6 ACACIA TERRACE, WASHINGTON DC, 10TH OCTOBER 1994, 19:34 PM
The rain was making vertical patterns on the windows when the first bolt of lighning illuminated the living room, followed almost instantaneously by an ominous rumble of thunder. Jenny and Robert Mardon exchanged worried glances.
"I don't think the roof's going to hold," Robert said finally, hearing the determined roar of the rain above them. He had spent the morning in an attempt to repair the hole in the roof left by a falling tree the day before, and he hadn't quite finished.
Jen made for the stairs. "Have you got any buckets up there?"
"Yeah, somewhere," came Robert's voice from downstairs.
Cautiously, she stepped on to the landing, and flinched when her bare feet encountered sodden carpet. Ahead, she could hear the steady trickle of water coming through the ceiling. The water must have soaked through the paper lining the attic floor. She swore sharply under her breath and scrabbled around for the buckets in the dark, not daring to turn on the light in case the water had got in to the wiring.
"Rob? Can you get me a torch?" Lighning flashed again, almost at the same time as the thunder this time. "Rob? The water's coming through!"
She heard his steps on the stairs behind her and the beam of the torch flashed duskily through the dimness.
"What's happening, Jen?" The light flashed over the ceiling, highlighting the water as it fell. "Oh. Great."
He was about to reach for the bucket when the doorbell rang downstairs. "I'll get it," he said quickly. "It'd better not be some nutter selling things..."
The rest of his sentence was lost behind the sound of rainfall as he went downstairs. Jen followed him down in time to see him open the door to a pale-skinned young man with anxious eyes, holding a clipboard and a pen, with rain streaming down a cheap yellow mac.
"Excuse me, would you mind answering some questions for a survey?" he asked hopelessly.
Robert wasn't in the mood for politeness. "Actually, I would, so go and ask your questions to some other loser."
"Ma'am?" the boy asked, undeterred. "Would you-?"
"Didn't you understand me?" Robert asked, his voice rising. "I said, get lost and find someone else to answer your bloody on!" Angered, he gave the boy a shove and slammed the door shut in his face. Jen sighed and turned away from the door, through which the glass-distorted figure of the boy could still be seen, retreating slowly towards the gate.
2 HOURS LATER...
Cold air shivered through the half-open window and breathed gently over the two sleeping bodies on the bed. Leaves rustled outside, their shadows dancing on the far wall. A floorboard creaked. Robert sat up, suddenly awake, and reached for the bedside lamp for light as he swung his legs to the floor. Beside him, Jen stirred. "What's happening?" she asked sleepily.
"Nothing," he whispered. "I'll be back in a minute."
She heard his footsteps padding across the bedroom carpet and out in to the hall, where she could hear the wet carpet squelch as he walked on it. Something rustled. And then there was a muffled thump and a crack that echoed along the hallway and in to the bedroom. "Robert? Robert? Are you okay?"
The only answer was a sudden gust of wind that blew open the window. Jen crept out in to the hallway and looked over the bannister.
Robert's sightless eyes looked up at her, his body inscribing lazy circles in the air, supported by the slowly untwisting length of a plain white sheet.
She screamed.
J. EDGAR HOOVER BUILDING, FBI HEADQUARTERS, WASHINGTON DC
"Mulder," groaned Special Agent Dana Scully. "Was there nowhere else you could find for us to go?"
"What's wrong with Washington, Sculy?" Mulder fiddled with his tie, at the same time assuming the innocent expression that almost formed his alter-ego - Fox Mulder the perfect, the little lost boy who didn't mean to find aliens - they found him, and there was nothing he could do about that, was there?
"The problem with Washingtom," she continued undeterred, "is that we're sitting in it right now. The problem is that it's not even an X-File. Mulder, the man committed suicide, for God's sake." She sighed in resignation and rolled her eyes. Mulder leaned back in his chair, silent. "Okay, Washington," she finally conceded. "Why?"
"There have been three suicides in one road over the last week. Acacia Terrace." He clicked on the inevitable slideshow: "Three deceased, two men and a woman. All of them committed suicide, one by hanging and two by a fatal overdose."
"A suicide pact?" asked Scully, intrigued.
"According to the first victim's wife, Jenny Mardon, her husband had never met either of the other two." Mulder paused to push the file across the table to her with a hint of a smile. "In fact, the second victim had only moved in the week before."
"So that rules out any kind of pact, and most likely any kind of long-term association. I'll have a background check run to make sure of that. Mulder, is there anything linking these suicides?"
"You mean, apart from them all living in the same street and committing suicide in the same week?" He grinned at her, happy now he had a trail to follow, a case to solve. "I don't know. But something tells me this isn't what it seems."
"Nothing ever is with you." She held his gaze for a moment and smiled. "So when do we talk to the witnesses?"
"You read my mind." Mulder stood, flung his jacket over his shoulder. "I hope you don't have any plans this afternoon, Scully."
17 ACACIA TERRACE, WASHINGTON DC, 14:22
"Hello, Mrs Oakley?" The woman who had opened the door was thin, and looked tired, her light floral dress belted at the waist. She nodded. "Can I help you?"
"Fox Mulder, FBI. We spoke on the phone - and this is my partner, Dana Scully." He flashed his ID and Mrs Oakley relaxed a bit. "We were wondering if we could ask you some questions - about your husband."
"Of course. please come in." She showed them the way in to her sitting room, furnished tastefully in muted blues and white. Scully sat down on an impeccable white sofa and crossed her legs, letting Mulder take the lead in asking questions.
"Mrs Oakley," he began. "Was there any indication that your husband was in an abnormal stae of mind yesterday evening?"
She shook her head, tears welling in her eyes. "No - nothing was any different. I mean, he yelled at the poor boy who came round with a questionnaire, but nothing else. Alan used to get like that sometimes."
"Like what," Scully asked gently.
"He got angry - didn't like people interfering with him. But he wasn't the type to...to kill himself..." Her bottom lip trembled and for a moment Scully thought she might cry.
"It's OK, Mrs Oakley." Scully stood and put a hand on her shoulder. "We're sorry for your loss. Thank you for your time - we can show ourselves out."
"He wasn't the type," she whispered, almost to herself. "He wasn't."
Mulder followed his partner out, but looked back in time to see Mrs Oakley look meaningfully at him. "I don't believe it, Agent Mulder," she said softly.
He nodded. "Thank you, Mrs Oakley."
Scully was waiting for him outside, the car keys dangling from one finger. "You want to drive?"
"You bet." He swiped them and walked quickly towards the car, eyeing the sky as he went. "It's going to rain, Scully."
He was right. Halfway down the street - no reason not to waste Bureau gas - the skies opened up. Torrential rain obscured the windows without wipers, and Scully eyed it dubiously. Mulder said nothing.
"Our next visit is to a Mrs Mardon, wife of the first casualty," Scully said a moment later. "Her husband tied a sheet around his neck and jumped over the bannister - autopsy revealed a definite suicide."
"No talk about bungee jumping then," her partner observed. She glared at him. "Mulder. That's not funny."
All she got in reply was an innocent look. She was about to say more when he cut the engine and opened his door to a gust of wind and cold rain, glancing at her as if to deny any responsibility for the foul weather. The Mardon's front door was just visible as a dash of red in the downpour, as if someone had smudged a bright canvas with grey, and Scully could see the faint glow of lights in the windows. With a sigh, she opened her door and followed Mulder up the well-worn brick path that let up to the front door.
"Mrs Mardon?" her partner called, rapping at the door. "FBI - could we speak to you?"
It took a few minutes for the door to open a crack and for a woman's face to appear in the gap. "What do you want?"
Scully let her ID fall open in her hand. "Can we come in, ma'am? We need to talk to you."
Reluctantly, the door opened in front of them. Jenny Mardon was in every way the opposite of Maria Oakley. Tall and blonde, she was dressed casually in blue jeans and a sombre grey t-shirt that reflected the sorrow in her eyes. "I didn't realise the FBI investigated suicides," she said simply, questionning.
"Sometimes," said Mulder, equally simply. He looked over at Scully and raised an eyebrow; she nodded imperceptibly.
"Mrs Mardon, could you tell us whether there was any indication beforehand that your husband was intending to commit suicide?"
"None," Jenny said decisively. "He'd had a bad day at work - we're a bit short of money - but apart from a few angry outbursts...he was the same man he always was."
"Outbursts at you?" Mulder asked quietly.
Mrs Mardon shook her head immediately. "Oh no. Some poor boy knocked on the door with a questionnaire and Robert gave him a bit of an earful. And there was an incident with the neighbours as well. But I don't believe he was suffering from depression. It just doesn't make any sense that..." She stopped midsentence and closed her eyes briefly before continuing in a softer voice. "But there must have been something, because he's dead."
"I'm sorry, Mrs Mardon. You've been very helpful." Scully was aware of Mulder's step towards the door but hesitated. "If you should remember anything at all that might help us..." she handed her a card with Mulder's mobile number on the back.
"I'll call." Jenny smiled with a visible effort.
"Okay Mrs Mardon. We'll show ourselves out."
Outside, the rain was still lashing down, and neither partner said anything until they reached the relative safety of the car. Once inside, Scully pulled off her coat, drenched with rain, and turned to Mulder, a tenuous link forming in her mind. "Mulder - the boy with the questionnaire. Both women mentioned the fact that their husbands yelled at him."
"I noticed," Mulder replied. "I'm just not sure how it fits in."
"All three victims were definite suicides, Mulder - no possibility of foul play. Unless this boy forced them at gunpoint, or something equally melodramatic..."
"Maybe not at gunpoint, not exactly." He looked at her exitedly. "What if this boy - unwitting - has a psychic effect on people?"
"Mulder-"
"What if, somehow, he has the power to amplify people's destructive feelings - or even create them?"
"Mulder." Scully spoke forcefully, trying to rein in his overworking imagination. "We haven't even met him." She was graced with the smile of a bloodhound suddenly in possession of a trail. "Well then, Scully. Where to next?"
J EDGAR HOOVER BUILDING, FBI HEADQUARTERS, WASHINGTON DC, 21:30
"Hello, is that Mr Prentice?" Mulder put his feet up on his desk, holding the telephone between his shoulder and his ear. "Yes, this is Fox Mulder, FBI. I'd like you to answer a few questions."
The man on the other end of the phone hesitated. "Can I record this call, Agent Mulder?" he asked finally. "It's just, in the absence of any form of identification..."
"Of course, Mr Prentice." Mulder rolled his eyes at Scully, who was listening in on the other phone. "Now, you employ people to carry out door-to-door surveys, don't you?"
"Yes, that is what my company's for, Agent Mulder."
"Can you tell me if you had anyone surveying Acacia Road on the 10th and 11th of October between six and ten both evenings?"
"May I ask why?" Prentice sounded wary - maybe he'd had one too many nutters phoning up about rubbish, but Mulder wondered whether he knew something. You're paranoid, he told himself - not for the first time in his life - and replied. "He may have been witness to a suicide." Best not to overstate the seriousness of his suspicions.
"Let me just check the records, Agent Mulder..." Prentice's voice had considerably relaxed. "Yes, we did. Jake Symmons."
"Do you have contact details for him?"
I do, Agent, but employee confidentiality-"
"Mr Prentice." Mulder let his voice harden in warning. "I can get a warrant tomorrow morning and come round to execute it, or you can just give it to me now and save us both the inconvenience."
There was a pause on the other end of the line, then, "12 Belgrave Lawns, Washington. He lives alone."
"Thank you, Mr Prentice," Mulder said more gently, raising his eyebrows in a 'did you get that?' to Scully. "That's all I needed to know." Replacing the phone on the hook, he stood with considerably more energy than he had had that morning.
"Mulder, it's too late to go now," Scully sighed. "Go home and get some sleep."
"Aren't you even curious, Scully?"
"No. Yes, but not now! It's nearly ten o'clock, and I don't know about you, but I'm so tired I can barely stand up right now. If you want to get that boy out of bed and bring him in for questionning, fine, but I'm going home."
Her partner blinked, surprised at her outburst. "Okay. Okay, Scully, I'll see you in the morning."
She smiled softly at him. "I'm sorry, Mulder. I'm just tired - I didn't mean to..."
"I understand." He touched her arm reassuringly before leaving the office, grabbing his coat along the way. She sank in to a chair, leaned back and stared up at the pock-marked and pencil-strewn ceiling. Before she even had time to think, she was asleep.
2 HOURS LATER
The persistent ringing of her phone coupled with a terrible neckache woke Scully up. She reached for the phone sleepily, peering at the keys to find the ACCEPT button. "Mulder," she began.
"Scully, it's Skinner," came her voice. "Where are you? I tried contacting you at home but you didn't answer."
"I'm...uh, I'm at work, sir." She stifled a yawn. "Is there a problem?"
"There have been two suicides and an attempted suicide in Acacia Terrace," he told her. "No names have been released as yet. Get hold of Mulder and get over there."
"Yes, sir." As soon as Skinner hung up, she dialled Mulder's number and waited, counting the rings in her head. One...two...three...
On the fifth ring he picked up. "Hello?"
"Mulder? Is that you?" The voice on the other end sounded unfamiliar.
"I'm sorry, the man you're trying to reach has been involved in an accident," said the voice. "I'm in the ambulance with him now."
"Is he okay?" She grabbed her coat and bag and made for the door.
"We've stabilised him - he'll be fine."
"Where are you taking him?"
"I'm under instructions not to discuss..."
"I'm a federal agent, dammit," she snapped at him. "The man you're with is Special Agent Fox Mulder, he's my partner, and I need to know where you're taking him."
"Bethesda Naval Hospital." The voice sounded reluictant but intimidated.
"I'm on my way. Where are you now?" The elevator up had never seemed so slow.
"We're responding to a triple attempted suicide at Acacia Terrace. look ma'am, I'm going to have to get off the phone now. We're not leaving for ten minutes - if you're in time you can ride up with him."
"Thank you." Scully keyed the phone off and closed her eyes. What the hell had Mulder been doing at Acacia Terrace? She exited the elevator at the parking lot and ran for her car, forgetting how tired she was and how angry she'd been at Mulder earlier. The doctor had said 'attempted suicide' - had he been right about the psychic effect of the questionnaire boy's feelings or was it something more serious?
She was halfway to Acacia Terrace when her cellphone rang again.
"Scully." She didn't dare drive any slower, not even in the dark with one hand on the steering wheel.
"It's Skinner. Scully, the doctors have just-"
"I know, sir. I'm on my way."
"How do you know?"
"I called his phone. I'll be with you in two minutes." She switched the phone off and threw it on the seat beside her with more force than was even remotely necessary.
When she got to the end of the road, she could see three ambulances, their lights repeatedly illuminating the police cordon around the area. Skinner was waiting as she climbed out.
"What happened?" she asked, pulling her coat tighter around her in the night cold.
"Apparently Mulder jumped in front of a car." Anticipating her next question, he added, "He's in the closest ambulance."
She nodded and began to jog over to the vehicle. As she approached, a doctor stepped out, and she caught sight of an IV drip going down to a stretcher before he closed the door. "Excuse me, ma'am..."
She flashed her ID at him. "I need to see Agent Mulder."
He indicated the ambulance door. "In there, ma'am."
He was lying on the stretcher, covered to the chin with a blanket. Another doctor was sitting next to him, monitoring the cardiograph.
"How is he?" Scully asked, kneeling down and brushing the hair back from Mulder's forehead.
"He's got four fractured ribs, a broken arm, tissue damage in the leg and possible concussion. Luckily he went over the top of the vehicle rather than underneath."
"What about his pulse rate?"
"Going steady. Once we get him to Bethesda he'll be awake in no time."
She nodded. "I'd like to stay."
"Okay, ma'am." The doctor stood and left, leaving Scully alone with Mulder and the steady beat of the cardiograph.
BETHESDA NAVAL HOSPITAL, 07:34 AM
Mulder opened his eyes to a painful, blinding light and promptly closed them with a groan. Daring to try again, objects swam in to focus: a clock on a white wall, a door, a cardiograph next to the bed. He turned his head, ignoring the sharp pain as he did so, and saw Scully sitting on the only chair in the room, smiling.
"So you decided to come back to life," was all she said, reaching out to squeeze his hand.
"I knew I wouldn't die," he replied simply.
"How?"
He grinned at her - "Auto-erotic asphyxiation, remember?" - and she had to grin back.
"Mulder...what happened out there?" She hardly dared ask.
"Scully...I was right. The boy. I went out to his house and he wasn't home, so I went out to Acacia Terrace in time to see him being yelled at by a man in pyjamas. And then I felt it." He paused and searched her eyes with his own. "I need you to believe me, Scully. The man slammed the door and suddenly it was as if I was the smallest creature on earth, as if nothing I could ever do would ever be good enough. I felt his anger, his shame, and the the top window of the house opened and the man jumped straight out. I don't remember any more."
Scully nodded. "The police found the boy dead in the river."
"So you believe me?"
"You've never lied to me, Mulder." She squeezed his hand again, stood and walked to the door. "I'll be back."
Outside, she closed it behind her and turned to see Skinner, a concerned look on his face. "How long have you been here, sir?" she asked, surprised.
"Not long. How is he?"
"He seems fine. Coherent, logical...his explanation of what happened to him was...unconventional...but well within the description of an X File."
"Is that what your report will conclude, Agent Scully?"
"My report will state that Agent Mulder was influenced by forces unknown in an attempt to committ suicide, as were five other people in the immediate vicinity." She didn't meet his eyes but spoke convincingly.
"And off the record, Scully?" Skinner asked gently.
She took a deep breath. "Off the record, sir, I think Mulder's story is partially true. There are certainly unexplained elements in the case."
"But you don't think his experience is a part of that."
"No. I think the story of psychic...projection...is a way for him to rationalise what happened. Frankly, we can't be sure it was an attempt at suicide, not a simple accident. He doesn't remember. But what he remembers feeling, the anger, the uselessness, that part I think is true." She looked back at the room she'd just left. "It's just that they were his feelings, not the boy's. After everything he's been through...his hospitalisation, closure at last over Samantha...I think he just rationalised what he felt the only way he could."
"You mean his story is what he wants to believe?" Skinner asked.
"No, sir. I mean it's what he needs to believe."
"In your opinion."
"Yes, sir." Scully pulled her hair back from her eyes. "I'll let you know when he's ready to talk to you."
Skinner nodded and seemed about to turn away when he hesitated and spoke again. "Scully-Dana-off the record, before you damn Mulder for creating a lie to believe, think about whether your judgement is based on what you want to believe."
"Sir?"
"Your attempt to rationalise Mulder's story is even less believable than psychic projection," he prodded.
"You're saying I'm afraid to believe?"
Skinner looked at her calmly for a minute. "Are you?" Then he turned and walked off down the corridor, leaving Scully alone.
She stood for a while, then, reaching out a slow hand, she opened the door to Mulder's room and looked in at his sleeping form. Gently, she walked across to his bed and sat down on the edge, taking one of his hands between both of hers.
"Back already?" he mumbled sleepily.
Scully smiled slowly and touched his cheek. "Next time I'm coming with you."