************
Chapter 16
************

Village Inn, Aubrey
November 8, 2000
1:28 p.m.

"Tell me *your* theory," he murmurs, attempting to breech
Scully's guarded exterior.  Mulder-style, he stirs reaction
from her with an enigmatic spoon she can't evade, by pulling
for an opinion she's reluctant to formulate on demand.

Though they sit at a corner table, she feels this is still
too public a place for such shenanigans.  Mulder might think
differently, but Scully knows that her tender sensibilities
beg to recover and she regrets that he didn't turn the car
toward their motel if he had something secretive to discuss.
Instead, when the coroner finally delivered her to the
police station, Mulder blocked her entrance and led her back
to their rented Corolla.

There, he placed the tiny white house in her lap, watching
her reaction while steering them toward a new restaurant for
lunch.  In monotone he described a shortened version of what
took place between himself and the boy in Tillman's office.

She needs food right now, not his foolishness.  Time alone,
not a test in which she's expected to churn out a quick
answer for him on the spot.  "Think fast --" Something her
brothers used to shout while zipping her the rock-hard
baseball across the backyard.  "Heads up, Dana!"  And she
would learn to snag whatever they threw her way or suffer
the consequences.

"Tell me your theory..." What her partner is doing now,
expecting her to mentally scramble and react to his split-
second questioning.  This time she thinks risking a penalty
might be preferable to going after the ball.

After the waiter retreats with their order, Scully sets the
small Lego house to the side of her placemat, fingers
releasing it with slow, deliberate calm.

"This isn't a good time, trust me," she warns, fresh from
autopsy hell with her heart raw from awakened loss.  Sudden
snapshots of construction-paper turkeys careen through her
mind, then visions of soft, childish hands hard at work
fashioning them.  Even after leaving the hospital, those
opposing thoughts linger, making her edgy and vulnerable to
scrutiny.  Now this gift, so called...

"Time is short."

"So is my tolerance for this, Mulder."

She pauses after the deflection.  He doesn't come close to
understanding what the morning has brought her.  Then again,
true to form, neither has she chosen to share.

"This case has nothing to do with me," she emphasizes.  "Are
we clear on that?"

"There are elements of this case that jump right up and bite
you on the ass, Scully, whether you want to accept it or
not."

She indicates the toy flanking her placemat.  "Look... it's
all very sweet; a thank you gesture from a grateful little
boy.  No more, no less."  Suddenly thirsty, she takes a
careful sip of water before continuing.  "I can also
speculate where you're going with this."

"So, enlighten me."

His faint grin could be disarming, if she wasn't already
busy shielding her soft places from invisible darts.
"You're convinced it's some sort of sympathetic magic.  A
charm.  A fetish or talisman that can protect from evil or
bring about good.  I, however, find it highly unlikely that
a five year-old kindergartener in Aubrey, Missouri would
know to dabble in such questionable --"

"He doesn't.  Believe me."

She blinks.

"You might say he's doing someone a favor," Mulder explains
with the same maddening, mysterious obscurity.  "Like his
mother, I'm finding Benjie is far more sensitive to
underlying synchronous elements than I realized before.
Visions as well as reacting to the stimulus that the killer
--"

"Wait just a minute... time out," she says, holding up a
hand.  He stops, surprised.  "Do you realize what you're
doing, Mulder?  You're a classic example of someone falling
victim to apophenia."

With a tight smile he murmurs, "Sounds like a serious
affliction.  Better jog my memory..."

"Apophenia -- a spontaneous perception of connections... the
propensity to associate seemingly unrelated objects or ideas
in meaningful ways.  In extreme cases it demonstrates how
closely psychosis can be linked to creativity... apophenia
and creative genius among psychologists may even be seen as
two sides of the same coin."

"Do tell."

"My God, Mulder..." She warms to the subject, stalling the
inevitable showdown.  "Look at the proliferation of so-
called tests created by analysts... like the Rorschach test,
which is projective and totally open to conjecture.  Then,
there are the people who see child abuse or sexual innuendo
behind every emotional problem.  One analyst thought he had
support for the penis envy theory because more females than
males failed to return their pencils after a test."

That example garners a soft chuckle.  "If I make clever
repartee here about 'pencil-dicks', would you be offended?"

She ignores his wit.  "Another analyst wrote in a
prestigious journal that sidewalk cracks represent vaginas
and feet are penises -- and the old saw about not stepping
on cracks is actually a warning to stay away from the female
sex organ."

"Poor misguided fool."

"My point being, Mulder, that apophenia is considered a Type
I error that forces patterns of association where non exist
at all.  This could also explain the proliferation of
phenomena such as numerology, most forms of divination, and
a host of other experiences claimed to be paranormal and
supernatural.  Including your inference about this...
house."

He reaches out and picks up the tight square of block,
holding it between them as a focal point, like a third
unblinking eye.

"Christ, Scully... you can sling that psycho-jargon hash
with the best of 'em, yet after all you've seen, after
everything we've uncovered together, from global conspiracy
to..."

Hearing the familiar diatribe again she's tempted to roll
her eyes, but restrains the urge in light of the distinctive
acuity he sends out over the table.  Rotating the house in
his hands as though to stimulate his thoughts and words, he
murmurs, "Everything from regression hypnosis to the
existence of little green men to psychrometry..."

She arcs a brow questioningly and he pauses to explain.

"Harold Pilar's psychic expertise, used in conjunction with
the search for the La Pierre girl, his own missing son...
and Samantha.  Remember?"

"I remember refusing to accept his pseudo-science."

"Or fast-forward to Oral Peattie and the proven efficacy of
his backwoods brand of hoo-dooism -- and you can call it
bullshit, despite what you experienced?  Little Benjie
Tillman feels driven to build you a safe-house to protect
you from an evil he senses and to which he reacts like a
barometer, and you denigrate its worth.  Scully... what are
you so afraid of here?"

"I'm --" Her forehead crinkles in exasperation and her voice
plummets, taking on an edge.  "I'm not afraid.  I'm
relegating some of this questionable *bullshit*, as you call
it, to its proper perspective.  Nothing more.  We have a
difficult case to solve here and I refuse to let my personal-
-"

She stops to swallow down a ball of emotion that threatens
to choke her.  God, not here... The ice is cracking beneath
her, cold water lapping at her feet as she scrabbles with an
insane desperation to hold onto something safe and
recognizable, secure and tangible before she slips under.
Before she drowns in an angry sea of her own skepticism, co-
mingling with the truth she so frenetically disavows.

She reacted this way several nights ago, held close in
Mulder's protective arms, deep in the succor his bed and
body provided.  A whispered, conversational question about
her remembrances of Emily and she felt swallowed by loss,
compelled to bolt back to her own room.  Only when he
soothed her anguish and exposed her cowardice with the
patient devotion of a soul mate, did his true, unselfish
intentions emerge.

Her healing.  Her emotional well-being, for both their
sakes.  Considering his track record over seven years' time
she should be willing to trust his judgment now.

"I said I could handle this case," she whispers, cursing her
damp lashes, the warmth on her face, and the touch of color
she knows marks her cheeks and upper lip.  Shamed by such
naked emotion in a public place, she angles her face toward
the wall, chin tucked to collar.

"You also pointed out, in the next breath, that I'd be right
here with you," he adds.  "Nothing's changed about that."

"Thank you.  I'm relying on it more than you realize."  She
blinks slowly and risks a look at his face.

Unseen by other restaurant patrons, Mulder's hand slips
underneath the table to grasp her knee.  As in other times
of crisis, his deep concern is evidenced by some small,
furtive attempt to comfort.  His warm fingers splay, pulling
her back from the edge, centering her with his touch.

Poised between them on the table, the small white house with
the single green door stands sentinel.

His grip on her knee is now a bold caress, thumb circling
the patella, before he withdraws completely and both hands
appear on the edge of the table.

"Scully... I had something I needed to tell you.  That I
felt you should know."  He leans back into his seat, eyeing
her.  "Now I see it's not the right time.  And I'm not the
right person to share it."

A wave of fear flutters against her heart and she shoves it
away.  "What are you talking about?  The case?"

"Synchronous communication... squared," he says, the words
heavy with significance.

"Mulder, why are you being deliberately obtuse with me?"

He shakes his head, eyes holding hers, dark and intent with
unspoken thoughts as hot food suddenly descends between
them.  Their small table seems cluttered with plates,
condiments, and good smells.  Hunger battles concern; she
watches as Mulder hesitates, scrutinizing her over the meal.
Only when she nods her permission does he dig in with gusto.

As for her fragile appetite -- it's already vanished like a
daydream.  The grilled chicken Caesar salad she ordered does
nothing for her now except crowd the placemat and turn her
stomach into a knot as hard and inflexible as Benjie's
little plastic house.

************

Tillman residence
November 8, 2000
3:12 p.m.

His son looks drawn and tired this afternoon, even without
the added excuse of kindergarten classes or bus rides.
After carrying the limp child from car to house and
depositing him on the living room couch, Tillman backs away
to reassess the situation.

Try a babysitter again?  It irked him, he admits, finding
Agent Mulder in deep discussion with Benjie, crouched on the
carpet in his private office at the station.  Without
permission again, as though the vague connection between the
agent and the boy should grant him some sort of immunity.
Such flagrant disregard galls Tillman, as does the fact that
Fox Mulder takes pride in possessing a renegade mentality
that sidesteps the usual protocols during an investigation.

His partner, on the other hand, is indeed the more
approachable of the two.  Dana Scully, pathologist, doctor,
FBI agent.  Sharp, scientific-minded, a conservative and
circumspect balance to Mulder's maverick approach.  To his
knowledge unattached, though Tillman can see she follows the
beat of her partner's drum unswervingly, keeping pace with
his every step.  An investigative tag-team with impressive
expertise and an admirable solve percentage, considering the
type of cases they handle.  Tillman's done his share of
research, too.

But, she also possesses a woman's heart, evidenced by the
generous gift to Benjie the other morning.  That gesture
showed personal interest, a step away from 'by-the-book'
mindset.  A promising avenue he should explore in the very
near future, if she seems at all receptive... personal
involvement with Mulder be damned, and still debatable.

The ringing of the phone on the end table jogs him from his
musing, and he picks up quickly before Benjie rouses from
sleep.  "Tillman here."

"Brian?  This is Jen.  What's going on over there?"

His sister-in-law's high, curious voice feels like welcome
salve after days of unanswered messages and no
communication.  Jennifer, Janine's sister in Lincoln,
Nebraska, where the normal branch of his wife's small family
tree thrives.  The younger, well-adjusted daughter who
married a doctor, raised a handful of kids to young
adulthood, has made a home in the suburbs, and sits on the
library board.  Who has also provided a loving, temporary
refuge for her distressed older sister as the need has
arisen over the years.

"Jen, thanks for getting back to me.  You've been out of
town?"

"Since last week.  Dave had a geriatric seminar in Omaha, so
we all went along to do some shopping and check out colleges
for your senior nephew."

"Can you put her on?"

"Who, Brian?  Do you mean Janine?"  They both pause at the
stark incredulity in her voice.  "Why... she's not *here*.
That's what I wanted to explain right off.  Honestly, I
haven't seen her since she visited back on Labor Day, for
Dave's fiftieth birthday bash."

"*What*?"

"That's right.  We just came home to a dozen frantic
messages from you and I was worried sick.  How's Benjamin
handling things?"

He shoots a wary look toward his sleepy son, cross-legged on
the couch, half-sitting up.  His head droops against its
overstuffed arm, eyes closed in fatigue.  The heart-shaped
face and soft brow remind Tillman of the child's true
parentage.  Of B.J., with her secret smile and bone-hard
intensity.  Of her loss to them both and her faulty
bloodline coursing through their son's veins ...

Sudden despair makes him gruff.  "As well as can be
expected, with your sister AWOL for nearly a week now," he
growls into the phone.

"Oh, Jesus!  Oh, my God --" Her exclamations only serve to
rattle him more and he grits his teeth against the receiver.
"Listen, Brian, let me make a few calls.  She has
acquaintances up here.  Let me check around for you and I'll
call back as soon as I hear something.  Is that okay?"

"Okay," he responds automatically, numbed by the eerie
coincidence Janine's disappearance poses at such an
incriminating time in Aubrey.

"You don't sound good.  Brian, now I'm really worried.  I'll
call her old doctor, too, and see if he's heard from her.  I
think she contacted him once last year, or maybe it was the
year before."

It feels strangely comforting to hear his wife's true
situation discussed openly and with someone else familiar
with her erratic behavior, her addictions, her maladies and
mental lapses, her past disappearances.  He lets out a shaky
breath, rubs his face, and nods to the calming voice on the
other end.

His eyelashes feel damp and he rubs at one eye with the heel
of his hand.

"Thanks, Jen.  I appreciate any help you can give me in
locating her.  I'd -- I'd like to keep the police out of it,
though.  Keep it quiet."

Ironic, these words coming from his mouth, but his sister-in-
law knows the rules and has years of sympathetic experience
under her belt.

"Well, of course we will!  And, Brian?  This isn't the first
time we've had to do this and things turned out okay --
isn't that right?"

"Unfortunately, yes... you're right."

"Daddy?"

A small groggy voice swings his attention back to the couch.
"Gotta go, Jen.  Yeah.  Okay, and thanks for your help."

He replaces the telephone into its cradle, then moves
quickly to Benjie's side, cuddling the boy's small body next
to his.  Short, tight arms encircle him, surprising in their
strength, and he wonders at the sadness he sees in his
child's pleading eyes.  "I'm right here, Benj.  Say, you
look like you need more nap."

"Don't, Daddy," Benjie says in his raspy little voice,
before hiding his face.

"Don't what?"

"Try to find her," the boy whispers from underneath his
father's arm.

Tillman tries to keep things light, counting on the fact
that the child has been drowsing for the length of the call
and may not have overheard correct details.  "Find who,
Sharp-ears?"

"Janine."

He feels a cold chill grip his chest, then the budding
warmth of parental irritation at the disrespect he perceives
coming from the boy.  "That's 'Mommy' to you, son --"

"No, it's not."

In a surge of exasperation he scoops the child from the
cushions, standing him on unsteady sneakered feet to face
him.  Benjie's head shakes slowly, despite his father's
disapproval.  Tillman finds himself grasping the diminutive
shoulders with firm hands, his patience sorely tested.
"What kind of nonsense is this?"

"She doesn't let me," whimpers the child, blinking back the
tears that fill his eyes, making them appear larger, bluer,
even more limpid.

"Let you do what?"

"She..." Benjie wavers, pauses in an agony of apprehension,
and then plunges ahead.  "She makes me call her Janine, and
gets mad at me if I call her Mommy.  She says I'm not her
real little boy... only yours.  But when you come home..."
He sniffles, wipes at an eye, "I have to pretend... or she
gets mad again."

He stares at the boy, mute, aghast.

"She says not to tell you," continues Benjie, confessions
tumbling from his lips as a fat tear runs down his cheek,
"or she'll send me away to the crazy place."

"What crazy place?"

He shrugs and weeps fitfully.  "I don't know where it is.
But she says my real Mommy lives there --"

With a grimace and a groan of anguish Tillman hugs the child
to his chest, sickened by the awful duplicity that has
flourished for years in his own home.  His dream, his one
hope has been shattered -- that this child born of
infidelity would have a happy, well-adjusted life, far
removed from the unholy legacy he carries with him into the
future.

"My God, son... she told you that?  How long ago?"

The boy shrugs and snivels, unable to express length of time
when focusing back to such short-term beginnings.  A long
time, much too long a time, Tillman realizes, closing wet
eyes and clutching his sobbing, grieving child to his heart.

************

Darnell's apartment
November 8, 2000
4:38 p.m.

It's more bachelor pad than definitive babe lair in spite of
Mulder's predictions to the contrary, Scully decides as she
eyeballs Darnell's domain.

The apartment is modest and adequate for a single man not
given to extravagance or much entertaining.  An overstuffed,
upholstered couch with depressions in all the right places
that suggest it doubles often as a bed.  Mismatched lamps
and pillows in varying, uncoordinated colors.  She notices
Mulder's appreciative grin, the way he scans the magazine
piles, stacks of videotapes, the TV/VCR, sports posters, and
sparsely outfitted kitchen.

"Remind you of home?"  She murmurs the words under her
breath, hoping to gibe him.  His instant response, also
sotto voce and delivered with fingertips soft on her back,
warms her soul.

"Not any more... "

"Coffee?"  Darnell, somewhat awkward in his hosting skills,
points toward the open kitchen area.  "Got a pot here that's
about two, three hours old.  Or, there's Coke, water...
beer...?"

Mulder chances the coffee, while Scully settles for a glass
of tap water with ice.  Their visit isn't social to begin
with, but an attempt on Mulder's part to glean more
information about previous victims of the Slash Killer,
going all the way back to 1942.

What Joe Darnell knows remains to be seen, but Mulder senses
he's someone who can be trusted.

The early forties was Linda Thibodeaux's era and the time
during which Harry Cokely began his reign of terror in
Aubrey by murdering three young women.  Not many years
after, two government agents tracking the killer, Sam Chaney
and Tim Ledbetter, vanished from the face of the earth.  The
mystery surrounding their disappearances went unknown and
unexplored until 1994, when newly-pregnant Detective B.J.
Morrow began having dreams and visions which led her to each
man's grave and revealed they suffered the same fates as the
other slash victims -- and precipitated B.J.'s falling under
the influence of the murderous impulses stemming from her
biological grandfather, Cokely.

Mulder feels certain the answer lies in the past.  He
believes a supernatural connection exists between the
present killer and the earlier victims.  Whether a surviving
sibling or other relative, he's lifted the study of
victimology to new levels of understanding by suggesting
that the evil from Harry Cokely has "jumped its tracks" as a
means to inhabit someone other than a genetic, blood
relative.

"How?  Why?"  Darnell's questions are legitimate; Scully
would like to hear the answers as well.

"Dunno, yet," says Mulder, thoughtfully tapping knuckles
against his front teeth.  "That's why I need to know whether
any of the 1942 victims have surviving siblings still living
in Aubrey.  They'd be fifty-eight years older by now.  Easy
to chase down, if we know who they are... don't you think?"

Darnell chuckles at the joke, but Scully holds out little
hope for easy resolution.  The local gossip, Natalie Warner,
has washed her hands and distanced herself.  Linda
Thibodeaux remains comatose, clinging to life at Aubrey
Memorial.  Darnell, it turns out, knows some facts about the
1994 victims, which he shared with Mulder last night, but is
of little real help when looking earlier.

"We could try courthouse records," she ventures, putting new
energy into the discussion.  "Or maybe the nursing home has
information on some of the older residents."  She pauses.
"Even Lieutenant Tillman or others at the station might
remember something from the original case."

Mulder shakes his head, offering no eye contact.  "Scully,
we've combed those files.  You and me, hours spent in that
same station, in the same room, and nothing more has been
forthcoming."

Sitting here, listening to the two men banter and discuss
the obvious, she has a similar feeling of weary
hopelessness.

The water in her glass has grown tepid, though Mulder agrees
to a fresh pot of coffee.  She excuses herself to use the
bathroom, which is neat, fairly clean, and boasts a full-
length mirror on the door.  Returning, she finds her partner
and the detective still talking with the easy rapport of two
men who have become comfortable with one another after a
trial period.

Late afternoon melds into early evening and the skies
outside darken and purple.  Mulder lays theories out on the
table like an assortment of flea market oddities.  Darnell
nods, sips, and listens, clearly not as put-off as Scully
expected and certainly not with the knee-jerk disbelief of
her earlier days.

When the recent little acquisition from Benjie Tillman
enters the conversation, Scully jerks to attention,
wondering what Mulder hopes to accomplish by sharing such a
thing with Tillman's right hand man.  Already sensitive, she
finds the disclosure intrusive and vexing.  She wishes they
would leave this place.

Besides, the mysterious message that Mulder hinted at during
lunch still remains a source of anxiety for her.

Listening to his brief exposition on the power of charms and
talismans, she cringes when Darnell affirms from his own
experiences with a rabbit's foot key chain.  When he
mentions picking lucky numbers on the weekly Lotto, she
squirms and decides all good things must surely come to an
end.

"I suppose you want to see it, too, detective?  The Lego
house?  After that," she says, with a sharp look to Mulder,
"we'll be going."

Darnell's gaze flickers from one partner to the other and he
gives a tentative nod.  "Yeah, sure.  If it's what you say
it is, I'd definitely like a closer look at it.  That is, if
it's no trouble."

"None at all," she assures him, lying through her teeth
while she stands to don her wool coat.  Intending quickness,
she laps it around her body, rather than taking the time to
button up.  "It's out in the car; I'll be right back with
it."

Dusk blankets the town with a gray filter, streetlamps and
headlights popping awake like a camera's flashes.  As Scully
exits the row of apartments all seems quiet, cold, and
disheartening.  No sign of snow, though the wind sends out
warning gusts, lifting her hair and encircling her neck with
icy fingers that make her shiver as she clips across the
narrow driveway toward their car.

Her breath punctuates her inner thoughts with small puffs of
displeasure, cloud-like and huffy.  Why, the damn toy has
gotten more attention in the last few hours than --

Blinding light stabs her eyes, followed by the roar and
screech of a car's engine close upon her.  Having no time to
think, she reacts explosively, with a desperate adrenaline-
induced surge of professional training and survival
instinct.

She barely feels the numbing thud against her hip as she
lunges out of the car's path, rolling over and over like a
rag doll thrown across the rock-hard pavement.

************
End of Chapter 16