TITLE: The Chilmark Project: Part I - Demonology (Comfort of Friends X-Files Section) AUTHOR: Wylfcynne and Ravenwald DISTRIBUTION: Anywhere; just please ask; that way we'll know where it all goes, so we can visit. SPOILERS: Does this really matter anymore? This is a post-ep for Demons, carrying on (and on, and on...) into an AU where some of the episodes beyond that happen, and others do not. This is the divergence point from the canon, but some episodes after that are included in our warped little world. Specifically, Biogenesis, The Sixth Extinction and Amor Fati do NOT happen here! Neither do several other episodes. Basically, we picked and chose what we want to have happened in our universe. Also, we reserve the right to kill off the Fowl One OUR way! And just WAIT till you see what we have planned for Phoebe Green! It's not nice to screw over our Mulder... RATING: R for adult concepts; chapters with NC-17 segments will be labeled. CLASSIFICATION: post-ep, MT, MSR, AU, Crossover (Highlander: The Series, The Sentinel, F/X: The Series) SUMMARY: Post-Ep for DEMONS; did you ever wonder why Mulder let that quack drill holes in his skull and shoot him full of Ketamine? TWICE? We figured it out, and things started to snowball... The Chilmark Project is a Consortium sideshow, one of the little jobs they had running while everyone's attention was on the Big Show. Six children born in Chilmark, Massachusetts between 1961 and 1966 were the original subjects... DISCLAIMER: They certainly aren't ours; if they were, they'd be having more fun, and we wouldn't be saving up for new cars! Thank you, Mr. Carter, for creating the show, and thank you, Mr. Duchovny, and you, Miss Anderson, and you, Mr. Pileggi, for creating the people. We're just borrowing Fox, Dana, Walter and the others for some fun and games. We promise we'll bring them back on time and unharmed, and they won't remember a thing. Fox Mulder, Dana Scully, Kim Cook and Walter Skinner belong to Chris Carter, Fox and 1013. In following segments: Jim Ellison, Blair Sandburg and Simon Banks belong to Pet Fly. Rollie Tyler and Angie Ramirez belong to Fireworks/Rysher. Duncan MacLeod, Amanda, Methos/Adam Pierson, Joe Dawson, Anne Lindsey and Matt McCormick belong to Panzer/Davis Productions. Anyone else belongs to us. XFC-FDBK: Yes!! AUTHORS' NOTES: at the end. +++ Prelude The Chilmark Project is a long-term genetics and environmental combined experiment. Loyal members of our Group have volunteered their own children to become the Subjects. The aim of the Chilmark Project is to induce an insoluble bond between pairs of children so that, as they mature, the bond intensifies. It is our hope that the bond will facilitate mind-to- mind, para-verbal communication (telepathy) between the members of the pair-bond. Lesser levels of success would entail less-than-verbal communication (non-verbal communication, empathy). The Project was conceived in order to have personnel available to us in the second generation who had been designed and trained, from before birth, to be covert operatives. Born and raised within the Group, loyalties unquestionable, these will be our most valuable operatives, able to pass information to one another with a thought. Telepathic communication, if it can be achieved, will be considered a fully successful outcome. Even with lesser levels of achievement, the subjects of the Project will be raised within the Group, by their biological parents, in as normal an environment as possible. They will be monitored continuously and tested regularly. They will not be told of the Project, but their parents are to be fully involved in monitoring the children and the progress of the Project. The parents will participate in the Project as much possible, depending on their individual abilities. Volunteer families are: Mr. & Mrs. William Mulder Dr. & Mrs. Vasily Lermontov Mr. & Mrs. Michael Decker Mr. & Mrs. Alexander McKenica Mr. & Mrs. Patrick Sullivan Dr. & Mrs. Alvin Kurtzweil Mr. & Mrs. Anthony Rosa Mr. & Mrs. Francis Miles Mr. Mulder, who was placed in charge of the program when it was first conceived, will also function as the local supervisor in Chilmark. Dr. Kurtzweil will be in charge of the actual obstetrical and gynecological procedures. Dr. Lermontov will be in charge of the biological research program. Mrs. Mulder and Mrs. McKenica are currently in the first trimester of their first pregnancies; the Project is to be initiated at once. The other couples will be monitored for pregnancy on a monthly basis and the unborn will be subjected to the Project's procedures. Over time, these procedures may be changed or refined, in accordance with what is learned from the earlier work. The parents understand that compliance with the Project's program is an irrevocable decision. If they refuse to continue with the Project after it has begun, their subject child(ren) will be removed from their custody and control, and placed with a family more reliable in their compliance with the needs of the Group and The Greater Good. (Memorandum of Intent, unanimously approved by the Board of Directors, March 3,1961). +++ +++ Demonology Scully's apartment Wednesday Scully opened her apartment door and pushed her partner inside. He moved stiffly, awkwardly, painfully, and only as he was shoved. When she let go of him, he stopped and stood, swaying, his eyes closed. Scully was weary herself, after the exhausting disaster of Mulder's last headlong dive into the search for his long-lost sister. He had been exonerated of the murders of the Cassandras, by the identification of David Cassandra's fingerprints on the Sig Sauer, overlaying all of Mulder's prints. The case was officially closed as a murder-suicide, much to Scully's relief. Mulder had recovered from the Ketamine overdose. The holes drilled into his skull were still there, but were healing over nicely. He did not appear to have suffered any truly permanent damage. Except to his psyche. And hers. (*How could he do that?*) she asked herself yet again, as she abandoned him in the middle of her living room. When she let go of him, he stood still, abandoned, lost. (*How could he let a quack like Goldstein do such things to him? When he's up to it, I'm going to tear him a new asshole.*) She did not look at him; she had been studying him for several days and she needed a moment that was not completely concentrated on him. She walked across her living room and punched down the PLAY button on her answering machine. "Doctor Scully, this is Sister Mary Fredericks. I am the administrator of the Queen of the Angels Long Term Care Facility and Hospice in Chevy Chase. We are trying to reach Fox Mulder and he listed you as his secondary contact. We notified him on Friday that his wife had died, but he was supposed to come in and sign the final paperwork. We have not seen him and I was wondering..." Scully was puzzled when she heard the woman's identity; she was vaguely aware that there was a Sisters of Charity hospice in the DC area, but only because of fund-raising drives through her parish. She froze as the meaning of the fourth sentence registered. (*His WIFE???*) Before she had time for more, Mulder cried out in agony and crumpled to the floor. She darted to his side, fearing some complication from the weekend. But he was simply sobbing uncontrollably. When she sat down beside him and cautiously touched him, he crawled into her lap and continued to cry. All she could do for him was hold him, so she did. (*Is this the explanation? His WIFE died, so he went looking desperately for Samantha? Why didn't he ever mention a wife to me? How could he have maintained a wife in a hospice for any length of time without it being common knowledge? We're professional investigators, for heaven's sake!*) Then she shuddered. (*He was married and she spent the last four years, at least, in a hospice. He's too caring to be unaffected by that...!*) Then a new idea struck her. (*Is this why we've never gotten any closer than we are...? He's married and faithful, even to a dying and incapacitated woman...?*) All she could feel for that was real admiration for such steadfastness and loyalty. +++ It was more than an hour later before he was calm enough to speak to her. He was sitting on the floor, his back against the front of her couch, his knees pulled up under his chin and his arms wrapped around. He was still rocking a little and his face was streaked with tears, but he was listening to her, now, not lost in grief, sobbing his heart out. "Can you tell me, now, Mulder?" Scully asked softly, sitting down close beside him. "I never knew you were married." "Her name was Annaliese McKenica. We grew up together," he said hoarsely. "There were six of us: Anni and me, Nick and Molly, Samantha and Kyle. We all lived within a block of one another and we all went to school together. We were all handed over for tests on a regular basis..." "What?!" she stared at him, rigid with shock. He flinched from the intensity in her tone and she leaned against him apologetically. Slowly, he relaxed again. "What sort of tests?" He avoided meeting her eyes. "Blood and tissue samples, pain tolerance, endurance, exploratories, drugs... lots of drugs." "But you were children!" Scully was outraged. "Who would do that to innocent children?" "Our fathers." His tone was hollow and he still had not met her eyes. "Our fathers were all part of the Consortium, Scully. My dad used to stand down at the far end of the lab having a cigarette and coffee with Anni's and Nick's dads. Molly's dad didn't smoke, so he'd be shooting darts with Kyle's dad." "Why did you never mention this before?" "I didn't actually remember it, except in nightmares, until..." "Until this weekend?" she guessed when his voice trailed off. He nodded. "Do you remember why they did that to you?" He shuddered. "They never explained anything to us. We were just lab rats to them. But we put most of it together by pooling what we could overhear." This was horrifying. Scully leaned closer. "What were they doing?" "Trying to induce telepathic bonds among the six of us. For purposes of instantaneous communication, which would be invaluable in espionage, in covert ops, in diplomacy." "Did they succeed?" Scully asked, more to keep him talking than to really get an answer. "Not the way they wanted to," he replied. "We were never happy when we were apart, especially the pairs: Annaliese and me, Samantha and Kyle, Nick and Molly. I could hear what Anni was thinking and she could hear me. It was pretty neat: we could plan to meet after school without needing to find one another in crowded hallways, even on days when we had no classes together. She helped me cheat on math quizzes and I helped her win a spelling bee, once. I sat in the audience and gave her the answers." Scully did not know whether to believe this or not. It sounded awfully far-fetched but she did not believe he was in any condition to lie to her. "Did you have a bond like that with Samantha?" she asked cautiously. He nodded. "Almost. We couldn't talk, but we always knew the other's emotional state." "So her abduction..." "I felt her fear and it added to my own," he agreed. "We were both broadcasting it, and the other four got scared, too. I was completely catatonic when I was found. I spent the next thirteen weeks in a hospital, recovering from the overload. What made my recovery possible was Anni sneaking into the hospital to find me because being without me was making her insane, too." Scully frowned thoughtfully. "What about...Kyle? Samantha's... partner?" Mulder shuddered. "We couldn't wake him up. He was shipped out of town before any of us could get close to him. We never saw him again, either." Scully sat silently for a few minutes, just digesting that information. Then she changed the subject. "So, did you and Annaliese get married right out of high school?" He shook his head and his tone was ragged as he went on. "I was sent to Oxford." He shuddered. "And I felt like an amputee without the others, without her..." He paused long enough for Scully to frown and turn to study his face worriedly. But then he went on. "Do you know what 'traumatic bonding' is?" Scully nodded. "A feeling of unity shared by members of a group that experienced some traumatic event together." He nodded. "Right. That was us, Scully. Our lives were one traumatic event after another. We were bonded. And they ripped us apart because we weren't performing up to their expectations. The emotional bond wasn't their goal; they wanted us to be able to talk to one another telepathically. It never occurred to them that one predicated the other: we could only talk to our partners and the emotional bond was what made the telepathic bond possible." "Why did you feel so bereft if you could speak to Annaliese telepathically?" Mulder closed his eyes for a moment, visibly fighting for control. "Because we discovered to our horror that even that bond had physical limits," he replied. His voice was so soft it was almost inaudible. "We always knew that beyond a certain range we couldn't talk, but the emotional connection was still there. But I lost complete contact with her somewhere over the Atlantic. She just faded out. I almost lost it, right there in the plane. I'd never been alone inside my head before. When it went on and on, I had to decide if I was going to function, or believe that she was dead, or... what..." His voice trailed off and he was shivering in earnest, now. "When the plane landed, I tried to call her, but her family had changed their phone number, and the new number was unlisted. I had to hope that Anni would call my mom and that my mom would tell her how to reach me. Mom said she gave her my mailing address; I didn't have a phone. I tried calling her from pay phones, from friends' phones, but I never succeeded. I kept trying...." "I bet you did," Scully nodded. She knew how obsessive he could be when he felt strongly about something. "It had to be another phase of the Project." He stopped, visibly steeling himself, then continued. "They... they wanted to know if Anni and I were strong enough to survive that kind of separation. I got one phone call from home. It was my father. He told me to stop harassing everyone back home and get on with my schoolwork. If I did well enough, he would let me come home for the summer. The unspoken threat was that if I didn't, I'd have to stay in England until I did measure up." He shuddered at the memory, still so clear after all those years. "So I worked." "Y'know, Mulder, I don't like to be cruel, but your father..." He shuddered again. "I'm sorry," she said at once. "You were talking about your first year in England...?" He had to take a moment to regain control of his voice. Then he took a deep breath and continued. "I was completely alone for the first time in my life, depressed as I had not been since right after we lost Samantha," he explained, his tone flat. "I was so desperate for companionship that... " "That any sort of attention was better than none?" she finished the sentence, not wanting his British lover's name mentioned aloud. He threw her a grateful look and managed to keep from shuddering again. "I didn't have many social skills, Scully. I knew a child's politeness to adults. But as children, the six of us in the bond-sib group didn't socialize much outside of it. We didn't need to. As a result, I didn't know how to approach social equals and establish relationships. I was sixteen years old and desperately lonely, so...I guess I was an easy target." "Did you get to come home for the summer?" Scully did not want him thinking about Phoebe, now. He dropped his forehead onto his knees for a moment. "M-My father said no," he whispered. "He said I'd just be wasting my time with some stupid summer job, that it was more fiscally responsible to take all the classes I could in the summer, and graduate early." Scully frowned. "How did you and Annaliese respond to that news?" He did shudder, then. "I came home, anyway. And she was gone." "Gone?!" That was the last thing Scully had expected to hear. "Gone where?" "They'd sent her away to school, too." "What school?" "No one would tell me." Scully stared at him. "And...?" "And her parents had moved away and apparently changed their names. I hired a private detective to find them, but he never did before I ran out of money to pay him. I wasn't a trained investigator, then, but that was when I started thinking seriously about becoming a police officer." "Why?" Scully prompted him. "Because the PI told me about all the access that a police officer would have that he would never have without breaking the law. He tried to let me down easy by explaining that there are a lot of ways a family could disappear legally in the US and that it would be even easier if they had left the country. He advised me to give up hunting for her, to just be visible so she could find me." "What did you do?" "I went back to Oxford, the last place Anni had an address for me. I stayed there as long as I could, added graduate and post-grad work... I never, ever went home again, not for anything. My father paid my tuition and the cost of my room and meals at school. Above that, he sent me what he considered enough money for clothes, but that was all. My friends used to help me find odd jobs so I could pay for gasoline and parts for the motorcycle I used to get around. I didn't have a work permit. I was very limited in the jobs I could legally hold with a student visa, so, in return for their charity, I'd house-sit and pet- sit, proofread their papers and just basically be available to help anybody out." Scully was silent for a minute, digesting this image of the young Mulder as a beggar, dependent on the kindness of classmates because his family would not be kind. "Why did you come back?" He paused for a moment and then continued, his voice flat and bleak. "FBI headhunter came to me after the monograph was published, convinced me that I could be a tremendous asset to them. I bought into it because I had already decided that I needed to become a cop and a federal cop was best. FBI was my first choice all along, because ATF, DEA and the Secret Service have specific jurisdictions and target crimes. FBI does everything and has international prestige and access. "I was assigned to VCS right out of Quantico. When I'd been there for six or eight months, I got invited to a reception for Bill Patterson. He was getting some kind of award for his work and he wanted us all there to lead his cheering section. I'd been feeling weird all day; kept looking over my shoulder, convinced someone was calling me. When I walked into the room I knew she was there. It took me six minutes to find her in a crowd of five hundred and when I did she was pushing her way through the crowd to get to me. She had just arrived in town that morning, transferring in from Auckland. We walked right into one another's arms and left at once. We got married that night. We were terrified of losing one another again." "Were you happy?" Scully asked softly. His eyes were closed, as if savoring that moment all over again, and Scully found herself wondering if either Mulder or Annaliese had ever realized that they had been set up. "Deliriously," he answered, his eyes still closed. "We finally felt whole again. But they just couldn't leave us alone..." Scully felt a jolt of fear. "Who? The Project? The Consortium?" "I don't know," he admitted with a shrug, glancing at her almost furtively. "Fate, maybe." "Fate, Mulder?" He shivered. "We had eight months of peace, happiness, domestic bliss... whatever you want to call it." "What happened?" She was almost afraid to ask. "We were going out Christmas shopping and our car was broad-sided by a truck. I was pretty badly hurt: broken leg, arm, four ribs, collarbone. Minor internal injuries, mild concussion, no skull fracture, but I was unconscious for a week." "A week? With no skull fracture...? Mulder..." "Who's telling this story, you or me?" She sighed and gestured vaguely for him to continue. "When I was recovered enough that they thought I could handle it," he made no effort to disguise his anger at that arrogance, "I was informed that she had agreed to some surgery to try to save the unborn child she was carrying." Scully gasped. "Oh, my God, Mulder!" He shivered; she put her arms around him and hugged him briefly. Then she settled back down beside him and waited. "She was coherent, informed and aware when she signed that release," he said steadily. "They had explained the risks and the likelihood of success. She decided the risk was worth it to try to save our son. I can't second-guess her decision; no one could have predicted what happened." "What happened?" Scully whispered when the silence began to stretch out. "She suffered a massive cerebral aneurysm in the OR," he said faintly. "The baby died, and she lost all her higher brain functions. Her body was still alive, breathing... But Annaliese... Annaliese was... gone." "Oh, my God, Mulder! I'm so sorry!" He was still shivering. She tightened her hold on him and he kept talking. "Her health insurance was so much better than mine that she had kept it and we had even debated whether I should switch. They sent her to Grosvenor Manor in Maryland. I went to see her a lot, at first, but she couldn't know me... I stopped going; it hurt too much. But I was still married. I kept the ring and I kept the apartment; I moved to the couch because I couldn't sleep in that bed alone." Scully nodded, realizing that Anni had been the love of his life and in her most desperate hours he would not, could not, abandon her. The relationship could not be maintained, however, and the legacy of that inevitability was guilt. "Grosvenor Manor isn't a bad facility," she commented. He nodded. "But when my father died, he left me a stock portfolio worth over eight million dollars, aside from the annuity he set up to take care of mom. Suddenly, I didn't need managed care numbers geeks making decisions for Annaliese. So I moved her to Our Lady of the Angels in Chevy Chase." "What made you pick a Catholic facility, Mulder?" "Your mom," he said quietly. "She said once, in the hospital, after you were returned, that if you stabilized in the coma and needed long-term care, that was where she wanted you to go. If it was good enough for your mom, it was good enough for me." "Mulder...? Why did you go to Rhode Island this weekend instead of Chevy Chase?" He buried his face against his knees, wrapped his arms around his head. "Because Anni's dead." Scully frowned. "Mulder?" When he looked up, he was crying again, quietly, without drama, just quiet sobs and tears streaking down his face. "Because Anni's finally really gone. There isn't going to be any miraculous cure. She isn't going to open her eyes the next time I visit and smile at me. She's finally, irrevocably, beyond all other alternatives, really, definitely, beyond all hope, gone." Scully swallowed hard. He had been holding out hope for a miracle, for eight years, all alone. Then, suddenly, all his hopes were dashed. (*I'm amazed he's rational at all!*) "Had the bond been gone since the accident?" she asked softly. That was an admission that, under any other circumstances, Mulder would have leaped at with all the energy of a hungry leopard. This time he just choked back a sob and nodded. "That's why I didn't wake up for a week. My injuries weren't that severe." "So this weekend you suddenly decided to let some quack drill holes in your head?" A trace of her original anger became audible in her voice. He cringed. "Scully. I was so alone. Annaliese is gone. My father's gone. My mother won't talk to me. And you..." He looked up at her, blinking back the tears, "you're leaving me, too." Scully felt herself go pale at the first reference he had ever made to believing in the mortality of her cancer. "I was suddenly possessed with the need to find Samantha. She's the only one I've got left. If you... if I haven't found her by the time you..." His voice broke; he could not say that aloud. "I don't think I can live if I'm alone, Scully..." Scully was horrified. He was crying again, deep, soul wrenching sobs that shook his entire body. She did not try to talk to him. She just held him until he calmed a little, until he was in control, again, however marginally. "Listen, you," she said intensely. "If you get yourself killed, no one else is going to find Samantha. Keep that in mind, would you?" He blinked at her, still looking very shocky, and nodded slowly. "So. Do you know what happened to the others? Nick and Molly? Did you ever find out where Kyle was taken?" He frowned for a moment and then resurrected the memory. "Nick and Molly did get married right out of high school and they were going to college together in Boston. Molly flew down to Florida to spend Christmas with her folks that first semester and the plane crashed." Mulder took a deep breath. "Nick, well, he disappeared. Knowing how he must have felt, I imagine he's locked up in a psych ward, somewhere. I was luckier; I was unconscious when Anni..." "Have you ever tried to find out?" Scully interrupted. "A lead to him, or to Kyle, might lead to Samantha. The Consortium has a long reach. Maybe they're still keeping tabs on all of you. They've got Samantha, right? And they've probably got Kyle..." "...and probably Nick, too," Mulder agreed hesitantly. Scully suppressed a grin as she saw the hunting light beginning to glimmer in his eyes, showing even through the all-encompassing pain. "So?" she said gently. "Let's start looking for all three of them!" Before Mulder could summon up the energy to respond to that challenge, the phone in the kitchen rang. "Stay," she ordered as she stood up. "Woof," he grumbled, pushing himself to his feet. She grinned at him as she reached for the phone. "Hello?" Mulder shook himself like a dog straightening his coat; he was suddenly aware of feeling dirty, grubby, and tried to remember the last time he had showered and changed. (*In jail,*) he realized. (*And that hardly counts!*) "Sir?" The tone of Scully's voice meant only one thing: the voice on the phone was that of AD Skinner. Mulder froze. "Yes, sir, he's here with me." She paused again, listening. Mulder took a step backward. He could barely think; he did not dare try to deal rationally with their supervisor now. "No, sir, he's asleep. I gave him a sedative. He's severely stressed." Her eyes sought his and they had one of their silent conversations. She asked his permission and he gave it. Mulder turned away and headed into the bathroom. She was going to have to explain his actions during this latest misadventure and he did not want to listen. He did not remember most of it and, for once in his life, he was glad to have blank spots in his usually perfect memory. He closed the bathroom door and turned on the sink faucet, trying to drown out Scully's voice. Scully watched him go, waited until she heard the water come on, and then spoke quietly into the phone. "Sir, I've finally discovered the trigger event, and it explains a great deal about Agent Mulder's behaviors and motivations over the years I've known him and, specifically, this past weekend." "Don't be mysterious, Agent Scully!!" "Agent Mulder's wife died of natural causes on Friday, after eight years in a hospice in a persistent vegetative state after a car accident." There was a long moment of silence. "Eight years?" was the incredulous response. "Yes, sir. Brain aneurysm during surgery that failed to save the life of the unborn child she was carrying. Mulder lost his wife and son in that car accident and, as near as I can judge it, he never told anyone. He apparently didn't have anyone to tell." "Oh, my God..." Skinner's voice betrayed his shock. "My sentiments, exactly, sir." "I want a report from you on everything that happened in Rhode Island, with all the filthy details. In writing. I'll give it back to you and you can burn it, but I need to understand all this so I can work on saving his job." "I'll see what I can get to you ASAP, sir. How about an e-mail to your home address?" "That's good for me. Your official report need not betray any confidences, but should contain enough detail to justify his actions and behaviors." "I understand, sir. I'll probably get a lot done, tonight. He's quiet, now." "Take care of him, Agent Scully. Take as much time as you need. I'll sign off on it." She was startled at that concession. "Yes, sir. Thank you. We will have to go to Massachusetts; I expect he will want to take her home to bury her." "Of course. When you know when the two of you will be coming back to work, let me know." "Thank you, sir. I will." She hung up the phone and went farther into the kitchen, intentionally tripping over the kitchen chair. "Ouch, damn it," she said loudly, to let him know the phone conversation was over. She looked up, wondering if Mulder had heard her, and saw that he had opened the bathroom door, but he had not emerged. Slowly, frowning worriedly, she approached. "Mulder?" He was sitting on the floor, leaning against the tub, in the same position he had been in earlier in front of the sofa. "Mulder?" "Scully, she was like that for eight years. What sort of allegedly benevolent deity would do that to her?" "I can't answer that, Mulder. We were taught as children that everything happens according to God's plan." "Then why free will? If everything is according to some heavenly master plan, nothing we do matters!" She sighed and dropped to sit beside him. "I don't know, Mulder. I'm a pathologist, not a theologian." She paused for a moment, but he did not react to the Star Trekism, so she went on. "We were taught that we have to do the best we can while we're here." He heard her, but he did not visibly react. She scrubbed at her own face and stood up. He looked up at her. "You must be hungry and you need a shower," she smiled at him. "You get cleaned up; I'll find something for you to wear." "Scully?" She had started to turn away but she turned back when he called. "Yes?" "Thanks." It was only one word, but she could hear all the emotion behind it. She smiled, averting her eyes just a bit, almost embarrassed by all the love and affection he was projecting. "Hey, that's what partners are for!" she managed. She shut the door behind her as she left him there. She went outside, back to her car and brought up their luggage. Since he had been traveling privately, not officially on a case, Mulder had carried only a duffel bag. He had brought no suits. She had only packed an overnighter before dashing off to Rhode Island at Mulder's panic-stricken call, so she had no trouble managing it all in one trip. By the time she brought both bags into her apartment and re-locked the door behind her, she could hear the shower running. She opened the duffel bag and stared, amazed. Mulder was messy in a number of ways; he tended to leave sunflower seed husks everywhere, for example. He was notoriously meticulous, however, about his clothes, even his casual clothing. She was shocked to see the clothing in the duffel was a tangled jumble. The only pieces not mashed or wadded up were a dark green tee shirt and a pair of matching Tweety- Bird boxer shorts, pressed flat against the very bottom of the bag. There was no Dopp kit here; he had either not taken it with him, or had forgotten it. That latter was a bad sign, if true. She would have to check his apartment later. She picked up the clean clothes and went back to the bathroom door and knocked. "Hey, Mulder, are you decent?" There was no answer, so she opened the door cautiously. His clothing was piled on the floor and he was sitting on the closed lid of the commode, naked, staring blankly at the water cascading from the showerhead. "Mulder?" She was worried, now: he was dry and he was not answering her. She picked up a towel and dropped it in his lap, then knelt in front of him, laying a gentle hand on his knee. "Mulder?" "I still can't believe she's really gone," he spoke suddenly, his voice harsh. "I mean, it's not like I've thought about her every day. I'd go weeks, sometimes, without thinking about her. Especially since..." His voice trailed off and he buried his face in his hands. "Since when?" He was silent. "Since when?" she repeated. "Since you." He forced that out and she saw him start to tremble as he looked up. "I felt so guilty... There she was, lying there, day after day, and I just went about my life as if there was nothing wrong. And everything was wrong! I actually started to look forward to what was going to happen next. I knew nothing could ever come of it, but I felt it, just the same." Now he had her totally confused. "Come of what?" "Us." He would not look at her. "This connection we have." He looked up, but avoided her eyes. "I should have made you leave when you had the chance, Scully. There's nothing left here but a broken shell. I thought I could do it, but I can't. I don't have anything left to give anymore. Almost everything I was died eight years ago on the Beltway. And now..." She sat back on her heels and considered her next words carefully. She knew there was something between them that was rare. But being rare, it was also fragile and she knew that she could break it with the wrong words. "When I was in my coma, my mom told me you came into the hospital the first time like an avenging angel. Why, Mulder? Was it just because we're partners, or was it more than that? Were you so adamant about my survival because you thought that anyone you felt anything for would leave you like that and you needed to fight it off, somehow?" He shuddered, wrapped his arms around his body. He still would not look at her. She took a deep breath. "I know I can't replace Anni or Sam, or even Nick or Kyle, but..." She remembered Clyde Bruckman, then, telling her that she *didn't die.* She decided to take a chance. It might turn out to be a false promise, but suddenly she did not think so. Bruckman had been dead- on accurate about everything else, and since he could not be implying that she did not EVER die, perhaps the reference had simply been to this. "I won't leave you, Mulder," she said intensely. "I can't. I won't let them win!" She took a deep breath and reached up to frame his face with both hands, her palms against his stubbled cheeks, her thumbs brushing away the tears. "Mulder. We are going to find the people who did this to you and to Sam and Anni. I promise. We will find them and we will make them pay. You and me, together. Come on, now. Get cleaned up and by the time you do, I'll have some food ready for you. You have to be hungry." He actually opened his mouth to deny it and his stomach rumbled loudly. Scully giggled. Mulder made a sound that might have been a shaky laugh. "I never could fool you, could I, partner?" Scully knew he was not talking about being hungry. "No, you can't. What do you want to eat? I've got some of my mom's lasagna in the freezer." "No fair, Scully. You know I can't resist your mom's lasagna!" "Well, by the time you get done in here, it'll be ready." She got to her feet and handed him the clean clothes. "Here. I'm going to throw a load of laundry in." She gathered up all the clothing he had piled on the floor. "Twenty minutes. There's a new razor on the top shelf and I think there's a new toothbrush up there, too." "Thanks, Scully." "You're welcome, Mulder." She pulled the door shut behind her. +++ The shower relaxed him, as she had known it would. She was not particularly surprised when he fell asleep on the couch, his brownie sundae only half-eaten. She pulled the bowl out of his hand where it balanced precariously on the arm of the couch. She pulled his feet up and then tucked him in with the afghan that her grandmother had made for her to take to her very first apartment. She stared down at him, seeing all the grief and pain still visibly carved into his face, and sighed. (*Married. And all this time I thought there was something wrong with me, that I could want him this badly and he didn't want me at all. Now, I know it was never true, and he needs me desperately. I can't let him get too close. I can't let him become dependent on me. Clyde might be wrong, and another death, so close, might be more than he can take...*) She sighed again; there was nothing to be done about it, now. She stacked the dishes and went to bed. She added a coda to her prayers for her partner's wife's soul... and a little extra for him. +++ The next morning Mulder took Scully out to brunch and then she took him home. She was still unwilling to leave him alone, but had not figured out a way to tell him. He wandered into his darkened apartment aimlessly. She watched him as he ended up by the aquarium and moved mechanically to feed the fish. He stood staring at their eager activity. As the goldfish consumed the processed flake food with every evidence of delight, his eyes drifted away, drifted up to a shelf at his eye level. He cocked his head to the right, as if puzzled, and reached for something buried under a stack of books and magazines. The item proved to be an old photo album. He turned toward the couch and opened the album to a random page. He dropped into the leather embrace as if someone had tripped him. "Mulder?!" Scully dashed across the room. By the time she got there he was staring at the album open across his knees. "Mulder? What did you find?" "This is the six of us." He showed her a snapshot of six small children sitting on the back porch of a big house, all happily eating ice cream cones. "This was taken at Nickie's and Molly's birthday party the year they turned seven." Scully studied the photo. The young Fox was instantly recognizable to her, of course, though he was much younger in this picture than in the ones she had seen before. He was sitting, shoulder to shoulder, hip to hip, knee to knee, with a slim and lovely girl with big dark eyes and dark brown hair that waved gently around her face. She was leaning her head against Fox's; Scully thought that the body language seemed too mature for children of their apparent calendar age. "How old were you?" "Eight and a half." His voice was steady, calm, but the finger that traced Annaliese's contented face was trembling. "She's telling me how much she thinks Molly's dad looks like Martin Landau of Mission: Impossible." Scully noticed that Annaliese had been eating ice cream at the moment the shutter had clicked. She could not have been speaking. "I recognize you and Samantha. Who are the others?" His finger tapped the little red-haired boy sitting beside Samantha on the step below Fox and Anni. "That's Kyle. He's four days older than Samantha." His finger tapped the two medium-sized blonds. "These two are Molly and Nickie. They were born the same day. Nickie was an hour older and never let Molly forget it." Scully studied the children. Samantha was sitting between her brother's feet, but she and Kyle were eating each other's ice cream. They were holding hands. Fox and Anni were leaning on one another, their expressions turned inward. Molly was smiling a huge gap- toothed smile as Nickie delicately brushed one of her curls out of her ice cream. It took Scully a moment to figure it out, but suddenly it leapt out at her. "The six of you are sitting in a circle, touching," she realized. "You to Anni, Anni to Nickie, Nickie to Molly, Molly to Kyle, Kyle to Samantha, Samantha back to you." She looked up at Mulder, then, and saw that his eyes were closed, his face twisted with grief as tears ran down his face. He was fighting it, but the grief was too fresh. She took a deep breath and moved very slowly, shifting until her thigh lay alongside his, just touching for their whole length. Mulder froze, then opened his eyes to stare at her. She leaned against him ever so lightly. "You aren't alone, Mulder. Never think that." Hesitantly, as if he feared a rebuff, he put his arm around her and pulled her snug against his side. She allowed it; she even smiled at him. Encouraged, he set the photo album aside, put his other arm around her and made it a real hug. Scully slipped around to face him, slid her arms around his body to return the hold. "How could I have forgotten all this, Scully?" he asked. She considered that as she held him and the answer came to her abruptly. "Mulder?" "Hmm?" "What did you see on Ellens Air Force Base?" He went very still, then pushed her far enough away that he could see her. "I don't know. I don't remember anything, Scully. You know that." "And you were sick when I got you back. You weren't right for nearly thirty-six hours," she reminded him. "Your eyes were bloodshot and you were unsteady on your feet. You wouldn't eat until we got home, and that was nearly forty hours after you were released. Why were you ill, Mulder?" His eyes were unfocused as he remembered that incident, so long ago... it had been their second case together. "I was drugged," he breathed as the memory came clear. "My eyes... I think they put it in my eyes... It burns. I can hear Samantha screaming, and Anni's crying because she knows she's next..." He doubled over, his eyes screwed shut against remembered pain and terror. Scully kept her hold on him and he buried his face against her body as he wrestled for control of the emotional roller coaster he was riding. Very slowly she felt him relax. "Mulder?" He was limp in her lap and she realized that he had fallen asleep. Slowly, being careful not to jostle him, she settled back to make herself a little more comfortable. His old brown blanket was thrown over the back of the couch and she pulled it down to spread it over him. He moved in his sleep to nestle closer to her and then went still again as she tucked him in. (*I can think of worse ways to spend an afternoon...*) Her fingers stroked lightly through his hair, over and over, almost hypnotically. +++ Scully watched her partner intensely in the days that followed, which included the funeral in Chilmark. It was attended by herself, Mulder, the Lone Gunmen, and much to everyone's surprise, AD Skinner. She was attentive through the first days back at work as well: Skinner's efforts to salvage Mulder's career had been successful. Mulder stayed at her apartment, on her couch, through all those stressful days leading up to the funeral and for two weeks afterward. His presence, and the cloud of imperfectly suppressed grief that engulfed him, kept her sleep light. Every time he made the slightest sound she woke up. She left him alone, even when she heard him crying, until she decided that he had been lost in grief too long; then she would get up and sit with him for a while. He was not sleeping very much, which did not really surprise her. When he did, he was frequently awakened by nightmares and his screams would wake her up. The first time it happened was the night after the funeral; they were in adjoining hotel rooms on Martha's Vineyard. Scully was soundly asleep when she was rudely awakened by an enraged scream from the next room. She did not have to think--she simply rolled out of bed and dashed in through the connecting door. She found Mulder fighting off some image from his dream, screaming and cursing. "Mulder! Wake up! Mulder!" But he did not seem to hear her. She leaned over to shake him and had to duck as he struck toward her with a fist. He tried to get up, tripped over her and landed hard on the flimsy round-topped table which collapsed beneath him. The room was suddenly silent except for the sound of two people trying to catch their breath. Mulder pushed himself off the broken table and rolled over to lie on his back on the floor. Scully sat up. "Mulder? Are you awake?" He sat up, wrapped his arms around himself, and began to rock back and forth. "Mulder? Are you hurt? You fell awfully hard..." She came closer and her hands came down on his shoulders. He flinched away from her. "Mulder? What was that?" He blinked a couple of times, shook his head, and finally focused on her. "Scully...?" She smiled tenderly. "Of course it's me." She sat down beside him, nestling close. He wrapped his arms around her and held her tightly. She let him hold on for a while, until his breathing calmed, and he relaxed a little. "Okay," she said softly. "What was that all about?" "I was in the woods, in the dark... There was a campfire and a few other guys... And then, suddenly, they all jumped me, pinned me down and cut off my arm with a big knife. I tried to fight, but there were too many of them. All I could do was scream, it hurt so bad..." He shuddered and took a deep breath. "And you want to hear the weird part?" "Weirder than that?! What?" "I could swear we were all speaking Russian." Scully swallowed hard and when she spoke the words came out slowly. "That's what it sounded like," she said quietly. He stared down at her. "What?!" "You were screaming and cursing... and I couldn't understand a word of it. Sounded like Russian to me." It was some time before he could settle down and longer before either of them slept. +++ Gradually, the raw wound of his grief began to heal. Three days after the funeral he was back at work. Mulder was still grieving deeply, still given to long periods of utter silence and long walks through the cavernous basement halls when he needed to be alone. He could not stand to be alone, but the company of most people grated on him terribly. He stayed in the basement and let Scully do all their errands around the building. They were trained investigators and, as FBI Special Agents, they had authorized access to a lot of records. Mulder concentrated on remembering everything he could about Kyle Decker, Nicolai Lermontov and Samantha Mulder: physical descriptions, birth dates, family names. They collected all the records they could on all three; Mulder concentrated his efforts on the boys and Scully did all the work on Samantha. It was his idea, but she agreed at once. +++ FBI Building, X Files Office Washington DC several months later (the week before a scheduled trip to Florida for a partnership seminar) Scully came to work that morning with a real smile on her face. Mulder had been to work every single day since they had returned from the funeral, even weekends. She was a little worried about that, but knew it was mostly because he wasn't ready to be alone with himself just yet. She expected him to already be there when she arrived. He was not there and her smile slipped. (*Holy Mary, please, tell me he hasn't ditched me again.*) "Morning, Scully." She turned and saw with relief that he had only gone for coffee. He handed her one of the cups he held and she accepted it with a smile. "Thanks, Mulder." "You're welcome." He went and sat down at his desk. She studied him as she set her coffee cup down. He still was not his usual pleasant self, but he was getting better every day. She took a deep breath and reached into her attach . She pulled out two empty, flattened half-gallon milk cartons, popped them back into shape, more or less, and set them on his desk. He only glanced at them before looking up at her. "What's this, Scully?" "Look at them," she nodded. Obediently, he picked up the one fractionally closer, and froze when he saw his sister's eight- year-old smile depicted there. Then he saw the young woman's face below and inhaled sharply. "Did you do this, Scully?" She nodded. "I took photos of her and Kyle, of your parents and his, and a couple of you to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. They took the photos, digitized them and age-progressed them. Kyle's on the other carton. As far as I could determine, Kyle Decker was never reported missing. His school records cease in Chilmark in third grade and never resume anywhere. I told the Center that it was possible his parents were killed at or near the time of his disappearance, although their bodies were not found in Chilmark and have never been identified." Mulder was still staring at the computer-generated photo of his sister as an adult. She looked nothing like the sincere- sounding young woman who had died on the bridge. "Scully, this is wonderful!" She was warmed by his response. "This way, if she's in the world anywhere, even if she doesn't know she used to be Samantha Mulder, someone may call with a suspicion. Now you have two hundred million assistants looking for her and for Kyle." He tore his eyes away from the photo to meet hers for the first time. She caught her breath; he was smiling faintly, though there were tears in his eyes. (*That's the first time he's really smiled since Annaliese died!*) Scully realized triumphantly. "Thank you, Scully." "You're welcome, Mulder." +++ One Week Later On the other side of the continent A young couple was seated at their breakfast table. They stared at one another, horrified, at the photographs on the carton of milk that stood on the table between them. = = = = to be continued in The Chilmark Project: Part II - "Mother's Day" = = = = Authors' Notes: There is more. It's just not ready, yet. It's written. But it's not ready. Be patient. You will be rewarded.