FIC: Sakonnet Point (1/1) (PG, SPN/XF crossover)
Title: Sakonnet Point
Author: zubeneschamali
Rating: PG
Word count: 5275
Warnings: none
Summary: Outsider POV, crossover with X-Files. Something is killing young men on the New England coast. Sam and Dean have to contend not just with the monster, but with two FBI agents, even if those agents might be more willing than most to hear them out. Written for spn_summergen.
Author's Notes: Since my first fandom and first fic-writing were for the X-Files, I was thrilled to see annie46's request for a crossover for last year's spn_summergen. I obviously had to bend canon to get these two in the same place and time as Sam and Dean, so consider this somewhere around S2 for SPN and S5 for XF. Thanks to fiercelynormal for the beta read.
"Mulder, there must be a dozen bodies here." Dana Scully looked over the rocky shoreline at the corpses draped over the rocks like seaweed. Some were fresh, but most were considerably older, bloated and grey in the harsh August sun.
"That's only this cove," Fox Mulder replied, shading his eyes as he looked off to their right. "Local sheriff reported at least two more locations like this within a few miles."
"These aren't all new." Scully squatted down at the side of what had been a young man in his twenties or thirties, boat shoes and bright green swimming trunks his only clothing. "This one is probably a week or two old. How did no one notice these before?"
"This part of the coast gets less traffic than it used to. People go to Newport for the big houses or the jazz, or down to Connecticut for the casinos. The families who used to come here every summer either can't afford the vacation time, or they can afford the Caribbean or the Mediterranean instead."
"Your family's summer home wasn't too far from here, right?" She sat back on her heels in the sand, shielding her eyes to look up at Mulder.
"No, it was all the way on the other side of the state," Mulder replied.
"So, about ten miles?"
Mulder's ha ha, very funny face had Scully giving a small grin in reply. "So you don't know this part of Rhode Island?" she asked.
"Never been to Sakonnet Point, no." Mulder looked around, taking in the low cliff above them and the waves crashing behind them. About a quarter-mile offshore, a squat white lighthouse perched on a flat brown rock, a twin to the boulders around them. "So I can't tell you why it's suddenly become a dumping ground. Local sheriff saw multiple bodies, connected them to a series of missing persons reports, and instantly thought 'serial killer,' which is why we're here."
"If these coves are more isolated than they used to be, that dumping ground theory might very well be what's going on," Scully replied as she rose to her feet. "Drug runners or other criminal gangs from New York could have found a convenient place to hide bodies."
"These aren't exactly hidden." Mulder waved at the dozen bodies strewn over the rocks. "And they look more like frat boys than drug dealers."
"Those are hardly exclusive categories," Scully reminded him.
"Well, maybe once we get some of these ID'd, we can determine that for sure."
"The local coroner will be helping, I assume?"
"The local coroner is on vacation in Bali." Mulder shrugged. "I guess they've called him back in, but it might be a day or two before he gets here."
"Great." She smiled sweetly at him. "Then I guess you'll be helping."
The tiny town of Sakonnet Point had a single brownstone building that served as city hall, police station, and fire station. And makeshift morgue. It was perched on a seaside cliff looking out over the Atlantic Ocean that was probably tall enough to hurt yourself if you fell down. The bodies had been only a few miles away at the base of that cliff.
Mulder stuck around long enough to help with the cursory exam of the bodies before getting a call from the sheriff and heading out. Scully was halfway through the second full autopsy when out of the corner of her eye, she saw the door to the morgue swing open. Expecting it to be Mulder, she didn't look up as she said, "I think I've got a cause of death for you, but it doesn't make any sense."
"That's good to hear. Or not."
It wasn't Mulder's voice, and Scully's head snapped up. There were two men in front of her, both of them younger and taller than Mulder, both in cheap, dark suits. She paused with her scalpel hovering over the second victim's skull and asked, "Can I help you?"
They reached into their jacket pockets and flipped open badges in unison. "Agents Sambora and Bryan," the shorter one said. "We're investigating a series of deaths along the coast."
"A series?" Scully asked, subtly shifting her grip on the scalpel. If the corpses on the shore were the work of a criminal investigation, it would be risky but potentially productive to send some of their members to see how the investigation was going. Disguising themselves as FBI agents might have seemed like a good idea if they thought they were dealing with the local coroner.
The taller man spoke up. "There's the cluster here, and there's another up the coast in Massachusetts on the Weepecket Islands."
Scully thought she heard a faint strangled sound coming from the other man, but his face remained neutral. "I hadn't heard that there were more out of state," she replied. "I'll have to get in touch with the coroner in Massachusetts. I can have a report ready tomorrow morning, if you gentlemen would like to come back then."
"You said you had a cause of death." It was the first man, and if his name was really Sambora, Scully was going to eat her sun hat.
"Not for certain." She gave him a tight smile. "If you'll let me get back to work, I'll have something for you tomorrow."
"They didn't drown, did they?" 'Sambora' asked, his green eyes intent on hers.
"As I said, my results are not conclusive." Scully tightened her grip on the scalpel. She tried to keep it unobtrusive, but from the way 'Bryan' suddenly went tense and put a hand on his partner's elbow, she knew he had seen her defensive move.
'Bryan' cleared his throat. "Agent, uh, Sambora, maybe we should let the doctor get back to work." He nodded at her. "Sorry to bother you. We'll come back tomorrow."
Scully watched them make a hasty exit, and then she was stripping her gloves off and reaching for her phone. Mulder answered on the second ring, and she said, "Mulder, I need you to get down here."
"You found something?" he asked. Or rather, shouted over the roar of something in the background.
She frowned. "What's that noise?"
"The outboard motor," he shouted back. "Sheriff's taking me off shore to see if we can find any debris."
"Debris from what?"
"From the boats. These might have been shipwreck victims, which would mean there'd be some debris left behind."
"I don't think it's a shipwreck," Scully replied.
"You don't?"
"They didn't drown, Mulder. Any of them."
"Huh." There was a pause, and she could hear his voice in the background, probably passing her information on to the sheriff. When he came back on, he said, "Good work, Scully."
"There's more," she replied. "The blood vessels in their eyes are burst, and in the one victim I've been able to autopsy so far, his eardrums were burst as well."
"Would that be consistent with an explosion?" Mulder asked.
"Not based on the lack of external trauma," Scully replied. "And there was no internal damage in the organs, no sign of an embolism generated by a blast that would have ruptured lung tissue."
"Interesting. Let me know if the other bodies turn up anything different, all right?"
She looked down at the corpse in front of her and sighed. "Will do."
She didn't realize until she'd disconnected the call that she'd forgotten to mention the fake FBI agents. Crossing the room, she locked the door and made sure her service weapon was in a place she could easily reach.
Then she got back to work.
It was after ten p.m. when Scully finally closed up the morgue and left for the motel room. Mulder was waiting outside on a bench, looking out at the sliver of the ocean visible between the two beach houses across the street. "Nice night," she said, locking the car and joining him.
"Do you hear something?" he asked, not looking away from the waves.
She tilted her head. "Just the ocean."
"Huh." He shook his head. "We didn't find anything out on the water, by the way. No debris that would indicate a boat broke up. Wherever those bodies came from, it wasn't a shipwreck."
"And I didn't find anything other than what I already told you. That is, unless the six autopsies left to do are going to be wildly different from the six I already did."
"Tough day, huh?" Mulder put his hands on her shoulders and turned her slightly away from him. To her surprise, he started to knead her shoulders, thumbs digging in next to her shoulder blades and releasing at least some of the tension of the day's work.
Scully sat there for a moment, letting Mulder's hands and the sound of the waves soothe her. Then she sat straight upright. "Damn it, I forgot the files. I was going to look them over tonight."
"We can get them in the morning." Mulder gave her shoulder a pat and let go.
"I'm not comfortable leaving everything there," she replied. "I forgot to tell you before, but there were two men who came around asking questions about the case."
"Locals?"
"They claimed to be FBI agents." She raised an eyebrow. "Agents Sambora and Bryan."
"Well, they certainly have questionable taste in music," Mulder replied. "You think they were involved in the deaths?"
"Why else would they be there?" Standing up, Scully rolled her neck back and forth to get rid of a few remaining kinks. "I'd better go back."
"I'll go with you."
She was tired enough that she didn't mind the offer, and they drove the short distance back to the police station in silence. As they pulled up, they noticed a sleek black car parked along the side, and it looked like a light was on in the back of the building.
"Scully," Mulder warned.
She kept driving past the station. At the end of the block, she turned around, cut the lights, and came to a stop across the street from the station. Quietly shutting the doors, they got out and hurried across the street and towards the back of the small stone building.
From the back door, it was a few short steps down the hallway to the area Scully had claimed as the morgue, and she led the way, gun drawn. There were low voices coming from the room, and she flattened herself against the wall, Mulder following suit.
"Told you so," came the rich voice of the man who'd identified himself as Agent Sambora. "Six dead bodies on the rocks that didn't get there by drowning. It's a water siren, Sammy."
"Great." They heard a long sigh. "Because those are so easy to kill."
"Hey, at least we don't need a carved branch of a rowan tree or anything complicated like that. Just gotta outlast the bitch."
"Easier said than done." There was the rustle of paper, and then, "Hey, did you notice that these are all guys?"
"Just like the group at, what was it, Wee Pecker?" There was a muffled chortle.
The reply was considerably more disapproving. "Dean. It's the Weepecket Islands."
"That's not really much better, Sam."
"Shut up," Sam said distractedly. "So either the siren doesn't affect women, or there didn't happen to be any on the beach at the time."
"Probably there weren't any there," Dean replied. "I mean, how likely is it that all these guys would disappear and the women with them wouldn't say anything about it?"
"Could just be that it works differently on women," Sam mused. "Maybe it's a spell of forgetfulness or something."
"Yeah, well, it's not gonna matter after we gank her."
Scully exchanged a look with Mulder. After his nod, she readied herself and then moved forward into the morgue, outstretched arms pointing the gun at the two men standing over her files. "Hands up, right now."
"Whoa." They were in flannel shirts and jeans, not their dark suits, but they did promptly put their hands up. "Ma'am," the taller one, who must be Sam, said, "We can explain."
"Agents Mulder and Scully, FBI," Mulder said from beside her.
Sam's eyes briefly closed, and she thought she heard Dean mutter, "Shit." Then he pasted on a charming smile and said, "Listen, agents, I think there's been a misunderstanding here-"
"There certainly has," Scully said, letting go of her gun with one hand to reach back for her handcuffs. "You misunderstood the concept of impersonating a federal officer. Not to mention planning a murder."
"Hey, that is not what it sounded like," Dean retorted.
"You have the right to remain silent," Scully said, holding up her cuffs and coming forward around the side of the autopsy table, watching from the corner of her eye to make sure Mulder was covering them from the other side. "Anything you say can-"
Seemingly without signaling each other, the two men moved as one, shoving the autopsy table towards her and then ducking as Mulder fired. Scully staggered back as the table hit her in the side, cuffs clattering to the ground.
"Sam, go!" Dean barked.
Sam's long legs leaped over her reaching grasp as he dodged and wove his way out of the room. He smacked at the light switch as he left, plunging the place into darkness.
"Scully?" Mulder called.
"I'm fine," she replied, aiming at where she thought Dean had last been. "Put your hands up and step back against the wall."
A clatter off to the left made her swing around in that direction. A second later, there was an "oof" to her right, and she whirled back to see Mulder wrestling their suspect to the ground. "Like she said," he ground out as he got a knee into Dean's back and yanked out his own cuffs, "anything you say can and will be used against you."
"You got him?" Scully asked.
"Yeah, go on!"
She raced out the door in pursuit of Sam, gun still drawn. To her surprise, she nearly ran smack into him, standing outside the rear door of the police station, staring out at the waves just visible beyond the short cliff behind the station.
"Hands up!" Scully barked.
He didn't move.
"Hands in the air!" she repeated. When he still didn't respond, she swung around to the side, keeping her aim steady.
His mouth was slightly open, eyes fixed in the distance, hands down at his sides. It was like he was listening to something, and though Scully strained her ears, she couldn't hear a thing. "Hands up," she said again, moving around so she was standing directly in front of him.
His gaze slowly focused on her, and then it was like he came back to reality. He carefully raised his hands, somehow shrinking into himself despite the fact that he towered over her. "Can you hear it?" he asked.
"Get back inside," she said, motioning with the gun.
He gritted his teeth and turned around, hands still in the air.
Back in the morgue, Mulder had his suspect cuffed to the radiator at the back of the room. He'd picked up her cuffs and held them up as they approached, reaching out to flick the lights back on.
"Thanks," Scully said, stepping back to let him cuff Sam.
Dean was watching his partner closely. "Sam, you heard it, didn't you?"
"I-I think so." He shook his head, long hair flying around. "But-we're a block away from the water, and a few miles up the inlet from the ocean. Water sirens don't come inland."
"She's probably hungry," Dean replied. "Means she has to range farther to find prey."
"Why don't you gentlemen tell us what you're talking about?" Mulder finished with the cuffs and stood back.
They exchanged glances but remained silent.
"Impersonating a federal agent is a crime," Scully reminded them. "So is breaking and entering. So is planning a murder."
"It's not a murder," Dean replied. "Not technically speaking."
She raised her eyebrows. "Not technically speaking."
"Murder applies to humans. Isn't that right, law school boy?"
Sam was looking towards the door, head cocked as if he was listening to something.
"Sam!"
He shook his head at Dean's sharp call. "Yeah. Sorry. Um, Dean, they're not kidding about the 'can and will be used against you' part."
"Yeah, well, we got bigger fish to fry. Literally." Dean grimaced. "Since apparently we can't leave the building."
"What are you talking about?" Scully asked.
Dean nodded towards the files, now strewn about on the floor. "What killed those guys is out there right now. It's getting desperate if it's coming onshore. Sam heard it out back, which means we'll hear it soon, too."
"You said it was a siren." Mulder moved closer. "What do you mean by that?"
"What I said." Despite being handcuffed to a radiator, Dean looked perfectly at ease, almost slouching against the wall. The sharp intelligence in his eyes as he constantly looked back and forth between her and Mulder, pausing occasionally to assess his partner, however, told her this was a dangerous man.
"You think it's a woman somehow luring these men to their deaths?" Scully asked.
"Not just a woman." Dean hesitated and then went on, "A water siren."
"The mythical creature. From Ancient Greece."
"There's lore on sirens and siren-like creatures from oceans all over the world," Sam said, somewhat distantly. "More recently, it's been blended with the lore on mermaids. There've been sightings within the past few years as close as Maine. Besides, exotic species make their way across the oceans in the ballast of ships all the time. Zebra mussels, silver carp, purple loosestrife-"
"Shut it, Sierra Club," Dean cut in. "They're not gonna believe us anyway."
"You said you had to be able to outlast her," Mulder said. "What does that mean?"
Scully turned to give him an incredulous look, but Dean was already saying, "It's what the lore says. Sirens are irresistible, so if you can resist them, they die." He made a poof motion with his cuffed hands.
"If you sail past them," Sam added. He was shifting his weight, looking like he was going to make a run for the door. "But if they're inland..." He gave a heavy sigh. "We should just go."
"Sam." Dean's voice was laden with warning. "Sam, look at me."
"Dean, it's okay," Sam replied, voice sounding almost dreamlike.
Dean shot Scully a pleading look. "You gotta cuff him to something. Or he's gonna be out that door and you won't be able to stop him."
"Do you hear something?" Mulder straightened up, looking out the door.
"Shit. Agent-Scully, was it?" She nodded, and Dean went on, "Are there earplugs in this place?"
"There should be." She started pulling drawers open.
"Sam!" Dean called.
She looked up to see their taller suspect halfway out the door. "Hold it," she called, raising her weapon.
"He's not gonna hear you," Dean replied. "She's already got her hooks in him. You gotta cuff him to the table. Please."
"Mulder, can you-?" Scully broke off as she saw Mulder standing stock-still, looking out the door past Sam.
"She must be getting closer," Dean said. "You can't hear her?"
If she concentrated, she could hear a faint, high-pitched buzzing sound, like a fly near her ear. "Got 'em," she said, holding up a package of industrial-strength earplugs.
"Put 'em in, just in case," Dean said. "You got another set of handcuffs?"
She hesitated. This man had just been talking about planning to kill someone, and here she was, obeying his orders.
A wry grin curled the corner of his mouth. "Yeah, I know. Listen, you gotta keep your partner and Sam from going to her. Lock 'em up, cuff 'em, whatever. Put your earplugs in and then you can stand guard over me all you want."
"What about you?" she asked, brandishing the container of earplugs.
The grin turned into a smirk. "Someone's gotta Odysseus this bitch."
Sam was already out the door when she turned around, but a tug at his cuffed hands brought him back inside. Mulder was starting to move towards the door as well, hands at his sides, gun back in his holster. She tried waving and snapping her fingers in front of his face, but it was like she wasn't even there. That sent a chill down her spine, and when he pushed her aside and started towards the door again, she figured what the hell, might as well try what Dean was suggesting.
There was a closet in the back of the room, and she managed to herd both Sam and Mulder into it, shutting the door behind them and jamming a chair under the doorknob. The buzzing sound was louder now, audible without straining, and it was starting to give her a headache.
"Earplugs!" Dean barked.
Scully drew her weapon again, looking at the box and hesitating. She hated to cut off one of her senses. Behind her, the closet door was thumping. With the size of the two men trapped in there, it wouldn't be long before they broke down the door, and with the earplugs in, she wouldn't know when it happened.
Then the buzzing intensified and went higher in pitch. Wincing against the sudden pain, Scully dove for the earplugs and squeezed one into each ear. The buzzing didn’t subside, but it became bearable, a distraction instead of all-consuming.
When she looked at Dean, she saw the same slack look on his face that his partner had worn. He was staring over her shoulder, jaw hanging loose. She turned to see a woman standing in the doorway.
She might have been the most beautiful woman Scully had ever seen. Her long, dark hair flowed over her smooth, tawny shoulders, water dripping from the tips. She wore a diaphanous gown in shades of blue and turquoise, trimmed in pearls and clinging to her lithe figure. Her arms were long and slender, and she was raising them in Dean's direction, a smile spreading across her face that was terrible in its beauty.
Then she opened her mouth.
Even with the earplugs, Scully could hear it. It was beautiful, haunting, like the old ballads of the sea that her father used to sing her to sleep with. But no song he had ever sung had the sharp undercurrent of darkness that this one did, and she gritted her teeth against it. Raising her gun, she stepped back so that she was standing beside Dean. "Stop right there."
The woman didn't seem to notice her, her sea-blue eyes locked onto Dean. His own eyes were wide, mouth agape as he stared at the woman. She slowly advanced towards him, still singing, and he started to pull at his bonds. The radiator shook with his struggles, and Scully could see how the cuffs were biting into his wrists. He was pushing back against the wall, struggling to stand, and all the while, the woman drew nearer to them. Scully tried to train her weapon on both of them at once. Through the floor, she could feel the vibrations of the closet door quivering with the weight that was being thrown against it.
Dean was standing up in a crouch now, hands still cuffed but body leaning towards the siren. There was a trickle of blood coming from his nose, and as Scully leaned closer, she saw that he'd burst a blood vessel in his right eye as well.
"Stop!" she commanded, aiming at the woman.
She continued to ignore Scully, focusing on Dean, her voice rising in pitch. She held out her arms and then, right before Scully's eyes, her slender fingers turned into long talons.
Scully gasped, and the woman drew back her arms to strike.
Without thinking about it, Scully pulled the trigger. Twice, and then a third time.
She hit the woman dead center, holes ripping through the ruffled silk of her gown. But there was no blood. The woman didn't even move, much less fall down dead.
Scully fell back a step, resisting the urge to rub her eyes in disbelief. She fired again, with the same lack of result.
Then the siren turned towards her.
She backed up again, gun still extended in front of her. "Don't move," she warned, but the woman kept coming. Her song had changed, and from the bit of it Scully could hear around the earplugs, it sounded lower and sweeter. Something more like what her father used to sing to her. Maybe if she took out the earplugs, she could hear it better.
She reached up to one ear, and the woman's smile intensified. Scully's fingers closed around the edge of the plug, starting to pull it out. The dark-haired woman nodded approvingly, taking a step closer, the long trail of her gown brushing past Dean's grasping fingers as she passed him.
She passed him.
Instantly, her song stopped. She looked around wildly, hair flying, water droplets pelting both Scully and Dean. Her beautiful features screwed up into a snarl, and she lunged at Scully, claws reaching out-
And then she dissolved right in front of Scully's astonished eyes.
Scully jerked out the earplug in time to ear the soft swoosh of sand hitting the floor. Dress and all, the woman was gone; nothing remained but the pile of sand at her feet.
She looked up to see Dean panting heavily, head hanging low. "Good thinking," he said, his voice gravelly. "Luring her away like that. Guess the siren passing her prey works as well as the prey passing by the siren."
She was about to ask him what he meant when there was a loud crash from the closet. When she turned, she saw Sam stepping out, briefly shaking his head.
Then, with a reluctant grimace, he raised Mulder's gun to point at her.
Scully's heart stopped. "Where's Mulder?" she asked tightly.
"He'll come to soon," Sam said. "I'm sorry, but we can't be arrested." He jerked his chin towards her. "Uncuff my brother, please."
"C'mon, Sam." Dean held up his hands, free and unencumbered. "Gimme some credit."
Sam rolled his eyes, and now Scully realized their interactions made a lot more sense. Brothers. "You all right?" he asked.
"Fine." Dean wiped the back of his hand beneath his nose, smearing the blood there. "We good to go?"
Sam grimaced and gave a nod in Scully's direction.
A chill ran down her spine as she became aware of her situation. Scully started to raise her gun, but Dean was faster. He slammed her against the wall and wrested the gun out of her grasp before she could do more than stomp on his instep. He backed away limping, pointing her weapon at her. "We're not going to hurt you," he said. "But we need to go."
"Where?" she asked.
"The road goes ever on," he responded dryly. Gesturing toward the open cuffs handing from the radiator, he raised his eyebrows.
With two guns pointed at her, there wasn't much else she could do. She carefully sat down and loosely fastened the cuffs around her wrists, eyeing Dean the whole time.
He checked the cuffs before backing off. To her surprise, he then set her gun down on the table, using the hem of his shirt to wipe it clean. Across the room, Sam was doing the same thing with Mulder's gun. "Your partner'll be fine," Sam said. "I really am sorry about this."
"Shut it, Sam, and let's go."
Special Agent Dana Scully, Field Journal Entry number 89. The remaining autopsies confirmed that none of the men drowned despite being found on the shoreline. Positive ID has been made of all but one, and all were vacationing somewhere on the shore between New London, Connecticut, and Chatham, Massachusetts, at the time of their disappearances. Coroners in those states have confirmed similar findings on small clusters of bodies found on the Weepecket Islands and Seal Rocks, respectively. My observations indicate that an explosion or other source of loud noise might have caused the ruptured blood vessels in the victims' eyes and ear drums. A sufficiently high-pitched sound could theoretically have impacted the cranium but not the other major organs as with a concussive explosion. Local law enforcement is working with scientists at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution to determine the likely cause of such a sound event.
Scully paused in her typing and looked out the motel window. It was two in the morning and she was exhausted, but getting her field notes down as soon as possible was a habit in which she had never faltered. At least one other motel guest was still up, given the light she saw in a room across the motel courtyard.
She sighed and turned back to her work. The open sea has always held an allure for young men, whether seeking fame and fortune or simply answering an ill-defined yet powerful call. Even today, when so few people earn their living on the open water, many are still compelled to travel over it and try to understand its mysteries. Yet every so often, they are claimed by it. It is this endless cycle that compels us to create stories to explain the seemingly arbitrary nature of who returns from the sea and who does not.
The light across the courtyard clicked off as two men exited their room, one tall and one taller. Scully sat up straighter in her chair. Her window was open to catch the sea breeze, and she heard one of the men say, "Dude, you gotta agree, she was hot!"
"That's part of her allure, Dean. That's how she drew her victims in."
Scully swiftly stood up and moved to the side of the window, straining her ears. Mulder was in the next room over, but there was no connecting door. She would have to go outside to get to his door, which would put her in view of the two men. Her phone was across her room, and she'd be silhouetted by the desk light if she moved.
"I'm not talking about the siren, Sammy." The lid of a trunk slammed. "I wouldn’t mind her putting the cuffs on me, if you know what I mean."
"Aw, get in the car." It was the same tone of a put-upon sibling that Scully recognized from her own youth. "We've only got a couple of days till the full moon, and there's a string of deaths near Rochester we should look into."
"Yeah, yeah, yeah." There was the creak of a car door opening.
"Hey, Dean. Are you sure you're okay to drive?"
"'Course I am. Besides, we need to get out of here in case those Feds are still around. C'mon, let's go."
There was the double slam of car doors, and then the throaty purr of an engine. Scully peered around the window frame and judged whether or not she'd be able to get to her gun and out the door in time to stop the car.
Then she remembered the pile of sand at her feet, and the way her bullets had disappeared into the woman's chest, and the way these two men had taken all of that completely in stride. How they'd been concerned about nothing but each other and eliminating the threat to random strangers, even at the risk of their own incarceration.
And Scully watched as the taillights of the big black car disappeared into the night.
Author: zubeneschamali
Rating: PG
Word count: 5275
Warnings: none
Summary: Outsider POV, crossover with X-Files. Something is killing young men on the New England coast. Sam and Dean have to contend not just with the monster, but with two FBI agents, even if those agents might be more willing than most to hear them out. Written for spn_summergen.
Author's Notes: Since my first fandom and first fic-writing were for the X-Files, I was thrilled to see annie46's request for a crossover for last year's spn_summergen. I obviously had to bend canon to get these two in the same place and time as Sam and Dean, so consider this somewhere around S2 for SPN and S5 for XF. Thanks to fiercelynormal for the beta read.
"Mulder, there must be a dozen bodies here." Dana Scully looked over the rocky shoreline at the corpses draped over the rocks like seaweed. Some were fresh, but most were considerably older, bloated and grey in the harsh August sun.
"That's only this cove," Fox Mulder replied, shading his eyes as he looked off to their right. "Local sheriff reported at least two more locations like this within a few miles."
"These aren't all new." Scully squatted down at the side of what had been a young man in his twenties or thirties, boat shoes and bright green swimming trunks his only clothing. "This one is probably a week or two old. How did no one notice these before?"
"This part of the coast gets less traffic than it used to. People go to Newport for the big houses or the jazz, or down to Connecticut for the casinos. The families who used to come here every summer either can't afford the vacation time, or they can afford the Caribbean or the Mediterranean instead."
"Your family's summer home wasn't too far from here, right?" She sat back on her heels in the sand, shielding her eyes to look up at Mulder.
"No, it was all the way on the other side of the state," Mulder replied.
"So, about ten miles?"
Mulder's ha ha, very funny face had Scully giving a small grin in reply. "So you don't know this part of Rhode Island?" she asked.
"Never been to Sakonnet Point, no." Mulder looked around, taking in the low cliff above them and the waves crashing behind them. About a quarter-mile offshore, a squat white lighthouse perched on a flat brown rock, a twin to the boulders around them. "So I can't tell you why it's suddenly become a dumping ground. Local sheriff saw multiple bodies, connected them to a series of missing persons reports, and instantly thought 'serial killer,' which is why we're here."
"If these coves are more isolated than they used to be, that dumping ground theory might very well be what's going on," Scully replied as she rose to her feet. "Drug runners or other criminal gangs from New York could have found a convenient place to hide bodies."
"These aren't exactly hidden." Mulder waved at the dozen bodies strewn over the rocks. "And they look more like frat boys than drug dealers."
"Those are hardly exclusive categories," Scully reminded him.
"Well, maybe once we get some of these ID'd, we can determine that for sure."
"The local coroner will be helping, I assume?"
"The local coroner is on vacation in Bali." Mulder shrugged. "I guess they've called him back in, but it might be a day or two before he gets here."
"Great." She smiled sweetly at him. "Then I guess you'll be helping."
The tiny town of Sakonnet Point had a single brownstone building that served as city hall, police station, and fire station. And makeshift morgue. It was perched on a seaside cliff looking out over the Atlantic Ocean that was probably tall enough to hurt yourself if you fell down. The bodies had been only a few miles away at the base of that cliff.
Mulder stuck around long enough to help with the cursory exam of the bodies before getting a call from the sheriff and heading out. Scully was halfway through the second full autopsy when out of the corner of her eye, she saw the door to the morgue swing open. Expecting it to be Mulder, she didn't look up as she said, "I think I've got a cause of death for you, but it doesn't make any sense."
"That's good to hear. Or not."
It wasn't Mulder's voice, and Scully's head snapped up. There were two men in front of her, both of them younger and taller than Mulder, both in cheap, dark suits. She paused with her scalpel hovering over the second victim's skull and asked, "Can I help you?"
They reached into their jacket pockets and flipped open badges in unison. "Agents Sambora and Bryan," the shorter one said. "We're investigating a series of deaths along the coast."
"A series?" Scully asked, subtly shifting her grip on the scalpel. If the corpses on the shore were the work of a criminal investigation, it would be risky but potentially productive to send some of their members to see how the investigation was going. Disguising themselves as FBI agents might have seemed like a good idea if they thought they were dealing with the local coroner.
The taller man spoke up. "There's the cluster here, and there's another up the coast in Massachusetts on the Weepecket Islands."
Scully thought she heard a faint strangled sound coming from the other man, but his face remained neutral. "I hadn't heard that there were more out of state," she replied. "I'll have to get in touch with the coroner in Massachusetts. I can have a report ready tomorrow morning, if you gentlemen would like to come back then."
"You said you had a cause of death." It was the first man, and if his name was really Sambora, Scully was going to eat her sun hat.
"Not for certain." She gave him a tight smile. "If you'll let me get back to work, I'll have something for you tomorrow."
"They didn't drown, did they?" 'Sambora' asked, his green eyes intent on hers.
"As I said, my results are not conclusive." Scully tightened her grip on the scalpel. She tried to keep it unobtrusive, but from the way 'Bryan' suddenly went tense and put a hand on his partner's elbow, she knew he had seen her defensive move.
'Bryan' cleared his throat. "Agent, uh, Sambora, maybe we should let the doctor get back to work." He nodded at her. "Sorry to bother you. We'll come back tomorrow."
Scully watched them make a hasty exit, and then she was stripping her gloves off and reaching for her phone. Mulder answered on the second ring, and she said, "Mulder, I need you to get down here."
"You found something?" he asked. Or rather, shouted over the roar of something in the background.
She frowned. "What's that noise?"
"The outboard motor," he shouted back. "Sheriff's taking me off shore to see if we can find any debris."
"Debris from what?"
"From the boats. These might have been shipwreck victims, which would mean there'd be some debris left behind."
"I don't think it's a shipwreck," Scully replied.
"You don't?"
"They didn't drown, Mulder. Any of them."
"Huh." There was a pause, and she could hear his voice in the background, probably passing her information on to the sheriff. When he came back on, he said, "Good work, Scully."
"There's more," she replied. "The blood vessels in their eyes are burst, and in the one victim I've been able to autopsy so far, his eardrums were burst as well."
"Would that be consistent with an explosion?" Mulder asked.
"Not based on the lack of external trauma," Scully replied. "And there was no internal damage in the organs, no sign of an embolism generated by a blast that would have ruptured lung tissue."
"Interesting. Let me know if the other bodies turn up anything different, all right?"
She looked down at the corpse in front of her and sighed. "Will do."
She didn't realize until she'd disconnected the call that she'd forgotten to mention the fake FBI agents. Crossing the room, she locked the door and made sure her service weapon was in a place she could easily reach.
Then she got back to work.
It was after ten p.m. when Scully finally closed up the morgue and left for the motel room. Mulder was waiting outside on a bench, looking out at the sliver of the ocean visible between the two beach houses across the street. "Nice night," she said, locking the car and joining him.
"Do you hear something?" he asked, not looking away from the waves.
She tilted her head. "Just the ocean."
"Huh." He shook his head. "We didn't find anything out on the water, by the way. No debris that would indicate a boat broke up. Wherever those bodies came from, it wasn't a shipwreck."
"And I didn't find anything other than what I already told you. That is, unless the six autopsies left to do are going to be wildly different from the six I already did."
"Tough day, huh?" Mulder put his hands on her shoulders and turned her slightly away from him. To her surprise, he started to knead her shoulders, thumbs digging in next to her shoulder blades and releasing at least some of the tension of the day's work.
Scully sat there for a moment, letting Mulder's hands and the sound of the waves soothe her. Then she sat straight upright. "Damn it, I forgot the files. I was going to look them over tonight."
"We can get them in the morning." Mulder gave her shoulder a pat and let go.
"I'm not comfortable leaving everything there," she replied. "I forgot to tell you before, but there were two men who came around asking questions about the case."
"Locals?"
"They claimed to be FBI agents." She raised an eyebrow. "Agents Sambora and Bryan."
"Well, they certainly have questionable taste in music," Mulder replied. "You think they were involved in the deaths?"
"Why else would they be there?" Standing up, Scully rolled her neck back and forth to get rid of a few remaining kinks. "I'd better go back."
"I'll go with you."
She was tired enough that she didn't mind the offer, and they drove the short distance back to the police station in silence. As they pulled up, they noticed a sleek black car parked along the side, and it looked like a light was on in the back of the building.
"Scully," Mulder warned.
She kept driving past the station. At the end of the block, she turned around, cut the lights, and came to a stop across the street from the station. Quietly shutting the doors, they got out and hurried across the street and towards the back of the small stone building.
From the back door, it was a few short steps down the hallway to the area Scully had claimed as the morgue, and she led the way, gun drawn. There were low voices coming from the room, and she flattened herself against the wall, Mulder following suit.
"Told you so," came the rich voice of the man who'd identified himself as Agent Sambora. "Six dead bodies on the rocks that didn't get there by drowning. It's a water siren, Sammy."
"Great." They heard a long sigh. "Because those are so easy to kill."
"Hey, at least we don't need a carved branch of a rowan tree or anything complicated like that. Just gotta outlast the bitch."
"Easier said than done." There was the rustle of paper, and then, "Hey, did you notice that these are all guys?"
"Just like the group at, what was it, Wee Pecker?" There was a muffled chortle.
The reply was considerably more disapproving. "Dean. It's the Weepecket Islands."
"That's not really much better, Sam."
"Shut up," Sam said distractedly. "So either the siren doesn't affect women, or there didn't happen to be any on the beach at the time."
"Probably there weren't any there," Dean replied. "I mean, how likely is it that all these guys would disappear and the women with them wouldn't say anything about it?"
"Could just be that it works differently on women," Sam mused. "Maybe it's a spell of forgetfulness or something."
"Yeah, well, it's not gonna matter after we gank her."
Scully exchanged a look with Mulder. After his nod, she readied herself and then moved forward into the morgue, outstretched arms pointing the gun at the two men standing over her files. "Hands up, right now."
"Whoa." They were in flannel shirts and jeans, not their dark suits, but they did promptly put their hands up. "Ma'am," the taller one, who must be Sam, said, "We can explain."
"Agents Mulder and Scully, FBI," Mulder said from beside her.
Sam's eyes briefly closed, and she thought she heard Dean mutter, "Shit." Then he pasted on a charming smile and said, "Listen, agents, I think there's been a misunderstanding here-"
"There certainly has," Scully said, letting go of her gun with one hand to reach back for her handcuffs. "You misunderstood the concept of impersonating a federal officer. Not to mention planning a murder."
"Hey, that is not what it sounded like," Dean retorted.
"You have the right to remain silent," Scully said, holding up her cuffs and coming forward around the side of the autopsy table, watching from the corner of her eye to make sure Mulder was covering them from the other side. "Anything you say can-"
Seemingly without signaling each other, the two men moved as one, shoving the autopsy table towards her and then ducking as Mulder fired. Scully staggered back as the table hit her in the side, cuffs clattering to the ground.
"Sam, go!" Dean barked.
Sam's long legs leaped over her reaching grasp as he dodged and wove his way out of the room. He smacked at the light switch as he left, plunging the place into darkness.
"Scully?" Mulder called.
"I'm fine," she replied, aiming at where she thought Dean had last been. "Put your hands up and step back against the wall."
A clatter off to the left made her swing around in that direction. A second later, there was an "oof" to her right, and she whirled back to see Mulder wrestling their suspect to the ground. "Like she said," he ground out as he got a knee into Dean's back and yanked out his own cuffs, "anything you say can and will be used against you."
"You got him?" Scully asked.
"Yeah, go on!"
She raced out the door in pursuit of Sam, gun still drawn. To her surprise, she nearly ran smack into him, standing outside the rear door of the police station, staring out at the waves just visible beyond the short cliff behind the station.
"Hands up!" Scully barked.
He didn't move.
"Hands in the air!" she repeated. When he still didn't respond, she swung around to the side, keeping her aim steady.
His mouth was slightly open, eyes fixed in the distance, hands down at his sides. It was like he was listening to something, and though Scully strained her ears, she couldn't hear a thing. "Hands up," she said again, moving around so she was standing directly in front of him.
His gaze slowly focused on her, and then it was like he came back to reality. He carefully raised his hands, somehow shrinking into himself despite the fact that he towered over her. "Can you hear it?" he asked.
"Get back inside," she said, motioning with the gun.
He gritted his teeth and turned around, hands still in the air.
Back in the morgue, Mulder had his suspect cuffed to the radiator at the back of the room. He'd picked up her cuffs and held them up as they approached, reaching out to flick the lights back on.
"Thanks," Scully said, stepping back to let him cuff Sam.
Dean was watching his partner closely. "Sam, you heard it, didn't you?"
"I-I think so." He shook his head, long hair flying around. "But-we're a block away from the water, and a few miles up the inlet from the ocean. Water sirens don't come inland."
"She's probably hungry," Dean replied. "Means she has to range farther to find prey."
"Why don't you gentlemen tell us what you're talking about?" Mulder finished with the cuffs and stood back.
They exchanged glances but remained silent.
"Impersonating a federal agent is a crime," Scully reminded them. "So is breaking and entering. So is planning a murder."
"It's not a murder," Dean replied. "Not technically speaking."
She raised her eyebrows. "Not technically speaking."
"Murder applies to humans. Isn't that right, law school boy?"
Sam was looking towards the door, head cocked as if he was listening to something.
"Sam!"
He shook his head at Dean's sharp call. "Yeah. Sorry. Um, Dean, they're not kidding about the 'can and will be used against you' part."
"Yeah, well, we got bigger fish to fry. Literally." Dean grimaced. "Since apparently we can't leave the building."
"What are you talking about?" Scully asked.
Dean nodded towards the files, now strewn about on the floor. "What killed those guys is out there right now. It's getting desperate if it's coming onshore. Sam heard it out back, which means we'll hear it soon, too."
"You said it was a siren." Mulder moved closer. "What do you mean by that?"
"What I said." Despite being handcuffed to a radiator, Dean looked perfectly at ease, almost slouching against the wall. The sharp intelligence in his eyes as he constantly looked back and forth between her and Mulder, pausing occasionally to assess his partner, however, told her this was a dangerous man.
"You think it's a woman somehow luring these men to their deaths?" Scully asked.
"Not just a woman." Dean hesitated and then went on, "A water siren."
"The mythical creature. From Ancient Greece."
"There's lore on sirens and siren-like creatures from oceans all over the world," Sam said, somewhat distantly. "More recently, it's been blended with the lore on mermaids. There've been sightings within the past few years as close as Maine. Besides, exotic species make their way across the oceans in the ballast of ships all the time. Zebra mussels, silver carp, purple loosestrife-"
"Shut it, Sierra Club," Dean cut in. "They're not gonna believe us anyway."
"You said you had to be able to outlast her," Mulder said. "What does that mean?"
Scully turned to give him an incredulous look, but Dean was already saying, "It's what the lore says. Sirens are irresistible, so if you can resist them, they die." He made a poof motion with his cuffed hands.
"If you sail past them," Sam added. He was shifting his weight, looking like he was going to make a run for the door. "But if they're inland..." He gave a heavy sigh. "We should just go."
"Sam." Dean's voice was laden with warning. "Sam, look at me."
"Dean, it's okay," Sam replied, voice sounding almost dreamlike.
Dean shot Scully a pleading look. "You gotta cuff him to something. Or he's gonna be out that door and you won't be able to stop him."
"Do you hear something?" Mulder straightened up, looking out the door.
"Shit. Agent-Scully, was it?" She nodded, and Dean went on, "Are there earplugs in this place?"
"There should be." She started pulling drawers open.
"Sam!" Dean called.
She looked up to see their taller suspect halfway out the door. "Hold it," she called, raising her weapon.
"He's not gonna hear you," Dean replied. "She's already got her hooks in him. You gotta cuff him to the table. Please."
"Mulder, can you-?" Scully broke off as she saw Mulder standing stock-still, looking out the door past Sam.
"She must be getting closer," Dean said. "You can't hear her?"
If she concentrated, she could hear a faint, high-pitched buzzing sound, like a fly near her ear. "Got 'em," she said, holding up a package of industrial-strength earplugs.
"Put 'em in, just in case," Dean said. "You got another set of handcuffs?"
She hesitated. This man had just been talking about planning to kill someone, and here she was, obeying his orders.
A wry grin curled the corner of his mouth. "Yeah, I know. Listen, you gotta keep your partner and Sam from going to her. Lock 'em up, cuff 'em, whatever. Put your earplugs in and then you can stand guard over me all you want."
"What about you?" she asked, brandishing the container of earplugs.
The grin turned into a smirk. "Someone's gotta Odysseus this bitch."
Sam was already out the door when she turned around, but a tug at his cuffed hands brought him back inside. Mulder was starting to move towards the door as well, hands at his sides, gun back in his holster. She tried waving and snapping her fingers in front of his face, but it was like she wasn't even there. That sent a chill down her spine, and when he pushed her aside and started towards the door again, she figured what the hell, might as well try what Dean was suggesting.
There was a closet in the back of the room, and she managed to herd both Sam and Mulder into it, shutting the door behind them and jamming a chair under the doorknob. The buzzing sound was louder now, audible without straining, and it was starting to give her a headache.
"Earplugs!" Dean barked.
Scully drew her weapon again, looking at the box and hesitating. She hated to cut off one of her senses. Behind her, the closet door was thumping. With the size of the two men trapped in there, it wouldn't be long before they broke down the door, and with the earplugs in, she wouldn't know when it happened.
Then the buzzing intensified and went higher in pitch. Wincing against the sudden pain, Scully dove for the earplugs and squeezed one into each ear. The buzzing didn’t subside, but it became bearable, a distraction instead of all-consuming.
When she looked at Dean, she saw the same slack look on his face that his partner had worn. He was staring over her shoulder, jaw hanging loose. She turned to see a woman standing in the doorway.
She might have been the most beautiful woman Scully had ever seen. Her long, dark hair flowed over her smooth, tawny shoulders, water dripping from the tips. She wore a diaphanous gown in shades of blue and turquoise, trimmed in pearls and clinging to her lithe figure. Her arms were long and slender, and she was raising them in Dean's direction, a smile spreading across her face that was terrible in its beauty.
Then she opened her mouth.
Even with the earplugs, Scully could hear it. It was beautiful, haunting, like the old ballads of the sea that her father used to sing her to sleep with. But no song he had ever sung had the sharp undercurrent of darkness that this one did, and she gritted her teeth against it. Raising her gun, she stepped back so that she was standing beside Dean. "Stop right there."
The woman didn't seem to notice her, her sea-blue eyes locked onto Dean. His own eyes were wide, mouth agape as he stared at the woman. She slowly advanced towards him, still singing, and he started to pull at his bonds. The radiator shook with his struggles, and Scully could see how the cuffs were biting into his wrists. He was pushing back against the wall, struggling to stand, and all the while, the woman drew nearer to them. Scully tried to train her weapon on both of them at once. Through the floor, she could feel the vibrations of the closet door quivering with the weight that was being thrown against it.
Dean was standing up in a crouch now, hands still cuffed but body leaning towards the siren. There was a trickle of blood coming from his nose, and as Scully leaned closer, she saw that he'd burst a blood vessel in his right eye as well.
"Stop!" she commanded, aiming at the woman.
She continued to ignore Scully, focusing on Dean, her voice rising in pitch. She held out her arms and then, right before Scully's eyes, her slender fingers turned into long talons.
Scully gasped, and the woman drew back her arms to strike.
Without thinking about it, Scully pulled the trigger. Twice, and then a third time.
She hit the woman dead center, holes ripping through the ruffled silk of her gown. But there was no blood. The woman didn't even move, much less fall down dead.
Scully fell back a step, resisting the urge to rub her eyes in disbelief. She fired again, with the same lack of result.
Then the siren turned towards her.
She backed up again, gun still extended in front of her. "Don't move," she warned, but the woman kept coming. Her song had changed, and from the bit of it Scully could hear around the earplugs, it sounded lower and sweeter. Something more like what her father used to sing to her. Maybe if she took out the earplugs, she could hear it better.
She reached up to one ear, and the woman's smile intensified. Scully's fingers closed around the edge of the plug, starting to pull it out. The dark-haired woman nodded approvingly, taking a step closer, the long trail of her gown brushing past Dean's grasping fingers as she passed him.
She passed him.
Instantly, her song stopped. She looked around wildly, hair flying, water droplets pelting both Scully and Dean. Her beautiful features screwed up into a snarl, and she lunged at Scully, claws reaching out-
And then she dissolved right in front of Scully's astonished eyes.
Scully jerked out the earplug in time to ear the soft swoosh of sand hitting the floor. Dress and all, the woman was gone; nothing remained but the pile of sand at her feet.
She looked up to see Dean panting heavily, head hanging low. "Good thinking," he said, his voice gravelly. "Luring her away like that. Guess the siren passing her prey works as well as the prey passing by the siren."
She was about to ask him what he meant when there was a loud crash from the closet. When she turned, she saw Sam stepping out, briefly shaking his head.
Then, with a reluctant grimace, he raised Mulder's gun to point at her.
Scully's heart stopped. "Where's Mulder?" she asked tightly.
"He'll come to soon," Sam said. "I'm sorry, but we can't be arrested." He jerked his chin towards her. "Uncuff my brother, please."
"C'mon, Sam." Dean held up his hands, free and unencumbered. "Gimme some credit."
Sam rolled his eyes, and now Scully realized their interactions made a lot more sense. Brothers. "You all right?" he asked.
"Fine." Dean wiped the back of his hand beneath his nose, smearing the blood there. "We good to go?"
Sam grimaced and gave a nod in Scully's direction.
A chill ran down her spine as she became aware of her situation. Scully started to raise her gun, but Dean was faster. He slammed her against the wall and wrested the gun out of her grasp before she could do more than stomp on his instep. He backed away limping, pointing her weapon at her. "We're not going to hurt you," he said. "But we need to go."
"Where?" she asked.
"The road goes ever on," he responded dryly. Gesturing toward the open cuffs handing from the radiator, he raised his eyebrows.
With two guns pointed at her, there wasn't much else she could do. She carefully sat down and loosely fastened the cuffs around her wrists, eyeing Dean the whole time.
He checked the cuffs before backing off. To her surprise, he then set her gun down on the table, using the hem of his shirt to wipe it clean. Across the room, Sam was doing the same thing with Mulder's gun. "Your partner'll be fine," Sam said. "I really am sorry about this."
"Shut it, Sam, and let's go."
Special Agent Dana Scully, Field Journal Entry number 89. The remaining autopsies confirmed that none of the men drowned despite being found on the shoreline. Positive ID has been made of all but one, and all were vacationing somewhere on the shore between New London, Connecticut, and Chatham, Massachusetts, at the time of their disappearances. Coroners in those states have confirmed similar findings on small clusters of bodies found on the Weepecket Islands and Seal Rocks, respectively. My observations indicate that an explosion or other source of loud noise might have caused the ruptured blood vessels in the victims' eyes and ear drums. A sufficiently high-pitched sound could theoretically have impacted the cranium but not the other major organs as with a concussive explosion. Local law enforcement is working with scientists at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution to determine the likely cause of such a sound event.
Scully paused in her typing and looked out the motel window. It was two in the morning and she was exhausted, but getting her field notes down as soon as possible was a habit in which she had never faltered. At least one other motel guest was still up, given the light she saw in a room across the motel courtyard.
She sighed and turned back to her work. The open sea has always held an allure for young men, whether seeking fame and fortune or simply answering an ill-defined yet powerful call. Even today, when so few people earn their living on the open water, many are still compelled to travel over it and try to understand its mysteries. Yet every so often, they are claimed by it. It is this endless cycle that compels us to create stories to explain the seemingly arbitrary nature of who returns from the sea and who does not.
The light across the courtyard clicked off as two men exited their room, one tall and one taller. Scully sat up straighter in her chair. Her window was open to catch the sea breeze, and she heard one of the men say, "Dude, you gotta agree, she was hot!"
"That's part of her allure, Dean. That's how she drew her victims in."
Scully swiftly stood up and moved to the side of the window, straining her ears. Mulder was in the next room over, but there was no connecting door. She would have to go outside to get to his door, which would put her in view of the two men. Her phone was across her room, and she'd be silhouetted by the desk light if she moved.
"I'm not talking about the siren, Sammy." The lid of a trunk slammed. "I wouldn’t mind her putting the cuffs on me, if you know what I mean."
"Aw, get in the car." It was the same tone of a put-upon sibling that Scully recognized from her own youth. "We've only got a couple of days till the full moon, and there's a string of deaths near Rochester we should look into."
"Yeah, yeah, yeah." There was the creak of a car door opening.
"Hey, Dean. Are you sure you're okay to drive?"
"'Course I am. Besides, we need to get out of here in case those Feds are still around. C'mon, let's go."
There was the double slam of car doors, and then the throaty purr of an engine. Scully peered around the window frame and judged whether or not she'd be able to get to her gun and out the door in time to stop the car.
Then she remembered the pile of sand at her feet, and the way her bullets had disappeared into the woman's chest, and the way these two men had taken all of that completely in stride. How they'd been concerned about nothing but each other and eliminating the threat to random strangers, even at the risk of their own incarceration.
And Scully watched as the taillights of the big black car disappeared into the night.