TITLE: Insight RATING: R (language, violence, child victims) CLASSIFICATION: X A DATE: October 2003 SPOILERS: Starts during FaD and takes a new direction. ARCHIVE: Gossamer, Ephemeral - yes. Others please ask. LEGALLY: Legally these characters belong to some combination of 1013, Chris Carter and Fox. Mulder's soul belongs to DD, for which I'm truly thankful. SUMMARY: Suppose Scully arrived at the hospital two minutes later in Folie a Deux. My thanks to Sana, Ann and Kel for their help. NOTES: Content warnings not supplied. Sorry. Though I consider this story complete in itself, it may be the start of an occasional series. ======= "What are you doing?" A foolish question. Mulder knew exactly what the nurse was doing. She was opening the window, tightening the straps that pinned him to the bed, offering him up to the shadow creature that skittered around outside. Yet still, he couldn't stop himself from hoping. Even as the shape returned. Even when his hollow screams found nothing more than empty echoes in reply. It couldn't end here. It couldn't. Kept shouting for help, certain that it couldn't end here. Vision failed as the thing entered - the man, the thing, the man thing, manthing. Choking on his own cries as he battled against the straps. Tasted panic as his body convulsed against the restraints. Fear sweat dripping into his eyes. Help? Too late now. It was on top of him, noisy breaths licking at his ears, smelling of something green and slimy. Hairs on its wings, on its legs, fluttering, tickling, terrifying. Mulder squirmed under its touch. Felt death as it jammed one hairy fist in his mouth to stop him from screaming. Felt dead as it jabbed something hot and wet and sticky into his neck. ------------- 2 Years Later - FBI Quantico Scully checked her watch again. OK, so it was not yet 11 and the appointment was set for 11. But still, she'd traveled down from New York this morning, and she'd already been kept waiting for twenty minutes. "You're sure he knows I'm here?" She wanted to add the phrase, "Me, Dana Scully," but decided that it would just sound petulant. His secretary looked up from the file. His *secretary* for God's sake! "Certain. He had the camera patched through to his office as soon as security told us you'd arrived." The woman glanced up towards the surveillance camera mounted high in the corner of the office. "But as I said, he's on a call. How about that coffee now? Or maybe you'd like to grab some breakfast yourself - I'm sure he'd understand." Great, a lesson in office etiquette from Mulder's secretary. She paused to take in the scene again. Section Chief Fox William Mulder's name plaque on a door guarded by the Prada-heeled, Donna Karan-suited administrator from hell. "Look," soothed the woman with the expensive feet, "I'm getting myself a cup. Is there anything you'd like while I'm up?" How about an explanation for why I've been hauled down here? Instead Scully simply growled a, "Black, no sugar." That earned her a sharp look and Scully braced for the, "What? Don't tell me you're sweet enough?" that she'd surely earned. But, infuriatingly, the angry glare lapsed into an indulgent smile. The dark-haired woman vanished and Scully took that as an invitation to prowl. The red light on the desk phone probably indicated that Mulder was indeed still talking to someone. The blank monitor was a disappointment. She had hoped that if he was watching the camera in here then at least maybe his secretary had a reciprocal arrangement. The camera in here! She winced, wondering if perhaps she could will herself invisible. What the hell had she been thinking? She hadn't been. She hadn't been thinking straight since she got the order to attend this meeting, complete with a priority statement from the ADIC of the NY office that made even her boss wince. 24 hours notice. Be there or be nowhere. Her boss had supplied a low whistle of surprise when he saw the ADIC's note. Her boss, who was planning to retire in six months time. Her boss, who had practically promised her that she was going to be his recommendation to take over the division. Her boss, a man responsible for a team of fifty agents and forensics specialists working out of the New York field office. Two years. Two years of silence. And then an edict! Mulder had better have a good excuse. She almost laughed, knowing with absolutely certainty, that whatever happened Mulder could always provide a good excuse. Anger. She closed her eyes, acknowledging the unfairness of anger, but accepting that anger was better than the raw terror that she knew was lurking beneath it. Come on, Mulder. Let's get this over with. The woman returned. Three coffees on the borrowed tray. A pile of assorted pastries at their side. "Whatever you want. It's yours." Scully could only assume she was referring to the food. Scully took the coffee and returned to her seat. Checked her watch again. 11 o'clock and counting. She sipped at her cup, found it too hot. Still counting. "You think he's playing with you, don't you?" The woman waited for Scully to look up before continuing. "Not his style, not his style at all." Scully wondered if maybe she should set her straight on a few details. "Wendy?" Both women turned at the sound of Mulder's voice coming from the doorway. "Breakfast. And some kind of industrial waste product they say is coffee." He looked towards Scully and nodded, offered her a hesitant, fleeting smile. Stood up a little straighter as he focused on her face. "It's great to see you. You look," he shrugged, "great." Smiled again, nervous now, looking embarrassed by the fumbled words. "I didn't mean to keep you waiting. Please come in." He waved her past him into the room, addressed his next words to Wendy. "Got everything you wanted?" The brunette nodded. Mulder took the tray into the office. The office was a hodge-podge of furniture and trimmings, ancient and modern, reality and fantasy. Inevitably and undeniably both eclectic and cluttered. In some ways it was a re-construction of the old basement office, in others it was anything but. The leather couch looked oddly familiar to Scully. The place had all the trappings of Bureau success - the unnecessary size, the nice new carpet, the good desk with the extra wing for the ubiquitous computer, the chairs huddled around the meeting table. Yet somehow, it missed the point. The lighting, the furniture, the pictures on the walls were somehow off. Where were the crime scene photos? Where were the carefully framed certificates and commendations speaking to the competence of the room's occupant? Where were the fluorescent tubes to wash the whole thing in harsh bleached white? Somehow, above the workplace statement about authority and professionalism, it said something else entirely. Home? "Scully?" She turned to face him, instantly aware of how carefully she'd been avoiding his eyes. Swallowing hard, he spoke in a rush. "I'm sorry for dragging you down here. I needed to see you." She'd been avoiding words as well as vision. Had she even managed to say hello yet? "That's all right. I was just surprised." He blinked and she took that as a question. "Surprised that you didn't phone." She wasn't even sure herself if that was a reference to yesterday or to the last two years. "You look so young," he mumbled, and she wondered if he'd intended to say the words out loud. He blinked, stared down at his desk before taking a deep breath as if he was trying to suck in enough courage to speak again. "The fact is. I need your help. The X-Files division needs a senior agent. They've got four people in there and they're good, but not good enough for the job they've got to do." Oh. "Which is?" "Saving the world!" His brief bark of laughter was tired and humorless. "I know you don't believe that an alien invasion is going to destroy mankind. But I do. I've got to know that someone's trying to stop it from happening." What the hell? Was he asking her to take over the reins? Why would he? Oh no. "Are you sick?" He just looked confused. "No more than ever." So why wasn't he running the X-Files if they were so damned important? "Then what's the problem?" "There aren't enough hours in the day. I can't do justice to the X-Files, while I'm doing this job." Was she missing something here? "So?" "You could run the X-Files." "To fight an alien threat that I don't believe in?" "You won't let your beliefs stand in the way of the truth." The Truth! He'd used one of those big T words. How long before he used the other one? "And you're the only one I trust." She stifled a laugh. How predictable. How ludicrous when they'd not even spoken for two years. "If it's so important, what are you doing here?" She waved a hand to indicate the comfortable office and what it represented. "Finally succumbed to the pleasures of the flesh?" She paused for an instant to consider it. Why was she so angry? Shock - she told herself. Here in Mulder's lair, drinking a cup of bad coffee, with not a psychopath, a mutant, or a life-threatening injury in sight, she was going into shock. It would be funny, if it weren't so sad. His silence was the loudest thing in the room. Finally, she looked at him. A tactical mistake because she actually saw him this time. He did not look great. He looked exhausted, expensive suit hanging loose on a sagging coathanger of a body. He looked like he hadn't seen daylight in a while, pale flesh perfectly highlighted by red-rimmed eyes. She'd seen healthier looking corpses. She almost gagged on the thought, and had to turn away. "No one else can do this job. But you could manage the X- Files." Right. Just when her anger was starting to dissipate in the face of his silence, he had to go and open his mouth. ------- Walter Skinner's Office "I don't know what happened," Scully stated. She did, but it in retrospect it made no more sense than it had the first time around. Mulder had taken one look at the fury that billowed up from her, and his demeanor had changed in an instant. Vulnerability vanished. Pain turned into anger. Two angry agents in a confined space. Mulder had defused the situation in the cruelest way possible. Anger vanishing, indifference reigned supreme. "Go back to New York. I was wrong to ask you to come down here." He left the office and she sat there alone, too stunned to move, until Skinner's secretary came searching for her. Skinner looked guilty, maybe even distressed. "I should have spoken to you first. I wanted to. But Wendy said -" "Wendy?" What did Mulder's secretary have to do with anything? "Wendy. You met her. Dr Adams. She thought it was important that Mulder made the approach. Own the solution - as she'd say." "*Dr* Adams?" "Psychiatrist. She thought it was a breakthrough. Experts." He shook his head, rubbed tiredly at the bridge of his nose. "I should have known better. I take it you don't want to come back?" "I'm surprised he decided to ask me to come back." Skinner shook his head, looked bemused. "Decided to ask you? No. He was ordered to ask you." "You know I can't work in the field anymore. I'm on restricted duties." She left out the fact that, despite that normally career-wrecking limitation, she was about to get promoted to exactly the kind of job that anyone would consider an honor. To say nothing of the idea that she'd finally got a life. A real life. "You wouldn't need to leave the office. There are already four agents assigned to the division; there'll be more once we've got a solid trail to follow." What the hell? More agents on the X-Files? A green light on Mulder's pet investigations? Hadn't all his dreams come true then? And where was Mulder? Holed up in an office that looked like it did double duty as an apartment? And Wendy wasn't Mulder's secretary; she was his damned shrink! Skinner's demeanor changed at the sight of her confusion; he spoke with soft authority. "He didn't explain any of it, did he?" We couldn't stay in the room together for long enough. She didn't say it, just shook her head. "Where should I start?" How about the moment, two years ago when she went running into Mulder's hospital room, saw that thing sitting on his chest and shot at it? Or maybe the next day, when the doctor told her that the beating she'd taken from the creature as it escaped, ripping at her body on the way out of the room, had damaged her stomach badly enough to cause permanent weakness and that the next incident would probably mean death or major disability. Or maybe a week later as Mulder opened his eyes for the first time and screamed his lungs out until a nice heavy sedative chased him back down the rabbit hole again. "What happened to Mulder after he left the hospital?" Skinner grimaced. "It wasn't easy. With his record. The fact that I'd had him committed. The story he gave the doctors about how he'd been injured." "He didn't ask me to speak on his behalf." "He had your report. You said you couldn't identify his attacker, or yours. I don't think he could face asking you to change it. The longer they questioned him for, the less inclined he was to involve you in it." "Stubborn." "You never called him?" Stubbornness was a madness shared by two. "He blamed me," she noted. Accepting the guilt without question and without self-pity. Acknowledging it as part of herself, something that had helped make her the woman she now was. Skinner took a deep breath. "Blamed? He was just glad you got out - alive and sane." "He's doing fine now," she said briskly. A lie of course. She'd made the fatal mistake of looking at Mulder. She wondered if Skinner had. The AD shook his head, breathing out in an amazed and angry gasp. "He's dying Scully, and there's not a damned thing I can do about it." "No." That was unacceptable. That, she refused to believe. "He's working round the clock. Day in, day out. I sent him home, but he didn't stop. I cut him off from access to the files; he went direct to the local cops. They'd use him until he couldn't see straight, and then they'd put him on the next flight home. "I told him I was going to commit him again; he said he'd be dead within the week. That office, the couch, the dimmers on the lights - that's the compromise. He sleeps when he gets tired. People take him food. He showers at the pool or at the gym. The laundry pick up and deliver to his desk." "Why?" "Because no one else can do that job." ------- Mulder's Office Special Agent Tom Gibbs looked tired. Not the bone-weary exhaustion that seeped from every pore of Mulder's body, just the haven't slept much for days kind of tired. Normal tired. Good man in a tough job tired. "No semen, he was wearing a condom, we've got latex residues. We've got DNA from a couple of hairs found on the girl's clothes. Not enough on its own for a conviction maybe, but enough even on preliminary analysis to convince ourselves that it's not one of Amy's family, nor a family friend. They all came forward for testing. No hesitation." Mulder nodded. "Your profile had anticipated that?" "Sure. Abduction by a stranger, he moved fast, overwhelmed her, bundled her into a vehicle. Preferential pedophile. A seducer MO." "Locked in the fantasy that the girl was willing?" "Yeah - willing! She was five years old. Five. Can you imagine?" "Do you have a shortlist?" "Depends on whether you think 600 names is short. He - " Gibbs' voice wavered, choked laughter drowning somewhere in the back of his throat. "The bastard paid for his parking lot ticket with a ten-dollar bill. New. We identified the bank and the day, but not the customer." "And you can't discard any names because of the possibility that the cash had already changed hands?" "Right, but we have prioritized them in case it hadn't." "No prints?" "Just Amy's. That's how we knew which bill to check." "Cameras?" "The one covering that area was broken, had been for a couple of days." "Local knowledge? Could the UNSUB have damaged it? Prepared the scene?" "Don't know. I'll find out. And I'll check to see if it's happened before." Mulder nodded, glad that Gibbs was a quick learner. "You've got the video footage from the bank? And the basic details on those customers? Cross-referenced to the DMV records?" Gibbs nodded and pointed at the evidence box he'd just delivered. The agent had learned well in the twelve months since Mulder had started running the group. He was good, very good. But magic was strictly Mulder's prerogative. "Thanks, Tom. I'll see what I can get. Meanwhile, I expect you to get some sleep." "I could say the same for you." "Not if you're expecting a decent performance review next year." ---------- Scully's Apartment - New York "They're sending you back to DC? And you don't get any say in it?" "It's part and parcel of the job." "They don't want to lose you. They won't force you." "Probably not. But if I turn it down, they may not make another offer." "I thought you were going to get Henderson's job, when he retires?" "That was never guaranteed." "If we were married, would they still expect you to transfer?" "Steve, we've only been dating for a few months." "We've known each other since med school." Dr Stephen Harrison paused, watching her carefully, convinced that he held a winning hand and desperate to play it. "I love you. The kids love you. We're not getting any younger." "Don't." "Don't what? Tell you that I want you to stay with me?" He smiled, anxious to lighten the mood rather than force her onto the defensive. "Am I supposed to go down on one knee for this? I can." "It's not you." Damn it. The situation was sounding worse by the minute. "Whose idea was this job?" "Walter Skinner." "Your old boss. And what about your old partner?" "He wants me to go back." Definitely worse. "You're actually considering it, aren't you? It's not them forcing you back." "I don't know." ---------- Dr Wendy Adams was lying on the battered leather couch in Mulder's office. Mulder was sitting in the comfy chair with the best wheels and the nicest swivel action. "You didn't tell her, did you?" Mulder took another sip of iced tea. "We didn't get that far." "But you asked her to take over the X-Files?" He nodded. "And you told her that you trusted her?" "Yeah." "And that she was the best person for the job?" He sighed, an amused noise completely at odds with the grim expression on his face. "Not exactly." Wendy closed her eyes, ready to visualize how that scene would have played out. "So what exactly did you tell her?" "That I couldn't do it myself." "What happened?" "She got pissed with me." "And said?" "She didn't say anything. She scarcely spoke to me at all. That's the point. I could have argued with her if she had." Wendy bit back a smile. "You know you're ruining her life?" He nodded in reply. "Of course." "Then she's entitled to be angry. Don't you think?" Mulder laughed. Not pleased, not amused, not even hysterical - just accepting the irony of the situation as well as the inevitability. ------------------ The fight up to New York was a minor annoyance, albeit unavoidable. Mulder had not become agoraphobic as many of his colleagues had surmised. In the absence of evidence, everyone liked to play at armchair psychiatrist. In Mulder's experience, the pros were no better - even profilers and psychologists were desperately keen to be the first to extrapolate and diagnose. The ones with the best hit-rates became heroes. The others learned the art of rapid revision and vague replies. Mulder had always been careful about evidence. Never allowing the shrinks a foot in the door. Of course, that had all changed after he died, pinned down by 5-point restraints in a psychiatric ward. There had been nothing near about his death experience. He'd been dead. He flipped his keys in his hand as he walked. Checked his jacket pocket to make sure he had spare batteries for both the key-ring and the cell phone. If Amy had been willing to talk to him in his office then he wouldn't have dreamed of wasting time and energy on a journey to Brooklyn. But she'd refused - point blank "I don't talk to strangers" denial. Which had given Mulder something to go on at least, albeit not enough. He'd filtered down Tom's Top 100 possibles by some process impossible to justify in a courtroom and difficult to explain, even to himself. Too old, too young, too not Amy's type. Perhaps he looked like someone Amy knew? Maybe he wore a uniform? He doubted that the man had been in town long. A psychosis deep enough to allow him to do those things to a five-year old didn't emerge overnight. Easier to hide the longings and even the actions by moving on. Did he have a child of his own? An as yet invisible victim, spared from death because she didn't yet question, didn't understand how to say no to daddy? Was that why he looked safe? Another daddy? An overlap from school or play or something else? He introduced himself to Amy's parents with an apology for bringing no good tidings, only more questions and another scraping of their wounds. "I'd like you to look at some photographs. People, cars, businesses, places. If anything seems familiar, reminds you of someone who came to the house, somewhere you went with Amy in the last three months say - tell me about it. Don't worry about whether it's relevant. I'll give you time to go through them together. If I could just look around Amy's room." Amy's father nodded, no arguments, no questions - he'd been through this kind of conversation before. "We've started to put things away..." His hand flew to his mouth, this new admission of his daughter's death too much for words. "I understand, sir. Please - if you could just point me toward her room. I'll be careful." The room was still largely untouched. The bed freshly remade with soft peach sheets and cheerful cartoon rabbits on the comforter. Mulder sat on the floor and waited. Amy still looked a little shy. "And now I'm not a stranger," suggested Mulder, a soft smile playing on his lips. She grinned back at him, tiny fists clenched in triumph at having found him in her room, in her home, with her mommy and daddy - not a stranger now. "You're Fox. Like in my book." --------- NY Field Office "I'm afraid my office isn't really up to your standards." "It's got windows," Mulder noted, risking a brief smile. Scully didn't smile back. "I wasn't expecting you to come up here. I really haven't had time to think." "I thought maybe you'd prefer to talk on your own territory." "Mulder. I don't know if I've got anything to say." "OK. I'll do the talking then. I want you to take over the X-Files division because you're the best person for the job." "Because you can't do it?" "No. Because you can. And I know what I'm asking you to give up, but I've still got to ask you to do it. It's that important." "Saving the world?" she suggested, trying to keep the bitterness and the sarcasm out of her voice. "Yeah." He closed his eyes, the muscles in his face tensing, and for an instant she wondered if he was going to cry. Here, in her office, in the Federal Plaza, in the middle of the New York Bureau field office, with all the privacy of a goldfish bowl and without even the illusion of its protection. And if he did break down - what would she do? He blinked his eyes open again and there were no tears, only calm, deep pools of control and resolution. A harsh blend of desert and ice. He cleared his throat before launching into what was obviously a statement rather than an invitation to dialogue. "If you were faced with an outside chance of saving billions of people in a decade or so's time or an absolute certainty that you could save a couple of people today - what would you choose?" A philosophy question? "Do the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few?" She almost laughed, thinking of Spock and Kirk and wondering if she was the one who was going to end up in tears here. "It's no kind of choice." "And if there were a third option that hurt only those few people willing to sacrifice themselves?" She shrugged, uncomfortable with his questioning but determined not to be the one to flinch first. "I guess I'd have to say that's the better option." "Then say yes." Bastard. "I'm happy, Mulder." She was, wasn't she? "I've got friends, I've got a life here. I've got an important job. I'm doing good work. I *am* saving lives. You can't expect me to just throw it away on a maybe." "You're wrong, Scully. That's exactly what I expect you to do." He rose suddenly, carefully straightening the sleeves of his jacket to sit nicely against the white cuffs of his shirt. Fox Mulder, master of disguise, had entered the building and was looking every inch a pillar of the FBI high command. "If you've got any questions, I'm always available." He handed her his business card and headed out of the office. -------- "Lone Gunman," announced the man at the other end of the line. Scully breathed a sigh of relief at hearing a familiar voice. "Langly? Hi. It's me, Dana Scully." A different voice broke in. "It's an honor. How are you keeping, Agent Scully." "Fine. I'm in New York." Not that Frohike wouldn't already know that, of course. "Is something wrong?" "That's kind of what I was hoping to find out from you. Mulder - is he..." Her voice trailed off as she failed to find a suitable question. Is he sick? Is he dying? Is he insane? Is he missing me? There was a moment of silence at the other end, and the line went hollow and flat suggesting that they'd switched off the mike to discuss their response. Then it was Frohike's turn again. "Not over the phone." "Damn it, I'm not asking for state secrets here. I need to know how he is." "You saw him today. You know how he is." Had she ever heard Frohike sound colder? Friend to foe in the space of a few sentences. And how the hell did he know they'd met today. Had Mulder called them? What had he said? Was he there now? "Can I see you?" "Any time." ------- FBI - Quantico They'd put up the barricades and driven the wagons into a circle. Mulder at its heart, Scully on the outside and getting no more than a glimpse at the man in the middle, no matter how hard she tried to look in. Determined not to make the same mistake twice, this time she looked more carefully at the woman now seated behind the desk in front of Mulder's door. "Hi, I'm Dana Scully." "I know," said the little blonde with the bright blue eyes and the big belly. "He's got a picture of you on his desk. How can I help you?" No appointment this time. "I was hoping to see him, while I was in town. Do you work for him?" She kept the question as open as possible. "Sorry. Special Agent Pam Hyatt, profile coordinator and extremely pregnant lady, please excuse my manners. I blame hormones and sore feet." She waited out the silence before adding. "I prioritize the cases, before he gets them. Send back the crap to the other profilers or to the police departments to be done over. Make sure he doesn't end up wasting his time." "And you sit here?" Scully nodded towards the relationship between desk and door. "I'm his guard dog. Not much gets past me. I was at my obstetrician's last time you called." Pam bared her teeth in a brief smile and checked the day planner, pushed a button to bring up the camera view of Mulder's office. "He's asleep. Give him thirty minutes and I'll wake him up." "Actually, Agent Scully. I was hoping you could give me a few minutes." Scully turned to face the new arrival. "Dr Adams." "Most people call me Wendy. But you can call me doctor. Joke. I'm joking, Agent Scully. Could we talk?" Wendy's office was quiet and cool and breathtakingly beige. Scully decided to clear the air. "Why did you let me make a fool of myself the other day?" "Why did you assume I was his secretary?" "The desk, I guess." Scully almost smiled, a little embarrassed, but attempting to move past that now. "I find that people act strangely if they know I'm a psychiatrist. It's more interesting to observe them if they're flying blind." "And Mulder?" "Measures every syllable before he gives it to me." "What's wrong with him?" "He's not Superman?" Adams scribbled a note on the pad in front of her and Scully flinched. When Wendy looked up she handed Scully her shopping list. "You see how it is? You know I'm a shrink. I write a little note. Your pulse rate rises, blood pressure starts to go up, sweaty palms, adrenaline. It's positively Pavlovian. Mulder though, he knows better. He gives nothing away. Nothing. I fight for every word." ----------- Scully chose not to return to Mulder's office after thirty minutes, too aware of her lack of knowledge to face him. Just what had happened to him in the last two years? She knew the raw facts. He'd gone back into profiling. The behavioral division's success rate had skyrocketed since his arrival. Predictive and analytical breakthroughs managed by his team had allowed the Bureau to offer more assistance to local police homicide teams than ever before. Mulder had gone from being the FBI's most Unwanted to key personnel in a matter of months. So key that he was a virtual prisoner in his own office? Apparently with the acquiescence of so-called friends like Skinner and of so-called doctors like Adams. A felt-carpeted prison for sure, but a prison. Complete with a compliant prisoner watched over by a very pregnant woman and surrounded by a wall of silence. ------ Pam should have woken him up. No doubt about it. Scully took precedence over sleep. Pam, of course, didn't buy it. Nor did Wendy. "She's not ready to talk to you, Mulder." He shook his head, dismissive. "You don't know that. She came here. To see me. Not you. Me." "She lasted ten minutes with me. If you'd made it past two I'd have been popping the champagne corks." She came to see me! Oh, he wanted to stay angry. Of course he did. But when it came right down to it, he didn't have the energy. ---------- The Lone Gunmen would tell her. She'd repeated the words like a mantra on the drive over. But now she was with them, she could feel only their unease and hesitation. Byers sounded like he was talking about the dead. "When he first got out of the hospital, he was in trouble." Scully felt like shaking him. It was only with effort that she resisted the temptation to scream an order for him to get to the point. Getting to the point was one thing they all seemed to have trouble with. "He was seeing things," stated Frohike. "Hallucinations, I suppose they'd say. He wouldn't talk about it. But sometimes you'd catch him looking at something, an empty chair maybe. Or he'd sidestep something as he walked. Like there was - " Frohike paused, licked his lips, waved his hands in a vague gesture of confusion. "He made us loan him some IR vision equipment." "The best," noted Langly. "It worked, I guess," added Byers. "But he couldn't wear them all the time. For a while he stuck to environments he could control." Scully nodded. "Like his office." "The cameras in there are equipped with infra-red as well as visual sensors. He was OK here. Otherwise he preferred there to be someone around who he could check-in with." "It's easier now, technology's moved on," Langly noted, his enthusiasm seeping through despite the painfully serious, respectful expressions everyone wore. "What do you mean?" "Point and shoot infrared thermometers - matchbox size, some of them. You'd hardly notice any more. He can go anywhere he likes now." What the hell were they talking about? ----------- Next Morning It was probably unnecessary to go back up to New York, though it was unquestionably desirable to deal with Amy's case in person, just for speed of closure. Some bit of his mind even saw it as a perk of the job, but he quickly suppressed that thought as too self-absorbed to be worth acknowledging. It was the idea of catching Scully at her office again that had sealed the deal. Tom Gibbs was waiting for him at the airport, ready to catch the flight up to Laguardia. Mulder went straight to the point. "Has he talked?" The he in question was Paul Johnson, a newcomer in town. The phrase UNSUB had vanished from Mulder's vocabulary five minutes into his chat with Amy, and vanished from his brain as soon as he re-interviewed her parents. "No, and he's got a lawyer." "He's a delivery man?" "With no known criminal record." "And he insisted on a lawyer? Do we have enough to search his house? What about DNA tests?" "Not enough connecting him to get a court order and I doubt he'll volunteer. I mean - I know where you're coming from. But the fact that Amy's dad used to work for the same delivery firm, and Johnson's got a four-year old daughter isn't enough for a judge." As the only eye-witness was dead, Johnson probably imagined himself indestructible even after the cops arrived on his doorstep that morning. The lawyer was an insurance policy against accidentally volunteering more than he needed to give. "What do we know about his daughter?" "No hospital reports, nothing of note. They've only been in town for a few months. His wife and daughter are away, visiting family in Wisconsin, he says." "We need all their old addresses. Every hospital they might have visited. Somebody needs to go and talk to his wife. See if she'll let a therapist see her daughter." "You don't think he'll roll over when we interview him then?" Mulder nodded, amused that Gibbs had called him on it. "99% certainty. But a confession's not enough, I don't want any chance of a retraction in court." The police officers who'd made the arrest had been expecting Gibbs. Mulder's presence was more of a surprise. Raised eyebrows and hushed voices welcomed them into the little office behind the mirror in the interview room. "He's had lunch, bathroom break, a chance to confer with his lawyer. At this moment, we're so by the book, it makes me want to puke," announced the chief detective. "What's he said?" "Never seen the kid. Never been to the house. He knows the street, been along it, but it's not on his normal route. Thinks anyone who hurts a kid like that should be strung up by the balls. Got a kid of his own. If someone did that to her, he'd kill 'em." "Model citizen then?" "Creepy fuck, if you ask me." Mulder's eyes demanded more. The detective replied, cool-voiced now, as if he was preparing to say it in court. "He was agitated, distressed about being brought in for questioning. We showed him a couple of photos of the girl and he calmed down, became positively serene." "Nice." "Tom called, asked if we'd keep him warm for him. Surprised to see you here though, Agent Mulder." "I met the parents." The other police officers mostly nodded, accepting that as explanation enough. Mulder shrugged, downed the last of his coffee, smiled briefly at the little girl in the corner of the room. "Let's go." Mulder's description of Paul Johnson's first and last meeting with Amy was simple and graphic. It started with the statement that Paul knew Amy's name already, presumably from some incidental conversation about kids and schools with another driver at the delivery company. It moved quickly to Amy's happy greeting as she saw what she'd assumed was her dad's van pull up to the front gate. "When she woke up she was feeling a little queasy, but that was OK because you'd put plastic sheets over the van's seats and the floor. And a little vomit wasn't going to put you off." Johnson was transfixed, staring at Mulder with some heady blend of disbelief and admiration. "You told her that she'd been sick and that her daddy was waiting for her in the hospital. You gave her a ten-dollar bill to pay for the parking and made her laugh by tickling her when you held her up to feed the machine. But she never laughed again - did she?" Johnson's lawyer hissed a, "Don't answer that," already uncomfortably aware of the glazed look in his client's eyes and looking more concerned by the second. "Amy started crying, didn't she? You put your hand over her mouth while you tore off her clothes. And then," Mulder sat forward in his chair, smiled conspiratorially at Johnson, "you made love to her." Johnson didn't hear the irony, licked his lips at the memory. "The thing no one else will be able to understand is, if it was love, how you could handle the screams." Mulder sounded almost conversational now, as if he was musing over the best place to catch some breakfast. "Did she scream when you ripped her? You did rip her, you know, must have been a lot of blood. The jury hates it when the kid screams." "She was asleep." And Johnson's voice suggested that he was relaxed enough to doze off himself. "Asleep?" pressed Mulder. Johnson's lawyer tried to call a time-out. Mulder's voice was the gentlest, most penetrating sound in the room. "You made sure that she wouldn't be in pain?" Johnson didn't hear his lawyer. At that instant, it was obvious that he could only hear Mulder. "Ether. Like a doctor. It was her first time, you see?" When Mulder left the interview room five minutes later, Tom handed him another coffee. "You going home now?" Mulder nodded, relieved that none of the police detectives present had the nerve to ask for more explanation or for more of his time. He was even more grateful when Amy smiled and waved goodbye before vanishing from sight. --------- Mulder had arrived at the New York field office with an apology prepared. He was asking a lot and he hadn't made it easy for her to say yes. He'd demanded that she sign over her life without anything more than his word that the stakes were high enough to justify it. The CD in the briefcase was hot stuff. Three layers of encryption including one that was illegal under Federal law. The bare minimum he could do given that he was carrying "Eyes Only" rated secret files illicitly. He knew it was a necessity, knew that he was incapable of patient explanation. Two minutes Wendy had suggested, and she was probably right. Two minutes before he would have backed them both into a corner again. Two minutes before he would restage a confrontation that would end up with him demanding her absolute trust and her clawing her way out. The files would speak for themselves. They'd worked on the FBI brass. They would surely work on Scully. Whether she liked it or not. Necessity is the mother of invention, and a bitch of a mother she was too. Forget it, he ordered himself, just get the job done right this time. He toyed with the keys in his left hand more from nervous habit than necessity. At least the habit was well enough entrenched to keep his gun hand free. His lips moved in embarrassed amusement as he attempted to regain his concentration on the elevator ride up. This time she was waiting for him. Alerted both by his phone call almost an hour earlier and by the security guards as he signed into the building. She was standing by the elevator doors as they opened. The element of surprise was hers and he smiled instinctively at the sight of her. "We need to talk," she said. He gestured towards the briefcase in his hand. "I've brought something I'd like you to take a look at." She ignored his reply. "Let's get out of here." Almost ten seconds and still counting he noted, mindful of Wendy's warning. The elevator down contained too many sets of ears to be included in the calculation. The test would come once they were outside and in a position to talk out loud. The coffee shop was half full, which was a relief. Neutral territory, and comfortable. A reasonable amount of privacy, yet also public. Innate good manners and convention would keep any damage to the minimum. Scully took on the role of investigator. "Tell me about the key ring." Mulder glanced at his hand, surprised to see the evidence so blatantly displayed. He gave her the infra-red thermometer and the keys it carried. "It's exactly what it looks like." "And what do you think it looks like?" "It looks like you should read what's on that CD before you make any decisions about the X-Files." She breathed out heavily, a tired unhappy sound, backed up by her neatly manicured fingers crossing lazily over her eyebrows as if she was trying unsuccessfully to wipe away the frown. "Skinner said that you don't blame me for what happened. But that's not true, is it?" "Do you blame me for what happened to you?" "Don't try and divert me." "It's just a question." "What would I blame you for?" He hesitated, considered offering her a multiple-choice questionnaire instead of the CD. But that really would be diversion. "When you came to my office, I was prepared for you to be angry about the job. But you were angry even before I told you about the X-Files division. If it wasn't blame, then what?" She licked her lips, the muscles in her body shifting to flight response even while those in her face sagged as if exhaustion had suddenly allowed gravity to take control. "You said it yourself. I didn't know why I'd been called down there at zero notice. I'm not in the habit of being kept in the dark anymore." Ouch. Fair enough. "OK. I just don't want your feelings about me to cloud your judgment." The skeptical look reminded him of old times, told him that was one of the most stupid remarks she'd ever heard in all her life and that she'd heard a few. He held tight onto the coffee cup to stop himself from bolting out of the door and not looking back. "Mulder. At least do me the courtesy of admitting that you're angry with me for what happened on the Pinkus case." But that would be a lie. And while telling the truth might be out of the question, a lie was unacceptable. "No. You need evidence. I can't be angry about that. It's why you'll be so good for the X-Files. But, I am still scared of you." She frowned, puzzling over the words. Mulder kept the reply strictly factual. "I think if you considered me delusional you'd behave the same way again." He stared at her as she considered it, saw the refutation build and bubble up through her body only to die before it actually reached her lips. "You don't trust me," she finally announced. "I trust you to act according to your conscience and beliefs." In the end she nodded, her expression pinched and tight. "So. I'm the right person to run the X-Files. But the wrong one to act as your confidante?" "Who says I've got anything to confide?" She shook her head, a slow smile dancing discreetly on her lips. He smiled back, scenting victory. She would read the files on the CD. She would take the job. He'd always known she would. THE END Return to X-Files Index Page EMail Me