Overweighted
Chapter Fifteen
By Rocketman

=====
"As you turned to go I heard you call my name.
You were like a bird in a cage, spreading its
Wings to fly
'The Old Ways are lost' you sang as you flew
And I wondered why"
-- "The Old Ways" Loreena McKennitt
=====

Mulder slid across the small bed, opening his eyes to the darkness of a
room without sunlight.

Scully slept still, her body washed in shadows and night, her breathing
the only assurement of her life.

He put a hand to her shoulder, touched the thin T-shirt there, let his
fingers slip down her arm and tease her palm.

She murmured, turned over, and gave him the view of her back, the short
expanse of muscle and skin and bone under a white top.

He lifted it from her back, slid his hand up to her neck, and rubbed her
shoulders and arms and skin as she slowly came awake.

A content sigh left her lips before she turned over, gazing up at him.

"What's going on?"

"They found a place for us."

She frowned, let her eyes adjust to the darkness and her mind to his
words.

"Who did?"

"Skinner and the whole team. Very, very clandestine. All in all, the
Consortium might know about it, but it's unlikely."

"They'd reveal themselves if they went after us. It'd narrow down the
suspects to an incredibly short list."

He nodded, bent forward and kissed her nose, then sighed and let his
lips taste hers.

She clutched his neck, pulled him farther into her, panic seeping into
desire.

"Do you think they wouldn't sacrifice one of their own to get her?"

Mulder frowned. "I don't know. I hope not. Let me tell you who knows.
Three people besides us."

Scully's face registered shock. "No way. How?"

"Skinner made it possible, somehow. He didn't talk to anyone in the FBI
or even in the Witness Protection Program. He went straight up."

"Up where?"

"Actually, I guess sort of diagonally up."

She poked him and shook her head. "Tell me, Mulder. You have this
annoying habit of making me wait for everything."

He smiled and lifted himself up, pulling her to a sitting position
beside him.

"I can't tell you right now. The Lone Gunmen think they have the place
spotless, but you never know."

She raised an eyebrow.

Listening devices? Here?

"I have a meeting, Scully. You stay here. I'll be back in exactly an
hour."

She shifted in the bed, glanced to the clock.

Two in the morning.

"So I did hear the phone?"

He nodded softly in affirmation but said, "No," shaking his head at her
to remain quiet.

His lips reached for her ear. "Say nothing. Pretend to be asleep. But
don't -- watch for things instead."

She licked her lips and nodded, then watched as he left the room.

She fell back into the bed, slowed her breath until it was a steady
rhythm, let her eyes slide half closed.

For all intents and purposes, to those watching she was asleep.

The shadows around the room made her feel anxious, the moans and creaks
of the place the guys called home were suddenly the footsteps of an army
of assassins.

She waited, watching and listening for a signal.

=====

He was amazed at how quiet his family could be when they needed it.

Helen was silent, no noises, no accidental bumping into things. She
glided through the room, putting on the dark clothes he had brought for
her, making no movements when he smeared grease paint on her face and
hands, letting nothing shake her as he tied up her hair and tugged a cap
down over her ears.

Scully and himself were similiarly clad: darkness their friend tonight
as they moved on foot. It seemed excesive, but they needed to be careful
that they *were not* seen in this first leg.

Dummies were propped in place, even one for the dog. Sam's tail was tied
to his back leg to keep it from swishing and knocking something down, a
muzzle clamped to keep him from barking.

Scully felt awful for it, but to keep the dog meant asking for trouble,
and Helen needed, wanted her dog.

Sam didn't seem to mind. It was as if he knew.

He also crept silently, making not even a growl in his throat.

There was no note left, no explanation; the Gunmen knew the day or night
had been coming, knew that they were either gone of their own volition,
or taken. Nothing could be done either way.

Mulder used the heightened senses he had only begun to cultivate, due to
Helen's influence, to make it through the city streets undetected.

At the corner, in a car with the lights off, slumped down far, was a
man.

He was watching for them. He thought nothing would happen at three in
the morning, so close to dawn and daylight.

He was asleep.

Mulder skirted wide of the car and carried Helen as he led Scully by the
arm to a building on the other block.

It was dark, dank, reeking of fish and wet cardboard boxes. The air had
a heavy, stuffy taste that caught in their throats and clogged their
lungs.

Scully kept a hand on Helen's foot, following Mulder down through the
darkness to the stairs.

It was like the Underground Railroad.

A man met them, a blind, she hoped -- not one of the three who knew the
entire thing.

He led them to a back tunnel, a door carved into the rotting wood,
pushed them into it while saying nothing.

The door slammed shut behind them and they were suddenly plunged into an
ocean of night.

Of the deepest dark that could never be breached.

Mulder moved his foot, connected with something and yelped.

He hushed quickly and placed Helen in Scully's arms, giving her comfort
in the dark.

Helen was not afraid, this was her home. Her dark room.

Mulder sighed.

"It's a chair, and here's another."

His hands came from the black and touched her; still she saw nothing.

They guided her to sit and immediately she felt a wet nose lunge into
her hand. She stifled her heart slamming fear, and relaxed as she
remembered Sam.

Quickly, she untied the yarn on his tail and loosened the muzzle,
letting him yawn and work his jaw a bit.

She leaned down and felt for the floor. It was dirt.

She crunched it with her feet, smelled the reek of fish and mustiness.
Sniffed the air for anything else, gas maybe, or a bathroom, or fire.

Nothing.

She felt Mulder touch her hand, reaching out for a connection in the
isolation of the darkness.

"We're to stay here until they come."

"How long?" she whispered.

"Days. We have to be sure the alarm is out and that the people looking
for us have moved on."

"Why let them know?"

"Because they'll know anyway; it's better to be safely hidden when they
do."

"The man who showed us in here . . ."

"He's a relay. He knows nothing about us, only that we are being placed
here. He may even think we're gone. He asks no questions. And if someone
does trace us here, he'll have no answers."

She nodded, let her head fall to Helen's with relief.

"Scully?"

"Yes?"

"At any time, the plans could change. Be ready."

She steeled herself, took in a deep breath that did nothing to make her
calm.

"I'm ready. I have to be."

He nodded. The smell of fish was making him sick, sticking to his
clothes and drowning his other senses.

"When we get out of here, we leave these clothes behind."

"What? Why?"

"The fish. It's easily traced back. We'll change out there, throw the
clothes back in here and leave. I have a set of clothes for each of us
tightly wrapped in a plastic bag."

She sighed. "How is it that you can think of all of this?"

"I don't know. Survival instinct?"

The dark was still soup-thick. She wanted to sleep, wanted to escape it
for a little while.

"Is there a bed?"

She felt Helen touch her cheek, sign yes to her face.

Scully shivered at her child's insight again, was reminded why they were
running like this.

Helen crawled from her lap, sank to the floor, then pulled her mother
along behind her.

When she met damp cloth and a soft, thick blanket, Scully sighed.

"Mulder?"

His voice came startlingly close to her ear. "Yes."

"Here's the bed."

He tripped over her arm making his way to her, then managed to find the
edge of the pallet and collapse into it.

Helen wedged between them and they curled in, touching hands over the
bridge made by their little girl.

She listened for sounds, for roaches and mice, making sure they would be
alone on the floor.

Everything was silent. Calm. Dark.

It was strange how suddenly, everything was changed.

"Scully?"

"Mm?"

He tightened his grip on her hand. "Our old life is gone. We can never
go back."

She shivered, still unsure if she was ready to make that sacrifice,
knowing only that she had to anyway.

For Helen.

=====
end chapter
adios
RM