FF: First Flight (3/3))
Title: First Flight
Author: Ellie (windblownellie@yahoo.com)
Rating: PG-13, for language and graphic images
Category: X, M/S UST, AU (veers off mid-S4 after Memento Mori)
Summary: Mulder and Scully meet a woman who may
provide answers about the origins of Scully's cancer.
Author's Notes: This is for Niki, who taught me so
much, and the memory of Mosby's, which will be much-
missed.
Major beta thanks to XScribe for comments, advice, and
smoothing over the rough edges.
****
Chapter 7
****
For the first time in several years, Mulder settled
himself into an orange plastic chair in the autopsy
bay, watching Scully as she began the autopsy on
Beatrice Stevens. He'd been eager to sit in, and she
had no particular objection. In autopsies past, he
had usually been more of a hindrance than a help, but
today she was inexplicably grateful for the silent
company. If he'd asked her, of course, she would have
simply said she was in an indulgent mood. She had to
admit, too, that he did occasionally ask questions
that led her in a useful direction with her
examination.
She worked slowly, taking her time and double-checking
everything. As she progressed, she took samples,
carefully tagging them for laboratory testing. Along
with the mounting stack of samples for testing were an
increasing number of questions. While she hoped the
lab work would provide answers, she doubted that would
be the case. Mulder had allowed her to work without
interruption, though she could feel him watching her
every move.
Two hours into the autopsy, she paused to stretch, her
shoulders and back popping as she did so. Before
returning to the body, she caught Mulder's gaze,
inviting his inquiry.
"Find anything, Scully?"
She sighed. "Unless something shows up on the tox
screen, the cause of death was cardiac arrest."
"Heart attack?"
"Well, technically. But I'm at a loss to explain the
cause of that--she was in excellent shape for her age.
There's minimal atherosclerosis. It's looking more
like her body just...stopped, instantly." She paused
and looked down at the body open in front of her.
"I'm running enzyme tests, but because she died so
rapidly, I doubt that they'll tell us much."
Mulder just nodded and settled back into the chair,
surprising her. She'd expected him to press for more
information or theories.
She returned to work, cautiously tipping the body onto
its side, then peering at the scar on the back of
Beatrice's neck. It was small, faint, and would
probably have been missed by someone not knowing what
to look for. But then, she told herself, it could
just be a coincidence. Yet given the number of
coincidences on this case, she felt it unlikely.
With a gloved finger, she carefully probed the skin
before making a shallow incision with her scalpel. In
seconds, she saw what she feared she would find.
"Mulder."
Her voice caused him to snap to attention, bouncing
toward the edge of his seat. "What did you find?"
"Come here."
She exchanged her scalpel for a delicate pair of
tweezers, and extracted a small microchip. As Mulder
reached her side, she held it out for him.
When she dropped it into a Petri dish, both stared at
it silently for a long moment.
****
Mulder looked up into the camera as he waited for the
Gunmen to buzz him into their lair. One hand remained
in his coat pocket, lightly grasping the Petri dish
there. The other hand toyed with the door handle,
giving it a swift tug when he was finally granted
entrance. The long hallway back to their offices was
dark, and he had to walk carefully to avoid the piles
of paperwork and unidentified mechanical parts.
"Mulder, my man." Frohike's voice rang across the
electronics-filled room as Mulder entered. "What have
you brought for us today?"
He removed the chip from his pocket, setting the Petri
dish on the cluttered countertop next to one of the
computers. "Scully found this today."
Langly looked away from one of the monitors long
enough to take in the chip. "Whoa. Another one?"
"Yes." Mulder felt no need to elaborate. Langly's
startled question was enough to draw Byers and Frohike
in for a closer look.
"Is this related to Agent Scully's current health
situation?" Byers' inquiry was tentative, and he
spoke from behind Langly.
"Not directly. It's related to a case we're currently
investigating. But the case does seem to have some
parallels."
Frohike pushed Mulder aside and removed the chip,
placing it on a microscope. Langly clicked a few
buttons on the computer, and the chip appeared, ten
times larger, on screen.
Mulder looked around at the faces of the Gunmen, all
staring carefully at the magnified image. "Well?"
"Well, it looks an awful lot like the one you and
Scully brought us." Langly clicked away as he spoke,
pulling up an image of the chip that had been removed
from Scully's neck.
Side by side, the images were nearly identical.
Frohike reached for the microscope, carefully shifting
the chip a few degrees to the left. Langly zoomed in
once more, bringing the details of the chip into the
foreground.
"I looks like the processors are a bit less advanced
than the one removed from Agent Scully," commented
Frohike, tracing a few of the electronic components
and addressing Langley.
"Yeah. I'd definitely say it's an older model."
Langley clicked away once more, bringing a similar but
streamlined image onto the screen. "Look at that.
Totally version 2.0."
"You boys all agree we're looking at the same thing
here? But a slightly different model?" Mulder
squinted at the monitor, trying to spot the
differences between the chips.
"There are some minimal differences in the exact
components used, but they're essentially the same
thing." Byers sounded certain. He reached out a
finger, tracing a group of tiny wires on Scully's
chip. "See this circuit? Not wired exactly how I
would expect it to be, but in and of itself nothing
unusual." He traced a similar set on the chip from
Beatrice. "But it's exactly the same way here, just
with slightly different wires."
Mulder continued to stare at the monitor, looking
between the two almost-identical images.
"Does this make those parallels a whole lot closer?"
Frohike queried, toying with the microscope set up,
bringing the chip into sharper relief.
"A whole lot closer," Mulder echoed.
****
Wind rustled through the tender spring leaves and
pushed puffy clouds across the slender moon.
Charlotte watched the ghostly clouds race overhead as
she rocked back in the worn, wooden chair. The wicker
seat creaked as she shifted, nearly drowning out the
sound of approaching footsteps on the gravel walkway.
The figure was a silhouette in the dark as it emerged
around the corner of the house. Only when the figure
halted at the bottom of the steps did Charlotte deign
to look down, noting the thin wisp of smoke floating
away into the darkness.
"You've got a lot of nerve showing up here tonight,
Charles."
"And you've got a lot of nerve to speak to me that
way, young lady." He stepped out of the shrubbery's
shadows and dropped the cigarette into the gravel.
"Young lady, am I?" she drawled. "Compared to you, I
suppose I am. But I think it's more than justified,
given the circumstances." She didn't move from the
rocker, simply gazed coolly down at him.
"You had to know what the outcome of this would be.
Especially after your little luncheon. You're lucky
you haven't met a similar fate."
"I told Agent Mulder nothing of use."
"Your mother would have been wise to do the same." He
stepped closer to the porch, once again standing in
the shadows.
Charlotte sat up straighter, poised on the edge of the
chair. "You took great care to make sure she didn't
reveal more than you wished. It never did sit well
with you when someone actually knew what game they
were playing with you."
"But you're well aware of the dangerous game you're
playing now, my dear."
"I am." She leveled a hard look at him, focusing on
the faint sparkle of his eyes in the darkness.
His eyes traced over her sitting form before he
answered. "You always were a gambler like your
father. Are you sure the odds aren't too high for you
this time? The stakes are very high."
"That's what makes the payoff worthwhile." She
finally looked away, out towards the pastures where
the dark shadows of horses could be seen grazing.
"And occasionally there are chances you have to take,
because not taking them isn't an option."
"You would risk everything we've worked for--your
father worked for--over this?"
"Are you barking mad?" She whipped around to look at
him incredulously. "A few harmless chips, brief
disappearances, the deaths of a few animals--that was
all justifiable. Unpleasant, but justifiable. But to
dispose so casually with the daughter, widow and
mother of those who have been involved since the
beginning is the most reprehensible thing you've ever
done. And you've done a lot of reprehensible things."
"You don't have much room to criticize my behavior,
Charlotte. You're no angel." He withdrew a pack of
cigarettes from his coat pocket, taking his time in
lighting one before offering the pack to her.
"No thank you," she said. "I'm well aware of what
I've done."
"Then you should think very carefully about what your
next move should be. You know there's only one out in
this--you've known that since the beginning."
"I never said I wanted out. But that doesn't mean I
don't want retribution." She settled back into the
chair, crossing her arms against her chest.
"There's no having it both ways. And I don't think
you'll find the others any more amenable to
retribution or restitution than I am." He took a long
drag on the cigarette, the end flaring red in the
dark. "We'll expect you at the meeting, to settle
this matter once and for all. I suggest you weigh
your words there carefully."
"I wonder whether I haven't already been weighed and
measured. I doubt my words will make a bit of
difference." She pushed off with one foot, slowly
rocking the chair. "Just give me time to grieve
this."
"A few days may give you a much better perspective on
all this, in the grand scheme of things."
"Indeed." She refused to be baited further by him.
For several minutes, they both rested in uneasy
silence on the porch. When a shrill whinny broke the
night, he turned away from her.
"Good night, Charlotte."
She didn't respond as he disappeared back down the
walkway into the still Virginia night.
****
Chapter 8
****
Scully shuffled into the office and Mulder instantly
regretted the ruin of her weekend. He'd known she
needed rest, but he'd also needed her on the case with
him. His guilt increased when she sat down,
motionless at her desk, without turning on her
computer.
"Did the preliminary test results come in yet?" she
finally asked.
"Yeah, they did." He rose and carried the bulky
envelope to her desk, resting it gently on the corner.
He took one step back, resting against a filing
cabinet as she tore into the package.
There was silence as she flipped through the pages,
occasionally nodding her head or frowning.
"Well, what do you think?"
"There's absolutely nothing in any of these tests to
indicate cause of death. No elevated enzyme levels,
no foreign substances. Nothing," she said. "For no
apparent reason, her body systems just shut down."
"Which is something, though, right?"
"Oh," she said with a sigh, "I don't have the energy
to play 'is this something?' with you on this case
again. Any other time, I'd say it wasn't, and that
plenty of people drop dead from nothing more than old
age every day. But like the cancer in her animals,
there are too many coincidences here for them to be
just coincidences."
He nodded and took in the exhausted resignation in her
voice. "So where do you suggest we go from here?"
For a moment she stared down at the test results, then
said, "Well, I don't know that there's much of a case
now. There's no medical evidence that Beatrice
Stevens' death was from anything but natural causes.
The animals are, for all legal intents and purposes,
property, whatever emotional attachments we chose to
place on them. Without a property owner interested in
pursuing the matter..."
"There is no investigation," he finished for her.
Both were quiet for a moment, and he studied her pale
face. He would almost be happy to give up this case,
to stay in the office doing inane paperwork for
several months. But this case had offered a possible
solution, tantalizing clues that seemed to point to
answers to his questions and her health problems.
Could he just walk away from that?
"I know you don't want to leave it, Mulder, but unless
one of her children is interested in pursuing it, I
fail to see how we can."
"There were just so many pieces of the puzzle here,
floating just under the surface. If I just had the
right lens, I could have seen them all, put them all
together-"
"Don't do this to yourself, not over this," she said.
"I know you would have liked to untangle this mess, to
find answers. Personally, I-I think I would have
liked some answers about all of this, too." She
stared down at her hands, denying him the opportunity
to study her face as she spoke.
"That's the biggest reason I wanted this case." He
spoke honestly, emotions close to the surface. He
needed her to know he felt this almost as deeply as
she did--that he wanted this for her. "This could
have saved you."
"You don't know that. It might have," she paused and
met his gaze before correcting herself, "looked likely
to provide some of the answers we've been hunting for.
But I'm not willing to make deals with the devil or
operate outside the boundaries of the law to find
them. Especially when we don't know whether they'll
really be of help to us. To me."
"You don't think the evidence we've seen on this case
was genuine? After being warned off it by that chain-
smoking bastard and seeing the woman who presented it
to us die under questionable circumstances?"
She shook her head. "I think Beatrice was truthful
about what she knew had happened. But you of all
people know that truth can be subjective. The
information we've seen on this case, though,
especially given the smoking man's involvement, I
can't quite bring myself to trust. It may be as much
of a red herring as Charlotte's denials of insurance
fraud--it looks and sounds plausible, but is it
really?"
"But what if it's not? What if pursuing this would
have revealed a cure for you, and answers about the
tests that were inflicted on innumerable women across
the country?" He knew he sounded as righteously angry
as he felt.
"Then it means I won't have a cure and we won't have
answers." How did she manage to sound so pragmatic?
"We're no worse off than before we took this case."
He raked his gaze over her, noticing a thousand tiny
ways in which she seemed much worse off than when
they'd taken this case. "Can you honestly tell me
you're not any worse?"
That seemed to spark something in her. "While I can't
tell you that I'm better, I also can't say that I'm
worse. But I'm undergoing treatment that has been
scientifically proven to help. That's worth far more
in my book than the speculation and presumptions we've
worked under on this case."
"Fair enough."
Mulder settled back down behind his desk, and Scully
turned back to hers. She finally started up the
computer and was checking her messages when he rose,
loudly jangling change in his pocket. "I'm going to
grab a soda. You want anything?"
"No, thank you." She didn't glance away from the
monitor as he passed.
When he returned from the vending machines, she was
still scrolling through the messages. He paused in
the doorway, watching and wondering if she was even
reading the messages, or merely putting in the
appearance of doing something. Closer to the latter,
he decided, as she stared for a long moment at what he
knew to be a reminder about the carpet cleaning due to
take place over the coming weekend.
Without a word, he walked back to his desk, pausing
only to place a small, yellow package on the corner of
hers. As he sat, he heard the crinkle as she picked
it up, then the split second of silence before she
ripped it open.
"Thanks," she said, her voice slightly garbled by the
peanut M&M she crunched down on as she spoke.
They continued playing at normality at their desks for
the rest of the afternoon.
****
The pungent scent of permanent marker ink filled her
nostrils as she finished addressing the manila
envelope. The padding inside crackled as she firmly
pressed the seal closed. It was all a bit more than
was necessary, of course--the tiny metal cylinder now
enclosed within certainly would withstand anything
that the US Post Office could throw at it. Just to be
safe, though, she reached into the top desk drawer and
withdrew a stamp. Pressing it to the front of the
envelope, she emblazoned FRAGILE in vivid scarlet.
The cylinder was small, barely making a bulge in the
mailer. For a moment, she worried about sending it
through so public a source as the US Mail. But she
returned to her original rationalization that hiding
in plain view was often the most secure camouflage of
all. And if she hurried, it could be in the mail
tonight, for delivery tomorrow.
Surely that would buy the valuable package enough of a
chance of arriving at its destination. So long as no
one realized it had come from her, perhaps she might
even see the fruits of its successful delivery.
****
Like a young child on Christmas morning, it was all
Mulder could do to resist ripping open the small
envelope that had arrived for Scully. With great
restraint, he'd placed it on her desk, propped against
the edge of her keyboard where he was sure she would
notice it immediately and put his curiosity to rest.
At the moment, his interest over the package was
tempered only by his concern over Scully's
whereabouts. It was around the time she had taken to
drifting into the office after her radiation
treatments, stolidly keeping up the façade of working.
Neither of them were getting much work done, but he
respected her effort enough not to mention it. And he
knew that she had taken that first Monday off to humor
him; further such suggestions would not be met so
well.
The trilling of his phone broke into his reverie.
"Mulder."
"It's me," Scully whispered over the line.
"Hey, Scully, where are you? There's something
waiting here for you."
"Oh." There was a moment of static before she
continued, "It'll have to wait for tomorrow. Put it
in the fridge. I'm not...I won't be in this
afternoon."
He smiled as he answered, "I wasn't talking about your
salad, but I'll put that in the fridge for you. Are
you feeling okay?"
"I'm fine, just tired. Working over the weekend
caught up with me. I've got journals here to catch up
on. I can read my mail tomorrow."
"Sure, get some rest. I'll catch you later, Scully."
"See you tomorrow."
He heard the beep across the line as she terminated
the call. He couldn't help but stare at the package
as he replaced the receiver on the cradle. Maybe
another Cosi visit was in order.
****
She wasn't surprised when a knock at the door roused
her from half-heartedly reading. The news ticker on
CNN told her it was nearly six; she'd passed the
afternoon without accomplishing a thing. Tossing the
latest issue of the New England Journal of Medicine
aside, she made a beeline for the door.
Without looking through the peephole, she swung the
door open wide; there was only one person it could be.
"Come in, Mulder."
He stepped into the apartment, the paper bag
containing dinner rustling with the movement. "I
brought sandwiches. I thought you might not feel like
cooking."
That earned him a smile as she locked the door once
more. "I never like cooking. But what's in the
envelope?"
"This arrived for you in the mail today. It doesn't
feel like there's much inside."
"You were groping my mail?" She barely stifled a
laugh as she reached for the small manila envelope.
"Just a little." He handed it to her and carried
their dinner into the kitchen. "It was mailed
yesterday from the post office by Farragut Square," he
called back over his shoulder, to where she stood
starting perplexedly at the envelope. "I don't
recognize the handwriting, and there's no return
address."
"Suspicious," she concurred, walking into the kitchen
herself and placing the envelope on the table. She
left it there as she found plates in her cupboards and
handed them to Mulder, who was eagerly unwrapping a
still-steaming tuna melt. "How close did you come to
ripping it open without me there?"
"Pretty damn close."
"You must have been terrible at Christmas."
"My parents made a rule when I was younger, that I was
not allowed out of bed before seven a.m. on Christmas
morning for any reason." He frowned and placed a
ginger chicken sandwich on the plate she proffered
him. "I used to bribe Sam with candy canes to go see
what was under the tree."
They were both quiet as they sat down at her table,
plates buffering the space between them.
Scully cleared her throat after a bite of sandwich.
"So this envelope arrived for me today, and you have
managed to avoid opening it. But you have your
suspicions on what's inside." It wasn't a question;
she knew he needed little encouragement to offer up
speculation, even when the question could easily be
settled by ripping the paper right now.
"I think it's from Charlotte Stevens." Scully's
raised eyebrow prompted him to continue, "The
handwriting looks feminine. I think she's doing what
she can to answer for her mother's death."
"By sending me an envelope." She put down her
sandwich and reached for the envelope, turning it over
in her hands. One small bulge was visible, and the
only sound was from the crinkling of plastic packing,
not from any notes.
Mulder held out a hand in invitation. "So open it and
find out for sure."
The kitchen suddenly seemed preternaturally silent.
The sound of the envelope being torn open was
astonishingly loud in the silence. Scully squeezed
the sides of the envelope, causing it to gape open.
She tilted it towards her face and stared inside,
confusion furrowing her brow.
She pushed her plate away, then tipped the envelope
sideways. With a metallic thunk, a silver cylinder,
no bigger than her pinkie finger, fell to the table
and rolled a few inches, coming to rest against her
napkin.
Before she could pick it up, Mulder's hand snaked
across the table and bore it away for his own
examination. She looked on in frustration as he
stared, nearly cross-eyed, at it, rolling it between
fingers that obscured it from her view.
Suddenly, he brought it down to table level and
twisted one end, which came off in his fingers.
"Stop, Mulder." He did, meeting her gaze without a
word. "We can't just open up whatever that is on my
kitchen table."
"And where do you suggest we examine it? The lab at
work?"
No, that struck her as a worse idea than experimenting
on her table. "The Gunmen?" she ventured.
Mulder was already pulling out his cell phone as he
nodded in assent.
****
Chapter 9
****
Mulder shifted impatiently from foot to foot as Scully
and Byers took turns gazing though the microscope. He
was getting an eerie feeling of déjà vu as Langly
called a series of images up on the computer monitor.
"Yeah, so this looks pretty similar," Langly said,
nodding to the side-by-side images on the monitor.
They looked identical to Mulder. "Which is which?"
"This one's from before," said Langly as he pointed to
the image on the left. "And this one is the one you
brought us tonight."
Mulder stood frozen, captivated by the images before
him. His fixation on the monitor broke only when
Scully took a few steps backwards. She'd been quiet
since they'd opened the tiny tube to reveal a
microchip. Now she was slowly disengaging from the
situation. The Gunmen were too engrossed in examining
their newest piece of mystery technology to pay much
heed, but Mulder noticed, saying nothing as she edged
out of the computer-filled room. He simply followed
her.
She had to know he was behind her; the poured concrete
floor did little to muffle either of their footsteps.
Still, neither of them spoke as she strode rapidly
down the cluttered hallway, maneuvering adroitly
around racks of electronics and piles of old
magazines. Mulder trailed two steps behind.
When she reached what passed for the Gunmen's kitchen,
she finally halted, her back to Mulder and her hands
planted firmly on the counter on either side of her.
"Scully?" Mulder's voice seemed terribly loud as it
echoed off the Formica and plastic of the kitchen.
Without thinking, he reached out for her, fingers
barely grazing her shoulder.
She drew up and away from his touch, pressing closer
against the battered puce countertop. "Mulder, I
just.... Give me a minute, okay?" She didn't turn to
face him.
He didn't respond, simply stepped away towards the
refrigerator. He pulled out two Diet Cokes and walked
to the ancient dinette set, sitting down and placing
the second can directly across the table from him. He
could hear her drawing a few deep breaths as he
snapped open the can. The sharp sound finally drew
Scully's attention, and she glanced back over her
shoulder at him.
Without a word, she crossed to the table and dropped
into the rickety metal chair across from him.
"Thanks." She popped open the can and took a sip,
buying herself yet more time to think.
Mulder waited.
"I don't know what to think," she finally said.
Mulder nodded and sat his can on the table, staring at
it rather than her. Abruptly, he looked up at her.
"How do you feel?"
Mulder could see the panic flicker across her face
before she replied. "It scares the shit out of me.
This is so far outside the realm of what I understand
about our medical technology that I don't even know
how to think about it." She drew a deep breath and
continued in a whisper, "It terrifies me to think that
I'm entangled in this."
All Mulder could do was nod and let her talk. He was
startled when she reached across the table and latched
onto his hand.
"There's someone out there with the ability to get to
anyone, anywhere. Who got to me. Someone who can
make information disappear and answers appear out of
thin air. And I don't know whether to be more
frightened by the power that these unknowns have, or
by the fact that this chip might not do what we're
meant to think it will."
"But Scully--"
"No, that's a possibility we have to consider. We
have no idea where that chip came from. I know you
want to believe it's a cure for me, but we have no
proof at all that putting a chip back into my neck
will ameliorate matters. What if it makes them
worse?"
Mulder saw the unspoken fear in her eyes, and being a
natural paranoid, he knew what was worrying her. What
if this chip did nothing? What if it caused her
cancer to metastasize more rapidly? What if They
could use it to control her? What if this chip killed
her?
Too many what-ifs.
For once, he kept his darker concerns to himself.
"What do you want to do?"
She graced him with a watery smile. "Do you think the
risk is worth taking?"
He was stunned and it took him a moment to formulate a
response. "I can't fathom not taking a chance that
could save your life. I think that potential good
outweighs all the other risks."
Slowly, her head bobbed in assent, and it seemed an
eternity before she quietly responded, "I'm not ready
to die yet."
"I'm not going to let you." He rose from the table
and used her grip on his hand to draw her up as well,
watching as the protest died on her lips. For just a
moment she tensed as he wrapped his arms around her,
then she returned the embrace.
He reluctantly drew away from her and looked down at
her face. There was fear and worry there, but also
determination. "So let's go figure out how to make
this happen."
The mood was much lighter as they maneuvered back down
the Gunmen's cluttered hallway. The men looked up as
Mulder and Scully returned to the room, seemingly
startled to realize they'd been missing at all.
****
Charlotte walked down the dim hallway, heels
connecting sharply with the herringboned hardwood
floor. When she reached the elegantly carved door
that loomed over the corridor, she rapped three times.
After a moment, the door swung open. All the old
familiar faces were there, though once more it struck
her how odd it was to see Marcus sitting in what had
been her father's wingback chair. It should be her
place.
The room was brighter than the hallway, but not by
much. Heavy draperies hung at the windows, blocking
much of the bright morning light. Two white stripes
broke through, making the darkness elsewhere seem much
more prominent. In the light beams, she could see
flecks of dust floating in the air. Everything here
smelled faintly of cigars.
"Charlotte my dear, so glad you could join us."
Stepping out of the darkness between two windows, CGB
Spender approached her. He gestured towards one of
the old cordovan leather chairs, urging her to sit.
The others, who had been socializing in small groups
around the room, moved to do the same.
A wizened man with a faintly British accent spoke as
the last members gathered around. "So has the Stevens
issue been resolved, Charles?"
Spender exhaled a cloud of smoke, which drifted up to
join the smoky haze lingering around the ceiling. "It
has, Richard, unless there's something our own Miss
Stevens would like to add."
Everyone in the room turned to look at her. She still
wasn't quite sure what to say to them, despite a day
spent thinking of little else. Even the funeral
planning had fallen to Thom as she planned for this
meeting. After a deep breath, she said, "Yes, there
is something I would like to add. While I realize
that some action was necessary to prevent Beatrice
Stevens from revealing information to the FBI, I don't
believe the manner of resolution was an appropriate
one."
"And what would you have had me do?" Spender
continued to gaze placidly at her. "Certainly those
who have crossed us in the past have met worse ends.
Of the possible solutions, this was the most humane."
Several of the other men nodded in assent.
Charlotte shook her head. "I don't know that it was
necessary to dispatch with her at all. She was a
woman of discretion, who knew that some information
was best kept to oneself. She was privy to secrets
over the years that she managed to keep. I feel sure
that had this been discussed with me before any action
was taken, I could have spoken with her and dissuaded
her from cooperating further with Agent Mulder."
"Just as you avoided cooperating with Agent Mulder?"
There was a nasty edge to Spender's voice.
"Just as you've done so much to hinder him over the
years."
The assemblage looked between the two of them as they
spoke, like the crowd at Wimbledon.
"You're treading on dangerous ground, Miss Stevens.
Don't speak on matters you have not been fully
apprised of."
"I think I know enough to put two and two together on
this. I did meet with Agents Mulder and Scully over
lunch, but told them nothing of help. Unless you
count the suggestion that my mother was involved in
fraud 'helpful'."
"Enough of this," barked a voice with a harsh New York
accent. "We're getting nowhere here. What's done is
done. As much power as the committee has, Charlotte,
we cannot raise the dead."
"I understand that very well, Johnny."
"So what would you have me do?" Johnny took a long
drag on his cigar, the end sparking to red.
"Nothing here can be undone," Charlotte said. "But I
ask that in the future, should such situations arise
with the families of those involved here, they be
apprised of the circumstances. My mother didn't know
what she was revealing--if she'd known it was a matter
of such importance, she would never have spoken a
word."
Around the room, heads nodded in assent. Their
families may not have known the nature of their work,
but they all understood its importance.
"Agreed," said Richard with a nod. "Now, on to more
pressing matters. I believe you have an update for
us, Marcus?"
Charlotte relaxed back into the comfortable leather
chair as Marcus began outlining his engineers' most
recent achievement.
****
Chapter 10
****
Mulder sat in another uncomfortable orange chair,
waiting. He'd calculated the number of ceiling tiles
in the hallway--214--and monitored the average length
of time the doctors spent in their patients' rooms--
six minutes--and was now busy figuring out the ratio
of avocado floor tiles to melon ones.
The door to Scully's room swung open and the doctor's
shoes squeaked against the garish tiles. Mulder
barely looked at him; the doctor had been clear in his
opinion of Mulder when he and Scully had presented the
chip to be implanted into her neck. The doctor had
thought they were both crazy, and had nearly refused
to be involved. It had of course been Scully who
convinced him that there would be no harm in trying.
Either nothing would happen and she would resume
treatment as she had been receiving it, or it would
work as she expected it to.
It wasn't even an operation, really, just a bit of
anesthetic on her neck and a quick slice of the
scalpel. She hadn't told him to leave the room, but
he couldn't stay. He wasn't even sure why--he'd seen
her cut and bleeding before and this would at least be
for her own good. He only knew that he couldn't stay
and watch that chip disappear into her neck. In the
abstract, it had seemed like such a good decision, one
that would save her life. Yet he could only see the
specter of the smoking man as the doctor stood ready
with scalpel and chip. So he had fled to the tacky
refuge of the hallway.
Less than ten minutes had passed between his flight
from the room and the doctor's departure. Drawing a
deep breath, he stood and pushed the door open.
Scully sat on the bed, two pillows propped neatly
behind her. Before Mulder could draw a breath to ask,
she drew her hair aside and turned her head slightly,
revealing a neat white bandage to him. "All done."
Stepping closer to the edge of the bed, he traced his
index finger down the taped edge of the gauze. "So
that's it." She dropped her hair back and he drew his
hand away, sitting half on the edge of the bed.
"That's it," she echoed.
"What do we do now?"
"Dr. Zuckerman thinks I'm crazy for even doing this,
but he doesn't see any need to keep me here. As soon
as I get changed, I can go home. And then...I guess I
wait and see."
"It seems too easy." He toyed with the edge of the
battered hospital blanket.
She nodded and reached back to touch the gauze,
herself. "It does, after all this. But we still
don't know anything. We won't for a few weeks."
"Weeks?" He looked up, meeting her entirely
reasonable gaze. How could she remain so pragmatic?
"I was scheduled to have another MRI on Friday to
monitor my radiation treatments. I'll still have
that, of course, but we won't have any way of knowing
whether what we see there is a result of the
treatments or this chip. Then I'll just wait a few
weeks and let this chip do whatever it's supposed to
do. Dr. Zuckerman is going to schedule me another MRI
in three weeks; we should know something then."
He forced a smile that appeared more enthusiastic than
he felt. "Well, then, what are we waiting for? Get
dressed so we can blow this joint."
As he headed back out the door, he saw her trying to
suppress a smirk at his lame attempt at humor.
Just maybe, things were going to be all right.
****
A corner of the tarp flapped loose on the back of the
truck bed; if Charlotte had peered closely as it drove
down the tree-lined drive, she could have seen the
curve of hoof it revealed. She didn't care to look.
Making the decision to destroy all evidence had been
simple enough and easy to accept. Even acknowledging
that this meant the death of Belle had not been
difficult. But actually killing her had been more
wrenching than anything she'd ever done.
It was no crime to destroy one's own property, of
course, so long as the end of one's living property is
humane. She could have simply shot Belle in the
middle of one of the pastures and no one could have
done a thing about it. But that would not have the
intended effect. The quiet death in the night of an
almost-forty pony would attract no attention. One
shot, far too much tranquilizer, and it was done;
without an insurance claim by her, there would be no
one to question the death.
The truck carting away the body disappeared into the
descending dusk, and she turned to enter the house.
The pack of corgis watched her as she passed through
the entryway, only Tristram rising to follow her
through the house. Moving purposefully, she went
directly to her mother's office to begin the removal
of more delicate evidence. Casting her eyes about the
room, the glint of the setting sun on her mother's
collection of silver-framed photographs caught her
attention. Quickly taking inventory of the pictures
and thinking of the paperwork to disappear, she
stepped back into the library and dropped to her knees
in front of the fireplace. In two minutes, she had a
small blaze kindling, deepening the burgundy tones of
the room and casting out the damp spring evening.
Returning to the office, she gathered four of the
frames and carried them to the fireplace. Tristram
hopped onto the couch, alert eyes following her
movement. Removing the photos was simple, and she
soon had the four in hand. First into the blaze was
Bea and Galahad at Westminster; that went with little
difficultly. She had not been lying when she told
Mulder that her mother often seemed to care more for
her animals than her children, and Galahad above the
others. A magazine-perfect shot of Julie foxhunting
Belle went into the flames next, as easily as the
first. Thom hitting a tennis ball to Galahad followed
with little sentiment. Charlotte lingered on the last
photo, however. The shot of her on Ophelia was such
an image of show ring perfection she hated to part
with it.
The scuttle of the dogs' nails on the slate entryway
floor and the creak of a floorboard interrupted her
reverie and she nearly cast the photo into the fire
without any conscious thought. She tightened her grip
on the corner of the page as she turned. "You really
must learn to knock."
"Tsk, tsk. I see the hospitality here is already in
decline."
"Friends of the family are always welcomed with the
greatest of conviviality."
"Always so wise, my dear Charlotte. And always one
step ahead of the game." He stepped closer and tossed
a cigarette butt into the smoldering pieces of
photographs.
"Just doing a little cleaning up around here. Someone
must clean up the messes, after all." She rose to
face him, wishing she were eye-level.
"You're quite good at cleaning up messes," he smirked,
"especially other people's."
On the couch, Tristram sat up, alert, watching the two
of them. The foxy little dog's seemed to understand
the tension crackling around him, and chose to bound
to Charlotte's side, where he sat like a sentinel
statue.
She patted the dog and responded coolly, "Perhaps if
other people took time to think their actions through
beforehand, their messes would not become my problems
with such alarming frequency."
"Anticipating messes and averting them has always been
your specialty. I see you're at it once again." He
nodded towards the fireplace.
"I'm just doing what should have been done in the
first place. It would have been so easy, if you'd
just taken the time to ask."
"Like you took the time to ask me about sending that
chip to Agent Scully?"
She met his eyes and refused to look away. "I don't
know anything about Agent Scully receiving a chip."
"Spare me, Charlotte. I'm not so naïve as some of our
compatriots and am well aware that Agent Scully
received an 'anonymous' envelope the other day,
containing a chip identical to one that went missing
from our vaults the day prior. Curious, isn't it?"
"It certainly sounds curiously like something you
would do."
"Are you going to accuse me of this?" Incredulity
crept into his voice for the first time she had ever
heard.
"As far as I know, nothing happened at all. And I'm
just disposing of some of my mother's things, that are
no longer of importance."
"We have an understanding then?"
"I understand that my mother is dead, the case she
brought to the FBI is no longer being investigated as
you wished, and now I am lady of the house here and
free to dispose of what I wish. As to the well-being
of Agents Mulder and Scully, it's outside my realm of
knowledge. You should understand that you're no
longer welcome at Avalon."
"Fair enough. I'll be seeing you, Charlotte."
Without waiting for her reply, he faded back into the
shadows of the room and glided out the door.
Charlotte sighed and headed back to the office, and
began pulling paperwork out of the filing cabinets,
Tristram trailing along behind her. Most of the
sheets were merely tossed in the trashcan; a smaller
pile was made on the desk, which she then took back to
the fireplace. She reached down to stroke the loyal
dog's head as she watched the old paper burn quickly,
leaving no trace that a trio of the Stevens' animals
had ever existed.
****
Mulder was surprised to see Scully bent industriously
over her keyboard when he entered the office. Since
implanting the chip several weeks ago, she'd been
feeling better, though she had made no mention of any
appointments to confirm that her good health was more
than coincidence.
"Morning, Scully."
Her head whipped around from the monitor. "Oh, good
morning."
For a few moments, they settled into companionable
silence, before Scully spoke up once more, with some
measure of hesitation. "What are you doing the week
of September sixth?"
He wasn't quite sure how to respond to her query.
What on earth was she talking about? "Nothing that
I'm aware of. It's a long way--" in the seconds it
took him to speak, a conversation on her couch
replayed in his head. Name a date, he'd said. "Oh."
"You were serious when you made the offer, weren't
you? I don't want to impose on you, but I thought..."
She trailed off, looking embarrassed, face reddening
as she looked down at her hands on the keyboard, hair
obscuring her face.
"No, no, I definitely meant it. I would love nothing
more. So what do you want to see across the pond?"
****
End
****
Author: Ellie (windblownellie@yahoo.com)
Rating: PG-13, for language and graphic images
Category: X, M/S UST, AU (veers off mid-S4 after Memento Mori)
Summary: Mulder and Scully meet a woman who may
provide answers about the origins of Scully's cancer.
Author's Notes: This is for Niki, who taught me so
much, and the memory of Mosby's, which will be much-
missed.
Major beta thanks to XScribe for comments, advice, and
smoothing over the rough edges.
****
Chapter 7
****
For the first time in several years, Mulder settled
himself into an orange plastic chair in the autopsy
bay, watching Scully as she began the autopsy on
Beatrice Stevens. He'd been eager to sit in, and she
had no particular objection. In autopsies past, he
had usually been more of a hindrance than a help, but
today she was inexplicably grateful for the silent
company. If he'd asked her, of course, she would have
simply said she was in an indulgent mood. She had to
admit, too, that he did occasionally ask questions
that led her in a useful direction with her
examination.
She worked slowly, taking her time and double-checking
everything. As she progressed, she took samples,
carefully tagging them for laboratory testing. Along
with the mounting stack of samples for testing were an
increasing number of questions. While she hoped the
lab work would provide answers, she doubted that would
be the case. Mulder had allowed her to work without
interruption, though she could feel him watching her
every move.
Two hours into the autopsy, she paused to stretch, her
shoulders and back popping as she did so. Before
returning to the body, she caught Mulder's gaze,
inviting his inquiry.
"Find anything, Scully?"
She sighed. "Unless something shows up on the tox
screen, the cause of death was cardiac arrest."
"Heart attack?"
"Well, technically. But I'm at a loss to explain the
cause of that--she was in excellent shape for her age.
There's minimal atherosclerosis. It's looking more
like her body just...stopped, instantly." She paused
and looked down at the body open in front of her.
"I'm running enzyme tests, but because she died so
rapidly, I doubt that they'll tell us much."
Mulder just nodded and settled back into the chair,
surprising her. She'd expected him to press for more
information or theories.
She returned to work, cautiously tipping the body onto
its side, then peering at the scar on the back of
Beatrice's neck. It was small, faint, and would
probably have been missed by someone not knowing what
to look for. But then, she told herself, it could
just be a coincidence. Yet given the number of
coincidences on this case, she felt it unlikely.
With a gloved finger, she carefully probed the skin
before making a shallow incision with her scalpel. In
seconds, she saw what she feared she would find.
"Mulder."
Her voice caused him to snap to attention, bouncing
toward the edge of his seat. "What did you find?"
"Come here."
She exchanged her scalpel for a delicate pair of
tweezers, and extracted a small microchip. As Mulder
reached her side, she held it out for him.
When she dropped it into a Petri dish, both stared at
it silently for a long moment.
****
Mulder looked up into the camera as he waited for the
Gunmen to buzz him into their lair. One hand remained
in his coat pocket, lightly grasping the Petri dish
there. The other hand toyed with the door handle,
giving it a swift tug when he was finally granted
entrance. The long hallway back to their offices was
dark, and he had to walk carefully to avoid the piles
of paperwork and unidentified mechanical parts.
"Mulder, my man." Frohike's voice rang across the
electronics-filled room as Mulder entered. "What have
you brought for us today?"
He removed the chip from his pocket, setting the Petri
dish on the cluttered countertop next to one of the
computers. "Scully found this today."
Langly looked away from one of the monitors long
enough to take in the chip. "Whoa. Another one?"
"Yes." Mulder felt no need to elaborate. Langly's
startled question was enough to draw Byers and Frohike
in for a closer look.
"Is this related to Agent Scully's current health
situation?" Byers' inquiry was tentative, and he
spoke from behind Langly.
"Not directly. It's related to a case we're currently
investigating. But the case does seem to have some
parallels."
Frohike pushed Mulder aside and removed the chip,
placing it on a microscope. Langly clicked a few
buttons on the computer, and the chip appeared, ten
times larger, on screen.
Mulder looked around at the faces of the Gunmen, all
staring carefully at the magnified image. "Well?"
"Well, it looks an awful lot like the one you and
Scully brought us." Langly clicked away as he spoke,
pulling up an image of the chip that had been removed
from Scully's neck.
Side by side, the images were nearly identical.
Frohike reached for the microscope, carefully shifting
the chip a few degrees to the left. Langly zoomed in
once more, bringing the details of the chip into the
foreground.
"I looks like the processors are a bit less advanced
than the one removed from Agent Scully," commented
Frohike, tracing a few of the electronic components
and addressing Langley.
"Yeah. I'd definitely say it's an older model."
Langley clicked away once more, bringing a similar but
streamlined image onto the screen. "Look at that.
Totally version 2.0."
"You boys all agree we're looking at the same thing
here? But a slightly different model?" Mulder
squinted at the monitor, trying to spot the
differences between the chips.
"There are some minimal differences in the exact
components used, but they're essentially the same
thing." Byers sounded certain. He reached out a
finger, tracing a group of tiny wires on Scully's
chip. "See this circuit? Not wired exactly how I
would expect it to be, but in and of itself nothing
unusual." He traced a similar set on the chip from
Beatrice. "But it's exactly the same way here, just
with slightly different wires."
Mulder continued to stare at the monitor, looking
between the two almost-identical images.
"Does this make those parallels a whole lot closer?"
Frohike queried, toying with the microscope set up,
bringing the chip into sharper relief.
"A whole lot closer," Mulder echoed.
****
Wind rustled through the tender spring leaves and
pushed puffy clouds across the slender moon.
Charlotte watched the ghostly clouds race overhead as
she rocked back in the worn, wooden chair. The wicker
seat creaked as she shifted, nearly drowning out the
sound of approaching footsteps on the gravel walkway.
The figure was a silhouette in the dark as it emerged
around the corner of the house. Only when the figure
halted at the bottom of the steps did Charlotte deign
to look down, noting the thin wisp of smoke floating
away into the darkness.
"You've got a lot of nerve showing up here tonight,
Charles."
"And you've got a lot of nerve to speak to me that
way, young lady." He stepped out of the shrubbery's
shadows and dropped the cigarette into the gravel.
"Young lady, am I?" she drawled. "Compared to you, I
suppose I am. But I think it's more than justified,
given the circumstances." She didn't move from the
rocker, simply gazed coolly down at him.
"You had to know what the outcome of this would be.
Especially after your little luncheon. You're lucky
you haven't met a similar fate."
"I told Agent Mulder nothing of use."
"Your mother would have been wise to do the same." He
stepped closer to the porch, once again standing in
the shadows.
Charlotte sat up straighter, poised on the edge of the
chair. "You took great care to make sure she didn't
reveal more than you wished. It never did sit well
with you when someone actually knew what game they
were playing with you."
"But you're well aware of the dangerous game you're
playing now, my dear."
"I am." She leveled a hard look at him, focusing on
the faint sparkle of his eyes in the darkness.
His eyes traced over her sitting form before he
answered. "You always were a gambler like your
father. Are you sure the odds aren't too high for you
this time? The stakes are very high."
"That's what makes the payoff worthwhile." She
finally looked away, out towards the pastures where
the dark shadows of horses could be seen grazing.
"And occasionally there are chances you have to take,
because not taking them isn't an option."
"You would risk everything we've worked for--your
father worked for--over this?"
"Are you barking mad?" She whipped around to look at
him incredulously. "A few harmless chips, brief
disappearances, the deaths of a few animals--that was
all justifiable. Unpleasant, but justifiable. But to
dispose so casually with the daughter, widow and
mother of those who have been involved since the
beginning is the most reprehensible thing you've ever
done. And you've done a lot of reprehensible things."
"You don't have much room to criticize my behavior,
Charlotte. You're no angel." He withdrew a pack of
cigarettes from his coat pocket, taking his time in
lighting one before offering the pack to her.
"No thank you," she said. "I'm well aware of what
I've done."
"Then you should think very carefully about what your
next move should be. You know there's only one out in
this--you've known that since the beginning."
"I never said I wanted out. But that doesn't mean I
don't want retribution." She settled back into the
chair, crossing her arms against her chest.
"There's no having it both ways. And I don't think
you'll find the others any more amenable to
retribution or restitution than I am." He took a long
drag on the cigarette, the end flaring red in the
dark. "We'll expect you at the meeting, to settle
this matter once and for all. I suggest you weigh
your words there carefully."
"I wonder whether I haven't already been weighed and
measured. I doubt my words will make a bit of
difference." She pushed off with one foot, slowly
rocking the chair. "Just give me time to grieve
this."
"A few days may give you a much better perspective on
all this, in the grand scheme of things."
"Indeed." She refused to be baited further by him.
For several minutes, they both rested in uneasy
silence on the porch. When a shrill whinny broke the
night, he turned away from her.
"Good night, Charlotte."
She didn't respond as he disappeared back down the
walkway into the still Virginia night.
****
Chapter 8
****
Scully shuffled into the office and Mulder instantly
regretted the ruin of her weekend. He'd known she
needed rest, but he'd also needed her on the case with
him. His guilt increased when she sat down,
motionless at her desk, without turning on her
computer.
"Did the preliminary test results come in yet?" she
finally asked.
"Yeah, they did." He rose and carried the bulky
envelope to her desk, resting it gently on the corner.
He took one step back, resting against a filing
cabinet as she tore into the package.
There was silence as she flipped through the pages,
occasionally nodding her head or frowning.
"Well, what do you think?"
"There's absolutely nothing in any of these tests to
indicate cause of death. No elevated enzyme levels,
no foreign substances. Nothing," she said. "For no
apparent reason, her body systems just shut down."
"Which is something, though, right?"
"Oh," she said with a sigh, "I don't have the energy
to play 'is this something?' with you on this case
again. Any other time, I'd say it wasn't, and that
plenty of people drop dead from nothing more than old
age every day. But like the cancer in her animals,
there are too many coincidences here for them to be
just coincidences."
He nodded and took in the exhausted resignation in her
voice. "So where do you suggest we go from here?"
For a moment she stared down at the test results, then
said, "Well, I don't know that there's much of a case
now. There's no medical evidence that Beatrice
Stevens' death was from anything but natural causes.
The animals are, for all legal intents and purposes,
property, whatever emotional attachments we chose to
place on them. Without a property owner interested in
pursuing the matter..."
"There is no investigation," he finished for her.
Both were quiet for a moment, and he studied her pale
face. He would almost be happy to give up this case,
to stay in the office doing inane paperwork for
several months. But this case had offered a possible
solution, tantalizing clues that seemed to point to
answers to his questions and her health problems.
Could he just walk away from that?
"I know you don't want to leave it, Mulder, but unless
one of her children is interested in pursuing it, I
fail to see how we can."
"There were just so many pieces of the puzzle here,
floating just under the surface. If I just had the
right lens, I could have seen them all, put them all
together-"
"Don't do this to yourself, not over this," she said.
"I know you would have liked to untangle this mess, to
find answers. Personally, I-I think I would have
liked some answers about all of this, too." She
stared down at her hands, denying him the opportunity
to study her face as she spoke.
"That's the biggest reason I wanted this case." He
spoke honestly, emotions close to the surface. He
needed her to know he felt this almost as deeply as
she did--that he wanted this for her. "This could
have saved you."
"You don't know that. It might have," she paused and
met his gaze before correcting herself, "looked likely
to provide some of the answers we've been hunting for.
But I'm not willing to make deals with the devil or
operate outside the boundaries of the law to find
them. Especially when we don't know whether they'll
really be of help to us. To me."
"You don't think the evidence we've seen on this case
was genuine? After being warned off it by that chain-
smoking bastard and seeing the woman who presented it
to us die under questionable circumstances?"
She shook her head. "I think Beatrice was truthful
about what she knew had happened. But you of all
people know that truth can be subjective. The
information we've seen on this case, though,
especially given the smoking man's involvement, I
can't quite bring myself to trust. It may be as much
of a red herring as Charlotte's denials of insurance
fraud--it looks and sounds plausible, but is it
really?"
"But what if it's not? What if pursuing this would
have revealed a cure for you, and answers about the
tests that were inflicted on innumerable women across
the country?" He knew he sounded as righteously angry
as he felt.
"Then it means I won't have a cure and we won't have
answers." How did she manage to sound so pragmatic?
"We're no worse off than before we took this case."
He raked his gaze over her, noticing a thousand tiny
ways in which she seemed much worse off than when
they'd taken this case. "Can you honestly tell me
you're not any worse?"
That seemed to spark something in her. "While I can't
tell you that I'm better, I also can't say that I'm
worse. But I'm undergoing treatment that has been
scientifically proven to help. That's worth far more
in my book than the speculation and presumptions we've
worked under on this case."
"Fair enough."
Mulder settled back down behind his desk, and Scully
turned back to hers. She finally started up the
computer and was checking her messages when he rose,
loudly jangling change in his pocket. "I'm going to
grab a soda. You want anything?"
"No, thank you." She didn't glance away from the
monitor as he passed.
When he returned from the vending machines, she was
still scrolling through the messages. He paused in
the doorway, watching and wondering if she was even
reading the messages, or merely putting in the
appearance of doing something. Closer to the latter,
he decided, as she stared for a long moment at what he
knew to be a reminder about the carpet cleaning due to
take place over the coming weekend.
Without a word, he walked back to his desk, pausing
only to place a small, yellow package on the corner of
hers. As he sat, he heard the crinkle as she picked
it up, then the split second of silence before she
ripped it open.
"Thanks," she said, her voice slightly garbled by the
peanut M&M she crunched down on as she spoke.
They continued playing at normality at their desks for
the rest of the afternoon.
****
The pungent scent of permanent marker ink filled her
nostrils as she finished addressing the manila
envelope. The padding inside crackled as she firmly
pressed the seal closed. It was all a bit more than
was necessary, of course--the tiny metal cylinder now
enclosed within certainly would withstand anything
that the US Post Office could throw at it. Just to be
safe, though, she reached into the top desk drawer and
withdrew a stamp. Pressing it to the front of the
envelope, she emblazoned FRAGILE in vivid scarlet.
The cylinder was small, barely making a bulge in the
mailer. For a moment, she worried about sending it
through so public a source as the US Mail. But she
returned to her original rationalization that hiding
in plain view was often the most secure camouflage of
all. And if she hurried, it could be in the mail
tonight, for delivery tomorrow.
Surely that would buy the valuable package enough of a
chance of arriving at its destination. So long as no
one realized it had come from her, perhaps she might
even see the fruits of its successful delivery.
****
Like a young child on Christmas morning, it was all
Mulder could do to resist ripping open the small
envelope that had arrived for Scully. With great
restraint, he'd placed it on her desk, propped against
the edge of her keyboard where he was sure she would
notice it immediately and put his curiosity to rest.
At the moment, his interest over the package was
tempered only by his concern over Scully's
whereabouts. It was around the time she had taken to
drifting into the office after her radiation
treatments, stolidly keeping up the façade of working.
Neither of them were getting much work done, but he
respected her effort enough not to mention it. And he
knew that she had taken that first Monday off to humor
him; further such suggestions would not be met so
well.
The trilling of his phone broke into his reverie.
"Mulder."
"It's me," Scully whispered over the line.
"Hey, Scully, where are you? There's something
waiting here for you."
"Oh." There was a moment of static before she
continued, "It'll have to wait for tomorrow. Put it
in the fridge. I'm not...I won't be in this
afternoon."
He smiled as he answered, "I wasn't talking about your
salad, but I'll put that in the fridge for you. Are
you feeling okay?"
"I'm fine, just tired. Working over the weekend
caught up with me. I've got journals here to catch up
on. I can read my mail tomorrow."
"Sure, get some rest. I'll catch you later, Scully."
"See you tomorrow."
He heard the beep across the line as she terminated
the call. He couldn't help but stare at the package
as he replaced the receiver on the cradle. Maybe
another Cosi visit was in order.
****
She wasn't surprised when a knock at the door roused
her from half-heartedly reading. The news ticker on
CNN told her it was nearly six; she'd passed the
afternoon without accomplishing a thing. Tossing the
latest issue of the New England Journal of Medicine
aside, she made a beeline for the door.
Without looking through the peephole, she swung the
door open wide; there was only one person it could be.
"Come in, Mulder."
He stepped into the apartment, the paper bag
containing dinner rustling with the movement. "I
brought sandwiches. I thought you might not feel like
cooking."
That earned him a smile as she locked the door once
more. "I never like cooking. But what's in the
envelope?"
"This arrived for you in the mail today. It doesn't
feel like there's much inside."
"You were groping my mail?" She barely stifled a
laugh as she reached for the small manila envelope.
"Just a little." He handed it to her and carried
their dinner into the kitchen. "It was mailed
yesterday from the post office by Farragut Square," he
called back over his shoulder, to where she stood
starting perplexedly at the envelope. "I don't
recognize the handwriting, and there's no return
address."
"Suspicious," she concurred, walking into the kitchen
herself and placing the envelope on the table. She
left it there as she found plates in her cupboards and
handed them to Mulder, who was eagerly unwrapping a
still-steaming tuna melt. "How close did you come to
ripping it open without me there?"
"Pretty damn close."
"You must have been terrible at Christmas."
"My parents made a rule when I was younger, that I was
not allowed out of bed before seven a.m. on Christmas
morning for any reason." He frowned and placed a
ginger chicken sandwich on the plate she proffered
him. "I used to bribe Sam with candy canes to go see
what was under the tree."
They were both quiet as they sat down at her table,
plates buffering the space between them.
Scully cleared her throat after a bite of sandwich.
"So this envelope arrived for me today, and you have
managed to avoid opening it. But you have your
suspicions on what's inside." It wasn't a question;
she knew he needed little encouragement to offer up
speculation, even when the question could easily be
settled by ripping the paper right now.
"I think it's from Charlotte Stevens." Scully's
raised eyebrow prompted him to continue, "The
handwriting looks feminine. I think she's doing what
she can to answer for her mother's death."
"By sending me an envelope." She put down her
sandwich and reached for the envelope, turning it over
in her hands. One small bulge was visible, and the
only sound was from the crinkling of plastic packing,
not from any notes.
Mulder held out a hand in invitation. "So open it and
find out for sure."
The kitchen suddenly seemed preternaturally silent.
The sound of the envelope being torn open was
astonishingly loud in the silence. Scully squeezed
the sides of the envelope, causing it to gape open.
She tilted it towards her face and stared inside,
confusion furrowing her brow.
She pushed her plate away, then tipped the envelope
sideways. With a metallic thunk, a silver cylinder,
no bigger than her pinkie finger, fell to the table
and rolled a few inches, coming to rest against her
napkin.
Before she could pick it up, Mulder's hand snaked
across the table and bore it away for his own
examination. She looked on in frustration as he
stared, nearly cross-eyed, at it, rolling it between
fingers that obscured it from her view.
Suddenly, he brought it down to table level and
twisted one end, which came off in his fingers.
"Stop, Mulder." He did, meeting her gaze without a
word. "We can't just open up whatever that is on my
kitchen table."
"And where do you suggest we examine it? The lab at
work?"
No, that struck her as a worse idea than experimenting
on her table. "The Gunmen?" she ventured.
Mulder was already pulling out his cell phone as he
nodded in assent.
****
Chapter 9
****
Mulder shifted impatiently from foot to foot as Scully
and Byers took turns gazing though the microscope. He
was getting an eerie feeling of déjà vu as Langly
called a series of images up on the computer monitor.
"Yeah, so this looks pretty similar," Langly said,
nodding to the side-by-side images on the monitor.
They looked identical to Mulder. "Which is which?"
"This one's from before," said Langly as he pointed to
the image on the left. "And this one is the one you
brought us tonight."
Mulder stood frozen, captivated by the images before
him. His fixation on the monitor broke only when
Scully took a few steps backwards. She'd been quiet
since they'd opened the tiny tube to reveal a
microchip. Now she was slowly disengaging from the
situation. The Gunmen were too engrossed in examining
their newest piece of mystery technology to pay much
heed, but Mulder noticed, saying nothing as she edged
out of the computer-filled room. He simply followed
her.
She had to know he was behind her; the poured concrete
floor did little to muffle either of their footsteps.
Still, neither of them spoke as she strode rapidly
down the cluttered hallway, maneuvering adroitly
around racks of electronics and piles of old
magazines. Mulder trailed two steps behind.
When she reached what passed for the Gunmen's kitchen,
she finally halted, her back to Mulder and her hands
planted firmly on the counter on either side of her.
"Scully?" Mulder's voice seemed terribly loud as it
echoed off the Formica and plastic of the kitchen.
Without thinking, he reached out for her, fingers
barely grazing her shoulder.
She drew up and away from his touch, pressing closer
against the battered puce countertop. "Mulder, I
just.... Give me a minute, okay?" She didn't turn to
face him.
He didn't respond, simply stepped away towards the
refrigerator. He pulled out two Diet Cokes and walked
to the ancient dinette set, sitting down and placing
the second can directly across the table from him. He
could hear her drawing a few deep breaths as he
snapped open the can. The sharp sound finally drew
Scully's attention, and she glanced back over her
shoulder at him.
Without a word, she crossed to the table and dropped
into the rickety metal chair across from him.
"Thanks." She popped open the can and took a sip,
buying herself yet more time to think.
Mulder waited.
"I don't know what to think," she finally said.
Mulder nodded and sat his can on the table, staring at
it rather than her. Abruptly, he looked up at her.
"How do you feel?"
Mulder could see the panic flicker across her face
before she replied. "It scares the shit out of me.
This is so far outside the realm of what I understand
about our medical technology that I don't even know
how to think about it." She drew a deep breath and
continued in a whisper, "It terrifies me to think that
I'm entangled in this."
All Mulder could do was nod and let her talk. He was
startled when she reached across the table and latched
onto his hand.
"There's someone out there with the ability to get to
anyone, anywhere. Who got to me. Someone who can
make information disappear and answers appear out of
thin air. And I don't know whether to be more
frightened by the power that these unknowns have, or
by the fact that this chip might not do what we're
meant to think it will."
"But Scully--"
"No, that's a possibility we have to consider. We
have no idea where that chip came from. I know you
want to believe it's a cure for me, but we have no
proof at all that putting a chip back into my neck
will ameliorate matters. What if it makes them
worse?"
Mulder saw the unspoken fear in her eyes, and being a
natural paranoid, he knew what was worrying her. What
if this chip did nothing? What if it caused her
cancer to metastasize more rapidly? What if They
could use it to control her? What if this chip killed
her?
Too many what-ifs.
For once, he kept his darker concerns to himself.
"What do you want to do?"
She graced him with a watery smile. "Do you think the
risk is worth taking?"
He was stunned and it took him a moment to formulate a
response. "I can't fathom not taking a chance that
could save your life. I think that potential good
outweighs all the other risks."
Slowly, her head bobbed in assent, and it seemed an
eternity before she quietly responded, "I'm not ready
to die yet."
"I'm not going to let you." He rose from the table
and used her grip on his hand to draw her up as well,
watching as the protest died on her lips. For just a
moment she tensed as he wrapped his arms around her,
then she returned the embrace.
He reluctantly drew away from her and looked down at
her face. There was fear and worry there, but also
determination. "So let's go figure out how to make
this happen."
The mood was much lighter as they maneuvered back down
the Gunmen's cluttered hallway. The men looked up as
Mulder and Scully returned to the room, seemingly
startled to realize they'd been missing at all.
****
Charlotte walked down the dim hallway, heels
connecting sharply with the herringboned hardwood
floor. When she reached the elegantly carved door
that loomed over the corridor, she rapped three times.
After a moment, the door swung open. All the old
familiar faces were there, though once more it struck
her how odd it was to see Marcus sitting in what had
been her father's wingback chair. It should be her
place.
The room was brighter than the hallway, but not by
much. Heavy draperies hung at the windows, blocking
much of the bright morning light. Two white stripes
broke through, making the darkness elsewhere seem much
more prominent. In the light beams, she could see
flecks of dust floating in the air. Everything here
smelled faintly of cigars.
"Charlotte my dear, so glad you could join us."
Stepping out of the darkness between two windows, CGB
Spender approached her. He gestured towards one of
the old cordovan leather chairs, urging her to sit.
The others, who had been socializing in small groups
around the room, moved to do the same.
A wizened man with a faintly British accent spoke as
the last members gathered around. "So has the Stevens
issue been resolved, Charles?"
Spender exhaled a cloud of smoke, which drifted up to
join the smoky haze lingering around the ceiling. "It
has, Richard, unless there's something our own Miss
Stevens would like to add."
Everyone in the room turned to look at her. She still
wasn't quite sure what to say to them, despite a day
spent thinking of little else. Even the funeral
planning had fallen to Thom as she planned for this
meeting. After a deep breath, she said, "Yes, there
is something I would like to add. While I realize
that some action was necessary to prevent Beatrice
Stevens from revealing information to the FBI, I don't
believe the manner of resolution was an appropriate
one."
"And what would you have had me do?" Spender
continued to gaze placidly at her. "Certainly those
who have crossed us in the past have met worse ends.
Of the possible solutions, this was the most humane."
Several of the other men nodded in assent.
Charlotte shook her head. "I don't know that it was
necessary to dispatch with her at all. She was a
woman of discretion, who knew that some information
was best kept to oneself. She was privy to secrets
over the years that she managed to keep. I feel sure
that had this been discussed with me before any action
was taken, I could have spoken with her and dissuaded
her from cooperating further with Agent Mulder."
"Just as you avoided cooperating with Agent Mulder?"
There was a nasty edge to Spender's voice.
"Just as you've done so much to hinder him over the
years."
The assemblage looked between the two of them as they
spoke, like the crowd at Wimbledon.
"You're treading on dangerous ground, Miss Stevens.
Don't speak on matters you have not been fully
apprised of."
"I think I know enough to put two and two together on
this. I did meet with Agents Mulder and Scully over
lunch, but told them nothing of help. Unless you
count the suggestion that my mother was involved in
fraud 'helpful'."
"Enough of this," barked a voice with a harsh New York
accent. "We're getting nowhere here. What's done is
done. As much power as the committee has, Charlotte,
we cannot raise the dead."
"I understand that very well, Johnny."
"So what would you have me do?" Johnny took a long
drag on his cigar, the end sparking to red.
"Nothing here can be undone," Charlotte said. "But I
ask that in the future, should such situations arise
with the families of those involved here, they be
apprised of the circumstances. My mother didn't know
what she was revealing--if she'd known it was a matter
of such importance, she would never have spoken a
word."
Around the room, heads nodded in assent. Their
families may not have known the nature of their work,
but they all understood its importance.
"Agreed," said Richard with a nod. "Now, on to more
pressing matters. I believe you have an update for
us, Marcus?"
Charlotte relaxed back into the comfortable leather
chair as Marcus began outlining his engineers' most
recent achievement.
****
Chapter 10
****
Mulder sat in another uncomfortable orange chair,
waiting. He'd calculated the number of ceiling tiles
in the hallway--214--and monitored the average length
of time the doctors spent in their patients' rooms--
six minutes--and was now busy figuring out the ratio
of avocado floor tiles to melon ones.
The door to Scully's room swung open and the doctor's
shoes squeaked against the garish tiles. Mulder
barely looked at him; the doctor had been clear in his
opinion of Mulder when he and Scully had presented the
chip to be implanted into her neck. The doctor had
thought they were both crazy, and had nearly refused
to be involved. It had of course been Scully who
convinced him that there would be no harm in trying.
Either nothing would happen and she would resume
treatment as she had been receiving it, or it would
work as she expected it to.
It wasn't even an operation, really, just a bit of
anesthetic on her neck and a quick slice of the
scalpel. She hadn't told him to leave the room, but
he couldn't stay. He wasn't even sure why--he'd seen
her cut and bleeding before and this would at least be
for her own good. He only knew that he couldn't stay
and watch that chip disappear into her neck. In the
abstract, it had seemed like such a good decision, one
that would save her life. Yet he could only see the
specter of the smoking man as the doctor stood ready
with scalpel and chip. So he had fled to the tacky
refuge of the hallway.
Less than ten minutes had passed between his flight
from the room and the doctor's departure. Drawing a
deep breath, he stood and pushed the door open.
Scully sat on the bed, two pillows propped neatly
behind her. Before Mulder could draw a breath to ask,
she drew her hair aside and turned her head slightly,
revealing a neat white bandage to him. "All done."
Stepping closer to the edge of the bed, he traced his
index finger down the taped edge of the gauze. "So
that's it." She dropped her hair back and he drew his
hand away, sitting half on the edge of the bed.
"That's it," she echoed.
"What do we do now?"
"Dr. Zuckerman thinks I'm crazy for even doing this,
but he doesn't see any need to keep me here. As soon
as I get changed, I can go home. And then...I guess I
wait and see."
"It seems too easy." He toyed with the edge of the
battered hospital blanket.
She nodded and reached back to touch the gauze,
herself. "It does, after all this. But we still
don't know anything. We won't for a few weeks."
"Weeks?" He looked up, meeting her entirely
reasonable gaze. How could she remain so pragmatic?
"I was scheduled to have another MRI on Friday to
monitor my radiation treatments. I'll still have
that, of course, but we won't have any way of knowing
whether what we see there is a result of the
treatments or this chip. Then I'll just wait a few
weeks and let this chip do whatever it's supposed to
do. Dr. Zuckerman is going to schedule me another MRI
in three weeks; we should know something then."
He forced a smile that appeared more enthusiastic than
he felt. "Well, then, what are we waiting for? Get
dressed so we can blow this joint."
As he headed back out the door, he saw her trying to
suppress a smirk at his lame attempt at humor.
Just maybe, things were going to be all right.
****
A corner of the tarp flapped loose on the back of the
truck bed; if Charlotte had peered closely as it drove
down the tree-lined drive, she could have seen the
curve of hoof it revealed. She didn't care to look.
Making the decision to destroy all evidence had been
simple enough and easy to accept. Even acknowledging
that this meant the death of Belle had not been
difficult. But actually killing her had been more
wrenching than anything she'd ever done.
It was no crime to destroy one's own property, of
course, so long as the end of one's living property is
humane. She could have simply shot Belle in the
middle of one of the pastures and no one could have
done a thing about it. But that would not have the
intended effect. The quiet death in the night of an
almost-forty pony would attract no attention. One
shot, far too much tranquilizer, and it was done;
without an insurance claim by her, there would be no
one to question the death.
The truck carting away the body disappeared into the
descending dusk, and she turned to enter the house.
The pack of corgis watched her as she passed through
the entryway, only Tristram rising to follow her
through the house. Moving purposefully, she went
directly to her mother's office to begin the removal
of more delicate evidence. Casting her eyes about the
room, the glint of the setting sun on her mother's
collection of silver-framed photographs caught her
attention. Quickly taking inventory of the pictures
and thinking of the paperwork to disappear, she
stepped back into the library and dropped to her knees
in front of the fireplace. In two minutes, she had a
small blaze kindling, deepening the burgundy tones of
the room and casting out the damp spring evening.
Returning to the office, she gathered four of the
frames and carried them to the fireplace. Tristram
hopped onto the couch, alert eyes following her
movement. Removing the photos was simple, and she
soon had the four in hand. First into the blaze was
Bea and Galahad at Westminster; that went with little
difficultly. She had not been lying when she told
Mulder that her mother often seemed to care more for
her animals than her children, and Galahad above the
others. A magazine-perfect shot of Julie foxhunting
Belle went into the flames next, as easily as the
first. Thom hitting a tennis ball to Galahad followed
with little sentiment. Charlotte lingered on the last
photo, however. The shot of her on Ophelia was such
an image of show ring perfection she hated to part
with it.
The scuttle of the dogs' nails on the slate entryway
floor and the creak of a floorboard interrupted her
reverie and she nearly cast the photo into the fire
without any conscious thought. She tightened her grip
on the corner of the page as she turned. "You really
must learn to knock."
"Tsk, tsk. I see the hospitality here is already in
decline."
"Friends of the family are always welcomed with the
greatest of conviviality."
"Always so wise, my dear Charlotte. And always one
step ahead of the game." He stepped closer and tossed
a cigarette butt into the smoldering pieces of
photographs.
"Just doing a little cleaning up around here. Someone
must clean up the messes, after all." She rose to
face him, wishing she were eye-level.
"You're quite good at cleaning up messes," he smirked,
"especially other people's."
On the couch, Tristram sat up, alert, watching the two
of them. The foxy little dog's seemed to understand
the tension crackling around him, and chose to bound
to Charlotte's side, where he sat like a sentinel
statue.
She patted the dog and responded coolly, "Perhaps if
other people took time to think their actions through
beforehand, their messes would not become my problems
with such alarming frequency."
"Anticipating messes and averting them has always been
your specialty. I see you're at it once again." He
nodded towards the fireplace.
"I'm just doing what should have been done in the
first place. It would have been so easy, if you'd
just taken the time to ask."
"Like you took the time to ask me about sending that
chip to Agent Scully?"
She met his eyes and refused to look away. "I don't
know anything about Agent Scully receiving a chip."
"Spare me, Charlotte. I'm not so naïve as some of our
compatriots and am well aware that Agent Scully
received an 'anonymous' envelope the other day,
containing a chip identical to one that went missing
from our vaults the day prior. Curious, isn't it?"
"It certainly sounds curiously like something you
would do."
"Are you going to accuse me of this?" Incredulity
crept into his voice for the first time she had ever
heard.
"As far as I know, nothing happened at all. And I'm
just disposing of some of my mother's things, that are
no longer of importance."
"We have an understanding then?"
"I understand that my mother is dead, the case she
brought to the FBI is no longer being investigated as
you wished, and now I am lady of the house here and
free to dispose of what I wish. As to the well-being
of Agents Mulder and Scully, it's outside my realm of
knowledge. You should understand that you're no
longer welcome at Avalon."
"Fair enough. I'll be seeing you, Charlotte."
Without waiting for her reply, he faded back into the
shadows of the room and glided out the door.
Charlotte sighed and headed back to the office, and
began pulling paperwork out of the filing cabinets,
Tristram trailing along behind her. Most of the
sheets were merely tossed in the trashcan; a smaller
pile was made on the desk, which she then took back to
the fireplace. She reached down to stroke the loyal
dog's head as she watched the old paper burn quickly,
leaving no trace that a trio of the Stevens' animals
had ever existed.
****
Mulder was surprised to see Scully bent industriously
over her keyboard when he entered the office. Since
implanting the chip several weeks ago, she'd been
feeling better, though she had made no mention of any
appointments to confirm that her good health was more
than coincidence.
"Morning, Scully."
Her head whipped around from the monitor. "Oh, good
morning."
For a few moments, they settled into companionable
silence, before Scully spoke up once more, with some
measure of hesitation. "What are you doing the week
of September sixth?"
He wasn't quite sure how to respond to her query.
What on earth was she talking about? "Nothing that
I'm aware of. It's a long way--" in the seconds it
took him to speak, a conversation on her couch
replayed in his head. Name a date, he'd said. "Oh."
"You were serious when you made the offer, weren't
you? I don't want to impose on you, but I thought..."
She trailed off, looking embarrassed, face reddening
as she looked down at her hands on the keyboard, hair
obscuring her face.
"No, no, I definitely meant it. I would love nothing
more. So what do you want to see across the pond?"
****
End
****