iron door of the jail 
cell closed behind him.  His face, swollen and purple, ached and he was 
pretty sure a couple ribs had been cracked in the working over he'd 
been given before he was delivered to his cell.  Judging by the looks 
of his cellmates, it might not be the last roughing up he would take 
before this was all over.

How the hell had they caught up with him so quickly?

The plan had been simple--head straight for Tunis, to make Burke think 
he planned to sell the journal to Strughold.  While Burke's men were 
looking for him to head in Strughold's direction, he would slip quietly 
out of the country by land and head back to Russia.

He had to hand it to the smoking bastard: the man worked fast.  Krycek 
couldn't help but be slightly offended that Burke thought he was 
actually stupid enough to turn something like the knowledge of Mulder's 
abduction over to a megalomaniac like Strughold.  No, Krycek's 
intention had never been to sell the journal, but to secure it.  It was 
apparent that there was a leak, perhaps several, in what was left of 
the Syndicate's power structure.  He couldn't take the book back 
without running the risk that Strughold would get word of the 
information it contained.

He couldn't destroy it--it was too important to not keep in case 
someday it would become necessary to present the journal to someone at 
the right time.  Besides, the old son of a bitch would have wanted to 
see it first.  He would never believe Krycek had destroyed it before 
returning.  Burke would think he'd kept it for his own purposes, so he 
would have wound up in this situation in any event.  And it was just 
too dangerous to give the journal back, even if the man had allowed him 
to someday destroy it.  Too much was at stake.  So Alex had been 
required to take it on the run, even though it meant betraying his 
intentions early.

It would have been so easy to just wait until the old man was dead and 
then take control...but the damned book had changed all that.

And so Krycek was stuck here.  He couldn't demand to see Strughold even 
if there was a chance someone would believe him and take word that he 
was in this prison.  The German would want to know why.  He would know 
Krycek was supposedly bringing him information, and would want to know 
what that information was.  He couldn't tell the truth, and he couldn't 
run the risk that the German wouldn't believe a lie.  So he must remain 
here until he found a way out under his own power.

Krycek growled with frustration.  Martyr was not a role that suited him 
well.

*     *     *     *     *

"Agent Scully?"

Scully looked up from the reports she was going over.  They had been 
sent to her by the Gunmen by way of an FBI courier.  Within was neatly 
laid out their plan of attack for revealing the proof she and Mulder 
had found to the public.  Amazingly, they did not claim first dibs on 
the story for their own publication.  They were realistic to know that 
publishing it in their magazine first might have negative consequences 
on the general credibility of the story and so the data would go 
directly to the major networks and newspapers as soon as Mulder 
returned with corroborating evidence from the Roush headquarters in 
Arizona.

"Yes, sir?"

"I just got off the phone with Kimberly and it appears that someone has 
been trying very hard to get in touch with you and Agent Mulder.  She's 
left five messages in the last two days.  She says it's urgent."

Samantha.  Scully didn't know why, but she was certain of it.  "Did she 
leave a number?" Scully asked uneasily.

"Yes, but--"

"I've got to talk to her, sir."

"Agent Scully, if you make a call to anyone known to be associated with 
you or Agent Mulder you're going to run the risk of exposing your 
whereabouts," Skinner warned her.

"I know that, sir," Scully said gravely.  "But if the person calling us 
is who I think she is, this could very well be a life or death matter, 
and not just for me."

He couldn't call her on that one.  He knew their duty every bit as well 
as she did--her own safety was of secondary importance when the safety 
of a civilian hung in the balance.

Minutes later, Scully was calling the number Samantha had left on a 
cellular phone, which would require much more sophisticated equipment 
to trace than a land-line would.  Samantha's nervous, wavering voice 
answered before the first ring had ended.

"Hello?" It asked urgently.

"Samantha?"

"Dana!  Oh, thank God!"

"Samantha, what's the matter?  Are you all right?"

"Yes, yes, Dana--I'm okay.  I just need to see you or Fox as soon as 
possible," Samantha replied breathlessly.

"Fox isn't here right now, Samantha.  I'll meet you.  Just tell me 
where."

Skinner didn't quite groan, but his irritation was palpable.

"I'll come to D.C.," Samantha said.  "It would take me almost four 
hours to drive.  I'll catch a commuter flight from Philadelphia, 
instead.  They run every half-hour or so.  I can be there within a 
couple hours."

"Okay," Scully affirmed.  "I'm going to put someone on the line with 
you.  He's my supervisor, Assistant Director Skinner.  We need to be 
careful, Samantha, for reasons I'll explain later, so he'll make 
arrangements for picking you up at the airport and bringing you to a 
meeting place."

"Okay," Samantha answered shakily.  Scully handed the phone to Skinner, 
whose jaw looked tense enough to snap right off.  She turned her back 
on him and paced nervously across the room.

Jesus, had she been wrong?  Had the smoking man lied to her when he 
told her Samantha was not in any danger?  Had she jeopardized Mulder's 
sister with her over-confidence that she knew what was right?

She couldn't think of any other reason why Samantha would need to see 
them so urgently.  Dear God, if something happened to Samantha because 
of an error Scully made..."It's set, Agent Scully," Skinner said, 
folding the cell-phone with an audible snap.  She didn't realize that, 
lost in her own frantic musings, she had tuned out whatever 
arrangements he and Samantha had made.

"Thank you, sir," Scully replied, her voice muted.

"The voice sounded familiar," he commented after a tense pause.  "Am I 
to assume we're dealing with *the* Samantha, Agent Mulder's sister?"

"Yes, sir."

"So she's not dead."

"No, sir." Scully gave him the digest version of the illness Mulder had 
suffered which had led them to the conclusion that Samantha Mulder was 
not dead.

"And you're sure it's really her?"

"Yes, sir.  I ran the DNA analysis myself."

"Is there anything else you would care to clue me in on, Agent Scully?" 
Skinner asked tightly.  "Because I can't protect you if I don't know 
what's going on."

Scully sighed and lowered herself into a chair, rubbing at the tense 
knots in the back of her neck.  She hadn't told him because it hadn't 
been relevant to the situation she was in and because she didn't want 
to expose Samantha to any unnecessary parties.  Skinner sat across from 
her and glowered until she began to give him a blow-by-blow account of 
everything that had happened since the morning Samantha Mulder had 
turned up in her partner's apartment.

By the time she had finished her narrative, excluding only what 
information he genuinely did not need to know, particularly about a 
specific twenty-four hour period she and Mulder had spent in those 
mountains, he had stopped glaring and begun questioning.

"Is there anything else I need to know?" He demanded finally, pinning 
her with a steely gaze. "Can I trust that no more 'incidental' little 
details are going to crop up along the way?"

"No, sir," she replied, thoroughly chastened.  "That's everything."

"Good," he said firmly.  "Then let's go."

*     *     *     *     *

The woman stared at the book in her painfully thin hands.  Only 
slightly less incredible than the fact that Burke, at long last, had 
summoned her once more was the information he'd given her.

One hundred fifty children, only two left alive.  Killed by a process 
called Grafting.  A process so dangerous no one had ever dared try it 
again.

"You see," Burke had given a wheezing laugh, his smile revealing 
yellowed teeth between pale lips, "they are a rather inflexible lot, 
these aliens.  That's why they needed us, needed the hybrids, for the 
same reason that after fifty years they still can't get the hang of 
flying their own craft in our atmosphere.  They are intelligent, yes, 
and powerful, but they lack intuition.  They cannot deal with concepts 
beyond the purview of their own established understanding.  The hybrids 
would serve as a link, a bridge between human intuition and their own 
intelligence, who would be susceptible to their influence.  But they 
failed, because in the many thousands of years since they left our 
planet, driven off by the harshness of the ice age, we had evolved 
beyond their capacity for understanding..."

They had failed, and killed one hundred forty eight children in the 
process.  The radiation and chemical treatments required to branch 
their DNA in the proper way were simply too much for a human being, 
especially one that small, to handle.  Ideally, a minute amount of 
branched alien DNA would be introduced into the subject's own DNA.  
Over time, if the subject was young enough, changes would manifest 
themselves as the child grew.  Heightened perception, intelligence, 
memory, sensitivity to psychic or telepathic influences...

Creating not a hybrid, but a new species of humanity altogether, one 
impervious to the effects of the black-oil virus that would be released 
to destroy them all.

It had simply been infeasible for the aliens to continue their own 
experiments.  Sure, they would continue to take humans, study them, try 
to learn from them, but they could admit their failure at creating a 
link between humanity and themselves.  Instead, they turned it over, 
into the hands of their new human allies.  Those humans would use their 
understanding of their own species and the technology and advanced 
knowledge of genetics to build their own bridge between human and 
alien.

"We knew we could never try to do what they had done with those 
children," Burke said gravely.  "It was too dangerous, and the 
knowledge of what these children represented too important to risk 
anyone else knowing.  So we buried it."

He, the Englishman, and their comrade, whom she had known only by the 
name Deep Throat, had destroyed any records of the abductions of Fox 
Mulder and Arlene Avery and buried any medical information pertaining 
to the process of Grafting so deeply that no one would ever find it.  
Not even those men who joined their syndicate afterward, when the 
conspiracy grew on an international scale, would be told.  Like the 
heavy-set man with the breathy, lisping voice, or the chilling German, 
Strughold.

"Arlene Avery is dead," Burke had wheezed.  "Fox Mulder is our last 
hope.  He must be protected.  I cannot trust anyone else with this 
knowledge.  I thought perhaps Alex Krycek--" he gave her a meaningful 
glance, "--but he apparently is working for Strughold as well, or is 
seeking to ally himself with him.  And so I thought you, of all people, 
would appreciate what this means."

And so he thought she, of all people, would be least likely to go over 
to Strughold, if for no other reason than to have nothing to do with 
Alex Krycek.  Never underestimate the swaying power of a grudge...

Of course, she would help him.  Of course she would see Mulder kept 
safe, and the work continued after his death.  She would be a good girl 
and keep her nose clean, promptly and unquestioningly doing his 
bidding.  She would regain her strength and stamina until she was in a 
position to make her move.

She looked at the journal once more, which she had been given specific 
instructions to destroy.  It was the most powerful proof of all.  Too 
important to lose.  She wiped away the tiny bits of char that clung to 
its edges, stroking it reverently.

Rising, she stripped off her silk blouse and began the process of 
wrapping a wide elastic bandage around her emaciated torso, binding the 
journal securely to her.

*     *     *     *     *

The empty hangar at Dulles International Airport was wide open, leaving 
Scully feeling exposed.  And yet, it was perfect for their purposes 
because it held no possible hiding places.  Skinner and the team of 
agents he had assembled for security detail made a thorough survey of 
the entire area before taking up surveillance positions around the 
hangar.

Any moment now, an FBI agent Skinner had hand-picked for the job would 
be meeting Samantha at the gate and bringing her directly here.  She 
and Scully would need to speak softly if they intended to have any 
privacy in the echoing cavern of a building, but it certainly gave her 
guards a vantage point from which to see any possible danger 
approaching.

Scully paced nervously, ceasing only when there was some activity by 
the door. Skinner and several of the guards gathered to challenge 
whomever was trying to enter, then backed away, parting to allow the 
visitor through.  Samantha crossed the empty space to where she stood 
waiting in the middle and with a trembling sigh, threw her arms around 
Scully and hugged her tightly.

"Thank God!"  Samantha whispered fervently then pulled away.  "Dana, 
what's this all about?" She gestured to the agents scattered around the 
hangar.

"I'm under protective custody, Samantha," Scully replied openly.  "I've 
been targeted by someone for assassination."

"Oh, Jesus!"

"It's okay.  It's not important now.  What's going on?  Why did you 
need to see me?" The questions flew rapidly from Scully's mouth.  "Are 
you in danger?"

"Me?  No." Samantha shook her head.  Scully couldn't prevent noticing 
Mulder's sister wore the same tormented look she had the morning Scully 
had found her in Mulder's apartment.  "You were right.  My father 
admitted it to me--he was behind the threats.  I went to see him the 
day I got back, to confront him about what he had done.  And that's 
actually why I needed to see you."

Scully frowned, confused.  "Why?"

"You see, when we were up in the mountains--" her voice trailed off at 
a commotion behind them.  They both looked toward where Skinner stood 
at the door.  His low voice echoed across the hangar as he spoke to his 
agents.

"We've got a possible breech outside.  Murphy, Javez, Abernathy, you're 
with me.  Josten, Alexander, Gardelli, stay put.  Disperse to cover the 
gaps.  Move."

A chorus of affirmatives met his commands and in a moment Skinner and 
three of the agents were gone as the three remaining spread out at 
better distances around the hangar.

"Jesus, Dana," Samantha murmured, facing Scully once more.  "This isn't 
important?"

"No, it's not," Scully replied impatiently.  "Not right now.  Go on."

"Okay," Samantha nodded reluctantly.  "I was looking through some of 
the journals Fox had brought of our Mom's and came across something 
odd.  In late 1964--" Samantha looked up, drawing a steadying breath as 
she appeared to struggle with what to say.  In slow motion, Scully 
watched Samantha's eyes fly wide as an expression of terror consumed 
her face.

"DANA GET DOWN!!!"

Samantha lunged at Scully even as gunfire split the air around them.  
Scully went down beneath Samantha's weight, rolling as she reached for 
her weapon in its holster.  She pulled it out and rolled to a crouching 
position in one fluid movement.  Her eyes took in the tableaux in a 
single glance.

Alexander was aiming at Josten and Josten was aiming at Gardelli.  
Gardelli was aiming directly at her.  

Josten squeezed off his shot a split second before Alexander's bullet 
took him through the neck.  He crumpled and out of the corner of her 
eye she watched Gardelli get thrown back against the wall, his brains 
splattered on the surface behind him.  She pivoted to face Alexander as 
he swung his weapon toward her.  Her own shot caught him in the 
shoulder of his gun arm and shattered it.  He went down clasping the 
wound, agonized cries providing a gruesome counterpoint for the blood 
pouring between his fingers.

She was barely aware when Skinner and the remaining agents came 
charging through the door.  Her gun hung limp in her hands as she 
crouched, shaking and stunned, on the concrete floor.  The carnage had 
taken place in a matter of seconds, but it was devastating to behold.

It wasn't until Skinner and the remaining agents converged on the 
shrieking Agent Alexander, in whose direction she still held her gun in 
a loose aim, that Scully remembered Samantha.  With a sinking sense of 
dread, she dropped her weapon and spun to see Mulder's sister lying on 
the concrete.

Blood seeped out slowly around Samantha's inert form.  Slivers of bone 
shone ghastly white against the bloodstain marking the entrance wound 
that had shattered her sternum just an inch or two above her heart.  

Scully felt her face drain of blood and her extremities go numb.  For 
one terrifying instant she thought she might actually faint.

"Oh, Jesus!  Oh God, Samantha!" Scully gasped, crawling over to 
Samantha.  "SKINNER!!!" She screamed, "Anybody!  I need help!!!"

A multitude of footsteps came running in her direction, echoing through 
the hangar like drums, but Scully was oblivious to the stampede as she 
whipped her mind into order from her terror and shock to assess the 
damage.

Judging by the flecks of blood on Samantha's lips as she gasped for 
air, the bullet might have nicked her trachea.  She was still 
breathing, so the damage to her windpipe wasn't so severe that she 
didn't stand a decent chance of making it to the hospital.  She was 
bleeding badly, but not enough to indicate any of her coronary arteries 
had been hit.  Miraculously, the sternum must have deflected the bullet 
and taken the brunt of its vicious power, prevent just such a thing 
from happening.  Instead, the projectile had traveled at an angle up 
and to the left, exiting from the back of her shoulder.  Scully put her 
ear close to the wound, listening for the telltale hissing that would 
indicate her lung had been punctured.

"Medi-vac's on the way, Scully," she heard Skinner assure her from 
behind.  "They'll be able to get in and out of the airport easier than 
an ambulance."

Were those the first words he had said or had he been speaking to her 
before that?

"I need plastic bags," Scully gasped, her hands trembling desperately 
as she ripped open Samantha's blouse to get a clearer view of the 
wound.  "And tape.  And bandages!"

She heard him bark some orders, but the words were lost on her.  
Skinner knelt on the other side of Samantha, stripping off his suit-
coat and white dress-shirt.  The suit coat he gave to Scully to drape 
over Samantha to keep her warm, and the shirt ripping apart for 
makeshift bandages until something better could be provided.  He handed 
each piece to Scully as it was separated from the mass and she pressed 
them over the entrance wound under the cover of the coat.

The urgency of her need to save Samantha's life blocked out any other 
thought or emotion.  It wasn't until sometime later, when Scully 
climbed into the helicopter behind the paramedic and the stretcher 
bearing Samantha and they lurched into motion that the reality of what 
had happened slammed into her like a physical blow.

Samantha had taken her bullet.

Scully began to hyperventilate.

It couldn't be happening.  It wasn't right, it wasn't supposed to be 
this way.  She could die protecting Samantha and that was fine, but 
dear Jesus, not the other way around!  Especially not Samantha!

Choking sobs built up within her chest and burned her throat, her body 
jerking with the effort to suppress them.  Not yet...Not now.  She 
couldn't break down. Samantha needed her.

"Samantha--" The name came out as a keening, desperate whisper. The 
tears flooding her eyes burned like acid, etching a blazing trail down 
her cheeks.  She dashed them away, her movements abrupt and furious.  
Damn it all, she couldn't help Samantha if she couldn't *see*!  
"Samantha! Oh, God, why?"

It wasn't God who answered.

"Had to..." Samantha's eyes were bright with pain, her voice overlaid 
with the soft sucking sounds of a bandage that had come loose.  Even as 
the EMT slapped another piece of tape over the failing dressing, her 
voice rasped weakly, but her eyes remained amazingly lucid.  
"Fox...needs you..."




CHAPTER TEN: Covenant


He leaned against the wall of the hospital corridor, the heels of his 
hands pressed against his eye sockets.  It was a struggle even to focus 
on the moment, so desperately did he want to retreat into the 
threatening fugue of disbelief that.

He couldn't, though.  He had to be here for...whatever might happen.

*     *     *     *     *

In strict accordance with the universal laws of irony, Mulder's plane 
had touched down on the landing strip at Dulles at the same moment the 
Medi-vac helicopter was lifting off.  Thus it was in blissful ignorance 
that he had de-boarded and gone to claim his single suitcase.  He 
stepped outside into the cool early-April evening, intent on hailing a 
cab, and walked directly into Assistant Director Walter Skinner.

His first reaction had been one of confusion, the second one of terror 
as he took in the assistant director's appearance.  Skinner stood 
directing the agents around him in suit pants and an undershirt.  A few 
small brownish-red smears marred the whiteness of the cotton.

"Where's Scully?" The question came out as a rasping bark, the blood 
rushing from his face as he spoke.

"There's been an incident, Agent Mulder--"

"Where IS she?" This time the question was shouted and the heads of the 
passers-by turned to watch the spectacle.

"In a helicopter on her way to the hospital," Skinner replied tersely.  
"I'll take you there and explain on the way."

It wasn't until Skinner had completed giving his instructions to the 
other agents and they were in the car and in motion that Mulder finally 
spoke again.

"What's her condition?" He had asked, his voice hollow.  What the hell 
had they been *doing* out here?  Why hadn't she been in protective 
custody?

"Agent Scully is fine, Mulder," Skinner answered, and Mulder stared at 
him, uncomprehending.  Just when Mulder thought he thought it would be 
impossible for him to be any more terrified, Skinner began to speak.

*     *     *     *     *

He staggered through the doors of the hospital blindly, mindlessly 
making his way toward the surgical ward.  The only thing that kept 
anyone from stopping the deranged man charging through the corridors 
was the grim presence of the imposing assistant director just behind 
him.

He came to a dead halt in a waiting lounge where a slim, red-headed 
form stood with her back to him, her arms wrapped around her chest, her 
shoulders hunched over.  As she heard the doors open, she turned 
slowly.

Her face was colorless, her lips drawn into a tight line.  Her eyes, 
rimmed with red, blinked rapidly as she saw Mulder there.  Her mouth 
opened wordlessly.

"Scully."  The word was half a prayer of thanksgiving and half a 
question.  As he watched, her face grew even paler if that were 
possible, and she looked more horrified than she had when she turned 
around.

"Mulder--" It came out as a strangled gasp.  She was shaking, he noted.

Then, before Mulder's eyes, she began to collect herself.  It was a 
physical process.  Her shoulders straightened, her arms fell to her 
sides, her face schooled itself to calm.

"She's--um, she's in surgery," Scully reported, only the tiniest hint 
of a quaver betraying the trembling she could not quite still.  "There-
-" she cleared her throat and began again in a firmer tone, "there was 
a lot of thoracic trauma."

"Are you all right?"

The question seemed to unravel her, if only for an instant, and then 
her rigid control was back.  "I'm fine," she said, almost bitterly.  
"Not a scratch."

"Scully--" He moved toward her but Scully backed from him, practically 
cringing, and looked past his shoulder at Skinner.

"Sir," she said evenly, each second regaining control over herself, 
retreating... "Is everything at the scene secure?"

Skinner nodded.  "We're still looking for Danvers."

"Danvers?" Scully's eyes widened and a confused frown wrinkled her 
brow.  Apparently she had missed the latter half of Skinner's tale the 
first time around.

"He was the one who reported the possible perimeter breech," Skinner 
answered, his jaw flexing.  "He disappeared while we were handling 
Alexander."

Scully's eyes blazed with anger for an instant.  "How--?"

She stopped herself, turning away from them both.  Mulder knew what she 
was going to ask.  How had not one but three plants made it into the 
security detail guarding her?

"We need to get you back into custody, Agent Scully," Skinner said 
after a moment.

Mulder watched their conversation silently, his mind numb.  Samantha 
had been shot...severe damage...in surgery...

"No, sir," Scully shook her head adamantly.

It was though he were observing them from a great distance, rather than 
just feet away, as they argued the possible merits of Scully staying 
over the probable futility of her going.  Assured that Scully was all 
right, Mulder could now feel the complete impact of what had happened 
to his sister.

*He said he tried to deter her from looking for you because he felt it 
would be safer for her...*

Scully's voice from that first night in the mountains came back to 
haunt him.

The smoking son of a bitch had been right.  If Samantha had never 
looked for him, never found him, never come to him for help, this would 
never have happened...

"You can't protect me from these people!" Scully exclaimed angrily 
somewhere in the corner of his brain.  "I told you that after the bomb!  
If what happened tonight proves anything, it's that I'm no safer in 
custody than I am anywhere else..."

Skinner's reply was drowned out by Mulder's own thoughts.

Samantha had a family, a home, children...He remembered her as he'd 
seen her those few short days at the cabins.  She was bright and 
beautiful and perfect...and she should never have come within a hundred 
miles of him...

Mulder staggered over to a sofa and sunk down weakly into its lumpy 
embrace.  Samantha's family...

"Michael."

His voice drew Scully and Skinner's immediate and undivided attention.

"Has her husband been called?"  Did that voice actually belong to him, 
hollow and raspy and weak?

Scully nodded, her eyes downcast.  "Samantha asked me to call him on 
the way to the hospital, before she lost consciousness.  I phoned him 
the moment she went into surgery.  He's on his way."

Good.  Scully and Skinner faded into the background again as Mulder 
stared unseeingly at the ugly carpet.  He was on his way...on his way 
to see his wife, who had been shot just for meeting a brother she had 
only partially remembered...

*     *     *     *     *

He was unaware of the passage of time as he sat, his mind numbed to the 
world surrounding him, and Scully paced on the other side of the 
lounge.  She hadn't spoken to him since confirming that Samantha's 
husband had been called.  And he couldn't speak, period.

He wasn't sure when Scully and Skinner had quit arguing, or when 
Skinner left to get some coffee.  He wasn't aware of Scully pacing the 
room, not approaching him, not speaking to him...

"Mulder?" He looked up, startled at the break in the silence.  Scully 
held in her grip a paper cup of coffee, and another sat on the table 
beside Mulder.  He had no idea how it had gotten there.  An exploratory 
sip found it had long since gone cold.  Skinner was no where in sight.

"I'm sorry, Mulder," Scully said softly, still holding herself at a 
distance from him.

"What?" He blinked at her, confused.

"She took my bullet, Mulder."  It came out sounding like a confession.  
He shook his head in immediate denial.

"No, Scully--No."  It was all he could say, all he could stay focused 
long enough for.

She looked away and resumed her pacing, falling silent once more.  Some 
distant part of his brain registered that it was odd she should be so 
far away from him.  At any other moment like this--his mother's stroke, 
her suicide, during that whole ordeal with Roche--she had been right 
beside him, ready to catch him or comfort him, whatever he needed.  But 
she wasn't there now, and he was too numb to wonder why, or to reach 
out to her.

A door opened and a male voice asked, "Are you Agent Scully?"

"Yes." Scully's voice was tense, alert.  From the distance, he saw her 
hand slide behind her to rest on her weapon.

"I'm Michael Jessup, Samantha's husband.  You called me..."

That brought Mulder back.  He realized that hours must have passed 
already, for Michael to be here now.  He rose, studying the man who was 
his sister's ex-husband.

He was handsome; dark, slightly built, not much taller than Samantha's 
own height.  His face was pale and his startling blue eyes were 
bloodshot and rimmed with red.

"Michael?" Mulder's voice came out raspy, tentative.  The man turned to 
stare at him.

"You're Fox."  It wasn't a question.

Mulder nodded, waiting for the fury and physical blows he was sure were 
coming.  Surely this man, of all people, recognized that none of this 
would ever have happened if Samantha had just stayed home where she 
belonged and forgotten she'd never had a brother...

Michael approached him slowly, studying Mulder carefully.  The 
condemnation Mulder expected to see in his eyes was nowhere to be 
found.

"She, um--Samantha told me about you.  I thought I might like to meet 
you, but Jesus, not like this."  Michael took a trembling breath, 
blinking rapidly.

Past his brother-in-law's shoulder, he saw Scully turn away, crossing 
her arms over her chest.  Searching for something to say to reassure 
the man, or to convey how sorry he was that this had ever happened, 
Mulder reached out awkwardly to shake his hand.

He was startled when Michael opened his arms and embraced him.  
Gingerly, Mulder returned the hug.

"She was so glad she found you," the man murmured tearfully, sniffing.  
"I've never seen her so happy.  She'll be all right; she has to be.  
You two still need more time together."

He heard what might have been a muffled sob from the corner where 
Scully stood with her back to them and it was his undoing.  He pulled 
back from Michael's hug, unable to check the tears seeping slowly down 
his cheeks.

"Michael--" his voice cracked, and he had to force himself to continue 
hoarsely, "I'm sorry...this should never have happened.  I don't know 
how to tell you how sorry I am..."

He choked on a sob and stumbled back to the sofa, dropping weakly onto 
it.  He hunched forward, his elbows braced on his knees, his face 
buried in his hands.  Michael seated himself in a chair beside the 
sofa, wiping tears from his own eyes.

"There's nothing to be sorry for, Fox," he said gruffly.  "Samantha 
told me that she knew it would be dangerous to find you.  She told me 
about her father, and the kind of people you were up against.  I've 
never experienced anything like she had--the loss of her family, what 
happened to her--but I know that if I had, I would have done the same 
as she did.  I would have moved heaven and earth to find what I had 
lost."

Mulder's head lifted and he stared at his sister's husband.  "Your 
children--?"

"They're with their godparents."

Mulder was about to reply when the doors opened once more and a man in 
surgical scrubs entered.  He and Michael rose from their chairs, 
instantly tense.  Scully migrated in their direction as the doctor 
began to speak.

"Mr. Jessup?"

"Yes?" Michael stepped forward anxiously.

"Your wife made it through surgery, but she's far from being out of the 
woods.  The damage was extensive.  The bullet fragmented, and our 
difficulty has been in finding all the smaller fragments and repairing 
the damage each of them created.  Frankly, I don't think I've ever seen 
a single bullet wreak that much havoc."

Scully met Mulder's eyes, her gaze flat and dead.  "Alexander was using 
a Colt Delta Elite 10mm semi-auto with Glaser Safety rounds," she 
explained dispassionately.  Somewhere in the back of his mind, Mulder 
recalled Skinner giving her the ballistics report hours ago.  The 
would-be assassin had made sure to pack a weapon and ammo that would 
penetrate the standard body armor Scully had been wearing.

"Well, the effect was pretty horrific," the surgeon replied.  "She's 
extremely weak.  If she makes it through the next twenty-four hours, 
she might stand a chance, but I have to be honest," he turned regretful 
eyes on Michael, "it doesn't look promising.  I think you need to be 
prepared to accept that she might not pull through this."

Michael's reply was a strangled sob and Mulder felt his own heart go a 
little bit colder.

"Can I--can I see her?" Michael asked, his voice breaking.

"She'll be moved from recovery to the ICU shortly," the doctor said 
kindly.  "I'll have a nurse come and get you when she is."

The surgeon left and Michael moved mechanically back to the chairs, his 
knees buckling beneath him in the last instant.  He pressed a trembling 
fist to his mouth, his chest heaving with muffled sobs.  Mulder began 
to slowly emerge from the shocked fog that had surrounded him since 
he'd seen Skinner at the airport.  He looked up to meet Scully's 
devastated eyes.  Instinctively, he moved toward her, obeying the soul-
deep imperative to comfort her and be comforted by her.  She moved back 
again, flinching away from his outreached hand.

"You should be with Michael right now," she whispered, a thousand 
shades of sorrow and remorse flashing across her features.  Her throat 
worked visibly with the effort of speaking.  "He needs you."

Before Mulder could answer, she had turned and left the lounge.  
Through the windows in the doors, he saw her pick up pace and begin to 
run once she was safely away from him.

*     *     *     *     *

She sat in the hospital chapel, her hands folded in front of her, 
needing to pray but unable to find a prayer within her.  What could she 
possibly pray for?

God, make it go away?  Make it not have happened?  Make it be me in 
that bed rather than Samantha?

It had taken a long time, but she had been able to come to terms with 
her own sister's death.  Melissa had also been killed in an attempt on 
Scully's life, and she had struggled for a long time with the idea that 
it wouldn't have happened if Scully had not been a part of the X-Files 
or the FBI.  But eventually she came to realize that Melissa, had she 
been able to tell Scully her own thoughts, would have understood, would 
have reassured her that what she was doing with Mulder, searching for 
the truth, fighting to bring an end to the lies, was what mattered.  
Melissa would not have blamed her, and therefore she was doing her 
sister a disservice by blaming herself.

Scully wasn't sure she could come to that sort of reconciliation this 
time.  Samantha was more than an innocent bystander; she was the 
fulfillment of the quest, the Grail, the goal.  She was what Mulder 
needed to justify his years of searching and all they had gone through.  
Samantha was what Mulder needed to feel complete, to heal the wounds 
that were inflicted during his lost childhood.

Had Mulder felt this way when Melissa died?  Perhaps it was easier to 
accept your own loss of a loved one than the loss of someone else's.

How had Mulder ever faced her again?  Scully wasn't at all sure she 
could ever face him.

God, let Samantha live...

A sound in the back of the chapel made Scully turn her head.  She froze 
for a moment, not sure she should believe her eyes.  And then she saw 
red...

*     *     *     *     *

He stood at the foot of the hospital bed, staring at his sister.  Her 
husband sat at her side, holding her hand, the occasional tear rolling 
down his cheek as he watched her.  Her eyes slowly opened, a tiny sound 
of pain issuing from her throat as she regained consciousness.  Mulder 
was the first thing they focused on.

"Fox..." The whisper was weak and pain-filled, but her sunken eyes were 
bright and aware.  She stared at him a moment, before turning her gaze 
to her husband.  It was at that point which Mulder turned and moved 
away, allowing them privacy.

*I think you need to be prepared to accept that she might not pull 
through this...* the doctor's voice echoed in his head.  How?  How 
could he possibly be prepared?

"Fox?" It was Michael's voice, hoarse and cracking.  Mulder swung 
around to face him.

"She wants to speak with you, Fox.  She says it's important..."

*     *     *     *     *

"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't put you down right now, you 
son of a bitch?!"  Every word was filled with helpless rage and 
despair.

It was his fault, all of it...from the very beginning.  None of this 
should ever have happened...

It was then that she realized she had the old man pinned against the 
wall with her hands around his throat.  Charles Geoffrey Burke made no 
effort to resist her, just stared at her with stricken eyes.

Disgusted and horrified, Scully backed away from him, wiping her hands 
on her thighs.

"Are you happy now?" She asked bitterly.  "Is this what you wanted?"

"Samantha is my child," was all he said in response.

"Mulder was right," Scully stated, blinking furiously.  "You are a 
walking pestilence.  You kill everything you touch.  You're a 
poison..."

She turned her back, unable to look at him.  She felt she might vomit, 
so powerful were the fury and disgust roiling in her stomach.  She 
looked up at the crucifix hanging at the front of the chapel, praying 
for just enough strength to get through this confrontation without 
breaking down in front of this horrid old man.

"Why are you here?" She asked finally, speaking over her shoulder.

"To tell you that you will be safe, for now," he replied.  "What 
happened today will not happen again."

"Hmmm, you just waved your magic wand and made it all go away, right?  
Is that how it works?" A sneer crept into her voice.  "It's a little 
late for that, don't you think?"

"Strughold now knows of the information you have, the data linking the 
mine and Roush and the abductions," Burke answered in a wheezing voice.  
"I have made sure of it."

"Oh, the final nail in my coffin.  Thank you very much."

"The information you have guarantees your safety.  As it stands, your 
information will never be enough to go public with." Scully swung 
around to face him, a protest forming on her lips.  He didn't allow her 
the chance to speak, however.  "All your witnesses insist on alien 
involvement, and without evidence of that involvement, your 'proof' 
will not be enough.  Their statements will never be considered 
credible, or taken seriously, and the case you have tried to build will 
fail.  Unless, of course, the public sees something else that makes it 
believe that your claims are true.  If something should happen to you 
now, the circumstances of your death will lend credibility to your 
claims.  What's more--" he pulled a small object from his coat, "--I 
think you might recognize this?"

It was a DAT tape, just like the one that had fallen into their laps 
during the same investigation in which she and Mulder first discovered 
the Operation Paperclip files in the Strughold mine.

Scully nodded cautiously, and Burke continued.  "If anything untoward 
should happen to you, this tape will wind up in Mulder's or A.D. 
Skinner's hands, as substantiation of the data you have already 
collected.  Everything Strughold hopes to preserve, which is his reason 
for trying to kill you, will be destroyed.  I have informed him of 
this, thus guaranteeing your continued well-being."

Scully stared at him a long moment.  "Why?" She finally asked, her 
voice cold.

"Because I owe it to Samantha," Burke replied softly.  "Had I taken 
these steps to insure your safety earlier, what happened today would 
never have transpired."

She continued to study him, perplexed by the number of contradicting 
things she knew about the man.  "How can I believe you?"

"I cannot give you any more proof of my good intentions," he told her.  
"But perhaps you will believe that your partner and I--we are not so 
different, in the final analysis.  In the end, it turns out that 
everything we have ever done, every course we have ever taken, has been 
for the love of a single person, a single woman.  And the only thing we 
cannot betray, cannot forsake, is that love."

Stunned, she fell silent and without another word, the old man turned 
around and left the chapel, his shoulders slumped as though under a 
great burden.  He was nothing near the intimidating figure he had been 
seven years ago when she saw him leaning against a file cabinet in 
Section Chief Blevin's office.  She couldn't forgive him.  She couldn't 
understand him.  But she found that she could pity him.

*     *     *     *     *

He leaned against the wall of the hospital corridor, the heels of his 
hands pressed against his eye sockets.  It was a struggle even to focus 
on the moment, so desperately did he want to retreat into the 
threatening fugue of disbelief that.

*Fox, I need to tell you something...important...*

Of all the things he might have expected to hear, what Samantha told 
him wasn't even close.

Michael was with her now, holding her hand, reassuring her that she 
would be fine, and Samantha simply looked at him wisely, knowing 
better.  They had fallen to discussing their children, Samantha trying 
urgently to say all the things she wanted her children to know.  And 
though Michael kept denying the necessity of doing so, he paid close 
attention.

An alarm sounded and suddenly the entire ICU seemed to be in motion, 
every person swarming toward Samantha's bed.  Michael stumbled 
backwards, an expression of horror and grief contorting his face, and 
Mulder joined him, standing by his side as they watched the final act 
of a drama they had never asked to see.

*Fox...don't feel responsible...* Again, that whisper.  That haunting 
voice that would never leave him.  *Finding you...was one of the best 
things that ever happened to me...*

He had gripped her hand in both of his, pressing it to his tear-
streaked face.

*I love you, big brother...*

As quickly as they had arrived, the medical personnel dispersed.  Fox 
Mulder was left staring at the body of his dead sister, holding her 
husband as he sobbed against Mulder's chest.

*     *     *     *     *

Scully walked slowly through the hospital corridors to the ICU, her 
mind leaving what had happened in the chapel to return to the immediate 
issues of the here and now.  She stopped as she walked through the 
doors of the ICU, every hair on her body prickling.

It was too quiet here, too subdued, as if a pall hung over the entire 
unit.  She began to walk faster, racing for the curtain behind which 
would lie Samantha Mulder Jessup, a sinking feeling of dread filling 
her chest.

She stumbled to a halt as she saw the slight, hunched figure standing 
in the corridor.

"Michael?" Her voice trembled, choked with tears.  He looked up at her 
with devastated eyes.

"She's gone," he whispered brokenly, his chest heaving with a repressed 
sob.  "Fox is in with her.  He won't leave her side.  I, um...I've got 
to start making calls..."

Michael Jessup staggered away and Scully looked into the curtained off 
area he had stood by.  And there she saw her partner, squatting beside 
the high hospital bed, his head on level with the still form lying 
within.  Tenderly, he stoked the dark curls from her face, his 
shoulders jerking occasionally with a sob.

Mulder, oh God, Mulder!  I'm so sorry...

She couldn't speak the words, couldn't go to him.  Not with the 
knowledge on her heart that the sister he had spent his entire life 
searching for had died so that she, Scully, might live.

She could only stare in horrified awe of the tableaux before her and 
its perfect picture of soul-shattering grief.  She had no part in what 
was transpiring between her partner and his sister now, as he communed 
with Samantha one final time.

And so she ran.

*     *     *     *     *

She wasn't sure how she made it home.  Some distant part of her 
remembered hailing a cab, but the memory was lost in the fog.  She 
didn't know how she made it through the front door of her building, or 
into her apartment.  She made her way, fumbling and nearly falling, 
into the bathroom and closed the door.

And there she saw herself in the mirror.

Her face was white, her lips bloodless as she stood trembling, 
regarding her reflection.  A large, dark stain spread out on her once-
pristine white shirt.  Scully plucked at it, feeling it peel away from 
her skin.

Blood.  She was covered in Samantha's blood...

She barely made it to the toilet before she started to vomit.

Unable to rise from the floor, she began to strip off her clothing, 
casting it away, into the corner where she wouldn't have to look at it.  
She blindly grasped for the taps in the bathtub, turning them on full 
and waiting for the water temperature to stabilize.

Samantha's blood...Samantha's blood on her skin...

Somehow she made it into the claw-foot tub and drew the curtain.  She 
stood under the spray of the shower, letting the stinging-hot streams 
pummel her.

The blood on her skin began to dissolve in pink rivulets that made 
their way to the white porcelain of the tub's surface and then 
disappeared down the drain.  Scully swallowed hard, willing herself not 
to be sick again.  She lifted her hands to push her wet hair back from 
her face and froze, staring transfixed at the dark streaks in the folds 
of her knuckles, beneath her fingernails.  She scrubbed at them 
furiously.

Out, damned spot!

The thought, so completely foreign to the circumstances, was her 
undoing.  She collapsed to her knees in the bathtub, dissolving into a 
quivering, boneless mass.  She wrapped her arms around her stomach, 
doubled over, her racking sobs growing in intensity and volume until 
they were nearly screams.  Her stomach ached unbearably, and still she 
couldn't stop, couldn't erase from her mind that final image of Mulder 
with Samantha...

And then a chill burst of air, a pair of arms grabbing her, dragging 
her bodily from the shower, sinking to the floor with her, clutching 
her as he trembled.

"Not your fault..." Mulder's tear-choked voice filled her ear as he 
buried his face in the hollow of her throat.  "It's not..."

"I'm so sorry..." The apology was a keening cry, filled with horror and 
remorse and pain.

He crushed her to him, crying into her shoulder, and she clung to him, 
the water dripping from her body and her tears steadily soaking his 
clothes.

"I'm so sorry..." This time, a powerless whisper, lacking the energy or 
ability to say anything more.

If it were possible, he held her tighter.  "Just don't leave me," he 
pleaded as he trembled against and around her.  "Don't 
ever...Please..."

"I won't," she promised breathlessly.  And they clung to each other, 
huddled on the floor, united in their grief and love.

*     *     *     *     *

Charles Geoffrey Burke looked up at the woman before him with eyes 
devoid of any human emotion.  Pain, grief, rage...it was as though his 
bereavement was so complete it wouldn't even allow him to mourn.  That 
was all right, he didn't have the right to mourn.

*You destroy everything you touch...* The enraged accusation echoed 
through him.  It was, perhaps, the one truth from which he could never 
escape.

"Everything has been settled with Strughold?" He asked the woman, his 
voice rasping in his throat.

"Yes.  He understands your terms and he will abide by them."

Burke nodded, her affirmation registering only in a distant part of his 
mind.  The rest was...empty.  No thought, no feeling...just wide empty 
blackness.

"Dana Scully is not to be harmed, under any circumstances, or the deal 
is off.  Make sure he understands it."

"I did.  He agreed, though not without wanting to know why."

"Why is none of his business, not after what all else I am giving him."  
He looked at the woman again with watery, desolated eyes.

"And the journal?"

"Destroyed, as you ordered.  I saw to it personally."

"Good."  Above all else, Strughold must never know what that journal 
contained.  "You can go."

She left, and then he was alone, as ever, with nothing but his thoughts 
and regrets.

If only Samantha knew, before she died, that even in dying she had 
performed a service for all of mankind.  Dana Scully must live, 
whatever the cost.

With her and Fox Mulder lay the hope of humanity.

There was one last secret he held, and this one he would take to his 
grave.

Fox Mulder and Arlene Avery had not been the last recipients of the 
Grafting procedure.  It had been performed just once more, thirty years 
later.  And that final time would be the most important of all.

*     *     *     *     *

Fox Mulder clung to his partner's hand as they mounted the steps of a 
small chapel in Chalfont, Pennsylvania.  The day was beautiful and he 
couldn't help but think that Samantha would be pleased.

Michael, looking thin and pale and tired, greeted them inside the 
vestibule.

"Fox, Dana..." He embraced each of them in turn.  "Thank you for 
coming."

Mulder gave him a sad smile and returned the hug.  There was nothing on 
this earth that could have kept him away.  This was his final chance to 
say farewell to his sister...and to thank her.

"The kids are inside the sanctuary," Michael said, turning away from 
them.  "Would you like to come meet them?"

Pain lanced through Mulder's heart.  Would he like to meet them?

"No," he replied, clearing his throat.  Michael and Scully both looked 
at him in shock.  "It's, um...it's not that I don't want to, Michael.  
I just think that they might be better off not meeting me."

He stood resolutely dry-eyed and stoic as they stared at him.

"Mulder..." Scully murmured, a hint of a plea in her voice.

But it was Michael's reaction that mattered.  Unhappy understanding 
filled his eyes, and he nodded grimly.  "Maybe you're right," he said 
honestly.

Of course Michael understood.  He was their father...

Patting Michael on the shoulder, he walked away, leading Scully inside 
the sanctuary.  He chose an empty pew midway down the aisle and they 
slid into it.  In a front pew, three children sat solemnly.  The two 
girls, each with unruly brunette hair, sat beside each other, the older 
one holding the younger on her lap as the four-year-old cried.  A 
black-haired boy in a somber gray suit leaned his head on the older 
girl's shoulder.

Jeanette, Daniel, and Amanda, he thought with a bittersweet pang.  He 
clutched Scully's hand tighter and she returned the grip, dabbing at 
her eyes as she observed the children as well.  Mulder could barely 
breath around the lump in his throat.

Then, Amanda looked up from where she sat with her head buried in her 
sister's neck.  Looked up and looked straight back at Mulder.  He 
gasped.

Her face was one he had held in his heart his entire life, pretty, 
serious, with a hint of mischief lurking in her eyes.  It was the face 
that had mounted a two-wheel bicycle one sunny Saturday morning and 
ridden to the end of the block and back unassisted.  It was the face 
that had climbed into the trundle bed beside his in the middle of the 
night, when she'd had nightmares.  Tears began to roll down his cheeks 
as he observed the child.

As long as this child was safe, as long as he and Scully kept the world 
from becoming the nightmare it might if they didn't find a way to 
expose the truth about the conspiracy and the extra-terrestrials it 
involved, Samantha would live.

He had to carry on.  Samantha would expect it of him.

*     *     *     *     *

Stunned, he stared at the file before him.  He had picked it up from 
the Gunmen that morning.  It was information he had requested they 
gather the day after his sister died, on a little girl from North 
Dakota named Arlene Avery.

The information in the file was not the first surprise he had received 
that day.  The first had been the parcel he had found slipped under his 
door early that morning, while Scully still lay asleep in his bed.  He 
had torn through the brown paper wrapped to reveal one of his mother's 
journals.  It was scorched around the edges, but otherwise whole.  The 
entries within were dated 1964.  The year he had been abducted.

He had sat down to read, setting the journal aside only when Scully had 
awakened and they sat to eat breakfast and plan their day.  She had 
needed to run home to collect some items she needed, and would be 
joining him in the office shortly.  For now, however, he was alone and 
could indulge his surprise.

Arlene Avery had been returned on Thanksgiving 1964, found in a 
hospital in a coma no one could explain.  She had awakened a few days 
later and returned home with nothing wrong with her but a mild case of 
epilepsy which she eventually outgrew.

She had excelled in school, been tested to reveal she had a genius-
level IQ.  She had become a top-rated psychiatrist, one of the best in 
her field for her ability to just know things about people.  She had 
died of breast cancer at the age of thirty-six.

None of this surprised him.  Until he came to the final bit of data in 
the folder.  Copies of her marriage license and the birth certificate 
of her only child.

At the age of twenty-eight, Arlene Avery had married a man named Thomas 
Praise.  Three years later, she gave birth to a son named Gibson.

*     *     *     *     *

The red numbers glowing on the face of the clock read 2:13 A.M.  Scully 
lay awake in her bed, her back supported by pillows lining the 
headboard.  Mulder lay sleeping with his head on her breast, her arms 
encircling him.  His breath warmed her skin through the soft satin of 
her pajamas.

It was inevitable that she should awaken.  She did so practically every 
night at one point or another since Samantha had died.  She would 
awaken to feel Mulder next to her, sleeping peacefully, and her mind 
would travel back through time.

It was amazing, how life-altering changes could take place in the space 
of a few days or a few weeks.  The things that had once concerned her 
before, the things that she had held most sacred and important, had all 
changed.  Priorities had rearranged themselves in her mind.

*Don't leave me...*

At the time, she thought Mulder had just been asking her to stay with 
him, to comfort him.  It wasn't until later that she had realized his 
soul-deep plea had been something else entirely.

Every single person he had ever loved in his life had died.  His 
father, his mother, Samantha...Even Diana Fowley had once meant 
something to him, and now was gone.  He had been asking Scully, the 
last person he loved left alive, not to abandon him by death.

She remembered the final night she and Mulder had spent in the 
mountains, the argument that they'd had over her safety versus the need 
for her to return to Washington and see their work completed.  She had 
told him that no matter how desperately she wanted to stay with him, 
she would leave if she had to, because they had work to finish.

If Scully were given that same choice again, now, she would choose 
differently.

She had made a promise.  A promise to a request whispered in her ear as 
Samantha had embraced her and said goodbye before leaving the 
mountains.

*Take care of him for me...*

That promise, which Scully had been only half-conscious of making at 
the time, had been sealed in blood that evening in the helicopter on 
the way to the hospital.

*Had to...Fox...needs you...*

Samantha had saved her life, had given her own life that her brother 
might be protected by someone she trusted to care for him.  And in that 
act, a debt had been incurred, a pact forged that Scully could never 
forget, never break.

Her days of putting duty before personal considerations were over.  She 
had a responsibility now, to keep herself safe, so that she might be 
able to live to see Mulder protected.  She couldn't risk herself 
anymore.  Mulder needed her, and she'd made a promise.

She thought of Samantha and smiled fondly.  Everything they had done, 
the paths their lives had ultimately taken, had been for the love of 
one man...and it was a love and an obligation that superceded all else.




EPILOGUE: Lux Aeterna


She slept on the sofa.

She didn't know why.  It had been in his bed that they had spent a 
great many of their nights over the last two months, but it was on the 
sofa where she felt the essence of *him.*

Scully told herself that it was for duty that she came here, to feed 
the fish, to pick up the mail, collect the newspapers...

But she lied.  She came here to feel him.

It had been two weeks now.  Two weeks since Mulder had been taken from 
her, disappeared without a trace. Two weeks since she had given him the 
cross that she had worn faithfully since she was fifteen years old. Two 
weeks since she had walked from the hospital to face a world that in no 
way resembled the one she had grown used to.

Two weeks during which, every evening, she made the pilgrimage to this 
apartment and fell asleep on the sofa beneath an Indian-print blanket.  
Two weeks of lying in the eerie glow of the fish-tank immersed in the 
scent of soft leather and Mulder.

Two weeks in which she had awakened every morning to the dual knowledge 
that everything was wrong in the world...and that everything was right.

Scully opened her eyes as dawn lightened the sky and birds began to 
chirp.  It was a lovely June morning, that opened on an empty June 
Saturday.

The apartment was empty.  She didn't know what she had expected.  
Somewhere inside her, deep within, a part of her that had nothing to do 
with logic and reality expected to see Mulder emerging from the 
bedroom, yawning and stretching and kissing her good morning.  Surely 
if she slept enough nights on this sofa, keeping her vigil, someday it 
would turn out that he had never been taken from her at all.

She hadn't gone with him.

That was, perhaps, the hardest knowledge of all.  Perhaps if she had 
been with him rather than Skinner, he would not have been taken.  
Perhaps she could have kept him here.

But she couldn't have gone with him.  She'd made a vow that she must 
not take unnecessary chances with her own safety, because she had to 
take care of Mulder.  Samantha's spirit demanded it of her.

Little had she realized that in going, it wasn't her own safety she 
would have been risking.

Rising, disoriented and nauseated, Scully stretched to loosen the knots 
that had formed in her neck and back from sleeping on the sofa.  How 
Mulder had ever managed to sleep there, night after night, for years 
without becoming a chiropractic nightmare she would never know.  She 
swallowed hard against the nausea, knowing that soon she would not be 
able to control it.  Soon she would have to surrender and bolt to the 
toilet in ignominious defeat to perform her new morning ritual.

But for now, she walked to the window and pulled the drapes open, 
allowing the morning sunlight to flood the room.  It would be hot 
today, miserable even.  Perhaps she would go over to her mother's house 
and spend the afternoon in the coolness of her mother's porch, drinking 
iced tea as she sat on the porch-swing.

But for now, she just wanted to bask in the light.  She let it warm her 
face, soothe her.  Fill the emptiness if only for a little while.

An object on the desk caught her eye, laying on the very edge of her 
peripheral vision.  It was half-buried under several papers and she 
dragged it out to see it was one of his mother's journals, which he had 
brought back with him from New England after her death.

It was dated 1964.  Mulder would have been just a toddler then.  What 
had he been like as a child?  Would their own child be anything like 
him?

With a small smile on her face, she sat down at the desk and began to 
read by the morning light.

It began as the tale of a relative happy and contented young wife and 
mother.  Enamored of her first-born, yearning for her husband stationed 
far over-seas.  She wrote of the small achievements and antics of her 
two and a half year-old son.  His father's visit home to take him to 
his first fireworks display over the Cape.  His new words and new 
mischief...

For the first time ever, Scully felt a kinship to Teena Mulder, and 
understanding.  What a tragedy she had never felt it before.

An hour later, she laid the book down on the desk, her smile 
eradicated, her face pale, her hands trembling.  The nausea that had 
been held at bay by a sheer sense of wellbeing had returned with a 
vengeance.

"He knew..." She whispered, a tear sliding down her cheek.

He had known about his own abduction, that had taken place in his very 
early childhood.

Mulder had asked Scully to stay behind, because he feared she might be 
abducted again, all the while knowing that there was a strong chance it 
would be him that was taken.

He had gone thinking he was taking her place...

And now she was here alone with their child.

With that thought, she lost her battle with her stomach and made a dash 
for the bathroom, laying her head against the cool porcelain of the 
toilet tank when she had finished.  She wiped at her moist face and 
leaking eyes.

Because he had gone, she was safe.  Safe to bear their child, safe to 
live a life outside the chaos their whole relationship had known.  For 
her, he had made that sacrifice.

Stumbling, she rose to her feet and brushed her teeth.  Then she 
returned to the living room, returned to the window where the sun shone 
warmly on her face.

*Everything we have done, we have done for the love of a single 
woman...*

The man who spoke those words was now dead and his legacy with him.  
Only the truth of his words lingered.

Somewhere, beyond the warm and comforting brightness of the morning 
sunlight, her partner existed, beyond her reach and yet always with 
her.  She placed a protective hand over a belly that in no way betrayed 
the presence of its little occupant yet.

Her partner had gone that she, and therefore their child, might exist 
in the light.  And for that, she vowed, she would find him again.

For there was no light without love.


THE END

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