CRUISE (1/12) by Madeleine Partous email: partous@total.net "Feedback both pro and con is deeply appreciated" This is the first time I write a long thing that's entirely from Scully's POV -- something I find hard because I'm much more comfortable with Mulder. So if you feel like it, let me know if you think it's working or what's missing if you think it's not. I'd really appreciate it. I know some of you are still mad at me about the Pact, but I can assure you I haven't given up on it. It's just that other things seemed to demand to be written. That said, I've learned a valuable experience -- which is never to start posting unless the story's finished or close to finished. Unfortunately, I still prefer not to post an entire long tale at once, and this is a personal call because it's true that many readers won't read a story until it's complete, but I'm not like that -- I find long postings overwhelming and much prefer a serialized story... as long as parts are posted regularly, of course. Ahem. So I apologize in advance to those of you who hate this kind of thing; you can always wait until it's archived. Or ignore it altogether, of course ... Category: MSR, x-file. Rating: R (NC-17 postings will be duly noted, if applicable) ** Summary: A series of mysterious deaths aboard its ships leads a cruise line to contact the FBI as rumours of a vengeful ghost begin to fly. Is the killer striking from beyond the grave?** Very vague season 4 spoilers. Okay to archive. Please do not publish or circulate otherwise without my permission. ************************************************************* DISCLAIMER: The X-Files and its characters are not the property of this writer and are borrowed lovingly with no intention to infringe upon copyright or achieve financial gain. All other characters and situations below are the author's own and as such are tragically flawed. This is a work of fiction. The cruise line and ships referred to in this story are imaginary and any resemblance between these and real cruise lines or ships is purely coincidental. ************************************************************* The night was coal black and it caressed the body of the ship like a petulant lover. Petulant because the wind had whipped whitecaps on the water and now it slammed against the rails as if in random fits of pique. As lovers go, though, the night was apparently still in love with something; it was warmer and moister than it had been just an hour earlier. She could smell the tropics on the breeze as she stood next to the sea-speckled railing. This. This was the kind of sailing she'd always yearned for, and even the monstrous size of the ship, the sheepishly tacky interiors and the crowds of rambling seniors in pressed white shorts couldn't undermine the majesty of the moment. They could keep their grotesque ice sculptures, kitschy stage shows and endless midnight buffets. As she leaned into the night, salt air drying on her skin, she silently blessed the folks at Dutch-American Cruise Lines for having the decency to keep the teak decks, the wooden deck chairs and the varnished salt-gnawed wooden railings. Someone at Dutch-American knew what sailing was all about. They'd made concessions for the convenience of the blue-haired set, but dammit, she thought as she stood there: This could be the Queen Mary on its way to England 50 years ago. Well. Except for the sultry humidity that said Caribbean all the way. Which was fine. Which was great. Who needed to sail the tempestuous Atlantic these days, with its mood swings and indifference to the frailty of human stomachs? She loved the sea but knew damn well a little too much rolling on the waves would have her retching in her tiny cabin next to all the other moaning landlubbers below deck. She was a hopeless romantic, but she was also pragmatic. She'd learned to be. A youngish woman alone on a cruise always raises a few eyebrows, as though the minute the ship sets sail, everybody forgets they're living in the '90s. Oddly enough, this was the one contingency she hadn't planned for. She'd been prepared for everything else, including the barely disguised lust on the part of the Indonesian waiters and cabin stewards, slight young fresh-faced boys whose faces seemed paralyzed with frustration and far too much hard work. Apparently, the fact that she was travelling alone -- and had paid a hefty premium for a stateroom by herself -- had spread through the belly of the ship on the very first day. She'd been fighting off unsubtle, if tentative, advances ever since. But she'd expected this. What she hadn't expected were the disapproving harrumphs of her fellow passengers. Not all of them, to be fair, but just enough to cause resentment and a faint, tiresome feeling of guilt. Being single wasn't a crime, was it? Not yet, anyway. It was true that virtually everyone else on the cruise was hopelessly coupled come hell or high water, as she put it to herself, gazing at some of the resigned faces she saw. At least half of the couples she saw looked like they were only barely resisting the urge to push their significant other overboard. A little voice teased her inside her head: Maybe they're not judging you after all. Maybe they're just *jealous* and those looks they're firing at you are a silent plea for help. Maybe. Probably not. She'd lived long enough to realize that most people embraced their long suffering with a smug and vaguely triumphant superiority. She reclined on a long deck chair most afternoons, rebelliously sipping short serious drinks without paper umbrellas, and thought as she studied the strolling couples through smoked glasses: These people are living amputated lives. She, at least, had no illusions about her own unhappiness. But, the same little voice whispered in the back of her mind -- she'd grown to loathe it, even though, when all was said and done, it was the only voice she trusted -- does it matter that they're unhappy when they believe they're not? Good question. Dammit. She'd been cursed with clarity of vision, and what had it brought her? A fabulous well-paying career with a lot of free time, true: clarity tended to make other people believe you were supremely competent. Which, as it happened, she was. But the price she'd paid for this intuitive understanding that nothing was ever as simple as it seemed (nor as complicated as you hoped) and that few people, if any, really understood their own fundamentally banal motivations, was a life alone. Of course, it wasn't as bad as it sounded. She was surrounded by friends who loved her in their own way, but who much more specifically needed her. The fact that she always seemed to grasp something that left others confused and uncertain made her extremely attractive as a friend. She knew it also made her disconcerting. Her friends liked to be around her. To a point. But when they'd gleaned from her all she would give them in one sitting, they invariably laughed, shook their heads and said something like well I feel a lot better thanks a bunch and then bye-bye, out the door they went. Or, if she happened to be at their place, they'd look at their watches and suddenly shriek with feigned astonishment about the time and where does it go gosh Fred'll be home any minute kiss kiss I'll call. And she'd be standing on the stoop within seconds. As for men, well, forget about them. She had no patience for dinner and flowers and all the other subterfuge that was a wearily transparent coverup for the hope that they maybe just maybe might get a chance to fuck her before the night was through. It wasn't that she didn't like sex. She prided herself on her normalcy. She was attractive and she knew it; men looked at her often in that way, women too at times, and that was fine. She knew enough to know that everyone likes to feel wanted -- including her. And it wasn't that she didn't like men, or at least she liked them as well as she did women, more in fact because at least they were usually more direct, which was actually a relief. It was only that more and more all of it was so *fatiguing* somehow, so stale and predictable that quite honestly she'd rather slit her own wrists these days than dance the dance for a 20-minute tumble in the sheets. But all this silliness was about to change. On that cruise, the first of many, she realized she had a mission. It came to her in a blinding flash of clarity one night when she'd tucked herself away in her narrow bed on the soothing swaying sea. This realization was spurred in part by a nascent conviction that while it was true most people didn't realize they were unhappy, this fact alone couldn't save them from a life of misery. She, on the other hand, could. It was, she suddenly saw, her destiny. It was, well, a kind of sacred trust, a duty of sorts. People lived like rats in a maze. It was sad. It was unnecessary. More importantly, removing them from the maze would give her a sense of meaning which so far had eluded her. Besides, as she discovered on that first cruise, she loved sailing and killing was kind of fun. CONTINUED IN PART TWO -------- CRUISE (2/12) by Madeleine Partous email: partous@total.net "Feedback both pro and con is deeply appreciated." DISCLAIMER & SUMMARY IN PART ONE WASHINGTON DC DOWNTOWN MONDAY, 9:11 AM It had been a bad weekend, at least as far as Dana Scully was concerned. She was stuck in a traffic jam no more than 10 minutes from the office and she was already late and it didn't look like she was going anywhere fast. The weekend hadn't been bad in any ordinary sense of the word. Nothing terrible had happened. Nothing had happened at all. Which was the problem. She was finding this predictable lack of anything happening increasingly irritating. What the hell was the matter with everything anyway? She wasn't unattractive. She had outside interests. She wasn't particularly boring -- was she? Scully was beginning to wonder. It seemed the more the years passed and the more time she spent working with Fox Mulder, the harder it became to relate with the real world. Okay. That wasn't altogether fair. Life with Mulder wasn't entirely divorced from the real world. Not entirely. But the fact remained that she'd drifted away from most of her friends, just from the sheer impossibility of sustaining meaningful relationships when she was always on the road or on stakeouts are just working late. As for dating, that was an even bigger laugh. The only males she ever saw these days were Mulder, Mulder, Mulder, Pendrell, Skinner and -- she shuddered -- the Gunmen. Look on the bright side, Dana, she smirked as she pounded the horn and veered around some guy who'd obviously passed out at the wheel. Out of this select group of six men in your life, two have the hots for you. Pendrell and Frohike. Great. Fabulous. Oops. Apparently the other driver was in fact conscious, judging from the finger he'd just flung at her. Scully sneered and cut in front of him. Buying the Explorer was the one independent act she'd taken in a long time -- and it felt great. "You bought a *what?*" Mulder had stood gaping in the parking lot when he'd walked her to her new prize possession. "You heard me. Feast your eyes on that baby." He stood and stared at both of them. "Scully, that damn thing is 400 times bigger than you are. Which was precisely the point. She glared at him. "I've had it with sharing a vehicle with you, Mulder. This is my first step towards getting a life." "But we get the Taurus free, Scully." He looked genuinely perplexed. It figured. Mulder wouldn't spend a penny on anything he couldn't write off. "One car per partners, Mulder. And only when we're on assignment. And always a goddam Taurus. I hate Tauruses. Besides, you almost always keep it." To his credit, he chose not to point out that this was his prerogative since he was technically her superior. He didn't have to. He knew that she knew. Scully admitted grudgingly that he rarely pulled rank on her, although he had his own ways of making sure she never forgot it. Of course, she realized he also knew that as a medical doctor, she actually made more money than he did. Bureau logic. And a skewed kind of sexism, as far as she could figure. But it seemed he was in a flirtatious mood that day; all he'd done when she'd mentioned the Taurus was pout at her because he knew it was disarming. Manipulative bastard. "The fact is, Mulder, I want my own method of locomotion. You're starting to cramp my style." "But, Scully..." God. He was whining. "*Please* do not start." And then he smiled beatifically, one of those rare smiles he rarely showed anyone, the kind that revealed his slight rather fetching overbite. Down, Dana. You're sick of him, remember? "I was just going to point out that you don't have a style to speak of, Scully." He looked insufferably smug. Scully considered slapping him just for the hell of it, but decided the jump up wasn't worth the trouble. "As a psychologist, Mulder, you should be better acquainted with the pitfalls of projection." That had shut him up. At least for a moment. She'd been pissed off at him for awhile after that, but relented when it became clear to her that he was actually hurt by her move towards greater independence. Hurt and maybe even a little jealous. It was normal for agents to spend a lot of time together. It was even encouraged -- to a point. The Bureau knew full well that unattached agents were more likely to get immersed in their work. Family life wreaked havoc with that particular agenda. At the same time, Bureau policy made it clear that agents shouldn't get overly attached to each other. Made them absentminded. In other words, the Bureau did everything it could to foster singleminded dedication without distraction. Scully knew that she and Mulder weren't the only two agents faced with the same predicament. Virtually all the best ones, the crack ones, were single and on-call 24 hours a day. Great. Look where it had got her. Nowhere. Unlike most of her colleagues, who at least got credit for some of the stuff they did, she'd sacrificed everything for the sake of derision on a good day and overt hostility on a bad one. She and Mulder were important all right. Important enough to be feared and loathed by the good and the bad guys alike. Assuming the sun was shining that day and you could actually tell the difference between them. Meanwhile here she was stuck in traffic and late again and the weekend had sucked despite the Explorer. Okay. So she wasn't entirely delusional. The fact was that the weekend had sucked primarily because Scully had forgotten what to do with one. It had been the first weekend she'd had free in a month. After she'd taken care of bills and laundry and housecleaning and everything else she'd neglected, she was horrified to discover that the only thing she could think of doing was calling Mulder. Appalling. Scully hadn't even spoken to her mother in six weeks. So she'd forced herself to go out to a club on Saturday night only to be deafened by House music, assailed by desperate single guys she couldn't even hear over the pounding bass -- which was probably just as well -- and ultimately bored out of her mind. You're getting too old for this, Dana. Too old. Christ. She'd just turned 32. So she'd returned home alone because quite honestly she couldn't bear the thought of bedding some sweaty accountant, and all she'd found on her answering machine was a rambling derisive message from Mulder about how she was probably out trying to have a good time in some club and failing dismally. She sat and listened and stewed and fought with every ounce of her will against the petty desire to call him back just to insult him. At least she'd gone out. What was he doing leaving her a long message on a Saturday night? He was at home doing nada, that's what he was doing. But there'd been something in his tone that had actually touched her, a need of some kind, and she knew he'd been through hell with that past-life business. Scully suspected Mulder felt lonely these days, but it was so hard to tell with him. When he needed something, his tendency was to become sardonic, cold and dismissive. She recognized this tendency. She shared it. It made it difficult for either of them to reach out, most of all to each other. In fact, Scully had come to believe this trait was one of three they had in common. The other two were an unerring dedication to the truth, even when they didn't agree on what it actually was, and a kind of generalized sentimentality. The latter wasn't immediately obvious given their apparent stoicism, but over the years Scully had come to realize that both of them, in their own guarded way, were complete mushballs. She knew it was true of Mulder. She just wasn't sure he knew it about her. FBI HEADQUARTERS FOX MULDER'S OFFICE MONDAY, 9:52 AM Scully breezed in and tried not to look apologetic. Mulder was already seated behind his desk, feet up. From the icy glint in his eye, he'd already had far too much coffee. "Scully. How delightful of you to drop by. Hope it wasn't a bother." "Look, I'm sorry, but the highway was a parking lot and I..." He dumped his feet to the ground and waved his hands at her. "Please. You don't have to explain. Anyone who works as many hours as you do is entitled to be late every morning." "Mulder, I'm not late every morning." Although even Scully had to admit she was late a lot of mornings. He smiled thinly. "Did you get my message?" Aha. Ammunition at last. "Which one?" She eyed him coolly, dropping her bags to the ground and settling gingerly in one of his least grungy guest chairs. "Uh..." "The raving lunatic one on Saturday night which proved you have even less of a life than I do," she continued, "or the one this morning?" He didn't even flinch. "Let's start with the one this morning." "Yes?" "I thought maybe you'd missed it because you'd already left to get here bright and early." She ignored the sarcasm. "No. Actually, I was still asleep. So was Lance, my lover." That had an impact. Mulder's eyes narrowed. "Lance?" He leaned towards her over the desk. "You have got to be kidding." "He's Swedish." She winced: now where the hell had that come from? It was too late. Mulder actually laughed. "You know, Scully, if you're gonna make up Swedish lovers, you'd be better off naming them Bjorn." "Not every Swede is called Bjorn, Mulder," she said stiffly, but she knew she'd lost the advantage. "I know. I spent the weekend with Lance's sister, Mathilda." Scully gave in and chuckled. "You waltzed a lot, I bet." "For hours." He grinned at her. "Help yourself to some coffee." She glanced over at the pot. "There's none left." "Feel absolutely free to make some." She sighed and got up. "Asshole," she muttered. "Excuse me?" "I said of course, your Lordship." "That's what I thought you said." Scully didn't actually mind making the coffee. At least that way she knew it would be fit for human consumption. "So what's this about? Your message only said I should come prepared to leave for a week." She could hear Mulder stirring behind her. "Well, I've got good news and bad news, Scully." She turned around. "The good news is you're going on a cruise." She gaped at him. He smiled. "The bad news is I'm going with you." CONTINUED IN PART THREE -------- CRUISE (3/12) by Madeleine Partous email: partous@total.net "Feedback both pro and con is deeply appreciated." DISCLAIMER AND SUMMERY IN PART ONE Scully thought it might be a good idea if she shut her mouth, which was hanging wide open. "A cruise?" Really. Mulder was getting far too much enjoyment out of this. "Yep. The New Westerdam. Very chi-chi, from what I understand." "And this is happening when?" "We're flying to New Orleans this afternoon. The ship leaves for the Caribbean at six." Scully scowled at him. "New Orleans isn't on the ocean." He grinned. "The Mississippi, darlin'. Right to the Gulf of Mexico. You must've aced those geography classes in high school." She rolled her eyes and sank in a chair as the coffeemaker began to hiss and spit. "Forgive me, O great one. I was too busy getting straight A's in everything else." "That certainly explains the way you navigate when we're driving." "You know, Mulder, that statement would really wound me if it wasn't coming from a man who can't change a lightbulb." He smirked. "It's the basis of psychology, Scully. You can't change a lightbulb. It has to want to change itself." "That joke is older than your hairstyle." "Who's joking? Anyway, so are you." As she bit down on the urge to retort "that's what you are, what I am," Scully decided she'd had enough of this juvenile nonsense. "So what's the excuse for the trip?" Scully caught him gazing at her affectionately as he stood up. It wasn't the first time, and much as she hated to admit it, it was a look she liked. That mushball thing. Of course, he always got rid of it the second he realized she'd seen it. Which she wasn't in a position to object to since she did the same thing all the time herself. "Murder, my dear." "Okay, so I'm listening." Mulder hit the switch on the projector. Scully was suddenly alarmed to discover she was actually looking forward to the slide show. God. When had that started to happen? A life. Get one, girl. Now. "In the last two years, 15 people have met mysterious deaths on Dutch-American's five prestigious ships." "Mysterious how?" "I know what you're thinking, Scully. Most of the passengers on these cruises are middle-aged or elderly, and it does happen that some of them expire of natural causes along the way. But it's actually rare." The screen flared to life as Mulder cycled through a few generic promo shots of ship exteriors and interiors, dining rooms, spas, poolside views. You'd think from looking at these pictures that no one above the age of 30 was allowed on board. "Why in God's name do you have these PR slides anyway?" Mulder shrugged. "I wanted to get a sense of the layout. All five ships are virtually identical." "You still haven't answered my question, Mulder. How were the deaths mysterious?" "They were all violent. At least to a point. And none of the victims had serious health problems. For one thing, most of them were fairly young, relatively speaking." He flicked through snapshots and obituary notices of men and women, most of them in their 40s and 50s, although Scully noted at least three who were considerably older. "What kind of violent deaths are we talking about here, Mulder?" He sat down. "That's what's interesting. Usually, a serial killer has a set pattern, an MO. It's rare for him to deviate from it significantly. The method is usually crucial to the satisfaction he gets from the act." Scully grimaced. "Were the victims sexually assaulted?" "No. Which may also explain why there's no consistency in sex, appearance or age. As you know, that's another commonality with serial killings. Most victims resemble each other in some way." "So what you're saying is that these aren't serial killings." Mulder shook his head excitedly. "No, that's not what I'm saying at all. I'm convinced they are, Scully. It's just that they don't fit the standard psychological profile." Scully sighed and rose to pour herself a cup of coffee. "Want some?" He smiled at her. "Sure." "Help yourself." She sat down again. Mulder chuckled and got up. "You are a vengeful, mean-spirited woman, Scully." "And proud of it. Get yourself a bimbo if you want your coffee poured." She watched, fascinated, as he dumped spoon after spoon of sugar in his cup. She didn't think she'd ever get used to seeing him do it. He went back to his chair carefully, blowing on the hot liquid and muttering expletives as it sloshed down the sides of the cup. Idiot. She smiled despite herself. "The deaths, Mulder?" "Yeah. Four strangulations, two slit throats, three overdoses of prescription medications -- these ones are more problematic since it's impossible to rule out suicide entirely, although according to family none of the victims was depressed or in dire straits -- two cases of suffocation with pillows, and three drownings." "Overboard?" Mulder nodded. "In each drowning case, it took some time for the crew and relatives to realize the individual had disappeared." "Photographs?" "Unfortunately, Dutch-American's desire to hush the incidents so as not to alarm passengers means that no one recorded the crime scenes. They'd pretty well cleaned everything up by the time the ship docked. A captain's prerogative, Scully, especially when these things take place on international waters with no local jurisdiction in effect. All I've got are autopsy reports and pictures." He handed her a thick file. Scully glanced through the sheaths of paper quickly. She looked up at him. "How could any one person dispatch so many people over two years, Mulder? Who cruises that much?" "As it turns out, a lot of people do, Scully. You'd be surprised. Apparently, we're hanging out with the wrong crowd." "Since when is two a crowd, Mulder?" He gave her his best ha-ha sneer. "And that's precisely what convinces me that one person is responsible. Most of the ships sail simultaneously. When these deaths occurred on one ship -- and they always came in pairs, Scully, except once where there were three in one 14-day trip -- the others reported no incidents." "Two deaths per trip, Mulder?" "Except that one time." "If you're right, that means the killer took seven cruises." "Exactly." "In two years." "Not too shabby, huh?" "If you call setting sail to kill people a vacation, Mulder." "Hey. To each his idea of leisure." "So when was the last one?" "A couple of months ago. The Noordansk." "Which isn't the ship we're taking." "Nope. Not much point. The killer switches each time and I'm gambling that the New Westerdam's due for an encore. Two of the others are docked, one's in the Mediterranean -- no murders have taken place outside the Caribbean -- and the Noordansk just went through it." "It's still possible that the murders are unrelated, Mulder, based on the lack of a pattern. Or that there's more than one killer working in tandem." He looked at her. "Yeah, I've noticed you're keen on the 'killers working in tandem' theory, Scully. Unfortunately, it almost never happens." He actually sounded impatient. She bristled at him. "It makes more sense than the idea that one person's hopping from ship to ship and killing random people in dissimilar ways." Mulder shook his head. "Not that dissimilar. There's been 5 methods so far, each of which was used more than once. I think there's a pattern here, Scully. I'm just not sure what it is yet." She said nothing for a moment. The truth of the matter was that this was prime Mulder territory. She'd seen him catch brilliant psychotic killers, deciphering patterns where no one could see them, and it was the one area where his colleagues showed him absolute respect. Hell, his unorthodox analyses had saved her life more than once. Pfaster. The chicken people. The lobotomist. Scully shuddered. She knew full well that this was his field of expertise and had been so long before the X-Files. Speaking of which. "So what's the X-File, Mulder?" He studied her before smiling. Apparently, she'd let him see that she was going to grant him the benefit of the doubt on this one. "Well, in a way, that's the best part. Word has spread that the ships are haunted." "What?" "Yep. Dutch-American's freaking out because people are cancelling trips right, left and centre. There's a story circulating about the ghost of some Dutch shipbuilder who died on the job and is now exacting revenge on the company." Scully stared at him incredulously. "You're kidding." "Cross my heart, Scully." "And I take it that you don't believe it for once?" He stood up and stretched. "Nope. Even though it would be easier than trying to figure out how a single human being could've done all of it." Scully groaned. "You're outrageous, you know that?" "So I'm told." "You're asking me to believe one of two impossible theories." "Before breakfast, Scully." He grinned. "Charming. You're really pushing it this time." He leaned over her and pat her shoulder. She caught his familiar smell for a moment, his morning clean slightly salty Mulder scent. "Look on the bright side. Maybe it'll be a ghost after all and you can just go on not believing any of it." Scully suddenly felt a profound sympathy for homicidal maniacs everywhere. CONTINUED IN PART FOUR -------- CRUISE (4/12) by Madeleine Partous email: partous@total.net "Feedback both pro and con is deeply appreciated." DISCLAIMER, SUMMARY AND INTRO IN PART ONE WASHINGTON INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT MONDAY, 12:58 PM By 1 pm they were sitting on a direct flight to Louisiana. Scully flew a lot. More than she wanted to. She still didn't like it much. This time the flight was booked solid. A 757, built in the days when no engineer cared about personal space. Three tiny seats on each side of the aisle. Mulder's long frame was crammed against the window -- Scully absolutely refused to sit next to windows -- while a man who'd had one too many Po Boy was bulging over her from the aisle seat. Fortunately, he was asleep within minutes, but not before he'd got a few good leers in. Scully found herself leaning in against her partner simply because it was the lesser of two evils. Mulder seemed rather to relish her discomfort. He lowered his headphones and gazed at her. "If I put my arm around your shoulder we'd both have a lot more space, Scully." "I'm a doctor, Mulder. You can tell me. What drugs are you taking?" He was unfazed. "God, you're right. Someone must've slipped me something. Everyone knows girls have cooties." He feigned a shudder. She leaned against him more, out of spite. It didn't have quite the desired effect. He mumbled something and shifted a little so she could settle against him more comfortably. Scully could feel the strong thud of his heart through his jacket. It was ludicrously comforting. She looked up at him, suddenly suspicious. His eyes were opaque. "Hi, there." She sighed and moved back a bit. "Don't go, Scully. Consider the alternative." He wagged his chin at their snoring roomie. "Maybe I'm ready for a window seat, Mulder." He shook his head vehemently. "Nuh-uh. I ain't sittin' next to that guy. He drools." She looked over quickly. It was true. She sighed again and nestled against Mulder once more. The lesser of two evils. His slow, steady heartbeat lulled her into a kind of pleasant doze until they reached New Orleans. NEW ORLEANS INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT MONDAY, 4:30 PM Scully had a feeling that Mulder had awakened her with a murmur and his lips against her ear, but she'd been too groggy to be sure. She could also have sworn that his arms were wrapped around her, a theory she could only back up by the fact that her clothes and even her skin smelled like him, but by the time she'd emerged from her haze he'd already been dragging their carry-on from the overhead bin. She'd squinted up at him. "Mulder, did..." He'd dropped her overnight bag in her lap with a whump, knocking the breath out of her. "C'mon, Scully. We've got less than an hour to catch the ship." He'd studiously avoided her eye, but Scully thought she'd caught the ghost of a smile on his lips as he made his way towards the front of the plane, leaving her to lug her bag down the aisle. Bastard. The huge man from the seat next to hers had stood against the bulkhead, giving her an appreciative look. "Ya know, honey" he drawled, "Yor boyfriend seems to like ya well enough but I ain't shore he appreciates you like you deserve." "You're not kidding," she muttered. All in all, it seemed wiser not to correct him. As the cab crawled through rush-hour traffic, Scully gazed at the city through the swimming heat. Suddenly she started and looked over at her partner. She'd been meaning to bring this up before. "Mulder." "Hmm?" He was staring out the window. "You know, Scully," he said absently, "I've never been here before." "Neither have I. Mulder..." "It's sad, you know. It's such a great town by all accounts. I wish we had a couple days to look around." "So do I. But Mulder..." "I mean, it's Halloween. Imagine: Halloween in New Orleans. It's gotta be outrageous." "I'm sure it is, Mulder, but..." He turned to look at her. "You can drink alcohol on the streets here, did you know that?" "You don't drink. Anyway..." "I do too. I drink sometimes. And women dance naked in the windows. Just like Amsterdam. Can you believe that?" "That's disgusting, Mulder. The point is..." "And the music, Scully. We're here in the America's jazz heartland and we can't even experience it for one evening. You like jazz, don't you?" "I like it fine. Except..." "Well, what is it, Scully? Spit it out, for God's sake." She expelled a sharp breath and punched his arm. Hard. "Ow." He batted his eyelashes at her and rubbed his bicep. "Don't play the victim, Mulder. I'm not buying it." "So what is it?" "You're seasick. Remember?" He stopped moving and stared at her. "I'm not seasick right now," he said weakly, but it was clear he'd forgotten all about it. Scully smiled. "You will be." "That's so nasty." But he looked genuinely terrified. Hah. Finally. He was always so smug about flying. She shrugged. "So charter a private jet and circle over the boat." "Oh, ha *ha*." The look on his face finally made her relent. "Fortunately for your sake, I didn't forget." "What d'you mean?" "Well, the fact is most of these cruises are designed to cause as little discomfort to passengers as possible. The itineraries, the ships themselves... Still, I brought a powerful intravenous anti-nausea drug just in case." If she hadn't seen it with her own eyes, Scully wouldn't have believed Mulder could get any paler. "Intravenous?" His voice was barely a whisper. Scully shrugged. "Only a doctor can administer it, Mulder. Consider yourself lucky." Mulder hated shots. In fact, the last time he'd had one while he was actually conscious, he'd fainted. She'd been there. It was a little secret they shared. Rather like her abject dread of spiders, which for some reason he never mocked despite the fact that once she'd actually climbed up his body and wrapped herself around his neck to get away from one. A big one. A huge black hairy one. Well. Maybe not that big. But it looked enormous on the white tile floor of the Baton Rouge ME's autopsy room. Scully barely repressed a shudder just thinking about it. He'd held her with one arm and stomped it with his foot while she'd babbled in his ear, but he'd said nothing at all as he deposited her back on the ground and bowed a little. "Just call me the Fearless Spider Killer. At your service." And unbelievably, that was all he'd said. Mulder could be surprising sometimes. Especially since she knew he hated killing spiders and almost always tried to set them free outdoors. "They're great, Scully. They eat flies. Flies are disgusting shit-eating disease-infested vermin." As it turned out, Mulder hated flies. She'd never heard of that one before, but phobias were always bizarre. Now all he said was: "Can't I wear a patch, Scully?" "They don't work." "So why do they sell them?" "Because." "Because why?" "I don't know, Mulder. Because they work in mild cases. They won't work for you." "Are you sure?" "Yes. And even if I wasn't, you can't get a shot for two weeks after removing a patch." Mulder's face lit up. "Sounds perfect." "Except the shot definitely works. It'll get rid of the worst seasickness within six hours. And you only need to have it if you actually get seasick, which means no unnecessary side effects." "Like what kind of side effects?" "Like vomiting." "What's the point of an anti-nausea device that makes you vomit, Scully?" She shrugged. "Exactly." He looked crestfallen. "Are you sure?" "Positive." Mulder sighed and leaned back against the seat as he rubbed a hand over his eyes. Scully tried not to sound gleeful. It would've been mean-spirited. "Don't worry, Mulder," she cooed, patting his knee. "You may not even need it." "You're enjoying this, Scully." "I am not." "You are." "Well, maybe a little." He made a strangled sound somewhere between a groan and a chortle. "You're an evil woman, Scully." "Hey. I always say do what you're good at." Mulder shook his head wearily. "One of these days, Alice..." PORT OF NEW ORLEANS MONDAY, 5:10 PM FBI membership had its privileges. Their IDs had them skirting the long lineup through Immigration; within minutes, they'd passed through the security check and were headed for the gangplank. Scully stopped in her tracks and gawked. God. It was like a movie from the '40s. The New Westerdam was big, but by today's standards it looked like a real ship instead of a floating hotel. The prow tapered elegantly to a no-nonsense point; she could see the warm rich woods of the deck which lay in the shadow of squat vaguely ominous lifeboats. Round portholes dotted the blackness of the ship's flank like precise, empty staring eyes. Scully shivered and she wasn't sure why. "Remind me, Scully. What's starboard again?" "The right side. Just remember: port is left -- same number of letters." "Right." He tugged on her arm and they resumed their way towards the staircase. "The bow, Scully?" "The bow is front, or forward, the stern is back, or aft." He mumbled to himself. "Navy brats." "Excuse me?" "Nothing." She was going to retort something when she looked up to see a crisp white-clad man striding towards them along the pier. Scully glanced at the braids on his arm. First officer. "Agent Scully. Agent Mulder." His words were caught by the wind and almost whisked away. She reached for the proffered hand and shook it briskly. "Sir." He nodded and turned to Mulder. "Hey." Her partner smiled laconically. The other man appraised him coolly. "Welcome to the New Westerdam." "Thanks." Scully cleared her throat. The officer was extremely... well, extremely officer-looking. And handsome. Tall, breathtakingly blond, not quite as tall as Mulder but just as lean. His name tag said "T. Hagenbrendt." From his accent, she surmised he was probably Dutch. Big surprise. His straight back and square shoulders betrayed years of service at sea. Mulder, on the other hand, was definitely slouching. She gazed at him. Funny this faintly rebellious stance he assumed in front of any real or perceived authority. "You know why we're here, sir," she said. The first officer nodded again. "The captain has requested me to meet you in order..." He paused. "Yeah?" Mulder actually sounded interested. Hagenbrendt coughed delicately. "In order to reiterate the importance of discretion in this matter." Mulder smiled widely. "Ah." "As you can well understand, it is essential that this investigation should not alarm the paying passengers." "Of course." Mulder kept smiling. "Already we have suffered as a result of these... unfortunate events." "I can imagine." The officer gazed at Mulder. "Yes. Well, it goes without saying that Dutch-American wants this resolved as quickly..." He paused again. "...and as seamlessly as possible." "Quite understandable," Mulder agreed amiably. "So. I would ask that you try as much as possible to be discreet." "Well, as it happens, Agent Scully and I are the very soul of discretion, sir." Scully barely resisted the urge to kick him in the shin. "Ah, good. I knew we would understand one another." Mulder nodded and smiled even more widely. "I know I speak for the entire United States of America when I say that we as representatives of the government want to cooperate in solving this... unpleasantness as seamlessly as humanly possible." Oh, God. Fortunately, the sarcasm was completely lost on Hagenbrendt, who grabbed Mulder's hand and pumped it enthusiastically. "Good. Good." Scully rolled her eyes. It was gonna be a long trip. "I will now show you to your quarters." Mulder saluted sharply, to the officer's obvious delight. "Ay ay, sir!" The poor man. She felt sorry for him already. He'd sailed the seven seas, but he'd never met a Mulder. Her partner turned to her and smiled as he gallantly shouldered her bag. Something he almost only ever did when handsome men were around. "Come on, Gilligan. The Minnow awaits." "I beg your pardon?" The officer looked back over his shoulder as he led them up the gangplank. "A private joke, sir. Cultural reference." "Ah. Yes. American humour. Very interesting." Scully followed the two men and prayed she'd make it. CONTINUED IN PART 5 -------- Cruise (5/12) by Madeleine Partous email: partous@total.net "Feedback both pro and con is deeply appreciated." THE NEW WESTERDAM MONDAY, 5:40 PM Hagenbrendt led them down through a confusing maze of stairways, landings, corridors and alcoves with a kind of indifferent ease that led Scully to wonder whether he wasn't subconsciously trying to lose them along the way. She couldn't exactly blame him. They hurried to keep up with the officer, who obviously had more important things to worry about, but she did get a glimpse of shops and luxurious lounges and statues of cherubs writhing in Dionystic rapture and even an exercise room where a few overachievers were already running on treadmills despite the fact they hadn't left dock yet. It should be easy to find their way back, Scully thought wryly. There was only one place to go -- up. Their cabins, it became increasingly clear, were in the bowels of the ship. "Mulder," she hissed, grabbing his arm. "Yeah?" "Are we gonna have to sleep with the crew?" He stopped for a second and smirked at her lasciviously. "Oooo, Scully. I'm sure they'll be relieved to see a woman. As for me..." "Oh, shut up. You know what I mean." He shrugged and kept walking. "What do you want me to say? We're not paying for the cabins. And besides, we're working, remember?" "Well, I'm sure whatever hellhole this guy leads us to will be a step up from your usual choice of accommodations," she muttered. "All you do is hurt me." She sighed. "You okay with that bag, Mulder?" "Actually..." "Good. Although I'm sure Hagenbrendt would take it off your hands in a jiffy. He looks like a gentleman." He snorted. "Looks can be deceiving, Scully." She jumped as Mulder suddenly yelped. Hagenbrendt had stopped dead in the middle of the corridor and her partner had almost got to know him better than he probably wanted to. "What is it, sir?" The tall officer turned to them. Scully studied his face -- it was pale and pinched. "Did you hear that?" Mulder threw a glance at her. "What?" "A voice." The officer swallowed, his Adam's apple bobbing over the high white collar of his uniform. "What kind of voice?" "Unhappy. Angry." Hagenbrendt took a deep breath and straightened. "You hear anything, Scully?" She shook her head. But there was definitely a strange atmosphere in the corridor. A heaviness of some kind. "There's just..." Mulder was looking at her, his eyes unusually bright. "Do you feel it?" It was a whisper. She caught his gaze and nodded slowly. Her partner turned back to the officer. "Anyone else down here?" "No. This is the last guest level." He hesitated. "No one else is booked on this deck; we have unfortunately not sailed at full capacity since... the troubles." Mulder nodded. "And this deck is part of the problem?" Hagenbrendt shrugged a little defensively. "It's where certain sightings were made. Foolishness, really. Hysteria." The first officer didn't look like he meant it. Scully understood. Seafaring men were a superstitious bunch. Even her rational father, so level-headed about most things, would often regale his kids with hair-raising tales of ghostly visitations in the Pacific. The funny thing was, he'd often looked more wide-eyed than they did. William Scully always wore the same socks when he set sail, and her mother had told her how he never left on assignment without her wedding ring on a chain around his neck. "For your sake," he'd said. And he'd never explained it. And for some reason, this reminded her of another thing her mother had told her, about how Mulder had worn Scully's cross around his own neck the whole time she'd vanished. For the second time that day, she shivered. Hagenbrendt recovered quickly and was obviously disinclined to discuss the matter further. In fact the heaviness dissipated so fast that Scully wondered whether she'd felt anything at all. "You have been assigned the first seating for dinner," the officer said. Lovely. It was a lot like being in the actual navy. "What time?" she asked as he handed her a card key. "6:15. Captain Jameson will be joining you tonight to brief you." Mulder pursed his lips. "Nice of him." It was clear from the first officer's brisk manner that he felt they should direct any other questions to his boss. "Yes. The captain rarely dines with passengers." "Then we're doubly honoured," Mulder said sweetly. This time the look Hagenbrendt threw her partner was definitely suspicious. "Yes. Well. I'm sure I will see you later. Good luck." They gazed at his back as he strode down the corridor. Mulder turned to her. "He's cute, don't you think?" "Didn't think he was your type." "I don't have a type. I like all kinds of people. Tall, short..." he paused for a moment, "...blonds, brunettes, even red- heads in a pinch." She smiled. "Believe me, Mulder, if you could actually discern the colour red, you'd never settle for anything else." His eyes widened but he recovered quickly. "Well, from what I understand, natural red-heads are rare, Scully. The advantage with someone like me is I can't tell the difference." He stooped a little, flashing a wicked grin. "Even au naturel." She leaned back. "That would probably reassure anyone who's got something to hide, Mulder." The conversation was taking an uncomfortable turn. "Besides," he added, dropping her bag at her feet, "I was referring to the fact that you might find him attractive. I mean, I may not have a type, but I suspect you do." "You don't know anything about my tastes in men." He shrugged and pushed his card key into the door next to hers. "Ahhh, come on. He's Aryan all the way. A perfect candidate to father a long healthy line of straight-shouldered firm- chinned uber-Scullys." She wished she had something handy to throw at him. Mulder smiled. "It's almost six. Meet you out here in 10?" She said nothing and watched as the door swung shut behind him. By the time she emerged from her cabin to find Mulder lounging against the wall, they were already late. He'd changed his suit -- their luggage had already been waiting for them inside the staterooms. It was one of his nicer Armani's. Where the hell did Mulder get the money for Armani? She'd never had the nerve to ask. Quite frankly, she was afraid to hear the answer, but she suspected it had something to do with Frohike's shadier connections. Still. The fact was that Mulder paid more attention to his appearance than the average male agent. The women, of course, had no choice; they were expected to dress well. Yet another double standard. But as men went, Mulder's hair was always in place and his shirts were always crisp and his suits were, well... Armani. It was one of the reasons rumours flew around the office that he was gay. Scully knew it and she suspected Mulder did too. To his credit, he didn't seem to care. Sexual preference based on clothes and personal grooming was an appalling stereotype, one that was unfair to straight and gay men alike. And of course, most people didn't know about Mulder's resolutely heterosexual video library. In any case he looked great, and his muted tie was actually tasteful for a change. "Sorry," she muttered. "I had to wash." "Believe me, I could hear your shower running. You can hear everything in this place." His eyes lingered on her appreciatively. This too was a look she'd come to recognize. And it was true she was wearing a smart little outfit, a deep blue skirt and blouse combo that hung exactly right. She knew it. "The engines aren't running yet, Mulder. They'll mask the bulk of it." He nodded. "Single bed," he began conversationally as they headed towards the stairway. "Yeah, but there's two of them." "Not much good unless you're planning a slumber party." "Keep in mind the engines will only mask sounds below a certain decibel, Mulder." "I'll remember that. Did you notice we're a little below the water line?" They rounded the corner to the main landing. Ornate stairs rose up, but none went down; it was obvious this was as far below as passengers were expected to go. "Yes. Means we can't open the portholes." "I like it. It's like being in an aquarium. There's a poetic justice to it: the fish can look in and we humans are the trapped ones." He said "hu-*mohns*," like a Ferengi. She didn't want to tell him that he'd be closing the curtains on his aquarium before too long. Already, she could feel the rumble of the engines through the floor; the ship was preparing to leave New Orleans. With Mulder's stomach, the sight of waves careening wildly against the glass would be enough to send him staggering to the toilet in a jiffy. Actually, an inside cabin would be much better for him. Less motion. She didn't want to bring it up. So to speak. For some reason, she didn't want him that far away down there. The dining room on Main Deck was already in full swing as Mulder ushered her through the glass doors. At least half the passengers were undoubtedly on the Promenade watching the shore dwindle; through the room's yawning expanse of picture windows, the banks of the Mississippi were beginning to twinkle in the gathering dusk. They were led to a small table where a man in uniform sat, bristling with gold braids. He rose as they approached. "Captain Jameson, I presume." Mulder smiled as he reached out a hand. "Mr. Mulder." Waiters hovered around the table, trying to achieve a delicate balance between obsequiousness and invisibility. They'd be getting flawless service tonight, that much was certain. The captain looked up and smiled at her, clasping her hand with a firm grip. "Dr. Scully. We're grateful for your help." American. Without a doubt. Strapping. Noble, driven, if a little bland. And the look on his face? Well. Gratifying, quite honestly. He obviously liked what he saw. Mulder cleared his throat. He suddenly swooped in front of a waiter before Jameson could make a move in her direction and pulled out a chair. "Scully?" She stared at him and sat down gingerly, half expecting him to yank it away at the last moment. Instead he tucked it gently under her bottom and laid a hand on her shoulder for a second before sitting down himself. A proprietal hand. If Scully hadn't known better, she would have described it as frankly territorial. Actually, she thought with a touch of wonder, maybe she didn't know better. She gazed at both men, who were now regarding each other coolly over an elaborate floral arrangement. Great. Just great. What the hell was this all about? Was she supposed to sit there like some kind of prize awaiting the outcome of a Viking skirmish? She didn't think so. Men. Christ. "So, Captain," she said evenly as she dropped her napkin in her lap. "Why are we here, exactly?" Jameson turned to look at her. His eyes locked with hers for a moment before dropping down almost demurely. "Well, Dr. Scully." His mouth twisted in a wry smile. "It would seem that we're haunted." CONTINUED IN PART 6 -------- CRUISE (6/12) by Madeleine Partous email: partous@total.net "Feedback both pro and con is deeply appreciated." DISCLAIMER AND SUMMARY IN PART ONE The captain was still smiling, but the look on his face made Scully suspect he wasn't altogether joking. "So we've heard, sir. Do you believe a ghost is responsible?" Jameson shrugged. "We sailors tend to keep an open mind, Dr. Scully. There's something about the sea that makes you suspend your disbelief." Mulder fingered the menu. "It's an elemental force. Untamed, somehow." The captain nodded, looking at Mulder with new respect. "Exactly. The sea does pretty much what it wants, and we're just along for the ride. It's funny, you know, because in many ways I find flying much less mysterious." Scully stared at him. "How do you mean?" "Well, you take off and then you fly over the clouds where nothing much ever happens. You more or less know how the plane works, why and how you're up there, what you should expect. Planes can avoid bad weather, for the most part. They cover miles in minutes so they can always find another place to land. When you're sailing, you can't control nature at all. Squalls can come up out of nowhere and then you're just in the thick of it, hanging on for dear life until it's over." He took a breath and laughed. "I'm not trying to alarm you here. Of course we've got sophisticated equipment which allows us to avoid the really bad stuff. In fact, there hasn't been a serious disaster on a cruise since the Titanic, and I don't have to tell you how many ships are out there these days. This is the best place to be in a hurricane, for example; if you're in a hotel in Miami, you can't just outrun the thing. For the most part we can." "But the sea's still largely an unknown." Mulder. "Yes. That's why so many legends still persist around it. Mythical monsters, the Bermuda Triangle, ghost ships in the night." He paused. "It's lonely out here, Mr. Mulder. Sometimes you're hundreds of miles from the nearest coastline with no other ship in sight. And we're dependant on a medium we can't control -- the water. Without it we wouldn't stay afloat, but as you say we haven't really even begun to understand it." Scully studied Mulder's face. It was clear from his expression that he'd decided he liked Captain Jameson after all. "That's very interesting, sir." The captain looked almost rueful. "You'll have to forgive me. Dr. Scully here will tell you that career sailors are a bit of a strange bunch." He turned to her. "Your father was a distinguished navy man himself, wasn't he?" "It was his life." Jameson nodded. "It always is -- at least when you're born with the bug." A steward suddenly appeared and whispered in his ear. The captain looked up. "We should order. The second service starts at 8:30 sharp." Scully leaned over to her partner. "You shouldn't eat too much tonight," she said softly. "But I'm starving, Scully." He looked at her. "Seasick, Mr. Mulder?" Jameson smiled broadly. "Uh..." "Dr. Scully's right, you know. The Gulf of Mexico is the only rough water we're likely to see, although it looks good at this point. We'll be out of it by morning, but you might want to be careful until you get your sea legs." "I think my sea legs were amputated at birth," he muttered. He sighed resignedly and ordered a salad. Two soups arrived in a flurry of efficient movement. Mulder looked at hers longingly. "What is it?" Scully poked at it. "Prawns and leeks, I think." "Mmmmm. Sounds yummy." He was giving her his best puppy-dog face. She patted his hand sympathetically. "Have some bread, Mulder. It's good stuff, solid nutrients; won't slosh around down there when you're trying to sleep." Just the image was enough to make him turn a little green around the gills. Scully thought she'd better distract him. She stood against the railing as the lights of New Orleans began to fade in the growing darkness. It was a view she'd seen many times. It was beginning to feel comforting to her. Each time she boarded these ships, all of which were familiar now -- although she'd also begun to notice subtle differences in decor and even in the sounds they made as they creaked and moaned in the night -- she felt as though she was coming home. Home is where the heart is. She giggled. She'd found her heart here. This is where she felt that her power had a focus. She had a mission. Her mission was to save the lonely ones. The ones who were lonely and refused to believe it. She was the one who could help them find themselves at last. Being alone wasn't the problem. She was the living proof of that. The problem came when you suffered because of it, and when your own blindness made you oblivious to it. So many lonely people. Many of whom spent their lives in the midst of others they considered to be loved ones. Fools. But gentle, misguided fools nonetheless. She would help them as she'd helped so many already. And even though it was difficult, even though she had to be careful, so careful, because one slip would lead those who didn't understand to lock her away where her talents would help no one, she would continue her work. In fact, she had already chosen the ones she would free. She always found them immediately. On this trip, there were two. A man. A man in his 60s with a shrewish wife. She'd seen him walk up the stairs, beaten, downtrodden, as his wife nagged him shrilly about the lineups and the expense and the kind of people on cruises these days and it had better be worth it because her friends would be asking. She couldn't help the wife. She was already living in a self- imposed hell. But him. He was kind and he meant well, and he'd been forced to move to hell because of her. She would release him. A woman. A woman in her 30s. Younger than any she'd chosen before. Attractive, her hair like fire, tiny but strong. She'd felt her strength as she'd brushed by her on a landing. Yet this strength hid a deep, deep pain. Loss. Frustration. Anger. She was with a man, a tall handsome man, but one who didn't understand. Not wholly. He was a good man and he cared about her. A brother, maybe -- not a lover. No. Not a brother either. There was sex in the equation. She could feel it. The potential of it. She couldn't quite grasp the part which this man played in her life. She felt there was a connection between the two, but it had nothing to do with the woman's pain. Her pain was all that mattered. She sensed that the woman had suffered much as she had suffered herself. Loss. Frustration. Anger. For the first time since she'd set out on her mission, she felt she'd met a kindred spirit. She would release her. Scully turned to Jameson. "So, Captain. You're saying these recent events are the result of a vengeful ghost?" He wiped his mouth and shook his head, throwing a glance at her partner, who was dejectedly applying about a pound of butter to a roll. "I'm not saying that, Dr. Scully, although God knows there's a lot of people who think it's true. As I'm sure you know, it's not clear in each instance that the... event in question was due to an act of violence. Suicide can't be ruled out in a number of cases." This discretion thing was beginning to get on her nerves, although she could well appreciate that other guests would be alarmed by their conversation if they knew the topic was murder. She nodded. "Still, it's odd to find so many similar... uh, events in a short period of time. This kind of thing is Mulder's forte, and I'm sure he can explain much better than I could how there seems to be a pattern of sorts here." Mulder looked up at her and smiled warmly. Obviously, she'd pleased him. But then he so rarely heard supportive words from any source. Including her. Well. To be fair she often questioned his theories to his face, but she was sure he knew by now that she always stood by him staunchly in front of everyone else. Didn't he? Yet he always seemed surprised when she agreed with him in public. Probably because she rarely seemed to do it otherwise. "I'd like to hear the ghost story first, actually," he said. "If you don't mind, Captain." Jameson shrugged. "There's not much to say. As I understand it, the word among Dutch-American crew is that Hans Vanmeer, a gifted shipbuilder who designed and supervised the construction of all five ships -- this one is the flagship, by the way -- is responsible for the... events. He died almost three years ago, shortly before all this started happening." "Was it a mysterious or violent death?" "No, although that's where the tall tales begin. In actual fact, he died peacefully in his sleep at the age of 84. Of course, people are now saying he was disgruntled, that he'd been fired after some kind of scandal involving an accident which killed seven builders during the construction of the Noordansk, and that he never forgave the company." "And none of these stories are true?" The captain waved over a wine steward and ordered a bottle. Scully was no wine expert but she recognized the name; it was definitely a French selection that would've set both Mulder and her back a few days' pay. Her partner looked at her beseechingly. "I wouldn't, Mulder." "One glass? Just one small glass?" He looked so forlorn that she laughed out loud. "You're a big boy. Do what you want." "One glass." He looked outrageously happy and it was all she could do not to laugh again. Mulder could be very adorable sometimes. No question about it. "It'll probably even help you relax." "I'm not tense, Scully. In fact, I feel great." She didn't have the heart to tell him that was probably because they were presently sailing the Mississippi, one of the world's calmest waters. It would be a different story in a couple of hours. "Captain?" Mulder repeated his question. "Do any of these stories have a basis in fact?" "Well, there was definitely an accident and it's true that seven workers were killed. Several more were injured, if I remember correctly. But there was nothing particularly mysterious about it -- a scaffolding collapsed, as I recall." "And as far as you know, no one blamed Vanmeer?" "No. He had nothing to do with it. At that point he was already semi-retired, and if anything, it was the workers' own fault. The scaffolding was badly balanced and it just fell apart, something to that effect. I certainly don't remember anything more being made of it at the time and as far as I know Vanmeer retired quietly with all the appropriate honours." The bottle of wine arrived and Jameson tasted it, smacking his lips appreciatively. Obviously a man who liked good things. And obviously a highly competent sailor, judging from the fact that he'd made his rank at his age. Scully didn't know how long he'd been captain, but he couldn't possibly be older than 45. She wondered absently if he was single. "So why would stories circulate around this man if he was so patently innocent?" "I didn't say he was completely innocent, Mr. Mulder. Vanmeer was renowned far and wide for his abilities, but also for his temper and his occasionally unreasonable demands. He threatened the company many times over what he felt was unjust treatment. Even before he died, and before anything happened on the ships, it was rumoured that he'd put a curse on Dutch-American, something about how he'd built the company with his own hands and he'd make sure it didn't last long without him." Scully stared at him. "Really?" "These are good ships, Dr. Scully. Some of the most solid and most graceful ever built. That's the reason they're so prestigious, actually. They're beautiful, particularly nowadays when the waves are being taken over by squat behemoths which as far as I'm concerned might as well have been built on land for all they've got in common with the sea. But that's a personal opinion, of course." He smiled at her. She sipped a little wine and he grinned as her eyes widened. "Not bad, huh?" "Not bad at all, sir. Thank you." It was the best wine she'd ever tasted. Judging by Mulder's rapturous expression, he agreed with her. "Vanmeer's eccentricities were tolerated precisely because he was so talented. But he was the last of his breed. The sad thing is that these five ships are outdated, frankly. Dutch- American actually owns a couple of other large cruise lines, lines which specialize in exactly the kind of ships I've just described. That's where the money is. There's no future in little elegant ships like this one; we can't even charge what it costs to keep them going, really, and they've been allowed to continue because they're recognized the world over." "The prestige thing," Mulder said. "Exactly. They don't have the topnotch facilities that passengers clamour for these days: there's a limited spa, a tiny casino, no disco at all; you might say they're ships for people who love to sail." "In other words, these ships are on their last sea leg." Jameson laughed. "If you like. This one, the oldest, will be retired next year. The others will follow gradually. Dutch- American's new flagship, which is being built in Amsterdam as we speak, is much bigger. It'll have all the bells and whistles and you won't feel it move at all -- which is something you'll be able to appreciate, Mr. Mulder. I, for one, will miss the rolling of the sea." Scully gazed at the captain. "So you're saying these are ghost ships after all." "They will be, Dr. Scully. They're headed that way." Jameson picked up his fork. "But that doesn't mean I believe a ghost is responsible for what's going on here." Mulder stared sadly at his salad. "Then you agree there's a living being behind it?" "Or more than one, Agent Mulder. I don't see how a single individual could keep reappearing on these ships without attracting attention." Scully threw a quick glance at her partner. He was examining the leaves on his plate with what could only be described as utter contempt. Jameson continued. "It's not just about recognition. In fact, it's conceivable someone could keep showing up without being recognized. After all, we're talking about five different ships here, five different crews. It's just that you need a passport to sail these seas, and there's no correlation between passenger names and all of the cruises where these events have taken place." Mulder looked up. "None at all?" Scully knew he already knew this. They'd talked about it that morning in DC. In all the cruises in question, as many as 14 passenger names reappeared twice. Fewer still reappeared three times. Two names were common to four cruises. None at all past that. Incidents had occurred on seven different trips. If one person was responsible, it meant he'd found a way to change his identity at least three times. "Well," Jameson admitted, "some passengers show up more than once, although I'm sure you know that already." "Yes. But anyone who can find a way to change his or her name once on a legal document can probably do it again." The captain studied her partner. "True. But doesn't it seem more likely that more than one person's involved here?" Scully opened her mouth and shut it again. Mulder gave her a look and spread his hands. "Maybe. Or one very determined person, Captain. One person with a mission." CONTINUED IN PART SEVEN From partous@total.net Mon Dec 23 11:39:58 1996 CRUISE (7/12) by Madeleine Partous email: partous@total.net "Feedback both pro and con is deeply appreciated." DISCLAIMER AND SUMMARY IN PART ONE *** SPOILER ALERT: 4th SEASON, ESP. TFWID AND HERRENVOLK. *** THE NEW WESTERDAM MONDAY, 8:25 PM Mulder had somehow managed to detract the captain from any further questions about his own theories. Scully wondered why, but he avoided her questioning looks. He'd been good, though, refusing dessert and even coffee at the end of the meal. He'd be grateful for it later, she thought ruefully. Poor old Mulder. In the midst of all this luxury, it was sad that he was plagued with such a poor excuse for a stomach. This was the kind of lifestyle people with his income, theirs, actually, could only dream of. Assuming, of course, it was also the kind of thing you'd always wanted. Which probably wasn't his case. Or hers, for that matter. When all was said and done, she suspected both she and Mulder were more the jeans, sweatshirt and hot dog types. Although she'd never given him much opportunity to find this out about her. As the waiters began to flutter around them agitatedly, Jameson finally smiled and folded his napkin. "Well. That's it. They're dying to get us out of here." Mulder smiled and started to rise. "Mr. Mulder. You and Dr. Scully should feel free to ask for me whenever you feel it's necessary." He looked at her. "I'll do everything in my power to help, but I have a job to do." Scully nodded. In other words, Captain Jameson would cooperate, but he wanted it to be clear that he wouldn't chaperon their efforts. Fair enough. Mulder shook the captain's hand warmly. Judging from Jameson's equally heartfelt handshake, Scully was relieved to see that her partner's admiration was apparently mutual. A nice change, all told. But then again, career sailors were a bit of a strange bunch. It suddenly struck her that Mulder rarely got along with other men at all. He was suspicious and defensive around them -- often for good reason, as it turned out. Mulder was more of a woman's man, all told. He liked them. He understood them. Hell, he even thought like they did. All in all, he related to them better than she did herself. Where men were concerned, Mulder generally liked nerds and wackos. And philosophers. He'd always had a soft spot for Deep Throat, for example, despite the fact it would have been sheer lunacy to trust him completely. Skinner, for his part, was precisely the kind of man Mulder distrusted by default, but the AD had won his respect and affection the hard way. By putting himself on the line for his agent over and over again. His agents. She knew that part of the reason Mulder trusted the AD, at least to a point, was because the older man had crossed that line altogether for Scully's sake on numerous occasions. And Mulder had returned the favour more than once, most particularly when he'd saved Skinner's butt during that bizarre prostitute case. Something had changed between the two of them at that point. The AD was both warmer and more considerate to her partner now, but there was also something more distant about him, almost as though he was vaguely... embarrassed. Yet he'd left them alone, going so far as to close the door on the two of them when Mulder had returned from God only knew where, shaking, in shock, stinking of gasoline, to stand at his mother's bedside. Skinner had understood intuitively that she and Mulder had come to a crossroads in their relationship -- and he'd let them have their moment alone. Mulder had cried in front of her for the first time that night, cried for his mother, cried for himself and the weight of his anguish. He'd let her in. For the first time. His mother had later recovered mysteriously from what Scully had secretly believed was a terminal coma. Believed. Christ. She'd *known* it. And as Mulder had stood and then fallen before her, tears coursing down his cheeks as he leaned against her with all his defenses down, at last, in front of the empty shell that had been his mother, Scully realized, maybe not for the first time but fully, for once, that she loved this man as though he were an extension of everything she held dear, of everything she was. Love? Love couldn't begin to do justice to the depth of emotion she'd felt for this bruised and battered man at that moment. She'd been suffused by it, by her connection to him, by the link between them that ran so deep despite their own particular natures which made it so difficult for them to draw closer together. It had nothing to do with sex. And that was what made the entire thing so unusual, so precious somehow. But since their journey through his past lives, a journey which she hadn't yet allowed herself to process or even to judge, she wondered whether maybe, just maybe, the fathomless love she'd felt for him that time had something to do with the fact that they'd been together forever. That according to Mulder's hypnotic regression, they'd been together since the very beginning. Always. Friends for a thousand years. It wasn't something Scully could bear to dwell on for too long. Her mind rebelled against it -- as it should. And yet... even though she hated to admit it, it felt conceivable somehow. More than conceivable. It felt right. According to what he'd revealed, it had culminated with the fact that she'd been his father in her last life. His father. Unbelievable. Outrageous. And yet... If it was true, she'd been killed by Nazis in her last life in front of his very eyes. Which would go a long way towards explaining why he always went ballistic when her life was in danger in this one. He was so standoffish the rest of the time. As you are, Dana. As you always are. Scully didn't know what she thought about it all. She'd seen it. She'd witnessed her partner's experience with her own eyes; she'd found the photograph of the man he'd said he was. But she was afraid. She was afraid to believe. And now as they prepared to leave the dining room, a ship's captain, a man they didn't know, a man who had no idea what they'd been through, smiled a little and said: "I hope you don't mind where you're staying. I thought that in light of what you do, you might find it interesting to spend your nights on the deck where most of the psychic phenomena have been reported." She looked up, distracted. Mulder was still smiling. "Sounds good to me. And no one else is staying on that deck?" "No. In fact, a quarter of the cabins on the ship are empty this time out, thanks to all the publicity we've received of late. I'm told Dutch-American was featured on 'Sightings' a couple of months ago. The most haunted ships on earth. Something like that." Scully gaped. "You're kidding." "I'm afraid not." "But I thought hauntings drew curious crowds, sir." Jameson shrugged. "As long as no actual deaths are involved, Mr. Mulder." Her partner pursed his lips. "That must've really pissed off your PR people." The captain chuckled "You're not kidding. We're still reeling from it. But I'm sure it'll blow over -- with your help. All we need at this point is a down-to-earth explanation. Which, I trust, is why you're here." With that Jameson reached for Scully's hand and held it for a moment before swivelling sharply and heading down the aisle towards the glass doors. Mulder turned to her. "Down to earth, Scully? The poor bastard. He obviously doesn't know me." They wandered out onto the Promenade deck just as the whistle blew, signalling their departure from the mouth of the Mississippi. She glanced at Mulder. They were headed into the Gulf of Mexico, and already she could feel the increased tension of the waves as they slapped against the bow. He leaned against the railing and looked out at the brilliant froth raised by the ship as it cut through water which was lit surreally by the spotlights that dotted the deck. The smell of salt hung heavy and Scully could just make out the beginning of a sultry, fragrant breeze beneath the snap of the cool fall air they were quickly leaving behind. She watched her partner as he gazed at the water, the wind whipping his suit, wrapping it around him, accentuating the lean determination of his form. The ship bucked suddenly as they cut through a particularly earnest wave, and she caught his look of panic as she braced herself instinctively against the deck, her feet parting and standing firm as though it were second nature. Scully walked towards him and lay a hand against his back. "The trick is not to fight it, Mulder." He looked down at her face, his own drawn and white in the glare of the overhead light. "What?" "You get seasick because you keep searching for a centre in the midst of it all." He said nothing as he gazed at her, and she knew that for some reason her voice had become hypnotic, rhythmic, echoing the motion of the sea. "Let go, Mulder. Just follow the rhythm of the waves. Let them head where they will and then go along for the ride." There was something in his eyes that smoldered as she spoke, cutting through her own hypnosis and reminding her where she was. *Who* she was. And with whom. She shook her head once and laughed. "It's true, you know. People get seasick because they resist." "How do you mean?" It was a whisper, but his eyes never left her face. His intensity was beginning to make her nervous, although she suspected she'd started it. She wasn't sure how. "It's a perfectly understandable human reaction. Everything's moving, so you want to enforce stability on it. But you can't control it; the most you can do is try to force stability on yourself. And that's what causes the nausea, Mulder. The conflict. You can't be still in the middle of motion." He said nothing, but she felt him lean closer to her. She breathed in the salt air. "Or maybe you can. It's funny." "What is?" Scully shrugged. "Maybe the only way to gain stillness is to surrender to the sea. To become part of its movement. Then it's as if there's no movement at all." Mulder looked out over the water for a moment before turning back to her. The ship tilted and she couldn't see his eyes, but she bit down a gasp as he reached out and drew a finger down her cheek. "Is that how it feels to you, Scully? Are you able to surrender to it?" She nodded, enthralled by the play of light on his face. "That's amazing. I'm not sure I ever could." His fingers danced along her lips and she couldn't figure out why she didn't back away, except that maybe the swaying of the sea had cast some kind of spell on both of them. A part of her kicked her for fighting it. "Uh, Mulder..." Her hand reached up and stilled his own, drawing it down away from her face. He backed up a little. She could see that she'd broken the spell. "Yeah?" "How do you feel?" She continued to hold his hand until he pulled it gently away and leaned against the railing once again. "Sick, Scully. No surprise." "Really sick?" He shook his head. "No. Just a bit queasy." Scully nodded, her efficiency snapping back into place. "It won't get much worse than this, Mulder. And it'll be over around two, when we enter the Caribbean." She watched his jaw jump as he clenched it. "Yeah." A thought suddenly dawned. "You know, this is the best place for you, actually." He looked at her. "The night air will do wonders." She turned and pointed to a wooden deck chair near the door. Blankets lay heaped nearby. "You should just stay here for awhile. And keep in mind that there's actually a lot less motion lower down, so your room will be fine by the time the water settles." Mulder smiled at her wanly. "You're very sweet." God. "Anyway..." she said hurriedly, "don't forget there's always the shot. If you need it." He groaned and turned back towards the railing. "God, Scully. Did you have to mention it?" For some reason, that did it. Reality clicked down firmly around her once again. She was back. Safe and sound. "Come on, Mulder. By the time you regained consciousness, you'd be fine for the rest of the trip." He lay his head on his arms. His voice was muffled. "I'd like to avoid it if I possibly can, Scully." "I don't know why. Would you rather suffer?" "Yes." She shrugged. "It's up to you." Scully stared at his bowed back for a moment. What the hell was wrong with her? "Mulder?" He rocked a little against the rail. She walked up to him and leaned up against him, looking down at his buried face as she lay a hand on his neck. He turned his head towards her suspiciously. "What now?" "I should get some work done, study the victim files. I'll miss you down there, but your staying up here is a good idea. And don't worry about waking me up if you need anything." He lay his cheek against his arm and studied her. "I appreciate it, Scully." "And, um..." "Yeah?" "I really will miss you." "Really?" "Honest." He straightened a little. "Are you scared down there?" She shook her head vehemently and stood up. "No. No, not at all, for God's sake. I'm fine. It's just that it'll be good to know you're next door when you do come down." He looked at her. "When you're feeling better. Only when you're feeling better, Mulder. Otherwise I'll worry and then neither of us will get any sleep." He nodded. He looked better already. "I'll be down soon, Scully," he said softly. "Okay. When you're feeling better." "When I'm feeling better." He smiled at her. Scully walked towards the door. As she swung it open, she heard a faint chuckle. "Don't let the ghosts bite your toes, Dr. Scully." She stiffened and let the door slam shut behind her. CONTINUED IN PART 8 -------- CRUISE (8/12) by Madeleine Partous email: partous@total.net "Feedback both pro and con is deeply appreciated." THE NEW WESTERDAM MONDAY, 10:02 PM She watched as the red-headed woman left her friend and went inside. Had they quarrelled? It didn't feel that way. She'd kept a discreet distance, and really it was quite a coincidence that the two of them had walked out onto the side of the ship where she was sitting. She never killed the first night out. It would be tacky. In any case the best part of the thing was the buildup until the right moment made itself known to her. By the time she struck, her victims were ready. In fact, she was always amazed by their apparent lack of surprise when she made her move at last. Sometimes it even felt as though they'd been waiting for her. Besides, she'd already decided to release the old man first. She liked the Promenade deck at night, when most of the other passengers were either at dinner or watching the first kitschy show of the night. This evening the featured entertainer was the Magnificent Michelle and her Performing Cobras. She'd seen her on the Noordansk. Appalling. Ridiculous. The funny thing was that people seemed to lap this kind of thing up. For a lot of people, cruising apparently caused the suspension of all good taste. You wouldn't pay a buck to see this kind of faux burlesque in the real world. She'd already seen all the entertainers booked this time around -- most seemed to make the circuit of the ships -- and she figured it had to be a disappointing life for them, everything considered. Surely no rational modern woman had ever sat at a school desk as a child, staring out the window dreamily and imagining herself as a snake charmer on a cruise ship. Surely these things just happened to people when nothing else worked out. Well. Maybe not. Maybe Michelle really had a thing for snakes. She'd have to find a way to ask her one of these days. This kind of thing always made her curious. Meanwhile, the man and the woman had walked out onto the deck, oblivious of everything except the sea -- and each other, she'd thought. Strange. She still couldn't put her finger on the nature of their relationship. She liked them, though. By default. They seemed misplaced on this ship, just as she did. She knew why she sailed. She wondered why they did. And now the man was standing against the rail alone, his eyes fixed on the sea. No question about it -- he was a good-looking guy. He was tall, slim and dark with a strong nose and sensitive mobile lips which glistened a little as he pursed them thoughtfully. Jewish? Possibly. Nicely dressed. She wasn't certain, but she suspected he was wearing Armani. The two of them made a handsome couple. If they were a couple. It seemed likely they were -- why cruise otherwise, she thought with a grin. And yet... She shook her head. This one also had pain. Deep, deep pain. Now that the woman was gone, she could feel it. But it was different, somehow. Almost as though he'd got used to dealing with it. Almost as if it was inescapably weaved into the fabric of who he was. That was it. His pain was part of what defined him. Perhaps this fact had made him blind to what his red-headed companion was going through. Yet she felt intuitively that he wasn't blind to it. Not blind at all. There was just... nothing he could do. They were linked by it. Her eyes widened. That was the connection she felt between them. That and... something else. Something much more profound that was difficult to read. Fascinating. She got up and strolled up to him, leaning against the rail where the red-headed woman had stood a few minutes earlier. "Nice night." The man started and looked at her. "Yes. Yes it is." Hmm. Very good-looking indeed. Strong but gentle, vulnerable somehow. She didn't think she'd imagined the interest with which he studied her for a moment before looking out at the horizon again. Even more fascinating. "I love the sea," she said quietly. He grimaced a little. "Yeah, well... you might say I've got a love/hate relationship with it." She nodded. "Seasick, huh?" "A little." "This is about as bad as it gets." She chuckled. "Usually." He turned to her. "You sound like an expert." His eyes ran over her features quickly, dipping down to her body for a brief moment before he raised them to hers again. She smiled. She knew only too well how good she looked. She was tall, only a few inches shorter than he was, actually; her hair was long, lustrous and black as the night. And her body -- well, she'd never received any complaints. Meanwhile, while the look he'd given her didn't by any means preclude his being involved, it did make it less likely. And apparently he wasn't gay either. "Your wife?" She lowered his eyes demurely. "I'm not married." Now there was no mistaking the flirtatious tone in his voice. She feigned surprise. "But I saw you with a woman a few minutes ago..." "A friend." This time she met his eyes. "A good friend?" He nodded with a small smile. "The best." "Now you're toying with me, Mr. Seasick." He shrugged and laughed. "I'm not. It's true. She's my best friend." "But a friend nonetheless." "The best." It was her turn to laugh. "I see." "What about you?" "No, no -- that's not the way it works." He looked at her quizzically. "As the woman, I get to ask the questions." "Ah. Well. That's convenient." "It can be." "So I guess there's not much point in asking what your name is?" She shook her head. "None at all." He nodded, smiling. His eyes never left her face. "Then you can't possibly expect me to tell you mine." "I didn't ask, did I?" "No. No, you did not." She smiled and began to walk away. "Maybe we can continue this charming conversation another night." "Do you sleep all day?" She turned back to him. "I keep to myself, Mr. Seasick. The other passengers tend to bore me." He'd pulled away from the glare of the spotlight and his face was in shadows, but if she knew her stuff, she'd piqued him. My. This cruise was getting better all the time. She wondered whether he'd be able to keep her interested. Well. They'd just have to see, wouldn't they? She fluttered a few fingers at him and continued walking. If she'd turned back once more, she'd have found him staring at her with an odd speculative look. It had been a strange moment on the deck with Mulder and frankly Scully was glad it was over. Since the regression session, there was something about her partner that made her vaguely uncomfortable. Something that disarmed her somehow. Scully preferred being armed. Just packing a gun made her feel a lot better most of the time. A bit literal as metaphors went, but there you were. Mulder had told her he remembered only bits and pieces of what he'd seen during his past-life regression, but she'd been there. Hell. She probably remembered more of the session than he did. And the fact that he now believed he'd known her forever put her at a disadvantage, in a way. She'd only known him for four years. Apparently, he'd known her for hundreds. She'd always been there. Her. And the woman they'd called Melissa. Bizarre coincidence, that name. She'd lost her sister. Mulder had lost his sister. Worse still, he'd lost his soul mate. Again. Melissa. Scully was troubled by the fact that during the session, Mulder had said only: "Souls mate eternal." But he'd added that souls come back together, to learn, to grow. Which souls? Melissa was in all his lives; he'd confirmed it later. A lover. But Scully had also been in all his lives. A friend. It made sense. So why this thing between them? Why this heat which she'd felt since the very beginning? They'd always been friends. What were they supposed to do in this lifetime? To learn, to grow. How? Scully shook her head wearily and rubbed her eyes. When she'd seen Mulder in her sleep that time, the time when everyone thought he'd died, he'd come to tell her he was coming back to her, to continue his work with her. She still believed that what she'd dreamed that night was real, real in a way she couldn't begin to explain or even justify. Mulder had told her a little about his out-of-body experiences when he'd hovered between life and death in that Navajo cave. If Melissa was his soul mate, why hadn't he seen her then? Why hadn't he realized then and there that he had to find her at any cost? He hadn't gone to Melissa. He'd come to her. Unless, of course, it had just been a dream. Or there was no such thing as a past life. Which, after all, was the logical explanation. And yet... Enough. She was getting a headache, but more importantly she was starting to bore herself. Scully grabbed the remote and jabbed it angrily at the tiny television above the bed. As the sounds of a documentary on shipbuilding in Holland filled the room, she turned to the files stacked on the desk and opened the first one. It felt like hours later when she finally raised her head, but her travel alarm clock said 11:30. God. This case was a killer. No pun intended. She sighed. Scully could find no sign of any link between the victims; in fact, from what she could see, there was no commonality whatsoever except that certain methods were used more than once. Assuming some of them were methods at all; based on what she could see, it was virtually impossible to rule out suicide in the case of both the overdoses and the drownings, which accounted for six out of the 15 deaths. On the other hand, that left nine definite murders. A lot. And it was true that nine murders on five ships in two years smacked of more than simple coincidence. What were the odds that nine different people would suddenly get the urge to kill on a cruise? She could see the logic of Mulder's point of view here. But although she knew she couldn't hold a candle to his expertise in this area, the fact remained that she'd never come across a serial killer who didn't have a very specific MO. If this was really the work of one killer, though, he was definitely someone with a unique agenda. A loud thump yanked her out of her reverie. She sat and listened. There it was again. In the corridor. It seemed to be coming closer to her door, as though... As though what? She strained to listen. As though someone was walking down the corridor and pounding on the wall as he went. Strange. And not very polite at this time of night. Scully rose and walked towards her door. Whoever it was, she'd let him have it. CONTINUED IN PART 9 -------- CRUISE (9/12) by Madeleine Partous email: partous@total.net "Feedback both pro and con is deeply appreciated." DISCLAIMER AND SUMMARY IN PART ONE Scully opened the door and inhaled sharply as the cold air hit. God. It was freezing. It took a moment for it to register. And there was something else. She suddenly realized that she could see her breath as it billowed from her mouth. Christ. She squinted up at the corridor lights. The lights. They seemed perfectly normal, except... They were dulled somehow, diluted, as though they were having to cut through a veil of some kind. The corridor was sheathed in an odd kind of half glow. Another thump, muted somehow. Her first instinct was to go back inside, but she fought it; her breath curled around her head as she turned slowly and looked down the hallway. Nothing. Nothing except a dent in the wall which filled in as she stared at it. The walls were metal, of course, coated in a kind of thin, mousey beige carpet. The lower decks weren't privy to wood panelling, she noted almost coolly as some part of her mind grappled for normalcy. Thump. Another indentation, sharp and round like a folded hand, which slowly vanished as she looked at it. Closer. It was closer to her than the last one had been. She struggled against paralysis as a third thump came a few feet from where she stood. A frigid rush of air reached her, raising goosebumps on her arms under her jacket. And then terror. Blind, animal terror which seized her by the throat and left her gasping, breathless. Something in her snapped, releasing her as she backed up and slammed the door shut, pawing at the lock, turning it and then scrabbling at the chain, dropping it twice before she finally slammed it into place. The next thump sang against her hands and she leapt back, almost falling, as she stared in horror at the unmistakable mark of a folded fist against the thin metal of the door. She grabbed the desk and leaned against it, waiting. Nothing. The metal slowly buckled back until the door was flat again and then she heard another thump a little further down the hall. Scully moaned; she could feel her pulse hammering in her throat. She sank into the chair, finally acknowledging the shaking in her legs. Another thump, further still. It was over. Wasn't it? Something told her it was over. She moaned again and dropped her head in her hands. When the gentle rap came moments later, she thought she'd lose her mind. "Oh God, no..." Christ. Her teeth were actually chattering. She knew enough to recognize shock when she saw it. Snap out of it, Dana. Now. The rapping came again, a little louder this time. When she finally stood, she was holding her gun and couldn't remember for the life of her how it got there. "Scully?" The voice was low, tentative, but God -- so beautiful, so familiar. Mulder. Relief flooded through her so fast and so completely that she felt the absurd prickle of tears against her eyes. None of that. She shook her head vehemently. Scully took a deep breath and walked calmly to the door, much more calmly, in fact, than she felt. All her resolve dropped when she opened the door and saw him standing there; his face when he met her eyes was a rueful combination of concern, defiance and... what? She suspected he was responding to the fear, the resolute haughtiness and the vulnerability he could read in her own. "Scully?" What the hell. She was tired and dammit, she was still frightened. She shuddered and leaned against him, her arms reaching under his to wrap themselves around his waist. She felt his own arms snake around her to pull her closer, one hand settling lightly on the back of her head, and she let him rock her for a moment as she registered the pressure of his face against her hair. Against her better judgement, she squeezed him tightly and gave in to the comfort. "It's okay. It's all right." A murmur against her ear. This too felt familiar, but she couldn't quite pinpoint why. His body shifted and she was suddenly closer still. Jesus. Too close. She pulled back slightly and he felt it; she felt his spine stiffen as he drew back a little. They were both suddenly awkward. Scully reluctantly withdrew her arms and pushed against him lightly, standing straight and quickly tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ear. She looked up. He was staring down at her mutely. "Scully? What is it?" She cleared her throat nervously and looked away. "I'm fine, Mulder." He actually guffawed. "Yeah, yeah. I know you're fine. You're always fine." He leaned against the wall on the other side of the narrow corridor and eyed her ironically. He'd recovered nicely. "So why the warm welcome, Scully? Is that a gun in your hand or are you just happy to see me?" God. It was true. She was still clutching her gun. "Uh..." He nodded, smirking. "Wanna tell me what happened?" And then he was suddenly next to her, grasping her arm, prying her gun from her fingers. She'd only vaguely sensed that her legs were giving away. Fuck. The thought was foggy. The last thing she wanted was to show this kind of weakness. In front of him. In general. "Mulder..." He half carried, half led her to the bed and sat her down, lowering himself next to her as he brushed hair from her face and raised her chin with a finger. She dimly heard the rattle of her revolver as Mulder laid it on her desk. "What's wrong? Scully, please." She stared at him. Now there was only worry on his face. Scully shook her head. "It's..." "What?" She looked at him again. "Did you see anything when you came down?" "How do you mean?" He was being cautious -- or at least that's how she chose to read it. "Did you feel anything?" Mulder studied her, his eyes roaming over her features. "As a matter of fact..." "Well?" She tried not to sound impatient. "That same thing we felt when we first came down here, Scully. A heaviness of some kind, as though..." "Yes?" He shrugged almost shyly. "You know. As though the hallway was holding its breath." Her lips parted and she felt her eyes grow wide. That was it. That described it exactly. "Yes..." He continued to look at her. "That's why I knocked, Scully. I mean it was late and I thought about it. But there was something freaky about the silence and I just wanted to make sure everything was okay." She nodded, once, and then told him what happened. Mulder leaned back against the headboard of the narrow bed and gazed at her incredulously. "Wow." "Yeah." "And you're not just saying this to make me feel better?" She was outraged. "Mulder, I..." He threw his hands up and laughed. "Okay, okay. But you have to admit this is one of the first times you've acknowledged the possibility of supernatural forces at work in the universe." Scully glared at him. "The first time I've acknowledged it out loud in front of you, you mean." He gaped at her. That would keep him wondering for a while. But God forbid he should let her get the upper hand. "You were really scared, huh?" There was something teasing in his tone, something seductive, as though they were both school kids with a crush on each other. It was infuriating. "Oh, and I suppose you wouldn't be?" she snapped before she could stop herself. Mulder grinned. "I'd've probably soiled myself, actually." He sniffed the air pointedly. "Apparently you're a bigger man than I am, Scully." God. It was all she could do not to slap him upside the head, for once that his head was at her level. But the fact was that her fear seemed to have dissipated completely and she wasn't sure why. Suddenly she remembered his stomach. "How are you feeling?" He seemed startled. "Me?" Scully pointed at his mid-section and said nothing. "Oh. Fine. The water calmed down, just like you said it would." "No nausea?" He shook his head. "Nope. Feel great. A little... spooked, maybe. In light of your story." She glanced at her clock. It was almost 1 am. Jesus. When had that happened? "Lost time, Scully?" He was gazing at her under drooping eyelids as he lolled against the headboard. Great. Now he was reading her mind. His long legs were sprawled out over the bed; she noticed for the first time that he'd somehow managed to park one on either side of her so that she sat pinioned between them, although he'd spread them carefully so that he didn't actually touch her. His hands were folded serenely over his crotch. She almost laughed. "Good night, Mulder." He sat up. "Don't you want to talk about this?" She shook her head and chuckled. "What's there to talk about?" "I don't know. Poltergeists? Unseen spirits? Maybe there's a ghost behind the killings after all." He looked at her earnestly, but she could see the faint light of laughter in his eyes. "You don't believe it for a moment, Mulder." He pulled his leg from around her and sat back up on the side of the bed. "I believe you saw something." "But you believe it's unrelated." He sighed, scrubbed his face with his hands and propped his elbows up on his knees. "Yeah. I think it's a red herring, Scully." She nodded. "Deliberate?" Mulder looked at her. "I don't know. You're the one who saw it." She took a deep breath and leaned back against the wall, her legs dangling over the side of the bed. "I was out there, Mulder, and I'm prepared to swear on a stack of Bibles that I didn't see anyone make the fist marks in the wall." "But you definitely saw the fist marks." She stared at him. "I saw them, Mulder." He was looking at her over his shoulder as he leaned forward, his feet shuffling against the floor. "I believe you." "So?" Mulder stood suddenly and stretched. She gazed at his taut form, wincing as she heard his joints crack. "So nothing. So I believe you. I think there's something supernatural going on here, Scully. I just don't think it's got anything to do with the killings." All at once Scully realized she was extremely sleepy. She yawned and opened her eyes again just in time to see him throw another affectionate look at her. "Tell me this, Scully. Did you feel threatened by what happened?" It was getting difficult to concentrate. "How do you mean?" "I mean did you feel this thing was out to get you?" She blinked. "No, actually." It was true. "It didn't feel personal at all." Mulder said nothing. Scully looked up at him, suddenly alert. "In fact, it was as though I just happened to be around when it happened." That was exactly right. Except... Her mind rebelled. "But I was terrified, Mulder." "Of course. Who wouldn't be?" She almost smiled. That was pure logic. He caught the play of her lips and smiled for her, leaning towards her for an instant and running a finger against her hair, tucking it behind her ear almost playfully before straightening once again. "I'll be right next door, Scully. Knock on the wall if you need me." She nodded. Interesting choice of words. She growled at herself and blamed the exhaustion. As he opened the door, he turned to her once more just as she stifled another yawn. "What you said up there. About missing me." It was her turn to stretch, but she felt her heart thump suddenly for no apparent reason. It hadn't been a lie, not exactly. There was something about this deck that made her uncomfortable, lonely somehow. "That was a little out of character for you, Dr. Scully." His hand hovered over the doorknob as he waited. Right. All she needed in her life was an even smugger Mulder. "As it happens, I just thought it might take your mind off yakking up supper." She saw his teeth flash in the shadows. "As it happens, it did." The door clicked shut softly behind him. CONTINUED IN PART TEN -------- CRUISE (10a/12) *** NC-17 *** by Madeleine Partous email: partous@total.net "Feedback both pro and con is deeply appreciated." DISCLAIMER AND SUMMARY IN PART ONE *********************************************************** RATED NC-17 FOR SEXUAL REFERENCES. NOT APPROPRIATE FOR YOUNGER READERS. *********************************************************** Thank you for all the lovely mail, folks. I couldn't persist without you all. Sorry about the delay, but I had a little accident which set me back time- wise. Everything's fine, except that all my good intentions about posting regularly have gone down the drain... Thanks for understanding, and for hanging in there. NEW WESTERDAM TUESDAY, 9:27 AM The next day slid by without incident. It was strange, really -- Scully had lain awake in the early morning, thinking that some paranormal event was probably due. She could feel the engines rumble up through the bed. It was comforting, in a strange kind of way, but she wondered whether Mulder found it as soothing as she did. There was also something about the rhythm of the engines that titillated her. She felt oddly restless as she watched the waves slap against the porthole. The engines rumbled and rode through her; by necessity, Scully had long gone past the stage where the thought of pleasuring herself instilled any kind of Catholic guilt in her, but for some reason she hesitated that morning. Maybe it had something to do with the narrowness of the bed -- the stateroom had a nun-like quality to it in any case, thanks in large part to its thin, spartan quality -- but she wasn't sure she relished the idea of moaning and tossing on a bed she knew was scant centimetres from where Mulder lay. That and the fact that the engines would only drown out sounds below a certain decibel. Scully knew from experience that she wasn't exactly quiet where sex was concerned, whether she was alone or in good company. And God only knew the latter hadn't happened for awhile. She felt bashful about it, for some reason, and thought that this time, she'd wait for the shower. Less than an hour later, she stifled her cries and came with the water pouring over and around her, deafening in the tiled silence of the bathroom, both her hands convulsing between her thighs as she leaned against the wall, gasping. As she heard the shower next door sputter and flair into life, she blushed and cursed herself for it; she knew Mulder was there, naked, running long fingers through wet hair, and she'd seen nothing but his face and his body as the orgasm hit. She'd imagined him in her, not for the first time, his cock hard and enormous and driving between her legs, his face contorted, his weight pressing against her, his mouth wet and glistening as he bit on his full lower lip, his head thrown back, dark hair glistening with sweat, the muscles in his neck taut as he came inside her, waves and waves of pleasure, hers, his, as he pounded against her, coming, coming, her climax mingling with his. God. Why him? It had to be because he was the only man she ever saw these days. She really needed to get a life. Scully sighed, soaped between her legs and put the thought of him behind her. They'd met for breakfast and she'd told him her conclusions about the case. "I can't find anything in common between the victims, Mulder. But the fact remains there are at least nine deaths here that are unaccounted for." He bit into a piece of toast and nodded. "Exactly." "What about the crew? Any chance one of them could've done it?" He looked at her as he reached for the peanut butter. "The crew doesn't move around much, Scully. I checked. And besides, it's hard to change your name when you're a foreign employee looking for a transfer." True. "And no one shows up in more than one place?" "Three stewards have been transferred once in the last couple of years. None of the officers. No sailors. It looks like Dutch-American likes to keep its people in place." Scully pursed her lips. It made sense. Many people who cruised were repeat customers. They chose a ship and stuck with it. A lot of that had to do with familiarity -- and the crew was very much a part of that equation. "So," she said, glancing up at him. "See anything suspicious yet?" Mulder winced as coffee sloshed over the cup and onto his fingers. "How d'you mean?" "Well, either the ghost of Vanmeer is having a field day, or someone who's actually alive is doing this. Knowing you, you've been people- watching." He shrugged. "As much as I hate to admit it, Scully, it may well be that the killer's not on this cruise." She stared at him. "Are you saying you're willing to admit you're wrong?" Mulder chuckled and shook his head. "Not wrong. Just... unlucky." "And so?" He gazed at her under a raised brow as he blew the steam off his coffee cup. "And so you may as well have a good time, Scully. Inasmuch as we're stuck here." "We're only stuck here 'til we reach Jamaica tomorrow, Mulder." He laughed. "I see. Are you saying we should take a plane out when we get there?" "If you think the killer's not on board." Mulder shrugged. "It's too early to tell, Scully. We have to hang around and see what happens. Whoever's doing this has a lot of experience by now. I'd be surprised if he or she feels the need to rush into anything." Scully looked at him. "She?" "Why not? You think men have a monopoly on this kind of thing?" "Serial killers are almost invariably men." "Almost." He grinned at her. "There've been exceptions. You know that." "Yes, but usually they do it with a male partner." Mulder nodded. "True. But not always." He smirked and leaned over the table to pat her hand. "Killers working in tandem, huh? It's possible. I still don't think it's likely." "Why not?" He folded his napkin and squinted out the window at the sparkling blue- green Caribbean. "There's something lonely about these crimes, Scully." "Lonely?" "Yeah. I can't quite put my finger on it, but something tells me our man -- or woman -- feels left out of the loop." "So he or she is wreaking vengence on people who aren't?" "Maybe. Or freeing those he or she feels are stuck in it." She stared. "You mean this individual might think he or she's doing the victims a favour?" "Something like that. A dark angel of mercy, Scully. I mean, look at the victims. Ordinary people living ordinary lives." "That applies to almost everyone, Mulder." "Yeah. It's funny -- I just have a feeling about it." Scully put down her cup and studied his face. "You're convinced it's a woman, aren't you?" He looked up, startled. "How can you tell?" She tapped a finger against the table. "I just know." Mulder kept looking at her. "You're right." "A dark angel of mercy, you said. A sort of anti-Florence Nightingale who travels at night, taking people out of what she perceives as their misery." "Yes." "Any proof?" "No." He was still looking at her seriously, but suddenly he smiled. "None at all." Scully shook her head affectionately. "You're a case and a half, Mulder. You know that?" "Yeah, but you love me anyway." She was startled for a moment until she saw the humour around his eyes. "I've stuck around despite the fact you're crazy, haven't I?" He nodded. "Yes, you have. Don't think I underestimate it." Scully breathed. "So what now?" He stood up, grinned and pointed to the glass doors which separated the buffet room from the Lido deck. The sun was already pouring down and a couple of passengers splashed lazily in the tiny pool. "So we go for a swim." CONTINUED IN PART 10B -------- CRUISE (10b/12) by Madeleine Partous email: partous@total.net "Feedback both pro and con is deeply appreciated." SUMMARY AND DISCLAIMER IN PART ONE The pool, it turned out, really was minuscule. But the sun was hot and liquid honey on Scully's skin, the deck chairs were padded and soft and the tangy smell of the sea rolled over her like a memory from childhood. She wasn't entirely sure this was a good idea -- after all, they were supposed to be working, and even if masturbation carried no spectre of guilt for her, slacking off certainly did - - but once she'd stepped out into the sunlight, it was impossible not to go with it. Of course, she'd had to slather on as much SPF as money could buy or she'd be lobster red by lunchtime. Scully sat on a chair, setting down her tote bag with its requisite sunscreen and book and even a few files thrown in for conscience's sake, and lay back in the heat with a satisfied sigh, adjusting her sunglasses against her nose as she nonchalantly hunted for Mulder. He hadn't arrived yet. God. What the hell did he need to do down there? Find the perfect Armani robe? Buff his toenails? Pomade his hair? She snorted and leaned back, surrendering to the sun. She gazed down at the red-headed woman from the overhead deck. Not a great idea, this basking thing. Someone with her complexion should probably stay out of direct sunlight. But the woman was spectacular nonetheless, despite how teensy-weensy she was. Her hair glowed and sparkled in the light. She lay as though she was alone in the world, her white robe barely hiding her lean, curvaceous figure. For the first time, she noticed a small mole over the woman's upper lip. Stunning. And yet... She could feel the woman's aloneness rise through the air like an aura of pain. She could tell the red-headed woman was self-sufficient, proud, defiant even. She could feel her strength, her confidence, her competence. But it wasn't enough. Was it. It was never enough. She could definitely relate. Everyone uses you when you're strong. They suck you dry and leave you with... what? With nothing. With nothing but their need for you. That included the tall, handsome, dark-haired man. He was kind, but he was needy and he used her. They always do. All of them who need you. They can never be filled. They can never be healed. That was the real tragedy. She knew what it was like to be sucked dry by people who could never be satisfied, never be made whole. If she could have believed for a moment that she could save them, she'd have given them everything she had. Everything she was. She'd tried. God knew she'd tried. And the irony was that they meant no harm. They were needy -- that was all. When an animal is dying, it does whatever it needs to do in order to survive. Humanity was dying. It was grasping at straws. Humanity used her -- and it used the red-headed woman lying below her. She wasn't sure how, but she could read the signs. She could recognize a kindred spirit. And she knew that no salvation existed for the killer she had become. Her mission was to free others. To free them from the horror she herself faced every day. The kind ones. The sensitive ones. The ones who were gnawed, swallowed and ultimately digested by the senselessness of it all. Nothing could free her. But she could free them. She would free the red-headed woman in a wordless tribute to the pain they shared. She would release her. Not now. But soon. Right now she had other business to take care of. Scully suspected she'd nodded off when she looked up to find Mulder standing in front of her and blatantly staring. "Hey?" She blinked a few times to scare away sleep. He said nothing. He stood there and looked down at her, his eyes hidden behind aviator Ray-Bans, a towel clutched in his hand. Finally he cleared his throat. "The sun's hot, Scully. You should be careful." She stirred and sat up. "I've got 5000 sunscreen on, Mulder. The guy who sold it to me said that if you put it on a steak, it'll still be raw when you pull it off the barbecue." He pursed his lips and looked away. "Still." "Where you been?" He shrugged a shoulder behind him. "Swimming." She peered over to the pool. "Mulder, if you lay on your back in there, you'd be doing a lap." He smiled. "It's not so bad once you push all the old fogies out of the way." "Mulder..." "Kidding. I'm kidding. They ran like rabbits when they saw me coming." "Must be the purposeful glint in your eye." "Maybe. In any case, it's all a matter of scale. I just did about six million laps in four minutes." "A world record, huh?" He shrugged and sat down beside her. "Yeah. If you use bathtub statistics." She was trying to ignore the fact that he was dripping wet and wearing a fine layer of goosebumps. She was also trying not to look at the form-fitting Speedo bathing suit he had on. It wasn't easy. Mulder leaned back against the chair. She'd seen him dressed scantily before. Hell, she'd even undressed him and put him to bed on several occasions. He normally wore boxers. It made all the difference. Once she'd even seen him naked, under water, but he'd been frozen almost to death and there hadn't been much point in looking under the circumstances. Hypothermia never does much for a man. Now there was nothing even remotely helpless about him. Scully thanked God for the shades she was wearing. As it happened, she suddenly realized he was also staring at her. And he wasn't gazing into her eyes. In fact, she was beginning to feel a little uncomfortable. "Uh... Scully?" "What?" It came out sharper than she'd intended. "You have a mole." She stared at him. "What?" "You have a mole. Right there." Mulder reached over and brushed a finger between her nose and her lip, lingering a little. She tossed her head and he pulled back hastily. "You say that as if I didn't know about it." "I've never seen it before, Scully." "That's because I usually make a concerted effort to hide it, Mulder." He folded his hands over his lap and stared at her, agape. "Why?" This conversation was beginning to get on her nerves. "Because it bugs me." Even through his sunglasses, she could see his incredulousness. "Why?" She stared down at her own hands. "I don't know." "There's got to be a reason, Scully." She grit her teeth. "Because the other kids teased me about it, I suppose." "Really?" "I don't want to talk about it, Mulder." Finally she looked over at him. He was still gazing at her. "It's beautiful." "I'm sorry?" Mulder took a deep breath. "Scully, it's sexy as hell." She gaped at him. "Really?" He shook his head in obvious amazement. "I can't believe you've been plastering the damn thing with makeup all these years." Scully suddenly felt defensive. "Look, Mulder..." "It's incredibly attractive, Scully. Just like the rest of you." He gestured at her body a little weakly, she thought. "Mulder..." He chortled suddenly, groaned and looked away, flailing his arms. "Danger! Danger!" Scully was younger than he was, but she'd seen enough "Lost in Space" reruns to recognize the reference. "Oh, for God's sake..." He sat up abruptly and peeked at her over his glasses. His eyes were lit with laughter and... something else. "Time for another six million laps, Scully. Wanna join me?" "There isn't room for both of us in there." "Mmmm. Too bad. Coulda been cozy." He jumped up and strode towards the shimmering pool. As Scully shook her head and leaned back again, her eye fell on a tall dark feminine shape on the upper deck. As she looked, the figure turned suddenly and vanished into the shadow cast by the smokestack. She felt an odd shudder and wondered what it was. Somebody walking over her grave. Right. She closed her eyes and let the sun have its way with her. CONTINUED IN PART 11 From partous@total.net Mon Dec 23 11:43:36 1996 CRUISE (11/12) by Madeleine Partous email: partous@total.net "Feedback, both pro and con, is deeply appreciated, although repeated threats to my life for not posting faster will only make me feel gleefully sadistic. A promise: It'll all be over by Christmas." DISCLAIMER AND SUMMARY IN PART ONE THE NEW WESTERDAM LIDO DECK TUESDAY, 3:30 PM The day breezed by pleasantly, a slow dance of sun, swimming and indolent ice cream snacks by the pool. As much as Scully hated to admit it, she was enjoying herself. And she was actually relaxing for the first time in a long time. The sultriness of it all seemed to suit her partner well too; he was starting to lounge back unselfconsciously, catlike and lithe in the sunlight, and even though they weren't talking much, there was a seasoned contentment in their silence. Scully couldn't help reflecting on the fact that the two of them really were surprisingly comfortable together when the pressure was off. Of course, that might be because they were also surprisingly comfortable with each other when the pressure was on. She tried to remember when that had started to happen, and suddenly realized the real question was why. Maybe it had something to do with the enforced closeness of their everyday lives. Because of everything they'd seen, they'd probably already talked through a greater range of intimate subjects than most couples did in a lifetime. Funny. And today Mulder had somehow found a way to stick close to her without making it look like he was hovering. Much. It was actually kind of flattering, if a little confusing. Once she thought she caught him growling at a middle-aged man who was gazing at her from a deck chair a few rows away, and she was sure that at one point he deliberately sat right in front of her to ruin the view of a young officer who was looking down at her rather longingly from the command deck. Bizarre. Apparently, she wasn't going to get lucky this time around, at least if Mulder had his druthers. It didn't seem fair -- or particularly appropriate. After all, how many chances did she get? Finally, she looked up at him over a spoonful of chocolate sauce. "Um, Mulder..." He was lounging back in a chair at the poolside table where they'd settled, licking an ice cream cone. There was something fascinating about the way he did it, but for some reason Scully preferred not to dwell on it. "Yeah?" "Don't you have anything to do?" He sat up. "In what sense?" She shrugged. "I mean, you've been sticking around like glue all day. Don't you want to go off on your own a little?" He said nothing and gazed at her. "You know. Work out? Explore? Have a drink? Read a book in the shade?" He kept staring at her as he wrapped his mouth around the now-diminutive scoop of ice cream, sucked it in and then licked his lips. Scully shivered. He leaned over towards her. "Are you trying to get rid of me, Scully?" "No." She shook her head, suddenly nervous although she couldn't imagine why. "Of course not. It's just..." "It's just that I'm cramping your style." She shrugged again, looking away. "Me and my car, huh? That's what we do. We cramp Dr. Scully's enigmatic style." Something had turned. His tone was still light but there was a flash of unmistakable anger in his eyes. Mulder folded his napkin and laid it neatly on the table, depositing the rest of his cone on it before standing. "Hey. Forgive me. The last thing I want to do is get in your way." "Mulder..." He pulled on his sunglasses and picked up his towel. "I understand, Scully. It's a cruise. There's bound to be single guys around. Women too, as it happens. Hell, who knows -- with any luck you might even score an officer. I mean, how often do we get a chance to get laid, right?" She felt a flare of fury. "That's not what I'm talking about." He laughed abruptly. "Oh yes it is, Dr. Scully. At least have the good grace not to lie to my face." Scully felt her face grow cold. "You have absolutely no right to speak to me that way, Mulder. We have a professional relationship and I *will* not..." She slammed a sudden fist against the table and Mulder jumped almost imperceptibly. "...I *will* not allow you to address me in that tone of voice. Is that perfectly clear?" He stood, rocking from foot to foot for a moment. When he spoke at last, his voice was as cold as her own. "Crystal." He turned on his heel and strode to the door, slamming his hand against it so hard that several passengers turned to gaze after him as passed through it and vanished inside. Scully watched the door as it swung gently closed behind him. Jesus. She remembered to breathe. What in God's name had brought all this on? And Christ. Why the hell had she said what she'd said? It was true he was out of line. Big time. No question about it. But still. She'd been chillier than the goddam Titanic's fatal iceberg. A professional relationship. As if that was all they had. Her words had been wounding and she knew it. But still. The son of a bitch. He had no right at all to talk to her that way. None. That much was true. Shit. Scully winced and leaned back. She suddenly realized that some of the other poolside passengers were looking at her surreptitiously, a few of them whispering. It occurred to her that what had just happened must have looked, on the surface, like a lovers' spat. Great. Fucking great. She sighed, stood and for no good reason at all that she could figure, went in search of Mulder. Scully didn't find him. She'd scouted the decks for him, the spa, the lounges, the movie theatre, even the casino. When she knocked on his cabin door and got no answer, she gave up and gave in to her anger. Bastard. Let him stew, for all she cared. Christ. For all she cared, he could jump overboard and swim back to New Orleans. Asshole. She changed into slacks and a tee-shirt, grabbed the case files and her laptop and headed back up to the deck. Once she'd settled into a shady deck chair on the port side, she bent her head over her partner's farcical field report and systematically began to debunk it, jotting quick notes in the margins. Screw him. He was full of shit about this case, as he'd been so many times in the past, and she'd had just about enough with pretending he wasn't. At last she opened her laptop and began to type. THE NEW WESTERDAM DINING ROOM TUESDAY, 6:40 PM Mulder appeared at dinner. In a tux. Scully still hadn't quite exorcised her anger, but exposing the gaping holes in his theory had put her in a marginally better mood. She hadn't expected to see him, though, and she was both relieved and put out when she looked up and saw him stroll towards their table. The worst part was that he looked great. Stunning, in fact. "Where the hell have you been?" she snapped when he reached his seat. She squinted at him. His expression actually seemed a little rueful. God. Even apologetic? "Glad to see you too, Scully." He grinned and pushed a hand through his hair. She tried not to laugh. He'd gelled it or moussed it or something, and thanks to his hand it now stuck straight up. He looked like a goddam Little Rascal. She snorted as he sat and then she leaned towards him, running her fingers briskly, efficiently, through his hair for a second until it behaved again. He eyed her warily and smiled. Jesus. Why was it so hard to stay mad at him? Then he leaned over and shyly poked the flower centrepiece over until it slid to a stop right in front of her. "Peace, Scully?" "Honestly. You could've brought me some from somewhere else, Mulder." He shrugged. "Believe me, I looked. You can't buy 'em anywhere on board." For some reason, the thought of Mulder in search of a floral peace offering on a ship was incredibly endearing. "Chocolates?" "I figured you'd had enough ice cream and you'd just yell at me if you gained weight." Scully nodded, smirking. "You have an answer for everything, don't you?" "No." "That's an answer, Mulder." "It isn't. It's just a statement." "See? You absolutely never let me have the last word." "You almost always get the last word, Scully. For one thing, you virtually always write the final reports." "See? See? There you go again." He said nothing. She burst out laughing and he grinned. The centrepiece vanished, the soups arrived and she raised an eyebrow at him. "I feel fine, Scully. Numero uno. Haven't been remotely nauseous since yesterday. And they're expecting smooth sailing all night long." She nodded as he plunged his spoon into the consomme. "So where'd you go, Mulder?" He glanced at her. "I figured you needed to be alone." "I looked everywhere for you." He stopped in mid sip. "Really?" "You overreacted to what I said." Mulder shrugged. "It's possible." He continued hurriedly as she opened her mouth to retort. "In any case, I thought I'd just take a look below deck, which is where a lot of paranormal activity has been reported." Scully decided to let it pass. "I thought our deck was the hotspot." "Only in terms of passenger accounts. Members of the crew on all five ships have been complaining of incidents in the engine rooms and around their quarters since the first murder." "Not before?" "Nope. That's the strange part. Apparently, the incidents began around the time of the first suspicious death." She looked at him. "You went down there without me." He choked suddenly and coughed into his napkin as she studied him coolly. "Scully, take it from me: you'd've hated it. Narrow corridors, no air, a bunch of sailors who haven't seen a woman in months. It's smelly, crowded and creepy as hell. Quite frankly it's appalling down there -- and from what I understand Dutch- American boasts some of the best conditions of any cruise line." "Hmm." "One Javanese cabin steward told me he wept tears of joy when he got a job on this ship. He said in the one he'd been on before, he'd had to share a room the size of ours with five other guys. Can you believe that?" Scully kept looking at him. This was another of her partner's most endearing traits: his recurring stunned disbelief at the inhumanity of man. "Cruise ships are notorious for the way the staff and crew are treated, Mulder. Why do you think everyone we see who's not a passenger, an entertainer or an officer is either Indonesian or Filipino? It's the only way an organization like this one can afford to maintain this kind of service these days. It's true that the waiters and cabin stewards make huge tips and many of them go back home with a lot of cash after a couple of years, but it's still essentially barbaric." He gazed at her, apparently spellbound. "These guys are indentured servants, Mulder. That about sums it up. And that's at least one of the reasons I don't like cruises." "How many other reasons do you have for not liking cruises, Scully?" His voice was soft. "Dozens." "Do you hate everything about cruises, Scully?" She glared at him suspiciously; his eyes danced with mischief and light. "More and more all the time, Mulder." He laughed outright and lay a quick hand on hers before drawing back. "Anyway, I didn't see or sense anything down there that was more than usually disconcerting under the circumstances, but I did hear a lot of stories, most of which have to do with the kind of thing you experienced last night." "Really?" "Yeah. Thumps in the night, fists in the walls, clanks and loud noises in the engine room when no one's there. Almost everyone I talked to reported the same sense of dread or heaviness that you and I felt on our deck, along with extreme dips in temperature, as you described. A few insisted they've heard a male voice too, incoherent angry shouts similar to what Hagenbrendt seemed to hear yesterday." "We didn't hear it." "True. But it's well documented that some people are more sensitive to paranormal phenomenon than others, Scully. Speaking of which, one guy confirmed that the resident psychic on "Sightings" did in fact come aboard and later declared that the New Westerdam, along with her four sister ships, were the most haunted ships on earth. The psychic claims Vanmeer is responsible for all of it -- in fact he insists he had a chat with him while he was here -- and that the ghost informed him the activity would continue until the ships are permanently retired." "How fabulous for them both." "Isn't it?" Scully poked at the salad which an invisible waiter had whisked in front of her. "So what do you believe now, Mulder?" For some reason, she didn't want to talk about the extremely pragmatic conclusions she'd come to that afternoon during the height of her rage. He looked at her for a moment. "I don't know, Scully. Frankly, I'm at a loss with this one." "Is that why you're so quick to get mad?" She fixed him steadily. This time he met her gaze. "I suppose it's one reason." She said nothing. "I'm not used to sitting around waiting for things to happen, Scully. Maybe it's getting to me." She nodded. "To us both." "Funny how we're not comfortable with inactivity, isn't it? Everyone else seems to get along with it just fine." "Maybe we've forgotten how to be like everyone else." She sighed. "Sometimes I feel like we've been living in a bad movie for so long that we don't remember how to turn off the projector." She looked up to find his eyes still on her. "When did all of it get so... melodramatic?" "I think it was around the time we discovered that life really is like a bad movie, Scully." "Our lives. Our lives, Mulder." And then she found a way to change the subject for the rest of the meal. Mulder stood for the second time that day while Scully still sat at the table, but this time there was no anger in it. "I think I'm gonna go for a walk on deck." She looked up at him. "Want me to come?" He shook his head. "I think you're right, Scully. You need a chance to hang out without my hovering around and crowding you." She wondered why she felt an odd stab of disappointment. And... what? Jealousy? Jesus. If it was true, they were both further gone than she'd thought. It was irrational in light of their relationship. In light of the way their relationship had to be. She smiled wanly. And then he leaned over and dragged a thumb on a spot over her upper lip. He pulled his hand away and wiped it on the lining of his jacket before she could lash out at him. "Believe me, Scully -- you don't want to hide that mole." She reached up instinctively and touched it before glaring at him. His eyes were black, unreadable. "Look, Mulder..." "Scully, I'm telling you. It's very seductive. Leave it alone." "I told you before I'm not looking for anything." He nodded and grinned. "I know, I know. But why disguise any of your charms when there's an off-chance Mister Right's strolling the Promenade?" She shut her mouth and said nothing. He waved and sauntered towards the dining room doors. THE NEW WESTERDAM PROMENADE DECK TUESDAY, 8:50 PM She loved the sea at night. In many ways, it was the only thing she lived for. Well. She tittered. The killing came first, after all. But other than that, the sea at night was all that mattered. She was sitting in her usual chair, half in shadows, as he stepped through the door and ambled towards the railing. He looked dashing, his sleek tuxedo glinting darkly in the glow of the spotlights. She'd known he'd come. They always did. What she didn't expect was that he'd turn around suddenly and look right at her. It took her by surprise -- and that was something she didn't like. Not one bit. She thought about ignoring him, about rising smoothly and walking away, but that would only be silly. It would only give him power over her. Instead she smiled thinly. The tall dark man bowed slightly. "Good evening." "I don't like to be surprised." He shrugged. "I'm not sure I know what you mean. You knew I'd come." She looked at him, startled. That was certainly true. There was more to this man than met the eye. Which was saying something when the first glance was already pretty good. Except, of course, that he was one of the reasons behind the red-headed woman's pain. That was a problem. You couldn't trust that kind of a man. Of course, nothing she hoped to get from him necessarily required trust. She rose fluidly and walked over to where he stood. This time she could feel something insistent about him, something determined. There was a glint in his eye she didn't recall seeing last night. He leaned closer to her. "I was hoping you wouldn't be so aloof tonight." "Oh?" Interesting. But vaguely unpleasant, she thought. And for some reason it didn't quite ring true. She'd felt this before from other men, but it didn't seem to fit her feeling about this one. For some reason, he wasn't being himself. Whatever that was. But she trusted her intuition enough to know that it was true. "I mean, we both know what we want." This time she recoiled. "Do we now? I'm afraid you're flattering yourself." He laughed harshly. "I don't think I am, actually." He reached for her and grasped her arm, but she pulled it away and stepped back. Suddenly she thought that maybe she understood why he was behaving this way. God. It was so clear. Just like that. She'd seen the argument he'd had with the red-headed woman on the Lido Deck. So had a lot of other passengers, for that matter. Ships were just like little incestuous suburbs. Everybody knew your business. This tall, handsome man, who for some reason now wore what she knew intuitively was an uncustomary expression, one filled with lust, need and anger, was in love with the little redhead. The problem was he didn't know it yet. How outrageously fascinating. "Or could it be it's not me you want?" She started and stared at him. "I'm just a plaything in your bigger game, isn't that right?" She fought a sudden rush of confusion. Had he just spoken? "What?" He leaned closer to her and she stood her ground, enthralled and unwilling to cede. "You think you know me. But I know *you.*" What was he saying? She shook her head to clear it. There was something mesmerizing about his tone. "The thing is, I've been watching you." He leaned back against the railing so that his face was shadowed once more. "I watched you watch her all afternoon." "You're obviously deranged." Her heart began to hammer in her chest and she didn't like it. Before she could move away, he grabbed her arms and lowered his face until it was inches from her own. This wasn't the way it was supposed to happen. It never happened this way. For a moment, she was too stunned to struggle. "Stay away from her, do you hear me?" he hissed. "Don't even dream of touching her. You only think you know her. I'm the only one who understands her pain and I'm the only one who can help her." He shook her once, twice. "She's not yours to do with as you please. She's mine -- do you understand?" "She belongs to no one." She spat the words through her teeth. "Least of all to you. At least my claim has some merit." She shook her head. "You can't free her." "Not that way. But I trust her and she trusts me. You defile trust." "No..." "I'll kill you if you go near her." She stopped struggling and regarded him coolly in the shadow of the spotlight. "I'll kill you first." He shook his head, his hands a vice around her arms. "You can't. I'm not the one you're after. I'm not the kind you free." A low wail escaped her throat, startling him for a moment. Her knee rose between his legs, impacting sharply, and he cried out, gasping. His grip relented and she tore away from him. He buckled and doubled over, sinking slowly to the gleaming teak of the deck. All she could hear was the clatter of her heels and the whistle of her breath in her throat as she ran. THE NEW WESTERDAM C DECK TUESDAY, 11:21 PM Scully was almost asleep when the gentle rap came. She'd tossed for awhile, annoyed at herself for expecting the worst although she'd felt nothing since she'd returned to her room. Except a vague sense of worry about this case. And about Mulder's apparent singlemindness where the perpetrator was concerned. He had no evidence to go on. None at all. In fact, they knew nothing more now than he had when he'd first been handed the files. And from what Scully could see, there was nothing in the files which would allow them to uncover any evidence unless the killer, or killers, struck again. It was maddening, certainly; but why was Mulder so unwilling to search out other possible avenues? He was going on a feeling. A conviction he had. She could sympathize -- to a point. But she knew she would have to confront him about his lack of scientific method in this case. Tomorrow. When they'd both had a chance to sleep on it one more time. Just as she was finally drifting off, there was a knock. She froze for a moment. It sounded human enough. "Who is it?" "Steven Spielberg." She couldn't help grinning as she rose to open the door. Scully had tried to have a good time. Honest to God she had. She'd wandered the ship, listened to a few of the lounge acts for as long as she could stand it; she'd stood out on deck and felt the wind in her hair. Hell. She'd even spent an hour in the casino. The fact of the matter was that it wasn't much fun without Mulder. The light from the corridor blinded her for a moment as she reached up and rubbed her eyes with the knuckles of one hand. When she could see, she found Mulder in sweatpants and a tee- shirt, wearing a strange expression which vacillated between tension and humour. "You look like a kid, Scully." "You act like one." She yawned. He grinned and shuffled for a moment. "So what's the matter, Mulder?" She waited. "Can I sleep over?" That woke her up. "I beg your pardon?" "C'mon. You've got two beds." She stared up at him. "You're serious?" He shrugged and squinted down the hallway. "Yeah. I got the heebiejeebies." "You have got to be kidding." "Don't make fun of me during a vulnerable moment, Scully." "But there's nothing going on. And I thought you'd be tomcatting around chatting up Ms. Right or something." He just looked at her. She didn't actually want him to know how relieved she was to see him standing there, alone. It was unbelievably selfish of her. She sighed and wondered why in God's name she was secretly so delighted by the whole thing. "All right. Come on in." He breathed and she noticed for the first time how pale he was. His face was pinched and grey along the edges. "You okay, Mulder?" "I'm fine. Just need to sleep." "No nausea?" "Nope. Fine." He was limping a little. Scully pointed to his leg. "What happened to you?" He turned to her in the tiny space and grimaced. "Bumped my foot against the bar." "Alcoholic." "Workaholic." She lay back in bed and studied him as he pulled the covers off the makeshift sofa against the far wall. "Mulder, we have to talk about this case." He stifled a yawn as he sat down. "I agree. But not now. I gotta get some sleep." "There's something that's been bugging me..." He nodded quickly but it seemed to Scully that he was avoiding her eye. "Me too. In fact..." He seemed to hesitate for a moment. "There's something I have to tell you." "What?" "Please. Not now. I'm really beat. Can't think right now." She watched him plump the pillows. Maybe he was almost ready to admit that he was working in the dark. Not an easy thing for him. She considered it and decided she'd wait. "Want me to close the curtains, Mulder?" "I'm fine, Scully. There's barely any movement at all." That much was true. So far they'd been blessed with seas as smooth as silk. Speaking of things that were hard to admit, she kind of liked having him there, making little Mulder noises as he settled into the narrow cot, his feet squeezed up against the wall. It hadn't occurred to her before that the beds were short. "You're sure you're okay, Mulder?" "Good night, Scully..." "But..." "Bye bye." She sighed and nestled in. As she closed her eyes, she thought she saw him look at her, his face drawn and tight as he turned out the light. And then she was gone. CONTINUED IN PART 12 -------- CRUISE (12a/12) by Madeleine Partous email: partous@total.net NOTE: Hi. I'm trying desperately to finish this before Friday for the sake of students who won't have email access for a month due to Christmas. See? And you think I don't pay attention. Thanks so much for all the lovely letters, but keep in mind that writers are very insecure and need constant reassurance. Or criticism. Anything. I'm not fussy. Muffin recipes will do in a pinch. MP THE NEW WESTERDAM A DECK WEDNESDAY, 2:36 AM She huddled on her bed in the luxury stateroom she'd come to know like the back of her hand. It was always the same stateroom. The numbers changed, even the decks -- she wasn't crazy, after all. The same room each time would have been asking for trouble. But the layout was always identical and the orientation was the same each time. Port side. The left-hand side. Sinistra. The devil's hand. She blew air from her lips and watched it billow out in the arctic chilliness of the room. She was used to it. It always happened right before she killed. Or when she was distressed, as she was now. In any case, both were true this time. She'd planned to free the old man first, but now there was no time to lose. The red-headed woman had to be freed. Her so-called friend, the tall dark man. He was dangerous. A lunatic. He thought he owned her. Just like her own ex-husband. He'd believed he'd owned her too. Until she showed him what life was like in hell. He'd forced her to live there in this world -- she'd done him one better. She'd sent him to the real place. Permanently. They still hadn't found his body. As if they could. They'd've had to scour four states to find all of him. That had been her first killing. It was also the last one she'd done in anger. Since then she'd only put lost souls out of their misery. Mercy killings. All of them. And she knew she was right, that she was divinely inspired, because an angel accompanied her on every one of her quests. A dark angel, certainly. But all light needed darkness in order to be defined. Without the contrast, how could you discern the difference? She was the heart of darkness in the midst of light. Cold, cold darkness. Hell was cold -- how could anyone have come to believe in its fire? Dante was right. At its very heart, hell was a field of ice. She watched her breath and studied the porthole as it slowly frosted over, fingers of ice playing along its edges in intricate patterns which reached tentatively towards the centre as she watched. It helped to calm her, as it always did. She'd made a mistake about the tall dark man. She'd thought he was a kind man, a considerate man. Now she realized he was as evil as her husband had been. What she still couldn't fathom was how he'd come to understand what she was. Perhaps he'd been sent to test her steadfastness. She smiled in the cold dark silence of her room. She was equal to the challenge. But he'd been right. She couldn't kill him. Not directly. That wasn't where her mandate lay. Her mandate was to free the sad ones, the ones who suffered blind. She could hurt him, though. She could make him wish for death. She could make death seem like the only goal left to live for. She couldn't kill him. But she could destroy him. This would be her last killing. After this one, everyone would know her name. Two birds, one stone. The red-headed woman would be free. And her freedom would destroy the man she believed was her friend. He'd find out then just how cold life could be. But first she had to make sure he didn't interfere. First she had to pry them apart. Scully awoke to the sound of pounding. The room was in absolute darkness; even the porthole was black on black. Which made sense: they were miles from nowhere. There was another loud thump and the sound of a cry, faint, obscure, as if it was drifting in from a great distance. God. They were sinking. On fire. Or something. Her body began to shake with the force of her pulse as she sat up, kicking off the blankets and swearing below her breath as she yanked at an end of the sheet which had somehow wrapped itself around her feet. "Mulder." She reached for the light and slapped it. Nothing. She hit the switch again, cursing loudly this time. "Mulder!" Nothing. What the hell was wrong with him? Worry welled up in her throat and she bit down on it. No time for that. But she could recognize the early warning signs of a panic attack and she willed herself to breathe evenly. She strained to listen. Another thump. And the voice again, deep, male, angry, even outraged, as though it were arguing loudly with someone, but it was still too far away for her to make out any words. "Mulder?" Flashlight. She always carried a flashlight in her overnight bag. Scully stood and stumbled over to her partner's bed. Another thump. Louder. She felt a shudder go through her. There was a body lying on the bed all right. It just wasn't moving. "Mulder, please! Something's wrong with the ship!" She reached out blindly and gasped as she connected with his face, its familiar features and the comfort of his soft short hair. Cold. Jesus Christ oh Mother of God, please, no. Cold as ice. Dead. God, how? Tears sprang to her eyes and she moaned as they welled and began to slip down her cheeks. "No..." Thump. Closer. Panic rose inside her again. "Sc-Sc-Sc-ul-leeeee..." A whisper, nothing more. But something. God. Something. She made a sound and wrapped her arms around him, prodding his face gently, letting her hands drop down to feel his chest, his arms, in search of warmth, any warmth. There was none. "Mulder, I've got to find my flashlight. We have to move. There's something seriously wrong." "D-d-d-d..." "What?" She could barely hear him. "D-D-D-Dana...d-d-don't..." This time the thump resounded through the metal of the wall, ringing. She moaned again and rose, patting him once and then grunting as her hip slammed against the side of the desk. Damn. Why weren't her eyes adjusting? They weren't adjusting because there was nothing for them to adjust to. No light at all, not even the faint glimmer required for shadows to loom. It suddenly hit her that the lights in the corridor had also gone out. That was it. There was no crack of light under the door. That was why she couldn't see anything at all. Her breath was beginning to catch harshly in her throat when her hand finally brushed against her bag, which she now remembered leaving propped up against the bed. Inches from where she'd been lying in the first place. Christ. A thump and the higher ringing of metal she recognized from last night when she'd seen a fist appear in her door. Mulder's door. It had reached the room next to her own. She rummaged through her bag until she felt the cool cylinder of the flashlight. It had to work. There was no reason for it not to work. She pushed the switch and almost sobbed aloud as a beam of light streamed out and hit the desk, making everything on it grow and waver grotesquely in the shadows. "Mulder!" She turned the light on her partner and gasped. His face was covered in a thin layer of frost which glistened in the light. His eyebrows and hair were white. As she stared at him aghast, she saw the frost grow and spread further like a living thing. "S-c-c..." His lips were pale and she saw the superhuman effort it took for him to reach out a shaking hand as his body began to shake uncontrollably. "D-d-d-on't..." "God. Oh God, Mulder." She started to go to him. "D-d-on't g-g-go out-t-t there..." And then the door exploded inward. The shock of it threw her to the ground. Scully gasped as excruciating cold air flooded the room. It flowed around her, sending long fingers of agony along her naked feet. Her gun. Where the hell was her fucking gun? She grabbed the flashlight -- thank God she'd fallen with it -- and shone it towards the door. The beam bounced off a thick whirling mist which was encroaching on all the corners of the room, sending long fog- like fingers into nooks and crannies. Whatever the hell this was, she had to get them out of there. She'd fallen down against the side of Mulder's bed. Mulder. Tears sprung up once more and she wiped them away angrily. He was freezing to death. That much was certain. She heard him mumble something. Alive. He was still alive -- at least barely. "Don't go to sleep." The shower. There was no reason for it to work, in light of all this, but you never knew. Whatever this was, whatever the hell was going on, Scully was beginning to suspect it had nothing to do with the ship itself. If a disaster was in progress, surely there'd be alarms and bodies running down the corridors. In fact, the silence was eerie in its wholeness. She got up and staggered to the bathroom, the beam from her flashlight bouncing against walls. She snatched at the shower unit's hot-water faucet and twisted. A cloud of sweet muggy steam rose suddenly to mix with the mist around her. Hot. Blessedly hot in all this brittle coldness. And then she yelped. Too hot. A little cold water too. No time to lose. She reached Mulder and grabbed his arm, pulling. "Get up. Mulder, please. Try to get up." Frost covered his features now and glowed dully in the glare of her light. She bit her lip. Never mind why, Dana. Christ. Why can wait until later. He moaned. Scully pulled at him again and winced as he tumbled from the bed. God. For a moment she was afraid he'd crack open like that scientist they'd seen. Not that cold. God. It wasn't that cold. He stirred and she felt a hot rush of relief. Then, as if she had all the time in the world, as if the two of them weren't suspended in the midst of madness, she began to drag his body steadily towards the bathroom. By the time she pushed him into the shower, her silk pyjamas were translucent with sweat. He was almost twice her weight at the best of times and the frost had added a few pounds. Steam sizzled as the water struck his skin. She held him up against the wall with one hand and fixed him in the glow of her flashlight. It was a drastic way to resuscitate someone in his condition, but he was in good shape and there was nothing else she could think of doing. He groaned as a shudder rode through him and clouds of steam rose off his body. Scully put down the flashlight and started to rub his face vigorously with both her hands. His head lolled as she moved down to his chest, massaging it through his shirt. Sweat and water flew off her body as she continued to rub him furiously, massaging his arms, hands, thighs, calves and feet. His feet. She hesitated for a moment, fearing the fragility of frostbite. All in all, a few missing toes would be a small price to pay. Anyway, the contrast between the heat of the water and the frigid air in the room would probably give them both pneumonia, assuming who or whatever was responsible for this hellish phenomenon didn't kill them first. He was beginning to stir, his head rolling back against the shower wall as he seemed to welcome the spray against his face, water flying from his lips as he sputtered. "Scully." It was a gurgle, but it was Mulder all the way. He was back. She laughed suddenly and lay a hand against his cheek. He smiled faintly in the glow of the flashlight as water streamed down his face. "Pins, Scully." "I'm sure. It's gonna hurt like hell." He winced and shivered. "Stay here, Mulder. I'll be back." "No..." He reached out and tried to grab her arm, the movement nearly unbalancing him. She didn't try to prop him up. "You've got to stay in the water for a while longer, Mulder. Doctor's orders. I've got to find out what's going on." "Scully, no. There's something..." "For all we know the ship is sinking, Mulder." She stood up and away from the heat of the water. The air was definitely warmer than before. Scully turned and peered out at the room. No question about it -- the mist was dissipating. "It's not sinking," he gasped. She believed him. "Then I'll be back soon." He began to shake uncontrollably as a fit of coughing overcame him. She bent over and grabbed the flashlight, narrowly escaping his hand as he swiped at her in the throes of the cough. "You'd almost stopped breathing. The coughing won't last long." "Scully, please..." She knew he was trying to stop her; she just wasn't sure why. Jesus. Next to some of the things they'd seen, this was practically child's play. Scully left the bathroom and slapped the wall switch just for the hell of it. The cabin exploded into light. She pulled off her soggy pyjamas and drew on slacks and a dry sweatshirt, pushing her feet into sneakers. By the time she'd found her gun, she turned to find Mulder standing against the door jam of the bathroom, dripping and taking deep breaths. "I said you should stay in the shower." "There's something I haven't told you, Scully." He grimaced suddenly and coughed again, doubling over, his hands pressed against his knees. "Tell me later. This is an X-File, Mulder. A real one. Now let me do my job." He raised his head and looked at her. She saw hesitation in his eyes. Hesitation and a strange mixture of determination and dread. She'd think about it later. Mulder let her slip by him and she left the door ajar behind her. CONTINUED IN PART 12b -------- CRUISE (12b/12) by Madeleine Partous email: partous@total.net "Feedback both pro and con is deeply appreciated." *** 4th-season spoiler alert: TFWID *** Well. Now we face the inevitable embarrassment of admitting that 12 chapters was a bit of an optimistic estimate. 12c appears tomorrow. And that'll be the end of it. MP Scully had almost reached the stairway before it dawned on her that the hallway lights were on again. She lay a hand against the wall and took a deep breath. What the hell was she looking for anyway? Traces of frost? A killer mist? An angry, diaphanous Dutch shipbuilder? She leaned against the wall and laughed shakily. God. She was just as bad as Mulder. So. What did that mean? Did she believe? She believed there was nothing normal about what had just happened. Scully straightened suddenly. She believed that Mulder had almost died. Whatever this thing was, wherever it came from, it was capable of killing. There'd been nothing prosaic about the sight of Mulder covered in frost in the middle of the balmy Caribbean Sea. The absurdity of her belief system in the face of everything she'd seen suddenly hit her smack in the middle of the solar plexus. She grimaced and shook her head. Dana, my darling: you're a fucking lunatic. Over the years Mulder had often looked at her, gently, most of the time, and said that anything was possible. Anything at all. Jesus. What if he was right? She wasn't sure she could bear it. Well. She could probably accept the premise. What would make her absolutely crazy was accepting that the big gangly flake was right. She snorted. Adrenaline coursed through her veins, and although she wasn't sure what she was looking for, she knew she had to do *something*. Something was up, in any case. But what? And Mulder was fine for the time being. For now, finding out whether the ship was all right would have to do. Besides, something told her she should go out on deck. It was a strange compulsion, but she'd learned to listen to her intuition over the years. Even though she didn't often acknowledge it even to herself, it was this intuition which had saved Mulder's life -- and her own -- on many occasions. Something told her that what she searched for was out on the Promenade Deck. On the port side. The left-hand side. She didn't know how she knew. Scully holstered her gun and headed up the stairs. She stood against the railing in the night as the wind whipped up and gusted fine spray against the deck. The woman was coming. As she stood there, she could sense that the lovely little redhead was climbing the stairs. Alone. Of course, she'd known she'd come. They always did. She breathed deeply and leaned back against the rail. She felt fluid, relaxed, as she always did in these moments. In these moments, nothing existed but the moment. Her senses were alert, alive; she could smell the salt in the air, even the distant scent of lavender and hibiscus as it drifted from the islands they skirted in the night. The thrum of the engines hummed through her; the glow from the spotlights danced off the gleaming white metal of the hull and played against her face, leaving tiny flecks of luminescence in the fine water droplets that hung from her eyelashes. She could feel the pulse of her blood as it beat in her fingertips. She waited. There was nothing amiss, at least as far as Scully could tell. The corridors were silent, heavy with the still air that comes with sleep. A few passengers lingered in the lounges, mostly male, but she avoided their hungry eyes, their questioning glances. It was past 3. She could hear the faint melancholy tinkle of a piano as it floated out from one of the bars. At this hour on a cruise ship, she figured that everyone who had something fun to do was already snug abed. And she didn't particularly relish the thought of running into the few who were still in search of fun. As she reached the Promenade Deck level, she came across a blond officer, a lieutenant, who was obviously on his way to work and possibly already a little late, judging from his expression. She could definitely sympathize. "Excuse me, sir..." He stopped in his tracks and looked at her with unabashed admiration. Another Dutchman. She was getting bored with the looks she was getting. Scully smiled. "Is everything all right?" He smiled back. "How do you mean... miss?" The last word was more of a question than the sentence was. "The ship? The lights went out on my deck and I wondered whether everything was okay." "Ah. What deck?" "C." He gave her a lecherous look which seemed to suggest that anyone staying on C Deck was probably cheap in all the right ways. "We have had a few problems on C deck, miss," he said a little condescendingly. "Nothing serious. Electrical stuff." He used the word "stuff" with a kind of pride and watched her closely, as if to see whether she'd be impressed by his use of American slang. She smiled even more broadly. Maybe he needed to find out exactly how much it took to impress her. "Ah. Well. I'm a doctor, you see, and my companion is a highly placed government official who's presently working -- incognito, you understand, but for some reason I feel I can trust you -- on very sensitive material of national importance. As you can imagine, the lack of electricity wreaks havoc with his need to send classified faxes back to Washington." The officer stared at her as his jaw dropped. "Not to mention that I can't very well treat his heart condition if the portable EEG isn't working, and the fact is, well..." She looked away for a moment before leaning closer to him. "...that if anything happens to him at this point, BOOM!" She threw her hands up suddenly and the lieutenant jumped back. "If you know what I mean," she whispered knowingly. The man had turned almost as pale as his uniform. He nodded, eyes wide. "I'll have someone look into it immediately, m'am." Scully smiled again. "Thank you. Our country..." she lowered her head for a moment and then looked at him earnestly. "Hell, why mince words? The free world appreciates it." He stood at attention and Scully could've sworn he was about to salute, but then he pulled at his collar and beat a hasty retreat. She chortled. That would keep him guessing. And then she almost laughed. Mulder would've been so proud. Scully stepped out onto the deck and was momentarily blinded by spray as a particularly violent rush of wind slapped water against the wood, turning it a deep dark brown. "Hello." She looked up, squinting. A tall, dark woman leaned back against the railing, her long black hair whipped by the wind. There was something familiar about her, but Scully couldn't quite put her finger on it. "We meet at last." The woman's face was shadowed, but Scully caught the glint of teeth. "I'm sorry. It's a bit of a cliche, but in this case it fits." Scully's eyes widened. This was her. This was the killer. She wondered how she knew. Because. Because who else could it be? "You..." she breathed. The woman nodded easily. "Of course. Who else?" She lay a hand against the railing and moved her head out of the shadows. God. She was striking. Pale, almost translucent, her face framed in lustrous dark brown hair which moved smoothly in the wind. Large, slightly hooded brown eyes. Full lips. God. Her hands clenched as she suddenly realized the woman looked a lot like Mulder. But resolutely female. Almost archetypal in her femininity. "I've come to take away your pain." "My...?" Scully stared at her. "You're to be free at last, my dear." "I'm free already." The woman shook her head and clicked her tongue. "No. It's an illusion, poor darling. This pain you bear. It's time for it to end." "But I don't want it to end." "You say that now. You'll see. You'll soon see how glorious it is to be free." Scully began to edge back towards the door. This woman was the killer; there was no doubt of it at all in her mind. She'd killed at least 15 times before and she was undoubtedly pretty good at it by now. This probably wasn't either the time or place to reason with her. And then the woman was on her, around her, and before she could do anything Scully felt herself suddenly weightless as she was lifted from the floor, the other woman's arms wrapping themselves around her, one arm crooked around her knees, the other holding her against her chest. Her arms were pinned against her body by the force of the other woman's grip. Her arm was like steel and Scully wondered dimly why she hadn't reached for her gun while she still had a chance. "Goodbye, my dear. Rest." She heard a whisper in her ear and felt the soft pressure of lips against her cheek before they brushed for a moment against her own. And then she was airborne and at first it did in fact feel like freedom before the whistle of the wind ran through her and she opened her eyes to see the sea, dark and bristling with whitecaps, hurtle towards her. The water broke against her and she gasped, feeling it fill her mouth, wet and warm, and she could hear a faint thrumming sound, no, not a sound, a vibration through her body as the world turned green and black and for a moment all was silent and still. Then she burst up through the surface, almost against her will, as the waves flailed against her face and she heard as if from very far away a familiar male voice, harsh and high, desperate and angry, but this time she could just make out the words, and the words were "federal agent man overboard man overboard stop the engines" and the voice seemed to crack as she felt the water roll over her once again. The silence was stunning and Scully felt a strange fathomless peace except for the thrumming which wouldn't stop and which shook her, disturbing her rest. And then she surfaced again without knowing why, and this time she saw him, his hair plastered against his face, his hand grasping an almost foolish splash of orange as he reached for her. "Scully!" She smiled and sank. Then she saw him under the water too, his body moving towards her, his eyes wide as bubbles exploded from his lips. She'd had bubbles too, she thought vaguely and giggled, remembering. All gone. They were almost all gone. But then she was a little put out because something grabbed her and pulled her, which didn't feel right, but the thrum was closer and the water was churning white and wild, and the vibration was unpleasant, so she let herself go and followed the strength of the other. The next time she surfaced she felt a strong arm around her, around her back, with a hand clasping her breast, cupping and hanging on to it for dear life so that it hurt a little but there was pleasure there too, somewhere, if she could only remember why. "Hang on to the life preserver, Scully." Words. Familiar words which might have meant something once. A groan. "God, Scully. Please. Don't go. Please!" The raw, cracked voice seemed far away. The arm tightened around her, the hand kneading her breast now, rubbing it roughly, desperately. She felt herself lifted and her arms were draped around something, the ridiculous orange thing, and then the arm again, around her, a hand snaking up under her shirt to touch the flesh of her breast for a moment before it curled into a fist and pounded her chest. "Scully. Stay with me." She coughed and water coursed from her lips and slid down her chin. The hand slid down and grabbed the back of her slacks, hoisting her up against the surface of the orange something which bobbed on the water, and then a fist slammed against her back, hurting. "Scully!" She cried out and coughed again, feeling water spurt from her nose and mouth as she retched. The fist hit again and again and she gasped, choking, water bubbling out until air whistled through her lungs, feeling foreign at first, like an intrusion, and then familiar. Air. God. And then she was on her back and her nose was closed by fingers and there was a mouth against hers, a cold wet mouth spread wide to cover her own, and it blew air into her, sweet warm air which tasted familiar like something she knew, like someone. Her chest rose with the giving and fell as the mouth withdrew. She could feel water and spittle leak from her lips and she knew, suddenly, as though from a great distance, that she had come close to embracing the water as her own. The mouth covered hers again and again until she coughed again and this time the sea left her in a great gush through her nose and her mouth, and she gasped, her chest heaving. Water still rose and fell around them but this time when she opened her eyes she was swallowing great gulps of air and it was Mulder she saw. She was floating with her back against a round life preserver. Mulder tread water next to her and held the small of her back up with one hand under the surface. His eyes were wild. "Scully?" She laughed. He stared at her. "I'm fine, Mulder." He spit water from his mouth and growled, enveloping her waist with one arm as the other clung to the preserver. "I know..." he gasped. "You're always fine." She grinned weakly and wrapped her arms around his neck. For once, it seemed all right to cling to him. Bright lights hit the water as a sailor reached out from a rope ladder which now hung against the hull. Scully vaguely registered the sailor's hands on her arms as Mulder held her out to him. It made her a little uncomfortable. After all, she didn't know the guy. "Can you climb?" She nodded and grasped the rung above her. "I'll be right below to catch you if you let go," the slight man said reassuringly. If I let go, buddy, she thought grimly as she started to pull herself up, we're both going down. "You're lucky, lady," he continued as he climbed up behind her. "Yes." She didn't have a lot of breath to waste. "That guy pulled you right out of the propeller's path." She stopped for a moment. "You don't want to know what that thing can do to human flesh, lady." She glared down and the sailor froze. "You're right. I don't." Scully looked up and kept climbing. Hands pulled her up and over the railing. She was grateful to feel the weight of a blanket on her but as far as she was concerned, there were too many people around. Fortunately, the lateness of the hour meant that very few curious passengers were milling about. That would've been just perfect. First a lover's spat, then a near drowning. She and Mulder would've come across as two lunatics with a pathological need for attention. She turned just as Mulder was helped over the railing. A cheer rose from the small crowd and several men clapped him on the back, shaking his hand. Great. Mulder the big macho man hero. Meanwhile, she was only the drowning victim. What was a near-death experience, after all, when compared to the triumph of the living? To give Mulder his due, he seemed genuinely embarrassed. He escaped his entourage and came over to her, putting an arm around her shoulder and leading her further down along the deck. An officer began efficiently to break up the crowd. "You okay?" "Dandy." "Scully..." "What do you want me to say, Mulder? Thanks. But I still wish it hadn't happened." He stiffened. "So do I. Believe me." "I heard you say 'federal agent.'" He nodded, still studying her. "To get them moving. But I told the officer on duty to keep it quiet. We don't want to alarm the killer." That was it. Scully suddenly remembered why she was so furious at him. Her eyes widened. "You knew." Mulder drew back a little. He was still wearing the same sweatpants and tee-shirt he'd taken to bed. "You knew all along." She felt blood rush to her face. "Christ, Mulder. I realized it as soon as I stepped out there and saw her waiting. You *used* me!" She slammed both fists against his chest. The blanket fell off and pooled at her feet. He fell back against the railing, more from the element of surprise than the blow itself, she suspected bitterly. "You bastard. You used me as a decoy, didn't you?" His face seemed to sag. "I never let you out of my sight, Scully. Not for a minute. Even when you ditched me..." Anger twisted his features for a second. "Christ. You son of a bitch..." "Even then, I followed you. I knew she'd picked you out." "How?" Her teeth were clenched. "I can't explain it, Scully. I just knew. The second I saw her." "You *saw* her?" He nodded earnestly. "The first night. It's an instinct, Scully. You know that. I can smell these types of killers a mile away. I can smell their psychology, their mental makeup. There's a taste to them that's always the same." She said nothing. Scully had been angry at Mulder before. But never like this. This felt like the death of something. She felt tears sting. My God. What had he done? What had they lost because of this? "Scully." His eyes pleaded with her. "That's why I'm good at this." The tears rose and this time she let them fall for him to see. "God. Don't. Please." He reached a hand towards her face. She pulled back. "Don't touch me." Her voice was cold. Mulder shivered and she saw the unmistakable shimmer of tears in his own eyes. "Scully. Christ. This was never meant to happen. I haven't slept since I saw her. I never stopped watching over you. But we had no evidence -- you know that. The only way to stop her was to catch her redhanded." "In other words, as she tried to kill me." "I was never going to let her come close." "But she did, didn't she, Mulder? She threw me overboard, you *fucker*!" He cringed and this time the tears slid down his face. "Dana..." His voice was raw. "I'm sorry. I was right behind you. She moved so fast..." He shook his head, gazing at her. Bile rose in her throat. She couldn't control her fury. "You watched your father die the last time," she spat at him sarcastically. "Or at least that's what you believe. Was that me, Mulder? Well. I shouldn't be surprised you almost did it again." He moaned and dug his palms into his eyes. "Don't..." "Maybe you do it every lifetime, Mulder. Huh? That's a thought. What about the sergeant? That was me? Did you watch me fall on the battlefield, Mulder? Did you stand by and watch? Or maybe you betrayed me to the enemy that time too!" She was screaming at him. His head was down. He looked numb, ashen, but the tears had stopped. A part of her mind knew how hateful this was, how wounding. A part of her knew she was breaking something. Fuck it. It was already broken. He'd broken it. When she spoke again, her voice was low. "So much for trust." "Dana..." A whisper. "Don't call me that. You don't deserve to call me that." She paused. "I'm sorry you lost your soulmate, Mulder." Where the hell had the words come from? She took a deep breath. The thing was, she meant it. "But maybe the lesson for me in this lifetime is that it doesn't pay to be your friend." His head snapped up suddenly and she flinched at the fury in his eyes. Before she knew it, his hand was wrapped around her wrist. "Don't ever say that." "Let me go." "No." He pulled her towards him. "I've got a gun, you bastard." "So do I." His other hand gripped her chin. "Look at me." She did. Why the hell not? "How dare you say that, Scully? I'm not saying I was right. Dammit. I tried to tell you tonight. You wouldn't listen." "You should've told me earlier." She could put up with this. After tonight, she'd request a transfer and she'd never have to look at him again. "You're right. It's just..." She waited. "It's just that you're not a good liar. You're so honest, Scully. Your face betrays everything. Your eyes..." He stopped and looked at her. "I'd skin myself alive before I'd let anything happen to you. I'd kill myself if you died because of me. Don't you know that?" There was nothing to say. "Don't you understand? Melissa's not my soulmate, Scully. She was an obsession. We've spent lifetimes ruining each other's lives. Not on purpose; it was just the futile attachment of young souls. I know that now. I realized it even when I was still under hypnosis. She knew it too. That's why this lifetime happened. To free us from it." Scully said nothing, but she could feel him tremble against her. "The evolution of souls has to do with a movement towards something, Scully, not senseless repetition. That's what maya is, the wheel of illusion that keeps souls enslaved. Melissa and I have been caught in a rut for hundreds of years. It's over now. At last." "What are you saying, Mulder?" "I'm saying she's free to find herself. As I am. And the only person I saw through all those lifetimes, other than her, over and over again, was you, Scully. It has to mean something. You don't have the right to mock it. Or to discount it." "It's your fantasy, Mulder -- not mine." He shook his head angrily and pulled her to him. She resisted, but she could feel his heart pounding against her neck. "No. You feel it too. Don't lie to me. Not now." God. The temptation to give in was strong. It was true, anyway. Scully was pragmatic and she wasn't one to deny the truth when she knew what it was. She'd always felt the link between them. Even now. It was just that it didn't necessarily matter. And then, almost detachedly, she felt him grow hard against her belly. Moisture flooded her centre almost immediately. It was predictable. Mechanical. She was attracted to him. She'd always been. This too didn't necessarily matter. She pulled away and he let her go. "We have a job to do, Mulder. Remember? We'll talk about this later." His eyes were still intense, but he nodded. "Where'd she go, anyway?" "I don't know, Scully. Quite frankly, once I saw her throw you overboard, the only thing that mattered to me was getting you out of there." "You saw her do it." Her voice was flat. He nodded again and looked away. "Did she see you?" "I don't think so. She was back inside within seconds." "Well. Our joint testimonies should be enough to put her away. Maybe we should just phone ahead, wait until the ship docks and then grab her with backup behind us when she gets off the ship." Mulder leaned against the railing. He looked completely exhausted. Scully felt a touch of sympathy. Of course he was tired. He hadn't slept in two nights, he'd almost died once and he'd dived off a ship to save her from a bloody mangled death. She met his eyes to find him gazing at her. "She's completely crazy, Scully. If we don't stop her, she's bound to kill again." "Not when she finds out I'm still alive, surely." "She thinks she's invincible. Divinely inspired or something. You can see it in her eyes. She'll just try to kill you again." "That would be stupid." "I hate to tell you this, Scully, but she's not exactly thinking straight. And the one thing we know for sure is she's dangerous. It's pretty clear she's got some kind of psychic power, for one thing. Who knows what else she can do? We've got to find her and confine her to quarters until we can ship her out." Scully pursed her lips. "Okay. Are you all right?" He looked startled. "Fine. It's you I'm worried about." "I probably wouldn't be able to run a marathon, but that's about it. Don't forget you almost died too, Mulder." He smiled faintly. "An eventful evening all around." Scully chuckled drily and headed for the door. "Just like the brochure promised." CONTINUED IN PART 12C -------- CRUISE (12c/12) by Madeleine Partous email: partous@total.net This is it, folks. It's a long chapter. If you have a problem with the download, drop me a line and I'll send it to you in two parts. Let me know if you're interested in a sequel -- I've kind of become enamoured with this particular universe. Thanks for your patience and support. Have a very happy holiday season, and all best wishes for the New Year. MP Scully waited restlessly for him on the landing as he stopped to speak with the deck officer on duty. She watched his back as he talked in a low voice, gesturing towards the staircase and catching her eye for a moment before turning back to the officer. His eyes were haunted. What she'd said had had an impact -- no question about it. Scully stood and shifted and wondered why she felt nothing at all. Betrayed. She'd been used by him. She felt nothing. And yet he'd saved her too, as he'd done many times before. She felt nothing. But there would've been no need to save her at all if he hadn't let this happen in the first place. She expected bitterness. She felt nothing. He loved her. This she knew. She'd always known it. Nothing. He loved her as a friend, as a life's companion, most of all. The physical aspect was almost incidental. Almost irrelevant. Almost. And yet it was the only part of their equation, if Mulder's theory about past lives held, which they hadn't explored. Scully searched her feelings. Nothing? No. Something. But what? Lust? Maybe. Due to general horniness? No. Scully knew she could have sex anytime she wanted. If she could be bothered. The problem was no one interested her these days. Somewhere along the line, her life had become so bizarre, so interesting, oddly enough, that most people actually bored her. Except... She started as Mulder touched her elbow gently. He was looking at her quizzically. "I told the officer what we were up to. More or less. He promised no one would get in our way as long..." She smiled suddenly and saw him catch his breath. "As long as we're discreet?" He grinned and nodded. For a moment, there was no mistaking the pure joy which radiated from his features. Because she'd smiled at him. No other reason. "So. Let's go, G-man." They took a few minutes to change. "I think I'm sprouting mould, Scully," Mulder said as he thrust his key card into his door. God. He'd been soaked for hours. He was bound to come down with something. On the way to their cabins, Scully had decided she would think about nothing. For the time being, she would go with Mulder, find this woman and let her know just how happy she was to see her again. She would think about all of it later. Right now, they were on Bureau time. Great. It was almost 5 AM. Talk about taking your work home with you. They met back in the corridor minutes later. Scully tucked her gun into her holster and closed her jacket. "You know, Mulder, I've changed outfits so often tonight that I'm beginning to feel like Cher." His eyes widened and crinkled. "Except you're better looking, Scully." "Flatterer." "Anyway, you're actually more Sonny's size." "So you're saying you're Cher, Mulder?" Something twigged in the back of her mind and she suddenly stopped walking. Mulder looked back at her. "She looks like you." "Who, Cher? I think I have better legs. And definitely fewer tattoos." She shook her head impatiently. "The killer. She looks a lot like you." He froze. "God." "Didn't you notice?" "No. Not until you mentioned it." "Better nose, though." Mulder scowled. "What's wrong with my nose?" "Your nose would look ridiculous on a woman, Mulder." "Meaning?" She sighed. "Meaning it would look ridiculous on a woman. It looks fine on you, for God's sake. Anyway, that's not the point." He still looked defensive. Then his mouth dropped. "What are you saying, Scully?" His face was tight. Scully shook her head quickly, resisting the urge to lay a hand on his arm. "She can't be Samantha. She's at least your age, probably older." He nodded mutely. "It would be..." He stopped. "It would be too ridiculous," she finished for him. "Anyway, we know what Samantha looks like." "Do we?" It was a whisper. She shrugged. "Life doesn't work that way, Mulder." "It does in bad movies." "Life isn't a bad movie." "Ours is. You're the one who said it." She looked at him. "For now, let's just try to find her." He said nothing and trailed behind her as she set off purposefully down the hallway. It became clear fairly quickly that they had no idea where to start looking. At long last they paused on the A deck landing as Scully sank onto a plush velvet sofa. "Are you saying we should knock on everyone's door, Mulder?" "American citizens don't necessarily need passports, despite what the Captain said. Valid birth certificates are often good enough, depending on the ports of call. In this case, Jamaica, Grand Cayman and Mexico don't require passports." "Which means there's no photograph of this woman on board." "I'll bet on it." Scully sighed. "Surely she's sailed itineraries that require passports." Mulder rocked for a moment. "Yeah, but so what? No one takes pictures of passports, Scully. And she hardly strikes me as the type who'd pose on the gangplank next to a floral arrangement." She ran a hand over her eyes. God. She was exhausted. Mulder stood next to her in jeans and a battered Knicks sweatshirt with the sleeves cut off. If she was exhausted, he had to be ready to drop. She gazed thoughtfully at his rounded bicep, studying a blueish vein which stood out in sharp relief and ran down towards his elbow. It took a moment for her to realize that she was imagining running her tongue down its length. Jesus. "The lower decks," she said hastily. Mulder stopped rocking and stared at her. "What?" She looked up at him. "The alleged ghost, Mulder. If this woman is responsible for the paranormal activities aboard these ships, then we should go where they're most commonly reported." He continued staring. "You're saying this poltergeist follows her around?" "I don't know that it's actually a poltergeist." Mulder grinned widely. "God. You're right." He began to pace excitedly. "The reports of ghostly activity seem random on the surface. One ship here, another there -- but why? Why would every one of these ships be affected?" "If it's some kind of psychic energy she projects and it only happens when she's on board." "Yes. If we cross-reference the sightings with the passenger list, we'll be able to narrow it down considerably." She hated to rain on his parade -- but what the hell. "Except for the fact that there's no commonality in names after four cruises and we're now up to eight." He groaned. "But at least we could establish that in each case of a mysterious death, some paranormal activity was reported on board." She chortled. "Right. That'll impress the judge." He looked at her. "Maybe not. But in at least six cases, it might help the victims' relatives come to terms with the whole thing by suggesting that their loved ones may not have killed themselves." Scully breathed. It hadn't occurred to her. Relatives. People who grieved and blamed themselves. They were likely to welcome the idea that some force, some embodiment of evil, had killed the one they loved. That they themselves hadn't driven the victims to take their own lives. And why not, after all? They were still alive. Why live with this? As she looked up at Mulder, she saw the light of something in his eyes that looked like a serene, almost resigned, compassion. God. For the victims. For their families. For the killer even. For her and for himself. He'd sat down next to her. "Three of the victims drowned overboard, Scully," he said softly. "Do you think they jumped?" She said nothing and shook her head slowly. "You can tell their spouses that. Their children. You know they were murdered. You know it wasn't anyone's fault except the killer's. Whatever else happens, that's already something." She felt the heat of him next to her. Something in her knew suddenly that despite everything, despite his blind spots and his foibles, despite his apparent darkness, something in him was good and pure and filled with light. This. This is what drew her to him. And she knew why. As if she'd always known it, the knowledge of what she'd always known suddenly flooded her. It cut through illusion like sunlight. Because she was the one who had taught him. The weight of immeasurable age descended on her like fatigue. Like a given. God. She had chosen him long ago. She didn't know how she knew. She just knew. But when had she forgotten? As exhaustion ran through her, she knew that she had lived by his side for a long time, for lifetimes, from a time when she was already old and he was young, so young. To show him the way. To bring him to this. This thing that in this particular life, she had chosen to forget. For his sake. So that he might learn it at last. That lives are fleeting. That death means nothing. That souls mate eternal, to learn, to grow. All souls. Not just this one with that one. Every one. All souls must eventually return to the centre, where the illusion of division is exposed for what it is. All souls are one. But that was the big one. And he wasn't ready for it yet. Right now, he needed her. The thoughts were a blur, and the feelings, and after all, in this lifetime, Scully was pragmatic. She was dizzy somehow, because of her journey under the sea, she thought vaguely, and now all she saw was his face, concerned but filled with wonder at something he'd seen in hers. He leaned in towards her tentatively. "Scully?" She smiled and reached for him on impulse, her hands against his face. His body stilled as she touched him. Some part of him knows, she thought. Some part of him knew what she was already forgetting again. For no good reason at all, she leaned towards him and brushed her lips against his mouth. His reaction was lightning swift. He moaned and wrapped his arms around her, one hand in her hair as he pulled her roughly towards him. The smell of him filled her senses as she felt lips against her eye, her cheek. Then his mouth opened and his tongue lashed out against her teeth, probing, until she relented and widened, and then it pushed inside her, stroking, filling her, and he continued to moan against her lips, his stubble rasping against her skin as his arms tightened convulsively around her. For a long moment, she let him kiss her. She felt the need to respond to his need, to his apology, to his bottomless remorse, but a nagging doubt caressed her and she remembered. She tore away even though the pain of it was almost physical and then she stared at him. His eyes were slits, his mouth wet and open. He licked his lips and reached for her desperately with his tongue, his face fevered and bruised with desire. "Mulder." She grasped his shoulders and shook him. He bent his head and licked her hand, his hips lunging as he tried to pull her to him again. "Not now." He groaned and nipped her knuckles, dabbing at them with his tongue. "Mulder..." He looked up slowly and gazed at her through narrow eyes. "I want you." His voice was animal and low. She took a deep breath and leaned back, although she was molten and ready and wanted nothing else herself. "Later, Mulder. After we catch her." She waited in the darkness. The thrum of the engines soothed her, as it always did. By now she was able to make her way here without being seen. The ships were all more or less the same, and anyway her angel always guided her through little-used corridors and accessways. But it didn't much matter because the crew was terrified of her angel and always vanished as soon as he made his presence known. He wasn't exactly subtle. There was something angry about him, about the way he manifested to others. Understandable. The world was riddled with injustice. It was enough to justify the most extreme displays of anger. She knew this. And now she waited because she knew the woman had survived and that the two of them were searching for her. No one had ever survived. Strange. Either she'd miscalculated or the little redhead was meant to live after all. It was possible. At this point, she'd learned that anything was possible. She had certainly underestimated the strength of the bond between the woman and the tall dark man. The woman was under his spell -- that much was clear. And yet doubt stabbed through her. It was possible, just possible, that the reverse was in fact true. Or that the spell was mutual. Strange. But she'd heard the man shout "federal agent" and although she wasn't entirely sure what this meant, she suspected he and the woman were on board to find her. To stop her. It had never occurred to her that anyone would try to stop her. Now she realized that this oversight on her part was actually somewhat -- strange. It was just that she'd always considered herself to be a good person, a person with a virtuous mission. Why would anyone try to stop the righteous? Unless, of course, they belonged to the darkness. And as she thought about it, she concluded that this was the only logical explanation. In that case, the forces of evil were in for a big surprise. She smiled. And waited. He'd stayed a little sulky for a while, pulling self-consciously at the front of his sweatshirt to hide the effect she'd had on him. But she knew he understood they had a job to do. First and foremost. In any case, it would've been unconscionable for them to turn their backs on the danger this woman represented. By the time they'd flashed their badges and gained access to the crew and engineering decks, he was his old self again. "Where d'you think she is?" "How the hell should I know, Mulder? You're the one with the instinct." The corridors were outrageously narrow. Crewmen in various states of undress poked their heads out and stared at them as they went by. At her, actually. The level of testosterone in the air was enough to make her long for a convent. Several men lounged in doorways and leered openly. She could feel Mulder close by her side, but to his credit he didn't try to establish ownership as they made their way through the hot, close halls. Evidently, the crew weren't privy to the same level of air circulation as the passengers. Scully could feel sweat beginning to trickle down her face. "Hear the ghost tonight?" Mulder was addressing one of the lounging crewmen. The Indonesian shook his head. "C Deck. Something there. The lights." Mulder nodded. "Nothing else?" "Always it's the engine room at night. Here is only day, sometimes evening." Scully looked at him. "Do you believe in this ghost?" The man studied her for a moment. "In my country, there are as many ghosts as living people. No one dies, miss. They become visible only to each other. Another..." he struggled for words. "Another world that exists in the same space." She stared, fascinated. "Sometimes they are angry. Because of the living, because of what we do. Sometimes only because we forget them." Mulder threw a glance at her. "The dead are... what do you say?" He turned around and said something to another crewman, who stared into space for a moment. "Conscience, yes?" The man nodded. "Ah. The dead are the conscience of the living." Scully shivered. She'd heard the words before, more or less. An old man, a career soldier, all American. A man who'd seen too much. "Universal truths, Scully," Mulder murmured. She looked up at him, startled. She'd quoted the old man's words to him when they'd stood together at her sister's grave. She thanked the crewman and kept walking. A blast of cold air greeted them as they emerged onto the engineering deck. As if that wasn't enough, the overhead lights flickered and dimmed in the cavernous space which housed the ship's monstrous engines. "Bingo," Mulder whispered as he rubbed his arms. She pulled her gun out and looked at him as he stood shivering. He really should've worn long sleeves. "You were a popsicle less than three hours ago, Mulder. What does it take for you to learn a lesson?" He gave her a dirty look and shushed her with a finger against his lips. They were standing on a metal grill platform which hung over the vast expanse of the deck. There was a smell of grease and oil in the air, cut considerably by the cold, Scully surmised. It should have been hot as hell in there. She peered over the iron railing. The space went down and down; huge black boilers gleamed dully in the subdued light. It would have been an eerie sight at the best of times. Scully sighed. Why was it they almost invariably seemed to wind up in places that looked like abandoned factories? Well. Most of the time it was true they actually *were* abandoned factories. So why was it that every criminal on the planet seemed to seek final refuge in what was at the very least a reasonable facsimile of an abandoned factory? She smirked. This was actually striking her as mildly amusing. God. How jaded could you get? She'd obviously been doing this too long. In this particular case, though, it was clear Mulder wasn't sharing her train of thought. He was heading for a narrow iron staircase. As she reached him, he stopped suddenly on a lower step and turned to her, his lips to her ear. "Be careful. She may try to kill you again." "How do you know?" Her lips barely moved. "She's not used to failing. Stay close to me." As they proceeded noiselessly down the steps, it occurred to her that this woman probably didn't have a whole lot of warm fuzzy feelings for Mulder either. If she knew she was cornered, she'd probably lash out at anyone who came near her. Scully set her mouth grimly and followed her partner into what felt like hell. Once they'd reached the floor of the deck, the dull throb of the engines was the only sound they heard and it was next to impossible to see anything at all. The large overhead lights were dim and ineffectual; a few even flickered and winked out as they walked. Scully suspected that the room was normally filled with harsh light which only added to the heat. A heat she could only imagine as the cold bit through her. Yet the boilers were hot enough; waves of warm air radiated from them only to be almost immediately dissipated by the wall of cold. She played her flashlight over looming coal-black surfaces and winced as metal snapped and popped around her. The contrast between hot and cold was causing the steel and iron to expand and contract audibly. As if she wasn't already jumpy enough. And then they cleared a bank of oil drums to find a little round clearing of sorts lit dimly by one of the overhead lights. The woman sat in the centre on a perfectly normal chair, looking for all the world as though she'd been waiting for them to arrive. Mist curled around her, licking her feet like an obedient pet. She recognized it. In fact, she could feel the cold emanating from it. The woman seemed oblivious to whatever discomfort the damn thing had to be causing her. "So nice to see you both." Scully raised her gun and held it firmly in both hands. "Hands in the air." The woman laughed and Scully yelped suddenly as she dropped the gun. It lay at her feet, covered in frost and smoking slightly from the intense cold. Her hands ached and burned. Christ. She felt something brush against her arm. Mulder. He was suddenly right next to her and she felt his hand move up her back until it settled on her shoulder. She gasped a little as he pulled her against his side. "Mulder..." Scully tried to unclench her teeth. Why didn't he reach for his gun, dammit? God. She knew why. There was no point. No point at all. "Lovely to see you too," he said mildly, his gaze locked on the woman. "Hope you don't mind if my friend and I stick together. Bad things seem to happen when we're apart." Scully stared at him and then turned back to the woman. The woman smiled and looked at her. "You're making a big mistake with this one, my dear. He's not to be trusted." Scully forced herself to relaxed and shrugged. "Well, you know men. Can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em." The woman laughed. "Isn't it the truth?" She studied her affectionately. "You're a feisty one. Maybe I worried about you for nothing." "What do you mean?" "It's funny, you know," she continued thoughtfully as if Scully hadn't spoken. "I never make mistakes about this kind of thing." She looked up. "Oh, well. First time for everything. I've had time to think a little. Now I'm fairly certain it's you, Mr. Seasick, who needs my help." "You're wrong," Mulder said tightly. She raised an eyebrow and waited. "Oh?" "The only one who still needs to be freed is you." "Me?" He nodded. Scully squirmed and tried to pull away from him, but his grip tightened as he spoke. "Think about it. Everyone you've... freed suffered in ways that are similar to what you've been through yourself." The woman looked at him calmly and said nothing. Scully wished he'd let her go, but part of her grasped what he was doing, and why. It was a standard analysis of a killer's motives, after all. Too bad this one seemed to have some kind of psychic force that might actually render her invulnerable. "You've done your job. You've fulfilled your mandate. We were sent to inform you that you can rest now. You've done well." God. What the hell was he doing? This had to be a dangerous path. The woman only smiled. "You're satisfied, then?" Mulder smiled back. "Very." The woman nodded serenely. Scully let out a breath. He never ceased to amaze her. "Well. I'm pleased as punch." She rose gracefully and smoothed her black evening dress. Something in the woman's tone made her suspicious, but she kept her mouth shut as Mulder gestured back in the direction they'd come from. "Why don't we walk you back to your room?" "A marvellous idea." The woman inclined her head graciously and stepped out of the circle of light. As they turned to follow her, her voice, clear, lit with laughter, drifted back towards them. "Except my mother always warned me not to walk with strangers. Especially when they're sent by Satan." Scully's world exploded into light as an unimaginable force struck her and sent her sailing through the air. She vaguely felt Mulder's arm loosen its grip before she slammed into a stack of oil barrels and fell, her breath knocked out of her. The barrels shook and trembled. Her body screamed with pain but she ducked and rolled off to the side just as two of the large drums crashed into the space she'd just occupied. "Scully!" His voice came from somewhere to her left. And then she heard him scream. "Mulder!" Scully rose shakily and stumbled, almost falling. She narrowly missed careening off a boiler stack as she skidded around the corner and stopped, aghast. Mulder was elevated in the air, held up by nothing she could see. He writhed in the mist that had wrapped itself around him. His eyes were squeezed shut, his lips open wide in agony as the mist swirled in and out of his mouth, his nose, even from the corners of his eyes. "No!" The woman stood in front of him, grinning. Her arms were folded across her chest. "Stop it!" Scully ran for her blindly and then froze as a tendril of mist broke away from Mulder and suddenly lunged towards her, hovering. "I don't want to hurt you, my dear. Please don't make me." "Let him go." "He's a bad man." "No. He's anything but." The woman turned and looked at her. As their eyes met, Scully suddenly saw her clearly. Fatigue washed over her as it had on the landing what felt like centuries ago and all at once she knew. She remembered. This woman. Her soul was dark, but the darkness was born of confusion, of unimaginable pain and sorrow. Lifetimes of it. Over and over again. She carried a magnet for it, somehow. A soul whose destiny it was to harvest sorrow out of others' way. As evolved a soul as you could find on the planet. These were strong beings, beings whose evolution was almost complete, bodhisatvas, the Buddhists called them, souls who chose for a time to bear the brunt of human pain so that others might be spared its paralyzing weight. The guardian angels of humanity. The teachers, the masters, the ones who did silent good and were rarely recognized. Some sorrow was necessary in every soul's life. To learn, to grow. But too much could lead to irreparable damage. This one had cracked under the pressure of other people's pain. Possibly because something in her had driven her to return over and over long past the point where she was useful. Some part of her still clung to human existence when in fact she should have been freed from it long before. A fallen angel. One who'd forgotten what she'd already achieved. Scully recognized her vaguely through the fog of memories she only barely knew she had. They were kindred spirits. Bodhisatvas both. But Scully's time was now. The other's had passed and now her soul was backsliding, regressing horribly. She'd accumulated enough debt in this lifetime to reincarnate as an animal. Tragic. And rare. But it happened. The woman's eyes grew wide as she stared at Scully. Something flickered in her eyes. Some frail fragment of memory. "No..." she whispered. Scully was already forgetting, but she knew, somehow, that the soul she saw staring at her from behind night-black eyes was the one who remembered, the one who'd already been old when Scully herself had embarked on the path. Powerful. And deadly if the power was turned towards evil. Scully knew vaguely that she herself didn't have nearly the power of the other. But she could make sure the other knew that she'd been recognized. Scully turned to Mulder and concentrated. On what? She wasn't sure. On freeing him from the influence of the other. On releasing him from the mist. On loving him. Nothing more, in the end. And nothing less. The mist swirled around him madly for moments and then broke apart suddenly, scattering; he fell to the ground, inert but alive. Alive. Scully could feel his life force as though it were her own. She turned back to the other, who was staring at her now in horror and pain. She remembered. She remembered what Scully had already almost forgotten. "Please..." Their eyes locked and Scully couldn't remember why. She felt a wave of dizziness and swayed. And then the tatters of mist seemed to regroup, billowing and roiling as they headed towards the woman and began to climb up her body slowly until she was completely enveloped. Scully could barely make out the woman's features now and she was tired, so tired. "I'm sorry..." The other's voice seemed to drift through the cloud which finally was all there was to see. Scully yawned and sat down. So tired. Her eyes closed. "Scully." The voice was familiar somehow, but she was so sleepy. "Scully!" She moaned a little and batted at the source of whatever it was that kept harping at her. She heard a muffled "ooof" and something stopped her hand, grasping it. "She's conscious." Yeah, right, she thought irritably. Anyone who thought this was consciousness was bound to be a real drag at parties. "Five more minutes," she mumbled, and reached for non- existent covers. God. Where the hell were the damn covers? She heard a chuckle. "Yep. That's Scully, all right." Mulder. Christ. She sat bolt upright, startling Mulder so that he almost fell off the side of the narrow bed. "Jesus, Scully. Can't you wake up like normal people?" The ship doctor hovered over her partner's shoulder. She stared at Mulder's face, worried somehow but she couldn't quite remember why. "What happened?" He reached over and stroked her cheek. "The killer's dead, Scully. Do you remember the woman?" She nodded slowly. "When I came to, I found her frozen solid like a side of meat. Hard as a rock. And you were lying in front of her, curled up peacefully like all was well with the world." "Really?" She tried to remember. "I panicked at first but you were breathing fine. You looked like you'd simply dropped off, except that nothing I did woke you up." She suddenly stared at him suspiciously and he grinned. "What did you try?" "Well, for one thing I'm sorry to report that Sleeping Beauty is just a fairy tale, Scully. Unless I'm not Prince Charming, which I suppose is remotely plausible." She poked him in the chest and he chortled. The doctor straightened and rolled his eyes. "Everything seems fine here, I'd say." She glared at him. "Medicine. Such an exact science." He nodded. "Agent Mulder mentioned you were a doctor. We make the worst patients, as you know." She started as she remembered. "Mulder?" Her eyes were wild for a moment. "You were suspended in that mist. Are you okay?" "Is that what happened?" He shook his head. "I don't remember any of it. Mild burns here and there; nothing too serious. The doctor patched me up." "Cold burns." He looked at her. "I was suspended in the air, Scully? And you're willing to admit it in front of a witness?" She shrugged. "I saw what I saw. I'm not prepared to advance any explanations for what it was." He smiled at her. "The ship's docked in Jamaica." "So we should go." "Go where?" "Back to Washington, Mulder. Where else?" He groaned in protest. Scully turned to the doctor. "Can you arrange for us to take the body back?" The man shuddered. "No problem. It won't thaw out for days. Never seen anything like it and quite frankly I'd rather it didn't stay on the ship. We'll have to take some quarantine precautions with the body, though." Scully nodded. Although she knew whatever this woman had died from wasn't remotely catching. She hesitated. How did she know? She could only barely remember what had happened. Hell. She just knew. "Do we know who she was?" Mulder looked at her. "A name, Scully. I've got a name. We'll have to run it through the computer to establish her real identity. My guess is we'll find out she was just an ordinary woman with no priors and no motives." She threw her legs over the side of the bed and fought momentary dizziness. Mulder steadied her. "You okay?" "I'm fine, Mulder." He wrapped his arm around her for a quick moment and sniggered. "I know, Scully. I know. You're always fine." She let Mulder doze on the flight home. After all, he'd been awake for days. Under the circumstances, though, he seemed in remarkably good shape; he'd made jokes, smiled and looked happier than he had in a long time. Since she'd known him, possibly. Scully suspected she knew why. She suspected he was looking forward to something. As it happened, she thought a little ruefully, so was she. But she wasn't sure she was ready for it. It had been four years. She knew she could count on him to wait a little longer if that was what she needed. Unfortunately, she wasn't sure what she needed. At some point he awoke and looked at her. By some miracle, they'd been blessed with the entire row on this flight. He lay back, sprawled against the window, and gazed at her as she sat on the seat across the aisle. "What do you think happened, Scully?" She shrugged. "The killer's stopped. That's the most important thing." He dropped his feet and slid over to the aisle seat next to her. "Yeah, but what do you remember?" "The last thing I remember clearly is seeing you suspended in midair, surrounded by the mist. You were obviously in a lot of pain." "And?" "And I remember freaking out and telling the woman to let you go." She stopped and thought for a moment. "Oh. I also remember the mist leaving you. You dropped to the ground." Her eyes widened. "That's it. The mist ended up around the woman. She was completely smothered in it." He nodded. "It killed her. She was covered in thick frost, Scully, like those guys from the Franklin Expedition they dug up in the arctic." "The same frost that almost killed you." He pursed his lips and she found herself staring at them. "I'm not sure it would've killed me. You said yourself that it started to dissipate shortly after you put me in the shower." She said nothing. "But what was it, Scully? If it was her own psychic projection, why would it suddenly turn on her?" "You're asking *me*?" She feigned disbelief. He grinned. No question about it. He was chipper as hell. This called for extreme measures. "Since you ask, I'd have to say that either a) the mist was a poltergeist-like psychic projection which turned against her when she admitted her guilt and/or felt doubt about her mission for the first time, or b) it was actually a manifestation of Vanmeer or some other spirit and she somehow tapped into its power because it had its own agenda to fulfil, except it decided to bail out when the going got tough, or c) it was some kind of manifestation of the killer's conscience which assisted her as long as she had the moral certitude of what she was doing, and then she willingly allowed it to consume her when she realized she was wrong. How's that?" His jaw dropped. "Mulder?" "Are you serious?" She smiled. "Well, actually -- naaaaaaah." He choked and started laughing. When he was finally able to talk again, he wiped his eyes and looked at her. "Still mad at me?" "No." She was serious, suddenly. "But that was the second- to-last straw, Mulder." He said nothing. "I've put up with your madness. I've tolerated your ditching me on cases, even when it actually put me in danger; I've let you run amok without me, putting yourself and our careers on the line. I've been dragged in front of committees and hearings because of you, and none of it's stopped you from prancing around doing whatever you feel like doing. "Scully..." "No more." She fixed him and he sat still, gazing at her. "The only reason I'm not asking for an immediate transfer is because I know that you care about me, in your own way, as much as you do anyone. More than you do anyone, probably. I know you'd die or kill for me. You trust me, even, and I actually believe there's no one else in that category." "Scully, you have to believe me..." "I do believe you. But there's a limit to what I'll put up with, Mulder. And you've reached it. This is it. There's no room for one more thing." He just looked at her. "You understand this isn't an ultimatum, Mulder. It's a statement of fact." He shifted a little. "So what about us?" "What about us?" "Something's happened between us." "Nothing's happened between us that hasn't been there all along." He shook his head impatiently. "Scully, you know what I mean." She considered this. "I don't know that I do. I have to think about it." "You think too much." "And you don't think enough." He brightened. "So we need each other." "We already have each other, Mulder. Don't you see? What you're talking about is... something else." "Something I want, Scully. Something I know you want too." "That doesn't mean it's a good idea." "It doesn't mean it's a bad one either. For Christ's sake, Scully..." "Look." She lay a hand on his. It was clutching the armrest. To each his turbulence, apparently. "Don't push me, Mulder." He met her eyes solemnly for a long moment. "Okay." She smiled at him. He didn't smile back, but although his body sagged a little, his eyes held nothing but patience. "I've waited this long, Scully." She squeezed his hand, leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. END