TITLE:   The Whole Catastrophe
AUTHOR:  DIEHARD
alvaradomccain@earthlink.net 
Rating: NC-17
Classification: Case file/MSR, WIP, Humor
Alternate Universe...people are actually happy here...
well, some of them


Spoilers: Everything through the first third of Season 7,
the story taking place in the universe set forth in
Absolute Beginners I, Absolute Beginners II--
Better With Practice, and Absolute Beginners III--
Comes The Morning---available on Ephemeral, Whispers
of X, Fran's Fanfic Addiction, and The Grove.
(It'll help to read 'em, honest!)


Keywords: Be careful what you wish for. Character
death...not who you think. Necromancy. Santeria.
Marriage Proposal.


Summary: This story takes place late in the year 2000.
In the early Spring of the same year, Mulder and Scully
finally got off the dime (after a false start, angst,
guilt and a nightmare or two) and did the dirty deed.
After a weekend of 'solidifying their relationship',
they are pulled of the X-Files, but managed
to find at least one way to console each other.
Fast forward about six months--and you'll be right
we begin, dear reader.


Disclaimers: You know, they're not ours. They're
Chris Carter's. Just using them for the fun, no money
involved.Archive: Yes, anywhere. Just keep it intact.
Feedback: Yes, please. you can contact me:
alvaradomccain@earthlink.net

Folks, this is my first attempt at collaboration, fueled by all the
insightful and supportive feedback I've received. (Some of which
has come from dryad, so she gets part of the blame for me getting
so nervy.) Much, much thanks to Alicia K., and Nikki B for their
beta wisdom, general support and encouragement of this fledgling
author. Thanks to Judith Weugel and the folks at Fran's
FanficAddiction. Judith wrote me a great e-mail that got me
stoked to write more. Also, thanks to my teachers--writers like
Bonetree, fialka, revely and jessemie's evil twin. What you do
with words!

Most of all, thanks to David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson
for almost a decade of complicated, passionate, subtle
portrayals of our favorite fighters against the
apocalypse--Mulder and Scully.


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x

After a long six months doing background checks, the X-Files are
reopened, our heroes are called to investigate a series of vigilante
style murders, but all is not what it seems. Oh, and by the way, M
and S are involved, living together, actually having quite a bit of
sex and it's not an an angst-ridden mess...well...mostly not.
The Whole Catastrophe

Prologue--October 1999---after work--early in the week.


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X

In a just a few months what was once her organized, unused
and uninhabited apartment was now relaxed and generally
showed signs of life.

Just like the two of them.

His black leather sofa was now the centerpiece of the living
room, and she'd bought two rust colored overstuffed chairs.
Serious negotiation on her part resulted in keeping the end tables,
bookshelves and the lamps; although he won use of the
dining room, turning it into his workspace. The Salvation Army
got a lovely oak dining room set, in a very generous, very
anonymous donation.

Her computer and desk were still in one corner of the living room
and the bathroom had become a sanctuary of music--he'd
surprised her with a sound system after the first month.
Candles of all shapes and sized dotted the bedroom
and the bathroom, due to a flurry of activity
on his part one rainy, Saturday afternoon.

As for the kitchen, it was actually used now since he
cooked, and they ate at the kitchen table or on the sofa.
Strategically placed stacks of magazines and newspapers
dotted the apartment, and much to someone's relief Scully
did not melt down. She'd added to them on a regular basis,
telling him he'd have to come up with a filing system.

One night while they were putting away groceries, he'd
told her it looked like the apartment of two university
professors. Two really attractive professors researching
human sexual response, was actually how he framed it.
Mulder's take on it notwithstanding, it did, sort of.
She just had to overlook the briefcase full of firearms
in the closet, (minus the strategically hidden SIGs and
Colt 1911's) the anti-surveillance hardware, and the high
security locks on all the doors and windows.

They did have their first skirmish one night after work about
six weeks into this new arrangement, when she'd tried to hide
his basketball after he'd left it on the kitchen table. After
catching her trying to shove it under the bed, he swooped
down to retrieve it, only to knock her on her round little ass.

He'd hovered over her as she'd sat there with her hair a mess,
skirt hitched up, and he had every intention of helping her up
when she asked, 'Is that all you've got, Milk?' Five minutes
later, with Mulder's mouth hotly latched onto that soft spot
at the hollow of her throat and his hand firmly inching
up her thigh, she had proof that he had plenty of game.

It was Tuesday night, which meant that she'd be wooed
with an evening of his dazzling domestic skills and dancing,
usually selections from his oddly eclectic dietary and
musical favorites. He plied her with home cooking and
wheedled her into shaking her proverbial groove thing
with him once a week, every week since they'd moved
in together.

The first time was after a surprisingly good combination of
red beans and rice, bock beer and cherry popsicles,
Once he drew her into slow-dancing to Al Green and Bonnie
Raitt, her enthusiastic late-night response was all the motivation
he needed to keep it up. And as for Scully, she'd come
to eagerly anticipate all this wooing, even if it was his own
off-center variety.


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X


Mulder crept through their inhabited kingdom, hoping to sneak
up on the love of his life, who'd perched herself on the edge
of that aforementioned black leather sofa. She was bent
over her partially disassembled service revolver which she'd
spread across the coffee table. Unfortunately, a niggling
question was causing her concentration to waiver.
Inquiring minds wanted to know whether he'd be hauling
his gluteus maximus out of the kitchen any time in the near
future. If so, she was prepared do a little exploration
of the up-close and personal kind.

As she polished the grip of her SIG with a tack cloth,
she heard his footfalls approaching. That's it, get a little
closer and I'll be glad to rub something else, she mused.

The tips of his size 12 Nikes appeared in her peripheral
vision, and she was about to stop what she was doing--
cleaning and oiling the barrel of her SIG, when a hand
gripping a ladle of steaming, fragrant liquid paused just
under her nose.

"Close your eyes, Scully...Taste."

"Shouldn't you be telling me to open my mouth?"

"I thought that part was obvious."

"And why should I close my eyes...is that some secret
sampling technique I'm not aware of?"

"It'll taste better...I promise." He leaned a little closer,
pursed his lips together and blew across the hot liquid.

"Must be why I close my eyes when I kiss...Mmmmm....Ummmm."
The banter was ended when the edge of the ladle grazed
her lips and she got a mouthful of Mulder's latest
culinary achievement. "Chicken soup...good." It was
rich, delicious, savory. Chunks of chicken, carrot,
celery. Redolent with fresh dill, rosemary and basil.
Definitely not Campbell's

"Not just good. This is manna from heaven, a cure for what
ails you...Gey gezhundt, meine shayna maidel."

"Since when did you become 'meine yiddische Mulder?' "

"I'm channeling here, have some respect." Wiping a drop of
soup from the corner of her mouth, he let his index finger
skim the curve of her lower lip.

"Unless you're planning on telling me about your new career
as a Borscht Belt comedian, I think I'd rather sit in the
kitchen while you dish up tonight's dinner."

"Wow. You just want a man all hot and sweaty in front
of the stove, don't you?"

"You don't have to be in front of the stove, actually."

"You suggest some interesting possibilities, Scully."
The ladle was dropped unceremoniously on the coffee table,
Mulder slid onto the sofa and hoisted her onto his lap.
She hadn't let go of her SIG, though. "It's a little hard
to focus while you're still holding your weapon,
partner." His hands eased away from her waist,
burrowing under her shirt, and he stroked her ribs,
a slow, feathery drag up and down, up and down.

The cloth and the pistol found their way to the floor.
Moving from sitting across his lap to straddling him,
she pressed tight against his hips and wreathed her arms
around his neck. She rocked slowly against him and felt an
enormous sense of satisfaction as one of his better
parts snapped to attention. When he started making that
whiskey rumble in his throat, she felt herself slicken
and her whole body thrum.

"Better, Mulder?" She felt his hands sweep across to her
breasts, where he captured each nipple between a thumb and
forefinger and teased them slowly to hardness.

"You tell me." Now his thumbs traced figure eights,
and his eyes followed the line of her throat as she
swallowed hard and a shuddery breath escaped slightly
parted lips.

"Later...quit talking and kiss me." Her eyelids drifted
shut, and she eased her arms from around his neck.
Steadying herself with strong, supple hands,
she gripped the tops of his thighs and wriggled against
his tightening groin.

She was most definitely rubbing him the right way, and
part of him really wanted to do what she said but she'd
left herself open for a smart-ass remark,
"Can't resist telling me what to do, can you? "

At that comment, she leaned in and licked the side
of his jaw, savoring the rasp of his stubble against her
tongue, the smell of his aftershave, and the taste of his
skin. Then, with her usual deftness, she worked her
way along his chin, and finished up by nipping at the corner
of his mouth. "Not when you're so good at it," she
murmured.

"Think so?...Well, as long as you insist ... " He turned
his head to make contact and his tongue swam toward hers,
making sure he gave her plenty of evidence to back up
her assertion.

He leisurely stroked the inside of that sweet mouth, and
was almost regretful when he managed to pull away, the very
tip of his tongue tracing the edge of her smile. The mole
on her upper lip got the same treatment, then there was a
shower of tiny pecks on the bridge of her nose, ending with
warm brushes of his lips against her cheek. After a momentary
pause, he captured an earlobe and softly bit down to the
sound of Scully's 'Mmmmm......my marvelous Mulder.'
He couldn't help chuckling at that and it made him relinquish
the lobe, and besides, he'd heard her laugh, too.

Leaning back on the sofa, he cupped her chin in his hand,
"Ready for the main course?"

"I could eat a little something...More of this later?"
She started to right herself, although she wasn't yet
ready to get off his lap.

"I think I could manage that...But first you will dine
on a delicious home-cooked meal, prepared with a skill
bordering on genius, by none other than yours truly."

"I see..." Her mouth quirked in a grin which he matched
with one of his own. "Is that all?"

He'd put on his negotiator's face, which bore an uncanny
resemblance to his panic face. She doubled down, too.
After all, they were at a critical juncture.
"Oh, no...there's dancing with me until the witching hour,
during which there will be hours of foreplay...a subtle,
but intense crescendo of sensual contact."

The eyebrow went up at that one. " 'Subtle, but intense
crescendo', Mulder? And here all I wanted was to make out
in the living room."

"I'm spinning metaphor here, work with me, Scully."

"I see...And just what else happens after this whole
'crescendo' of yours peaks?"

"I will, of course, make love to you for a prolonged period
of time." The bargaining face still held, although his eyes
glinted wicked green.

"You drive a hard bargain, Agent. But if those are your
conditions..."

"They are."

She shook her head, huffed out a huge sigh, and slumped her
shoulders in mock resignation, "Well, you leave me no choice,
then...I agree."

"Not so fast, there's one last thing."

She slapped a hand to her head in an impression of wonder
and disbelief, "And what on earth could that be...?"

"You'll have to fuck me senseless. And that may take all
night." Now he arched an eyebrow.

With the barest hint of a smile, she cupped his balls with
one hand and with the other, caressed him with long, slow
strokes. "A girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do."

She'd almost derailed him with that move. But he didn't
want to take a pass on the rest of the evening, the ritual
of it, the way it made him feel he hadn't forgotten how
to get it right. "Miss Scully, release my testes and dinner
will be served."

She did, and extricated herself from his lap. As he pulled
himself to an upright and standing position, Mulder teased,
"Thought you had me there, huh?" He snatched the fallen
cooking utensil from the coffee table, turned on his heels,
and gingerly strode into the kitchen with an odd hitch in
his step.

"Once again, you proved me wrong," She nodded in
self-congratulation though, as he walked away from her
very, very slowly.

~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~

As they set the table, Mulder waxed theoretical on the
significance of the 'Matrix', its place in pop culture's
post-digital paranoia, and Keanu's Reeves' classic
understated acting as a postmodern messiah. Setting a tureen
of soup in the middle of the table, he tapped the ladle on
its side to emphasize his point. This clever segue also gave
him the opportunity to slow things down and prolong
tonight's pleasure. He'd discovered yet another way his
experience in delayed gratification was finally going
to pay off...

When she turned her back to get the rest of the silverware,
he watched the way she skimmed happily across the floor
in her stocking feet, jean-clad, white shirt rolled up
to the elbows. Leaning against the table, he watched
her, breath hitching and fluttering in his chest.
Here was Scully, branched DNA and battle scar survivor,
healer and warrior, and his heart broke open once again
just from the sight of her. There'd never be any
way to fully explain how visceral her hold on him was,
a basic construct of his reality, She was larger than life,
a universal invariant, she was all of eternity he would
ever understand.

Scully sauntered back with a hand on one hip and spoons
in the other and caught him with some kind of otherworldly
look on his face. She was just about to ask what was up
when what looked like an epiphany evaporated and the rant
resumed.

"Brilliant, subversive movie making...all from two
working-class Polish guys from Chicago. It's the definitive
statement on Everyman's ambivalence toward a technologic
universe, and the hardrive plutocrats it creates."

She snorted as she fussed with the place settings,
"You're so full of crap, Mulder. What you love about that
movie is the super-attenuated kung-fu on the part of the
principals, especially the paybacks administered by
women in PVC."

"And your point would be?"

Laughing, she shook her head and sat herself in the closest
kitchen chair, "That you're a whoop-ass-loving, testosterone-
driven connossieur of popular culture...A sex-crazed man
of letters, with an unnatural affinity toward John Woo
and the Wachowsky Brothers."

"And that's a bad thing?" He served up the soup, and passed
her some dark rye heaped with butter.

"You'll get no complaints here."

He slid his chair next to hers and plopped himself down.
"Be nice to me and later I'll spell some really interesting
words with those letters."

"I'll remember to ask you about that." She broke off the end
of her slice of bread, and popped it into his mouth.

In a slightly garbled, but still intelligible voice,
"I take it we should just eat now." Then he leaned over
and poured them both a glass of the white wine she'd opened.

Smiling, she nodded and shot him the thumbs up, and
proceeded to start in on her soup with a relish.

This was one of parts he loved, eating in the kitchen
in the hush and the quiet that settled around them, like
some an old married couple; it made him feel blessedly
ordinary, normal. Contrary to what motivated him for the
majority of his life, the pull of the unknown no longer
remained his driving wheel. It was this--the everyday sacred,
salvaged from the wreckage of both their lives. He would do
what he had to, when it was time, and so would Scully.
All the rest of it would come and there would be these
shards of normalcy, nights like this that they could both
hold onto, nights that they would fight the good fight
to have again. He was thinking about the past imperfect
and the future unknowable, when she snapped him back into
the present by leaning into to steal a kiss.

"Soup's that good, huh?"

"No. You are." Scully hadn't been watching him, but felt
the spell of this silence and simple things, and she knew
he'd meant it for her. For them.

"I..don't know what to say." He startled as if someone
had awoken him from a dream.

"Say, 'thank you Scully'." She'd peered up her from her bowl
of soup, at first bemused. What she saw, she was completely
unprepared for. He looked astonished, embarrassed. She
carefully laid down her spoon and placed her hand on top
of his.

"Thank you, Scully." His eyes shone bright as he blinked
away some unexpected tears.

"Thank you, Mulder. And now that's makes us even."
She leaned in and kissed him again with tenderness and
deliberate care, anchoring both of them once more
to the quiet of their kitchen and their semblance
of an ordinary life.

~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~

She'd just about finished the dishes, wringing out the
sponge while the soapy water glugged its way down the drain.
She was enjoying a pleasantly warm buzz from her share of Pinot
Grigio, when it hit her. Something was amiss.

Where was the man with the dishtowel, and why wasn't he
drying the dishes? She twisted away from the sink, only to see
Mulder rapidly approaching, waving the towel in one hand and
clutching the CD player's remote in the other.

"Boys will be girls and girls will be boys! Gender will be
bent tonight, Scully. It's Bowie, you know him, you love him."
Throwing the towel onto the dish rack, he grabbed her by
the wrist and spun her toward him. Apparently she wasn't
the only one working off a slight buzz.

"Wait, Mulder! We're not...Whoa!" Scully slid in her
stockinged feet and collided with him. Bumping up against his
pelvis, she laughed as he got purchase on her around the waist
with his free arm. "You're not going to dry the dishes
are you?"

"It will give you scientific proof that water does in fact,
evaporate from solid surfaces." With that, he punched in a
track on the remote and flung it on the counter.
"This first song was picked with you mind, Special Agent
Doctor, D.K.Scully...."

Guitars ripped and growled, and Bowie belted, 'Let's dance.
Put on your red shoes and dance the blues... '

He shimmied her across the kitchen floor, their hips pressed
together, pivoting back and forth to the beat. One hand
curled around the curve of her waist and the other slowly
combed through her hair and teased its way to the nape
of her neck.

'Let's sway, while color lights up your face.' They circled
their way out of the kitchen and into the living room.
He bent his forehead to hers and she could sense him smile.

Mulder's fingers pressed tiny circles just above her
shoulders, "Hours of foreplay, Scully." Driving her wild
with need was too delightful to rush the process. Then
softly, almost imperceptibly, he brushed his lips against
hers in a slow slide, once, twice, three times. She tasted
the wine, and the spark of excitement was almost palpable
on his lips.

Yes, indeed, hours and hours, she thought. She felt flushed,
but instead of backing away embarrassed, she wriggled her
hips with a little more enthusiasm. The sound of his
'Mmmmmm" underneath the music was all the encouragement
she needed.

Bowie pleaded, 'Let's dance for fear tonight is all...
Let's sway, you could look into my eyes.'

She was radiant, tossing her head back and leaning into
his touch. Both of his hands were in her hair now and
he gazed at her for a hot, silvery moment. His heart was
beating staccato, but he wasn't going to yield. He craved
more of this, wanted to bring her slowly to the midnight hour.

Leaning in to kiss her deeply, he felt time speeding up and
slowing, flowing into the feel of his mouth on hers, savoring
the stroke of his tongue between her parted lips. Bowie was
just about to reveal the reason Mulder chose this cut in the
first place. As the music ribboned all around them, he pulled
away and pressed his lips to her ear and whispered along.

"If you say run, I'll run with you." Mulder's voice raspy, his breath
warm, "If you say hide, we'll hide. Because my love for you
would break my heart in two." His strong arm captured her waist,
and he eased her backwards. "If you should fall into my arms,
and tremble like a flower."

She shifted in his arms and leaned up to kiss him, still
moving to the music, and now brushed her warm lips against
his, once, twice, three times. "Hours of foreplay,
you said?"

"Hours and hours, Scully...I'm a man of my word." And he
closed the centimeter's distance between them, made contact,
and they stopped listening to music for a minute or two.

~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X


Crooning about serious moonlight had faded away, the two
of them, however, were still seriously wrapped around
each other. Diamond Dogs barked in the background, and
Mulder rose to the occasion when her fingers grazed the
waistband of his jeans. He countered with a move of his
own, starting the slow descent down her neck, biting down
where it sloped into her shoulder. Shoulder, shudder,
bow-wow-wow, her panting and his growl--it was all making
him lightheaded, which is why he didn't notice right away.
Out of nowhere she'd started laughing, that deep, throaty
one that always pushed him over the edge. This time was no
different, a realization later and he was rock hard.

A staccato Bowie howled, "Aaah-oooh...aah-ooh...Woof...
Woof.'

One of her hands began to move away and he was about to
grab it and put it back where it belonged, but it was too
late. She'd steadied herself and pushed against him and
then they were upright.

"You're laughing, Scully. Tell me it's for the right
reasons."

"Like I'm really, really, happy and really, really,
turned on? Because I am."

"Glad to hear it. I, for one, can offer ample proof
that you're not without your charms."

"There does seem to be a preponderance of physical
evidence..." She chewed at her bottom lip, nodded
appreciatively at the bulge under his fly . "I'd let you
have your way with me, but now it's my turn."

"Your turn?" He closed his eyes and held himself very,
very, still. Do your worst, he hoped. Or your best.
Either. Both. He held his breath.

She stood on tiptoes and whispered in his ear, all smoke
and 12 year-old Scotch, "Yeah...It's my turn to pick
the music."

~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~

'Ground control to Major Tom...Take your protein pills
and put your helmet on,' a voice from beyond droned.

He was still glued to the spot where'd she left him, but
now he was smirking, and when she tapped him on the arm,
his eyes opened and his hand flew up and caught hers by
the wrist. "You're funny."

'Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven..." The music was
steadily building.

"What?" She tried hauling out her 'Good-Catholic-Girl-Who-Me?'
face, but she could see he wasn't buying.

"Space Oddity? Really, I'm crushed." He didn't really
look all that devastated.

"Parts of you still seem pretty buoyant." Her blood was
still buzzing with arousal, just ratcheted a few notches
down.

'Check ignition and may God's love be with you,' and the
guitars zoomed out into the stratosphere.

A sight adjustment of his jeans revealed that all systems
were still go. "I'll show you buoyant...C'mere."
With that, he snaked himself around her and pulled her
flush against him. He cupped her chin in his palm, and
pinned her with a look that managed to be both devilish
and tender. "But you'll have to wait, Miss Scully,
I've got other plans for you."

She followed his lead with subtle, almost imperceptible
touches as they drifted in a slow waltz across the floor.
He held her the old-fashioned way, one arm clasped loosely
around the waist, the other holding her arm aloft, holding
hands, fingers entwined. Her thumb stroked his wrist
as his circled the skin above the snake at the small of her
back. Their movements flowed seamlessly, like syrup
spilling over the edge of a spoon.

As they drifted around the living room, they caught a
glimpse of themselves in the window. Gliding together,
elegant, fitted to each other. They watched their joint
reflection and both wondered if somehow it could be
etched into the glass.

That window must have held some magick, because after
one last trip around the room, they found themselves slow
dancing in front of it again. It was raining, hard enough
for the light from the street lamps to streak like fireworks
against the inky shadows of the street and the night all
around.

'And the stars look very different today...'

They'd begun to slow and finally still, leaving them
standing pressed to the windowpane, looking down at the
motionless street below. Scully leaned back, fitting
herself snugly to his chest. He wrapped his arms around
her, and dipped his head to whisper in her ear. "Happy?"

"Very...and you?" Her smile beamed at him from her
reflection.

"More than you'll ever know. But maybe I could try to
show you... " Now his image in the glass was sultry,
almost giving off reflected heat.

"Is this the part where you make love to me for...
what was it now?"

His hand swept across her chest and cradled a breast.
"...for a prolonged period of time, I believe."

"Hmmm...that seems right." Now both his hands stroked
her breasts. "Mmmmmmm."

'Can you hear me, Major Tom?"

A low burr coming from the direction of phone on the
end table.

'Can you hear me, Major Tom?'

"Mulder, I think we should answer the phone."

The burr persisted unabated.

"I don't know what you're talking about." He sighed as he
felt her extricate herself.

"Go answer the phone, and I'll stay right here and hold
your place." She'd turned around and gave him a rueful
smile that definitely telegraphed frustration.

"Right. Be right back." He spanned the gap in three huge
strides, picked up the phone and grunted, "Mulder. What?"
She'd gone over to the CD player and turned it off.
There was a pregnant pause, during which Mulder tried to
regroup. A look of surprise flitted across his face,
"A.D. Skinner. Sorry, sir...I was in the middle of a
conversation with Agent Scully when you called..."

Hearing Walter Skinner's name got her over to Mulder's
side ASAP. Hovering nearby, she bit her lip anxiously
as her mental gears started to turn. Skinner. What did
he want? Every piece of godawful paperwork they signed
off on had been checked and rechecked, why couldn't he wait
to tell them whatever it was until the morning?

Mulder had been silent, taking in what Skinner was saying,
and it was several long minutes before he responded. He
motioned to her and slipped an arm around her waist,
pulling her close enough to eavesdrop.

"Let me get this straight, sir. There's been a series of
unexplained murders in Chicago, and the local P.D. is at a
loss due to the unexplained, bizarre aspects of the killings.
The local SAC mentioned us to the mayor, the mayor has
friends in the DOJ, who in turn have friends in the
Director's Office, who in turn have now informed you that
our valuable skills are now required in the ongoing
investigation."

Scully could hear Skinner's growl, "Agent Mulder, the
X-Files have been reopened, and I believe I've made the
circumstances of the case clear. Don't make me repeat myself.
Rest assured a sufficient amount of grease has been applied
by parties more than experienced with high level reach-arounds.
It's my job to tell you and get you flown out to Chicago.
It's your job and Agent Scully's to go there and apply your
expertise to assist fellow law enforcement officers. Be
in my office at at 0-600 hours for a briefing.
You're already booked on a 9 am flight into O'Hare."

"0-600 hours? Very military of you, sir." Mulder could
see Scully mouthing 'Don't piss him off' in his peripheral
vision.

"Mulder, I suggest you refrain from sticking your dick
in a departmental vice for at least forty-eight hours.
Can the salient observations about military protocol,
and just get your ass in here on time. I'll assume you'll
make Agent Scully aware of her change of assignment."

'Yes, sir."

"Agent Mulder?"

"Yeah?"

"Welcome back."

They moved apart so that he could hang up the phone.
The atmosphere had definitely been drained of its earlier
playful charge, and they stood by the end table, not speaking
until Mulder ruptured the silence.

"You heard it all, right?" He made his voice as neutral
as possible.

"Looks like we're suddenly popular again. This is good, Mulder.
You don't belong in the bullpen shoveling papers, and neither
do I. Although I would've thought you'd be doing handstands
after hearing you finally got a reprieve." She managed a wan
smile. "Let's start packing partner, we've got a big day
ahead of us tomorrow."

And right before his eyes she'd changed from laughing and
flirting to squared shoulders, and mental prep lists. He
stood riveted to his spot while she went over to the sofa
and sat down to finish reassembling her service weapon.

She fitted piece to piece, checking alignment and trying
desperately to shore up the part of her soul that felt
cheated, threatened. He need her to be on point, to be
Special Agent Scully, ready for whatever they would throw
at them. She tried to organize her thoughts--check weapons,
evidence kit, medical bag--pack the laptops and enough clothes
for at least a week. It was 10 o'clock now, with any luck they'd
be done and in bed by midnight. Looking up to tell him he'd better
start packing, she saw that old, familiar look painfully grieve
his features. She rested her SIG on her lap, "You're happy
about this, aren't you?"

The rush of a sadness he hadn't felt in months hit him,
and he made himself quickly push it away, hoping she hadn't
caught it. "Are you?"

"I asked you first." Now she was trying to be equally
opaque.

He shrugged, and stared down at the floor, "Happy that
we're going to do what we have the talent and the insight
to do. Not so happy that we'll be under scrutiny again,
that our..." He struggled for the right words, but she
finished it for him.

"...honeymoon is over...You think things are going to be
like they were before. That's it, isn't it?"

"You don't seem to be having a problem hopping back in
the saddle. I mean, you're getting ready with a vengeance."
He shrugged again, steeling himself for the rift his worst
instincts told him was not far away. He saw she'd already
pushed away any thoughts of intimacy, tamped them down to
get on to the business at hand. He wasn't sure he could
reach her, and didn't think he could deal with being severed
from all they'd built over the last six months. "Be honest,
Scully. We have very different, ingrained ways of working.
Our approaches have always counterbalanced each other,
and that's made us a successful team. Don't get me wrong,
I've always valued it, needed it. But it kept us apart, Scully.
Seven long years apart, until we broke through it..." His
voice trailed off and his green eyes clouded with his need
for reassurance.

"Just tell me it won't happen again, Scully...tell me
and I'll believe it."

She looked up at up him and for all her effort to suit up,
she couldn't halt the tear that escaped and trailed down
her cheek, "Is that what you think?" He brushed away
that wet line, wishing he could erase it from her memory.

She sighed at the touch of his large, warm hand against
her damp, cool skin. "Listen to me. If you think I plan on
acting the way I used to, trying to hold on to some kind of
emotional distance...I can't, I won't...We can't go back, Mulder,
only forward." Her blue eyes were lit with a fire he recognized,
she wasn't retreating. But underneath that fire he sensed
her inner turmoil.

The fact of the matter was that neither one of them had the
vaguest idea as to how balance the changes in personal lives
and the demands of the X-Files. The bullshit assignment that
Kersh had engineered allowed them to hide in plain sight,
saving all their energy for the pair-bonding of new lovers.
Now the rubber was hitting the road, and Mulder noted ruefully
that they had, in fact, both slipped into familiar patterns.
She'd stepped up the plate, trying to cover his back and he
embraced his own neuroses without hesitation.

"Sure you want to keep putting up with me?" Now he
knelt at her side, hand still resting against her face.

She moved closer and whispered in his ear, "If you say run,
I'll run with you...If you say hide, we'll hide." Her voice
roughened with the knowledge that they still had so much to
prove to each other.

He eased away and cradled her face with both hands, gazing
at her with a look hot enough to singe off her clothes.
"Let me make love to you...I know we should be packing,
that Skinner expects us at 6 am, and that we're going to
have to make up the rest of this as we go along...I'm glad
we're reinstated, Scully, I am... But there is nothing,
nothing that I want or need more than you."

The mundane details of daily living or end-of-the-world
theatrics didn't matter in the end, only that. "You know
that promise I made earlier? It's time I kept it."
In a flash, he'd taken her gun and set it on the table,
had her up on her feet, and was marching her to the bedroom.
He steered her from behind, hands firmly grasping her
shoulders, planning on a quickly arrival at the desired
destination, but somehow she'd found away to to slow their
progress.

"Mulder?"

"Yes, Scully?"

"What about packing?" She tried not to let the tease show
in her voice.

"I'll set the clock for 4." He was on to her, but played
along anyway.

"Are you sure?"

"Yes, Scully, I'm sure. I'm also sure if I don't get you
in bed soon, I'm gonna throw you down take you on the
dining room floor.

"Maybe some other time." She did file that one away
for future reference.

"What about the evidence kit?"

"You'll call that guy Jake in the lab once we get to
the the Bureau, and tell him we need a fresh one
in Skinner's office by 7 am."

"Medical bag?" She was rapidly running out of roadblocks
as they crossed the bedroom's threshold.

"In seven years, I've never known you to be short of any
of the necessities."

"Mulder..." She'd started that laugh again...

He picked her up by the waist and set her on the bed and
set the alarm. He snatched off his T-shirt, popped open
his fly, hurriedly shoved his way out of his jeans and
the rest of his clothes. "No more talking shop, Scully."

The outline of his strong, smooth body, the rise of his
cock as it stood taut and waiting for her touch did indeed
end that conversation. She started to unbutton her blouse,
but was stopped by his hands covering hers and easing her
down against the bedding. "No, don't...I want undress you."

He undid each flat disk, kissing and licking each spot of
exposed flesh while her shirt fell away. She kept watching
him move slowly, almost too slowly, feeling the sharp twist
of pleasure, the wet, slick burn between her legs. He palmed
each breast, undid the wisps of lace that held them, pushed
them away and bent his head to suck each nipple. She moaned
his name as he roughed them with his teeth and sighed when
he soothed them with the flat of his tongue.

His talented mouth trailed streaks of heat down her stomach,
nipping the flesh just above the waistband of her jeans.
Instead of undoing those, he rose up and covered her with
his body, parting her lips and kissing her hungrily, kissing
her very breath away. She arched underneath him, finding his
hand, guiding it between her legs. "Don't make me wait,"
her voice wanton and pleading, barely audible.

He drew the zipper down and in one drag pulled the rest
of her clothing away, then pulled himself up to straddle
her. Her hands trailed up and down his breastbone, coming
to rest against his heart.

In the ribbons of light coming from the rain-drenched
window, her face shimmered, her hair flickered like fire
across the pillow. Bringing his knuckle to her clit,
he pressed soft, feathery circles again and again.
She was astonishing, in this way most of all, her flesh
tightening and swelling under his touch, yet liquid,
molten. When Mulder drew his index finger against
that clit in a slow pull upward, she cupped his free
hand to the side of her face. In the depths of her eyes
he found everything he'd ever want, every promise.
His gaze never wavered from hers, neither one of them
spoke as her legs fell open for him.

Trembling as her hand wrapped around the base of his
cock, she slid him inch by inch until he was completely
inside her. He took her hands and laced his fingers in
hers, then bowed her arms above her head, his own arms
arching, holding himself steady. Drawing her toward
orgasm, he covered her like a canopy, angling himself
forward so the base of his shaft stroked her as he
thrust back and forth, the pace slow and sinuous.
Agonizing, torturous and exquisite, it was
the closest he could come to becoming one
indestructible element.

He groaned uncontrollably as she tensed and shuddered
all around him, her feet rubbing the backs of his
calves. It was hitting her, a helix of pleasure
unraveling deep inside her body--he could feel it,
pushing him closer to the edge.

Mulder watched her fall beautifully apart, felt himself
begin to slip, the tight, sweet heat closing in on him.
He wanted to come when she did, wanted to drown, wanted
to disappear in her, become her, never leave her.
Her hands seemed to fly across his back, his sides, her
nails rasping the tender places, sending shivers that
drove him fast to the brink. Panting and shuddering,
he still had to know, "Tell me...we'll have this...
tomorrow."

"....Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow..." Her voice
faded away, there was nothing else to say, the world
was too small to hold them, they were larger than the
universe.

He fell toward her, and like always, she caught him.
Their soft lips pressed together and sealed their
covenant, and then it was still, so very still.

Sleep steered them toward uncharted territory, they'd
make their way in that world when morning came.


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~

Two weeks Earlier

Alex prayed for strength. The cemetery frightened her.
Maybe it was because of what she was about to do, even
though it was the right thing, maybe it was because she
couldn't get away from the feeling that got under her
skin of so many eggun scrutinizing her, waiting for
their chance. Most of all, it was the quiet that set
her on edge. How could it be so quiet in the middle of
the city, even at this time of the night? It was 11:30,
just enough time, but she had to stay focused, release
her fears, do what she came to do. It would have to be
finished by midnight.

She'd practically ran to her car after her class, cutting
off the questions of eager students, students hoping to
curry favor, students for which she had nothing but
contempt. They were only interested grades and post-doc
positions, not knowledge, and certainly, not wisdom.
She fervently hoped she'd acquired both, threading bits
and pieces of the truth together. She could not fail,
she would not fail. She'd risked so much to learn the
things she did know, now it was time to see how apt a
pupil she herself had become.

Scaling the fence had been ridiculously easy, proving
the rightness of her actions. Obatala was surely guiding
her, even as Oya prepared the way. She needed no moon
nor flashlight, for gravestones led her to the newest
section of the cemetery. Here the monuments were of thick,
polished granite, rough-hewn on the top if not set flush
with the ground. There were no ornate pillars with
cloth-draped urns, no 19th century statues of winged
angels asking blessings from God, no columned mausoleums
inscribed with Latin, all those were at the front where
the rich had succumbed in ages past. She left the main
road and headed down the 15th row, only the slight swish
of grass against the soles of her shoes audible.

When she arrived at his grave, she removed her backpack
and withdrew a change of clothing. Everything she needed,
and a few things she wasn't sure of, was in the pack.
Preparing for the ceremony had taken most of the past
two weeks. A ritual bath every day for nine days.
Meditation before bedtime. Buying twelve tiny bottles,
filling three with white rum, Holy Water, and Florida
Water, one with black coffee, the rest with spring water.
She had a black and white photo of Florinda, and
another of Nat when theyhad gone to the Bahamas, his sly
grin a prelude to the first time they'd made love. No one
had ever touched her that way, no one had ever given her
that much pleasure. He'd told her that he loved her,
that it was forever, and sealed his promise over and
over all through the night. This was the man she came for,
it was all for him, these talismans, this ritual. Nine
votive candles smelling of white jasmine, and nine white
carnations, plus a white, fringed silk scarf to lay it
all out on.

She almost removed the photo of Florinda.
Her nanny. Alex knew that she would never approve of
the risk involved. When Alex was about 15, she found
out that Florinda was a priestess of her own House,
strong with Oshun. She'd eavesdropped on a conversation
between her beloved Flori and a visitor who'd come
and left tribute for an intercession.

When she'd asked about it, Florinda bluntly told her that
this was not for her to know and that to ever speak of it
would enrage her parents. But Alex prodded until Flori told
her about the House, her pledge to Oshun, even her true
name, Iyalosha. Then with tears welling in her eyes,
she begged the young girl to be accept her own path,
the life her parents had made for her, and to trust
that Flori was doing what she was meant to do as well.
When she came to ask for help in bringing Nat back to
her, the older woman quietly said, 'Do not ask me,
mi'ja. Do not do this. There can be no good end in
it.' Still, Alex could not bring herself to remove
the photo, telling herself it was good luck, a blessing.

She changed from her pearl gray, tailored suit into
the white tunic and flowing skirt of an acolyte. She
removed all her jewelry, her shoes, and stood barefoot
on the cold, damp ground. As the final step she piled
her thick, dark hair on top of her head and wrapped it
with white cloth, to show her respect, her complete
devotion. She must be humble, do everything to seem
worthy of the gift. She didn't know why the eggungun
sought her out, but they had, she was sure of it. What
had been intellectual curiosity, became passionate
interest, and now was the faith of a zealot. They would
all be horrified to learn she'd started following the
old ways, that her whole career had become an excuse
to learn the ways of Santeria.

Cultural anthropology. Dr. Ruiz-Cardenas. That was
respectable. If they only knew. It had been a doorway,
one that led her over the the last year to seek The Seven
Powers. No babalawo, no madrina, not even Flori
would teach her or make an asiento for her, so she was
never really touched by the gods, as all true children.
She was never fully accepted by any House, but she'd come
to believe, and hoped someday she'd have the way to prove
her devotion. At least she was able to use her position
to dig, to research, to glean from arcane texts and the
occasional fallen believer, pieces of the mystery that
she wove together. Nat had laughed when he found out,
telling her she must have cast a spell on him.

Kneeling next to the headstone, it was clear that the dirt
on his grave was still fresh. Eighteen days gone.
From the moment they lowered his coffin into the ground,
she swore she would make things right. She withdrew from
her family, her friends, only went to the university when
absolutely necessary. They all thought it was grief, a normal
response to such a heart-shattering loss, the horror she'd
seen. They had no idea she was searching for the truth
beyond truth, his death, the catalyst pushing her from their
world into the one they foolishly ignored--the one that held
what she so desperately sought.

Her fingers caressed the letters carved into the cool
marble, Naftali Rene Gonzalez, beloved son,
a warrior in this life and the next--1965-2000.
Spreading the scarf over the burial mound, she arranged
the bottles, the photos, the flowers, the votives in what
she desperately hoped was the right constellation.
"Alafia. The beginning is important in all things, I begin
with a pure heart. Hear me, eggungun. I come to ask for what
is mine. Ashe." Her voice trembled even as the night air
carried it into the trees. "Seek Her out for me, beg Her to
show Herself . Ashe. I call for Her three times three.
Oya. Oya. Oya." She sprinkled the contents of the bottles
around the scarf. "Oya. Oya. Oya. Hear your daughter."
She took the flowers and draped them around the photo of
the two of them. "I beg you, Mother of the Cemetery,
Guardian of the Other World, bring him back to me. Ashe."

She lit the votives and bent at the waist, touching her
forehead to edge of the scarf. "Oya. Oya. Oya.
Do not deny me. I beg you, make yourself known and answer
this humble one who would be a yawo."

She had to close her eyes against the white flash of
lightening, the crash of thunder made the ground shake
beneath her. It was happening. Oya was coming.
She held herself completely still, barely breathing
for several long minutes, then she hears the voice.
"Child, rise and face me. Listen to me, I have much to say."

Alex somehow found the courage the stand, despite the fear
twisting her heart in on itself. Looming before her was a
woman, tall, elegantly dressed from head to toe in dark
purple robes. Black hair blew away from her face like a
dark corona, and her wrists and feet were circled with
copper bands glinting in the wan moonlight. The night air
blew and twisted around them. But Her face was obscured
in shadows, Alex knew Oya always hid her face in
shadows or wore a mask. She was a warrior as well as
guardian, able to take on any guise in battle. The sword
she carried was further proof of that, it had the power
to kill, to drive someone to insanity, to open the Gates
of the Dead.

"Foolish child. What are you doing, little rabbit?
Be thankful you have so many ancestors interceding on your
behalf." She made the wind blow hard around the grave.

Alex tried to draw herself up into her full height, to
seem sure, confident. But she was trembling uncontrollably
in the front of The Queen of the Dead.

" I...Yansa...Mami...You know what I came here for,"
she pleaded. "I have prepared, I have done what is
required to..."

"Silence! You have threads of the whole and understand
nothing. Your colors, these feeble talismans, do not
please me. Where is the red wine, the grapes, the purple
silk, the eggplant?"

"But you came! Tell me you'll give me what I seek,
I beg you."

This foolish little girl was trying Her patience, but
Something in Her warrior's heart felt pity for this
Lost One. "Do not force my hand. You are not of my House,
you do not observe my Ways...and I will tell you only
once, little girl...you cannot have what you ask for.
No mortal can. It is forbidden.

"Yansa! No! Oh, please ...No! ..." Alex's voice was
choked with grief, scalding tears bean to streak down her
face. All this work, all this suffering for nothing.
How could this be happening? She felt herself sink to the
ground, onto the grave, and she lay there prostrate,
helpless, sobbing. "Naftali...I won't leave you...
I won't."

Oya's voice swirled above her, the wind gusted stronger,
as if a storm was moving in. "Go home, little rabbit.
Live the life that was meant for you. Leave this life
to those who are able. You will be with him in the next
world." Thunder roared in the heavens. "Go now...do not
disobey me."

A flash of lightening so close that Alex flew back in
shock, half-sitting, half-kneeling, only to see that Oya
was gone, leaving scorched earth where she'd stood.
Drenched with tears, she moans Naftali's name over and over.
In her mind's eye she sees him, across the street from
where she sits at their favorite restaurant, walking towards
her. She sees the car, the slow motion parade after that.
The car window. The hand. The gun. The bullet.
And Nat falling, falling, falling to the ground.
She sees the blood blooming under his head like a flower.

It is too much.

Somehow she steadies herself and finds her belongings.
Her watch. 11:55. There is one thing left to try.
She knows it is wrong, that it may damn her to eternal
pain but there is no pain greater than the one she has,
she tells herself. It is too much. She moves fast as
she can, but she feels weak, clumsy. Fumbling in the
bag, she pulls out a bone-handled knife. 11:59
Kneeling above the grave, she cuts her left hand, once,
twice, smears the blood over her heart, cuts again and
lets the blood drip onto the grave dirt.

"Ellegua," she whispers. "Do for me what no one else
will do."

Everything around her stops. The wind stops blowing,
the moon is covered with a cloud, the cloud itself
holds fast in the sky. No birds, no animals move.
This is the one minute that is not governed by the
other gods It belongs to Ellegua, The Trickster, to
do what he will. Most times he does what the other
gods will not. He loves chaos and conflict, and will
use any chance to remind both man and The Seven
Powers he is not someone to ignore.

11:59. Much suffering has been born in this
minute.

She starts as a hand clasps her shoulder from behind.
Whipping around, she finds a filthy, old man, with
ragged clothes and a gold tooth. Grinning and smelling
of rum, he's a beggar, maybe a thief. No, she knows
who this is. Ellegua.

"Bonita, you ask, and I came. Ellegua will make you
happy." He pulls her to her feet, takes her hand
and kisses her bloody palm. "Tell me what this old
man can do for you." Licking his lips, he savors
the taste of copper, the taste of desperation.

"Fulfill my heart's desire. Give me what
I want most of all and what he wanted at the end."

"As you say, Bonita. It shall be done. Rise up
and stand away." For a minute Alex think she sees
something unbearably cold and cruel in those
fathomless, dark eyes, but she tells herself she
must be wrong. It is too late for fear or doubt.

Ellegua straddles the the top of the grave, and spits
on it.  "I call you, I unbind you! Naftali Gonzales,
come forth and do what you will." Then with a cackling
laugh, he stumbles off to one side, fishes in his tattered
overcoat for a half-pint bottle, gulps a huge mouthful,
then another, and spits one last time on the mound of dirt.
"There! It is done!" He walks over to Alex, caresses her
face with a greasy hand. "Bonita, don't forget to thank me."
He waves his hands above his head and the world
moves again.

"Never, Ellegua. I will always be grateful."
Alex's heart is pounding in her chest, she feels
the sweat trickling between her shoulder blades,
even in the chill.

"So you say...so do they all. Gratitude for Ellegua's
help is a fleeting thing, Bonita." He looks her up
and down the way a hungry wolf eyes fresh meat.
"Naftali is a lucky man. Do this to keep him by your
side. Make sure you take a handful of his dirt with
you. Every third night, do what you did tonight.
And make sure no one disturbs his grave."
Another cackle, and The Trickster flaps his
overcoat and is gone.

She closes her eyes, standing still for what seems like
an eternity. Then a hand touches her cheek, a hand
whose feel is as familiar as her own name.

"Alex, it's me." It is him, but not him---tall,
strong, beautiful. He's dusky-looking, dark, almost
giving off negative light. Dressed in a black suit,
black shirt and long black overcoat. His brown eyes burn,
but not with joy or lust. It is something far more feral
than that. But she doesn't notice or doesn't
care. Naftali. Nat. Home. He's home now.

He kisses her, and even though she wraps her warm
body around him, his body stays cold, his lips are cold,
but she's sure that will change later on. He tells
her that he'll stay with her forever, just like he
promised, but no one else will ever see him and he can
only come to her late at night.

"It doesn't matter Nat", she murmurs, "I want
want you, no matter what."

As they make their way out of the cemetery,
Ellegua laughs again, "We'll see, Bonita, we'll see."


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x




The Whole Catastrophe
Chapter One
By Diehard and Dryad



5:15 am, Wednesday, October 15th.

He'd almost finished dressing--charcoal gray suit,
blue dress shirt, managed to find his shoes, and was
slapping on his holster and service weapon when he
heard Scully's pleas from the living room to hurry up.

"'Mom! Help me, or I'll be late for school!" Mulder
knew that would get her in the bedroom pronto.

"Mulder...What kind of Oedipal stalling tactic is this?"
Scully'd marched in there only to find him grinning,
and dangling a dark maroon tie in his hand.

"C'mon Scully, do me."

" 'Do' you?"

"The necktie Scully, help me with my tie, and we'll get
going. Unless you think we can skip meeting with Walter."
He made sure he threw in the obligatory leer. Anything
to shore them up,make it seem less like they were on
foreign ground. Maybe banter and innuendo would hold
them until they could figure out how in the hell they
were going to hold on to both personal lives and the
X-Files.

"Give it here." She strode purposefully to the target,
grabbed the proffered tie and slipped it around his neck.
She didn't want to be amused, but he'd gotten around her
brisk flurry of making ready and she let her guard down.
Against her better judgment, her fingertips traveled
the nape of his neck once the silk was set under his collar.
He started to say something and she snapped right back to
attention, all business, her hands moving away, finishing
the task in front of her.

"Scully...I don't know how to do this."

"...Get dressed all by yourself?"

After she straightened out the knot, her hands rested
on his shoulders and she looked up to find him watching
her--serious, maybe even a little worried.

She was trying to parry his usual thrusts, but even she
couldn't keep up with this quicksilver change of mood.
Trying to be 'normal' with a vengeance was wearing on her.
She looked her usual self, with her black suit, heels,
tailored, white blouse and perfectly applied make-up,
but she felt miserably off-center. She wished it was
all mapped out, she wished her game face was firmly in
place, she wished she had the time to reassure him,
reassure herself. But the way things were and what she
wished for were two different things.

"No...I know...I'd like to tell you how we're going
to handle this, Mulder. But I can't...we can't figure
it all out right now. We have to go, Skinner's
expecting us in a half hour."

She started to move away, and he grabbed one of her
hands, lacing his fingers through hers. "Wait. What
about tonight, Scully? We'll be in the field, and I
assume we'll have adjoining rooms...I don't want to be
alone in some hotel bed, staring at the ceiling, I've
had a lifetime of that."

"Mulder..." She was past worrying about regulations
and damage to their reputations, appearances and
professional respect. Their relationship had been grist
for the mill for years. No one had seemed shocked that
they were living together, it'd had been assumed they'd
been lovers long before it'd become a reality. But for
the last six months they'd been nothing more than two
extra grunts in the bullpen, and now the stakes were
higher. They had a chance to do work that mattered,
and she'd be damned if they were going to make it easy
for the powers-that-be to snatch it away again by
obviously consorting while on assignment. Scullly felt
a lump forming in her throat at the thought of him
anywhere else but in her bed.

"I want what you want. But we've got to think this
through, and we've got to be smart about how we handle
ourselves in the field. We'll have some time
on the plane to talk."


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X


The thing was, most of the time they managed to sit
together, usually alone, not only because they had a
tendency to review casefiles, but also because
people's eyes tended to glaze over once Mulder turned
on the charm. He said she had a lot of charm, too,
but Scully didn't believe it for a minute.

Unlike him, she had no illusions about her ability
to deal with people in a pleasant manner when they
were in her way. And the man wedged in the seat
betweenthem was definitely in the way. She was stuck
in the window seat, and their companion's droning
wasn't helping the fact they weren't going to be able
to talk about much of anything, and frankly, the
predatory look he was giving her partner was just icing
on the cake.

"So, I just told Ms. Thing to mind her own business,
y'know?"

Scully ripped open her tiny snack bag of 'Krunchy Kreme
Krackers', which sounded like something Queequeg should
have eaten, and wondered if she could casually give Tim
'but you can call me anything you want, sugah' McMinn a
fatal brain aneuryism by murderous thoughts alone.

"Oh, you should come to Provincetown, it's on the very
tippy toe of Cape Cod, y'know, in Massachusetts? You'd
be the hit of the summer, and I mean that in a good way,
y'know?"

Don't say it, Mulder.

"I've been to P-town, Mr. McMinn."

Ignore this idiot, Scully silently pleaded. She chewed
absently on a kracker before turning the foil packet over
to read the ingredients. Strangely, cardboard and matzo
meal were not included.

"Ooh! Maybe I've seen you around, y'know, at the
Glory Hole, or maybe The Dungeon?"

"I think your gaydar's a little off, I'm afraid."

"Oh, what a pity."

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw McMinn grab
Mulder's left hand and turn it over.

"But there's no ring, and I can't believe a such handsome
boy would be on his lonesome. . ."

Mulder retrieved his hand, but said nothing.

"So, not married - girlfriend?"

"Partner."

"Ah, never married, then."

There was a short silence.

"Once...but she was able to commute her sentence.
My partner won't be so lucky..."

Scully blinked. What the hell did he mean by that?
And why was he telling this to a complete stranger?
She knew he'd been married. It'd been a late night
confession about two months ago. In what was now a rare
recurrence of his insomnia, she'd found him sitting at
the kitchen table in the dark. She'd knelt at his side,
her voice a soothing whisper, asking him what was wrong.
Two words. Rebecca Tate.

She'd pressed him, and he told her about a marriage that
he thought would normalize his otherwise screwed-up life
and please everyone else involved. He was still in BSU then,
but the nightmares had started, and he'd started using time
on the job to gather data on alien abductions. He'd been
sleeping with Rebecca for about six months--she was on the
DOJ fast track, a smart prosecutor and she liked the idea
that he was a profiling wunderkind with a well-connected family.

Apparently much more than she actually liked him. Four
months into the whole thing, she left, mailed him the
rings and left him a note mentioning a psychiatrist he
might want to see.

As shocked as she was, all Scully could ask was,
'Why, Mulder? Why settle for something like that?'

'Because I didn't know I'd meet you.'

After hearing that, she took him by the hand and brought
him back to bed and erased that woman's name with her
hands and her mouth on his naked skin.

Fast forward to the present---here she was with Mulder,
Tim McMinn and his question, and what now seemed like
a surreal conversation. Married. She never really
thought about him being married, even after that.
Mulder. Someone's husband. It just didn't fit.
Dana Scully. Someone's wife. As she tried to clear
her head, it was unsettling to realize she didn't think
of herself in that way any more. At least not in any
familiar sense of the word.

McMinn nodded sagely and leaned into his handsome
companion. "Careful, dear. Once a woman gets her claws
into you, professional or private life, it's all over.
Doesn't matter if they're dykes or not, they're all the
same. No offense, sweetie," he turned and reached over,
patting Scully's arm. She grimaced and pulled away.
Was that obscure remark about her not being lucky enough
to commute her sentence some kind of hint, some typically
whacked out, indirect, Mulder statement of intention?
God. Mulder proposing. Marriage. Traditional,
or modern? Jewish or Justice of the Peace? Think of
something else, Dana, like the case they weren't
discussing. Or better yet, shrink the universe to the
ridiculously small, the inane, the manageable. Who was
going to win the Pennant next year. Why Mulder found it
impossible to put his socks in the laundry basket.
He could get them on top of it, around it, but never in it.
And why were most men seemingly incapable of such a small
thing?


Propping her blanket up, she leaned against the shaded
window, closed hereyes and tried to get a little more rest.


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X

"Bring me a beer!" Vinnie yelled, scratching his balls
with one hand. What the fuck had she given him? His luck,
she gave him the clap from whoever she'd been screwing.
A guy spends a few months behind bars and his old lady
thinks she can hook up with someone else behind his back?
Sure, Ashleen had a great ass and legs that wouldn't quit,
but increasingly, he was thinking about dumping her in
favor of that little girl who worked behind the counter
at Benny's, the one with the big tits. She always
served him extra fries.

"Ashleen!" He felt for the remote among the couch
cushions, tired of Dr. Phil and all of that Oprah crap.
Same for Sally and Montel and Ricki. Had to watch that
shit every damned day when he was in the slammer because
those were Hank's favorite shows, and what Hank wanted,
everyone wanted.

Asshole.

Days of Our Lives, All My Children, some talk show on PBS.
Wheel of Fortune. Basic cable sucked. ESPN and all the
other sports channels only came with the Standard Package,
and neither of them had the cash for that right now.
Once Ashleen got some regular clients they'd be in Fat City
once again. They'd have to lay low for awhile, of
course, until the news stories died down, but he figured
it wouldn't take long before some other poor saps took all
of their interest.

Ashleen slowly stepped out of the kitchen, a little knife
in one hand, two sweating brown bottles in the other,
a cigarette hanging out of her mouth. She was pretty
loaded, so she kept her mouth shut, not wanting
to slur her words. He hated that, even bitch-slapped her
the last time her tongue got tied in the middle of some
mangled rant.

"'Bout fucking time," he muttered, reaching for more beer.
"Didn't I tell you to stop wearing that apron? Flowers
on some cock-sucking apron do not make you Suzie-fucking-
homemaker. Christ, you look like something out of Roseanne."

Vinnie took a good swig, nearly spat it out again.
He looked at the lable. "Tuborg? Horse-piss would taste
better! This shit cos' what, four bucks a case?"

She said nothing, moving behind the couch. He glanced
over his shoulder to see where she stood, having learned
the dangers of not knowing where everyone in a room was
at all times in jail. He was a really woozy, at the tail end of
his first drunk of the day. "I wanna a sandwich. Run down
to Benny's and get me something to go, a sub, yeah,
an Eye-talian sub. Lots of onion, hot pickles, extra
provolone, extra muenster, and plenty of real mayo.
Tell'em to go easy on the green pepper and tomato.
And chips, don't forget the chips. While you're at it,
gimme decent beer, Heineken or MGD or something,
I can't drink any more of this crap." They'd killed a case
between them, drinking since they'd stumbled out
of bed a couple of hours ago. This was normal for them,
they'd get their drink on, then they could stand each
other until they one of them felt like fucking. Who was he
kidding? He was so loaded he couldn't get it up even
if she sucked him like a vacuum cleaner.

Hearing a floorboard creak, he turned his attention back
to Pat and Vanna. He shook his head. Why couldn't he get
a woman like that, a smart blonde who turned letters on
a game show for a living? "It's E, you idiot!" he shouted
at the contestant. If he were ever on Wheel of Fortune,
he sure as hell wouldn't be buying any fuckin' E's. Drunk
on his ass, even he remembered it was the most popular
vowel in the English language, and he'd barely finished
his junior year at Roosevelt High.

There was a flash of movement from the corner of his eye,
and then the floor came up and smacked him in the face.
Stunned, he blinked slowly, wondering why he was no longer
on the couch. On tv the audience clapped wildly as Pat
Sajak said, "Spin the wheel!"

"'sleen, heb me," he slurred, watching her form divide
and then triple. "Shi. . ."

She came closer, wiping the bottom edge of her bottle
on the apron before chugging back half the contents.
Pulling the coffee table in front of him, she sat down
and took a few puffs on her cigarette.

"Heb m'up, 'slee," Vinnie rolled onto his back
and touched his head, gazed at the dark smear on his
palm. "I'b hur! Beed'n!"

Ignoring his plea for help, Ashleen drank the rest
of her beer. Then she held down his leg with her foot
and snubbed out her cigarette behind hisknee.

He screamed and kicked out, hit her square in the chest.
She flew back against the edge of the couch with an
ominous snap. Sobbing from the burning pain, he pushed
himself onto his side and slowly sat up. Sour saliva
immediately filled his mouth, and he vomited up beer
andhalf-digested peanuts. Got to get up, got to get
to the kitchen.

Ignoring his soon-to-be-ex lover, Vinnie managed to get
to his feet. Walking was incredibly difficult with the
room swaying like a ship in a gale, 20/20 vision coming
and going with logic he didn't understand, but he made it
to the doorway before he was forced to balance against
the jamb. Where the fuck were the plastic bags?

And then he was staring at filthy yellowed linoleum,
unable to breathe for the hot liquid clogging his throat.
Something nudged his hip, flipped him over onto his back
forcefully. His focus returned and he saw Ashleen
straddling him, a large spray of new red flowerbuds
arcing across her apron. Her upper body was oddly canted
to one side, as if a chest-wide fault-line had slipped
under too much pressure. Her mouth was slack, he couldn't
see it, but there was spittle and blood trailing from her
mouth.

He shivered as her figure began to fade.
"'Slee, wha's doin'? I'b col."

Her hand twitched, light glinting off the knife.

Just before sight faded entirely, he heard a voice say,
"You're both such goddamned cliches."

The Whole Catastrophe
Chapter Two
by Diehard and Dryad

Kris ruffled through the stack of folders to no avail.
Shinoda's file was nowhere to be found. If the day could
get any worse, she didn't know how. God, she needed
more coffee. She needed a caffeine drip. Failing that,
she'd live with a luke-warm Mountain Dew and an apple
fritter.

Allen Ostrowski ambled over from the snack station, Coke in
one hand, coconut-covered donut in the other.
"You look terrible."

Kris glanced at him with smile she knew didn't reach her eyes.
"Been that kind of a day."

"And it's only," he checked his watch. "the crack of noon.
Must be hard with the Feebs coming in."

She nodded and pushed her hair out of her eyes.
"Any advice?"

"They buy the donuts," Then he leaned forward and
whispered,

"Lazarov?"

"Unfortunately."

He shook his head. "Better you than me. Sorry."

"Not half as much as I am," she replied, looking over the
nearest desks to see if the file had magically shown up there
instead. After a second she put her hand up to her forehead.
"This can't be my life."

Allen patted her arm as he started to walk away. "You'll be all
right. I've heard rumours Lazarov has a good side, so let me
know if you find it, 'kay?"

"Ha ha," she muttered, brushing toasted coconut off of her
shoulder. Where was the freaking file? Lazarov was
going tohave her ass if she didn't find the damned thing.
Then Captain Small would ream her a new one, and so on
and so forth until she cried mercy. She'd heard of make or
break cases, but in all honesty had never expected to find one
given to her. Rising up the ranks of thepolice force had never
been one of her goals, she was pretty content as a detective.
Long hours...sure. Good pay, could be better. Higher rank, with
more responsibility, plus departmental politics...no way in hell.
Besides, she only had an associate's degree, she'd been lucky
to make detective at all. Nowadays you needed a bachelor's
just to walk the beat.

"Yo, Jorgensen! Heads Up!" Cassius Morgan called from
behind his desk at the doorway of the bullpen.

"What?" she yelled back, irritated with herself and already
anticipating the look of glee on Lazarov's face as he
bitched her out.

"Got some guests for ya!"

And thank you for letting the entire bullpen know. The
'guests' were a tall man and a petite, red-headed woman, both
wearing the stereotypical trenchcoats over expensive-looking
suits. Right, time to get the show on the road. Ignoring
the smirks of her fellow officers, she approached the pair,
reaching out to shake hands. "Hi, I'm Detective Jorgensen."

"I'm Agent Scully," the woman motioned towards her companion,
"and this is Agent Mulder."

"Pleased to meet you," Kris said, leading them back towards
her desk and the two chairs in front of it. "I apologize for the
seating. I've requested an office for this investigation, but I
haven't heard back from anyone yet. So, we're all stuck around
my desk in the meantime."

Agent Scully gave her an understanding half-smile and sat on
the left, while Agent Mulder took the right.

Be bold. Be strong. Focus on what's happening right now,
not what happened at breakfast this morning when she'd figured
it all out. "There are a few things you need to know before we
start. First, if you value your stomach lining, do not drink
the coffee. The bagged tea's pretty safe, and there's a Starbucks
blocks over in Printer's Row. The Women's toilet is one floor up,
to the left of the elevators. My Thai, Jimmy Z's, and Berghoff's
make the best ethnic food in the area and they won't cost you an
arm and a leg. They're a little ways away, but worth it, though.
Al Sahara makes great vegetarian and vegan lunches, and if you want
basic American for a little extra money, you can't beat the cafe
across the street from the Art Institute."

They were staring at her as if she'd sprouted a third arm, but
both seemed more amused than anything else. Okay, looked like she
had half a chance not to completely fuck this up. "Have you had a
chance to go over the case in-depth?"

"Briefly," Agent Mulder answered. "Five murders, the victims
all criminals who were released from trial due to technicalities.
Each victim killed according to how they killed their own victims.
The investigator who worked on all of these cases was recently
murdered in a drive-by shooting."

"Nat was a very good man, Agent Mulder, a good cop..."

He frowned, shook his head. "Just Mulder, please."

Kris nodded once. "Mulder. All of the trials were well
publicized, so it would have been very easy for someone to kill
them in the same manner as their victims. The problem is many
specific details of the original crimes were never mentioned in
court because the trials never got that far. Either there's a
leak in the DA's office, and I don't want to be around for that
discussion, or none of the deceased had anything to do with
original crimes in the first place,
which can't be true according to the forensic evidence."

"Did Det. Gonzales' death have anything to do with this case?"

"Hard to say. One of the criminals was Dakota Roberts.
He's a real distant cousin of the Maloney family, they're small
potatoes compared to some of the other families and syndicates,"
Kris slipped the top five folders off the stack and pushed it
towards Mulder, who promptly pushed it towards Agent Scully.
She flipped open the top and began to skim. "We do have a suspect
in custody, Hector Dean Shinoda, but we've can only hold him for
another fifteen hours."

"I'd like to interview him," Mulder said.

"No problem. Y'know, if you really think Nat's death was part
of this whole thing, you should talk to his partner, Alex.
She was there when he was killed."

"Then we'll talk to her too," Mulder shuffled through the
folders. "Is Shinoda's file in here?"

She felt her cheeks heat. "Uh, no, I... "

"Excuse me," Lazarov's basso profundo voice boomed from
behind her. "are you the FBI agents?"

Mulder stood, Scully too, so Kris got to her feet as well.

"I'm Sgt. Lazarov, your liason for this case. Sorry I wasn't
here earlier, Jorgensen should have called me when you arrived."

Kris gritted her teeth. Only a prick like him would try to
push that kind of shit in front of the Feds. She wasn't his
goddamned secretary. To their credit, neither Mulder or Scully
showed any surprise at the dichotomy that was Dan Lazarov.
Maybe they were used to meeting big black men with tightly
curled hair, pale gray eyes, and Russian names.

"I assume you want to begin with Shinoda?" asked Lazarov.
"I've got his file in my office."

The fucking bastard had stolen it right off her desk, that was
why she hadn't been able to find it earlier. It was official, her
luck had finally gone the way of the Dodo.

"Actually, while Agent Mulder conducts the interview, I'd like
to do a cursory re-examination of the bodies," Scully said.

FBI Agents did that sort of thing? Scully must have seen the
look on her face, for she continued on.

"I'm also a Forensic Pathologist."

Kris was impressed. Scully couldn't be more than a year or two
older than herself, and to fit med school in before she had FBI
training showed one hell of a sharp mind. She wished she had
had that kind of opportunity. Then again, maybe she might have
had Hannah not come along. Now Hannah wasn't in the same
damned situation, with the same damned choice to make.

"I see," Lazarov said. He gave Kris his 'dead-eye' look, the
one that on any other person would have been a nasty grin.
"Det. Jorgensen will go with you. I don't think she's had any
experience with pathology, have you?"

"No, I haven't," she mumbled. And she didn't really want it,
either. Scully regarded her quietly, then glanced at her partner.
He didn't do anything so far as Kris could see, but she could
practically feel the communication passing between the two
of them.

"Fine," Scully said.

And that was that. Mulder and Lazarov took off, and as she
was putting her pea jacket on, she caught a glimpse of the clock
above Lt. Caplan's office door.

12:17 PM. Eight more hours before she went off-shift and
had to try and salvage what was left of her daughter's life.

Some days, the crimes just never seemed to end.


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x


The Whole Catastrophe
Chapter 3
By Diehard and Dryad

Note: lyrics taken from DJ Krush/Only the Strong Survive/
Meiso


Interview rooms always had this particular smell.
The very seats of the chairs were soaked with acrid
odor of sweat and fear, while the carpets reeked of
stale cigarette smoke. They all looked the same,
too, with beige and tan duo-toned walls, or
institutional green and cream painted cement blocks,
those cheap-ass styrofoam ceiling tiles. The one way
mirror, the tape recorder, the video camera. And,
God, fluorescent lighting making everyone look tired
and worn-out.

The Bureau somehow forgot to mention this when
they recruited him.

Mulder pulled out a chair and sat down, carefully
keeping his tie from dragging on the table.
He arranged his notepad and pen, then, finally,
gave the suspect the once-over while Lazarov put
a new cassette into the recorder. This was turning
into a day from hell. Today's investigation had
shifted to now include trying to tie a suspect
in Gonzales' murder to the others.

Hector Dean Shinoda was a massive man, still
powerful looking in his late forties. He could have
given any of the Bears' linebackers a run for their
money. His facial features suggested biracial,
epicanthic folds at the eyes, an aquiline nose
that in profile reminded Mulder of a priest in an
Aztec codice. He had that golden tone to his skin,
but there was a reddish cast underlying it.
Japanese, Chicano, perhaps second generation.
Brown eyes, large and lit with intelligence,
an intelligence he deliberately tried to hide
when addressed by anyone. He'd crammed his tall
and wide body into the too small chair, heavy
muscles straining the fabric of his orange
jumpsuit.

Mulder thought the arrest was a stretch, at best.
Lazarov had told him that there were two links
potentially connecting Shinoda. Witnesses had ID'd
him as someone who'd sold PCP in the recent past
to one of the deceased, La Shawn Michaels.
The Lieutenant was grasping at straws. There was also
an informant who placed two other victims, Vincent
Coluko and Ashleen Wienhoft at a club that Shinoda
frequented. He'd suggested that maybe the two of
them talked Shinoda into somehow offing Gonzales.
The corollary theory, even less promising, then
connected him to some possible intra-gang warring
between the Kings and a faction of the Maloney family,
headed by the recently deceased Dakota Roberts.
Maybe Shinoda was the trigger and shot Gonzales by
mistake. Then maybe all of them pissed Shinoda off
and he killed them.

He'd spent the morning going over the files,
listening to previous interrogation tapes, reading
Gonzales' reports. The rap sheet told him that the
prisoner was late to the game, without a single
arrest until he was 32. Then he hooked up with
The Latin Kings, primarily though gun-running.
But not a lot, just enough to make himself useful.
He gradually took on a small turf for dealing,
mostly PCP. Several arrests, one conviction, some
serious plea bargaining and some minimal time done
in Vienna, a downstate work farm. There was some
evidence he was also involved in several gang-related
deaths, but no conclusive evidence ever positively
linked him. Mulder ran the name through the Bureau's
data bases and got an explanation as to where this
man had been prior to all this.

Northwestern University. The Department of Philosophy,
his thesis,'The Use of Weapons and The Warrior's Mind'.
It didn't fit, it didn't make sense, but it was true,
nonetheless.

Then there was Gonzales' notes, private notes that never
made it to the report. He'd pulled in Shinoda several
times, in connection with killings that seemed way out
of the league of a low-level hustler and thug. Errant
Mafiosi in the Witness Protection Plan. Rich pedophiles.
Politicians involved in a drug cartel. Never any real
evidence, never any links, just Gonzales' suspicions.
After the last fruitless interrogation, the last note
contained one word, 'Chameleon.'

Mulder was here ostensibly to get a handle on this guy
and get to the truth. He had a hunch he was going to
get some answers, but none of them would have anything
to do with the questions at hand.

"The time is two twenty-nine pm," Lazarov said, taking
a seat at the end of the table. "Sgt. Daniel Lazarov
and Special Agent Fox Mulder interviewing Hector Dean
Shinoda. Also present is Officer John Clark."

Mulder nodded as Lazarov leaned back in his chair.
"Mr. Shinoda, what can you tell me the death of Det.
Naftali Gonzales?"

"Cops play for medals, killers play for corners, in
the middle are your sons and are your daughters."

Judging by his cadence, the easy way the lyrics flew off
his tongue, Mulder guessed the man knew his rap music,
knew it would antagonize his interrogators and threw
it in their faces like a gauntlet. Somehow, Mulder
couldn't shake the suspicion Shinoda was dropping
hints, and that, combined with the evidence that Shinoda
just liked fucking with the two of them meant they were
in for a long, long day. Now all he had to do was to
decipher lyrics the man in custody tossed at them
like hand grenades. Judging from Lazarov's reaction,
it was obvious the good lieutenant wasn't familiar
with the genre. Frankly, while D.J. Krush was so fresh,
so clean, his own tastes ran to Tupac and Nortorious
B.I.G. He was Old School.

"Cut the crap," Lazarov snapped. "I'm not in the mood
to deal with this shit today."

"The ghetto reacts to warfare, real bullets miss
you by your hair, survival of the fittest. Hell
for three time losers, the prisoners of wartime
manouvers, hold down the fort, cause life is short
enough to get it taken," Shinoda finished with
a smirk.

Well, that was easy enough to understand. But it
didn't answer his question. "Could you be more
specific?"

Lazarov shot him a hard glance and shook his head.
Mulder wondered how long it would be and what he'd
have to say to begin to crack this one open. Shinoda
was much more than he let on, and this posing was
somehow necessary.

Shinoda eyed him, and wagged his head back and forth,
drumming on the table, "Slip into the world of sheisty
individuals, a troubled man stalked by criminals. He
laughed, a deep rumble that shook him in his chair,
then started drumming on the table again.
"Orale, carnal, this ain't nothin' but a thang."

Mulder stopped leaning his chair against the wall and
sat forward, "Most people don't find incarceration and
a charges of capital murder all that amusing."

"Make the charges stick, I wanna be a legend."

"Your lack of concern surprises me." He locked eyes
with Shinoda. "I can play chicken, Homestyle."

There was a sharp rap on the door before he could say
another word, and Lazarov and Clark turned away,
distracted.

''Matters of great concern should be treated lightly.
Matters of small concern should be treated seriously.'"
Hector wondered if he could toy with the FBI agent, there
was something about him that set him apart from his
pedestrian counterparts.

Something clicked in Mulder's head, something that told
him who Shinoda really was.

A uniform poked his head in. "Sgt. Lazarov...you coming?
There's a situation -"

"Sgt. Lazarov has left the room," Mulder said to the
recorder. "The time is two forty-one pm, Agent Mulder
speaking. Initial questioning of one Hector Dean
Shinoda. With me, is officer John Clark." He laid out
the thumbnail by rote, "You've got a BS in Physics from
U of C, an MS in Engineering and Applied Mechanics from
Stanford, and a PhD in Ethics and Philosophy from
Berkeley. I'm exceedingly curious as to why such an
educated man did such a 360 degree turn."

"I only tell the story to one person at a time."

Mulder pivoted slightly toward the policeman,
"Officer Clark, could you give us a few minutes? Just tell
Lt. Lazarov I requested it."

Behind Shinoda, Officer Clark's eyes widened. What the
fuck was going on? The genius from D.C. must've slipped
a gear. There was no way in hell this worthless piece
of barrio shit would fit this description. And he didn't
appreciate being shoved aside, either. He could barely
contain his contempt, both with the prisoner and this
pretty-boy profiler from out of town. "Yeah, no problem.
I'm outta here," his voice dripping with sarcasm. He
turned his back on the two of them and stalked out.

To Shinoda, "The Hagakure."

A flash of recognition passed between the two men.

Shinoda sat erect in his chair, his slouch and attitude
transformed. He was serious, and his eyes burned into
Mulder's with the white-hot intelligence he'd been
working so hard to suppress. He dipped his head, in a
quick bow. There is honor in this one, he thought.
Warrior to warrior, he understands the Way. He abruptly
leaned forward. "I didn't kill him I didn't kill them."

"No?"

"No," He motioned towards the door with one finger.
"Lazarov's just desperate to get a conviction and
figures I'm the best candidate for the position."
His speech was impeccable, his voice clear.

"Why?"

Shinoda snorted. "Because he's a careerist, because
convicting me would mean he could get out of the field
and into an office with comfortable furniture and
meeting with the Mayor. Any more questions, Kitsune?"

Whatever deja vu Mulder felt at hearing the word was
well-concealed. He folded his arms. "How'd a university
professor end up as a small time gun-runner and drug
dealer? "

"It serves a purpose."

"That's it? Cryptic. I'm afraid you'll have to do
better that that."

"Turn off the tape recorder."

"What?"

"Turn it off and I'll tell you."

Mulder's hand moved to the tape recorder, and the
button clicked off.

"One must prepare for death every day. The weak,
the corrupt, the false, must be punished. I travel on
my path and Det. Gonzales traveled his. Naftali Gonzales
knew the incorruptability of the Way. He served his
retainer, as do you...This I respected... But the nature
of my service, Kitsune, is a different matter...I have no
master, but serve many. But I was never called on to deal
with him. Or the others. Someone else attended to
matters there. Perhaps someone who knew them better
than I."

Mulder honed in on what had just been said.
"But...his suspicions were right? You contract out to
those who have a need you agree with...you execute
'the weak, the corrupt, the false.' "

"My affiliation with the Kings makes many things
possible. No one suspects the dedicated small man capable
of large things. A very old form of camouflage. "

"And you spared Gonzales because he was a brother."

Shinoda gave him a disappointed look. "No. No more than
you are. He was my enemy as much as any other criminal,
but unlike them he was honorable. A samurai - "

"Whereas you're ronin," Mulder interrupted, with memories
of Robert Patrick Modell swirling in the back of his mind.

"Those who understand the Way live and die by that code,
that is the singular truth of things."

" 'It is bad when one thing becomes two.' " Mulder
needed to hear how Shinoda reconciled his life, his
choices, what he'd become.

Shinoda's voice was soft, "My other life was a dream.
Degrees. The University. All illusion. But slowly,
I began to awaken, and chose the Way. There is no conflict,
Agent Mulder, only a man awakening from a dream. And as
I said, my affiliation with the Kings is no more than a tool."
He looked at his adversary and saw no acceptance,
but a kind of understanding.

Mulder studied the man across from him, then spoke slowly.
"You're going to walk on these charges concerning Gonzales."

"More than likely."

"And what you've told me, what we've discussed, is hardly
a confession to other crimes."

"Hardly."

"And if I tried to have you arraigned for a series
of murders..."

"A judge would refuse on the basis of hearsay evidence
and insufficient proof. Besides, which murders would
we be talking about?"

Mulder drummed on the table for a minute with his pen.
"But you understand I need to finish this interrogation,
don't you?"

"I would expect it, Kitsune. But I know nothing about your
samurai's death."

"Only the deaths of certain lesser men. Men that Gonzales
tried to link to you...But there's nothing else you're going
to say, is there? Honor forbids it," Mulder leaned
into Shinoda, his eyes locked onto the other man's steady
gaze. There was a long silence, and neither one of the
men moved. He made a last point, " 'As for the things
that we don't understand, there are ways of understanding
them. Furthermore, there are some things we understand
just naturally, and again some that we can't understand
no matter how hard we try. This is very profound. It is
natural that one cannot understand deep and hidden things.
Those things that are easily understood are
rather shallow.' "

"You do understand the Way."


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X


The tape recorder whirred as he hit the on button,
"Where were you when the murder occurred?"

He was about to answer when, Clark pushed the door open
and strode in puposefully, "Lt. Lazarov says it's back
to standard operating procedures, normal interrogation,"
with special emphasis on the word normal. That meant
he'd be staying for the rest of the interview, and that
they were detectives on the other side of the mirror.
The other two men both knew what it meant. Mulder blinked,
and in that split second, Shinoda's mask descended.

"Pues, carnal..I got an al-i-bi." Slouch. Scowl.
All in place.

Clark jumped in, as Mulder he knew would. "Asshole,
just answer the fucking question."

Mulder grimaced. Brilliant interrogation style.
This man had a career in law enforcement supervision
ahead of him.

"Seeing my girlfriend."

Officer Clark snorted.

Shinoda spit on the floor, "Hey, fuck you, you dickless
wonder."

"And her name?"

"Her name." Clark grabbed a handful of orange jumpsuit,
only to have his arm pushed away by the prisoner as if
he was no more than a pesky fly.

"Vanessa Murasaki."

Mulder raised a questioning eyebrow as he wrote
down the information. "Japanese?"

"Nisei."

"And where does she work?"

"The Genji. It's a club. I was there with her, people
saw me. Big Dog got his party on all night long..."

"She's a dancer?" The wheels in Clark's narrow little
mind started whirring.

Mulder kept taking notes. "The Lady Murasaki, "
he murmured. He shrugged one shoulder, making the point
more for himself than for Clark.

Shinoda looked up at this samurai, this FBI agent.
Vanessa had left the University with him, disappeared
into this universe. A chid prodigy, with her doctorate
in Eastern Literature at age 19. It was unfortunate
she'd never meet this man. He was a worthy adversary,
this would be an excellent tale.

Clark shifted in his chair. "Must be her stripper name."
He wondered how Shinoda had to pay for a lap dance. How
long he waited before going to one of the private rooms
for a trick. The man was fucked in the head if he thought
a 'exotic dancer' actually considered herself his
girlfriend. Besides, in his world, Asian women didn't
date outside of their ranks. On the other hand, times had
changed. And business was business.

"I know what you're thinking," Shinoda said, upper
lip curled into a snarl. "You want to know what is like
to be with a beautiful woman. Too bad, carnal.
No action for you, Ese."

"And the only action you're gonna see, Hector, is when
you become a prison tier bitch. You better tell..."
Clark was red in the face, and had leapt up from his chair.

"Clark, sit down. Try not to be an embarrassment."
Mulder interrupted, turning to see who had opened
the door.

A short, stocky man with a broad face and a well-tailored
suit entered the room, Lazarov hot on his heels. He slung
a leather briefcase onto the table, popped the clasps.
"Mr. Shinoda will not be answering any more questions
until I've had a chance to speak to him."

"Goddamnit, Gillespie, you can't do this!" Lazarov roared,
slapping his thigh for emphasis.

"Quite to the contrary, Sergeant. By law it is my client's
right to representation, regardless of what you think.
Now," Gillespie hit the stop button on the recorder and
looked from Lazarov to Mulder and back again.
"If you'll excuse us?"

Lazarov made an inarticulate sound of fury, then stalked
out of the room. Mulder followed, closing the door behind him.

"Jackson, Dunphy, get the hell out of there," Lazarov
muttered to the two detectives watching the proceedings
from the other side of the one-way mirror.

"Who's Gillespie?" Mulder asked, trailing the man
into his office.

"Big shot attorney," Lazarov sat down heavily, the chair
squealing in protest. He opened a drawer and drew out
a large plastic bottle of white pills, offered it to Mulder,
who declined with a shake of his head. "They say an aspirin
a day keeps heart attacks away, but I don't think it makes
a damned bit of difference when you have to deal with scum
like him."

"Shinoda or his lawyer?"

Lazarov huffed, then dry swallowed two pills, grimacing
at the taste. "Both. Gillespie's already got the machine
in motion. He's got a flunky down at the courthouse,
bailing that piece of crap out as we speak. I knew this
whole thing was a long shot, but fucking Shinoda is
guilty of something. Tell me, Agent Mulder, how the hell
did we ever got here? What kind of society do we live in,
where gangbangers, drug pushers shove the Constitution
in our face? Where some fuck gets to play executioner
and we get to stand around with our dicks in our hands?
Where a cop gets killed in a driveby and we keep coming
up with zip?"

Mulder had no answer for him. But he knew plenty about
a world of shadowy men, and killing above the law, and
assassins who can disappear without a trace. He just
didn't think Lazarov wanted to hear about it.

"That's a question I ask myself more times than you
could imagine."

"Agent Mulder?"

"Yeah?"

Lazarov rubbed his forehead with the back of his hand.
"Whatever you think are my reasons for wanting this case
solved, whatever you've heard, Nat was a good detective.
He deserves some justice. And somebody's got to find our
vigilante and stop him."

He heaved an enormous sigh and shook his head sadly,
"I just wish our side would get a easy win for once,
don't you?"

"All the time, Lieutenant, all the time."



~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x


The two men walked in silence until they reached
the elevator. Lazarov got on, but Mulder stood in the
threshold, tapping himself in the chest, lost deep in
thought .The lieutenant held the doors for his companion,
but soon realized that he'd better say something.

"Give you a lift, buddy?"

"Yes. No. Actually I think I'll just walk over
to Records, it's on this floor, right?"

"Down the hall and to your left." Lazarov's broad
arm gestured in a lazy arc. "Is there something I can
help you with?"

"No, I just want to do an in-depth review the of police
reports on the deceased, then cross check them with
the local coverage on the cases. I'll need access
to a computer, though."

"I'll call from my office and take care of it. You're
looking for something, Agent Mulder. Want to let me in
on what it is?"

"I won't know what it is until I find it." Mulder was
eying the door on the left side at the end of the hall.

"So that's FBI prime investigative technique, huh?"

He wasn't paying attention anymore to Lazarov, focusing
instead on possible search parameters.

"Mulder!" The Lieutenant's voice boomed.

The FBI agent snapped to, "Sorry, occupational hazard.
I get a little preoccupied. "

"So I noticed." Lazarov let the elevator doors close.

~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x

They stopped at the hospital cafeteria for something
sweet before heading down to the basement. Kris bought
a brownie and one of those little things of milk, like
she used to have in school. Trying to comfort myself,
she thought.

Agent Scully scrutinized Kris and said, "I confess I'm
a little surprised that you aren't more familiar with
the morgue."

Kris grimaced at the dryness of the brownie and set it
aside, started peeling her napkin apart instead. "I know.
It's hard to explain. I see dead bodies all the time
on the job, in all sorts of ways, from beheadings to
eviscerations," she looked down, brushed the remaining
shreds of napkin off of her lap.

"I guess it's the fact that once they get here,
they're...just stiffs with a toe tag....body parts.
As bad as it can be at a crime scene, somehow I'm still
able to see that they were people, that they had lives,
even if some of them were wasted. Does that make any
sense?"

Scully capped her soda and stood. "It does. But Det.
Jorgensen, what science offers here is an explanation as
to how those lives were cut short. An explanation that
needs to be revealed....to victim's families, to ourselves."
She looked away, remembering it was just a small portion
of what was owed the dead. What she still owed Emily.
And Melissa. What she and Mulder owed so many
loved ones.

And for a split second, she saw a wave of images--
dead men, dead women, dead children swirling in her
mind's eye, freezing her in place. She took a deep
breath, swallowed hard, steadied herself. Dear God,
help me do this, she slilently pleaded, make me
ready to do this. This is how I pay that debt, Lord.
I find the answers hidden in these bodies. She asked
for herself, for Mulder. Strength, give us the
strength to do what needs to be done.

"Agent Scully, is there a problem?" Jorgenson
immediately noticed the abrupt halt in the procedings.

She recovered, professionalism locked into place once
more. "I'm fine. Not enough caffeine this morning,
I suppose."

"I'm sure there's plenty in the machine, I'll keep you
stocked. Just let me know when."

"Good to know. Now let's get started, shall we?"

The morgue was what Kris expected, the nostril-searing
odor of chemicals almost more than she could bear.
Oddly enough, the overlying sweetly rotten scent of
decay was far more manageable. There were two rows
of perforated steel tables, above which were hanging
scales like the ones you found in the vegetable aisle
at the grocery store. Along one wall were jars filled
with remains and parts of remains, she really didn't
want to get a closer look. Smaller tables held
instruments she could imagine were first used during
the Spanish Inquisition, or maybe the European Witch
Trials. She'd have a hard time putting the image of
the bone saw out of her mind.

Agent Scully walked swiftly into the room, having changed
into oversized blue scrubs and a white lab coat while Kris
waited outside. She had declined when Scully had offered
to find her a pair of scrubs as well -- there was no way
she was going to get any more involved than she absolutely
had to. "Here," Scully handed her a small bundle of cloth.
"Those are booties, a hair net, gloves, and an apron.
I've got some wintergreen oil if you need it."

She really didn't like the sound of this. She slipped the
gloves on last and followed the other woman into the cold
room. Bodies wrapped in sheets and white plastic bags lay
on tables on both sides of the room. It was enough to give
a person a serious case of nerves. Scully had to open
a few sheets before finding the right body. "Here we are,
one Vincent Coluko."

Kris helped her roll the table into the other room and
watched as sheunwrapped the body. Vincent was not an
attractive sight.

Scully snapped on her latex gloves, "I'll take his head,
you grab his feet. On the count of three we'll lift him
onto the autopsy table, okay?"

Scully nodded, grimacing as she rotely began to probe
at his chilled flesh, surprised to see Det. Jorgensen
utterly focused on the task at hand. Once he was on
the table and under better light, she found things that
caught her attention right away. There were dark yellow
bruises around his chin, andhis nose was off-kilter,
clearly broken. At some point he had bitten through
his bottom lip. His right ear was cut through half-way.
Another cut was on his throat, barely visible on the left,
obviously cutting through skin and fat to the muscle
beneath on the right. The Y incision was more of a U,
running from one shoulder and underneath the nipples to
the other shoulder, then a line straight down the middle,
to the left of the naval, finishing just above the pubis.

Scully snipped through the neatly stiched incisions with
tiny sewing scissors, glanced up at her curiously. "You
seem to be handling this well." Maybe better than I am,
she thought. She used her scapel to freshen the cuts,
giving her easier access.

Kris shrugged. "It's...easier than I thought it
would be."

Scully smiled slightly. "Well, you must have heard the
secret, then. We have a saying in Forensics, 'The bigger
the cop, the bigger the drop'. "

"I like it," Kris said, trying to focus as the other
woman exposed Coluko's internal organs. "Should they
look like that?"

"Not ordinarilly, no. Once an autopsy is performed,
all the organs weighed, all necessary tissue samples taken,
everything is then replaced. You could reattach the organs,
but what's the point? Their families aren't interested in
seeing what we've done, only in the results we get."

"Yeah, I guess that makes sense," she watched as Scully
lifted and prodded the various masses of flesh and tissue,
bits of fat. "What are you doing now?"

"Checking for anything out of the ordinary. Lumps, nodes,
odd smells."

Kris stared intently at each poke. "Right...You'd have to."

"You can tell a lot from smell alone. Did you know that in
Medieval times, physicians would diagnose many causes
of death this way, by examining the odors of everything
from feces to pus?"

"Well, I'm sure you've got that covered..."

Scully eyed her. "Can you smell the alcohol this man was
drinking before he died?"

Kris gave a cautious sniff, concentrating on what exactly
she was smelling, and there it was. Faint, but becoming
stronger the more she inhaled. She opened her mouth, let
the flavor roll across her tongue. Rancid smell of booze
and cadaver.

"About half of the population can detect the bitter almonds
of cyanide. Unfortunately, because of OSHA regulations,
pathologists are now supposed to wear rebreathers and
metal mesh gloves, which means you don't smell anything
except plastic and recycled air, and you rarely feel
anything of note. Of course the gloves prevent you from
cutting yourself with the scalpel, but I think you lose
more than you gain..." Her voice trailed off as she
realized something, she'd smelled rum on Coluko. There
was no rum listed in any of the coroner's reports that had
been turned over to her this morning.

"Det. Jorgensen, I want to run this man's tox screen again.
The autopsy report doesn't list what I think I'm smelling.
And while we're at it, re-run the screens on the others'."

"I'll take care of it I'm assuming you'll want the
results first thing in the morning."

"I would think so. You were about to ask me something
else?"

Kris made a mental note to call the coroner's assistant,
then shifted gears "Yeah, actually. I did have another
question. What about HIV? Aren't you afraid of exposure
from infected blood?"

Scully shrugged. "It's a calculated risk, and for the most
part, I practice universal precautions. Although, having
said that, I did get hepatitis from my very first autopsy,
when I was in med school."

Kris watched her inspect Coluko's hands, the insides of
his wrists and elbows, his armpit, his feet. With the
organs removed, she helped turn him over onto his stomach.
Despite the maroon lividity, he had a number of barely
visible spiderweb tattoos on his shoulders, a clock face
without hands, a crying woman. All inked in prison,
judging by the lack of quality. He'd certainly done a lot
of time. "I wonder what kind of life he dreamt about when
he was a little boy."

"Probably not ending up on a morgue table at thirty-five,"
Scully murmured, peering at an impression in Coluko's skin
with a magnifying glass. She hadn't dreamed about slicing
open men with jaihouse tattoos with she was little,
nonetheless, here they were.

"I'd hate my daughter to end up like this," Scully didn't
reply, in fact she did nothing more than continue with
the examination, but Kris felt as if she had crossed some
invisible line. She was debating whether or not to
apologize when Scully straightened and readjusted the
overhead light to geta better look. The woman's
expression was not quite the mask of Federal implacability
she had become used to seeing.

"How old is she?"

Kris sighed. "Fifteen going on forty-seven. Convinced
she knows it all."

Scully smiled again, but it didn't quite reach
her eyes.

"Do you have children, Agent Scully?"

"I did. She died."

"Oh. I'm sorry," she began.

Scully shook her head. "You didn't know."


Silence, apart from the soft and slick sounds of body parts
being moved around, reigned until Kris' cell phone chirped.
With an apologetic glance at Scully, she answered.

"Jorgensen."

"Mom?"

"What's wrong, are you okay?" she asked, lowering her voice
and moving away from the table. Several long seconds later,
No, it's OK, I'll be right there." She sighed, turned off
her cell, "Shit."

"Det. Jorgensen?"

"It's my daughter...she's pregnant...and now there seems to
be a problem. I need to go home, probably take her to an
emergency room."

"Did she tell exactly what her symptoms were?" Scully had
stopped the examination, stripped off the gloves and was
heading toward Jorgensen."

Well...no. But I thought..." It was obvious how unnerved
the call had made her, she was shaking. Almost imperceptably,
but Scully noticed immediately.

"I have a better idea. Let's go over there together, and I'll
do an initial triage, then we'll see what she needs."

Jorgensen let out a ragged breath, closed her eyes, and
patted her chest " I guess this mom needs your help too,
Agent Scully...Thank you."

~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X

"Hannah!" Jorgensen yelled, leading Scully past the stairs
and into the living room. "Could you come down here,
please?" Taking off her coat, she said, "Are you hungry
at all? I think I've got some ham and cheese in the
fridge, if the bottomless pit hasn't already gotten to it."

Scully was starving, actually, but didn't want to stay for
that long. She hated herself for being envious, for not
having the grace to accept her own lack with humility,
for not being able to be happy at the luck of others.
The pregnancies of other women dredged up an ache
in her that for the most made her feel off kilter, vulnerable,
too vulnerable. And especially on a day like today,
that feeling was a luxury she couldn't afford.
Once today was enough. Maybe later, maybe while
she and Mulder lay in the dark, but not now.

"Thank you, no."

She wasn't sure what she had expected, but the combination
of chintz covered furniture, needlepoint American flag
pillows, dark wallpaper, carpeting in British racing green,
and reproductions of Degas' ballerinas just didn't gel
with who Jorgensen seemed to be. Magazines littered the
coffee table, TV Guide, New Scientist, and Nature competing
for space with YM and Teen People. Two rubber plants
bracketed a bookcase beyond the back of the couch,
reaching for the ceiling with dusty leaves.

Jorgensen picked up a throw crocheted in colors reminiscent
of 1973 and folded it, tossed it over the arm of the couch.
"Would you like something to drink? I've got coffee, decaf,
tea, soda.. ."

"I'm fine," Scully answered, wishing she had suggested
the girl go to the nearest emergency room, instead.

"Mom?" The speaker was tall and skinny, straight, mouse
brown hair falling past her shoulders.

"Hannah, this is Dr. Scully, a colleague of mine. She
agreed to come take a look at you, make sure you weren't
miscarrying or anything like that."

Sullenness, thy name was ever 'teenager'. Scully couldn't
quite work up a smile that reached her eyes, not after
the look of intense dislike thrown at her from Hannah.
God, she hoped she had never treated the guests of her
parents in the same manner. No, that would've never
happened. "We could do this in private, if you prefer."

Hannah looked nervously at her mother, then nodded
her head.

"Okay. I'm not an obstetrician, so this is at most
just a preliminary checkup to make sure you're not on
the verge of a miscarriage. You'll need to see your own
doctor as soon as possible, and by that I mean within
the next day or so, okay?"

"Listen, I'm going to go make a few calls, see if I can
get an appointment as soon as possible," Jorgensen said,
already heading out of the room.

Scully took a deep breath and began the examination.
She did what physical checking she could, given the lack
of equipement, asked questions and received enough terse
answers from the girl to ascertain that neither she, nor
the baby were in any immanent danger. She knew she wasn't
a patient person, even though it was obvious that this girl
felt embarrassed about the whole situation. This was the
reason she preferred the dead over the living. The dead
never lied, didn't try to sway a person towards one answer
or another, didn't need coaxing and prodding. There was
always a clear cut answer with the dead, once you asked
the right question, the whole story was revealed.
Hannah on the other hand, revealed just enough, not an
iota more.

She finished, repeated her recommendations, and watched
Hannah scurry off to her room. Good deed for the day
all done, she only wanted to get back to the hotel
and take a nap. She just needed some time for herself,
to not think of what she couldn't give him, what she
couldn't have. She'd let Mulder soothe the rest of it
out of her tonight, including this morning's fear and
hesitation. He'd gotten quite good at finding the hurts
and making them go away, and she'd gotten
better at letting him.

A wave of self-pity lapped at her, so she distracted
herself by wandering over to the bookcase to see what
Jorgensen liked to read. There was the usual panoply
of general knowledge books, atlases and dictionaries
and a well-thumbed Roget's International Thesaurus.
Jorgensen had some of the same texts as Mulder -
the Crime Classification Manual, the Death
Investigator's Handbook, Sexual Homicide: Patterns
and Motives. Oddly enough, she also had several True
Crime books, which Scully would have thought Jorgensen
would avoid, considering her day job. Then again, even
she herself had a few titles stuck somewhere in the back
of her closet.

"Agent Scully?" Kris was standing in the doorway, anxiety
writ large on her features, "How's my girl?"

"It looks like some minimal spotting, no abdominal
pains, so I think we're in the clear. But she needs
to see an OB/GYN as soon as she can."

"I've got her got an appointment with my doctor at
Illinois Masonic, 11 am tomorrow. I'm on duty, but my
best friend Rachel will take her." Scully's response
had smoothed out the tension in her face, and she sighed
with relief. "Excuse me for a sec, I need to inform my
darling daughter of her upcoming itinerary."

Scully wanted to get going, she'd pulled herself together
again, but was sure it would last long if she had to be
part of a mother and child reunion. Her cell phone
trilled in her pocket, "Scully."

"Miss me?" Mulder's innuendo was just what she
needed to hear.

"I'd say it's you who misses me. You're the one calling,
after all."

"Busted. We'll, I do have another reason for interrupting
your busy day at the morgue."

"I'm not at the morgue. Jorgensen's daughter need a
medical evaluation and so the good Detective and I are
at her house."

"Anything serious?"

"Well, the daughter's pregnant and there was a possibilty
of miscarriage...everybody's good, though.

"Including you?" He knew something like that would weigh
heavy on her.

She waited a beat, "Yeah, I'm OK. What was the reason
you called?"

"The interrogation was a washout. I did meet somone who's
guilty of several murders, but not the one's we're
investigating. And just as a parenthetical aside, he didn't
leave enough evidence for anyone to do anything about
the killings he's actually responsible for. I spent the
rest of the afternoon doing a little record diving.
And you, Agent Scully? You come across anything tasty?"

"Well, I wouldn't exactly call it tasty, but one of the
deceased smelled of alcohol. Rum, I think. I asked for
all the tox screens to be run again, since this
particular man's autopsy report didn't show anything
but trace amounts of beer, peanuts and possible residual
use of PCP."

"Why all the tox screens? Sounds like you're making
a leap here, Scully."

She could hear the amusement in his voice. "You're right,
the end of civilization must be at hand. Seriously, I just
want to be sure nothing else got missed. What about you,
did you come up with anything?"

"Well, for one thing, facts in the police reports and
the local papers pretty much mirror each other. The
killings were so well publicized, coverage so detailed,
that we could have anyone of a number of copy cat killers
at work here. One thing stands out, though. Since the murders
started about two weeks ago, they've occurred every three
days. So we're due soon for another, if the pattern holds."

"That's the good news?"

"That's the news. I tracked down Gonzales' girlfriend
at home, and it's probably a good idea we talk to her.
Alex Ruiz-Cardenas was a witness to his shooting. Maybe
she can help us to connect Gonzales and the other deaths,
maybe give some idea where to look for suspects. She's
at 424 Diversey Parkway. At least it's near the lake,
Scully. "

She looked up to see Kris back in the room, motioning
that she was ready to go. "I'll have Jorgensen drop
me off...424 Diversey Parkway? I should be there..."
Jorgensen mouthed 'thirty'. "In a half hour."

"Good. I'll be in the lobby. Hey, Scully?"

"Yeah?"

"I need a house call, Dr. Dana...I've got this condition..."

"Good bye, Mulder." She hit the off button, but there
was just the wisp of a smile at the corner of her mouth.


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X

The Whole Catastrophe
Chapter Four - Penthouse Suite
By Diehard and Dryad

They could see the north end of Lincoln Park as they
rode in the glass-walled elevator, dotted with the red
orange stands of trees saluting the peak of Midwest autumn.
Directly across from them, Lake Michigan shimmered
burnished gold as the edges of the sun's fading western
light dappled its waves. Looking down, Alexander Hamiliton's
bronze countenance pointed the way toward the running path,
with its after-work joggers, and the black, wrought-iron
entrance to the zoo was just visible at the far end.

Cardenas was waiting for them in her 26th floor penthouse.

It was Scully who spoke first, "Well, I'd say you won that
pissing match." There was a slight smirk caressing her
lovely face.

He was rocking back and forth on his heels, feeling flush
with victory. "I'm not sure I know what you mean."

Neither one of them looked at each other, but they could
see their wavering images in the glass.

"You know damn well what I mean. I realize that our
thick-necked friend at the desk was being a tad too gung-ho
in his zealousness to protect the tenants."

"Extremely rude, I thought."

"OK. But when he asked you what our business was, I
believe your response, 'F. B. I. Business. Business that
doesn't concern you', accompanied by brandishing your badge
close enough to his face to give him whiplash,...That was
very... Alpha male of you."

"Well, I suppose I could've been silent and just let you
shoot him. You do seem to be able to fire on a man in order
to make a point."

"And I can do it again, don't forget."

"So you admit I'm not the only one with aggressive
tendencies, eh, Scully?" He turned and leaned in
toward her.

She tilted her head in his general direction, "You know,
Mulder, other couples seem to be able to flirt with each
other without mentioning gunplay. One of us seems to always
bring it up."

"That's what makes us special, Scully. By the way, is that
what we're doing here, flirting? I thought you were
reproaching me for unseemly conduct. We're still on
the clock, partner..."

As the elevator slowed and stopped, the doors opened just
in time to save him from her retort.

The first things they saw were a small hallway with mauve
colored walls, a gilt framed oil of what Mulder recognized
as Old Habana in its heyday, and an enormous ginko in a
planter. Walking toward them with her outstretched right
hand was tall, elegant figure of Dr. Alejandra Ruiz-
Cardenas. Her other hand was kept behind her back.
She was what used to be his type, tall, with a curvy
figure beneath white jeans and a loose white sweater.
She wore no jewelry, save an expensive wristwatch---
nothing gilded her heavy-on-the-cream cafe-au-lait skin.

"Agent Mulder? Elliot told me you were on your way up.
I'm Alex." She'd given him the full wattage of her
perfect smile. Even, white, beautiful teeth. It would've
been lovely except Mulder couldn't help but notice
that her smile never reached her eyes.

Looking at his companion with something less than
delight, she drawled, "And this must be your...
assistant?"

"I'm Special Agent Mulder," he dryly replied as they
shook hands, "and this is my partner, Special Agent
Scully." He made sure there was just a hint of extra
emphasis on the word 'partner.'

"Ah, I see..." Turning to the other woman, Cardenas
made a show of seeming apologetic. "Please forgive
me, Agent." Again, the outretched hand.

"We appreciate you making time to see us." Scully replied,
her smile now just as dazzling. Interestingly, her smile
never made it to her eyes either. The handshake was
phenomenally lukewarm.

Alex eased her hand away and looked at the two of them,
"Where are my manners? Please come into my home, we can
talk there." She turned on her heels and walked back
into the open door just a small distance away. As she did,
both agents noticed her left hand was wrapped
in a bandage.

Mulder and Scully's eyes were set on scan as they followed
Gonzales' former girlfriend into the huge suite, as she
led down a long foyer. Almost simultaneously, they noticed
an oil painting of St. Peter next to the door, which Mulder
would guess was 17th century Spanish. Otherwise devoid
of decor, the only other items were a small marble-topped
table that held a faience vase of Bird of Paradise.
By contrast, the painting was glaringly out of place with
its ornate, colonial-style gold leaf frame.

The foyer opened up into the living room and the rest of
the penthouse. It too, was starkly furnished, very
Bauhaus, white rugs, black leather and shades of gray
as accents, chrome tables and lamps. One whole side was
wall to ceiling glass, with a spectacular view of
the lake. An oil portrait of Our Lady of Mercy, in an
elaborate wrought iron frame hung in counterpoint to all
the simplicity on the far wall. The bedroom, kitchen,
and study all clearly visible, coming off the main room
like the spokes of a wheel. The living room was by far
the largest room, but the others were by no means small.

Alex turned to her guests, "Please feel free to look around.
Let me make you both un cafecito. I'll just be a moment."

Scully replied, "Really it's not necessary."

"Oh, but it is, Agent Scully." Alex pulled her jet black
hair to one side, draping it over her shoulder. "I'd never
live with myself if I didn't offer you something." With that,
she moved into the kitchen. In a few seconds they could hear
the hiss of an espresso machine. Cardenas' back was to them
as she busied herself at a workstation.

The rest of the suite was furnished in the same spartan
elegance. Black lacquer funiture in the bedroom, chrome
in the study. Luxurious and simple at the same time, but
there was something cold about it. Virtually no personal
effects to be seen, save photos in the living room of
Alex and what both agents assumed were her parents,
and one of Cardenas and Gonzales apparently on vacation,
which rested on a nightstand near the bed. Judging from
the first photo, the attire of two older adults and the
sumptuous surroundings would indicate that Alex came
from a wealthy family. How Alejandra Ruiz-Cardenas
was able to afford an apartment overlooking Lake Michigan
on a professor's salary was beginning to make sense to both
of them.

They continued their self-conducted tour as the hissing
of the espresso machine grew louder, accompanied by the
sporadic clatter of dishes coming from the kitchen.

"Rich girl." Mulder said over his shoulder.

"Very rich girl from the looks of things." Scully opined.

"Very rich girl with old money form Cuba, who would seem
to be a little bit of a control freak." Mulder drew close
enough to whisper in Scully's ear.

"You think?"

Even the study was ordered to the extreme, even though it
held a huge amount of artifacts. They were all neatly
labeled and placed on stands or display tables. Mulder
noticed though no strictly religious or ceremonial
artifacts, only those that held functional value or were
objects of personal adornment. There was also a small, rough
looking chest with a padlock and with an oblong cedarwood
box resting on top. It didn't go with the rest of the room.
Scully winced a little as they looked over the perfectly
organized work area, files, computer station. Mulder caught
her pained expression.

"What?"

"Was I that bad, Mulder?"

"I think that's one of those questions like 'Does this make
me look fat?' "

"Thanks." Her lips quirked in a grin.

"Don't mention it." He brought the tips of his fingers to
the small of her back for just a second, and what about to
say soomething else, when a oil paintng of St. Teresa in
a bronze die-cast frame stopped them both in their tracks.
Mulder moved away to more closely inspect the piece.
Touching his elbow, Scully caught his eye and his solemn
nod told her he'd made some connection.

Now the kitchen noise had been replaced with music.
It was clearly Latin, melodic and slowly rhythmic.

Ruiz-Cardenas emerged from the far side of modern kitchen,
and strode leisurely back toward the living room, passing
gray granite worktops, a professional grade stove, and a huge
stainless steel Sub-Zero refrigerator. She reminded herself
she'd have to start interviewing someone to do the cooking
soon, the last girl was a nightmare.

Mulder strolled to the window, ostensibly to check out the
twilight skyline and the boats on the water, but really
he wanted to watch Ruiz-Cardenas' reflection unobserved.
>From what Jorgensen had initially told them Nat Gonzales
was a good man, intelligent, a hard worker, but not someone
who moved it the same circles as his girlfriend. Personally,
he figured that anyone who gained the respect of someone
like Hector Dean Shinoda had to fall on the extra side of
ordinary. He had some idea why this woman would be attracted
to a man so far outside her universe.

The two women were at the breakfast bar, which was situated
just outside the main work area of the kitchen, bracketing
the main layout of the living room. Scully was on a stool
on one side, and Alex on the other, laying out an expesso
pot, demitasses, cream, sugar.

Scully said, "Professor Cardenas..."

"Alex, please." Her tone just barely avoided being
patronizing. It was the way one might invite a long-term
employee to useyour first name.

"Alex, I'm really sorry we have to ask you all these
questions again."

"Don't concern yourself. I know it's necessary in order
to arrest Naftali's murderer."

Her expression was one of detachment, an odd one for the
still grieiving lover, Mulder noted, as he turned and walked
toward them, taking a seat next to Scully.

Ruiz-Cardenas gave a close-lipped smile, pulling a leather
covered stool around with her unbandaged hand and easing
herself down. "Allow me a small boast," she requested
as she poured, "Cafe cubano. The only way to drink coffee."

He didn't respond.

"Thank you, for all this effort...especially when you've
been injured." Scully said. Now she was the one with
the slight tone in her voice. It was the voice of Dr.Scully,
and Mulder always enjoyed watching her zero in. "What
happened to your hand?"

Ruiz-Cardenas turned away from them and reached down
into the bar. Jet black hair now spilled down her back,
evenly cut right beneath her shoulderblades. She pulled
out some demitasse spoons and set the on the counter.
"Yes...well it's somewhat embarrassing...when I heard
what had happened. I lost it...threw a glass against the
wall...and cut myself trying to clean it up." Mulder
watched her intently, her expression didn't match what
she was saying. She didn't seem all that embarrassed
to be telling two strangers a story of an supposed
emotional outburst. As a matter of fact, she seemed calm,
too calm, she could've been reviewing her syllabus with
some graduate students.

"So, that was about two weeks ago?"

"Yes, ridiculous thing to do, wasn't it?

"Grief can make someone do things they wouldn't do
ordinarily." It was Mulder's voice now.

"Yes. Yes it can." A momentary shift, in which both
Mulder and Scully could see something a little wild
in Alex's eyes, something that quickly was banished
and replaced with smooth calm and a practiced diffidence.
She poured them all cofee, very deliberate
in what she did, with great economy of movement. Mulder
guessed that being a cultural anthropologist would make a
person hyperaware of what they were doing at all times.
The point was to observe, not be observed. In a way,
psychology was the same thing, only on the micro-linear
scale. And it was his turn to observe Cardenas, observe
and draw the right conclusions.

"But you need me to tell you about that night, don't you?"
Alex was clearly giving the signal that the line of
questioning about her hand was over. "I was already
waiting at the restaurant. I was early. The guest lecturer
for one of my classes cancelled due to illness, so I popped
home and told Naftali I'd meet him there. Our table is right
next to the front window. We like to watch people as
we eat," she smiled briefly. "I had a glass of white
wine. . .spied him stepping off the curb, walking towards
me with that big grin that always means he's had a good day.
A car slowed to let him cross, and I see the window rolling
down, which I thought was odd, because although it's not
winter yet, it was a cold day. There was a flash of light
from the car window, but not from the window itself.
I think it was light from the restaurant glinting off
of the gun. Anyway, the next thing I see is a bright
flash, then he's on the pavement."

Scully hadn't touched her espresso. Ruiz-Cardenas went
into her solititous host routine, "Our cafecitos are an
acquired taste. Perhaps you'd prefer some tea, Agent
Scully...I know how the Irish love their 'tay.'

Mulder finished his and fought a grin as he imagined
the look on Scully's face. No eyebrow, not even a twitch
of the lip, just a straight-on, dead glare that said
'And the horse you rode in on, too'. Ruiz-Cardenas would
learn.

"You didn't recognize the car or the driver?" asked Scully,
icily ignoring that cultural swipe.

"No. All my attention was on Naftali. I could have cared less
what the driver looked like. But I've already told the
police all of this, is it really necessary to go back over
it again and again and again?"

"Well, Professor Cardenas, should this go to trial, you'll
certainly be expected to do so again, yes." Her words hung
in the air.

Ah, there it was. Scully's bright head turned towards
him in their traditional 'jump in any time, Mulder'
interview stance. Ruiz-Cardenas looked at him too, her
face losing its let's-be-pleasant-about-this expression
for a moment. It returned when he went on, "You have a
lovely home, Professor. I'm surprised to see there aren't
any objects of veneration displayed in your collection."

"I beg your pardon, Agent Mulder? "

"I found it fascinating that you only seem to have objects
of everyday use or adornment on public view ," he replied.

"You must respect other cultures in order to be respected,
Agent Mulder. What about you, Agent Scully, would you mind
if your family bible was torn up and sold as an nothing more
than an item of curiosity? Surely your devout Irish clan
would be beside themselves.'

Scully said nothing, but started sipping delicately
at her espresso.

Mulder jumped on the opportunity. "Point taken, but tell me,
Alex, why would you display evidence of your devotion to
Ellegua, Obatala, and Oya? That's the significance of
those wonderful oils you have, if I'm not mistaken."

The bullet hit the target. Cardenas' cool dissolved and
both agents were treated to a look of shock and anger.
She was however, able to rally quickly. "Agent Mulder,
I didn't realize you were familiar with the Seven Powers.
But I'm hardly a devotee. What would make you say that?"

"The placement of the pictures. Only a devotee would make
sure each image repressenting a god would be placed in its
sacred delegation in the home."

"You flatter me. I'm afraid my attention to detail is
my interest in maintaining cultural sensitivity and a
certain historical accuracy. The paintings were from
an estate in Cuba, pre-revolution. The owners were
important Santeristas, unusual in that they were of the
educated class." A pause, and then a full display of
those beautiful teeth again, "It's a gesture of scholarly
respect, Agents, nothing more. She glanced at the Chanel
watch on her left wrist, "Speaking of scholarly things,
I have office hours tonight, and I'm afraid I'll have to
be on my way soon. Please forgive me for cutting our
discussion short. But feel free to come again, should you
think I could be of any further help."

"Well, actually, there was just one more thing, Alex."
Mulder wanted to cast one more line. "I noticed what
seemed to be a locked chest and a cigar humidor in your
study...those are yours?"

Ruiz-Cardenas looked at him long and hard before
answering. "No, they're just a way to keep Naftali near.
You can't blame me for doing that, can you?"


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X


The Whole Catastrophe
Chapter 5
By Diehard and Dryad

Scully slid into the passenger's seat, and sat
up as straight as possible, they'd just done an
interview, and it was time to compare notes.
Surprisingly, Mulder hadn't taken the lead in
pulling together their observations.

She took a deep breath, brushing away an errant
strandof hair from her eyes. "You know, Mulder,
Cardenas shouldn't still be bandaging a cut that's
over two weeks old. I'm thinking it's more recent."

"And that would mean..?"

"That she's had some injury, possibly in the last
day or so, one that she didn't want to tell us about.

"I'd say that sounds right. And I'm not sure I buy her
story about those paintings."

"Why am I not surprised to hear you say that?
There's a lot that doesn't add up. Overall, her
behavior was odd." Scully paused, looking over
at her partner, whose eyes were on the road.

"Very. No love of the Irish, either." He could hear
a chuff coming from the passenger's side.

"Mulder, you still haven't told me." She knew Alex
was a stunningly beautiful woman, an enigma, and if
she knew anything at all about her partner, he'd
already assumed there was some paranormal
connection to all this.

"Told you what?"

"What you think of Alex Cardenas."

"Aside from the obvious facts that she's a snobbish,
wealthy intellectual, with more than a passing interest
in Santeria? That she's displaying some seriously
incongruent behavior after witnessing the shooting
death of her lover?...You mean beyond that?"

"I guess she didn't make much of an impression, then."

"I'm trying to withhold judgement."

She cut him a look, and saw him biting his lip, trying
to smother a laugh. "Right. Well, I guess we should
review the rest of the visit with our lovely host
once we get to the hotel."

"Well, actually, I'm relegating my impressions to my
unconscious mind. Using the occult process of discovery
that such a tactic offers, I'm sure further light will
be shed on the situation by morning."

"What?" She twisted herself around and leaned against
the window. She wanted to get a good look at this.
"Explain."

He turned a gave her a squinty look, "In laymen's terms,
I'm giving it a rest until tomorrow. And so should you.
Go on, Scully, assume the position."

"Excuse me?"

"Lay that head back down, close your eyes and let me
shuttle you in my golden chariot."

"Chariot?'

"Taurus. Whatever." Much to his satisfaction, a second
later she was head against the head rest, eyelids
fluttering shut. He went for her hand, and lacing her
fingers in his, she drew them both against her chest.
The Drive rolled on before them, purple in the dusk,
with Lake Michigan darkening in the fading light.

"Mulder, you know I know."

"Know what?"

"Alex Ruiz-Cardenas is a gorgeous woman."

"Really? I hadn't noticed. Besides, I've got this thing
for redheads."

"That was the right response. Smart man."

~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X


She rode the rest of the whole way with her eyes closed,
sinking back into the passenger's seat of their Taurus.
What she wanted was a clean, quiet place to lay her head,
a hot bath, and she hoped to God Mulder hadn't gotten them
rooms in the worst fleabag in town.

She was tired physically, but no more than what she'd expect
her first day back. What she felt was a kind of mental
exhaustion, the cost of containing this morning's episode.
What she'd flashed on at the morgue took its toll-- deeply
disturbing her, even though it'd only lasted a second.
Afterwards, it had taken a tremendous amount of psychic
energy to stay detached and keep back the ghosts.
The last six months had been a reprieve from defenses
that were second nature to her, defenses she'd built up from
the moment she'd sliced open her first cadaver.

But Mulder had pulled back the layers one by one with
a lover's infinite care. It was just what she'd needed,
for all the obvious reasons, but it had opened up those
parts of her she'd kept sealed tight. The grief and pain
and terror of her life were hers alone to bear, or so
she thought. Her survival plan had worked pretty well,
too. The only problem was that it'd kept anyone from being
able to touch her.

All that had changed. And slowly, slowly, she was learning
to let down her guard. But now she'd have to to flex some
of those protective those muscles again, too much
depended on her resolve for her to weaken, too many souls
who needed her to put the pieces together. Her little side trip
to Jorgensen's house hadn't helped her equilibrium either.
It had pushed old grief into the foreground, and a new
assignment in the field was not the place to visit
memories of what she'd lost.

Lulled by the motion of the car as they cruised the Drive,
she remembered a night months ago, sated and lazy in
each other's arms. He'd told her they were a force of nature,
unstoppable together.

She'd laughed then, but now she just wanted him to be right.

~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X

He found the local jazz station and Mc Coy Tyner's piano
soothed her spirit. The shimmering notes filled the car
as they cruised south on Lake Shore Drive. His right hand
was still on hers as it now lay on her lap, cupping it
loosely as the car spanned the long blue stretch of road
in the settling twilight. She let her mind wander, not
thinking about anything except the feel of his palm on the
back of her hand. Minutes passed, she wasn't sure how long,
she wasjust glad to be able to wind down, at peace in the
wordless comfort between them.

"Hey Scully, you asleep?"

"No, just resting my eyes."

He'd been watching her from the rearview mirror,
letting the music weave its way around them. It was some
kind of coda to their first day in the field, something
bringing them home to each other.

"How was the first day back?" He was asking about a
day that included corpses, latex and morbid lividity,
women who could have children, and wanted to know if
there was a slow bleed in his partner's heart.

"Long. Hard. Harder than I thought it would be. But I
ended up spending time with a guy who's so crazy, it was
just the distraction I needed."

"Lucky you. The only thing I had to keep me going was
knowing I'd end the day in the arms of a woman who lives
to keep my ego in check."

"Anyone I know?"

"Behold, the rapier wit of my beloved." He cut a glance
toward her and saw her smiling slightly, eyes still shut.
His hold on her hand tightened.

As they pulled off the exit ramp, he thought about Shinoda
and the interrogation leading to nowhere. His old self would
have made the man one more obsession. In the past, he
needed his obsessions, his frantic searches, brandishing
them like a badge of courage. His relentlessness was in part,
a way to not feel the pain of Sam's disappearance.

Scully'd taught him other things could soothe that loss.

He was not the man to unravel Shinoda's secret, not this
time. He could live with that. And if their paths crossed
again, if it was his task to capture his man, he could
live with that, too. She'd also taught him acceptance,
strengthened his belief in fate.

Meanwhile, Naftali Gonzales was dead, and there were
plenty more of the dead whose bodies held the truth,
waiting for him, waiting for Scully and the questions
only they could ask. Somehow, Santeria or the community
of believers in Santeria were a part of this. How,
exactly, he didn't know. Tomorrow, they would
do more investigation, review the lab results, debrief,
reconstruct, deconstruct. Mulder was going to get
answers, he'd find a way to stem to the chaos and
brutality that had killed a good cop and left a trail
of bodies in its wake.

But Scully had finally brought him to the place where
he could value having his own life, where he could fight
each battle, one skirmish at a time, one day at a time.

"Mulder, are we there yet?"

"Agent Scully, we are approaching our destination.
Get ready to feast those baby blues on our refuge from
the storm."

~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X

Scully did some light reconnaissance of the building's
entrance as he pulled up to the curb. It was smooth granite
and carved cupolas, cornices that spoke of Louis Sullivan,
and bronze letters spelling out their destination. She was
hit with the dazzle of levered glass and the entrance of
clearly one of the better hotels in town. Before she could
say anything,a valet hustled over to the driver's side and
welcomed both of them.

The Burnham.

Her personal deliverance from seven years of variations
on the Bates Motel.

Mulder. He did this.

When he slid out out their rental to retrieve their
luggage, she took in the full effect of the phalanx of
red-coated doormen, bellhops, and car parkers swirling
around the terazzo walkway. Out of the rear view mirror,
she saw him slip one of the troops a couple of bills,
and the luggage was whisked away. She craned her neck
to take in her partner as he sauntered toward her, hands
shoved in his pockets. He seemed more than amused,
judging by the smile playing at the corners of his mouth.

He opened the passenger door and gestured toward the
entrance with a flourish. "I know you're used to some
place with more character, but duty calls. We'll just have
to make the best of it."

"Oh my God...How can we...?" peering up at him over
the bridge of her nose, still partially under the influence
of a temporary haze. She didn't resist when he helped her
out of the passenger's seat with his hand on her elbow,
or utter a single word as their chariot was whisked to
the netherworld.

Mulder thought he was home free, slipping his hand to
its familiar spot at the small of her back as he steered
her toward the door. But by the time they'd made it through
the threshold, whatever she was feeling had morphed into
full-out resistance. Digging her heels into the lush
Persian carpet that spanned a third of the lobby, it was
time for an explanation. Visions of expense reports, audits
and Kersh's office flashed before her eyes. How was her
brilliant, albeit crackpot partner going to justify this
in their report?

"You better explain how we ended up here, because I don't
plan on taking another step until you do." She reached
behind her,took his hand and drew him in front of her.
"I mean it, I want to hear it, all of it, and it'd better
be good."

His eyes shifted from gray to green, barely containing his
enjoyment." Well, one explanation is that the CPD so
appreciates our time and expertise that they made
sure we were well taken care of."

"Right. So they booked us accommodations at a luxury
hotel. Just because no one else who's requested us on a
consult has done anything remotely like this in all the
time we've been in the Bureau shouldn't make me suspicious.
How about we try this again, with you telling me the truth
this time?" Fingering his lapels, she pinned him where he
stood with a look that told him she was worried, and not
about to back down, either.

He raised his hands above his head in surrender.
"I give up, Scully." He tried looking sheepish, but
felt way too self-congratulatory to pull it off.
"I was me, G-woman, I'm the guilty party. Lazarov told me
this was the best small hotel downtown, so I booked the
reservation after the interrogation this afternoon."

Now she was tapping his shoulder, "That much I already
figured out. Listen, this kind of unwarranted expense could
get us a reprimand, if not a suspension. Jesus, Mulder....
Kersh could transfer us to Cornhole, Kansas for this.
Seriously, we just got the X-Files back..."

"Scully, The Burnham is close to the Field Office, the 11th
and State lockup, and City Hall, so we can safely make the
case there's a practical reason this is a good choice.
And there is nothing about this hotel stay that Skinner,
Kersh or any bean-counting geek in Cost Override Control
will take issue with. The Bureau's Amex gets a charge for
the per diem rate, and I had the rest put on my Visa."

"Why are you doing this ?"

"I figure I needed to make amends for all the times you
stuck itout with me in rat traps, forests, caves, you know,
our usual accommodations." His voice softened, and he took
her by the hand, "I thought...I thought it might be hard
to plunge back into all the slicing and dicing...I wanted
to make it a little easier."

"You know you don't have to."

"But I want to Scully. I want to because I finally can."
He smiled, his vulnerability so transparent, it made her
heart clench in her chest to see it. "Because...because
you've let me in. Maybe it'll help with the rest of the
day, too"

She took both his hands in hers, her fingers stroking his
knuckles, She could accept this attention, this care,
but as his equal, always his equal. "Just so we're clear,
we take care of each other, Mulder." She held his gaze
in hers, "Right?"

"Always, Scully. Always."

The earlier smile has been replaced with a full-tilt
shit-eating grin. "You know, sometimes I'm so clever
I scare myself."

"And is this where I offer to console you?" The level of
intimacy receded with that little boast and she was
now brushing away some imaginary lint from his sleeve.

"Actually, since I've been a bad, bad, boy by keeping this
from you, maybe you just better take me to bed without
any supper."

"Isn't that 'send' you to bed without any supper?"

"I won't argue with you over semantics. You can explain
the difference to me in a tutorial. That's what I need,
Scully, a little one-on-one." He was going to steer her
toward the registration desk, but she'd already eased past
him, heading in that direction.

Over her shoulder she teased, "C'mon Mulder,
play your cards right and maybe you'll get that private
instruction."

"Promises, promises." He stood there for a second
enjoying that stride of hers, that glorious rear view,
and then decided he'd appreciate it more once they were
behind closed doors, and sprinted to her side.

They strolled under a vaulted tin ceiling toward the
curvedbrass reservation desk, complete with a pair a
bright, young clerks poised at the ready. Huge potted
palms flanked a nearby alcove flagged with a placard
which read, 'The Redoubt', the hotel's bar, she guessed.
Passing paisley covered wing chairs, they spied another
couple having what appeared to be Cosmopolitans. She
sighed with satisfaction, something not lost on Mulder.

His popularity quotient was soaring as her heels
clicked on the maple parquet floor. Once they'd
made it to the desk, she noticed he got them registered
in record time. Leaning in as he finished signing,
she whispered, "You're going to spoil me."

He tossed the pen aside and turned to face her.
"That's the plan, Scully, that's the plan. Unless of
course, you think this place is overkill...'cause we
could always hit The Pacific Garden Mission. I hear
there's at at least 100 beds, and a soup line
to die for. "

"The only place I'm going with you tonight is
upstairs," as they made their way toward the elevator,
"After all, Agent, Mulder, it's in your best interests
to get us to our rooms as soon as possible."

"Why is that, Agent Scully?"

"Where else would I be able to properly thank you?"

He had plenty of suggestions, but didn't say a word
as the elevator doors slid shut.


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~


She was sure she'd been speaking English, and he'd
given the impression that he'd been paying attention
to what she'd been saying. Mind you, it wasn't
particularly brilliant or complicated, but it would do
the trick. They'd both go into their separate rooms--
adjoining ones, of course--unpack, make an effort to
have their rooms looked used and reconnoiture in his
room in about an hour.

These basic steps would be repeated every night, while
alternating the finale destination.

Simple. Right.

He'd given her the room key in the elevator, number
1008--he was in 1010. She'd outlined the plan of action,
and should be opening the door right now. So why was he
planted in her doorway, not going into his room, not
unpacking, and looking sly, sexy and immovable?

"You look a little tired Scully, why don't I help
you unpack?"

"I think I've got that covered."

"Really? I can be very helpful. You know, lay out your
clothes, draw your bath, help you undress..." He started
worrying his lower lip with the tip of his tongue and
she was aware of the blush creeping up her neck.

"No thanks, your concern is touching, though." Snaking her
arm around his waist, she began to fiddle with the lock.
She had to bite down on the inside of her cheek to keep
from laughing.

"C'mon, let's play bellboy and business traveller. Or you
could take me into protective custody. That's it...I'm
a man with a terrible secret and you have to keep an eye
on me at all times. Especially when I take off my clothes,
moving slowly, very slowly. "

Now she was chuckling, and the lock wasn't opening any
more easily. She kept trying to get a clear shot at it,
but he kept darting in front, blocking all her efforts.
She was really laughing now.

"Step away from the door. Really, I'm serious."

"You don't seem all that serious." He was laughing now.
He was pushing it, definitely pushing it.

"I am." She stopped struggling with the lock, and in one
swift, decisive move, pulled back and pinched him hard
around the middle.

He leapt back, yelping, and she moved with a purpose.
Key in lock. Lock turning, door opening. Scully on
the other side of the threshold. Blowing away a strand
of auburn hair that had gotten mussed in all the exertion,
she took in the sight of him rubbing his side, mouth open
in shock. Victory.

He started toward her and she shut and locked the door,
peeking at him through the peephole. He was still standing
there, waving at her.

"Mulder?," she yelled through a couple of inches of
solid oak.

As soon as her heard her, he turned on his heel and
let him himself in next door.

A split second later she heard the ring of the phone
by the nightstand. She went over and picked up, fairly
sure who was on the other end.

A sultry drawl, "Unpack. Make the room look lived in.
Then get that beautiful ass in here."

Click.

"I'm on it, partner," she said to no one in particular
as she pulled her suitcase onto the bed.


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~


This was risky for her, she knew it. She'd plumbed Mulder's
hidden depths as his lover, coming to understand his need
to be touched, for tenderness, for simple reassurance.
And he's tapped into something the others never found,
something she'd kept buried even from herself. Desire.
Not just that feeling of wanting, but the need to see it
reflected in the eyes of your lover, the power of it.

And so here she is, standing at the connecting door of
their rooms with a tray, two glasses, two bottles of Scotch
from the minibar. She has on her blouse, her skirt, her
heels, and nothing else. This isn't anything like her and
it's everything like her. None of few and far between men
from her past ever suspected her capable of this. She'd
spent years telling herself she didn't have that kind of
hunger, but it was Mulder who proved her wrong, with
his hands stroking her skin, whispering in her ear,
whispering things she wanted to believe.

That she owned him body and soul. That she wasn't some Ice
Queen, but just the opposite, a match for him in every way.
That after everything they'd been through, they were meant for this.
And like many things that had come to pass in seven years,
he told her she had to trust that he was right.

But there are still shreds of doubt that still her hand
before she can knock. She is Ahab's daughter, and there is
part of her that feels embarrassed to be so bold. She lets
herself imagine him lying naked in the next room, touching
himself, calling her name.

She knocks, and in a heartbeat Mulder's thrown open
the door. His shirt sleeves are rolled up to the elbow,
tie loosened. His eyes rove over her body, but he's silent.
Instead of inviting her in, he's frozen in place.

Her worst fear is coming true, she thinks. "I know..."
Instead of looking at him, she stares down at the carpet.
"This is so unlike me... I..."

Mulder doesn't move because the blood in his head is
rushing to his groin, his heart is pounding and he's
telling himself he's not dreaming. The second he opened
the door he could see her nipples pressing against the silk
of her blouse, the bare, smooth skin of her legs. That,
plus the idea that she might have no panties on,
literally makes him speechless.

She tries to smile, "I guess you didn't order room
service." She starts to turn away, and before she knows
what's hit her, Mulder has her in his room, the tray's
out of her hands, and he's kissing her, kissing her,
kissing her.

Then he's laughing and groaning and pressing her against
the door with his body, fumbling for the lock until it clicks
behind her. His hands weave through her hair, and he's biting
her earlobe, then his mouth becomes one long, hot drag until
he reaches the hollow of her throat. She can feel his cock
through his dress slacks, through her skirt, pressing against
her thigh. Now one hand is over her heart, and the other
is sliding underneath her skirt.

She's breathing heavily, she wants this, all of this, and the
look in his eyes as he finds her, sends of shock of heat right
through her. No else ever looked at her that way, and it's
almost too much. She takes his hand from her chest, kissing
the knuckles, biting the soft pad of his thumb. He slides his
hand between her legs, tracing the outside of her labia,
feathery touches. He shudders as she grows more and more wet.
She stills his hand, and they're both suspended as the room
spins around them.

"Mulder...I need..."

"Anything, just tell me...Tell me, Scully."

For a second, she's Ahab's daughter again and remembers
that actions speak louder than words. With his hand warm
in hers, she walks him to the chair across from the foot
of the bed.

It's dark in the room, except for the light from the bathroom
and the skyline spanning in front of them. She guides him down
and straddles his lap, foreheads touching. Working his tie
free, she lets herself caress his beautiful throat. She
unbuttons his cuffs and the front of his shirt. She revels in
the smooth planes of his chest, the tips of her fingers sliding down,
down. Her hands find their way to undo his belt, unzip his pants.
Lifting up just enough, she finds hard length of his shaft and pulls
him free. She traces the veins that run up and down, feels every
pulse as she does. Licking her thumb, she circles and strokes
the head of his cock

Now he stops her, takes his time following her lead. The cuffs
of her blouse are undone and he strokes figure eights on her
wrists with his thumb. One by one, his fingers undo her buttons,
andhe makes an 'X' on each spot he exposes. Bending his head
down, his kisses the rise of her breasts, nips and suckles on her
nipples. She feels dizzy, but doesn't want to stop, can't imagine
stopping.Then he eases his hands under her skirt, working it up
toward her hips. Sliding them under her ass, he lifts her up,
and she braces herself with her hands on his shoulders.
They look at each other, they're at the deepest part of the river
here. There's a smile in the recesses of her eyes, and he knows.
He eases her down over his cock, and she's a delta--lush,
wet, ready.

He thrusts up and into her and she moves into him, sliding up
and down, up and down. Tightening and pulling him deeper
and deeper, she knows by his breathing he's close. His eyes
are shut, but a single tear runs the length of his jaw.

"Only you," he rasps, and her hand's already
brushed it away. "Always...you."

Then he unfurls against her, slowly, intensely.
Once. Then again. And again. A rapid final release
and he's spent, his head on her shoulder, and
she can feel the wetness again.

"Shhh,'' she tries to calm him.

"Don't." He raises his head and kisses her with such
tenderness that she thinks her heart might break.
"I'm good."

Now she feels tears on her own face. "Yes.
Yes, we are."

They hold each other for a long time, motionless, and
then Mulder stirs. Taking her hand in his, he brings both
hands to the place where they're joined. He's softened,
but he's still inside her. She looks up at him, and he
nods. Circling her clit with her own fingertips, his palms
cupping the back of her hand, they travel around and
around her perfect knot. Then his hand slides underneath
hers, and its him touching her there, his fingertips moving
in perfect rhythm. She swells against his strokes, burgeoning,
blossoming, and she watches him watching her--his gaze
fixed on that auburn swipe of hair, mesmerized by the flash
of pink flesh beneath.

"This is beautiful," he whispers.

She wants to say he is beautiful, that they're beautiful
together, but it's hit her and she trembles and grinds
into his lap. She can't stop herself, not even to tell him
how precious he is to her, how necessary. Rippling,
rippling, flowing in and away and to him, always to him.

~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~

A couple of hours have come and gone and they've showered,
ordered room service, eaten their fill and toasted each other
with the Glenlivet she'd snagged earlier. Right now, they're lying
face to face in his king-size sleigh bed. He's got his long thigh
draped over her hip, and her head is nestled against his chest.
They're having a conversation, sort of, the kind that's a hazy
trail leading nowhere in particular. It's the kind you have with
the trace of your lover still on your lips.

Every once and a while, post-orgasmic Mulder waxes literary.
He has a range that spans quantum physics to bad puns, but
tonight it's Irish poetry. Scully's always a good audience,
and tonight's no different. She loves the sound of his voice,
especially in bed, when it's rough and slurry and sweet beyond
belief. So she plays on his eidetic memory, asking him to name
his favorite Irish bard and recite his favorite poem.

"Easy. W B. Yeats. 'When you Are Old and Full of Sleep.' "

"Go on, I'm waiting."

And he does, and it's lovely. His voice does the poem
justice--gravelly, slow and sensual. But one line throws off
his recitation.

"But one man loved the pilgrim's soul in you, and loved
the sorrows of your changing face." His voice quavered
on that one, and she stopped him with her fingers on
his lips.

"My pilgrim," she whispers, and they watch the skyline,
the lights of the buildings, and she tells him there's no room
for sorrows in their bed.

~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~

It's later, much later. They've both drifted in and out of sleep,
but now they're awake. She knows he's thinking about something,
she can sense it.

"Mulder?"

"Hmmm?"

"What are you thinking about?"

"Nothing."

"Liar." She stifles a yawn, she wants to know, but
Morpheus is beckoning. "Tell me."

"Nothing...everything." He shifts from where he's rolled away
while asleep and draws her close. Now she's lying her back to
his front, and he runs his fingers through her hair.

"You better tell me." She's breathing a little more slowly.

"Wolves. I was thinking about wolves. And geese.
That's what I was thinking about."

"Why?" Sleep calls and she's hovering, back and forth,
but she's trying to rouse herself.

"Because they mate for life."

"Ah...I see..." The bed is so soft, his arms around her feel
so right, and her eyes flutter shut.

"Scully?" He wasn't going to wait. They'd waited too long
and lost too much time.

"Hmmm?"

"Marry me."

There is only the sound of her snuffling into the pillow.
He raises himself up and leans over to see the long,
slow pulls of her breath.

"Don't worry," his whispers into her ear, into her dreams.
"I won't take no for an answer," and settles down next to her.

Morpheus finds him, too.

~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~


The Whole Catastrophe
Chapter 6
By Diehard and Dryad

6:00 am---breakfast finished. They were both feeling
sleep deprived, but neither one of them was
complaining.

He was already in typical hotel-room-briefing
mode--siting up against the headboard, crime scene
and autopsy reports strewn across the bed.
With his black suit, white dress shirt and black tie,
he was a well-tailored island in a sea of photos,
Xeroxes of police files, handwritten notes in his
semi-legible scrawl. Nothing new there.
She had her back to him, brushing her hair as she
stood in front of the beveled mirror above the dresser.
Watching his reflection as he scanned the papers,
she'd always been amazed at the amount of data
he absorbed, how quickly he'd make connections,
take point on each case.

Last night, he'd waited for her to bring up the interview
with Cardenas. This morning, as room service cleared
their trays, he'd asked her how she wanted to proceed.
He was deferring to her more, seeking her input. She
could see the effort he was making to have things on a
more balanced footing. She liked it, although it'd taken
her a minute to answer, to get her bearings.

"Something wrong, Scully?"

"Not wrong...just surprising. You usually
don't ask me my opinion at the outset."

He sheepishly shuffled through sheaves of paper,
"It was long overdue. Let's just say I have a new found
appreciation for where some of my strengths lie."

"That almost sounds like flattery, Mulder."

"Not flattery...just a statement of fact."

She stopped what she was doing and turned toward
him. "Then I can't let you down, can I?"
Her eyes held a glimmer of warmth that her
intent expression couldn't hide. "Well...
each of the deceased were also arrested for crimes
like the ones resulting in their own deaths. It seems
important to check those crime scene photos against
the ones taken on this case to check for discrepancies."

He slid off the bed and strode to the writing table
where he'd set up his laptop, settling in as best he
could into a chair that was clearly a tight squeeze
for his lanky frame.

"Agreed. I'm guessing you can get those from Det.
Jorgensen. I looked at Gonzales' case files
yesterday and again this morning, but I'm interested
in what you'll see once you review them and check the
autopsies of our unholy dead."

"I'll ask her to pull a set of photos from Gonzales'
files when she calls...which should be any time
now. Apparently the CPD is sending a squad car
to pick me up this morning."

"Ah...the VIP treatment. Just make sure they don't
make you sit in the backseat. You know...if it
looks bad..."

She finished it for him, "...it's bad for the FBI."
She chuffed after that one, and her eyes narrowed,
the scope of the day settling in. "Well then, my day
looks pretty mapped out...what's on your agenda,
partner?"

"I'm looking over the most recent crime scene
data one more time. And just to be sure, I'll set up a
walkthrough with the someone from the evidence
collection team. So far, there's no indication of anyone
present at the these new murders, except the
deceased."

You certainly won't win any popularity contests
doing that." She'd done enough of these consults
and knew that the local PD always chafed at the idea
that anyone would be looking for blind spots, mistakes.

"I think Lazarov and his people are already clear I'm
a pain in the ass." He shrugged off the knowledge that
that it could be problematic. Truth was, he didn't care.
Besides, there was one other thing, another approach
beginning to occupy his attention

"I...also want to locate a footnote in an old X-file."
He paused a second and went on. "It refers to
a Santera practice concerning retribution and
untimely death. There may be similarities to certain
Haitian voodoo rituals, and cross-referencing may
give us a better handle at some possibilities. After
that, I'm thinking I want to visit some botanicas to
get some firsthand information."

"Mulder...Isn't it a little soon for us to make that
kind of leap?"


"But Scully...that's why we get the big bucks."


X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~



He memorized every move as she slipped on her jacket
and shrugged on her trench coat. Coat, brown pantsuit,
beige silk blouse---had all been smoothed into place
with an efficiency and grace that fascinated him.
It was that same fluidity of movement when she made
a Y-incision, sutured his wounds, pulled the trigger.
Leaning back from his laptop, he wanted to make sure
he could fully appreciate the view---her daylight persona
in place, ready to take on the world, adjusting her holster
as a finishing touch.

Jorgensen had called to say a car was on the way
and Scully'd arranged for the photos to be at
the lab when she arrived. She also made sure
the dieners pulled all the bodies from the cooler
and set them up in an exam bay, and that all the
tissue samples and test results were available. She'd
already hit the ground running, and expected everyone
else to keep up.

Her drive was apparent on their first case. It took him a
while to admit it to himself, but it spoke to him, made him
willing to trust her, even though he knew she thought he
was probably certifiable. Time and tragedy had given him
many more reasons, not the least of which was somewhere
along the way he'd fallen in love with her.

She'd caught him red-handed. "We're on the clock, Mulder."

"My nose is pressed to the grindstone." He was smiling
despite his transgression.

"Grindstone, huh? I don't think so." She leaned back
against the dresser and folded her arms across her chest.

"I could see how you might miss the level of intensity.
I tend to hide it...it can be intimidating."

"Uh huh." There was the barest hint of a smirk teasing
the corner of her mouth.

"Seriously, I'm deeply focused on uncovering new leads."

"You just won't stop, will you?"

"I've got some momentum here, Scully. Can't blame
me for tryin' to run with it ."

She walked over, put her hands on his shoulder and
whispered in his ear, "I can see it's up to me to keep you
in line. Go on. Get to it, Mulder. We've got our work cut
out for us..." She brushed her lips against his jaw.
"I'll see you tonight, partner."

He turned so that they were facing each other, and his
hands snaked up and around to lace behind her neck,

"I'll be good. See you tonight."

X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~


The ride to the Coroner's office and the County morgue
was brief. The complex was attached to the County public
hospital just south and west of the downtown area.
The building was a huge slab of dark cement and
steel---ugly, utilitarian---harsh looking even from the
outside. Scully felt her composure shift and slide. It was
a cold, slate-colored day, typical for October in Chicago.
As rain pelted the windows of the squad car, something
coiled tight in her chest and she worked at drawing slow deep
breaths. There was no room for a repeat of yesterday--
no room for hesitation, today had to go by the numbers.

It'd never occurred to her to tell Mulder what had happened
at the morgue yesterday. It wasn't something for him to fix.

The patrolman let her off at the staff entrance,
and she tried without success to shake off the chill, making
her way down the dank, poorly lit halls to Bay #3,
where Kris Jorgensen was waiting. She strode to the
doorway, paused to take a deep breath, to force down
a wave of dread that tasted like bile.

Scully walked quietly toward the other woman and
saw a keen interest lighting the her features as she
checked out the dressing on two of the corpses, bending
close to examine the wrapping, the ties.

"Detective?"

Kris jerked away from the light touch above her elbow,
then immediately flushed with embarrassment.
"Agent Scully, sorry. Didn't see you there."

"You seem absorbed, Det. Jorgensen. Feeling less
put off by the dead in this setting, it would seem."
I wish I could say the same, she thought.

"Actually, I should thank you for insisting I stick it
out yesterday."

"Why is that?"

She looked away from Scully and focused on some of
the linen dressing, fingering it as she spoke, "This is all so...
fascinating. I feel like a new avenue of investigation's been
opened up for me. This is work I'd like to be more familiar
with, understand better." She stopped to consider something
for a moment, "Who knows? Maybe I'll ask for a
transfer to the Forensic Unit."

Scully swallowed hard and nodded in response to
what appeared to be her liaison's rapid-fire conversion
from avoidance to affinity "Great. Are we ready to get
started?"

"Well, actually...there's one thing. We've got all the bodies
here, except for Nat." Jorgensen looked at he rows of
corpses. "When we tried to exhume, Nat's family told us that
Alex Cardenas had power of attorney. She blocked it...
said it was too painful..."

"Nothing we can do about that." Scully was sure Mulder
would jump on Cardenas' reluctance to cooperate.
That woman was anything but the typical grieving lover.
They'd get to her later---right now, the dead were demanding
her attention. "What about the tissue samples?"

"They're in collection jars next to each body, just like
you asked."

She stared at the line of dead bodies. Vincent Coluko,
Ashleen Wienhoft, Albert Breen, La Shawn Michaels,
Dakota Roberts. A bitter lump started to form in her
throat and she had to force down the urge to dry heave.
Taking another deep breath, "We've got plenty of work
to do, so let's get started."

As she walked to the display of photos laid out on the
Assistant M.E.'s desk, her mind formed just three words,
a prayer. 'Please. Help me.'



~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x

Scully let Jorgensen pace up and down the rows between
the exam tables, studying the bodies, while she looked at the
crime scene shots, the crimes these dead had committed.
Children, mothers, couples, old people--gutted, raped,
sodomized, shot, stabbed, branded, garroted. She could
feel a trickle of sweat between her shoulder blades, even
though it was almost as cold as storage in the bay.
I have to do this, she told herself, I have to.

"Agent Scully," a voice from amidst the cadavers, "should
I suit up? I've got gowns, masks, and latex gloves." She
was ready for action, and feeling a little restless. It was time
for revelation, and she wasn't about to miss a thing.

"You do that." Scully piled the pictures with care into
some kind of organized whole---Murderers on one side---
Victims on the other---first dead at the bottom, with the most
recent staring at her from the top of the pile. "I'll be there
as soon as I'm done looking at these." She took the new lab
results and checked the the drug screens against the write-ups
of all the stomach contents. No rum. No rum in any
of these victims. Maybe the thing with Coluko was a fluke.
There was only one way to find out. She made her face
into a mask of passivity--bland, unreadable.

"What about the tissue samples?"

"I plan on checking them after each autopsy, away from
the bodies. We may have a repeat of what happened with
Coluko, where the scent is evident on exam. If so, then
checking the samples separately is an additional safeguard.
If not, then it's a more discrete method to find if rum is present."

"You're very thorough." Jorgensen's admiration was evident.

"It's what the job requires..." Scully's voice trailed off.

"Agent Scu..."

"I''m coming, Det. Jorgensen."

~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x

On the surface, it all appeared to go smoothly. First,
checking and finishing the re-dressing of Coluko, then
beginning the re-autopsy of Weinhoft. Only someone who
knew her would sense that she was struggling, the set of her
jaw was just a little too tight, her grip on the scalpel whitening
her knuckles. Jorgensen was too enthralled with the
proceedings to notice any of it, not even Scully choking back
the nausea that would appear erratically. The sweating had
stopped a while ago, and she felt drained and hollow, but she
went on, providing a running commentary for Jorgensen's
benefit.

It was a perverse relief, having to focus on explaining
the routine of slicing through skin and muscle, sawing through
bone, weighing organs, instead of thinking about what these
people had done. Jorgensen wrote down the specifics on
the chart, inspected the straight line bruise across Weinhoft's
back where her spine had been snapped, while Scully
looked over her shoulder.

"So she fell, or was pushed against the sofa, that's how
she broke her back?" asked Jorgensen, forehead creased in
concentration. "It's obvious there was a fight in the living room,
but who attacked who?"

She stretched her arms over her head, leaned to her left,
then her right, rolled her shoulders and neck back and forth
several times before answering. Don't, don't do it, she told
herself, stay focused. Scully looked over Wienhoft. Despite
pallor and rigor, she could make out that the twenty-five
year old had been pretty, but her youth and her beauty had
begun to fade. Her shoulder-length dark brown hair showed
traces of gray, her face etched with the legacy of life on
the stroll--wrinkles at he corner of her eyes, bitten and broken
nails tipping her slender fingers, her full breasts, narrow waist
and long legs mottled with bruises, and the ragged cut
in her pelvis, a horrible, bloody gash.

For an instant, the image of the young couple Wienhoft and
Coluko garroted for the fifty dollars in the man's wallet had
flashed before her eyes. Scully could feel herself blanch,
her grip on the instruments slacken and tighten. Keep going,
she urged herself. Just keep going.

"Let's review the findings. Although both of her fingerprints
were on the beer bottle, I'd concur with the assessment he
didn't hit himself in the back of the head with it. Aside from
the implausibility of self-abuse, the angle and the amount force
precludes any other option but a another party. His skull gets
cracked and he bleeds all over the floor in front of the tv.
Coluko manages to get up, somehow tries to stumble towards
the kitchen when according to the ME, Wienhoft apparently slits
his throat from ear to ear. Despite his injuries, he manages
to get up, drag her toward the living room where he's able
to not only able to assault her, he get the knife away from her
and guts her in a crude hysterectomy. Judging from the crime
scene photos, it's assumed he shoves her, forcing her to trip
over the coffee table and she just lands wrong on the edge of
the couch. The ME postulates a double murder, with the lovers
killing each other, which would make sense, except..."

The other woman's head bobbed up in curiosity, "Except
for what?"

"The amount of alcohol in their systems would have impaired
both strength and motor skills...I don't think she could've done
that kind of damage in a struggle."

"So the ME was wrong?...Maybe some drug use we didn't catch?"

"The screens were the most comprehensive available." Scully'd
already catalogued this one as an X-File--unexplained dual murder.

"So what are you saying?" Jorgensen was feeling confused
and a little pissed. This investigation was unraveling the loose
ends, not tying them up in the neat resolution that Lazarov
was expecting.

"I'm saying the ME made a reasonable assumption at some
level, given that there was only evidence of two people in the
apartment. The condition of the livers support a diagnosis
of chronic alcoholism on both their parts. He assumed that
chronicity was at the maintenance level, still affording them
the capability to function. I disagree, even at the maintenance
level, the savageness and the extent of the attacks suggest
some other variable."

"Like a third party? Agent Scully, did you find something?
Skin under the fingernails? Something the ME missed?"
Jorgensen was getting worked up. Maybe there was a lead,
something to point to a perp. "I helped with the evidence
collection...there was no physical evidence present but the
victim's. Not a single goddamn clue to be had. Not in Coluko
and Wienhoft's apartment, not in any of the crimes scenes."

"Sometimes one has to consider extreme possibilities."

"Like what? A killer who can murder at will and not leave a
trace? That's not something I'm comfortable with."

Scully had managed to push back the nausea yet again.
"Welcome to my world, Detective."

She'd spoken slowly and deliberately as she leaned
down, sniffing at the abdominal cavity. She wanted
to wretch and the sweating had started again. But there
was one thing she was sure of.

The faint odor of rum coming off Ashleen Weinhoft.

She beckoned Kris Jorgensen closer, grabbed the
sample jar and walked them about fifteen feet away.

"Here's some on-the-job training in forensics, Detective,"
handing over lump of flesh floating in the jar. "Open it."

Jorgensen did what she was told after only a second's
hesitation. Closing her eyes, she took a whiff of the
contents.

"Rum. I smell rum."


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x


They took a brief break in the afternoon, giving the dieners
an opportunity to move away Weinhoft to the far side of
the bay, and place Albert Breen in the central exam area.
Over late lunch from the vending machines by the snack
station, Scully barely finished half of a sandwich, relieved
that she could keep it down. She hoped she might be
leveling off, with whatever she was going through this
morning, finally over. Focusing all her attention on the
repeat tox screens, she saw confirmation of the initial
findings of PCP use in La Shawn Michaels'--vodka and
sedatives in Breen's--heroin and cocaine in Dakota Roberts'.
There was so far, no explanation of the anomalous odor--
both of them had smelled rum emanating from Coluko and
Wienhoft. If the same happened with Breen, Scully honestly
didn't know what she'd say to Kris Jorgensen. She'd already
decided Mulder would have to come up with one hell of an
intuitive leap to piece together this puzzle.

As she walked back in Bay #3, Jorgensen in tow, Scully
had a strong flash of intuition, one she couldn't ignore.
She was getting more and more like her partner all the time.
Not knowing why, she grabbed one of the dieners by
the elbow as he was leaving, "Take the tissue samples
and put them back in storage."

Jorgensen shot her a surprised look.

Ray Faneuil, the diener, started to protest, "Jeez, Doc...
My shift's over...'

Scully cut him off, "Just do it and do it now. I don't think
you want me calling the ME over this."

Faneuil gathered each jar, set them on a rolling cart and
hustled his way to cold storage. Not completely under his
breath, he muttered, "Fucking bitch."

Scully pretended she didn't hear a word.


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x


Scully glanced up from her examination of Albert Breen's
bruised lung and blinked. This was going well enough.
They were a couple of hours in--no sweating, no urge to
vomit--just the still, cold dead, formalin, scalpels, bone
saws, body parts weighed in grams. She'd peppered her
play-by-play of this exam with bits and pieces of forensic
history. For example, the origin of the manner of wrapping
cadavers. Jorgensen was enthralled when Scully revealed
it had started with the ancient Greeks, with its current style
having been developed in the Middle Ages.

Now they were taking who's who in the field.

"My opinion as to who's the top forensic specialist?
I'd have to say Dr. Henry Lee."

"Is he published?"

"Absolutely. His 'Crime Scene Handbook' is a text
at Quantico."

Then the conversation took a turn for the worst. It went
bad when Scully glanced up from re-closing the gaping
abdominal wound. There was definitely an odor of rum
emanating from the man, slight, subtle, buried underneath
the stench of putrefaction and the slight sweetness of
ethanol from the breakdown of bodily processes. Somehow,
she could still smell it after working on bodies since early
this morning. It must be some kind of marker. Of what,
she wasn't ready to say.

The detective had a dark look on her face "How could
he do it?"

It didn't register. Somehow she'd capped what she'd
been going through before. This autopsy was just her doing
what she did. With Kris Jorgensen's remark, that terrible
knowledge sprung forth again like tainted water from a
polluted well. Breen had been suffocated and shot, gutted
like a fish, lower intestine removed, sodomized and there'd
been traces of semen present in his mouth. Scully had
managed to block and compartmentalize, and shut-down
and soldier on and it'd gotten her this far. And then she was
brutally shoved back to Ground Zero. She could feel a
knife-sharp pain twisting her gut---pain so strong it made her
stop suturing and grip the table.

Breen. Albert Anthony Breen. A man who raped and murdered
a child in front of her parents, who eviscerated a ninety-year old
woman, then sodomized her while she was dying, using part of
her own intestines as a condom. Scully's field of vision
narrowed, she thought she might faint. She didn't. Instead of
the relief of blackness, she saw the ten year old, suffocated,
her Winnie-the-Pooh pillow held tight over her small mouth, that
same small mouth corrupted beyond all understanding, her parents
screaming until Breen shot them dead, an old woman whose last
sight in this life was a man slicing her open, her bloody entrails
pulled like a leash while he took her from behind. Her punishment
for opening a door to a man who said he was lost.

Scully's breath was shallow, and she could feel the sweat bead up
on her forehead.

Jorgensen did notice that. She was about to ask what was wrong,
when her cell phone trilled in her pocket. Hannah. It was Hannah
calling from Rachel's house. It was eight o'clock and her daughter
had been waiting since three for a ride home. Jorgensen walked
to the far end of the room, and stood near the doorway.

"Sweetie, I'm sorry...I'm really sorry...Yeah, I got caught up
at work. Again." A pause. "OK...I'll come get you...I know
Rachel had class,that's why she couldn't drive you home...I know,
it's my fault." She needed to get her head out of her ass, go pick
up her daughter, bring her home, and try acting act like a concerned
mother. She could think about the Forensic Unit and these stiffs
later. She did want to know if Agent Scully was all right, see if
she should come back to the morgue once Hannah went to bed.
"No...don't try to walk home, it's too far. Stay there, I'm on
my way."

Jorgensen strode back to the table, where Scully stood ramrod
straight, lightly mopping her brow with a Kleenex from her pocket.

"Are you OK?"

"I'm fine, really."

"You sure?"

"Yes, Detective, I'm sure. Probably a combination of bad food
and too little sleep."

"I guess you heard everything, huh?" She hesitated. "I...need
to go pick up Hannah, get her home, make sure she's settled in.
But I can be back later, by about ten... "

"It won't be necessary, Detective. I've done this alone for almost
a decade."

"Are you sure, Agent Scully? You know, it wouldn't be a prob..."

"Just go.." She managed to paste a wan smile on her pale
face. "Like I said before, I'm fine."

~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x

Jorgensen had been gone about fifteen minutes, but Scully
hadn't moved. She made herself pull deep, cleansing
breaths, tried to find the center, tried to talk herself down.
She almost made it, too.

Looking at Breen's lower abdomen, Scully saw something pushing
up out of his pelvis. It was tiny, wriggling furiously. Snagging
the tweezers from the instrument table, she quickly and carefully
probed the spongy flesh for the larva. She caught a glimpse of
white and immediately went after it, holding up its soft body under
the lamp. Depositing the maggot in an empty sample jar, she turned
back to search the body further. Maybe she'd find another.

She didn't have to worry, Breen's body was now swarming
with them,a seething, milky-white mass. Reflexively, her eyes
darted to the adjoining tables that held the rest of the bodies.
All of them, teeming with maggots, swarms of them working their
way through the dressings, making steam rise from the heat thrown
off by their feeding frenzy. She felt her hand drop to her side
and the tweezers hit the floor. "Good. Let them eat your
miserable flesh, you sonovabitches," she murmured.

Whatever thin strands of control she'd tried to hold had finally
shredded to nothing.

The room filled with obscenities she realized were coming from
her own mouth. Her voice -- she was screaming at corpses,
shaking and sweating like a pig. Bile scorched her throat, with
one vicious epithet after another hurtling through the air like
molotov cocktails. Reeling from the venom and the rage that
coursed through her veins, the room spun, and her hand went
instinctively to her throat, her fingers brushing against her cross.

It was her undoing.

Who had she become? All too quickly, the bitter knowledge
washed over her. Faithless. Vengeful. Someone without
discipline, courage or strength. Betraying everything
she'd built her whole life upon. Scully felt the scalding,
stinging tears stream down her face. She wanted to pray,
but she could feel the spasms start. Running to the bathroom,
she barely locked the stall before vomiting, wretching
violently into the ancient toilet.


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x


White as a sheet, weak, and still trembling, Scully put all her
effort into pulling herself together. She had to get back in there,
get someone to help her clean off the bodies. With handfuls of
rough paper towels, she bathed her face in the icy tap. Reaching
out for God and science---she desperately prayed out loud,
"Please, give me the strength." By the time she dried her face
and rinsed her mouth, she could feel herself start to calm.

As she made her way toward the bay, a litany ran through her
mind---she needed her other bedrock---science---and its
answers. 'Egg to larva to pupa to adult, and then the cycle
repeats until the optimal conditions for that particular species
have passed. What had she seen in there? Calliphora vicina,
Cynomyopsis cadaverina, Phormia regina, Sarcophiga carnaria.'
Latin for the common bluebottle, the shiny blubottle, the black
blow fly, and the family of flesh flies. Sarcophiga carnaria---
Flesh flies. Both pupa and adults can consume a fifty times
their body weight in carrion.' She could feel her heart race
as she opened the door.
~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x

Breen's body was no more than a skeleton. Scully ran and
hastily undid all the wraps on the cadavers---only skeletal
remains. The maggots had slithered off the bodies, and
were one swirling mess on the floor. Scully walked over
to the intercom the wall and paged the dieners. Pulling
herself up, and squaring her shoulders, she wanted to appear
in charge, able to minimize any possible resistance from
staff in handling the clean up. It felt like posing after
what'd just happened.

After a wordlessly staring at the floor and the bodies,
Joe Gilliam, the 60 year-old second-shift guy, who'd seen it all,
asked dryly, "Why do I always get the weird-ass calls?"

Over her shoulder, as she passed him on her way to storage,
Scully yelled, "Good to know you've got it covered."

She could see wisps of her breath as she opened the jars
containing Breen's, Michaels', and Roberts' samples.
Taking a whiff of each---there it was---what she'd smelled all
day long.

~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x


Yesterday, his instincts told him Shinoda wouldn't be a
viable lead. Today--so far, so good. Lazarov didn't dig
in his heels when he'd called to ask to for the walk-throughs,
he'd been able to locate the necessary reference, and
a combination of web surfing and the yellow pages
narrowed down the list of locales friendly to Santeria.
Something told him he should make his search based
on Alex Cardenas' choices for veneration.

Lucky for him, of all the dozens of botanicas in Chicago,
there was only one connected with Oya, and one associated
with Obatala. Apparently, there were no cults of Ellegua,
no botanicas dedicated to him, so he'd have to punt to come
up with how to locate his devotees. Hopefully, he'd be able
to get these walk-throughs done by mid-afternoon,
and start interviewing members of houses after that. Right now
he was on edge, his sixth sense tingling. He was going
to find something important to the case. Something hidden,
something no one was expecting.

Pacing in front of the Burnham for about fifteen minutes,
his trenchcoat flapping in counterpoint to his steps,
he was close to wearing a groove in the rain-slicked
pavement. Waving off the doorman's offer of an umbrella,
the nervous energy came off him in waves. Mulder ran his
hands through his hair and and shuddered off the excess
dampness like a dog shaking water off its fur. It'd been
a little over two hours since Scully left.

"Where the hell is the asshole from the ECU?," he spat out
under his breath.

Grabbing his cel, he'd started punching in Lazarov's
number again, when he felt a tap on his shoulder. Whipping
around, he almost fell on a woman wearing a CPD windbreaker
over jeans, a Bears' sweatshirt and shoulder holster. She was
almost his height, athletic build, her curly brown hair pulled
into a ponytail and tucked under black a baseball cap. She'd
jerked back to avoid a head-on collision, her brown eyes flashing.

The woman brushed herself off reflexively and adjusted
her cap, "I'm Detective Patricia Garrett, Evidence Collection
Unit. I'm supposed to assist you."

Mulder just kept taking the woman in. Fair skin, thin lipped,
not smiling. Definitely not smiling. He decided to go for the
obvious joke, which proved to be a very bad choice,
"So you're Pat Garrett..."

"Uh-huh. Before you say anything else, I've heard every
half-assed Wild West, Billy the Kid, OK Corral remark on
the planet, so let's not go there..." She straightened her
jacket, muttering, "I must've really fucked up to pull this
assignment."

Mulder extended his hand, hoping to salvage the situation,
making his voice as placating as he could. "Sorry. I'm
Special Agent..."

She didn't reciprocate. "I know who you are, why you're
here, and for the record, I'd rather be doing anything else
than giving you a guided tour so that you can try to hang
us out to dry. We know how to do our job, Agent. And just
for your information, I'm fifteen years on the job, five
as ECU Supervisor."

Mulder wanted her on his side, but his own frustration was
eating at him by this point. "Detective, I'm here to find the
truth, I assume you are, too. I was invited here to do what
I do and I'd appreciate you removing whatever's crawled up
your ass so that we can get on with it. You and me.
Together."

That appeared to get through, some of the hostility subsiding,
"All right then, we'll get started. I'm parked around the corner...
I'll wait for you...Get your car and follow me." She turned to go
and Mulder motioned one of the car hops to get his rental.

Garrett turned back, "Agent Mulder?"

His head snapped around, "Yeah?"

"Just remember, I didn't invite you here."

X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

Pulling into the parking space right across the street
from the last location, he could make out Garrett's glare
even from inside his car. Her resentment hadn't lagged
much since they'd started six hours ago, fed by the fact
that he'd come up with nothing. He wasn't exactly a
happy camper, either. The good news was that this woman
was right, the Unit's work a textbook example. Print dusting,
moulage castings, fiber, hair, and blood collection--laboriously
done, virtually perfect. The bad news was he'd shot a good
portion of the day on another dead end. He wasn't about to
share that particular assessment with Garrett, however.

He clicked off the ignition and rolled his neck until
he could hear the vertebrae pop. Slamming the car door
behind him, he jogged over to where she stood arms
crossed over her chest, waiting. She was in front of the
crack house where Dakota Roberts had dealt his last rock,
a dilapidated graystone in the heart of Englewood,
one of the poorest neighborhood's in Chicago.
According to the photos and write-up, Roberts had
been killed in stages--brutally beaten with a truncheon,
his ribs and right leg broken, larynx crushed, spleen
ruptured. He was found face-down on the floor next
to piles of tens and twenties, shot in the back of the head
execution-style.

"You ready, Agent?" Garrett was curt, not even
bothering to wait for his answer. She'd already turned
and started waking up the stairs.

Mulder took the stairs two at a time, closing the
distance until they were both standing in front of the
door. He was pissed now, and decided to sling some
attitude. Pushing past her, he pulled up the yellow tape
blocking their entry, and jimmied open the door.
Motioning her through, "Ready as I'll ever be, Detective...
After you."

Garrett went in, thinking she'd later fire off a complaint
to Lazarov--report this Fibbie's unorthodox entry,
then decided against it. She had a feeling this piece
of work was used to being called on the carpet.
No sense in wasting my time, she told herself
as she waited for him to follow her.

X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

Dust motes swirled around them as they made their
way through room after room, mattresses dotting the
filthy linoleum floor. Geeking crack heads would
sit down, smoke up, sputter and stutter and buy more,
and be shoved out by Roberts' posse when the money
ran out. Incongruent to the whole scene was the formerly
barred room where Roberts and his boys counted and
sorted the money--expensive furniture, empty bottles
of Cristal scattered all around, the black bloom on the floor,
remnant of Roberts' exit wound.

Mulder ran the scene like he had the others. To anyone
else but Scully, all someone would see was an intense,
highly focused review of the chain of evidence. He took in
more, so much more. He was always hyper-sensitive,
absorbing, cataloging and analyzing the environment, the
situation, the people. Striding through each room, blinking
like the shutter of a camera as he mentally recorded every
aspect, thinking about every possible scenario. He'd noticed
the traffic around the house, the music coming from the boom
box the teen next-door had been playing, the fact that they
were in a first floor apartment, and there were no footsteps
coming from above, even though he'd seen a name on the
second mailbox.

Most of the time he'd find something in those those details,
those nuances--have a breakthrough, an insight that blew
the case open. It hadn't happened in the other places, it
wasn't going to happen here. Strange thing, his premonition
about today hadn't gone away.

What he was looking for was somewhere else,
hidden in the world of The Seven Powers.


X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

Mulder wasn't expecting any professional courtesy as they left
the building and made their way to their prospective cars.

He didn't get any.

He did get Garrett to yell the directions out her car window
to his next two stops as she sped off---Botanica Santa Teresa,
a likely place to find acolytes of Oya, and Jardin de Obatala,
both located in a part of the city known as WestTown.
She told him he was about twenty minutes away.
As he headed toward Division Street, his premonition
grew stronger.

X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

It was almost dark and the air was heavy and thick,
chilling him as he made his way along Division by foot,
leaving the car in front of the Woods Street police station.
A patrolman tried to wave him off, but he flashed his badge,
got the fraternal thumbs-up as he walked the four blocks
toward what he hoped was the beginning of enlightenment.

Mulder stops next to a restaurant specializing in
'comida criolla', 1947 W. Division--This is the place.
But instead of going in, something pulls him across
the street. He wasn't startled by this, it's happened before--
one of the most memorable times led him to ignore
a dusty crossroad and plunge headlong with Scully
into the midst of Texas cornfields.

The urge keeps pushing him down the block until he
finds a storefront wreathed with butter-yellow drapes.
Statues of the The Virgin Mary in various sizes
stand in the the window, surrounded by votives
and bunches of roses, jasmine. The scent of the flowers
mix with orange and cinammon, the heady odor wafting
through the open doorway. He sees dishes crowded with
slices of pumpkin and mango, pieces of honeycomb---all
spread on blue cloth shot with gold metalic thread.
This is a House of Oshun, dedicated to matters of the heart.
He knows there's no logical reason for him to be here,
and that being here is absolutely right.

Entering quietly, he passes a couple talking to a young
woman in a sunshine-colored robe, asking questions as
to what herbs would best to protect them from lovers'
quarrels. The young woman reaches over to a near-by
stalk of what looked and smelled like goldenrod.
She dips the the dried plant an uncovered dish
of honey, wraps it in white tissue, and rings up the
purchase on an old-style cash register.

A tall, bronze-skinned man strides up to the visitor
and without a word, leads him to a seat in what appears
to be a waiting area. He too, is dressed in yellow, and
exudes an air of strength and control. There were five
people ahead of Mulder, clutching talismans and small,
folded pieces of paper. All of them, male and female wear
coral bead necklaces, which he recognizes as elekes,
marking them as devotees of. He guesses the young man
is a temple guard and that this is the antechamber.
The priestess must be in the rear, behind the velvet curtain
covering a small doorway. Listening to the conversation
swirling around him, he finds out her name.

The fact that the young man doesn't seem surprised to see
him is not lost on Mulder. The cult of Oshun, as well as
most of the other cults in Santeria, were known to have
many clairvoyants as members. The level of psychic ability
varied from person to person and from cult to cult.
Either the guard, or the priestess---possibly both of them
had been waiting for him. He's grateful he knew enough
not to show his badge or ID. That would've been seen as an
insult, an act of arrogance and disrespect. If he was going
to get any information, he had to come as a seeker.

He readies himself for whatever answer he's going
to get.


X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

He rubs his eyes and when he looks up, there's
the same young man, beckoning him up and through the
curtain. He gets up immediately, passing by the others who
are left waiting in their chairs. As he brushes past the velvet
and enters the small dimly lit room, he can hear the guard
speaking firmly to one of the waiting supplicants. "Iya asked
for him. Do you questions her choices?"

Iyalosha Adisanya, swathed in a golden robe, sits at a small
table, smoothing the cloth that covered it. The only light
in the room comes from candles that were perched on shelves
and small, wooden stands. Iya herself was fiftyish, Mulder
thought, but he wouldn't swear to it. The flickering lights
dance across her face, revealing and obscuring. She is
beautiful--dark eyes, smooth, brown skin barely etched by
the passing of time, high cheekbones, and a long, graceful
neck. Tapered fingers play with a locket that holds a photo
of someone he recognizes as he draws close, someone
whose face he is not surprised to see.

Mulder approaches the woman, bows and holds his position
until he feels her touch the crown of his head.
It is taboo to touch the hands of a priest or priestess
in greeting--their hands are consecrated for sacred tasks,
for blessings, for the work of the gods. Bowing is the way
a humble person approached a Keeper of the Temple.
He raises his head to find her with eyes closed, one hand
clutching the locket.

"Iya...I'm here about Alex."

"I know. Oshun told me you were coming...that you would
help my Alejandra."

X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

She's motions to Omi, telling him to bring them
tea made from flor de tilo. While they wait, Iyalosha tells
him her story, her other name, Florinda Zavala. How
she came with the Cardenas family from Cuba as their maid,
how she became Alex's nanny. She glows with pride as
she recounts how she became Alex's nanny, how much she
loved that baby, what a wise and kind child Alex Cardenas
had been. What a beautiful woman she'd become.

Mulder sees the love in her eyes, mixed with fear and
something like expectancy.

He listens thoughtfully, and wondered in Iya ever
saw the arrogance, the insincerity. Perhaps she did,
and chose to ignore it, seeing with a mother's eye instead.

Two china cups are placed on the table, each with
a piece of honeycomb to sweet it and strengthen the drinker.

"Please have something. Refresh yourself, you've spent
too much time at the gate today."

"The gate?" He settles back in the chair directly
across from her.

"Yes, warrior. The gate, the place where someone
leaves this world and enters the next. You seek out
the places where that entry happens through violence,
through the evil that men do..."

"Not just men, Iyalosha."

She closes her eyes again, bites down hard on her lip.
"Tell me what's happened to mi hija, my Alex."

"You call me warrior..."

Iyalosha answers, "Because that's what you are.
Oshun told me in a dream you that you've fought darkness
for a long time with a strong heart. That you bear your scars well.
She told me there's another one who fights with you...a woman
whose story is like yours."

"You honor both of us."

"You bring honor to yourselves...Please...why did the
gods send you here, what darkness touches my Alejandra?"
Her voice trembles a little more with each word.

Mulder tells his story now, his given name, why he's here,
why he met with Alex. She blanches when Mulder says
the words 'los muertos que no muere.'

"We never speak of it, it is the greatest taboo for us.
Only Oya can move from one world to the next.
Those who practice it are outlaws, close to Ellegua.
They could never be of our house...and they pay for
their insolence, believe me." Her hands grip the
edge of the table.

"What do you mean?" Mulder felt an urgency--this was
it---he needed to know more

"Whoever would dare to raise the dead must suffer a
terrible punishment. They are consigned to death, and
forced to endure a terrible fate in the Other World.
When they pass from this world, they are never reunited
with their ancestors. We believe there is nothing worse--
to be severed from family. There is no honor, no peace, nothing
but floating between this world and the next...Only someone
desperate..."

Mulder stops her, "...someone like Alex."

She wants to end this and tell him to leave, tell him she
knows nothing. Drinking the last of her tea, Iyalosha tries
to brace herself for what must come next. She is sworn
to serve righteousness above all else, and so she reveals
what happened the night Alex came to her with keening grief,
how the woman she calls daughter begged her to do the
very thing he asks about. Her refusal and Alex's bitter
recriminations. Oshun had taught her the deepest love
sometimes forces you to deny those who mean everything
to you.

She is crying now, " My Alejandra didn't do this...she
couldn't do this."

"But it's possible she could've found someone who
would..."

Mulder feels there's someone else in the room.
He looks over his shoulder and sees Omi standing by
the curtain.

Iya looks up, startled to see him. "It's all right.
Go help Osunrete. Go on." The young man moves away.

Iya stills for a moment, then brushes away the tears
running along the length of her elegant cheekbones.
"Yes...She met the families of many houses...
and there are ways to find the followers of Ellegua."

"How can I find someone who'd do this?"

She looked at the man for what seemed like a long time
before she spoke again, "There's no one in this house
who would do such a thing. But let me ask the people who
might know, babalaos of other houses. You stand a better
chance if I help you this way...I'll have something to tell
you in the morning. The gods will reveal what you need to
know, I feel it." She took Mulder's hands in hers,
"If it's true, promise me you'll stop it. If my...daughter
is part of it, promise me you'll help her."

Mulder's eyes burns into hers, "You have my word."

Iyalosha squeezes his hands then lets go, "Oshun told
me that would be enough."

He reaches into his pocket, pulls out his card, circles
his cel number and writes down the number at the hotel.
She takes it and nods.

X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

He's walking through the store, almost at the door,
when Iyalosha stops him. "I have something for you...
to protect you...and your lover." She opens his
hand places two red cords in the center of his palm.
Thin strips of leather, wound with gold threads.
"Wear them on your left wrist, the one closest to your
heart. This talisman will keep the two of you from
harm." She closes his hand around them, "There is
much danger surrounding both of you."

Mulder doesn't hide his curiosity very well, "You
mentioned a woman who fights the same enemies I do...
you never mentioned a lover."

That last sentence makes Iyalosha Adisanya smile.
"They're one and the same... You're a man with much
to protect."

X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

It is later now, and the remaining temple members help
Iya close the store, secure the temple. One by one, they
leave, until there is only Omi. He stands next to the
entrance of the antechamber, stroking the velvet
curtain, watching Iyalosha preparing to leave. Her
back is to him, and for a second he tries to turn away.

As she throws a long, dark cloak over her shoulders,
something makes her stop and start walking toward him.
Omi is troubled, his face knotted with guilt. Iya knows
he's done many bad things in his life, things that ended
when he came to her to begin a new life in Oshun.

She waits for what he has to say.

"I was the one...I told her, Iya."

She motions him closer, and he goes knowing
punishment must be meted out. Remorse pours out
of him, but it is too late. There is only what will come next.

"I'm sorry...She was hurting...I thought...I thought
I was helping...Please believe me, Iya." Tears run down his
proud face, and he sees Iyalosha looking at him with infinite
sadness.

"I swear I'll never tell anyone else."

"I know."

She has to do this, if she doesn't, Oshun will do
something far worse to him, her familiar is the vulture for
a reason. Iyalosha will save his life, but she doubts he will
thank her for it later. She closes the distance between them,
places her hand over his mouth. Whispering in the language
of the gods, she holds her hand in place, feeling his breath
shudder into her palm.

Omi feel his throat constrict, he tries to cry out, but there
is only silence.

X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~


The Whole Catastrophe
Chapter 7
By Diehard and Dryad


She is beyond exhausted.

She drags herself through the lobby, into the elevator and
down the hall to her room. Her body's leaden, she wonders
how she's capable of walking at all. Glancing at her watch.
she sees it's after ten. Yesterday was long, today longer.
With debriefing starting at 5:30 this the morning, it's
been about an 18 hour day. By this time last night, she
was easing toward sleep, warm with lovemaking and some
good Scotch.

Last night seems like a long, long time ago...

And once again she faced the hideous, the excruciating,
and got the job done. Someone else would be telling
themselves they were a success today. But not Scully.
She's failed, failed miserably. Not by anyone else's
standards, but by her own.

Today she autopsied killers of the innocent and could barely
hold on while visions of their crimes eroded at her self-control.
How she ended up having a physical and emotional breakdown.

How can she tell Mulder about this, how can she not?

As a raft of maggots consumed the flesh of these murderers
today, pedophiles, child killers, she was glad something
ripped into them, desecrating their remains. She hates herself
for losing objectivity, for wishing she'd killed these monsters
herself. Those feelings do not belong the woman she is,
or thought she was. And it frightens her. What if it happens
again while they're in pursuit---some meltdown that cripples
her in the field, halts her from getting his back? What if today
means the compass she's held onto her whole life has
disintegrated,that their reassignment six months ago only
forestalled her from seeing the truth about who she's become.

She finds her key and rather than opening the door
to her room, she stands there remembering the only
other time she'd felt this much out of control. It was not
the night her father died, not when she heard her diagnosis,
not even when the truth of her own barren body was revealed.
Even after Emily's death, all she would allow herself was the
overwhelming sorrow that scored her heart.

Through it all, she resisted falling into the pit that
claimed her today. Somehow, she kept going and kept
fighting the good fight. There was only one other time
she was as close to losing her way as she was today.

It was the night Missy was killed--it hit too close to home,
the lamb slaughtered, the lamb she couldn't protect. That
night, if she'd had the chance, she would've have shot
and shot until she emptied her SIG. But there was no one
there to empty her clip into, no revenge to be had.

The dead wait for them, day in and day out. She cannot
allow herself to falter like she did today, her job is
to find answers, uphold the law, serve justice.

And she will, in the light of a new day. Right now, she
plans to crawl into the shower and wash away the weakness
and beg her God for absolution, a God she prays will show
her where strength lies and remind her of her better self.

And she hopes she'll have the courage to tell her partner,
the one man who means everything to her, the truth.


~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~~X~X~

Having trudged through the connecting doors between their
rooms, he's grateful he had the presence of mind to leave
them open this morning. They're supposed to be in her room
tonight. Lying on the bed fully dressed, with his trenchoat
still on, he's got his arms draped across his chest. He made
it back about an hour ago, and was completely seduced by the
idea of getting horizontal and not moving. Eyes closed, he's
fingering the cord around his left wrist.

He'd never say anything, but right now, he's feeling
his age--pushing forty--just back from a kind of furlough--
and in desperate need of a break to catch his second wind.
He never needed anything like that before, but he was
younger then, and had never been spoiled by the rhythms
of a normal life. Normal. What he'd had a taste of for
six months would be filed under 'ordinary', and he's come
to find he craves it. But the major ingredient of this
normalcy is missing. He starts thinking about her, about
the matching cord Iyalosha gave him. Hauling himself up
to check the clock on the dresser, he starts worrying when
he sees how late it is. He starts fishing in his pocket
for his cel when he hears the key in the lock.

Scully comes in, drops her bag, her coat and the room key
on the dresser and heads toward him. She hopes it seems
like she's still in one piece, even though that's a lie.
The tension pulls her features tight, makes the muscles
of her back ache, but she's holding her ragged self
together. He's got that cockeyed grin and he's sitting up
in bed, rumpled and obviously delighted to see her. She
wants to throw herself into his arms, bury her face in
the crook of his neck and let rip the litany of what's
eating her soul.

She doesn't.

She walks to the edge of the bed and just stands there,
waiting, for what she's not even sure. Maybe she'll just
say hello, excuse herself, lock herself in the bathroom
and fall apart completely. And in about an hour, once she
starts gluing herself back together, she'll come out and
try to let him help her finish the job.

"Hey." He realizes something's wrong, and the grin
dissolves like ice on hot asphalt. "Bad day, partner?"
He reaches for her, but she won't let him.

Her hands are splayed palm side against his chest,
stopping him. "One of the worst. Listen, I need to
take a shower. Just...just let me do that, and I'll
tell you about it when I'm done."

"Scully, you look wrung out." His hands come around
to cover hers, pressing down, warm. "C'mere...Let's see..."
Her face is pale--without a hint of makeup, her eyes tired
and clearly showing signs of earlier crying.

"Please, Mulder, I need some time for myself. Can't you
just let me have that?"

The sting of rejection always registers on his face,
although he knows that's not what's really happening.
He can give her space, he's done it before. He wants
to give her what she wants, what she needs. "Sure.
How 'bout I go on a food run. You know, something
greasy, preferably between two sesame seed buns."
She nods, and he starts to get up, watching her
go toward the bathroom. He grabs her key from the
dresser and makes for the door.

Before she shuts the door behind she turns around, "We'll
talk later, I promise."

At first, he doesn't reply.

"Mulder."

He turns to her, and the depth of sadness in their eyes
surprises them both. "And I promise to hold you to it."


~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~~X~X~

He's out on State Street and he can see a McDonald's
about a half a block away. It's beautiful fall evening,
clear obsidian sky, some stars nascently visible against
city lights, not too much downtown foot traffic at this
hour, the wind slicing cool, crisp and clean.

He couldn't care less.

The only thing he's thinking about is Scully and the fact
she's alone and clearly in pain. He's not even hungry
really, but he said he'd go get food, give her some time
alone. But it doesn't feel right. It's still not
feeling right as he passes under the golden arches,
feeling even worse by the time the bright faced teenager
--'Jamal'--asks him if he knows what he'd like to order.

No response.

Mulder feels like he's ditched her even though she asked
him to go. He wonders if he agreed so quickly because
part of him didn't want to see her in that much pain. It's
only recently that she let him help her deal with anything
emotionally difficult in daily life. Before, she had to
be dying to let him in. Otherwise, he could only get so
close, knowing she hid the worst from him. The thought
of her, working in the basement, pale and silent as she
grieved her father, her sister, her daughter makes his
throat burn. That's how it was with them. Never mind
that she's seen him raving, murderous, stricken--over his
father, his sister, his mother. And saved him each time,
even though once, it took a bullet to do it.

Scully never turned away. Never.

But when it boiled down to how she felt, they used to
adhere to 'don't ask, don't tell,' seven years of it.
They used to do a lot of things that kept them longing
for each other, lonely, and apart.

"Sir," the teen tries again, "Do you know what you want?"

"How 'bout an ass-kicking, he mumbles, "and hold the
fries." He knows where he should be, and is afraid he's
utterly blown it. It knots his gut and without thinking, he's
turned around, pushed aside the two people behind him,
and is back out on the street, walking at a fast clip back
to the Burnham.

He's a dick, a possessive sonovabitch, he's whatever she
wants to call him, but he's going back to that hotel room
and she's going to tell him whatever it is.

Jamal seems a little put out, and moves along to the next
in line. "Welcome to McDonald's, may I take your order?"


~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~~X~X~

He has a close encounter with a doorman, brushes past
the concierge, hops the nearest elevator, and before he
knows it, he's letting himself back into the room. All he
can hear at first is the sound of the shower, but
underneath it another noise emerges. Sobbing--raw--
and the sound of her voice, 'God...help me, dear God."
He moves, crosses the room in seconds, shoves
the bathroom door open and sees her.

Scully's sitting hunched on the floor of the shower, head
drawn up to her knees. The water's pummeling her, she
sits there rocking back and forth. She did the same thing
the night Missy died, said the same things, begged the
same God for help.

Heaving cries, a wail she tries to smother, her thin
shoulders shuddering with their force --- the whole image
stuns him. She doesn't hear him when he enters, it's when
he's kneeling and touches the nape of her neck that she
startles and jerks back. It only makes him reach harder
for her, and he's getting soaked and he doesn't care.
Neither does she.

Falling toward him, sinking into him, sobbing like
she'll never stop, hot tears, hot water raining down
on them both. He pulls her up, holding her against his
chest with one hand, shutting off the water with the
other.

"Scully...Scully, please...what is it?"

"Mulder...I...I lost it today..." She haltingly smoothes
her hair back, trying to compose herself, but she's
trembling, and he won't let go of her. Still shaking, she's
able to inch back enough to see his face. "You're soaked,
you should change. Let me get myself together, and we'll
talk. I'm sorry...sorry if I scared you."

"No." He grabs a towel, and starts wrapping it around her.

"No?" She's confused, unsettled. 'What do you mean?"

"It doesn't work like that."

"Like what?" She finishes tucking the towel under
her arms,she desperately hopes they won't have a fight,
but she sees he's deeply upset now, too.

He peels off his soaked trench, his suitcoat, throws
them on the hamper, and roughly rubs himself with one
of the extra towels. "Remember when we started this?
When I still thought it was impossible that you could
really love me, knowing how I am. When I thought
it'd be better if you left me. You told me no one
leaves, that it was too late to run away.
That this was it for you...Sound familiar?"

She's sat down on the edge of the bathtub, "Yes."

"Scully...you've seen me at my worst and you're still
here." He sits next to her on the lip of the tub,
"This is not about having space," resting his hand on
her knee. "It's about trust...it's about believing
someone wants to be there, and will be there...
no matter what."

"Mulder..." She stops her own feeble protest.

He takes his hand from her knee and cups her cheek,
turning her face so that they're eye-to-eye.

"It's about believing that someone is me."

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

It looks like his trenchcoat caught the worst of it,
although his suit's also in pretty rough shape. They're
both on a hanger, hopefully drip-drying on the shower
rod, and the suit may be salvageable after he sends it
to the cleaners. Luckily, he had couple of others
packed besides this current waterlogged mess. The tie's
a total loss and the shirt's draped over a chair in
the room.

They've moved to the bed and are perched cautiously
on the edge. He's got on navy sweatpants and grey
T-shirt, and is currently pressing his heels of his
bare feet into the carpet. Sitting with her hands
folded on her lap, she's has her cream-colored robe on,
fastened tight and secure.

There more noise to be heard in a catacomb than this
room right now. Mulder is waiting because he knows if
he pushes too hard, she'll just wall herself up. Scully's
mum because she realizes it has boiled down to trust
and belief in flesh and blood, not just God's invisible
hand, and now she's got to show exactly what kind of
real-life faith she has.

"What happened today was inexcusable..."

"Before I join you in passing judgment, how 'bout
telling me what actually happened today?" He makes
a bold move by inching closer to her and slipping his
arm around her shoulder.

She lets him. They both exhale. She starts speaking.

And the whole story gets laid out, every gory, grisly
detail, how her unraveling started yesterday before
she even touched Coluko. How she'd struggled and
temporarily pushed it out of her mind. How it washed
over her today, all of it---flashing on unspeakable crimes,
losing control. How after fighting today to keep it
together---the maggots---the floodgates opening.

Her rage, her craving for revenge so strong,
it made her stop in the middle of an autopsy. Ranting
and raving like a madwoman, unable to do her job,
unable to conduct FBI business. The way the shame
and sickness overtook her, making her run to the
bathroom and empty her guts, tears steaming down
her face. How she swore and shook uncontrollably in
the morgue's icy toilet until she could hardly breathe
and her throat tightened, hating herself for what she
feels is a fundamental betrayal of her beliefs.

How she finished the day on grit alone.

And how she feels she's failed herself. Failed him.

All in a voice barely above a whisper.

Then, she turns so she can see his face. She couldn't look
at him before. "What does this mean for our work?
How can you forgive me? How can I forgive myself? "

"Forgive what, Scully? What was inexcusable? His voice
cracks, but he swallows back his own tears. "Scully...
you haven't told me about anything other than a human
response to inhuman circumstances."

"Mulder, I'm charged with a responsibility..."

"For Crissakes, listen to yourself." She tries to get
up, but the way he says one word, 'Please,' makes her
stop.

Makes her take a leap of faith.

She does something he wasn't expecting. She says,
"Hold me..."

And he does, and the quiet gets punctuated again with
the sound of their breathing. He can feel her crying
again, but not like before. Barely moving, her tears
blotted by his soft cotton of his shirt.

He wants to get this right, wants to say the words that
will mean something, heal something. For as many times
as she's healed him, physically and emotionally, and finally,
in the most complete way, he's desperate to give her
the same. He will tell her the things he knows to be true
above all else.

"You could never be a failure, Scully. Not to me.
You are the most dedicated, the most moral person I've
ever met...Listen to me, there's no one else I'd ever
want at my side...No one I believe in more than you."

Now he's whispering. "You've seen and experienced and
lived though things that would've killed someone else.
And the fact that today, some of it caught up with you,
I'm sorry, Scully, I just don't see it as an indictment
of you who are. Who you'll always be, no matter what."

"Mulder, how do I get through this? How do I deal with
if it happens again?" She sees how he looks at her,
another object lesson in love on a daily basis.

He eases her down and until they're lying the wrong way
on the bed. "I think it's time you cowboy up to all that
tough talk, hypocrite." He says this, and kisses
the palm of her hand.

"What did I say?" For the first time since this morning
she can feel her body relax.

"How soon we forget. Last night. The lobby. I believe
the phrase 'We take care of each other' was what you said.
For starters, maybe you can tell me when something first
happens, maybe you can let me carry my share of the weight."

"Your share?" She bring her hand up to his face,
rests it on his cheek. Her lips begin to curve upward
and she sees him mirroring it back.

"Yes, Scully. My share. And why, you might ask?
Well, it's pretty simple. Te amo. Je t'aime. Te quiero.
Are you getting my drift?"


~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

They've slid around and at least now they're under
the covers and lying the right way in bed. By the
hushed tones, a person overhearing might think it's
strictly pillow talk. It's actually Scully's review
of her findings, with Mulder trying to connect the dots.

"Played a hunch, Scully?"

"Acted on intuitive rather than empirical data, Mulder."

He rolls onto his back, and laces his hands behind
his head, nodding as he looks at the ceiling "Dear Diary,
I am beside myself hearing that Agent Scully embraced
unorthodox methods today. The grasshopper snatches
the pebble."

She scoots over and presses up against him, lying on
her side. "Are you going to keep gloating, or can
I finish?"

"Please...go on."

"OK...the bottom line here is that I can pretty much say
the County coroner did his job, but there were anomalies
that never got addressed. The listed causes of death,
I would say, are accurate---all pointing to foul play. However,
in what seemed initially to be a fatal fight between Weinhoft
and Coluko, I saw evidence to support a possible attack by
another party...The amount of damage to the bodies and
the victims' impairment due to drug and alcohol use, I think
support my hypothesis. Weinhoft was also given a crude
hysterectomy, at a point at which Coluko had to have been
extremely debilitated."

Her voice trails off for a second as she collects her thoughts.
"Then there's the presence of rum on the skin, Mulder...I can't
begin to tell you how it got there. The scent was so faint, it's
not hard to see how it could've been missed. And despite
variety of substances having been found in the stomachs,
including narcotics, sedatives, cocaine, PCP, beer, and vodka,
the tox samples show no evidence that rum was ingested by
any of the deceased."

"So that would mean..."

"That it couldn't have been emitted through sweat prior
to death. Supporting further hypothesis that the skin was
somehow imbued or infused post mortem..." She hesitates
for a second.

Mulder caught it immediately. "Too late to stop now, Scully.
You're on a roll."

She can hardly believe what she's going to say next.
"Lastly...there's the presence of the maggots. Flesh flies
aren't indigenous to this area, but to tropical and semi-tropical
locations. How they got in the bodies post-mortem, reproduced
at an incredible rate is anomalous, to say the least. And the
fact that they stripped the bodies in less than a half hour
defies explanation."

"Do you have any idea how much hearing you say that turns
me on?"

"No, and frankly I'm too tired to even try to respond."
She's laughing at him as she says it.

"I knew I could finally wear you out."

"Uh huh. By the way, you don't look so energetic
yourself."

"Maybe you wore me out...Maybe I'm gettin' old.'

"Well, Gramps, what's your take on all of this?"

"Ow. Thanks for that last one, Scully. Despite your
obvious lack of respect, I'll tell you what we've got.
From the outset, there was the ritualistic pattern of the kills---
one every three days. We knew the murders were done by
someone with knowledge of the crimes of the deceased...
Pretty wide field if we consider how much information about
our bad guys were disseminated, making it easy to replicate
the original crimes as a means of murdering the murderers.
The CPD ended up with us because forensic evidence
doesn't show anyone else present at the deaths besides
the deceased. "

He stretches both arms and legs and let loose a huge yawn.
"Your findings and the crime scene data supports the
assumption that overall, a person or persons of tremendous
physical strength committed all the crimes. We're in agreement
with the coroner's findings except for Coluko and Wienhoft.
The coroner dropped the ball on our couple--their
intoxication would have made doing that amount of damage
to each other impossible. I agree there's no way they could
have leveraged that kind of attack on each other---they were
both too far gone. The whole thing screams third party."

Another yawn, even larger than the first.
"Jesus...I am wiped...." He pauses to roll his neck
before he continues. "So, do you concur, partner?"

Slowly, she gets up to sit crosslegged next to him.
"I'd say so far we're on the same page...C'mon,
up you go," and starts yanking on his T-shirt.

He scrambles up into sitting position and she slides
herself behind him, snaking those small hands underneath
his T-shirt and begins rubbing his shoulders. "Now, let's
get some blood going here...Go on, finish."

He's unbelievably tired and can only imagine how wiped
out she is, but the fact she's touching him is irresistable.
He should stop her, but it feels so damn good. "OK...the
new evidence further supports the possibility that a
supernatural force is responsible for the killings---an
entity able to exert incredible force on its victim,
apparently leaving no traces. There's no evidence of
forced entry, latent prints, anything to indicate that there
was someone else with any of the deceased." He sighs
as she works the trigger points at the base of his neck.

"When I accessed some files this morning, I came across
research concerning certain outlawed Santeria practices.
These indicate the possibility of the raising of the dead
in order to exact revenge. In these instances, victims
show post mortem traces of herbs or other substances,
including rum. This undead entity marks its kill,
either at the moment of death or directly thereafter.
There's also anecdotal data indicating such victims having
also been marked as targets of retribution by the appearance
of insects post-mortem." Now she's kneading up and down
his spine with a supple touch. He can't help it, he groans with
pleasure and hears her chuckling from behind. If she keeps
it up, he'll be a quivering mess before he can finish.

He decides to hurry.

"You noted the insects you saw didn't come from the
environments in which the killings occurred, that
the amount of maggots present, the rapidity of consumption
doesn't fit any known description. I'm thinking it's another
indicator that divine punishment had been dealt. A woman I
interviewed today gave me reason to think there are people
who could enact the ritual that could cause these things
to happen...And that woman knows Alex Cardenas. And
speaking of our favorite cultural anthropologist---C'mon Scully,
her attitude yesterday was not one of a woman who just lost
the love of her life. The good professor is not a just a student
of an occult religious practice, she's a believer...Yesterday
she said she was trying to keep Gonzales close to her.
Maybe she told us more than she meant to. It would
explain her refusing to allow the CPD to exhume
the body...Scully, I bet there's nothing in that casket
and that Gonzales is meting out justice from the afterlife."

"I don't suppose you'd consider perpetrators emulating
those practices to cover their tracks." Her fingertips find
the last knots of tension in his shoulders and work
them out. She smiles as he leans into her touch.

"Nah...not when I can go out on a limb and try to take
you with me." He starts groaning again, this time softly,
as she rubs his temples. "I'll give you a week
to stop that...Oh...God...that is so good."

"Uh huh...it's the special doctor training...What about
this contact...are you saying she's an accomplice?"

"No, what I'm saying is that she's had a long connection
with this woman, who just also happened to have been her
nanny. That this woman might have unwittingly been a point
of access for Alex to find individuals who know of this
practice, possibly enacting a ritual for her. This woman,
Iyalosha is trying to find out who those individuals
might be. As a matter of fact, I'm hoping she calls me
with some leads."

"Are you really saying that the dead have been
raised to kill killers?"

"You aren't going to try to tell me that is impossible,
are you? Scully, you blasted the gray matter of some
zombies last New Year's..."

"You realize we'll have to investigate your theory on our own.
This is not going to please Lazarov, the SAC or our superiors,
Mulder. And I don't imagine the CPD would assign manpower
to track down the undead..."

"But you wouldn't expect it to go any other way, would you?"

"No," she sighs, but I can dream, can't I?"

"Sleep. Perchance to dream...Sounds like a plan, Scully.
Tomorrow we figure out how to best corner the good
Professor and get the answers we want." He's deliberately
left out something, wants to see if she'll notice.

"Uh, there's one last piece of business."

"What? Do we need to call Skinner?" He might be half
dead, but he'll still try to goof on her.

She knows all his little games. "Nooooo...what about
my turn?"

"Oh, I see. You want a backrub, too?" He feigns
exasperation, huffing and chuffing. "Well, move it
so I can get at it, Scully." He can't help but laugh
when she clambers off the bed like a ten year old and
motions him to the edge.

"C'mon Mulder, get over here and get busy."

As soon as she says that, he dredges up the mandatory
leer her opening requires. "OK, Wild Thing, but
you'll have to give me a minute first."

She has to groan after that one. "The backrub.
I meant the backrub. You couldn't possibly have the
energy for anything else."

He leans toward her so that their foreheads touch,
"And I better do it now 'cause old 'Gramps' here
is gonna pass out soon."

They both yawn, then smile at each other.

She eases herself between his legs and he moves back
enough so that she can sit. Her head lolls forward and
he can see the implant scar. Taking his thumb, he
strokes it, then bends forward, resting his lips there.

He whispers, "Feeling better?"

Much, much better," she whispers back. "Thank you
for tonight...for taking care of me."

He kisses her there, and thinks he's the luckiest man
on earth. "Thank you for letting me."

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

The backrub was brief, but he hit the right spots,
eliciting enough sighs of pleasure to make him
think he's still got the magic touch. Unknotted and
unkinked, they're in the bathroom, brushing their teeth.
And this is where it hits him.

They're standing at the sink. Scully--with her
particularly thorough and energetic approach that
literally make her upper torso shake. She's busy,
she's oblivious--it makes him smile to watch her
in the mirror. As he's spitting and rinsing, he idly
thinks of his first year at Oxford and his colloquium
on classical Greek theater. He has no idea why he's
remembering this now, but Aeschylus' reference to
marriage comes to mind.

The whole catastrophe--for the first time he thinks
he understands.

The day she blew into the basement, insect bites and
candlelight, graveyards--more than he can count,
clawing through mounds of dirt and deception for signs
of Samantha, abductions and miraculous returns, blood
stains, burials, a man face down on his living room floor
with his face blown off, faceless aliens, cancer, chemo,
gashes, stitches, exit wounds, restraints and padded
cells, more pain and sorrow and loss than any two
people should ever have to know.

And batting practice, Apollo key chains, years of rock
and roll and innuendo, a truly horrible serenade in a
Florida forest with a thousand stars blinking overhead,
the feel of her warm mouth on his stubble, devotion
that leaves everything tainted and corrupt in the dust,
her eyes watching him as he enters her body for
the first time, the way the hollow of her throat tastes
sweet, grocery shopping and fighting over who does
the dishes and who drives and signs of the apocalypse.

He knows. This is what he wants. All of it--the sacred
and profane, the exquisite, the banal, and in the least
romantic situation possible he couldn't love her more,
minty foam at the corner of her mouth.

Ask, he tells himself, ask her now.

She's wiping traces of toothpaste away with the back of
her hand, after carefully laying both their rinsed
toothbrushes side by side. She looks over at him, and
there's an amazement, a wonder that's taken over his
tired face. This intrigues and amuses her.

"You know, I do this every night."

"I do know...Listen, I have to ask you something."

She thinks it's about the case. "C'mon Mulder. Bed.
It's late. You can ask me all about it in the morning."

"No. It won't wait. Just...stay there. Don't move,
I need to get something." The look on his face tells her
this is important and she can't bring herself to argue.

Fishing around in his damp jacket pocket, he finds it,
walks over to her, takes her left wrist and ties it on.
"We both have one now."

Two cords, red leather wrapped in gold thread.

"I noticed you wearing it before." Things begin to fall
into place, all of a sudden she thinks of his remark on
the plane and last night's meditation on mating and she
realizes in an instant what this is, what he's about to
ask. Whatever she told herself about not being sure
she even wanted to get married anymore has been ditched
by the wayside. She may never have what other women
have, but she wants him, every part of him, whatever life
they can make.

Ask me, Mulder, she wishes, ask me now.

"I got them from the woman I saw today...they're a kind
of amulet. I was told they bind the wearers together,
protects them whatever may come."

"Why are you giving me this?"

"The short answer? I want to get hitched. To you."
He doesn't move to kiss her, but his hands close warm
around her wrist. "Marry me, Scully." His voice is soft,
soft when he says it, but his eyes burn into hers, alive
with a thousand promises, and a hunger for one answer,
and one answer only.

It seems like the air's being rapidly sucked out of
the room because she has a hard time gathering enough
breath to speak. Her free hand come to rest on the side
of his face. "My God..."

"I was hoping for something a little more definitive as
a response." He's trying to defuse things, trying to
cushion this awkwardness with a joke, although she can
feel his jaw clench underneath her fingertips. "I realize
that I don't have anything to offer you, anything like what
you've hoped for, what you deserve..."

"Stop right there." She covers his mouth with her hand.
"What I hope for Mulder, is a life with someone who's
brilliant, driven, exasperating, fallible. A fighter.
A man who won't quit, no matter what. A man who will
tax me, challenge me, fight with me, fight for me, make me
laugh. A man with whom I can have passion and purpose.
There's only one name that comes to mind. Yours."

She moves her hand away and rests it over his.
Hand over hand, they look like they're getting ready to
stroll down the garden path.

Now he's the one having a hard time breathing. "But you
have to answer my question."

"You mean the one you just asked, that one?" She's giving
him the full-wattage smile.

"Scully, let me remind you I have a history of psychiatric
hospitalization. So, yes...before I start raving out,
answer the question I just asked you."

"Well, since your mental health's in the balance...Yes.
Definitely, yes."

With that, he dips toward her, his mouth finding hers
for a slow, soulful kiss. Their hands find their way around
each other's waist, and they stand in a hotel bathroom,
sealing the bargain. It's heartbreakingly tender, it's
wonderful, it's the stuff that memories are made of,
it's cut short by enormous yawns coming from both
of them.

"What was that thing you mentioned before?'

"Bed?"

"That's it. I think it's time we head for the Great
Unconscious."

"Can't you just say 'let's go to bed?' " It's slurred
when she says it, because she's yawning again.

"It's part of that whole exasperating..." Huge yawn.
"... thing you're so fond of." His hands on her shoulder,
turning her face forward, guiding her to bed from behind.

As they settle in, Scully's head resting on his chest,
their legs twined together, he whispers, "You know,
in my mind I'm making love to every inch of you right now."
His eyes close against the sensation of her kissing him
softly through the cotton of his shirt.

She tells him, "Shhhhh. Celebrate tomorrow. Sleep now."


~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~


It's that sliver of time between two worlds---neither night
or day, the light coming through the window dappled
deep violet and gold. Blinking slowly, he wakes up to find
her lying on her side, propped up on her elbow. She seems
younger, almost as young as she was their first night
together in an Oregon motel.

He doesn't move, taking in the play of light on her face,
her shoulders, her breasts, the swirl of auburn hair between
her legs. Her robe's been discarded in an ivory pool behind her.
She pushes away the sheets, then reaches over to stroke his
wrist, running her fingers along the thin band of leather.

His eyes meet hers. He sees something deep as eternity.
He lets himself fall in.

Giving him a broad, relaxed smile she wants him to know she's
happy---unguarded, utterly so.

She pulls his hand to her lips and he sees something
else glinting in her eyes that make his blood stir.
Forcing himself to keep still, he lets her work her way
around his wrist, planting one kiss after another, pausing
to moisten her lips, then pressing sweet heat over and
over against his smooth skin. She find his pulse, brushes
her slightly open mouth back and forth over the spot,
flicking her tongue in tiny circles where she feels the
echo of his heartbeat. His whole body is humming now---a
head rush---a rush to his groin---his erection poking
through his clothes

He won't be still much longer, but Mulder loves it when
she makes the first move.

"Someone's trying to sleep here," he tries to growl.

"I'm so sorry." She draws out the words as she
leaning in to return to her busywork.

"Just what do think you're doing?" He's slid arm over
her, pulling her slowly on top of him.

Scully's skin is the color of parchment, warmed by
the light, and soft as down. She's got him on his back,
holding onto his arms, swaying very slowly, brushing
his chest almost imperceptibly. Her nipples harden,
her voice lowers as if she's telling him a secret.

"Celebrating."

That one word answer melts whatever tantric discipline
he was trying to practice. In an instant he's flipped
her onto her back. Gathering both of her hands
with his, he raises them above her head, pinning them
down on the pillow. His mouth finds every tender spot,
kissing her--nibbling her--everywhere he can think of.
She smells of sleep, and soap, and her body opening
to him.

Trailing down her arms, the crown of her head,
marking her temples, her brow, the tip of her nose.
Devouring her full, delectable mouth, Mulder's
tongue parts her lips, plunders her tongue.
He knows how wet she's getting and whispers
her name. Her little moaning sounds are music
to his ears.

Moving beneath him, she wrangles her hands free
and pulls off his T-shirt.

Their arousal surges between them, a closed arc,
charging them like particles, fueling them to find
release.

"You," she says, breathless, and begin to slide
his sweatpants off.

He rears back onto his knees and finds a way to
remove the offending garment, tossing it to the floor.
He's naked, she's naked---he slowly begins to lower
himself back onto her. That mouth of his finds her
nipples, licks them, laves them, sweeps them with the
flat of his tongue, nips them until she's breathing
his name likea mantra. Then unexpectedly, an idea seizes
him. He starts a downward slide, kissing her ribcage,
her flat belly, coming to rest at her navel, his hands
holding her by the hips.

And starts tickling her. Shrieks of laughter coming from
both of them, she hurls herself up and into him. Now she's
on the attack, ribs, underarms--all fair game. They wrangle
around in bed, giggling guiltily like two teenagers and loving
every minute of it.

Then she grabs his face, holding him still until they're just
tangled up in bed, face-to-face, sweaty and breathless.
And she tells him, "You." She's said this word her whole life,
a million times, but in this instance, he knows what it means.

You are my everything.

"You," he replies, telling her the same.

She reaches down until she finds him, wrapping her hand
around the hard length of his shaft. Dragging the pad of
her thumb up and down, he thrusts into her curled
fingers when she traces the veins near the tip. Circling
the sensitive, round head, she spreads the moist beading
over the velvety skin. He draws a deep uneven breath,
shudders it out. She has an urge to kiss him there,
to wrap her lips around him, so she starts to slide down.

"I need to be inside you." he says, shaking his head
earnestly. "I want to feel you come while I'm inside you."
Pulling her up, he kisses her again, but whisper-soft
this time. It undoes her a little, tears slipping down
the side of her face before she realizes it.

He tenderly guides her so that she's below him, brings
his body down to hers and she parts her legs for him.
He cradles her face in the palms of his hands as she
reaches for him and begins to slip his cock inside
her. "More," he says as his head finds her hot and slick.
Not his most articulate moment, but it's succinctly
descriptive of what he craves.

Scully bites down on her lip, wincing as she tightens around
his swollen shaft, pulling on him as he plunges into her--
it's a paradox of pleasure she feels--aching and ecstatic
as she tightens and releases. She can feel the torrent
inside her building, she's wound tight, she's so ready.
"I'm..." she breathes, "I'm..." It's going to happen soon,
she's dying to have it happen, never wants it to end.

He is so sensitive, so utterly at the brink of flying apart,
a hair's breath from rushing headlong into the depths of
her body. Looping his arms underneath her knees, urging
her legs around his waist, he has to keep her near him.
He levers himself so that he can slide against her beautiful
bud of a clit.

Bringing a hand to her mouth, she kisses her fingertips
and touches him right at the base of his shaft. He groans
at her gesture, leans in to kiss her hard.

Then it happens. Long, slow waves of pleasure so
intense they start laughing together---they've done something
amazing for them. There's no bonding of soulmates here---none
was needed---no sorrow buried in a frenzied knot of limbs.
This was for the sheer joy of it.

They get to have this, too.


~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x


He promises to buy her a bagel and a Starbucks as they
finish dressing. He's wearing the navy suit, and she's
dressed in steel grey, fitted slacks and jacket, with
those high-heeled boots that add an extra three inches
and communicate a 'don't-fuck-with-me' attitude.
She checks her weapon, and strides over to her suitcase,
gets out the extra clips, tucks hers in her pocket and
tosses him the ones for his Colt. She makes sure her
handcuffs are secure on her belt.

The plan was to drive down to University of Chicago,
check the class schedule for the dear professor, wait
for the first break, and proceed to escort her to the
confines of 11th and State, where they hope they
can get the skinny on how she's done what she's done.

And how to stop her.

But they need to hear from Iyalosha, her contacts
are needed to pressure Cardenas. It's almost nine,
and there's been nothing yet.

They're both pacing the room--they're charged up
and it's time to go. Mulder cracks a joke about
getting her two bagels to fatten her up, now
that she's officially his betrothed. "Nothin' wants
a bone but a dog, Scully. Gotta put a little meat
on my woman."

She's about to illustrate her understanding of the
proprietary nature of marriage, as well as indicate
where he can stick that extra bagel, when she's stopped
by his cel ringing.

Lucky for him, it was in the inner pocket of his jacket,
so he's actually able to take the call. His face rapidly
loses the relaxed look of earlier, his brow furrowing.
Wincing, he's able to get a few remarks in edgewise.

This is not good.

"Mulder, who was it?" Scully' can feel her heart
speeding up--maybe there was another murder
last night.

"That was SAC Mitrovic." He purses his lips together
and blows out his frustration.

"Jesus, what does he want?"

"Well, Lucy, looks like we got some 'splainin'
to do."

~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x~X~x



The Whole Catastrophe
Chapter 8
By Diehard and Dryad



He and Scully had done little but exchange knowing
glances since their arrival.

They knew the drill.

Mulder leaned back in his chair and stared at the clock
overhead. Almost three hours had passed since they'd
drove over from the Burnham. Proceeding with his internal
monologue, he reviewed the morning so far. They drove
the Taurus to the Field Office, even though it was only a
fifteen minute walk. Didn't want to keep the SAC waiting.
Right. And then they sat. And sat. And sat some more.
An interminable wait followed by coma inducing boredom
was one of the key features of an official reprimand.

Finally, the intercom buzzed and the secretary took the brief
call. Motioing them toward the large mahogany door, she
shook her head as they collected themselves and made their
way through the office door.


~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~


Kris almost felt sorry for the two Agents as she watched
them cross the threshhold. Not, however, sorry enough
to try to run any more interference. She's gotten there
first and was treated to hours of Mitrovic's non-stop diatribe.
Speaking of which, what in the hell was Lazarov thinking in
sending her here? She was supposed to sit in and report back
to him what happened. As far as the SAC was concerned, she
wasn't FBI, she was just a lowly investigative detective, barely
able to sign her name and eat a donut according to him. And
despite the fact he didn't fucking appreciate having CPD
involved in intra-Bureau business, he used her to vent his
spleen concerning The X-Files, CPD burocracy, and piss poor
state of law enforcement. Her attempt to become one with
the walls failed miserably, but that didn't mean she couldn't
give it one last try.

"Just what the fuck are the two of you doing? SAC Mitrovic
glowered as the two of them took seats across from his desk.
"When a Sergeant Lazarov calls me at seven forty-fucking-five
this morning to ream me a new asshole I thought to
myself, oh, who could possibly have fucked up a cop-killer
case?" He pulled his chair out and sat down. "Your names
were the first that came to mind. Funny, huh?...Wanna hear
what he said?"

Mulder started to say something, but Scully cleared
her throat just in time to cut him off.

Before sketching in the details, Mitrovic peppered the room
with a truly astounding combination of obscenities before he
brought the two agents from HDQ up to speed. It didn't
let up much as he lit into them.

Jorgensen took in their reaction. Mulder seemed untouched
by the whole thing, as he tapped his foot on the plush
carpeting. He had a pretty tight grip on the armrest, though.
She also caught a flash of anger in those green eyes. Scully
sat ramrod straight in her chair with her hands demurely
folded on her lap. Her lips were pressed tightly together,
and she definitely had a bead on Mitrovic, her eyes clocking
every move as he moved in on her partner.

"For starters, Lazarov thought you'd be calling him with a
report after he set up the walkthroughs for you, shithead.
Then you come up with nothing. Nice, asshole, nice.
He's hears about it from his detective, and I get to hear it
from him. He's not the only one who expects to be kept in
the motherfucking loop, Agent Mulder. So let's see where
we're at...diversion of CPD resources to facillitate your
"consult," coming up with zip..."

Settling back in the leather chair, he spoke slowly, trying
to seem deferential. "It was crucial to verify that CPD
conducted the proper forensic investigation..."

"No, don't say anything yet, I'm not done. There's the stunt you
pulled with Shinoda. He was the primary suspect and the way
I see it, you essentially helped him walk. Lazarov didn't bitch
to me about it, he said it was a long shot. He actually thought
you'd get the answers by applying your brilliant mind in the
field." Mitrovic's voice dripped with sarcasm with that last
remark. "I'm the one who's pissed. You interviewed the cocksucker
alone, without a tape recorder. Have I been in a fucking goddamn
cave, Mulder? Did the Bureau change standard interview technique
without fucking telling me?"

"Sir, I felt it was necessary in order to conduct the interview.
My call." Mulder's face was all bland acceptance, almost blase.
"Hector Dean Shinoda, while conceivably guilty of other crimes,
is not connected with the death of Det. Gonzales, nor the crimes
we're investigating. If anything, he admired the man as a fellow
warrior, one to be respected. There's evidence to support other
forces at play - "

Mitrovic let him have it full force, "Enough! Cut the mystic
bullshit, Mulder! There's nothing fucking supernatural about
the death of a cop. Some jerkwad rolled up and shot the man
in the head. End of the motherfucking story. Now if you want
to argue Shinoda didn't have ample motive and opportunity,
you go right ahead. If you want to put in your report there's
no real circumstantial evidence linking him to the deaths of
Gozales or any of the others...fine. I don't give a rat's ass about
some Twilight Zone jag-off explanation of yours. If that kind of
shit flies at HDQ, fine. I just don't want to hear of any more
breach of protocol." He slammed his fist on his highly polished
desk to make sure he was getting through.

Agent Mulder shifted around in his seat, managing to look bored
yet irritated at the same time, which Jorgensen didn't think was
very wise, while Agent Scully was definitely more stonefaced
than usual. Jorgensen wondered when the SAC would rip into
the tiny redhead.

She didn't have to wait long.

"I won't even bother to fucking ask you why you've stayed
with Boy Wonder. The fact that you wanted to flush whatever
career you could've had down the crapper is your business."
Mitrovic eyed her up and down with contempt. "The ME
ripped into Lazarov after your 'consult,' and then Lazarov
ripped into me. There are no bodies, Agent Scully. None.
Just fucking skeletons, which the ME says the diener
swears were a goddamn bug buffet. Did it even occur
to you make me or the ME aware of such a motherfucking
unusual occurance?"

"Sir, our usual practice is to gather all pertinent data,
review it and report directly to A.D. Skinner...when we deem
it necessary. My understanding was that this consult was a
favor to the CPD, not a mandate to alter normal X-File
procedure." Her voice was brisk, clipped, totally professional,
totally unfazed.

Mitrovic grinned evilly, and leaned in toward the two of them
on his massive forearms. 'Well then, it seem to me that given
the highly fucking unusual manner in which the two of you
conduct investigations, it makes more sense that CPD interface
directly with A.D. Skinner. I'll call Walter myself...Detective..."
looking at the previously invisible member of Lazarov's team.

Kris spoke up, "Jorgensen."

"You tell your boss that from now on..." pointing to the
two on the other side of his desk. "...he can call their boss."

"Agent Mulder, Agent Scully?"

They responded in unison, "Sir?"

"Dismissed."


~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~


Walking to the elevators, Jorgensen was the first to rupture
the uneasy silence. She wasn't about to comment on what
supposedly happened, she could barely wrap her mind
around it.

"I thought Lazarov could be a prick, but Mitrovic...Jesus."
Kris muttered.

"They don't make'em like they used to," answered Mulder
with a wry smile.

"We've worked with Mitrovic before," Scully said dryly.
"years ago in New York. I don't recall him being quite
so...colorful."

"You know I have to tell him what happened," Kris sighed,
referring to the grilling she'd get once she got back
to 11th and State.

"Don't worry about it. Scully and I are used to being a
hot topic of conversation." Mulder rested a hand on
Jorgensen's shoulder.

"For what it's worth, I'm not one of the ones who has a
problem with you." Looking over to Scully, "Either one
of you."

Scully gave her her arm a squeeze. There was even
a faint smile on her face. "Thank you, Detective.
Mulder's right though, we're not exactly the most
popular Unit in the Bureau....By the way, how's
Hannah?"

That surprised Jorgensen. "Good, she's good.
My OB/GYN says it's time for weekly prenatal
visits, eating for two...the usual. There's just
one problem."

"What's wrong?"

"She started calling me grandma."

Both women started laughing, and Kris wondered
if that was a rare occurrence in Agent Scully's life.

They were cut short by the ringing of Mulder's cel.
Looking over at her partner, she watched his eyes
light up as he answered. It's my contact, he mouthed.

"Iyalosha. Let me go somewhere more private.
Give me a minute...Yes, my partner's with me."

Kris Jorgensen turned and started for the stairwell.
She needed some time alone to clear her head of
the dust from Mitrovic's blast radius. And she wanted
to get the edited version of her story straight before
she met with Lazarov.

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~~X~X~

It was a good thing no one was in the elevator.
Doors closed, Mulder beckoned Scully over and
stooped low enough so she can hear the conversation.

"Just tell me, when you saw her..." the ache of grief
rose in her voice like a tide, "...was she hurt?" She
knew the answer, she needed this man to say it, to kill off
any last doubt.

"Her left hand was bandaged, supposedly cut the night
Det. Gonzales was killed. We think...it's more recent."

What they heard next is a strangled cry, low, but
unmistakable. Mourning. What happens when a mother
loses a child.

"It was my baby, mi hija...she made it happen." Her voice
barely steady, Iyalosha Adisanya forced herself to tell
him about about Omi, what he help set in motion, what Alex
has surely done.

Mulder looked at Scully, and saw shock, but not disbelief.
Instinctively, his hand reached for her left wrist. Nodding,
Scully 's closed her free hand over his.

"We need to end this, Iya."

The elevator opened to the garage, Mulder held the
emergency button, while Scully waived off the potential
riders.

The words poured out of Iyalosha, unable to stop.
Too late, she told herself, too late for anything but this.
"It will take both of you...Alejandra will try to make him
strong again. She will try to call him forth, and this is
the only chance you have to stop both of them. It will not
end otherwise. Nafatali will have some of his power and
he will fight you, he comes back to revenge himself on
those that were his enemies..."

She choked back tears, caught her breath and went on.
"Do this and you become his enemy...do you understand
now why I offered you protection?" Revealing the tasks
all of them must carry out, she made sure the two of
them understood what would happen if they failed.

"I think Oshun was wrong about me, about what
I could do for Alejandra." Mulder's jaw clenched,
Cardenas was another woman he couldn't save.

Iya's voice brimmed with pain, "No, warrior....this is
the only help that's left for her now."

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~~X~X~

Anyone passing would think the man and the woman
on the bench were there to commune with the night
and each other--sitting close, whispering in each
other's ears. It was eleven thirty now, and the immediate
area was almost deserted. They'd been there for a
good long time, having moved from their Taurus,
which they'd parked just up the street hours before that.

The truth be told, they'd been there ever since early this
afternoon, after this morning's fall-out. A well-timed phone
call to the U of C's anthropology department revealed that
the good professor had classes staggered throughout the day,
with office hours tonight until ten. They decided they'd
plant themselves here, in the unlikely case she made
a quick run home.

This meant that once again they were able to partake of
all the glamour that was the stakeout. Lunch had been a
hot dog snagged from a park vendor, and thankfully,
the public rest room was just the other side of the
Hamilton statue.

Neither one of them forgot the world of pain they'd
witnessed earlier, it hovered over them, seeping into
the silence as they kept watch.

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

He glances at her in one of those still moments,
catches her eye, and sees his own regret reflected
there.

"My ass is falling asleep." He shifts in his seat.

A smirk from her, "Maybe if I kick it it'll improve
the circulation.''

Cracking jokes---it seems out of place, but it's
what they've always done. It's been a code
between them, emotional currency, and right now,
a lifesaver.

"Another hostile comment, Scully. You might want
to see someone about that." He leans just a tiny bit
closer. "I know a good psychologist, someone with a
lot of experience dealing with anti-social behavior."

She cuts him a look, "And what kind of...treatment...
would I be receiving for this problem?"

"He's extremely innovative...I think he uses
a kind of body-centered emotive therapy."

"Which consists of...?"

"Deep, physical contact. My understanding is that it
leads to a release for the subject resulting in a
flood of endorphins, completely eradicating any
negative impulses."

"You don't say."

"There's just one drawback. It requires
ongoing treatment for the rest of the person's life."

"Sounds expensive..."

"Oh, I'm sure you could work out something.
Possibly some quid pro quo..." He stopped as a tall,
dark haired woman got out of a Lexus and handed
the keys to an attendant.

"Mulder...what is it?"

"Game time."

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

11:45 pm---424 Diversey Parkway

They've been pacing in front of the back entrance since
they saw Alex go in nearly a half hour ago. The lobby's
a no-go, there's too much risk that the night doorman
will announce them. Normally, they would've apprehended
her before she even made it into her building, but Iya had
instructed them to stop Alex only after she's started,
and the time for this work is between now and midnight.

Mulder checks his watch and motions them to the door,
fishing in his pocket for his picks. Scully takes shotgun
and keeps an eye out for the night watchman. It takes extra
effort, he's out of practice, and he salts the air around him
with mumbled curses until he feels the tumblers click.

They get inside, find the service elevator, and it's all
bristling adrenal rush as they climb to the top floor.
They both feel the blood coursing through their veins,
their senses primed. In situations like these, the world
shrinks down to them, the target, and whatever's in their way.
Success depends on it, to say nothing of their lives.
The elevator stops, the doors part and they're moving
down the hall so fast it's a blur.

They're there now---Mulder's working the picks
and it's easier this time. She whispers the time---11:56.
Without making a sound, he pushes the door open and
she's right behind him, the two of them moving as one
body across the threshold. It's dark in the penthouse,
things just barely visible from the light thrown off
from the study. As they silently draw closer they can
see a kneeling Alex, dressed in a white robe, but there's
dark brown stain on her chest. Old blood. She's
lit by flickering candles on a small table, which also holds
a bottle of rum, the photo from their vacation, the humidor
of cigars. There's a half smoked cigar burning in a metal
dish, and the air near her is full of its earthy, bitter smell.
They are too late to stop her from drawing a bone-handled
knife across her palm, what is clearly a second cut.
She smears the blood in a fresh streak over her heart.

This is as far as she can go, this is where they have
to stop her or face the consequences. Time speeds up.

They both charge her, knock her to the floor, struggling
to force the knife out of her hand. Writhing beneath them,
Alex spits and kicks, punching at Mulder with her free hand.
He throws his whole weight on top of her to keep her down.
Scully pins the hand with the knife to the floor, snatches
it away and tosses it into a corner.

Cardenas is screaming every foul epithet she can think
of as Mulder slams the other hand above her head.
Before he clamps his hand over hers, he sees the time
on her watch---11:59.

Mulder looks over at Scully and she meets
his questioning gaze.

What they don't see the thickening shadow in the corner
begin to move and take the shape of Naftali Gonzales.

The candles blow out.


~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

11:45---All Saints Cemetery

Standing alone in the cold and dark, she gazes up
at two sorrowful angels and wonders if they'll watch
over her tonight.

Directed to this place by Oshun, Iyalosha stoops in front
of the granite entry of the cemetery and places nine
pennies in the dirt, takes the bottle of red wine from
her bag and pours a libation on the ground. "I ask
permission, Yansa. Oshun sends me here, but it is only
you who can give me passage." Out of nowhere, the wind
begins to gust at her back, pushing forward. Gathering up
her bag, she hurries to find the grave, robes the color of
butter billowing behind her. She saw the headstone last
night in another dream, and soon she's running to find
the place where this tragedy started.

Time is short, so when she sees the headstone and
the words 'Naftali Rene Gonzales,' she begins her work
in earnest. Setting her bag down, she pulls out covered
dishes of cooked eggplant, black-purple grapes in thick
clusters, the wine, a horsehair broom, a bunch of dried rue
and a jar of orange-blossom honey. At the bottom of her
bag is the most important thing, a photo brown with age,
Alex when she was a little girl, all smiles and innocence,
taken a lifetime ago.

Reaching into the pocket of her robe, she takes out nine
more pennies, walks around the grave whispering her
pleas in the old tongue, placing the coins at the corners,
on the side, and on the headstone. Taking the food,
she places the dishes at the foot of the grave.

"Yansa, hear me. I come to end this. He who walks
must come back to this place, she who raised him
must be undone."

Lightening cracks once, twice, three times, streaking
across the headstone. Iya covers her eyes from the
blinding light, and when she takes her hand away,
Yansa is standing before her in all Her fierce glory.
For once, under this moonless sky, she allows
a mortal to see Her face.

Iya doesn't tremble, doesn't cry out, but what she sees
brings tears to her eyes. Dark beauty so transcendent,
it breaks her heart to witness it. This is the face that
brings the final moment. But she does not come to
claim Iya.

"You will do this thing, daughter of Oshun?"

"There is no one else. I give you my oath
it will be done."

"So be it. Prepare yourself, I will tell you when it is time."

"Yansa!"

"Yes, daughter."

"You made a promise to her, didn't you?" It was the last
thing Oshun revealed in her dream.

"Keep your word Iyalosha, and I will keep mine."

The winds swirl and blow, and now there's thunder
in the distance. Kneeling in the dirt and leaning forward
until she's almost prostrate, she takes the horsehair
broom and brushes the grave dirt from right to left,
all the way from the top to the bottom. The air grows
heavier around her, and she sees the man and
the woman in her mind's eye---sees her Alejandra---
sees the streaks of blood.

It has begun.

Iyalosha Adisanya does not allow herself to feel
anything but grim determination. She will not falter.

Pulling her self up into a kneeling position, she lays down
the broom, reaches behind her for the honey and the rue.
Carefully, she opens the jar, crumbles the herb into the
thick golden mass and places it beside her.

There is nothing to do now but wait.


~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

Midnight---424 Diversey Parkway

The dark becomes a shadow and the shadow
becomes a man. The only light comes from the
stars and the city at skyline.

Time slows to a standstill.

Naftali springs from the corner, his midnight coat flapping
as he lunges himself onto Mulder. Pulling him away with a
viscious force, they slam into one of the bookshelves.
It falls, the shelving collapses, and the two of the are fighting
and rolling over the debris. Gonzales is punching like
a jackhammer, a brutal machine, unerring as he meets
the mark. Mulder head snaps back each time he connects,
he pulls the dead man away from Scully and Alex, landing as
many blows as he can.

Alex tries to scramble back up to get the knife, but Scully
hurls herself on top of her. Smaller than the other woman,
they're half-kneeling, half-lying. Alex spits and scratches,
but Scully's able to find the pressure point at the base of
her throat and uses it to drive Cardenas to the ground.
They wrestle until Alex is finally on her back. Pulling out
her cuffs she makes sure Alex is secure, and falls on her
to hold her down.

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

Midnight---All Saints' Cemetery

Iyalosha is poised at the brink, when she finally hears
Oya's command.

"Now, daughter. Now is the time. Quickly, move quickly!"

Iya takes the photo, brushes her lips against that beloved face,
then buries it under the grave dirt. Without hesitation she pours
the honey over the the top of the mound. Rising slowly, Iya lets
loose a wail, cries out to the silent sky.

"Mi hija...my beautiful baby. Forgive me."

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

12:02---424 Diversey Parkway

She can hear the fighting behind her stop, but it's still,
too still.

"Mulder," she yells without moving from her captive.

"Mulder!"

"Gonzales, Scully...Gonzales is gone."

Scully begins to get up, reaching for her weapon,
but is frozen in place as a shadow oozes under
Alex. Mulder's hit the light and is already crouching
at her side, together they roll Cardenas over. The inky
darkness covers her like a film, enters her body, and
Alex begins to gasp for air.

Suddenly, sheet lightening hits the penthouse,
shatters the windows, filling everywhere with blinding
white. Neither of them move until it's over. As soon
as they can see, the two of them maneuver around
Alex's prone body, trying to start CPR.

In the charred remains of what is left of her life,
Alejandra Ruis-Cardenas closes her eyes and is gone.

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

12:05---All Saints' Cemetery

Oya has left, the winds are still, all the necessary
tools have been gathered up, with the food and wine
left as offerings. Iyalosha sits on a stone bench across
from the grave and waits. She has to see for herself,
she has to know.

Then she hears what seems like two people
whispering, but so faint she can't make out
the words. Peering into the darkness, she begins
to make them out. Alejandra and Naftali, standing
together at the foot of the grave. Sorrow and remorse
are etched into their features, she thinks she sees
her baby crying. Iya does not approach, she cannot.
There is nothing to say, no way that this will ever
be undone. They will never sees their ancestors,
never sit at the table of the Seven Powers.
There will be no rest for them, no joy. But Oya kept
her promise, they will be together always.

It is done, and Iyalosha Adisanya rises and leaves
this place.

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

12:15---424 Diversey Parkway

"It looks like a bomb blast site." Scully steps
gingerly through the debris. She's really talking to
herself, Mulder just happens to be in the vicinity.
Both of them are still pretty shell-shocked as
they follow the necessary protocol. A suspect
died from respiratory failure while resisting
arrest. Scully tells herself that's about the only
thing they'll all agree on on once the reports are
written.

He has his back to her, finishing his calls to the 911
dispatcher and Jorgensen.

"They'll be here soon." He's done now, and turns
to face her. They've covered the body with a sheet
from the bed, and now they're waiting for the coroner
and the crime scene technicians.

"Mulder, look at us."

"Yeah, pretty amazing, huh?"

Essentially miraculous would be a more apt
description. There is nothing, virtually nothing
wrong with either one of them, save for the blood
stains they have on their clothes from struggling
with Alex.

"Amazing? It's...unreal...unbelievable. We have
no discernible injuries whatsoever, no physical
complaints, no symptoms of trauma, all of which
should be present after the beating we took.
How do you explain something like this?"

He dangles his left wrist with its red band in front
of her, trying to muster a half-hearted grin as he
points to hers, "I got your explanation right here."

"You can't be serious...There's no basis for it,
no viable scientific rationale..." She was only
partially unconvinced at this point, but she
wanted to make him work for the rest.

"OK," he sighed, as exhaustion began to claim him,
"maybe it's 'cause we put the 'B' in badass."

Listlessly rubbing her forehead, she caught his
eye as she muttered. "Mulder, you're making
your first explanation sound better all the time."

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~



The Whole Catastrophe
Chapter 9
By Diehard and Dryad


Calm-eyed, Kris took in the scene before her without
saying a word. Cardenas' formerly pristine apartment
was wrecked. Furniture had been had been knocked
over, magazines lay on the floor in heaps, several throw
rugs had been shoved against the walls, all bearing some
signs of scorch march. Zigzag burn marks raced across
the walls, all the windows were shattered, and though
she stepped carefully, glass crunched underfoot.

She grimaced at the sound.

Cardenas herself was on her back, arms still above her
head. Fresh blood trailed from her mouth and her left hand,
and it looked liked and there were old blood stains on her
chest where Mulder and Scully desperately worked to revive
her. Both of them looked tired, the bone-deep exhaustion
Kris had seen time and time again on the faces of firemen
and beat cops. A certain kind of shell shock that came only
from living through trauma, knowledge of certain failure
to save a life despite doing everything you could.

"Excuse me - "

Kris moved out of the way as the evidence tech behind
her tapped her arm. The other tech followed the first, setting
up the print kit and collection bags. The coroner had came
and went, pronounced Alex dead, and the wagon had already
taken her to the morgue. Mulder stood up and watched Scully
confer with the two men, unintentionally smearing blood across
his forehead as he brushed the hair out of his eyes.

Christ, what a mess. At least they wouldn't have to write up
the reports for Lazarov. Time to tackle what had happened.
"Agent Mulder," she called. "Could I speak to you for a
moment?"

He nodded, circled the trio surrounding Cardenas.
"Yeah, sure. Ask away..." His voice trailed off.

She shrugged apologetically. "You two okay?"

"Cuts and scratches I think."

"What happened here?" Kris hoped she sounded calm and
collected, like she was trying to help, instead of how she felt,
like a sneak thief trying not to get caught. Fuck, she thought,
I better tell him now, better get it over with.

"Agent Mulder,"

"Yes, Detective." He had a feeling where this was going
after this morning.

"Sgt. Lazarov' s instructed me to make the official report
in this matter."

"On our consult, our case."

"He was crystal clear, and uh...he's calling it his case as
far as the CPD, the Superintendent and the mayor
are concerned. He says you should consider yourselves
lucky the case broke open, that he won't bother calling
your boss over your 'cowboy' investigation style."

Mulder mumbled something she couldn't make out
and ground some of the glass on the floor with his heel.
"Right. Fine, then."

"I'm sorry, Agent Mulder, but I've got to get your statement.
Lazarov did say you're free to write up your own report
for the Bureau when you get back to D.C." Kris had
to throw in her own assessment, "Listen, it's screwed up
and we both know my boss is a tool. But this thing is
over, and I have to do..."

He managed a rueful smile, "...your duty. Then let's get
this over with, Detective."

"So, what happened?"

"I..." Mulder shook his head. "Cardenas was performing
a ritual that involved cutting herself. When we tried to stop
her, she went after Scully. Someone else was here with her,
because I was hauled off, ostensibly to have the shit beat
out of me."

"Someone else?" she asked quietly, wanting to know who
whatever the answer.

He licked his lips, staring her directly in the eye. Apparently,
like he liked what he saw, because he didn't hesitate,
"Gonzales, Detective. Cardenas raised Gonzales from
the dead."

"From the dead."

"Cardenas practiced a bastardized form of Santeria, an arcane
ritual that gives the undead the means to essentially become
instrument of revenge. All of the victims, Breen, Michaels,
Roberts, Coluko and Weinhoft, were in turn killed by the same
methods with which they had killed their own victims.
Gonzales had a history with all the deceased. One in which he
had to witness the guilty go scot free...My guess is that all Alex
wanted was Naftali back whatever that meant. "

Kris resisted the urge to step back. "You can't be serious"
she hissed, mindful of the evidence techs overhearing and
running their mouths. "What you want me to believe is
impossible...Someone read the casefiles...someone..."

Mulder smirked and leaned closer, voice equally soft as
her own. "Casefiles? The information about this case had been
leaked to every major news source. That narrowed the field
down to just about anyone who read a paper or watched
the news. Your boss didn't like those numbers, that's where
we came in. Your version puts you back at square one.
Is that what you really want to tell Lazarov?"

Shit, he had her there.

"Scully tells me you smelled the rum in the bodies yourself,
saw the evidence of people doing impossible things to one
another, to themselves. How else do you explain it?"

She couldn't. She took a deep breath, let it out slowly.
"I can't. You're saying Gonzales was here, and attacked you.
So where is he now?"

He hesitated briefly. "A Santeria priestess who knew Cardenas
well. . .took her power away. Once she lost power, Gonzales
had no choice but to return to the spirit world... She was bound
to him," he glanced at Scully, now sitting back on her heels,
and then at the techs, starting to collect additional samples,
comparing notes, "and couldn't stay here. For what it's worth,
Detective, I don't think she could've lived without him."

"And now they're together for eternity?" Kris said. "Not exactly
happily ever after, is it?"

"I can see how it would appeal to a person, especially if they
lost someone they loved greatly."

"I guess," she murmured. The only person she loved that much
was Hannah, but she wasn't going to dwell on the rest of it.

"Well, I think the report will say something to the effect that
as you attempted to apprehend the suspect, a struggle ensued,
inadvertently Dr. Ruis-Cardenas to experience fatal respiratory
distress." She called over to Joe Pettibone, one of the techs.

"Doc Nadich said it was respiratory failure, right?"

Pettibone laid aside the kit and pivoted toward her,
"Yeah, Kris. He said to tell you the autopsy on this
one'll be done my mid morning."

Looking to Mulder again, "I think you two should head on
over to the ER, just to be on the safe side." Mulder grinned,
white teeth a shocking contrast to the dark red streak of
Cardenas' blood above his eyebrows. "I'll get Scully to check
me out. She's a doctor, y'know." He said it a little louder
than he needed to.

Scully turned to them and gave him a look that told Kris
she wasn't all that bothered. She liked Mulder, she liked
them both. And clearly, the two of them really liked
each other.

Like wasn't quite the right word, Jorgensen amended,
something a little more...intense. Kris shook off that
train of thought. She needed to get the hell out of here
and start filling out paperwork before Lazarov had another
meltdown.


~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~~X~X~

Mulder folded his arms and sat back in the hard plastic
chair, letting his head rest on the wall. He yawned.
A moment later he cracked another one. Jesus Christ,
it had to be 5 am. He just wanted to go back to the
Burnham, wash off the spectres of the dead detective,
his dead lover, crawl into bed with his own lover and
sleep for a couple of hours. Tomorrow they could fly
back home, write their reports, and maybe have time
enough to look for rings.

A ring. He was honest enough with himself to realize he
wanted to show he was claimed, and for her to be
claimed, too.

"C'mon, partner - "

Something gently nudged his knee and he moaned a half-protest.

"Let's get the hell out of Dodge before Dr. Singh finds some
other way to poke or prod us. We've been good little patients,
had our exams, our X-rays, our CAT scans. Don't get me
wrong, I'm grateful for the VIP-head-of-line treatment, but
now it's time to go."

He opened one eye, taking in the dried blood on her jacket.
She looked rumpled, exhausted, but she didn't have a scratch
on her. Just like him.

She nodded. "I'm fine. You?"

"Yup. Just tapped out," Mulder hauled himself to his feet,
aware of just how much he wanted to stretch out right here
and close his eyes. "How come the undead never have to
worry about getting their beauty sleep? It just doesn't seem
fair, Scully."

The few other people in the waiting room eyed Mulder,
surreptitiously leaned to one side, clutched handbags
and magazines, and in one case, a child, as he and Scully
left the area.

"Well, Mulder, I guess you could chalk it up to their not
needing food or water. Their bodies don't need to process
products into energy, which of course takes energy."

He looked down at her in amazement as she mumbled on.

"If you're right, Gonzales was getting his strength from
Cardenas, through her blood scarifice. Once that was
interrupted, Gonzales no longer had a link to the living.
So, in the end, it's the cycle of life and death and
rebirth. Why are you looking at me like that?"

"Ah, you, uh, aren't usually so enthusiastic about my theories."

"Don't get used to it," she said. "I'm too tired to come up
with anything better. Besides, it was hard enough trying to
explain why nothing was wrong with me to Dr. Singh.
I think he was personally affronted he couldn't find anything,"

Mulder chuckled mid-yawn, nearly walking into an empty
gurney as they headed towards the ER walk-in exit.
"I think Dr. Burrows was in the same frame of mind."

"So you think the talisman protected us."

"Got a better explanation? " His breath hung frostily in the
cold air as they stepped outside the sliding doors. "We've
seen stranger things, Scully. Maybe there's someone
out there... something else besides random events emerging
from chaos, maybe this time someone was watching out for us."

Scully smiled up at him, "That almost sounds like faith."

"Maybe I'm ready to believe..." Mulder's cel trilled in
his pocket. He let it ring several times before he answered.

"Yeah."

"It's Kris Jorgensen. I just thought you and Agent Scully
should know that a member of a Santeria house just
confessed as the perp in the Gonzales case.

"What?" He knew he was out of it, but he thought
he heard correctly.

"He walked into 11th and State with his written statement
swearing he killed Coluko, Wienhoft, all of them as a favor
to Alex Cardenas..."

"Did you interview him? What did he say?"

"He can't speak...He was brought to the station by
a woman who said her name was Iya...she said to tell
you the circle's complete now. I don't suppose
you're going to explain what that means."

"I don't think you really want me to."

"No, I don't think I do."

On the drive back to the Burham, as daylight began
to emerge, Mulder told Scully about Kris' call and
Iyalosha's message. She didn't say anything for a long
time, then reached for his hand.

"I think you're right about what's been at work
here..." she whispered. "...and about what's kept us
safe."

"Are you serious, Scully?"

"Maybe we're starting to believe the same things,"
sliding closer to him, watching the early light play
across his face.

Bringing her hand to his lips, he kissed the knuckles,
and thought about what he said in the ER, about a force
greater than themselves, "Maybe we are."


~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~


The Whole Catastrophe
By Diehard and Dryad

Epilogue


10:30 am --- The next day---Various Locations

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

Sgt. Lazarov leans back in his armchair, feet up on his desk,
lazily going over a glossy catalogue of new office furniture
he was sure he'd be needing when he got the call from
the Superintendent. Oh, he'd be getting that promotion,
he'd be the Mayor's new Liaison for Community Affairs.
He's busted his ass for too long, and they had to toss
him a bone after tying up the Gonzales case. The only
thing he's waiting on to get the ball rolling is Jorgensen's
goddamn report.

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

Kris Jorgensen's hunches over an old Selectric, hunting
and pecking what she hopes will be the approved version
of the most bizarre case she's ever had to deal with.
Ostrowski and Clark were arguing about who was going
to pay the tab at the Claddagh Ring, saying something
about needing to cut back on the beers anyway.
She's hasn't been to bed yet, drunk so much coffee that her
teeth are chattering. Her phone rings and it's Hannah, all
excited and chirping in her ear about baby names. No, she tells
her, there will be no Brittney or Justin. Hanging up the
phone, she wonders if there are any openings in the coroner's
office. Somehow, the quiet seems really appealing right now.
Going back to her typing, she hopes she's spelling that
Adisanya woman's name correctly.

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

Iyalosha Adisanya waves off the gaggle of seekers,
with their requests for love spells, healings, and divinations.
She tells Osunrete to make her some hawthorn tea to
lessen her sorrow, settles in to a chair in a small
alcove in the rear of the temple. Murmuring ancient words
she weaves a band of red and orange, a talisman for
Omi. He will need to be kept safe from the predators
in prison. She owes him her protection now, she will
watch over him the rest of her life. Osunrete brings the
steaming tea, and she reminds the girl to start gathering
rose blossoms, myrhh and sweetgrass. There is a wedding
gift to be made for the FBI man and his woman.

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

Walter Skinner doesn't know why, but he's feeling like odd
man out when his phone assaults him with a blaring ring. It's
a call from SAC Mitrovic who takes great delight in letting
him know that his agents are a traveling freak show, and that
he'll soon be regaled with details of their exploits. Walter
takes great delight in telling Mitrovic what he can do with
himself, hangs up on him, buzzes Kim and asks her for his
Mylanta. She cancels his appointments for today, asks him if
he still wants to meet with Mulder and Scully. He shakes his
head, and tells her tomorrow, late tomorrow.

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

Mulder's just finished stuffing himself, enjoying the hell out his
breakfast in bed, and Scully's in the bathroom running the shower.
He tries to call Skinner, but Kim tells him the A.D. isn't feeling
too well, so he won't be meeting with them until late the next day.
He seizes on the opportunity, makes another call and pushes back
their flight until four.

They're all packed, so they have the rest of the morning and
good part of the afternoon...

Scully's standing under pulsating streams of hot water, working
out the kinks in her neck, eyes closed and blissfully not thinking
of anything. She feels a slight draft and the looming presence of
someone who starts soaping her back, working away the
tightness running along her spine.

"Just can't let me take a shower alone, eh, Mulder?"
She leans back into his slippery grip.

"I'm very ecologically concerned, Scully. Global reserves
of water desperately need conservation." He rinses off a
shoulder and starts licking a trail to the nape of her neck.

"Unbelievable," she laughs. "Oh...right there... that's it,"
as his hand slides slick concentric circles over her breast.
She's not laughing any more.

"Say, Scully," his voice low and hypnotic, "studies recently
show that men's sex drives do not decrease as they enter
their forties," as he rubs the newly energized proof of his
statement against the curve of her ass.

Reaching around to verify the necessary empirical
evidence, "I'll have to see that for myself."

Spinning her around and pressing her to the tile, his mouth
descends onto hers as he provides a very pointed illustration.


~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~

On a flight to Osaka---somewhere over the Pacific.

Vanessa Muraski stretches like a lazy cat in her first-class
seat, uncrosses her long legs and rubs her calves until
she feels his hands begin to do the work. "I wondered what
it would take to get your attention, Hiroshi."

Teacher. Her pet endearment for Hector Shinoda. He's
a brilliant instructor and she's been an apt pupil.
Unfortunately, his tutelage involves things like garotting,
a Makarov with a silencer, and bad men who've begged
for mercy that never came.
"You've been reading a long time." She reaches for the sheaf
of papers on his lap, sees the title, 'The Code of Bushido,
and its Influence on Pathological Knight-Errant Response.'

"He wrote this?"

"Yes, my love, this was written by one who knows the Way..."

She regards him thoughtfully, "Are you planning on dealing
with him?"

Shinoda turns to gaze out the window, white clouds
forming everything and nothing. "No, but perhaps he may want
to deal with me one day. A man must prepare for death always."

Settling back in his seat and closing his eyes, Shinoda hoped
he would be ready if their paths crossed again.


FIN

~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~
Author's notes: diehard's

This has been a labor of love, impossible to complete without
the foundation I received from dryad.

To Dryad--I may have done more of the scribbling, but this story
would've never happened without your bedrock.

To the wonderfully encouraging XDKSFAN, Inya, Fran Weugel,
Sherri Kelm, girlie_girl74, Little Spooky, Linda (aka/linc),
fifee, Evie Whiting, and Beach 2329----you shored me up, got me
through, got me going---and for that I'm so very grateful.
For the wonderful sites, Ephemeral, Gossamer, WIPOL, WIP Nest,
The Grove, Whispers of X, atxc, The Spookys, musea, Fran's Fanfic
Addiction---I can only express my deep appreciation for creating
worlds of wonderful fiction.

To Ms. Suture--fellow traveler and brilliant writer--thank you
for the glorious words!

And to Mulder and Scully and David and Gillian---you continue
to occupy the best part of my imagination,

Feedback to: alvaradomccain@earthlink.net