<![CDATA[Iolokus III: Vix te Agnovi 15/20
You taught me language, and my profit on't
Is, I know how to curse.
When we arrived back at the house, a verbal firefight was
already in progress. A gaggle of agents cowered in the living
room while Skinner and Julie Graff barked at each other.
"I don't appreciate having my competence questioned," Graff
was saying as we came in. "Mulder's behaved himself for
five months in ISU, in fact his misbehavior can be traced
directly to the reappearance in his life of *your* agent -"
"Agent Scully is not responsible for the actions of a serial
killer - or those of his brother." I saw Skinner pace by the
open doorway, but he hadn't scented us yet. He'd loosened
his tie a fraction, though his dove-gray jacket was still in
place.
"I get it - your agents can do no wrong. You'll keep the
problems in the family, right? With a mentality like that I can
see why we lost Vietnam."
I stepped into the kitchen, tugging Mulder behind me. Graff's
face was white splotched with red, ten years older than when
I'd seen her before. She was raising a handful of ice cubes
from her Starbucks cup to her mouth when we entered. They
skittered on the floor as she turned to Mulder.
"I expected better from you."
He blinked, a tad sheepishly. "He threatened my daughter."
Skinner took up the attack, Graff forgotten with the
appearance of this more appealing target. "And this has
some connection to your unwillingness to tell anyone your
insights and go haring off into the ether?"
I knew it would be wiser to remain silent. I'd let George go at
the Smithsonian just as Mulder's little trick had undoubtedly
scared our favorite brother away from Hegal Place. I could
hardly expect Mulder, of all people, to act rationally when I
couldn't control myself. What worried me more, really was
the gleeful smirk Mulder had worn in the car when he
described his little spirit writing act on George's mirror. And I
couldn't wait to hear him recount *that* part of the day's
adventures to our superiors.
Mulder just shrugged. "I thought I would have more success
than a barrage of men in black descending on my old
apartment. The neighbors get jumpy when that happens -
bad memories, you know."
"And what insights did this excursion give you?"
"The name of the lawyer who's bankrolling George."
Graff blinked. "I thought he was just ripping off his victims'
purses."
"Don't forget my trenchcoat," Mulder added petulantly.
"Anyway, even twenty purses won't get you enough for a
security deposit and three months' rent at my apartment. Not
to mention a complete set of furnishings including an Italian
leather couch."
I wondered if we could trade Mulder's couch, that unhealthy
veteran of the porn wars, for George's new, improved
version. Maybe we could have it forfeited when we caught
him.
"Mulder," Skinner rumbled, "you continue to labor under the
delusion that you have to do this alone. This is not your solo
battle. It's not even your battle at all - as was made amply
clear today, your presence merely complicates matters while
we're trying to catch this killer. I believe that your supervisor
and I, along with the agents with whom you're supposed to
be working, deserve your cooperation as we attempt to keep
George Naxos from taking more lives. If you can't give us
your assistance, at least stay out of our way." Julie Graff
nodded; she wasn't the kind to play backup singer and I
doubted she'd say anything further.
Mulder stiffened his shoulders and let out a long breath. "It
was a mistake," he admitted. "Obviously I have a heavy
emotional involvement here. But don't you think we should
explore the information I've discovered, now that we're done
with the spanking?"
Skinner looked down in disgust. The beanie baby by his foot
didn't appeal to him any more than Mulder's face, so he
strode to the kitchen chair his trenchcoat was draped over,
shook his head again, and stalked out.
Julie Graff watched him go, bemused. Then she turned back
to Mulder. "You embarrassed me today, Mulder. Don't do it
again." She shut him out as completely as if she'd changed
channels, focusing entirely on me. "I'm sorry to hear about
what happened at your apartment. I know what it's like to be
stalked and I'm sorry this has become so personal. Let me
know what comes of Mulder's little jaunt, will you? I have a
team ready to go if you give the word."
****
"What happened at your apartment?" I asked distrustfully
when Graff left. A pair of agents remained behind, whether
they were trying to keep George out or me in I couldn't really
say.
Scully didn't reply, just wafted out into the living room. She
went to the window and looked out into the yard. I followed,
waiting. The daffodils were bowing their heads as if in
shame, bent from the latest storm.
"I found my gynecologist's body in my bed," she said.
"And the cut on your cheek?" I hadn't asked before because
I'd been too afraid of triggering a lecture on what happened
when I stole away from her side and how we were both
endangered by my impetuousness.
"My mirror broke," she said, in a responsibility-evading
locution that would have made Nixon proud.
"Was he there?"
She nodded.
"Did he..." Did he touch you again, Scully? I didn't think
they'd fucked, I would have smelled it on her. But I didn't
know if she'd wanted to.
"I never saw him directly," she said. "We talked through the
door, and then I shot at him."
She gave me one of her razor-wire looks when I breathed
relief, but didn't comment further.
I showered and changed into clothes that didn't stink of jail. I
was nearly out of suits at this point, but really I only
*needed* one. I just wanted more.
It was almost time for dinner, so, like some LSD-trip version
of June Cleaver, I cooked. We waited to eat until Ralph
called to update us with the latest on the gynecologist's body
- Scully had been interrupted at the hospital by the call from
the cops who'd arrested me, but she'd made him supervise
the transformation of her apartment into a crime scene.
Maybe she thought he'd take care of her privacy; the other
agents would certainly be looking for gossip material as they
investigated, particularly now that everyone knew that my
twin was fixated on her. By extension, so was I; not that it
was a real shock to anyone, but after six months the rumors
had cooled to mere embers before George added all those
corpses to the pyre.
Miranda made most of the dinnertime conversation, which
was fine by me although I wished that I could understand it; I
would have liked to have known what she thought the Red
Sox's chances were this year.
Just as I was putting the dishes in the dishwasher and Scully
was trying to make friends with Miranda, who was still
wearing most of her dinner on her face and in her hair, the
doorbell rang. Raindrops glittered off the shining skull of AD
Skinner. Two visits in one day? Was he going to ask me to
play golf that weekend? Warwick got Miranda and started
coffee. The rest of us went into the living room.
Scully got the nice chair and Skinner and I were forced to
share the couch.
"So, what happened this time?" Skinner's tone was standard
office issue, with the slightest hint of warmth breaking
through.
Scully shook her head. "It was...personal." She looked at me
sidelong, she might tell me more later but probably not.
Skinner's eyes flashed behind the glasses.
"Agent Scully, your report was vague and misleading in the
extreme. If you are obscuring information that could
endanger the life of yet another agent, I'll have *you*
arrested. Do I make myself clear?"
Good old Walter, tough love to the end.
Her face was whiter than my word processor screen. God I
loved seeing her react to a challenge.
The specific reaction, however, was unfortunate. "He talked
to me about what happened when Jason raped me and then
later what I said to Mulder when I still thought it had been
him."
Skinner's head came up so fast I thought he'd hurt himself.
Obviously she hadn't shared this little bit of ancient history in
any of her reports. The look of guilt and pity that scampered
jackrabbit-fast across his face made my stomach twist and
growl for Scully.
I stared at him, thinking: Get out, get out, get out. This is
none of your fucking business, sir.
Scully put her head down and swallowed. Well, at least I
knew why she hadn't chewed me out for ditching her. I doubt
the abandonment even registered on her internal
seismograph of Bad Things.
"Coffee's ready," Warwick offered from the doorway,
Miranda clinging to his hip, a thick trail of drool dangling from
her lower lip.
"The Assistant Director is leaving," I said and stood up.
Skinner blinked then followed suit.
Yes, I telegraphed to him, I am throwing you the fuck out of
my house, sir.
He went quietly, making a few sounds about reports in the
morning and winding the case up as quickly as possible. I
made the appropriate responses and locked the door behind
him. When I got back into the living room, Scully had let the
glassine facade she'd offered Uncle Walt shatter into powder
and was in a bad way, curled in a fetal ball in the chair,
rocking slightly. Her eyes were cloudy as a corpse's and she
was eerily silent.
I eased her out of the chair, murmuring words I didn't
understand, and took her back to the bedroom. With three
blankets wrapped around her, curled up against the
headboard, she eventually stopped shaking. On my way out,
I noticed that the CD from last night was still in the player,
like a bone stuck in a choking victim's throat. I ripped it out of
the player and broke it in half.
It was eight o'clock in Dallas, so I called Lanson & Hogue
from my study. Jon Kyle had gone home for the day, but I
was able to reach a paralegal. The name "Fox Mulder"
produced a surprising amount of deference and, eventually,
a faxed list of recent transactions they'd handled for "me."
There wasn't much. Aside from my apartment and the rat-
trap he'd used to boil the PA, there was only a building in a
bad part of Southeast. A fixer-upper, I thought as I read the
short description of the two-family building. Separated from
its nearest squatters by empty burned-out lots. The windows
came with complimentary boards to protect the broken glass
of the panes.
I had a few questions I wanted to ask the realtor. I mean,
how does a person *find* these places? "I need an isolated
building in terrible disrepair, in a location where the
neighbors won't pay any attention to screams, thumps, or
flashing lights, at whatever hour they may appear." "Why
yes, sir, I'll just check my list of psychopathic killer lairs - I
believe you'll find one of these three to your liking, and
they're all so affordable!" I could just imagine the standard-
issue smile on the realtor's face - she was probably a
Stepford clone of the one who'd sold me this house.
I called Ralph Williams and filled him in. He busied himself
organizing a real raid, something at which he excelled. This
time I accepted my fate, imprisoned in suburbia. Scully had
to go, if she was going to beat him. At this point she might
need to kill him herself to feel safe; anyone else's bullet
wouldn't be good enough. So I told her, and she uncurled
and began searching for her vest and gun.
I grabbed a beanie baby off the floor and stared into its eyes.
A gun would have made me feel better, but as things now
were, the closest I could manage was a squirrel.
****
I called the hospital and talked to Zippy, who was still stoned
on pain meds and only partially coherent. At least he was
alive, as few people who had been in intimate contact with
George were. When I hung up the phone I headed back
upstairs, my feet too heavy to lift to the treads.
I needed to talk to Mulder, and I had a small window of
opportunity before the rest of the team was ready to go after
George. We'd had sex that wasn't good for us before. But
last night had been different, worse, and I didn't want to
leave him with a final memory of us in which he couldn't be
sure if he was himself.
Mulder's eyes in the halogen brightness of his bedroom were
absinthe green. Look too long in them and you might go
mad. As for me, I would have been more stable if I'd been
drinking mercury for breakfast for the past year instead of
living this particular life, and so I could stare all I wanted.
When I walked in, he looked up from the latest pictures from
my deadly bedroom and immediately went on the defensive.
"Isn't this the part where you tell me how irresponsible I've
been and how I should behave myself while you're out
saving the world?"
"Why would I do that?" I understood him so much better
now. I had become him at least as successfully as George
had - tangled up in a conspiracy that had destroyed (and
created) my family and stolen my memories, embittered by
the past, dedicated to illuminating truths that no one else
respected. Miranda had redeemed him, but she'd left me in
his place.
And I hadn't applied for that part of the fucking job, X Files or
no.
While I edged forward, Mulder stared at me as if I were a
crop circle, ready to believe and ready to declare a hoax. He
looked so vulnerable in his stained T-shirt and jeans,
compared to my pristine black suit. There was, of all things,
a squirrel beanie baby clutched in his hand. He looked like a
civilian, a little girl's father -- except for his eyes.
As ever, he smelled like lust and intellect. It had to be my
imagination, filling in for lost nerve pathways. Like the little
girl's red dress in Spielberg's black-and-white Holocaust
movie, Mulder stood out in a world gone tasteless and bland
to me.
He looked down at my feet. Before we started sleeping
together, we were often able to look each other in the eyes
during the tough patches. I had more regrets than there were
books in the Library of Congress, and most of them were
Mulder-based. But I still believe that time, if not a universal
invariant, flows in one direction only. I had to deal with
Mulder as I'd made him, and sex had settled into every curve
and pockmark of our relationship.
I could feel his moist breath ruffling the air above my head as
he shifted to look at some nonexistent spot on the far wall.
When I put out my hand, he flinched. Obviously I wasn't the
only one who had some reservations about last night's
command performance. This time would be different,
honestly. If there was anything left in my soul that was
beautiful, I would give it to him now. Not to make up for the
past; that was impossible. But I remembered nights when
we'd sit on stakeout, waiting for something to happen,
comfortable in each other's silence. I remembered holding
him for comfort, grasping his hand because we could only
trust each other, scrabbling with him in the dirt looking for a
little girl's bones. Just once, I would try to be the woman he
first desired.
He made a guilty protesting sound when I slipped my right
hand under his T-shirt, but I was ready; I covered his mouth
with my left, relaxing as his tongue slid out and accepted my
offer.
He was heavy as a stone statue above me as we eased
down onto the bed. He let me strip off his clothes, but didn't
move to reciprocate. I had to wiggle off my pants and
underwear from my position underneath him, grinding my
hips against his feverishly sweat-cooled skin, and then push
him away long enough to get my shirt and bra off. When I
tossed them to the floor he put his hand in between my
breasts, pinning me down, as if I were going to change my
mind and make a break for it, and it was like being stepped
on by an elephant.
The air was forced out of my lungs in a pitiful squawk. He
eased up for a moment, smoothing the hair away from my
forehead with his lips.
I let my hands and legs embrace him automatically; I knew
the mechanics of the act so well that I was free to
concentrate on the sensation. The worn cotton smoothness
of his skin, the heat of the blood and muscle hiding
underneath, the sharp prodding point of his hipbone, the
knot of tension standing sentinel above each shoulder blade.
Knives flashed behind my closed eyelids as he kissed a
crown of thorns onto my forehead. Hot wax flooded my
veins.
His mouth came down on my shoulder like a wrecking ball,
sledding downwards to my breasts, avoiding the weeping
scab of the bite mark he'd given me before. Then up again,
so that we were kissing, close-mouthed and almost tender.
His fingers teased the sides of my breasts, compressed
under his weight. My hands bracketed his head, and then he
turned to take my right wrist in his mouth, tongue tickling
against my pulse point. I felt the hard ridges of his teeth
denting the skin and was almost afraid that he'd bite through
the flesh to get at the bone, crack me open and suck out the
marrow. I'd wanted to consume him that way before.
I shifted my legs so that his erection fit firmly between my
legs, tightening around him so that he knew what he was
missing. He groaned and reached down to enter me,
returning his mouth to my lips as he slid into me.
He was slow and deliberate, as gentle as he'd ever been. I
felt the uncertainty that had been flickering on and off like a
distant radio signal fade entirely. I was shivering as he
covered my face with yogurt-cool kisses and I reciprocated,
wanting to know that I'd touched every part of him at least
once.
He held me tightly for several minutes, not moving much. We
were vibrating to the same silent frequency; the blood might
have been flowing from my arteries to his veins, our hearts
alternating beats.
I let the pleasure seep through me like brown sugar
dissolving in hot oatmeal and thought about a story I'd read,
a long time ago. A frog meets a scorpion on the bank of a
river. The scorpion asks the frog to take him across the river.
"I can't do that! If I take you on my back," the frog says,
"you'll sting me and I'll die." "I wouldn't do that," the scorpion
replies. "If I sting you while we're in the water, we'll both sink
and die." The frog thinks about it, seeing the logic, and
agrees. The scorpion climbs aboard. In the midst of the river,
rushing water surrounding them, the frog feels the sharp
sting of the scorpion's tail. "Why did you do that?" the frog
wails. "Now we'll both die!" The scorpion replies: "You knew
what I was when you took me on."
I don't know if I was the frog or the scorpion. But if you had
to take the stinger metaphor literally . . .
Still locked together, tab a fitting tightly in slot b, I rolled him
carefully onto his back. I squirmed against him until I was
looking straight down into the moving green and brown
abyss behind his eyes. The sharp bones of his hips bit into
the soft muscles of my thighs. I felt huge, as though I were
crushing him underneath me, despite the fact that his cock
was digging far enough into me that I could feel it pressing
into my brain.
All at once we both began to move, going from zero to eighty
in .5 seconds. Jagged spikes of pleasure cut up inside my
body, slicing my brain into diced meat. My breath stuck in
my lungs, burning my windpipe, breathing fire, burning and
blackening all around us. I grabbed his forearms in my
sweating hands and used the grip to push harder and harder
against him. Underneath me, he tossed his head back and
forth against the dark comforter, his gyrations highlighting
the long tendons along the sides of his throat. He tasted of
salt, sweat, and butter against my tongue. His hands were
on my hips, bruising the skin, digging into me, pulling me
down harder and faster into the bone-hardness of his cock.
"No one," I gulped in a mindless slurry of sensation, "you
and me only, only--"
"I know," he hissed back.
"Don't let him," and I couldn't go on.
His head was back now, mouth open and I could see the
darkness of his fillings. I grabbed his jaw and forced him to
look up at me, and he did, his eyes black and pulling me into
the darkness inside. Shuddering and sweating, I pushed my
mouth down onto his and he snarled as he arched up
against me. I gagged back a shriek of pure animal pleasure
as he spasmed up into me hard. I whimpered against his
mouth as I went on the same wild ride on the nerve ending
roller coaster. I dropped down onto his chest, reassuringly
hard and sweaty underneath me. While I panted into the
sticky skin of his neck, his hands smoothed the equally
sweaty skin on my back. His chest heaved unquiet below
me.
A gorgeous, George-less lassitude rolled over me and I
could have lain there for hours.
Then Ralph pounded on the door, signaling that all was
ready, and I had to extract myself from Mulder. It was like
moving through glue, but I found all the important pieces of
clothing, including the body armor, and turned to him one
last time.
"Tomorrow, we should talk about what happens when this is
over," I said. "I'm sorry, Mulder. Love isn't supposed to be
like this."
Lightning flashed in his eyes. I was vaguely surprised that I'd
managed to hurt him. "You're presuming," he said slowly,
like a marksman placing his red laser dot on the target, "that
I love you."
"No, I'm not."
What do you know -- I got the last word, for once.
It sat in my mouth like ashes from a cremation as we drove
into the District.
Iolokus III: Vix te Agnovi 16/20
A pox o' your throat, you bawling, blasphemous, uncharitable
dog!
I had to sit in between Ralph Williams and another agent in
the back seat of the car, because I was as always the
shortest one. I hated it; the position reminded me of car trips
from my childhood, crammed in between hot child-bodies.
Melissa and Bill always got the outsides because their legs
were longer, leaving Charlie and me with no place to retreat
and no way to open the windows.
The drive was mostly silent. Ralph reviewed the pictures of
Dr. Shimada. I glanced over a few times but didn't enjoy the
contrast between the dead body and the comforter I still
remembered picking out at Woodward and Lothrop's, the
long-dead DC department store.
I wondered if they could smell Mulder on me, but I wasn't
sure how much I cared.
We stopped the car a few blocks away from the target site. I
estimated the chances that the car would still be intact when
we returned as falling in the slim-to-none category. The
agents, except for Ralph, stood out like -- well, like white
folks in Southeast in the middle of the night. The Bureau isn't
exactly the poster organization for affirmative action.
"We hardly need the badges," Ralph whispered in my ear as
we scanned the street, looking at the faces fluttering behind
shades and the people darting into dark corners of porches.
"Maybe we should announce that we're not looking for
anyone local," I suggested, but the other agents were
already moving.
George's latest investment was a large building, three stories
separated into two halves that had at one time been painted
different colors, though with all the chipping it was hard to
see what those colors had been.
"Two front doors," Ralph commented. "Strategically
unfortunate."
"Highly suggestive, don't you think?" Twin brothers, Siamese
houses -- I thought, unwilling to question the source of the
intuition, that George had been knocking out the dividing wall
between the two addresses. It probably helped him keep his
musculature intact while he couldn't work out in the prison
yard.
The symbolism was clear enough for even a literalist like me
to follow. Two bodies with one mind. Two facades with one
owner, though they looked separate to the outside world.
Muffled noises from our earphones indicated that the team
was spreading out, positioning people to cover every
possible exit.
Finally, the signal was given, and we went in, boiling over
the house like a kicked wasp's nest in reverse.
Sure enough, the two front doors opened onto the same
large entry hallway. Ralph kept himself at my side; it was like
being in the car again but with more legroom. I looked up
into the gloom of the hallway, listening to the noise of FBI
agents kicking in doors and rushing up stairs. The ceiling
had been painted a long time ago, and curls of rotting paint
hung down like streamers of moss in a phantom forest.
From what I could see around Ralph's enormous torso, there
wasn't much furniture in the place. Instead, George had
done it with mirrors. Forget ten fragments of himself, he was
working on exponential numbers -- a dozen reflections of my
strained face spiralled away in every direction. Somewhere
in the distance an Elvis CD was playing, and I resolutely
tuned it out. The shouts from upstairs were routine "clear!"
and related noises. We walked through the house, towards
the dual kitchens at the end of the hall. I could see insectoid
movement, skittling through the beams of light that swept
over the stove and countertops; George was about as good
a housekeeper as Mulder.
Before the kitchens came the basement stairs. The doors
that concealed the stairs must have been attached to the
departed dividing wall, because the steps began with a hole
in the center of the hallway, gaping like the severed grin of a
slashed esophagus. There was only one staircase; the
building had always been whole, underground.
More metaphors.
Ralph cursed as he followed my eyes downwards. "I fuckin'
hate basements," he complained. "Spiders and shit."
"More 'and shit' than spiders this time, I think," I murmured
and stepped forward to go down into the pit.
The stairs weren't wide enough for us to go down two
abreast, particularly when one of the breasts involved
belonged to a former Golden State Warrior, so instead Ralph
took point, muttering about never wanting to be a field agent.
Picking my way like Dante behind his guide, I descended
into the gloom. Our flashlights swept the dreary blackness,
crossing and uncrossing like Sharon Stone's legs. Don't
cross the particle streams, Egon, I bit back, knowing that my
companion wouldn't appreciate the reference. I missed
Mulder terribly in that moment, missed being the straight
man and having a partner whose actions I could never
predict but always trust.
The light bounced off more mirrors, creating a disco-strobe
effect that immediately gave me a headache. It was a
brilliant tactic on George's part. With the light flashing back in
our eyes, the beams were as dangerous to us as to him. I
pointed my light at the ground to diffuse it somewhat. Ralph
noticed and followed my lead.
We reached the bottom of the stairs. The concrete floor of
the basement was cool and clotted with dirt. It had been
used recently. Someone had tracked in dying leaves torn
down by the spring storms. Green buds smeared across the
floor along with torn petals from blooming dogwoods.
"Come out, come out, wherever you are," I called. "You feel
more comfortable in the basement than in Mulder's
apartment, don't you? The basement is where you really
should be." The same could be said for Mulder, but it was
different. Really.
Ralph trained his beam on the wall behind the staircase,
which was covered with more photographs instead of
mirrors.
The impromptu shrine to me had been annoying, especially
the yearbook picture which every agent in the Bureau had
probably seen by now. It was hard enough getting respect
with the handicaps of my height and sex, and now I was
eternally going to be eighteen and pitifully geeky in my
colleagues' eyes. Another sin to lay at George's feet.
This was a step beyond annoying. The photos coated the
wall, covering it from cobwebbed ceiling to dirt-creased floor.
Many of these pictures had been taken recently -- in the
bouncing glaring light I caught a glimpse of Zippy's slicked-
back hair, remaining after the rest of him had been ripped
out of the picture. I'd been trapped in George's viewfinder a
thousand times: entering the Hoover building, walking to my
apartment late at night, eating lunch in the Old Post Office. I
could all but taste his come in the air; he'd sat and
masturbated to these photographs. And always he'd inserted
himself into the pictures, himself as GQ models wearing ten-
thousand-dollar suits. Each time there was a white cut-paper
head pasted over the model's lost face, with brown hair,
brown eyes and black tattoo crayoned in. George's artistic
training had been sorely neglected, and the five-year-old
drawing style just made everything creepier, as if I were
Dorothy sharing space with the Scarecrow in those pictures.
There was a rush of air and a liquid thunk and Ralph's light
went spinning away across the floor, illuminating completely
useless detritus and bouncing against countless silvered
fragments. The air was black as copier toner where the thin
lines of light didn't pass. I swung my flashlight and my gun to
Ralph's last position. There was nothing, neither George nor
Ralph, where the big man had been standing just moments
before. I screamed for backup as I moved my light in wide
swathes across the basement. Mirrors flashed on and off like
perverse lightning bugs in this underground spring night.
"You've gotten so crude," George's voice boomed from
everywhere and nowhere as I spun frantically, looking for
movement, trying to keep my light down to find his feet
without getting mirror-struck. The only thing I saw was the
flashlight, spinning towards me. I got a blinding flash of light
in my eyes before it bounced away. My vision obscured by
purple afterimages, I was helpless, but I kept scanning as if I
could see.
"Come here and I'll show you what crude is," I promised,
blinking, trying to sort out movement from nothingness.
Lights semaphored at the edges of my vision and I couldn't
tell what was real and what mere sensory artifact.
The skin between my shoulderblades tingled and I spun as
his hands clawed at me, slipping free of the smooth rayon
shell I was wearing. I screamed rage and fired. Glass
splintered and shrieked as I destroyed a few of his mirror-
selves. The shot hadn't been close to well-aimed, but I felt
air hiss as he stumbled away, and now I knew where to point
the light.
He was backing up now. The angle of the beam pointed at
his feet made him cast an elephantine shadow against the
wall; in the dimness I could see his hands raised in a parody
of nondangerousness. "Don't shoot me, Scully."
"That didn't work for Mulder, either." I knew that no shooting
board in the world would reprimand me, not with Ralph
stretched out on the floor somewhere and the basement
darkness aiding George's threatening actions.
"Mulder's a wimp," he asserted, and threw the rock that had
been concealed in his balled hand. My flashlight crashed to
the ground as I felt the impact on the bones of my shoulder. I
tried to fire but my arm was vibrating with the pain, as if I'd
slept on it for hours, and I couldn't keep it aimed correctly.
Dark, infernally dark, the criss-crossed lines of oily light from
the two downed flashlights only serving to emphasize the
utter blackness they didn't illuminate, blinking in the mirrors
like dangerous stars. My finger tightened on the trigger; I
would have sprayed the room with bullets if I'd been sure
that Ralph was out of my range of fire.
I scrambled for the closest flashlight and tucked it under my
arm so that I could aim two-handed. Finally, there was
motion on the stairs as the other agents bought a clue.
Swiveling my body around to track George, I caught a
glimpse of legs, climbing onto a table that had been pushed
up against the wall. There was a crash as he punched out
the plywood covering a high-set window and then he was
wriggling through. I fired and thought I'd hit him, and the herd
on the stairs began firing in that general direction as well, but
then his feet disappeared and it hadn't been enough to stop
him.
Most of the agents were still in the house, looking through
closets or crowding the stairs to see what the hell had
happened, and I could tell from the cross-talk over the radio
that the two outside giving chase had no chance.
While the other agents got their useless workouts, I found
Ralph's crumpled form on the floor, hidden by a toppled
mirror, and checked him out. Even though he still had a
linebacker's body, his head was made the same way as
anyone else's and he'd have a big headache. George's
weapon lay abandoned by Ralph's body; just another two by
four, pulled from the shattered hulk of the house. I pulled
back his eyelids; the pupils were still the same size but it
would take time to be sure what was going on inside. Ralph
had ordered an ambulance to stand by -- he was going to
make a really good AD someday -- and I could hear it
screaming through the broken window.
When the EMTs came I moved behind the stairs and found
George's workspace. From the underside of one stair
depended a tiny stuffed fox, garrotted with wire that was
beginning to cut through the fabric of the toy. He'd done
something obscene with the feet.
It resembled some of Miranda's toys, I thought. There was a
series of little animals scattered around the house, and of
course what would be better to give Mulder's baby than a
fox, as if he'd never heard that joke before. Ingveld had
mentioned, in one of her bouncy stream-of-consciousness
ramblings that she used to fill the dead space created by all
the dour old folks around her, that there were at least three
of the little foxes, kept in the laundry room because Mulder
didn't like to see them. I stood on my tiptoes and sniffed;
nothing.
"Come here," I ordered a random agent, who obediently
trotted over.
"What does it smell like?"
He gave me a strange look but leaned in and drew a deep
breath. "Is that...detergent?"
Isn't it wonderful to have your intuitions confirmed?
Oh, and I hadn't even looked at the dead girl on George's
worktable, pressed up against the back of the stairs so that
we'd been inches from stepping on her as we came down.
The other agents' faces crumpled as they tried to keep from
vomiting; the sour smell of semen and the odor of beginning
decay had to be heavy in the air. The latest victim was
stretched out like an autopsy subject on the old wooden
table, her stomach as yet undistended with bloating and her
flesh pale and mostly intact.
There was something wrong with her eyes.
The delicate flesh underneath them was distorted, marred. I
stepped closer. What had looked like tear-loosened mascara
revealed itself to be runnels of dried blood, emanating from
the rips in her flesh. He'd torn her eyelids and the skin of her
orbits when he'd removed her eyes, replacing them with
glass whose ever-blind irises mimicked my own dishwater-
blue shade.
I wondered what he did with her real eyes. Over in the
corner, against an exposed beam, there was a pile of rags,
bunched as if they'd been soaked with something and then
dried in stiff folds. I holstered my gun, put on my gloves and
knelt to examine the pile. The cloth pulled free of the floor,
cracking like a scab being ripped from skin. The blood had
only leaked onto patches of the cotton cloth, so some parts
flowed easily while others were as stiff as heavy canvas.
Underneath, sticking both to the cloth and the floor until
gravity prevailed and they fell to the floor like rotting fruit,
were her eyes. It looked as if they'd been brown.
I turned back to the corpse, my curiosity about the eyes
satisfied for the moment. There were more things under that
cloth, but I wasn't ready to look at them. The other agents
followed in my wake, looking at the additional stray parts
he'd discarded in that corner. I heard a voice whisper, "How
did she know where -" hastily shushed by another, wiser
agent.
She was wearing, I realized, one of my bathrobes - the ratty
terrycloth one I always wore when there was no reason to
show off. And thus, of course, the only one I'd worn for the
last six years or so. It was the only item of clothing I'd worn
during one memorable seventy-two hour period, some
federal holiday or other, and I'd only put it on to pay the pizza
delivery guy. I'd had to bring the box into the bedroom, as
Mulder refused to get up and join me in the kitchen. As soon
as I'd brought it over to the bed, grease already seeping
through the bottom and threatening to stain anything it
touched; he'd grabbed the belt of the robe and pulled it out,
exposing some critical portions of my anatomy. He made
some smartass crack which stung at the time, but I had
managed to forget. I let the robe slip off, put the box on the
floor, and got back into bed. Later I made him clean up the
grease on the floorboards as we wolfed down congealed
Hawaiian pizza. I'd been naked until he left early Monday
morning.
The memory was vivid enough that I could smell pineapple
and salt in my nostrils, stronger than anything I could
actually smell these days, as I moved to examine her throat.
Automatically, I pulled out my recorder and clicked it on.
"Deviation from prior pattern," I noted. "Strangulation was not
manual, but effected by means of a ligature - there are
fibers embedded in the skin, apparently from the belt of the
terry-cloth robe worn by the victim. The belt is -" I glanced
around - "lying on the floor near the body."
I droned on, recording the rest of my observations. There
were no visible mutilations other than the eyes, no apparent
bruising. On her thighs I discerned the silver snail-tracks of
semen. It had been postmortem, while she was still warm
but unresisting. He didn't like the struggle; he wanted to be
loved and accepted. I felt the clammy residue on my own
thighs pulse as if suddenly flash-frozen. Like calling to like.
"I think you got him," one of the faceless crowd said, coming
up to me, carefully positioning himself so that he was in my
line of sight and didn't surprise me. "There's blood on the
boards. But it doesn't seem to have been deep; there's no
trail that anyone can find."
That was George for you.
But there was a trail, found by younger and sharper eyes
than mine, a sticky pile of what looked like skin-colored
rubber. Only it wasn't rubber, it was skin. I held a strip up to
the light, a strip inscribed with an arc of barbed wire,
weeping blood.
"What the fuck is that?" Ralph asked, in a voice gruff with
pain.
"Destruction of evidence. He's whittled the tattoo off his
neck. If it heals well, it will eventually be virtually impossible
to tell them apart."
"Shit," he said and I agreed.
It was long after midnight when I got back to Casa Mulder. I
slipped through the house after keying in the code on the
alarm system. The children were nestled all snug in their
beds. Ingveld and Warwick tangled in a knot on the sofa
downstairs while MTV silently blazed from the television like
a warm technophobic fireplace. In her shiny new room,
Miranda rolled on her face in a ball underneath the mobile of
mermaids and fairies. I touched her feather-soft skin and
watched a bubble of drool ease itself onto the crib mattress.
Down the hall, Mulder curled tight as a shrimp underneath
his cotton blanket. When I touched his head he was as hot
as Miranda, his hair damp with sleep-sweat. For once his
face was relaxed into something like peace. Peace that
would evaporate come daylight when today's information
was processed. I deshelled myself from kevlar and Donna
Karan and slid my naked body next to his. Gradually, the
warmth of his body soothed me like warm water into sleep.
We slumbered like fetuses in the womb for hours of lovely, Lethe-blank
silence, un-haunted by twins or Elvis
Iolokus III: Vix te Agnovi 17/20
Where, but even now, with strange and several noises
Of roaring, shrieking, howling, jingling chains,
And moe diversity of sounds, all horrible,
We were awak'd . . .
I slept like the dead. Really. I slept through Miranda's three
o'clock feeding, I slept through my six o'clock alarm, I slept
through Warwick's six thirty 'be there or be dog food', I slept
through the spring sunlight's feeble knock, knock, knocking
on my chamber door, and I found out later that I outslept
Scully (which was an oversleeping of Olympic proportions).
What finally woke me up was a familiar pair of tiny, cold,
hands latching onto my nose like a tick looking for breakfast.
"Mooselet," I reached out and got an armful of hot, heavy
baby.
While Scully sat at the edge of the bed, muffled in her
sweats once again, Miranda greeted me with a solemn look,
her jadeite eyes, and the usual probicus squeeze. Sitting
pertly upright and
staring down at me as through she was cataloging each and
every thought that had flitted across my mind since last we'd
seen one another, Miranda blinked, her nearly translucent
skin shining pink in the sunlight. Sometimes I thought I could
see though her skin and see each and every blood cell
running through her incredibly tiny and complex arteries and
veins. She was so small, so indescribably fragile - made of
damp tissue paper and bamboo bones that I thought one
casual brush with my oafish hand could crush her like a
paper lantern. Scully seemed made of brick and mortar by
comparison.
Finally, Miranda sighed and pressed her wet little mouth
against my left eye. She was trying to
kiss, but her aim needed work. Then she straightened up
and twined her wet little fingers in my hair. At the other end
of the bed, Scully made a strangled noise -- ooh, bad
adjective, under the
circumstances, but it's the conventional designation for the
sound -- and stood up. Miranda, watching her movement,
stared after her with her usual nosy interest. The kid was
either going to follow in her parents' career footsteps or
become a gossip columnist. I hoped the latter - being sued
was better than being shot at.
"What's that all about?" I asked, my voice coming out in a
freshly awakened croak.
"You two look so *cozy*," Scully admitted and shrugged.
"You sound jealous," I said and wiped a clear pearl of drool
away from Miranda's bottom lip.
"She's so . . . easy with you. I don't think she likes me,"
Scully's voice trailed off in such a
hopeless fashion that I wanted to laugh.
"She doesn't know you yet. She's really developed a
personality over the last few months."
Scully stared at her hands. "I have to admit, she wasn't like
this when I was taking care of her.
Human babies are altricial, they're born about three months
before they're really ready for
independent life, it has to do with the size of the human brain
and the compromise shape of a
woman's hips that allow her both to walk and to give birth.
Newborns are just fetuses outside
the womb, really, responsive to stimuli but not operating in a
recognizably human fashion . . .
Am I rambling?"
"Usually you refer to it as 'explaining the science behind the
phenomenon'."
The corners of her mouth twitched and Miranda burbled,
detaching her Velcro fingers from my
hair long enough to stretch out an imperious hand to Scully.
"Yah-yah-yah-yah-yah-yah!" she declared.
Roughly translated from Mooselet-speak this meant: "Come
hither mere mortal and you may amuse me."
"C'mon," I said. "I'll show you how to bribe her into
adoration."
Cautiously, Scully crossed the room and perched on the
edge of the bed, looking at the Mooselet as though she were
a small bomb in a pink onesie that was liable to go off at any
moment. I could have assured her that the Mooselet rarely
had a bowel movement until at least noon, so she was safe
for the time being.
"She likes you to sing to her," I explained and Scully rolled
her eyes in pain; neither one of us could carry a tune in a
bucket.
"This is not time to be vain," I added a moment later as I lay
down on my stomach on the bed so I was eye to eye with
Miranda.
Scully watched, one side of her mouth threatening a smile.
I took a deep breath and started.
"Take me out to the ball game
Take me out with the crowd,
Buy me some peanuts and Crack-er Jack
I don't care if I never get back."
I paused, and Miranda looked expectantly at me, knowing
that there was more. I couldn't look at Scully. Some things
are too embarrassing to share with the person you've been
having kinky sex with.
"Let me root, root, root for the home team,
If they don't win it's a shame;
For it's one, two, three strikes you're out
At the old ball game."
On cue, Miranda squealed like a piglet and kicked at the
mattress while she clawed at the air with devilish glee. She
really liked to see me make an ass out of myself.
Now that her Highness had been jollied into a more
hospitable mood I looked at Scully, who was actually smiling
down at Miranda with something other than curiosity.
"Put your face down to her."
Scully complied, pushing her hair back behind her ear in an
ember swath over the ash of her sweatshirt. Miranda
watched solemnly as Scully bent down, then she looked
back to me with a composed expression that didn't belong
on a face that small.
"Kiss," I instructed her.
Miranda blinked and jerked her attention back to Scully. I
swear Scully didn't breathe the entire time Miranda thought it
over. Then Miranda leaned over and slammed her wide-
open sucker mouth onto Scully's cheekbone, practically on
her ear. So she needed a little target practice. I figured I had
at least thirteen more years before boys were lining up at the
door to get open-mouth kisses from Miranda, if the boys
made it past the moat full of alligators, the drawbridge, the
attack dogs and the anti-personnel mines.
When Miranda got bored of sucking on Scully's face, she
straightened up, looked Scully straight in the eye and made
a loud and lengthy declaration in Mooselet-speak.
Scully nodded and thought about it.
"No, you are completely right, I couldn't agree with you
more."
Miranda seemed satisfied with this and stuck her fingers in
her mouth for some meditative sucking. She latched her free
hand into Scully's hair and began to squeeze the thick
handful she'd gathered, looking at the lock of hair as though
she was going to write an analysis of its color and texture
later.
Apparently all it took to win complete and unconditional
approval from Scully was to be fat, bald, and wear a lot of
pink.
I couldn't watch anymore, my chest felt like a tourist voodoo
doll. I left them there on the bed wrapped in some strange
feminine communion and went to take a shower.
If that fuckhead brother of mine did anything *else* to
endanger this spun-glass truce, I was going to rip off his
fucking head and piss down his neck. Twice.
Later, I found Scully sitting on the floor with Miranda by her
side in Miranda's bedroom. They were looking at a Dr.
Seuss book and Scully was going over the Cat in the Hat's
MO while Miranda listened intently. The spring sun oozed
through the window like honey and set their hair on fire. I
leaned against the doorframe and warmed myself in it. I
must have sighed or something because Scully looked up at
me with something like regret.
"I have to go to the Hoover Building for the debriefing.
Skinner was kind enough not to schedule it until three. I
need to prepare a summary."
"Go right ahead."
Miranda looked at Scully and then at me before thumping
her fist down on Scully's thigh.
"Yah-yah-yah-yah-yah!" she protested.
"I'll be back," Scully assured her.
****
The briefing hadn't gone well, the younger agents didn't
have their information even halfway coherent and by the
time it was over, the conference room stank of raw agent-
meat after Skinner had gone through a round of ass-
chewing. With a headache and a queasy stomach, I
escaped to the courtyard and looked up at the overcast sky
that was getting darker and more Gothic by the millisecond.
Someone moved near me and I jumped, but it was only
Ralph Williams. Mulder must have given him instructions to
stick near me, since Williams had turned into my oversized
shadow.
My cellphone rang.
"Scully."
"Yah-yah-yah-yah brrrrrrrrrrrrrthhph!"
I had to chuckle, turning my back on Ralph. Miranda had
lapsed into a bi-labial fricative commonly known as a
raspberry. She obviously was developing Mulder's fondness
for the phone.
"Hey," Mulder said.
"Hey yourself."
"We're looking at chicken or pasta here. If I could get OUT
OF THE HOUSE, I could shop. What do you think?"
"Thai?"
"Warwick won't eat Thai," he said in a repressive tone.
"Pasta's good," I agreed.
"Okay. Pasta it is," he agreed and I could hear baby-babble
in the background. "Can you stop and get Italian bread? And
ice cream. Don't get that girly ice cream. Get something
good."
"Sure, fine, whatever."
He cut the connection and I was about to put the phone
away when it rang again.
"What do you want now? Beer?"
"I want you, angel."
My stomach felt as though I'd swallowed an entire gallon of
Heavenly Hash still in the carton.
"You know," George growled. "I'm going to have a scar from
that bullet."
"I thought you wanted me to treat you like Mulder."
"That's really funny, Scully, I always knew you had a sense
of humor. Don't you think it's time we settled this? You and
me? We don't need anyone else. I can leave the rest of it
behind if you -- I just need to talk to you."
Was he promising to leave Mulder and Miranda alone if I
came to him? I thought he was. He sounded sincere, and
Mulder had always been a terrible liar.
"Yes," I replied. "I want the answers too."
"There's a playground by the neighborhood school, about six
blocks from his house. I'll meet you there."
Like Mulder, he wasn't big on long goodbyes.
I put the cellphone away and turned to find my latest
protector, Ralph Williams, staring at me, his hands on his
hips pushing back the ubiquitous trenchcoat. Maybe the men
knew of some secret discount warehouse somewhere;
trenchcoat replacement ate up perhaps thirty percent of
*my* disposable income but I never heard them complaining
about it. Alternatively, maybe they just didn't ruin them on a
regular basis.
"I have to go," I said and every thought stampeding through
my mind must have been tattooed across my face.
Ralph scowled. "Were you planning on bringing anyone else
on this little jaunt?"
"Ralph, if you're willing, I could use the backup."
Surprise twisted in his eyes like a guttering candle flame.
He'd heard the rumors and read the reports, but it had taken
a few days of actual exposure for him to understand just how
renegade the X Files agents tended to be. But I had no
investment in running off all alone; it just seemed like that
when he read the reports of me following Mulder around.
We headed to his Bucar. I had to give him directions when
he wouldn't let me drive.
"Look here, Dana," the unfamiliar use of my first name made
me lift my eyes from the road beyond the windshield wipers
for a moment and take in the blunt profile of the younger
man, "Spooky loves you. You guys have a baby. Don't be
getting your ass killed. It won't do any of you any good."
"I'll keep that in mind, Agent Williams."
The rain was picking up. Lightning rather than streetlights
illuminated the sign for the middle school as we approached
it. "He'll run if he sees anyone with me," I pointed out as the
car slid to a halt in the rain-coated school parking lot. The
playground looked empty of anything but wood and metal, in
the darkening early evening. Security-conscious parents had
ensured that the fence around the area was high, and that
there was only one, easily monitored entrance. I always
knew that paranoia was good for something. "Wait here and
watch out -- if he tries to leave he has to come by here or go
over the fence, and either way you should be able to see
him."
"Don't teach your grandmother to suck eggs, Agent Scully.
I'll let you go in, but you will come out at the first sign of
trouble." It wasn't a request. He wasn't my superior, either,
but he was about five times bigger than I was and that had to
count for something.
I nodded sharply and headed through the gap in the fence
that allowed the children in.
****
After losing myself on the treadmill until I was sweaty and
shaking, I was late for dinner and I only had time to plunk
Miranda into the high chair and turn towards the kitchen to
start water boiling for pasta when the lights went out.
Total blackness relieved only by strobe-flares of lightning
outside.
Shit.
The spring storm continued outside while I barked my knees
on the coffee table feeling around for the flashlight in the end
table. Damn southern spring storms, one good lightning
blast knocks down a tree, which cuts a line, and the entire
town would be plunged into pre-Industrial darkness for the
entire night.
Shit squared. That meant that Frohike's entire alarm system
was running on battery power, only guaranteed to last three
hours. We should have gotten a dog. A big, ugly Rottweiler
and named it Walter.
Blind, I fumbled my way into the living room.
While I rummaged among the pacifiers and other
accumulated junk in the drawer, my hands slowed as the
messages from my lower centers finally made their way to
my brain. The short hairs on my arms bristled, my heart
jittered, and I could feel my lips peel back from my teeth in a
wary snarl.
I smelled him, sour with sweat and decay, rank with blood as
a jackal.
He was in my favorite chair; a flash of lightning illuminated
his smile - my smile.
I straightened up, showed George my empty hands.
"I knew it was just a matter of time before you got here," I
said, my voice sounding oddly calm between howls of the
maelstrom outside.
He shrugged, crossed his legs, his-my eyes narrowing in the
flashes of light from outside.
"How'd you get through the alarm system?"
A Nazi death's head grin. "Su casa es mi casa." What I
knew, he knew. I should have guessed.
"Finishing Jason's job?" I asked.
"Fuck Jason, and fuck you too."
Okay, so George wasn't the most articulate member of our
family.
"You've got a nice little deal here, cute kid, cute woman, nice
clothes, and I've been rolling in shit since the day I was
born."
Just a little sibling rivalry, perfectly normal if the sibling in
question wasn't a card-carrying member of the Brotherhood
of Convicted Serial Killers Local 479.
"Take that up with the assholes who made us. Look George,
I'm sorry about what happened to you and it's a damn
shame, but there's fuck all that can be done about it now."
I took a deep breath and went into the standard Bureau
pitch. "If you give yourself up we can see what we can do
about having you extradited to Canada and get you a good
deal."
"There's no death penalty in Canada, nobody here would
agree to that, you think I'm fucking stupid, Fox?"
For some reason the use of my first name pissed me off
more than the invasion of my house and the passes at
Scully.
I took a half step towards him.
He stiffened in the chair
From the kitchen, Miranda, left too long without amusement,
began to wail like an air raid siren.
"The baby," he said and smiled.
Fuck.
I was on him before he made it halfway across the living
room. That was my first mistake. Years in prison with no
other physical outlet but the weight room had made George
one walking muscle, a muscle with the adrenaline-boosted
strength of the insane. I hit him in the solar plexus and only
managed to hurt my hand for my trouble. He grabbed me
around the neck and slammed me face-first into the doorway
between living room and dining room. I slid, blind with pain,
down to the floor; my mouth filled with broken things that
might have been teeth. I grabbed his ankles and pulled.
George went down in a howl of pain an octave lower than
Miranda's wailing. Kicking at me, he tried to crawl away. I
saw stars, stripes, and heard the 1812 Overture when his
boot caught me in the temple.
"What the fuck is going on?"
Thunderous footsteps tromping from downstairs, Warwick
and Ingveld to the rescue. Hands grabbed me and pulled
me off, I spit out a bloody protest that I was me, but found
myself underneath Ingveld's shapely Teutonic posterior.
"He attacked me," George panted in a fairly good
approximation of my voice.
"No!" I moaned around my torn lips and bleeding tongue,
sounding not entirely human, let alone like myself.
"Shut up," Ingveld warned and twisted my right arm up
behind my back.
I spit blood onto the hardwood floor and struggled against
her, but she was in full Amazon mode and there was little I
could do to budge her.
"Get him upstairs, away from the baby," George instructed.
They pulled me, fighting feebly and getting rugburn for my
troubles, upstairs. Into my bedroom, where George took the
chair from the small desk under the window and put it at the
foot of the bed. I was moaning Miranda's name, unintelligible
even to my own ears.
Duct tape and clothesline, purchased on a whim when I
thought it might be nice to air-dry our clothes sometime, was
brought from the hall closet and Ingveld propped me up in
the chair. George set to work strapping me in. Warwick
vanished for a moment and came back with the shotgun,
which he trained on me with a dishearteningly efficient
manner.
"You fucking bastard, " I choked, "It's me! Goddamnit! It's
me! He's George! I'm Mulder."
"No one's falling for that one," George told me in my own
voice, "fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame
on me."
Warwick nodded in agreement and Ingveld quickly ripped a
modest piece of duct tape and slapped it over my mouth, her
lovely face a portrait in disgust. Holding out his hand,
George accepted the shotgun from Warwick and checked
the shells.
I sobbed against the tape as I watched George head
downstairs, toward the kitchen and Miranda, Warwick and
Ingveld following as placidly as lambs.
"The storm took out the phone lines as well, and Scully and
Williams are out tracking a lead," Warwick told him, "guess
we better call the cops from your cellphone."
"That wouldn't be a good idea," George said with my voice.
The shotgun went off twice. The heavy thud of falling bodies
counterpointed the distant drumming of thunder. More noise,
he was dragging them somewhere, out of the way so that
they wouldn't block the staircase.
Then he was back in the bedroom. I was crying with relief
that he hadn't gotten to Miranda. Yet.
He looked at the gun with disgust and put it down, kicking it
into the hallway well out of my reach. Then he examined his
bloody hands, grimacing, and headed into the master
bathroom, shedding muddy clothes as he went.
The shower lasted only a few minutes, which I spent
struggling fruitlessly with my bonds. George hadn't been a
Boy Scout but he was no stranger to well-tied knots, and I
cursed the Martha Stewart impulse that had led me to buy
the strong plastic line.
He emerged, naked and gleaming. The son of a bitch had
spent most of his time in jail at the gym and he had the kind
of musculature I could have had if I spent hours a day on
weight machines. I felt like the before picture in a Charles
Atlas ad.
In just seven years of hard time, I can make you a man.
But - oh sweet God.
He'd done something to his neck, the mark of Cain; the mark
of the murderer was gone. A wide band of skin had been
peeled away, replaced by an ugly red ring, crusted with
scabs. He'd gone and cut off the prison tattoo, and how he'd
managed to do it without slipping and cutting his own throat
open was an amazement. The pain must have been . . . I
didn't want to think about it. It took the mind of a madman to
mutilate oneself like that.
"It's going to be such a pity," he said, putting his hands on
my shoulders, and I could smell the baby shampoo in his
hair.
"What?" I croaked.
"After your crazed criminal brother killed your woman and
your baby, a broken man, you leave the FBI and are never
heard of again."
The incomprehension must have registered on the ground
beef that was my face.
"You're pretty stupid for someone who's supposed to be so
fucking smart," he added with a feline sneer, "I'll see you in a
few minutes. I just have a ... little ... something to take care
of downstairs."
Miranda. I felt the flesh at my wrists part and blood begin to
flow, but the line was too tight to slip from even with
lubricant.
"Wait," I gargled desperately. Scully and Ralph would know
they'd been tricked, they'd be here shortly. If I could keep
him up here for even a few minutes, Miranda's chances
would improve markedly. "Leave her alone," I begged. "I'll do
anything..."
His face twisted in a predatory sneer, the response of the
alpha wolf when the beta bares its throat to prove its
submission.
"Anything?"
I swallowed more blood. Mine, his, ours, forensics was going
to have a hard time sorting this out when I killed him. In
some versions, Faust gets out of his deal with the devil. My
voice was nonexistent and I only had minimal control of my
fear-loosened bowels. "Anything."
His fingers were hot on my face.
"Don't fight me," he whispered.
Iolokus III: Vix te Agnovi 18/20
These are not natural events, they strengthen
From strange to stranger.
I looked under and around every piece of playground
equipment. The rain increased in intensity as I got more and
more soaked. I jumped when I heard a thunderous noise that
turned out to be, in fact, thunder, and lightning lit the sky in
enormous broken-blood-vessel patterns.
Nothing by the swingset, nothing by the monkey bars or the
twisty slide. Nothing in the pit for the tire swing. Nothing
under the rope hammock and certainly nothing over by the
basketball hoops and the smearing hopscotch and four-
square chalked-in courts. I made a second circuit of the
playground in frustration, but George failed to materialize. I
even flipped open the nearby dumpsters and found neither
George nor any of his victims. I had been less wet during
many baths that I'd taken; you could have used my clothes
to relieve drought in Africa.
My stomach clenched as I realized that it had been a ploy,
something to distract me while he moved on Mulder. I cursed
and jogged back towards the car, where Ralph was waiting.
I couldn't see Ralph standing by the car. I looked around the
perimeter of the fence, and didn't see any stiff man-shaped
figures through the rain.
I was rapidly going from trigger-happy to trigger-delirious.
Looking from side to side with every step I took, I slowly
worked my way back to the car. I didn't go within grabbing
range of the car, but circled it from a safe distance.
Ralph's slumped form awaited me on the far side. I hurried
forward, dropped to my knees and tried to get a look at him
while keeping an eye out for unfriendly visitors.
I could tell how the story went. Naturally, Ralph looked at
George and saw Mulder, the man who could get beaten up
by an eight-year-old child on a crutch and was famous for
same around the Bureau. Had Mulder known he would have
died of shame. Ralph wasn't viscerally aware of the fact that
George was a wall of death underneath those stolen G-man
clothes. Ralph had jumped George. Result: Ralph zero,
George one.
When assaulting men, my suitor was willing to use killing
aids, in this case a knife or similar bladed instrument. I
guessed that he'd used a standard hunting knife, the kind
that could be purchased at any sporting goods store. He'd
come in low, stabbing upwards and penetrating the sternum.
My ER rotation was a distant memory, but I heard a
recording of the attending's voice playing in my head: "A
sucking chest wound is nature's way of telling you to slow
down." Ralph had gotten the message, special delivery.
****
George grabbed the back the desk chair and hauled me
towards the bathroom. The legs of the chair cut grooves in
the carpet.
"You're going to have a brief opportunity to know what it's
like to be hunted and reviled by everyone and I, in turn, will
have an extended time to know what it's like to be a valued
member of society."
I had to have a concussion, which was why none of this was
making sense. Jerk by painful jerk, he continued to drag me
into the bathroom. I didn't care what he ended up doing to
me, really. He could beat me, rape me, and cut off my dick -
whatever - as long as there was enough time for them to get
Miranda out of the house. Scully had to know what was
going on. She had to. She'd pulled my ass out of trouble
worse than this a thousand times, when it was only my own
life on the line. All I had to do was hold out until she showed
up with a grim look in her eye and her Sig in her hand, an
avenging angel in size six pumps.
Just don't take too long this time - please?
"If you behave yourself, I won't kill the baby - I'll turn her
over to your mother - our mother to raise."
It wasn't much of an incentive, but I was counting the
minutes so I nodded. This seemed to satisfy George and he
crouched next to me in the shower. With quick and efficient
strokes, he cut the wash line away from my body as well as
the duct tape. Then he used my own belt to lash my hands
to the showerhead.
"You're such a fucking pussy," he sneered and turned the
hot water on full.
Half of my brain shrieked back to Scully being torn in two by
Jason in the shower in Texas, the other half of my brain
decided that I deserved it.
The water hit me full in the face gagging me on a mixture of
my own blood and hot water. I coughed and George
punched me in the gut to silence me. While the water
blinded me and filled my eyes and probably broken nose, he
set to work with his knife, slicing away at my clothes with
smooth efficiency. This must have been the way that he
undressed his victims once they were dead. When I was
finally naked and vulnerable, he shut off the water.
What happened next shouldn't have surprised me, I really
should have seen it coming. It only made sense, to a
madman. The knife kissed the back of my neck where the
hair is sparse and fine as Miranda's. The kiss was insistent
and became an ungodly pain. I snuffled against my own
biceps and tried not to scream as he began to strip the skin
away from my neck, in a duplicate of his own mutilation.
Yeah, it hurt. It hurt like nothing else I'd ever felt, the
deliberateness of inch by inch slicing away the skin down to
the muscle. Warm blood ran down my shoulders and chest,
splattering on my feet and the shower wall. Slowly and
carefully he continued, humming that same fucking song
under his breath. I couldn't look at him; I didn't want to know
if George was finding this sexually arousing. Many serial
killers do find sexual pleasure in pain and mutilation rather
than in what is considered sexual behavior. In an odd way, I
was breaking his pattern; he didn't usually mutilate other
men.
"Why?" I asked on a gasp of air.
"Why?" he echoed, his breath close enough to sear the raw
nerves on my neck, "because I *like* you. M - I - C- K -E -
Y. . ."
"Cut the shit George, you might as well tell me since you're
going to kill me anyway."
"It's rather Freudian, actually," he said in a dismissive tone
that I'd used when going over a profile with novice agents.
God, did I really sound like a sanctimonious know-it-all?
"My mother, God rest her soul, was what you might call a
woman of carnal appetite. When she was entertaining her
men friends, I got to stay in the cellar. A very small and dark
place. No washroom," he continued as he nonchalantly
continued to skin my neck, "and if I made a mess, she made
me eat it. And her boyfriend's cocks if that's what they
wanted."
"Classic," I groaned.
"You got to stay with our mother and had every advantage.
Did you ever have to eat shit, Fox?"
His hand yanked at my hair, wrenching my head back. I
opened my watering eyes and stared back into a cracked
mirror of my own face.
It hurt too much to speak, he had carved away all along the
back of my neck and was working towards my Adam's apple,
where the skin was thinner, where I was already burned from
Scully's mouth.
Any time now, Scully.
"Did you ever have a man cram his cock in your mouth?" he
asked in a poisonous whisper, "Jam your head up and
down, making you suck his dick even though it gagged you?
Did you ever have a sweaty stranger shoot his wad in your
mouth and have to swallow it?"
Kind of made Tina and Bill sound like ideal parents.
No wonder. Not that it excused any of his actions, but at
least it explained some of them.
"I'm sorry," I choked.
"It's too fucking late."
I must have passed out through most of it because the next
series of sensations were enough to bring Elvis back from
the dead. He used a brush and bleach to clean the forensic
evidence away from the shower stall and my body, rinsing
every shred of evidence away with hot water. Through a red
frost of pain I watched him take the strips of skin that had
been part of my neck and flush them down the toilet.
****
The big man was breathing raggedly but I couldn't see any
blood on his lips, which was at least the absence of a bad
sign. I didn't have the right materials -- I wasn't in the habit of
carrying around three-point pressure bandages now that
Mulder was gone from the X Files -- so I had to fake it with
my jacket.
I had a bad moment when I realized that unless I underwent
a sudden mutation that added a limb, I would not be able to
keep my gun out, hold the jacket on Ralph, and also call for
an ambulance. Ralph weighed a ton, I didn't have the
hysterical strength to move him, and he was going to die if I
just waited for George to return.
I put the gun down and dialed emergency. Nine-one-one is
my fourth speed dial. Pressing the phone between my
shoulder and my chin, I retrieved the gun and scanned
around again. With the dispatcher in my ear and the rain all
around, I wouldn't hear George if he came up on me. I could
only hope that at this point I'd be able to smell him.
The rain was falling faster now as I pressed down on Ralph's
chest, trying just to keep him from bleeding out until the
ambulance arrived. They were going to have trouble
navigating in the blacked-out streets as were the Arlington
Police and the team from the Bureau who would accompany
them. I hoped someone had a good map or lived close
enough to know the twists and turns of the suburbs.
Sirens, off in the distance, unnatural over the pounding of
the rain. George had stabbed Ralph a while ago. He could
be at the house already. No one picked up on the main line
or Mulder's new cellphone.
Lightning cracked and on the wet grass next to Ralph's head
I saw a vision of Miranda, complete with high chair. My hand
slipped and he groaned.
She couldn't be...George hadn't had time--I blinked and saw
the inside of the house, Mulder trapped and George
grinning, this time I did not hesitate in distinguishing the two.
"He's in the house, Ralph," I said into his ear. Ralph blinked.
"Can you...hold this down?" I brought his big limp hand over
his chest and placed it over mine. Several agonizing
seconds passed before I felt pressure, not a lot but probably
enough to keep the improvised bandage in place.
"I have to go now, Ralph. Please try to hold on...they'll be
here soon." The emergency whine was getting louder, a few
blocks away at most. I had to believe he'd be safe. He
nodded, tough linebacker to the core.
"You're bad news, girl, you try to kill everyone you work
with?" he whispered.
"I try not to," I said, "hang on."
Turning the key in the ignition didn't start the car; George
had obviously done something to the car and I didn't have
time to determine what, so I got out of the car and began to
run.
****
My knees gave out and George had to drag me out of the
shower stall. He flopped me on the bed and set about
dressing the two of us.
I watched him towel-dry his hair, then use a fresh towel to
dry the rest of his body. Deodorant, a dash of cologne at the
base of the neck. I felt an uncomfortable warmth rise as I
watched the hard body of my workout fantasies pull out the
dresser drawers.
"You know, you've really let yourself go," he said as he
pulled on my most comfortable old jeans and FBI sweatshirt,
complete with formula stains, "you used to be such a sharp
dresser."
He looked as though the declasse clothes pained him as
much as the bleach burned the abraded and cut skin on my
body. I was lightheaded with pain and blood loss and there
was little I could do but lay passive and watch him.
He dressed me in gray Calvin Klein boxer-briefs and an
undershirt, then an Italian cotton shirt with French cuffs.
Every movement hurt, I welcomed the pain. It reminded me
who I was: victim, loser - but not George.
He spent a few minutes choosing cufflinks and ended up
with my Oxford pair. Show-off, I thought, and he shot me a
lemon-sour glare. "Some of us aren't used to all these
advantages," he snarled and turned to the tie rack.
He picked out one of my Hermes ties, the one with a pattern
of tiny pomegranate-colored wolves against a forest-like
background of eggplant, deep blue, and pine green. When
he brought it over to me, I was sure that he was going to
strangle me (auto-erotic asphyxiation, my mind whispered),
but he simply held it up against my chin, checking the color
scheme I suppose. He bent and I felt his carrion breath moist
in my ear.
"After I retire from the Bureau, I'm going to use my
inheritance to fund a mission of retribution. I'm going to hunt
down and kill everyone who was even peripherally involved
in the crimes against us. Do you think I wanted to be this
way? How do you think it feels to find out that your bitch
queen of a mother wasn't even your mother, that you were
farmed out to her just to see what would happen? You ought
to thank me for doing what you don't have the balls to do."
"Let me go," I choked, "and I promise I'll be one vengeful
motherfucker." He breathed a laugh, torrid against my
earlobe, and he was gone again, throwing the tie on the bed
as I gagged on blood. Returning to the walk-in closet, he
emerged holding my one remaining unstained good suit.
God damn it. Now I was going to bleed all over it.
He pushed my rubbery legs into the pants, taking only a few
seconds to figure out the closures, and tucked in the shirt.
Knotting the tie gave him some trouble, but he finally
produced a decent version.
I knew how Miranda felt.
But my brother was holding me up like I was drunk to infinity
and beyond while he put me in the jacket. I had to admit it
was a lovely suit, dark with a subtle pinstripe. Dizzy and
punch-drunk, I contemplated its beauty. The threads of the
stripe were almost silver if you looked closely, but it wasn't
flashy at all from a distance. Single-breasted, for that slim
runner's look. The only problem with the suit was that both
waist and ankle holsters ruined the line, but I wasn't armed.
Pity.
Finally it was time for socks, standard black wool, and black
leather Bruno Maglis. Honestly, I bought them before the
Simpson trial and I had no reason to be embarrassed.
He settled the jacket on my shoulders, tugged at the cuffs,
and smiled.
"You're going to make a beautiful corpse."
"You forgot the wedding ring," I said, my probably broken
nose and shattered teeth giving me the ludicrous
pronunciation of a man with a bad head cold.
"You've got no right to wear it, do you?" He smirked. "What
room do you want to die in?"
Now would be good, Scully.
Iolokus III: Vix te Agnovi 19/20
Stand fast, good Fate, to his hanging, make the rope of his
destiny our cable, for his own doth little advantage. If he be
not born to be hang'd, our case is miserable.
I ran through blackened backyards like Matthew Broderick at
the end of Ferris Bueller's Day Off. I tripped over something
and landed face-down in the mud, losing a shoe in the
process and wrenching an ankle. Cursing against the pain
that shot up from the wounded joint, I got up and staggered
forward, branches whipping me in the face, rain pounding
through my hair to my scalp. The trenches Frohike and the
others had dug in the backyard of Mulder's house were
almost welcome, although a trial to navigate between flashes
of lightning. Why did this kind of thing never happen on a
bright and sunny day? There had to be a rule in the
Psychotics International Handbook that forbade making a
stand in clement weather.
My security code didn't work. It had been changed since I'd
last left. The front door was locked, the back door was
locked, and the garage door was locked. Damn Mulder and
his security! I stumbled around to the side of the house,
testing my memory of the layout until I came to the laundry
room windows. I took off my remaining shoe and used it to
punch in the glass, which set the alarm system into Defcon
Three Mode. Not that the automated call-in to the police
station would do much good at this point, if George had even
left the phone lines intact. Anyway, the alarm was barely
audible over the torrential rain. I was beginning to wonder if
God had broken his promise to Noah.
Glass cut into my arm as I broke away the shards with my
Nine West pump, and I had liked those shoes, too. I
managed to hoist myself up and squeeze through the small
window frame, one of the few advantages of being of less
than average stature. More glass chewed on my skin as I
slid onto the top of the washer. Leaving a telltale black trail
of mud and blood behind me, I dropped to the floor and
cradled my gun in steady hands.
Simple. No-brainer. Small house. One man. Just another
training exercise.
Except for the pathetic choking sobs of the baby in the
background. Not a baby, mine.
Shit.
I tripped over the bodies in the hallway between the laundry
room and the kitchen. Flashes of light revealed Warwick
and his leggy girlfriend piled up like stuffed animals thrown in
a corner. I felt around, my fingers contacting sticky blood.
He had a thready pulse and a gunshot wound to the
shoulder. She - I couldn't tell where she'd been hit, and I
jumped so far that my back slammed into the opposite wall
when she moved.
"He's here," she slurred, like the cheap talent imported from
Poland to keep the cost of the B-grade movie down. "He
tricked us - Vox - upstairs -"
I nodded. "Get out of here. The police are on the way. Tell
them that Miranda is still in here." A swarm of bullets held no
terror for me, but I couldn't let some cop kill her, thinking that
he was just taking out a madman.
She got her long, long legs underneath her and staggered to
her feet. Her lover's blood stained her tank top, making it
cling even more tightly. She cast one last glance down at
him. "He'll be all right," I lied, wadding his jean shirt over the
wound to slow the bleeding a little. "Go."
She skittered down the hallway, towards the garage.
Miranda's cries stopped.
My stomach gave a dizzy lurch - like an airplane hitting
turbulence and dropping several thousand feet.
Calm, Dana, stay calm.
The kitchen was slashed with moving black shadows from
the trees' bacchanal outside. Zippy's loaned shotgun lay on
the table and the smell of cordite burned my nose, I scanned
the room as quickly as possible, the high chair lay on the
ground, and half the cupboards were open. What had
George been looking for? Something to season his latest
human meal with? He had to know that there wasn't time to
prepare a late-night cannibalistic snack. Then again,
reasoning with a Mulder was not unlike climbing a glass wall.
Something scuttled across the floor, making me jump. The
cat, the cat that Mulder and Warwick fed and let in the
garage in bad weather. George must have come in through
the garage, and the cat followed. Smart animal, she wanted
to get in from the rain.
I was too enthralled with the cat to see the shadow move
until it was entirely too late. The gun was smashed out of
my hand and my entire body slammed into the refrigerator,
alphabet magnets rained to the floor as I looked up into his
face.
His face, their face, the face.
Oh God it had to be George, but--
Are you lonesome tonight,
do you miss me tonight?
Wet hair, sloppy sweatshirt, smelling of babies and warmth?
No.
"Hey baby, I knew you'd come back to me," George said and
gave me one of Mulder's charming smiles.
Thank God.
His smell changed as he stepped closer and I saw the red
line of grade A chuck peeking over the top of the shirt. The
odor almost drove me to my knees. Blood and sweat and rot
- he smelled like a gravedigger, like death itself, underneath
Mulder's new father smell. I was flattened against the
refrigerator like a paper doll with his fingers digging into my
arms, his thighs flat against mine, and the barbed hardness
of his evil erection digging into my stomach like a knife. I
would cut my own throat before I let him violate me as his
brother had. I tried to knee him in the groin, but my legs
were too well pinned. He slammed me against the
refrigerator door again to assert his dominance.
"You were waiting for me in the office, weren't you?" he
asked, his breath rank on my face like a jackal's.
"No."
He leaned his face down to mine, so the clean-shaven skin
of his expensive-smelling face scraped against my cheek
and his tongue brushed the bruises on my neck. Part of my
mind shivered and curled into a fetal ball.
Are you sorry we drifted apart?
Does your memory stray to a brighter sunny day
When I kissed you and called you sweetheart?
"You want me."
What is it about every man, sane or not, that makes them
think that a woman is only interested in the protrusion of
muscle and erectile tissue hanging between their legs? Give
me a break, a vibrator can give the same results with half the
complications. To be fair, though, I hadn't exactly rejected
his attentions as firmly as Paula Jones dissed Bill Clinton.
But I knew what I wanted now. "Not if you were the last
homicidal maniac on the face of the planet," I assured him
and slammed my skull into his as though he were a soccer
ball.
Yes it hurt, but it hurt him more than me and he staggered
back across the kitchen. I kicked him in the solar plexus and
he grunted, shaking his head like a stunned bull in the ring.
My hands scrabbled across the countertop, feeling for
something that would serve as a weapon. Baby bottles
spilled to the floor as George roared with pain and rage and
came back at me. I stabbed him in an outstretched hand
with a fork, which only made him roar louder and slam his
uninjured fist into my face. The drying rack went down with
me and I hit the linoleum in a cascade of breaking glasses
and bouncing baby dishes. I rolled through the glass and
silverware, trying to escape, my face screaming in pain,
while I struggled against the six-foot plus man on top of me.
There was no contest; his weight crushed me into the floor
and the broken dishes while his hands homed in on the
choker of bruises around my throat. I wasn't going to stand
passively this time, I yowled curses at him as long as I had
breath, and clawed at his face the best that I could.
A screech, loud, shrill, and almost preternatural, cut the
thunder and George gave out a high yelp of pain. The feral
black cat had attached its claws into the thin skin of his scalp
and forehead like a flying demon. It hissed and wailed,
drawing thin lines of blood on his face. I dropped my hands
to the floor and my fingers closed on a good-sized shard of
dinner plate. George batted the cat free from his head and it
vanished into the darkness of the kitchen with another yowl
for good measure.
"You bitch, you fucking bitch," he choked and grabbed for
my throat again.
Shard of plate in my hands, I sliced upwards, aiming for the
line of raw red flesh.
It rained blood.
George writhed off of me, grabbing at the puncture
underneath his chin, his breath bubbling through its new
blowhole, unable to scream with his mouth fountaining blood
above and below. His feet pounded against the floor as he
struggled for breath. Something fell down in the other room
with an almighty crash, but since George was still somewhat
alive, I sat up and watched him rather than investigate. My
arms and legs were like wet string as I pulled myself into a
crouch and looked down into George's eyes, saw the fear,
saw the realization that he was beaten, and rolled it in my
mouth like sweet candy.
Maybe I could have done something to save his life, if I'd had
the proper instruments, but I didn't. I also didn't have any
witnesses, save for the cat, and it wasn't going to give
evidence. I'd killed hundreds of unborn mutant fetuses, so
what was a serial killer?
In the silence between thunderclaps, I heard Miranda start
howling again, as if she had known that the Big Bad Wolf
was dying. The howling was surprisingly loud. I looked
around the kitchen again and didn't see any baby. I did,
however, see the cat slide into one of the cabinets under the
microwave. My various hurts screaming in protest, I crawled
across the floor. Reaching into the cabinet, I touched fur,
and then fabric. Behind a Jell-O mold, Miranda was sitting
upright next to the cat, her face scrunched into a pink knot of
misery and howling like Pavarotti on a bad day.
"Come on sweetie," I rasped in my new voice, "mamma's
here."
I caught her by the front of her romper and eased her out of
the cabinet. Once I had her out, I plopped her in my muddy
bloody lap, my nose twitching at the smell of dirty diaper,
strong enough to raise the dead. She looked up at me with
wide eyes before stuffing a fist in her mouth and going limp
against my chest, humming to herself. The cat sat next to
me, its eyes slightly more yellow than Miranda was, and
gave me an assessing look before beginning to wash its
paws.
I heard the banging noise again. Warwick, I thought, and
rose on rubber-band legs. Warwick was alive, barely, and I
grabbed a freshly laundered shirt from the basket in the
hallway to wad against his damaged shoulder. Propped up
against the wall to slow blood flow, he'd survive until the
ambulance arrived.
Miranda wailed, wanting to be changed. I picked her back up
and returned to the kitchen.
George was gone, blood spoor leading out the doorway to
the main hallway and the living room. I couldn't put Miranda
down - literally, I was clinging to her like superglue. I picked
my way through the shattered china on bloody bare feet and
found my Sig. Despite George's earlier snide remarks, a
Snugli would have been a big help to free my left hand.
God, where was Ingveld the Valkyrie?
The wet red trail extended through to the living room. I knew
I should probably be outside, gibbering with fear and
handing Miranda to someone who could keep her safe, but
that was no longer an option. George and I had a
rendezvous with destiny.
We crossed the hallway, waiting for the attack, any George-
noise obscured by Miranda's whimpers. She was working
herself back up to full-fledged screaming, but wasn't quite
there yet.
Into the living room, where I swung the gun along the path of
crimson splashes to target the figure silhouetted in the door
to our right, staggering down from the steps.
I was two ounces of pressure from firing when I realized that
it was Mulder, his face battered and black with blood,
incongruously dressed in a suit and tie. George's chameleon
attire suddenly made more sense -- he'd been planning to
pull a switcheroo, with no one left alive who could reliably
distinguish him from the object of his affections.
"Well -- shit," Mulder said in a thick voice.
He sagged against the doorframe, looking around with dumb
amazement. Miranda homed in on Mulder and stared at
him. She pushed against me and took her fist out of her
mouth, reaching toward Mulder.
"Da," she said.
A crooked smile split his beaten face.
Red and blue lights from the front driveway exploded the
night like fireworks.
Mulder collapsed as George hit him from behind like a
truckload of cement. In a beautiful arc like synchronized
swimmers they dove behind that damned Ikea sofa. I
couldn't see them, they were on the other side of the couch
from me, and I couldn't hear them because men were yelling
through bullhorns outside.
Gun in hand, I stepped over to the couch and pried Miranda
off, shoving her ungently under the end table, which had a
baby-sized space as if it had been designed for cover under
fire. She squawked and then went silent.
I couldn't hear anything from the brothers over the din of the
cops outside, and so I just held my gun out and stalked
towards the other side of the couch.
They were squirming. In the pulsing light from the squad
cars they looked half-merged, like the kind of thing you'd find
in the booth next to the Enigma. Siamese twins joined at the
torso, hands clutching at each other's blood-slick throats.
This time I could tell the difference easily, but at the angle I
had any shot would tear through both of them. There's
something to be said for low-power ammunition -- though not
much.
The men outside were insisting that they'd fire on anyone
who made a move. I believed them. They could see
someone holding a weapon, they warned, and a wheel
turned in my mind. That was me. They were going to fire at
me in a minute if I didn't put the gun down.
Both of them looked up at me as I realized this fact, still
unable to lower my arms.
"Mulder..." I croaked, and George pushed him into the
carpet, slamming his head hard enough to keep him down
for a bit, and staggered upright, his arms extended like
Frankenstein's monster. Mulder groaned and went
gelatinous on the floor.
"It's all right," he gargled, and threw himself on me as the
first shotgun blast sounded in my ears. I collapsed to the
ground, borne down by George's weight. Guns went off like
popcorn, and I felt George's body shudder and thrust on top
of me in a grotesque parody of intercourse.
The noise stopped. Or maybe I just passed out.
Iolokus III: Vix te Agnovi 20/20
Now I will believe that there are unicorns.
Ralph Williams died.
He coded on the table. His big linebacker's heart couldn't
take the insult of being stabbed by a pseudo-Canadian.
Scully cried at the funeral. When I put my arm around her
shoulders it remained attached to the rest of my body. She
even leaned into me a little, until I winced and she let up.
Julie Graff sat with on my other side and didn't mention that
Scully and I had killed Ralph. Skinner was not so kind. I
appreciated his willingness to treat me like a competent adult
and not a circus freak. I also appreciated his decision not to
put an official reprimand in Scully's file, since Ralph was the
only agent around at the time and she'd done her level best
to get appropriate backup.
Warwick was luckier than Ralph. He was recovering in his
bedroom. Ingveld was experiencing serious survivor's guilt
and would not let him even hold his own utensils, though she
let him use the keyboard that she rigged just for his use in
bed. This kind of thing either destroyed a relationship or
cemented it; I truly hoped that it was the latter for them.
Zippy recovered slowly, aided by a pert young home-care
nurse who, after the first week, would have done the job for
free just to bask in Zippy's thousand-watt smile. The famous
charm was working again, after a long dry spell, and I was
pretty sure she wouldn't be leaving when the insurance
stopped paying for her to come. I mean, when it stopped
paying for her to look after his medical-care needs. Hey, if I
had known that being attacked by a dinosaur was such a
chick magnet, I would have done a half-gainer into a
stegosaurus years ago.
Scully grumbled as the X Files languished. Given the
damage to her feet from her imbroglio in the kitchen, she
wasn't going to be running anywhere even in flats for a while.
Which meant she'd be easier to catch, but I was in no shape
to chase.
On the plus side, her scars -- the ones on her epidermis --
were going to be minimal, her throat was fine, and she'd
even been promised that she wouldn't have a bump in her
nose to match mine. As for me, things weren't going to get
worse (nose-wise), and I guess that's all that one could hope
for. With the matching splints on our noses, we looked like
we'd gotten a group rate on plastic surgery. Rhinoplasty!
Buy one get one free! Worse, Miranda was convinced that
we'd had these fabulously neat toys attached to our faces
just for her amusement, and she divided her time between
trying to play with the bandages and skittering around in her
walker like a rocket ship. She was the fastest person in the
family (family?) at the moment; the two of us were still
hobbling in pain.
The doctors also assured me that, in a few months, I would
be ready for plastic surgery to make my neck look more
normal. In the interim I was wearing lots of turtlenecks, even
though the stormy spring had given way to standard
Washington sauna weather and despite the fact that putting
them on felt like it broke my much-abused schnozz anew
each morning. Vanity, thy name is Mulder. That was one of
the other things that had seemed to breed true in the
experiment - narcissism.
The day after the funeral, Skinner dropped by and laid a
minefield between Scully and me as efficiently as the U.S.
Army in the Korean DMZ.
He'd begun innocently enough, having appeared on our
doorstep to chew Scully out for rushing into the fray without
sufficient backup. Having the lecture take place in the
privacy of my own study didn't make it any more fun, but at
least Kimberly didn't get to watch us slink in and out. Scully
actually listened to him as he droned on, while I just watched
and wondered what he'd think if he knew what usually
happened on the couch he was occupying. Finally he was
out of gas, and that was where the trouble began.
Skinner took his glasses off and rubbed his temples, staring
at a ninety-degree angle away from us in our matching
swivel chairs. Then he delivered a speech that had me
twisting in well-concealed agony from his first words.
"Agents," he said, with stiffness that might have indicated a
rehearsed speech or might simply have been second nature
to him after all those years in command, "I was unaware of
the true circumstances surrounding Agent Mulder's transfer,
and I understand the reasons for your circumspection.
Please be assured that I will treat your confidences with the
utmost discretion. I'm hopeful that your current status
indicates some resolution of the outstanding issues between
the two of you."
I twitched and Scully breathed carefully, the way she always
does when she's preparing for combat. "Sir, with all due
respect, this conversation is touching on matters that cannot
be of legitimate interest to the Bureau. I look forward to
resuming my regular duties as soon as medically feasible." I
wanted to cheer. See, you tight-assed bastard, Scully took
the same damn course on Orwellian newspeak as you.
"The issue, Agent Scully, goes beyond the momentary
objective and relates to the long-term success of the X Files
division in revealing and halting the high-level deceptions
we've struggled so long against. You need to be able to
focus on the work."
"What does that mean, sir, that a child is too much of a
distraction?" I could have carved the words into the floor with
the icicles hanging in the air from her words.
He sighed again and worked his shoulders back with the
careful motions of one who spends too much time at a desk.
"I don't personally believe that Bureau members, particularly
section heads, should have their loyalties divided by such
time-intensive commitments. But I'm aware that the situation
in which you find yourself is highly unusual, and I would not
fault you for whatever resolution you find acceptable." His
voice lowered and he looked at her, ignoring me completely.
"I want you back on the job one hundred percent, Agent
Scully, and frankly I don't care if you and Mulder get sex
change operations and convert to Tibetan Buddhism so long
as you maintain your dedication to the X Files. Your family
drama is important as a sign of the abuses of power by the
men we seek to expose, but it is not the end of the story."
Sometime during Skinner's speech she'd risen from her chair
and was standing directly in front of him, hands on hips. I
don't think she was consciously aware of how close her right
hand was to her holster. "With all due respect, sir, I think I've
spent the past few months proving that I understand exactly
that. I didn't decide to make George Naxos the center of my
work or my life."
Skinner stood as well. I had no desire to join them. In fact I
was considering hanging a sign around my neck that said
'noncombatant'. The Marines usually honored the Geneva
Convention, right? My former boss blundered on like a train
about to run off its rails. "I'm aware that many recent events
have been beyond your control. But you seemed . . . very
affected, perhaps even overwhelmed, when I saw you last
week."
"I deal with what happened to me every day, sir. I deal with
the fact that I have been abducted, experimented upon, my
body violated and children of my body created without my
consent. I deal with the fact that some of those children died
horrible deaths. I deal with the fact that I was given cancer
from those experiments and that I could go out of remission
any day if whoever is responsible for the chip in my neck
decides to turn it off. I deal with the fact that I was raped and
that my rapist created the child I'm now responsible for. If
this series of events didn't bother me just a little I suspect I
would be clinically insane. Don't mistake my pain for
inattention to duty, sir. If it upsets you, I suggest that you not
ask the questions you don't want answered."
She left the study. He didn't object.
Skinner wasn't my immediate superior anymore, but I was
nonetheless aware that it would be imprudent to ask him if
he was satisfied now.
He rubbed the back of his neck and sighed once, loudly.
Well, my neck hurt too, and I couldn't work up much
sympathy. "Sometimes I wonder -- only a person who is
good and true can fight these interlocking conspiracies, but
the battle itself seems destined to eliminate all the light from
that person's soul."
"Do you think I made a mistake, leaving the X Files?" I
shouldn't be surprised that his opinion mattered to me. I had
a severe shortage of admirable paternal figures in my
background. And he'd dealt to save Scully, proving that he
had a touch of Don Quixote in him, which I had to respect.
"I can't presume to judge, Mulder. But you must know that
there are two worlds in this household. You're going to have
to decide if they can coexist without destroying each other. If
you don't decide, the choice may be taken from you."
With those reassuring thoughts he departed. I found Scully
in the bedroom, unearthing toys from the crevices and
corners into which they'd migrated, straightening up with the
tears running down her face. I took a Disney rabbit from her
hands and drew her down onto the bed. She pressed her
face into my sore ribcage and moaned; she'd used up all her
words with Skinner. We rocked ourselves to sleep, and I
dreamt that George's tattoo reappeared on my throat after
the surgery but that I was the only one who could see it.
Everyone else thought I was the same as ever, except for
Miranda who pointed at my throat and giggled. There's a
reason Scully and I rarely speak of our dreams.
The good news was that Scully still hadn't made any move to
leave. We'd had a bad moment the following morning when
she couldn't find her favorite blue shoes and she'd realized
that they were in Annapolis. The look of panic on her face
meant that she was thinking about fleeing back to Maryland,
with the excuse that this household was already overloaded
with people in need of care. I'd distracted her by bringing
Miranda in; the Mooselet could "walk" in a drunken salesman
path if you held her hands up in the air and I'd helped her
crash into Scully's legs. Scully was comfortable enough with
her now to scoop her up and airplane her, landing on the
bed and bouncing with her, shoes forgotten.
****
I only stayed with Mulder, Miranda, Warwick, and Ingveld
because they needed someone with medical training in the
house. Casa Mulder was like a rehabilitation facility for the
strangely injured. But I knew it was dangerous for me to
stay. Dangerously easy.
My dangerous liason was sitting with me in the kitchen as we
waited for morning coffee to boil. Mulder was working from
home full-time while Warwick was laid up, and I was learning
how to telecommute; I wasn't willing to let either Mulder or
Miranda out of earshot for more than a few hours at a time
until recent events faded somewhat. I was disgruntled
because, without the matching shoes, my one remaining
clean work suit was useless and I'd have to make the quick
trip to the Hoover building dressed like a slob. Mulder hissed
as the stray, who was now living indoors with us, jumped on
to his lap, claws extended.
I shuffled over to the refrigerator and extracted a grapefruit
to follow the cereal and toast I'd already absorbed. "Hungry
much, Scully?"
"I'm *healing*," I said petulantly. "That takes energy.
Calories. Fuel for the body's miraculous engines."
"You must be getting some pretty low mileage," he said. I
refused to give him the satisfaction and pulled out a
grapefruit spoon. The silverware had Christina Mulder's
initials engraved on it, I noticed.
Mulder didn't let me eat in peace long. "What do you think
we should name her?" He was cooing disgustingly over the
cat, petting it with the gooey sappiness of a man in love. It
made me a little ill.
"Mulder, are you aware that the cat is male?" I carefully
scraped the last clinging fragments of fruit from the white
zest shell.
He looked surprised. "But it's so small --"
"Personal experience to the contrary, gender dimorphism is
not terribly pronounced in most mammals. Also, Mulder, this
cat can't be more than eight or nine months old. Look how
it's expanded in the past few weeks now that you're feeding
it."
His hands never stilled on the cat's coat, which was growing
out faster than my roots. It looked as if the scrawny stray
was going to be a longhair, even though it had been
practically bald when we'd first met.
He didn't take the opportunity to comment on my own
expansion, also related to Mulder's nesting instincts. I was
almost not underweight and my bras were beginning to fit
again. He held the cat up in the air, lifting it with his hands
under its shoulderblades; it looked at him with measured
disdain. "All right then, what will we call him?"
"Spike?" I suggested.
"Hell Toupee wouldn't be bad, given his recent performance
with George."
I gave the requisite frown-and-eyebrow combo, and he
grinned, then winced as the motion pulled sore muscles.
The pathetic thing was that rather than resuming our carnal
activities at night, all we'd done was Raggedy Ann and Andy
cuddling. It hurt too much for anything else. Sleeping
together without sex was pleasant, but the broken-nose
snoring was not. The cat even snored as he slept on the
valley between our pillows.
"He keeps getting bigger every day."
"Yeah, he's turning into a real Catzilla."
I just looked at Mulder, knowing that he'd found the name; he
knew it too and winked. I supposed that it was better than
Velvet Elvis. At least at the vet he'd discover that pets are
known by their names and their owners' last names; I
wondered how he'd react when they called for "Catzilla
Mulder."
Hell, he'd probably be proud.
The doorbell rang. Mulder was complacently stroking the cat
and made no move to get up. Even though my feet still hurt
from the glass explosion on the kitchen floor, I let him have
his moment of contentment and went to answer the door.
My mother smiled thinly at me through the fisheyed
peephole.
"Mom," I said stupidly as I opened the door. The spring
storms had passed and the rain pattering gently on her
parka was almost light enough to be unnoticeable. She
stepped in and I reset the alarm.
"Honey, we need to talk."
This phrase had a power like no other to turn my stomach
and send my mood down to China.
"Things are a little hectic around here," I explained, full of
shame, as I led her back into the kitchen. Warwick was
recovering in luxury down in his apartment, and he hadn't
been up to cleaning anything yet. As neither Mulder nor I
could even identify the average household cleaning product
except when used as part of an intriguing method of killing,
this meant that blood and mud were everywhere,
indistinguishable from one another, crusted on floors, walls,
and even a spatter up on the ceiling.
The various bullet holes made one wall of the living room
look like a modern art installation. Even the indestructible
Ikea couch now appeared a little lopsided, since there was a
big black dried-blood patch upsetting the geometry of the
pattern. I'd scraped up most of the gore that absolutely could
not be mistaken for dirt, and that was all the housecleaning I
could tolerate. There are some things you just don't ask
guests to do. Mulder had at least gotten the front windows
replaced and we were going to have a crime-scene cleaning
specialist come in as soon as he was willing to trust
strangers in the house -- I was thinking 2010 or so.
The kitchen wasn't much better than the living room, though
I'd managed to soak some paper towels and scrape the
worst of the blood off the floor. The walls were almost surely
a loss; I thought maybe the best thing would be to give
Miranda some crayons and tell her to go for it.
I automatically went to the coffeemaker to start another pot.
Mom watched me, evaluating, and I felt like she'd seen my
report card and was about to explain to me where I'd failed.
Mom and Mulder exchanged grunts that might have qualified
as greetings if you were being generous.
I took a deep breath. "So, what's going on?"
The doorbell rang again. We looked at each other; Mulder
wasn't going to wait in the kitchen without me, so he and I
both trotted out this time, the cat twining around his feet. He
opened the door and I stood behind him, my hand on my
gun where our visitor couldn't see it.
"Dana Scully and Fox Mulder?" The man wearing a
nondescript business suit could have been a functionary for
any one of the conspiracies we've encountered over the
years.
"In general," Mulder replied.
He smiled and handed each of us an envelope. "Consider
yourself served. Have a nice day."
I looked stupidly down at the thick yellow paper. Mulder
opened his and didn't blow up, so I followed.
"My god," he said.
My letter was short and to the point. I could only assume that
his was as well.
Bill and Tara were suing us for custody of Miranda. I, they
alleged, had abandoned her, demonstrating my unfitness,
and continued association with me in my unstable state
would be detrimental to her development. Mulder was not
her biological father and was also unfit, given his history of
mental impairments. We were summoned to court next
Monday, for appointment of a guardian ad litem for Miranda
and scheduling of home visits by an independent expert who
would evaluate the suitability of Miranda's environment. The
custody hearing would follow thereafter.
"That's why Mom's here," I said dazedly. "What are we--?"
"It gets worse," he said, as if commenting on the weather.
"Hunh?"
He pointed to the signature on the bottom, below Bill and
Tara's. "That's the lawyer from the firm that handled Jason's
affairs. The firm that did the legal defense for Roush."
End.
(heh, heh)
Author's notes:
Rivka says: Sally eternally challenges me to take the
characters places they haven't gone, and this time was no
exception. So, this is our version of Snugglebunnies, via the
Tempest. Are we going soft in our dotage? Inquiring minds
want to know.
Sally says: The challenge, as ever, was to take the tired old
chestnuts (evil twin and Mulder and Scully have a baby) and
try to look at them in a new (if jaundiced) light. As ever,
without Rivka prodding me, none of this would have been
possible. And to all the kids who awarded me a "black belt in
babysitting" .
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