_Vengeance_ -- a sequel to "Anasazi"

by JulietttXF@aol.com


((My sincerest apologies that this thing took so long to post.  As the
title says, this is a follow-up to "Anasazi."  Yeah, *that* "Anasazi."
The second-season-finale one.  I'm telling you up front so that if you
don't want to read something so "old" you won't waste your time.

At least I offer an explanation for the boxcar. . . !

--J3XF))

Like most X-Philes I have been wracking my brain trying to figure out
how Chris Carter and the gang are going to begin the new season.
This is one possible solution.  Rate it PG; no explicit violence, no sex
(sorry, all you relationshippers out there, but I wanted to write
something
that might actually serve as a season premiere -- in content if not in
quality -- well, maybe. . . ;-) ).  There is, however, some UST, some
scullyangst, and lots of friendship.  It fairly gushes with friendship.

You guys know the drill by now, so sing along: Dana Scully and Fox
Mulder and Walter Skinner and Margaret Scully, in fact, just about
everybody you recognize here, along with the premise behind "The X-
Files," belong to Chris Carter and Ten-Thirteen Productions and FOX
Broadcasting, or some amalgamation of the three, and are used
lovingly but without permission.  I am a doctoral student, so suing me
won't really get you anything except four or five bookcases full of
English Literature.  Jackie St. George and Martin Nantus (oh, yeah!)
appear courtesy of Sheryl Martin and are borrowed lovingly and *with*
her permission.  The character of Bruce Cunningham is copyright 1995
by me, as is this story.  I am very proprietary of Bruce; ask me first if
you're interested in borrowing him, okay?

This one is dedicated to The Troupe and the irrepressible IP's and one IF
(you know who you are!), except for Chapter Eight, aka "the conspiracy
chapter," which is dedicated to my fellow Lone Gunwomen.

A note on authorial integrity: I began this story at the beginning of the
summer (1995) and worked on it off and on in between work and studies.
When it came time to post, however, lo and behold -- Phoebe the
Fiend (my computer) suddenly and without provocation, I might add,
decided *not* to let me post!  Hence, having missed the September
22nd deadline ("The Blessing Way"), I decided to hang onto this for
a little longer (okay, by now it's a *lot* longer, due to many
circumstances, some of which were beyond my control) for more
editing and revision.  Although I *did* expand the story in some areas,
Chris Carter's revelations in the the third season premiere effected
no changes in the story.  Hence those readers who live in the more
deprived areas of the world (where they are still in the second
season) can read this story, as it contains no third-season
spoilers.  Thus the characters, as always, belong to their creators,
but this story, as always, belongs to *me*.

And now, sit back, relax, suspend your disbelief and, hopefully,
enjoy!

******************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter One: "Grief"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
******************************************
(1a/17)

September 22, 1995

        The funeral was at Arlington.  Scully was almost surprised
by how many were there in spite of the rain -- Mulder had thought he
had no other friends in the Bureau, and perhaps this was strictly true,
but he had also commandeered a lot of respect in surprising places.
Some of their fellow agents had come out of a sense of that respect,
others out of curiosity.  He would have laughed to see them, she
thought.  The Lone Gunmen were there, the three of them scattered
through the small crowd, more than half the time spent looking
nervously over their shoulders.  But then, most of the mourners did
that.  Only seven did not: the minister, Walter Skinner, and the four
women and one man who stood huddled together at the front of the
group under three umbrellas.  With Dana were her mother and, on
Margaret's right, her sister Melissa.  Grasping Dana's left hand was
Jackie St. George, with Marty's arm around her.  Bruce Cunningham
stood behind them, his eyes wide with pain.  Melissa sniffled and
Margaret wept openly, but Dana and Jackie were dry-eyed.  Agents
in the pack of mourners proper pointed and whispered at Spooky
Mulder's redheaded partner, standing very straight and very pale and
very beautiful in an immaculate navy blue suit.

        "She didn't even wear black."

        "Yeah, and look -- not a tear."

        "Thought they were close."

        <snort> "*I* heard they were sleeping together."

        Walter Skinner heard that last and glared at the indiscreet
agent, who suddenly couldn't find a place to put his hands.  Skinner
sighed.  He, too, had sometimes wondered at the pair's closeness.
He had never seen anything like the bond they shared.  Together
they were better than any three agents in the field; apart they were
brilliant and driven but no more effective than might be expected.

        He sighed again.  In losing Fox Mulder he had also lost Dana
Scully.  He had been surprised at first that he had not received her
resignation immediately.  Fox Mulder may not have been her lover,
but he *was* her partner -- and not just in the sense that he was the
man with whom she worked.  He was the other half of the team.  And
with him gone more than half that team was missing -- just as it had
been during the long months of her abduction.  Over the few years
they had been working together Mulder and Scully had formed a
partnership, a *friendship*, as deep as any he had ever seen.  It was
caring and supportive and fiercely protective, as he had discovered
when Mulder approached him pleading for help in finding and bringing
Cancerman to justice, or rather to vengeance, Mulder's own private
justice for what he believed the obscure man who haunted Skinner's
office had done to Scully.  He had offered everything, even his badge
and the X-files which, Skinner knew, translated to his search for his
sister.

        It was not the last time he would make this choice.  Skinner
had been on that bridge the night of the second occasion.  And when
Mulder had actually tendered his resignation the A.D. had asked
himself: had he done so because, as he said, he hated what he had
become, hated the fact that he had been willing to take a life for a
life in simple vengeance?  Or was it deeper than that: did he hate
himself for being so bound by his own honor that even in the midst
of his comingled love for his comatose and dying partner and hatred
for the man who had put her in that condition he could not break his
oath to serve and protect?

        Walter Skinner knew that Mulder's and Scully's relationship
was a loving one; he had loved his own longtime partner, too, in a way.
It wasn't romantic or sexual or even physical.  It was the complete
and utter trust and dependence that two people who routinely place
their lives and sanity in one another's hands gain over time.  Some
forged this relationship more deeply than others, and it often became
so entire that it would admit no other, lesser, bonds.  He had seen
more than one marriage die because of the jealousy and separation
such an emotional and mental connection between "work partners"
could cause between "life partners."  It had troubled his own
marriage even though his partner had been a man.

        But Mulder and Scully, unlike Skinner and his partner, had
had no-one else.  For unmarried and unattached partners the
relationship quickly became not only the most intense but often the
*only* close relationship, simply because it was so utter and
complete.  So Mulder, in losing Scully, had lost not only his partner
but his best friend and confidante and sister and wife, of sorts, as
well.  And for Scully it must be just as bad; unlike Mulder she had
family, but their relationship was five months stronger than it had
been during her disappearance.

        He looked at her, standing straight and silent by the casket,
and remembered the phone call he had gotten five months earlier. . . .

*****

        His private line at home had rung.  "Skinner," he said tersely.
It had been a hard week for him, beginning when he had received a
call from the man from whom he hated to hear on any subject,
especially one this serious: Mulder was accused of having come into
possession of some rather sensitive files.  Then, his sometimes errant
rogue agent had gone berserk and attacked him in the hallway.  Despite
Mulder's reputation in the Bureau this had surprised Skinner, who
knew that, despite the younger man's penchant for the bizarre and
unconventional, Mulder was brilliant and eminently sane.  Next, Scully
had been called in for questioning and had tiptoed around the issue of
Mulder's abberation and had been very evasive about her knowledge
of some DAT tape for which the board was looking.  He could have,
he felt, handled the interrogation much better on his own; the minute
Carter had asked her whether she would lie for Agent Mulder he had
groaned mentally.  It had been the wrong tack to take and had
forced her into a split-second decision as to on which side of the line
she would fall this time.  He could have gotten an answer from her
by allowing her to speak without forcing such a decision and thus
jeopardizing her career.  For all their high position the board
members were naive and impolitic and he hated being at their beck
and call.

        Then word had come that William Mulder had been found shot
to death in his bathroom on Martha's Vineyard.  He later discovered
that Scully herself had brought Mulder's gun in for testing, along with a
bullet that she claimed she had pulled from Mulder's wall after it had
narrowly missed her.  By the time he was made aware of all these facts
Mulder and Scully were gone.  He had half-heartedly put out an APB on
Scully's car and checked the airports, but he had had no real hope of
finding them.  Both Mulder and Scully were far too bright to make those
simple kinds of slips.  And, despite himself, he had been rather proud
of their abilities in spite of his consternation.  Deep down inside of him
where the remnants of Marine Skinner still lived, he had rooted for them
to find the answers and return triumphant.  He wanted to put his Morley-
smoking shadow in his place once and for all.  Wanted to believe that
the Mulder he knew could never have turned his gun on his father and
pulled the trigger.  Wanted to believe that the Scully he knew would not
have helped him had it been true -- after all, she trusted him, and the
bullet later pulled from Bill Mulder's body had proven to have been fired
from the same gun, the gun that she sent him from somewhere on the
road west, along with the dialysis filter which, she insisted in her
accompanying note, had been pulled from Mulder's water supply and
would prove to contain a powerful hallucinogen.

        Above all, he wanted the good guys to win one for once.
Heaven only knew the number of times he had had to rein the two
agents working on the X-Files in at the last minute when they were just
inches away from closing a case one way or another.  Their frustration
was his own.  He was made to feel, as they were, like a yo-yo sent out
to the end of its tether only to be reeled back in once more.  He had
begun to ask why -- why were they even sent out if they were going to
be reeled back in each time?  And ultimately he had come to the same
conclusion Mulder had drawn: they were pawns, all of them, tools and
toys in the hands of an unseen manipulator.  And he hated being a
plaything.

        But he had seen to it that on each successive case Mulder
and Scully had stretched that tether nearly to the breaking point before
being reeled back in.  And one day soon, he had been certain, the
twine would snap and they would escape the tyranny of the unseen
hands and arrive at the truth.

        But now it seemed that Mulder himself had snapped.  And
so, when he answered the phone and heard Dana Scully's voice on
the other end of the line, he did not know what to expect.

        "Skinner."

        "Sir?  This is Dana Scully."

        He sat up in bed and clutched the phone to his ear.  "Scully?
Where are you?"

        "I'm in New Mexico, Sir."  Immediately, even without
processing the lost sound in her voice, he had known something was
terribly wrong.  She never would have given him her location
otherwise; it had been merely habit that had made him ask it.

        "Is Mulder. . . ?"

        "He's gone, Sir," she said quietly.

        Gone?  Gone how?  "Agent Scully?"

        "I don't know, Sir.  He -- we came out here to -- investigate
a lead. . . ."

        "Would this have something to do with the DAT tape that
you denied his having, Scully?" he asked sternly.

        He could almost hear her body stiffen.  "I never responded
one way or the other to that question, Sir," she said firmly.

        <No.  No, you didn't.>  Score one for Dana Scully.  He
sighed.  "What happened?"

        "We -- were staying in a hotel," she said quietly, calmly,
although he could sense it was a false calm.  "He -- I sent him off on
his own to follow a lead -- I was going to come back for our
meeting. . . . He called me on the phone and then -- we were cut off.
And I went to -- the site from where he called me, and -- he was
gone."  She paused, then went on in a near-whisper.  "There had
been a fire. . . ."

        He closed his eyes.  Fire.  And Mulder was pyrophobic,
and Scully knew that.  She had played by the book -- well, as close
to the book as she had at any point in this mess -- and had planned
to come back and face him and the board.  Had broken the rule of
sending her partner off on his own to avoid breaking the rule of
obedience to a superior officer.  Out of a deeper sense of loyalty to
Mulder, he knew.

        "Agent Scully?"  It took him several tries before he got her
to answer.  "Agent Scully."

        "Yes, Sir?"

        "When does your flight arrive?"

        "My -- flight, Sir?"

        "Your plane, Scully.  When does it arrive?"

        "I've -- missed it," she confessed.  She had planned to fly home
yesterday, leaving the rental car with Mulder.  And the more she talked
the more lost she sounded.

        He closed his eyes again and made a decision.  <Where do
your loyalties lie, Walter?>

        "Give me your telephone number and I'll call you back with
your flight information, Scully."  She did so, in a daze, and he hung up.

        <What about you?  Where do *you* stand?>

        First he called the airline and found the first flight out and
booked her on it.  And then, before calling her back, he made two more
telephone calls . . .

        <When you're out in the trenches, Marine, it's gonna be just
you and your buddies.  You forget about home, your forget your
girlfriend, you forget your Congressman, your mama.  Hell, you even
forget *me*, you got that, boy?!  There's nobody but you and your
platoon and you watch each other's butts or you won't have no butts
to watch!  You take care of your own out here, and you *survive*.>

        . . . one to Jackie St. George, and one to Margaret Scully.

        He had wanted to meet her at the airport himself but had left
it up to the two women to decide what to do on that count.  There had
been no warrant issued for Scully's arrest as of yet, and he trusted her
to make her full report to him upon her return.

        <You trust her?  Her partner assaults you, she all but lies to
the board of inquiry, putting her job at stake, evidently drives that
partner, who is now wanted for questioning in the wrongful death of his
father, across state lines to look for who knows what without telling
anyone where she's going, putting *your* job at stake, and you trust
*her*?>

        <Yes.  I do.>

        Her report, when she gave it the next day, added little to what
she had already told him, what he had already surmised.  He had taken
action to protect himself and, hopefully, to curtail the punishment the
board, in its anger and impotence, might have wanted to visit upon her,
and took her gun and badge.  And he had hinted that she might want
to "take some time to think about" what she had done.

        He had hoped she would take St. George with her on her
"meditative" journey, but she hadn't.  For some reason the Canadian
agent had not even requested personal leave.

        He had seen agents broken in the past over lesser matters:
rejected promotions, relocations, injuries, forced retirements.  Had
seen Scully's absence and then her reappearance in a comatose state
begin to break Fox Mulder.

        As the days and weeks stretched into months with no further
word of Mulder, he watched Dana Scully and wondered how long it
would take for the same process to begin its work on her.

*****

        If Skinner had been surprised by the depth of Mulder's
anguish over Scully, he was stunned now.  Dana Scully, cool,
methodical, by-the-book, stood as calmly as she ever did when
presenting a report or performing an autopsy.

        But then he got a glimpse of her eyes as the funeral ended
and he filed past the casket and he was truly frightened.  They were
dry and hot and seemed to burn as if with the very fire that had killed
her partner.  And he knew exactly why she had not yet tendered her
resignation.  It was for the very same reason he had not forced her to
take a leave of absence until she had requested one to begin after the
funeral, the reason he had assisted Jackie St. George in getting
some personal time off from the embassy, knowing that Scully would
need the Canadian agent at her side for the search she was about to
undertake to find Mulder's killers.

        And then to exact vengeance.

*****

End 1a/17
(continued in 1b)

******************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter One: "Grief"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
******************************************
(1b/17; continued from 1a)

        Jackie sat slumped against Marty in the back seat of
Margaret Scully's car.  He held her firmly yet tenderly, stroking her
hair with his free hand.  Dana sat on her left, her face turned toward
the window.  She was straight, almost rigid, her back barely brushing
the seat.  Jackie's gaze dropped to Dana's lap where she held the
envelope one of the three men known as The Lone Gunmen had given
her.  Scully had hesitated, almost afraid to touch it.  It was an ordinary

long white envelope with her name written on the outside in Mulder's
strong script.  But she knew it held perhaps the last message she
would ever receive from him.  So she had taken the envelope, thanked
Frohicke gravely, and turned away from his sad smile.  Now the tips
of her fingers just brushed the edge of the envelope, over and over,
as though she were at once drawn to and repelled by it.

        Jackie thought back to the conversation she and Dana had
had several days before.  She had burst into the basement office that
housed the X-Files and told Scully of her arrangement for a two-week
personal leave from the embassy.  She wasn't certain but she thought
Skinner had pulled strings.  She remembered again the look in his
eyes as he handed her the memo that had come in over his personal
fax line.  Pain in his eyes, and perhaps a little guilt -- over his harsh
treatment of Mulder? -- and understanding.  He had not said a word but
she knew that he knew.

        And so she had descended to the basement, leave-of-absence
voucher in hand, and had been calmly congratulated by Dana Scully,
who suggested that she and Marty take the time to visit some of the
nicer spots in New England.

        Jackie had stared at Dana.  "Huh-unnh, Dana Scully.  I'm
going with *you.*"

        "With me?"

        "Yes, with you!  You think I'm gonna let you do this alone?"

        "I don't know what you're talking about."

        "The hell you don't!  Special Agent Scully," she had hissed,
"you may fool everyone else around here with that smooth, cold-as-
ice exterior of yours, but *I* know you.  I knew Mulder.  I know what
you two had."  Her voice had softened.  "He was my friend, too.  I
loved him, too."  She had held her breath for a moment on that last
one.

        But then Dana had lifted her head and gazed at her for a
moment, her eyes unfathomable.  Turned away.

        "And besides, you're gonna need backup."

        Scully nodded.  "Okay."

        That night, the night before the funeral, she and Dana had sat
up late in the porch swing at Margaret Scully's house.  They were both
sleeping there, as were Melissa and Marty.  Margaret had wanted
them all there, wanted the house full again, the bedrooms of her sons
and daughters filled.  That the son she had more or less adopted was
absent only made her the more eager to welcome Marty. Melissa had
Brian's old room since hers had been made into a den when she had
left for college.  Marty and Jackie were staying in Bill's room just
across the hall, the room Mulder had occupied the past Christmas --
had hoped to occupy again come December.

        After Margaret and Melissa went to bed Dana and Jackie
swept the rest of the house for bugs.  They had already cleared the
upstairs earlier.

        They found none, and Scully breathed a sigh of relief.  If they
had found even one they could be certain there were more and despite
a thorough search might have missed some, but it was unlikely they
would have missed *all* of them.

        Nonetheless they sat out on the porch watching the night
sky and sipping tea.  Marty had gone to bed after kissing Jackie on
the lips and Dana on the cheek, watching them both, the two women
he loved, with eyes full of sadness.  Wishing he could help, knowing
he could not.  He had liked Mulder, had especially appreciated the
help the other man had given to Jackie, but he had neither the training
nor the innate ability to help them, except by staying out of the way
and giving Jackie something to come home to after it -- whatever *it*
was -- was all over.

        They sat in silence for a long time under the stars.  Dana
watched the sky.  Jackie watched Dana.

        She remembered again the three phone calls she had
received, the latter two just a week ago, that had ultimately led her
to this house and this night.  She had been sitting at her desk in the
embassy when her phone rang the first time.

        "St. George."

        "Jackie, this is Walter Skinner."

        "Walter."  She stiffened.  No. . . . He had a tone in his voice
that reminded her of the way he had sounded when he called her
after Mulder had first gone missing, to tell her that Scully was coming
home and that Scully needed her.

        "Jackie. . . ."  He stopped short.

        "Just tell me," she whispered hoarsely, closing her eyes and
drawing on an inner reservoir of strength.  "Tell me quickly."

        "They found -- a body. . . ."

        She remembered slumping in her chair, fighting the tears that
threatened to overwhelm her as no marauding psychopath could.  "No.
I don't believe it."

        She could hear the smile in his voice.  "Neither does Scully.
For once . . ." he trailed off, then cleared his throat.  "For once I hope
you both prove the government wrong."

        And then the second and third phone calls, just a week ago.

        "St. George."

        "Jackie."

        "Walter?"

        A brief silence.

        "Tell me."

        "It's bad. . . . His . . . the body arrived this morning."

        Her heart froze.  "Dana. . . ."

        He sighed and she could envision him removing his glasses
and rubbing his eyes tiredly.  "She -- insisted on doing a second
autopsy."

        "And you *LET* her?"

        "Jackie. . . ."

        "Forget it," she snapped.  "Where is she?"

        "Autopsy bay six."

        "I'm on my way."

        "Jackie. . . ."

        "Yeah?"

        Another, longer pause.  "I'm sorry."

        She dashed to her car.  When she opened the door she
realized that her cellular phone -- a gift from Mulder, she remembered
with a pang -- was ringing.  <What now?>

        "St. George."

        "Agent St. George -- this is Bruce Cunningham.  We've never
met, but. . . ."

        Cunningham?  Oh, yes.  "Dana's assistant."

        "Yes, ma'am.  She -- performed the autopsy on Agent M--
on the body this morning, and. . . ."

        *No.*  "What happened?"

        "She's -- in pretty bad shape."

        She closed her eyes momentarily.  Her last bastion of hope
was gone.  So long as Dana Scully believed her partner was alive she,
Jackie St. George, could make herself believe it, too.  But if *Dana* had
given up. . . .

        "Bay six.  I'm on my way.  Oh, and Bruce?"

        "Yes, ma'am?"

        She grimaced.  Under any other circumstances she would have
given him strict instructions *not* to call her "ma'am."  "Could you do me
a big favor?"

        "For Dr. Scully?  Anything."

        She smiled sadly.  It seemed those two had actually found an
ally in the FBI.  "Could you call her mother?  Tell her . . . I think I'd
better bring Dana there tonight."  She gave him the number and hung up.
Ruthlessly squashing her own emotions, Jackie concentrated on driving.

        She made it there in record time, her sidearm and identification
at the ready on the passenger seat next to her.  If some quota-happy
traffic cop had some notion of making an example of her, he was sadly
mistaken.  She would claim diplomatic immunity and if *that* didn't work
she was certain her 38-calibre companion would be . . . persuasive.

        But for once all the police seemed to be otherwise occupied.
She made it across town in record time and screeched to a halt across
two spaces in the parking garage.  She only hoped one of them belonged
to Cancerman.

        She ran into the building in search of her friend and found Bruce
Cunningham waiting for her in the doorway of bay six.  He looked very
pale and slightly sick.  He gestured over toward the wall and Jackie
hurried over to the limp heap that was Dana Scully and squatted down
on the floor next to her.  Scully was staring at the opposite wall, her
face
so white it was almost gray.

        "Dana."

        There was no response.

        She leaned closer and tried again.  "Dana.  Look at me," she
commanded gently.

        Slowly Scully swung her gaze to meet her friend's.  Her eyes
were blank and bewildered and very, very tired.

        "He's gone, Jackie."

        "I know, Dana," she said, patting the smaller woman on the
shoulder.  Funny -- crouched down like this she and Scully were
almost the same size.

        "I didn't believe it, Jackie.  I thought. . . ."  She bit her lip.
 "I
was sure I would know. . . ."  Her face crumpled but she did not cry.

        Jackie's own eyes filled with tears.  She understood -- she
felt the same way about Marty.  "Come on, Dana," she said gently.
She stood up and helped her friend to her feet.  Scully followed her
silently to the car.  On the way to Dana's apartment St. George
told her matter-of-factly that they were going to Mrs. Scully's house
for the night.  When they arrived Dana got out of the car and walked
woodenly up the path.  She automatically unlocked the door and began
throwing clothes into a suitcase.  Halfway through she stopped cold
with a panicked look on her face and dashed into the bathroom,
stripping off her clothes as she went.  The door slammed and seconds
later Jackie heard the shower come on full force.  She listened
carefully but that was the only sound that emanated from the
bathroom.  She sighed and addressed herself to the task of packing
up Dana's things.

        Now she sat here on Margaret Scully's front porch,
remembering, and thinking that nothing had really changed since that
day.  Certainly not for the better; Dana still showed no emotion over
Mulder's death, wouldn't even talk about it -- or him -- at all.

        Finally Dana turned to Jackie and looked into her eyes.  The
Canadian almost recoiled from the blankness there.

        "Jackie, you don't have to do this."

        "Dana, I *am* doing this."

        Scully took this at face value and nodded.  "Okay."

        "So when do we start?"

        Scully just looked at her.  "I already have."

        "What?!"

        She nodded.  "I know who did it, Jackie."

        "Who--"

        "Cancerman."  Her eyes narrowed and Jackie could feel her
hatred.  "He got too close -- again.  And Cancerman had him killed."

        Suddenly St. George realized that Scully had not said
Mulder's name in her hearing once since the body had been found in
the burnt-out shell of a house in New Mexico.  "How do you know?"

        "Eric Hosteen remembered his ordering the boxcar burned."

        "But I thought. . . ."

        She nodded.  "But at least part of it was true -- he was in
that boxcar."

        "How do you know?"  Scully had never told her any of this
before.

        "I was on the phone with him," she said calmly.

        "You were on the cellular with Mul--  when -- it happened?"

        "Yes."  She turned to face her friend.  "It was all a lie, Jackie.

Always a lie.  He killed him.  And then he lied about how he
died. . . ."

        "Well, I knew the official reports were. . . ."

        Scully snorted, her lovely face contorted in disgust.  "Of
course not.  He didn't kill himself.  And it wasn't an accident.  *And*
he didn't die in that house, either."

        "Tell me."

        Scully told her.

        The "official" story was that Mulder, moody and unpredictable
as always and rendered more so by the drugs found in his water
supply, had finally snapped and gone off on his own to search for his
father's killer, and that he had died in an abandoned house when it
burned to the ground.

        The unofficial rumors were even more devastating.  They
suggested that Mulder had killed his father, escaped to New Mexico,
and then killed himself out of remorse.

        Lies, all lies.  Made the more damning in that they contained
a kernel of truth.  Mulder *had* gone psychotic, punching Skinner in
the face in front of a dozen witnesses.  A strong hallucinogen *had*
been found in his water.  His father *was* dead and he *had* been
there when it happened.  He *had* -- with Scully's help -- escaped to
New Mexico.  And -- the final, damnable truth -- *he was dead.*
Burned to death.

        But Scully knew it could not have been either suicide or
accident.  Mulder hated fire.  He would never have taken a chance
like that.

        And, after much thought, she realized that this was just exactly
what they had intended for her to deduce.  Their way of scaring her off --

of warning her that they could reach her at any time.  As they had him.

        But in this they did not know her.  In her years of working on the

X-Files -- of working with Mulder -- she had come to thirst after the
truth
as much as he did.  True, at times she had lectured him for risking too
much, even his own life, for the answers that always seemed to evade
them in the end.

        But this was one truth for which she herself was going to
risk everything.

        They had taken his sister and, in doing so, his childhood.
They had taken his father and, with that, his only chance of reconciling
with his parents and absolving himself of the guilt he had always felt.
They had taken her from him, possibly twice, depending on whether
Duane Barry had been working for the government or. . . . She shook
her head.  Before that they had taken the X-Files, although those had
been given back, as had she.  Then they had taken his life.  And
now, finally, his reputation.

        And now it was her turn to take.

        Jackie had heard most of this from Dana's lips, had read the
rest in her eyes.

        Dana finished speaking and turned to her.  "Are you still
determined to do this?"  The Canadian was struck yet again by the
strength of this petite, seemingly fragile woman.  The Truth burned in
her heart, clear and strong.  She took a deep, shuddering breath.

        "Yes."

        Dana Scully could not weep for Fox Mulder, so Jackie St.
George did it for her.  That night Jackie had wept in her bed as Marty
held her, gently rocking her until she fell asleep.

        But from Dana's room there was only silence.

*****

        St. George remembered all this as she gazed at her friend
on the way back from Arlington.  She caught a movement from the
front seat and glanced up.  Margaret Scully was watching them in
the rear-view mirror, pain and fear both in her eyes as she gazed at
her daughter.  Melissa was twisted around in her seat.  Jackie looked
at her and Dana's sister slowly shook her head.  She had a
reputation for being spiritually "sensitive," but Dana was blocking her
out.  A tear dripped down her cheek.  She had liked Fox, too -- would
have been willing to love him as a brother, had he and Dana ever
worked out for themselves what had been clear to her since her
sister's return.  She and Fox had begun a wary friendship during that
time and had become closer during the long weeks of Dana's illness
afterwards.  He loved to tease her about her crystals and auras,
although she sensed that he had gained a healthy respect for her
"instincts" when her assessment of Scully's mental state during her
coma had proven true.  And then, last Christmas, he had joined in the
family celebration and she had welcomed him with her whole heart,
seeing how much his friendship meant to Dana and how much they
depended on one another.  She hurt for herself, hurt for her mother,
hurt most of all for the younger sister who sat in a blank silence in the
back seat, staring out at the rain.

*End Chapter One*

*******************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Two: "Rain"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
*******************************************
(2a/17)

        The ride back to the house was conducted in silence, any
communication among the passengers in the car -- and there was
very little -- conducted nonverbally.

        At last they pulled up in front of the Scully house and began
to get out of the car but stopped when they that noticed Dana was still
staring out the window, unmoving.  Jackie climbed out past Marty and
walked around to look in the window at her friend.  Her deep blue eyes
gazed at nothing, focused either at some point beyond St. George or
inward, inside her own mind instead of out the window.  Jackie
shuddered: Dana looked as though she were in a trance or a waking
coma.  She gently opened the door and tried to take Scully in her arms,
but the smaller woman brushed off her embrace -- too gently to hurt the
Canadian's feelings -- and stepped out of the car, walking silently and
stiffly up the stairs to the front door.  The rain fell on her hair and
shoulders, beading and rolling off the material of her suit, dripping off
the
ends of her hair and nose, but she never felt it.  She let herself in with

her key and disappeared inside.

        The other four watched her go and then exchanged glances.
Jackie and Marty joined the Scullys on the walk to the house.

        "I'm worried about her," Mrs. Scully said softly.

        Jackie reached out to reassure the other woman.  "She has
something to live for, Margaret--she won't hurt herself."

        Dana's mother shook her head, tears sliding down her cheeks.
"That's not what I meant.  Not entirely."  She took a deep, shaky breath.

"I'm worried about her mind -- her soul."  Melissa slid an arm around
her mother, wishing she could comfort her but knowing she could not.
She, too, was worried.  She and Dana had suffered some
misunderstandings and alienations through the years, but she had
never felt so completely shut out before.  If there was a crack in her
sister's facade, she had not found it yet.

        "I've never seen her like this, Jaclyn.  Not even when her
father. . . . Has she -- cried at all?"

        St. George shook her head.  "No.  Not with me."

        Melissa spoke up quietly.  "She can't cry.  Not yet.  It's the
only thing holding her together."  The others swung to look at her.
"Don't push her to let it out.  It may be healthy for most people but I
don't know if she could take it right now.  Give her time.  Her mind,
her spirit will know when to begin grieving."  <And please, please let
it be soon,> she begged.  She was reminded of Fox's despair during
Dana's coma, of the "dark place" she had told him he was inhabiting.
What frightened her was that she could not see exactly *where*
Dana's spirit was.  She only knew that it was not *here*.

        Her mother smiled faintly.  "She's always been the strongest
one.  She was always strong for us.  Who will be strong for her?
Now that Fox. . . ."  She trailed off.

        "I will."  Margaret turned to face the Canadian.  Her eyes
were blazing.  "And I will help her get the bastards who did this."  She
felt the fierceness of her anger stream through her body like fire, like
wine potent and pure.  She had never felt this much hatred and
righteous anger, even when her own blood was shed.  She shoved the
feelings down.  <Not now, St. George.  Save it.  You're going to need
all of it later.>

        "And I will make them pay."

        The other three stared at her for a moment, then turned away
almost in embarrassment from the fierceness in her eyes.  Then they
walked up the steps and into the house.

        Scully was standing at the window, still staring out at the rain
as her mother came up behind her and placed her hands on the younger
woman's shoulders.  They were tight, the tension boiling beneath the
surface.  Margaret was terribly afraid for her daughter.  She was so
very like her father; the other children were quick-tempered like their
maternal grandfather, but Dana and Bill, Sr. tended to hold in all their
emotions until they reached critical mass, and then Heaven help the
one who set them off and took the brunt of all that pent-up anger.
She would have welcomed one of her daughter's rare rages at this
moment, however; anything but the blank, bleak silence that had
been her only emotion for the past week or so.  Or the complete and
utter breakdown that she was beginning to be certain would be the
ultimate release of all her tensions.

        "Sweetheart."  She steadied her voice and went on.  "You're
soaked.  Run upstairs and change into something warm while I make
lunch, okay?"  Unconsciously she had slipped into the language she
had used when Dana was a little girl.  It seemed to comfort the cool
young woman standing in front of her slightly.  She turned with the
ghost of a smile and walked upstairs, the heaviness of her steps
belying her slight weight which had dropped even more over the past
few months of worry and, more recently, of anguish.  Margaret
walked to the kitchen with a sigh.  Soup.  Tomato soup and grilled
cheese sandwiches -- Dana's favorites growing up.  She opened the
cabinets and began pulling down the ingredients.

        Melissa came up behind her.  "Soup and grilled cheese,
Mom?"  The mother turned with a smile which her daughter mirrored.
"I'll put on the kettle for tea."

End 2a/17
(continued in 2b)

*******************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Two: "Rain"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
*******************************************
(2b/17)

        Margaret allowed her mind to wander as she stirred the soup.
Her children were all so independent.  They were each different,
individualistic.  And yet each integrally a part of her and her husband.

        Dana was next to the youngest.  As the child of some of Bill's
more flush years in the military she had had some material advantages
the older two had not.  Had they spoiled their younger daughter?
Margaret smiled.  No -- Dana could never have been spoiled.  She had
always seemed to have a different nature than the others -- as if she
were made of a finer material.  Dana was her wonder-child in so many
ways.  Where the others' laughter was warm and golden, hers was
pure silver.  She was quiet where they were loud and boisterous,
despite her love of tomboyish activities, and she was just as capable
of amusing herself with her books and daydreams as she was of joining
in her siblings' games.  Her features seemed to have been carved with
finer tools.  Their eyes were a dark blue-grey, but hers, even as a child,

had always been twin wells of deep, bright blue, clear and serene as
the summer sky when she was tranquil, burning steel when she was
angry.  She had always been fair, a faint sprinkling of golden freckles
across her nose and shoulders the only coloring besides the pale roses
in her cheeks.  Dana blushed more than the others, too -- sometimes
they would tease her just to watch her face go crimson to match her
hair, a shade deeper red than their sandy orange.

        A beautiful child.  Sensitive and brilliant.  And with an
incredible strength that surprised those who found it impossible to
reconcile the face and voice of the angel with the will of iron.  She was
willful, even stubborn.  Definitely stubborn.  Part of that was due to her

innate intelligence -- she could *see* how a thing was and could not
understand why others did not.  In high school she loved algebra and
calculus and hated geometry because her quick mind could reach the
solution in two or three steps instead of six or eight.  "But *why* do I
have to write down all those extra steps?" she had complained more
than once.  "They're not necessary."

        That was the key to her personality, Margaret thought.
Economy of thought and action.  Her movements, whether in solving a
jigsaw puzzle or performing an autopsy, were quick and precise.  She
hated to wait for a thing to be done -- grew impatient waiting for her
slower classmates to catch up to her.  All through school she took the
responsibility for group projects on herself because she could never rely
on her teammates to do the quality of work she herself would do.  She
hated for anything with which she was involved to be done haphazardly.

        Margaret remembered when Dana had first discovered Biology,
in ninth grade.  She had come home excited about their new studies and
laughed at Melissa, who had made a face in memory of the dissections.
Every day for weeks she had come home smelling of formaldehyde, and
it was only after a long talk with her father that she reluctantly
refrained
from telling her family of her experiments at the dinner table.  She had
quickly determined that medicine was to be her destiny.  Most mothers
would have sighed in relief.  But then many mothers would have assumed
that their daughters would become nurses or, at the most, OBGYNs or
general practicioners.  Pediatricians.

        But Dana had wanted to be a surgeon, had loved the feel of the
scalpel in her hand.  Her parents had accepted this, Ahab in particular
proud of his little "Starbuck," as he always called her in reference to
the
fact that as a child she had promised that one day she would sail with
him as his first mate.

        But then she had come home one Spring Break during medical
school -- uncharacteristically, for she usually used the time to catch up
with -- for Dana Scully this meant "keep ahead in" -- her studies -- and
with a deep breath had told them she wanted to go into pathology.

        Margaret had been shocked even while a part of her understood
her youngest daughter's attraction to pathology.  She could work alone
without having to rely on others.  And every autopsy was an investigation,

an attempt to solve a mystery.  Dana had always loved mysteries,
practically inhaling every detective novel she could get her hands on.
But then Dana read everything.  It disturbed her mother, though --
this deliberate move toward a career she would spend in veritable
isolation was merely the latest in a series of alienating moves on her
daughter's part.  She was beautiful, brilliant, and witty.  And for some
reason this combination, instead of driving the men in her class insane,
frightened them away.  Deep down Margaret wondered whether her
youngest daughter were not choosing pathology *because* of the lack
of competition.  Not that she could not hold her own; she could have
been a brilliant surgeon, but forensics was a field unto itself and as
such would allow her to shine without casting a shadow over any
potential mate.  Dana had always been fiercely competitive; had
something happened to make her decide that being alone professionally
might prevent her from having to be alone personally?

        Ahab had been less understanding.  What was Starbuck
doing, turning down a chance to work with live patients to work with
dead ones?  By the time she was called in to figure out what went
wrong it was too late, wasn't it?  And even if by some miracle she did
discover something that would save other lives, she wouldn't be the
one saving them.  Once again she managed to put herself under a
spotlight to the left of center stage.  She had been his pride and joy --
his beautiful genius, the child he had always known would make him
proud.  Would succeed in everything she did.  And now here she was,
hidden in a back room surrounded by dead bodies.

        Margaret had tried to console her husband in his
disappointment while still supporting her daughter's decision, much
as she disliked it herself.  But he had been angry, and Dana had
been angry, and the first wedge had been driven between the father
and the daughter who, though he would never admit it, was his favorite
child.

        Eventually Dana had compounded her parents' concern by
determining to work for the FBI.  Now she was Special Agent Dr.
Scully and she carried both a scalpel and a gun.  That she was very
good with both was little consolation.  What the hell was their feminine
daughter doing cutting up dead people and chasing down bad guys?
Something had gone very wrong in the scheme of things as Captain
Scully saw it.

        Oddly enough, it was Melissa who understood her little sister
best -- Melissa the freak, who liked spirits more than studies and boys
more than anything.  She was Dana's confidante, the understanding
ear into which the brilliant scientific mind unburdened itself of her
hopes
and fears.  And she was the one who had first asked Dana about Fox
Mulder.

        Margaret remembered the day she had found out about her
daughter's new assignment -- and her new partner.  The three women
had met for lunch in Georgetown.  Dana, of course, had planned the
whole thing as yet another attempt to reconcile her beloved sister
and mother.  The years had softened the misunderstandings
somewhat, but the deep hurt was still there.  This lunch was a start,
although it still did not make Melissa feel comfortable enough to
attend her father's funeral some months later.

        Over her perusal of the menu that day Melissa had made
it abundantly clear -- yet again -- what topics regarding her life were
"allowed" and what were off-limits.  Margaret had bitten her tongue
and accepted her daughter's boundaries, albeit reluctantly.  Melissa
had always shut herself out of the family's life more than the others.
Dana, as usual, had skilfully stepped in and diverted the
conversation to ease the rising tensions.

        "Mom, they've assigned me to a department," Scully had
said over her salad.  Margaret had sighed, glancing at the Sig Sauer
tucked under Dana's jacket, and said a quick prayer that it wasn't to
Violent Crimes.

        "Oh?  Tell us about it, dear."

        "It's called the 'X-Files.'"  Dana caught Melissa's eye and
grinned mischievously.  "And it's right up your alley, Mel."  Margaret
watched as Dana sat back and eyed her older sister.  Unlike Dana,
Melissa could not hide her interest.

        "Well?"

        Margaret laughed.  In a battle of wit between these two, her
baby would win hands down every time.

        "The paranormal."  Melissa's eyes grew wide.  Dana nodded.
"Thought you'd like that.  ESP, alien abductions, crop circles, the
whole shebang."  Melissa's eyes fairly glowed.  "Actually, I'm supposed
to keep an eye on the guy who's doing the investigating."

        "What's his name, dear?"

        "Agent Mulder."

        "Does he have a first name?"

        Scully took a deep breath.  "Yeah, but he never uses it.  It's
Fox -- Fox Mulder."

        Melissa was watching her sister's face, her eyes narrowed.
"And *is* he?"

        To Margaret's surprise Dana blushed.  "Melissa -- he's my
*partner."  She emphasized the word.

        "So -- is he?"

        Margaret watched, fascinated, as Dana blushed even more
deeply, biting her lip.  The last time she had seen her daughter blush
over a man had been in high school. . . .

        "He is!"  Margaret flashed a warning look at Melissa.  Had
the two of them been fifteen years younger her eldest daughter's
tone would have led her to expect Melissa to break out into sing-
song about Dana and Fox sitting in a tree. . . .

        Some things never changed.

        "He is a man I work with.  That's all.  I don't really think about

what he looks like.  I'm only concerned with making sure he follows
the rules."  Margaret shook her head mentally.  That was cold, even
considering that Dana was attempting to derail Melissa's questions.
This man must really be something. . . .

        It had always bothered her that Dana might have sacrificed
her professional life for a chance at a personal one, although she
desperately wanted to see her little girl happy.  The more so because
the man for whom she was certain her daughter was looking had
never materialized.  Oh, she had dated, Margaret knew, and there
had been that bastard, Jack Willis, who had resurfaced so many
years later only to hurt her daughter again. . . . But nobody ever
seemed to stick around long enough for Dana to bring them home for
Thanksgiving dinner.

        Except Fox Mulder.  But then, Mulder was Scully's partner
and friend.  Whether he was more than that only Dana herself could
answer.  If even she could.  Margaret had gathered from little things
Dana had said and *not* said that their relationship was confusing
at best.

        Early on in their partnership all contact Margaret had had
with Mulder had been on the telephone; they had spoken several
times at the office when she called for Dana, a couple more at Scully's
place.  She knew he and her daughter were friends as well as partners.
But nothing could have prepared her for what she found when she
arrived at Dana's house to find it surrounded by red and blue lights and
shouting men armed with guns and cameras and searchlights.  And
inside, Fox Mulder standing forlornly by Dana's abandoned sofa.

        During the months of Dana's absence she had come to
appreciate Mulder.  She had a soft spot in her heart for him, at first
because he had meant so much to her daughter and thus served as
a link to Dana.  As time wore on through their increasingly frequent
meetings at the park bench and, once or twice, over coffee, she
grew to like Mulder for himself, for the lostness she saw in his eyes
every time one of them spoke her daughter's name.  And then, finally,
she began to love him as a son, could even see him as a son-in-law,
although she would never tell either of *them* that.  If they were going
to figure it out on their own, well and good; she simply knew that
*no-one* had ever felt about Dana as Fox did, and she knew that
no-one would look out for her daughter like he did.  She wished Bill
could have known Mulder; she was certain he would have felt much
better about Starbuck's being in such a dangerous occupation had he
known that she had somebody like Fox Mulder to watch her back.

        When she had met Fox for the first time it had shocked and
concerned her that he seemed more broken and despondent over
Dana's absence than she herself did.  At first she had told herself that
this was because Fox believed Dana had been kidnapped by aliens and
that he was terrified of the things they might be doing to her; he had
never said so, but she had read the account of Duane Barry's capture
in the paper and was smart enough to put two and two together.  But as
the weeks passed she knew that there was more to it than that.  And
then Dana had been returned and she had watched the joy burn in his
eyes as though he were on fire inside.  But then that joy had turned to
an even deeper despair when Scully's condition dropped below the
guidelines in her living will and she had, over Fox's vociferous
objections,
followed Dana's instructions and had given the permission for the
doctors to turned off the machines keeping her body alive.

        That had been a very bleak time in her life; she had lost her
husband so recently, her sons lived out of state, and she and Melissa
had been estranged for years.  Dana had been the shoulder she had
leaned on for so long, and she had felt disloyal to her little girl in
seemingly giving up on her recovery.  But then she had warred with
her heart and her conscience and come to this decision based on her
respect for her daughter's strong will and formidable intellect.  She had
truly believed she had made the right decision, despite Fox Mulder's
protests.

        That awful time had had several positive side effects, the most
immediate being the beginnings of her reunion with Melissa.  Old
wounds seemed dull in light of the newer, sharper pain of losing
daughter and sister, and after that first shocked meeting in Dana's
hospital room they had clung to one another, united first in their
love for Dana and then by the bond of years and blood that even the
most bitter of misunderstandings and disagreements could not
sever.

        She gave thanks again for that reunion; by the night of Dana's
crisis her relationship with Melissa had healed enough that she had
bitten her tongue when it seemed her daughter had abandoned Dana's
bedside and had instead been willing to listen when she returned from
what, it turned out, had been a daring and essential mission.  Melissa
had risked missing saying goodbye to her sister to go in search of
Fox, whom she had not been able to reach despite numerous phone
calls.

        Margaret had sat in sorrowful silence while Melissa described
Fox opening the door to reveal a dark apartment.  When her daughter
haltingly described her image of Mulder's mental state as being even
darker she had simply nodded; perhaps Melissa's "psychic" abilities
were simply another form of observation, she thought: she, too, knew
that Fox Mulder was in "a very dark place" and that he was in just as
grave danger as his partner, albeit from a different source.

        Melissa had told her of the sense of impending violence she
had read in Fox's demeanor -- she was very careful not to call it an
"aura" -- and had shuddered.  She wasn't certain that he intended --
what she thought perhaps he intended.  But murder, even the
execution of those whose actions were killing her baby girl, was
barely less incomprehensible than suicide.  And she knew that Fox's
revenge would be another form of suicide, whether he held the gun to
his own head or somebody else did it for him.  She guessed that
perhaps he knew that, too, and that he no longer cared.

        Thus she had been pleased -- more than pleased -- when he
had shown up in ICU shortly thereafter and had offered to sit with
Dana while she got some much-needed rest.  She had balked at
first, willing to let him stay but reluctant to leave, herself.  Finally
Melissa had practically dragged her away and she had slept,
surprisingly, through the rest of the night, and had, upon awakening,
hurried back to discover Fox Mulder asleep in a chair pulled up
next to the bed, his head close to Dana's and her hand clasped in
his own.  She had sat for awhile, watching and waiting, before
finally awakening him and sending him home.  He had sat with his
partner for more than twelve hours.  He had left with much the same
reluctance she had shown the night before, his eyes bleak and
without hope as he dragged wearily from the room.

        It was then she knew that this man was the one for whom she
had been waiting all of Dana's life.

        And as she sat there where he had sat, the chair still warm
from the long hours his body had occupied it, she had a sudden
presentiment that more than one life was at stake that morning.
Fox's life, and perhaps his soul as well, was in danger.  In her
mind's eye she saw him sitting on his sofa with Dana's
abduction picture in one hand and his gun in the other, waiting for
the phone to ring.

        Fox Mulder was willing to die for her daughter, she was
certain of it.

        Somehow, she  had to convince him to live for her.

        She rose from her seat, taking a last glance back at her
little girl's too-still form, and headed down the hallway to the parking
lot, knowing that when she got back it might be too late, knowing also
that Dana would want this, that she cared so much for him that it
would have hurt her deeply for him to take a life -- his own or another's
-- in recompense for her own.  She would do as Dana would have done
-- beg him to wait, promise him that if he would only wait to see what
happened he could still do this tomorrow or the next day or the next if
he had to, telling him anything to prevent this man who loved her
daughter so much from blanking out his own life.

        And then, reluctantly, because she was terrified of Dana's
dying alone, she had awakened her elder daughter and hurriedly
explained her intentions.  In that moment something approximating
spiritual kinship passed between this rebellious daughter and herself,
and the last bit of distrust and wariness crumbled away.  Melissa, she
knew, had always feared that their parents loved Dana more because
she was "the obedient one," but here her mother was giving the
prodigal charge of the faithful, and they reached for one another in
their grief and need, and as they held one another in that timeless
instant, Melissa Scully finally, truly came home after long absence.

        The long-overdue embrace was broken by the sound of
running feet and shouts along the corridor.  They had both blanched
and stared at one another, frozen, and had taken off at a run back
down the hallway.  Nurse Owens, who throughout Dana's ordeal had
seemed always to be on the perimeter of things although Margaret
had caught her more than once hanging over her daughter's bed,
holding her hand and speaking softly and lovingly to her, had met
them halfway and informed them with a glowing smile that Dana was
awake and would recover.  As they collapsed against one another
Margaret's next thoughts had been of Fox -- she had to tell him, and
yet she was so concerned; she knew, had she been in his position,
what her first thoughts would have been in that horrible, suspenseful
eternity between the moment she answered the phone and the
moment the caller's intent became clear.  Before she could say a
word, however, the nurse had smiled again and calmly promised her
that she would call Fox Mulder and give him the good news.

        Later, Fox had thanked her for delivering the message in the
way that she had; he could not remember her words, he said, but
he had known the moment he heard her voice on the telephone that
everything would be all right.  And he had insisted that it had been
she on the phone until she had begun to doubt her own memories of
the incident.  Perhaps the nurse had forgotten; perhaps she had,
indeed, called Fox herself.

        Against all expectations Scully had lived, and the doctors
were shocked, the attending physician shaken to the core of his
confidence in living wills.  No-one could imagine what had brought her
back from the brink it had seemed she had already crossed over.
But Margaret knew that Fox Mulder had had a lot to do with it.  And
she had seen her daughter's face when he removed the cross from
his pocket -- Dana's cross that he had worn all the time she was gone
-- and returned it to her.

        What had she said?  "I had the strength of your beliefs"?

        What could she find to give her strength now?

        It had always hurt her that her baby was so independent.
Even as a child she had relied on herself, never even seeming to need
her own mother.  But now that child had grown into a strong, self-
reliant woman, and that woman had finally found someone on whom
to depend.  And now that someone was gone.  And what would she
do now?  Margaret thought of Mulder on the couch and thanked God
again that she had hidden the clip for Dana's gun.  Jackie had said
there was no danger, but she wasn't taking any chances.  She couldn't
keep all dangers away from her daughter, but she could protect her as
much as possible.  And with Melissa's help and Jackie's and Marty's it
might just be enough.

        She sighed again.  Physically Dana would survive.  But she
doubted her mind and spirit would ever be fully whole again. . . .

        "Mom!"

        She shook her head to clear the thoughts still clouding her
mind.

        "Soup's boiling over."

        She automatically reached for the knob and turned the heat
back under the bubbling pot.  Melissa was flipping the sandwiches
on the griddle and the tea had already been poured.  She hadn't
noticed the lunch preparations going on around her.  Now she saw
that Jackie and Marty were setting the table.  She smiled.  Dana
may not have many *close* friends, but she certainly knew how to pick
'em.  "Pour the soup, would you, Melissa?  I'll run up and get Dana."
Her daughter nodded and Margaret reached out to pat her hair in
passing.  She didn't know what she would do without her children.
The loss of Ahab had been enough -- what must Mrs. Mulder be feeling
right now?  To lose her daughter, husband, and son, all tragically, all
violently. . . . She knew the other woman had had a minor breakdown
after Fox's death.  She would have to see about going to visit her
tomorrow.

        Margaret's steps grew heavy on the way up the stairs.  It
could so easily have been both of them, she thought -- if Dana had
gone with him. . . . She didn't fully understand the official reports,
but she could tell from her daughter's reaction that they were, at
the very least, incomplete.  She shivered.  Dana had accompanied
Fox out to New Mexico -- had taken him there.  If she had gone
with him they would both be gone. . . . And then the thought crossed
her mind that Dana wished that she *had* been with him, and she
grabbed the banister to steady herself.

        She knew what it was to love and to lose.

        But Dana and Fox had never had their chance.  She knew
from seeing them together that her daughter loved him, knew from
watching his eyes on her and from the time of Dana's abduction that
he loved her -- not romantically, but rather selflessly, sacrificially.
Their bond had been formed in the fires of battle, of confrontation
and danger and circumstances that required -- and created --
absolute trust.  The resulting partnership was like blue steel, heated
at extreme temperatures to remove all the impurities.  Likewise,
their relationship went far beyond the physical, the sexual involvement
that might have weakened it, especially in its earlier stages.

        She also knew that they had both been afraid of another
separation like that they had suffered when the X-Files were closed.
At that time she had never met her daughter's partner and so was blind
to the depth of the pain Scully had felt when she was reassigned to
Quantico.  Her father would have been been thrilled -- the instructorship
was quite a plum, especially for a young agent like Dana Scully.  But
Margaret had sensed her daughter's unhappiness and had bitten her
tongue whenever she was tempted to say anything about the promotion.

        She wondered -- she truly wondered just how far things had
progressed between them.  She would never ask, of course.  But it
hurt -- it hurt very much to see Dana in this much pain.  She was
behaving like a young widow bereft of her soulmate, yet Margaret
felt there had never been any physical involvement between them.
And somehow the thought that her daughter had lost the potential
for that kind of happiness hurt her even more than had Dana lost
a lover.

        She paused at the closed door to the Dana's bedroom and
glanced across the hall and into Brian's room, the one she always
thought of as *his* room because he stayed there whenever he came
to spend the holidays.  Last Christmas Brian and Karen had taken
the hideabed downstairs, and Fox and Dana had laughed about
"connecting rooms."  Fox, she remembered, had gazed at her
daughter and said something cryptic about that arrangement only
working when they were on the clock, and Dana had blushed.  Once
again she wondered. . . .

        Margaret lifted her hand to knock but decided against it.
She eased the door open and peeked around the edge.  Dana was
sprawled out on the bed face down, her shoes and suit jacket still on.
Her body was limp in sleep.  Margaret Scully slipped inside the room
and carefully removed her daughter's shoes.  She wanted to do
something about that jacket but was afraid to wake Dana, who had
barely slept since Fox -- since they'd discovered the body.  And then
she had insisted on doing a second autopsy. . . . Margaret shook her
head.  Dana was strong, but some things were too much even for her.
She stood looking tenderly at her sleeping daughter for a few minutes,
then walked out and gently closed the door behind her.

End 2b/17
*End Chapter Two*

**********************************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Three: "Fires of Memory"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
**********************************************************

        Dana Scully slept -- fitfully -- through the rest of the
afternoon.
It was nearly dark when she awoke, the dim light from the setting sun
turning the air in her bedroom gray.  She pulled herself to a sitting
position and stretched.  Her hair was damp against her face and she
ached all over.

        She slid off the bed and walked over to the window, raising the
sash, and stood for a moment staring out at the sky awash with color.
This was usually her favorite time of the day -- the border-time the Scots
called the "gloaming," when it seemed as if the earth and sky were
uncertain whether to continue to cling to the hem of the day or to turn
and embrace the night.  It always fascinated her that, try as she might,
she could never quite identify the precise moment when the scales
tipped and it became more night than day, when the colors deepened
past the point of no return.

        <So much in life like that.  So many lines drawn without our
realizing it until we've crossed them, caught in the haze that obscures
the boundaries.>

        <When did I cross that line?  When did Mulder go from being the
man I was sent to spy on to my partner, then my best friend, then --
something else entirely?>

        <When did I stop belonging only to myself?>

        <When did he become such a part of me that his absence is
like an amputation?  And this -- missing him -- like the phantom pain
that lingers when the first sharp pangs have gone?>

        <When did it happen?>

        <And why didn't I stop it?  Didn't I see it happening?>

        <Did I ever really have a choice?>

        She shook her head and purposefully turned her thoughts to
her father, the only other man she had ever really -- trusted.

        She looked down at the platform of boards beneath her
window and smiled softly.  Scully remembered building the Nest.
Each of the Scully children had his or her own special private place.
Bill's was a hidden stream back in the woods where he liked to go
fishing for bream and trout.  Melissa's was a clearing in the middle of
the blackberry thicket.  Brian's was the loft of an empty barn two cross-
lots over.

        She, Dana, had always been a tomboy.  When she was
younger she had been readily accepted into her brothers' and their
friends' games, but as they grew older -- and taller -- she was left
behind.  Until much later when the little boys whom she had struck out
in sandlot baseball came back looking for dates. . . .

        But during those confusing middle years she had taken refuge
in the limbs of the great old king maple that grew just outside her
window and had finally convinced her father to help her build the simple
tree house that still remained there.

        Actually, Ahab had taken little convincing -- it had been Maggie
who was concerned for her daughter's safety.  Bill had placated her by
promising to build it himself, the platform actually touching the flat
part
of the roof.  It could serve, in a pinch, as an emergency fire exit from
the second floor of the house.

        But at all other times it was Starbuck's Nest, and she revelled
in her freedom.  On rare occasions the boys or even Melissa were
invited up into to her secluded aery, but they were not allowed to
intrude without permission and, for the most part, they obeyed their
parents' ground rules.  Dana, in her turn, was sometimes taken fishing
by Bill or kitten hunting in the loft by Brian or played in Melissa's
bright vine-house and picked and ate living amethysts off the growing
walls.

        As for the Nest, she and Ahab had built it sturdily and added
a railing around the three free-standing sides, again as a concession
to Maggie's maternal sensibilities.  There was a rope ladder that could
be lowered to the ground for emergencies -- such as the aforementioned
fire or the occasional early schoolbus.  The Nest was hidden in the
dense foliage of the tree and was relatively invisible to the casual
onlooker as well as very nearly inaccessible from the ground, as the
lowest branches were six feet up.

        Dana had spent many of her wonder-moments here.  When
her father would leave on a tour of duty, on those occasions when the
hour or some other factor prevented all four children from accompanying
their mother to the dock to see him off, she would climb out onto the
Nest and wave at him until even the cloud of dust had settled behind the
retreating car.  While he was gone she would creep out o'nights and sit
in silence, watching the stars and knowing he was seeing the same
constellations -- most of the time.  And she would imagine, sometimes,
that the Nest was actually the crow's nest of his ship, that he was
standing on the deck far beneath her awaiting her report for good or
for ill.

        Here, too, she studied and read, shedding her first tears over
_Romeo and Juliet_ and unravelling the mysteries of algebra.  It was in
the Nest that she had finished reading _Jane Eyre_ for the first time in
the tenth grade.  She was so angry at Jane for returning to Rochester
that she threw the book over the side and then leapt up to watch in
horror as it fell heavily to the ground and split down the spine, sending
pages flying in all directions.  That was the first, last, and only time
she
ever mistreated a book so.  She was only glad it had not been _The
Odyssey_.  And years later, when time and maturity and experience
had given her a fellow-feeling for Jane, she remembered those days of
innocence when things seemed so clearly delineated in black and
white, and sighed.

        The Nest was also the perfect place for a young Dana to write in
her diary, which she afterwards secured in a crook of a branch beneath the
platform itself where she hoped it would be safe from Melissa's prying
eyes.  In later years she turned to journal- and letter-writing here as
well, and on several trips home from college had even studied for term
exams there, shaded from the hot sun that filtered through her leafy
ceiling to illuminate the pages of her Shakespeare or Einstein or
_Gray's Anatomy_.

        At the end of one board was a scarred area where she had once
carved her initials with those of the boy's she liked, only to return the
following week and viciously hack the letters out of the wood when she
discovered he had turned his attentions to an older, more mature,
ninth-grade girl, one whose knees were covered in nylons rather than
Band-Aids.

        And one afternoon several years later she had even brought a
guy out here to neck, secure in her own literalist mind that the caveat
that forbade her from having boys in her *room* certainly did not apply to
the Nest since it was, technically, outside the house.  Unfortunately,
Maggie had chosen to return from the store -- early -- just in time to see
Doug MacKenzie swing one long, gangly leg over the windowsill from her
daughter's room.  That had been one of those other occasions the
emergency rope exit had been used.

        Bill's sons had discovered the Nest on a previous visit to
Grandma and Grandpa Scully's house and had begged to be allowed
access to it, but their father, with a bittersweet wistfulness for days
past
and out of deference to Scully's memories of their father, had disallowed
it.  After that the boys had lurked around under Scully's window hoping
to catch their Aunt Dana on the roof.  The day before they had left she
had taken pity on them and, laughing down into their excited faces from
her lofty perch, had promised them that one day when they were older
she would invite them up.

        She had gone there last night, too, to watch the stars and think
about . . . things.

        She had wanted to show Mulder the Nest. . . .

        Scully snapped back to the present.  The indefinable moment
had once again passed unnoticed; the sky was now rapidly darkening
from a deep rosy lavender to a velvety blue-purple, and soon it would
be night.

        <The sunsets in New Mexico were beautiful. . . .>

        She shook her herself, wincing when her neck cracked.
Perhaps a shower would help.

        Scully closed the window and crossed to the bathroom that
connected her room to the den next door, which had been Melissa's
room before she had left for college.  She smiled, remembering how
her father had always maintained that one of the smartest things he
had ever done was to put an extra bathroom between his two girls'
rooms.

        She turned up the water as hot as it would go, peeled the
now-limp suit off her body, and climbed in.  Ahhh.  Bliss.  She stood
for a long time directly under the spray, allowing the water to beat
the soreness out of her neck and shoulders.

        But then she began remembering again.

        She remembered the shower she had taken at the hotel in
New Mexico although for the life of her she could not recall how she
had gotten from the explosion site in the desert back to town.  She
remembered scrubbing at her skin until it was red and washing her
hair four times to get the smell of smoke away from her, as if the
water would wash down the drain all the anxiety and fear and anger
that permeated her entire consciousness.  She most vividly
remembered breathing in deeply the shampoo-scented steam in an
attempt to clear the stench from her nostrils.

        She had been worried -- very worried -- then, but still hopeful.
The Navajo boy had not even been found yet, and they couldn't be
*certain* Mulder had been in that boxcar. . . .

        And then the next shower that she remembered vividly, back
at her own apartment, a scant week ago.  The one she had taken to
get the feeling of death off of her.  The one she had taken to scrub the
feeling of sickness out of her mouth.

        Strange.  She couldn't remember the drive with Jackie from the
lab to her apartment or the one from the apartment to her mother's
house, but she could remember that shower.

        Scully had insisted on doing a second autopsy herself, arguing
calmly and quietly with Skinner until he threw up his hands in despair
and let her.  And she had done well, really well, approaching this post-
mortem as she would any other, snapping her rubber goves on with
precision, recording her findings in a flat, controlled voice.  Noting the
extensive damage to the skin and upper layers of flesh.  The numerous
older injuries that had left their identifying marks -- a pin in his left
leg,
healed fractures in both arms.  The extensive scarring in his left
shoulder and thigh which were consistent with bullet wounds.

        She had been totally, utterly in control of herself until,
finished,
she had cut off the tape recorder and removed her gloves, throwing them
into the waste container in the corner.

        And then reached out her finger to touch that one patch of
unburnt flesh on the inside of his right forearm.  It was soft and smooth.
And terribly, terribly cold.  It had seemed to her that his death had
somehow not truly touched her until that moment, but the coldness of
that fleeing contact with his skin had crept into her own body, into the
very marrow of her bones, taking with it the deadly and sick creeping
sensation of death and decay.  *His* death and decay -- and, in a
sense, her own. . . .

        And then she had burst out of the examining room, lurching to
the bathroom, and was horribly, violently ill.  She had heaved again and
again although there was very little in her stomach.  She hadn't eaten
for days.  Had collapsed weakly against the wall of the bathroom.  Her
assistant had returned and found her there.  His eyes were
compassionate and he was very young.

        "Dr. Scully?"

        "Bruce, could you . . . ?"

        "Yes, ma'am."  He tried to smile at her but the result was
ghastly.  He turned without another word to replace the body in storage.
Her partner -- her friend.  How could she even. . . ?

        He shook his head.  Dr. Dana Scully was somewhat of a
legend at Quantico.  Her brilliance, her uncanny ability to distance
herself from even the most gruesome of autopsies, was infamous.
From all he had been told of her he had expected that the Ice Maiden
would live up to her p.r.  He had been unprepared for -- but impressed
by -- the firm gentleness with which she handled the bodies they had
autopsied together.  From her manner it was obvious that she revered
life and was determined to give the bodies the respect she would have
given the living people.  Her stitches as she closed the horrible wounds
they routinely gave the cadavers were small and careful, although
no-one else would ever see them, the final gift she could give to the
dead.

        And so when, after making a brief telephone call to the one
person he believed could truly help, he began to re-stitch the incisions
on the body of Fox Mulder, Bruce Cunningham used small, careful
stitches.  It was the least he could do for him -- and for her.

*****

        Dana climbed out of the shower, dried herself, and dressed
quickly.  If only she could stop thinking -- even for a little while.
Just
turn off her mind for a few minutes so she could rest.  Even her fitful
sleep was filled with nightmarish images of the things she had seen --
*they* had seen -- and experienced.

        And the fear.

        Whom to trust?

        The government who employed her but who had lied to and
about her?

        Walter Skinner, who obviously sympathized with her but who
was, in the long run, answerable to that same government?

        The Lone Gunmen -- paranoid and obsessed with conspiracy
theories, but full of sympathy when they had finally -- reluctantly --
called her with the results of the DNA tests?

        Her mother and sister, who loved her but could not possibly
understand?

        Jackie.  She could trust Jackie.  But she couldn't tell her
everything -- couldn't put the Canadian agent's life at risk.

        Mulder.  She could have trusted him -- always.

        <I trust him as much as anyone.  I trust him with my life.>

        <You're the only one I trust, Scully.>

        <If you left I would consider it more than a professional loss.>

        <I still have you. . . .>

        She rushed downstairs blindly, fleeing the voices in her mind.

        They were all seated around the fireplace, their voices hushed.
So they would not wake her, she instinctively knew.  She took a deep
breath and sank to an empty chair.

        "Dana!"  Her mother smiled at her.  "Sleep well?"

        She gave her an approximation of a smile in return and said
nothing.  She hadn't.

        Melissa jumped up.  "We saved you some soup and I can
make more sandwiches. . . ."

        "No."  Four pairs of eyes swung to look at her in concern.
"Just -- a cup of tea, if you wouldn't mind."

        "'Course not, Cat."  Dana did smile at this.  Mel hadn't called
her "Cat" since high school.  A wave of fondness for her family and
beloved friends swept over her.  They were trying to make her
comfortable, but they were trying too hard. . . .

        She accepted the mug of spiced tea her sister handed her
and sipped slowly, allowing the hot liquid to warm her all the way to
her toes.  This was one of her very favorite things to do at her mother's
house -- just sit companionably by the fire sipping tea.

        Except that this particular flavor -- her mother called it
"Russian
tea," made with tea and Tang and cloves and other spices -- reminded
her of Mulder and last Christmas, which he had spent here.  She
remembered the presents they had given one another, carefully chosen
as always to keep that distance between them that would allow them
to continue working together, and yet so charged with significance in
their own way.

        And the fireplace.  She had called her mother the afternoon
she had finally wheedled Mulder into joining them for Christmas and
had carefully explained his phobia.  She had related to Margaret the
story he had told her about his friend's house burning down and had
added a rather sketchy description of the L'Ively case which had made
the extent of his fear so evident to her.  She had not been able to help
just touching on Phoebe Greene's involvement; she was still bitter
about the woman's manipulation of Mulder's angst to prove she still
retained her old power over him.  At least, she had convinced herself
that that was the source of her anger.

        That first cold night, though, Mulder had approached Margaret
and carefully, determinedly asked her why she had not built a fire in the
fireplace.  He must have noticed the looks exchanged at his question
but had not mentioned it.

        After that they had had a fire every night.  At one point she
had approached him about it and he had shrugged and tried to convince
her that contained fires did not affect him.  But he could not hide the
way he jumped when the sparks crackled against the screen, and he
had noticed her noticing and had joked about his "pyrotherapy."  All in
all he had seemed determined to fit in, to take Maggie at her word and
make himself "one of the family."

        A log broke in the fireplace and she jumped, a momentary
panic coursing through her body.  Fire.  Dear God, why fire of all
things?  Why not a nice quick bullet or -- or anything but that. . . .
Anything but the fire that had taken his body and burned out of him
everything that had made him Mulder and turned him into that
twisted mass of burnt flesh and ash and bone that had been the best
partner and friend she had ever had. . . .

        Suddenly her tea was very bitter and the fire could not seem
to chase the chill from her bones.  She looked at the floor.  She
dreaded going up to bed alone.  The dreams would undoubtedly
come again . . . but she was even more afraid to stay awake.  All at
once she wished for a husband or a lover, someone to hold her in
the night and keep her from being afraid.

        And suddenly, inexplicably, she thought of Mulder again.

        No!  I will *not* do this!

        <Why not?> a small voice inside asked.

        Because he's my *partner*, my best friend, that's why.

        <He's gone.  They can't take him from you again, can they?>

        No -- but. . . . And then the walls crumbled and for an instant
-- just an instant -- she allowed herself to remember the light in his
eyes when he teased her, the half-smile that curled his lips, that one
shock of dark hair that always fell over his forehead and that she had
given into temptation to brush back too few times, his full lower lip
with the crease that divided it in the middle, the feel of his arms as he
held her after he had rescued her from Pfaster. . . .

        <And who will hold me now?>

        Unabashedly she admitted to herself -- finally -- that she
had wanted him.  Okay.  Yes.  I did.  And I didn't do anything about
it because I couldn't stand to risk losing him as my partner and
friend, not even --

        <And now?  What would you do if you had him back?>

        Now?

        <What would you change?>

        She thought about that for a moment.

        Nothing.  I would change nothing.  Except to tell him more
often how much I appreciated him.  To admit with less reticence
the times that I believed him -- believed *in* him, which was more
important.

        And to go with him into that boxcar.  They were a *team*.
What had she said?  "I'm afraid you're on your own with this,
Mulder"?  Because she had missed a meeting with Skinner and was
concerned for her *JOB*?

        <No.  One of you had to try to make peace with Skinner.
So you could keep the X-files.  And stay together.>

        It didn't work.

        <No.  But you tried.>

        Okay.  Yes.  I tried.  I did.  I tried but I failed.  And now he's
gone and I've lost or *will* lose everything anyway. . ..

        "Sweetheart."

        She jumped.  Her mother was standing over her, concern in
her eyes.

        "We're all going up to bed now.  You want to stay down here
for a while?  I'll stay with you. . . ."

        "No.  No -- I should go to bed, too. . . big day tomorrow."

        Her mother raised her eyebrows and looked across at
Jackie, who looked away.  Yes.  A big day.  Tomorrow they would go
after Cancerman and Krycek.

        "Okay, hon."

        Dana rose wearily.  Her mother took the mug from her and
watched her slowly climb the stairs.  "You know where the extra
blankets are -- "

        Yes.  She knew.

        "Good night."  She nodded and continued up the stairs to
her room and closed the door.

        Downstairs Marty doused the fire and stood in silence in
the near darkness with the other three women, listening to the
stillness.

*End Chapter Three*

**************************************************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Four: "Sometimes Love is Stronger Than
        Reason"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
**************************************************************************

        Dana stood with her back against the door for a long time,
feeling the unnatural stillness of the house creep into her.  Perhaps
she should have stayed downstairs for a while longer.  Remained
with the others.

        Then she sighed.  It didn't matter, really -- she would be just
as alone there as here.  Because her aloneness was not a function of
her proximity to other people.  She was alone inside her skin.  The
emptiness consumed her, filling her bones with blankness.  She was
surprised at times that she did not just -- implode.  And then they
would look at her and understand.  "Look -- she was empty inside."  A
hollow where her heart used to be.  Only a little ash remaining, enough
to make her hurt so terribly but not enough to allow her to grieve.

        There was nothing left.

        She supposed she should be glad for the task she had set
for herself -- to find Cancerman and Krycek and bring them to justice.
Exactly what that justice would be depended entirely on the
explanations they gave her and the emotions she happened to feel
at the moment.  If she felt anything.

        With a cool, detached part of her mind she was slightly
amused at this.  <So this is how it's going down, eh, Dana Kate?
You spend your entire adult life calmly and methodically tracking
down some of the most horrific criminals ever to walk the face of this
earth and now you sit here just as calmly and methodically planning
the deaths of at least two men.>

        Upon her return from her second trip to New Mexico, when it
had become evident that Mulder had been the victim of foul play, she
had attempted to contact the shadowy figure known simply as Mr. X.
She had taped the "X" on Mulder's window -- the glass pane replaced
by the landlord during her absence -- and waited.  And waited.
Knowing that in doing so she was placing her own life in danger.
Caring little.  In the weeks that were to come she would care less and
less.  She could understand, now, Mulder's obsession with finding his
sister, with believing that she was still alive and out there, somewhere,
waiting for him.  She, too, believed, despite all the evidence to the
contrary, despite all the well-wishers and not-so-well-wishers who
urged her to go on, to forget. . . .

        <I want to believe.>

        She had spent nights dozing on his couch, keeping herself
awake drinking coffee made in his coffeepot -- made with bottled
water, for she was still somewhat paranoid about his water supply --
feeding and watching his fish, reading his books and magazines.
Once, in a momentary aberration of good sense and decorum which
she could only attribute to boredom and acute loneliness, she had
even popped in one of his "special" videos and watched it for a few
minutes.  When she finally stopped and ejected it it was not with the
mingled disgust and amusement with which she normally reacted to
his admittedly juvenile predilections but rather with an overwhelming
sadness, a sudden understanding.

        Despite the admittedly pornographic content of his videos and
magazines, Fox Mulder was no pervert.

        He was lonely.

        And with this realization came a rush of fellow-feeling.

        She, too, was lonely.  Had been for a very long time.  She
chose to stave off her aloneness by burying herself in her work.

        But for Mulder his work was all-consuming.  The X-files
allowed him to search for Samantha, and when he was not working on
the paranormal he was helping to profile monsters like Donny Pfaster,
something at which he was highly adept but which, she knew, always
took a lot out of him.  For Mulder every new Violent Crimes profile was
a fresh look into the abyss; he had become so used to the abyss
looking back into him, as Nietzche would say, that he routinely
absorbed some of that darkness into himself and it was a long time
before he was able to step back from the edge and into his own skin.

        So where did Fox Mulder go to escape Fox Mulder?

        One of his defense mechanisms was to turn to visual and
print pornography.  Ironically, the very things that she as a woman
deplored about such items -- their soullessness and dehumanity --
were the things that made them Mulder's life preserver.  In his short
-- all too short -- life he had learned too much about human -- and
inhumane -- nature, most of it bad.  Retreating into the realm of
dehumanization was, for him, infinitely safer and thus infinitely
preferable to risking what little trust he had left on the potentially
untrustworthy.

        He had trusted her.  And she had trusted him.  But it was
too much to expect one person to be able to fill all the holes in one's
life, as important and essential as that person might be.  As much
as you might love them and be loved by them.

        And it hurt now that this revelation, for revelation it was, and
she recognized it as such, had come so late.  If -- *when* -- he
returned, she would find some way to let him know she understood.

        And then, because at the time she had still believed with
all of her being that he *was* coming back, and knowing his
memory which, while photographic, was also somewhat selective,
she had steeled herself and rewound the tape to the approximate
segment at which she had begun watching it.

        Now, remembering, she felt yet another wave of bitterness
wash over her at the unfairness of it all.  That she should be given
such insight into her complex partner after it was too late, that
Cancerman had denied her the opportunity to show him that she,
at least, understood and would not judge him, seemed consummately
unjust.

        And it merely fed her determination to hunt him down and
exact vengeance for Mulder's death and for her own loss.

        For that is what this was.  She had kept trying to tell herself --

as she had told Jackie -- that she intended to find Krycek and
Cancerman and turn them over to the authorities with proof enough to
convict them of Mulder's murder at the very least.  But deep down she
knew that once she heard from their lips what they had done to him --
and she had absolutely no doubt that she *would* hear it -- she would
coolly terminate their sorry lives with no regrets.  And from the look in
Jackie's eyes she knew it, too.  And so she could not allow St. George
to come in on this, as much as her friend wanted her own vengeance.

        She supposed this was insanity.

        She supposed she ought to be frightened.  She had learned
at Quantico that every psychopath has a rationale -- irrational though
it may be -- for his actions.  The criminally insane believe themselves
to be eminently sane in an insane world.

        But she felt nothing.  Not remorse for what she planned to
do, nor anticipation.  Nothing.  Only the pain of that dull, aching
emptiness, a pain that was painful in its very lack of sensation, a
pain that seemed to be growing instead of diminishing.  They had told
her it would eventually go away, this pain.  The thought that she might
someday forget, that she would wake up in the morning and her first
thought would not be of *him*, was the single thing that terrified her
now.  The pain was all she had left.

        No.  That was not strictly true.  She had the envelope.  She
turned and looked at it lying there, white and innocuous, on the
bedside table.  To a casual observer it might have seemed as
innocent and insignificant as a flyer or a bill.

        But to Dana Scully it was the one final truth of her current
existence.

        She knew what was in that envelope, categorically if not
specifically.  Fox Mulder's last words to her.  She had written a letter
and sealed it in an envelope very much like this one after her abduction.

It was in her mother's safe deposit box now, and Margaret had strict
instructions to give it to Mulder after Scully's funeral were she to go
first.
She remembered again the haunted look in Margaret's eyes when she
had made her promise that.  It had been too soon after the abduction,
and she knew that, but she couldn't risk it again, couldn't risk leaving
without some semblance of a goodbye, unnatural as it might seem on
paper.

        She remembered laboring so carefully over that letter.  What
to say?  And how?  And how much?  What would hurt, and what
would heal?  What would it accomplish for her to pour out in black and
white all the things left unsaid?  If he read the letter it would mean she

was gone -- no satisfaction there.  And too much might hurt him -- just
as too little undoubtedly would.

        Finally she had sealed the envelope with a little sigh,
praying that someday all those things would be said verbally. . . .

        And now she was the one with the envelope.

        Had he, too, struggled with his words?  Had he been afraid
of saying too much and too little?  Of hurting her?  Above all, what
had he ultimately said?

        She could open the envelope.  Force herself to confront once
and for all time that this man who had been her partner for the past
two years, her best friend and something else she was not quite ready
to deal with yet, was gone.  Dead and gone.  Forever.  Could force
herself to stare at the lines his hand had drawn on the paper in an
attempt to pour out his heart to her, could read it and remember, as
she read, that as he wrote it he had *known* that she would only
read it under these circumstances, that in his own mind Mulder had
been dead, or imagined himself dead, even as he wrote, just as she
had done in writing her own posthumous epistle.

        Fire.  It was an apt analogy for what she had suffered -- no,
not truly suffered, for she knew that she had not yet begun to suffer
as she would undoubtedly suffer once this fog lifted and the anguish
and sorrow and disbelief she still felt that he could have died without
her knowledge gave way to the other loss, the one the others who
mourned him could understand.

        Third degree burns.  At the very least.  The kind that went
deep into the flesh and destroyed the nerve endings that should have
sent messages of pain from the injuries to the brain.  It was an irony
of fire-related injuries that the first- and second-degree burns were
more painful than the more serious third-degree ones.

        In life, too, she had discovered that at times it was the minor
annoyances that irritated the most.  The things that mattered, those
were the things that hurt down deep so badly that it took time for the
pain to surface, as if the mind and body had to prepare one another
for the onslaught.

        But she wouldn't open it.  She couldn't.  Not yet.

        It was the last she would hear from him.  After the envelope
there would be nothing left, nothing new, only memories.  And she
did not have his photographic memory to cherish their friendship, the
years of their partnership.

        Maybe after she had found Cancerman and Krycek.

        Maybe then.

        She sighed.  She did not want the -- for lack of a better word
-- hurt -- to stop; she was certain that that would mean she was either
insane or dead, and she could not allow either fate to befall her while
Mulder's killers were still free.

        But she did want the comfort of uncontrolled grief, the sharp,
stabbing pain of tears instead of the dull, empty ache that was even
harder to bear.

        Perhaps tonight it would stop.  Maybe tonight she could cry,
could drop those walls that persisted in trapping her grief somewhere
inside her body so deeply that it could not escape.

        What was wrong with her?  She had cried for her father, for
Jack Willis even though he had hurt her.  And Fox Mulder had never
hurt her -- never intentionally hurt her, not like that.

        As a child she had wept for dogs and cats, and even for the
snake she had helped her brothers kill that day in the woods.

        When had she stopped crying?

        The Academy had stripped her of most of her emotions.  She
was a woman in a boys' club.  She was small.  She was attractive.
She was smarter than anyone else in her class, try as she did at first
to hide it.  It had been easier to turn off her emotions than it would
have been to deal with the criticism she knew would otherwise be
forthcoming.

        But that had only made them turn their animosity in a
different direction.  She became The Ice Maiden.  The Queen Bitch.
And that made her shut herself off even more.

        But Jack and her father had been after Quantico.  No, she
couldn't blame this entirely on the Academy.

        She made herself think.  When Jack had died after kidnapping
her, *he* had been there.  And again when her father died.  Again after
that blank of time that was the abduction she still could not remember.
And again when he had rescued her from Pfaster.

        He had held her that time, his mere presence an assurance
that here, at least, was someone who would not criticize her for
losing control temporarily, who would help her pick up the pieces of
her brokenness and put them back together -- wounded but whole.
And stronger, like a mended bone.  She could let herself go with
him, lose control without losing herself because he owned a part of
her, somehow, and could thus give her back to herself.

        But this time he wasn't there to help her and the hurt was
too deep.

        There was a gentle knock at the door.  When she didn't
answer it creaked open slowly.  She knew it was Jackie.

        The other woman came up behind her and slid her arms
around Scully.

        "Dana."

        She didn't move.  Jackie sighed.

        "You gonna be okay?"

        Of course she wasn't.  And Jackie knew that.  But that
wasn't what she meant.

        She nodded.

        "If you need me. . . ."

        She turned and tried to smile at her friend.  Jackie had been
wonderful.  She wondered what would happen when St. George found
out that Scully had ditched her.  Time and again she had rebuked
*him* for doing that very thing.  <I'm drawing the line, Scully. . . .>
But now she understood why he had done it.

        Sometimes love was stronger than reason.

        And so now she was drawing the line.

        Jackie gave her another squeeze and left, quietly closing the
door behind her.

        Scully sighed and rubbed her eyes.  Despite her long nap
that afternoon she was exhausted.  Of course, her sleep was never
peaceful now -- it was filled with dreams of Barry and Pfaster and
Jack Willis, only Mulder never came to save her.  And then dreams
of shooting him over and over, of missing and hitting his heart and
watching the blood gush from his body as he stared at her reproachfully.
Of throwing him into the boxcar herself and slamming the lid and then
of watching him burn and burn and burn until she awoke screaming,
her entire body shaking.  And even then, when she was finally
completely awake and knew that it was just a dream, she also knew
that she had sent him to his death just as surely as if she had thrown
the incindiary device herself.

        <I want you to find out, Mulder.  I need you to.>

        She had awakened the whole house last night with her
screaming.  And then when they had all come running to her room
she had just sat there, stiff and silent as Margaret embraced her.
There was no comfort in her mother's arms because there was no
comfort to be had.  The only one who could comfort her was the one
who could not.

        "I miss you so much," she whispered.

        And then the pain was in her chest and throat again, choking
her.  Yet she still could not cry.  She had tried everything -- not
thinking about him, thinking about him, poking and prodding at the
emotional wounds in an attempt to bring the pain to the surface.

        She turned and looked at the envelope again, reconsidering.
Open it or not?

        <Open it.>

        Perhaps the fresh pain of seeing his words on the page
would bring the relief she needed.  She picked up the envelope.

        <No.  Not yet.>

        But then what would be left?   Nothing except revenge.  And
this act was too final, too -- sacred, almost. . . .

        No.  Not yet.

        With another sigh she replaced the envelope carefully and
went into the bathroom to brush her teeth.  She gazed at herself in
the mirror, dispassionately noting the deep, bruise-like shadows
under her eyes, the sickly paleness of her face, the fine lines in her
forehead.  And she had lost more weight.  She looked -- dead.

        Well, why not?  My heart is dead.

        <You should be taking better care of yourself, Dana
Katherine. . . .>

        Why?  I don't care anymore.  And don't give me any of that
"he wouldn't have wanted this" crap.  Since when do I listen to him?
He never listened to me. . . .

        <Dana. . . .>  And then her memory showed her her partner
sitting patiently in his chair listening to her scientific theories which
were very often more improbable than his paranormal ones, agreeing
to go through proper channels first, time and again holding his
enthusiasm in check and allowing her to have her say before they
made the final decision.  Not every time.  But often enough to let her
know he thought of her as his equal, his partner.

        Surely the tears would come now?

        <You have to keep up your strength, Dana.  You have to
stay healthy so you can find the men who did this to him. . . .>

        Okay.  You're right.   Tomorrow.  Tomorrow I will eat
something. . . .

        She glanced at her reflection for a moment, then shut off the
light and walked back to the bed and picked up her pajamas and slid
into them, dropping her clothes on the floor.  The night air was cool
and she shivered as she crept under the covers.

        She huddled under the two quilts trying to get warm, feeling
that she never would be warm again.  She knew this was primarily
psychological, but there it was.

        Sighing again in exasperation, she slid out of bed and
padded over to the dresser.  Maybe there were some of Brian's old
sweats here. . . .

        She opened the bottom drawer and then stopped, stunned.
There lay a blue and white Oxford University sweatshirt.  *His*
sweatshirt.  He had left it here accidentally after Christmas, she now
remembered.  Her mother had offered to send it but he told her to leave
it where it was.  She knew that part of this was due to his modesty --
he would never have worn the Oxford shirt out in public -- and it felt
good that he felt comfortable enough with her family to wear it when he
was with them.  And her mother had told her how good it made her feel
that Fox was secure enough to leave his shirt at her house -- it was
like an unspoken promise that he would be back. . . .

        A promise she knew he had fully intended to keep.

        She reached out and touched the soft material gently, then
pulled the sweatshirt out of the drawer and pulled it over her head in
place of the pajama top, added a pair of baggy sweatpants, and went
back to bed.

        It still smelled faintly of him.  Evidently it had never been
laundered. . . . She lay in the darkness feeling the soft material
against her upper body and breathing in the ghost of his scent.  The
soft warmth wrapped around her chest and arms and back felt -- almost
-- like someone holding her.  Finally, she drifted off to sleep. . . .

*****

        She started up in bed.  Something had awakened her.  She
listened carefully, hearing nothing but stillness.  And yet -- she knew
there had been -- something.  A noise?  A movement?

        Her senses were prickling, that sixth sense, intuition, jangling
loudly.  Experience had taught her never to ignore it.

        Slowly, cautiously, she reached for the gun that lay on her
nightstand.  Normally her cel phone would have been there, too, but
only one person ever called her on it late at night. . . .

        She grabbed the gun, feeling its comfortable weight fill her
hand.  Wait -- it was lighter than usual. . . .

        With a sinking heart she checked.  The clip was missing.

        <Oh, Mom.>

        Great.  She could just see the headlines now: FBI AGENT
FOUND MURDERED IN BED HOLDING EMPTY GUN.  MOTHER
FEARED FOR HER DAUGHTER'S LIFE.  It was all she could do to
restrain the hysterical laughter that bubbled up on her lips.

        And then she saw it.

        Something on her window.

        An "X."

        She slid out of bed again and crept over to the window.  It
was made out of masking tape pressed against the outside of the
glass.  She stood beside the window out of the line of fire of any
possible snipers and cautiously peeked out.

        A man was standing under the tree in the front yard.  As she
watched, he stepped back into the shadows.

        She turned quickly and hurried across the room to the door,
opening it carefully to avoid any noise.  She made herself pause to
listen.

        Nothing.

        She hurried down the stairs to the front door and paused.

        It could be a trap.

        It could be help.

        Her gun was unloaded.

        He -- they? -- wouldn't know that.

        What to do?  If there were more than one of them they might
take her by surprise and then go after the sleeping women and man
upstairs.

        But then they might do that no matter what.

        The danger to her own life was a tertiary concern at most.
Except that she wanted -- needed -- to find Krycek and Cancerman
before she died.

        What to do?

        She opened the door cautiously and slid out onto the front
porch, empty gun first.

        The man stepped out of the shadows again.

        "Agent Scully."

        The voice was slightly familiar.  Then, looking around, he
stepped closer and she recognized him.

        "You!"

        The man known simply as "Mr. X" smiled briefly, his white
teeth flashing in the moonlight.

        "Myself."

        She wanted to kill him, this enigmatic man who had put
them in jeopardy so many times, who had refused to help her the last
time Mulder had been in serious trouble.  Who had never shown up
*this* time when she had wanted him.  But he had helped them as
well -- nobody knew which side he was really on. . . .

        "What do you want?"  she hissed.

        "He stood regarding her gravely.

        "No, Agent Scully.  The question is -- what do *you* want?"

        She blinked.

        "More than anything else in the world, Agent Scully. . . ."

        "Cancerman," she breathed.  "And Krycek."  She walked
over to the tree.

        He smiled slightly and shook his head in amusement.  "No
-- I cannot help you there.  It is beyond my power.  It may be beyond
anyone's."

        Her shoulders slumped.

        "But you surprise me, Agent Scully.  I thought two years of
working with Fox Mulder would have opened your mind to -- extreme
possibilities?"  He glanced behind him.  Behind the tree.

        A trap --

        Oh, Lord, it was a trap and she had no ammunition. . . .

        He stepped to the side.  She tightened her grip on the
useless gun.

        And then froze.

        <Oh, my God. . . .>

        He stepped closer to her.  "Agent Scully," he said quietly,
"you still have a friend in the FBI."

*End Chapter Four (*SUFFER!*)*

*******************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Five: "Tears"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
*******************************************
(5a/17)

        "Agent Scully, you still have a friend in the FBI."

        He stood watching for a moment as she swayed, her gun
slipping from her fingers to strike the ground with a muffled *thump*.

        A man lay slumped against the tree.

        A man in a tattered suit and the remnants of an awful tie.

        A man who was dearer to her than her own life, than the very
marrow of her bones. . . .

        Her heart's desire.

        Not Cancerman.

        Not Krycek.

        "Mulder!"  She lurched forward and fell to her knees next to
him.  She reached with shaking hands to check for his pulse.

        Warm.  His skin was warm.  And smooth, unburnt. . . .

        A heartbeat throbbed, steady and strong, against her
fingers.

        *He's alive!*

        "Mulder!" she cried again, and his name on her lips sounded
alien in her ears.

        He stirred and opened his eyes.

        "Sc-Scully?"  His voice was soft and wondering.

        And then she was in his arms, running her fingers through his
longish hair and hugging him close.  He winced and she noted the red
stain on his head.  <He's hurt -- bleeding -- but it's red -- not a clone
--
not -- it's Mulder -- it's really Mulder . . .> and she was laughing
through
the tears that streamed down her face and onto his in the moonlight. . . .

        They clung to each other for some minutes, both too
overwhelmed to speak.

        When she finally looked up again, Mr. X was gone.

        "Thank you," she stage whispered, not knowing whether he
was nearby to hear her or not, intending it also as a prayer.  It seemed
an inadequate expression of her gratitude, but she had no other words.
She was certain that Mr. X had done this for his own reasons, and
even after this they

        <they!>

still might not be able to trust him, but for now he had given her what
she wanted -- what she needed -- and she was grateful.

        She turned back to Mulder.  His face was pale in the
moonlight, his cheeks thin.  But it was *his* face, that dear face she
never thought she'd see again. . . .

        "Scully --" his eyelids fluttered and he looked at her -- not
meaningfully or passionately or anything else.  Just looked at her.  As
though he were afraid he was seeing a vision that would vanish if he
closed his eyes for too long.  And a rush of joy consumed her.  Alive
-- he was *alive* and with her again.

        She struggled with her words.  "Yeah -- it's me, Mulder."
She paused and then grinned at him.  "Geez, do I really look *that*
bad?"

        He smiled and reached up one hand to brush her cheek with
one forefinger.

        "No.  You look that *good*."  His eyelids drooped.

        "Mulder, do you think you can stand?"

        He sighed and nodded.

        "Good.  I need to check you over but first I need to get you
inside the house and to bed."  She saw a tired grin cross his face
and grinned, herself.  Sometimes he was such a juvenile.  "I have no
idea how Mr. X got you here, or whether he was followed.  Do you
know?"

        "Don't remember -- just a car -- I was on the back seat --
nobody else with him -- he said I'd be safe here."

        "Good.  Okay," she said, rising to a crouch, "I'm hoping
nobody followed you here.  But whoever had you will probably have
a good idea where to start looking."  For once she hoped that
Mulder's enigmatic and often infuriating contact was nearby.  She
still didn't fully trust the man, but he evidently meant them no harm
this time, else why would he have bothered to return Mulder?

        Right?

        Scully sighed a little, wishing she could be sure.  She also
wished she had the clip for her gun -- and Mulder was unarmed.

        Mulder.  Couldn't have him catching cold lying on the ground
like this.  He didn't seem to have any major injuries, but he didn't
look particularly good, either.  Health-wise, that is.

        Because he looked really, really good to her. . . .

        She braced her hands under his elbow and pulled him up
with her.  He staggered and leaned against the tree.  She
remembered the gun and hurried to retrieve it, placing it in the
pocket of her sweatpants.

        She stood for a moment, biting her lip, watching him lean
against the tree.  She pondered whether or not to go inside and wake
someone to help her, then decided against it.  She couldn't just leave
him here.  And besides. . . .

        She crossed over to him.  "Mulder, are you going to be able
to make it to the house?"

        He shrugged wearily.  "I'll try."

        She slid one arm around his waist and used the other to hold
his arm around her neck.  He leaned on her heavily as they crossed
the lawn, his steps dragging, stumbling occasionally.  The clatter of
their feet on the steps seemed loud to her, but there was nothing she
could do about it.  Luckily the front door had not locked behind her.

        Once inside she bolted the door, then paused.  "You want to
rest a bit first?"

        He shook his head slowly.  "No -- if I sit down I may not be able
to get back up again."  He looked at her searchingly.  "What about
you?"

        "Me?"

        "Yes, you.  You look like you're about to faint."  His eyes
roamed over her, taking in the deep, bruise-like shadows under her
eyes, her pallor, her thinness. . . . She was even thinner than she
had gotten in the wake of her abduction, he realized.  "Scully. . . ?"

        She shook her head.  "Let's go."  As they climbed the stairs
slowly, wearily, she noticed that now he was leaning on her less,
trying to stay upright and leaning on the bannister when he needed
to.  She felt suddenly, irrationally angry at him.  Why did he always
feel he had to protect her?  Coddle her?  Even now, when he was the
one who needed protecting?  She *needed* him to need her.

        And then another thought swept her, defusing her anger.
This was Mulder, after all.  This was the way he was.  His instinct to
protect her was just as much a part of his personality as was his
innate openness to the impossible.  And it was yet another sign that
he cared about her.

        And that he was real.

        She paused at the landing as this new proof that he was
alive and here rushed over her in a flood of relief so powerful that she
felt momentarily faint.  Scully wrapped both arms around his waist
and hugged him.  After a moment he hugged her back.

        And then, as if sensing the need she had to care for him --
or perhaps simply because his reserve of strength had finally given
out -- he allowed her to support most of his weight the rest of the
way up the stairs.

        Mulder showed slight surprise when Scully led him to the
door of her room.

        "Jackie and Marty have Brian's room," she explained, carefully
shutting the door, "and Melissa's here, too."

        He nodded.  She helped him over to the double bed and he
sat down, slumped in exhaustion.  He desperately needed a bath and
something to eat.  But suddenly he knew there was no way he could
move.  He doubted he even had the energy to undress himself.

        She reached down and helped him swing his legs up onto the
bed.  He sank back against the pillows with a sigh and she wondered
how long it had been since he had slept in a bed.  She bent to undo
his shoes, dropping them to the floor.  Scully knew she really should
check his head and examine him for any other injuries, but the
adrenaline that had carried her through the past half-hour or so was
fading fast, taking her strength with it.  She looked at him.  He didn't
look as though the restrictive clothing would keep him awake.  In fact,
he was already half-dozing.  She settled for unbuckling his belt with
fingers that shook -- from exhaustion, she told herself -- and
unbuttoning the top two buttons of his shirt and then sank weakly to
the edge of the bed, vaguely aware of his moving over to make room
for her.  She kicked off her own shoes and crawled under the covers.
Something hard pressed into her side.  The gun.  She pulled it out and
laid it on the bedside table again, then settled back against the pillows
with a sigh of her own.

        Scully felt Mulder's arm go around her, pulling her into his
warmth.  She smiled in the darkness.

        Funny how things could change in just a split second.  She
had felt her life end when she saw the body in the examining room.
And she had felt her heart start beating again when she saw Mulder
tonight. . . .

        And here she was, lying in the same bed as she had been
forty-five minutes ago.  Dressed in the same clothes.  Her empty gun
beside her on the nightstand.  The "X" taped to the window.

        And yet everything was different.

        Because now *he* was here, safe and alive and holding her,
the soft sound of his rhythmic breathing lulling her with its implications

of security.

        <Safe.>

        It was her last conscious thought as she drifted off to sleep.

*****

        Dana Scully woke with a start.  For just an instant the
vestiges of the dream clung to her and she could swear she could
almost feel him there in the darkness beside her.

        But then cold reality crept in and with it the all-too-familiar
rush of emptiness and pain.

        A dream.  It had all been a dream.  Mr. X hadn't come, hadn't
climbed the tree outside her window and taped an "X" there, hadn't
met her.  Hadn't given her her heart's desire. . . .

        "You still have a friend in the FBI."  His words mocked her
as she lay in the stillness of the dark room.  A friend in the FBI?
<I only ever had one. . . .>

        Her heart ached in her chest.  The rest of it had been a
dream as well.  But then she had known that all along, really, had
known it with the same part of her brain that sometimes reassured
her that her nightmares weren't real, that any moment she would
awaken safe and sound in her own bed.

        This time that rational voice whispered to her that the sight
of Mulder lying there on the ground had only been a fantasy, that
the earth-shattering feeling of his arms around her and his face in
her hair had been merely a figment of her fevered imagination.

        <Why?> her heart cried.  <Why couldn't I have slept just a
little longer?  Have seen his face in my dream one more time instead
of the bodies -- dear God, the smoldering bodies in the boxcar and
then *his* body, blackened and burned and dead. . . .>

        She wanted to sleep again, to retreat into that blissful dark
place where Mulder was alive and everything was all right.  But she
could not.  She would lie awake the rest of the night hurting and
alone, denied the comfort of tears.

        Well, at least she was warm.  When she had gone to bed
hours ago she had been so cold she thought she would never be
warm again.  But now she was positively toasty. . . .

        And then her eyes flew open as she realized that she was
warm because a very warm, very male, and very much alive body was
curled protectively around hers and then she knew . . . she knew it
had not been a dream but reality. . . .

        And then she burst into tears.

        In an instant he was awake.  "Scully?"

        The sound of her name spoken so gently in that dear voice she
had known she would never hear again made her sob harder.  He
reached for her and pulled her more securely into his arms, holding
her, brushing his fingers through her hair again and again, whispering
words of comfort and reassurance.

        She clung to him, weeping into his chest, five long months
of sorrow and pain and grief pouring out of her in a trembling rush.

        He rocked her gently as she quietened and finally lay spent
in his arms.  He wiped her tears from her face with his fingertips and
waited.

        "Are you real?" she whispered.

        He couldn't help himself.  He laughed.  "Well, I *could* reply
'what is real?' like the Velveteen Rabbit. . . ."

        Now she was laughing, too.  It felt almost as good as crying
had.  She hugged him.  This was *definitely* Mulder. . . .

        "Scully?" his voice was soft with concern.  "You all right?"

        The words and tone were so familiar.  She thought of the
many times he had asked her that same question -- the many times
she had lied to him, when "yes" had meant only "I will survive."

        Never had she meant it more.

        "I'm fine, Mulder."  <Now,> she added mentally.  then -- why
not?  "Now."

        He gave her a squeeze.  He had never seen Scully cry like
that.  Never.

        She seemed to read his mind.  "I -- woke up," she said
softly, hesitantly.  "I thought it was just a dream. . . ."

        He hugged her again.  "It's me, Scully.  I'm here."

        <I'm here.>  An echo from another time she had been lost. . . .

        "Mulder . . ." she whispered, her eyes filling again.

        He released her and backed away, a look of mock horror on
his face.  "Hey, Scully -- these are the only clothes I've got.  If they
get any wetter. . . ."

        She laughed, a few tears sliding down her cheeks.  "Oh,
Mulder.  It's so good to have you back."

        He smiled softly, again wiping her tears away with his thumb.
"It's good to be back, Scully."

        They gazed at each other again.  So many questions. . . .

        She shook her head.  Later.  "Speaking of clothes. . . ."

        He grimaced.  "Yeah, I know.  These are pretty bad."  He
picked at the scrap of silk that had once been a tie and sighed.
"My favorite tie, too. . . ."

        She grinned slyly at him.  "I'll buy you one to replace it,
Mulder."

        He grinned back.  "But, Scully, I don't think we share the
same taste in ties. . . ."

        Her eyes suddenly took on a puzzled expression.  "Mulder,
you weren't wearing a suit when you rode into the desert. . . ."

        He nodded.  "Right.  They took my clothes for the body."

        'The body?  The one that . . . but the clothes -- didn't survive
the fire."  Practically nothing else had, either, she thought wryly.

        His face was grim.  "They're very thorough."

        "'They'?"

        <Comfortable in your new clothes, Mr. Mulder?  Oh, but then
they're not *really* new, of course.  I'm sure you recognize them.  We
retrieved them from your apartment just the other day.  Your lovely
partner did not notice that they were missing.  Pity.  But then she was
quite obviously upset.  Such a shame, really. . . .>

        Mindgames, as always.  If they had hoped eventually to be
able to befuddle him enough that he would believe he was sitting at
his desk in the basement of the J. Edgar Hoover building so that he
would betray the location of the DAT tape, it hadn't worked.  For one
thing, the room simply hadn't *smelled* right.  He had had to admit,
though, that they had done a fairly thorough job on the mock-ups of
the X-files.  They had even managed to photocopy his "I Want to
Believe" poster.  But then they had not been able to duplicate
Scully. . . .

        He shook his head.  "Time for that in the morning.  Right
now I *really* need a bath and a change of clothes.  And I think
maybe a shave," he said consideringly, rubbing his hand across
his face.

        "Yes, you *really* do."  She smiled at him, then slid out of
bed.  For the first time he noticed that she was wearing his sweatshirt.

        She noticed his eyes on her and blushed slightly.  "I was
cold," she said defensively.  "You can have it back -- and I think
there are some old sweats of Brian's in here. . . ."

        "No."  She glanced back, puzzled.  "I mean, keep the shirt."
Her eyes dropped.  He attempted to cover their confusion with a joke.
"Hey, you've cried on it already.  No sense ruining another shirt."

        She threw a pair of dark blue sweatpants and a white
sweatshirt at him.  He grinned.

        She crossed to the connecting bathroom.  He could hear
her rummaging in the cabinet.  His curiosity got the better of him and
he slid out of bed, groaning a little as he did so, and padded over to
stand in the doorway.  She was pulling out a spare toothbrush still in
its original packaging, towels, a washcloth.  And a first-aid kit.  He
grimaced, knowing what she could do with one of those.

        "You got any bubble bath, Scully?" he teased.   She shot him
a Look.  "Hey, I just think I'm gonna need to soak to get this dirt off."

She nodded and ducked back down to retrieve another bottle and a
disposable razor.

        He dropped the sweats on the counter and began to undo
his tie and unbutton his shirt.  "Wanna scrub my back, Scully?"

        She shoved the pile of towels and toiletries into his arms
and went past him.  "Go ahead and take your bath, Mulder.  I'm
going to go find you something to eat."  She waited until she heard
the water come on and then left the bedroom smiling and tiptoed
down the stairs to the kitchen.  She opened the refrigerator and
stared at all the food choices, trying to decide what would be
appropriate to feed a man who hadn't eaten properly in -- she had
no idea just how long it had been since he had had a decent meal.

        Her stomach rumbled.  <And just how long has it been
since *you've* eaten a decent meal?> she thought ruefully.  Finally
she began simply pulling out everything that looked good.  Cold
chicken.  Cheese.  Grapes.  Half a pie -- coconut, she decided.
Milk.  A half-bottle of Riesling.  She added the rest of a loaf of
French bread and shoved everything into a paper sack.  <Nothing
like shopping at Mom's.>  Started to leave, then doubled back for
two wine glasses.

End 5a/17
(continued in 5b)

*******************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Five: "Tears"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
*******************************************
(5b/17)

        Mulder sank back into the bubbles with a wince and then a
sigh.  The hot water stung his skin, but it was a good pain, a *clean*
pain, unlike the pains he had suffered while being held by those
rat-bas. . . . He shook his head slightly.  Time enough for that later.
For now he would just relax and enjoy being here, enjoy being with
Scully.

        <Scully.>  He smiled a little sadly.  It was good, good,
*good* to see her, to hear her, to *feel* her again, but her very face
was a reminder to him of the suffering they had both endured
during their separation.  He could see the vestiges of anguish in
her eyes, the lines of her too-thin face, the pallor of her cheeks.
When he had held her as she shook with sobs he had been
shocked to feel her shoulderblades sharp against his forearms.
She had looked as though she barely had the strength to hold her
gun on Mr. X -- how had she ever dragged him across the lawn and
up the stairs?

        And yet her spirit was just as indomitable as ever.  He
could feel the fire in her, see it in her eyes.  There had been anger
there as well as sorrow.  Rage.  He had a sickening feeling about
what those mixed emotions might entail and something that might
have passed for a prayer of thanksgiving to the God Scully believed
in scurried through his mind on the coattails of that thought.

        His eyes drifted open lazily against the steam as he
searched for a washcloth or sponge to use to scrub himself
clean.  Just soaking wasn't going to do the job this time.  He
caught sight of a soft-looking nylon bath puff and reached for it.
A bottle of bath gel sat next to it and he grabbed that as well.
As filthy as he felt, he would need all the help he could get.
He squeezed some gel onto the puff and began scrubbing.  As
he worked he thought again of the nice, soft bed awaiting him --
awaiting them, if he could somehow convince her to remain with
him.  With the way his mind had begun to work over the past few
months he was afraid he would awaken and this would all be just
another dream, a fantasy to torment him through the harsh
reality of life in a cage.

        He sighed and worked the lather across his neck and
chest.  The feeling was decadent -- the first time he had truly
felt *clean* in months -- and the moisturizers in the gel, its
subtle scent. . . .

        He froze as he smelled it.

        *Scully.*  His eyes flew open.

        He was washing himself with Scully's scent.  It was all
over him, coating his skin and hair, filling his nostrils, combining
with the steam to form a giddying sensation that made his head
swim.

        He smelled of Scully.

        He looked down at the bath puff in his hand and
realized -- this was *hers* -- her bath gel -- this soft bundle of
netting in his hand was used to wash her flesh, her soft, pale
skin. . . .

        With a shaking hand he replaced the implements on
the ledge, but not before he lifted the sudsy puff to his nose and
breathed deeply -- just once -- inhaling that sweet, slightly spicy
smell and memorizing it again.

        For the first time he was grateful for the exhausted and
weakened state of his body that prevented it from following the
tortured imaginings of his mind.

*****

        It was harder to tiptoe back up the stairs with her arms
laden with the food.  But she managed.  And also managed to get the
door open without the glasses clinking together more than four or five
times.  She held her breath.  Nothing.  Slipped inside.

        Now.  What to do.

        The bathroom door was open.

        She walked quietly to the door, still clutching the bag.
"Mulder?" she whispered.

        "Come in.  I'm decent -- more or less," he said wryly.

        She took a deep breath and pushed the door the rest of the
way open.  Steam billowed out.  "I've got food."

        "Bring it on.  I'm ravenous."  She smiled and walked into the
bathroom.  He was lying in a tub full of water and bubbles and the
water was still running.  She noted that he had managed a partial
shave so that the familiar outlines of his face were now visible
although he still had a scruffy five o'clock shadow.

        "Yeah.  Well, here --" she opened the sack and pulled out
the wine glasses.

        He motioned for her to sit down.  "Come on, Scully.  I can
tell you haven't been eating in addition to not sleeping."  He nodded
at the toilet.  "Sorry I can't offer you better accommodations, but. . .
."

        She grinned at him and sat on the lid.  <Isn't it romantic. . . .>

        Here she was in the bathroom and her partner and best friend
and -- well, Mulder -- was in a tub full of bubbles, and she was sitting
on the toilet lid holding a bag full of groceries and wearing an oversized

Oxford sweatshirt.

        And there was nowhere else she would rather be.

*****
        A couple of rooms down the hall, Margaret Scully awoke
with a start.  What was that?  A creaking noise and a funny clinking.
And somewhere, water was running. . . .

        She sighed.  Just Dana taking a bath.

        Her eyes flew open.  Dana had taken a shower earlier -- a
bath -- a hot bath -- oh no. . . .

        She scrambled out of bed and forced herself not to run down
the hall to the door of her daughter's bedroom.  It could be a mistake.
No point in waking everybody else for a mistake. . . .

*****

        Over the gushing water Dana heard a knocking at her door.
She practically shoved the bag into Mulder's arms and dashed to the
door.

        Calm, Dana.  Calm.

        "Sweetheart?"

        She opened the door a crack, praying Mulder wouldn't crinkle
the bag -- or have to turn off the water. . . .

        "Mom?"

        Her mother stared at her.  What had happened to her
daughter?  Her eyes were red as if she had been crying -- finally --
but she had some color in her cheeks and her eyes didn't seem dead
anymore.

        "I just wanted -- to see if you were okay."

        The realization of what her mother had heard and had thought
struck her like a blow.

        "Yes -- I'm fine, Mom. . . ."

        "I heard the water running. . . ."

        "Yeah.  I woke up and couldn't get back to sleep and
decided I just needed to relax a little," she lied.  She hated lying to
her mother.  She was a very good liar (which always stood her in
good stead at poker), but she always felt guilty about lying to her
mother and so tried never to do it.

        Margaret sighed with relief.  "Are you sure you're okay?"

        <I'm fine!>  she wanted to scream.  <Fox Mulder is in that
tub, *naked* and up to his neck in my bubble bath, and I am about to
feed him because he is terribly thin and because I want him to have
enough strength so I can drag him to bed and. . . .>

        Whoa, Scully.  Where did that come from?

        <Yo, Dana.  Remember me?  Your libido?  I know you've been
ignoring me lately -- well, for a looong time -- but I haven't forgotten
you.
And it seems you haven't quite forgotten me, either.>

        She was cracking up.  She was definitely cracking up.

        She wanted to tell her mother the truth . . . well, most of it,
anyway.  Wanted to tell her that she could go back to sleep, that
everything would be okay now because he was back, he was back
and alive and at this very minute enjoying a bubble bath and cold
chicken.  And so everything would be fine.

        She wanted to say all of this but didn't.  First, because it
would be too much, with the whole household awake and excited and
asking questions, and they were all so tired.  And she wanted to
keep him to herself for just a little longer.  She just hoped she was
not being cruel to hide the truth.

        And second, because she was suddenly struck with the
irrational fear that maybe this -- his return and the closeness and
gentle humor -- was all just a cruel joke her overtaxed mind was
playing on her, that she had just dreamed that he was there.  She
had to go see for herself.  And in order to do that she had to get rid
of her mother.

        "Yes -- I'm fine.  I'm just going to go turn off the water and
take my bath and go to sleep.  We'll talk in the morning, okay?"

        "Okay, darling."  Why did she get the feeling Dana was
rushing her away?  But she didn't look suicidal.  In fact, she looked
better -- not only better than she had earlier that evening, but better,
somehow, than she had looked since she had returned from New
Mexico.  She sighed.  Grief could do strange things to the human
soul.  She hugged her daughter and returned to her own room.
Tomorrow.  They'd talk tomorrow.

        Dana shut the door and hurried back to the bathroom and
peeked in, then sighed with relief.  And then she had to laugh softly.
He was there, all right -- almost up to his chin in bubbles.  The water
was about to spill over the edge of the tub, and he was vainly trying
to hold the paper bag full of food above the surface.  His eyes were
wide with panic.  She reached over and shut off the water.  He
relaxed and the motion sent a thin film of water over the edge.  She
laughed again and reached over to let some of the water out,
accidentally encountering his bare ankle in the process.  They both
jumped as if they had been shot and even more water slopped over
the side.

        There was a moment of uncomfortable silence broken only
by the sound of water gurgling down the drain.  She ducked her
head and busied herself with mopping up the mess with towels.
He allowed enough water to drain that it would no longer be in
danger of overflowing and then replaced the plug.  She tossed the
sopping towels into the sink and sat back down.

        Mulder took a deep breath and changed the non-existent
subject.  "So, what's in the bag?"

        She reached over and took it from him.  "Umm -- cold
chicken.  *Not* fried," she smiled.  "Grapes.  Cheese.  Bread.  Pie.
Milk and wine."  She began laying out the food on the floor.  He
replaced the plug in the tub and reached for a wine glass.

        "Not that we'll need it to sleep, but. . . ."  She filled it,
filled
the other for herself, and started to take a sip, but he leaned over
and clinked his glass against hers.  She smiled faintly and nodded,
then drank, feeling the coolness of the wine turn to a warmth in her
stomach.  Then they settled down to eat.

        "Who was at the door?" he asked around a mouthful of
chicken.

        "Mom."  She sighed.  "She heard the tub."

        His eyes widened, then narrowed.  She didn't have to explain.
But. . . .

        "She was worried," he said casually.

        She nodded.  His unspoken question was implicit: <Did she
have good reason?>

        <Might as well tell him the truth -- he'll find out eventually
anyway.>  "She also took the clip from my gun."  She smiled faintly.
"Good thing Mr. X was on our side tonight."

        <*Our* side.>

        She looked at him seriously.  "Mulder, no.  I wasn't planning
on . . . on killing myself, if that's what you're thinking."  She knew it
was.  "Jackie and I were going after Cancerman and Kryceck in the
morning."  She shook her head.  "I can't believe Mom would think I
would give up without a fight. . . ."

        She felt his eyes on her, knew what he was silently asking.
<And after?>  She avoided his eyes.  She didn't know.  She had only
thought things through up to the point when she found Cancerman and
Kryceck and made them confess and then made them pay.  She
would have gained great satisfaction watching Kryceck beg for mercy
before she killed him.  She felt no guilt at the thought of executing him,

although she did feel somewhat uncomfortable at the thought of torture.
These men were outside the law and could never be stopped by
conventional means.  They had hurt and killed others before.  Bill
Mulder and Deep Throat.  She herself had been abducted at
Cancerman's behest, and she had read the field reports in her own
files and knew that Krycek had been involved somehow.  And now
Mulder. . . . She would make certain they paid in a way that would
prevent them from hurting anyone ever again.  But still, they were
*human*, after all. . . .

        <If you wanna call them that.>

        Mulder watched the warring emotions on his partner's face.
No.  Scully would never commit suicide, he thought.  At least not
directly.  But she just might put herself in a situation in which the
outcome was as inevitable as if she put her Sig Sauer to her head
and pulled the trigger.  She would do it for her family, he knew.
For him and for Jackie.  But for revenge?

        Then again, he had very nearly done the same thing
himself, once.

        <You're in a very dark place. . . . Much darker than where
my sister is.>

        She was aware of his eyes still on her.  "Scully."  She
looked up.  "You were planning on taking Jackie with you?"

        Her gaze wavered and then dropped.  And he knew he had
the answer to all his questions.  <Oh, Scully. . . .>

        He went on as if he had never asked the question nor
received her silent answer.  "Well, I guess it's a threesome now.
Those two have a lot more to pay for than my disappearance," he
continued seriously.  "Just give me a few days and I'll be good as
new."

        She eyed him warily.  From where she sat she could see
that the wound on his head was not bad, but he was thin and
malnourished and exhausted, and probably dehydrated to boot.  She
wanted to protest but knew he would simply throw her own physical
condition back at her.  And with good reason.  She had been sleeping
in fits and starts for months, and this light meal was the most she had
eaten in a single day in longer than she could remember.  So she
simply nodded.  They could hash all this out tomorrow.

        She swallowed the last of her wine and stood up, brushing
bread crumbs off the sweatshirt.  He was finishing the pie and licking
his fingers.  She began to brush her teeth and heard the water
draining.  Her eyes widened slightly and she hurried.  Not that she
*wanted* to hurry. . . .  But things had already changed enough
between them.  Well, okay, not enough, not really.  At least not as
much as a part of her really *wanted* them to change.  But Mulder
was first and foremost her partner, her friend, and she didn't want
to lose that.  Not even for. . . .  She shook her head mentally.
Even if they did eventually decide to take that next step, now was
not the time.

        <Then when?>

        Their defenses were down and it would be easy . . . so
easy just to give in while they were weak and still a little giddy with
joy, to celebrate his return and their closeness in a way that would
forever bind them to one another.

        But it might also drive them apart.

        She knew she was not alone in her thoughts -- she had
seen the look in his eyes, the one where he looked at her as a
man dying of thirst looks at a cold glass of water.  And she had
felt her pulse leap in response, the heat of the blood rushing
through her veins and coloring her cheeks, the way it became
just a little more difficult to breathe.

        Oh, yes, it would be easy.  And it would be good.  She
knew that it would be good just as surely as she knew that it
might also be the biggest mistake of their lives.

        Would it be worth it?

        Maybe.  Just maybe it would be worth the risk.

        But she couldn't trust herself to think clearly enough to
make any irrevocable decisions right now.  And so she would
slip back into the relative safety that delineated this side of that
line, no matter how close to it they walked.

        Suddenly she realized that she had been standing and
staring at herself in the mirror and that the gurgle of water was
louder.  She laid down her toothbrush and turned to go, averting
her eyes as she did so.

        Just one look -- after all, she had seen most of him at
one time or another -- after Alaska, and during the first part of this
whole fiasco -- and she was a doctor -- she had seen hundreds of
naked bodies. . . .

        But this was Mulder's body.

        Mulder's strong, damp, alive and gloriously naked body. . . .

        She firmly tamped down her curiosity and opened the door.
Steam billowed past her into the bedroom.

        His voice stopped her.  "Scully."  She didn't turn.  He
grinned.  "Toss me a towel, wouldya?"  Then he laughed as it hit
him in the face and he heard the door shut with a muffled click.

        A few minutes later Mulder joined her in the bedroom,
towelling his wet hair.  The sweats hung on him even more than they
usually would have, and he had had to tie the drawstring at the waist
just to keep them on.

        He walked over to the bed and climbed in, leaning back
with a sigh of pleasure.  "Last time I slept in a real bed was the
motel in New Mexico," he said.  "And I don't remember that very
much."

        She nodded and reached for a pillow.  He stared at her.
"Where are you going?"

        "Downstairs to the couch."

        "Why?"  He didn't want her to go.  And he didn't think she
wanted to go.  One way to find out. . . .

        He threw back the covers and held out his arms in invitation.
Without hesitation she threw caution to the wind, dropped the pillow
onto the bed, and slid in beside him, even daring to rest her head on
his shoulder.  <After all,> she rationalized, <it's still a far cry from
what you were considering just a few minutes ago.>  He curled his
arm around her so that her head slid to his chest and she was half-
embracing him.  <Well, maybe not.>  She knew she should protest,
knew she should push away, but he felt so good . . . and she could
hear his steady heartbeat under her face.

        She was tired of being rational all the time, tired of always
being Special Agent Dr. Scully.  Tonight she wanted to be just Dana,
just a woman, and hold and be held by her best friend.  Tonight he
wasn't Spooky or Special Agent Mulder.  He wasn't even "Mulder."
Tonight, his defenses were down and they were closer than they had
ever been before.  Tonight -- although she could never tell him that
she thought so -- tonight he was Fox.  The man's body held her but
his heart was open like the little boy's.  She knew and trusted them
both.  So she simply sighed and snuggled up against him, the damp
heat from his body seeping into hers, soothing her, calming her.  She
might have imagined it, but she thought she felt his lips brush her
forehead.

        "Good night, Scully," he whispered into the darkness.

        She smiled.  "Good night, Mulder."

End 5b/17
*End Chapter Five*

****************************************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Six: "Christmas in September"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
****************************************************************

        Jackie St. George could stand it no longer.  She dropped the
newspaper she had been reading to the floor with a sigh.  In the
armchair on the other side of the reading lamp Marty glanced over at
her and lowered his paper with a quizzical smile.

        "Hey, babe," he said softly.

        She smiled at him in return.  She could never have made it
through the past weeks without Marty.  She could hardly remember
what it was like before him, before Dana and Mulder, when she had
been so alone. . . . And Marty -- he had come to mean so much to her.
Almost everything. . . .

        Marty reached over for her hand and she gave it to him.  "I'm
just worried about Dana, Marty.  She's beaten everyone else
downstairs by hours for the past few days.  And it's almost noon and
we haven't heard a peep."

        Jackie sighed again.  When Scully had not been downstairs at
breakfast -- even though she usually only had a cup of tea she always
made a concerted effort to join them -- she had been concerned and
had wanted to go upstairs and check on her friend.  But then Margaret
had told them about her conversation with her daughter in the middle of
he night, and Melissa revealed that she had heard her sister crying before

that.  And then there was evidence that she had raided the kitchen as
well, although the quantity of food missing seemed excessive even for
a woman who had practically been starving herself for the past few
weeks.

        By all accounts, therefore, Scully had wept, eaten, and taken
a bubble bath.  All good signs so far as they were concerned, although
it did all seem rather sudden.  It seemed the funeral yesterday had
been the catharsis she had needed finally to begin grieving properly for
Mulder.  Her emotions had been repressed for far too long, and she
moved through her days with a heavy lethargy, spending her nights in
fitful, nightmare-filled sleep, as though her mind were never fully awake
nor fully at rest.

        Jackie sighed again and settled back against the chair once
more.  She was afraid perhaps Dana was just putting on an act.  It
had occurred to the Canadian that her friend planned to ditch her when
the time came.  But then wouldn't she have made certain to appear
downstairs to reinforce her act?  Maybe Dana really was asleep --
if so, she hated to bother her.  Maybe when Margaret and Melissa
returned from the store. . . .

        After discovering the evidence of Dana's midnight snack
Melissa had ventured that perhaps she might appreciate one of her
favorite meals.  Accordingly Jackie and Marty had packed mother
and daughter off to town despite Mrs. Scully's protests.

        "We'll take care of her," Marty had promised.  "And maybe
she'll like waking up to lasagna and garlic bread."  Margaret had
twinkled at him.

        "And you probably wouldn't object too much, either."  They
had all laughed.  It felt good, but then they stopped.  Somehow it just
didn't feel right.  They missed Dana's silvery laugh and Mulder's
ironic chuckle.

        After a moment of silence Mrs. Scully had nodded and she
and Melissa had left, promising a surprise for dessert.

        Marty looked over at her.  "I'm sure she's fine," he reassured
her.  "But if you want to peek in on her. . . ."  He had to smile when
she stood up immediately.

        "I'll be right back," she promised.  He nodded and picked up
his paper, but at the foot of the stairs when she turned and looked
back at him he was watching her with a look in his eyes that made
her shiver.  A promise.

        <I'll be here.>

        She smiled at him and made her way up the stairs.  She
thought about what Dana and Mulder had had and sighed.  Maybe
they couldn't see it or at least would not admit it even to themselves,
but she knew.  And she had never thought she could ever have
anything even remotely like the closeness they shared.

        Until Marty.  She grinned, remembering the first time she had
met him.  He had been wearing that ridiculous Medieval costume --
that suddenly didn't seem so ridiculous now that she thought about
it.  He had pursued her persistently, refusing to give up on her even
when she wanted to give up on herself.

        And then she thought of her friends again and sighed even
more deeply.  All the teasing banter between those two could
never replace even one of Marty's kisses.  She knew why they kept
their distance.  But still. . . .

        She paused at the door to Dana's bedroom.  Her friend had
finally wept for Mulder in the night.  Maybe today she would feel
like talking.  Jackie steeled herself mentally for the pain and hatred
and sorrow that would probably come pouring out now that the dam
had burst.  Anything was better than the tortured and torturous
silences to which they had all been subjected the past few days.

        Jackie took a deep breath and turned the door handle,
carefully swinging the door open and stepping into the room.  She
turned to the bed.

        Froze in shock and utter consternation.

        A man!

        In bed with Dana!

        And she was in his arms!

        Her jaw dropped and she shook her head, confused.

        Dana Scully was half on her side, half on her stomach.  Her
head rested on the man's chest.  Her right arm was curled around
him and her left hand gripped the front of his shirt tightly.

        And his arms were around her, his face buried in her hair
spread out like flames across his sweatshirt and the pillow.

        This wasn't Dana's style.  At least, she didn't think it
was. . . . No, she had known Scully for a year and she was the most
logical, levelheaded. . . . She would *never*. . . . Unless she had
finally lost it under the strain of Mulder's disappearance and the
funeral. . . . No, that still didn't seem right.  And besides, where
would she find a man at that hour of the night?

        Yet here he was.  Here she was.  Ocular proof.

        <You gotta be losing it, St. George.>

        She blinked, then rubbed her eyes.  Nope.  He was still there.

        What on earth. . . ?

        She must have made a slight sound of disbelief because the
man shifted slightly, moving his face from where it had been buried
in Scully's hair to rest his cheek against the crown of her head with
a sigh.  She didn't move, her body utterly relaxed against his.  What
Jackie could see of her face was content and peaceful.

        But it was to the man that her attention was drawn again and
again.  Long and lanky.  Longish hair messy from sleep.  Scruffy
stubble shadowing the lower half of his face.  Chiseled features and
long eyelashes.

        It couldn't be.

        It simply could not be.

        But it was.

        <Oh, my God.>

        "Mulder!" she gasped.  His eyelashes fluttered, then opened,
and she found herself staring into the hazel eyes of the man she loved
second most in the world.

        "Mulder!" and she crossed the room to his side of the bed and
stood gazing down at him.

        "Hey, Jackie," he whispered, and tried gently to disentangle
himself from Scully's embrace to hug her.

        "Mulder," Scully whimpered, tightening her hold on him.
Her face contorted in fear and he wrapped his arms around her more
securely.

        "Shhh . . . it's okay, Scully -- I'm here," he whispered, holding
her close.  "I'm here."  She sighed softly and relaxed against him.
"Sorry," he said, smiling at Jackie.

        She sniffed and laid her hand against his cheek.  "'Sokay,
Mulder.  I understand -- but the minute she's awake I'm gonna
collect, okay?"

        He eyed her with exaggerated wariness.  "Thanks for
warning me."

        She grinned.  "Oh, Mulder -- it's so good to have you
back. . . ."

        He smiled.  "We'll talk later, okay?"

        "Yeah.  Maybe even play a little poker tonight after dinner if
you feel like it?  Unless. . . ."  She glanced meaningfully at her
sleeping friend and wiggled her eyebrows.

        He stifled a snicker.  "Hah.  I'll bet Marty's here, isn't he?" he

asked with a teasing grin.

        She blushed slightly and nodded.  <Drat you, Fox Mulder.>
"He's downstairs.  Melissa and Mrs. Scully went grocery shopping."

        "Good."  He nodded in satisfaction.  "All hell's gonna break
loose when they get back, and I think Scully needs some more rest."

        "Mmmm?"  The sleeping woman in his arms stirred.  He
stroked her hair.

        "Sleep, Dana.  Go back to sleep."  She snuggled up against
him and slept.  He grinned at Jackie.  "She *never* listens to me."

        She grinned back.  "I think you need some more rest, too,"
she whispered.  She bent and kissed him gently.  "I'll just leave you
two -- *lovebirds* -- alone for now."  She ignored his chuckle and
swept out of the room.

        Mulder watched her close the door with a soft *snick* and
then looked down at the red head pillowed on his chest.  He smiled
in satisfaction.  Sure, he hurt like the devil and he probably looked
like it, too, but he was alive and in the safest place he had ever
known.  Mrs. Scully's house.  And his partner was asleep in his
arms and she was at this moment the most beautiful sight he had
ever seen. . . . Of course, she was very thin and pale and had
horrible bruise-like shadows around her eyes, but he saw none of
that.  All he saw was the angel whose face and voice and faith had
kept him sane for the past five months. . . .

        <I had the strength of your beliefs.>

        Smiling, he pressed his lips against her scalp and
settled down with a contented sigh.  Soon he, too, was sound
asleep.

*****

        Jackie fairly ran down the stairs.  Marty threw himself out of
his chair, nearly knocking over the lamp in the process.  Tears were
streaming down Jackie's face but she was smiling.

        "What -- is she -- is everything okay?" he asked in concern,
grabbing her arms.

        She pulled him into a rib-cracking hug and wept.  "She's okay
-- he's okay -- he's back -- he's alive -- Mulder's alive and upstairs
and . . ." she paused and pulled back to look at him smugly.
"They're in bed together.  Ooooh, they're gonna hear about this
for a looong time. . . ."

        He gaped at her.  "St. George, have you finally lost your
mind?"

        She laughed and shook her head.  "Maybe, but not about
this.  I know that's what it sounds like, but . . . Mulder *is* alive -- I

don't know how, but he is.  They're asleep upstairs."

        His mouth dropped open again.  "Are you sure?"

        "Sure I'm sure," she said, slightly irritated.  "If you want to
see for yourself go right ahead, but I have to warn you Mulder will
probably growl at you if you wake Dana."

        He shook his head in disbelief.  "But how. . . ?"

        "I suspect we'll find out when Mrs. Scully and Melissa get
home."  A door shut and they could hear voices in the kitchen.
"Which should be right about now.  This is gonna be good."  She
smiled again, mistily.

        "Like Christmas in September."

        Jackie hurried into the kitchen with Marty hot on her heels.
There were sacks of groceries all over the counter, and she had to
grin.  It was a good thing Mrs. Scully had done some real shopping,
because she didn't know it yet, but she had two half-starved FBI
agents upstairs.

        Margaret looked up from the bag she was unpacking.
"Hello, Jackie."  She handed her a bottle of wine.  "Could you put
this in the refrigerator, please?"  She turned back to unpacking the
groceries.  "Dana awake yet?"

        St. George set the bottle carefully on the counter.  "No."
Something in her voice startled Melissa, who swung to look at her,
her eyes dilating.  <Why was Jackie grinning at her like that?>
She sat down, the items she had been unpacking still in her
hands.

        "She's still asleep," Jackie continued.  "She's okay --
everything's okay -- better than okay. . . ."  She trailed off, realizing
she was almost yelling.  Margaret Scully stared at her.

        She took another deep breath and tried to remain calm.
"Mrs. Scully, I think you'd better sit down."

        The older woman opened her mouth to speak, then sank
to the chair next to her daughter.

        St. George pondered how to say what she had to say and
finally just blurted it out:

        "He's alive!  He's okay -- he's back -- upstairs asleep with
Dana.  I don't know how but. . . ."

        "What are you talking about?  Who's alive?"

        "He is -- Mulder is.  Mulder's alive!"

        Margaret and Melissa gave a simultaneous gasp.
"WHAT?!"

        She shook her head.  She was almost jumping up and down.
"I went to check on her -- he's there -- I talked to him and he's
okay. . . ."  She knew she was babbling but was powerless to stop
herself.

        Margaret shut her mouth with a snap, realizing that she was
going to get no further with this particular line of questioning.

        "Let's go."

        They trooped upstairs.  Margaret's mind was whirring.  Was
it possible?  Could Jaclyn be delusional?  She *looked* normal. . . .
Then -- could Fox be alive?"

        She stopped at the door to her daughter's bedroom and
closed her eyes.  She remembered when, many months ago, Dana
had been gone and Fox had gone with her to choose the tombstone.
That time she had been certain her baby girl was gone forever.

        God had given her one miracle.  She knew she had no right
to expect another.  But. . . .

        She swung open the door.

        And there they were, her youngest daughter and the man
she had come to think of as her third son, curled up together in the
narrow bed.  Clutching each other tightly as if to make sure even in
their dreams that they would not be torn apart again.  Her eyes
softened at the look of utter peacefulness on Dana's face.

        He was back.  It was impossible, but he was back.

        She crossed the room and stood over them, smiling tenderly.
Scully's eyelashes fluttered, then opened, and she was looking down
into a bluer version of her own eyes.

        "Mom."  And then her daughter looked over as if to make
certain Mulder was really there, and smiled.  Margaret thought to
herself that she had never seen that particular smile on her
daughter's face before.  But then Margaret had not been there when
Mulder had awakened in the hospital in Alaska. . . .

        Next to her, Mulder was waking up.  He mumbled something,
and Margaret reached out to stroke his hair.  He started, then
opened his eyes.  He blinked twice, puzzled, then remembered where
he was and his entire body relaxed.  When he saw Mrs. Scully leaning
over him a childlike smile crept over his face.  She felt certain he was
about to call her "Mom."

        Instead, he reached up and hugged her.  "Hi, Mrs. Scully,"
he said softly.

        She hugged him back -- hard.  "Fox," she whispered around
the lump in her throat.

        Scully frowned slightly.  "*Not* 'Fox'. . . ."

        He shushed her.  "It's okay, Scully."  He sat up in bed,
wincing as the movement pulled at his injured shoulder.

        "You gave us quite a scare," Margaret said finally, pulling
back and wiping her eyes.

        "I know.  Sorry about that," he said seriously.  Then he
grinned.  "They took all of my quarters so I couldn't call home."

        Margaret nodded.  She was certain he had no idea of what
he had *really* just said.  *Home.*  *This* was "home" to him.  But
then, she had a notion that for him wherever Dana Scully was was
home. . . .

        Mulder glanced down at his partner and grinned.  "Mrs. Scully,
this isn't what it looks like. . . ."

        "Well, I would hope not!" she exclaimed.  The others in the
room stiffened in surprise.  "Because what it looked like, *Fox*, is
that, after managing to sleep through breakfast and lunch, you were
planning on sleeping through dinner as well."

        He grinned again.  "Nope.  I know what a good cook you
are. . . ."  He glanced over at Melissa, who was standing on Dana's
side of the bed, smiling at them.  His eyes dropped to the package
in her hands.  "Those for me, Melissa?"

        She looked down and gasped, her eyes wide.

        A package of sunflower seeds.

        "I -- I don't even remember picking them up," she stammered.

        Scully turned and just looked at him.  "Don't you say it,
Mulder."

        His face was the picture of innocence.  "Say what, Scully?"

        She scowled at him and the rest of them laughed.  The
partners climbed out of bed and followed Margaret downstairs, Mulder
whistling the opening bars of "The Twilight Zone."

*End Chapter Six*

**********************************************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Seven: "While You Were Out. . . ."
by JulietttXF@aol.com
**********************************************************************

        They chatted over sandwiches and soup that Margaret threw
together from the contents of her refrigerator.  Margaret kept herself
busy hovering over them, refilling their cups of tea before they really
got cool enough to drink, pushing second helpings on them, and
practically feasting herself on the sight of Fox alive and well -- mostly
well -- and her younger daughter with bright eyes and a smile, sitting
at her kitchen table as though nothing had happened.  Except for
Mulder's beard and both agents' painful thinness and their unhealthy
pallor they might almost have been replaying a scene from the
previous Christmas.

        Mulder, the edge of whose appetite had been slightly dulled
by the impromptu feast the night before, ate two sandwiches but
refused a third with a grin when he saw the makings of lasagna on the
counter.  From Hell to Heaven in less than twenty-four hours: he had
clean clothes, plenty of food and drink, the comfort of friends, a warm
bed . . . and Scully.  What more could he need or want?

        Justice.

        Not only for himself, but for his father.  And, he now
suspected, for his partner as well.

        He only wished that it would be possible to share enough of
what he had learned to assist in their search without having to reveal
what he had learned about Scully.  He watched her as she laughed
at one of Melissa's comments, and mentally compared the two
sisters.

        When he had first met Melissa he had been struck by her
similarities to and differences from Dana.  The resemblance was
there, of course, in their coloring, and both women had quite
obviously inherited their mother's beauty.  Melissa was slightly
taller than Scully, and he knew instinctively both that this was a
sore spot with his partner and that Melissa made use of that extra
two inches of height whenever possible.

        Both intelligent and likeable.  It would have been so easy
for him to like Melissa, really *like* her, if it hadn't been for
Dana. . . .

        He shook off *those* thoughts and continued his mental
inventory.

        What struck him now was the disparity between the
sisters' appearances.  Using Melissa as a physical and emotional
barometer he was able to assess for the first time just how much
his absence had changed Scully.  She looked, he reflected, as
though she had been sick for a very long time.  Her normally fair
skin was now an unhealthy white, although two bright spots burned
high on her cheekbones.  She was very thin, and her hair was dull,
one of the tell-tale signs of illness.  She spoke at times as though
unused to the sound of her own voice -- or to its tone -- and her
rare laugh had seemed at first rusty.  Judging from the looks on
the faces around the table the first time she had laughed Scully
had not done much laughing lately.  Watching her, and watching
the others watching her, he made a decision.

        They chatted at first about lighter subjects: the pennant
race, and football, and politics, each new revelation serving to
remind Mulder just how fully he had been removed from the world
into which he had now stepped after so long an absence.

        Finally, during a brief lull in the conversation, he asked what
had been done about his father's death.

        Scully took a deep breath and told him.  As he had
suspected, at first they had tried to pin it on him.  His disappearance
made this much more believable, and the evidence of the water filter,
which had cleared him of the attack on Skinner, had actually given
Them ammunition for their accusations; They had suggested his
psychosis had pushed him over the edge.  They painted a portrait
of William Mulder as an abusive father and proposed that Mulder's
drug-induced paranoia combined with repressed memories of years
of abuse had led him to murder.  Because of the evidence of the
water filter they had offered to reduce the charges to manslaughter,
reminding the court that because there was no Mulder there was no
proof of drugs in his system.  Scully had recognized the implicit
threat: buck us on this and we will make you *both* pay.  They
could no longer hold his personal safety over her head, but they
*could* threaten his memory.

        The ballistic reports had shown that both the bullet that had
killed Bill Mulder and the one that had wounded Scully had come from
the same weapon.  Scully had sent Krycek's gun to Skinner on the
way out of the District and the bullets matched.  Alex Krycek was still
missing, and some rumors around the Bureau whispered that Fox
Mulder -- or Fox Mulder in tandem with his partner -- had killed Krycek
and hidden the body.  Dana came to wish that that were true.

        Unfortunately, because she had helped him to escape, Scully
was considered an accessory.  Thus her evidence regarding the gun,
Krycek's attack on Mulder, and the water filter, were looked upon with
suspicion.

        Her staunchest ally, somewhat surprisingly, had been Walter
Skinner himself.  Despite Mulder's attack on him in the hallway he
had testified on the missing agent's behalf.

        Scully had been officially censured for her role in Mulder's
flight and had been relieved of duty for a suspension of six weeks
-- unpaid -- pending further investigation.

        She later learned that Skinner had pushed for the suspension.
She suspected he had done so because he wanted to give her time
to do exactly what she did.

        Look for Mulder.

        Because she was not officially considered a suspect in Bill
Mulder's murder -- she had been investigated by the Bureau, not the
police -- she was allowed to leave the state.  So she headed back to
New Mexico.  Albert Hosteen's grandson had returned but had little
memory of what had happened.  He had ridden out into the desert
with Mulder.  He told a strange, shaky tale of Mulder's forcing him off
his bike at gunpoint and then riding off, leaving him alone in the middle
of the desert.

        This was Their first mistake.

        Scully knew that Mulder did not have a gun.  His was still
in the lab at Quantico, and hers she had kept in her holster until she
had been forced to relinquish it -- temporarily -- while on suspension.
And she had cared for Mulder during his fever and gunshot-wound-
induced delirium.   She had packed what few clothes and personal
items he had had in New Mexico.  She knew what possessions he
had had with him, right down to his underwear.  None of them
included a firearm.

        Or, for that matter, a suit and tie.

        She started to ask him about that but stopped, remembering
his words to her earlier.  The others would not think to ask because
they had not seen him the night before.

        So, after a pause, she went on.

        She had recorded her findings on audio cassettes and in
files on her computer, to be used in clearing Mulder when she found
him -- or at least. . . .

        Confronted with the disparity between fact and report, Eric
Hosteen's father had agreed to allow his son to undergo regression
hypnosis.  The boy had then remembered an entirely different tale.
One of a boxcar in the desert and a fire.

        This was at least consistent with what Scully had found the
previous month when, concerned when her phone connection with
Mulder had been severed, she had gone looking for him and found
smoke still billowing from the buried car.  And inside, the charred
remains of very small bodies.  There was too little left for proper
autopsies, and when she had returned later the boxcar was empty,
with only the pungent odor of fire remaining to corroborate what her
eyes had told her.

        Of Mulder there was nothing; none of the corpses -- or what
was left of them -- that she had seen had been large enough to be
his, and at this she had taken heart.  But then the boy was missing,
too, and she felt the first stirrings of fear.  When the boy had been
discovered wandering, dazed, more than a hundred miles away a
week later, her spirits had risen again.  After all, *someone* had to
have taken him there.

        Then again, there was the missing bike. . . .

        After the boy's regression she did not know how to respond.
Despair at Mulder's supposed demise in the boxcar?  But then who
had taken the boy, and why had she seen no sign of his body?  The
fact that Eric had recalled, while under hypnosis, a different story
altogether, suggested some tampering with his memory.  It reminded
her of what had happened to Mulder at Ellens Air Force Base.  He
had never recovered his memory of that incident.  That the boy *had*
recalled something else prompted her to believe that either the wiping
of his memory had been incomplete or that They had *wanted* her to
find the truth, for once.

        Or, possibly, that They had another agenda entirely.

        But then where was Mulder?

        After two weeks of vain searching she had returned to
Washington D.C. and made her report -- unofficially, of course -- to
Walter Skinner.  She had stubbornly paid Mulder's rent and utilities
for that first month, grinning determinedly as she marked the receipts
for future repayment.  He *would* be back.  She kept telling herself
this on the first of the month, every month, when she posted his rent
and hers.  She even fed his fish several times a week, just as she
always did when he was -- away.

        He had never been gone this long before.

        If she thought her earlier suspensions had been nervewracking,
she was miserable now.  At least before Mulder had been suspended
*with* her.  Now she had no-one to talk to.  She became so bored
and misdirected that Jackie even considered doing something stupid
and getting herself suspended as well.  But then who knew what
They would do?  They might even try to send her back to Canada as
a disciplinary action, and for the first time since her involuntary
exile St. George did *not* want to go home.  Not yet.

        At the end of her suspension Scully had gone back to work.
Skinner had returned her gun and badge and had *officially* reminded
her that she was still *officially* on report, the final investigation
still
pending.  She had thanked him and returned to the basement office,
now painfully empty.  And waited, wondering how long it would take
before she received notification of the closure of the X-files and her
reassignment.  She was certain both would happen in time, whether
Mulder returned or. . . .

        And so she waited.

        It didn't happen.  Instead, she sat in the office day after day.
The X-files Division was not closed, but neither were any new cases
handed down.  Every day was an exercise in monotony, broken only
by the occasional consult she did when the other pathologists were
unavailable.  No VC involvement, either.  She began to understand
that she was a pariah, even more after Mulder's disappearance than
she had been before.  Unofficially _persona_non_grata_.  Without
even the ability to contest it, because it *was* unofficial.

        And then she began to understand that Their intent was even
more insidious than Their earlier closure of the X-files.  They were
trying to get *her* to quit, to ask for reassignment.  Without Mulder,
without her, the X-files would die on their own.

        It made her angry.  No, to put it bluntly, it pissed her off.  But

what could she do?

        So she began playing Mulder's games.  They would assign
her no new cases?  Fine -- she would find a few of her own.  She
searched old X-files for leads.  Spent hours in the library scanning old
and current newspapers for stories.  She even broke into his e-mail
account and began reading his mail from NICAP and other watchdog
groups.  She did, however, draw the line at tabloid magazines.

        Scully found very little that *she* felt was worth investigating,
and at first she felt a certain smugness at tossing leads she knew
Mulder would find intriguing.  Those few she felt were meritorious she
sent up to Skinner.

        He denied every one of them.

        Finally, one day, she could take it no longer, and burst into
his office unannounced to confront him.

        "Agent Scully."

        "Sir."  She took a deep breath.  "I would like an explanation."

        "An explanation for what, Agent Scully?"

        "For why every single 302 I have sent to you for approval has
been turned down."

        "Those proposed cases showed insufficient evidence to
warrant. . . ."

        "Insufficient *evidence*?  We have been assigned to cases
in the past that were based on nothing more than a _National
Enquirer_ photo!"

        "Agent Scully. . . ."

        "Now, I can face the fact that *They*" -- <good grief, I'm
beginning to sound like Mulder!> -- "want to close us down.  What I
want to know is where *you* stand.  And don't give me that line
about standing on the line that we keep crossing, because it seems
to me that the lines are pretty well delineated on this one.  Just tell
me," she said angrily, almost desperately, "tell me -- do you still
have confidence in my ability to do my job?"

        He simply looked at her.

        How easy -- how simple to make an end right then.  To say,
"No, Agent Scully, I feel your emotions have affected your judgment."
To reassign her -- or worse, suspend her again.  There were so many
reasons, so many excuses that would have served.  Psychological
instability.  Incompetence -- after all, her solve rate had ben nil
because her investigations had been nil-- she had been "unable" to
locate any persuable cases at all.

        But he had said none of this.

        "I'm sorry, Agent Scully.  I can't approve this case," he had
said quietly but firmly.  "That will be all."

        But, looking into his impassive face, she had understood.
It didn't help that she knew he was the puppet of others above him in
this.  It *did* help that he still believed in her.  Still believed in the

X-files.  After everything, still believed in Mulder.

        And so she had returned to the basement.  They could drag
her out kicking and screaming if They wanted to do so -- and that is
what it would take.  They would not drive her out like this.

        But she couldn't just sit there -- that *would* drive her crazy.

        So she set about systematically going through old case files.
Reading clippings and reports, viewing photos and film footage.

        And reading Mulder's case reports.  Listening to his few
recorded analyses on audio cassette.

        It made her feel closer to him.

        She told herself that *when* he returned, *when* he was
cleared of all the charges against him, and *when* they were both
returned to active duty, she would be able to keep up with him due to
her reading, to have the immense wealth of the X-files at her fingertips
to pull out for reference as he so frequently did.

        She didn't become a believer.  But then she didn't set out to
gain the confidence in the odd assortment of clippings and photos
and reports that Mulder had.

        What she *did* gain was an even greater respect for Mulder,
the man and the investigator.  For his intuitive leaps, often
astonishing and almost always corroborated by later findings.  For
his restraint during the later cases after she had begun working with
him.  She saw the way he held himself back in his field reports.  Not
so much in the beginning, but later, as he gained confidence and
trust in her, she saw the way he reserved judgment for her opinions.

        And, too, as she read she saw the way the styles and biases
of their reports began to alter, to grow toward one another.  She, in
the beginning, had been fiercely analytical -- cold, almost.  She was
slightly shocked at just what a wet blanket she had been, tearing
down theories she now realized *were* founded on fact.

        His earliest reports had been cold as well, rife with his
suspicion of her.  After the first few months he grudgingly began to
accept some of her theories, but it was with reluctance.  She saw
the biggest early change after the Arctic Ice Core Project
investigation.  She remembered that case, remembered how they
had had to trust one another in the face of so much evidence that
compelled them to the contrary.  How they had, in one split second
of faith, cemented the bond that ever after sealed their partnership.

        Then the last case report before the closing of the X-files,
written mostly by Scully herself.  The incredulity she had felt upon
seeing the humanoid foetus.  Her tracking of Mulder to Puerto Rico.
The loss of the evidence.

        While compiling a chronological cross-listing of files she
noticed that there was a three-month gap in the files, and then a
small trickle of folders.  She recognized this former period as the time
the division had been closed and Mulder had worked the punishment
"junk" cases, sitting wiretap except for those rare occasions on which
Skinner himself fed him a case out of -- pity?  She had had no idea,
however, that Mulder had worked on so few cases immediately after
the reopening of the X-files divison during her . . . absence.

        Then a huge file with her name on it.  She opened it with
trepidation.  There was the photo of her in the trunk of her car, the
pictures of her trashed apartment.  A lock of red hair stiffened with
her blood.  The evidence list showed that her glasses and FBI
identification wallet had been here, too, until her return.  But no
mention was made of her cross.  Her mother had told her of Mulder's
attempt to return it to her.  She had learned from Jackie that he had
worn it himself while she was gone.  He had never told her that.  There
was so much he had never told her. . . .

        It was at this point that she had taken one of her many "study
breaks" in the library.

        Later, she read for the first time his reports on her
disappearance.  In them she saw the worry he had felt early on, then,
reading between the lines, the despair and loneliness.  The files for
the few cases he had investigated during her absence were slim to the
point of emaciation -- and not simply due to the absence of her reports.
She was shocked at how sketchy his reports were.  There were gross
errors in some of his calculations.  Missing expense reports -- she
knew he could never have been reimbursed for any of the vehicles or
hotel rooms he must have rented or the meals he had presumably
eaten.  She noted with a sad smile a requisition for another flashlight.
He had failed to provide his customary long, convoluted explanation for
how he had lost it, an explanation that Scully knew from experience
was more than likely true.  In fact, he had failed to provide any
explanation at all.  He had been granted a new flashlight but his pay
had been docked.  And he had not protested.

        She shook her head.  The sketchy and inaccurate reports,
missing paperwork, his meek willingness to pay for equipment
undoubtedly lost or destroyed through no fault of his own -- these
signs all bespoke him a man distracted, despondent.  He had felt
her loss to the extent that it had affected his work.

        She also noted that although Skinner had reopened the X-files
every one of the cases Mulder had pursued during her absence had
been assigned.

        She knew why.

        All his spare time had been spent going over *her* file,
searching for some previously unnoticed clue.  The file marked
"Scully, Dana," bulged thick with notes and reports and false leads.
The edges of the pages were worn and smudged from frequent handling.
Even her photo, digitally imaged from a videotape, was creased, and
for no *logical* reason, since she knew they had found her empty
car where Barry had abandoned it.  It could only be because Mulder
had looked at the picture repeatedly during her time away.

        She was beginning to understand just how immense his
sense of loss and guilt had been.

        And she wondered how long it would be before she, too, let
her guilt and sorrow affect her work.

        After her return the files thickened once more.  And Mulder's
tone -- and hers -- changed again.  The unity of purpose was palpable
even through their most wildly disparate reports.  Proving themselves
*right* wasn't as important anymore.  Finding the truth -- together --
was.

        Scully didn't tell them all this, however.  She simply
mentioned reorganizing the X-files, smiling at his half-hearted groan
that he would never be able to find anything ever again, and went on.

        It had been two weeks ago that the body was found in the
burnt-out shell of an abandoned house.  Faulty wiring, the reports
had concluded.  But elsewhere, buried deep in the report, was the
notation that the electricity had been disconnected six months
earlier when the last owners had moved out.

        In the rubble they had found the charred remains of Mulder's
FBI badge.  No explanation was offered as to how the metal and
leather survived the intense heat that had devastated the house and
the body found inside.

        And so she had taken hope.  Here was one more inexplicable
detail.  Surely, *surely* the DNA tests would prove that the body was
not his.

        But they had not.  The pathologist at the FBI field office in
Alma Gorda had performed an autopsy and sent the findings to the
lab at Quantico.

        DNA results: human male, age thirty-two to thirty-six.
Identification: Fox Mulder, FBI X-files Division.

        There was one more detail.  Evidence of branched DNA.

        She glossed over her despair.  Over her disbelief that was
based less on the natural and expected rationalization that *this
could not happen* and more on her shattered faith that *this could not
happen without my knowing it*.  On the deep, intuitive belief she had
somehow formulated without even realizing it -- that he could not --
absolutely could not -- have left her universe without her feeling it.
Without her stars falling from the sky or her world tilting on its axis or

her sun just forgetting to come up one morning. . . .

        Surely she would have felt -- something.

        Surely.

        After all, when her father had died she had seen him there,
in her living room, even before word of his death came.  And she
loved her father.  He was her *father*.  But Mulder -- Mulder
was. . . .

        Could he be gone without her feeling it?  Could he have left
her without so much as a goodbye, corporeal or -- otherwise?

        She firmly refused to believe it.  There must be some
mistake.  Had to be.

        And so her voice as she had requested -- no, *demanded*
that Skinner order a second autopsy back in Washington and that
she be allowed to perform it, was firm and calm, betraying none of
the raging emotions inside her.

        He had not wanted to allow it.  Had finally agreed on the
condition that another pathologist perform the autopsy.  She had
balked.  Finally, due perhaps to the niggling in the back of his mind
that suggested that perhaps she was right, that this was *not*
Special Agent Fox Mulder, that Dana Scully would be thorough and
precise to a fault in this even more than she was in every one of her
investigations, he had agreed.  Reluctantly.  But he had had to draw
the line at ordering a second set of DNA tests -- if she found
evidence that the body had been misidentified he would reconsider,
of course.

        So she had taken a sample to the Lone Gunmen and they
had gone through whatever channels they used in a situation like
this, and about which she really did not want to know, while she
had performed the autopsy.

        Scully told her by-now captive audience that she had
performed the autopsy and had come to the same conclusion that
the other pathologist had.

        The subject had died within the past month of smoke
inhalation and burning.  The evidence of branched DNA made her
wonder what else he had suffered before his death.

        And both her autopsy and the new DNA tests identified the
subject as Fox Mulder.

        She fell silent, unable to relate her breakdown at that point.
Jackie and her family knew of it, of course.  Mulder guessed it from
her eyes.  She told him only that Jackie had taken her to her
mother's house, and that the funeral had been the previous day.

        And one final note of interest.  That several days after the
second autopsy, several days before the funeral, a motion had been
filed to drop both the investigation into Bill Mulder's death and that
into his son's.

        The message was clear.

        Push to find out what happened to your partner and he will
go on record as a patricide.  He will be buried without any of the
honours his earlier heroics earned him.  He will be a martyr to the
Truth, but a martyr unmourned.

        Try to uncover the secret and you will go down with him.

        The captain is dead, Scully, but you don't have to go down
with the ship.  Save yourself.

        Skinner had saved her from making any fateful decisions
by granting her two weeks of personal leave, which she had coming
to her only because her earlier time off had been agency-enforced.
Once again her respect and admiration of and genuine gratitude to
the man rose.

        She made no mention of her intended quest for vengeance.
She still wanted it, of course -- only now it had been tempered by
Mulder's return into something more akin to a hunger for justice.
But that was for later.  Not now -- not with her mother and sister and
Marty staring at her, fascinated.

        Scully had said most of this without interruption, and now
she paused to take a long swallow of her now-lukewarm tea.  The
others waited for Mulder to respond with his version of the story,
but he remained silent, lost in his own thoughts and memories.

        The silence spun itself out over several long minutes until
the three civilians began to feel uncomfortable.  There was some
undercurrent flowing among the other three that they could not
understand.

        Finally Margaret Scully stood up resolutely and turned to
Marty.

        "Have you ever made lasagna, Marty?"

        He stared at her, stunned by the apparent _non_sequitor_.
"Uh -- no."

        She smiled.  "Well, you're about to learn.  *One* of you
needs to know how to cook before you and Jackie get married."

        St. George simply chuckled.  "Well, if one of us has to be
domesticated. . . ."

        The older woman turned to Melissa.  "Could you start the
veggies?"  Then she spoke over her shoulder to the three agents.
"This is, at most, a three-person job.  Go find something else to
do -- but not too far."

        They stared at her, then at each other.  Jackie and Mulder
got up and left the room, but Scully remained behind for a moment.

        "Thanks, Mom," she whispered.

        Margaret Scully simply smiled, but her eyes were troubled.

*End Chapter Seven*

*************************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Eight: "Answers"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
*************************************************

        Scully stepped out into the living room where her friends were
waiting for her.  She smiled and went past them to the front door,
opened it, and went outside.  They followed her, Jackie shaking her
head.

        "Your mom's something else, Dana."

        She grinned.  "She's *very* perceptive."

        Mulder was looking at her.  "Runs in the family."

        Her eyes met his and for the first time since before this whole
mess had begun with his becoming so ill from the drugs in his water
supply the silent communication flowed between them once more.

        She had forgotten how wonderful -- almost intoxicating -- it felt.

        She sank to the porch swing.  A moment later it creaked and
dropped several inches as Mulder joined her.  Jackie grinned and took
her place on the porch railing.

        They swung for a few minutes in silence, each lost in his or her
own thoughts.  Gradually Scully became aware of how easily the swing
moved with the two of them in it together, his much longer legs pushing
gently in perfect rhythm with her shorter ones.

        <Just like our partnership.  Give and take.  Each of us taking
up the slack in the other.>  She looked over at him.  He was watching
her and gave her a half-smile.

        *I missed you.*

        *I missed you, too. . . .*

        St. George, watching them, decided it was up to her to bring
things back into the realm of words.  She cleared her throat and they
both jumped slightly.

        "So."

        Mulder took a deep breath.  "Where do I start?"

        Scully bit her lip.  "The phone call."

        He nodded.  "Okay.  Eric -- that's the boy who took me out
into the desert on his bike," he explained to Jackie.  She nodded.
Dana had been able to tell her about Eric.  Mulder continued.  "We
rode out into the desert -- I don't know -- several miles.  He showed
me a group of buried boxcars -- I guess the earthquake had
uncovered them.  We went down to the one where he had been before,
where he had discovered -- what he had discovered.  My cel phone
rang," here Scully looked up in interest.  She had not known this
before.  Mulder nodded again.  "It was Cancerman.  Gave me some
line about how my father was involved in everything and that if I went
any further I would be exposing him."  He dropped his eyes.  "Maybe
I should have listened to him."

        "No."  Scully's voice was firm and he looked up.  "One thing
I've learned during my time with the X-files, Mulder -- sometimes it
hurts to find the truth.  But in the end the lies always seem to hurt
more."

        He considered this for a moment and then nodded.  When
Scully had been returned after her abduction and could not remember
anything he had not pushed it.  There had been between them the
unspoken understanding that perhaps it was better *not* to know
everything that had happened to her.  She was frightened and he
knew it -- what was more, he understood.  He was frightened as well.

        But then when the MJ files had been unencrypted -- at least
partially -- she had discovered her own name among them, with
Duane Barry's, which suggested to her that in these files were the
answers behind her abduction.  And suddenly the truth had become
important once again.

        <I want you to find out, Mulder.  I *need* you to.>

        But how could he tell her what he now knew?

        When was the Truth no longer as important as sleeping at
night?

        <Not yet.  Later.>

        "Anyway.  I climbed down into the boxcar and there were . . .
these *bodies*, Scully -- they weren't human . . . they were small
and misshapen . . ." he shook his head at the memory.  "And then
I called you."  She nodded and he continued.  "I looked at the arm
of one of the bodies and there was a mark on it, like a smallpox
scar.  You said something about the files speaking about tests.  I
got to wondering -- what if these bodies were the bodies of aliens
that the government had somehow captured and subjected to tests?
Were they testing the aliens' immune systems?  Testing for
evidence of previous exposure to human diseases? -- that would
suggest either that they had come here before or that we -- some
humans from somewhere -- had gone to wherever it was they came
from.  In any case, somebody was keeping secrets."  He shook his
head again.  "Or maybe they were trying to see if the aliens
possessed some sort of super antibody that could be used in
treating human diseases.  Or maybe --" he trailed off and looked at
her warily.

        "What, Mulder?"  When he didn't respond immediately she
sighed in exasperation.  "It can't possibly be any more outrageous
than what we've heard so far."

        He simply looked at her for a moment.  Then, "branched
DNA."

        Jackie's head snapped up.  "What?!"

        He nodded.  "I know -- it seems to be a recurring theme,
doesn't it?  Maybe one of the government's pet side projects."

        Scully said nothing.  <They found branched DNA in my
system when. . . .>  Mulder was evading her eyes.  She closed her
own and said a silent prayer for strength.  Somehow she knew she
was going to need it.  "Go on," she said softly.

        He took another deep breath.  "The hatch clanged shut and
cut off our phone conversation.  At first I thought," he grinned, "I
thought that maybe Eric was . . . involved in something. . . ."  He
darted a wary glance at his partner but was relieved when she
merely nodded.  In those early days of confusion and paranoia she
had considered nearly every possibility, including this one.  "But
then the hatch opened again and some men climbed down in and
pulled me out at gunpoint."

        She stared at him.  "Where was Eric?"

        He frowned.  "They had him down on the ground -- it looked
like they were sedating him or something."

        Scully nodded absently.  This confirmed her suspicions that
the boy's memory had been wiped and new information implanted.
They had been very clever, erasing only the few minutes it had taken
to remove Mulder from the boxcar.  The smaller the amount of
information eradicated, the less likelihood of errors and
inconsistencies.

        ". . . okay?" Mulder asked.

        "'Scuse me?"  She shook her head to clear the muddled
thoughts that were beginning to cloud her mind.

        "I asked if you had heard anything more about Eric Hosteen.
Is he all right?"

        Scully nodded.  "Somehow word got back to them when
the . . . the body was found.  Albert called me to tell me how sorry
he was."

        Mulder sighed in visible relief.  "At first, when they took me,
I was afraid they had taken him too," he continued.  "They told me
they had, but I hoped it was just another threat."

        "Do you know where. . . ?"

        He shook his head.  "No -- they drugged me and shoved me
in a car.  I remember an explosion and then everything went black."
He grinned.  "At first when I woke up that was all I could remember.
I thought I was . . . dead."

        She looked at him.  <Me, too.>

        He cleared his throat and went on.  "When I came to I was in
some sort of laboratory, on a table.  There was another table next to
me, and another man on it."  He stopped and bit his lip, unwilling to
continue.

        Jackie spoke up.  "Don't tell me.  The body they found in the
house."

        He nodded.  "He didn't look like me, really -- same general
build, and dark hair."  He paused again, then went on.  "Then they --
some people in surgical scrubs and masks -- came in and started
examining me.  No," he hurried to explain when he saw the concern in
Scully's eyes, "they didn't hurt *me*."  He stopped again.

        Her eyes grew wide at the implication of the stressed word.

        Mulder picked up his story again.  "They -- stripped off my
clothes.  I noticed at the time that they were very careful with them --
I couldn't imagine why until later, when . . ." he broke off.  Now was
the time when he had to be most lucid.  There were so many details,
so much to explain to them, but he had to be calm.  "They examined
me, went over every inch of my body, and made notes.  They
especially spent a lot of time on my left shoulder."

        Where she had shot him.  She closed her eyes, remembering
again the feel of the kick of the gun when she pulled the trigger,
hearing the shot and smelling the burnt cordite and seeing him slump
to the pavement. . . . She felt a touch on her arm and opened her
eyes.

        He smiled at her.  "I didn't tell you before -- but thanks."

        "For what?  Shooting you?"

        He nodded.  "For preventing me from becoming a murderer."

        She stared into his eyes.  There was no anger there.  Only
gratitude and friendship and -- something else.  He didn't blame her
for hurting him.  What was more, he was not angry at her for allowing
Krycek to escape.  And so as she gazed into his eyes something
that had been hurting her for five months, something that had nothing
to do with Mulder's disappearance, finally began to heal.

        He settled back and resumed his tale.  "Then they moved
over to the other table and they pulled back the sheet."  He swallowed
hard.  "And they . . . they . . ." he closed his eyes, unable to
continue.

        "What?"

        His voice was very hoarse.

        "They shot him."

        "WHAT?!"  St. George jumped down from the railing and stood
in front of the swing that had ceased to rock.  "They did WHAT?!"

        "They -- shot him.  Stood right over him and shot him right in
the left shoulder where my scar was.  He -- he jumped a little but he
didn't scream or anything so. . . ."

        "He was ALIVE?  He was alive and AWAKE?!"  Scully was
shaking.  "They. . . ."

        He nodded, his eyes full of pain.  "Scully -- they went over my
body -- they were looking for new scars and they . . . they inflicted the
wounds on him so he. . . ."

        "So he would have the same scars you had.  The BASTARDS!"
Jackie shouted.  She was trembling with rage.

        Scully was very white.  It had been bad enough that she had
had to shoot Mulder.  But now -- some poor man had suffered for it
as well. . . .

        Mulder's swallowed painfully.  "I -- don't know what all they
did to him after that because I yelled and they put me out."

        At least he had been spared that.  Had been spared watching
Them replay the rest of his injuries, *intentionally*, on another subject.

        He went on again.  "Later -- I woke up.  I have no idea how
long I had been out, but I was thirsty.  And I noticed that they had
bandaged my shoulder again.  Not as carefully or as well as *you*
had, Scully," he teased.  He was rewarded with a faint smile.  She
still looked sick.  "Anyway.  I had -- a lot of time to think about
everything.  About what they had done -- would do to me.  To us."

        "Did you ever see anyone else there?"

        He nodded.  "That man -- I saw him twice more.  They
were checking for any scars they might have missed."  He
shuddered.  "And then they took blood from both of us a couple of
times.  He was conscious but looked -- drugged -- every time I saw
him.  I figured that they had to keep him awake so that they could
monitor him -- make sure he didn't die during their . . . treatments."
He shuddered again.  That human beings could be so capable of
cruelty -- intentional cruelty -- to one of their own.  That they would
keep this unknown man alive simply in order to kill him at their own
whim. . . .

        "What else?" Scully asked softly.

        He took a deep, shaky breath.  "Sometimes a couple of men
would come into the -- cell -- where they were keeping me and ask
me questions.  I don't remember that part very well for some reason --
maybe it'll come back eventually.  And then one of the -- scientists --
there told me. . . ."  He grinned sardonically.  "Isn't there a line in a
lot
of movies when the villain says, 'I might as well tell you what I'm going
to do to you because you won't ever make it out of here alive anyway'?
I always figured that if they *didn't* tell you everything it was a good
sign you were going to be released.  But with these guys," he shook
his head.  "For all I knew they were just going to wipe my memory
again.  In fact, I *still* don't know whether they were planning on
killing
me.  Glad I didn't stick around long enough to find out.

        "Anyway," he continued, "after -- I don't know how long -- a
couple of weeks? -- a couple of months? -- they came in and drugged
me again."  He remembered hoping that they were going to return him
to D.C. or the desert or the Hosteens' house -- anywhere away from
here, anywhere where Scully could find him. . . . He had lain there as
the drugs took effect, trying to remember everything he could.  Although
at that point They had not revealed to him the full extent of Their plans,
he was smart enough -- and paranoid enough -- to figure out that They
would not stop at just inflicting injuries on the other man.  His double.
They had a lot to answer for already; he only hoped he would be able
to escape before they added to their list of crimes.

        "When I woke up this time I was in our office."  He turned in
time to see Scully's mouth drop open, and nodded.  "A replica.
Pretty convincing, too -- they'd even dressed me in a suit and tie.  I
figure they wanted to see if I would reveal the location of the DAT tape."

        "But you didn't," Scully said softly.  He shook his head.

        "A clumsy attempt -- they must have figured it wouldn't work
but was worth a try.  Eventually I grew to wish I had. . . ."  He sank
into silence again, obviously lost in his memories.

        Jackie leaned forward.  "What did you do while you were --
away?"

        He sighed.  "They kept me in a cell of sorts.  I did sit-ups.
A *lot* of sit-ups.  Conjugated verbs in English, French, and Greek.
When I got *really* bored I memorized the Declaration of
Independence backwards.  Sometimes I wrote letters in my head.
If I concentrated hard enough I could 'listen' to music from memory.
I went through everything I could think of -- classical, pop, rock, jazz
-- even a couple of musicals."

        Jackie grinned.  "I didn't know you liked musicals, Mulder."

        He made a face at her.  "I went to a few shows while I was in
England -- besides, any port in a storm, right?"  He grinned suddenly.
"Guess what I realized?  Whoever owns the rights to _Madame
Butterfly_ has got grounds for a suit -- the tune for 'Bring Him Home'
from _Les Mis_ was lifted straight out of 'The Humming Chorus.'"

        Scully shook her head as she digested this piece of
information.

        "I recited some poetry, too," he said, watching for her
reaction.

        "Oh?"

        He nodded.  "Some Shakespeare -- and Chaucer.  The
Brownings.  Some Donne and Dickinson, too."  She blushed faintly.
She didn't have to ask which ones by Donne and Dickinson.  He
smiled.  "A couple of nights I even put myself to sleep with Dr.
Seuss. . . ."  What he *didn't* tell her is that he did not say aloud
the page from _The Sleep Book_ that she had recited for him on one
of their stakeouts; instead he simply closed his eyes and listened to
her voice in his head repeating the lines until he fell asleep.

        <Way out in the West, in the town of Mercedd. . . .>

        "Anyway.  I tried to keep track of how long I was there by
counting meals, but I had no idea how accurate that was."  He
paused again.  He was about to head into those dangerous waters.

        "A couple of weeks ago I noticed they started treating me a
little . . . differently.  They would come into my cell more often.
They took more blood.  Almost like they were -- double-checking
something."

        Scully closed her eyes.  "Your double," she whispered.

        He nodded.  "Yeah -- I figured that.  They must have been
giving him time to heal before . . ." he swallowed.  "I only hope that
-- they killed him or at least knocked him out before . . ." his voice
trailed off.  Knowing that another man had died in his stead in agony
in that fire was only marginally better than suffering it himself.  Or
maybe it was marginally worse.

        "It worked," Scully said dully.  "The wounds they inflicted --
the branched DNA -- hey convinced the FBI pathologist -- and *me*
-- that it was your body."  She still said nothing of her irrational faith

that had, in the end proven right.  He *was* alive.  "Wait a second.
The body had DNA that was a combination of your DNA and an
unknown. . . ."  She trailed off and stared at him, her eyes wide.
"Oh my God."

        He nodded.  "You figured it out," he said softly.

        "Mulder -- they -- but how could --"

        "I don't know, Scully.  But they did."

        It hadn't been Mulder's body with irregularities in his
bloodstream.

        It had been an unknown man with irregularities in his
bloodstream.  The "irregularities" had been the man's own blood;
ironically, it was *Mulder's* DNA which was foreign in this
equation.

        How twisted, and sick, and . . . and very nearly
successful.

        No, it had been successful.  Had X not had his own
agenda. . . .

        She thought again of the emotions she had allowed
herself during those first few awful hours after the news of the body
had reached her.  Her disbelief that covered a trembling fear

        <Noit'simpossibleitcan'tbeIdon'tbelieveitI'dknowI'dknow
wouldn'tInohe'snotdeadit'snothimit'snotit'snotitcan'tbeMulder>

and then the frozen resolution as she performed the autopsy and
then that one moment of excruciating, blazing pain as she
touched his arm and knew then that she had been wrong -- about
him, about her, about *everything*.

        And then blessed nothingness.

        And once again she believed, as she had before, that had he
died in that boxcar or at any other time, she would have known it.
It was a gift, a very great gift, this renewal of her faith in their bond
that X had given her -- almost, but not quite, as great as the gift
of Mulder himself.

        Not that she would ever tell him.

        Not that she *could* tell him.

        Or at least not yet. . . .

        His voice was hoarse.  "There's more, Scully."

        "More?"

        He nodded and swallowed hard, but when he continued his
voice was, if anything, even more hoarse than before.  "That --
scientist -- told me . . ." he trailed off and just looked at her, pain in

his eyes.

        "Go on, Mulder," she said quietly.

        He closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them, seeking
hers.  "They told me -- oh, Scully . . ." his voice was low and rough.
"They told me they have a double for you, too. . . ."

        Scully went very pale and her lips trembled.

        "Scully," he pleaded, taking her hands in his, "they may just
have been torturing me -- I don't know. . . ."

        Her mind spun.  How long?  How long had the monsters
been planning this?  And had it been Mulder all along, or was he
merely a convenient test subject?

        And then with a sudden wave of clarity, understanding
rushed through her, nearly rocking her to her knees.

        <Oh, God. . . .>

        "No, Mulder," she said calmly although she was still white to
the lips.  "It makes sense.  I wonder. . . ."  She broke off, then
continued in a whisper.  "I wonder if . . . if that's why they . . . took
me. . . ."

        Now St. George was white as well -- with fury.  "The
bastards," she hissed.  "If I find them . . ." she clenched her fists
and Mulder and Scully were very glad she was not wearing her
gloves.

        Scully sat very still with her eyes closed, but she was
shaking.  Mulder slid an arm around her and she hugged him back,
tightly.

        More and more of the pieces were slipping into place.

        The branched DNA in her bloodstream -- perhaps They had
been experimenting with her to see whether They could mix her
genetic material with her double's to obtain a close enough -- or at
least a confusing enough, as in Mulder's case -- match to serve
their purpose in the future.

        But something had gone wrong and so she had had to be
returned.  Perhaps they had kept her for so long because they had
been trying to repair the damage.  <To save my life so they could take
it at their own pleasure later,> she thought angrily.  They had been
unable to remove all trace evidence of the tests from her system, but
they had broken the molecules down to prevent any correct
interpretation of the clues.  In the end, the "waste products" of the
genetic mutations they had performed had served their purpose in an
even more deviously convincing way.  They had led Mulder -- and, she
admitted, to some extent, she had at least entertained the possibility
herself -- to believe that she had been abducted by aliens and
submitted to extraterrestrial experimentation.

        The truth was even more horrific.  And even more unbelievable.

        By manipulating the evidence they had assured that any
further investigation into Scully's abduction, whether she died or not,
would be impossible.  Mulder's suggestion that she had been taken by
aliens -- a possibility planted in his head by the men who *were*
responsible -- would have gotten him laughed off the case.

        Mulder began to speak again, and quickly told them that one
day -- or night, he could not be certain which -- the lights had
suddenly gone out in the building in which he was housed.  He had
lain in the darkness, ready to spring at whoever came through the
door and make at least an attempt at escape.  By now he knew that
Scully and all the others must believe him dead, and that no help
would come to him.  He had to count only on himself -- and he had
to get to Scully. . . .

        When the door had opened he had tensed himself.  But in
that instant before he leapt a voice had spoken out of the darkness.
He could have not been more surprised -- no, shocked -- had it been
Scully herself, although he wished it had been.

        But he had reacted to Mr. X's presence in an entirely
different manner than he would have reacted to his partner's.  His
embrace had been one of attack rather than joyful reunion.  And the
last thing he remembered happening in that building was a sudden
pain in his head and that calm voice saying, "I'm sorry, Mr. Mulder,"
and then blankness.

        He had awakened in the back seat of the car, his head
throbbing.  Mr. X had given him water and aspirins and he had slept
off and on, losing all sense of time and space once more.  It could
have been hours or days from the time he had been rescued, as he
ultimately realized he had been, to the time he had awakened
under the tree in Mrs. Scully's front yard.

        The three agents sat in silence for a long time, lost in thought.

        Jackie watched her two friends, so close in proximity, their
minds racing in similar directions, but so far apart.  She alone knew
that both of them had the same fears about Scully's abduction.
During a particularly memorable drunken stupor Mulder had told her
of his visions of Scully on an operating table, surrounded by
shadowy beings, her belly expanding beneath some sort of high-tech
instrument.  Even she, without a psychology degree, recognized in
that symbolism of impregnation her friend's fear that his partner had
been sexually violated.  And she also saw something in it that Mulder
himself did not realize: his proprietary protectiveness of Scully's body,
particularly of her sexuality.  His feelings for her -- whatever he wanted

to call them -- compelled a deep angst within him when he thought
of anyone hurting her, especially in *that* way.

        And she knew that Scully, too, had feared something of this
nature.  Physical examinations had shown no evidence of either rape
or impregnation, though goodness only knew what They had done to
her.

        Might not Mulder's experience finally give them some answers
that could put to rest at least some of their fears?  Perhaps this is
what they had done to Scully herself -- but they had had a chance
to wipe her memory, which is why she could not remember anything.
Mr. X had gotten to Mulder before they could wipe his.

        As horrific and terrifying and humiliating as it might seem, it
was far less so than all the things each of them had imagined.

        Scully took a deep breath.  "Mulder, do you think. . . ?"

        He nodded.  "Yes, Scully, I do."

        So much said in so little.  Their customary shorthand was in
and of itself as comforting as the message.

        She closed her eyes, feeling a knot loosen in her chest.
Perhaps he was wrong.  Perhaps he was only saying this to make
her feel better.

        But it was working.

        Suddenly a tension she had not known was there, that
*must* have been there for nearly a year now, eased.  And she knew
in that instant that she belonged to herself again.  To herself and. . . .

        Mulder stood up.  "Is that lasagna I smell?"

        Jackie jumped up as well.  "I'll just go see if they need any
help," she said, obviously intent on leaving them alone for a moment.

        Scully accepted Mulder's hand and rose from the swing.

        "Thanks," she said.  His eyes met hers and he smiled briefly
in understanding.

        They had not settled everything, but it was a start.

*End Chapter Eight*

***********************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Nine: "Laughter"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
***********************************************
        Margaret Scully stood in the kitchen stirring a pan of hot cocoa
while   Melissa set out mugs and a bowl of marshmallows on a tray
nearby.
        Suddenly there was a burst of laughter from the other room
where Dana and Fox and Jackie and Marty were playing poker.  All
four were laughing, but Margaret's face softened as she recognized
Dana's silvery laugh among the others, and Fox's deeper, earthy laugh
in counterpoint to hers.  She caught Melissa's eye and they both
smiled.  At times during the past five months she had wondered if
her baby girl would ever laugh again. . . .
        But now Fox Mulder was back and safe and -- for she had
seen to it herself -- well-fed, and Dana was happy again.  Really, truly
happy, not merely functional, which was the best Margaret had begun
to think possible.  With Mulder's return the whole atmosphere of the
house had brightened, as if the heavy pall of sorrow and despair that
had covered it had been lifted and replaced with a blanket of warmth
and comfort and hope.  It might still be -- and was -- raining outside,
but now the raindrops fairly sang on the windowpanes, and the
howling of the wind in the chimney served only to remind them that
they were safe inside, together.  Safe and loved.
        Dinner had been a merry affair, the six of them chatting and
laughing and feasting until it indeed seemed, as St. George had
suggested earlier, like Christmas in September.
        She had sat and watched, observant as always with her
mother-eyes, noting with concern that while Fox had heaped his plate
with an enormous serving of lasagna and garlic bread and salad, he
had not even eaten as much as she herself did, let alone enough for
a man who had quite obviously been starving himself -- or had been
starved.  And Dana ate even less than she normally did, which was
little enough, though quite a bit more than she had been eating of
late.  She sighed and reflected that they still had so far to go --
Mulder was back and so they could begin the healing process, but
it had just begun.  She wondered how long it would take.
        She was cognizant, too, of the undercurrents that wove
their way beneath and through the various conversations among
the diners.  Dana and Fox and Jackie evidently still had unfinished
business to which to attend, although she was also aware of the
fact that *something* -- something of major import -- had been
settled.  Dana in particular seemed more at ease with herself than
she had been in longer than Margaret could remember -- since
far before Fox's disappearance.  Perhaps since her own
disappearance.  And Fox would watch her with the eyes of his soul,
speculatively and with great concern, seeking in her face the
answer to some unspoken question.  And when she turned to him
eyes clear for the first time in months he seemed to find what he
was looking for, for Margaret saw him close his own eyes momentarily
and bow his head.  When he opened them again everything was
completely different; he looked enormously relieved and had shed
several years around his eyes which Maggie had found herself
thinking looked far too old for such a young man, even one who
had seen so much.  And he even managed to tuck away another
few bites of food before finally pushing his plate away with a groan.
        After dinner she had made good on her earlier promise and
cut Fox's hair.  It had been a few years since she had last cut
Brian's hair -- the girls had insisted on having their hair done
professionally beginning in high school, though she continued to
cut the boys' hair until the left home -- but she had always been
good at it.  Dana and Jackie hung over her and made worried
noises as she snipped carefully in an attempt to make Fox
believe she was botching the job, just as Dana and Melissa had
done to the boys when they were all children.  When she was
finished, however, they all had to admit that she had done a good
job; if it was longer than Mulder usually kept his hair, it also gave
his too-think face a softer look.  She knew he would return to the
regulation FBI cut when he returned to work, but he seemed
genuinely pleased, and that pleased her.
        It was while they were thus occupied -- Marty and Melissa
had taken cleanup duty -- that Jackie had proposed the poker game,
and that delighted Margaret.  They had lost so much time -- had so
much to catch up on.  And unless she missed her guess, she was
certain that the three agents had begun to lay some very serious
plans.  Fox still might have to face some sort of official action when
he returned to duty; for all she knew, Dana might as well.  Whatever
happened, though, it had to be much better than the not knowing and
the emptiness and the anguish.  For tonight, though, they would push
all that away and revel in the pleasure of friendship and warmth -- and
poker.
        Soon they would have to call Skinner -- and Fox's mother.
She didn't know all the details of what Fox had endured during his
absence, but she suspected that he was not entirely out of danger.
Her eyes darted around the kitchen and she thought of all the
windows and doorways in this house.  Long ago, on Jaclyn's first
visit here, they had been attacked.  She had been asleep at the
time but Melissa had told her about it much later.
        Tonight, she would return the clip to Dana's gun.  It
seemed so silly now that she had taken it.  But then she hadn't
known what to expect.  She only hoped her daughter was not angry.
She didn't seem to be, but then her reactions today had been
overwhelmed by the joy of Fox's presence.  <Forgive me, Dana.>
        She would pull Jaclyn aside and assess the situation.  If
need be, they could raid the Captain's gun cabinet.  She herself
hated firearms, but on Dana's insistence after her father's death
Margaret had accompanied her daughters to the firing range and had
learned to handle a gun.  She was surprised to discover she was a
decent shot and remembered the thrill of pleasure she had felt in
seeing the open approval in Dana's and Fox's eyes.  Oh, yes, Fox
had been there as well.  Sometimes it seemed to her that he had
always been there.
        <You're alone in that big house, Mom.  I want to know that
*you* know how to protect yourself.>
        Another burst of laughter from the living room and she
smiled.
        <Not so very alone.>
        She filled the mugs and added a plate of cookies to the tray
and they went out into the dining room.  She paused in the doorway
and took in the scene.  She knew the mental snapshot would remain
with her for the rest of her life.  Dana's eyes were dancing at her
partner-turned-adversary as she smacked him on the arm.  He had
his hands raised in front of his face in protest as well as to ward off
the sunflower seeds Jackie was flicking at him.  Next to her Marty
was holding his sides and laughing.
        There were piles of sunflower seeds in front of each player
and another in the center of the table.  She noticed that Mulder's pile
consisted mostly of empty shells and that Scully's pile was by far the
largest.
        As she watched Mulder reached over and took a handful of
Scully's seeds.  He popped a few in his mouth and dumped the rest
on the table in front of him.
        "Hey, cut that out, Mulder!" her daughter laughed.
        "Like you'll really miss them.  Mrs. Scully," he said, shaking
his head as she set down the tray, "I swear this daughter of yours is
a card shark."
        She laughed.  "Her father taught her.  She used to sneak
downstairs and watch him play with his Navy buddies.  Once he
even let her play but when she started winning they said they'd never
come back again if he let her play.  She was eight."
        "True," Scully agreed, "but he didn't make me give back the
sixteen bucks I won."  Her mother stared at her in shocked surprise
and they laughed.
        Mulder eyed his partner suspiciously.  "I think she's been
counting cards."
        She laughed, then glared at him.  "That's not cheating except
in Vegas, *Mister* Photographic Memory.  And besides, isn't it
cheating to crack sunflower seeds and then count both halves of the
shell?"
        Jackie chuckled.  "He wouldn't stand a chance otherwise."
        Marty took another look at his cards and groaned, tossing
them into the center of the table.  "None of us do, anyway."
        Mulder shrugged, chewing.  "Hey, at least I only cracked
them with my teeth instead of putting them in my mouth like I
usually do. . . ."
        They all groaned.
        Mrs. Scully dropped a marshmallow into a steaming mug and
handed it to him.  "Well, chew on some cookies instead, okay, Fox?"
        He grinned and added two more marshmallows to the mug
and passed it to Scully.  "I think you could use the extra sweetness,
partner."
        "Hah.  I think *you* could use. . . ."
        Everyone laughed and the pair stared at them blankly.
"What's so funny?"
        "Just like old times," Jackie said, wiping her eyes.
        "Maybe not," Mulder said, grinning.  "This is winner take
all, right?"
        Scully eyed him back.  "Right."
        Jackie shook her head and tossed her cards on top of
Marty's.  "I'm out.  Gimme some cocoa."
        Mulder triumphantly spread his cards on the table.  "Full
house.  Read 'em and weep, *Scully*."  He sat back and regarded
her smugly.
        Behind her sister Melissa grinned and winked at Jackie.
Then her mouth dropped open as Scully nodded carefully and casually
tossed her cards onto his, face down.  "Congratulations, Mulder.
Maybe absence makes you a better poker player."  She stretched and
reached for her cocoa as Mulder chortled and raked the huge pile of
seeds in front of himself and popped more in his mouth.
        "Geez, Mulder -- that's the first time you've won in recent
history.  Dana, are you *sure* he's not a clone?"
        "I'm sure," her friend said softly.  Then she reached out and
ruffled his hair affectionately.  "Besides, who would want to clone
*him*?  One is most definitely enough."  The other three women
heard the undercurrent in her words but Mulder appeared not to
notice.
*****
        Later, over the dishes, Melissa confronted her sister.  "Dana,
I may not be as good a poker player as you are, but . . ."
        "You're not," Scully retorted, drying the mugs.
        Melissa ignored her and went on.  ". . . but to my knowledge
a royal flush beats a full house.  You let him win."
        Scully shrugged.  "Must've been the extra marshmallows,"
she joked.
        Melissa narrowed her eyes.  "You *hate* to lose."
        Scully closed the doors to the cabinet and faced her sister.
"It's a technique we use sometimes on perps.  With some of them,
if you never let them win they get frustrated and quit trying, and you
can't catch them that way."  She paused.  "Think of it as an
investment in the future."
        Melissa eyed her carefully.  "To keep Mulder playing poker,"
she said, understanding what Dana was really saying.
        The younger redhead dropped her gaze.  "To keep him in
the game," she agreed softly.  And then she blushed slightly, but her
sister made no comment.
        Sometimes, only sometimes, a full house beats anything
else you can lay on the table. . . .
*End of Chapter Nine*
**********************************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Ten: "Distracted Globes"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
**********************************************************
        Dana and Melissa finished cleaning up the kitchen and
rejoined the group in the living room to find an argument in progress.
        "You've got to be kidding me."
        "Mulder, why would we joke about something like this?"
        He shook his head.  "I suppose I should have known."
        "Hey, it's *your* legal system. . . ."
        Scully sank to the floor next to Mulder and turned to
Jackie, questioning.  "What's going on?"
        "Mulder here doesn't believe us that the O.J. Simpson trial
is still going on."
        She nodded.  "Yep.  Jury hasn't even gone out yet."
        He shook his head.  "This is *crazy*!  I mean, everybody
knows that. . . ."
        Scully clamped a hand over his mouth.  "Not again,
Mulder.  You know we made an agreement not to get into that
again."
        He looked at her with an exaggerated expression of
innocence.  "We did?  Hmm -- must've been wiped from my
memory."
        She regarded him slyly.  "Oh, really?  Then I suppose you
will also have forgotten the deal we made just before New Mexico?"
        He eyed her warily.  "Deal?"
        She nodded, a glint of mischief in her eye.  "I agreed to
find somebody to . . . look at some files you found, and you
agreed to do all of our paperwork for the next month."  The others
in the room sat back, grinning.  <Go get him, Dana!>
        "I said that?"  She hesitated, almost feeling sorry for
him, until her memory presented images of her filling out
endless piles of forms in an attempt to justify one ridiculous
expenditure or another for him, and she simply nodded.
        "You said that."
        He made a wry face at her, knowing she was lying.  But it
was too late to backpedal now.  She had him over a barrel and they
both knew it.  And it *could* have been much worse.  And he *was*
grateful to her for putting her career -- her *life* -- on the line for
him.
Yet again.  He sighed.  "Okay."
        She grinned at him and winked at Jackie, who chuckled
softly.
        The easy banter lasted a little longer, but they were all
still very, very tired.  Finally Margaret stood up.  "I'm going to bed.
Last one up, please douse the fire."  The others stood up quickly.
Scully turned to Mulder.
        "Mulder. . . ."
        "No, Scully," he said softly, shaking his head.  "I'll take the
couch."
        "But. . . ."
        "No 'buts.'  I sleep on my couch at home half the time,
anyway."  He followed her up the stairs.  "I will accept your kind
offer of some covers and a pillow, however."
        She made a face at him as she opened the closet and
pulled out a set of sheets and a quilt.  "Well, then, here.  But don't
blame me if you wake up with a crick in your neck.  I'm a lot shorter
than you are and I could fit on the couch perfectly well."
        Marty opened his mouth to offer Scully his place but Jackie
laid her hand on his arm and shook her head warningly, and he
obediently remained silent.
        "I'll be fine, Scully."
        "Fine."  She shoved the bedding into his arms and marched
into her bedroom and retrieved one of her pillows.  The others were
all already in use now with the house as full as it was.  "Here."
        "But. . . ."
        "Shut up and take it before I change my mind, Mulder."  He
knew she liked to sleep with two pillows, but he shut his mouth and
accepted it with a nod.
        "'Night, Scully -- and thanks."
        Her face softened slightly.  "'Night, Mulder."
        He turned and trudged slowly back down the stairs and she
disappeared into her room, shutting the door behind her.
        Marty, Jackie, and Melissa exchanged glances and slipped
quietly into their respective rooms.
        And for a long, long time the house was quiet.
*****
        She was in the morgue again, dressed in scrubs and a pair
of safety goggles.  A body lay before her on the table, covered with
a white sheet.  She was both compelled toward and repelled by the
shrouded figure, but she didn't know why.  There was something
about it she needed to remember, but the knowledge just barely
tickled at the back of her brain and then withdrew, leaving behind
discomfort but no revelation.  She sighed and stepped up to the
table, reached for the microphone and the file, and began to record.
        "The date is April 23rd, Special Agent Dana Scully acting
pathologist."  She opened the file and the recording echoed in the
room, redoubling over and over until it fairly rang with the sound of
her own voice.
"The date is April 24th, Special Agent Dana Scully. . . ."
  "The date is April 25th, Special Agent Dana Scully. . . ."
    "The date is April 26th, Special Agent Dana Scully. . . ."
      "The date is April 27th, Special Agent Dana Scully. . . ."
        "The date is April 28th, Special Agent Dana Scully. . . ."
          "The date is April 29th, Special Agent Dana Scully. . . ."
            "The date is April 30th, Special Agent Dana Scully. . . ."
              "The date is May 1st, Special Agent Dana Scully. . . ."
And on and on, until the voice finally said, clearly and loudly enough
that she could hear it over all the echoes,
        "The date is September 22nd,"
and stopped.
        "Subject is a Caucasian male, mid-thirties."  She drew
back the sheet and reached for her measuring tape.  "Decedant is
186 centimeters in extremis."  She glanced up at the face.
        Recoiled in horror.
        *Mulder.*
        She shoved herself away from the table, her hands over
her mouth.  Slowly, deliberately, the body -- *his* body -- sat up on
the table, the sheet falling around its waist.  It swung its legs over
the side of the table so that it was facing her, and then suddenly
it was dressed in one of Mulder's trademark dark suits and loud
ties.
        "Ssssculllleeee. . . ."  The mouth opened and her name
came out of it, a sibilant hiss.  She whimpered and backed up
against the wall.
        It hopped down from the table, its eyes fixed on her.
        "Sssscullllllllleeeeee, I neeeeed yourrrrr helllllllppppp. . . ."
        She was hyperventilating now, crushing her body back
against the corner of the room.  Her eyes widened as wisps of smoke
began to curl off the fabric of his suit.  He smiled at her, that dear,
engaging smile, but his eyes were blank, and it terrified her all the
more that he looked just like himself but his intellect was gone.  It
was even worse than the time she had almost been fooled by the
shapeshifting alien because *this* was Mulder, was really he, but
there was something terribly, terribly wrong with him.
        He took another step towards her.  Smoke was pouring off
of him now, and his hair was steaming.
        "So, Agent Scully, any thoughts?"
        And then he burst into flame and it was like Cecil L'Ively
except that Mulder did not laugh and wave his arms, Mulder just
stood there looking at her reproachfully.
        "Scully, you know how much I hate fire."
        She heard a voice screaming and knew that it was her own.
*****
        She sat up amid a tangle of sheets, cold sweat pouring
down her face, her breath rasping harsh and fast in her throat, her
heart thudding painfully in her chest.
        She had been dreaming.  But this time that part of her that
assured her that it was only a nightmare had failed to push through
her terror.  For an instant, only an instant, she had been more
terrified than she had ever been in her life.
        She lay in her bed, chilled now, and listened.  The house was
too still.  There wasn't even any wind to make the old building creak
on its foundations, a sound which had frightened her badly as a child
but which she now would have welcomed in its implications of sheer
normalcy.
        So quiet.  Evidently her scream had been part of the dream as
well.  And a good thing, too -- she knew the rest of the household, her
mother in particular -- had not been sleeping well lately.  It had been
her fault, she thought ruefully; her mother especially had been on edge,
listening even in her light slumber for any sign that her daughter needed
her.
        Scully turned on her side and checked the clock.  Groaned.
<Great.  Almost two o'clock.  You're turning into as much of an
insomniac as Mulder is.>
        Mulder.  Wonder if he was up as well?
        <Why don't you go check?>
        <I don't need to go check.>
        <But you *want* to, don't you?>
        <No.  Not at all.  He's back and he's healthy -- well, fairly
healthy -- and he's perfectly safe and *probably* asleep, downstairs
on the sofa.>
        <Then why are you getting out of bed?>
        <I'm thirsty.>
        She crossed to the door.  <There's a faucet in the bathroom.>
        <I need a glass.>
        <snicker>
        <Fine.  While I'm downstairs *getting a glass*, I'll check in on
him.   Happy now?>
        <Immensely.>
        She sighed and reached for the door handle, pressing in on
the wood just above it as she turned the knob to prevent making any
noise -- a trick she had learned years ago.  She stuck her head out
into the hallway.
        Nothing.
        Scully tiptoed into the hallway and hesitated at the head of
the stairs to allow her eyes to adjust to the darkness.  Called herself
ten kinds of fool.  And then she started down.
        <Step.  Step.  Step-step.  Step.>  An echo?
        She paused, and then she heard it.  A step that was not her
own.
        "Scully?"
        She breathed a sigh of relief.  "Mulder!" she whispered.
"What are you doing?"
        He continued up and she continued down and they met
somewhere in the middle.
        "Couldn't sleep."
        "Me, either."
        They stood in awkward silence for a moment.  He could
sense the tension in her shoulders, the remnants of whatever
nightmares had driven her from her sleep.  Then she reached a
decision.
        She took his hand in hers and gently but insistently
pulled.
        He followed her up the stairs and into her room and they
shut the door.
        Two of the other doors on the hallway opened softly and two
faces peeked out and smiled sleepily at one another.
        Then the doors closed and all was quiet once more.
*****
        She woke slowly and then stretched luxuriously.  It had been
a long time since she had felt she could sleep this late -- sleep at all,
really, with all that Dana had been suffering.  But last night had been
quiet and she had been tired.  She had not realized just how tired she
had been, but she had evidently needed the sleep, because now it
was -- she rolled over to look at the clock on the bedside table.  Ten
o'clock.
        Ten o'clock!!!  She hadn't slept so late in *years*!  Margaret
Scully rose to a sitting position and then slid out of bed.  She had
missed Mass, for the first time in longer than she could recall at the
moment.  And today of all days, when she felt more grateful than she
had for anything since Dana's recovery from her coma.
        <Come to me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I
will give you rest.>
        Rest.  They had all definitely needed the rest.  She yawned
and crossed the room to the door, pulling on a robe as she went.  At
this rate it was going to be lunchtime before she had her first cup of
coffee. . . .
        Coffee.  This made her think of Fox, and made her smile.  He
had stayed with them for nearly a week over the previous Christmas,
after Skinner, who was still concerned that Dana did not seem to be
recovering as quickly as they had thought, had given them five days'
personal leave.  Fox had made a show of reluctance when she had
asked him to spend his mini-vacation at the Scully house, but she
had seen through his charade and had pushed the issue, knowing that
Dana needed him there and that he needed to know that she was all
right.  Then, as now, the house had been full, but because there had
not been room for the boys and their wives and their children they had
opted to stay in hotels and only Melissaand John, Dana, and Fox had
stayed at the house with her.  It had been perfect; Dana had her own
room, as always, and Melissa and John had Bill's room, since her own,
which connected to Dana's via the extra bathroom, had been
reconverted into the den it had been before the two girls had hit the
pre-teen years and demanded separate rooms.  Fox had had Brian's
room, where Jaclyn and Marty slept now.  Those two had been
somewhat nervous and more than a little embarrassed about sharing a
room under the Scully roof, but Margaret had seen no reason to inflict
her moral sensibilities, whatever they might otherwise have been, on
the younger generation especially during this time of sorrow.  As it was,
she missed her Captain more painfully than she had done since Dana's
disappearance.  And Jaclyn and Marty were engaged, and she had a
feeling the Canadian agent was a lonely young woman.  And, too, her
loss of Bill and their loss -- their *supposed* loss -- of Fox Mulder had
reminded her just how very uncertain life was.  Let them sort it out
between them; she was there simply to mother them, all of them, and
she felt she was doing that quite well.
        Fox Mulder.  That young man needed the mother-touch,
and he evidently was not getting it from his own mother.  She didn't
fully understand what his relationship with his parents had been, but
she had gathered from something Dana had said that they were not
close, and had not been for quite some time.  It had been Dana, not
Mrs. Mulder, who had taken care of Fox during and after his nearly
fatal illness after Alaska.  But Dana's care was not exactly the
mother touch.  She didn't know quite what it was, but she knew it
was something more than simply a doctor's care for her patient or
that of a friend for another friend.  Just how much more she could
only speculate.  She wondered about Fox's and Dana's own
speculations on the subject.
        He cared, she knew that.  About Margaret herself as well.
That first morning he had spent at the house the previous Christmas
she had come downstairs, smelling freshly brewed coffee, and had
found Fox sitting at the kitchen table with a cup and the morning
paper and a sheepish, half-apologetic look on his face.
        "I hope you don't mind, but I helped myself," he said, waving
the cup at her.
        "I told you last night, Fox -- make yourself at home."  A
glance past him into the living room told her that he had done just
that; a pillow and blanket lay tangled on the floor.
        "I -- uh -- have trouble sleeping, sometimes, especially in a
strange bed," he explained with some embarrassment.  "I -- sleep on
the sofa a lot, even at home."
        She had simply nodded, hiding her surprise and concern and
filing that little bit of information away in her brain for further
consideration.  So he had sleeping problems.  Well, no wonder.  She
was often surprised Dana herself did not have trouble sleeping -- come
to think of it, her daughter's eyes were shadowed more deeply of late,
and she had heard her whimpering in the night, not crying, exactly, just
making little sounds as though something were troubling her.  Then
again, she *had* just come home from the hospital a month previously,
and she still had not recovered.  For one thing, she was still far, far
too
thin and pale.
        She had filled a cup and taken a seat.  "Done with the first
section yet?"  He relaxed visibly and she made another mental note.
He had told her of his sleeping problems in greater detail than he
need have.  Hence, he both felt comfortable enough with her to confide
in her and craved her concern and care.  But he was obviously relieved
when she made no move to press further about the matter, so he was
uncomfortable with his weakness at the same time that he longed for
someone to recognize and help him with it.  His brain and his heart
were at odds -- in more areas than one, if she did not miss her guess.
He and Dana were quite a pair.
        In the end she had incorporated his bizarre sleeping habits
into her own morning routine.  He would get up and make coffee and
retreat to the sofa, usually with the paper,  and she would come down
and join him.  She had no idea just how early he awakened, but
evidently he began sleeping better as the days went by, because late
that week she had come down to find the coffee still "jumping," as
Brian had described it as a boy, and on one memorable morning, his
last there, she had had to brew it herself because he had worn himself
out playing with the children the night before.  The children all adored
Fox.
        It was a little tradition she had greatly enjoyed for those few
days the previous winter, and now she looked forward to spending
that quiet time with Fox again, sunk chummily into the depths of
the sofa or seated in companionable silence around the kitchen
table, getting to know this intense, quiet, enigmatic man who filled
such a large part of her daughter's life.  She had never thought to
share coffee with him again.  She smiled.  Just another unexpected --
but greatly welcomed -- miracle, scarcely less important to her than
Dana's own return.
        As she padded down the stairs in her bathrobe she sniffed.
No coffee.  Two possibilities: either he had gotten up so early that he
had thrown out the coffee because it had become stale, or he had
actually slept late -- later than even she usually slept.  She fervently
hoped it was the latter.
        When she entered the kitchen her sharp eyes immediately
took in the lack of coffee cups, and there was no morning paper
awaiting her on the table.  She checked just to be sure.  The coffee
pot was dry.  Smiling, she measured the grounds and water and then
went outside to bring in the paper while it brewed.  She was sure
Fox would be waiting when she returned, hanging over the pot whose
aroma would certainly have awakened him.
        She stepped back into the kitchen.  No Fox.
        <Well, he must *really* be out of it,> she thought as she
poured them each a cup, added cream, and carried the mugs into
the living room.
        A quick glance told her that the sofa was empty, although it
had been slept on.
        She frowned.  A shower?
        Well, Dana always loved a good cup of coffee first thing in
the morning.  She detoured back through the kitchen, added more
cream, then headed upstairs.
        Almost ten-thirty.  Well, they had all been up very, very late
the night before despite Fox's and Dana's exhaustion, enjoying one
another's company -- and playing poker.  Toward the end of the night
they had even roped her into playing.  She noted with a grin that after
that first hand Dana had won with almost appalling regularity.  She
guessed her little girl's pride was stronger than she had thought; she
had not been blind to the fact that Scully had *let* Mulder win the first
game, though he had not appeared to notice.
        At the door she paused to shift both mugs into her right hand
so that she could open it with her left.  And then she paused again.
        Dana and Fox were asleep together in the double bed, her
daughter held protectively in his spoon-like embrace.  She shook her
head slightly.  This looked like it was becoming a habit, and she
wondered what would happen when they had to return to D.C.  Still,
they looked awfully sweet all snuggled up like that. . . .  She turned to
retreat but stopped when she heard a sliding sound of cloth against
cloth, and turned back around.  Dana was sitting up in bed, rubbing
her eyes.
        "Mom?"
        "Good morning, darling.  I brought you some coffee," she said,
holding out the steaming cup.
        "Oh, thanks."  Scully took a long, invigorating swallow.  And
then her surroundings seemed to register <Mulder . . .> and she
nearly spilled the hot liquid.  She seemed hesitant to meet her
mother's eyes and blushed when she finally did so.
        "Sleep well?" Maggie asked softly with a smile.
        "So-so," she shrugged.  "Better -- towards morning."  And
blushed again.
        <After Mulder came upstairs.  No wonder.>  And speak of the
devil. . . .
        He stirred and then sat up, blinking sleepily.  Then he, too,
realized exactly where he was, and his eyes widened.  She
stepped forward and held out the mug of coffee to cover their
confusion.
        "Here, Fox.  Coffee."
        "Oh.  Uhh -- thanks," he mumbled, clearly uncertain as to
where he stood, whether or not he had crossed some invisible line
from grace to disfavor.  She didn't seem angry, though. . . .
        And she wasn't.  Not at all.  "See you downstairs.  Breakfast
in half an hour," she warned, and then she left, closing the door
behind her and leaving the two agents staring after her in stupefied
wonder.
        They would have been even more stunned had they seen the
expression on her face as she paused in the hallway before heading
back downstairs to start breakfast.
*End Chapter Ten*
****************************************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Eleven: "A Leave of Absence"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
****************************************************************
        When Mulder and Scully came downstairs forty-five minutes
later after showers and a change of clothing for both of them -- they
had slept in sweats as they had the night before, but somehow they
felt more in control appearing downstairs in fresh casual wear instead
of their sleep-rumpled clothes -- they found breakfast already in
progress.  As they sat Margaret placed a plate of blueberry pancakes
and bacon in front of each of them and reheated their coffee.  Mulder
tucked his chin into his chest and began to eat, and Scully
successfully avoided the others' eyes.  When Jackie calmly asked
her to pass the compote, however, she glanced up and caught the
twinkle in her friend's eyes and had to duck her head again.  After
just a few moments the tension eased and soon they were joking and
arguing over the paper.
        "So, what's on tap for today?" Maggie asked.  Nobody
answered for a moment, her daughters, Jackie, and Marty all intently
and with great fascination watching Mulder polish off his fourth plate
of pancakes and Mulder's mouth too busy occupied with astonishing
them.  She smiled and answered her own question.  "First off, we
need to find some more clothes for Fox here.  That suit you were
evidently wearing is unsalvagable," she informed him.  "I have some
sweaters and things of -- of Ahab's, but you'll need jeans and such."
        He nodded around the last bite of pancake.  "I wish I could
get to my apartment and get some stuff, but. . . ."  He shrugged.
        "We have to decide," Scully said.  "When to go back, I
mean."  <I don't want to go back,> part of her insisted.  <There's so
much pain to go back to.>  They needed to call Skinner.  Mulder
might be back, but a murder had still been committed, and if they
were going to bring the killers to justice. . . .  They needed Skinner
to have the body exhumed, for one thing.  And then there was still
the matter of the investigation.  It had been dropped, but since
Mulder had never been put on trial and acquitted he still might face
charges and she, Scully, might find herself facing more than a
simple suspension.
        Mulder laid down his fork and nodded.  "You're right.  We're
going to have to call Skinner sooner or later and -- my mom," he
finished reluctantly.  It wasn't that he didn't want to set her mind at
ease -- there were just so many hurdles to jump every time he tried
to get close to her.  His father's death -- and his own supposed
demise -- were just two more obstacles to overcome.
        "So how do we do this?" Jackie asked.  "I mean, do we go
back trailing clouds of glory and march in and just announce to
Skinner and the rest of the world that Mulder's alive?"
        "Works for me," he grinned over his coffee cup.
        Scully frowned for a moment in perplexed concentration,
then her brow cleared and she grinned.  "Nope," she told the men and
women gathered around the table, "I know how to take care of Skinner."
*****
        In the end Mulder decided to attempt to call his mother but,
accurately reading his fear of terrifying or confusing the poor woman
even more than she already had been, Margaret offered to make the
call for him.  He agreed, rationalizing that she probably had a better
sense of how it would be best for a mother to hear that her child, whom
she had thought dead, was alive.  He wondered how the hospital had
broken the news of Scully's return to her.  He had never thought to ask,
being more concerned with the message itself rather than the manner
in which it had been delivered.
        He and Dana and Mrs. Scully sat down at the kitchen table.
Scully looked ready to flee at the moment he began speaking to his
mother, but he hoped she wouldn't.  Mrs. Scully, he was certain,
*would* duck out of the kitchen after handing him the phone, but he
didn't want to be alone with this, not with his mother.  It registered
only
momentarily how odd it must have seemed to others that he was
closer to his coworker and her family than he was to his own.  But
then Scully wasn't just his coworker.  She was his *partner*, his best
friend. . . .
        Margaret hung up the phone with a sigh.  "No answer."  She
picked up the second number Mulder had given her, that of his
mother's next-door neighbor, and dialled.  This time she spoke
briefly with the woman on the phone, then hung up again and turned
to the two young people sitting at the table sipping the last of their
coffee.
        "Mrs. Gilbert says your mother went away for a week with
a family -- the Conways?"
        Mulder closed his eyes in relief.  The Conways were old family
friends who owned a villa in Florida.  They had been trying to get his
mother to accompany them on their annual migration south for years.
He explained this to Scully and her mother, feeling slightly guilty.  Was
he relieved because she was in such good hands or relieved because
he wouldn't have to deal with this just yet?  Perhaps a little of both?
        "Guess there's nothing I can do about Mom right now then,"
he sighed.  Scully and her mother exchanged a look of understanding.
        "Now," said Dana, picking up the phone.  "Skinner.  I'll try his
office first just in case. . . ."  Jackie poked her head in and Scully
motioned her to take a seat.
        "She's calling Skinner," Mulder mouthed, and the Canadian
agent grinned.  This was going to be good.  She could read in her
friend's posture a certain restrained excitement, even exhiliration.
And she understood.
        This was a triumph of sorts for Dana -- she would be able to
call her boss and report that her partner was alive, that she had not
failed him, after all.  More importantly, she would be able to prove that
her gut instincts had been right all along.
        The phone was ringing and she held up her hand for silence.
        "Bureau, Assistant Director Skinner's office."
        She frowned a little.  His personal assistant was there?
"Laurel?  This is Agent Scully."
        The woman's voice took on a sympathetic tone.  "Oh.  Agent
Scully.  How are you?"
        "I'm fine.  Is Skinner in?  It's kind of an emergency," she
explained.  She had really hated getting the kid-glove treatment from
her coworkers in the Bureau during the past few, difficult months,
even from those whose pity and sorrow were genuine, as Laurel's
were.  But she was not above playing on the woman's feelings a little
to get what she wanted. . . .
        There was a brief silence, then a click and Skinner's
businesslike tones.  "Agent Scully."
        "Sir -- sorry to bother you on the weekend, but. . . ."
        "No problem, Scully -- I had a meeting."  He paused.  "What
is it?"
        She hesitated.  "I'm calling to -- ask a favor, of sorts.  I know
Mulder's case has been closed, but. . . ."  She took a deep breath
and then continued.  "I'd like you to order an exhumation of the
contents of the grave, sir.  I have reason to believe -- we may have
been hasty in our identification of the body."
        "Reason to believe?  What sort of reason, Agent Scully?"
        "Some -- new evidence has come into my possession" -- she
caught Mulder grinning out of the corner of her eye at this but she
ignored him -- "which suggests that the -- body -- is not that of Agent
Mulder but some unknown man.  If we could positively identify the
body we would be that much closer to discovering who is behind this
whole fiasco."
        There was a long silence.  "I take it, then, that you haven't
heard. . . ."
        "Heard what, Sir?"
        A long sigh.  He had NOT wanted to be the one who had to tell
her this.  "Agent Scully."  His voice was very compassionate.  "The --
grave -- was disturbed over the weekend."
        "And the body's gone."  She closed her eyes with a sigh of
her own.  "Great.  Just like in Oregon."  No body, no DNA.  No DNA,
no identification.  No identification, no possibility of bringing home
this murder -- for murder it definitely was, though, thank God, not
Mulder's -- to the perpetrators.  Suddenly a thought struck her and
she sighed again, in relief.  The Lone Gunmen.  They presumably still
had the sample she had taken them earlier.  She grinned, imagining
Frohicke's face when he she told him the news.
        Skinner was stunned.  Ever since receiving the unwelcome
phone call Saturday afternoon he had been playing scenarios in his
head of Scully's reaction when she received the news.  This was NOT
one of them.
        "Agent Scully. . . ?"
        She straightened.  Her victory was somewhat more hollow now.
Somewhat.
        "Sir.  I -- the evidence of which I spoke.  You're not going to
believe this."  <With Mulder I'll believe practically anything.>  "Sir --
he
-- Mulder's alive, sir."
        "WHAT?!"
        She nodded, then, realizing that Skinner could not of course see
her, responded with a verbal affirmative.
        "But. . . ."
        She couldn't help but grin.  For once Skinner was speechless.
"Would you like to speak with him, sir?"  He still didn't respond, and
she took that as a yes.  Mulder reached for the phone but she waved
him towards the kitchen extension.  This was just too good to miss.
        "Sir?"
        "Mulder?!"
        "Yes, sir.  Uh -- sorry for hitting you. . . ."  Silence again
from
the other end.  "I guess this is where I say something like 'the reports
of
my demise have been grossly exaggerated'?"
        The sudden release in tension was palpable.  "Then it IS you.
I should have known -- if Scully believes it. . . ."
        "Yeah, Ms. Skeptical.  Can't put anything over on her.  I tried
to convince her I was Mel Gibson having a bad hair day, but. . . ."
        This time Skinner let go with a low chuckle.  "How are you?"
        Scully broke in.  "He has no injuries which require any
immediate medical attention that I cannot give him here, sir.  He is,
however, suffering from extreme exhaustion, malnutrition, and
dehydration.  He's lost a lot of weight and has a few minor injuries as
well, but nothing a lot of rest and a good diet won't cure."  He glared
at her but she ignored him again.
        "Hmmm."  Skinner thought rapidly.  He wondered. . . . "In your
profession opinion, Dr. Scully, is he fit to return at this time?"  He
stressed the word "professional" slightly, just enough to suggest that
he was asking her opinion as a medical doctor and as a partner.  And
also, perhaps, as a friend.
        Scully's eyes widened and then she smiled.  She was
beginning to like this man more and more.  "Well, sir, in my
*professional* opinion I would say that Agent Mulder would be much
better off remaining where he is for the time being."  She held her
breath and waited.  That much was true, and Mulder *was* healing
much, much more rapidly than she knew he ever could back in his
apartment, where likely he would neither sleep nor eat enough, nor
do either well.  But it was primarily for psychological healing that she
felt Mulder needed to stay -- for his and her healing both. . . .
        "I see."  There was another momentary silence as if Skinner
were considering his options.  He knew his superiors would have
questions -- lots of questions -- for Mulder upon his return.  As would
he.  In fact, he was anxious to speak with the younger man, to hear
his explanation not only of his absence but of his actions.  And he
could read Scully's hedgy answers; he knew that Mulder was in no
serious danger physically *or* mentally -- had that been the case his
partner would have insisted on taking him to a hospital directly.
        But they both needed the time off; Scully herself was on a
two-week leave of absence.  When they got back there would be so
much for them to face, although he had a feeling he knew how to
handle at least part of it.  He knew, though, that were he to order
Mulder back Scully would come back, too, and while he had no idea
just in what shape Mulder was he knew that Scully had been at the
physical and emotional breaking point.  And, too, despite her mixed
reassurances and unspoken pleading Scully had not been able
completely to hide her concern for Mulder.  He could order them back
and then put him -- perhaps both of them -- on involuntary medical leave
while he attempted to straighten out this whole snafu.  Or. . . .  "I want
you back to make your report. . . ."  They both tensed.
<So much to face back in D.C., little of it good. . . .>
<Everything he needed or wanted was here. . . .>
". . . Next Monday morning, eight A.M.  You, too, Agent Scully."
They would be much better off in Margaret Scully's care; he knew they
would be forced to get the rest they both needed.
        Mulder's eyes widened.  "Is that an order, sir?"
        "Agent Mulder, there are no outstanding warrants for your arrest,
and I don't want to see your sorry face in my hallways for the rest of the
week.  And if you think that lame apology is going to get you off for
giving
me a shiner that lasted me two weeks, you are sadly mistaken."
        Mulder grinned.  "Yes, sir."
        "Agent Scully."
        "Yes, sir?"
        "Agent Mulder is officially in your custody.  I expect you to
make certain he gets plenty of rest and whatever else he needs and
that he arrives here on time -- and in one piece, if at all possible --
Monday morning.  Is that clear?"
        "Yes, sir.  Crystal."
        "Goodbye then."  He paused.  "And, Mulder?"
        "Yes, sir?"
        "Welcome back."  He was smiling as he replaced the telephone
in its cradle.  He was much, much happier than some of his superiors
would be -- one in particular, if his guess was right.  His eyes narrowed.
He still had one card to play. . . .
        They hung up and looked at one another.
        "What just happened here, Scully?" Mulder asked her.
        She smiled.  "What just happened here, Mulder, is that we
just got ourselves a leave of absence with Skinner's full approval.
Now, anybody tapping the phones will know that you are here, but they
will also know that Skinner knows, and he will undoubtedly file a report
with somebody.  I think we're safe for the time being and can relax
without feeling threatened *or* guilty."
        They grinned at one another, absurdly pleased, considering.
        Well, the body was gone.  Great.  There went any opportunity
they had of identifying the unfortunate man and proving Cancerman's
involvement; the DNA samples would not be enough evidence without
a body.  Then again, They would not want any prying into how the body
had wound up with injuries so close to Mulder's as to be improbable and
a mixture of DNA that was impossible in nature -- or for one man of
Mulder's admitted intelligence but limited resources -- to produce.  And
from what they could gather from the conversation just past, Skinner was
on their side, on this one at least.  They had a feeling they might both
just come out of this on their feet.
*****
        Later that afternoon while the others went their separate ways --
Margaret to an afternoon Mass, Melissa off to call John and check in
with the shop, and Marty and Jackie off for a private tramp in the woods.
Mulder and Scully sat in the front porch swing.  She yawned and
leaned her head on his shoulder, lulled by the gentle creaking of the
swing and the quiet sounds around her.  She was really quite sleepy.
She might even do the unheard-of later and take a nap.
        Mulder smiled down at the top of her head.  Scully was not
usually so -- physical, so demonstrative in her affection.  The
nightmare the previous night had shaken her badly, he knew; he
had held her in the silent dark for a long time before her rigid body
had relaxed and her breathing evened out into sleep.  He closed
his eyes.  He liked this new, softer side of his partner, his friend.
        They swung gently, enjoying in companionable silence the
cool breeze that ruffled the still-green leaves of the trees like so many
tenuous feathers.  Before long they would be changing into their fall
coats of golds and reds and rusts before shedding.  Mulder had
always found it interesting that while animals put on heavier coats for
winter most of the trees got naked.  The original Polar Bears Club.
        Funny -- for years he had taken the seasonal changes for
granted.  But curled up in that dark cell who-knows-where he had
longed to see again -- among other things -- the approach of autumn
in the District.  To watch the leaves change and then drop, leaving the
trees more and more bare to the wintry sky.  To walk across Memorial
Park's crunch carpet.  He might even scuff his feet and enjoy the dry,
crackly sound of the leaves under his shoes as he hadn't since he
was a boy.  And then to breathe in the sharp bite of encroaching winter
as the days began to lengthen.
        And now he was here, and now he could do all those things.
He was even looking forward to that awful sweater his aunt who, while
she was an amazing woman in most respects, had questionable
fashion tastes, had bought him and which he never wore unless he
had been warned of a visitation.  This year he might just wear it --
just because.
        Odd, really.  So many changes had taken place in his life --
in Scully's life.  And yet the world went on, as it always did.  The sun
rose and set in the same directions and the seasons, given long
enough, would change.  He had never really thought of himself as
an important person -- not really, although over the past few years he
had made some friends that, he now knew, would miss him were he
to vanish from the world.  He wasn't a vain man.  Oh, he had his
faults, and he knew it -- a certain pride that insisted that no-one could
do what he did any better than he.  But perhaps that was well-
founded.  In any case, when he had realized with a shock that the vast
world took little or no notice of his existence, he had accepted it with
wry humor instead of indignation.
        But the universe and personal universes were two entirely
different things, as he had discovered during Scully's disappearance
and then her coma.  He now knew that a part of the helplessness
he had felt had been more than simple agony at not being able to
*do* anything -- it had been anger and despair that nothing outside
of her hospital room had seemed to change.  Aside from a few
hushed condolences from the small handful of agents at the
Bureau who actually felt comfortable speaking to him on a casual
level, things there continued as if she had never left.  None of their
coworkers sent a card or flowers, much less stopped by once she
had been moved to a regular room after awakening.  Well, that
wasn't entirely true -- Skinner had come by several times, staying
only long enough to wish her a quick recovery -- and to reassure
himself with his own eyes that Dana Scully truly was alive and
(relatively) well.  He had never stayed long enough to tire her -- or
to alert their enemies to the fact that his concern was anything more
than professionalism.
        But no others had come.  And that infuriated Mulder.
        Would they have been so cold toward her had it not been
for her association with the X-Files?  With *him*?  She deserved
better, he thought angrily.  From her coworkers and from her
superiors.  It stunned him, the way they all seemed to write her
off and expected him to go on as if the very earth had not just been
jerked out from under his feet.
<You weren't even partners anymore, not officially.>
He had been lost, with no bearing.  He had not realized to what
extent she had become his compass, constantly reminding him of
the existence and direction of due north when his own obsessions
and weaknesses threatened to send him spiralling out of control,
off course, led by one emotion or another.
        And so, when she had returned, he had decided that he
needed her too much to let her go.  He had not protested -- not
really -- her request that she be reassigned to the X-files.  Perhaps
that was selfish, but there it was.  And he had felt guilty about it,
guilty enough to suggest a couple of times that she take some time
off, that she speak to the counselors the Bureau provided, all the
while holding his breath that she might come to him one day and
tell him she wanted out, wondering what he would do then.
        But Scully, being Scully, had jumped right back into things,
a little more frail, for a brief time, but once again his rock and his
compass.  All questions had been asked and answered without
the benefit of verbal communication, but she had known of his
concerns and he had received her affirmation that *this* was where
she wanted to be, *this* was what she wanted to be doing.  And he
had breathed a mental sigh of relief, even only then realizing what it
would have meant to him had she wanted out.
        And then, in New Mexico, after the effects of the drugs in
his water had worn off, as he lay in the hotel room listening to her
speak so calmly and matter-of-factly of sedating him and helping
him and driving him out of state, halfway across the country to
meet a Native American code-talker with whom she had never
even spoken before, to get answers for him, answers from files which
supposedly dealt with a subject in which she did not even believe,
he wondered once again whether he had made a mistake.  He
should have scared her off, as he had so many others before her
-- not potential partners, but others who might have gotten too
close.  So many opportunities to push her away . . . after that very
first meeting when they had clashed so forcefully and he had been
his cockiest, trying to unnerve her with talk of UFO's and EBE's
and she had thrown back every barb he had tossed her way.
Later, during that first case, when they had argued about the
physical evidence of the body in the grave and the strange
markings on the children's backs.  In the Arctic when they had
really begun to trust one another.  So many times on so many
cases when his cynical self had reared its head and taunted him
that he would be better off without her, urging him to make that
one comment, push that one extra button that would break the
tenuous link that had begun to grow between them when they had
sat in the darkness of his hotel room on that first case and he had
told her about Samatha.
        It had hit him full force when she had sent him off on his
own to search for the truth.  At first he had felt a pang of doubt
but then her voice had arrested him on his way out of the room
and she had implored him to find out the truth for her.  She
needed to know.
        And that was another kind of guilt.  She never would have
lost those months had it not been for him.
        But then Scully had never really asked him for anything
before, and he would have done what she asked even without
the extra impetus his guilt gave his search.
        Guilt.  Perhaps his own kidnapping had been an atonement
of sorts.  Not that it would do anything to bring back the many
weeks Scully had lost from her life -- and from the way she looked
she had lost time during his disappearance, although not in the
same way; that first night she had looked, in some ways, as badly
as she had when she had awakened from the coma -- but he had
felt a need to suffer some, too, to assuage his guilt.
        Not that it had helped.  And now she had an official
reprimand on her record and might be facing even harsher discipline
because of him.  Her universe had been turned topsy-turvy by
everything that had happened since his disappearance, and now she
would be affected by his return as well.  He turned to her and opened
his mouth to say something, he really had no idea what.
        And was stopped cold by the look of warmth in her eyes.
        He couldn't help it.  He relaxed and smiled.  That look
reminded him of how he had felt when she had awakened from the
coma.  He had felt himself glowing on the inside and had been
certain that he must have beamed so brightly everyone could see
his heart and the joy that filled it to overflowing.  But she couldn't
possibly. . . .
        He looked at her again.
        She had forgiven him and so that was all right.
        Perhaps someday he would even be able to forgive himself.
*End Chapter Eleven*
***************************************************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Twelve: "A Preponderance of Evidence"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
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     Scully was awakened by the crunching sounds of her 
mother's car driving up the gravel road to the house.  She opened her 
eyes and blinked against the light, soft as it was.  They had 
somehow managed to fall asleep in the swing.  She didn't remember 
shifting but somehow she had ended up stretched out with her head 
on Mulder's knees, his arm curled around her shoulders keeping her 
from falling.  She looked up.  His head had dropped back against the 
corner the back of the seat made with the cable and he was out cold.  
She tried to sit up very gingerly to keep from setting the swing 
rocking again.  To no avail.  He woke up, blinking sleepily, and smiled 
down at her.

     "Hey," he croaked.  "Sleep well?"

     She nodded.  "I don't see how *you* could have, though."

     He yawned and shrugged, working the kinks out of his neck 
and back.  "It's a gift."

     Margaret pulled up and got out of the car, carrying several 
flat cardboard boxes and a shopping bag in her hands.  Mulder stared 
and then his smile of bemusement widened into an ear-to-ear grin of 
delight.  "Pizza!"  He stood up, wincing as his back cracked, then 
hurried to take the boxes from her.

     She held up the shopping bag.  "And a couple changes of
clothes."  She smiled.  "I figure you probably didn't get much pizza 
where you were. . . ."  Her voice trailed off, implying a series of 
unspoken questions.  He chose to answer the most immediate and 
least threatening.

     "No, I didn't, and that's one of the things I missed most, 
along with sunflower seeds and good coffee."  He grinned again.  
"Both of which cravings have been satisfied.  If I stick around long 
enough maybe I'll get everything I missed while I was gone. . . . Ow!"  
He frowned and rubbed his arm where Scully had elbowed him, then 
his face took on an understanding, if slightly guilty, expression.  "I 
didn't mean. . . ."  He paused again and smiled, a slow, wicked 
smile that crept across his face like a bright shadow.  <Then 
again. . . .>

     "Forget it, Mulder," she muttered, following her mother into 
the house.  He shrugged and trailed after them, lifting the lid of the 
top box to peek inside.  Super deluxe.  Yum.

*****

     By all rights they should have been ravenous, but both Mulder 
and Scully only ate a couple slices of pizza.  Margaret eyed them 
worriedly.

     "You two aren't eating enough," she fretted.  

     "When you don't eat for a long time your stomach shrinks," 
Scully reminded her patiently, and she nodded.  Mulder, however, 
stopped drinking his soda in mid-sip and his eyes narrowed.  He knew 
she had lost weight; he now began to wonder whether her decrease in 
appetite had been anything like his during her absence.  He had 
practically fasted because nothing had appealed to him, and gradually 
even the thought of food had sickened him.  And now she was avoiding 
his gaze, stolidly working her way through a second slice even though 
he could tell she didn't want it.  He gazed down at his own half-eaten 
third slice with a sigh.  On a normal day he would have polished off at 
least half a pizza on his own, and when he was really hungry, perhaps 
a whole pie.  That morning he had stuffed himself with blueberry 
pancakes -- they had tasted wonderful, warm and homey.  And the act 
of making breakfast for a whole family -- a real breakfast, not cereal or 
toast or something else grabbed on the way out the door -- had always
had in it something inherently domestic and loving in it.  It had been as
though in eating Mrs. Scully's pancakes he had been revelling in the love
and safety he felt in this house.

     But his stomach had been feeling the aftereffects of his gluttony 
all afternoon.  At least, he supposed that was what had given him those 
bizarre dreams, that and the gentle motion of the swing.

     He glanced up.  Margaret was clearing the table.

     He leapt to his feet.  "No -- Mrs. Scully -- we'll get these," he
assured her.  He wanted a chance to talk to Dana, anyway.  She cast
him a curious, wary glance and the others quickly left the room.

     They cleared in silence and carried the dishes over to the sink.
She turned on the water and let it run, holding her hand under it to test
the temperature.  "So," she asked over her shoulder, "wash or dry?"

     "Scully," he said gently, "we need to talk."  She refused to 
look at him and finally he sighed.  "Dry."

     She nodded and added detergent to the sink and began to
wash.  He stood next to her, waiting, and as she handed him the clean
dishes he wiped them and put them away.

     When he spoke his voice was soft.  "Scully -- why do I get the
feeling you haven't told me everything?"

     She did not pretend to misunderstand him.  Instead, she 
sighed.  "Because I haven't.  Not everything," she admitted.  And there
were some things she still wouldn't tell him.  Maybe someday, if. . . .
But not now.

     "They *did* come after you, didn't they?"

     She nodded slightly.  "Not -- overtly.  Not at first.  At first they
sent someone -- a real smooth-talking guy -- who suggested that if I
had any information at all it might help them find you."  She bit her lip,
remembering how horribly tempted she had been at that moment.

     "What did you say?"

     She smiled wryly.  "I told them that as an officer of the law
I fully realized the ramifications of withholding evidence or interfering 
with an ongoing investigation, and that if there were anything I could do 
to find you, I would."

     "They didn't buy it."  At her swift look of surprise he hastened
to clarify himself.  "That you didn't have the tape, I mean.  I'm assuming
that's what they wanted since. . . ."

     She nodded again.  "Once or twice I came home and -- I couldn't
be sure, but I thought somebody had been in my apartment."

     He felt a tightening in his chest.  "Scully. . . ."

     Another wry smile.  "Lucky I bought that extra weapon, huh?"
He nodded.  After her abduction Scully had casually mentioned that she
was thinking of buying a second gun.  They had gone together.  Funny.
Some couples shopped for rings or furniture or even houses.  The pair
from the X-files shopped for guns together.

     She continued.  "I needed to look for you anyway, so that's when
I went back to New Mexico."  She thought for a moment, remembering
Skinner's face as he asked for her gun and badge and informed her of
her suspension.  "You know, I think Skinner sent me off to New Mexico
on purpose.  He knew I wanted to look for you, but I think he also 
suspected my apartment was being searched."

     "You think he was behind it?"

     Slowly, she shook her head.  "No, I don't."

     He considered, then nodded.  "Me, neither."

     "I *was* wondering, though. . . ."  She trailed off and turned
to look at him.  "Mulder -- do you think Skinner had anything to do 
with Mr. X rescuing you?"

     He paused in wiping the dishes.  "I hadn't really thought about
that.  Could be," he shrugged, "but he *did* seem surprised when you told
him."

     She nodded and handed him a glass.  "I know, but maybe he hadn't
heard that you had been found -- maybe he just -- I dunno -- planted the
bug in Mr. X's ear.  No pun intended," she said in response to his grin.  "I
mean, he seems to know who this X is -- or at least how to contact him.
And they've met before," she added, remembering the night Skinner had
evidently fought with Mulder's mysterious contact to get the information
Scully had needed to find him in Alaska in time to save his life.

     "Which brings us back to the age-old question: who is X working
for and what is his stake in all this?"  Mulder shook his head.  "I'm
beginning
to think we can trust Skinner.  I had no idea how much I distrusted X until
he showed up and tried to rescue me and I jumped him."  He grinned
ruefully.  "Didn't do a very good job, either."

     "And a good thing, too," she retorted.  "He could have killed you,
Mulder."  Yet another point in this whole mess at which he could have
gotten himself killed.  And she never would have known. . . . She would
have gone through the rest of her life believing that they body she had
helped bury -- the body she had autopsied -- had been Mulder, never
knowing that he had at that very moment been alive and hoping she would
come for him.  "I'm sorry, Mulder," she whispered.  Two tears trickled down
her cheeks to join the hot water in the sink.  "I shouldn't have stopped
looking. . . ."

     "Hey."  He set down the glass and turned to her, lifting her chin
with a forefinger so he could look her right in the eyes.  "You didn't stop,
Scully.  Even after everybody else gave up, you *still* *believed* I was
alive.
You know that's true -- that's why you insisted on doing another autopsy
and requested a second battery of DNA tests, right?"

     She nodded, reluctantly.  She had known, somehow, that he was
still alive.  When she had come to the conclusion after the second autopsy
that he was indeed dead -- the sudden realization that that bond she had
thought existed between them that had made her believe, the revelation that
she had imagined it, that they *weren't* that close -- that had hurt, 
somehow, even worse than his death had.  It had seemed a betrayal of her
understanding of what they had had.  She had allowed herself, against 
every bit of her scientific training, to believe in something that went far,
far
beyond the realm of science.  And her blessed/cursed science had proven
right in the end after all, and she hated it -- hated herself -- for it.

     But then!  That night, that blessed night he had come back to her,
and she knew that she had been right from the very beginning to trust her
heart instead of her analytical mind.  Her brain had betrayed her -- her
heart never had.  And she felt, now, a sense of embarrassment and sorrow
that she had allowed her mind to lead her astray.  She should have known
-- should have believed. . . .

     <In what, Scully?  In something that cannot be proven in any 
laboratory in all the world?  In something that, were you to share it, would
get you branded insane by your coworkers and possibly even your family?
In something at which even *Mulder* would probably laugh?>

     Then again, maybe he wouldn't.  Her mother had told her of how
Mulder had insisted on not giving up on her while she was gone.  Margaret
had gone to select her tombstone and he had been sorrowful and pleading,
almost angry.  And then, after her return to the hospital, he had insisted 
that the doctors fight to save her, despite the fact that she was in a coma
and they had no idea what was slowly killing her, believing beyond all 
reason that she would survive.

<Since when have you begun to look for answers outside the realm of
Science, Dr. Scully?>

     "But Mulder -- I should have known They could manufacture 
evidence as well as faking test results.  *You* would have suspected it. . .
."

     He shook his head.  "I don't know about that, Scully.  Maybe I
would have.  But then I see gremlins behind every bush."  He bent to look
at her seriously.  "You and I see things differently, Scully.  You're the
rational one, and I *need* that.  I need you to keep me anchored to the
ground sometimes, just as I think sometimes you need a flight of fancy.
We see more clearly together.  We keep each other honest.  So, yeah --
maybe I *would* have thought about it.  But then what?"  He shook his
head again, remembering the time during her coma when he had, with
the help of the Lone Gunmen, discovered evidence of branched DNA in
her bloodstream, but nobody would listen to him.  "Who would have
listened to me?  You have the knowledge, Scully.  But more than that,
you generate the respect we need to get where we're going."

     She gave him a wry smile.  "After all this I don't know if I have
that anymore."

     He sighed and nodded.  "I'm sorry about that, Scully."

     "I didn't mean. . . ."

     He nodded again.  "I know you didn't.  But look at it another
way -- you, armed only with your instincts, came to a conclusion that
despite all the evidence to the contrary has proven true."  He grinned at
her.  "You may just have made your reputation in the VC."

     She laughed a little.  "But what *kind* of reputation, Mulder?"
She considered.  So what if they started thinking she was "spooky,"
too?  Right now it seemed better than being considered cold and
unfeeling.  *Mrs. Spooky.*  It could be worse.

     In fact, she kind of liked it.  

     "The kind of reputation that might make them let you stay with 
the X-files instead of transferring you away," he said, watching her
face.  "That is, if you *want* to stay. . . ."

     "What kind of question is that?" she asked, turning to face him,
her hands on her hips.  "You think after all you've put me through that
you can get rid of me?  No way, Fox Mulder.  You're stuck with me
and don't you forget it."

     His eyes lit up and he slowly nodded.

     "Now let's finish these dishes."

*****

     That night they were all exhausted again.  The previous day
had been run on adrenaline, but now that they had taken care of
business so far as Skinner was concerned, the rush of energy had 
gone, leaving them drained.  Mulder flopped onto the couch next to
Jackie and, after a moment's hesitation, Scully eased to the floor next
to Marty, who sat between St. George's feet.  From her vantage point
on the hearth Melissa smiled at them, the glow from the fireplace
turning her hair almost as red as her sister's.

     After less than an hour of spotty conversation punctuated by
deep yawns they were all more than ready for bed.  As they rose
from their various positions around the room Mulder hesitated, then
turned to Scully and looked a silent question into her eyes.  She 
smiled slightly and nodded, and his face relaxed as he smiled back.
She held her head high, her face flaming, ignoring the exchange of 
looks among the other four in the room.  

<So what?  Let them talk.  At least I know I'll sleep tonight.>

They all tramped upstairs as a group, saying their good-nights as 
they went.

     No-one commented when Mulder followed Scully into her
room and shut the door, but Maggie winked at her older daughter 
as she closed her own door behind her.

*****

     Mulder gave Scully the bathroom first and lay back on the
bed waiting for her to come out.  He rested his head on his clasped
hands and stared at the ceiling.

     Had he been told a week ago that he would be at Mom
Scully's within a few days, back with Scully again, sleeping 

<with *Scully*>

and eating well for the first time in so long, he would have scoffed.  
Odd, really, how he so appreciated now the creature comforts he 
normally denied himself.

     Of course, he always *did* eat and sleep better at Mrs.
Scully's house, just as he always ate and slept better with Scully
herself nearby.

<And just how much more "nearby" can you possibly get, hmm, 
Mulder?>

<Don't even think it.>

     He closed his eyes and sighed.  He admitted to himself that
he was enjoying being close to Scully -- more than he should have.
Last night he had tried to explain it away -- they had been
separated for five months, after all; it was only natural that he should
have missed her and that he should relish their time together now.

     But none of that explained the way he felt, holding her in
the darkness.  His heart thrilled to the fact that she wanted to be
with him, too.

<Purely platonic, right, Mulder?>

<Shut up.>

<I mean, if she were Agent Henderson, you'd do the same thing,
right?  Or Bruce Cunningham?>

<That's disgusting.>

<But why?  If it's merely *platonic*. . . .>

<silence>

<Do platonic friends hold each other like that, Mulder?>

     The water stopped running and he opened his eyes and sat
up.  As he did so his eyes fell on the envelope on the bedside
table.

     Scully came out of the bathroom drying her hair with a large
white towel.  "All yours, Mulder."

     When he didn't answer she pulled the towel away from her
face.  He was staring at something on her bedside table.  She
glanced over to see what it was.

     Oh.

     Slowly he swung his gaze up to meet hers.  *Had she
opened it?*

     Scully simply looked at him.  Suddenly all the emotions
she had felt during his long absence -- grief, pain, fear, betrayal --
came back in a trembling rush and she had to bite her lips to
keep the tears that burned behind her eyelids from spilling out.
Funny.  For so many months she'd been unable to cry, and now
it seemed it was all she could do to keep her emotions in check.

     Mulder uncurled himself from the bed and walked past her
into the bathroom without a word, though he gave her a gentle smile
before he closed the door.  She crossed to the bed and crawled in,
then reached over and picked up the envelope, turning it over slowly
in her hands.

     She wondered what he thought.  Was he relieved she had
not opened it?  Disappointed?  She tried to imagine what he might
have done in similar circumstances, how she herself might have
reacted.  She couldn't.

     She dropped the envelope back on the bedside table with
a sigh and closed her eyes, leaning her head back against the
headboard.  There was so much they had yet to settle.  But not
tonight -- tonight she was tired and emotionally needy.  She was
grateful Mulder had asked her that unspoken question with his
eyes; she wanted -- no, *needed* -- him with her, but she had
questioned whether she had the temerity to come right out and
ask him.  *Especially* in front of her mother and sister and
friends.  It sounded so -- odd -- for her to be *sleeping* with her
partner like this.  And yet it was so right, and it was *exactly*
what she needed after all those months of loneliness.  She knew
they were treading on thin ice in some respects, knew she was
in danger of becoming dependent on Mulder. . . . <I already *am*
dependent on him,> she realized in shock.  And he was
dependent on her as well.  She just had to take care that that
mental and, to some extent, even *emotional* dependence did
not become physical.  She knew she was sleeping better with
him beside her at night -- better even than she had for months
before New Mexico.  Better, perhaps, than she had since her
abduction -- definitely better than she had since Donnie Pfaster.

     But this wasn't forever.  After this week it would end.

     And so she would enjoy every minute of this week,
knowing even as she slept that she was safe and cherished and. . . .

     The door opened and Mulder stood there towelling his
hair.  She smiled at him and he grinned back and padded barefooted
across the floor to join her in the double bed, draping the towel over
the back of the chair before pulling back the covers and sliding in.
The bedsprings creaked beneath his weight as he settled back
against the headboard next to her with a sigh.  He turned.  She
was staring at him.

     "What?"

     "Mulder, if you go to bed with wet hair you'll catch a cold."

     "Now, *Doctor* Scully, you know that's just not true."

     She chuckled a little and nodded.  "Sorry.  For just a
moment I felt like I was channeling my mother."

     He grinned.  "You *sounded* just like her, too.  Besides,"
he reasoned, "my hair's short.  It'll be dry before I fall asleep."

     Knowing his usual sleeping patterns, that was true.  He
sighed and stretched out.  She jumped.

     "Ouch!"

     "What?"  He straightened up in surprise.

     "Mulder, your feet are ice cold!"  He looked at her for a
moment, then sighed again and slid back out of bed.  She watched,
puzzled, as he crossed to the dresser.

     "Do you mind?"  He gestured to the top drawer.  She shook
her head.

     "What're you. . . ?"  She broke off when he made an
exclamation of satisfaction and turned back to her with a pair of
gray ragg socks in his hand.  She stifled a smile.  <Very
thoughtful, Mulder, but. . . .>  "I don't think they'll fit."

     "Academy PT socks, Scully -- these things are one size
fits all."  He sank to the edge of the bed and pulled one sock over
his left foot -- up to the heel.  There it caught and would go no
further.  "Okay, maybe one size fits most."

     She shook her head.  "I'm not up to debating the fine
points of footwear sizing with you, Mulder.  Come back to bed."
She realized just how that sounded and blushed.  He grinned but
said nothing, and obeyed.  She noticed that this time he took care
to keep his feet well away from her.

     They lay in silence for a few minutes.  <Now's a good time
as any,> she thought.  She took a deep breath.  "Mulder."

     "Hmmm?"  He turned on his side to face her, his head
resting on his hand.  She bit her lip for a moment, then rolled over
to retrieve the envelope from the nightstand.

     She held it out to him.  "Here."

     He took it, immediately noticing that it had not been opened.
He didn't know whether to feel relieved or sorry.  Then he realized --
<those things I said in the letter -- she should never have to hear
them that way.  I'll have a chance to tell her.  Not now -- not right
now.  But someday. . . .>

     "You didn't open it."

<You didn't open it and yet you still want me here with you.>

     "No."  She shook her head.  She glanced up.  He was gazing
at her, his eyes serious and questioning.  She sighed.  "I -- couldn't.
It was . . . too final."

     He nodded, understanding, and tossed the envelope onto
the chair.  It caught for a moment on the towel, then slid to the floor.

     She watched it go.  <Just two days ago that envelope was
all I had left.>  She still wondered about the contents.  Then she
looked up into his eyes and suddenly it no longer mattered.

     They had time now.

*End Chapter Twelve*
     
*******************************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Thirteen: "Miles to Go"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
*******************************************************

     He was in the boxcar again, and there were bodies 
everywhere.  Not human bodies, just as he had told Scully.  At least, 
not *strictly* human.  He was rummaging through them, searching, 
searching for  . . . something.

     There were piles of teeth in one corner, watches in another,
glasses in a third.  In the fourth -- oh, horrible! -- were piles of toys,
piles and piles of toys. . . .

     It was to this pile that he walked, stifflegged.  Bent and
began pawing through, searching. . . .

     There.  He reached out for it, but before his fingers closed
on the object another hand grasped it.  He looked up into the face
of his father.  Bill Mulder held up the Stratego piece between his
thumb and forefinger.

     "Is this what you're looking for?"

     He nodded, silenced as always by his awe for this man, his
need for approval.

     He slowly shook his head and curled the piece into his
palm.  "You're no longer a boy, Fox.  Grow up.  Use your man's wits
to find her."

     "Where is she?"

     The long forefinger pointed and he turned his head.  One of
the EBE's was looking at him.

     And her eyes were hazel.

     <Please, please let me wake up.>

     "Where is she?"  This time it was another voice, not his own.
A cruel, hard, disbelieving voice.

     "I don't know."

     "You're lying!  You're trying to protect her.  It won't work, you
know," Hoffer mocked, his upper lip curling in a sneer.  "We took her
once before.  Next time we might take her right in front of you.  We
can, you know.  Just like we took Samantha."

     "No!"

     "Then give us the tape!"

     "I -- I can't!"

     "Your choice, Mr. Mulder.  The tape?  Or Scully. . . ."

     And then she was there, standing in front of him.  She
was dressed in a hospital gown, IV tubes running from her arms,
as if she had just arisen from her hospital bed when she was in 
the coma.

     "Mulder -- I need your help. . . ."

     "Choose, Mr. Mulder!"  The voice was Deep Throat's.

     "Scully -- but I can't remember. . . ."  He closed his eyes
and thought hard.  "Wait -- wait. . . ."

     "Too late, Mr. Mulder. . . ."  They were dragging her away,
and her eyes reproached him.

     "No, *wait*!  I remember!  I know where it is!"

     Hoffer turned to him with an evil smile.  "So do we."  The
door slammed shut and its echo nearly drowned his scream. . . .

*****

     He sat up with a gasp, his chest heaving.  Cold sweat dripped
into his eyes and he blinked, for the moment not recognizing his
surroundings.

     "Mulder?"  A soft, concerned voice cut through the darkness
of the room, the even bleaker darkness of his soul, and he sighed in
relief.

     <Scully.>

     She sat up beside him, her hand on his shoulder.  "Are you
okay?"

     He nodded, still breathing heavily.

     "Bad dream?"

     He nodded again, squeezing his eyes shut.  "Yeah," he
whispered hoarsely.  "They were injecting me -- wanted to know
where the DAT tape was."  He panted for a moment, remembering
the jumbled images from this and others in his series of dreams
that night, dreams that escalated in nightmarish intensity until
sheer terror shocked him back into blissful reality.

     He began to speak quietly, his voice shaking, telling her
what he remembered of the small cubicle in which they had held
him, furnished only with a narrow, lumpy cot and a single straight-
backed chair.  In the corner was a toilet and sink.  For a wonder, 
both of them worked.

     He told her about the two men who had visited him 
repeatedly, towering over him where he sat, bound, in the chair,
their presence making the tiny cell seem claustrophobically small.
He wouldn't tell her everything, but he needed to share what he
remembered, to create a backup of sorts for his memory, for when
they returned to D.C. and he was called upon for answers.

*****

     *Where is the tape?*

     He pressed his lips together in a firm line and stared
stubbornly at the opposite wall.  They had been asking him the
same question for approximately twenty minutes now.  He wondered
whether they really thought he would finally become convinced or
whether they were trying to drive him slowly insane with the
redundancy of it.  After the first half-dozen times he had begun
keeping count of the number of times they asked it, then counting
his heartbeats between repetitions, then calculating, knowing his
own resting heart rate, the delay.  It seemed to him that the pauses
were growing shorter.

     Soon they would turn to a more physical form of 
persuasion, he was sure.  Physical torture he could probably handle --
at least for awhile -- if he could only keep himself centred properly.  
But eventually they would turn to chemicals, and there was nothing he
could do to fight them then.  In fact, he was somewhat surprised they
had not yet resorted to drugs.

     He wondered, when they finally did, what they would 
discover.

     Part of his refusal -- the majority of it -- was due to his
stubbornness.  He would not divulge the location of the MJ files to
these criminals.

     Even if he knew where they were.

     The truth was, he simply could not remember.  Everything
after his phone call to Scully after his father's death was a blur, with 
only a few details poking their way through the drug-induced and 
feverish haze in which he had evidently been at the time.  He did not
remember the drive from Martha's Vineyard back to Scully's, although
he *did* recall arriving there and nearly collapsing on her in the door-
way.  He vaguely remembered her taking care of him, bathing his face
and body with cool, damp cloths, feeding him acetominaphin to 
reduce his temperature.  And he remembered waking up alone and
finding his gun missing.  The next thing of which he was aware was
Scully's strident tones cutting through his feverish delirium, telling
him not to kill Krycek.  With a jolt he had come to himself and 
realized that he held the young ex-agent at gunpoint.  He could not
remember how he had cornered Krycek, but that didn't matter --
because he *did* know that somehow the traitor was responsible for
his father's death -- and for what had happened to Scully.  He
remembered again the sickening lurch as the cable car froze high 
over the gorge below and swung uselessly, suspended between the
safety of the mountain's base and his goal at the summit where he was
certain Scully had been taken.

     *He killed my father!*  <And kept me from saving you from
Barry,> he thought but did not say, then or now, recounting the
story to Scully.

     And then the sharp flare of pain that spread like fire through
his shoulder and seared its way to his brain, and then nothing at all.

     He thought he remembered a little of the drive to New 
Mexico.  Not much -- just vague, dreamlike images of rapidly 
changing scenery, of gas station after gas station, of Scully bending
over him several times with a syringe in her hand, of her soft voice
talking to him, reassuring him that she was there, that he was safe,
of that same voice rising in frustration as she altered her speed to
remain within the acceptable limits despite her urgency to get to
their destination as quickly as possible.  After all, he now reasoned,
she could not risk being stopped by the highway patrol; the DC police
probably had a warrant out for his arrest by now.  He even thought he
remembered bits of songs on the radio -- he was almost certain
that one of them had been "Against All Odds," and that he had
moaned something that had made her change the station.  

     Then waking up in the hotel.  After that his memories
became clear again.  Albert Hosteen.  The World War II code
talker had been translating the MJ files, but he had been given a
printed copy of the originals rather than the source tape.  

     And for the life of him he could not remember where he had
put that tape.

     Scully had had the printed copy and Hosteen's translation,
but. . . .

     *Scully.*

     *NO!*

     The smaller of the two men leaned over him.  Mulder strained 
at his bonds slightly, knowing that even in his weakened state he 
could easily take this one, at least.

     "Does your partner have the tape, Mr. Mulder?"

     His mind whirled.  Should he answer?  After his previous
unwillingness to respond to them, would this convince them that
Scully *did* have the files?

     On the other hand, would his continued silence put her in
even more danger?

     What to say?

     In the end he settled for nothing.  

     "Does she have the *tape*, Mister Mulder?!"

     Silence.

     "Would you lie to protect her?"

     <Of course I would.>  Still, his mind whirled.  If he answered
"no". . . .

     The larger man, evidently more comfortable in his role as
enforcer and quite obviously not the brains of the outfit, sneered at
him.  "You *are* lying to protect her.  Do you really think *she* would 
lie to protect *you*?"

     Suddenly Mulder's mind was calm once more.  Of course 
she would -- had, on occasion, done that very thing, he knew.  But
he knew that even had he never had proof of this extent of her loyalty
from her actions in the past, that she would, undoubtedly, do 
anything short of a serious crime she could not justify to herself to
protect him.  Actually, she already had -- she had helped him, in the
eyes of the law at least, to escape the state.  His accomplice in so
many ways in the past, she was now an accessory after the fact.
Unless he could prove his innocence and, in doing so, clear her. . . .

     The shorter man scowled at this change in tactic.  *Fool!*

     But Mulder had regained his center.  *Scully.*

     Now if only he could remember where he had put that tape. . . .
Frantically he wracked his mind, searching.  Where . . . where . . .
where?  He had several hidey-holes: one with The Lone Gunmen, who
had the letter he had left for Scully. . . . Temporarily his mind wandered.
He was certain she thought he was dead.  *Oh, Scully . . . I'm so
sorry. . . .*  Then he shook his head to clear it and tried again.  
Definitely *not* the safe-deposit at the bank; that was not even secure
enough for Scully's letter, although he had left a key for her.  Where,
then?

     "Mr. Mulder.  If you do not tell us where the tape is we will 
be forced to assume that your partner has it.  Ask yourself: what is
the truth worth to you?

     His eyes blazed and the smaller man laughed mirthlessly.
"Your devotion is very touching."

     "She doesn't have it," he said through clenched teeth.

     "Ah.  Now we're getting somewhere.  Either you are telling
the truth, in which case you *will* tell us where it is, or you are lying
to protect her, in which case we have at last discovered your
weakness.  Which is it, I wonder?"  He shook his head.  "No matter."

     Mulder eyed him warily, then barely stifled a grin.  For some
reason the man's reasoning reminded him of the poisoning scene
from _The Princess Bride_.  He and Scully had rented that one
afternoon over Christmas and watched it with her neices and 
nephews. . . .

     "So tell me, Mr. Mulder -- *where is the tape*?"

     He set his mouth into a grim line again.  <Better not let
them know that *you* don't know. . . .>

     The other man sighed in disappointment.  "It's a shame you
won't cooperate, Mr. Mulder.  I did so want to avoid using drugs on
you.  It will slow down our progress with the other -- subject.  And, of
course, there can be those nasty side-effects. . . ."  He turned to a
tray laid on the bed and picked up a shining needle.

     Mulder swallowed hard, his stomach churning, and then had
a thought.  He allowed his eyes to roll back in his head and slumped to 
the side, slipping off the chair to the floor before they could catch him,
his hands bound tightly behind his back preventing him from catching
himself.  His last thought before his head hit the concrete floor was
that an unconscious man under the influence of sodium pentathol or
whatever had been in that syringe was of no use to them at all. . . .

     He awoke slowly, the merciless light drilling into his eyes
increasing the throbbing in his head.  <If Jackie's headaches are
anything like these, no wonder she takes those Tylenol 3's.>  He 
moaned before he could stop himself and heard a chair scrape.  He 
was still in his cell, now lying on the cot.  He had no sense of how 
much time had passed.

     "Ah, Mr. Mulder.  Welcome back.  No, please, don't bother
 to get up," his tormentor sneered, bending over him.  "We wouldn't
want you to have a -- relapse -- now, would we?"

     "Never could stand needles," he murmured groggily.

     "Hmm.  Rather convenient for you, though.  No matter.  We
have time on *our* side, you see."  <Yeah, right.>  "I can see you
don't believe me.  Our sources tell us that you were unable to have
the files fully unencrypted."

     <Yeah, but by now Albert will have had -- how much time? --
to finish them.>

     The smaller man shook his head in amusement.  "And don't 
count on the Navajo man.  We have his grandson, you see. . . ."

     This, despite the raging pain and nausea in his skull, sent
Mulder bolt upright.  "You bastard!"

     "Tch, tch, Mr. Mulder. . . ."

     "You bastard," he whispered, collapsing once more onto the
cot.

     "Rest now, Mr. Mulder.  I *will* be back."  The other man swept
out of the room, leaving Mulder to contemplate his words.

     *Eric.*  He had seen Cancerman's goons injecting him with 
something.  But why keep the boy?  Did they really think that would
prevent Scully from finding the truth?

     <She thinks you're dead, Mulder.  And who knows what they've
done to her after the stunt she pulled, aiding and abetting a fugitive?
You might even be a convicted felon by now -- Scully reprimanded . . .
or suspended . . . or even fired . . . Or. . . .>

     <No.  Don't even think like that. . . .>

     He groaned and pulled himself to a sitting position once more.
Somehow, he *had* to find a way out of here. . . .

     Surprisingly, it had been a long time before his inquisitor had
returned.  Again, however, he had no sense for how many days had
passed; he began to suspect they were tampering with his sense of
time.  Sometimes it seemed that an unreasonably long amount of time
passed before his next meal; at other times he was not even hungry 
when they brought it.  They had taken his watch, and his room had no
window, no door save the one through which his meals and questioners
came, and that opened on a hallway.

     As nearly as he could guess it was more than a week before
the man returned.  He had begun to think -- to hope -- that they had
given up.  <Given up?  That would mean they had found the files.  And
Scully. . . ?>

     At first he was surprised they did not use her against him 
more readily -- or St. George.  But then, he rationalized, that would be
to relinquish that hold they had upon him; so long as Scully remained
alive he might be willing to bargain -- for her life if not for his own.

     This time the man was smiling.  

     Mulder sneered at him.  "Gee, you were gone so long I was
beginning to worry -- why didn't you write?"

     The man laughed lightly, mirthlessly.  "Why, Mr. Mulder, *I*
knew we would be seeing one another again shortly.  Did you really
believe I had forgotten?"  He shook his head with apparent 
amusement, then motioned behind him and another man, this one
dressed in a white lab coat, came in behind him carrying another of
those trays that he knew from experience held needles or probes or
other equally distasteful objects.  "Dr. Coreggi here has some tests
to perform on you.  He has to get clear readings.  And then I'll be
back."

     <With drugs.  Great.>  This time Mulder held his groan until
the inquisitor had left.

     That was his first meeting with Coreggi, who eventually gave
him the information that led him to connect Scully's abduction with
his own.

     That time the doctor merely took blood and tissue samples
before knocking on the door, which was quickly opened.  He left and
the first man, whom Mulder eventually learned was named Hoffer,
returned.  This time he held only one needle.

     And this time he did not waste his time with questions, but
simply crossed the room and plunged the needle into Mulder's arm.

     He felt the darkness swirling around him and fought it, but
it was too strong.  As unconsciousness swept over him like a 
merciless tidal wave his last thought was, "Scully, I'm so sorry. . . ."

*****

     Slowly he came back to himself and realized that he was 
half-sitting in the bed in the darkness, his head on Scully's shoulder,
and that she was stroking his hair.  He must have fallen silent some
time ago, his mind alone racing through the memories of his ordeal.

     Suddenly she shifted and he realized she was reaching for
the lamp on the bedside table.  His hand grabbed hers before she 
could switch it on.

     "No -- don't.  You'll never get back to sleep."

     <I'm not going back to sleep in any case.  Not until. . . .>

     He sighed again.  "They kept asking me for the tape.  
Scully -- I couldn't remember."

     She smiled.  "And this is a bad thing?"

     He took a deep breath.  "Scully -- I was afraid . . . I was so
afraid I had given it to you."  His voice was a whisper and he shuddered.

     She patted his shoulder.  "It's okay, Mulder."

     "No."  His voice was hoarse again.  "Later, they told me they
had it.  I thought . . . I didn't know if they had gotten it from you -- if
maybe I had. . . ."

     <If maybe you had sent them to me.  Oh, Mulder. . . .>

     She tentatively reached for his face, cupped his chin, and 
turned him toward her.  "They didn't hurt me, Mulder.  And if you *had*
told them I had it -- which I didn't -- it wouldn't have been your fault,
anyway."

     He turned slightly away from her and she sighed, this time in
exasperation.  "Fox Mulder -- you think you're supposed to be some 
kind of superhero or something.  Half the time I believe you think you
really *are*.  Well, you're not."  He twitched his shoulders.  "And you
don't have to be.  All I need you to be is yourself, Fox Mulder, my
best friend and my partner and the guy who watches my back on 
those rare occasions when I get into trouble before he does."

     He couldn't help it.  He laughed.  She smiled.  <Good.>

     "Now lie back down and get some sleep."  He nodded and
slid back down under the covers, but his mind was racing.  No *way*
was he going to get back to sleep.  And from the tension in Scully's
body where her arm just touched his, she knew it as well.

     Suddenly he felt her shift next to him.  She pushed on his
shoulder so that he rolled on his side facing away from her.  And then
her body pressed behind his, her arms around him, her face at his
neck just below his ear.

     "Close your eyes."  He complied.

     And then her voice, very low and very soft. . . .

     "Way out in the West, in the town of Mercedd. . . ."

     By the time she got to the Moose and the Goose he was 
sound asleep.

*****

     After the previous morning, even before they had headed up 
to bed that night, Margaret Scully had known that her early morning
coffees with Fox were over -- at least for the time being.  Mulder, she 
knew, would be upstairs in the double bed with her daughter.  And,
given their openness about it the prior night, Mulder and Scully knew
that she knew.  And she figured they knew that in some way she 
approved of their strange new relationship.  They had no idea what 
Captain Scully would have thought of it, though.

     What they could not know was that that night when she went 
to bed Mrs. Scully had smiled in the darkness at the thought of them 
together.  Ahab would have approved of Fox Mulder, she thought.  And 
contrary to what Dana thought of her father, he would even have 
approved of their sleeping arrangements.  She had always set higher 
standards and stricter limitations on herself than her parents had; and 
Margaret Scully knew that she and Fox were too emotionally needy right 
now to forgo the physical and emotional comforts of holding each other.  
Once things were back to normal -- well, as normal as they would ever 
be for those two -- they would have to reassess the situation.  But for 
now the warmth and companionship they gave one another in the 
darkness, combined with the TLC Margaret and Jackie and Melissa gave 
them both during the day, was the best medicine.

     Now, headed up the stairs with a cup of coffee in either hand,
she smiled again.  It was good to have Fox back.  And it was good --
good -- good to have *Dana* back, really back, instead of the shadow
that had haunted her house for the past week.

     She tapped lightly and eased the door open.  This morning 
they were spooned together again but with Dana holding Fox tightly, 
her tiny body curled around his larger one in an obvious attempt to 
enfold him.  Last night, it seemed, it was Mulder who had had the 
nightmares. . . . 

     Margaret shook her head.  They only had this week.  What
would they do when they had to go back to Washington, back to the
Bureau, back to being Agents Scully and Mulder, partners and best
friends instead of the very light and air that sustained them both?  It
would take more than just these few days for them to heal, even
physically, she knew, and the emotional healing could take months
or even longer.  But how could they hope to explain things to Walter 
Skinner, even if they did have the courage to admit in the light of day 
what was an unspoken agreement even in the dark?  "Oh, no sir, we're 
not *sleeping together*, we're just *sleeping* together."  And who 
would believe them?  

     The separation was going to be very, very hard.

     She sighed and closed the door and headed back downstairs,
the two mugs of coffee still in her hands.

*End Chapter Thirteen*

**************************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Fourteen "Healing"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
**************************************************

     The rest of the days of that week slipped by like so many 
pearls on a string, each unique in its particular qualities and with 
beauties and imperfections of its own, but each connected to the next, 
inextricably linked, altogether forming a flawless and gorgeous whole.  
The gradations were several: each new dawn found both Mulder and 
Scully somewhat more healed, somewhat closer to one another, and, 
unfortunately, somewhat closer to their imminent return to Washington 
D.C. and the X-files.

     It wasn't that they didn't want to go back, exactly, but they 
both felt they had come so far in that week of closeness and 
interdependence, and both were afraid of losing that when the real 
world beckoned them "home," back to rules and regulations and 
professionalism and away from the homey Scully kitchen and living 
room and the narrow double bed that had become for them a haven 
of sorts.  And what if, as a result of their admittedly unauthorized
activities in New Mexico, they were separated again?

     Several times Scully opened her mouth to ask him questions 
that, immediately realizing she could not -- or *should* not -- ask, 
she discarded.  She wanted to ask him more about his experiences 
during his absence, hoping to receive some answers regarding her 
own.  She wanted to ask him what, if any, implications all of this had 
on his search for the Truth and for Sam.  Most of all, the least 
askable question: how did he feel about her as he held her in the 
darkness night after night?  Was he afraid, as she was, of crossing 
that invisible line they had walked for so long?  Of overstepping some 
unknown boundary in the physical and mental haze of the night and 
being unable to find their way back?

     Then she comforted herself with the thought that what really 
frightened her was losing *him* somehow.  If they got lost in the dark, 
so be it.  At least they were together.

     And so she held her peace and simply rested in the safety 
of that twilight time when they, if they did not exactly belong 
precisely to themselves alone, did not belong to the outside world
either.

     They fell into a routine.  The whole household slept well into 
the midmorning, then there was a rush for the showers before all the 
hot water was gone.  After the third day Mulder and Scully and 
Maggie began taking showers at night and found that they slept better 
for it -- and the two agents revelled in the extra precious moments of 
slumber in the mornings as well.  Then everyone trooped downstairs 
for a substantial, hot breakfast of Mrs. Scully's preparation.  After the 
first few days she stopped looking at her daughter and Fox with such a 
disapproving expression over their smaller-than-normal appetites and 
slyly began slipping extra portions onto their plates.  They would 
bicker good-naturedly over whose turn it was to read what section of 
the paper first.  Mulder had made it a habit of years to read the entire
paper every morning before work; who knew what brief article might
generate the proof for which he had spent years searching?  At one
time he would have circumvented the debate by simply reading the 
paper before anyone else arose, but now he went at it hammer and 
tongs with the rest of them.  He was sleeping well -- too well, he 
realized, wondering vaguely what would happen when he returned 
home to his empty apartment.  It wasn't only Scully's presence beside 
him at night -- well, not entirely.  Even deep in his dreams he 
somehow felt the presence of the others in the house, and felt safe, for 
the first time in years.  Not safe from attack, precisely -- safe from 
loneliness, from fear.  Safe from the dark aspect of himself that 
especially in the long hours before dawn taunted and tormented him.
And so he slept through the night and awakened refreshed in the
morning and then, over breakfast, purposefully annoyed whoever 
had the section he wanted next by by reading the back page facing 
him and sometimes rising from his seat to read over a shoulder.   

     They would go for long walks after doing up the breakfast 
dishes, with which they all took turns.  Usually this involved a 
circuit of the Scully property but sometimes they traipsed through 
the woods and once even found some early apples ready for picking.  
Mulder and the two Scully sisters made a game of pretending not to 
notice when Jackie and Marty slipped off together, although they
could be certain their absences would be fodder for plenty of light-
hearted teasing upon their return.  Light-hearted.  That was exactly
what Mulder and Scully felt these days, unburdened from the
anxieties and responsibilities that weighed them down so often in
everyday life.  The relief was almost giddying.

     Sometimes Melissa, too, would vanish without notice and 
leave the two of them wading in streams cold enough to redden their 
toes or sitting quietly in a clearing, talking or just listening to the wind.
 
Sometimes the wanderers would return in time to help Margaret 
prepare lunch; when they did not there was always the bosun's 
whistle that hung next to the kitchen door, and they would turn back 
from wherever they were for hot soup and sandwiches or chicken pot 
pie or whatever homemade delicacy she had prepared.  Within a few 
days Mulder's and Scully's appetites returned and before long he
was joking that he was going to have to go on a diet when they got 
back to D.C. because he was eating more than he ever did and 
exercising far less.  Margaret's eyes told him he was far too thin, and 
not just from his time away, and he said nothing more.

     Besides, he knew she was right.  He watched Scully's thin 
cheeks fill out again, her wanness replaced with the healthy glow of 
a woman eating and sleeping and simply *living* right for the first
time in a long time, and rejoiced.  Almost as he watched, it seemed,
she blossomed, becoming once again the Dana Scully they all knew
instead of the pale wraith she had been for so long.  Her sparkle and
energy came back quickly and by the middle of the week she was
beginning to look almost -- though not quite -- normal.

     He knew his own appearance must have progressed similarly;
the approval and deep happiness in the others' eyes -- particularly
Maggie's eyes -- apprised him of his improvement, and he felt better 
than he had since well before the episode with his water supply.  He
accepted this as a gift and as the natural by-product of Mrs. Scully's 
doting.

     It was during one of the times they had purposefully -- and
not very subtly -- been left alone in the woods that Mulder tentatively 
approached a subject that had been preying on his mind, and soon 
they were both hot with anger.  He and Scully had been talking 
about what awaited them in D.C. and she had made some 
suggestions regarding his defense should the state decide to bring 
charges against him.  He was more concerned about what the 
investigation might do to her and said so.

     Their raised voices led Jackie to them.  She had been 
searching for them  to tell them it was time for lunch, for they had 
evidently missed the signal.  She set out with a grin on her face, 
intent on teasing them, but quickly grew perplexed at the 
unmistakeable sounds of a Scully-Mulder fight.

     She burst upon them in a small clearing.  Mulder was seated 
with his back against a tree, his long legs clad in an old pair of Brian
Scully's jeans stretched out before him and crossed at the ankle.  
Scully stood nearby with her arms crossed over her chest.  They were 
turned slightly away from one another, and both were clearly fuming.  
It was a textbook example of two very stubborn people evidently at 
that stage in a fight when each has realized that there is nothing they 
can do to convince the other but neither has reached the point of 
giving in or proposing a truce.  Her grin returned.

     It was a beautiful sight.

     "So . . . what's going on here?"

     Mulder looked up at her, hands clasped in his lap.  He 
regarded her with a too-innocent expression that confirmed what she 
already knew: he was wrong and he knew it, but he still thought he 
had his reasons that outweighed the irrationality of his opinion.  Scully 
simply glared at him.

     "Dana?"

     Scully tilted her chin and responded.  "Mulder here was 
just telling me he wished he could have gotten back sooner -- so he 
could have convinced me to lie and tell Skinner that he *forced* me 
to drive him to New Mexico."  It was a topic that had continued to
haunt him despite their prior conversations on the subject, and he 
had made the mistake of opening his big mouth.  It wasn't that she 
particularly disliked his concern, although it bordered on hovering
at times, but this was ridiculous, and she had told him so.

     St. George regarded the stubborn man before her with a 
mixture of amusement, affection, and exasperation.  "Mulder. . . ."

     "I just don't see why she should have to suffer because of me," 
he said firmly.

     <That's why you're a fool despite your fancy Oxford 
education,> she thought but did not say.

     "We're *partners*, Mulder."

     "That's no reason for you to take the blame.  You've lied to 
them before," he reminded her.

     <For *you*.  Not for *myself*.  Those are two totally different 
things.  One is selfish.  The other is . . . not.>  "Like they *really* 
would have believed that you could have forced me across the 
country against my will."  

     "I was psychotic, Scully -- you said so yourself."

     "And they knew it was because of the water.  Your psychosis 
would have weakened as it cleared your system, Mulder -- and it did."  
She paused.  "Besides, what kind of FBI agent does that make me if 
I can't hold my own against a feverish, delusional, and *unarmed* 
man?"

     Pride he could understand.  But. . . .

     "Okay, kids," Jackie stepped in.  "It's great fun watching you 
two argue again, but is this really accomplishing anything?  Dana, 
you've already told them your story, and they've taken action based 
on that.  Mulder," she turned to him, "what's important now is to figure 
out what kind of response they're likely to have to the fact that you're 
alive and have your memory intact.  Seems to me -- assuming that the 
guys doing the investigating are the same ones who took you -- that 
that's their weakest link."

     "Okay," Mulder sighed.  "You're right."

     "Of course," she said smugly.  He rolled his eyes but 
chuckled reluctantly.  "Besides, Margaret's been blowing that whistle 
for fifteen minutes and lunch is getting cold."

     Scully pushed away from the tree and walked slowly over to 
where he sat, and held out her hand.

     <Friends?>

     <Always.>  He smiled and pulled just hard enough to 
unbalance her but not to make her fall as he stood, and caught her
forearms in his hands.  They began walking back to the house but he 
placed a hand on her shoulder and stopped her, using the other to 
brush her back lightly.  "Bark," he said simply when she looked back 
over her shoulder, and headed for the house again, but she knew he 
had offered her his apology and she smiled and nodded to show she 
had understood and accepted it.

     Behind them, Jackie St. George shook her head and gave 
thanks that Marty was able to express himself in words like a normal
man.

*****

     In the evenings after dinner they took turns doing the dishes
and then reconvened in the dining room for more poker or Scrabble or
Trivial Pursuit.  Mulder was virtually unstoppable at the latter and 
whatever team he was on almost invariably won.  

     Sometimes they would simply gather in front of the fireplace
and talk and laugh until the logs fell into glowing embers and the
chill drove them upstairs.  It was these nights that Scully enjoyed 
the most, with a comingled sense of pleasure and pain, remembering
the night of the funeral when she had sat alone among the others,
staring into the fire.

     And every night now she and Mulder headed upstairs together.
It had become an accepted fact, one on which none of the others
commented.  Jackie's reticence on the subject surprised her the most;
she knew the Canadian must have been dying to say something, but
whether it was from relief or joy or something else, she refrained.  And
for her part, Dana was so grateful for his warm presence beside her in
the dark that gradually drove the night terrors away that she found 
herself comparatively apathetic to her friends' and familys' opinions on 
the matter in any case.  Perhaps eventually it would bother her, but
not now.  And it certainly would not bother her enough to induce her
to give him up.

     One evening when Jackie and Melissa had volunteered for
kitchen duty she had a sudden thought as she rose from the table and
beckoned for Mulder to follow her.  She led him up the stairs and into
her room.  When she crossed the floor to open the window he merely
stared at her, puzzled.

     "There's something I've been wanting to share with you,
Mulder," she explained, then hurried on, "and if you make one smart
remark you'll regret it."  She turned and climbed out the window and
onto the flat roof just beyond.  Mulder gaped at her for a moment
before she turned and held out her hand.  "Well, come on."

     He peered out the window and saw that the roof was level for
a distance and that the flat surface was continued by a sort of
platform that had evidently been built into the huge tree that grew
just beyond the roofline.  He sat down on the sill and threw one long
leg over.

     Downstairs on the front porch where she was watching the
sunset Margaret heard a strange scuffling sound.  Puzzled, she 
descended the steps and turned to look up, shading her eyes against 
the sun.  She grinned at her daughter's back as one gangly leg 
appeared over the sill to Dana's bedroom to be followed by the rest of
a wary Fox Mulder.  She ducked back onto the porch and then 
headed into the house.

     This time she wouldn't say anything.

     Mulder straightened up next to his partner and followed her
across the roof to the platform.  She stepped onto it and walked over 
to lean against the tree trunk that grew up through the middle.

     "Careful," he warned her.  "Are these boards still sound?"

     She grinned.  "They were a few nights ago," she informed
him.

     A sudden comprehension dawned in his eyes.  "This is
how X got in touch with you."  

     She nodded.  "Sit down."  She took her seat on the far
side of the Nest and dangled her legs over the edge, under the
wooden railing.  He sank down next to her and leaned on his arms
on the lower board in the railing.

     "My dad and I built this when I was -- oh, I don't know --
twelve, maybe?"  She looked around.  "Hard to believe it's been almost
twenty years. . . ."

     Mulder peered over the edge.  "It's a long way to the ground,
Scully.  I'm surprised your mom agreed."

     She grinned.  "She almost didn't.  Dad talked her into it.  He
argued, among other things, that it would be a good fire escape."
Mulder nodded and she continued.  "And then he told her that if they
were too overprotective of me I'd never know which were my own
instincts talking and which were theirs."  She watched for his
reaction out of the corner of her eye.

     <Ouch.>  "I see," he said slowly.  He looked down again.
"Y'know, this is kind of like the crow's nest of a ship."

     She nodded.  "We called it the Nest."

     He grinned.  "Ever have any seafaring ambitions, Scully?"

     She shrugged.  "A few, maybe.  I think they've been cured,
though," she added, thinking of their single ocean voyage together
which had resulted in their contracting some bizarre ailment that 
aged their bodies, nearly killing them in the process.  He nodded
wryly.

     He looked around.  "Hey," he said.  "Whose initials are
all those on the tree?"

     She smiled.  "It was a tradition of sorts.  Whenever I had
somebody out here for the first time they got to carve their initials
on the tree."  She stood up and leaned against the trunk, tracing the
initials with her fingers.  "Here are mine, and Dad's," she said softly.
"We carved those the day we finished the Nest.  And over here are
Melissa's -- I finally got her to come out here one afternoon.  She
*hated* heights," she remembered with a fond smile.  "Still does.
And here are Bill's -- and Brian's. . . . They both begged for *months*
for me to let them come up."  He was standing by her now, looking
at the scars in the wood over her shoulder.  "Beth, my best friend
from high school.  And Jules, my college roommate. . . ."  Her
eyes grew soft as she remembered old friends who had shared so
much of her life. . . . But none as much as this friend who now
stood beside her.

     "Any guys?" he teased.

     She shook her head.  "Nope.  No guys.  Mom and Dad
wouldn't let me have guys in my room."

     "And you never snuck anyone up?"

     She blushed faintly.  "I tried -- once."  She furrowed her brows
in thought.  "What was his name -- Doug MacKenzie.  I was sixteen.
Mom caught him climbing out the window."

     Mulder laughed.  "Climbing out, not in, eh?"  He scanned
the tree trunk.  "But I don't see any "DM" here."

     She shook her head.  "He didn't get to stay up here long
enough for that."  <Or anything else,> she added mentally.

     "Too bad -- it really is quite an original take on the backseat
of a car," he teased. 

     "My life isn't over yet, Mulder," she retorted, then turned back
towards the setting sun, but not before she saw his jaw drop.  She
faced away from him, grinning.  He came to stand next to her and they
watched the sun, now a great orange ball of fire, burn its way through 
the deepening western sky.  "We still have a few minutes," she
informed him.  "Here."  

     She held out her hand and he took the pocketknife from her.
"What's this. . . . Oh."  His eyes lit up.

     She shrugged.  "I guessed you didn't have yours."

     He shook his head.  "Didn't take it up to Dad's. . . ."  His 
voice trailed off.  Hard to believe -- he hadn't been back to his
apartment since receiving the telephone call from his father.  Scully
had run in and gotten several changes of clothing for him, he knew,
and he also now knew that the men who had been holding him had
been there as well.  <Grand Central Station.  No telling who else has
been there by this time.>  He hefted the small knife in his hand.
"You really don't mind?"

     She smiled at him.  "I told you, all of my friends get to carve
their names the first time they come up."

     He stepped to the tree and opened the blade, scanning the
trunk for a good spot.  From the looks of it no-one new had been up
here in years.  He selected a likely spot just below the "DKS" that
Scully had carved next to her father's "WJS" and began to carve.  As
he worked she told him about her nephews' pleas to explore the Nest
and Bill's forbidding it.  "Maybe next summer they'll be old enough," 
she told him.  "I have a lot of fond memories of this place.  It would
be a shame to let it just die."

     They were creating new memories now.

     He finished carving and stepped back.  She leaned around
him to look.  The letters "FWM" were straight and neat and fresh
beneath the faded, aged and broken letters cut in the wood by a
young Dana Scully.

     "W?" she asked him.

     "William," he responded simply, turning away from the sudden
comprehension and pity in her eyes.  "Hey, look -- perfect timing!"
They sank again to the floor of the Nest and watched a blood-red sun
sink slowly to the horizon.  The fading light turned the grey sky a
faint greyish-pink like that color that was at one time called ashes-of-
roses.  The ashes of the dying day -- or the birth pangs of the coming
night?

     He scooted closer to her and she leaned into his side with
a small sigh.

     The sky varied in hue from a deep, brilliant blue to purple to
rose and, just above the sun itself, a glowing orange-gold.

     "There it goes," he whispered, his voice the merest breath on
the night air.  Just before the sun was swallowed up by the horizon
the sky exploded in a riot of color, oranges and yellows and deep
reds battling for prominance and then fading to dark and darker.
Finally, only the faintest touch of pink touched the night sky that waited 
in limbo for the dead light of day to fade enough for the bright new moon
and stars to come up.

     "It's gone," he said softly, and she nodded.  But she had
not been watching the sun.

     She had been watching his face.

*End Chapter Fourteen*


*****************************************************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Fifteen: "The Reports of My Demise. . . ."
by JulietttXF@aol.com
*****************************************************************************



     As the week wound down Margaret watched with satisfaction 
the changes each successive day wrought in Dana and Fox.  At first 
it was the physical changes that she noticed most, the relaxing of the 
fine, tight lines around their mouths and the gradual brightening of her 
daughter's dulled eyes.  Then, too, they were eating and sleeping better.


     But it was their mental and emotional progress that gave her 
the most delight.  Early on she had noticed that time and time again 
when Fox was out of her sight Dana would look for him; 
subconsciously, if he were in the room, her eyes would dart over to 
his and she would relax, reassured.  Or if they were in separate 
rooms she would find him and speak just a word to him, or none at all, 
the anxiety that tightened her face relieved for the time being.  And he 
would do similar things: touch her arm to get her attention, look up 
from his book with a faint smile when she entered the room, both still 
afraid, somehow, that this was all a dream and that they would awaken 
in the hell of loneliness and uncertainty once more.  Margaret knew 
that they were completely unconscious of their actions and found it 
both painful and pleasurable to watch them.  What, she wondered for 
the nth time that week, would they do when they had to go back to the 
X-files? 


     But as the days passed she could literally see their sense 
of security return, and she knew that they would be all right.  It
might be difficult to curb their newfound closeness, but nothing,
*nothing* could be as painful as being separated.


     And as the days went on they both began to grow restless.  
It was a combination of factors, really: the sense of not knowing 
what awaited them, their status in the FBI, when they returned.  The 
desire to get back to work, back to their shared search for the Truth, 
which now included the truth behind several very personal murders.  
And, underlying it all, the uneasy knowledge that this was a very 
temporary haven at best, that the peace they had gained while at the 
oasis of the Scully house might very well disappear as soon as they 
left its walls.


     As real a threat to this sense of safety as the real world and 
the dangers they daily encountered was the knowledge that with a 
return to the X-files would come the return of Agent Mulder and Agent 
Scully.  They would again be partners first and friends a not-too-
distant second, but professionalism would reign in a way that it did 
not have to, here.  Here they could be Mulder and Scully, best friends 
and companions.  Not that they had overstepped the boundaries set up 
for them by the written and unwritten FBI guidelines and the unspoken
restrictions they had placed upon themselves and one another.  But 
here they could walk that tightrope more easily because the fear of 
falling was not compounded by the knowledge that they had an 
audience.


     Well, of course they had an audience, but a sympathetic one.  
The new sleeping arrangements were never mentioned, but they knew 
that their friends and family understood.  As much as they themselves 
understood.  Maybe more.


     The physical closeness they enjoyed at night did not continue 
in the revealing, sometimes harsh, light of day.  Aside from the 
occasional tap on the shoulder or Mulder's perpetual and ghostlike 
hand at the small of her back when he guided her before him over the
uneven terrain of the Scully property, they rarely touched then.  It was as 
though they were determined to convince themselves -- and the others 
-- that their need for comfort was a part of the dark, a simple result of 
the nightmares that still plagued them at times.  That their lives 
themselves had been a living, hellish nightmare for the past five months 
was something they pushed away somewhere with the anger and 
frustration and need for justice, to be dealt with some other time.
After this week.  When they were forced to deal with it.


     And so, without ever discussing it, they looked forward to the 
night.


     On Wednesday morning Melissa left to rejoin her husband;
his niece had done a wonderful job running the bookstore, from what
he said, but she had a professional and personal life of her own.  And
so, after breakfast and a round of hugs from which even Marty did not
escape, she drove off, leaving behind her a certain emptiness that
Margaret Scully knew was only the beginning as the house continued
to empty.


     And she left behind her a vacant bedroom.


     Margaret and Jackie and Marty all wondered what Mulder
and Scully would make of that.  Mulder wondered about Scully.  And
Scully wondered about Mulder.


     On Wednesday afternoon Skinner called and told them that 
the gun used to kill Bill Mulder and injure Scully had been traced to a 
dealer in Boston.  His records showed that the purchaser was a man 
by the name of John Murel.  Scully snorted into the phone at that and 
when Mulder looked at her inquisitively she explained.  


     "That was the name of one of Humphrey Bogart's characters 
-- I forget which movie."


     On the other end of the telephone Skinner was nodding 
approvingly.  "Very good, Agent Scully.  We had the owner fax us a 
copy of the signature and ran it through Handwriting.  No match, 
Agent Mulder, I'm happy to say."


     Mulder sputtered.  "Did you really think. . . ?"


     "Easy, Mulder," Scully calmed him.  "I'm sure Director 
Skinner was just covering all of the bases."  And if they could
manipulate DNA they certainly had the ability to create a convincing
forgery, either at the moment of purchase or sometime during the
transmission of the copy from the point of origin to its destination.
Frightening when you didn't know who you could trust.


     <And that's not all he was covering,> Mulder mouthed to her 
before turning his attention back to the phone.  She smirked at him.


     "Exactly, Agent Scully.  I also made note of the fact that on 
the date the weapon was purchased you two were in Dudley, 
Arkansas.  Both of which facts are negative clues at best.  But they 
were still enough ammunition for me to approach the board about your 
reinstatement, Agent Mulder."

     "And?"


     "And upon your return you will undergo a complete psychiatric 
evaluation to determine whether whatever caused your 'outburst' in the
hallway is likely to recur.  Those charges have been dropped, by the way,
due to Agent Scully's evidence.  You may not have heard," his voice 
became very quiet and serious, "but Mrs. Thomas, the woman from your
building who shot her husband, had to be hospitalized due to her
hysteria.  They -- found her dead a few days later.  It was ruled a suicide."


     Mulder slumped over the table, his head in his hands.  "A suicide."


     Scully darted a glance at him before speaking into the phone again.
"And the autopsy?"


     "Revealed high levels of the same toxins found in the dialysis 
filter you sent me," he said simply.  "I had Cunningham assist the acting
pathologist -- actually, he approached me and suggested it."  Scully's 
respect for and gratitude to their boss soared.  He had been determined 
that any results from the autopsy be reliable.  The test results and the 
handwriting analyses would have been so easy for people with the 
resources and connections of the people with whom they were evidently 
dealing to fake.  "And incidentally, we were able to recover water samples
from several apartments that also contained the chemicals."  His voice 
took on a slightly humorous tone.  "As good as these men -- whoever 
they are -- were, they forgot to clear out the ice makers in the affected 
apartments.  This evidence was enough to convince the board that the 
filter was real and not simply a plant intended by you, Agent Scully, to 
clear Agent Mulder."


     <Would you lie to protect him?>


     "That's good, sir."


     "Do I want to know how the board reacted to the news of my
return to the land of the living?" Mulder asked sardonically.


     "You will receive full reinstatement pending your psychiatric
evaluation, Agent Mulder," Skinner said sternly.  His tone of voice 
said, "don't ask for much more than that."


     Mulder sighed silently.  "Yes, sir."


     There was a slight hesitation.  "Some of us will be very glad to have
you back aboard, Agent Mulder."


     He grinned at Scully.  "Yes, sir.  Thank you, sir."


     "Agent Scully, if I could have a word. . . ?"  Mulder hung up 
the phone and made a show of looking at the pictures and photographs 
collaged on Mrs. Scully's refrigerator.  Scully conversed for a few 
moments in low tones with Skinner, then hung up.  He swung to face 
her.


     "Well?"


     "Eavesdropper."  He made a face and she relented.  "He just 
wanted my opinion of how you were doing," she explained.


     "And you said?"


     "That you were doing well but that you would do even better 
with two weeks paid medical leave in the Bahamas," she retorted, then 
laughed at his stunned expression.  "I told him you were improving, 
that your appetite was good, but that you still needed rest.  I wasn't 
going to chance his sending for us early," she finished with a nod 
and a smile.


     "Sneaky, Scully," he said with admiration.


     She shrugged.  "It's true, Mulder.  You're still not a hundred 
percent -- neither of us is.  It may be a while."  She hesitated.  "Oh, 
and he also wanted to know whether I would be taking the second 
week of my two-week personal leave," she said casually.


     He looked at her.  "And?" he asked softly.


     She continued to stare at the phone receiver cradled in her 
hands.  "I told him I thought it would be a good idea if I came back 
when you did, so I could catch you up on what you'd missed."  She 
paused for another moment, then looked up and met his gaze with 
her own, steady and sure.


     What he'd missed.  He had missed nothing so far as the 
X-files were concerned, he knew; she had been assigned absolutely 
no cases during his absence.  And Skinner knew that as well, but 
he hadn't called her on it.


     He smiled and she smiled back.


*****


     "I want to make some calls this afternoon," Mulder announced
as they sat down to lunch.  "There are a few people who might actually
be glad to know they'll still have me to kick around for awhile longer."


     "Actually, Mulder, I'm certain there are quite a few people who
would be glad to know they'll still have you to kick around," Jackie
deadpanned.  He glared at her and she made the sign to ward off evil.


     "I think that's a wonderful idea, Fox," Margaret smiled.  "I
know that if I didn't already know I would really appreciate knowing 
that you were safe."


     His face softened.  Why, why couldn't he feel this way about
his own mother, he wondered.  After all, Mrs. Scully wasn't even. . . .
"Thanks, Mrs. Scully," he murmured.


     "So, who's on the list?" Scully asked, ladling the rich-
smelling clam chowder into her bowl.  "I know I want to call Bruce.
Skinner told me he already knows, but. . . ."  Her voice trailed off.
"He did a lot to help me," she added quietly.  "In fact, if we throw
that party in your honor when we get back we'll definitely have to
invite him."


     "A party," he groaned.  "I don't particularly like parties."


     "Nonesense!"  Maggie Scully exclaimed.  "Everybody
likes parties, especially when they're in your honor."


     "Dad didn't," Scully piped up.  "Remember that bash we
planned for his fiftieth birthday?"  Dana and her mother rolled their
eyes and groaned.  Mulder was quick to pick up on a good story.


     "What happened?" he asked eagerly.


     Scully looked at him and realized -- Mulder had never
thrown his father a surprise party.  Had never spent hours on the 
phone with their siblings plotting just how to pull things off while 
working on it from different corners of the country.  It was a funny 
story, but now it seemed a little more poignant.  And a little more 
precious.


     Dana watched Mulder laugh at Margaret's energetic
description of the elaborate set-up and the Captain's equally
emphatic though unexpected reaction to it.  <This is Mulder's
party,> she reflected, <practically everyone in the world about
whom he cares and who cares about him is in this very room.>
There were others, she knew -- his buddies at The Lone Gunman,
a few friends with whom he played pick-up basketball or had an
occasional drink.  People with whom he was friendly and who
would welcome him back with a smile.  But nearly everyone who 
had truly mourned him, whose lives had been shattered by his 
loss and whose lives would be infinitely brighter for his return, was 
here.


     Her first reaction to this revelation was pity -- to have so
few truly kindred spirits in the world struck her as sad.


     But then she realized that these same few were the 
ones who had mourned *her*, as well, along with her brothers
and their families and a few close friends outside the Bureau.


     And maybe it wasn't so bad, after all.  Their friends 
were few, perhaps, but they were *good* friends.  Friends who
would willingly lay their lives on the line for them.


     And she thought about the men and women with whom
they worked on a daily basis, who always seemed to have some
function or another to attend, whose parties often excluded the
spooky pair from the basement, and she wondered: with all their
parties and after-work get-togethers, how many of them had true
friendships, with anyone, like the friendships she had with Jackie
and with Marty -- and especially with Mulder?


     She relaxed and allowed herself to smile again as 
her mother ended the story to Mulder's and Jackie's crows of delight.


     "He sounds like a wonderful father," Mulder said softly
after the laughter had died down.  "I wish I could have known 
him."


     "I wish he could have known you, too, Fox," Margaret
said with a curious undercurrent in her tone.


     They fell into a brief silence, then a slow smile spread
across Mulder's face.


     "The Lone Gunmen."


     "Huh?"


     "I'm going to call the Lone Gunmen."  He turned to Scully
and grinned.  "Wanna help?"


     She hesitated, then grinned back.


     This could be fun. . . .


*****


     "Lone Gunman."


     "Hello, Frohike."


     "Agent Scully -- should I turn off. . . ?"


     "It doesn't matter, Frohike."  The incoming line at the
Lone Gunmen's office was as secure as it was possible to be,
she knew, and she and Jackie had of course checked for wiretaps
when they had swept the house for bugs earlier that week.


     "Oh."  Pause.  "How are you doing?" he asked gently.


     She smiled.  She had been pleasantly surprised by this
enigmatic and admittedly squirrelly man's honest willingness to
help her during Mulder's absence.  He might tease her and make
passes at her when all was right with the world, but when things
had fallen apart he had been there, willing to help.  In fact, he
had called her and offered to run a second set of DNA tests.  
She still had no clue how he'd heard about the second autopsy;
the same way they seemed to know about everything else, she
reflected.  And when the call from the Lone Gunmen had come
through with the results of that test -- the call Jackie had taken 
because she, Dana, had been in shock after completing the
autopsy and coming to the irrevocable -- and now obviously
erroneous -- conclusion that Mulder was dead -- it had been
Byers who made the call.  Frohike, she imagined, was too
torn up to do it himself.  Reflecting back, she wondered now
whether he had felt greater pain at his friend's death or at the
thought of having to tell her.  Whichever was the case, she was
glad it was Frohike who had answered the phone this time.  He
deserved to be the recipient of this news.


     "Actually, Frohike, things are going very well, thank
you.  I actually called for three reasons: one, to thank you for all
your help.  It really meant a lot to me."


     "Uhh -- you're welcome, Agent Scully," he mumbled. 
What had gotten into her?


     "Two, I wanted to ask you whether or not you still had
that DNA sample I gave you."


     "Uhh -- yeah.  Yeah, we do," he averred.  Then he 
paused.  "What's this all about?"


     "Well, that's reason number three," she grinned.  "There's
somebody here who wants to talk to you."  Mulder picked up the
extension.


     "Hey, Frohike."


     There was a long pause.  Then, "Mulder?"  His voice
was weak.


     Mulder laughed.  "Well, this is a first.  I would have
guessed you knew all along that I was alive and where I was --
I thought maybe you just didn't say anything so you could have
Scully all to yourself."  She made a face at him but he ignored
her.


     "Mulder?  It *is* you -- fanTAStic!  *Where* have you
been?  And how did you pull this off?  Geez, man -- the duck and
cover of the century!  Maybe you can give us some pointers to
help us find Elvis!"


     She rolled her eyes as Mulder laughed again.


     "Well, unlike the King I didn't actually do this alone, 
Frohike -- in fact, it wasn't even voluntary, I'm afraid."


     "No kidding?  Wow.  You were vanished, huh?  I should
have guessed -- you would be insane to run off and leave that
tasty partner of yours."


     Mulder hid his mouth in his hand as he watched Scully
stiffen.  Things were getting back to normal.  Fast.


     "Yeah.  I'll tell you all about it -- it'll make your wildest
conspiracy theories look tame, Frohike."


     "Any chance we could do a feature for next month's 
issue?"


     "I'm afraid not.  This one is very hush-hush -- you got it?"


     "You bet.  Can't wait to tell Langley and Byers -- they're
out investigating a supposed Hoffa sighting -- bogus, if you ask me."


     "Okay.  I'll be in touch. . . ."


     "Wait -- Mulder?"


     "Yeah?"


     "Umm. . . ."  Frohike's voice dropped several notches in
volume and pitch.  "Is the lovely Dr. Scully still there?"


     Mulder's eyes lifted to those of his partner.  She was waving
at him frantically and making slashing motions across her throat.
What she would do to herself or to him? he wondered.  No matter.
Any other time he might be tempted, but now. . . .


     "Sorry, Frohike," he said apologetically.  "She stepped 
out."


     "Oh.  Well, tell her --" he cleared his throat.  "Tell her that
when she -- gets back -- I'd like to take her out for a sort of --
victory dinner," he said haltingly.


     Scully opened her mouth, tempted to respond.  Amazing.
The man was blunt to a fault in front of her, but in discussing her
behind her back he was almost -- courtly.  Mulder gave her the eye
and her mouth snapped shut.


     "Will do.  Bye now."  He hung up.


     "Thanks, Mulder," she said with a smile.


     He shrugged.  "Just didn't feel like sleeping on the couch
tonight," he teased.


*****


     Next Scully called Bruce Cunningham.  Unlike Frohike,
he had already heard the good news, but she still wanted to speak
with him.


     "Hello."


     "Bruce?  This is Dana Scully."


     "Dr. Scully!  Assistant Director Skinner called me -- I'm so
glad to hear that Agent Mulder is okay."  She smiled.  Cunningham
called Mulder "Agent Mulder" but she was always "Doctor" to him.


     "Thanks, Bruce -- I'll tell him you said so.  The reason I was
calling, really, was to -- thank you, Bruce," she said softly.


     "For what?"  He sounded genuinely puzzled.


     "For assisting on the Thomas autopsy."


     "Oh, that."  It was a verbal shrug.  "Just part of my job. . . ."


     "No," she said firmly, "it wasn't.  Skinner told me that you
approached him and insisted on getting involved.  It probably wasn't
a very politic move, but -- you've really earned our thanks."  She had
no confidence that *his* phone wasn't bugged, but whoever might
possibly be listening would know by now of Cunningham's
involvement, anyway.


     He cleared his throat, clearly embarrassed.  "No big deal,"
he muttered.  "I just -- I couldn't stand by and just watch them ream
Agent Mulder out like that.  He didn't deserve it -- and neither did 
you."


     She smiled and wondered again whether it was her 
imagination or if Bruce Cunningham had a slight crush on her.  Even 
if so, he had never acted unprofessionally or spoken to her with 
anything other than respect.


     "I don't know if you heard, but it worked -- the board reviewed
your findings and Mulder and I are being reinstated."


     "Really?"  His voice betrayed his excitement.  "That's fantastic!
Guess the good guys do win occasionally, after all."


     "Only when we stick together," she said quietly.  


     He was silent for a moment, then -- "Dr. Scully?"


     "Hm?"


     "I -- when A.D. Skinner told me that Mulder was alive -- I 
thought -- maybe you'd want those test results.  You know, in case you
wanted to -- continue investigating or something."


     She sat up a little straighter in her chair.  "Oh, really?"  Her
mind raced as she tried to determine where he was going with this.
Should she try to warn him that the line might not be secure?  Wouldn't
that tip their hand even more?  Surely anyone listening would expect her
to respond with enthusiasm. . . .  But before she could decide on a 
course of action her assistant continued.


     "Yeah.  I, uh -- unfortunately, Dr. Scully, the samples and the
official records are missing. . . ."


     <Of course>


     ". . . Anyway.  I turned in the paperwork and audio recording
myself, but -- can't imagine what happened to them -- I *know* they
were there."  He managed to convey a sense of disorientation and 
genuine confusion, but suddenly her mind cleared.


     She remembered the small pile of cassettes Bruce had 
collected since beginning to work with her.  After ascertaining from her
whether or not an autopsy were considered sensitive information, he
would remove the recording she had made and duplicate it on a small
machine he kept in the lab for that express purpose so that he could
review their notes and conclusions on his own.  Evidently he had
somehow managed to play dumb and make a copy before turning in
the DNA results and was attempting to convey that information
without alerting anyone who might be "listening."


     <Agent Cunningham -- you brilliant, wonderful, paranoid 
guy. . . . You'd do the Lone Gunmen proud.>


     "Oh, that's too bad," she said with apparent dismay.  In 
reality she was grinning like a madwoman.  <Oh, Bruce -- remind me
to give you a big hug when we get back. . . .>  Mulder, who was not
privy to Cunningham's end of the conversation, looked on, puzzled.
"Later," she mouthed at him.  "Well, we'll talk when we get back, okay?"
she asked her assistant.


     "Okay, Dr. Scully.  And if there's anything I can do to help --
anything at all. . . ."  He let his voice trail off, hoping that she had read
him properly.  He *would* do anything he could to help -- and he had.
Too bad he couldn't have kept a part of the tissue sample. . . .


     "I'll remember, Bruce -- and thanks again."  She hung up and
practically jumped at Mulder.  "That sly little devil -- I'm beginning to
be even more glad he's on our side, Mulder."


     "What?"


     She relayed their conversation to him, along with what she had
deduced.  He grinned at her.  "Sounds like the kid's got a future."


     She nodded.  "But only if he stays smart.  I'd hate to think of
anything happening to anybody else because they were trying to help
us -- to help me. . . ."  She paused and looked up at him, her face
serious.  "Mulder -- I never said -- I'm really sorry about sending you off
alone like that. . . ."


     <I'm afraid you're on your own with this one, Mulder.>  Those
words had haunted her all these months.


     He waved away her apology.  "Hey -- you did what you thought
was right."


     "No."  She shook her head.  "I mean -- you went there 
because of *me*, Mulder -- I told you I needed you to find the answers
and you went down there and --" she broke off with a shudder.  His 
quest this time had had nothing to do with finding Sam and everything
to do with her.


     <I want you to find out, Mulder.  I *need* you to.>


     And he understood.  "Scully," he said softly, placing his hands
on her shoulders, "you said once that this search -- our search for the
Truth -- had become your search as well.  Well, finding out what 
happened to you -- that's a part of that Truth -- and it's important to
me."  


     <As important as finding Sam. . . ?>


     <Yes.> he admitted.


     Her eyes lifted to meet his, and, after a momentary pause, 
she smiled, her eyes clear for the first time in months.



*End Chapter Fifteen*
     
*******************************************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Sixteen: "Picking Up the Pieces"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
*******************************************************************


(Same disclaimers apply.  I swear I wrote the line about the gun
well before "Nisei". . . .)




     The rest of the week went quickly -- too quickly, Margaret
thought privately.  Melissa had had to leave, but she had four 
other beloved "kids," as the privately called them, to look after 
and mother to her heart's content.  She particularly enjoyed 
watching Dana heal and blossom under the influence of love and 
good food and plenty of rest.  


     The night Melissa had left she had been unable to hide
her interest in whether the vacated room would have any effect
on the sleeping arrangements of a certain pair of FBI agents.  The
sheets on Melissa's bed had been changed earlier in the day; she
would leave the decision entirely up to her daughter and Fox 
Mulder.


     When bedtime came they all trudged up the stairs as
usual, Marty steering Jackie into their bedroom when it appeared
the Canadian was tempted to linger in the hallway.  For her own
part, Margaret, having remained downstairs to close up the house
for the night, caught the questioning, half-hopeful look on Mulder's
face as he paused in the hallway between Scully's door and that 
of the empty bedroom.  Dana kept her own eyes averted as she
opened the door and stepped in, then turned to meet Mulder's 
gaze with her own.
     
     So simple.  So trusting.  Mrs. Scully swallowed the
lump in her throat and smiled to herself as her daughter's partner
slipped into the room and the door closed, leaving her alone in
the hallway.


     With a sigh she passed the closed doors on her way to
her own empty and silent room.


*****


     Margaret glanced up from the book she was reading
at Dana and Jackie, who were poring over one of the Scully
family photo albums.  Mulder was lounging indolently in one of
the armchairs, catching up on some of the reading he'd missed
out on during his absence.  She shook her head slightly in
amazement at the stack of _OMNI_ and _Time_ magazines
they had picked up for him, most of which he had read already.


     As she watched, Mulder looked up from his article,
his gaze coming to rest on Scully.  Behind his glasses his eyes
softened slightly; he seemed content simply to look at her, to
know that she was nearby, and safe.  Perhaps feeling her eyes
on him, his gaze flitted to meet hers, and he answered her smile
with one of his own.


     She had found herself becoming increasingly more fond 
of Marty as well, and fully approved of him as a match for Jackie.  
Not that it would have mattered had she disliked him.  The Canadian 
could so easily have been one of her own daughters for all the Scully 
stubbornness and intensity that she radiated.  


     Margaret sighed a little and wondered whether those same 
traits would prevent her younger daughter from finding that same 
kind of happiness.  For years she had watched Dana and worried 
that this lovely young woman, who had so much love to give to the 
right man, would never find him.  Oh, not that she thought Dana 
should be content to sit at home and wait for Prince Charming to 
come to her doorstep; she applauded Dana's desire to make her 
own way in the world and, after her initial shock, openly supported 
her.  But there were still times she lay in her bed at night and 
trembled at the thought of her baby out there facing some of the 
horrors of which Dana had spoken.  Knowing her daughter, those 
cases she actually mentioned were the tame ones, and that frightened
her all the more.  The danger level had risen sharply during the time she 
had been with the X-files, and at first she had wondered why Dana did 
not request a transfer.


     But then she had had The Dream, as she always thought 
of that particular nightmare.  The one that had led her to drive to her 
daughter's house late at night without even calling first.  The one 
that had introduced her to Fox Mulder.  One look into those sad and 
terrified dark eyes and she knew exactly why Dana had stayed.  
And later, after her return and her recovery, when her daughter 
informed her that the division had been reopened and that she had 
requested a transfer back there from Quantico, she had bitten back 
all the motherly concern that prompted her to scream and clutch her 
baby girl protectively to herself and had instead forced a tight smile 
onto her lips.  At least they would be together.


     She had just never thought that Prince Charming would have
such an abominal taste in ties.


     They left on Saturday.  They had originally planned on 
returning on Friday so that Mulder could take care of all the little
things that needed his attention.  But Scully had paid his rent, and his 
basic utilities -- even the cable, she informed him with a grin, failing to 
admit that she had spent more than one night curled up on his sofa in 
the gloom of that lonely apartment lit only by the glow from the 
television screen, waiting and hoping for word from Mulder, or at least 
from Mr. X.  She only hoped his fish had fared well during her week-
long absence.


     He needed groceries, but that was all.  It was so little -- it 
seemed somehow *wrong* that he could have been gone so long 
and yet he would simply be able to walk back into his apartment 
without things having changed, to perform all those little daily rituals 
he used to perform.  *He* had changed, and it seemed impossible 
to him that anything else could have remained the same.  He 
wondered if Scully had felt the same sense of disorientation after 
her return.  But then she had been so sick for so long 
afterwards. . . .  He brushed those thoughts aside and when Scully
teasingly suggested that this might be a good opportunity to make 
some long-overdue changes in his life, he came back with some 
smart remark about painting his walls a different color.  Deep down,
however, he admitted that she was right.


     Margaret had asked them to stay that extra night, reminding 
Mulder that anything he had to do could be done on a Saturday 
equally well, and had been pleased when they had conceded without 
too much protest.  Even she could not convince them to stay until 
Sunday, however.


     That last night they all curled up in various spots in the
living room and watched the fire in relative silence.  This felt so 
*right*, somehow, and they each found themselves wondering how 
long it would be before they felt that kind of peace again.  Mulder in 
particular found himself taking mental snapshots of the evening to 
tide him over those long, sleepless nights alone in his apartment: 
Margaret Scully, sedate and smiling at them all from the depths of 
her chair; Marty sitting next to the hearth with Jackie in his arms; 
Scully. . . .


     Scully was curled up on the sofa next to him with her head 
on her hand, looking for all the world like a sleepy kitten as she 
blinked at him drowsily.  He smiled and resolved that the next time 
she stood in front of him looking every inch the professional, a tiny 
dynamo with her hands on her hips, chewing him out over some 
mistake or another, he would remember this moment, the way her 
hair fell softly and messily around her face, her small body 
practically swimming inside a set of her younger brother's old sweats.  
He would remember and he would bite back the retorts that usually 
came springing to his lips under such circumstances.


     The fire flickered and died and they reluctantly got up and 
went to bed.  And slept, if it could be believed, without any 
consciousness of dreaming.


*****


     He woke to the sound of a gentle rain on the roof and Scully 
in his arms and the knowledge that his peace, this ever-so-fragile 
peace, was about to come to an end.  She shifted slightly and he 
froze, not wanting to awaken her, wanting just to hold her for a little 
longer, his partner, his friend.  Knowing that she was safe and he 
was safe and they were together again, that the long separation was 
over and the future was ahead of them bright with promise.  Well, as 
bright as it had ever been.  His eyes flicked over to the clock.  Eight-
thirty.  Still early for them these days.  He closed his eyes and 
pulled her a little closer and slept again.


     She felt him stir and lay still as still, then relaxed again as he 
relaxed and then she, too, slept.


     Margaret Scully had set her alarm and awoke early to make 
biscuits.  She would have no influence over how her children ate once 
they returned to their own lives, but she was determined to send them 
away well-fed.  So when they all trooped down several hours later, it 
was to behold a spread that made the rest of the week's hearty 
breakfasts seem meagre.  And for once, Mulder was able to eat 
enough of it to win her smile of approval.


     She watched glumly as they packed up to leave.  Jackie had 
given Scully the keys to her car and would ride with Marty, picking up 
her car from Dana at lunch the next day.


     "You're all coming back for Thanksgiving, right?" Margaret 
reminded them.


     "Yes, Mom," they chorused, the three newest "adopted" 
Scullys included, and she grinned.  Jackie hugged Margaret and the 
two agents, pausing to mutter under her breath into Scully's ear.


     "Tank's full, Dana -- no excuses about running out of 
gas. . . ."  And then she dodged her friend's slap with a laugh, and 
she and Marty drove off, leaving Mulder and Margaret to stare at a 
blushing Scully.


     "What'd she say?"


     "Nothing worth repeating, Mulder."


     Margaret accepted hugs from both of them and watched 
them approach the car with a bemused smile on her face.  They had 
both headed for the driver's side.


     "I've got the keys, Mulder."


     "Scully. . . ."


     "Jackie will kill you if you move her seat and mirrors."


     "I'm shaking."


     "You should be."


     He paused.  "You're probably right."  Shrugging at Mrs. Scully, 
he walked around the car and slid in the passenger seat.  But he just 
couldn't give in without a parting shot.  "It'll be good to get my gun 
back -- maybe then I'll get a little more respect."  He already had a
replacement cellular phone; Margaret had presented him with it the
night before.


     "Ask for one with a Velcro grip this time, Mulder.  Better yet, 
start carrying a spare."


     They drove off, leaving Margaret Scully laughing on the doorstep. 
She watched until the dust had settled behind their car and then 
reentered the house with a small sigh.  It was quiet now -- too quiet.


     Things were going to seem awfully empty for awhile.


*****


     They rode in silence for awhile, each wrapped in private 
thoughts -- memories of the past few months and the past week, 
speculation on the future.  Mulder's thoughts ran to Scully's 
intentions and preparations for vengeance before his return.  He 
wondered how she felt about everything now -- how *he* felt about 
everything now -- and finally decided he had to ask.


     "Scully?"


     "Hm?"


     He glanced over at her.  "We never really finished talking 
about what we're going to do about Cancerman and Krycek."


     She sighed and nodded.


     "You still want to go after them?"


     She bit her lip.  She *did*, of course, but that was no longer 
uppermost in her mind.  Her primary concern had always been to get 
Mulder back and then, when it seemed that was no longer possible, to 
find out what had been done to him and why, and to make those 
responsible pay in the only way she could be certain they would ever 
see justice.  Those first two goals had been achieved with his return 
and recounting of his kidnapping.  As to the last. . . .


     "I want justice, Mulder.  I just don't see how we're going to get 
it."


     He nodded.  So long as he had been missing she had been 
willing to risk everything to find and punish Cancerman and his 
henchmen, Krycek in particular.  But now that he was back 
everything had changed.  It was no longer worth it, not when they 
still had the possibilty of working within the law, within the X-files, to 
find the answers they sought.  It was the same reaction he had had
during her coma; while she lay on the brink of death he wanted 
nothing but revenge, but once she had recovered his hatred had
melted, giving way to gratitude and a desire for answers.


     But the evil was still out there, and it was as strong as it had 
ever been.  There had been and would still be others, others who 
would perhaps not be as fortunate as he and Scully had been.  Yet 
he still believed his return -- and its timing -- had been fortuitous.  Not 
only for him, but for Scully as well.  It had prevented her from crossing 
that line upon which both of them had teetered so often.  He 
remembered holding Kryceck with one hand and his gun with the other, 
the rage and grief washing over him, drowning him until he could see 
and hear and feel nothing else but the roaring of his own blood in his 
veins.  Another time, standing in a bleak, hidden apartment staring 
down the barrel of his gun at the man he despised most, determined to 
rid the earth of at least one of its many vermin.


     Twice he had been a hair's breadth away from becoming a 
murderer.  He had killed before, of course, but only in the line of duty, 
and only to protect himself, his partner, or a civilian.  But those two 
times he had wavered on the edge of that precipice, had gazed into the 
abyss and recognized the monster there as the darkness in his own 
soul.


     <You're in a very dark place.  Much darker than where my 
sister is.>


     Twice he had walked that thin line and teetered on the brink of 
lunacy, of becoming what he hated most.


     And twice this same woman had brought him back into light 
and life and sanity.


     It appeared his own timely return had served some similar 
purpose for her, and for that he gave thanks.


     "Someday, Scully," he said firmly.  She looked at him for a 
long moment, then nodded, and they drove on in silence once more.


*****


     They stopped at the grocery store on the way to his 
apartment and filled a cart with enough supplies to stock two 
relatively-empty kitchens.  When she began placing her own 
selections in the cart he had raised his eyebrows -- after all, she 
had only been gone a week -- but she simply shrugged.  He then 
realized that she probably had no idea in what state she would find 
her own cupboards, yet another testimony to how far gone she had 
been the last few weeks.


     When they reached his apartment she helped him carry in his 
groceries.  At the door he paused and she hurried to unlock it.  She 
had forgotten that he did not have his keys.  He would have to 
replace the contents of his wallet as well.  She swung the door open 
and, when he hesitated, preceded him into the apartment.  By this 
point she was probably more comfortable with his place than he was.


     He entered slowly, almost tentatively, looking around him at 
the foreign/familiar surroundings.  It seemed eerily quiet, and after a 
moment he realized it was because his computer, which he normally 
left running, was off.  The entire place was so -- still.  And clean.  
Everything was in place except for a blanket which lay crumpled half 
on the sofa and half on the floor, and an empty mug which sat on the 
end table.  He looked over at Scully.  She avoided his eyes for a 
moment.  She had been half-asleep on his couch when the early-
morning call had come in about his -- about the body.  Slowly she 
lifted her eyes to his and he smiled reassuringly.


     He caught a slight movement out of the corner of his eye 
and swung to his right.  A slow grin spread across his face at the 
sight of the fish swimming in the aquarium.


     She watched as his shoulders relaxed slightly and relaxed, 
herself.  She remembered how strange it had been to walk in the 
front door of her own apartment after her abduction and find things so 
unchanged.  Well, unchanged from the way they normally were -- 
Mulder had had the broken window and the phone replaced and all 
other evidence of that awful night removed.  Then again, time had not 
passed for her in the way it had for him; when she had awakened in 
the hospital she had had no memory of anything after the car ride to
the mountain top with Duane Barry.  So it did not seem entirely 
strange to her that her apartment still looked relatively the same; 
even after she had been told the length of time she had been gone 
she could not fully comprehend it, and yet she had still had a vague 
sense of vertigo upon entering her apartment for the first time since 
her return.  She had felt then that it might almost have been better 
had some of the evidence of Barry's intrusion been left; with things 
returned to their pristine condition her memory and her senses had 
been in conflict.  It must be far worse for Mulder.


     She went with him as he walked through the apartment, 
watching the tension flow out of him, feeling as much as seeing him 
settle back in to his life.


     His personal life.  Here in this apartment.  Alone.


     Without her.


     They looked at one another and she knew it was time.  And 
there was ice cream melting in her car.


     "Guess I should go."


     "Want me to come with you?"


     "No, that's okay.  It's only been a week."  *Only a week.*  
Impossible, but true.


     "Okay."  He hesitated.  He wanted to ask about dinner, but 
surely she had things that required her attention after a week's 
absence.  She probably had to call, mail to read.  And he had 
monopolized her attention for the past week.  He felt vaguely uneasy 
when he recognized his mindset slipping back into that of Agent 
Mulder instead of the much more easygoing and open man he had 
been for the past week, but he felt powerless to stop it.  It was better 
this way, he assured himself.  Better to start now so that things 
would be normal by Monday morning when they had to report to 
Skinner.


     Normal.


     Right.


     She felt him withdrawing and a slight chill swept her.  Was 
she going to lose him now?  In their attempt to overcome the 
closeness they had gained over the past week would they have to 
resign themselves to being cooler than normal toward one another?  
She didn't think she could stand it if things changed now.  As 
wonderful as it had been to be with him in that way, it wasn't worth it.  
Not if it turned him into the stranger she saw taking over the man 
standing in front of her now.


     He looked at her and slumped slightly, then smiled self-
deprecatingly.  This was *Scully*.  His partner.  His friend.  Nothing 
could change that.  Nothing, that is, except something within 
themselves -- deceit, dishonesty, coldness.  He had tried shutting 
her out when the X-files had been closed the first time, and it had 
almost broken his heart.  No way could he do that now, even if he 
wanted to.  And he certainly did not want to.


     She smiled back at him, and when he saw the relief in her 
eyes he reproached himself.  He stepped forward, then stopped.  
Somehow the intimacies they had shared at the Scully house 
seemed to have become a part of that place, so far removed from 
their everyday lives.  He regretted the loss of their physical 
connection and hoped that the emotional and mental communion 
would not be diminished as well.  Time would tell.


     "I should go," she said again.  She grinned.  "Or else that 
half-gallon of Ben and Jerry's will be 'Cookies and Mush.'"


     He laughed and the tension eased somewhat.  Not entirely, 
but enough.


     "You going to be okay?" she asked.  <Are *we* going to be 
okay?> 


     He nodded in response to both her spoken and unspoken 
questions, and she smiled again, then headed for the door.  She 
turned in the doorway.


     "Oh, I forgot."  She opened her keyring.  After a moment's
hesitation she removed his key and held it out to him with
reluctant fingers.  "Here," she said softly, avoiding his eyes.


     His hand closed over hers.  "Keep it."  She looked up and
he smiled down into her eyes.  "I have a spare."


     Her smile of relief lit her whole face and she nodded, 
replacing his key on the ring with a satisfying "clink."


     "'Night, Mulder."


     "'Night, Scully."  She hesitated another moment, then 
turned and walked out to Jackie's car.  He stood at the window and 
watched her drive away, then turned with a sigh to begin picking up 
the pieces of a life put on hold.



*End Chapter Sixteen*
*********************************************************************
_Vengeance_ Chapter Seventeen: "Dream a Little Dream"
by JulietttXF@aol.com
*********************************************************************



     Scully couldn't sleep.  Rather, she couldn't *stay* asleep.  She
rolled over and stared at the clock beside her bed and groaned.  Almost
midnight.  She had been tossing and turning for nearly half an hour
after awakening with the cold certainty that Mulder was dead.  She had
sat up in her bed, shaking, for a long time before she finally convinced
herself that it had all been a horrible dream.  For one, there was the
sweatshirt, his Oxford sweatshirt that she had "accidentally" packed 
with her things at her mother's house and which she had worn to bed,
ignoring that part of her mind that sniggered at her for doing so.


     But what if *that* had all been a dream?  She was reminded of
the Japanese philosopher she had read of in college who once said 
that, upon awakening from a dream of being a butterfly, he did not
know whether he were a man who had dreamed of being a butterfly or
a butterfly who was now dreaming of being a man.


     She had to smile slightly, thinking of what Mulder would say
about that story and about her reaction to it.  She rolled over and
turned up the volume on her clock radio; listening to music to dispel
the nightmares had become a habit over the past few months, and 
tonight upon awakening she had automatically clicked it on to the
soft rock station she usually used.  She listened for a moment to 
the end of a song that just ten days ago she would have found 
depressingly cheerful:


     As I lay me down to sleep
     This I pray
     That you will hold me dear
     Though I'm far away
     I whisper your name
     Into the sky
     And I will wake up happy
     And wonder why. . . .


She smiled a little.  At least now it was a possibility.  She curled
herself around the pillow and closed her eyes, willing her mind to 
recall the sense of peace and safety and comfort she had felt last
night at her mother's.  


     It wasn't working.


      Finally she sighed.  It was, after all, not yet midnight.  This 
was, after all, Fox Mulder.  He would still be awake. . . .


     Reaching for the phone and the light at the same time, she
flipped the switch and hit the first speed-dial button.  He answered
before it had even finished ringing.


     "Hello."  


     That was odd.  He always answered, "Mulder."


     "Mulder, it's me. . . ."  This, at least, was *her* standard
response.  She could hear the smile in his voice.


     "Hey, Scully."  He sounded like he had known it was she on
the phone before he had even answered.  Well, that made sense.
What *didn't* make sense is the impression she got that he had
somehow *expected* her to call. . . .


     "You okay, Scully?"


     "I'm fine, Mulder."  She closed her eyes again and smiled.
<Go ahead, Dana, follow the script. . . .>  "Just . . . missing you, 
that's all. . . ."  <Okay, add a line here and there. . . .>


     "Oh, really?"  She could hear teasing and affection in his
voice now.  Warmth flooded her as she thought how very close she
had been never to hearing that tone again.


     "Yeah."  She took on a light, bantering tone of her own.
"Guess I forgot what it was like to be able to stretch out in bed 
without hitting somebody's big, *cold* feet."  Try as she could, she
could not quite keep the longing out of her voice.  <One more night.
If I could just have one more night of that safety and warmth. . . .>


     "Hmmm."  He sounded slightly out of breath.  His next
words took her completely by surprise.  "You decent, Scully?"


     "What?  Of course I'm . . . you gonna ask me what I'm
*wearing* now, Mulder?"  Geez.  She would have expected it of
Frohicke, but. . . .


     "No," he said quietly, "I'm just going to ask you to open the
door."


     Her heart leapt in her chest.  Did he mean what she thought --
*hoped* -- he meant?  She jumped out of bed and hurried through the
dark apartment, the phone still clasped to her ear.  Peeked through
the peephole in the door.


     He did.  He was there, standing there on her doorstep with
his cellular phone to his ear, looking directly at the peephole.


     She fumbled with the latch and finally succeeded in 
dragging the door open.  And then she was in his arms, the hug
she had wanted to give him early in the day overwhelming her.


     They held each other tightly for a moment, then he gently
propelled her back into the apartment and shut and locked the door.
Turned and stood staring at her, a half smile on his lips.


     She took a deep, calming breath.  Then a thought struck
her.  "How -- how did you get here so fast?"


     His smile was sheepish now.  "I -- uh, I was in my car out
front, listening to the radio."  She frowned and he hung his head a 
little.  "I had just gotten here -- was trying to decide whether or not 
to come up when I saw your light come on and then you called. . . ."  


     "Why?  Why did you come?"  She knew but she wanted
to hear it anyway.  Needed to hear it after her own admission.


     "I -- ah -- well. . . ."  He took a deep breath.  "I guess I just
wasn't used to having all the covers I wanted. . . ."


     They looked at each other.  Their silences had always been
meaningful, but this one spoke volumes.


     Finally she simply smiled at him and nodded.  He slipped out
of his jacket and she realized he was wearing his "sleeping sweats."
So he had intended all along. . . . He had driven over here in the middle
of the night just to sleep with her. . . . The thought made her flush
warm all over.


     He followed her to the bedroom without a word and slipped in
beside her.  She put her head in the spot between his collarbone and
neck that had become so familiar and felt his arms go around her.
Sighed.


     "Good night, Scully."


     "'Night, Mulder," she whispered.  And then, so faint that she 
almost missed it, that soft brush of his lips against her hair.  She had 
never been quite certain before, but she knew now that he had gently 
kissed the top of her head.  She smiled into the darkness.


     <You will hold me dear. . . .>


     She fully intended to stay awake as long as she could, simply
enjoying the warmth and security of his arms, but his soft, even
breathing soon lulled her to sleep.


*****


     The phone was ringing.  Groggily, Mulder rolled over and 
reached for it.  It wasn't where it normally was, on the end table 
next to the sofa.  But then, he half-realized, he wasn't where he
normally was.  Where was he?  His bed.  He finally succeeded in 
knocking the phone off the hook before he was able to drag it to his
ear.


     "Mulder."  Silence.  "Hello?"


     "Mulder?"  Jackie's voice.  Why did she sound so surprised?  
He decided to ask.


     "*You* called *me*, Jackie."


     Another pause.  Then her voice again, sounding slightly
strangled.  "No, actually, I called Dana. . . ."


     His eyes shot open.  Dana?  But. . . . And then he felt the
warm weight on his chest shift slightly and looked down.  Red hair
tumbled from sleep.  Her hand clutching his shirt like it had the first
morning they had awakened at her mother's.  Scully.  Oh, yeah.
Despite his disorientation a sudden warmth swept over him and he
smiled.


     "Uhhhh. . . ."


     "Mulder?"  He could hear her wheezing slightly now.  "Is she
awake?"


     He panicked, pure and simple.  Lie to her?  <Sorry, St. George,
but you must have called me by mistake. . . .>  Lie to her?  <Uhhh, 
yeah, Jackie -- let me go wake her up.>  Lie to her?  <Yeah, I just came
over to pick her up for an early breakfast. . . .>


     "Umm.  Jackie, she's still asleep.  Can I have her call you 
back?"  He winced.


     "Yeah -- you do that, Mulder.  Have her . . . call me . . . 
definitely. . . ."  


     "Uh -- okay.  I will."


     "Oh, and Mulder?" she paused for effect.  "Tell her -- no hurry."
He heard riotous laughter just before the phone clicked.  Hoo boy. . . .


     Then he looked back down at Scully sound asleep in his arms
and smiled.  <I will wake up happy. . . .>


     Whatever Jackie had in mind, it was worth it.


     He tucked her more securely into his embrace and slept.


*****


     When she awoke it was after noon.  She blinked for a moment,
disoriented, unsure of where she was or *when* it was.  The only thing
that felt familiar was the strong arm around her, and she knew exactly
whose that was.  She smiled a little.  Funny that the one sensation she
had never felt before that week -- sleeping in Mulder's arms -- should
now be the first thing she recognized upon awakening.  She sighed a
little and snuggled down to enjoy those first few precious moments
between waking and sleeping that always seemed to set the tone
for the rest of her day.  His arm tightened around her back.


     "Morning," he said softly, the motion of his breath stirring
her hair.


     She smiled.  "Morning," she murmured, and waited for him to
pull away, banishing the physical comfort of his proximity once more
to the darkness with all the other hidden, unspoken fears and wishes
too shy for the light of day.  


     But he didn't move.


     <It shouldn't feel this good.>


     <What shouldn't?  Not being alone for once?  Waking up and
knowing right where you are for a change?  Feeling safe?  Knowing 
your best friend is safe?  Is that what shouldn't feel good?>


     <Weeellllll. . . .>


     <Lighten up.  Time enough for rules and regs when you get
back to work.>


     Suddenly she realized -- Sunday.  Noon.  Lunch.  Jackie. . . .
She stiffened and he immediately slid his arms from around her and
sat back against the headboard.  Her heart sank.


     "I was supposed to call Jackie," she said quickly, and he
paused.


     "She called earlier.  Said for you to call her back but there
was no rush."  He saw her relax slightly.  He hesitated, unsure of
himself.  "So -- want to get some lunch?"


     She looked him straight in the eye.  "I'm really not all that
hungry."


     He nodded.


     "In fact, I'm more tired than anything."  She lifted her 
eyebrows at him.


     He nodded again, still uncertain of what -- if anything -- she
was offering, and unwilling to overstep the bounds.


     She watched him.  He seemed undecided about whether
to stay or go.  <Mulder. . . .>  Finally he slid back down and
closed his eyes.  A moment later he felt her move a bit closer to
him and he slid his arm around her with a smile.  Tomorrow things
would go back to the way they had been.  He was certain of it.
But today was still a part of that fuzzy, half-lit time where the
strict rules by which they governed themselves could be bent
and stretched a bit.  Not broken -- not yet.  Perhaps never.  But
for now he was content simply to lie down in peace and rest.


     A phrase he had once heard popped into his head: living
well is the best revenge.  Perhaps in his case, *living* was the
best revenge.  They did not have all the answers to their
questions -- yet.  But he knew that with the woman who now
lay dozing in his arms he had a better chance of finding the
Truth than he had ever had in his life.  She was as committed
to his search as he was, had taken his quest and made it her
own.  No, they had made it *their* own.  And what was more,
she was committed to *him*.  And she would help him -- they
would help each other -- to find the Truth and to deal with its
consequences.  And, together, they *would* find it.  He
believed that.


     With a vengeance.

     T    H    E         E    N    D


Songography: "As I Lay Me Down" by Sophie B. Hawkins