Quietus 

By Allison Johnson
allijohn@nucleus.com


Date: 22 Jan 1999

I'm not entirely sure just yet how to classify this.  It's sort of a case
file.  It's a post-"Paper Hearts" piece, a sequel, if you wish.  It's
Muldercentric, but with some good, strong Scully moments.  It 
delves a-plenty into their relationship, but it's not romance.  It's got
angst.  It's got humour.  It's got Assistant Director Kersh and Johann
Sebastian Bach.   Nachos, chicken wings, beer, corned beef
sandwiches, chocolate, and margaritas all  make an appearance at some point or
other.  It's  under 300K.  Oh heck.  Just read it, and let me know what you
think. 

I'd like to thank my good friend Nancy FF of the OBSSE for beta-reading this,
for her suggestions, her insight, and her kind words.  You're a big ball of
right, Nancy.  Thanks, sweetie!! :) 
  
Quietus
Non omnia moriar.
(Not all of me will die.)- Horace

  

Washington, D.C. 
J. Edgar Hoover Building 
Wednesday, February 10, 1999 
7:24 p.m. 
  
Mulder stepped off the elevator and frowned, looking around for the music. The
bullpen was still, the day's end defined by quiet, now-hushed rows of empty 
desks, blank computer monitors, and unruffled stacks of paper. One remaining 
bank of still-humming fluorescents cast deep shadows over all. Half-full mugs 
sat
cold, beige and brown coalesced in swirling patterns, the way of whitener in 
stagnant coffee. One of the cleaning staff was running a floor polisher at the 
end of
the corridor. Mulder stopped - and listened. Above the hum of the remaining 
fluorescents, above the distant whine of the polisher, he heard a soaring flute 
and its violin counterpoint. Bach's Fifth Brandenburg Concerto, first movement, 
about two-thirds of the way through. 

Turning his head, he pinpointed the source. Quietly, he walked toward his
desk, the music growing louder. He squinted and looked at the odd sight, dimly
lit because his and Scully's desks were under a bank of extinguished lights. 
Emerging from behind the computer monitor on Scully's desk, propped on a pile of 
file folders, were a pair of pantyhose-clad feet, crossed at the ankle. He could 
swear the toes were conducting Herr Kappellmeister. 

He softened his step even more and crept closer. Scully lounged in her office
chair, head back, hair swinging gently, eyes closed, lips slightly parted. Her
lower arms were raised, elbows bent and tucked in at her sides. As the 
harpsichord solo began, her fingers moved rapidly, lightly polished nails 
capturing the dim
light, tapping the keys of the invisible Baroque instrument hovering just above 
her lap. Mulder grinned and stood by quietly, fascinated. Her expression, her 
gestures, her entire body moved lithely, subtly, in synch with the tinkle-crash 
of the harpsichord. He might have found the scene arousing if the whole thing 
weren't so goddamned funny. 

It was a long solo. Mulder fished around in his memory for scraps of a music
history course that he'd taken at Oxford. What was so unusual about this
concerto - something the fairly staid Bach had done to break with convention. Oh 
yes, the harpsichord solo itself. The harpsichord normally formed part of the 
continuo, the background accompaniment in Baroque music, the delicate but 
stalwart force that provided the distinctive foundation for orchestral works of 
the period.  The harpsichord never took centre stage. Not until this 
composition, if he recalled correctly.  He tilted his head to the side and 
stood, arms folded, regarding Scully. She was fully into the music, and he was 
finding it hard not to burst out laughing. That blistering arpeggio was coming 
up - oh brother! His hand involuntarily slipped up to cover his mouth, his eyes 
welling with suppressed tears. He bit his lip, watching as she finished the solo 
with a flourish and conducted the remaining few seconds of the Allegro. The last 
chord faded - and he lost it. 

Her eyes snapped open. 

She bolted upright, her feet pulling several folders off the desk and onto the
floor. Wide-eyed, she stared as Mulder doubled over, howling. She fumbled for
her voice and her dignity, feeling the hot flush creep unbidden and unwanted 
over her face. 

"M-mulder!" she stammered finally. "Jesus, how long have you been standing
there?" 

Mulder straightened. "Go on!" he brayed, his voice hoarse. "You've still got
the rest of the concerto!" 

Scully drew her feet under her desk, probed for her shoes, and stared at the
keyboard for no other reason than it was a hell of a lot easier to look at
than Mulder just at the moment. She slipped off the chair and knelt to retrieve 
the folders, placing the desk between her and her partner. This was an even 
better proposition as it allowed her to focus on the tiles. A hole to disappear 
into would be just lovely, she thought. 

Mulder crouched to help her pick up, his laughter reduced to a steady chuckle.
He looked at her, at the sections of gold-red hair swinging in front of her
face that only partly hid her relentless flush. After a moment, she raised her 
eyes to his.  Seeing his ongoing amusement, knowing she'd been caught cold, no 
possible
alibi, Yer Honour, she flashed a broad, guilty smile and laughed voicelessly. 
She shook her head and stuffed papers into the last folder. 

"I always pegged you as a Bach person," Mulder said, still grinning, as they
stood up. 

"Oh?" Scully drew herself together with immense dignity. "And why's that?" 

"He's so precise. Logical. Every note and phrase goes exactly where it's
supposed to. I think you and he would have had a lot in common." 

"Yeah. We'd both work a lot of weekends." Scully regarded her partner, giving
him a look that promised vengeance. "I thought you went home hours ago." 

"I thought the same about you. I was down in Kersh's office." 

Scully frowned. "Uh oh." 

Mulder shook his head. "Not this time. He was running an arson case past me;
he wants us involved. It wasn't a formal meeting - he wants to see us both
tomorrow for that." 

"Arson?" 

"It's Federal," Mulder said. "A number of deliberately set fires in Baltimore
during the past year and a half. Government offices and archives. Falls under
the rubric of do-mess-tick terror-izm." 

Scully shrugged, dropping the folders on the desk with an indifferent smack.
"Well, it beats harassing farmers over their fertilizer purchases. You don't
dare suppose this might actually be an attaboy-girl for keeping our noses clean 
lately, do you?" 

Mulder shrugged. "A journey of a thousand miles, Scully. But I hate fires, you
know that." 

"Does Kersh know that?" 

"I doubt it. Doesn't matter. This is all after the fact stuff, anyway. I'm
okay with it. I guess." 

Scully nodded, one side of her mouth curving upward. 

"Why are you still here?" Mulder asked. Scully stopped the CD, popped it out
of the drive, and waggled it at him. 

"My CD player is on the fritz. I found this recording at lunch today that the
Post's classical music reviewer recommended, and I just thought I'd stay and
listen to it once everyone had gone home." She stared at Mulder for emphasis. 
"And now I'm going home." She found the jewel case, pressed the disk into place, 
snapped the cover shut. 

"I was going to invite you over to my place tonight," Mulder said. "I picked
up a couple of new videos at lunch today." 

Scully glared at him. "No thank you," she deadpanned as they walked to the
elevator. They stood in silence, waiting. 

"By the way," Mulder said, leaning close to her, "that was a great thing you
had going there with the toes." 

She punched him on the arm as the doors opened. 
  


8:15 a.m. 
Assistant Director Kersh's Office. 

Kersh sat behind the desk of his spacious office, regarding them flatly, the
way he always did. This look fascinated Scully even while it made her
defensive. It forever irritated the snot out of Mulder. The look was somehow 
emphasized by the backlighting effect of the office windows, which turned Kersh 
into a semi-sinister silhouette. 

"Agents," he said by way of greeting. As they sat opposite him, Kersh pushed
an open file folder across the desk. In synch, the agents leaned forward
slightly to look at the case information. 

"As I mentioned to you yesterday, Agent Mulder, there seems to be an arsonist
on the loose in Baltimore," the assistant director intoned. "Now normally the 
Bureau wouldn't involve itself in local cases like this, except that the 
arsonist has
seen fit to torch two buildings that house Federal government offices, and one 
warehouse where government archives are stored. In each case, a readily 
identifiable accelerant was used, and the fires were started after regular 
office hours.  There have been no deaths or serious injuries, although in the 
case of the warehouse fire one security guard was taken to hospital suffering 
from smoke inhalation and was later released." 

Scully flipped the first page over. "Material first ignited appears to be
naphtha," she murmured thoughtfully. "Used in canned heat products and as camp
fuel. Very flammable." Reading further, she frowned slightly. "The first fire 
was set eighteen months ago, the second a year ago, the third last week." 

Kersh nodded. "Baltimore P.D. believes that it's the work of one individual,
probably with some kind of grudge against the government." 

"Well, that narrows it down to about half the population of the United
States," Mulder snorted. Kersh turned his bland gaze to Mulder, who returned
it with an equally bland gaze of his own. 

"Agent Mulder, I'm counting on you and Agent Scully to work with the Baltimore
P.D. to narrow that group down just a little more." 

"Sir," Mulder began in a monotone, "are we to continue with our current
assignment involving the transfer of animal waste material into clandestine
facilities designed to produce nitrogen compounds for illicit explosives 
manufacture, which incidentally involves the regular exposure of Agent Scully 
and myself to the not-so incidental presence of truly obnoxious quantities of 
poorly contained methane gas?" 

Scully stiffened beside him. Kersh's countenance continued to fail to register
any expression whatsoever. 

"No, Agent Mulder. You and Agent Scully will make this your priority
assignment for the time being. I will return you both to the explosives
assignment once this is completed." 

Mulder grinned humourlessly. "Thank goodness," he said, now making his voice
bounce with sarcastic enthusiasm. "Investigating illicit shit-shovelling is
the highlight of my workday." 

Scully surreptitiously kicked his shin. 

"Glad to hear it, Agent Mulder," Kersh droned, leaning forward on his elbows,
hands clasped. "I'll be sure to give you priority consideration on future
assignments of that nature as they become available." Kersh smiled, a very small 
smile, at his obstreperous agent. Mulder fell silent and looked at his knees, 
shaking
his head slightly.  Scully relaxed. 

"Detectives Branch and Hurley are expecting you to call." Kersh closed the
folder and leaned slowly back in his chair. The agents stood; Scully swept the
folder under her arm. "Thank you, sir," she said. 

Kersh's secretary flicked her eyes at Mulder as they passed, then offered a
vaguely contemptuous look to Scully. The agents ignored her. Once in the
hallway, Scully glanced warily up at her partner. 

"You just have to keep endearing yourself to him, don't you, Mulder?" 

Mulder opened the door and gallantly waved her through. "Either that, my dear
Scully, or I'm going to have to hurt him." 

END PART ONE

---------------------------------------------

[Quietus - Part 2 of 14] 

4:27 p.m. 

They'd wrapped up what they could on the fertilizer case, and headed out to
Baltimore. The Baltimore Police Department Headquarters was, like most large
urban police stations, swarming with frenetic yet controlled activity. Phones 
rang,
officers bustled, paper shuffled, all to the beat of whatever criminal
activity pulsed through the city on any given day. Looking around, Scully saw a 
tall, tough-looking blonde woman in her late thirties approaching them, trailed 
by a heavyset man in his mid-forties.  The woman held out her hand to Mulder and 
Scully, smiling warmly. 

"Agent Mulder, Agent Scully, I'm Detective Dayle Branch, this is my partner
Detective Bob Hurley." Hands were shaken all around, and Branch waved them
into a briefing room. The sounds of the Baltimore P.D. bullpen muted as she shut 
the briefing room door and Hurley performed the coffee honours. A moment of 
convivial smalltalk, mention of a football game, talk of the weather. Both 
Federal
agents instantly felt at ease and welcomed. 

Hurley leaned casually back in his chair and sipped his coffee. "Branch and I
have worked arson for the last two and a half years. This case isn't
particularly odd or unusual. But since it involves government property, that's 
where you come in. And I'm told that your investigative skills are - well, I've 
heard that you have a knack for creative and unusual approaches." 

"Well, we don't have a lot of opportunity to get creative these days," Mulder
said, lifting his own cup for a sip. "We're happy to help you out, but frankly
I don't know if there's anything Agent Scully and I can bring to this that goes 
beyond what you and Detective Branch are capable of." 

Hurley nodded, smiling wryly. "Pretty routine, huh? That's what Dayle and I
thought, but this is Federal jurisdiction, so here you are." 

"We've been briefed on the basics," Scully said. "Anything special or unusual
about these government offices that you've been able to determine?" 

Branch shook her head. "Employee records, human resources stuff in one office.
Public works records in another. Nothing particularly juicy or sexy. I wish it 
was."
She chuckled. "Like falsified immunization records, LSD experiments on armed
forces personnel, secret files on alien abductions..." Scully noticed how
Mulder's head jerked up and instantly felt sympathy. As happy as she was to have 
a relatively routine, nine to five schedule now and the opportunity for a life
of sorts, she felt yet another pang of loss for the X-Files. She knew Mulder 
felt it even more keenly. 

Branch and Hurley took them through what they knew of the case so far. No
suspects, few leads. The detectives had been assigned to the case full time as
of the last fire several days previous. The forensics data had been gathered, 
but was still being analyzed. 

"I'm going to go over the forensics information tonight, try to pull together
a report of sorts for you," Hurley offered. "I work at home when I can; I've
got a little girl I like to be there for. Maybe you folks would like to drop by 
tomorrow and we can go over some of this stuff." 

"I'd like to see the site of the fire, too," Scully said. Branch nodded. 

"I'm going over there with some of our arson specialists tomorrow morning, if
you'd like to come along." Scully bobbed her head in agreement. Hurley jotted
down his home address; Mulder took it. They said their goodbyes, primed for a 
fresh start in the morning. Mulder sighed heavily as he and Scully walked down 
the steps of the precinct. 

"Nothing juicy or sexy, Scully," he said. "What I wouldn't give for something
juicy and sexy right about now." 

"Well, we could go over to that un-juicy and not-sexy building and have a
peek," Scully suggested, looking up at Mulder's dispirited face. He shrugged. 

"Just a burnt-out shell, Scully. That's all it is. Just a bunch of charred
stuff." He kicked a pebble, watched it bounce into the street. They walked to
the car in silence. 

"Hey," she said as they got in, feeling the need to cheer him up. "That
restaurant with the great chowder. You up for that? It's on me." A small smile
touched Mulder's eyes as he pondered her offer. The smile migrated to the rest 
of his face as he turned the key in the ignition. 

"Only if there's a pitcher of something really potent from a local microbrewery 
to go along with it." 

"You're on." 

  

He strolled along a waterfront pathway. The day was dank, drizzly, and foggy;
midwinter on the east coast. Seabirds cried and squawked, wheeling in the air
as they searched for fish, squabbling with each other over their catches. He was
dressed in a t-shirt and sweatpants, no socks or shoes. He wasn't cold. He
should have been. 

A small figure loomed out of the fog, fuzzy and indistinct at first. A dark
vertical streak obscured much of the upper half of its body. Mulder moved
closer. A young girl, her back to him. The dark streak resolved itself into 
long, dark hair. She turned, presenting her profile to him. 

Samantha. 

His pulse quickened and he picked up the pace. Closer. The girl turned to face
him fully. Samantha's face disappeared, replaced by the face of a child he'd
never seen before. Her young body filled out - stockier than Samantha, but still 
about her age when - when... 

The girl smiled and was suddenly standing before him, gazing up at him. She
still looked like Samantha, unnervingly so. 

Hello, Fooox, she said. She pointed toward a nearby jetty. He looked, saw
nothing. She stretched out her hand toward him, fingers curled around an
object. Mulder reached out to take what she was offering. Then she was running 
back down the pathway, vanishing into the fog. He looked at his hand. 

Woke with a start. 

Mulder eased back onto the pillow, rubbed his face. He looked at his hands,
flexed the fingers. He hated dreams of Samantha. He hadn't dreamt of her in a
long time, and now she was back. But that other girl ... He shook his head. 

Whatever. 

He rolled over and closed his eyes again, but never really went back to sleep. 
  


  
Hurley lived in an older neighbourhood full of bungalows and two-storey
houses, a classic '50's era suburb. Mulder cruised slowly down a broad lane
lined with large mature trees, seasonally leafless, peering through them and 
past expansive lawns to find Hurley's house number. Ah, there it was. Mulder 
eyed the
greenspace across from the modest two-storey house as he moved up the walk, 
glancing about him, noting the carefully maintained yard. Very nice. Very homey. 

  
A woman in business attire greeted him at the door. "You must be Agent
Mulder," she said pleasantly. "Come on in - Bob's expecting you." As he
entered the foyer and removed his shoes, the woman introduced herself. "I'm 
Jeanne Hurley. Why don't you have a seat in the living room? Can I get you 
anything, a coffee perhaps?" 
  
"Coffee would be great, thanks," Mulder responded, casting an appreciative eye
around the entryway. He liked homes, as opposed to houses, and he liked the
sort of people who turned mere residential spaces into living spaces. It was so 
unlike his apartment. He crashed there. People lived here. 
  
He heard the Hurleys talking in the kitchen, the sound of low, muted laughter,
the clink of coffee cups. His own life was so unfettered, a good thing,
considering his line of work. There was a definite warmth to the house, 
dispensed by its uncomplicated but intimate dcor. He felt vaguely uncomfortable, 
like he was
intruding. He felt a little empty. 
  
His gaze wandered across the window to the fireplace mantle, to the array of
family pictures that sat upon it. His eyes narrowed. He rose from his seat and
moved over, focused intently on a frame that held several small pictures, all 
featuring one subject. 
  
Her. 
  
Mulder stared, confused. The young girl, the one from his dream, stared
happily back from the embrace of a smiling, elderly woman. There was a formal
school picture.  A picture of her holding a freshly caught fish, grinning 
proudly. A baby picture. A picture of her in a rangy dogpile with Jeanne and 
Bob, her hair,
her dark, long hair, falling over her face, which was contorted in a giggle. 
  
"Agent Mulder, good morning," Hurley said from behind him, breaking his focus.
Mulder turned. Hurley stood, holding two steaming mugs of coffee. "Black okay?" 
he said, somewhat apologetically. "Seems that the milk is off - I forgot to
pick some up on the way home yesterday." 
  
"No, that's fine, thank you," Mulder said, a little absently. Jeanne popped
her head into the living room. 
  
"I'm off," she said crisply. "Nice to meet you, Agent Mulder." 
  
Mulder smiled politely and nodded. "Thanks for the coffee, Mrs. Hurley," he
said, hoisting the mug. She smiled and disappeared. 
  
"I'll bring the milk home tonight, honey," she called, a note of playful
reproach in her voice. The door shut. Hurley rolled his eyes ceilingward. 
  
"I have that data for you," Hurley said, reaching for an envelope on the
credenza and motioning for Mulder to sit. Mulder slid his fingers into the
manila envelope and withdrew a package of neatly word-processed pages. "This is 
the stuff that came back from our labs shortly after you and Agent Scully left 
us yesterday.  It's pretty standard arson stuff - definite signs of an 
accelerant, the same stuff that was used in the other fires. The fire was 
started in a file room, in this case
a securely locked file room. We're looking into the employment records of 
everyone who worked there, and cross checking with our criminal database. We're 
thinking it might be one of the cleaning staff." 
  
"Makes sense," Mulder nodded. "What about the other fires - did you check into
employment and criminal records there too?" 
  
"We did. Everyone appears clean. Until this last fire, we didn't feel it was
necessary to check into the Federal database. It wasn't deemed a pattern until
last week." 
  
"We'll get on it," Mulder said. A sound came from the ceiling, followed by the
patter of feet down the carpeted stairs. A young girl with long, dark hair
appeared in the living room, dressed in jeans, sweater, and winter jacket. 
  
She locked eyes with Mulder. 
  
Hurley turned, smiling. The girl flashed a grin at Mulder, then ran to her
father's outstretched arm. Hurley gathered her close and kissed the top of her
head. 
  
"Agent Mulder, this is my daughter Meryl," he said. Meryl favoured Mulder with
a confident, very adult look that made him feel a little odd. 
  
"Hello, Fooox," she said, putting a slight, rising glissando on his name that
went straight to his spine and slithered down it. Mulder shivered. 
  
Hurley snugged his daughter in tighter. "That's Mr. Mulder to you, you
monkey," he said reprovingly. Meryl giggled, her blue eyes never leaving the
Federal agent.  Mulder smiled, hoping it didn't look as forced as it felt. 
  
"Hi, Meryl," he said. He cast about for something else to say. "Not in school
today?" 
  
"Nope," she said crisply, an echo of her mother's voice. "Teachers'
Convention." 
  
"And then she gets a two week break starting Monday," Hurley said. "She's in a
year-round program and her group is off until March. And then she gets a 
four-day
Easter break a month after that. I wish I had that many holidays." 
  
"I'm going to visit my aunt in Calgary," Meryl piped. "My cousin's going to
teach me how to ski." 
  
"Sounds like fun," Mulder said. He felt the need to challenge the look in her
eyes, a look that seemed so out of place on a child's face. He shook himself
internally. It doesn't mean anything, he told himself. She's just a kid, and 
I've never seen her before in my life. 
  
"Going over to Jen's place today, right?" Hurley asked his daughter. Meryl
nodded, finally breaking her gaze with Mulder and looking at her father.
"Well, don't spend all your allowance," Hurley cautioned. "Give your mother or 
me a call if anything goes funny, okay?" 
  
Meryl rolled her eyes. "I know, I know," she protested, squirming a little.
Hurley planted a kiss on her forehead. Meryl extricated herself from her dad's
embrace and ran to the front door. 
  
"Meryl," Hurley called. "You're forgetting something." 
  
Meryl popped her head back into the living room. "Nice to meet you, Mr.
Mulder," she sang, then disappeared. Hurley chuckled. 

 "She's the love of my life," he said, taking a sip of his coffee. Mulder
nodded, a little stupidly. Children were so far outside his experience, and
Meryl had, quite frankly, creeped him out. 
  
"Kids of your own?" Hurley asked. Mulder shook his head. 
  
"I don't know if kids in general are worth the sacrifice, but Meryl is," the
detective said. "I never thought I wanted kids, but Jeanne got pregnant and
boom, my life as I knew it was over. Now I can't imagine it any other way." 

Unable to add anything, Mulder gathered up the papers and put them back in the
envelope. He felt a minor surge of resentment toward Hurley - his perfect kid, 
his
perfect wife, his perfect house... He tried to feel superior as a freewheeling
bachelor, but comparing Hurley's comfortable existence to his own cold leather
couch and video collection made him feel oddly cheated. He pushed his alien, 
covetous thoughts firmly aside. 

"You've made a good start here," Mulder said, turning the conversation back to
work mode. "As soon as we get a look at the crime scene, Agent Scully and I
will run through the Federal database and see if we can come up with any matches 
for you." 

 "Appreciate that," Hurley said, swallowing the last of his coffee. He took
Mulder's empty cup out to the kitchen. Mulder went to the hallway and as he
slid into his shoes he took a last look at the pictures of Meryl on the mantle. 
A sudden thought made him glance down at the envelope in his hand. Printed in 
the
detective's scrawl was the name, Special Agent Fox Mulder. Well. That took care 
of one little mystery. 

Still, he thought, that was weird. 

END PART TWO
---------------------------------------------

[Quietus - Part 3 of 14] 

They met up with Scully and Branch inside the burned warehouse. The fire had
been relatively well contained, but the damage to one section was extensive. 
Mulder sniffed as he entered the blackened section. He'd never liked the wood 
smell of a campfire much even as a kid, never mind the pungent smell of burnt
insulation, plastic, and wiring. He drew himself together inside his coat and 
watched his breath condense in the chilly air. Scully appeared beside him. 

"Well, you can see they did a pretty thorough job," she noted, poking at a
fragile shard of paper with her foot. "The point of origin is this way." She
led him through to a room filled with filing cabinets, all thoroughly charred, 
black streaks scarring the hallway walls. Mulder eyed a sooty filing cabinet and 
smiled
wryly. He walked over and, slipping his hand into a latex glove, pulled on the 
top drawer. He prodded at the skeletons of paper, which crumbled at his touch. 
Digging further, he found a portion of a scorched form. Part of someone's 
expense claim, as far as he could tell. Nothing juicy or sexy, indeed. 

"Why would someone torch expense claim records?" he muttered to himself. He
looked at Scully. "What else was stored here?" 

"Well, we discovered a section with archives of parolee files," she said.
"There were backups made on the Federal database, of course. It shouldn't be a
problem finding out whose records were stored here. Detective Branch said that 
they've started looking into employee records and cross referencing them with 
the state criminal records database." She looked at her partner, who appeared to 
be staring absently into the filing cabinet drawer. 

"Did you hear me, Mulder?" she asked. Mulder didn't respond. Scully moved
closer, looking into the drawer. She saw nothing. "Mulder?" she asked again,
trying to catch his eye. He blinked. 

"What? Yeah. Yeah, I heard you. Cross checking employee records with the state
criminal database." Mulder slid the drawer shut and opened the next one. More
of the same. He shook his head. 

Scully frowned. "What's wrong? What are you looking for?" 

"Nothing," Mulder said distractedly. "I'm just a little tired. Didn't sleep
well last night." 

"The fish stew was a bit spicy," Scully acknowledged, laying a hand briefly
over her stomach. Mulder didn't respond. Mildly irritated, Scully started to
say something, then stopped herself. Wherever Mulder was, he'd come back 
eventually. She walked away. 

"Scully," Mulder called. She turned. "I, um, had a thought about something.
Are you staying here for a bit?" 

"No, I think we're just about done here," she said, looking over at Branch and
Hurley. Mulder pressed his lips together thoughtfully, then motioned her to
the car.  Opening the door, he handed her the envelope Hurley had given him 
earlier. 

"Get a ride back to the precinct with Branch and Hurley," he said. "I'll meet
you there in about an hour, and we'll head back to Washington to run the
Federal database." 

"Where are you going?" 

"I've, uh, gotta pick up some milk and bread," he said, winking at her and
sliding around to the driver's side. Scully stared at him, shaking her head as
the car eased out
of the lot. 

"Whatever," she muttered, turning back to the detectives. 
  


Mulder drove, confident of his direction, somewhat less confident of why he
was headed where he was headed. A hunch. He felt a swirling sense of dreadful
anticipation as he approached the waterfront, pulling into the parking lot
beside the public pathway. A couple of hardy joggers moved past him as he
stood beside the path, gathering his bearings. It was misty, drizzly; he 
shrugged his shoulders reflexively against the chill. He turned left and walked. 


He walked for about ten minutes, growing less and less certain as he wandered.
A kink in the pathway ahead made him resolve to turn back at that point, but
as he reached it he told himself, one minute more. Then he saw it. 

The jetty, the one in his dream. Jutting out into the inlet, the seawater
swirling sluggishly around its pilings. He stepped off the pathway and picked
his way down the rocky embankment to the beach. The air was redolent with 
rotting seaweed, creosote, and cold. He felt for his flashlight and stepped 
under the dock, unconsciously pressing the back of his gloved hand against his 
upper lip. The dreadful anticipation coalesced in his mind as he shone the light 
around, stepping gingerly over the detritus of the desperate - hypodermic 
needles and used condoms. He was looking for a body. 

Ten minutes of tentative probing and peering into nooks and crannies revealed
nothing. Hunched under the deck, he closed his eyes; the image of Meryl
pointing to the jetty appeared crisply. There was a body here, the body of a 
child, a girl. He didn't see that part. He felt it. He opened his eyes. He'd ask 
Hurley to put someone from
Homicide on it. 

Climbing out onto the pathway, Mulder pulled out his cell phone and dug for
Hurley's card. He punched in the number and hesitated, his thumb hovering
above "send".
After several seconds, he pushed it. 

"Detective Hurley." 

"Detective Hurley, it's Agent Mulder. I - have a bit of an odd request for
you." 

"What's that." 

"Do you believe in hunches?" 

A moment's hesitation, then, "Sure. I have them all the time. Do you have one
about this case?" 

"No, not on this case. I was wondering if you wouldn't mind checking with
Homicide about any unsolved cases involving the possible murder of children.
Little girls, specifically." 

"Uh, yeah, I could pass it on to them. Why? What have you got?" 

Mulder made a face, and the words "never mind" sprang to his tongue. He pushed
them aside. 

"A hunch. Nothing more. It's probably nothing at all, but you might send
someone down to a jetty just off the public pathway near the waterfront."
Mulder looked around him and described a few distinctive landmarks. He hoped 
Hurley had been truthful about appreciating his and Scully's creative and 
unusual
investigative skills.  He listened carefully to see if he could discern a pen 
scratching notes on the other end, but the ambient noise of the outdoors made 
that impossible. He felt a little foolish. 

"I'll pass it along and see if anyone is interested," Hurley said, his voice
even. Mulder pressed his lips together, feeling the issue move out of his
hands. 

"Thanks," he said. "I'm headed back. I'll see you in a bit." Mulder flipped
the cell cover closed, ending the call. He looked back at the jetty, at the
dark, foamy water swirling ominously about the pilings. The uneasy feeling was 
still there. 

He shook himself and walked back to the car. 
  


Washington, D.C. 
5:45 p.m. 

Scully gazed thoughtfully at the computer screen as Mulder looked on over her
shoulder. She pointed to a list of several names. 

"Great job the government does screening their employees," she said. "Here's
eight people who worked at the warehouse in various capacities over the last 
eighteen months, all with either state or Federal records ranging from 
shoplifting to
assault." She slid the mouse and clicked on another window. "Here's a list of
five people who were employed at the office building at the time of the fire a 
year ago, and another list of five people who worked at the building that was 
torched
eighteen months ago."

She clicked again, and a final list of four names appeared. "These people
worked at all three places as low-level clerical or custodial staff." She
pointed. "This one was released from prison two years ago after serving a 
sentence for aggravated assault. Problem is, none of these people have ever been 
charged with or convicted of arson or any other property damage offences." She 
leaned back in her chair and looked up at her partner. "They're all misfits of 
one stripe or another, but not inclined to burn buildings." 

Mulder regarded the list. "Any match with the parolee files that were
destroyed?" Scully shook her head. Mulder pondered this for a moment, then
straightened, satisfied.

"Still, I'd say that narrows our list of possible suspects to considerably
less than half the population of the United States. I'll call Hurley and let
him know to look for the fax." He reached for the desk phone, then jumped as it 
rang. He picked up the receiver. 

"Mulder." 

"Agent Mulder, this is Detective Hurley. You win the fabulous prize package." 

"Come again?" 

"That little tip you had me pass onto Homicide? I'll be damned, but you hit
paydirt, my friend. They dragged a body out of there late this afternoon." 

Scully stared as Mulder's expression registered shock. He reached for a chair
and sat down. 

"They did?" 

"They did. It's a partial skeleton, tangled up in what looks like a child's
pyjamas. Not much left of either the body or the sleepwear. It's astounding
anything's left at all, considering the estimated age of the remains." 

"Which would be what?" 

"It's all very, very preliminary at the moment, you understand. They've got a
lot of work to do before anything definitive can be said. But judging by the
cold files in Missing Persons and by the apparent age of the remains, it looks 
like this individual has been dead since the mid-1970's, early '80's." 

The colour drained from Mulder's face. "Can you tell if it's definitely a
child? What sex it is? How old it might be?" 

"Well, we can't tell, Agent Mulder. This is Homicide's case. I can pass you
onto the officer in charge, and he'll eventually be able to give you more than
I ever will. I gotta tell you, though. He thinks you're a fucking genius." 

Scully had moved closer, registering Mulder's emotional state. She raised her
hand to grab his attention; he held his up, forestalling her. 

"Yeah, sure. Give me his name and number." Mulder scribbled on a piece of
notepaper. "Thanks. Thanks a lot, Hurley. You - you wouldn't be able to tell
me anything relevant about the missing persons' cases, would you?" 

"Not in any detail," Hurley responded, his voice carrying an edge of
puzzlement at Mulder's persistence and intensity. "All I know is that during
the period from about 1973 to 1985, eighteen children went missing from the 
Baltimore area and were never found." 

Another question rose to Mulder's mind, but he forced it down. Hurley didn't,
couldn't have the answers he was looking for. Maybe nobody did. He bit his
lip. 

"Okay, thanks again, Detective. I'll talk to Homicide about this." Scully
waved at him. He looked at her, irritated, and noted that she was pointing at
the computer screen. He closed his eyes, remembering. 

"Oh, Detective," he said. "Scully ran that cross check and came up with some
names for you. We'll fax it over right now." He listened a moment more, then
ended the call. He leaned his elbow on the desk and nibbled his thumb, staring
sightlessly ahead. 

Scully eyed him as she set up the fax and sent it. "What was that all about?" 

Mulder shook his head. "I hate what I do to myself sometimes, Scully." Meeting
her puzzled eyes, he leaned forward, elbows on thighs, rubbing his hands 
together.
"Remember that little milk run I took this afternoon?" 

"Milk run." 

He smirked at her. "Milk and bread. When I left you at the warehouse. I didn't
get any milk and bread." 

"No kidding." 

He pursed his lips. "Remember a few years ago, I kept having these dreams
about the Paper Hearts case. We confronted Roche about the murders he didn't
cop to at his trial, and he kept insinuating that one of those little girls was 
Samantha. I shot him before I could find out for sure." 

Scully nodded, waiting for the other shoe. Mulder dropped his gaze. 

"I had a very strange dream last night, Scully, and a very strange thing
happened to me today. I dreamed about a little girl who I thought at first was
Samantha, but then she changed into a girl I'd never met before. In this dream, 
we were standing by an old jetty down by the waterfront, and she pointed to it. 
Then she gave me something, but I didn't get what it was. This morning, I met 
Hurley's daughter when I went to his place to pick up the forensics data. She 
was the girl in the dream." 

"That's weird," Scully said, frowning. 

"It certainly creeped me out. But something hit me about that dream. I decided
to go find the jetty. I did find it. I looked around but didn't see anything
out of the ordinary. But it bothered me. So I put in a call to Hurley, who 
passed it on to Homicide." He thumbed a gesture at the phone. "He just told me 
they dragged a partial skeleton out of there late this afternoon." He filled her 
in on the rest of his conversation with Hurley. 

Scully shook her head, marvelling, but disturbed by Mulder's revelation. "I
thought the Paper Hearts dreams stopped after you'd shot Roche," she said. 

"They did," he replied. "In fact, I'd stopped dreaming about anything even
remotely to do with Paper Hearts or Samantha." He waved a hand dismissively.
"I'm not prepared to read anything into this. It was a weird coincidence. I 
helped to
close a cold missing persons' file that is anywhere from fourteen to
twenty-five years old.
That's all." 

"That's remarkable," Scully corrected softly. "You have a gift that I could
never claim to understand." 

"Well, as investigative tools go, it'll never get written up in Criminal
Justice Review." Mulder smiled, but his eyes were serious. Scully smiled back. 

"Come on. It's the weekend. Let's get out of here." Mulder shook his head. 

"You go ahead. I've got a phone call to make." He reached for the phone and
began dialling the number Hurley had given him. 

Scully gathered her purse and car keys. "See you Monday, then." She moved away 
from the desk and glanced back at her partner, who was too engrossed in the 
phone to notice her leave-taking. She hesitated, thoughtful, then left the 
office. 


END PART THREE
---------------------------------------------

[Quietus - Part 4 of 14] 

Meryl appeared to him again that night. 

This time she was running, skipping through a wooded area, along a pathway
that followed the shoreline of a lake. The woods were in full summer foliage. 
Sunlight shafted through the branches and leaves, making little spotlights on 
the dirt path. Mulder watched her, charmed with her youthful exuberance, the way 
the
mottled light reflected off her long, brown hair. He had recollections of 
Samantha that way.

His heart ached. 

She ran around a bend and reappeared, looking back. Waving, she called to him.
"Foooooox!! Over here! You've got to see this!!" She disappeared. Mulder 
followed her, running to catch her. He noticed a boathouse on the opposite 
shoreline, through the trees. 

He rounded the bend and looked around. Meryl was nowhere in sight. He turned
slowly in a circle, looking for her, looking to see what she might have been 
referring to. See what? 

He found himself on his hands and knees, digging in soft loam. 

He dug. 

He jerked his hand back in pain, looked at the ring finger on his right hand.
Blood ran down from a gash in the pad of the first digit. He could see the
ragged end of the cut, the flap of skin, the dirt embedded in it. Wincing, he 
shook the pain out of his finger. Droplets of blood spattered. 

He smoothed the dirt as one might sculpt clay, smoothing it around the sharp
edge that had sliced his finger open. He looked. 

It was bone, splintered and rough. 

hey mulder. 

found another one. 

He looked up. Meryl stood beside him, smiling. But she'd spoken with Roche's
voice. 
  


Baltimore, Maryland 
Robert E. Lee Memorial Park 
Saturday, February 13, 1999 
1:11 p.m. 

Baltimore's got a lot of dogs, Mulder thought. 

He stepped out of the car and was nearly bowled over by an exuberant black
Newfoundland. The animal's young charge jerked back on the leash and grinned
at Mulder apologetically before being dragged off by his pet. There did seem to 
be dogs everywhere. Mulder crossed a footpath into the park, noticing how it
overlooked the dam. He headed deliberately toward the woods, wondering how he 
would find the remains in a park that was over 400 acres big. 

The day was pleasant; the sun shone with warmth though the air was cold. He
occasionally passed other hikers and joggers on the wooded pathway, but for
the most part he had the place to himself. This he liked. He came upon a fork 
and
paused, letting his intuition tell him where to go. He went right, noticing he
was now following the shoreline of Lake Roland. As he walked, he reviewed his 
conversation of the day before with Detective Falsone of Homicide. 

What they knew so far: not much. A cursory exam of the remains had revealed
that it was most likely a child or a small adult of indeterminate sex. The
remains were indeed approximately fifteen to twenty years old, judging by the 
state of deterioration. The tattered fabric that had essentially held the bones
together had a pattern on it reminiscent of children's sleepwear, probably a 
girl's nightgown. Falsone had been quick to point out that the fabric might have 
become entangled in the bones at some point after death and might therefore be 
unrelated. They were planning to do a PCR on the bone tissue in hopes of 
identifying the sex, and then approach relatives of the most likely missing 
persons on file to attempt a positive ID. Mulder expressed his interest in 
learning the results of the DNA tests. What he'd avoided telling Falsone was 
that, failing a positive ID, he hoped to run his own DNA against the victim's. 

Scully would help, he knew. She, more than anyone, knew how important learning 
Samantha's fate was to him. 

He rubbed his face as he hiked. Years of frustration, dead end after dead end.
After learning that Samantha was apparently grown up and living her life happily
elsewhere, he'd attempted to bury the issue without much success. It had
worked for awhile. Now he found himself revisiting all the options he'd ever
been presented with to explain her disappearance, none of which he'd ever really 
found satisfactory. Samantha, adopted - or biological - daughter of the 
Cigarette
Smoking Man?

Samantha - spirited away by Bill Mulder to a secret facility to be cloned and
enhanced with alien genetic material? Samanthas - many Samanthas - as little 
drone-girls living on an apiary in Canada? Samanthas - many Samanthas - living 
as adults in genetic research facilities? Or perhaps the most mundane, the most
plausible, the one his gut reacted most strongly to - Samantha, dead at the 
hands of a serial killer now also dead. 

Mulder remembered the last cloth heart, the one that Roche left him with.
Burned along with everything else, along with the X-Files, in his old office.
He winced. 

A heron landed on the shore not thirty feet from him. He looked at it; it
peered back at him and flew off again. He stopped, gathering in a sudden
feeling of familiarity.
He glanced around. 

He'd just come around a bend in the pathway, one of many kinks and turns that
he hadn't recalled from the dream. But there - he could see a boathouse
through the trees on the opposite shore. He looked left and saw a small freshly 
cleared area just off the main pathway. The ground had been marked off with 
surveyor's tape, stakes, and paint. They were about to build something here. 

He knelt and dug. He dug for almost an hour. 

Nothing. 

Sitting back on his heels, he flexed his gloved but still icy hands painfully.
He eased himself stiffly back to his feet, noticing for the first time the
extent of the mess he'd made of the surveyor's markings. He spent the next 
twenty minutes pressing the dirt back into some semblance of shape, 
reconstituting the painted X marks as best he could. He'd found nothing. 
Frustrated but not terribly surprised, he resolved to come back Monday on some 
pretext once the work crew had started with whatever work they were doing here. 
Mulder brushed the dirt off and went back to the parking lot, pensive and 
troubled. 

As he exited the wooded area, someone called his title and name. He turned,
saw Bob Hurley waving at him. Meryl was with him. 

"Hi, Mr. Mulder," Meryl called gaily. 

"Hi, Meryl," Mulder responded, forcing a smile. He wasn't in the mood for kids
today. 

"I didn't know you lived in Baltimore, Agent Mulder," Hurley said. 

"I don't. I live in Alexandria. I - remembered this park, so I thought I'd
come here this weekend and have a look around." 

"It's a nice park, especially in the summer," Hurley said. "Meryl usually
drags either me or my wife out here every weekend for a walk." 

"I knew you'd be here," Meryl said coyly, looking at Mulder. Mulder raised his
eyebrows. 

"You did? How'd you know that?" 

"I just knew." Led by Meryl, the three of them began walking toward a busy
carousel that stood beside a ticket booth and a concession stand. Hurley gave
Mulder a knowing look. 

"I should clarify. Meryl usually drags me or my wife out here so she can scam
something sweet off us." Mulder nodded, eyeing Meryl as she ran ahead, making a 
beeline for the concession stand. She whirled. 

"Hot chocolate, Dad? Please?" Hurley smiled and reached into his pocket for
change. Looking at Mulder, he said, "You want anything?" Mulder shook his
head. Hurley moved off to join the concession line-up. Meryl ran back toward 
Mulder and climbed up on a bench to wait. She reached over and patted the space 
beside her, her child face friendly and open. Mulder hesitated, but in spite of 
the unsettling connection she had to his dreams he felt her ingenuousness and 
was drawn to it. He moved over and sat. 

"When do you go to your aunt's?" Mulder asked. Meryl kicked her legs.
"Tomorrow," she said. There was a bit of an awkward silence as Mulder fished
around for appropriate conversation topics. Meryl spoke first, cautiously. 

"Can I ask you something?" 

"Sure." 

"Did you used to get beat up a lot because your name is Fox?" 

Mulder laughed in spite of himself. "What makes you say that?" 

"Because there's this boy in my class, his name is Bruin, like a bear. He gets
beat up a lot." 

"I see," Mulder said, amused. "Well, if I did get beat up because of my name,
they stopped doing it. I used to beat them up right back." 

"Why did your mom and dad call you Fox?" 

"I don't know. I guess they thought it was a neat name." 

"Everybody calls you Mulder, right? Dad says that your partner even calls you
Mulder." 

"Yes she does." 

"Is that because she doesn't like you very much, or because she just doesn't
like your first name?" 

Mulder grinned at her youthful audacity. "I think she likes me okay. I told
her a long time ago to call me Mulder." 

"Well, I like your first name, Mr. Mulder," Meryl said firmly. 

"Thank you." Mulder checked Hurley's place in the concession line-up, thinking
that perhaps he should have taken Hurley up on his hot chocolate offer. Now
that his initial skittishness around Meryl was dissipating, he found himself 
wanting to spend a little more time with her. He regarded her thoughtfully as 
she stared
straight ahead, swinging her legs. The profile was different, the hair perhaps 
darker than he remembered Samantha's being. But she wore the same two braids 
down the back, the ones that lay on top of waves of loose hair. He couldn't help 
but feel that somewhere inside her, there were answers. 

"What about your name? Meryl is kind of an unusual name." 

Meryl grimaced. "Guess," she sniffed. Mulder thought for a moment, and came up
empty. Meryl looked at him impatiently. 

"Mom's favourite movie is something called Sophie's Choice. She won't let me
watch it, says to wait until I'm older. But the lady in it, the actor, her
name is Meryl." 

"Meryl..." Mulder searched for the last name. She wasn't in the kinds of
movies he usually watched. "...Streep." 

"Yeah. That's her." 

"It's a nice name." 

"It's a dumb name." Meryl sang, making her voice nasal and mocking: "'Meryl,
Meryl, looks like a squirrel.' That's what Trevor Masefield and his friends
call me, all the time. He's in fourth grade, and he's a jerk." 

"That's not very nice of him," Mulder agreed. He thought for a moment,
reaching back to his own childhood for an appropriate rebuttal. "I had a kid
in my class called Trevor. Some of the kids used to sing something like, 
'Trevor, Trevor, ugly forever.'" Meryl looked at him with wide-eyed delight. She 
giggled. 

"'Trevor, Trevor, ugly forever,'" she chanted softly, pleased. Hurley was
wandering back to them holding two steaming styrofoam cups of hot chocolate.
Mulder felt a slight twinge of guilt at teaching the detective's daughter an 
unflattering singsong to use against her classmate. As if on cue, Meryl leaned 
over to Mulder conspiratorially.

"Don't worry," she said in a stage whisper. "I won't tell Dad you told me
that." 

Mulder leaned close to her in response. "Okay," he said, matching her stage
whisper. 

"Here we go," Hurley said, handing his daughter the chocolate. Mulder and
Meryl stood; Hurley grasped his daughter's hand. 

"I should be going," Mulder said. 

Hurley nodded. "By the way," he said, "I know this is work stuff, but did you
learn anything from Falsone?" 

"Not much," Mulder answered. "They've got some lab tests to run, and I've
asked him to keep me posted." 

"Falsone is a good man," Hurley said confidently. "He'll find out who that
person is and put closure to it." 

Mulder waved down at Meryl. "See you around, Meryl," he said. She winked at
him. Mulder winked back. He watched as Hurley and Meryl turned to go. He moved
toward his car. 

"Mr. Mulder, wait!" He turned. Meryl was running back from where she and her
father stood, leaving him holding the two cups of hot chocolate. Meryl was
fishing in her coat pocket as she ran. 

"We made these in class last week," she said. "If you don't like it, maybe you
can give it to your partner or girlfriend or something." She held out her hand
and deposited something into Mulder's palm. She ran back as he uttered a 
surprised "thank you." He looked at it. It was mounted on thin cardboard, 
surrounded by a pink lace border, a safety pin hot-glued to the back. 

A delicately patterned flannel heart. 

Stunned, he looked up at the departing backs of Hurley and Meryl. Meryl turned
and smiled at him. 

END PART FOUR
---------------------------------------------

[Quietus - Part 5 of 14] 

Washington, D.C. 
February 14, 1999 
7:49 a.m. 

Sunday. He got up and went for a run, a long, strenuous run that accelerated
his heart and lungs, sent his blood racing. Spent, he stopped on the way home
for a paper.  Among the racks of magazines and papers, foreign and local, there 
were small, pink, heart-shaped boxes of chocolates with plastic roses glued to 
the top. Mulder paused, remembering. The significance of the cloth heart pin 
that Meryl had given him yesterday suddenly clicked into its proper context. 

Valentine's Day.

Her class was making those hearts for today, Valentine's Day. He shook his head, 
noticing an adjacent display of some syrupy-looking heart-shaped cards and 
single, long-stemmed roses. He felt relieved - sort of - by the mundane 
connection. 

He picked up the Sunday edition of The Washington Post and eyed the roses and
chocolates thoughtfully. On impulse, he bought a box and a pink rosebud, thought
about a card but decided that was beyond silly. He paid the clerk and jogged
home. 

He dropped the chocolates and the paper on his coffee table and went to the
kitchen. Hunting around in a cupboard, he found a coffee mug he didn't
normally use and filled it with water. He grabbed a sharp kitchen knife, trimmed 
the rose stem to fit, and plunked the rose into the mug. He carried the mug into 
the living room and put it on his desk, but not before giving the flower a 
perfunctory sniff. Hm. Nice. 

He clicked the TV on and, flopping onto the couch, unwrapped the chocolate
box. He perused the front page of the Post and popped a random chocolate into 
his
mouth. 

Happy Valentine's Day, Fox, he thought to himself as he chewed. He ran his
tongue around his back teeth. Strawberry cream. Not a particular favourite. 

He flipped through the paper, looking for the Sports page. A picture in the
Lifestyles section caught his eye; a feature on exotic gardens. The main
picture showed an elaborate garden maze of boxwood hedges. 

He went back to pondering his dream of last night. 

No bodies this time. Whatever was feeding him information had evidently
decided to give him the night off. He recalled standing in a maze, moving
hesitantly as he tried to map out the path to the exit. He recalled feeling 
flustered and frustrated. He'd been here a long time. Periodically, Meryl would 
appear, smiling and pointing.  He'd go to her, and her figure would flicker, 
almost morph into a much taller figure, then disappear. He recalled the complete 
and oppressive lack of any sound whatsoever. Even his footfalls failed to 
disturb the air. 

Meryl appeared and disappeared, over and over, each time nearly manifesting as
someone else. He turned a last corner and ran smack into John Lee Roche. He
looked up to see Roche smiling his salesman's smile. Then he woke up. 

What the hell is going on here? he mused, sucking pieces of chocolate out of
his teeth. Were Meryl and Roche somehow, some way, connected to each other and 
to him? That nexus he'd theorized about that originally drew him back into the
Paper Hearts case - was he still connected to the dead Roche through a very
much alive Samantha look-alike? Did Roche in death uncover that last shred of 
human decency that Mulder had once challenged him to find? Was he still - if he 
was ever - trying to lead him to Samantha's body? 

Mulder shook his head, confused and irritated. Too many coincidences. He
stared absently at the TV, thinking, slowly crunching a praline cluster. He
hated the idea that he was being sucked back into something of Roche's design, 
that Roche was playing with him still. But he couldn't discount the 
circumstantial evidence of Paper Hearts, that the conditions were right for 
Samantha to have been one of his victims, to be the source of the last cloth 
heart. 

He stood abruptly and went to take a shower. Standing under the hot spray, he
leaned one hand against the wall and rubbed the tension out of his neck with
the other, feeling the water course over his head and down his back. He tried a 
different tack. How would Scully approach this, he wondered. What would Scully 
do. She'd sympathize, he decided. She'd assure him again that she knew how 
important this search for his sister was to him. Then she'd gently tell him that 
these
were just dreams, amazingly prescient dreams, perhaps, but dreams nevertheless. 
Not things that any reputable investigator would put stock in without objective, 
empirical, conventional evidence to support them. 

But Scully, he argued with the model Scully he held in his mind, there is at
least one body, possibly two. There's your evidence. He saw her face, earnest 
and
concerned, her mouth poised to correct him. 

It's too small a sample, she protested. This is not a reliable method for
investigating anything, much less a murder or a disappearance. So far you have
an n of one. You can't conclude anything from that. 

I can conclude, he asserted, that I have to keep looking. At least one last
time. 

He shut the water off more forcefully than he had to. 
  


February 15 
7:15 a.m. 

Scully sat impatiently in her car across from Mulder's apartment building,
checking her watch. She'd buzzed him once. It had taken awhile, but he'd
finally answered and told her he was coming right down. That was ten minutes 
ago. 

She reached for her cell phone to dial his number, but before she could press
"send" the door opened. Mulder ran smoothly down the steps and to her car. His
hair was still damp, towel dried. He looked exhausted. 

"Good morning," she said, studying him as she handed him a coffee and started
the car. He mumbled something in reply as he buckled himself in and took as
long a draught of the coffee as temperature would allow. He sighed and leaned 
his
head against the headrest, closing his eyes. 

"Rough sleep?" she said, noncommittally. "Or was it Mulder's Annual
Valentine's All-Night Video Marathon Extravaganza?" He opened one eye and
looked at her, wrinkling his nose in a sarcastic smirk. 

"Fun-nee," he said, stifling a yawn and taking another sip of coffee. They
pulled up to a light and Scully reached back for her purse. Searching through
the contents, she produced a small envelope. "Happy belated Valentine's Day, 
Mulder." 

Mulder opened the envelope. It was a child's Valentine card, featuring a
large-eyed green alien holding a red heart in long-fingered hands. The printed
message on the back read "You're Out Of This World. From Your Extraterrestrial 
Valentine."

Written below in neat script was, simply, "Dana." 

He smiled and tipped the card toward her before tucking it into his inside
jacket pocket. "Thank you - Dana," he said, simultaneously amused and warmed
by her simple gesture. 

She shrugged as the light changed and she moved the car forward. "Well, I
couldn't very well sign a Valentine's Day card 'Scully', could I." Mulder
reached into another pocket and produced a very small foil covered box. He 
placed it on the dash. Scully made an impressed face. 

"Oooo," she exclaimed, looking briefly at the elaborate chocolate shop sticker
that sealed the box shut. "My favourite." 

"They're very fattening," Mulder admonished. "I didn't see any fat-free
truffles there, so I was forced to go with these." 

"Now there would be an exercise in pointlessness," Scully said with a soft
laugh. "Fat-free truffles." She looked as Mulder placed something else on top
of the tiny box.  The pink rose, partly open, the cut end of the stem wrapped in 
a wet paper towel and aluminum foil. 

"Mulder," she said, this time genuinely impressed. "This is feeling
dangerously like one-upmanship." 

Mulder saw that she was slightly taken aback and felt enormously pleased with
himself in spite of his tiredness. He settled back into his seat, warming his
hands with the coffee cup, and closed his eyes again. "I know I can count on you 
to make it up to me, Scully." 

"Right," she said flatly. "Always a catch." Scully turned the volume up
slightly on the radio and they drove on without speaking for perhaps fifteen
minutes. At length, Scully looked over at her partner, expecting him to be 
napping. Instead he was staring straight ahead, his expression grim. 

"Everything okay?" she asked mildly. Mulder blinked, drew a deep breath. 

"Um, yeah," he lied. "I was - I was just thinking about that body they found
last week. I was wondering about the PCR results, when they'd be ready." 

"Probably not till later this week," Scully said doubtfully. "I'm hoping they
can locate the family and return the remains for a proper burial, but it's
going to be hard if there are no tissue samples on file. They weren't doing DNA 
fingerprinting when Homicide estimates the body went missing." She looked at 
him, saw that he still had the same fixed expression. 

"Come on, Mulder," she said after a pause. "What's up?" 

"Nothing, Scully," he said, a little more sharply than he meant to. Softening
his tone, he continued, "I'm just tired. I woke up early this morning and
didn't get back to sleep. That's all." 

"Okay," she said, backing off. They slipped down the Interstate in silence
once again. Mulder chewed his bottom lip, knowing he needed to talk to her.
Now was not the time. He needed more - more data, more evidence. He knew she 
would appreciate that. 

He'd dreamed again last night. Recalling it made the coffee in his stomach
turn acid. 

He'd been there when the body was uncovered at the park. More bones, covered
in a tattered nightgown. The face bones were small, the jaws studded with some
oversized adult teeth interspersed with a few remaining baby ones. The skull
was turned unnaturally to the right shoulder and down, beyond the neck's
normal range of motion. The nightgown was torn at the neck, and some ribs and 
part of the left arm were missing. The skull rested on clumps of strand-like 
material - hair, long, brown hair, still attached by a piece of scalp to the 
bone. The nightgown had a piece cut out over the ribcage on the left side. A 
heart-shaped piece. 

In the dream, he'd moved closer to the pit. He'd crouched down at the edge to
study the body, feeling oddly calm, detached. He reached out a hand, his palm
blotting out the heart shaped cut-out. Then the skull turned up to face him, no 
longer bone. It was Samantha. 

Her face twisted in terror; the tendons in her neck stood out. Ligature marks
on her throat were raised as angry welts, some ragged and bloody. Samantha
reached her arms up to him, the limbs still naked bone, the left one still 
incomplete,
ending in a splintered ulna and no hand. 

"FOOOOX!" she screamed, piercingly, terrified. "Help me! He's hurting me,
Fox!! Please! Make him stop HURTING ME!" 

Galvanized, he'd reached for the one skeletal hand and grasped, intending to
pull her out of the pit. Instead the bones shattered, imploding under the
pressure of his grip. Her screams died, but not before they'd turned his blood 
to ice. 

Horrified, he stared at her face. She lay silent, her head tilted sideways and
down in the position the skull had been earlier, her eyes dead and sightless,
staring into nothing. 

A hand grasped the back of his shirt and hauled him to his feet. He looked up
at Roche's grinning face, Roche dangling a bloody garrotte in one hand and
holding a cloth heart in the other. Adrenaline rushing through his system, 
Mulder wound up and connected hard with Roche's jaw. A blinding pain jolted him 
awake. 

Sitting in the car now, he absently rubbed his right hand where he'd struck
the coffee table. Sore, but no real damage done. He remembered sitting up on
his couch, cradling his throbbing hand, his heart jackhammering, the sweat 
running cold down his face and torso, dimly aware of his own ragged breathing. 
It had taken him several minutes to realize he was crying. Deep, wrenching sobs. 
He drifted off fitfully just before dawn, jolted back to consciousness again by 
the apartment buzzer. 

He looked out the window at Robert E. Lee Park as they passed on the way to
the precinct. He planned to go there today, regardless of what the arson case
held in store.

He needed to gather more evidence. Scully would understand. 

END PART FIVE
---------------------------------------------

[Quietus - Part 6 of 14] 

Baltimore P.D. 
8:30 a.m. 

Hurley and Branch briefed them on the arson case to date. Scully asked the
questions; Mulder sat quietly beside her, a million miles away. 

"We've tracked down two of the four people on the list you generated for us,
Agent Scully," Branch said. One is still living in Baltimore, the other in 
Milwaukie, Oregon. We've contacted the Portland police and we thought you or 
Agent Mulder might want to connect with the FBI field office nearest Milwaukie 
to arrange for pickup and questioning." She glanced at Mulder, whose gaze seemed 
to be fixed on a spot somewhere inside the tabletop. She looked back at Scully. 
"We're still looking for the other two, tracking them through several changes of 
address. You know how that can go. We'll keep at it." 

Scully nodded. "You're planning to call on the Baltimore suspect today, I take
it." At Branch's nod, she added, "I'll go with you." 

"Agent Mulder," Hurley said. Mulder pulled himself back from his reverie,
feigned alertness as though he'd been with the conversation the whole time.
"I'd like to review the forensics on the warehouse site again. I also have the 
reports from the other two fires. I know we've gone over them, but I'd like your 
eagle eye
to make sure we haven't missed anything. I'm also running background checks on 
the four suspects, looking into employment records, hobbies, that sort of stuff. 
I've
also identified some former neighbours and employers of the suspects. I thought 
we could track some of them down today and see what they have to say." 

"Sure," Mulder nodded agreeably. The informal briefing ended, the four pushed
their chairs back and stood. Scully and Branch wandered off to Branch's desk,
discussing some point about the case. Mulder looked at Hurley, suddenly seized
with thoughts about Meryl. 

"So," he said casually. "Meryl left yesterday, I take it." 

Hurley smiled. "Yeah. I miss her already. First time she's been on a plane
alone. That makes me nervous, but Jeanne's sister will be there to pick her
up. The airline also has a great reputation for dealing with kids travelling by 
themselves. She was so excited. First trip without Mom or Dad." 

"She seems very confident," Mulder said. Hurley chuckled. 

"Confident. That's one way to describe it. She scares me sometimes - she's a
little too trusting, a little too quick to see the good in people. Maybe
that's just the cop in me talking." They moved over to Hurley's desk, which was 
butted up against Branch's. Scully and Branch had moved off somewhere else. 
Mulder glimpsed Scully's purse on Branch's chair. 

"Anyway," Hurley continued, picking up file folders. "Here's those reports."
He handed Mulder two folders and pulled up a chair for him next to his desk.
Mulder felt a surge of impatience. 

"Is there anything in particular you think we've missed? We did go over these
pretty thoroughly." 

"I just want to flag some questions for the people we'll be talking to later
today," Hurley said, sitting and opening the first folder. Mulder sighed
softly and sat, trying to concentrate on the page in front of him. I have to 
focus on this, he thought. I'm over-thinking the dream thing. His cell rang. 

"Mulder." 

"Detective Falsone, Agent Mulder." Mulder heard noise in the background, the
sound of other voices, the general ambient noises of the outdoors. "We've found
something I thought I should call you about." 

"Yes, Detective?" Mulder's jaw set. He knew what it was already. 

"I'm at a big park here, the Robert E. Lee Memorial Park. We got a call about
an hour ago from a work crew. They found another body dressed in the same sort
of fabric that we found on the first one. You asked me to keep you informed 
about the first body, and since on the surface at least this one appears to be 
related,
I thought I should let you know." 

Mulder swallowed. "I'd like to see it, if you don't mind." 

"Sure," Falsone said, a little hesitantly. "You're not saying you had another
hunch, are you?" 

"No," Mulder lied. "Not exactly. It's - it's interesting that this one appears
to be similar to the last." He felt the uncomfortable silence that ensued.
"I'm interested because I worked a similar case many years ago with Violent 
Crimes. Similar victims, and some of the circumstances seem similar." 

"Oh, I get it," Falsone said. Mulder relaxed. "In that case I'd consider it a
professional favour if you had a look at this. I know it's got nothing to do
with the case you're on, but maybe there's something from the case of several 
years ago that can help us, if you've got the time." 

"I'll be right there." He impatiently listened to Falsone's directions, then
hung up. He stood, feeling in his pockets for his keys. 

"I, um, have to leave you for an hour or so," he said to Hurley
apologetically. "That was Falsone - they've found another body like the one
they pulled out of the water last week." 

"No shit." 

"I worked a similar case several years ago. He wants my input. I won't be
long." He pulled his keys out of his pocket and paused, staring at them.
Dammit. Wrong vehicle. 

He looked at Scully's purse, hesitating for a moment. Then he looked around
the office. 

"Agent Scully and Detective Branch were here a while ago. Any idea where they
might have gone?" 

Hurley pointed down the corridor. "Lunchroom is that way. If they're not
there, I'm not sure where they'd be." 

Mulder strode down the hallway and found the lunchroom. It was empty. He
walked back to Hurley's desk, debating. The debate was resolved as he saw
Scully's purse again. 

He opened the flap and reached in, feeling the jagged edges of her keys. He
lifted them, flipping the flap shut. He gripped them in his fist, met Hurley's 
slightly
disapproving frown. He ignored it. 

"Back soon." Hurley watched his back as Mulder pulled his trenchcoat from the
rack and left briskly. 
  


"It's a ways in," the police officer said, accelerating his pace to keep up
with Mulder's long, purposeful strides. Mulder was silent, focused on the
trail ahead. The officer followed, puzzled by the intensity of the FBI agent. 
"Straight down here?" Mulder asked needlessly, camouflaging his familiarity with 
where they were going. He knew exactly where they were going. He noted the wide 
tracks of a vehicle, freshly imprinted in the icy mud. He soon saw the flash of 
emergency lights, the barrier of police tape strung across the pathway. 

A man turned as Mulder approached. "Agent Mulder?" he said, presenting his
hand. "I'm Detective Falsone. I'm glad you could join us." 

Mulder shook Falsone's hand as the officer brought up the rear. "What have you
got?" Mulder asked, trying to mask his urgency, betraying it by allowing his
eyes to find the pit, exactly where he knew it would be. Falsone led him toward 
the pit. Mulder held his expression carefully neutral as he saw her, kept his
clenched fists out of sight in his coat pockets. He closed his eyes briefly, 
calming himself. 

She lay in the identical position his dream had described, on her back, head
unnaturally turned down and to the right. A few details were different. The
lower jaw was displaced, resting approximately where the right clavicle should 
have been. The left clavicle was also gone, as were several ribs, but the left 
arm and hand were basically intact. The leg bones were slightly scattered. But 
the main difference, the biggest difference, was in the nightgown. It was far 
more tattered than he remembered from his dream. Most importantly, the upper 
front of the garment was completely missing. She lay on the back piece, a few 
inches of fabric encircling her pelvis. 

Mulder crouched by the side of the pit, an eerie dj vu overtaking him for a
moment. He resisted the impulse to put his hand up over where the heart
cut-out should have
been. He couldn't bear the thought of actually witnessing what had come after,
in his dream. He frowned, studying the nightgown. 

"The work crew had cleared out some brush here to put up a maintenance shed,
which they were starting on this morning," Falsone reported. "They found that 
the
ground had been disturbed, their survey marks upset, though whoever did that
was careful to put things back the way they were. We've started checking into
that." 

"I can help you with who upset the ground," Mulder said, standing, still
staring at the fabric. He looked at Falsone. "I did." 

Falsone frowned. "You did?" 

Mulder hesitated, looked at the ground. "I did have a - a hunch," he admitted.
"More of a dream, really." He indicated the trees. "I dreamed of this exact
spot, the same way I dreamed about the jetty where you found the first body. I 
came here Saturday and did a cursory search. I should have called you or someone 
at Homicide, I know.  I was wrong not to. But I found nothing. I didn't go as 
deep as the backhoe did. I decided the notion that there was another body here 
was foolish," he lied, meeting Falsone's incredulous eyes. Falsone regarded him 
suspiciously. 

"I didn't put her there, Detective, nor was I responsible for the first
victim," Mulder said, looking directly at Falsone and speaking with relaxed
sincerity. "You're right to be thinking that way. I would too, if our positions 
were reversed, and I'll cooperate fully if you wish to consider me a suspect. 
But I think you'll find that this body has been here for a very long time, and 
I'd encourage you to establish when this person died. I'm willing to bet that at 
the time this happened I was still a kid, probably in my early teens or even 
younger." 

Falsone stared at Mulder, decided eventually that the agent's candor was
genuine. "Believe it or not, we've actually used psychics before in
investigations," he said finally, nodding. "I've always believed that psychics 
are no better at solving cases than good old fashioned detective work." 

Mulder smiled. "I'm not psychic. At least I've never considered myself to be.
But I felt very strongly about the previous hunch, and I felt strongly about
this one. I'm glad you called me." 

Falsone kept his eyes on Mulder for a moment longer, then looked over at the
remains. Other Homicide personnel circled the body, taking pictures, taking
measurements. "I know about feelings," he admitted. "I'm sometimes afraid to
follow them, because I know I can't go on just feelings. But when I have, 
they've
sometimes been right, especially the strong ones." He looked back at Mulder,
who had gone back to studying the nightgown. "You looking for a new job? We
need a full time psychic in Homicide." 

"Detective Falsone?" The officer who met Mulder at the trailhead called over,
holding up a cell phone. "For you." 

"Excuse me," Falsone said, leaving Mulder by the side of the pit. 

He looked carefully at the skull, looking for traces of long, brown hair.
There were none, not that he could tell. He tasted blood, tangy and metallic,
and realized he'd been chewing the inside of his lower lip. His eyes moved to 
the shoulders, difficult to recognize as such without the clavicles. 

Samantha had broken her left collarbone falling off the tree swing. He
remembered her crumpled in a heap as it swung over her head. He remembered her 
screaming in pain, screaming with the terror of pain. He remembered her 
screaming in his dream. 

He felt something in his pocket, a soft roughness, a velvet firmness. With a
shock of recognition, he pulled it out. Meryl's heart pin. He stared at the
flannel, then shot a look at the nightgown. Peering through the grime and the 
dirt, he was sure that the pattern was identical. 

Mulder saw Falsone moving toward him. He put the heart smoothly back in his
pocket, hoping the motion went unnoticed. 

"We're just about finished here for now," Falsone said, making no mention of
the heart. "You want me to call you as we learn more?" 

"Please," Mulder said. "When do you expect the lab results from the first
victim?" 

"Probably tomorrow or Wednesday." 

"I'd like a call about those too, if you can." 

"So you said." Falsone wasn't sure if he was supposed to be impressed or
annoyed by the agent's intrusive interest in his case. He guessed the Bureau
had its share of eccentrics, just as most large municipal police departments 
did. 

"Thanks, Detective," Mulder said, clapping Falsone's arm below the shoulder.
He moved off down the path. As he neared the parking lot, he pulled the heart
from his pocket again. 

Identical. 

He pulled his cell phone out and dialled Hurley. 

"Agent Mulder, Detective. I have an odd question for you. What school does
Meryl go to, and who is her teacher?" 

"Why?" Hurley's voice projected irritation in the single syllable. Mulder
ignored it. 

"She gave me this heart pin on Saturday that she made in class. The fabric
it's made of - it's the same sort of fabric that the new victim is dressed in.
I want to find out more about it." 

"Mrs. Kennedy at Mapleridge Elementary," Hurley replied curtly. "Agent Mulder,
I think it's important that we get on these interviews. How soon can I expect
you back here?" 

"I'm on my way now." 

"Okay. And by the way, your partner left with Branch to talk to their suspect.
I have to tell you, Agent Scully seemed pretty choked about you taking her
car. You should prepare yourself for an earful." 

Mulder unlocked the door and slid behind the wheel, glancing at the rose and
chocolates still on the dash. He moved them to the caddy under the radio. "I'm 
expecting it," he said ruefully. "If you talk to her before I do, tell her it 
couldn't
be helped." He clicked off the phone. 

He started the car and looked at the heart again. He ran his thumb over the
flannel, staring at it hard, as though the tiny flowers would somehow move and
spell out an answer, a clue. They remained mute and immobile. 

He ran a hand over his face. God he was tired. He looked around, saw a phone
booth at the edge of the parking lot. He turned off the car and walked to the 
booth,
looking for the white pages. 

Mapleridge Elementary School. Here it was. He hunted for a pen, tore a corner
off the book's cover and wrote down the address. A quick trip to the school,
just long enough to flash his badge and obtain Mrs. Kennedy's home address. 
She'd be on break like her students. He only hoped she'd stayed in town. He'd 
visit her tomorrow.  He'd use his own car then, his turn to drive, anyway. 

END PART SIX
---------------------------------------------

[Quietus - Part 7 of 14] 

It was dark on the drive home. Mulder sat in the passenger seat, staring at
the headlights as they passed going the other way. Hurley had been wrong; he
didn't get an earful from Scully. He got The Look. The one that always said 
"we'll discuss this later." So far, she hadn't brought it up. They'd barely 
exchanged two
words since starting for home. It wasn't an angry silence, merely a 
contemplative one that he used to his advantage until they were well along the 
Interstate. Then he
couldn't stand it any more. 

Contritely, he said, "Sorry about stealing your car, Scully." 

Her expression didn't change, save for a pursing of her lips. "No harm done,"
she sighed, the edge in her voice betraying her lingering irritation. "I would 
have
appreciated it if you'd asked me first." 

"I did look for you," he protested. "You and Branch had disappeared. Falsone
wanted me to meet him at the park right away." 

"And you couldn't have asked Hurley about using his car, or maybe taken a
cab?" 

"Yes, yes I could have asked Hurley. But I didn't. I knew you probably
wouldn't be using yours, so I borrowed it for a bit." 

She drew her eyebrows together. "What were you doing taking off on your own
anyway, Mulder? What do these remains have to do with our current assignment?" 

"Nothing." 

There was a pause. Scully made a questioning face at the road, uncurled her
right-hand fingers from the steering wheel. "So?" 

"Falsone wanted my input on the body in the park." 

"You left Hurley hanging. You had a job to do. So did Homicide, and it sounds
like they were doing theirs just fine." 

"It was a professional courtesy, Scully. He asked me, I obliged him. End of
story." Now Mulder was getting irritated. 

Scully opened her mouth to retort and bit down on the words. She didn't want
to get into an argument right now. She was tired, and she hated arguing while 
driving.  Mulder saw her back down. He was glad. There were too many questions 
he knew she had, questions he wasn't prepared to answer here and now. I'll fill 
her in later, he promised himself again. 

They drove on silently for a minute more, a lingering discomfort hanging
between them. Mulder briefly closed his eyes, decided this put him too much at
risk for dozing off. He needed a conversation - any conversation. 

"How was the interview with your suspect?" Good, he thought. Nice, safe,
work-related. No need to bring up the unauthorized borrowing of personal
property. 

Scully welcomed the change in atmosphere and relaxed a little. "He didn't
reveal much. He's lived in Maryland all his life, high school dropout, bounced
around from one McJob to another, fast food, retail, light custodial stuff. Did 
a stint on welfare. Busted for a drunk and disorderly once, roughed up his 
roommate and spent some time doing community service. Lived on the streets for a 
bit, pulled a B and E right before Christmas not last but the one before because 
he needed a warm place to stay over the holidays and the state obliged him." 
Straightening her arms, she pressed her back into the seat, relaxed with a sigh. 
"No record of arson, no charges or convictions on major offences, just an all 
around general loser type. Right now he's unemployed and on the dole again. We 
talked to some of his immediate neighbours and one of his former ones. They 
didn't remember him. What about you?" 

Mulder inclined his head. "Interviewed a couple of neighbours, a couple of
former employers. Neighbours said that the suspects were quiet, kept to
themselves, but only after we showed some pictures and reminded them that they 
existed. The employer of one fired him two weeks after starting because he 
failed to show for work several days in a row, the employer of the other said he 
did a good job, didn't associate much with the other staff, simply handed in his 
notice one day and disappeared." 

The silence stretched between them again, more comfortable this time. Scully
raised her eyebrows. 

"Maybe he was abducted." 

"Huh?" 

"Your suspect, the one who just disappeared. Maybe he was abducted by aliens.
Maybe they all were. Or maybe just their mental capacities were taken. I know 
the
suspect we interviewed wasn't exactly all there." 

"I hope not." 

"Why?" 

"Because then we'd have to turn the case over to Spender and Fowley." 

Scully smiled with grim humour. "Oh. Right. Skip that theory, then." 

They continued on home. 
  


Mulder felt much better the next day. After laying awake till two, afraid to
fall asleep, he'd sunk into a dreamless chasm that not even Roche could
penetrate. The alarm buzzer pierced the shroud his consciousness had drawn about 
itself, but only after it had sounded for several minutes. He showered, dressed, 
washed down a slightly stale bagel with milk that was only marginally past its 
use-by date straight from the carton, and got into his car to pick up Scully. 

This was going to be a good day; he could feel it. 

On the agenda that morning, more interviews. Reports to review from the
Portland police and FBI. The Milwaukie suspect had a current address there,
but couldn't be found at home or at work yesterday. They'd try again today. One 
of the other two suspects had been located and was living in Bethesda. Mulder 
teamed up with Hurley again, Scully with Branch. The pairs went their separate 
ways for the morning. 

Mulder let Hurley take the lead in the interviews, interjecting questions as
he thought of them. As the morning wore on, he began to feel antsy, looking
for an opportunity to leave Hurley and find Mrs. Kennedy. He sensed it around
lunchtime. 

Hurley was driving and pointed to a row of storefronts. "There's a really good
deli there - makes some of the best corned beef sandwiches anywhere. That
sound good to you?" 

"Sounds fine," Mulder said, wondering how to put things. "We're supposed to be
meeting up with Agent Scully and Detective Branch at one-thirty, right? At the
precinct." 

"Yeah, why?" 

"I need to run some errands over lunch. Would you mind if we just got takeout,
and you took me back to the precinct?" 

"Okay," Hurley said, sounding a little disappointed. He liked Mulder, in spite
of his apparent eccentricities. He'd been hoping for an opportunity to talk to
Mulder about working at the FBI, over lunch or maybe over a beer sometime. Oh 
well. They got their sandwiches and drove back to the precinct. Mulder waved him 
a see-you-later as he drove off in his car. 

He found Mrs. Kennedy's townhouse easily enough, though it was well across
town. Mulder rang the doorbell several times, peered in the adjacent window. 
Dammit.  She wasn't home. Mrs. Kennedy had planned to stay in town over the 
break, the school secretary had told him. He decided to wait for a bit. 

Mulder sat in his car across the street, eating his sandwich. Hurley was right
- it was good corned beef, piled thick on dark rye with tangy mustard. He
washed it down with bottled apple juice, hoping he didn't look too conspicuous 
sitting here in broad daylight. Normally that didn't bother him. 

He waited. 

He pulled the heart out of his pocket again, ran his forefinger thoughtfully
along the lace edging. Tiny pink and blue flowers. He thought he recalled
seeing Samantha wearing the same sort of flannel nightgown and berated himself 
silently for not paying closer attention, back then, to the pattern. He shook 
his head, dismissing the self-criticism. What self-respecting twelve year old 
boy paid any sort of attention to what girls were wearing, much less what their 
little sisters were wearing? 

He checked his watch again. 1:35 p.m. this time. 

Drumming his fingers on the steering wheel, he looked at the townhouse.
Shaking his head in frustration, he reached for the ignition. Just then a
compact sedan pulled up in front of the townhouse and a woman stepped out and 
around to the trunk. Mulder climbed out of his car. 

"Mrs. Kennedy?" 

The woman turned. "Yes?" 

Mulder pulled his badge out and crossed over to her. "I'm Special Agent Fox
Mulder of the FBI," he said. "I was wondering if I could have a minute of your
time." 

Mrs. Kennedy looked startled. "Well, yes, of course," she stammered, nervous.
Mulder smiled at her. 

"Don't be alarmed, you haven't done anything wrong." He regarded her.
Sixty-ish, carrying a few excess pounds in the tradition of many women her
age. A warm, thoughtful, motherly face, a few deep wrinkles creasing her dark 
skin, her black hair salted liberally with grey. A teacher who loved her job, 
loved her students, he guessed. He liked her immediately. "I have some questions 
relating to a case I'm working on, some evidence that I'm trying to track the 
origin of. Do you recognize this?" He showed her the heart. 

"Yes," she said. "I had my third graders make these last week for Valentine's
Day." She looked up at him fearfully. "Nothing's happened to one of my
students, has it?" 

"No, not at all," Mulder assured her. "I got this from Meryl Hurley. I'm
working with her dad on a case, and she gave this to me." Mrs. Kennedy's face
lit up. 

"Oh, Meryl," she said. "She's a great kid. She made several of those and did a
good job, too." 

  

"I'm interested in the fabric that the heart is made of, and I'm hoping you
can shed some light on where it came from." 

"Oh sure," Mrs. Kennedy said. "I just brought in a load of old worn out
clothing for the kids to cut up. I brought what was left home - I don't know
why. I guess I'll do the same art project next year, save the fabric for that." 

"Can I have a look at the fabric?" 

Mrs. Kennedy flipped open the trunk lid. Inside were several bags of
groceries. 

"Help me carry these in, and I'll show you anything you want to see." 

Mulder smiled and, putting away the heart and his badge, reached in and lifted
two bags. Another trip finished the job, and he waited in Mrs. Kennedy's
kitchen while she went to the storage room. She came back with a medium sized 
box full of fabric scraps, all with a red or pink colour scheme, some patterned, 
some solid. She put them down on the kitchen table next to the groceries. Mulder 
sorted through the rags until he found what he was looking for. He lifted the 
garment out, noting that several heart-shaped holes had been cut from it. He 
felt his heart skip. 

"Those holes are all Meryl's, as I recall," Mrs. Kennedy chuckled. "She was so
insistent on making all her pins out of that particular old nightie." 

"Mrs. Kennedy, where did you get this? All of these clothes, actually." 

"They belonged to my daughter when she was a little girl. She's thirty now.
She used to get a new nightgown every Christmas Eve. I don't know why I kept
them - sentimental, I guess. I gave some to a shelter, but these were so worn 
out. So I finally got tired of having them around and thought I'd use a few of 
them
for this art project." 

"This pattern," Mulder said, fingering the flowered flannel. "You wouldn't
know whether or not it was a common fabric pattern, would you?" 

"Oh, Agent Mulder, I don't know," Mrs. Kennedy said. "I remember seeing a lot
of little girls' nightgowns with little flowers on them. I imagine it was
pretty common."

"Do you mind if I take this with me? I'll return it later if you like." 

Mrs. Kennedy waved her hand. "Take it if you think it'll help. I've got plenty
of fabric here to use next year." He thanked her and folded the nightgown,
noting that the label was still affixed to the back of the neck. He'd get 
someone back in Washington to run a check on the pattern. He had a feeling that 
Mrs. Kennedy was right; the pattern was bound to be common. 

"Would you like some coffee, Agent Mulder?" 

"No, thank you. I should be going." He checked his watch. Five to two. He
moved to the door, slid his shoes back on. 

"Thank you very much, Mrs. Kennedy. I appreciate your help." 

"No problem. I hope it helps you with your case." 

"Thank you," he said, opening the door. "I'm sure it will." 

He rubbed the fabric in his fingers as he moved to the car, finding some
solace for his whirling mind in the warm, soft material. As he slid into the
driver's seat, his cell phone rang. Mulder reached for it hesitantly. No doubt 
Scully was wondering just where the hell he was. 

"Mulder." 

"Detective Falsone, Agent Mulder. Got a second?" 

"Yeah, sure." 

"We got the PCR results back on the first victim, and we think we got a
match." 

"A match? A match with who?" 

"A family that used to live in Maryland but now live in Sacramento. Their
ten-year-old daughter went missing in 1980. It's interesting - we weren't
doing much with DNA back then, but they had insisted on providing blood samples 
in case the notion of DNA fingerprinting ever took off. Turns out her dad was a 
geneticist and saw this kind of thing coming. Anyway, she seems to be their 
daughter. Lucky thing, since we weren't able to run a dental on her." 

"That's great news," Mulder said, disappointed. "It'll help them put some
closure to her disappearance." 

"That's it, Agent Mulder. I have nothing on the second victim yet. We're
checking dental records on her - we believe it to be female, anyway - and
we'll run a PCR if necessary." 

"Thanks, Detective. I appreciate your call." 

"I'll be in touch." Falsone ended the call. 

Mulder sat for a moment pondering this outcome. On the one hand, he was happy
that the family could now give their little girl the proper burial she deserved. 
On the other hand, it wasn't Samantha. She was still out there, alive, dead, he 
didn't know. 

He started the engine and drove off. 

END PART SEVEN


[Quietus - Part 8 of 14] 

"...so we're following up on neighbours' reports that this guy used to set
fires as a kid," Mulder heard Scully saying as he entered the briefing room.
They all turned and stared at him. Hurley and Scully both looked pointedly at 
the wall clock.

Twenty after two. 

"I apologize for being so late," Mulder said, taking a seat. "I got held up." 

"We're just collating the data we've collected so far through the interviews
we've done," Branch said evenly. Mulder nodded, feeling Scully's eyes on him.
He glanced at her, then away again, quickly. The Look, more reproachful this 
time. 

The meeting ended about ten minutes later. They'd managed to flesh out their
potential suspects' motives and behaviours, and even tentatively eliminated
one. Mulder left the briefing room first and headed to the water cooler. Scully 
strode past him, her posture stiff. 

"I want to talk to you. Now." She spoke tightly, heading to the lunchroom that
she hoped was empty. Mulder drew a small paper cup of water and followed her
reluctantly. The room was, indeed, vacant. She whirled on him, clearly angry. 

"Mulder, that meeting was at one-thirty. It was an important meeting, one that
I hoped you would consider important enough to show up for. Where the hell
were you?" 

Mulder hesitated, knowing he couldn't hedge or prevaricate any more. He
gestured toward a naugahyde couch that wasn't aging too gracefully. "Sit down
a minute," he said quietly. "I need to fill you in on something." 

"I'll say," Scully said sharply. She sat leaning forward, elbows on thighs,
hands hanging loosely between her knees. Her "I'm listening, and it better be
good" posture at its most belligerent. Mulder pulled up a fifties-style chrome 
chair that also wasn't aging well and sat on its faded and worn vinyl seat 
cushion. 

"This is going to sound - weird," he said, stalling uselessly. Scully's whole
body said "really". She stared at him. He sighed and began methodically
destroying the paper cup. 

"I had another dream. Homicide found another body, exactly where I dreamed it
would be, presented exactly the way I dreamed it would be presented." He
looked at her, hoping she was with him. She wasn't. He continued. 

"Roche is back, Scully. He's showing me these bodies in these dreams. Both of
these bodies are little girls, between eight and ten years of age, I'm sure of
it. They positively ID'd the first one, the one caught on the pilings. They're 
working on the second right now." 

"Wait a minute," Scully said. "John Lee Roche? Roche is dead, Mulder. You shot
him point blank through the head on an abandoned bus, remember? He is very
dead." 

"His body is very dead, Scully, I've no doubt about that. But before, he was
connected with me through some kind of mental conduit, some sort of nexus. He
led me to those other bodies, his other victims. All except one." He saw the 
connection form in Scully's eyes, watched her anger melt into confusion. 

"One more victim, Scully. He's trying to tell me about the last victim. I
don't know why. He's chosen a new conduit, an avatar to bring me these
messages. He's working somehow through Meryl." 

"Hurley's daughter?" Scully asked incredulously. "How is he working through
Meryl?" 

"In the dreams, Meryl is the one who shows me the bodies. Once she spoke to me
in Roche's voice. I've seen Roche twice in these dreams, always in proximity to
Meryl." He made a small circle with his hands, touching the forefingers and
thumbs. "She gave me a cloth heart, made out of light flannel, made from a 
girl's
nightgown, only it was a pin that she made in school for Valentine's Day.
Meryl is Roche, Scully, and he's finishing up some business with me." 

Scully looked suspicious. "And this business is..." She knew already - she
just wanted Mulder to say it. 

Mulder looked at the disintegrating cup, steeling himself for her reaction.
"Samantha is still out there, Scully. There is one more victim. Roche is
showing me dead female children. One isn't Samantha, but one still could be. I 
need to know." 

Scully closed her eyes and passed a hand over her face. She fixed on a spot on
the floor and stared at it. Mulder pushed into her silence. 

"Remember you said that I would somehow find out who the last victim is, who
the last heart belonged to? Here's my opportunity. I'd be as ready as you are
to dismiss these dreams as meaningless, but they've led me so far to two dead 
children, children who have been unaccounted for by their families for a very 
long
time." He leaned forward, pressing his point. "That has to count for something, 
Scully. Doesn't it?" 

"Of course it counts for something," she snapped, her aqua eyes flicking up to
meet his hazel ones. She sighed and shook her head, calming herself,
responding to the sympathy Mulder's fixation on Samantha always generated in 
her. She continued, more gently than before but still sternly. "Outside of you 
and your family, I probably know better than anyone how Samantha's disappearance 
has affected you. But -" She hesitated, seeking different words. Mulder finished 
her sentence. 

"We've been here before. You watching me chase yet another useless set of
clues, trying to find someone who's probably not there to find." 

"What was the last thing you told me?" Scully asked. "That she's a grown woman
now, living with her own family somewhere? That Cancer Man raised her as his
daughter, that they seem very devoted to each other?" Mulder remained quiet,
silently demolishing one of the cup pieces. Scully continued. "Isn't it
possible that somewhere inside, you actually think that she's better off dead as 
a child than alive as Cancer Man's beloved grown daughter? Isn't that why you 
need to find her body?"

"You think I want to find her dead, Scully?" Mulder asked testily. He looked
at her face. Predictably, it had softened, morphed into the compassionate look
he was familiar with, the kind she always gave him before she zapped him with 
some truth he'd carefully hidden from himself. 

"Yes," she said softly. "I do. Because if she's still alive, there are still so 
many hard questions. Who is she? What is she? How did her life come to be as it 
is now?
What is the nature of her relationship to Cancer Man? How does she fit in with
his work? With your dad's work? Is she really Samantha, or does she bear only
a genetic relationship to the little girl you knew and loved as your sister?" 

Mulder pondered this quietly for a long moment, now turning the hapless cup
into tiny shards of confetti. Then his expression changed, a defeated "you may
be right" gesture with his eyes and mouth. He hated it when she nailed him like 
that. He relied on her to nail him like that, and he hated that, too. 

"I have to follow this through, Scully," he said, his voice low. "I have to
let this play out. Maybe I do hope to find her body." He frowned. "I didn't
dream last night. It may be over. I don't know. But I owe my sister more than to 
ignore what is happening to me." 

"I know you do." Scully sighed. "I'm glad you finally told me, Mulder; I knew
something was up and that you'd get around to it eventually. But we have a
case we're supposed to be working on. I need you with me on that, and I need to 
know I can count on you professionally, especially while we're working with
colleagues in another police force." Scully leaned forward and laid a gentle 
hand on his forearm. "You know I'll support you - within reason. Now. Can we get 
back to work?" 

He nodded and rose, following her out into the bullpen. 



Scully poured herself another coffee, tipped some whitener into it, and
stirred. She warmed her hands around the mug and sipped, staring out the
window. It was late afternoon. Her thoughts were on Mulder and this latest 
incarnation of his endless quest for his sister. She admired his dedication and 
his
steadfastness, awed by the power of it still after all these years and after all 
the frustrations. She felt useless when it consumed him like this, annoyed and 
angered by how it persistently drew him away from his professional duties, his 
commitment to work by her side as her partner.  It alarmed and worried her too 
because he was her friend. She'd known of people for whom these kinds of quests 
ultimately served as their instrument of self-destruction. 

How close had he come, how close had they both come, to dying because of his
need to know? How would it profit him to learn the truth at the expense of his 
own life, his own sanity? Even if there were some grand conspiracy involved, he
had too few connections of importance to make more than a minor ripple should
he die suspiciously, and too many of those connections had their own interests 
to
protect. Samantha was lost. Mulder's sister had been swallowed up by any one
of a number of forces that were beyond his, Scully's, or anyone else's power to 
reverse, be it death or any of the more grandiose and fantastical stories Mulder 
had
told her to explain Samantha's disappearance. Mulder wasn't crazy. He was just 
insanely driven. 

Still, she thought, taking another sip, who am I to tell him to stop? My own
sister is gone, clearly and unequivocally. If her removal from my life had
been any less definite or final, would I not want to do what I could to find out 
what happened? How long would I look? What price would I be willing to pay to 
learn the truth? What routes would I take once all the conventional ones had 
been exhausted? What relationships would I be willing to jeopardize? I couldn't 
be that obsessed, could I? 

"Agent Scully?" 

Scully started, pulled back from her reverie. Detective Branch leaned in the
doorway. 

"Good news. The Portland police have put out a warrant for the arrest of Frank
Keough. They think they have enough to lay charges." 

Scully shook her head. "Somehow that doesn't feel right," she murmured. "I
don't know why, exactly." 

"We're looking into accomplices. If there is one, hopefully Keough will roll
over on whoever it is, if he didn't set the fire himself." Branch ticked off
points on her fingers. "He moved to the Portland area just a few days ago. He 
was a fire starter as a kid. He's got a history of anti-government behaviour, 
according
to neighbours - that flag burning incident last Fourth of July, for instance. 
He's on your list of former employees at each of the burn sites. He's got some 
loose
associations with a militia group in Idaho, and they have a whole library on 
fire, fire behaviour, accelerants, that sort of thing, plus a cache of weapons 
and explosives. He could have got whatever education he needed on how to torch a 
building from them." 

"He also could have got it from the Internet," Scully mused, an idea suddenly
clicking in her head. "Then again, any of these people could have. They could
have logged on to the server after hours if they were cleaning staff. In many 
offices, you don't need a password to access the Internet, just the local 
network and mail servers." 

Branch jabbed a finger at her. "That's good. We should check the servers to
see what kinds of records they have. Good thinking." Branch regarded Scully,
who had turned back to the window, still cradling her coffee. "Anything wrong?" 

"No, nothing, everything's fine," Scully said, giving Branch a quick smile.
Branch made a face. 

"Bullshit," she said. "You're trying to figure something out. I've been a cop
long enough to recognize that look in another cop." She stepped into the room
and leaned toward Scully confidentially. "It's that partner of yours, isn't it? 
The
maverick?" 

Scully looked startled. "No. Not - well, yes. Sort of." She grew
uncomfortable. Whatever her gripes were with Mulder and his methods, it was
unseemly and unprofessional to confess her frustrations to another law 
enforcement officer, especially if Mulder wasn't present to defend himself. She 
smiled dismissively at Branch.

"Partner stuff. That's all. You must know what that's like." 

"Do I ever," Branch chuckled. "Especially guy partner stuff." 

"I feel I must apologize for his behaviour today," Scully sighed. "He's - got
some very definite ideas as to what constitutes an interesting assignment and
what doesn't.  We're making good progress on the arson investigation. That's the 
problem.  What Mulder needs is something more complex, with lots of red herrings 
and improbable avenues of investigation. The more convoluted it is, the better 
he likes it." 

"He's been helping Homicide out with something, hasn't he?" 

"Apparently," Scully said, feeling the conversation move into dangerous
waters. "He worked in Violent Crimes for a number of years as a profiler. One
of the best the FBI has ever had. He - I think he misses it sometimes. That's 
the only way I can explain his interest in these homicides." 

"These are kids, aren't they? I can understand people feeling driven to solve
cases involving kids. It's a vulnerable spot for many officers." 

"Yes, it is. Mulder kind of gravitates toward the underdog, the
disenfranchised, the powerless." Scully stopped, afraid of revealing too much.
Over the last few days she'd grown to like Branch and felt a bond of friendship 
forming, a trust and an ability to safely confide. They saw things much the same 
way, although Branch was coarser, more irreverent, more inclined to say things 
that were impertinent, impolite, or just plain rude. Branch's down-to-earth, 
convivial pull frightened her. 

"Agent Scully - Dana - can I call you Dana? You want to go grab a bite to eat
after work? You know, maybe a couple of drinks, just us girls, get away from the
testosterone for a bit." 

Scully took a last swallow of coffee and poured the rest down the sink, trying
to hide her sudden apprehension. "Yeah. Um. That sounds great. But, I don't
have my car. Mulder drove today, and I really should get back to Washington. 
Maybe - another time..." 

"Sure," Branch said lightly, not offended. "We can do that another time, no
problem." She began walking out of the lunchroom. "I'm going to make a few
calls, try and get a line on that server information you suggested." She left. 

Scully shook her head, annoyed with herself at bouncing Branch off of one of
her walls. She ran water in the sink, watching it swirl into the coffee and
wind its way


END PART EIGHT
---------------------------------------------

[Quietus - Part 9 of 14] 

"...so anyway," Branch continued, "Bob's wrestling with this informant, this
woman that I never trusted not to turn on us, but Bob put so much faith in.
She's a lot stronger than he expected, and she's wild. Just wild, flailing about 
like
crazy. He grabs for something, anything that he can try and get a grip on. So
he - he grabs her tit.  By accident. And it comes loose." Scully's eyes went 
wide as she bit into a chicken wing. Branch laughed. "Turns out she's a he - a 
transvestite, and utterly convincing as a woman. Bob is totally freaked - he 
lets go and she - he, whatever - takes off down the street. I've never seen 
anyone sprint so fast in five inch spikes." 

"Oh my god," Scully said, laughing along with Branch. "So how does he feel
about informants now?" 

"Well, we came off the drug squad shortly after that. He's been pretty wary,
though, let me tell you. I still bug him about it." 

They sat in a booth at the pub, a basket of chicken wings, a heaping plate of
nachos, and a mostly depleted pitcher of red ale between them. The room was
abuzz with various and sundry conversations. The light was muted but not overly 
dark.  Clapton's From the Cradle played moderately in the background. Scully 
felt a light buzz spinning in her head. It felt good. 

"So what kinds of exploits have you and Mulder been on?" Branch inquired. 

"A few," Scully said, then frowned, thinking. Flukemen, shapeshifters,
vampires, psychic insurance salesmen, sentient black oil, murderous artificial 
intelligences, alien-human hybrids... "We, uh, had this one, years ago now, a 
series of murders in a town populated by circus freaks." 

"No kidding." 

"Um, another one where we investigated the deliberate contamination of chicken
feed in a poultry processing plant." She paused, staring at the chicken wing
she'd just bitten into. 

"Go on." 

"A lottery in San Francisco's Chinatown that was a front for illegal organ
procurement." 

"Ew." 

Scully thought a moment more, searching for other cases to spin into more
conventional terms. "And then there's our current assignment, domestic
terrorism. Mostly, as of late, confined to tracking down and accounting for 
unusually large purchases of fertilizer. Mostly involving the interrogation of 
perfectly innocent and confused farmers." 

"I always thought there was something sexy about working for the FBI," Branch
said dryly. 

"Well, if traipsing through mud and cow shit is your thing, then the FBI's got
it," Scully replied ruefully, swallowing a mouthful of ale. 

"So," Branch ventured slyly, reaching for a jalapeno slice. "Tell me more
about Mulder." 

"What about him?" 

"Oh, you know. How'd you guys come to work together? What's he like to work
with? How do you deal with his bullshit? That sort of thing." 

Careful now, Scully thought. She reached for a cheese-slathered chip. "Well,"
she said, taking a bite, "we were assigned to work together about six years
ago. We didn't exactly hit it off at first. You were right when you called him a 
maverick.  He's unconventional, impulsive, prone to rather bizarre leaps of 
logic,
highly, highly intuitive.  Hates authority. Prefers to work by himself, follow 
his own hunches. I was actually assigned to rein him in, make him follow 
procedure. That made neither of us happy, especially since I was not that long 
out of Quantico and he had a long and impressive field record. I don't like 
babysitting, and that's what I felt I was being asked to do."

"Yet here you two are, six years later. Something must have clicked." 

"Opposites attract, I guess," Scully shrugged. "I'm trained as a medical
doctor, specializing in forensic pathology. I believe in the observable, the
quantifiable, what can be replicated, what stands up under peer review. I don't 
mind following leads based on hunches, but those hunches have to be grounded in 
something. Anything else is random speculation." She thoughtfully rubbed her 
fingers on a napkin, then closed her eyes and shook her head. "He drives me 
nuts. Okay, I'll be fair; I know I drive him nuts, too. But somehow we balance 
each other. He's taught me to go on faith a little more often. I've taught him 
to take the time to gather evidence, to provide objective proof. We somehow end 
up in the same place, usually by different routes. We've grown to respect and 
accept each other's methods, and to bite our tongues.
Most of the time." 

"Bob and I are kind of the same way," Branch said. "Only I'm the intuitive
one. I'm the one who gets the brain spasm in the middle of the night and takes
off on a tangent, based on nothing more than a feeling. Sometimes I'm even 
right. Bob is the one who slows me down, goes more by the book. He hasn't got 
the scientific background you have, but he's got a terrific conviction rate, 
mainly because he's so methodical." 

Scully nodded. "I've never questioned my faith in science, never seriously
anyway. I will always look at the world through that lens. But Mulder - he's
forced me to concede that there are other perspectives. His instincts are 
absolutely
uncanny. I so often feel like I'm scrambling to keep up, feeling a little
stupid as I'm trailing behind him going 'evidence, proof, evidence, proof.'" She 
laughed softly and topped up her mug. 

"From what I've seen over the past few days, Dana, you have absolutely no
reason to put your methods down," Branch said earnestly. "You're a terrific 
investigator. Your questions are incisive, and your thought processes are crisp 
and
rational. You don't miss a thing. I've really enjoyed working with you." 

"Me too," Scully said. "We've worked well together. Yes, you are more inclined
to go with speculation, but you're not so - so way out there, like Mulder
often is." 

"Tell me to shut up if I'm prying, Dana. But you've seemed really frustrated
with him the last couple of days." 

Scully waved her hand. "Oh, it's just this homicide thing he's veering off on.
He does that. Like I said, he's bored with what he considers to be mainstream
police work.  He's had his wrist slapped so many times for his unconventional 
practices, and he's chafing." So am I, she added privately. 

"Even with that, one thing is pretty obvious, at least to me," Branch said.
Scully looked at her, questioning. Branch leaned closer. "You two are batty
about each other." 

Scully frowned. "What do you mean?" 

"You stopped working together just because you were assigned to each other a
very long time ago. Now you're together by choice, because you can't imagine 
being anywhere else. It's like Bob and me. We've been through so much, as I'm 
sure you and Agent Mulder have. That kind of shared peril opens up places that 
no one else ever gets to see." Branch looked at her intently. "Look at Bob. He's 
married, very happily. But Jeanne and he will never, ever share the kind of
experiences, the kind of intimacy that Bob and I have. They've never put their 
lives on the line for each other. They've never nearly died for each other. Bob 
and I are so fused it scares the hell out of me. I've seen other officers who 
have lost their partners in the line of duty. They are never, ever the same 
after. It's like a huge chunk of them has been ripped out." 

"Well, that's a little different from being 'batty' over each other," Scully
said, a little defensively. 

Branch shrugged. "Poor choice of words," she admitted. "I didn't mean it to
sound like an adolescent crush thing. And maybe I'm wrong - maybe it's just a
function of the years you've spent working together. But there's a bond there 
and a
comfort level that is so evident in the way you look at each other, the way
you carry yourselves around each other, especially when you're in private 
conversation." 

Scully shifted, uncomfortable. "I didn't realize I was that transparent." 

"Only to another cop, maybe, who understands how close partners can be. How
close they have to be." A mischievous gleam lit Branch's eye. "You're sleeping 
with him, aren't you?" 

Scully jumped. "Dayle!" she protested. 

"Sorry, impertinent question," Branch said, backing off but grinning impishly.
Scully tried hard to be offended, but the playfulness in Branch's manner made
her start laughing instead. 

"No, we're not sleeping together!" Scully said, projecting an outrage she
didn't really feel. If anyone but Branch had asked her that question, she
might have walked out. 

"Sorry," Branch said again, laughing. "Brain fart. I've seen it happen with
male-female teams. Hell, I've seen it happen with same sex teams. It even
happened to Bob and me, once." 

"Oops," Scully said. 

"That was our general conclusion after the fact, too," Branch agreed. "He and
Jeanne were going through a rough patch. I'd just broken up with my boyfriend.
Bob and I had only been working together for a year. We were on a stakeout, and 
we just started spilling our guts as we waited for a suspect who never showed 
up. Somehow we managed to hold off until our shift ended, then we went back to 
my place and fucked each other's brains out." Branch smiled at the memory, 
playing with a slice of black olive. "Once that was out of our system, we 
realized it was a mistake. He went home to his wife, and I threw my boyfriend's 
leftover belongings in the garbage.  We haven't looked back. But I'll tell you, 
Dana, we connected so strongly that night, and I don't just mean in bed. No one 
will ever be as important to me as Bob Hurley." 

Scully nodded, relating completely. "Yeah," she said softly. "You're right. We
do have a bond, Mulder and me. And it scares the hell out of me. I don't like 
that
feeling, that fear. There were times when he went missing and I was sure he
was dead. I went missing a few times, and he pulled off the impossible to find
me." She felt her eyes sting, recalling Antarctica. "No one else would have done 
that for me, but Mulder did. I don't know what I'd do without him. I don't like 
being that dependent on somebody." She took a long swallow of ale. 

"It's a two-edged sword," Branch said. "You can't feel that way about somebody
and reap its benefits without risking having it come back on you, demanding
repayment for all you've received." She saw the emotion on Scully's face, saw
her trying to keep it together. The beer was making it harder. Time to lighten
up. 

"So," Branch piped, animating her voice. "If you two are such good buddies,
why do you never call each other by your first names?" 

Scully's face brightened a little. "He started it, back when he was so pissed
off at being bird-dogged by some wet agent. 'Scully' or 'Agent Scully'. For
me, it was
'Mulder' or 'Agent Mulder'. We'd no desire to get friendly. Things loosened up
a bit later and I tried calling him Fox, but he insisted on Mulder. I think he
was still trying to keep me at arm's length, and I didn't mind. He's since 
slipped
'Dana' past me a few times, and it just sounded so odd coming from him. So we
just kept calling each other Scully and Mulder. As close as we are, it would 
just feel too weird to have him call me Dana, and for me to call him Fox." 

"Even in bed," Branch quipped. Scully shot her a friendly don't-go-there look.
They both laughed. "Ohhh, Mulder, Muuulllder," Branch cried softly in mock 
ecstasy, provoked. They laughed harder, Scully clapping her hand over her eyes. 

"There's one other intimate detail I need to know," Branch said once the
laughter had subsided. 

"Oh, Dayle, no," Scully said, waving her hand and pressing into the back of
the bench seat. Her face was flushed from delighted embarrassment, from the
sheer joy of having someone to laugh with. Branch looked at her intently, 
relentless. 

"Does he ever deliberately let a big sulfurous one rip just before you get in
the car?" 

Scully slid slowly down the vinyl bench seat, convulsed, drawing stares from
the nearby patrons. 


Scully called Mulder later that evening from Branch's apartment. She and
Branch had cabbed there from the pub on Branch's insistence that she made the
best goddamn margarita Scully would ever know. Already half-looped, Scully had 
agreed, insisting on one, just one, then she had to cab it back home. There was 
a
distinct cosiness about the single-woman clutter of Branch's place. After 
downing one of the best goddamn margaritas she'd ever known, Scully found the 
prospect of a cold cab ride home less than appealing. Branch magnanimously 
offered her the couch, and she gratefully agreed. Besides, she wouldn't have to 
get up as early. 

"Mulder, it's me." 

"Hey, Scully, what's up." 

"Um, don't expect me to pick you up tomorrow morning. I'm staying at Detective
Branch's tonight." 

"Everything okay? You two find something in those server records?" 

"Uh, yeah. We kind of got into what we were doing and it didn't make sense to
quit." Scully winced as Branch fired up the blender again. 

"What is that, a vacuum?" 

Scully was about to speak when Branch yelled from the kitchen, "Dana, you want
a little more Triple Sec this time, right?" 

"Scully, what are you doing?" 

"Gotta go, Mulder," she said hurriedly. "I'll drive the next two times, I
promise. See you tomorrow." She hung up. 


END PART NINE
---------------------------------------------

[Quietus - Part 10 of 14] 

Mulder arrived at the precinct before Hurley, but not, evidently, before
Scully. He hung his coat and scarf on the peg next to Scully's and glanced
around the bullpen.  Members of Baltimore's Finest sat or stood, scattered at 
random throughout the area, some on phones, some talking to colleagues, some 
tapping information into their computers. He noted that Branch sat at a desk 
across the room, leafing tiredly through a stack of paper. She and Scully must 
have worked late. 

He encountered his partner as he approached the lunchroom. Scully moved more
slowly than usual with careful, measured steps, carrying a large mug full of
coffee. She seemed smaller somehow, her shoulders slightly bowed, her head down, 
grimly making her way to the bullpen. She was wearing even less makeup than she 
normally did, her usual lipstick colour standing out like a slash against her 
pallid skin. Concerned, he grasped her arm gently, startling her into slopping 
her
coffee. 

"Hey, Scully," he said quietly, noting her jumpiness. "You okay?" 

Scully drew her shoulders back and looked at him, gathering her dignity. "Hi,
Mulder. Yeah, I'm fine. Just - fine." He looked into her slightly reddened
eyes and recognized something he'd rarely seen in her before. His expression 
turned incredulous. 

"Scul-lee," he said with wonderment. "You. Are. Hungover." 

"No," she said regally, her voice wavering ever so slightly. "I. Am. Not. I'm
just - a little tired." She flashed him what she knew was a pathetic little
grin and bent herself again to the ponderous task of making it over to where 
Branch was working. Mulder watched her go, amazed, then went to get his own 
coffee. 

He was still mulling over the concept of a drunk and hungover Dana Scully as
he sat at Branch's desk. Hurley was just arriving. He followed Mulder's gaze
over to where Branch and Scully sat quietly chatting, Scully making motions as 
if to leaf through a pile of paper that the detective had passed her way. 
Branch,
Hurley noted, looked like hell, but had that mischievous, conspiratorial look he 
was familiar with. Scully looked just as bad, but was clearly sharing in the 
mood
Branch was projecting. 

"Uh oh," Hurley said, pulling out his chair and sitting across from Mulder.
"Looks like your partner got The Treatment last night." 

Mulder tore his eyes away from the two women, who were now laughing as hard as 
their respective headaches would allow. Scully was pressing her fingers to her
temples as though she thought her skull might fly apart. "What 'treatment'?" 

"I just call it The Treatment. Dayle's particular specialty. Anyone she clicks
with gets it eventually. I got it the first time years ago. I still get it
whenever things are going particularly badly for me." Hurley grinned at Mulder. 
"Dayle has this radar that goes off whenever someone she likes or cares about is 
feeling particularly stressed out.

The details of The Treatment vary from one occasion and one individual to the
next. I suspect that Agent Scully got the classic Girls' Night Out version:
nachos and beer at the Regal Beagle, and then some particularly lethal 
margaritas at Dayle's place. And a lot of girl talk. I guess she didn't go back 
to D.C. with you
last night, did she?" Mulder shook his head, feeling oddly bothered. 

"What do you think they talked about?" Mulder asked, feeling pulled back to
the two women. Scully now had her forehead cradled on her arms and was rolling
her head slowly back and forth. Branch leaned back in her chair and laughed. 

"If I had to bet on it? You. Me. Things we do that piss them off. Whatever
secrets you have that you thought were safe with Scully are out, my friend,
and Scully now knows everything that's shit to print about me, too." Hurley 
noted Mulder's troubled expression. "Dayle has a way of pulling information out 
of people, whether it be during an interrogation or over a pitcher of Hammerhead 
Red. I wouldn't worry about it, though." Hurley grabbed his empty mug and headed 
toward the lunchroom, clapping Mulder on the shoulder. "She won't let on to 
anyone else. Coffee?" 

"Yeah, sure," Mulder said absently. Feeling uncomfortable, he followed Hurley
into the lunchroom, stealing another glance. This time he caught Scully's eye,
threw her a questioning look. She missed it as her eyes darted back to Branch's 
face. He thought Scully looked a little uncomfortable herself. 

1:37 p.m.Mulder leaned back in the chair, one foot on Hurley's desk, tapping
his teeth with a pen as he perused the fax he'd received from the FBI's hair
and fibre lab. The cover sheet told him everything he needed to know about the
nightgown. Now he was poring over the attachment, picking through the details, 
the chromatograph results, the fabric manufacturer, et cetera. None of which 
were
terribly relevant. The pattern was indeed a very popular one, printed on
fabric that was in turn used for hundreds of thousands of night-clothes for 
girls from about 1968 to 1982. He bit the end of the pen and sighed. 

His peripheral vision caught movement in front of him. Looking up, he saw
Scully seating herself at Branch's desk. She leaned forward, propping up her
chin with one hand. She still looked tired, but better than she had this 
morning. 

"How's the head," Mulder asked around the pen, deadpan. Scully made a face. 

"It's all right," she said, stifling a yawn. "What you got there?" 

"Before you say anything, I made sure I did all my homework before I went out
to play." He hefted the fax. "Analysis of the fabric from that cloth heart I
told you about.  The fabric's pattern matches what was found on the second 
victim. I'm still waiting for the Baltimore P.D. to send me the results of the 
tests they did on the second victim's clothing, but I don't think it's going to 
reveal much of interest.  Plenty of kids evidently dreamed sweet dreams while 
wearing this particular fabric in this particular pattern, at least according to 
the FBI." 

Scully nodded, non-committal. "How about your sweet dreams?" 

"Two nights in a row without them. Meryl's out of town, though, visiting
relatives in Canada. I'm thinking it's a proximity thing - when she's around,
I dream." He frowned. "Except for Sunday night. She left that day, and I dreamed 
that night." Scully studied his pensive face and gestured to the family photo on
Hurley's desk. 

"She does look something like Samantha, doesn't she? I'm sure that explains
her presence in your dreams." 

"Yeah, but how is she leading me to these bodies?" 

"Maybe she's not. Maybe there's something else going on, and that because
these victims bear some superficial resemblance to the victims of Paper Hearts
your mind is connecting the two somehow." 

Mulder pondered this for a moment, then shook his head. "That sounds
plausible, Scully, but it's not the explanation. There's more here. I'm still
convinced that Roche is somehow involved. I need to find a way to contact him, 
wherever he is. Find out from him what the hell he wants from me, what he's 
really trying to tell me." 

Scully pinched the space between her eyes, not wanting to pursue the issue.
"I'm not sure what to say, Mulder." She sighed. "I do have something of a
minor update on the arson case, however." 

"What's that?" 

"The server records that Detective Branch had sent over show that someone was
in fact accessing the Internet up to a month before the last fire, logging on
to several newsgroups and sites that deal with making explosives, obtaining and 
using accelerants, that sort of thing. She's contacting the Internet service
providers of the other buildings that were torched to see if anything similar 
was going on there prior to the fires. I'm not sure how useful that information 
is just yet, but it's another piece, anyway." 

"Yeah," Mulder said, distant. "Scully, could you do me a favour? Could you
please tell me you find this arson case as irrelevant and superfluous as I
do?" 

She smiled wearily and stood, contemplating another cup of coffee. "It may be
irrelevant and superfluous, Mulder, but it's what we do." She touched his
shoulder lightly as she passed. 



Meryl stood before him once more, her body encased in a bright, angelic
aura. They were in the same park again, on the shore of the lake. It was winter
now. There was no sky, only a blank, grey-white void from which innumerable 
snowflakes fell. They formed spectral patterns on the ground as the wind stirred 
them rhythmically into flowing, organic networks and mini-cyclones, spinning, 
crashing apart and reforming, skittering across the dead ground. She was dressed 
in a little girl's nightgown, with piece shaped like a heart cut out of the left 
side of the chest area. The wind whipped her long brown hair around her head. 
She favoured him with a look of certain knowledge, a small smile animating her 
features. Her eyes were very blue. 

Mulder watched her in wonderment. The aura flickered and glowed, changing
shape and colour like a personal aurora. She held her hand out to him and he 
moved involuntarily toward her. He felt her small hand take his and his own 
fingers close around hers, engulfing them. She moved toward the water, tugging 
at him. He hesitated. The ice isn't thick enough, he protested. It's fine, she 
replied.
You'll see. 

They stood in the middle of the lake. Mulder looked at his feet and saw air
pockets hugging the underside of an impossibly thin sheet of frozen water.
Below was blackness. He felt vertigo, knowing he and Meryl should have fallen 
through instantly. But here they stood. She tugged at his hand, and he looked at 
her. 

Down there, she said, pointing. This is where I put her. This is where she is.
This is where she's been all this time. This is what you've wanted. You'd have
known by now if you had let me tell you. Overtones of Roche's voice intermingled 
with his young companion's. 

Mulder knelt on the ice, peering into the blackness. He saw motion, something
flickering past. He glanced up at Meryl again. Meryl was gone. Samantha gazed
back at him, an impossibly sad expression on her child's face. The nimbus around 
her had turned an angry red. 

She put her arms around his neck and held him, burying her face in his
shoulder. He felt the energy field surrounding her, felt a sense of imminent
danger. But as her hold on him tightened he could also smell her, the fragrance 
of the shampoo their mother used to use on both of them, the clean soapy 
child-scent he remembered, the essence of the freshly laundered nightgown. He 
put his arms around her, returning her embrace. The smell - bathtime before bed. 
Fox, kiss your sister goodnight. No, don't make that face. You two will be glad 
I insisted you be nice to one another one day. 

I'm so sorry, Fox, he heard her say, her voice tearful. I'm so sorry I had to
leave. I'm sorry I never said goodbye. 

Samantha..., he replied, overcome, but could say no more, anguish welling up
inside him in an indefensible surge. 

He saw and felt the aura surrounding her creep over his body as well. It
ignited, engulfing them both in flames. 

END PART TEN
---------------------------------------------

[Quietus - Part 11 of 14] 

Friday, February 19, 1999 
8:17 a.m. 

"We got another one." 

Mulder's head jerked up at the voice, disoriented, his thoughts on the
homicide case and Samantha. The correct context of the remark slid into place
as he saw Hurley breathlessly put the phone down, his eyes alive with 
excitement. Branch and Scully stood nearby, also looking over at Hurley, 
anticipating. Mulder
remembered now.  All of them had heard about last night's warehouse fire on the 
news this morning. Hurley filled them in on the just-ended phone call. 
Preliminary
investigation had confirmed it was most likely arson, and true to MO the 
warehouse had stored, among other things, Federal government records. 

"Keough is not our guy," Scully said, glancing at her colleagues. 

"No," Hurley said. "Damn it, I thought we had him. But at least we have a
witness to this one. Jesus H. Christ." 

Mulder let the obvious deadpan response go by, settled for the obvious query
instead. "Who?" 

Hurley laughed. "My wife! I can't goddamn well believe this. She came home
late last night from a client meeting. She passed by the warehouse district
and saw flames.  She pulled over to call 911 and saw someone, some guy, standing 
across the street, watching. They actually made eye contact and she got a good 
look at his face before he took off. I've got people out looking for him." 

"Unbelievable," Scully muttered, impressed by their luck. "Do we know who he
is yet?" 

"Not yet," Hurley said. "I've got an idea, though. Jeanne gave me a good
description; she's coming in in a minute for a session with the police artist.
We'll have a picture circulating in no time, and this case is as good as done." 

Branch nodded, satisfied. "Sometimes you get lucky," she said. "It's just too
bad another building had to go up - I didn't need to see that happen." She
glanced at Mulder and Scully. "Sorry to have dragged you out here today, you 
guys. We should have this wrapped up by lunch." 

Scully leaned against the desk. "Back to shovelling," she muttered resignedly.
She peered at her partner. "Sure you wouldn't like another arson assignment?" 

Mulder was about to reply when his cell rang. He answered it. 

"Detective Falsone again, Agent Mulder. We found another one, same as the
other two." 

"Where?" 

"Back at the park. This one was buried on the shore of the lake. Some kids
were out here yesterday evening with a metal detector and a shovel. Skeletal
fragments again, in a nightgown that is more or less intact. Something 
interesting about this one. There's a heart-shaped hole in the chest area of the 
clothing." 

Mulder felt his nerves jangle. "Say that again." 

"Looks like someone cut a hole in the shape of a heart out of the clothing
before the victim was buried. Sounds like your Paper Hearts' guy's MO." 

Mulder tried to speak but found his voice uncooperative. "Where is the body
now?" he finally managed to say. 

"Coroner's Office." 

"I'll be there as soon as possible," Mulder said, ending the call before
Falsone could reply. He lunged for the coat rack, remembered, looked
questioningly, pleadingly at Scully. She stared back at him hard, then 
reluctantly searched for and produced her car keys. He grabbed them, raised his 
hand in a gesture of thanks, and was out the door. 
  


"We haven't done anything with the body yet," the coroner said, leading Mulder
to the autopsy bay. "It's been tagged and bagged. We've scheduled an autopsy
for this afternoon." 

Mulder followed, tense. "I appreciate you letting me look at it. I know it's
not your normal procedure." 

The coroner looked back at him. "You're thinking this has something to do with
an FBI investigation?" 

"Yes," Mulder replied. They pushed through the swinging stainless steel doors.
Two other autopsy tables lay empty, their sterile steel surfaces gleaming
coldly under the fluorescents. Mulder saw neither of them, focusing only on a 
black body bag that occupied the third table. A small shape swelled the middle 
of the oversized bag. 

"There it is," the coroner gestured. "Let me know if I can be of any help."
Mulder thanked him and proceeded to unzip the bag. The coroner left. 

The skeleton was caked in mud and leaves; very little had been disturbed.
Mulder stared hard at the face, at the skull, at the nightgown. Pulling on
latex gloves, he pulled gently at the stiff material. The heart came into view. 
He closed his eyes. 

Opening them again, he let his gaze wander over the rest of the body. A
child's, a girl's, there was virtually no mistaking. He moved around the end
of the table, crouched low, studying the head. The hoped-for traces of scalp and 
hair were absent. He straightened, gently touched the jaw, studied the bone 
structure of the face, looked at the teeth, struggled to remember any dental 
work Samantha had had. He couldn't recall. She had a long face, though - he 
tried to superimpose Samantha's features onto the forehead, the cheekbones, the 
jaw. He went blank. He couldn't. 

Mulder clenched his gloved hand, aware that he was trembling, aware of his
shallow breathing. He forced air deeply into his lungs and out, several times.
He relaxed his hand, placed it gently over the heart cut-out. This was her. 
Roche's last victim. 

His hand moved to the collar of the dress, reluctantly checking one last
detail. He hesitated, then carefully pulled away the fabric over the
clavicles. The right one, then the left. He ran his finger along the left one, 
felt his head spin and heard the blood rush in his ears. The shaking started 
again. 

The left clavicle had been broken and healed. A very slight misalignment of
bone, a definite scar where the knit had taken place. 

oh my dear god. 

He came to his senses sitting in a stall in the men's room, no recollection of
how he got there or how long he'd been there. He fumbled for his phone. 

"Scully." 

"It's me, Scully," he said, trying to keep his voice steady. 

"Where are you, Mulder? It's almost eleven." 

"It is? I'm sorry, Scully. I had no idea." 

"What's wrong?" 

"Jesus," he whispered, covering his face with his free hand. The implications
of what he'd seen - he'd always been so consumed with finding Samantha that
he'd never, ever seriously considered the impact on his world if he ever found 
her. 

"Mulder?" 

"I - may have found Samantha," he said very slowly, his voice on the edge of
breaking. There was a long pause. 

"Mulder, are you sure?" Her words were carefully paced. 

"I, um, I need confirmation. Dental records, maybe a PCR. I - I'd want a PCR
done on the victim and me if - how long do they keep dental records, Scully?" 

"Where are you, Mulder?" 

"Coroner's Office." 

"Mulder, listen to me carefully. I'm coming over there. I'll have a look at
the body. But I need you to consider this: it might not be Samantha. Okay? I
need you to hang onto that for now." 

"Okay." His voice had dropped to a whisper again. 

"Hang on, Mulder. I'll be there as soon as I can." 
  


Scully's gloved hands touched and probed the skeleton gently, expertly,
patiently as she tried to ignore the pacing, hovering Mulder. She was glad
when he moved to the other side of the large room to examine the contents of the 
cabinets through their reinforced glass doors. She put the memory of his 
stricken face out of her thoughts as she worked, all the while knowing that 
whatever she found here would not ease his mind in any significant way. That 
would have to wait for the autopsy and the results of the lab tests. She was 
here more for show and for emotional support; she knew Mulder realized that as 
well. 

She straightened with a sigh, stretching out the kink in her back and removing
the gloves with a soft snap. Mulder was beside her like a shot. She glanced at
him and then back to the body. 

"I'm not sure what to tell you, Mulder," she said gently. "You're right about
the collarbone - it was broken and it looks like it's a relatively old break,
perhaps two to four years ante mortem. But lots of kids break their collarbones 
- it's a common childhood injury. Bill and Charles both broke one of theirs, and 
my
best friend in fifth grade did too." She looked up at Mulder and saw how this 
failed to reassure him. She continued. "The body is dressed in a girl's 
nightgown - not proof positive that it's female, but we can go with that until 
we get the DNA tests back. Her dental records will be very helpful - what can 
you provide?" 

Mulder shook his head, looking sick. "I went over my old office with a
fine-tooth comb after the fire. I didn't find a trace of her file. Either it
was burned or somebody lifted it. I have a hard copy of the paperwork at home 
and on a disk in a safety deposit box, but neither of those include dental 
x-rays." He slammed his hand on the stainless steel examining table in 
frustration, making Scully jump. "Goddamn it, Scully! I made a copy of 
everything except the fucking dental x-rays. They were in her original file." 

"What about contacting the dentist you had as a kid?" 

Mulder shook his head again. "He was an old guy even then - he retired before
I left home. Mom told me, I don't know, about fifteen years ago that he'd
passed away. I don't even remember his name, and I can't begin to imagine where 
his old files are." 

Scully considered this. "I know it's a reach, Mulder, but we can try to track
them down." 

"They've been destroyed, Scully. I'm almost sure of it." 

"Maybe. Let's have a look, anyway." She watched as Mulder shuffled over to a
chair and sat down heavily, disconsolately, rubbing his face with both hands.
Scully bit her lip thoughtfully, then moved over to the cabinets, searching 
their
contents through the glass. Finding what she was looking for, she tugged
hopefully on the door. Unlocked, it opened. Reaching in, she picked out what she 
needed and walked over to Mulder, snagging another pair of latex gloves on the 
way. 

Pulling another chair directly in front of him, she sat and arranged the
equipment on a small steel tray on her lap. "Roll up your sleeve and give me
your arm," she commanded, her voice low but authoritative. She could see her 
tone taking the desired effect on Mulder as he obediently removed his jacket and 
pushed his shirt sleeve up to his bicep. Scully tied the soft rubber hose around 
his upper arm and tore open the packet of antiseptic, swabbing the inside of his 
elbow. 

"Make a fist." He did. Scully probed the skin with gloved fingers, searching
for a likely spot. Unwrapping the cannula, she hesitated a second, aware she
hadn't drawn blood from anyone for a long time, then smoothly slid the sharp 
point into the swelling vein. "Relax your hand," she murmured, clicking the vial 
into place and tweaking loose the tourniquet. Blood jetted in a diminutive spurt 
into the vial. She watched until it was nearly full, then removed the vial, 
pressed a cotton swab over the tiny wound, and smoothly withdrew the cannula. 
Mulder pressed his finger on the swab and bent his lower arm up. They locked 
gazes. 

"I'll get our people to run a PCR on this," she said plainly. "You'll obtain a
copy of the PCR results from those remains over there, once they're available.
They won't be ready till next week. I'll see what I can do to expedite the 
tests. We'll compare them. Then we'll know." Her eyes, projecting confidence and 
certainty, stayed fixed on Mulder's. He searched her gaze, absorbing her 
strength, feeling her simple, direct language pierce his own fog as surely as a 
lighthouse beacon. He moved his head up and down, a slight movement, signalling 
his comprehension. Scully straightened his arm, reached for an adhesive bandage, 
and smoothed it over the cotton swab.  She stood and moved over to the bright 
orange sharps container, depositing the used cannula into it. She slipped the 
blood sample into a plastic zip bag and pocketed it, then replaced the borrowed 
equipment. 

"Scully." 

She turned. Mulder was standing now, fastening the button on his cuff. He
regarded her gratefully. 

"Thank you." He smiled wryly. "I knew you'd make it up to me for the
chocolates." 

She ducked her head and smiled, moving back over to her partner as he reached
for his jacket. She took his arm briefly, steering him toward the door. "Let's
get back to the precinct, finish up what we need to there, and get back to 
Washington." Pushing open the door, she added lightly, "I expect a bigger box 
than that for my birthday." 


END PART ELEVEN
---------------------------------------------

[Quietus - Part 12 of 14] 

Saturday, February 20 
Baltimore, MD 

It had snowed the previous night, a heavy, thick, wet snow that bent branches,
made roads treacherous, and delighted children. A group of them played now in a
greenspace, the greenspace across from the Hurley residence. Snowmen, snow
forts, and snow angels had been erected or etched into the open ground,
destroying the small park's once smooth, pristine coat. The sun was illuminating 
all that was left, patiently melting a ponderous layer of snow off the branches, 
glancing off countless minuscule icy lenses in random patterns of crystalline 
light. 

Mulder sat in his car on the side of the greenspace opposite the Hurley home.
He watched Meryl intently, gathering his nerve. Yesterday's events had left
him feeling hollowed out, as though someone had gone through his chest cavity 
with a rake. He hadn't slept. Wouldn't, until he learned what he needed to know. 
As he stared at Meryl, he grew more certain than ever that she was the conduit 
to the answer he sought. Oh, he could wait for the lab tests. Yes, he could. Or, 
he could ask her. 
Ask Roche. 

Meryl's coming home tonight, Hurley had told him yesterday, off-handedly. I
just hope they don't cancel or divert her flight because of this snow. "They"
didn't. And here she was. 

Setting his jaw determinedly, he got out of the car and walked across the
street, oblivious to everything but Meryl. She had amassed a fair arsenal of
snowballs and was gleefully flinging them, along with several other girls, at a 
similarly equipped snow fort staffed entirely by boys. As he got closer, a 
wayward
missile piffffed off his shoulder, sending a wet, icy spray over his head and 
down his neck. He closed his eyes and gritted his teeth, more pissed off than he 
knew he should be.  Nerves on edge, he managed to compose himself and looked 
around for the culprit. The guilty party stared back at him, abashed, from a sea 
of boyish faces. 

"Sorry, mister," the boy said. His friends collapsed around him in giggles. 

"Way to go, Trevor," Meryl admonished sarcastically from her bunker. "He's
only an FBI agent, you know." 

Mulder brushed the snow off his neck and shoulder. He looked at the stricken
face of the unfortunate Trevor, who was being besieged unmercifully by his
friends with taunts of "you're in big trouble noooow". Mulder forced a grin. 

"I can help you with that wild arm," he said, altering his course to give the
battlefield a wider berth. He stopped after a few steps, spread his hands. 

"Sorry, guys. Didn't mean to interrupt. I just want a word with Meryl for a
minute." Heads whipped around to stare at Meryl. 

"What for?" Meryl asked, cautious. 

"Just for a minute, Meryl. Could you come over here? Please?" 

Meryl hesitated, then picked her way over the battlement and ammunition and
the huddled, whispering bodies of her comrades. Reluctantly she wandered over
to where Mulder stood. Mulder touched her shoulder lightly, steering her away 
from her friends. Eyes followed them for several seconds, then someone pitched a
snowball and the battle was on again. 

She stared up at him uncertainly, disturbed by his demeanour, his rumpled,
unshaven appearance, the intensity that he was unsuccessfully trying to hide.
Seeing her wariness, he sought for ways to put her at ease. "So, how were things 
in Calgary? Did you learn how to ski?" 

"Yeah, sort of," she said, not entirely mollified by his attempt at small
talk. "I actually like snowboarding better. Skiing's kinda dweeby." 

"I'm afraid I don't know how to do either," Mulder confessed. He glanced back
at the snowball fight, satisfied they were a sufficient distance away. They
stopped next to a tree, one that the kids had shaken free of excess snow 
earlier. Mulder crouched to Meryl's level. 

"I need to ask you some questions, Meryl, questions that are probably going to
sound very strange to you," he said patiently. She looked at him, frowning
slightly. 

"What kind of questions?" 

"I need you to tell me what you know about John Lee Roche." 

"I saw something on him on A and E," she said. "One of those shows on serial
killers. I like that stuff." 

Mulder closed his eyes, remembering how he'd refused to be interviewed for the
show in question; he'd refused even to watch it when it aired. 

"Meryl, I believe you know more about Roche than what the TV show told you."
He looked at her intently, then spit it out. "I think that part of you is
Roche. We had that connection, that bond that allowed him to get inside my head, 
the way I got into his when I profiled him. I think that's why I dream about 
you, why you sometimes speak in his voice, why it's you that's directing me to 
find these victims.  He's using you, your resemblance to my sister, to get to 
me, to finally tell me what happened to her." 

"What are you talking about?" 

Mulder pressed further. "It's Roche, working through you, who's leading me to
find Samantha. His last victim. Isn't it?" 

"Who's Samantha? I don't know anything about anybody called Samantha." Meryl's 
face and voice registered confusion, frustration. Mulder grabbed her arms,
felt the girl stiffen in his grasp. 

"My sister! Samantha! You led me to believe that she was your last victim! She
may be the one lying in the morgue at the Coroner's Office! I know that's your 
last
victim, Roche, the last Paper Heart! Is it my sister?" He shook Meryl, once,
tried to keep his volume low. "Is it her??" 

Something very unchildlike flickered across Meryl's features then, a look
Mulder found familiar. A calm, open, curious look, inviting, reassuring,
completely out of place on an eight-year-old's face. 

"The FBI can't tell that?" she said. Mulder stared at her, flabbergasted. Her
voice, Roche's placid tone. He felt the pull, felt the connection to Roche
drawing him into the mind, the spirit of this child. It was him in there, at 
least part of the time. 

"Is it her?" he repeated slowly through his teeth, his voice hard, barely
above a whisper. 

Meryl's expression was now one of studied curiosity, a look of satisfaction
mingled with gentle surprise at some good fortune, some outcome wished for but 
never really expected. Roche smiled softly, using Meryl's face to do so. "I knew
it," he said, his voice touched with delighted amusement. "I knew it would be
worth it, just to see your face." 

Mulder's grip on Meryl's arms tightened. Her face changed again, a look of
fear and pain replacing the expression she'd had a moment before. 

"You're hurting me!" she cried, leaning back and twisting, trying to break
free. 

"Is it her?!?" Mulder shouted, giving her another shake, his anger boiling
over. Meryl wrenched her body against his grip. 

"Stop it!" she yelled. "Let me go!" 

Startled, Mulder released her. Off-balance, Meryl fell backwards into the
snow. She scrambled to her feet and ran back to the snow forts, back to her
friends who had turned and stared when she'd cried out. On his knees, his hands 
resting on his thighs, Mulder looked after her, a rock in the pit of his 
stomach. 

Meryl glanced back once as she ran, her features taut with fear and confusion. 



Sunday, February 21 
Mulder's Apartment 

Mulder opened the door to let Scully in. She looked upset. Mulder wasn't sure
whether to interpret her expression as one of anger or anxiety, exactly, and
he was too tired to care much. All he knew is that she'd called, asked if she 
could come over; she needed to talk to him in person about something. No, no it 
wasn't
his lab results, they wouldn't be ready till at least Tuesday, and in any case 
they had to wait for the Baltimore P.D. to obtain their findings. 

She looked up at him, registering his exhaustion, his apprehension as to why
she was here. He waved her to a chair; she refused and stood with her arms
folded loosely, facing him. Mulder recognized the posture as something she 
affected when she had something weighty to say, something difficult. He knew 
what it was. He sat on his couch and waited for it. 

"I got a call from Detective Hurley last night," she said. "He was very angry,
very upset. He said he'd called you already to voice the same concerns." 

Mulder nodded. "He did. And I apologized." He stopped there, gazing levelly at
his partner. Scully knew the look, knew that Mulder wasn't sorry at all. 

"Mulder, I heard a very frightened, confused, and angry father when he called.
He said you'd grilled Meryl in front of her friends, accused her of - of being 
Roche?" Her voice rose as her brows knitted together. "He said that you yelled 
at her, shook her, threw her to the ground and basically frightened her to 
death." 

Mulder rubbed his face. "Yeah, that was the same thing he told me." He paused,
staring out the window, refusing to meet Scully's eyes. "I didn't grill her in
front of her friends, and I didn't throw her to the ground. I did shake her. She 
lost her balance when I let go of her." 

"Mulder, you had no business touching that child, much less shaking her! Hell,
you had no business being in her company at all!" 

Now he did look at her. "She is Roche, Scully! I have all the evidence I
need." He stood, moved over to her. "That heart she gave me was no accident.
The things she said to me, the way she looked, the way she led me to those 
remains, through those dreams, the way she played with me, the way he played 
with me, Scully, showing me those other bodies, the ones that looked similar. 
They may have been more of his victims. We'll never know. But the last one, the 
one I believe to be Samantha, definitely was one of his victims. The last Paper 
Heart. And he led me to her, through Meryl." 

Scully stared at him, challenged. "She is not Roche, Mulder," she emphasized,
her voice hard. "Not to me, or to her father. She is a little girl, a little
kid that you basically stalked and assaulted to get some information that she 
does not and could not possibly have." Scully looked away, gathering her 
composure. "I managed to convince him not to lay charges, Mulder. I know he 
threatened you with it. I told him as much as I felt I could about what had 
pushed you to behave that way. And I apologized for you. Again." 

Mulder looked at her tight features. "I was interrogating a suspect," he said
firmly, slowly. "I don't care what you think, or what Hurley thinks." He flung
an arm out and back, pointing at some unseen force. "That was Roche. He has 
information about my sister, about the crime he committed against her. I am not 
only duty bound as an officer of the law to get that information, I also have a 
duty to my sister, to my mother, to find out everything that I possibly can 
about what
happened to her, no matter what it takes. I also owe it to myself." 

"Listen to yourself!" Scully said incredulously. "You are talking about an
innocent little girl having some otherworldly knowledge about your sister,
who's been missing now for what? Twenty-five years? How far does this go, 
Mulder? How far do you have to take this? You got so wrapped up in this that you 
neglected your professional duties and compromised the working relationship that 
we both had with some very competent officers of the Baltimore Police. This 
arson case was solved without much help from you, Mulder. I suppose I should 
just be thankful that you stayed out of the way!" 

"Well, they caught the suspect, didn't they?" Mulder shot back. "You didn't
need me on this, Scully. They didn't need either of us. This case was a waste
of my abilities, and yours, too." 

"First off, they haven't caught him yet," Scully said, her voice taut. "He's
gone underground. We believe he's around; it's just a matter of time before
he's found. And second, that last fire didn't need to happen. With all of us 
working together, we might have prevented it, and saved a lot of people a lot of 
headaches. I did need you on this, Mulder. You weren't there." 

Mulder stared at her, stung by the verbal assault. He felt his adrenaline
rising, felt it simmer while she continued: 

"Look. I have tried to be supportive, but I was actually - embarrassed to be
working with you this time, especially around Branch and Hurley," she said. "I
felt like I always had to look over my shoulder to see if you were still with 
us! You've done some pretty bizarre things in the past, but this was so - so 
incredibly unprofessional. Your behaviour not only spoke badly of you, it also 
compromised me, my credibility, my integrity. You are my partner. I rely on you 
to be there." 

"I didn't think it mattered," Mulder said levelly. "You were mostly off
somewhere with Branch, off with your new buddy." 

Scully's eyes narrowed. "Detective Branch and I worked well together," she
said, defensive. "It was refreshing for a change to work with someone who
respects my take on things, who is actually capable of telling me that I do a 
good job and that my work is appreciated. And we only socialized once. I like 
her. I
respect her." 

"Then let's talk about your professionalism," Mulder seethed. "Let's talk
about how you compromised me during that little bit of off-hours socializing,
shall we? What did you talk about with her, Scully, after a few drinks? This 
crazy asshole that you've worked with now for six years? The one who believes in 
aliens and telepathy and every manner of folk legend, believes it's all real? 
Who can't make up his mind about what happened to his sister, who believes that 
everyone and everything is out to get him? Who disses you and insults you and 
puts down your methods, who runs off half-cocked to pursue some irrelevant piece 
of paranormal crap at every opportunity?
Let's talk about how you've discredited me, okay?" 

"Oh Mulder, that is so juvenile," Scully snapped, casting an abrupt, imploring
look at the ceiling, her voice now wavering with anger. "What we talked about
is none of your business. If Branch and Hurley have reason to question your 
integrity, it's because you've done it to yourself. You didn't need any help 
from me." She paused, trying to remember her partner's state of mind, the stress 
he was under, and fought to soften her words and her tone. Rubbing her forehead, 
she said, "I know that waiting for these test results is trying." 

"Do you," Mulder said quietly, furious. "Do you know what it's like to look
for someone for twenty-five years? Do you know what it's like to follow one
dead-end lead after another? Do you know what it means to hear one report about 
the fate of your sister, then hear another one, trying over and over again to 
reconcile the stories, trying endlessly to get the facts, any facts, and then 
trying to get them straight? Do you know what it's like to live every day not 
knowing what happened to her, knowing that you may never know?" 

Scully felt something snap inside. "No," she said icily. "No, I don't. Thanks
to you, my sister is dead." 

They both froze, Scully's words hanging, irretrievable, in the air. She
registered the shock on his face, knew that it mirrored her own. 

"Mulder, I'm sorry. I didn't mean that. I didn't..." She stopped, not knowing
how to continue, wishing she could snatch the words back, erase the hurt from 
Mulder's expression. She saw his jaw set, watched him stalk to the door, 
grabbing his coat on the way. 

"Mulder," she repeated, louder. He left the apartment, slamming the door
behind him, rattling the prints on the wall. She jumped at the noise. 

Dismayed, she sat on the couch, pressing the heel of her hand to her forehead,
feeling the rush of shame flow hot through her body. 

END PART TWELVE
---------------------------------------------

[Quietus - Part 13 of 14] 

It was dark by the time Mulder returned to his apartment building. He shivered
as the warmth of the foyer enveloped him, and hugged the light jacket around
him with shrugged shoulders. His anger had long ago subsided, replaced now by a 
hollow, aching emptiness, a gnawing hurt. Rationality had replaced rage. It was 
a poor substitute; cold and unsatisfying. He rode the elevator up, paused in 
front of
his door, feeling in the pockets for a key. Damn it. He tried the knob. It was
unlocked. 

He entered cautiously, apprehensively, fearing that Scully was still there.
She wasn't. He closed the door behind him, not sure how to feel about it being
left open like that. Thoughtful of her, yes, considering that he'd left so 
abruptly that he'd forgotten his keys. Then again, anyone could have walked in. 
He decided to
think more positively about her intentions in leaving the door unlocked. 

He flopped on his back onto the couch and stared at the ceiling. The long walk
he'd taken had settled his thinking, the rhythm of his feet on pavement
supplying a soothing, metronome-like beat. Twenty-five years. He'd looked for 
Samantha for a quarter of a century. No, that wasn't quite true. He'd wondered 
what happened to Samantha for a quarter of a century. He'd only really been 
looking for less than half that time. 

Mulder turned onto his stomach and grabbed a pillow, burying his face in it
and letting one arm dangle over the side of the couch. How often had he felt
he was this close to discovering the truth about his sister? How many times had 
he felt this sure in the past? How many times had he been left with as many 
questions, if not more, when the lead he'd been following ground to a miserable 
halt? And how would finally knowing absolve him of the responsibility he felt 
for her disappearance? 

His mind tried to engage his interest in tallying up the cost of this whole
escapade; he shoved this train of thought aside. Scully's brother Bill had set 
Mulder's subconscious in motion on the question more than a year ago, when 
Scully was dying of cancer. Had it been worth it? Had he found what he was 
looking for?
At the cost of his own life, Scully's life, Scully's sister's life... 

Mulder let out a long, slow breath, painfully. Scully's sister's life,
Melissa's life. He always believed - maybe hoped was the better word - that
Scully never really blamed him for that. She'd said so herself - that it had 
been her choice to follow Mulder on his path, that Melissa had got in the way 
through no one's fault. He'd always wondered about her honesty about her 
feelings, about where she placed the blame. Now he knew. 

She was upset, a small voice told him. She didn't mean it. But it resonated
within him, tapping a truth deep inside. It was his fault. The web he'd spun
to capture the truth Out There had caught too many unwitting victims, no more 
responsible for their own fate than whatever random circumstances had caused 
them to blunder into his trap. 

How badly did he have to know? How much did others have to pay for his
satisfaction and peace of mind? 

As for the arson case - could they have solved it earlier if he'd been more
focused? He didn't know. It didn't matter. Not now. They probably already had
the guy in custody. 

He awoke several hours later to the sound of his ringing cell phone. Groggily,
he got up and looked for it, found it, answered it. 

"Agent Mulder? It's Detective Branch." 

Mulder's foggy brain fought to make the connection to something familiar. Oh
yes. Branch. 

"Yeah." 

Branch's voice was tight, anxious. "There's a fire at Detective Hurley's
place. I'm there now. The fire crews are here - it's bad, Mulder. I thought -
I thought you should know." 

Mulder's thoughts flew to Meryl. "Is everyone okay?" He listened, heard
silence. He looked at the phone. Listening again, he heard a dial tone. Branch
had hung up.
Damn her. 

Mulder grabbed a warm jacket and his keys, and flew out the door. 



Baltimore, MD. 
Hurley Residence 
1:37 a.m. 

Mulder saw a tall woman entering the rear of an ambulance as he pulled up
behind a fire truck. Branch, he supposed. Then the doors shut and the
ambulances, two of them, raced away. The car had barely stopped before he was 
out and running for the Hurleys' front lawn. A handful of neighbours stood in 
their night clothes on the sidewalk and on the neighbouring lawns; others peered 
from their windows. The lights from the fire trucks and police cruisers flashed 
intermittently, blood red and ice blue against the charred siding of the upper 
floor. The hiss and crackle of two-way radios carried distorted voices. A fog of 
lingering smoke hung about the house and hovered over it, illuminated by 
streetlights and reflecting the strobing lights of the emergency vehicles. No 
flames were visible now. 

He absently reached for and presented his badge as the fire captain approached
him. She glanced at it and nodded. His eyes were locked on the house. 

Mulder heard the crunch of tires on ice, the momentary revving of an engine
before it dies. Then Scully was suddenly at his elbow. Branch - Branch must
have called her, too. He stared at Scully without seeing her. 

"Mulder...," she said. He ignored her. The whirling in his head stopped as
clarity rushed back in with a bang. He looked at the captain again. 

"The ambulances that just left - is everyone..." He couldn't finish. 

The captain looked back down the road after the departed ambulances. "We found
two adults on the upper level. They were alive, just barely." 

"What about - what about the daughter?" 

Scully looked at Mulder, startled. 

The captain's eyes shifted away from Mulder's and focused on the distance. "We
haven't found her yet," she said grimly. Mulder didn't hesitate. He sprinted
across the debris-strewn lawn and into the front door before anyone could stop 
him. 

"Sir!!" the captain yelled after him. "You can't go in there! It's not safe!
Sir!!" She traded glances with Scully, and knew from the agent's eyes in a
split second that she'd have to go after both of them. 

Scully followed Mulder through the open front door of the house, her hands
coming up in front of her face involuntarily as the smoke and humidity slammed
into her lungs and eyes. She heard Mulder pounding up the stairs and followed 
him, finally catching up with him at the doorway to what appeared to be a 
bedroom. She coughed, and was aware of heavy boots coming up the stairs behind 
them. 

The upstairs was hot and steaming; the stench from the fire was overpowering.
Water ran from what was left of the fixtures and onto the floor in greasy 
puddles.
Everything in the hallway was covered in a layer of waterlogged ash and soot,
the walls, floor, and ceiling were streaked with black, slick with water and
foam. But the bedroom seemed nothing more than a great, hollow cinder. 
Everything smelled of fire; insulation, carpeting, wiring, paint, wood, 
something indefinable and awful, very, very awful. Peering through irritated 
eyes, Scully glanced around the room, taking in the pattern on what remained of 
the wallpaper, the charred husks of furniture. This was a child's bedroom, a 
little girl's room. She felt a weight press down on her chest, momentarily 
crushing the breath out of her. 

Mulder's was staring at the bed. Scully followed his look with one of her own
and laid a cautionary hand on his arm. 

"Mulder," she said. He shook her arm off, roughly. He moved to the foot of the
bed, grasping the brass railing. It was hot still, hot enough to make the skin
of his palms recoil. He didn't care. He pulled, hard. 

No. Oh no oh no oh no no no... 

Meryl lay near the wall, looking for all the world like she might have been
asleep were it not for the charring of her skin and clothes. Like most fire
victims, she didn't burn to death. The fire took her not by heat and flame but 
by sucking the breathable air out of the room, out of the lungs, and replacing 
it with hot, noxious gases. Curled into a fetal position, she somehow looked at 
peace, arms clutching something. A stuffed animal, maybe. Hard to tell. She was 
only a shape, a shell; the spirit departed. 

They stood there for what seemed an eternity, overwhelmed, numbed. Then Mulder 
abruptly pushed his way past Scully, past the three firefighters that had
gathered at the door. Retching noises could be heard coming from down the hall. 
Scully closed her eyes and swayed slightly, fighting her own nausea. Winning, 
but
just barely. She swallowed hard, willing herself to ignore the smells and the 
emotions that had set her partner off, willing her stomach to stop lurching and 
herself to stop feeling, just for the moment. Her pathologist's skills and 
discipline asserted themselves, finally. She pushed past the firefighters into 
the hallway. 

At another time, she might have been a little amused; most people under these
circumstances wouldn't have bothered with a toilet. The bathroom was, 
surprisingly, relatively intact. Soot and ash covered the discoloured countertop 
and the vinyl shower curtain was partially melted, but the bathroom was 
otherwise
oddly, surreally functional. The toilet was flushing and Mulder was running 
water in the sink, his hands and face glistening and wet in the faint light. He 
scooped another double handful onto his colourless face and held his hands 
there. Scully reached for a singed and sodden hand towel. It had been perhaps 
seconds from bursting into flame, she thought, studying it, wringing it out. She 
put a gentle hand on Mulder's back, offering the towel with the other. She 
pressed a little harder, instinctively, feeling the tremor in his muscles. After 
a minute he took the towel from her wordlessly and pressed it to his eyes, then 
methodically, slowly, to the rest of his face and neck. He stared at himself in 
the smoked, cracked glass of the mirror, aware of Scully's reflection, but 
avoiding her gaze. He couldn't handle her sympathy, her concern, her willingness 
to be there with him and for him, his own sudden, overwhelming gratitude for her 
very existence. 

He turned to walk past her into the hallway, but his knees buckled. Grabbing
the edge of the counter, he sat heavily on the toilet seat lid. Scully
flinched, resisting the impulse to grab him. She watched him as his eyes glazed, 
his gaze turning inward, fighting to pull himself together. Almost 
imperceptibly, he began to rock himself, a rhythmic back and forth motion, in 
primordial self-soothing. At last his eyes came into focus and he smiled 
faintly, shook his head, and finally met her eyes. The sheer anguish of the look 
knifed straight through her. 

She hesitated a moment, then stepped forward, gently pulling his head into her
shoulder, her other arm encircling his back. His arms locked around her waist,
pulling her hard and close. She shot a glance at the door where the three 
firefighters had gathered. They sprang back out of sight under the heat of her 
glare. 

She held tight as Mulder convulsed against her, laying her cheek on his head.
Squeezing her eyes shut, she felt the prick of her own tears, felt the heat of
their earlier argument fall away before the torrent of something far more 
powerful. She felt as if her chest would explode. 

It was over. All of it. 


END PART THIRTEEN
---------------------------------------------

[Quietus - Part 14 of 14] 

West Potomac Park 
Washington, D.C. 
Five Weeks Later 

Mulder sat at the narrow end of the long reflective pool near the Lincoln
Memorial, the Washington Monument reaching simultaneously for the sky and for
the middle of his back. He held the newspaper open, his elbows resting on his 
knees, smiling broadly at what he was reading. Dilbert and the pointy-haired 
boss. Now there were a couple of losers. 

He never knew what it was that always made him look up. A subconscious
registering of the rhythm of her feet, some subliminal scent carried upon a 
minuscule approaching bow wave, a vibration in the ineffable force that bound 
them together, a trembling of the space-time continuum... There existed a
scientific explanation for it, probably, one perhaps forever out of reach. But 
who cared. 

He folded the paper under his arm and stood, watching her approach. Her face
was composed as ever, but the set of her jaw and the look in her eyes betrayed 
relief, worry, a bit of reproach. He felt guilty. He'd ditched her again, and 
this
time he actually felt guilty. He smiled, closed-mouthed, and she read his
wordless apology. One corner of her mouth turned up, and she held out both 
hands. He took them, bending to receive and offer a publicly appropriate peck on 
the cheek. He'd rather have gathered her up in his arms and never let her go. 

"I'm out of hibernation," he said, noticing that she still held his hands
tightly. Scully nodded. She gave his hands an extra squeeze before releasing
them. 

"I noticed," she said, turning aside and moving along the pathway. He fell
into step beside her. They walked in silence for a moment, basking in each
other's company.  The plaza was busy with people strolling, people in suits, 
people on cell phones, people jogging, people sitting. The sun was warm, but the 
spring air still held the crisp, slightly sour tang of lingering winter. 

"I - ," they both began at once. Their eyes met briefly; Mulder gestured for
her to continue. Scully sighed. 

"I'm glad you're back," she said. "I was worried about you." 

"I was worried about you worrying about me," Mulder quipped. He touched her
elbow. "I got the message you left on my machine just the other day." 

"The one I left for you two weeks ago?" 

"Uh, yeah. That one." He squeezed her elbow. "Thank you." 

She nodded. "I know I didn't need to tell you, Mulder. And I didn't expect you
to call back." 

"But you wished I had?" 

A small smile. "Maybe," she said, tilting her head slightly. A pause, then,
"You were scaring me. I know that, after the funeral, you needed time to
yourself, time to sort things out. It was unusual enough for you to request even 
a week off, not that I wouldn't have endorsed it whole-heartedly, but when that 
week turned into two, then three, and I hadn't heard from you..." The thought 
trailed off. 

"I know. And I'm sorry. Would it make any difference for you to know..." He
paused, searching for the right balance between his need to say what he felt
and his need to avoid embarrassing her, "...for you to know that you were with 
me the whole time?" 

Scully looked at him, then forward again, smiling. Mulder looked thoughtful
for a moment. He gestured toward a park bench they were approaching. They sat. 
Mulder rested his elbows on his knees, his hands clasped. He pressed steepled
forefingers to his lips, staring pensively at a crack in the pavement. Scully
waited quietly, one leg crossed over the other, the arm nearest Mulder resting 
casually on the back of the bench. 

"Which is odd, you know," he said finally. "Your being there. Not odd in and
of itself, exactly, but..." He trailed off, then shifted, looking at her.
"Meryl was Roche,
Scully. I'm absolutely certain. But he's gone now. Completely. Gone for good.
No more dreams. No more messages or opportunities. Just gone. And Meryl..." He 
looked forward again, out at the reflective pool. 

"Losing Meryl like that - the feelings of frustration and helplessness and
guilt and - and loss were overwhelming. I liked her, Scully, in spite of what
she represented. And I know it's no consolation to anybody to know how I felt - 
how I still feel - about not having done all I could to prevent the fire that 
killed her." Mulder paused, the distress clear on his face even in profile. 

"You don't know that, Mulder," Scully said. "You don't know that there was
anything you could have done differently that would have saved her." She
stopped. "I think," she continued carefully, "that regardless of whatever else 
it was you might have done, maybe Meryl was in your life for a reason. And maybe 
she left for a reason." 

Mulder made a slight face. "I'm not sure I buy that, Scully. I screwed up, and
a child may have died because of it. I don't know right now what it will take
to make me see it differently." He sighed pensively, falling silent for a 
moment, then continued. "After the funeral, I went to Chilmark, and then stayed 
at the
house at Quonochontaug for a while. I did a lot of thinking there. A lot. The 
ghosts were...everywhere. And everything. There was such - emptiness." His voice 
had dropped to a near-whisper. "Except - I had you with me." 

Touched, Scully stared at her lap, chewing the inside of her cheek, her eyes
stinging. She turned her thoughts elsewhere for the moment to steady herself.
Clearing her throat, she said, "I heard that the DNA tests on the last two 
victims didn't match yours. I'm sorry, Mulder. I'm sorry that you still don't 
know." Mulder nodded, acknowledging her support. She continued on another tack. 
"You know they convicted the arsonist. Glen Oberg. One of the Baltimore 
suspects." 

"Yeah. I know they caught him the day after the fire. He got sloppy at the
Hurleys', I understand." 

Scully nodded. "After Jeanne Hurley identified him, Oberg tracked down where
she lived, staked out the house, broke in, and set fire to Meryl's room.
Neighbours saw him leave, and saw the fire in the bedroom. They called it in, 
but it burned so hot and fast that..." She trailed off. "No one could have done 
anything. This was no one's fault but Oberg's. And get this." Scully paused for 
emphasis. "He knew John Lee Roche from prison. They were friends." 

Mulder looked at her in surprise, then shook his head. "The circle closes," he
muttered. He went back to staring at the pavement crack. "I'll have to call
the Hurleys. Tell them...I'm sorry. I couldn't approach Detective Hurley at the 
funeral." Mulder stopped, his brow furrowed, unable to speak. Silence stretched 
between them again. Mulder rubbed his palms together slowly, thoughtfully. 

"Something else, Scully." He paused, allowing a lump in his throat to subside.
"Samantha - is gone too." A smile wafted over his lips, a sad smile that made 
Scully's heart pitch. 

"What do you mean?" she asked, gently. 

A long pause. "I don't know what happened to my sister," Mulder said finally,
his voice held steady in a controlled monotone. "She may have been abducted by 
aliens. She may have been taken away for hybridization experiments. She may 
really be living her life somewhere with her own kids. I don't know. Wherever, 
whatever she is, she's gone. I have to let her go. I have to because she's my 
sister and I love her. And I have - let her go." 

His voice caught on the last syllable. Scully watched the muscles in his
throat and jaw work, saw the haunted look on his face. Stretching her arm
forward, she slid her palm across his upper back. She felt the pain he was in, 
as she so often had in the past, but sensed now that it was somehow different. 
It was a healing pain, the kind that does its work and dissipates with time. 
Moved, she squeezed his shoulder gently. 

They sat quietly for a long moment, each lost in their respective thoughts.
Finally Mulder stirred, remembering something he'd forgotten. He reached for
the paper he'd set beside him and unfolded it, retrieving a package he'd 
carefully hidden there. He handed it to Scully. 

"Happy belated birthday," he said. "I'm afraid I missed it this year." 

Scully recognized the shape and colour of the package. It was larger than the
last one, its contents discernibly weightier. It was a copper foil box with a
bronze ribbon tied around it, and a familiar elaborate sticker sealed it shut. 

"Why Mulder," she said, breaking into a smile. "You did get me the bigger
box." 

"Yeah," he said, his composure returning along with a lightness of spirit. "I
figure you earned it." 

  
 Finis.