Title:  Cunegund's Restoration, or, The Best of All Possible Worlds,
Really
Author: Livia Balaban
Feedback: Tee hee.  livia@stoodjood.com
Website:  http://go.to/inkspot  (Enhanced HTML version coming soon!)
Rating:  PG-13 (language and implications of nookie)
Content: MSR, H, Mytharc
Classification: S, R, H, A; AU, Scully POV.  HappyEnding!Fic.
Spoilers:  Up through Requiem. No Season Eight.  It's "Mulder Returns"
fic.
Distribution:  Auto-archives, okay.  All others, please ask first.
Disclaimer Haiku:
      Legal restrictions
      Make me sing this harsh refrain:
      I do not own them

Summary: Despite the "hard news" angle taken by his correspondent
Christiane Amanpour, CNN Washington Bureau Chief Frank Sesno finally
got to the point and asked the question everybody had been silently
asking themselves. "So, Agent Mulder, how did the spacecraft handle?"


Notes: All right. After all the doom and gloom my pals and I have
perpetrated through our little babykilling pact, I decided it was time
for something a little more cheerful. I thought about the best
possible way for the events of "Requiem" to turn out, and the list was
so long and ridiculously optimistic, I felt the only way to handle all
those options was to make this a parody!fic. It got very silly indeed.

Then I decided, as a writer who had only recently committed to the
worst-case scenario (multiple times), I would find it much more of a
challenge to take the BEST-case scenario and make it work, logically
and sensibly, without making it all gooey. We'll see how successful I
was. Coming up: one actually happy ending, with lots of little loose
ends tied up nice and neat.

For my inspiration, I have chosen the delightfully evil "Candide" by
Voltaire. I've done things in this that would make him run and scream
in Optimistic horror. Assuming he wasn't already dead at the time.

Herein: Romance, baby, recovered family, vindicated conspiracy
theorists, turncoats gone good, re-grown limbs, loads of international
publicity, and no more icky aliens. I can do it. Just breathe, Livia.
Just breathe.


ABUNDANT THANKS to: Tara, EPur, Piglit, and my poor beleaguered
Xochiluvr. Especially Mr. Livia, who has had to sit through vivid and
enthusiastic descriptions of every section of a story he will never
actually read. And multitudinous curried goates to YV.

Professional and referential thanks to Douglas Adams, Genndy
Tartakovsky and William Goldman. They'll know why.

This story has been a labor of love for me. Well, that's only half
true. It's been a labor of love-hate. It's extremely hard to write
Scully in the first person and make it feel genuine. Add to that the
absolute impossibility of a happy ending for ANYBODY on this show, and
you'll understand what I faced in writing this. I hope you find it
effective and sensible. And maybe just a little entertaining.

Well, enough that it made the months of work worthwhile. But I won't
push it. ;-)

For the record: Writing Morris Fletcher was some of the best fun I've
had in a while. We may see more from him in the future. Just think of
the divinely talented Michael McKean, and hear his voice in your head,
and Fletcher nearly writes himself. I <heart> him.

Sources For Which I Am Grateful: Deep Background, Tiny Dancer's
Transcript Archive, United States Air Force, United States Marine
Corps, U.S. Geological Survey, CNN.com, The Princess Bride, Ford
Prefect, Dexter's Laboratory, and www.justtomatoes.com.  Crunchy
freeze-dried mango bits are VITAL to the editing process.

 - LB


Part 1/9.  

November 5, 2000
Unknown Location
The Kitchen


This is surreal. I couldn't explain it if I tried.

My sister, Melissa, is pouring milk into my coffee. Alex Krycek just
passed me a nicely toasted English muffin, which I am now wolfing down
along with a delicious Western egg-white omelet.

Mulder is quietly assessing everyone in the room, vibrating like a
Jack Russell terrier on stimulants. His left arm rests possessively
along the back of my chair. He really should eat something. He's still
weak.

My mother is watching every glance I exchange with Mulder, clearly
attempting to glean something more about our relationship than I've
been willing to share, from our behavior at the table. I'm certainly
not helping matters; I'm eating like a draft horse. My shirt is loose,
though, so I have a little time before I have to start answering
questions on that front. But it couldn't possibly have gone unnoticed
that we shared a bed last night.

Samantha is sitting to Mulder's right, picking at her breakfast. I
don't blame her, the poor thing. The last three days have been
terribly disorienting for her. Mulder, despite his erratic energy, is
gently stroking her left shoulder, trying to convince her to eat
something. She's had fewer than a dozen meals since they took her
twenty-seven years ago, and she doesn't appear to have aged even a
year.

Melissa's husband, Eric, is doing all the cooking. And they're the
only ones with the keys to this place. We're prisoners here.

"It's for your own safety," they tell us every time we bristle.

My sister is alive. I am pregnant with Mulder's child. Nine-year-old
Samantha sits with us, another addition to our new family, and Krycek
seems impossibly pleased with himself as he eats his own omelet with
his right hand while he stirs his coffee with his left. It's also
morning, and for the first time in three months, I'm not the least bit
nauseated.

This is a panorama of the impossible - a living, breathing, Magritte
portrait - yet all I can manage to think of right now is that I'd love
to know what kind of cheese is in this omelet.


It began a little over one hundred hours ago. As has become
traditional, one of the most important events of my life began with a
call to my cell phone.

"Scully."

"Scully, you need to get down here right now. There's something you
have to hear."

"What is it, Frohike?"

"I can't play it for you over an unsecured line. Get over here. It's
important."

I sighed indulgently. "It had better be good." I hit "end" on my phone
and rose from the sofa.

I slipped my jacket and shoes back on, and after smoothing the afghan
over the back of the couch, I fed the fish and left, locking the
deadbolt behind me.

Over the prior three months, I had experienced my share of "important"
breakthroughs, courtesy of my three peculiar friends. They were as
dedicated as I to uncovering any information that might lead to
Mulder's recovery.

That's how I had come to think of it - as a recovery mission. The
sadness had been too difficult to bear alone early on, so I distanced
myself from it. It had become only a matter of finding something that
had been lost. Not my partner, not a man with the potential to be
afraid, lonely, harmed...

I drove at the highest speed I could without jeopardizing my life or
that of my unborn child.

With every choice I made, personal or professional, I thought of my
child. When I completed the PCRs from the amnio, I realized I had even
more at stake: Mulder's child, without question. I owed it to him as
well to keep the baby from harm.

I blinked in surprise to find a parking spot available on the street,
immediately in front of The Lone Gunman office. I found the
improbability of parking staggering evidence that I was in for
something big. Either that or a surprise baby shower. I winced at the
thought of each.

I buzzed at the door, tapping my foot impatiently. I have always hated
their sense of drama.

Frohike pushed between Byers and Langly to take my hand and lead me
inside. I followed, with the remaining two lagging behind. When I
chanced a look back, straining against Frohike's hold on me, I saw a
pair of intense gazes, clearly ushering me inside with serious intent.

A sweetly concerned Byers stepped forward and led me toward the
specially designed chair they reserved for my use. I sat and waited
for the revelation.

"Okay, you need to be really calm about this. Can you do that,
Scully?" Frohike's concern should have been touching, but I was
impatient, and found it irritating.

"Oh for crying out loud," I muttered. They could be frustrating sons
of bitches when they wanted to be. "Get on with it, whatever it is."

Frohike exchanged a nervous glance with Langly and Byers, while his
right hand hovered over a switch on a large recording deck. "Okay, you
asked for it. Remember that...Okay, a buddy at Arecibo picked this up
with a little help from one of *his* buddies at the VLA in Nevada. The
frequency is really weird, but he got a recording and wired it to me.
From the specs of the transmission, he thinks it was sent about six
and a half hours ago - around lunchtime."

He pressed a small button on the panel, and copious amounts of static
buzzed through the room.

Then I heard it through the static.

"...and it's lookin' bad. No radiation in here yet, but we can't
figure out all the controls, so the whole compartment could be
flooded. Nobody's sick, though, so it's hard to know. We have an
engineer here, but he can't figure out the interface, so we're pretty
much locked on trajectory, which means unless there's some kind of
fancy landing program in place, we're lookin' at one hell of a
landing. Well, more of a crash, really. Tell me somebody can hear
this..."

It was Mulder's voice. Unmistakably Mulder. It was Mulder.

"If you're on Earth and you're human, please contact my partner,
Special Agent Dana Scully of the FBI in the United States...she'll be
able to help. And if you're listening, hey, partner. I'd play you a
request, but I don't know if this panel over here is a jukebox or the
planetary destructo-ray, so I'm just gonna let that go for now."

Mulder, in full smart-ass mode. It was the best music I'd heard in
weeks.

"Now it would be *really* good if you guys could help us land this
thing and soon, because we've been out of water for two days now, and
we haven't seen anything edible for almost a week. We could do a
Donner Party on the casualties, but we'd really rather not. Breathable
air is low, and we're running out of canisters. Our engineer, Russell,
thinks if we restrict ourselves to the main control room here -
assuming we ever figure out how to seal the fucking doors - we might
have enough air for another four or five days, max."

He was conscious, lucid, and - I was deliriously happy about this - in
a thoroughly disagreeable mood. At the time, I was too happy to hear
his voice to worry about such trivial things as air and food.

I leapt out of the seat, something I could still accomplish. "Frohike,
tell me your friend has found a way to communicate with them."

"They're working on it, but he said they don't have anything right now
that can create the kind of signal they're receiving."

Langly shook his head. "Besides, this isn't one of those movies where
the stewardess lands the plane with the help of the tower, Scully.
This is a complex alien space craft. Nobody knows how it operates."

Byers shot him a withering look from his left while Frohike smacked
his arm on the right. Langly flinched. "What?"

"All right," I interrupted. It was time to get down to business. "We
need to get in touch with somebody in the Air Force with good, high
connections. Mulder's convinced that recovered space crafts have been
stored at both Area 51 and Ellens. We need to find someone who's
involved with their recovery and research. And Krycek. Maybe he knows
somebody."

Byers blinked blankly. "We've had a hard enough time even proving that
Area 51 exists, Scully. What are you suggesting - that we just stroll
up to the front gates and say, 'I have a call for you on line one'?"

I sighed in irritation. "You're honestly telling me that your friend
at Arecibo has picked up a voice signal from an alien space craft and
*no one* in black helicopters have paid him a visit?"

Frohike and Byers exchanged a glance.

"Think conspiracy, boys. If the signal is genuine, and people have
been doing research on the crafts, they'll be looking for signals just
like this one. They'll be on top of it. If possible, they may even jam
it. We have to get in touch with them before they take control of the
situation and end it before it can begin. Mulder said 'we'. That means
there's more than just his life at stake. Possibly the lives of
hundreds, if that ship crashes in a populated area."

Frohike was the first to speak. "This is the best moment of my life,"
he said, one begloved hand over his heart. It took a moment - and a
quick glance at each of the three - to realize that their expressions
of worship expressed something I would normally resent: I was -
apparently - a conspiracy theorist's wet dream come true.

"Get over it," I suggested, and bless their hearts, they listened.
"I'll contact Skinner and arrange a meeting with Krycek. You three,
find a way to contact that ship, I don't care how."

"We're on it," I heard Langly say, as I jotted down the frequency,
took a copy of the tape, and headed out the door.


Skinner sighed heavily in apparent relief when I played the tape for
him. "I'll get in touch with Krycek. He may have some contacts within
the organization, someone who knows someone with access to the remains
of the other crashed ships. There has to be someone with even a remote
idea of how they operate."

I was happy enough to hear him admit the existence of other vessels,
and with his promise to get on it - in a tone that meant business - I
was satisfied. Skinner was back in charge and in his element. For the
first time in just over three months, he had a genuine lead and a
chance to make up for his mistake in Oregon.

I ended up at my apartment, to pack a small bag, and then dashing over
to Mulder's place, to pack a bag with some of his clothes and
toiletries, as well. Without information, all I could do was prepare
for a trip.

It wasn't until I'd tossed Mulder's shaving kit into the bag that I
realized he might actually get a chance to use it.  He was coming
home, and he would need to shave.  I culled item after item from his
apartment, while I thought about how he would look, how he would
smell, how wonderful he would feel in my arms again.

I had a few extra moments and I thought briefly about calling Mom, but
I didn't want to have the hour-long conversation I knew we'd have. I
hadn't actually told her about the pregnancy yet.

It wasn't that I was embarrassed or ashamed - - I just needed some
time to ensure the child was healthy, human, and - most importantly -
Mulder's. The results had come back only a few days before. I had
planned on telling her over the weekend. So much for that.


By the time I got back to my car, my cell phone was ringing. Skinner.
He'd contacted Krycek, who knew someone who knew someone who knew
someone. We were to rendezvous at the Hoover and leave from there. I
called the Gunmen and, reluctantly, they agreed to the plan.

We ended up, the six of us, on a military redeye to Nevada. Krycek
wouldn't tell us much more except that we were going to meet a contact
of his at Area 51.

The expressions on the faces of my three friends were payment enough
for the months of loneliness and frustration I'd endured. At Krycek's
declaration of our destination, tears fell unrestrained down Langly's
cheeks. Frohike closed his eyes and sighed deeply, a faint smile
tugging his scruffy cheeks upward. Byers looked at me earnestly
through glassy eyes, and mouthed two words, "Thank you." Their
sincerity broke my heart.

When we landed a little past midnight and I saw a familiar face, I
knew we hadn't been had.

I didn't know the man's name, but I remembered his face from an odd
and vaguely disconcerting incident on a Nevada road two years ago. His
clothing, automotive choice, and his companions all but screamed "Men
In Black", but it had never been confirmed. And really, at the time, I
wouldn't have been in a particularly receptive state of mind anyway. I
didn't believe then as much as I do now. What a difference two years
make.

I had the strange recollection that I'd seen him since the incident,
but the memory was foggy. Maybe it was a dream.

He introduced himself as Morris Fletcher, and bundled us, equipment
and all, into a large black panel van. We drove for only a few minutes
before heading underground. When the van stopped, we were deposited in
some dull-looking offices. Our office in the basement of the Hoover
Building was more elegant and spacious.

However, our basement office does *not* have high-powered
communications technology, which this one possessed in abundance. My
three friends gaped in awe when we moved through a narrow corridor and
passed into a huge, open electronics laboratory.

"This is the heart of the operation," Fletcher said to me
dramatically, spreading his arms wide and leering openly. He'd only
said a dozen words since we'd landed, and I already disliked him. He
was, however, the supervisor of a project which we were assured had
the best chance of contacting the ship, so I smiled. If he detected
the disingenuous intent, he never let on. I recall that at the time it
made me immeasurably sad that someone ruled more by hormones than
common sense would be in charge of something so important.

"We spent years reverse-engineering the ships we'd captured," he told
me, seemingly oblivious to our companions, "before we made contact
with the shape-shifters. Brilliant little corps of rebels. They've
been especially helpful." As he unraveled the story of the rebel
aliens and their private war against the colonizing aliens, he flipped
switches and turned dials, never once taking his eyes off me. It was
horribly disconcerting.

"The rebels are an unusual bunch," Fletcher told us, as static
reverberated throughout the laboratory. "Developed on the same planet
as the unfriendlies, against pretty much everything we know about
evolution. Two intelligent species taking up the same space and all."
He turned a dial and the static cleared, only to make way for a
horrible high-pitched squeal. He raised his voice casually over the
din, as he continued to adjust the controls. "Some of them work for
the unfriendlies, but mostly they're proponents of non-aggression,
healers, that kind of thing. Sort of the Gandhis of Quadrant Two.
Toxic as hell, but generally pretty nice guys once you get to know
'em."

The squealing abated, much to my pleasure, and he went on. "They've
been helping with the project in some respects since the beginning."

I turned to Krycek for confirmation of this, and he shrugged.
"Different project," was all he said.

Fletcher seemed put out. "Do you want to hear this or don't you?"

"Yes," my five companions and I said in unison. We waited patiently
while Fletcher puffed himself up again.

"As I was saying," he postured, "they've given us a good bit of
information on how the vessels operate. It's in their best interests
to help us, they said. They appear to have lost favor on their
homeworld and need a new place to crash."

I looked up in alarm.

"So to speak," Fletcher clarified. "Anyhow, they gave us the specs,
we've been working on 'em, and here we are."

But that didn't in any way assuage my concerns about his or his
organization's plans for the ship or its passengers. I had spent so
many years taunted by minuscule scraps of information, that my
patience had simply crumbled. I was direct.

"Mr. Fletcher, why have you granted us access to this facility?"

His smile broadened, but I saw what appeared to be resignation. "Your
partner sent out a broad-frequency signal, which means more public
access than we can cover up effectively. So we have a new plan:
Openness."

Frohike made his sole, snide, contribution to the conversation. "A
kinder, gentler, Area 51."

Fletcher turned to him. "Read some Herbert Spencer, trollface," he
said, continuing to fiddle with the controls. "Everything begins with
adaptation."

As he spoke those final words, Mulder's voice rang clearly through the
speakers along the top of the control panel.

"...and we have some requests for cheeseburgers, even from the
vegetarian here. All right, one more time, with feeling. This is
Special Agent Fox Mulder of the Federal Bureau of Investigation,
Washington, DC office, somewhere near Europa I think, on board an
alien vessel, without helm control. Repeat, no one is flying this hunk
of junk. If any of you black-suited, black-helicopter-flying guys can
hear me, the time to help is now. I know you have crashed vessels,
which you've been tinkering with for years. Well, now it's time to
apply that knowledge. And NO, we don't have a PowerBook. I seriously
doubt the computer systems here are Mac-compatible."

I snorted at that. Mulder had never hidden his contempt for that awful
film.

"If there's anybody out there who can hear and respond, please let us
know you're getting this. And call my partner, Special Agent Dana
Scully, also at the DC office, and let her know I'm okay."

I leaned forward toward Fletcher, and flashing just a little bit of my
new hormone-augmented cleavage, said to him in a low voice, "Can you
respond?"

He nodded dumbly for a moment, failing miserably to make eye contact.
Men. He finally turned his attention back to my face and with a
hideous leer, said, "No problem, sugar." Ick. One series of fluid
motions later, I heard Fletcher's voice pronounce clearly, "This is
Earth, Agent Mulder. ATRD Director of Operations Morris Fletcher
here."

The pause seemed interminable. Finally, after twenty seconds or so,
Mulder responded. "ATRD? Man, I KNEW you guys existed. Scully won't
believe this when I tell her."

"Tell her yourself," Fletcher chuffed. There was another long pause.

Mulder's voice returned, sweetened with the tenderness I've come to
know like my own reflection. "Scully? Are you there? Can you hear me?"

Fletcher nodded to the microphone and rolled his chair aside with a
long push of his legs. I bent over and spoke, doing my best to keep my
voice steady, despite my combined happiness and fear. "Mulder, it's
me. I'm here. Talk to me."

After another long pause, Mulder spoke again, his voice thick and
jagged. "Scully, oh God, it's you. I'm coming home, I'm trying, but
we're kind of locked on course and nobody knows how to fly this thing.
I'm sorry..."

A voice interrupted him. "That your Scully, man?" There was a pause.
"Hey, you think you could find my wife, Sandy? She must be worried
sick. They've never taken me for this long before."

I looked over at Fletcher and he shook his head and said, "We've gotta
get to business. If they have any hope of landing here instead of
crashing, we have to start the flying lessons now."

"I'm sorry," I told the man softly. "Maybe later. Right now we have to
work on teaching one of you how to operate the vessel. Mulder," I
asked him, "who's it going to be?"

There was a good deal of silence, and then just a few murmurs.
Finally, Mulder returned to the line. "Well, I guess that would be me.
Nobody else wants to do it. I'd have Russell try, but he keeps passing
out. We're all pretty tired here."

"That's okay," I told him. "You can do it. Just listen to everything
that Fletcher tells you, and you'll be just fine."

"Where are you, Scully?"

I looked at Fletcher and he shook his head again. I disregarded him.
"Area 51. Skinner and Krycek are here, as well as the gunmen."

Fletcher 'tsk'ed me, and rolled back to his accustomed spot,
displacing me from in front of the microphone. "Enough of that, boy
and girl," he said with casual drama. "It's time to teach this Fibbie
to fly."

-------------------------
End Part 1/9.

Part 2/9.  

And with that, he began to describe a series of control mechanisms
that defied everything I'd ever seen or imagined.

Fletcher described the holographic interface, one that wrapped around
Mulder's body, and when he directed Mulder to touch a particular panel
or move his hand in a specific direction, we were all relieved to hear
that the controls were behaving as expected.

I would've kissed Fletcher in gratitude -- if he hadn't been so damn
ugly.

The interface, which Fletcher brought up eventually on his own
workstation as a reference, was visually stunning. It was essentially
a starburst of projected light, surrounding him, with his body as the
central vertex of all axes. Colored lines projected outward at
forty-five degree intervals. The entire virtual apparatus moved when
he did, so that his reference points were always relative. It was
amazing.

The beams shone in pure white, yellow, and blue, which when 'tapped'
lightly with one finger, turned bright red.

"I'll take your word for it," Mulder said. "It changed color, but it
looks kinda grayish to me."

"Red-green color blind," I whispered to Fletcher, who rolled his eyes.

He grumbled, "I see the Bureau's recruitment qualifications are as
high as ever."

"Moving on," I suggested tersely.

Fletcher explained to Mulder how to read the display and how to "pull"
the specific interface lines into position to control every
operational parameter of the ship. At first, he merely ensured that
the interface was functional, but later he moved on to optimizing
communications so there would be no time lapse, and closing the
control room doors, so they could release some additional oxygen into
the very thin air. Then he moved on to confirming the ship's course
and speed. Finally, he had Mulder modify the ship's course and speed
to bring it into proper range at Bellefleur. The modifications were
minute, but Fletcher assured us they would make the approach and entry
through the atmosphere smoother. He sounded confident, so Mulder
simply went along with him. Given Fletcher's obvious understanding of
the ship's operation, I would have done the same.

All in all, the procedure took just over three hours, and my friends
were beginning to droop. Langly was the only one who was still paying
attention, sleep having already claimed Byers and Frohike. Skinner was
off in a far corner, conversing quietly with Krycek.

"All right, last one," Fletcher sighed tiredly. Single-tap the yellow
beam at three o'clock, the one we labeled CCY. Has it changed color?"

"Yeah," Mulder said weakly. I tried not to think about his previous
statements with regard to starvation and dehydration.

"All right. Using your thumb and forefinger, grasp the beam about
halfway down its length, and drag it back toward yourself until the
little counter is vertical. Tell me when you're done."

"Okay, hold on...all right, the counter's vertical."

"Now release it, and single-tap the beam again to change it back to
yellow."

"Done."

"What does your auto-course display read now?"

"Um...one of those sideways squiggles that's longer on the bottom than
on the top."

"Any vertical lines?"

"Not really. Just two little squiggles joined at the right side, like
an uneven "U" tipped onto its left side."

"Okay. That's good. That should soften your landing." Fletcher
deactivated his own display, and wiped his brow with a handkerchief.
"You're done. Deactivate the interface and just sit back and relax.
You'll be in Oregon in..." he scrawled some notes and finally arrived
at "...thirty-six hours, twenty-seven minutes, fifty-three seconds."
He grinned smugly at me. "Give or take an hour and a half."

I heard Mulder sigh heavily, and what sounded like him dropping into a
chair.

"Are you okay, Mulder?" I asked him, taking over the position in front
of the microphone.

There was a brief pause before he finally responded quietly. "Yeah,
just tired. I think I need to zonk for a few minutes. Leave the line
open, okay, Scully?"

I nodded, even though I knew he couldn't see it. Maybe I just needed
to reassure myself. "I'll be here," I said warmly.


A few minutes later, Fletcher left the room to, in his words, 'snag
some grub' for us, handing me some red file folders on his way out. Of
course, he completed the transaction with a light slap on my behind -
the pig - but I ignored the gesture in favor of diplomacy.

About forty-five minutes after that, Mulder awoke and asked for me
with his first words. I smiled and perked up at the familiar sleepy
sound of his voice.

"I'm here, Mulder."

"Good. Thought I'd lost you there."

"Nope," I said cheerfully. "Just reading through some highly sensitive
material."

"Anything good?" he asked optimistically.

"A few things about the advent of antibiotics and Ginsu knives. And
there's a fascinating document here about Bigfoot. I'd get you a copy
of it, but it's on that red security paper."

"Just tell me the highlights when I get home."

I paused for a moment, before I began to chuckle. "Mulder, I'm
kidding. It's mostly about viral research and alternative energy
sources," I told him. "But it's still fascinating reading."

He chuckled softly in response, and asked me, "How'd you get the
information out of old Morris?"

Perhaps it was the hormones that accounted for my boldness, or maybe I
was simply tired of waiting. Either way, I assumed Mulder would
appreciate a distraction. "I flashed him some cleavage, and he gave me
everything I asked for."

He chuckled again. "Scully."

"Blame yourself. I remember when I used to be professional. Now look
at me."

He voice turned wistful. "I wish I could."

I closed my eyes and composed myself. Soon, I reminded my naggingly
impatient spirit. "You'll be home soon. We're going to stay here a
little while longer, and then Skinner and I are going to head out to
Oregon to meet you when you arrive. How many do you have onboard?"

"A dozen of us made it through the fighting," he told me.

I didn't remember his saying anything about a battle. "What fighting?"

He took a moment while I heard him breathe deeply. "The rebels staged
the coup from the beginning. That's why they took those of us who'd
had the brain spike last year. Apparently we'd all switched on at the
same time, like some kind of telepathic power surge. When the fighting
began, the grays reactivated our malfunctioning tissue, but the rebels
were busy fighting, so they couldn't help us control the ability. Most
of us were pretty much out of commission right from the beginning.
Since my hyperfunctioning brain tissue had been removed surgically, I
was pretty much unaffected. I was able to coordinate the two others
who'd undergone similar surgery, and we fired a few weapons and then
mostly just hid like rodents."

"My God," I whispered.

"It wasn't very dignified, but it was effective. We managed to hole up
the first eight humans we could lay our hands on. Most of them were
immobile, so it was hard going. We had to drag them into a back access
bay with our eyes closed, holding our breath, because of the fumes
from the injured rebels. By the time the fighting was over, there were
only a few rebels left. They wished us luck, handed me a box
containing ten vials of something blue, took all the escape capsules,
and left us here to fend for ourselves. That was almost eight weeks
ago. To their credit, they did pre-set our course and leave us food
and water, but they underestimated pretty badly on the quantities. I
guess they expected fewer of us to survive."

I could hear the hunger and thirst in his dry, brittle voice, and the
weariness in his words. He'd been through absolute hell, and I was his
only lifeline. I wouldn't let him down. "How is everybody holding up?"

"Better, actually, now that they know what's going on and how much
time we have left. Danny and Marlene were right on the edge, but I
think they'll be able to hold on now, knowing they'll be home in less
than two days." He cleared his throat. "Less than two days. Jesus,
Scully, I miss you."

I closed my eyes and smiled. "Me too," I told him, "but you'll forgive
me if I wait to embrace you until after you've bathed. I don't even
want to think about how you smell after all this time."

"Actually," he responded, "if they hadn't shown us how to use the
ultrasonic showers, we'd be a pretty ripe bunch, but that really
helped. It's this amazing massage thing. You'd love it after a day of
trotting around on those stilts of yours."

I smiled. "It sounds wonderful."

"It is," he confirmed. "Keeps our clothes clean, too. I really want
one of these once we get home. The money we could save on dry cleaning
alone..."

Once they got home, he said. It struck me again that he was indeed
coming home, and with all the inappropriate, inefficient thoughts
occurring to me upon his words, I had to force myself to get back to
business. "So who do you want me to call, Mulder?" He had this once
chance, this singular opportunity to go as public as he wanted, and it
was only right for him to decide who should be present to witness the
event.

"I haven't really thought about it. CNN I guess. The networks." I
suppose I should have expected television from him first, the ham.
"The big magazines: Time, Newsweek, Life, Omni. You guys have been in
touch with SETI, right?"

We hadn't thought of that. "We'll get right on that. It's possible the
people at Arecibo or the VLA who first intercepted this signal
contacted SETI and MUFON themselves, but we'll make sure." I was
looking pointedly at Frohike, who had already awoken. He nodded his
head and picked up a telephone. I felt a momentary pang of guilt for
having forgotten comrades who had remained so vigilant in their search
for Mulder. I scrawled a quick reminder to myself to thank them
publicly for their help.

"Who else?" I asked.

"Would it be too childish to call up Kersh and say 'Neener neener'?"

I chuckled. "I would think."

Langly piped up suddenly from where he was perusing the files I'd
abandoned earlier. "I'd pay cash money to see that, Mulder!" he called
out.

After a few more chuckles, Byers led his friends out of the room to
offer us some privacy.

"We're alone now," I told him softly.

"Yeah, you, me, and about a hundred radio telescope operators."

I hadn't thought about that.

"Hey, guys," Mulder announced solicitously, "meet Special Agent Dana
Scully, M.D., fastest scalpel in the East, and one damn fine example
of the ideal human female. That is, if you like 'em smart, strong, and
sexy."

"Mulder," I chided him gently.

"Hey, I calls 'em like I sees 'em."

"I have some news for you," I teased in retaliation. I decided to wait
until he was home and rested before I told him about the baby, but I
was bursting with the news. It seemed fair to make him wait.

"Anything good?" he asked. "Peace in the Middle East? Cubs win the
World Series? DAMN!" he shouted.

"What?" I was suddenly terrified something had gone wrong with the
ship.

"Goddamn it. I missed the World Series again."

I sighed in relief. "I taped it for you. And I guarantee you'll be
pleased with the outcome."

"Really?" He said in a little squeak.

"Of course. And I have another couple of videotapes you'll find VERY
interesting, but you're going to have to wait for those."

"Scully," he taunted lightly, "you been clickin' on the higher end of
the Spectravision lineup?"

"Well, the footage is certainly revealing." I'd spend months waiting
and wondering how he would react to the tapes of my ultrasounds, to
the growing form of our child. It was very difficult to keep from
telling him.

Part of me thought that I should tell him, just in case he didn't make
it. Then I thought about it, and realized I didn't want him to hear
about it, half-starved, from a disembodied voice. I wanted him to be
here with me when he found out he was going to be a father.

"Speaking of footage," he said, returning us to more vital matters. He
must have been exhausted to depart from idle chitchat so suddenly.
"Let's figure out the rest. What do we have so far?"

I read from the list I'd jotted down. "CNN, all the major magazines,
and all the networks. Except Fox. They're not exactly high on my
credibility scale."

"Are you kidding? After that Alien Autopsy thing and COPS? They'll be
all over this." He had a point.

"Oh, all right. It's not as if they'd hold back on impugning your
credibility anyway. You do understand that anybody and anything to do
with you will be in the spotlight."

"You afraid of a few flashbulbs, Scully?"

"No, it's just that I realized that absurd book might make it back to
the bestseller list."

"Oh God, and that piece of crap movie could end up back in the
theaters. That thing has 'cult classic' written all over it."

We both groaned.

"On the other hand," I told him, "the Gunmen will finally be able to
publish the 'Inside Area 51' article they've always dreamed of. You
should have seen them, Mulder. It was like Christmas morning."

I could feel his smile, despite the thick emotion in his voice.
"Thanks for getting them in there. They deserve it."

I reminded myself that he was still weary and asked for the last bit
of information I needed so he could go back to sleep for a while. "Why
don't you tell me the full names of everyone on the ship, and we'll
contact their families. We'll try to get everybody there in time for
your arrival."

Mulder listed off everyone there, and to my relief, both Billy Miles
and the Hoeses were among the survivors. He only gave me ten names,
though, and when I asked for the eleventh, he said she didn't have any
family to contact. He didn't give me her name.  I wanted to press the
issue so we would have a complete list for the authorities, but he
seemed reluctant to discuss the matter any further, and I was
desperate for a bathroom break.

"I'll be right back," I told him, and left the connection open.

I made my way out of the laboratory and down a narrow hallway toward
the sign that indicated the presence of restrooms.  All the doors
lining the hall were closed with the exception of one.  Light streamed
out of the crack in the nearly sealed door, and I heard voices.  I
approached and recognized them as Skinner and Krycek.  With all my
attention concentrated on Mulder, I hadn't even noticed that they'd
disappeared from the room.

"So just establish the contacts and get ready for the release data.
I'll contact you when it's time," Krycek said in a firm voice.

"Why didn't you just tell me all this from the beginning?" Skinner
responded and sighed loudly.  "We could've avoided all this conflict."

"And maintained the illusion?" Krycek snorted derisively.  "He
would've seen right through it, you know that.  Spender might be a
total waste of flesh, but he's still got twice our brains combined."

I didn't know what they were talking about, but since they both gave
the impression of being opposed to Spender in every respect, and my
bladder was screaming for relief, I decided to ask Skinner about it
later.

I was back in the lab, talking with Mulder, by the time Fletcher
returned with dinner. Skinner and Krycek followed him in. Skinner
appeared vaguely pleased, and Krycek looked terribly smug.  I made
quick eye contact with Skinner, who shot me a grin and held up one
hand to indicate he would explain later.

Mulder went back to sleep for a while, and the Gunmen returned, ready
to get to work. Byers occupied himself immediately giving directions
to the families of the survivors, and I ate a little something.

Skinner, meanwhile, contacted the local authorities in Oregon, and
advised them to prepare for our arrival. Concerned that Fletcher and
his Men In Black would work themselves into a froth over the idea of
cameras committing their secret vessel to global reality, Skinner and
I agreed not to contact the media until we were out of the facility.

With the Gunmen on the SETI/MUFON and family contacts, and Krycek
stating that he had his own business to attend to, whatever that
meant, Skinner and I made to depart.

"Mulder?" I asked into the microphone.

After a muffled cough, I heard his voice. "Yeah?"

"We're going now. Everything is in the works." I looked over at
Fletcher and engaged him in intense eye contact. I wanted to shame him
into remembering his promise to get Mulder and the others home safely.
"You just listen to Director Fletcher and he'll bring you down safe."
Of course the flattery didn't hurt. Fletcher nodded at me. "We'll be
there when you land."

"Okay. See you soon, partner."

-------------------------

When Skinner and I were alone on a military jet to the Air Force base
at Kingsley Field, Oregon, I asked him what had transpired with Krycek
during their absence from the control room.

"He had a little present for me." If he'd said it with less relief, I
would have thought he was being sarcastic. Instead, he pulled a Palm
Pilot out of his pocket and showed it to me. "Control mechanism. Those
little buggers have just gone to meet their maker." To punctuate his
point, he put the unit down on the floor of the plane and raised his
foot, clearly intending to smash it with the heel of his shoe.

"Don't!" I shouted, and reached forward to grab it. I was less than
graceful, considering my slightly altered center of gravity, but he
did stop his leg before he made contact with the unit. "We need to
research this. I believe I've had enough of destroyed evidence for the
remainder of my natural life."

Skinner smiled slightly and huffed a breath out his nose, and
returning his raised foot to the floor, he began to dial on his cell
phone. When he reached his assistant, he instructed her to contact my
entire media list, and to identify herself as "Assistant Director Jana
Cassidy, Bureau Director of Media Relations". Before he ended the
call, he also instructed her to recruit Cassidy's assistant to cover
her, which, gauging by his smile and nod, meant that she indicated it
would be little trouble to accomplish.

I looked at Skinner long and hard until he must have felt compelled to
speak. "Assistant Director Cassidy is on vacation this week," he said,
and I swear I saw just a hint of a grin.

I liked him enormously at that moment. It was a sneaky tactic, utterly
false in almost every regard, and it made me irrationally happy. It
was certainly the only way to assure that the networks would pull out
all the stops and get their top correspondents out to Bellefleur with
live satellite feeds. Any other A.D. would have garnered a pre-taped
interview with a two-week lead time.

But his behavior had me concerned. "Are you all right, Sir?"

He didn't answer for a long time. He closed his eyes and breathed
deeply, and when he finally turned his gaze to meet mine, I
understood.

"I'm free," he told me.

Yeah, you and Mulder, I thought. When was it going to be my turn? We
went through the remainder of the flight in silence. There was a lot
to think about.

-------------------------

When we arrived at Kingsley, we were escorted quietly to a sheriff's
department car by a tall, handsome blond in uniform. "Welcome to
Klamath Falls," he said. "I'm Eric Lindgren, Bellefleur Sheriff."

Skinner extended his hand. "Walter Skinner, Dana Scully, FBI. Thank
you for meeting us."

Lindgren shook Skinner's hand quickly and then turned to me.  "Agent
Scully," he said, holding out his hand in my direction. I shook it
cautiously, and his face lit up with a broad smile.  Good Lord, I
thought at the time, what the hell was it with men?  When I pulled my
hand from his, he appeared to snap out of whatever spell he was under,
and motioned us to the waiting vehicle.  "Do you want to go straight
to the site, or do you want to drop by the motel first?"

"The motel," Skinner and I said in unison. Sixty-eight miles later,
they remained the only words we'd spoken.


When we arrived at the motel in Bellefleur, we were surprised to
discover we were alone there. Apparently the local media hadn't had a
chance to get there yet. In all fairness, Bellefleur is remote. We
figured we'd be lucky if any media showed up in time for the ship's
arrival. Fortunately, two agents from the Portland field office were
waiting for us by their nondescript sedan, and Skinner went to speak
with them at once while I checked in at the front desk and the sheriff
waited by his cruiser.

When I returned outside, Skinner had completed his conversation with
the agents, and returned with me to obtain our luggage.

I was making for my bags when Skinner intercepted. "I'll get that," he
said, taking Mulder's bag along with his own. His step was noticeably
lighter, I realized, walking behind him toward our rooms.

I opened my door, and Skinner slid Mulder's bag just inside, and I put
mine beside it, before closing the door. He didn't comment as he put
his own bag inside his room, and I suppose I was a little surprised.
In all the time since Mulder's disappearance, Skinner had never
brought up the subject of my relationship with Mulder or the possible
paternity of the baby.

Well, that's almost true. When the test results arrived last week, I
did share them with Skinner.

"Is everything okay?" he'd asked cautiously.

"Yes," I'd told him, still relieved beyond measure. "Healthy and
human. It appears to be a normal, natural pregnancy, if a little
high-risk."

He'd nodded, told me to take care of myself, and that was that. I had
wished I'd known what he was thinking, but I had been loathe to bring
up the subject. It had seemed like a don't-ask/don't-tell situation.

So as we followed the footpath back to the parking lot, I was
surprised to hear him ask me, "Do you trust Morris Fletcher?"

It was a simple question to answer. "With regard to the operation of
that craft, yes. With regard to the disposition of the ship after it
lands, no."

"What do you think the chances are for a smooth landing?"

And then I understood. Two of his greatest burdens were lifting from
his shoulders in the space of just one day, and it must have seemed
too good to be true. He had just been freed from the ravaging invaders
in his blood, and he was soon to be vindicated publicly for his
supportive supervision of the X-Files, and for losing track of Mulder
three months ago.

I spoke softly. "I think our chances are good. The controls operated
as expected, and Fletcher seemed to know what he was talking about.
Taking that into consideration as well as the apparently benevolent
intentions of the rebels aboard the ship, I'm optimistic."

He nodded.

We returned to Sheriff Lindgren's cruiser and drove out toward the
forest site in silence until I realized I had no idea how we planned
to protect the site from military intervention. Perhaps his brief,
hushed conversation with the two agents had been a measure in that
direction.

"Sir?" I asked. "Do the local field agents have something afoot to
keep the landing site open to the media?"

"Yes," he responded simply. "In addition to a sizeable contingent
provided by a friend in the Marines."

I smiled. "Semper Fi."

He smiled as we sped along the tree-lined road. "Indeed."

Skinner explained to me that although the Air Force or Army might have
been able to claim official jurisdiction in the woods, should they
have attempted to take over in front of the cameras, it would have
been what was traditionally described by the United States Armed
Forces as "A Bad Thing". Skinner's pal in the Marines had set him up
with three platoons of fully armed men ready to kill or die to protect
public access to the site.

"Your job..." I muttered. "If the Air Force or Army, or even
officially sanctioned Marine units are called in, the conflict would
be publicized, Sir. You could lose your job."

"I'll lose it anyway," he said simply. "What we're doing is so far
beyond protocol, I'll be surprised if they don't bring me up on
charges of Endangering Public Safety. This isn't pencil-theft, Agent.
It's full-on misappropriation. If I'm lucky, I'll stay out of federal
prison."

I looked at him in horror.

"It'll be worth it," he said with relief, "believe me. Maybe I'll try
my hand at producing. That movie made a chunk of change."

I smiled in return. "A bigger flashlight, sir?"

"It was funny."

It was. God help me, it was. Poor Mulder.

-------------------------

Skinner and I arrived at the promised landing site early in the
afternoon, and we were, to our surprise, the only people there. The
solitude didn't last long. Just as Skinner, Lindgren and I had combed
through every available inch of woods, personnel carriers arrived and
troops poured out of them. The Commanding Officer approached Skinner
and saluted, which I took as a good sign.

Skinner was in his element. He returned the salute and immediately
huddled in conference with the C.O., pointing to potential landing
areas, and indicating which paths should be cleared for media access.
The C.O. nodded and shouted orders to his junior officers, and the
operation began. Within minutes, a solid wall of fully armed soldiers
surrounded the landing site, lined the newly cut pathway from the
road, and dotted the road itself. When Skinner took me past the
troops, describing which responsibilities had been assigned to which
platoons, soldiers nodded to me firmly, and said, simply, "Ma'am." It
was an astonishing feeling to be able to trust government employees
unconditionally for once.

When we walked down the path toward the road, I saw two things that
set my heart at ease. The first was the sheer quantity of soldiers,
placed strategically down the road in both directions. No one was
getting through without media credentials. The second detail was
something that I myself had overlooked. Skinner had ensured that
blocks were placed around the faded orange "X" painted on the pavement
at the side of the road. He thought it might make a promising location
for a background piece on our work, and the depth and extent of our
dedication to uncovering the truth.

I smiled and thanked him.

When media trucks began to arrive, Skinner recommended that we conduct
a few interviews by the "X", before returning to the motel for a few
hours' rest. I really was exhausted, and a good meal followed by a hot
bath were my only other plans for the evening.

-------------------
End Part 2/9.

Part 3/9.  

CNN arrived first, of course, and correspondent Christiane Amanpour
appeared at our site almost immediately. I tried not to think about
the television coverage, or of anyone's reaction to it. I focused
instead on the importance of speaking the truth and preparing the
world for the ship's arrival.

By the time Ms. Amanpour was able to get her crew set up and ready,
other news crews had descended upon Skinner and me in one large
cluster. The flailing microphones and bright lights were intimidating,
but I followed Skinner's lead. He spoke authoritatively.

"My name is Walter Skinner, and I'm the Assistant Director of the
Missing Persons and X-Files divisions of the Federal Bureau of
Investigation. This is Special Agent Dana Scully, a forensic
pathologist in the X-Files, or unsolved crimes, division." I nodded
curtly as Skinner turned his head and looked into the woods behind us
and turned back.

"Twelve weeks ago, Agent Scully's partner, the SAC - or Special Agent
in Charge - of the X-Files division, Special Agent Fox Mulder,
disappeared in these woods, under my direct supervision. Agent Mulder
and I were investigating reports of local disappearances in the
vicinity of a concealed, unidentified craft when Agent Mulder
literally vanished from sight. Moments later the sky was filled with
bright lights, and I saw a large craft, hovering over the site, travel
away from here, upward and toward the southwest, at an incredible rate
of speed."

He paused for a moment, as flashes went off, accompanied by the sounds
of camera shutters.

"Agents Mulder and Scully had been involved in the investigation of
possible alien infiltration of U.S. government organizations, with the
intent to colonize this planet. In just a few hours, we will have all
the proof any of us require."

When the reporters began to roll their eyes and murmur to themselves
in disbelief and disgust, I broke in.

"I know it sounds ridiculous, and frankly I don't blame you for your
skepticism. When I worked on my very first case with Agent Mulder
seven years ago, I found the notion of alien abduction positively
ludicrous. Then we came here, to this very spot." I stepped aside, so
the cameras would be able to pick up the large strokes of orange
paint. "Our watches and the clock on our car behaved oddly, and Agent
Mulder painted these marks to indicate the location of the anomaly.
Seven years later, only twelve weeks ago, we were called back to this
very spot to investigate further disappearances."

I paused for a moment to lend as much gravity as possible to my words.
"I have been trained as a medical doctor and physicist, and I began as
skeptical as all of you. But what I have seen and experienced since
1993 has changed my outlook utterly. I cannot explain all that I have
seen, and I look forward to the upcoming events with great enthusiasm.
Although what the events portend is frightening, public understanding
and acceptance of the possibility of alien colonization will lend
itself to a more complete and expedited series of protective measures.
In short, we have a species to safeguard: Our own."

"What are the events you're alluding to?" Amanpour asked first.

Skinner took over. "Approximately twenty-four hours ago, a distress
call was picked up by crews at large radio telescopes all over the
globe. After confirmation of the signal's origin - somewhere in the
vicinity of Jupiter's moon Europa - we succeeded in communicating with
the individual sending the message. It was Agent Mulder, who had been
left behind in the craft by its owners, after what appears to have
been a savage battle between warring alien factions. There were human
survivors, and they appear to be en route to this very location on
autopilot. Our best estimate, courtesy of the ATRD Director of
Operations' office, is that the craft should arrive here at 5:28 p.m.
tomorrow, Pacific Standard Time."

"What is the ATRD?" one of the reporters asked.

"Alien Technology Recovery Division," Skinner responded, "operating
out of Groom Lake Air Force Base, Nevada."

"So the U.S. Government is officially stating that this craft is
approaching and is of alien origin?" a Fox reporter asked.

"Yes," Skinner replied, and I bit back a chuckle. "Although there are
factions within our own government that have plotted to cover up the
existence of extraterrestrial life, and have engaged in a private war
against all those intent on bringing these facts to light, it is
nevertheless fact that multiple United States government entities
stand behind our report of this ship's existence and origins. Agent
Scully can fill you in on the details of this private war and the
major players in the conspiracy to conceal the truth."

Thanks, Walter, I thought. Where the hell would I start?

"Thank you, A.D. Skinner," I began. "A chronological explanation of
all the forces at work and the machinations of the plots would be too
detailed and laborious to go through here, so I will provide a very
quick summary of the activities with which I am familiar. Agent
Mulder, when he arrives, will be able to provide you with a more
detailed report of his own experiences and discoveries," I told them.
"Additionally, under the Freedom of Information Act, many of our case
file reports can be made available to the public. Agent Mulder and I
will be pleased to provide case numbers when and if that becomes
necessary. In all, there are twelve human survivors on the ship, and
many more who did not survive the trip, and we speculate they
represent only a fraction of those abducted over the years. The
families of the survivors are en route and should be here by the time
the craft arrives tomorrow.

"Please understand that many of my accounts are based on personal
experience, and that everything I have seen and experienced was real,
and that although my scientific analysis has not always provided us
with conclusive answers, many years' worth of experience and many
series of similar questions have created a very strong sense of
probability. With craft's arrival and the then-uncontestable proof it
will provide, I believe our experiences will give you a strong
background on what you are going to witness tomorrow."

I took a deep breath, gathered myself, and began to tell the reporters
excerpts of the past seven years of my life.

They took the story of our first trip to Bellefleur with a grain of
salt, and rolled their eyes again when I described the inferno at the
motel. But when I compared the location of the implant we'd discovered
to the location of my own nasopharyngeal tumor, they quieted down and
began to pay attention.

It was horribly difficult to spin out one of the most painful and
harrowing experiences of my life to strangers, especially knowing that
millions would be listening in. Describing my condition just prior to
the implantation of the chip was difficult enough, but having to
recount the horrible deaths of Penny Northern and Betsy Hagopian
became nearly impossible.  I found myself unexpectedly overcome, and
had to take a few moments to breathe deeply and recover my composure.

I described what I saw in Dallas and at the farms in Texas and Canada.
I described my experience in Antarctica, in detail I had never
provided to even my own family. I wondered as I spoke if my mother and
brothers would even believe the story I recounted, since it differed
so greatly from the watered-down version I had related to them.

I told the media of my limited memories of my own abduction, and again
I began to tremble. I described C.G.B. Spender in excruciating detail,
and explained - attempting to eliminate any trace of anger from my
voice - every instance of his interference with my life. I told of
Mulder's near-fatal illness and the unauthorized surgery performed on
him at the Department of Defense. I told of his sister's abduction and
eventual cloning, of the vial of my own ova he found at the fertility
clinic and the chip with my name on it at DARPA. I described those I'd
seen with chip implants and their remarkable recovery from devastating
illness, as well as my own sudden and inexplicable remission. I
explained what we'd found in the vast file vaults at Strughold Mining,
of the ostensibly alien body we had found in the ice, and I described
every instance I could remember of vital evidence being stolen or
destroyed. From my bag, I produced rubbings from the ship I had
studied in Africa.

I carefully avoided any tales describing events too easily ascribed to
the supernatural. Instead, I stuck to the facts as I saw them about
events directly related to the matter at hand.

When I was done, there was silence, which I didn't expect. I honestly
thought the reporters would latch onto one sound bite or another, and
attempt to discredit some vital evidence. Instead, there was a full
five seconds before anything happened.

First there was the click of a single camera shutter. Then a few eyes
blinked. Finally, Amanpour dove back into the breach and asked the
question I'd been dreading.

"Agent Scully, from these fantastic tales, we are led to believe that
you consider hostile alien colonization of Earth an undeniable fact.
Is this characterization accurate?"

I chose my preferred method of confrontation, and picked her question
apart.

"First of all, I would like to state that based on the evidence I have
procured - most specifically DNA information, as well as post-mortem
examination of an infected individual, I do believe that intelligent
extraterrestrial life has stepped foot on this planet." I thought to
myself at the time that Mulder would have wet his pants upon hearing
those words.

I continued. "Second, based on the physiological manifestation of
infection by the mutagenic strain of the black oil virus, it is clear
that an infected human body will be used as an incubator and
eventually nourishment for the growing alien fetus. There is no
question in my mind that such a genetic arrangement was designed
intentionally to facilitate colonization through the simultaneous
eradication of humankind."

There was a tremendous outcry at that, followed almost immediately by
a question from a local newswoman. "You mentioned a vaccine that Agent
Mulder administered to you in Antarctica. Is this vaccine effective,
and if so, is it widely available?"

The question was difficult to answer, but I was delighted merely in
its having been asked. They were beginning to go with us.

"Judging from my current state of good health, yes, I would have to
consider the existing vaccine effective up to a certain point. Agent
Mulder had been warned that it would only remain effective during the
first ninety-six hours after infection, however, so it remains only a
partial answer to the problem. As for availability, we will have to
see if we can uncover the individuals responsible for its creation. We
have yet to locate or name effectively those who developed it,
although we are aware of two separate vaccines: One held by the
Americans, and another by the Russians, which Agent Mulder himself
received during his captivity in a Tunguska gulag a few years go. We
remain hopeful, however, that a global outcry for the vaccine will
step up efforts to uncover, produce and distribute it."

Skinner then stepped in and took control of the scene. "One last
question."

I was glad. The whole process was exhausting.

An attractive man in his forties, wielding an ABC microphone, asked,
"It seems unusual for so much nefarious activity to have been directed
at just one person. Have there been any other theories advanced
concerning the cause of Agent Mulder's disappearance?"

Skinner answered before I could. "No, there have been no other
convincing theories advanced. I was present when Agent Mulder
disappeared, and it was perfectly clear that he had been taken away in
the craft I witnessed."

"Satellite tracking data compiled by the United States Air Force as
well as SETI and MUFON," I added, "confirmed the course and speed of
the vessel."  I remembered the one debt I needed to pay, and appended,
"The latter two organizations  - The Search for Extraterrestrial
Intelligence and the Mutual UFO Network - have been especially helpful
in their ongoing scrutiny of satellite and radio telescope data."

"Agent Scully, are you worried about Agent Mulder?" one reporter
wedged in on the heels of our responses to the prior question.

My eyes began to well up, and I felt my control begin to slip away. It
would have been easy to blame hormones, but I was exhausted and
utterly wrung out emotionally. Missing him had become a physical,
tangible ache. I would not even consider the possibility that we were
mistaken. Skinner put one hand on my shoulder, and I cleared my
throat.

"Agent Mulder is my partner. Of course I'm worried." Unbidden, my
hands came to rest on my lower abdomen. Skinner must have noticed,
because he quickly took my arm and led me away from the cameras.
"That's it for tonight. We'll be back in the morning."


When Sheriff Lindgren returned us to the motel, we were relieved to
notice a distinct abundance of satellite-dish-topped vans and trucks,
and more arrived behind us. Fortunately, Kimberly had made us
reservations at the motel, so we had rooms when we arrived earlier in
the day. The same could not have been said for many of the media
people, as evidenced by their grumpy departures from the motel office
as we arrived for the night.

A half hour later, I was crying in a very large, very hot tub full of
jasmine-scented water. I hadn't slept in at least a day, I hadn't
eaten in nearly as long, and I had finally tottered off the fine edge
of control. One good cry and I would be fine.

Just as I was enfolding myself in a big fluffy robe, there was a knock
at my door. I wrapped my hair in a towel and went to see who it was.
There were no peepholes in those stupid cabins, so I had to actually
open the door a crack. It was Skinner, and he bore food. And
surprisingly, no tagalong journalists.

While I went into the bathroom to dress, Skinner spread the food out
on the bed. When I returned, there was a magnificent feast awaiting
me. I smiled and dove in.

With a mouth full of sliced turkey breast, Skinner asked me if I was
feeling all right. Munching on a pickle, I assured him that I was.

"Hell of an experience," he commented through a slurp of soup.

"That it was," I replied, tearing into a small loaf of crusty bread.

"You handled yourself very well out there," he praised, reaching for a
can of Pepsi.

"Thanks. I appreciate the tone you set. It helped," I replied, chewing
happily on some of the delicious Italian bread.

I was famished. So was the baby, apparently, because I ate more than I
ever remember consuming in a single sitting. I knew I'd sleep well.

When we were done with our meal and had tidied up, I suggested to
Skinner that he return to his room. With the press hovering around
like flies, it might have been seen as unseemly for him to be visiting
my room too late into the evening. I thanked him for dinner, and rose
from the bed.

As he was walking toward the door, he asked over his shoulder, "What
will you do if the ship doesn't get here tomorrow?"

I didn't even want to consider the possibility.

"Vamp until it does, I suppose." Fletcher did warn us there would be a
margin of error. "Even if it lands elsewhere, there will still be a
ship and we may still have time to scramble forces wherever it does
land."

He sighed. "And Mulder will still be home."

"Amen," I said.

-------------------------

By morning the press became more intrusive, following us from the
motel out to the landing site, shouting questions. The guard soldiers
appeared fresh and alert as well, so I assumed they were the relief
for the night shift.

Sheriff Lindgren, who ended up acting less as local law enforcement
and more as chauffeur and errand boy, was surprisingly helpful and
solicitous. For the sake of my own composure, I made a significant
effort to not think about the circumstances that led to his
appointment as Sheriff a number of weeks ago.

By morning, as well, all the big guns had arrived from all the major
networks, and the area was simply buzzing with big-name journalists
and anchormen. A few foreign factions were there as well. I saw crews
from Great Britain, Canada, Mexico, Chile and Ecuador, as well as a
few latecomers from Australia, Japan, Russia and China. It was very
exciting. Skinner introduced me to Tom Brokaw, Peter Jennings, Dan
Rather, and the CNN Washington Bureau Chief, Frank Sesno. I thought it
odd at the time that he would be there in addition to another
correspondent, but I didn't ask any questions myself. The aura of
authority was vital to maintain our credibility throughout the many
hours of waiting for the ship's arrival.

More questions ensued, these more detailed and in-depth, and I was
glad to address them. They were concrete and specific, even if I
couldn't give complete answers to all of them. "There's only so much
one can remember before and after unconsciousness sets in," was a
phrase I had to repeat more than once. Without Mulder there to expand
on many of my tales, there were many unanswered questions.

One by one, Skinner and I gave private interviews to each of the big
network representatives. We must have spent six solid hours moving
from truck to truck, being fussed over and primped for our moments on
camera in the impressively lush, climate-controlled, portable studios.
For the most part, the big name journalists were intelligent and
thoughtful, asking insightful questions, and tempering the
invasiveness of some of them with humor.

Tom Brokaw, especially, earned my appreciation.  So many of the
journalists seemed intent upon classifying my relationship with Mulder
as professional, platonic, or romantic, that I began to spout the same
tired company line, "Agent Mulder is my partner, and what matters
right now is getting him home safe."  Some of the other senior anchors
pressed the issue farther, to no avail, with many of them actually
having the nerve to show their disappointment and asking point blank
if I was "involved" with him.  "Agent Mulder is my partner," began to
cloy, even to me.

Brokaw, on the other hand, was clearly interested in the truth about
my relationship with Mulder, and seeing through the prefabricated
nature of my statement, made one very telling comment.

"All these tales of, well, horror, Agent Scully, they're truly
terrifying.  It's been said that traumatic events tend to reinforce
the strength of existing relationships and create others where none
existed before.  How would you classify the effect of these traumatic
experiences on your relationship with Agent Mulder?"

He was sneaky.  My response of, "Naturally, going through so many
dangerous situations together has strengthened an already strong
partnership," didn't seem to satisfy him, but he was gracious and let
it go, adding an amusing comment about how I should expect my expense
reports to be automatically approved for life now.  That was class.

Skinner seemed calm but tired after all the interviews, and despite
the meals and beverages they offered us, I found my energy flagging.
Skinner must have noticed it, because he insisted that I get some
rest.

"How do I do that without enticing the press further?" I murmured to
him.

"Hold on," he told me. He went and had a brief discussion with the
shift commander of his Marine platoons, and returned with him. "Agent
Scully, Captain Mark Pacey will escort you to one of the troop
carriers, and he will post two guards outside. There are blankets and
benches inside. You can tell the press you're making phone calls."

I nodded in agreement, and followed Captain Pacey to the vehicle. I
pulled out my phone and began to mime making phone calls, so my
intention would be clear. By the time the fabric flaps had been
lowered and I was safely inside, the press had calmed down. While I
had the privacy, I thought it would be a good idea to call my mother.

"Hi, Mom," I said, scrunching my eyes closed against the impending
verbal assault by my mother.

"Who is this?" she asked in just the wrong tone.

"I'm sorry, okay? Things happened very quickly. I'm sorry it took you
by surprise. You have no idea how surprised I was by all of this."

She sighed loudly, and after a pause just long enough to be dramatic
but not long enough to constitute melodrama, she spoke quietly. "Are
you all right, honey?"

"Yeah, Mom, I'm okay. Just tired."

"So you really believe in all of this?" she asked.

"You know I do, Mom. I know we don't talk about it very much, but I
wouldn't dedicate my life to it if I didn't ultimately believe in it."

"And you're sure that there's a ship coming, and that Fox is on it?"

"I spoke with him. It was amazing. I watched as a secret military
officer trained Mulder to fly the ship. I've never seen technology
like it, it's so far beyond anything we're capable of."

"You must be so relieved to know he's coming home, honey."

"You have no idea. I used to feel guilty every time I did something I
enjoyed. It's been so hard to take, Mom. I don't know how he did it."

"For the most part, Dana," she confided, "he didn't. He was a mess.
You seem to be handling this better than he did."

The baby had a lot to do with that of course, but I wasn't ready to go
there with her yet.  But I still felt I owed her an explanation
regarding my ability to survive the anxiety of his loss, so I settled
on, "I'm in a different place now than he was then. And we hadn't
developed such a deep investment in the work, or such a full trust of
our friends. Things are easier now because we've had the time to make
them easier."

"And you've obviously had the time to become a 'we'," she finished.

"That's complicated," I told her.

She laughed tightly and shot me down, the way mothers always can. "I'm
sure it is." She was silent for a moment before she took action to end
the call. "Don't forget to eat. And get some rest. You look puffy."

"That's the cameras," I told her, hoping to diffuse concerns for my
health or suspicion of my pregnancy. "They add ten pounds."

"Apiece?" she teased.

I smiled. "I love you, Mom. I'll call you later on, when things calm
down a little. Switch to NBC if you can. I've become a fan of Tom
Brokaw."

"Introduce me?" she asked playfully, and I grumbled in response. "I
love you, Dana. Call me later."

I signed off and settled in to a pile of blankets on the floor of the
truck. I must have been exhausted, because the next thing I remember
was Skinner waking me up with news of a new transmission.

"Your friends have rigged up a relay signal, and are broadcasting the
ship's transmission over short-wave. You might be able to communicate
with Mulder for a while, if you want."

If I wanted? Please. I was dying of thirst, and Mulder's voice was
ice-cold Evian.

-------------------------

We tested the Marine unit's bulky transmission equipment first, to
make sure we had a good relay signal, and indeed we did. Then it was
time to take it public.

Surrounded by cameras and lights, nearly suffocated by microphones, we
began the transmission in front of the media.

"Mulder? You can go ahead. You're on the air."

Silence met us. I was afraid we'd lost the signal, or that the ATRD
had finally clued in and was taking over, but then I heard him
breathing.

"Mulder, can you hear me?"

Then I heard him chuckle. "Yeah, Scully, I can hear you. I'm just
trying to think up something pithy to say. First statements from outer
space are supposed to be profound."

A few chuckles rippled through the crowd of reporters and crew people.

"Too late, then," I told him indulgently. "You already blew it."

More laughs. Then everyone quieted and just listened to him.

"I know this must seem like the ultimate practical joke, but believe
me, it's not. You're not just pointing cameras at a radio. You're
reaching your voices out beyond anywhere humans have ever been. This
is an exceptionally important moment in our evolution as a species,
and I am evidence of that, surrounded by a handful of weak survivors,
and almost a hundred casualties. There are anterooms filled with human
remains here, all people just like me - taken against our will - who
didn't survive the fighting on this ship. Those of us who are still
alive are thirsty and starving, we're running out of air, and we're
scared to death. But mostly, we're homesick. We just want to be home
already. I know we'll be there soon, but we've been trapped like this,
out of touch, for three long months, and these last few hours have
been the worst of it."

There was piercing silence amongst the reporters.

I spoke to keep the momentum going. "Mulder, I've tried to explain
what I can about my experiences with the Consortium and their colonist
friends, but there are pieces missing from my accounts - events only
you remember. I thought maybe you could tell everyone here about what
you've found. Maybe you could start with the Arctic, Canada, Dallas,
and Antarctica, and then tell a little about what you've seen at the
Department of Defense, the Pentagon, and some of the private
facilities."

It was a daunting task, and he was no doubt tired, but we needed to
keep the media interested and involved.

Mulder undertook the job with relish. He spun out dizzying tales, some
of which I'd never heard. I suppose a penchant for avoidance is less
than helpful when one tries to relate stories to others. I'd never
really asked about what he'd found in the Antarctic, because I was
afraid to hear the truth. I'd known I'd been harmed, and that I'd been
left for dead, and all that mattered to me was that Mulder had crossed
the earth to find me.

"Agent Mulder," Christiane Amanpour asked brusquely when he was done,
"how can you substantiate these claims without corroborating physical
evidence? And isn't that why the Bureau has shut down your division
more than once?" She'd done her homework.

"Normally," he responded tersely, "we've been unable to maintain
possession of key physical evidence. The allegiances and loyalties of
the Consortium have reached into nearly every organization we've
encountered. But I think if you could be patient for a couple more
hours, you'll have all the corroborating physical evidence you need."
I was proud of him for holding it together.

An older man holding a BBC microphone was next to speak. "Agent
Mulder, did the rebels you described offer you any explanation as to
why you personally were so important to their cause?"

"Not really," Mulder responded. "They said something very briefly
about genetics, so we'll all probably end up poked and prodded nine
ways to Sunday once we get home." Then he put on his playful voice.
"Protect me against the big, bad doctors, Scully?"

I smiled faintly, a few reporters chuckled again, and the questions
continued.


By the time they had run out of first-run questions it was nearly four
o'clock, and everyone was getting pretty weary.

Skinner was looking at me from a distance and tapping his watch, so I
turned the conversation away from the Q&A. "Mulder, have you had any
word on an amended ETA?"

"Hold on," he said, and mumbled something unintelligible. I head a
faint response. Although I couldn't make out the words, the cadence
was definitely Fletcher's. They spoke back and forth for a few minutes
before Mulder returned.

"Fletcher thinks we're going to be on schedule. We're close to the
Moon's perigee, he says, which is good news. We just turned off the
scanning jammers, so we should be visible now. Any decent telescope
should be able to pick us up."

The reporters fell into a sea of murmurs, mostly asking their crew
people if the networks were on it. Most confirmed that they indeed
were.

"How soon until you breach the atmosphere?" I asked.

"Fletcher says about 5:05. I'm taking us in nice and slow." I was
relieved at their obvious caution. "We should be visible to the naked
eye about twenty minutes after that. I'm guessing we'll be on the
ground around 5:30." And again the playful voice returned. "We suggest
you return your seat backs and tray tables to their upright
positions."

The smartass. I decided to end the interviews on that note. "Why don't
we all take a short break and allow Agent Mulder to rest up a bit?

A few reporters nodded, and Captain Pacey picked up the radio. He
followed me back to the truck and placed the radio inside it along
with me. He was exceedingly genteel, offering me a hand up, and asking
if I needed anything. There has always been something I've adored
about servicemen.

"I'm fine, thanks," I told him.

"I heard that," a creaky voice accused.

I changed the subject. "None of the media people have left, Mulder.
They're all staying in droves."

"Any word from SETI or MUFON?"

"Yes," I told him. "Frohike called me this morning to let me know that
they've been informed and that SETI is doing all the satellite
tracking they can. Although that will probably be a foregone
conclusion once the ship arrives."

He sighed.

"You sound tired. How is everyone else holding out?" I suddenly felt
terribly guilty for the fine meal and comforting bath I'd had the
night before.

"We'll be okay. We have three who'll need ambulances right away."

"It's covered," I told him. "The local Sheriff's office has arranged
for everything on Skinner's orders. He's been so helpful, Mulder.
You'd be proud of him."

I left the radio on, but kept quiet after admonishing him to get some
rest. He submitted readily, which worried me. He wasn't usually that
compliant.

I lay down again and tried to sleep, but couldn't. I wasn't hungry, I
wasn't angry, I wasn't even afraid. I simply couldn't keep still. I
was antsy.

"I'm gonna turn the volume down if you don't Zen out, Scully," he
scolded.

"Okay, okay." I gave in and lay still, imagining the light and the
wind and the cries of the media. It was going to be wonderful.

-------------------
End Part 3/9.

Part 4/9.  

An hour later, I heard a warm, mellifluous tone emanate from the
radio. "Mulder?"

"Hold on," he said sleepily and muttered something unintelligible.

When I heard again the distant sound of Fletcher's voice, I knew he
was being looked after.

"Proximity alert," he told me.

"Pretty," I remarked.

"Yeah. You'd better rejoin your photogenic buddies out there. We'll be
down in under a half-hour."

I felt giddy.

When Captain Pacey and Sheriff Lindgren helped me back to the main
media area with the radio, the reporters were all abuzz with
excitement. Some of them had fled to their trucks to watch the descent
of the ship through the atmosphere on the live Air Force feed to CNN.
A few clutched hand-held telescopes, hoping to catch a glimpse of the
ship as it approached. It was still light out, so it wasn't likely at
that point.

Mulder spoke more loudly as he conversed with Fletcher about the final
details of their landing procedure. "Oh, hell. The radiation detector
is lit up again." Concern rippled through the crowd.

"Recalibrate it the way I showed you," we heard Fletcher say. He
sounded exhausted as well.

After a few moments, Mulder sighed. "Okay, it's all right. Within
tolerances."

"Good," Fletcher replied, and the local assemblage heaved a combined
sigh. "It's probably a pressure thing. Don't worry about it. Now keep
an eye on the attitude controls. Keep her level all the way in."

"We're level. No change."

"All right, I think that's it, Agent Mulder. Just watch the readouts
and enjoy the ride. You'll be home soon."

There was a significant pause before Mulder spoke again. "You're going
to take the ship, aren't you?"

Fletcher's response was a little snort. "Yeah, we're gonna steal it
right out from under you on national television. Get real."

"Great," he said. "I gotta find out how to get personalized plates for
this thing. 'Cause with a good meal and some pillows, this would beat
the living snot out of coach class."


At precisely 5:19 p.m. the ship had grown close enough that we could
see the brilliant patterns of light adorning its underside.

"Mulder, all our power is still on. Doesn't that contradict prior
behavior of this type of craft?"

"No," he replied. "We turned off all the jammers. No effect on power
now. All the cameras are working, right?"

I turned to the media, and many of the crewmen nodded their heads.
"Yes, they appear to be."


At 5:25 p.m., the ship inched toward the tree tops. The wind was
something amazing, and the light was unbelievably brilliant. The
reporters were losing their minds; shouting loudly over the howling
wind, each one competing to be heard in a massive cacophony of human
voices. Had it not been for the exhilaration blazing in their eyes,
the scene might have suggested panic, rather than supreme excitement.
It was, indeed, wonderful. Shortly after the tumult began, the lights
faded and the wind stopped. The voices lowered to a collective murmur,
awe in evidence in front of every camera.

At 5:27, the ship itself stopped, hovering quietly just sixteen feet
above ground level. The Marines immediately moved in to establish a
perimeter around the potential landing area.

At 5:36, the ship still hadn't moved.

At 5:41, I got back on the radio to find out what was going on.

"Stuck," Mulder said, irritated. "No landing gear. There's supposed to
be some kind of matter transference thing to get us to ground level,
but I told Fletcher to stick it up his ass. No way I'm gonna scramble
my molecules when I'm this close to home."

Damn straight. "So what are you going to do?" I motioned to Skinner,
who came over and listened.

"Open the hatch. There's one down below in the access bay."

"Good," I told him. "We'll get a cherrypicker or a ladder truck out
here to get all of you out."

Skinner nodded, called Sheriff Lindgren over, and went to it.

At 5:52, the hatch opened, and light spilled out of the ship toward
the ground. There was a collective gasp as it did.

At 6:24, the cherrypicker's bucket ascended to the opening on the
underside of the ship. From the murmurs rippling through the crowd, it
was clear that the sight was less than inspiring. I suppose most of
them were looking forward to a special effects extravaganza. Me, I
just wanted Mulder back on terra firma.

At 6:38, the first bucketful of survivors came down in the
cherrypicker. They were the three most in need of medical attention,
and they were placed carefully on gurneys and taken to the waiting
ambulances immediately. Their families wept, climbing in behind them,
and three of the five available ambulances departed. Journalists
crowded around the site, hoping for a good shot of the three as they
were taken away to the hospital.

At 6:47, the first of the able-bodied survivors came down in the
bucket. It was Mulder's idea that they come down one at a time, so
they could each take advantage of their own fifteen minutes in the
spotlight.

It was all very dramatic, with the sun going down behind the ship,
brilliant and gleaming orange behind the slowly lowering cherrypicker.
If I hadn't been so invested in the final outcome, I might have found
the scene as tacky and overly theatrical as that hydraulic-lift death
scene in Cats.

The media mobbed each survivor as he or she exited the bucket, aided
by rescue workers.

Throughout the entire process, the Marines kept to their posts,
although by the time the seventh survivor touched down, it was clear
there would be no interference at the site. Everything had been so
easy, it felt too good to be true. As it turned out, I was right.

I camped out at the base of the apparatus, looking up into the ship,
trying to learn as much as I could from the ground, but I couldn't see
anything. It wasn't until the bucket lowered again that I saw the top
of Mulder's head peek out from one edge of the circular opening. As
soon as his eyes met mine, he leaned all the way forward, and flashed
the most beautiful smile I'd ever seen. I forgot completely about the
press, or the slight hollowing of his cheeks, or the dark circles
under his eyes. All I saw was pure joy.

I must have smiled in return. I don't remember exactly what I did or
how I did it, but I remember that later on, Mulder told me about all
the shutters and flashes that went off as I looked up at him in
happiness.

"I'm coming down last," he called down.

My next smile I do remember.  I made it just before I stretched my
mouth around the silent words, "YOU HAM."

He laughed, and then his expression turned serious.  "I'm sending
somebody down to you," he called out. "I told her all about you, so I
think she'll be okay. Just hold her hand and keep her calm."

I nodded. Then I saw him help a young girl into the lift, and I
understood. I guessed that she was under ten years of age, and she
held Mulder's hand very tightly until he had to tell her to let go as
she was lowered to the ground.

"No!" she cried, looking back up into the ship. "Fox!" she exclaimed
in distress.

"It's okay, sweetie. Dana's right there. Remember what I told you
about her? Just hold on to her hand and don't let go until I get
there. See? Look over the edge of the bucket and you'll see her. She's
the pretty lady with the red hair and the big smile."

She looked down at me, and my blood froze. I'd seen that face before,
on a farm in Canada. But her eyes gave nothing like the vacant stare
of the clones. There was fear and trepidation there, layered with a
kind of anticipation that can't be counterfeited. She was the genuine
article, I was certain of it, and the depth of Mulder's smile suddenly
made sense in context. He wasn't just home, and he wasn't just
returning to me; he was coming home with his sister.

I continued to make eye contact with her, going out of my way to
smile, and holding out my arms to her, until the bucket touched the
ground. When the reporters began to swarm around her, I stepped in
protectively and took her hands in mine.

"It's okay, Samantha. I'm Dana. Step down, that's right."

She looked around for a moment, wincing at the bright lights, and
moved to my side. I wrapped one arm around her shoulders, and she
clung to me.

I spoke quietly. "Let's get out of these lights and wait for your
brother to come down, okay?"

She looked up at me and nodded. "Fox said you were pretty."

I stood between her and the cameras and looked over toward Skinner,
hoping he'd understand the meaning implicit in my expression.

He didn't fail me. Within seconds, three burly Marines had moved to
keep the media at bay, so I could take her aside and sit with her
quietly. When we'd moved farther into the woods, well protected by the
circle of Marines dotting the periphery of the ship's space, I found a
large fallen tree, and sat with her quietly.

"Your brother has been looking for you for such a long time, Samantha.
Do you know how happy he is?"

"Yeah," she replied quietly. "He smiles a lot, even when he's hungry."

Her words stung, because I knew Mulder well enough to visualize the
horrible scene: a dozen people, crowded together, waiting patiently to
die of starvation. And Mulder at the edges, smiling tenderly at his
sister, the joy of reunion bittersweet with the fear of imminent
death.

The thought was painful, and I worked quickly to change the subject,
for her sake and mine. It occurred to me that questions might bring
her out more. "Is he like you remember?"

She settled back against the rough bark, and pulled away from me just
a hair. She wasn't shaking quite so much, and she seemed to relax
slightly. "No, he's nice now."

I smiled at that. "I know what you mean. I have a big brother, too.
They can be a real pain sometimes."

"Yeah," she agreed.

"He loves you so much, Sam." She looked up at me. "Is it okay to call
you Sam?"

She nodded.

"You've been the most important part of his life for a very long time.
Longer than I've known him, and that's been years already. Nothing in
the world mattered to him as much as getting you back. You're very
lucky to have a big brother who loves you so much."

"He told me about that," she said, "but then he started crying, and
said he was sorry he gave up."

"Oh, Sam," I sighed. "He'd been looking for so long, and he found some
information earlier this year. It said that you'd been taken by
humans, and that they'd hurt you very badly. He thought you'd died
when you were fourteen."

"Fourteen?"

"Yup. I think maybe he felt so bad about what he found that he
imagined you at peace, so he could keep working on other important
things. Now that he's found you," I said, nudging her shoulder gently
with my arm, "he probably feels a little guilty about moving on." I
looked firmly into her eyes. "Does that make sense?"

She nodded. "He said he'd tell me the rest when we got home. Isn't Mom
here?"

I closed my eyes for a moment in grief. She didn't know. I opened my
eyes and changed the subject. "Let's go see how close he is to coming
down. I bet all the television people will be really excited to see
him."

"Okay," she said dejectedly.

I rose and took her hand again. Side by side, we returned to the
arrival area. The third of three more survivors had just finished
taking his turn riding down, and I could see from the side that it was
Billy Miles. I met him as he touched down, and we smiled at each
other. He looked a little thin, but he was mostly unharmed.

"Welcome home, Billy," I said and I hugged him, one-armed. "I'm so
glad you're safe."

"Thanks, Agent Scully," he said, smiling awkwardly at the cameras as
we spoke. "I'm really sorry about calling you in on this. They never
would have taken him if..."

"It's okay, Billy. It's not your fault. We're just relieved you're all
home." According to Mulder's count, only twelve of one hundred eight
abductees survived, but we were at least granted the privilege of
burying our own dead.

He nodded, a little unsure, and went along with his father. As I
watched him go, I noticed Theresa Hoese and her husband, Ray, speaking
passionately with Skinner. I took a few steps toward them, Samantha in
tow, in time to hear Skinner respond, "We'll take care of it
immediately. I'll get a court order if necessary."

Of course, their baby. I'd seen her taken away by Family Services, and
the distress I'd felt at the sight had threatened to shatter my
professional composure during the investigation. And I'd thought it
had been bad the night before, when Mulder had attempted - once
again - to compel me to leave the Bureau, and by extension, him.

We'd fallen asleep in his bed, fully dressed, clothing and pillows
damp with tears. I hadn't dreamed at all that night, and when I'd
awoken early in the morning, I'd opened my eyes to see Mulder looking
back at me, his expression tender. I'd felt the unity and purpose
between us then.

"Do you really want to wake up without this?" I'd asked him gently,
reaching up to caress his cheek.

He'd given me an affectionate little smile, put one arm over my waist,
and drawn me close. With his short, warm puffs of breath tickling my
ear, he'd fallen asleep again.

So standing in that forest, with the Hoeses well on the way to getting
their baby back and Mulder's young sister holding fast to my hand, I
was filled with hope. Mulder was alive and missed me, and the human
race had allies. I hadn't felt so optimistic in years.


Finally, when the eleventh survivor had been bundled up and sent off
with her family, it was Mulder's turn to come down. Naturally, he took
his time. I'd always known he'd had an overblown sense of drama, but I
was almost embarrassed by the show he was putting on. Looking around,
however, at the expectant and excited faces of the newspeople
surrounding us, it was clear I was the only one who noticed.

I saw his feet step onto the platform of the cherrypicker, and finally
it began to descend. I know the thing had only one speed, but I felt
as if it was moving in slow motion. Frankly, with Mulder away so long,
the thing couldn't have come down fast enough for my taste. When the
bucket finally cleared the hatchway of the ship, I saw his face, and
he looked a little nervous. In his hands was a small rack of test
tubes containing something translucent blue.

Then he looked down, ignoring the cameras - which was a surprise - and
found me and Samantha. He gave a gentle little smile, and when I
looked down at Sam, I saw that she was returning it. When all was
settled, and the three of us had made our silent confirmations of
relief and satisfaction, only then did he return his attention to the
press. They would have it for nearly every minute of the next two
hours.

"Agent Mulder!" they called out en masse. "Agent Mulder! Tell us
about...!" He snorted out a little laugh and stepped off the platform.

Skinner moved in immediately and said, simply, "Welcome home." He then
relieved Mulder of the objects he was holding, and stood off to the
side, surrounded by guards. At the sight, Mulder relaxed and stepped
into my arms. We only held each other, with Samantha pressed tightly
to both of us in a quiet little huddle, but the press lost their minds
over it. "Agent Mulder! Agent Scully! Who is the little girl? Are you
glad to be home? What is the nature of your relationship?"

In response, Mulder merely held me to his distressingly thin frame,
and muttered into my hair, "My family."

The months of waiting and fear broke out of me, and tears began to
fall, big fat tears over the end of distress, and the beginning of a
new chapter of our lives: a chapter in which our work is legitimate,
our families are restored, and we are unified without embarrassment. I
was happy and afraid at the same time, but all I could do was recite
"You're home" over and over.

Finally, he pulled away just enough to look into my eyes and I saw,
close-up, how thin and frail he was, and immediately ordered a chair
for him. I knew he'd want to speak to the media before going to the
hospital, and I decided not to fight it. He thanked me silently with a
little grin and a light trail of his fingertips down my cheek.

I looked over toward the clot of cameras and microphones from NBC, and
summoned Tom Brokaw to ask the first question. When Mulder gave me a
look of confusion, I said, simply, "Trust me." We set up a chair for
Sam as well, but Mulder immediately settled Sam down onto his lap and
wrapped his arms around her, and motioned for me to take the seat next
to his. Sam seemed to loosen up a bit with the close contact, and I
was glad for it. She wasn't as thin and weak as the rest of the
survivors, but she needed some serious TLC.

I accepted two bottles of water proffered by Sheriff Lindgren, and
gave one to Mulder immediately. He opened it and gave it to his
sister, who drank deeply from it. He took the second, which I'd
already opened, and drained it in one long pull. His relief was
palpable. If any of the journalists had had any reservations about the
sincerity of his claims, Mulder's unbridled thirst dispelled them. I
took the empty bottle and motioned for another for each of them.

Brokaw approached in the interim. He was composed but clearly excited
to have been asked to go first, and took his own seat with remarkable
composure. Although all cameras were picking up the interview, only he
had the privilege of speaking to Mulder first.

"Agent Mulder, it's an honor to speak to you so soon after your
arrival."

Mulder just nodded and took a swig from his second bottle.

"Everyone has so many questions, and I'm sure we won't be able to ask
them all today. What you have been through is truly historic, and we
all look to you and your fellow survivors to tell us of what you
experienced on this ship." Brokaw tipped his head backward and to the
left, to indicate the ship behind them, clearly in the shot. "I
suppose we should all ask first, were you all treated well by your
captors?"

Mulder sighed. "For the most part we weren't hurt, as I expected we
would be. Most of us were unconscious when the fighting began between
the abductors and the rebels, and it was only when our telepathic
abilities were activated that most of us woke up. I and a couple of
others actually had to be roused by another human, in that our own
telepathic brain tissue had been removed surgically last year."

Brokaw appeared confused, and rightly so. I'm fairly sure no one had
ever spoken with such open confidence about something normally
considered as flaky as mental telepathy. Regardless, he forged on. "Do
you know why the one hundred eight of you were selected to be taken?"

"It's hard to know with any certainty," Mulder replied, stroking his
cheek against Sam's forehead in a comforting gesture. "Our original
hypothesis was that the bulk of us constituted proof of their presence
and plans, and they determined to round us up and eliminate us. I
honestly expected to be executed at some point." He suddenly seemed
visibly agitated, so I placed my hand on his elbow as he continued.
"Almost all of us had experienced the same neurological anomaly last
year - the one described to you by Agent Scully - so it's likely we
all have something in common, genetically, that they wanted to
eliminate." He took a deep breath, held it for a moment, and exhaled
slowly. It was a self-calming gesture, and an effective one at that.
His posture relaxed a little, and he appeared ready to continue.

I didn't move from that point onward. I held on to him, and reminded
him from time to time, with a gentle squeeze, that he was safe.

I hadn't had the opportunity to ask Mulder how it was possible for
Samantha to appear so young after nearly thirty years, so I was
relieved when Brokaw's last question addressed that very issue.

"We found a whole bank of cryogenic chambers in one of the back
rooms," he replied. "We didn't know how to open them without harming
the occupants, though. I remember seeing Samantha through the glass,"
he continued, nudging her forehead with his chin, "and the
anticipation was excruciating. I'd met so many clones over the years
that I really needed to know if she was the real deal. We were all
pretty surprised when the chambers sort of defrosted themselves
automatically when we passed the outer edge of our own solar system.
They must have been on some kind of automated system."

His expression fell a bit as he finished. "Sam was the only one to
survive the process. We had two others who came out of it alive but
very weak, but we couldn't keep them alive, no matter what we tried.
They both passed away only a few minutes after their chambers
deactivated themselves. That was almost a week ago." He held Samantha
close, clearly conflicted about his own gain in the face of so many
others' losses.

When Brokaw had finally finished asking his questions, a few more
journalists came forward and asked their own questions. They were
highly detailed and some were exceptionally difficult to answer,
especially those from Amanpour, who demanded to know what was in the
test tubes, and what procedures we planned to go through to determine
the origin and authenticity of the craft.

At last, Amanpour was very politely dismissed by her network's other
journalist, who took over, clearly aware of Mulder's waning energy.
Despite the "hard news" angle taken by Amanpour, CNN Washington Bureau
Chief Frank Sesno finally got to the point and asked the superficial
question everybody had been silently asking themselves. "So, Agent
Mulder, how did the spacecraft handle?"

Assorted chuckles rippled through the crowd, and Mulder's spirits
brightened somewhat.

"The controls were terrific, and the ship itself must have had one
hell of an inertia dampening field in place, because we never felt any
of the course or speed changes." He looked down at Sam, who nodded in
confirmation, and looked back up at Sesno with a little smile. "It was
definitely a sweet ride."

Sesno continued to go for the sound bites. "With water being so
dangerously scarce on the ship, bathing must have been difficult or
impossible. But none of you appear to be suffering from any hygiene
problems. How did you manage?"

Mulder then proceeded to describe the sonic shower, and its side
benefits for their hair, teeth, and clothing. "We may be a little
malnourished," he said lightly, "but my gums have never been
healthier."

And so it went, for over two hours. Finally, I had to step in.
Mulder's eyelids were drooping, and Samantha was asleep against his
shoulder.

"Last question, please," I told Mr. Stewart of Comedy Central. I
agreed to the interview only because Mulder had insisted on it. He
thought it would show a kind of journalistic diversity necessary to
prove the veracity of his claims. I rolled my eyes and conceded only
because it was easier than arguing with him. It was his moment in the
spotlight, after all, and we needed to present as united a front as
possible.

The questions had been irreverent and amusing, and not as
disrespectful as I had expected. It was actually Mulder's responses
that frightened me more.

Stewart asked with facetious solemnity, "So, zero-gravity sex: pro or
con?"

The crowd chuckled, and Mulder smiled, turning to me shamelessly.
"I'll get back to you on that," he said directly to me. I could have
killed him.

On that incredibly personal and inappropriate note, the interviews
ended, and I ushered Mulder and Samantha toward Sheriff Lindgren's
waiting cruiser for a trip to the local hospital. Skinner remained
behind for only a moment, and announced a 6 p.m. press conference for
the following day, and promised the attendance of the President
Clinton, Attorney General Janet Reno, and our big boss, FBI Director
Louis Freeh, as well as Colonel Ron Rand of the United States Air
Force, ATRD Director Morris Fletcher, and both Mulder and me. That was
news to me, but it did sound exciting. I had always wanted to meet
Attorney General Reno.

Just as we reached the car, however, we were intercepted by a man
wearing a bright red polo shirt emblazoned with an unmistakable
corporate logo, followed by a huge entourage including a camera crew.
He thrust a microphone into Mulder's face, and asked cheerfully,
"Agent Mulder, you've just flown an alien spacecraft and landed it
safe on planet Earth. What are you going to do next?"

Mulder turned to look at me and Sam, an expression of surprise and
delight on his face. "Please," he was begging me silently. As an
armchair athlete, he'd probably always wanted to say those hallowed
words. I looked at Samantha, and thought about how much she would
enjoy the benefits of his selling out to The Mouse. I pursed my lips,
and nodded my reluctant approval.

Mulder smiled broadly, and turned back to the camera. Hugging Sam with
enthusiasm, he proclaimed, "We're goin' to Disney World."

-------------------
End Part 4/9.

Part 5/9.  

Celebrities or not, I still wanted to get them to a hospital, but
Mulder refused, asking to be taken to the motel to get some rest. He
assured us that they hadn't been harmed and that they were just tired
and hungry. Reluctantly I agreed, after extracting a promise that they
would both submit to full medical examinations in the morning.

I pulled out my cell phone en route and made a quick call to my
mother, to let her know I was fine and that I would try to call her
the next day.  Samantha looked on, fascinated.

Once I'd ended the call, she asked me, wide-eyed, "Is that a
telephone?"

I smiled and nodded, offering the little unit for her inspection.
She'd missed out on so much during her absence: cellular phones,
personal computers, the Internet...she had, and still has, a lot of
catching up to do.

"It's so little," she whispered in awe to Mulder, turning the phone
over and over in her hands.  "Where's the cord?"

Mulder smiled.  "It's like a walkie-talkie.  No cords."

Her voice was reverent.  "Neato."


Sheriff Lindgren had arranged for a full range of meal choices to be
available, and whoever his caterer was deserved a medal. The dresser
was positively covered in plates and dishes of every kind, and when
Mulder and Samantha looked at the spread, they both stared, mute, in
wonder. It hurt to watch, understanding the source of their awe was
near-starvation. Despite how hungry the food made them, they both
opted for soup as being the least likely thing to upset their empty
stomachs.

"Good night," Lindgren said in a kind voice, handing me a card with
his contact information.  "Call me if you need anything."

I nodded and thanked him for his help.

For a moment he just stood there, looking at me, almost as if he
wanted to ask me something.  But before the atmosphere had a chance to
become tense, he turned and left.

A few minutes later, Skinner and I asked Mulder, between spoonfuls of
soup, if he felt up to a very quick debriefing, or if he wanted to
wait until the morning. He shrugged and said, "Whenever," as he leaned
over Sam and patted at the corner of her mouth with a napkin. She was
half-asleep over her soup, and had only managed to get a few spoonfuls
into her mouth before the spoon slipped out of her weary hand.

My own tears began to fall again, and Skinner - bless his soul -
simply left the room without another word. I sidled up beside Sam and
picked up the spoon, as Mulder gently shook her fully awake.

"Sam, honey, come on, wake up and have a little more soup," he
implored.

Her eyes snapped open, and she looked up into my face and panicked,
crying "Fox!" before recognizing me and realizing that she was safe.

"I'm right here," he said to her, and she turned to look at him.

Immediately her body relaxed, and her breathing evened out. "Sorry,"
she said suddenly and looked down, clearly embarrassed.

"It's okay," Mulder and I said in unison.

Samantha looked up at our words and chuckled. She took the spoon from
my hand, and dug into her soup again, and didn't stop until the bowl
was empty. When she was done and asked if there was any more, Mulder
put his hand on hers, and suggested that they'd both had enough for
the night - that too much food might make them feel sick.

I took both of our bags out of the closet, and dropped them on the
bed. I opened mine, looking for something for Sam to change into, and
found at once the light blue silk nightgown I'd brought on a whim. It
would fit better than the pajamas, I realized. Without hips, she'd
find the bottoms sliding right off her.

I pulled out Mulder's overnight kit out of his bag, so he could get
ready for bed, but before I could hand it to him, there was a knock on
the door. It was Skinner, who had very thoughtfully located a big
t-shirt and a small toiletry kit for Samantha. As Skinner stood there
in the doorway, I stood mirroring him, and Mulder stood behind me, his
arm around Samantha. At that moment, we all four shared the same
expression; one of relief and gratitude.

Mulder took the items from both me and Skinner and gave them to Sam,
instructing her to get ready for bed. She went into the bathroom and
closed the door behind her. And still Skinner stood in the doorway of
the motel room, and only then did I notice the presence of the lights
and cameras behind him. Fortunately the door to my room was fully
open, and the two queen-size beds were clearly visible. I was certain
my mother was watching still, and the last thing I needed was to
explain things *before* I'd had a chance to explain things.

But there stood Skinner, quiet, imploring one of us to pull the words
from him before he burst.

Mulder, of course, got right to the meat of it. Stepping forward to
stand immediately behind me, he assured, "It wasn't your fault,
Walter," he said with profound kindness. "When they want you, they
take you, and there's nothing you can do about it."

Skinner only nodded, unsurprised by Mulder's use of his first name.

Mulder made certain Skinner understood. "Thank you for trying so hard
to find me, and thank you for what you did today." He placed his hands
on my upper arms and continued. "And if you're in any way responsible
for Scully's obvious good health, well, thank you for that, too."

I hadn't thought about that, but his words made the point clear. He
must have been remembering the vertigo and nausea I suffered during my
first trimester, and had been worried about my health. The notion that
he held such a fear made the anticipation over telling him about the
baby that much sweeter.

Again, Skinner did nothing but nod, so I jumped in to end the awkward
exchange.

"We should get some rest. We all have a big day tomorrow."

He must have understood, because he wished us a good night, and left
for his own room. To their credit, the paparazzi didn't inundate us
with questions. There were more camera flashes than I could safely
count, but no intrusive questions. I was grateful, as I closed the
door and locked it.

By the time I turned around, Mulder was standing before his open
suitcase, snickering. "Obsess much?" he asked teasingly.

Okay, I was a little preoccupied when I'd packed for him, I'll admit
that. I ended up folding and refolding each cherished item of his
until the case was stuffed to bursting with my favorite articles of
his clothing. No fewer than three of those crisp blue dress shirts
capped the stack. Beneath them, mocking me silently, was Mulder's
softest flannel shirt, his Knicks T-shirt, those plaid cotton pajama
bottoms that ride so gorgeously low on his hips when he wears them
without a shirt, three pairs of silk boxers, two pairs of knitted
cotton boxer briefs - which I insisted on, despite his protests - his
black and white turtlenecks, three pairs of jeans, two pairs of
sweatpants, a sweatshirt, his sneakers, some socks, a couple of plain
white t-shirts, and - to his apparent amusement - the case containing
his reading glasses. So sue me. I was pregnant and hopeful, and the
notion of seeing him in that flannel with those glasses set my heart
thumping noisily away. I was, obviously, thoroughly busted.

He turned to me, his smile full of mischief, and pulled me to his
chest. His voice was nothing more than warm breath against the top of
my head. "I missed you too."

Obviously, thoroughly, and irreversibly busted. It was wonderful.

We broke off the embrace when Sam returned from the bathroom, and
Mulder took his turn. Meanwhile, I settled Sam into one of the beds
and then set about packing up the leftovers and putting them in the
small refrigerator near the door. When I was done, Samantha was lying
alone at the far edge of the bed, her little hands holding tight to
the edge of the blanket.

"Is this okay?" I asked her as I approached the bed and made to sit
down.

She nodded.

I sat in silence with her for only a few moments before she blindsided
me.  "Is Mom dead, Dana?"

I looked down at her, and saw the misery in her expression. Mulder
hadn't told her, the bastard, and her question was so direct that
anything other than a real answer would be unfair. I couldn't hedge. I
made the decision that since Mulder trusted me with her, I would tell
her the truth.

I reached over and began to stroke her tense little hands with my
fingertips. "I'm so sorry, Sam. She died a few months ago."

She appeared to be dangerously close to tears, but she held them at
bay, biting her lip and looking away for a moment. Her show of
strength broke my heart. "Did they hurt her?"

I shook my head. "No, it was nothing like that. Your mom had a very
serious illness that couldn't be treated. She went to sleep and just
didn't wake up. It was very peaceful." I hated telling her only part
of the truth, but it seemed the only kind thing to do.  "We're not
going to let anything bad happen to you.  Okay?"

"Okay," she said simply.

"This must be very hard to get used to," I murmured, "but I promise
we'll do everything we can to make coming home easier."

Her mouth crinkled up and she looked at me.

"Now I need a promise from you in return. I need you to tell us if
there's something you need. Don't be afraid to ask. We might not be
able to do everything you ask, but we'll do all we can. And we can
only do that if you talk to us. Will you promise that?"

She nodded and her mouth relaxed, the corners turning up just a touch.

I smiled in return. "Good. Now if you get hungry in the middle of the
night, the leftover food is in the refrigerator, so just help
yourself, and don't worry about waking us up." I continued to stroke
her hand with mine. "For now, a lot of little meals will be better for
you than a few big ones, okay?"

"Okay," she responded. "You have soft hands."

I smiled, my cheek muscles protesting from their overuse in the past
day.  "Your brother and I are proud of you.  You're very brave."

"I don't feel brave," she replied, sinking further into her pillow.

I understood.  "Are you still a little scared?"

She nodded.

I most definitely understood.  "Being brave doesn't mean not being
scared, Sam," I told her.  "It means going ahead and doing things
*even though* you're scared."  I tapped the tip of her nose with one
finger.  "Looks to me like you're doing great."


Mulder finally emerged from the bathroom; hazy, dressed in loose,
light cotton, and deliciously tousled. "That," he emphasized, "was a
near-religious experience."

I chuckled and gathered my own things to prepare for bed.

When I returned to the room, I found Mulder snuggled up next to
Samantha, her little hand in his, her head nestled in to the crook of
his arm. They were already asleep.

I was disappointed to end up sleeping on my own in the other big bed,
but the comfort of having him so near was enough to prevent melancholy
from taking over the moment. He was home, he was safe, his sister was
alive and remembered him, and she seemed to like me. And, of course,
we were absolutely and unquestionably vindicated, professionally. It
had been - without question - the best day of my life.

Still, the thought wouldn't abandon me as I tossed and turned under
the covers of my own bed - that a good-night kiss would have been
good. Regardless, they both needed their sleep. I turned off the light
and tried to relax enough to rest, despite the sharp shafts of light
pouring into the room from between the gappy curtains.

I don't recall precisely what I did to wake Mulder, and if anyone here
asks me about it, I will deny any attempt to rouse him that night. But
Mulder insists now that I sighed loudly and turned so much that the
rustling of my sheets drove him to distraction. All I know about this
is that he turned to me, opened his eyes, and pulled up the corner of
his blankets, imploring me with his eyes to just join them in their
bed already and shut the hell up.

He didn't have to ask twice.

I rose, and executing a tremendously tricky maneuver involving the
tacky lined curtains and my notebook computer, managed to seal off the
room from prying eyes. Then I slid in beside him, and mirrored Sam's
acquisition of half of his body. Of course, my thoughts were by
necessity different from hers, comprising the comfort she must have
been feeling as well my own desire for him. I couldn't have made love
with him if we'd had an entire honeymoon suite to ourselves, but I
enjoyed the notion of simply being with him again and feeling free
enough to adore him without reservation. He deserved it, and so much
more, for all he'd been through.

He wrapped his free arm around me, and pressed his lips to my
forehead. I felt him squeeze both Samantha and me tightly as he
muttered, "My girls." That was when I tensed up.

"What is it?" he whispered, continuing to hold me against his chest.
"Startin' to crash?"

I'm sure a sudden lack of adrenaline in my bloodstream could have
explained part of what was happening to me, but really it was mostly
fear. I was afraid he'd just placed me squarely into the "sister"
category of his life, as I had feared he'd been doing for years:
creating in me a surrogate for Sam. When our relationship took a turn
toward couplehood, I felt confident those old reservations had been
unfounded. So with his simple utterance, I found all those fears
crashing back in. With the kind of surprise I still had in store for
him, the thought was frightening.

I still hadn't answered him, and I didn't even know how to begin. Any
protest I could have offered at the time would have been selfish and
ungrateful. So I said nothing.

Finally, he shook his head and sighed. "I haven't forgotten, Scully.
Have you?"

Of course I hadn't. The conversation and activities that occurred that
last night before he left for Oregon have been etched on my brain ever
since.

"I don't like the idea of your being out there without me," I'd told
him as he'd packed.

"Me neither, but I'll have Skinner there. I'll be fine. If I go, it's
just an investigation. If you go, it could be the end of the world."
He'd looked up and whacked me in the forehead with a rolled-up pair of
socks. "My world, anyway."

"I hope these are clean," I'd sniffed in disgust as I approached and
handed them back to him.

He'd taken both my hand and the proffered socks, and held me there
with both his hands and eyes. "You get that now, right?"

I'd nodded, biting the inside of my cheek.

He'd released my hand and gone back to his overstuffed closet to
retrieve another shirt. "We have to do something about this closet,"
he'd told me, and it was then I'd understood that he'd finally meant
it.

In prior weeks, he would make a big show of how crowded his closet had
become, overloaded as it was with my own clothes. I'd had a similar
problem at my own apartment. "We have to do something about this
closet," had been our unapproachable code phrase implying, "Are we
ready to discuss moving this relationship of ours forward?" Avoidance
and glib responses had been our usual fare. I hadn't been so willing
to let go of the idea that last night together, however.

"Yes, we do," I'd confirmed to him, pleased that he was in no way
surprised.

"Okay," he'd said simply, folding up the shirt and placing it gently
into his bag. "We can talk about arrangements when I get back."

"Right," I'd said, trying to overcome the surrealism of the
conversation we were having. "My place is a little bigger, but I think
maybe we should just start looking for a new place."

"Neutral territory," he'd said, smirking.

"Yes."

"You wanna set a date?" Just like that. He'd managed to propose
without proposing. So like us, I'd thought at the time.

"We can talk about it when you get back," I'd said.

And that had been it. No vows of unending love -- no vows of love at
all, in fact. He'd simply finished packing and taken me to bed.

I hadn't forgotten that decision, the pledge we'd made without words
like "I promise," or "I vow."

"I remember," I answered him. "Is it still what you want?"

"Yeah, it's still what I want, Scully."  He was silent for a few
moments. Finally, when he spoke again, his voice was low, quelling my
concerns with his disarmingly pre-emptive assurance. "You are not now,
nor have you ever been, a sister by proxy."

I relaxed at once and leaned in to him, and just as I looked up, he
tipped his head up off the pillow to meet mine. We kissed; a sweet,
soft, gentle kiss that spoke more of promises than any oaths could
have. I have no memory of when the kiss ended. I think I must have
dropped off to sleep in the midst of it.


The next day went by in another whirl of activity. Fortunately, the
combination of a midnight snack and a big breakfast helped to bolster
both Mulder's and Sam's strength, and they proceeded through the
trials of the day with surprising energy.

Sheriff Lindgren arrived bright and early with a small bundle of
clothing for Samantha - a pretty dress which she disdained at once,
and a pair of jeans she put on eagerly. I gave her one of my t-shirts
and we rolled up the sleeves. He'd also brought three pairs of
inexpensive sneakers, unsure of her shoe size. We were all immensely
grateful for his help. Sam was thrilled to dress like a boy after so
long wearing that little girl's nightgown.

I'd expected Sam to be afraid of the doctors, considering what must
have been done to her early on in her abduction, but she handled the
entire experience with remarkable composure. Sam accepted Mulder's
suggestion that I remain with her throughout the examination, and it
turned out to be an excellent idea. My presence seemed to help her
remain calm.

Since Mulder hadn't been harmed in any appreciable way, his
examinations were only difficult in that he himself is a dreadful
patient. I wouldn't wish him on any respectable physician. Between his
whining about being "harpooned" with various needles and his annoying
habit of chattering endlessly through an examination, he kept the
medical staff more than occupied.

Finally, with samples drawn and countless tests performed, it was time
for lunch, and I elected to keep them sequestered for the time being,
so we returned to the motel in another flurry of clicking camera
shutters and blinding, flashing light.

Again, Sheriff Lindgren proved to be a wonderful host, supplying us
with lunch - this time an array of local freshwater fish - simply
steamed for the benefit of our guests of honor - served with boiled
potatoes and accompanied by milk for both Mulder and Sam. Mulder put
up a fight over the milk, but I reminded him that it was a complete
food and would help him regain his strength faster. When I applied an
arched eyebrow to the explanation, he began to drink without
reservation.

It's strange, I discovered then, how little things can shift one's
perceptions utterly. I was enjoying the sight of the two of them
eating enthusiastically, and I thought about how happy Mulder must
have been to have his life back. I was also pondering how much better
off Sam was, having two people who would love and protect her without
fail this time. I floated along on happy untethered thoughts of our
instant family, complete with visions of Christmas mornings and
birthday parties, and thus failed to consider the very real, practical
implications of the situation at the time.

It wasn't until I heard Mulder encourage her, "C'mon Sam, drink your
milk," that the full depth of the situation struck me. He was
accepting responsibility for her, behaving the way a guardian should,
and his easy authority and concern seemed so effortless, I was
stunned. For better or worse, Sam was suddenly our responsibility, and
we were to be both siblings and guardians to her. Both of us.

I had been looking forward to our first foray into adult
responsibility for a minor child, but I had expected it to be that
first wonderful day after our baby was born, not his first day back on
earth, his nine-year-old sister in tow. The thoughts were selfish, and
I did my best to banish them. We were all lucky, all three of us, and
I would do everything possible to remind myself and them of our good
fortune.

During the meal, Mulder told me more of what he'd experienced on the
ship and what he'd been told by the rebels before they'd left. It wasn
't anything earth-shaking, but we had such a vital responsibility in
those test tubes - which Skinner assured me were under constant guard
by an entire platoon of Marines - that I felt a little on edge at the
thought of the future of the human race all in one place, so
vulnerable. Skinner agreed, apparently, because he left the room, and
when he returned forty-five minutes later, he informed us that the CDC
was to take possession of all but four of the vials within two hours.
One of the remaining four was going to the ATRD archives for
safekeeping, and the last three were going back to Washington with us.

After lunch, I insisted that Mulder and Sam get some more rest, and
they resisted.  Sam was taking her first look at a personal computer,
and in characteristic Mulder fashion, she was thoroughly focused on
the task.

At first I'd thought she was impressed and in awe of the minute size
of my notebook computer, so when I caught her snickering, I was
confused.

"Mulder, what are you showing her?"  I was concerned he'd found
something inappropriate on the Internet.

He chuckled in response.  "Nothing.  It's just that it's, uh...a
little..." he searched for the right word, "well...kind of *primitive*
compared to the systems on the ship.  I think Sam's a little
disappointed."

Her stifled chuckle turned into patronizing laughter.  Pointing to the
keyboard, she exclaimed, "You have to spell things out!"

After her initial interest wore off, she finally gave in a slept a
bit. I was encouraged that their energy was increasing so quickly.

By the time we were ready for the press conference Skinner had
arranged, Lindgren had stopped by with more of the boyish clothing Sam
seemed to like.

I followed Lindgren out of the room to thank him, when I noticed he'd
already pulled out his cell phone and begun a brief but heated
conversation.  I only overheard one disturbing piece of it.

"Well find out!" he whispered harshly.  "Nobody's taking my calls, and
nobody's calling back...This is really, really bad...Yeah, I
know...Just keep working on the projections and release maps.  I'll
get you the real thing."

His tone was stronger, more forceful than I had ever heard it, and the
sudden switch in demeanor put me on edge.  We'd met too many people
who weren't who they'd claimed to be.  I slipped away before he had a
chance to discover my presence.

"I'll look into it," Skinner told me when I asked him to find out
everything he could about Sheriff Lindgren.


The press conference itself was spectacularly dull, but it was a
genuine thrill to meet so many successful and respected individuals.
Janet Reno was poised and powerful, and despite the fact that I
normally see myself as composed and strong, I felt like a little girl
in her imposing shadow. The President was charming and utterly
dignified, and Director Freeh was businesslike and respectful. "You
have done the human race an incalculable service, Agents," President
Clinton told us, his voice quivering with just the right amount of
calculated awe.

In all, however, the thrill abated quickly, as the high-profile
members of the panel took their positions in front of the cameras, and
annexed our work as their own. Mulder and I both made efforts to keep
from embarrassing ourselves, so we had to be very careful not to make
too much eye contact. We'd made the mistake once, just as Director
Freeh described the "open-minded approach of the FBI in its pursuit of
the truth," and Mulder and I had to choke back facetious snickers. I
don't know what was going through Mulder's mind at the time, but all I
could think about was the obvious open-mindedness of Alvin Kersh, Tom
Colton, and their ilk.

When it was over, and we'd all had a chance to listen to the leaders
pontificate, we made our respectful good nights, and headed back to
Sheriff Lindgren's cruiser. The sheriff mentioned to Skinner that he
would take us back to the hotel and that he would return for the A.D.,
explaining that the press had become very invasive at the motel, and
he didn't want to split his attention between parties going to two
different rooms. Skinner agreed, seemingly pleased to return to his
prior conversation with Director Freeh and Attorney General Reno.  His
apparent comfort with the arrangement was enough to assuage my concern
about Lindgren's loyalties.

It was just after eight p.m., and Mulder and I had bundled up Sam and
were sitting quietly in the back seat of Sheriff Lindgren's cruiser,
on the trip back to the motel. Yet again, a cellular phone call in the
car served as a catalyst for the flurry of activity that followed.

At first, Lindgren ignored the ringing. The phone was an unusual
built-in dashboard unit that I'd never seen before. It looked like a
cross between a stereo and a palmtop computer. Over the prior two
days, I'd thought idly that it was awfully advanced for a rural
sheriff. As it rang, Lindgren glanced quickly away from the road
toward the Caller ID display, read the gibberish on the screen, and
disregarded the call.

A few moments later the ringing stopped. Then it started again. Again,
he let it go.

"Really, Sheriff," Mulder told him, "go ahead and take the call if
it's important."

"It's okay," he assured him, "it's personal. I'll return the call
later."

The phone continued in its pattern of ringing, stopping, and ringing
again, until, with an exasperated sigh, he hit the "phone" button.
There didn't appear to be a headpiece. Before the caller could speak,
Sheriff Lindgren blurted out, "Hi. Sorry, I can't talk right now. I
have a couple of FBI agents in the car with me. I'll call you later."

The male caller, undeterred, replied, "Don't hang up. It's important.
Encrypt." The voice sounded familiar.

"Really," he stressed, "can we talk about this later? I have Agents
*Mulder* and *Scully* here with me," he replied, emphasizing our
names.

"No, it can't wait. Encrypt."

That single word, "Encrypt," made it clear that Lindgren was anything
but what he claimed to be.  I cursed Skinner inwardly for failing to
discover the Sheriff's duplicity, and looked over at Mulder.  He
returned my glance with a concerned expression.

Lindgren meanwhile huffed out an annoyed breath, and punched a few
buttons on the control panel. A disarmingly calm female voice prompted
and confirmed each step of the encryption process, while Sheriff
Lindgren split his attention between tapping entries on the keypad and
watching the road as he drove. "B-Level encryption in process. Enter
Code Key. Stand by. Enter PIN. Stand by. Rerouting. Stand by.
Encrypting. Stand by. Line Secure." It was sophisticated.

Finally, after a brief pause and a long, high beep, the line crackled
back to life.

Lindgren spoke first. "We're clear. What's going on?"

The caller's voice was a little rough, and his breathing was rapid. He
sounded upset. "Strughold just found out about the serum and put a
contract out on Mulder and Scully. I've got the mothers and Michael.
Your wife's en route. Get them to the northwestern safe house. I'm
locking up tomorrow at six. You have ID and cash?"

It really was too much to absorb. It had all come out on one breath,
and I honestly couldn't keep track of everything he said. Strughold
wanted us dead? The mothers? Who the hell was Michael? Who the hell
was the caller?

"Plenty of each," the Sheriff replied. "What the hell is this about a
contract? Strughold hasn't returned my calls today.  I prepared for
the worst, but...shit, who got the contract?"

He was in communication with the Consortium? I began to feel queasy.

"*I* got the contract," the voice said. "Must be trying to out me. Get
them to the safe house, Eric. I'll meet you there and we'll wait it
out. I had Brin take out the last of the installations last week. The
last set of clones are history. We're ready to prep the airborne and
the preliminary projections are good. In a few weeks it'll all be
moot, and we can do some clean-up. Right now I need to get the three
of you - and those vials - somewhere safe."

"Four. Mulder's sister is here."

There was a brief pause. "His sister is alive?" Just as I had given up
on identifying the voice, it hit me. Krycek.

"Yeah, looks like we've got a big reunion weekend planned. I take it
you haven't been watching television. You fixed on supplies?"

"Yeah," the caller said. "I wasn't exactly planning on ten people, but
we have the space. Holmes and Watson there are gonna have to share a
room." Sarcastic son of a bitch. "Our supplies and power factor out
for ten people at.just under seven months. We're set. Just get your
asses there, and fast."

"All right, we'll see you there."

"Good. And Eric, be gentle with the civvies, okay?"

"I'm a little short on bedside manner right now. You're the one with
all the PR skills."

He laughed. "Tomorrow noon lockup. Be careful."

"We will. Take good care of the sprog."

He pressed a button on the control panel, and the line went silent.
When he spoke again, his voice was low and deadly serious. "I'd really
like to discuss this in depth, but I'm afraid that if I pull over,
you'll bolt. So just listen up while I drive, okay?" He was addressing
us both, but his eyes were fixed solely on mine.

"With all the publicity, I was afraid something like this was going to
happen. I was only going to take those vials off your hands, but when
my 'bosses' stopped returning my calls I decided to take action. To
that end, I've packed up your things; they're in the trunk. Now if I
don't get you somewhere safe, one of Strughold's men will take you out
before you'll even know there's a weapon sight on you.

"That was Alex Krycek." I wasn't losing my touch entirely. "I'll
explain all that later. Yes, he's with us, and no, we're not THEM.
Neither is he. Not really, anyway. But you'll get all the background
when we get to the safe house.

"We have your mother, Dana, so she's safe as well. It's very likely
Strughold would have gone after her in the wake of your disappearance,
as a way of compelling you to resurface, despite the publicity it
would create. That's simply not an option. We'll lie low for a few
weeks until our work is complete, and then we'll be able to go back to
our lives. But for now, you'll need to do exactly as I say, and
question nothing. Do you understand?"

Refusing of course to question nothing, Mulder asked, "Who are you?"

"It's a really long story, Fox," he said in amusement, "but we just
don't have the luxury of schmoozing right now. We're going to change
vehicles a couple of times, and then head out to the safe house. Alex
is going to seal the place up tomorrow at six. That means nobody in or
out, even me, and I *paid* for the goddamned place. It's a
non-negotiable deadline."

And out of all that, all I focused on was that he'd called Mulder
'Fox'. As it turned out, it was my most astute observation of the day.
That and the fact that we had just under twenty-four hours to make it
to our destination.

---------------------
End Part 5/9.


Part 6/9.  

The rest of the night was a blur. After a few disturbingly relaxed
phone calls, we changed from the Sheriff's car to a bland, American
mid-size sedan, to a panel van, to another anonymous sedan, to another
van, and finally to a nice, comfortable full-size luxury car. At each
stop, the drivers merely traded vehicles, and with the exchange of
passengers, a few thick file folders, and coolers filled with food and
water, we were on our way again.

We'd changed direction a half-dozen times in only a few hours, and I
was thoroughly lost by midnight. To her credit, Samantha held herself
together surprisingly well. She cried a little here and there, but
Mulder told her stories for much of the night, and answered her
questions about their family as well as he could.

It must have been a horrific task, deciding how much to tell her and
how to say it - how much to withhold and why. But Mulder handled the
task with gentleness and understanding, offering her hugs and smiles
between kid-sized answers to her very big questions. I simply sat
there, holding either her hand or his, offering tacit support. I fell
in love with him all over again as I watched him comfort his sister.

When she asked him, "Was Dad one of the bad guys?" his expression
fell, and I thought he'd run out of diplomacy. He surprised me with
the depth of his compassion.

"No, Sam, I think he was just confused about what was right and what
was wrong. That happens to everybody sometimes. What makes a person a
real grownup is their willingness to learn from their mistakes. I'm
not sure Dad ever really learned from his."

"But what he did hurt us, so he's bad. He let them take me, you said
so," she insisted crossly.

Mulder responded with more words in a soothing tone. "I don't think
you should be angry with him, Sam. I think it's probably better to
feel sad for him because he never really grew up. You and I have the
chance to make sure we don't make the same mistakes. We can learn from
him and Mom."

She thought about his answer for a long time, and finally responded,
"I'm glad he's dead."

"Honey," Mulder implored.

She remained resolute. "He didn't do anything good. He let them take
me, then he left Mom and you all alone."

"Sweetie," Mulder insisted, "he was still our Dad. He did plenty of
Dad things before it started to go wrong. Don't forget that."

"Like what?" she asked petulantly. "He never taught me to fish - it
was Uncle Chet who did that. He never played baseball with us - that
was Uncle Chet too. Uncle Chet was the one who took us sailing, and
took us out for ice cream with Mom when Dad was away. Dad was *always*
away."

I attempted to control my shock when I looked at Mulder. He was
stunned.

"You remember him, Sam?"

"Yeah. He was way nicer to us than Dad ever was. He was nicer to Mom,
too. He never yelled at Mom the way Dad did."


By the time she'd run out of questions and finally given in to
exhaustion, Mulder and I were too tired to do anything but the same.
He sat on the hump in the middle of the back seat, with Samantha's
head nestled on the folded jacket in his lap, and my head against his
chest.

Once she'd finally fallen asleep, I asked Mulder a little about what
had happened to her on the ship.

"I'm not really sure," he told me.  "The tests showed no evidence of
surgical damage, which is good, but it's clear they managed to remove
her ova somehow.  There's no chip in her, and the doctors say she's
healthy, so I guess maybe they just kept her in the freezer most of
the time."

I shook my head sadly.  She might never be able to have children.  Of
course, that's what they said about me, too.

"She said she remembered little bits and pieces over the time she was
there, so maybe they thawed her out every now and then."  He breathed
out a nasty little chuckle through his nose.  "But they kept her in
that nightgown - -"  he yawned, "Hell, I don't know."

I tipped my head up just a little and pressed my nose into his neck.
"We should get some sleep," I murmured.


A few hours later I awoke lying on my side, with Mulder stretched out
behind me, holding me close to him with one arm. Samantha lay curled
up in the far corner of the seat, her little legs wrapped around
Mulder's feet.

"Sheriff Lindgren?" I called to him quietly. I considered it amazing
he could still drive after all those hours. "Are we far from a public
bathroom?" Although I wasn't showing all that much, the internal
pressure on my bladder had begun to increase noticeably.

He spoke quietly. "Looks like there's a place up on the left. Your
partner awake yet?"

I sat up and looked back at Mulder's face, so lovely and tranquil.
"Not yet."

"Wakey, wakey," Lindgren called out loudly. "Time for all Federal
Agents to go potty!"

Mulder awoke with a start, and sat up, rubbing his eyes. "Where are
we?" Samantha rose as well, yawning and stretching.

"Somewhere north of where we were before," Lindgren replied
unhelpfully. He pulled the car into a modern service station and after
killing the engine, turned to face us, his expression grave. "Listen
up, both of you. I'm doing this to save your lives. If you try to run,
you'll only end up hurting yourselves. By now they've long figured out
that Alex has no intention of carrying out his orders. In fact, it's
likely Strughold gave him the contract in the first place as a means
of flushing him out. So Alex has been outed, as have I, and we're
mortgaging our own lives for yours. So be grateful and get back into
the car when you're done. We'll be at our destination before sunset."

I surprised myself by nodding. Mulder did the same. "All right,"
Mulder told him, opening the door and maneuvering himself stiffly out
of the car. He held out his hand to assist Samantha and then me.

That's how you define a gentleman, I thought to myself: the ability to
be genteel when everything is uncertain.

It was a brief but efficient stop. The bathrooms weren't too horrible,
and by the time we returned to the car, Lindgren had already filled
the tank with gas, and purchased some additional provisions and food
for us at the little mini-mart. Mulder insisted on driving for a
while, and I gratefully moved into the passenger seat. Ah, lumbar
support. Sam sat on the large bench seat between us, watching the road
intently.

Sheriff Lindgren had given us written directions but no map, so I was
grateful for the large cup of coffee he'd provided. It was decaf, of
course, but the taste and smell of it acted as an effective placebo.
I'd needed to stay awake to follow the convoluted instructions.

After our brief meal of hot dogs and soft pretzels, Lindgren had
dropped off to sleep in the back seat. Mulder asked Sam if she was
tired, and she nodded.

"Come on and get comfy," I offered, raising my arm, and inviting her
to rest her cheek on my shoulder. She did without a second thought. I
found that exceptionally comforting, and draped my arm around her as
she too succumbed to sleep. Quietly, so as not to disturb his sister,
Mulder and I began to discuss our situation.

"Mulder, what do you think is really going on here?"

He shrugged. "Actually," he paused, "I think he's telling us the
truth. I haven't figured out all the machinations of it yet, but I
think he's being essentially honest with us."

"And Krycek's involvement?"

"I'm having a hard time accepting that he's Captain Wonderful."

"Me too," I told him. "He's proven himself helpful recently, but that
doesn't do much to improve my estimation of his trustworthiness. The
very idea that he has my mother in his clutches is chilling. I wish I
could talk to her."

He turned to look at me for a quick moment, before turning his
attention back to the road. "What did you make of all the mission
jargon?"

Honestly, I'd focussed so much on names that I hadn't really heard
anything else. I had vague recollections about taking out an
installation, dead clones, and something airborne. Good thing I had
the Human Tape Recorder in the car with me. "Refresh my memory?"

He gave a little smile and began to recite the caller's words
verbatim: "Brin took out the last of the installations last week. The
last set of clones are history. We're ready to prep the airborne and
the preliminary projections are good. In a few weeks, it'll all be
moot, and we can do some clean-up."

"Okay," I began, "he's destroyed some kind of base or installation.
Good thing or bad thing?"

"Hard to know," Mulder replied. "They keep claiming to want to protect
us from the Consortium. So let's assume it's a Consortium
installation. In that case, good."

"Generous assumption. All right," I continue, "the last set of clones
are history. I think we're safe to assume they were killed."

"Safe guess."

"I'll put that on the 'good thing' side of the equation," I agreed.
"Okay. The 'airborne' being prepped and the projections looking good?"

"Well, what travels airborne?"

"Pathogens. Humidity. Fighter jets. Overnight packages."

"Spaceships," Mulder quipped.

I raised one eyebrow and continued. "Let's pass on that one and get
back to it later. Not enough information to go on right now."

"Agreed," he said.

"Everything being moot in a few weeks, and performing 'clean-up'?" I
glanced back at Lindgren, to ensure he was still asleep. He appeared
to be.

"Well, something is airborne that's going to change the Consortium's
power base permanently, evidenced by the sudden need for our
elimination. Lindgren and we assume Krycek want us alive. They're
protecting us until whatever it is blows over." He continued, thinking
aloud.

I sat back and listened to the strings of logic stream from him,
nearly effortlessly, as I usually did when he would shift into
Pontification Mode. "Why does the Consortium exist?" he asked
rhetorically before answering himself. "It exists to facilitate
colonization, preserve their own existence, and usurp power from the
legitimate authorities. Working in reverse, it seems unlikely that two
lone individuals could undermine the virtual tapestry of loyalties and
professional relationships Spender and his men have woven over
decades. So the power grab is out. They live to preserve themselves,
but since I have no more information on them today than I had three
months ago, it seems unlikely they wanted us eliminated to cover their
own asses. That leaves colonization."

"Go on," I encouraged.

"I still don't know very much, regardless of what I learned on that
ship. The call for the hit didn't happen until I got home and we met
Sheriff Lindgren. Maybe he knows something. Or someone."

"Maybe he *is* someone," Lindgren mumbled from the back seat. I turned
in surprise. Mulder merely angled the rear-view mirror to allow him to
see him better. "I'm somebody you were never supposed to meet.
Strughold obviously didn't trust me to keep my silence. The contract
on your lives was likely a direct result of that. Pity, too. You never
would have known if he hadn't outed me. What a schmuck." He rolled
over and went back to sleep.

"Well, that cleared *that* up," Mulder deadpanned.

We spent the next half hour in silence, comfortable but anxious in our
purloined luxury sedan.

I'd been holding back from Mulder, listening to the news and updates
from others for so long, that I'd nearly forgotten about reporting my
own news. I'd spent an anxious half hour then, wondering if I should
tell him in the relative calm of the car, or if I should wait until we
had a moment alone. I was still nervous about our arrangements, and
concluded that with Lindgren and Samantha asleep again, I might not
have another opportunity to bring up the subject.

The problem was, although I'd rehearsed a dozen different ways of
telling him, when it came right down to it, I had no idea how to
approach the subject. So for the time being I said nothing.

Finally, Mulder angled the rear-view mirror down and to the right.

I caught the reflection of his eyes with my own, and then looked away.
I would do it in my own time. "It's a safety device, Mulder, not a
surveillance system."

A voiceless chuckle hissed out through his nose. "You've been quiet. I
didn't want to take my eyes off the road."

"I'm..."

"Don't you dare say that, Scully."

I nodded. He had a point. "You're right. I'm sorry. It's just...I
don't know how to say this."

"Well if you string words together, they create what we call
sentences." He glanced in the left side mirror before changing lanes.
The burgundy hatchback we'd been following for the last ten minutes
had slowed again. "Then you string some sentences together, and..."

I grimaced at his glibness. I had something incredibly important to
tell him, and he was being lighthearted about it. I looked back up and
chided him. "Mulder."

He shook his head. "You have a choice here: you can either tell me
what's on your mind or we can pretend that nothing's going on. One of
them is a hell of a lot healthier than the other. And I don't mean to
influence you unduly, but I'm sick and tired of being unhealthy." He
slowed down in frustration when a white SUV attempted to cut us off as
we passed the hatchback. "I didn't go through all of this, neither of
us has, so we can skip right on back to silence and self-denial." He
glanced up to my reflection again. "Now out with it."

"All right. There *is* something on my mind, Mulder, something I need
to tell you. It's just that...I was so happy when we reconfirmed our
decision your first night back, especially in light of the fact that
you didn't know everything, that..." I paused and cleared my throat.

His eyes flicked up again. "I don't know everything about what?"

I pursed my lips and exhaled. Which approach to take?

When he spoke next, his voice was small and shaky. "Are you sick?"

I shot a quick glance back to his in the mirror, and he must have seen
the surprise in my expression. "No, nothing like that. I'm perfectly
healthy. It's just that what I have to tell you might have affected
our discussion, and..." I shook my head. "I'm not saying this at all
the way I'd planned."

He chuffed out a quick, impatient breath. "Just say it, please. You're
killing me here. What's going on?"

"Mulder," I began, "you're an honorable man. You have such a
well-developed sense of decency and charity, that I'm sure we would
have made the same decision if I had told you first. I just needed to
know that we were going to do it for the right reasons."

"Okay, I think I get that," he prompted. "So...?"

I took a deep breath, held it for a moment, and released it. "I'm
approaching this all wrong."

Mulder slammed his left hand on the steering wheel in frustration.
"Why does it have to be like pulling teeth? Just fucking say it."

"Mulder," I whispered harshly, "Sam." I looked down at her sleeping
form to remind him to lower his voice and to watch his language.

"Sorry," he husked back at me in irritation. "Just tell me what the
hell is going on, Scully. You're scaring the living *shit* out of me,"
he whispered severely.

My sheepish murmur was so soft and so quick on the heels of his
exclamation that if he hadn't been listening for it, he might have
missed it entirely. "I'm pregnant."

His brows furrowed, his eyes blinked, and his head shook briefly from
side to side. I took all of it as a sign of disbelief. Then he did
what I didn't expect: he cut the car across two empty lanes and pulled
to a smooth stop on the shoulder of the road. Breathing heavily, he
leaned his weight on both hands, perfectly positioned at ten and two.
"What did you say?"

"You have no idea how many ways I'd rehearsed it. I was thinking of
settling on a speech about my mother's 'birds and bees' talk when I
was twelve. It was excellent. You really would have liked it."

"Promise to tell me another time."

I smiled faintly. "I will."

He turned only his head to face me. "So it's true. It's real."

"Yes." I couldn't meet his eyes.

Turning completely, he reached over and drew my chin to the side so he
could look into my eyes. "You're going to have a baby."

I nodded dumbly. Samantha stirred, probably aware that the car had
stopped, but I stroked her back gently, and she went back to sleep,
settling her head down on my thigh.

Mulder watched warily as I comforted his sister. "How long?" he asked
me.

I shook my head and squeezed my eyes shut. "I found out about three
hours before I was told you'd been taken."

My words deflated him. He expelled his held breath, and as I opened my
eyes to look at him, I saw his spine collapse in on itself. "Oh my
God, Scully."

"Believe me, they were three wonderful hours," I told him softly,
looking back up at him. "I tried to imagine how you would react, what
you would say. I already knew you'd be happy. I just couldn't figure
out what kind of happy to expect."

"Then I was gone. Jesus."

"It was hard, I won't lie to you. But this baby saved me. There were
days when I wouldn't have eaten or slept. I might have lost hope, but
I had this tiny life to consider with everything I did. It was so
important to me that I...that I preserve the little piece of you that
you left behind. So you see," I said, forcing a cheerful tone into my
voice, "I wasn't really sick. Well, not permanently anyway."

"So there we were, agonizing over your inability to conceive..."

"When we'd already accomplished the job three weeks prior. We always
have been overachievers."

That drew a smile across his lips, and when he raised his head, his
body followed. "We accomplished it. It's ours."

I heard the implicit question. "Yes."

"What tests have you run?"

"Everything the doctors will let me run. I had an amniocentesis nine
days ago, and I had them draw a small fetal blood sample at the same
time. The obstetrician ran standard amnio screens and I ran the PCRs.
"

"And?" he asked, chewing the inside of his cheek.

"Healthy, human, and ours."

He nodded in relief.

"Well, mostly human. Considering our individual genetic anomalies, the
baby is as human as can be expected."

He nodded again.

I finally turned to face him fully. My expression was gentle. "Are you
okay with this?"

He was quiet for a while, maybe trying to find the right words. But
what he ended up sputtering out was, "Three weeks prior?"

I smiled and nodded, my eyebrows raised in near-condescension.

He didn't seem pleased by the implication. "Caddyshack and beer.
Great. Well, you can't say I don't know how to romance a lady," he
muttered.

I smiled at him indulgently. "Remind me not to let you plan the
reception."

A muffled voice from the back seat made us both jump. "Why did we
stop?"

"It's okay," I told Sheriff Lindgren, "we're just discussing something
important, and we didn't want to be distracted."

Lindgren rose, blinking, and shook his head. "We don't have any time
to waste. Let's get back on the road. We have to be there by six."
When Mulder and I nodded in agreement, Lindgren lay back down.

"What's going on?" Samantha asked sleepily as she stretched her arms
across my lap.

"Come on back here, Samantha," Lindgren muttered from behind us.
"There's room to stretch out if you want."

Sam turned to her brother to ask if it was okay. Mulder smoothed down
her hair and smiled. "Sure." Before he was done with the single word,
Samantha had unbuckled her seat belt and climbed into the back.

Mulder caressed my cheek with the back of his knuckles and smiled
warmly. "I could get used to this normal stuff."

"Normal," I choked out on a breathy half-laugh. "We're on the run to a
mysterious safe house operated by persons unknown after having rescued
you and your still-pre-adolescent sister from an alien spacecraft."

"Just another day at the office," he chuckled. He was being entirely
too flippant about the matter for my taste, and had been since his
return the night before.

"When the shock wears off, Mulder, you'll feel differently." I hoped
his euphoria and good humor would remain, but I was genuinely worried
about his inevitable crash. "Mulder...are you really okay with this?"

"Okay?" He looked at me in disbelief. "Scully, it's like I had a
second chance with that genie," he said warmly. "And this time I made
better wishes."

"Good. Now get out of the driver's seat; you're still tired. I'm
driving from here on out. You nearly got us killed back there by that
SUV."

Mulder was suddenly indignant. "HE cut ME off."

I reached over and lightly poked the dip in his chin. "That traffic
hot-button never ceases to amuse me. You're cute when you're
Pavlovian." I slid out of my seat and circled around back toward the
driver's side.

"But HE was the one..." he whimpered, exiting the car, before I kissed
his cheek and swatted his behind lightly, cutting off the remainder of
his complaint.  "Yes, Boss," he muttered in a mock pout and moved
around to the passenger side of the car.

--------------------
End Part 6/9.

Part 7/9.  

By five-thirty p.m., true to his word, Lindgren directed us to a
lengthy patch of gravel road that ended at a hill. Dead end. I was
momentarily concerned we'd driven all that way just to be executed in
a shaded forest far from home, but Lindgren interrupted my thoughts.
"I'm here to keep you safe. Haven't you pounded that into your
conspiracy-addled head yet?"

He exited the car and ushered us toward the side of the hill. He
cleared some dead leaves away from the grassy slope, and instead of
revealing the grassy slope itself under the watchful gaze of the car's
headlights, we were presented with a large pair of metal doors. He
inserted a key card into an unmarked slot, tapped a few buttons in
succession, and waited.

A few moments later a loudspeaker crackled into activity. "Password?"

Lindgren replied immediately, "Never trust a salamander." Cloak and
dagger. How quaint.

The doors opened with a loud metallic hum and we entered, as a short,
unremarkable man passed us by on the way out, deftly catching the set
of car keys Sheriff Lindgren tossed to him. The doors sealed behind
the four of us, and we descended a long staircase.

At the bottom of the stairs, we moved through a series of elaborate
metal doorways, all sealing soundly behind us as we moved forward.
This was no mere safe house. It was a bomb shelter as well, clearly a
secure facility for surviving the fallout of nuclear war. Or alien
invasion.

When the final door closed behind us, we found ourselves in a warm,
wood-finished room, reminiscent of a large country cabin. Exposed
beams and thickly padded, comfortable furniture abounded. It was
actually very cozy. It was easy to forget that we were completely
buried in a hillside, trapped underground.

The coziness faded, however, when the first face to appear belonged to
Alex Krycek. Inexplicably, he was smiling.

"Glad you guys made it in early. I'll lock up now. Last call for fresh
air," he called cheerfully over his shoulder, as he passed us, and
exited the room through the door we had just closed. I shook my head
in disbelief, and looking up, discovered that Mulder was doing the
same.

Another face appeared, and that time I was grateful. It was my mother,
beaming a broad smile, as she hurried to my side and enfolded me in a
fierce embrace.

"Mom...?"

Her smile broadened. "Isn't it wonderful, honey?"

"Isn't *what* wonderful, Mom?"

Her smile fell, and she appeared confused. She looked over at Sheriff
Lindgren and asked, "Are you Eric?"

Sheriff Lindgren nodded.

"Haven't you told her?" my mother asked.

One more layer of subterfuge and I would have suffocated. I couldn't
stand it anymore. "All right, that's it. I've had it. I want to know
what the hell this is all about, and I want to know now. No more
half-truths, no more 'it's all for your own good'. Just the truth." I
had directed my comments toward Lindgren, but for a moment my mother
seemed to think she had earned my anger. I took her hand as assurance
that I bore her no ill will.

Lindgren returned my mother's gaze, and told her softly, "Go ahead,
Margaret. I thought you'd want to tell her. It's okay."

My mother sighed, and still holding my hand, led me to another room,
through a large open archway.

We ended up in a sizeable, well-equipped kitchen. At the large pine
table sat two middle-aged women I didn't recognize, a toddler
rummaging intently through a half-empty bowl of dry Cheerios, and - I
still can't believe what I saw there - nursing a cup of tea, my
sister, Melissa.

She looked up at me, and a slow, bright smile appeared across her
face. "Dana," she muttered, and rose.

I was stunned, transfixed. I couldn't move, I could barely breathe. I
would have believed she was a clone if I hadn't seen the obvious scar
on her forehead where the bullet had entered. It was really Melissa.
My sister was alive.

"Missy?" I hardly recognized my own voice, so small and shaky-sounding
 in my ears. "Missy, is that you?" I couldn't move, I was so stunned
by the sight of her and the flood of feelings which the sight awoke in
me.

A large, gentle hand pressed lightly on my back, moving me ever so
slightly forward into the room. I turned to see Mulder's face,
brightened by a smile of overwhelming surprise. He turned his eyes to
mine and nodded toward Melissa. Go to her, he told me silently.

I don't recall the steps I took to take me to her side. All I remember
is being in her arms, stunned and silent. My sister was alive.

"How?" I managed to choke out.

Between her own choking laughs, she told me, "Alex got me transferred
to a special facility in Seattle. Once I was up and about, he got me a
new identity, and hid me there."

"Krycek? Why...?"

"Because they would have killed her, Dana," Krycek said from the entry
to the kitchen. "They would have used her against you, as leverage. It
was better for both of you for Missy to be dead. But now that I'm out,
it's only a matter of time before they trace me to the operation. I
needed to get all of you somewhere safe." He gestured grandly with his
left...arm...? "Welcome to your new home. At least for the next couple
of weeks."

It was still too much to process. "But Mom saw you die, Missy. She
watched you die." I turned to my mother, who shrugged cheerfully in
response.

"What you saw," Krycek answered for her, "was a chemically induced
state of hypocoma. Sort of a non-thermal suspended animation. It was
intentional. We had to create the impression that life signs had
ceased."

"Did you know about this?" I asked my sister.

"No," she told me simply, "I didn't know until afterward. But I'm
grateful. You know they would have just let me die. I don't know
everything they did for me in Seattle, but I know they saved my life."
She began to smile again. "That's all that matters to me." She
embraced me again.

Finally, she looked across the room and smiled at Mulder. "I'm so glad
you're here, Fox, and that you're still looking after my baby sister."

I snorted indignantly at the comment, and Missy laughed. "Or is she
looking after you?"

Mulder puffed out a short laugh, and told her, "A little of both, I
think. Though more of the latter these days." He turned to my mother
and smiled. "It's good to see you, Mrs. Scully."

Mom moved to his side and hugged him. "I'm so glad you're home, safe,"
she whispered to him. When she pulled away, she was of course the one
who reminded me about my manners. "Dana, would you like to make the
introductions?"

I stepped back from Missy, gathered my wits, and began. "Mom, Missy,"
I said, moving toward Sam, "this is Samantha, Mulder's sister. Sam," I
said to her, "this is my sister Melissa, also back from the dead," at
which Sam smiled. "And this is my Mom, Margaret." I had a fairly good
idea about the baby and the two women, but I left it up to the others
to perform those introductions.

Sam sidled over to Mulder's side, leaned against his leg, and offered
up a meek little "Hi."

"Hello, Samantha," my mother said in the most bizarre June Cleaver
voice I've ever heard.

After a few moments of quiet reunion, Missy spoke up. "By the way,
Dana, Fox," she said, gesturing toward Sheriff Lindgren, "this is my
husband, Eric. He's our resident gourmet, so be nice to him," she
snickered, "and he won't spit in your food."

Eric elbowed her in the side and smiled. "Glad to have it all out in
the open." He picked up the toddler and introduced him as well,
holding one chubby little arm and waving it at us. "This is Michael."
He turned to kiss the boy's forehead and muttered sweetly to him,
"Mikey, this is your Auntie Dana."

So there it was. Eric Lindgren was my brother-in-law, their baby was
smiling, and Missy was a mother. I smiled and went to meet my new
nephew. "Hello, Mikey," I said to him in an uncharacteristically
singsong voice. "I'm your Aunt Dana." No silly "auntie" crap for me. I
took his soft little hand and shook it until he giggled. He was
precious. Missy's eyes, Missy's hair, Missy's laugh. Unfortunately, he
also had Eric's long nose. It made me wonder about my own impending
bundle and if it would bear its father's nasal inheritance. I hoped
so.

"Missy, he's darling."

She didn't say anything. She just stepped to my side, stroked the
baby's head, and kissed me on the cheek. "I've missed you."

I sighed. "Me too."

Fortunately, before we could mangle the moment with unnecessary tears,
Eric jumped in with practicality. Leave it to law enforcement. He
gestured toward a gray-haired woman at the table. "This is my mother,
Annette, and this," he said, nodding toward a handsome brunette woman
by the stove, "is Helena, Alex's mother. Why don't I show you three to
your rooms?"

I blinked dumbly at the second woman, thoroughly stumped. Really, what
does one say to the mother of a man who has caused so much misery?
"Gee, Mrs. Krycek, that's one heck of an assassin you raised there,"
wouldn't have been entirely tactful. So I settled for a quiet nod at
both women, and turned to see that Mulder was just as dumbfounded as
I.

Eric led on, bless him, and with Mulder and Samantha, I left the
kitchen and climbed a series of seemingly hand-carved wooden steps. At
the top of the landing, Eric motioned to a door on each side of the
hallway. "Here are the two bathrooms; 'fraid we'll all have to double
up. This is your room," he said to Sam, opening the second door on the
left. "You and Margaret can share."

Sam turned to Mulder with a terrified expression, clearly afraid to be
separated from him. He responded with a kind voice. "It's okay, honey.
We'll be just down the hall." He crouched to see eye-to-eye with her
and whispered conspiratorially, "Margaret's been like a Mom to me.
You're gonna love her, sweetie, and I bet she'll feel the same way
about you."

I had to smile. I knew that Mulder and Mom haven't spent a lot of time
together, and those few shared moments have always been under the
worst of circumstances, but he's found a way to create a trusting
relationship with her. That's normally no easy task; Margaret Scully
is hard to impress. I think it was probably his trip to the Antarctic
that marked his place in her heart. I didn't tell her all of the
details, of course - I never do - but she got the gist of it, and
understood immediately how dedicated Mulder has always been to my
protection and safe return.

Conversely, however, my good mood was spoiled slightly by Mulder's
repetitions of "honey" and "sweetie". I decided to mention that when
we had a moment alone.

Samantha nodded, and Eric led her into the room. "There are plenty of
towels in the bathroom closet," he told her, his limited experience as
a father already showing in the gentle tone of his voice. "Go ahead
and fix your bed up the way you like it. I'm going to show Dana and
Fox to their room, and then I'll be right back."

Sam smiled weakly and said "Okay." My heart broke for her, the poor
thing.

At the end of the hall, on the right, we entered and found a
beautifully appointed room, equipped with every possible luxury. A
huge pine armoire housed a television, VCR, and stereo system. The
closet was spacious, and our overnight bags were somehow already
there. I didn't have the strength to ask how. The centerpiece of the
room was a rough-hewn, wooden king-sized bed, generously layered with
quilts and pillows.

"Are you two hungry?" Eric asked us cheerfully.

I shook my head, and so did Mulder. "Actually," I told him, "I'm a
little overloaded. I think I need to get some rest."

Eric smiled. "I'll bet." He nodded and let himself out of the room.
"Sleep well, you two. I'll keep some dinner warm for you. Come down in
a few hours and have something to eat, okay? "

My stomach suddenly sank as I realized I'd forgotten something of
immense importance.  "Eric," I asked with dread, "what's going to
happen to my brothers' families?"

He turned and smiled.  "We have more than one safe house, Dana.  Bill
and Charlie are at sea, but we have their families in our Southern
California facility, along with Brin's wife and kids.  They'll be
fine.  Now get some rest. There's a lot to do."

I smiled and nodded, and pretended I didn't really care what the
future would bring. Of course, being both captive and hormonal, I was
utterly full of shit. When Eric closed the door behind him, Mulder
came up behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist.

"Alone at last," he whispered into my ear. The little zinging shivers
his breathy words created felt indescribably good.

It was time for a change of subject before we forgot what we had to
do. I pulled away regretfully. "I'm going to have a quick word with
Missy," I told him. "I'll be right back."

"Okay," he said, pretending to be distracted by a loose thread on the
cuff of his shirt. "Take your time." I sighed and left the room. What
a sweet, sweet man.

I dropped by Sam's room, but she was busy talking to Eric, who was
handing her a pillowcase, so I let them do their thing. Mulder would
be in soon enough to settle her down for a few hours.

When I returned to the main floor, Missy was on the sofa, bouncing the
baby on her lap. They were cooing happily at each other. I'll admit
I'd never really thought of Missy as anything other than one of those
flaky hippie-chick mothers, putting the baby in tie-dye and buying
little baby Birkenstocks, but I'd been wrong. There was a warmth, a
glow about her, and the quiet confidence took me by surprise. I had
never seen her so mature and lovely.

I moved quietly around the sofa and sat beside her, looking silently
into the fire.

I felt, rather than saw, her turn to me, and when I turned to look at
her, there was the warmth and maturity again.

"I've missed you so much, Dana," she said softly.

I nodded and leaned my head against her shoulder. "I'm numb."

I heard her chuckle as she responded, simply, "Well, you've been
busy."

I laughed with her, and reached over to stroke Mikey's cheek. "He's
beautiful. He has Dad's smile."

I felt Missy nod. "I'm glad you see it too."

We sat together, quietly enjoying each other's company for some time,
as I felt my muscles relax and loosen, preparing to usher in welcome
sleep.

Missy patted her lap, and I shifted to rest my head there, lying on my
back on the sofa, dangling my legs over the arm. She placed Mikey flat
on my chest, and he snuggled his sweet little head under my chin. As I
wrapped my arms around his surprisingly heavy body, Missy asked very
quietly, "Does Fox know?"

I closed my eyes and shook my head with a self-deprecating chuckle.
"You're good."

"Intelligence runs in the family," she replied. "So does he know?"

"Yes," I sighed. "I told him on the way here. How did *you* know?"

I looked up into her face, looming sideways over mine, and saw her
smile. "Woman mystique. Didn't you get any?"

"I must have been absent the day they handed it out."

She laughed. I remembered that laugh, so simple and unfettered. I
remember how free she'd always seemed to me, and how much I'd resented
that freedom. But yesterday, that laugh was music to me. "So how long
have you two been together?"

"Seven years." I smiled, blindly poking the dimple in Mikey's chin
until he giggled. "Although admittedly sometimes it feels longer."

"No, I mean how long have you been a couple?"

"Oh, that." I pursed my lips and tried to find a way to explain it to
her. "It's knotty."

"Well, classify it then. Break it down. I do speak Dana-ese."

I chuckled softly, and counted off my points with little finger taps
on Mikey's back. "All right, let's see. We've been friends for years.
We've loved each other almost as long. We began sleeping together in
the spring. We fell in love - I don't know - somewhere in there. I
think we might have been on different schedules for that. But we only
really committed to being a couple the night before he left."

"Before he knew about the baby?" She sounded surprised.

I nodded, tracing the little curves of Mikey's ear. "Mm-hm. I don't
know how much Mom has told you about my medical history, but the whole
thing is heading dangerously close to the miraculous."

Her face crumpled a bit and she nodded in response. "Mom told me all
about the effects of your abduction; the cancer, your depression, the
trouble between you and Billy, your daughter..."

"...Emily." I sighed. "I thought she was yours at first. She looked
like you."

"Mom said I came to you in a dream. Do you believe that?"

"I did. Now I understand it was some sort of instinctive reaction."

Her eyebrows shot up. "You believe in visions and instincts now?"

I nodded awkwardly against her leg and rubbed soft circles on Mikey's
back. "I'm becoming a believer in a lot of things."

I felt happy and calm, and utterly safe lying there with my sister and
nephew, but I had unfinished business. "I should go to bed. I haven't
had any time alone with Mulder yet. We have a few things to discuss."

"I'll bet," Missy whispered, obviously as awestruck as I about the
recent developments.

I held Mikey up over me, and Missy took him back as I rose. I placed a
soft kiss on his cheek and another on hers, and remained there for a
moment, relearning her scent and recalling the comfort of my sister's
presence. "I'll see you at dinner."

"Sleep well," she whispered back as I pulled away.

"Don't tell Mom," I told her, ascending the stairs. "I want to tell
her myself."

"Secrets between sisters," she commented wryly. "I *am* home."

I smiled all the way up the stairs, despite the growing fatigue that
made each step more of an effort than the last.

--------------------------

When I arrived at the doorway to Samantha's room, I poked my head in
to see Mulder sitting on the bed beside her, talking in a low voice.
Just as I decided to give them their privacy and move on, Mulder
turned to me and smiled.

"Come on in," he said, turning back to his sister. "I was just telling
Sam a little more about you and me."

"Secrets," Samantha uttered in a playful whisper as I approached the
bed, and when she smirked, I saw the stunning resemblance between
them.

"Margaret will be back any minute, so ixnay on the eddingway," he
whispered back to her. "Dana and I want to tell her ourselves."

Samantha nodded in assent. Then she surprised me by getting up on her
knees and coming over to me to whisper into my ear, "I'm glad you're
going to be my sister." She kissed me on the cheek and lingered there
for a moment.

Surprised and relieved to find Samantha receptive and open to the
idea, I drew my arms around her and whispered back, "Me too, Sam.
Welcome to the family."

I was afraid I'd said something wrong when she pulled away from me,
but then she smiled again and confided, "Fox says that we'll be more
Scullys now than Mulders."

I was stunned. When I didn't respond at once, she elaborated, "He said
your family's really nice."

I didn't know what to say. Her words cut through me, reminding me of
the awesome responsibility we had just begun to undertake, as well as
underscoring Mulder's low-level envy of my family's unity. But both he
and his sister had made it clear: They were thrilled to become part of
my family. We weren't just making a new little unit of the three -
soon to be four - of us, but rather Mulder and Sam were content to
simply slip into my own existing clan. I was so delighted I couldn't
speak. My jaw trembled, and tears tumbled down my face.

Mulder's hand stroked across my cheek, and I leaned against him as I
looked into the faces of my new immediate family. "Let's all get some
rest and go down for dinner in a couple of hours," he suggested in a
soft voice as my mother entered the room.

"Why don't Dana and I take the other room?" my mother suggested.

I approached her and said, simply, "Mulder and I haven't had a chance
to talk since he got back. We'll be fine in the other room."

When I looked over to Samantha's bed, I saw Mulder rise, having tucked
her in, and approach as well. "Let's let Sam get some uninterrupted
sleep," he said, and ushered me out of the room by the elbow, past my
silent mother.


"That was in no way subtle," I commented to him as we fell into bed,
fully clothed, only seconds later.

"Mm-hm," he said into my hair, wrapping his arms around me and
sighing.

"Mulder."

He tightened his grip on my shoulders. "She's going to know soon
anyway. We'll be able to handle it with clear heads once we get some
sleep." He yawned. "I'm wiped."

He was right, of course, but I wasn't about to allow him to control
the events without a token protest, even about something as trifling
as bedding.

"Move," I grunted, trying to loosen the comforter from under his hips.
"I'm cold."

"Bitch, bitch, bitch," he mumbled playfully as he lifted his hips in
assistance.

We lay there for a while, quietly warming the air beneath the thick
layer of down. "Thank you for what you said about my family, Mulder."

He stroked my arm with his large, warm palm. "You're good people," he
said in a drowsy voice. "I just hope Bill won't develop an
overwhelming urge to clock me when he finds out I knocked up his baby
sister."

There has always been something comforting about his use of deadpan
humor to utterly fail to conceal his fear. I settled in and found
myself drifting away almost as soon as I closed my eyes, but I still
needed to reassure him that we were finally on stable ground, despite
the death threats over our heads. "We're vindicated," I told him.
"Nobody can argue now that our work wasn't worth the sacrifices, not
even Bill."

"In the abstract," he replied.

"Don't sweat reality," I told him, and he hugged me even tighter. I
felt safe and happy, and the next words spilled out of me before I was
aware I'd even thought them. "I love you," I murmured.

His breathing hitched, and for a moment he was still. Almost at once I
felt warm, wet tears trickling along my scalp. Despite all the plans
we had made, I had never spoken those particular words to him before,
and I assumed he was weeping in relief. He'd been through so much, and
between the stress of his captivity and his relief at coming home, I
was under the impression he was experiencing the inevitable crash I'd
predicted. He didn't say anything for a very long time.  I lay with
him, and stroked his back gently with my palm.

Finally, sniffly but recovering, he explained his reaction. He'd only
been gone a dozen weeks, but how quickly I'd forgotten the speed of
his mind. He surprised me by leaping well past the obvious - that he
loved me in return, that he was still committed to our personal plans,
that he was looking forward to fatherhood - and asked if it was okay
that Sam was going to live with us. Silly man.

"She's family," I encouraged. "Yours and mine."

"Thank you," he breathed. "We'll be good parents to her. Better than
mine, anyway."

"No," I said, pulling away. Although I understood the sentiment, I
couldn't permit him to spend one more minute convinced that Samantha's
return was his chance to correct their parents' mistakes. I raised
myself on my hands so I could look at him. "We're not her parents,
Mulder. She had parents, and they're gone now."

He looked at me wild-eyed, clearly struck by the blow of my words. I
regretted having to upset him, but he had already spent too much time
thinking of himself as Samantha's father figure.

"You're her brother and guardian. You are not her father. You're going
to be a father soon enough, and it's important that we delineate the
difference to Samantha from the very beginning." And to ourselves, I
added internally.

His expression softened, but he didn't say anything.

"We have to be careful how we talk to her, Mulder. Words like 'honey'
and 'sweetie' might be too endearing for a sibling relationship, and
you've been using those words a good deal."

I saw comprehension of the situation begin to dawn on him, and I
softened my tone. "We can love and support her without thinking of
ourselves as her parents."

"I'm gonna have to work on a new nickname," he said darkly. "The old
ones won't do."

I thought of myself at Samantha's age and remembered what my own
siblings had called me. I couldn't imagine that his nicknames for his
baby sister had been any less hurtful.

"'Buttmunch' isn't loving *or* supportive," he added.

I smiled. "We'll figure out something," I said softly, and he nodded
in reply.

I felt my eyelids begin to droop, and rested my weight against his
chest again. I was asleep almost at once.

--------------------------

We arose a few hours later and after washing up, went down for dinner.

The rest of the group had already assembled, but hadn't quite finished
eating when the three of us arrived at the table. We were still fairly
groggy from the events of the past two days, but even through the
nap-induced fog we all noticed how quiet it was at the table. Krycek
and Eric mumbled calmly throughout dinner about "the numbers" and
other incomprehensible things and my mother chatted in a soft voice
with Annette and Missy about the news coverage they'd been watching.
They all seemed impressed with the reporting, and I was favored with
warm smile from Annette when she spoke about my on-camera appearances.
Krycek's mother, Helena - like Samantha - sat silently and pushed the
food around her plate.

"It's usually more effective if you get the food somewhere in the
vicinity of your mouth," Mulder teased his sister in a soft voice, but
Sam only sighed in response. He put his fork down and wrapped his arm
around her. With a light peck on the top of her head, he whispered,
"It's okay, kiddo. You don't have to eat now if you're not hungry."
She nodded a little against his chest.

Conversely, I dug into dinner with delight. Eric had made a stew out
of vegetables and very lean beef, and the rich aroma made me ravenous.
I actually stopped myself for a moment when I saw the bottle of fine
red wine on the counter, but common sense won out. The alcohol would
have cooked off in minutes. I was in greater danger of choking on a
chunk of potato. Considering the speed at which I ate my portion, I'm
a little surprised I didn't. Mulder must have been watching me devour
the remainder of my meal, because when I finally pushed the bowl away,
I caught him looking over at me with unconcealed amusement. I wondered
if there was a copy of "What To Expect When You're Expecting"
somewhere in the safe house for him to read, so he would know that
"eating for two" thing was legitimate.

Later, while I nursed a cup of mediocre decaf, I asked if anyone had a
sewing kit. We needed more clothes for Sam.

Melissa smiled and said, "It's covered."

Sam perked up a bit when Melissa told her she would measure her before
bed and alter a few of her own garments in the morning. I offered up a
few pieces of clothing as well. But when Eric got up from the table
and commented that he would haul the sewing machine out of the
downstairs closet before going to bed, I choked on my coffee. It
seemed like such an innocent comment, but the underlying meaning was
terrifying: The safe house had a sewing machine, and that implied
nothing less than the expectation of a very long stay.

--------------------
End Part 7/9.

Part 8/9.  

After Sam's measuring session, Mulder announced that he was going to
tuck her in, and the two rose to head upstairs.

I also rose and caught Krycek's eye. "Could I have a word with you?"

He nodded and led me out of the kitchen and into a book-lined library
farther back in the structure. It was, like the living room, cozy and
inviting. Overstuffed chairs sat scattered around the room, almost
randomly, each complemented by a small side table and reading lamp.
Again I was struck by the planning involved, and the obvious
anticipation of a long period of hiding.

Krycek moved to the far end of the room, near another fireplace, and
sat on the sofa. I took the chair opposite. For a moment, neither of
us said anything. Between my fatigue and his unerring projection of
ease, we might have been mistaken for old friends, comfortable in
silence.

Finally he turned to me and with a slow grin he confided, "It's been a
hell of a week."

I grunted out a little chuckle.

"Good dinner," he continued. Then he prodded, "Did you get enough to
eat?" Smug son of a bitch. Of course he knew.

"Yes, thank you," I replied casually, determined not to be out-cooled.
I settled back into the chair. "Nice arm."

I saw absolutely no guile in his responding smile. "There are
friends," he said, "and there are *friends*."

"I assume yours aren't natives."

He didn't say anything in response; he simply relaxed into the soft
cushions of the couch and let his head tip back, eyes closed.

"What kind of thanks are you looking for, Krycek?" I asked him.

"Alex."

I lowered my head just a little and looked up at him under stern
eyebrows. "You've got to be kidding."

He rolled his head to the side and opened one eye. "Friends call each
other by their first names. And I'm definitely your friend right now,
Dana." He closed the eye again and returned to his former position.
"And no, don't try to explain to me about 'Mulder'. I don't want to go
to bed with a headache."

I shook my head. Someday - and this is truly my fondest wish - someone
will simply tell me something without obfuscation or theatrics.

"Back to my question," I said, "*Alex*."

"Not now," he said simply. "I have work to do, you have work to do, we
all have work to do. We can socialize when it's all over." Then he sat
straight up and looked at me with purpose. "We're *this* close to
winning the goddamned war. I can fucking *taste* the victory, and I
won't get complacent now with idle chitchat."

"Fine," I agreed, "then inform me. What's really going on here?"

He stretched his arms above his head, weaving the fingers of both
hands together, and rotated his back from side to side until a few
vertebrae popped. "In the morning. We'll go down to the lab, all four
of us, and we'll go through every last speck of data." He lowered his
arms and appeared to be evaluating something about me. "Don't flatter
yourself into believing you're here for any other reason."

His attempted use of reverse-psychology was almost touching. Knowing
I'd doubt any stated motive, he attempted to convince me that his use
for me was strictly professional, assuming I'd believe the opposite,
and use his preservation of Melissa as proof. For a moment I'd thought
of letting it pass unnoticed, but I was feeling bold.

"Neither goblet is poisoned," I informed him, cutting through the
crap. "I won't be Vizzini for you.  There is no such thing as iocaine
powder."

Krycek rose, chuckling, and strolled over to a tall wall of books
adjacent to the fireplace. He paused for a moment, looking for
something, and made a little "Mm," when he found it. Crossing back to
me, he dropped the book into my lap, and moved to leave the room. When
he arrived at the door, he turned around and confided, "I'll choose a
more effective role model the next time I attempt to manipulate you.
Goldman's fucked in the head."

I looked down at the paperback novel in my lap and laughed.

---------------------

By the time I'd made it upstairs, Mulder was already in bed. He looked
up when I entered the room, lifted the corner of the comforter, and
patted the mattress suggestively.

I tossed the well-worn copy of "The Princess Bride" onto the vacant
space on the bed and began to open bureau drawers until I located my
pajamas. When I finally found them, folded neatly beneath two pairs of
Mulder's silk boxers, I smiled and withdrew them. They looked good
together. "I'm going to take a quick shower."

Mulder picked up the book with a bemused expression, but didn't look
up. As he flipped through the pages he asked me, "Have a nice
tete-a-tete with The Man in Black?"

"Nice, no. Enlightening, maybe," I said and left the room.


One hot shower later, I was in light blue satin, padding back to our
room, when I noticed the door to Samantha and Mom's room open. Sam's
bed was empty, and Mom was sitting up in bed, reading. When I
approached, she looked up.

"You look better," she said.

"I feel better," I replied. "Cleaner, anyway."

It was Mom's turn to pat the mattress beside her, and I sat with her
for a few minutes.

"I know this must be overwhelming, Mom," I told her. "How are you
holding up?"

She looked at me as if I'd spoken in ancient Sumerian. "That's quite a
selective memory you have, Dana."

I wasn't as surprised by her composure as I was by her accusation.
"What do you mean?"

She shook her head in that Mom way all mothers do. "After all I've
witnessed in your life, these are hardly the most difficult events to
accept. Except for the death threats against you and Fox, I've
received nothing but good news over the past couple of days." She
adjusted the crease of the sheet folded down over her lap. "I watched
Fox step out of a space ship on national television, honey. There
isn't much left that has the power to surprise me."

"Then you're doing better than I am," I admitted. "Seeing Melissa
really shook me."

Mom didn't say anything. She merely sat there, waiting for me to
continue.

"I'm so relieved that she's alive and okay, that she has a wonderful
family and that we can be together again...but - -"

"But you're worried that they're going to take her away again, or that
she won't really be who she appears to be."

I lowered my head a little. "Something like that."

"If you're so busy protecting your heart from being broken again,
you're going to miss out on the joy of this miracle." She lowered her
face just enough to bring her gaze in line with mine. "And I doubt
that kind of self-denial is how you and Fox managed to come to an
understanding."

It was not the time for explanations. I was still exhausted and
emotionally drained, so I settled for a repetition of what I'd told
her two days before. "It's complicated."

She smiled just a little. "If it was easy, it wouldn't be worth
having."

"Platitudes?" It was unlike her.

"Well," she confessed, "I might be a little overwhelmed. Let's all get
some sleep."

I looked over at Sam's bed.

"She's in Fox's room," Mom told me. "Why don't you stay here and let
them get some rest?"

I shook my head. "It's not a good time to set any precedents. She was
fine in here earlier. I'll go get her."

"Dana," Mom called after me as I rose to leave, "she's not your
responsibility."

I turned to her, taken aback by her accusation of meddling.

She continued, "Samantha is Fox's responsibility, and you should let
him handle the situation as he sees fit."

"She's *our* responsibility, Mom," I insisted. "All of ours."

She smiled dryly. "It takes a village?"

I sighed.

She shook her head. "Now who's guilty of platitudes?"

"We'll call it even," I suggested tersely as I left the room.


Sam was indeed in our room. I was already in a disagreeable mood
thanks to Mom's stubborn wheedling, so although I expected Sam's
constant presence to chafe a little, I couldn't help but smile when I
entered the room and looked over to the bed. Mulder was sitting back
against the headboard with his little sister nestled on his lap. Her
head was against his chest and she was sleeping soundly.

He looked up and took in my appearance as well - from my feet to my
abdomen, and then to my face - and when he smiled, I understood what
he found so amusing: I was standing before him, barefoot and pregnant.
He looked down at the limp, sleeping form of his sister and shook his
head. With one word, he summed up the entirety of his awe. Without
making a sound, he mouthed, "Surreal."

I nodded. There wasn't anything else to say.

Very gently he gathered Sam up in his arms and took her back to her
own room.

When he returned, he was wearing a sly smile. We still didn't have the
energy to make love properly last night, so we decided to wait, and
settled instead for some slow, deep kisses. He dotted little pecks up
one side of my slightly rounded abdomen and down the other,
whispering, "Baby" after each press of his lips. In retrospect, I
suppose the walls were too thin to disguise the sounds of the giggles
induced by each tickling kiss. At the time, I didn't care. Now, I
think I should have known better.

---------------------

So now it's morning and here we are, all ten of us, gathered around
the breakfast table, still a little uncomfortable, still mostly
uninformed, still evaluating one another.

I'm busy eating, Mulder is busy tending to his sister, my mother is
busy assessing my every interaction with Mulder, and Krycek is looking
on with unrestrained glee.

I'm really enjoying my breakfast, but I can feel my mother's eyes on
me and it rankles. She has been pushing it, demanding just a little
too much information at the most inopportune times, and I'm about to
lose my patience.

"Dana," she prods, and I know I'm about to lose my cool. I determine
to say something before I do.

"Fine," I concede aloud, mostly to my mother, but partly to everyone
else as well. Missy looks on with that knowing big-sister smile, and
Mulder turns to me, entertained, as I place my fork down and look my
mother directly in the eye.

"Scully," Mulder warns. "Like this?"

I don't turn to him. "Any objections?"

He pauses for a half-beat, and says, simply, "Guess not."

"Good."

My mother looks concerned, and I'm glad. She's been demanding to know
what's going on, and she's about to find out. So much for composure.

I keep my voice level. "Yes, Mother, there are big things afoot. I
would have preferred to tell you when we were ready, but since you're
determined to force the issue, here it is: Mulder and I are getting
married, I'm nearly four months pregnant, and we're about to subvert
an alien plot to eradicate humankind through a viral apocalypse. Not
necessarily in that order." I don't even blink. "Any questions?"

She scowls. "Thank you," she whispers harshly, and leaves the table.

"Shit," I mutter under my breath. I call after her, "Mom!" and follow
her out into the sitting room.

"Four months, Dana? You might have told me before," she snaps as I
enter the room, "or in some way other than this. That wasn't a joyful
announcement, Dana, that was a reprimand."

I should find it amusing rather than irritating that she's chosen to
focus on my pregnancy rather than on the possibility of human
extinction.  I release a harsh breath and backpedal. She is my mother
after all.  "I'm sorry. I wasn't ready to tell you yet, but you kept
pushing."

She folds her arms over her chest and looks at me. "We sat there last
night, Dana, just you and me, and you didn't say a word."

"I'd just told Mulder a few hours before about the baby, Mom. Didn't
we deserve even a day to get used to the idea before we told everyone
else?"

"I'm not everyone else, Dana. I'm your mother."

I sighed. "I know. I'm sorry. I was angry." I shake my head and flop
down onto the sofa. "But be fair; you really were pushing."

She remained standing. "I just wanted to know."

"How does that not constitute pushing?"

She pursed her lips and gave in, sitting delicately on a side chair.
"All right. You held back and I went too far. But you really shouldn't
have done it that way. Now everyone knows."

I tip my head back against the soft cushions. "There are ten of us in
this little place, Mom. We're not likely to have any secrets here."

"I know," she sighs, "but I would have liked to know before that
murderer did."

I smile. "He already knew. Don't ask me how."

"Well, perhaps he heard something through a wall, the way the rest of
us did last night." I cringe as she completes the thought. "Neither
you nor Fox have been subtle in your possession of each other's time
and space. You nearly ran me over on your way out of the room
yesterday."

I shook my head. "It's been a long time," is my only excuse. She
doesn't need a roadmap for the rest.

She nods. "So how did it happen?"

With a shrug, I confess, "The usual way."

"Dana," she chides.

This is obviously going to take a while, so I fold my legs underneath
me and get comfortable. "We'd only been together for a couple of
months before he was taken. We decided to make things official the
night before he left." I shook my head. "We didn't even have time to
work out the how or when of it. We agreed to talk about it when he got
back from Oregon."

Her voice softens. "He's back."

"Victorious," I add.

"And the baby?"

I shrug again. "I really don't know, Mom. It could be as simple as a
well-timed, albeit unexpected, ovulation. But I've run every test
imaginable, and everything is okay. It's just a baby, nothing more."

"Of course it's more than that, Dana," she says, and she sounds like
my mother again - warm but firm. "Don't you dare treat this baby as
something commonplace. All your doctors said it was impossible. This
is a gift; it's a miracle."

"If it's okay with you," I tell her, "I'd prefer to consider it
ordinary. This baby deserves better than the burden of being
monumentally important."  I pause.  "At the moment, there are bigger
issues to deal with."

Whether or not she agrees, she must understand my position, because
she rises and returns to the kitchen. "Come on," she says, holding out
her hand, "your breakfast is getting cold."

---------------------

An hour later, Krycek and Eric cull Mulder and me from the group and
lead us down into an enormous laboratory, easily half again as large
as the main floor. It is clearly a multipurpose room, filled to its
rafters with biological and medical informatic equipment. There are
hotboxes, banks of computers and computer-aided measuring devices, an
impressively new electron microscope, and vast lab benches teeming
with sample trays and stacks of computer printouts.

In the center of a large empty space on one bench is one of the three
vials of blue liquid we were permitted to keep. Contrasted against the
clutter in the remainder of the room, the single test tube appears
conspicuous, the center of all activity surrounding it.

"It's an antiviral serum," Krycek says, moving toward the nearest
hotbox. "At least that's what we were told it is." He turns to me. "We
have samples of the black oil - both strains - and our contacts have
insisted that this stuff will wipe them out."

"Care to be a little more forthcoming about the identity of your
contacts?" Mulder asks. "Or do I already know?"

"You've already met them, Einstein," he replies. "Or did you think
those rebels on the ship just made the impulsive decision to save your
sorry ass?"

Before Mulder can take umbrage against Krycek's remark - something he
almost always communicates with a show of physical aggression - I step
in.

"I take it this is what you meant by 'airborne'."

Eric nods and raises a tiny syringe with a very long needle from the
surface of the bench. "It's supposed to be ultra-dense -- toxic to the
alien spores, but harmless to humans. The computer modeling we've done
projected a success rate very close to the rebels' claim of potential
damage."

"What information did you use for your computer modeling?" I ask.

"They provided genetic sequences." Eric grins and continues. "We ran
the PCRs against the serum overnight and they're a match. We weren't
misled." His smile is that of success, and it's familiar.

Mulder is less enthralled than I. "What's your role in all this?" he
demands, his posture still stiff.

"For lack of a better term, I'm a double agent."

Mulder rolls his eyes. "Oh, please."

I concur. "You're telling us that they permitted one of their own to
marry my allegedly hidden sister?"

Krycek interrupts with an irritated slap of one hand on the
countertop. "Mingle on your own time. We have unwelcome visitors to
kill."

And for the first time, there is just a hint of discord in the ranks.
"Alex, go upstairs and have some decaf," Eric suggests with utter
condescension. "You're no use to me right now."

He resists. "No fucking way. This is it."

"And," Eric continues in the same patronizing tone, "you're no
scientist. If you want to watch and fill them in on the political
background, fine, but if you're going to pace and snipe, you can go
elsewhere."

I see the corners of Mulder's mouth turn up just slightly in vicarious
triumph, but before he can say anything inflammatory, Krycek stalks
off, his shoulders held high.

"Call me when you're ready to test."

Eric sighs and we get to work.


A little over an hour later, Eric has explained the bulk of the
situation to us, and it really does make appallingly plain sense. The
serum is an inoculant and biological contaminant in one. Ecological
damage would, in theory, be a non-issue because the serum has been
engineered to attack only specific DNA sequences. Collateral damage
seems unlikely because the microparticles are non-organic, which means
that they will not mutate over time. It has became clear to us that
the nanomachines Krycek used to infect Skinner were an early human
effort to create the nanocytes the rebel aliens had already perfected.
All they needed was a delivery mechanism, in that they've been
prohibited by the grays from leaving any of their ships ever since the
incident on Ruskin Dam.

Mulder thinks aloud. "So this last set of abductions was the rebels'
idea, ostensibly to eradicate evidence of their tampering, but really
to facilitate the delivery of the serum to earth without the grays'
interference." Mulder is usually more colloquial in his day to day
communications, which doesn't bother me normally, but there is
something irresistible about him when he hauls out and dusts off his
polysyllabic vocabulary. I smile in appreciation.

Eric nods. "That's the extent of it. And the big boys don't want you
to have it because of the precious power base they've established."

A question is still nagging at me. "If they're so concerned about
protecting their usurped authority, why did they risk exposure by
permitting you to marry my sister?"

He shrugs. "Hubris."

Mulder shakes his head to indicate he needs more than that. So do I.

"They figured that nothing would happen if they put on their Big Scary
Men voices and threatened to kill you if she told a soul."

I blink.

He shakes his head. "I think something must happen to you when you
have unimpeachable authority for such a long time."

"Yeah," Mulder smirks, "you get sloppy." He doesn't look pleased.
"This is too easy."

Eric bites the inside of his lower lip and nods in assent, but before
he has a chance to respond, Mulder appears to have an epiphany.

"An EMP could wipe out the micro-machines in the serum." He begins to
pace. "In earth terms, a nuclear warhead detonated in the upper
atmosphere. In alien terms, maybe just a death ray. If these things
are computerized," he says, flailing his hand in the general vicinity
of the vial, "then an electromagnetic pulse could disable them in one
shot."

Eric smiles. "EMP isn't an issue.  They're resistant." When I squint,
he explains further. "Which is why their serum is better than ours.
The circuits are powered by something called SRE, or subatomic radiant
energy, and all the data processing occurs at light speed across a
microluminescent silicon grid. They don't rely on electromagnetic
energy for either form or operation, so an EMP would have no effect."

Mulder and I look at each other, stunned into silence.

Eric only grins. "I was a bit of a student before I took on the role
of rural sheriff." He approaches, syringe in hand, and moves toward
the hotbox. "Let's give this a go now, shall we? I've been hopped up
on the anticipation since the day before yesterday."

I move one step closer to Mulder, and we wait.

"Alex!" Eric cries out as he rotates his neck until it pops a few
times. "Let's find out if it's soup yet!"

Before he can take another step toward the hotbox, Krycek is already
barreling down the stairs, approaching at nearly a run. He doesn't say
a word - in fact, he doesn't even acknowledge our presence there, so
focused is he on the fate of humankind behind the thick, well-sealed
glass. I find the lack of his customary bravado uncomfortable.

Eric slips the syringe through the vapor lock, and squeezes out a
single drop of the serum into the waiting petri dish. When he removes
the syringe, he and Krycek both take a couple of steps backward, and
Mulder and I do the same.

The hotbox is constructed like a fortified aquarium: Thick glass walls
comprise its structure, unmarred by joins.  It was clearly molded in
one piece, to reduce the chance of leaks.  The vapor lock is
siliconized around the seam, and when the thick glass partition slides
back into place over the opening, it appears safe.  That's not to say
that I feel safe in any way.  I'm terrified about what the black oil
could do to me and the baby, but this is too important a development
to miss.  I take another step back, however, and Mulder moves with me.
He squeezes my hand in acknowledgement.  I will run if  I must, but
for now, I wait and watch.

After a few deep breaths, Eric approaches a computer panel and lets
his right hand hover over a small white touchpad. "If you have a god,"
he suggests in an unsettling voice, "you might want to pray to him
right about now." He closes his eyes for just a few seconds, and I
take the opportunity to ask an otherwise ambivalent creator to
reconsider his commitment to us. Six seconds later, Eric opens his
eyes and presses lightly on the touchpad.

Immediately small drops of black oil drip down into the enclosure from
recessed tubes. On the left side, the flow coalesces into a single
puddle. On the right, the droplets remain individual, and appear to
move across the floor of the hotbox of their own volition.

Eric moves his hand to hover over the red "abort" panel, that will
instantly trigger the incineration of the contents of the box should
they pose a danger.

One, two...

My internal voice doesn't even make it to three. The large puddle
dessicates into powder, and the individual drops simply evaporate. By
the time my mind has counted to four, it is over.

The room is deathly still.

"The pool on the left," Eric whispers, "was the parasitic strain." No
one responds. "The mind-control strain was on the right."

"How much do we need?" Krycek asks in a responding whisper.

Eric pauses. "Please, gimme a minute."

Mulder releases a shuddering breath and lowers his head.

I am unable to move or utter a sound.

For a little while, there is only the deep silence of the room,
punctuated by our deep, irregular breaths, but eventually, Eric
composes himself and answers Krycek's question.

"Seven vials. Use some of the batch that went to the CDC."

Krycek just barely nods. "Get me the release point maps and I'll send
them to Brin. Mulder, call Skinner and tell him we're ready to roll."

"He knows," Mulder says, more confirming the assumption than asking
for an explanation.

Krycek nods. That must have been what they were discussing on their
own at Area 51.

"There a phone in here?" Mulder asks.

Eric finally lowers his hand and steps away from the control panel. He
turns toward the stairs and simply begins to walk. "Follow me," he
intones.

---------------------

In the wake of the test, there was precious little to do after all. I
had thought I had been brought here in order to work, but it became
clear by the end of the third day that all I was doing was reading
computer readouts on ambient density levels at various checkpoints
around the globe. Eventually, in the middle of a set of very promising
results from the northwest coast of England, I rose from my stool at a
workbench to go upstairs.

"On track?" Eric asked me.

"You don't have to pretend you need me for this," I responded,
smiling. "Thank you for protecting us."

He looked at me for a moment, clearly unsure how to reply.

"I won't say a word to Krycek if you won't," I assured him.

He closed his eyes and laughed. "You've discovered his inner pussycat,
have you?"

I went upstairs and I've spent all my time with my family ever since.

Seven weeks have passed in this little place, and those of us who are
not family or friends already have developed a kind of courteous
camaraderie.

Annette and my mother appear to have adopted Helena, who, although
still very quiet, has begun to contribute to conversation.  They
conscripted her and Missy to play endless games of kitchen-table
euchre, which have become lively in recent days with the advent of
Chore Wagering.  It was Helena's suggestion, and once it was accepted,
she revealed herself to be quite the cardsharp.

Samantha has spent most of her time either in the library or in the
sitting room, attempting to catch up on nearly thirty years of
technological and social advancement.  Mulder has been exceptionally
thorough in her remedial education; so thorough chronologically that
Samantha has had the opportunity to reject the Disco trend not once
but twice. She is fascinated by how "Star Trekky" so many everyday
devices have become, and is especially attracted to computer
technology.  I wonder from time to time how we are going to be able to
afford to indulge her obvious taste for gadgets, especially in light
of all the inherent expenses that accompany a new baby.  Maybe we'll
let her play with the Gunmen once a week and cajole some of their
gadgetry from them.

Mulder regained his strength quickly, and although the walls are thin,
we have learned to muffle the telltale sounds of our mutual
gratification.  At first I was uncomfortable with the idea of making
love in what was essentially a public place, but after hearing a
similar bout of activity from Missy and Eric's room, we began to care
less.  Our secret was out, and we didn't care who knew.  Sam was too
busy deciding what to wear as Flower Girl to wonder about any other
aspect of our relationship.  We made a note to have The Talk with her
before the end of 2001.  Mulder's suggested approaches for this have
proved to be an endless source of amusement.

Once a week I review the summary of the density readings, but they've
progressed as expected

Three weeks ago, Mulder got his first blurry look at our son, courtesy
of the ultrasound equipment in the downstairs laboratory.  He made no
effort to conceal his tears.

"We're ready to prep the airborne and the projections are good,"
Mulder whispered to me that night as we lay in bed. "Brin took out the
last of the installations last week. In a few weeks it'll all be moot,
and we can do some cleanup."

"Cleanup," I confirmed.

He nodded his head.

"You think we'll be able to get enough evidence to support some
indictments?" I asked him quietly.

He shrugged. "I guess that's our part of the operation. I'll ask Alex
in the morning."

I hoisted myself up on one elbow and looked him straight in the eye.
"Alex?"

"We've already agreed to recommend that the murder charges be
dropped," he answered. "Maybe we should drop the grudges, too."

I was confused by his sudden turn toward reconciliation, particularly
where Krycek was concerned. "Mulder?"

He pulled me back down against his chest. "What am I gonna do,
Scully - - go out and seek hot-blooded revenge during the day and come
home to my family at night?"

"A fresh start," I said, trying out the feel of the words.

"Mm-hm," he mumbled sleepily. "This is the payoff. A normal life."

"I have no idea how to do that," I confessed.

"Me either," he replied with a faint chuckle.


This morning we got the good news that global immunity just surpassed
the ninety-sixth percentile. That, Krycek pronounced, combined with
Skinner's carefully planned capture and incarceration of a
hospitalized Spender and three of his high-level operatives, was the
sign that it was time to re-emerge from our self-imposed exile.

So now, for the second time in nearly two months, Mulder emerges from
a small place to the intrusive clicking of camera shutters and the
blinding lights of portable video cameras. This time, however, he
steps aside and directs the journalists to badger Eric and me for
details.

Last time, I protected my fear and joy behind a mask of
professionalism. This time, I withhold nothing.

Last time, I concealed my pregnancy out of the fear that it would be
used against me. This time, I waddle out of the subterranean
structure, six months pregnant and already huge, unconcerned about the
intrusive assumptions of the press.

Last time, I believed the world was in incomprehensible danger, and
that I was essentially powerless to help. This time, I understand how
we were able to fight back, and why our efforts were effective.

Last time, we had only questions. This time, we have answers.

--------------------
End Part 8/9.

Part 9/9.  

**EPILOGUE**

Spring, 2009


Special Agent Fox Mulder sold the print rights to his autobiography
for a record $12.4 million to Harper Collins. He insisted on writing
the book himself. Screen rights have never been negotiated. He retired
from the FBI at 46, and currently teaches new programs in
Parapsychology and Divergent Thinking at the FBI Academy at Quantico.
He lives with his wife, sister, and two children in Stafford,
Virginia.

Special Agent Dana Scully retreated from public life after The Sunday
Mirror published forged photographs of her participation in a
drug-induced orgy supposedly taken during her second year in pre-med
at the University of Maryland. She resigned as a field agent from the
FBI at 38, and resumed her career in education, teaching Forensic
Pathology at the FBI Academy at Quantico.  Despite her intensely
private lifestyle, she did maintain important relationships in both
law enforcement and politics, so it was no surprise when, only twelve
hours after the results of the 2008 federal election were announced,
she appeared at a press conference with President-Elect Rodham to
announce her acceptance of a Cabinet post as Secretary of Health. She
lives with her husband, sister-in-law, and two children in Stafford,
Virginia.

Assistant Director Walter Skinner was dismissed from the FBI for
"Misappropriation of Bureau Resources" and "Misrepresentation of
Bureau Personnel", along with two assistants; Kimberly Cameron and
Marla Daniels. He acquired his P.I. license and began a private
investigation firm in Washington, D.C. three months later, with
Cameron and Daniels on his staff, as well as a stable of investigators
and researchers whose names could not be determined. He is married and
has twin sons. There are unconfirmed reports that he has been working
for Interpol.

Alex Krycek disappeared from sight shortly after the murder charges
against him were dropped. He has been glimpsed on occasion in the
Metro D.C. area, but these sightings cannot be confirmed.

Morris Fletcher reconciled with his wife of twelve years and relocated
to the Washington, D.C. area. Upon early retirement from the ATRD, he
accepted the position of Curator of Extraterrestrial Artifacts at the
Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, and currently oversees security and
programming for the daily tours of the alien craft housed there.
Twenty-five percent of the daily grosses from ticket sales are donated
to the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta, Georgia, and earmarked
for research at its Xenovirology unit.

Samantha Mulder graduated with honors in the advanced Focus program
from Stafford, Virginia's Colonial Forge High School. She plans to
attend Oxford University in the fall, to study Xenotechnology at the
school's newly established Mulder Hall for Extraterrestrial Studies.

Eric Lindgren toured the lecture circuit for two years before
accepting a position in the Surgeon General's office, as Special Envoy
to the Armed Services.  He resides in Ellicott City, Maryland with his
wife, Melissa, and their son, Michael.

Melissa Lindgren currently operates a holistic book store in
Baltimore. She resides in Ellicott City, Maryland with her husband,
Eric, and their son, Michael.

CNN Washington Bureau Chief Frank Sesno received three Emmy awards for
his network's coverage of the alien craft's landing.

William Miles is currently the Sheriff of Bellefleur, Oregon, and has
reconciled with his estranged wife, Patti. He sold his story to the
National Enquirer for $1 Million, and has appeared on talk shows
nationally.

Baby Hoese was returned to her parents, Theresa and Ray Hoese, within
eighteen hours of their return to Earth. Although both were
hospitalized following their return, a specially drafted court order
granted them a return to full parental privileges. For 8 days, during
which the Hoeses and all the other surviving abductees (with the
exception of the two Mulders) remained under observation at the base
hospital at Kingsley Air Force Base in Oregon, Baby Hoese slept in a
crib between her parents' hospital beds.

"The Lone Gunman" has become the single most popular
conspiracy-oriented publication in U.S. history, with a current
circulation of just over 1 million copies monthly. The founders still
refuse to accept advertising or to grant public interviews. Richard
"Ringo" Langly, Co-Founder and Technology Editor, recently
self-published "The Hacker's Treatise: How To Protect Yourself", and
sales are reported to be brisk. Melvin Frohike, Surveillance and
Security Editor, was honored by the 225th Marine Corps, and was
awarded a Medal of Honor by Marine Commandant General J.L. Jones, for
his participation in 'work uncovering the gravest of threats to
mankind'. John Fitzgerald Byers, Intelligence Editor and CEO of The
Lone Gunman L.L.C., currently lives in the Washington area with his
wife, Suzanne, and three retired greyhounds.

The terminally ill Chesterton Gabriel Bloodworth Spender and three of
his high-ranking lieutenants died in federal prison under suspicious
circumstances only days after their indictments.  All four were
eventually convicted posthumously by the World Court of three hundred
ninety-four counts of war crimes, including espionage, obstruction of
justice, and treason.

"The Lazarus Bowl" recently entered its third printing on DVD, and now
includes rare never-before-seen interviews with former Special Agent
Mulder and Associate Producer Walter Skinner. It has netted close to
$500 million worldwide, and has spawned a new crossgenre of
science-fiction/religion films, including the commercial hits "Icon"
and "NanoProphets", and the critically acclaimed "God Rode the
MagLev".

Jose Chung's previously published book, "From Outer Space", has
entered its fifth printing, and was on the New York Times bestseller
list for two hundred sixty-four consecutive weeks.

"Jose Chung is From Outer Space", a parody work written by 'Alan
Smithee', has entered its second printing, and has been on the New
York Times bestseller list for thirty-seven consecutive weeks. The
profits are being paid to the Center for Missing and Exploited
Children and the American Cancer Foundation. Simon and Schuster,
parent company of Pocket Books, the publisher, is contractually
obligated to protect the identity of the anonymous author. No firm
identification has been made, despite the potentially helpful
dedication, "To my one in six billion, with love. And all right, I
admit it: L.H. didn't have buck teeth. There, I said it in public.
Happy?"

Edward van Blundht Jr., an inmate at a West Virginia penitentiary, was
sentenced to an additional fifteen years for escaping and
impersonation of a Federal Officer in conjunction with his brief but
ultimately unsuccessful kidnapping of Fox Mulder. It was his second
such offense.

The issue of Life magazine in which former Special Agent Dana Scully
was depicted on the cover sold out in its original printing, and
called for an unprecedented three additional printings, each of which
sold out within days. The shot of Scully, smiling broadly, looking up
into the alien spacecraft, framed by a brilliant orange sunset, was
subsequently sold to Design Media, Inc. for an undisclosed sum, and
has sold extremely well in all forms: Posters, coffee mugs, mouse
pads, and refrigerator magnets. A second shot, nearly as popular, was
taken by a staff photographer for USA Today: That of Fox Mulder
peering down out of the access port of the craft. The shot can
currently be seen in the above forms, as well as on stickers and
keychains, and was purchased by Berkeley Systems for use as part of a
new line of computer screen savers.

Life magazine published a special issue dedicated to the Ten Most
Significant Photographs of the Century. In addition to the
now-legendary shots of JFK Jr. saluting his father's casket and the
sailor/nurse V.E. Day kiss, the Scully cover shot was included as
number nine.

A monument was erected on the mall in Washington, D.C., honoring the
96 abductee casualties. Artist Leonardo Nierman, in a rare display of
representative style, sculpted it in bronze. It depicts a man, woman
and young girl, standing firm on an enormous globe. The woman holds a
test tube aloft in defiance, while the man wraps protective arms
around the woman and girl. The names of the deceased are engraved on
the surface of the sphere, near the locations where they lived prior
to their abduction. A plaque at the bottom reads, "This is our truth:
We stand together, as one race."

Although information is sketchy, the decomposed body of one Alger
Strughold, former proprietor of the now-defunct Strughold Mining
Corporation, was found in an oil drum in New Jersey. It has been
suggested that Strughold was involved in the global conspiracy to
conceal the truth from the public about the planned alien invasion.

The American Centers for Disease Control currently maintain samples of
both strains of the alien virus, as well as an inventory of the
nanoserum. All are kept under the strictest security of any substance
on the planet.

+++++++++++++++++

End.



Thank you for reading!

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