The Bill Scully Files 3: Almost Midnight

by Brandon

Fox Mulder and Tara Scully join forces to investigate an X-File.

TITLE: Almost Midnight
SPOILER WARNING: Numerous spoilers all the way through Season6.
RATING: PG-13, for language.
CONTENT WARNING: Bad words; ; MulderAngst and TaraAngst; M/Sfriendship; Mulder/Tara friendship; Bill,jr/Tara romance
CLASSIFICATION: XRA
SUMMARY: Fox Mulder and Tara Scully team up to solve a mutualproblem, and find themselves swept up in an X-File.
NOTE: I have stolen the title for this story from a novel byMartin Caidin. It was...less than wonderful, and this story reallyhas nothing to do with Caidin's (although it has a vaguely similar theme). But the title was cool, and so I have liberated it.
DEDICATIONS: To Nonie, for tireless beta tests. To Rachel,for nagging. And to the two Kristens for help with the San Diegolocale.

Almost Midnight

by Brandon D. Ray (publius@avalon.net)

Fox Mulder's Apartment, Alexandria, VA
December 25, 11:58 p.m.

It was dark and the phone was ringing.

Fox Mulder struggled groggily to wakefulness, trying to sort out whatwas real from the dream he'd been having. The phone ringing for thethird time helped orient him, and he clumsily reached out and grabbed thereceiver before the answering machine could pick it up.

"Mulder," he mumbled.

There was silence on the other end; then he thought he heard someonebreathing.

"Hello?" he said, more sharply. "Is someone there?"

"Fox." It was a woman's voice, very faint.

Who the hell? There were only a handful of people who might callhim at this time of night, and only one or two of them would call him byhis first name. His eyes flicked over to the Caller I.D. box, andhis photographic memory identified the number instantly.

"Tara?" he said.

"Oh, Fox," she said, and this time he detected a tremor in her voice.

"Tara, what's wrong?"

There was another silence, and he thought he heard a choked sob. "Fox, I need your help. I don't know who else to turn to. Thepolice say they can't do anything, and the Shore Patrol --"

"Tara!" he repeated sharply. "What's wrong? What's goingon?"

There was another silence, longer than the others, and when she finallyspoke again, he could barely hear her. "Bill is missing. Andso is Dana."

# # #

Ten minutes later Mulder hung up the phone. He'd spent five ofthose minutes calming her down, and another five gleaning from her whatlittle information she had. Scully had been visiting her brotherand his family for Christmas -- that much Mulder already knew. Onthe evening of the 23rd she and Bill had gone out in search of eggnog. They had not returned.

Tara had, of course, notified the appropriate authorities: TheSan Diego Police and the Shore Patrol. Neither agency had been ableto find Dana or her brother. Not a clue, not a lead, nothing. To all appearances brother and sister had climbed into his car, pulledout of the driveway, and vanished without a trace.

But Fox Mulder had been living in the shadows for a long time, and onething he knew with certainty: Nothing vanishes without a trace.

Now he started dialing airline ticket reservation offices. Twentyweary minutes later his initial suspicion was confirmed: There wasnot a single seat available on any flight from Washington to Californiauntil after the first of the year. Which was, of course, totallyunacceptable.

Next he called Skinner. The phone was answered on the sixth ring.

"Hello?" His former supervisor's voice was foggy with sleep.

"This is Mulder. I need your help."

"Wha --? Mulder?" A pause. "I'm not supposed to betalking to you." Another pause. "Do you know what time it is?"

"Scully's missing." He didn't say "again". He didn't haveto. "So's her brother Bill."

Another pause, very brief. Then: "What can I do?"

"I need a civilian air transport priority for Delta Flight 1109, departingfrom Dulles at 5:30 this morning, with a connection in Atlanta with Delta423, non-stop to San Diego."

A faint rustling sound. "Okay, got it. Anything else?"

"I also need to assert federal jurisdiction, with myself as SAC."

"Jurisdiction shouldn't be a problem," Skinner replied. "Scullyis a federal agent, and her brother's in the Navy, right?"

"That's right."

Skinner continued, "But the San Diego SAC may have some problems withan outsider --"

"Fuck the San Diego office," Mulder said flatly. "If they weredoing their jobs, instead of sitting around with their thumbs up theircollective asses, maybe this kind of thing wouldn't happen." He wasbeing irrational, and he knew it, but there was no one else to take hisanger out on.

There was another moment of silence. Finally, Skinner said, "I'llsee what I can do, Mulder." He hesitated. "Have you spokento Kersh?"

Kersh. The new A.D. Mulder hadn't even considered callingthe man; he didn't really know him, and he certainly didn't trust him. "No."

He could almost hear Skinner nodding to himself. "All right. All right, I guess I understand. I'll do my best to expedite thingsfor you; with luck your authority should be waiting for you by the timeyou arrive in San Diego. Anything else?"

"Not for now."

"Keep in touch, Mulder. I'll do anything I can to help; you knowthat."

"I know." And he punched the disconnect button savagely.

One more call to make. This time the phone was answered promptly,and the voice at the other end sounded as alert as it ever did.

"Frohike," Mulder said. "Turn off the tape."

After the briefest of hesitations: "Done."

"I need some research done, and I need it fast. I need you toget me everything you can find on a missing persons case. The informationwill be in the files of the San Diego Police Department and wherever thehell the local headquarters of the Navy Shore Patrol is located in thatarea. The subjects are Bill and Dana Scully."

A shocked silence. "Jesus. I'll get right on it."

"Whatever you find, send it to me on the net. My private account;not the FBI one. I'm flying out of Dulles at 5:30, and expect tobe in San Diego by 12:30 or so Washington time. If you can startfeeding me information before then, I can study the files on the planeand hit the ground running as soon as I arrive." He hit disconnectwithout waiting for a response.

Mulder rose from the sofa and moved rapidly to his bedroom. Owingto the nature of his job, he always kept a suitcase packed and ready togo. All he had to do was add a few toilet items, and his Sig Sauer. The entire process took less than ten minutes, leaving him with far toomuch time to kill before he had to leave for the airport. He consideredfinding something to eat, but his stomach rebelled at the very idea. He considered pouring himself a drink to calm his nerves, but he was afraidthat once he started drinking he wouldn't be able to stop. Finally,he sat down on the sofa again to wait.

# # #

Dulles International Airport
December 26, 5:14 a.m.

The airport was crowded, even at five in the morning. Mulder knewhe should have expected that, given the impossibility of making a reservationwithout using government muscle, but he hadn't really thought about it,and the reality of the bright lights, the incessant Christmas music onthe overhead speakers, and the jostling, happy crowds of travelers cameas something of a shock. For the past five hours he'd been livingin a world even darker than the one he usually inhabited, and finding himselfsuddenly in a bubble of holiday cheer was hard to cope with.

At first he had dealt with it by ignoring it, and concentrating on themundane tasks of procuring his boarding pass, getting his gun past airportsecurity, and making a belated phone call to Tara to let her know he wason his way and when to expect him. But that had taken only so long,and now he was sitting in the waiting area of his assigned gate, tryingnot to think too much.

God, he was tired; he was exhausted. He knew he should have slept;he'd only been asleep for a couple of hours when Tara's phone call came,and the only thing he was certain of was that the day ahead was going tobe a long one. But just as his stomach had refused to entertain theidea of food, so his mind had refused to embrace the concept of sleep. He'd alternated sitting on the sofa not watching the television, and pacingrestlessly through his apartment. He'd thought about going runningas a means of diversion, but shied away from it, not wanting to leave theshelter of his apartment until he absolutely had to. Not wantingto acknowledge that there was a world out there, and that he had to dealwith it somehow.

God, Scully, what have they done to you this time?>>

He had finally gotten past the guilt he used to feel when somethinghappened to her. After Antarctica, it had at last seeped down intohis soul that she was there with him because she wanted to be, becauseshe had as much invested in this quest as he did. He had known thatwith the top of his mind for a long time, but it had really only been lipservice; his heart had not been in it. She had known that, and deepdown he had known it, and hated himself for not giving her the respectshe needed and deserved, but they had seldom spoken of it, because thoseconversations always ended so badly.

But somehow, out there on the ice fields, holding each other as theywaited to die and watched an indisputably alien spaceship rising into thesky, the knowledge had finally trickled down to the small, dark place whereFox Mulder really lived. At that moment, as he finally acknowledgedin his heart that she was a free and independent adult, he had also realizedthat the one who had really been imprisoned by his obtuseness had beennot his partner, but himself, and that now, finally, he was setting himselffree.

Somehow they had struggled out of that experience alive, and they hadboth emerged the stronger for it, as well as infinitely closer. Butstill they hadn't spoken of it. Both of them had recognized the change,but by its very nature it hadn't seemed necessary to say anything.

He had thought for awhile that they might become lovers, but that hadn'thappened either, and after awhile that seemed right, too. They werecloser than lovers, and Mulder had come to realize that adding sex to theequation would be...wrong, somehow. Not morally wrong, but wrongin the only way that mattered: It would be wrong for them. As he had remarked to her just last month, at the height of another casewhich neither of them had expected to survive, "We don't need that, Scully. That's not us. That's not real. If we did that, we would notbe who we are." And she had agreed.

None of this, of course, made it hurt any less, now that she was missingagain. But unlike so many occasions in the past, this time it wasa clean hurt.

Finally they called his flight, and he was able to stop thinking againfor awhile.

# # #

Somewhere over Arizona
December 26, 8:59 a.m., Pacific Standard Time

The trip from Washington to San Diego was the longest seven hours ofFox Mulder's life.

First had been the comparatively short hop to Atlanta; then an excruciating55 minute wait for the connecting flight. Finally they were in theair, headed west, but still time seemed to drag, and the fact that he wasseated next to a young couple bubbling over with love hadn't helped mattersat all.

As soon as they were airborne he'd opened his laptop and logged ontohis ISP, but there was nothing there from Frohike, which meant that therewas nothing there of importance. He'd spent the next three hoursdisciplining himself to only check his email once every quarter hour, whichrequired almost all the self-control he had, and also left him with morethen fourteen and a half minutes out of every fifteen with nothing to occupyhis mind.

Now, finally, there was the message icon blinking in the upper lefthand corner. With a sigh of relief Mulder clicked on the icon andwaited for the message to appear.

Two minutes later he slammed the laptop shut in disgust. Nothing. Nothing nothing nothing. Frohike had been apologetic almost to thepoint of obsequiousness, but the fact remained that he'd found nothingthat Tara hadn't already told Mulder over the phone the night before. The San Diego Police Department's records showed only a routine missingpersons investigation: No clues, no evidence, no leads. Deadend. And the Shore Patrol didn't even have that much; from the informationavailable on their intranet, they were barely interested.

Thank god he was almost to San Diego, so he could start a real investigation.

# # #

San Diego International Airport
December 26, 9:48 a.m.

The San Diego airport was just as crowded and just as overflowing withholiday cheer as Dulles and Atlanta had been. Grimly, Mulder pushedhis way through the crowds, his eyes searching for Tara.

In the back of his mind he wondered how she would receive him. The last time he'd come to San Diego he had not been at all welcome inBill Scully's home, and he had left as soon as possible. True, thingshad thawed a bit between himself and Bill in the last few months, but hehad no way of knowing how much of that Bill had shared with Tara.

She called me,>> he reminded himself. This wasn'tmy idea.>> But at the very least that indicated a willingness towork with him on their mutual problem, and that was good enough. It wasn't necessary that they like each other, as long as they had a commoninterest.

Not that it really mattered very much one way or the other; Mulder washere to find Scully, and nothing, but nothing, was going to prevent thatfrom happening. Tara's cooperation would make things a little easier,by giving him a base of operations and perhaps an entre to officials atthe Shore Patrol, but he didn't imagine she would make much real difference.

He found Tara waiting just outside the security checkpoint, hands inher coat pockets, staring off into space. Elbowing his way past anoverweight businessman, Mulder walked up and stood in front of her, butshe didn't stir.

"Tara?" Still nothing. More sharply: "Tara!"

She shook her head, and then she was seeing him. "Fox," she said,very faintly.

"Tara...are you okay?"

Her features firmed up and she shook her head again. "That wasa damned stupid question, Fox."

He sucked in his breath, then nodded slightly. "Sorry."

"That's okay. I guess I was kind of out of it for a minute. Do you have any luggage?"

"No," he replied, hefting his carry-on. "I try to travel light."

"Then let's get going."

A few moments later Tara was popping the trunk on a late model Saturnand stepping aside to watch in silence as Mulder dropped his carry-on intothe compartment. Leaning over so that his body would conceal hisactions from casual passersby, he removed his Sig Sauer and holster fromthe bag, withdrew an ammunition clip from the outside zippered pocked,and finally clipped the whole assemblage to the right side of his belt.

"Was that supposed to impress me?"

He turned to look at Tara, and raised his eyebrows. She was standinga few feet back with her arms folded across her chest and a cold look onher face. "Was what supposed to impress you?"

She waved a hand at him. "The whole routine with the gun."

Mulder shook his head. "No. I always carry a weapon whenI'm on an assignment."

She looked at him for just a moment, then some of the tension seemedto go out of her and she nodded and sighed. "Sorry, Fox. It'sbeen a tough couple of days." She smiled briefly, but only with hermouth, and then moved towards the driver's side of the car. "I guesswe're even now."

"Sure."

The drive to her home passed in silence. Mulder sat in the passengerseat, staring out the window, trying not to think about Scully, and themost obvious distraction was the woman sitting next to him.

He really didn't know Tara Scully at all well. He'd met her onlyonce, when he had come to San Diego the previous Christmas. She hadn'tmade much of an impression on him then; he'd been focusing all of his attentionon his partner, and Bill had seemed to be just as happy to have Mulderkeep his distance from Tara in any case. A few days after he'd arrived,she'd gone into labor and had her baby, and that had ended what littlecontact he'd had with her.

The bottom line was that Tara was an enigma to him. He'd triednot to tar her with his negative emotions towards her husband, but pasta certain point he couldn't help himself. The fact that he'd finallygotten to know Bill a little better in the last few months had helped,but he still had more than a little residual unease towards her.

He was so absorbed in his thoughts that he didn't even notice that he'ddrifted off to sleep.

# # #

Residence of Bill and Tara Scully
Miramar Naval Air Station, San Diego, CA
December 26, 4:02 p.m.

Someone was shaking his shoulder.

"Fox, wake up."

He stirred groggily, and pulled the blanket up a little higher.

"Fox! Wake up!"

A momentary pause, then a rustling noise, and suddenly the room wasflooded with light. With a groan, Mulder rolled onto his back andopened his eyes, and tried to remember where he was. He didn't recognizethe room, so he must be in the field, working on a case. There'dbeen a dream...a nightmare. Scully had been taken again --

Scully. He sat bolt upright and squinted at the figure silhouettedagainst the window. As he watched, the figure moved closer, and thenhe recognized her. Tara Scully.

Shit. It wasn't a dream. But it was a nightmare.

He shook his head and ran the fingers of one hand through his hair. "How -- how long have I been asleep?"

Now she was standing next to the bed. "About six hours. You fell asleep in the car on the way from the airport."

He nodded slowly. The last thing he remembered was staring outthe car window at the light Saturday morning traffic. He'd been thinkingabout something....something.... He shook his head in frustration;he just couldn't remember. "I was really out of it," he admitted.

"I'd say so. I had a hell of a time getting you into the house. One of the neighbors, Tom Christopher, finally came over and helped me." Her lips quirked in annoyance. "He seemed to think it was a littleodd for me to be bringing a strange man into the house when Bill wasn'taround. But I told him you're with Dana, and I think he believedme."

Mulder stared at her for a moment, then shook his head again. "Great," he muttered. "That's all I need."

Tara raised her eyebrows. "Aren't you? I thought --"

"No," he replied, cutting her off. "No, we're not." He threwback the blankets and swung his feet out of bed. He was still wearinghis slacks and undershirt from the morning, and after a quick glance aroundthe room he spotted his bag sitting on top of the bureau. His weapon,still in its holster, was laying next to it. He padded over and pickedup the bag.

"Fox?" He turned to look at her. She was still standingby the bed, but now she wore a look of acute embarrassment. "Fox,I'm sorry. I didn't mean --"

"It's all right, Tara," he said, more sharply than he'd intended. "People make that mistake all the time."

They stood looking at each other for just a moment longer, then sheseemed to notice that he was half-dressed and holding his overnight bag. "I'll leave you be, then," she said awkwardly. "Go ahead and change,or whatever, and I'll try to put together some sandwiches or something. I'm sure you must be hungry. I'm starving; I haven't eaten sincelast night."

He nodded. "Okay."

She walked over to the door and pulled it open, then paused for justa moment, and turned to look at him over her shoulder.

"It's okay, Tara," he said softly. "Really."

She nodded once, and turned and left the room.

# # #

Mulder came downstairs a few minutes later to find Tara in the kitchen,mixing something in a bowl. He felt a little more human, having changedto jeans and a polo shirt after taking a minute to splash some water onhis face in the bathroom.

"Tuna salad," Tara said in answer to his inquiring gaze. "I hopethat's okay. Normally I'd have leftovers coming out of my ears today,but I...I didn't feel much like cooking yesterday."

"Sure," he answered. "Tuna salad is fine. Can I do anythingto help?"

She shook her head. "No. I'm just about done. Whydon't you grab a couple of beers, or whatever you'd like, and go on outand sit down. I'll be out in just a moment."

Mulder nodded and crossed to the refrigerator, pulling the door openand bending down slightly to examine its contents. A half gallonof milk, still mostly full; orange juice; miscellaneous jars of jelly,salsa and so forth. A couple of jars of partly eaten baby food.

And a six pack of Rolling Rock, with one bottle missing.

He stood very still, trying to control his breathing, while at the sametime cursing himself for his weakness. Dammit, if every single littlething that reminded him of Scully was going to set him off like this, hewas going to be no good to anyone. He had to get better control ofhimself. He had to. For her sake, as well as Bill's.

"Fox? Are you okay?"

Somehow Tara's question broke the tension he was feeling, and he wasable to chuckle. Grabbing two bottles of beer, he shut the refrigeratordoor and turned to face her, a slight smile on his face. "That wasa damned stupid question, Tara," he said, hoping she'd pick up on his amusement.

She flushed and looked away. "I -- I'm sorry, Fox. Thatwas thoughtless." She took a breath and looked back at him. "I'm sorry."

Mulder shook his head, and took a step towards her. "No, Tara. It's okay. It was funny."

She stared at him for just a moment, then looked down into her bowland resumed mixing. "No it wasn't."

Mulder stood looking at her for just a moment, waiting to see if shewould add anything. Finally, he shrugged and walked out of the room.

# # #

5:14 p.m.

The meal passed quickly and in silence, with Mulder and Tara sittingacross from each other at a dining room table that seemed far too large. Mulder tried to concentrate on his beer and sandwich, doing his best toignore the ghosts in the apparently empty chairs.

After they'd finished eating they continued to sit quietly for a fewminutes, looking at everything except each other. Finally, Mulderbroke the silence.

"Tara, we have to talk. I have to know what happened. Allthe details."

She nodded reluctantly. "I know. I don't want to, but Iknow it has to be done." She closed her eyes for a moment, then openedthem. "Just let me clear the dishes. I'll be right back."

A few moments later she was seated across from him again, her expressionwary, and perhaps just a little angry. As gently as he could: "Tara, I really am sorry. I know how hard this is, and I know youprobably already went over this with the police."

"You got that one right," she said flatly. Her voice deepenedin an exaggerated mimicry of Joe Friday. "'When was thelast time you saw your husband Mrs. Scully? What was he wearing Mrs.Scully? What sort of car was he driving? What color?'" She drew in a deep breath and continued, and now the anger was in her voiceas well as on her face. "'Was he having problems at work Mrs. Scully? Was he having problems at home Mrs. Scully? Are you sure it was hissister he left with Mrs. Scully? Can we see his address book Mrs. Scully? Who is this woman listed under the R's Mrs. Scully?'" She slammed her hand down on the table. "Fucking cops! Fuckingsons of bitches! Whose side are they on, anyway? They don'tknow anything about him!!" She blinked angrily, and wiped her forearmacross her eyes.

Mulder flinched slightly at hearing that sort of language coming fromher. He opened his mouth to respond, but she must have seen the expressionon his face, because now she turned her anger on him.

"What's the matter, Fox? Didn't think I had it in me? Youthought I was just some sweet little housewife, and never let a bad wordcross my lips? Well you can fucking well think again!" Andshe folded her arms across her chest and glared at him defiantly.

Mulder felt his own anger flare, and he looked down at his hands, clenchedtightly together on the table in front of him. He took a deep breathand tried to control his breathing. Scully. Focus on Scully. This was for her, and he had to stay focused; he couldn't afford to losehis temper, as tempting as that might be. Besides, Tara wasn't reallyangry at him; he was just the most convenient target at the moment. Suddenly he could almost hear Scully's voice in his ear: "Not everything'sabout you, Mulder."

He shuddered. That had been one of the bad times. But thatwas a long time ago, and it was over. Now Scully was missing, andhe had to find her.

He had to find her. Failure was not an option.

He looked back up at Tara, his features calm and composed. Helocked eyes with her, and in measured, deliberate tones he said, "Okay, Tara. Let's take those questions one at a time."

She continued to glare at him for just a moment longer; finally hershoulders sagged in acceptance. "Sorry, Fox," she said, very softly. Then she straightened up and looked him in the eye again, and this timehe saw determination rather than anger. "Let's get it over with."

They were about three quarters of the way through the interview whenMulder realized she was holding something back. He wasn't sure whatit was, but from the set of her shoulders and the tone of her voice, heknew that she was hiding something. The very idea that she wouldtry to conceal something infuriated him, but he had conducted too manyinvestigations for it to come as a complete surprise. People oftenshaded the truth in these situations, at the very least. Unfortunately,this time he was personally involved, and that was making it difficultfor him to maintain his own objectivity.

"What is it, Tara?" he asked abruptly, a little more roughly than hehad intended.

She blinked, and shook her head. "What is what?"

"What is it that you aren't telling me?"

She stared at him for just a moment. Then: "Nothing. There's nothing...." Her voice trailed off, and if Mulder hadn'tbeen sure before, he was now.

Again he felt the anger rise in his chest. He needed this information;he needed everything. He knew it was hard on her, but he'd thoughtshe had understood the importance of this. Now it was his turn toslam his hand down on the table, and he glared at her as he did so. "Dammit, Tara, don't lie to me!"

The words hung between them in the air for a timeless interval. Finally, she looked back up at him, and once again fury flashed in hereyes. "You son of a bitch!" Her voice was cold. "Youbastard! You think you have to know everything? Fine; I'lltell you." She stood up and leaned across the table at him, her handspressed flat on its hardwood surface. "Bill and I had a fight, okay? A nice little lovers' quarrel. Is that what you wanted to know?"

As quickly as it had come, Mulder's own anger was gone, and he noddedslowly. It felt right. He even thought he knew why she hadn'twanted to tell him, and why she hadn't told the police. When he spokeagain his voice was very soft. He knew he was taking her on an emotionalrollercoaster ride, but he couldn't help himself. He was respondingin the only way he knew how. "It was because of the questions aboutother women, wasn't it?"

Again she stared at him, her face an expressionless mask. Finally,she nodded.

Mulder continued, "The police asked you those questions, and insinuatedthat Bill was seeing someone else, and that made you angry, and you didn'twant to give them anything that would reinforce that idea. And youwere afraid I thought the same thing, because I was asking a lot of thesame questions."

He stopped and waited. Again she nodded.

"Tara, I'm very sorry. I know -- believe me, I KNOW -- how muchthis is hurting you. Most people think that in this sort of situationthe fear and worry over the missing loved one is what causes all the pain,and that is important. But that's only part of it."

He stopped and took a breath before continuing. "And the otherpart of it, in some ways the worst part, is the sense of violation youget from the people who are supposedly trying to help you. They pryinto your life, they ask embarrassing questions, they go through your personalpapers and other belongings, they draw unpleasant inferences. Andyou know they have to do those things, you know they have to do a thoroughjob, but that doesn't make it any less of a violation."

He reached across the table and lightly laid one his hands on top of each of hers. "Tara, tell me about the fight. I needto know. It's the only way I know how to do this. I'm sorry."

For a moment he thought she was going to lash out at him again, andhe braced himself for the onslaught. But then she took a long, shakybreath and sank back down in her chair. And after another moment,she started talking.

"It was...it was that same afternoon. Wednesday afternoon, the23rd. Dana had been here since the previous Saturday, and everythinghad seemed to be fine." She smiled at the memory. "Dana andMatthew really hit it off. It was so sweet." The smile diedas quickly as it had come. "Then on Wednesday afternoon, I walkedin on them in Bill's study. They were talking about something, andthey both looked pretty grim." She shook her head. "I haven'tseen Bill look that way since...since the Gulf War...."

Her voice trailed off. Mulder waited a moment to see if she wouldcontinue on her own. Then, in the same soft, accepting tone of voice,he said, "Go on, Tara. Tell me. Tell me what happened next."

She shrugged restlessly, and her eyes dropped to look at their hands,now twined together on the table top. "It was really nothing. I guess I interrupted something, but I didn't mean to. I just wantedto ask what they wanted for dinner. But then they both looked sotense and worried, and I couldn't help myself, I just blurted it out, andasked Bill what was wrong."

"What did he say?"

"Not much of anything." She looked back up at him, and now hereyes were large, wounded circles. "He said it was none of my concern. Those were his exact words. And then...and then he pushed me. He actually pushed me out of the study and shut the door."

Mulder hesitated, trying to decide how to ask the question which hadto be asked. At last he said, "Tara? Remember, I'm trying tohelp, so don't get mad at me. I have to ask this. Is Bill...abusive?"

She shook her head violently. "No. No. Absolutelynot. He's never laid a hand on either me or Matthew." She lookedMulder square in the eye. "You have to believe me; I would neverstand for that. My...my first boyfriend was like that, and I putup with it for far too long, until the day he actually put me in the hospital. After that I swore that I would never allow a man to do that to me again. And Bill never has."

Mulder nodded. "Okay, I believe you. Let's move on. Was there anything more to the fight?"

Tara shook her head again. "No, not really. I was waitinguntil we went to bed, so we could have some privacy when I confronted himabout it. So I suppose the fight, as such, hadn't actually happenedyet. But I had planned it, and Bill had to know it was coming."

"All right. Do you have any idea, any idea at all, what Bill andScully were talking about?"

"No. They were talking about something, and I think it was important,but they both shut up as soon as I came into the room."

"And this was in the study?" She nodded. "I presume thepolice went through the study? Bill's files, papers, that sort ofthing?"

"Actually, he doesn't have much in the way of files. He keepseverything on the PC; he's a very modern sort of guy." She smiledslightly.

"Did the police look at what was on the computer?"

She shrugged. "I suppose so. I wasn't there while they weresearching. I couldn't bear it."

"Did they take anything with them?"

She shook her head. "No. No, I'm sure they didn't."

Mulder nodded sharply, and stood up. "All right then. Let'sgo see what we can find."

# # #

8:22 p.m.

Mulder leaned back in the swivel chair and stared at the computer screen. Nothing there. Nearly three hours of searching, and there was nothingthere.

Everything was neatly organized, each item labeled and sorted and tuckedaway in the appropriate directory on Bill Scully's hard drive. Andthere was nothing there. Nothing there to interest him.

Dammit.

Tara sat in a straight backed chair that she'd brought from the diningroom, but Mulder was barely aware of her presence. Neither of themhad spoken a word since leaving the dinner table. There hadn't seemedto be anything to say.

Mulder sighed. Time to start on the floppies. Not that there'dbe anything on them, either. He opened one of the desk drawers andstarted rooting around.

"What are you looking for, Fox?"

He paused for a moment, and turned and looked at her, slightly startled. "Uh, his backups. His floppies. At least, I'm pretty sure they'llbe on floppies. He doesn't seem to have a zip drive. Do youknow where he keeps them?"

"Oh, sure. Bottom left hand drawer."

Mulder pulled the drawer open, and saw that it contained a storage casefull of floppy disks. He lifted the case out and set it on the desk.

Like the files on the hard drive, the storage case was carefully organized,with each disk assigned a slot in one of several categories, and each onelabeled and dated in Bill's neat, meticulous handwriting. Correspondence,personal finances, downloads from various newsgroups and mailing lists,freeware, shareware....and then he found it.

Maybe.

It was a blank disk. No label. Sitting all by itself inthe back of the storage case. Mulder glanced quickly down at thestill-open drawer where he'd found the case, and noted that it also heldtwo boxes of unused floppies. One of the boxes had been opened, andlooked as if it was about half full. So Bill didn't keep his unuseddisks in the storage case.

Mulder tapped the disk against the edge of the desk thoughtfully. This could be innocuous. It could be just another blank disk whichfor some reason had been put in the storage case instead of being leftin the box. It could also be another backup which Bill hadn't gottenaround to labeling yet, set aside as a reminder that this still neededdoing. It could be any of a number of innocent things, unrelatedto Scully and her brother's disappearance.

But Mulder didn't believe it for a minute. All of his professionalinstincts were screaming that this was the key.

One way to find out.

He slipped the disk into the floppy drive and waited for the machineto read it. His eyes lit up, and he smiled for the first time inhours. Bingo.

It was password protected.

"Fox? What is it?"

Mulder blinked. Once again, he had forgotten about Tara's presencein the room. He turned to look at her. "I'm not sure yet,"he replied. "I found it in with the rest of his floppies, but ithasn't got a label, and it seems to be password protected. The harddrive isn't protected, and neither are any of the directories or fileson it, so I'm guessing this is something important. With luck, itmay be a clue." He paused for a moment, and drummed his fingers onthe desktop. "Do you have any idea what the password might be?"

She shook her head, and dragged her chair a little closer. "No. I didn't know Bill had started using passwords."

Mulder nodded absently, and stroked his chin. Then he went on,talking mostly to himself. "Passwords are supposed to be random characterstrings, for security reasons, but almost nobody actually does that. Most people use something they can remember -- a word, or a phrase. Something that means something to them. That's how most computerhacks get done -- by guessing what the original user would have chosenas a password."

He drummed his fingers on the desktop again, then moved his hands tothe keyboard. "What's Bill's date of birth?"

"March 1, 1962."

Mulder tried typing the date in, using several different formats. None of them worked.

"Your birthday?"

"August 20, 1965."

Still no luck.

"Your anniversary?"

That one didn't work either. Mulder worked his way through thesignificant dates he could think of: Matthew's birthday; Maggie Scully'sbirthday; Charlie's and Dana's and Melissa's birthdays. Graduationdates. Engagement dates. The date of Bill's first command.

So maybe he wasn't using a date. First names of family and closefriends. Middle names. Last names. The names of favoritepets. Current and former duty stations. Favorite movies andCD's. And on and on and on. Finally, Mulder ran out of ideas,and just sat staring at the screen in frustration. He was so close;so very close. He could feel it. Whatever was on this diskwas important. If only he could come up with the right password. It was driving him nuts, knowing that the information he needed might besitting right in front of him. If only he could find some way toread it!

"Lucasta."

He swiveled his head and looked at Tara. "What?"

"Lucasta," she repeated, an odd look on her face. "It's one ofour...our favorite poems. It means something to us. Try it."

Mulder turned back to the keyboard, and typed in the word.

Paydirt.

His eyes rapidly scanned the filenames appearing on the screen. There were an even dozen of them, most of them labeled simply with a date. Towards the bottom of the list, three files caught his eye. One waslabeled "Dana". One was labeled "Jiggs". And one was labeled"Mulder". All three had been created on the 21st. Five daysago. Two days before Scully and Bill had disappeared.

He double-clicked on the one with his name on it. And then heswore.

It was encrypted. And a moment later he discovered that the otherswere, as well.

This time, Tara touched him lightly on the shoulder, and when he turnedthere were question marks in her eyes.

"I don't know, Tara," he said, responding to the question she hadn'tasked. "I don't know what's going on, and I can't find out. Not directly, anyway." He waved at the computer screen. "He'sencrypted these files, and I'm no computer whiz. Figuring out a passwordis one thing; breaking any serious encryption is something very different."

"Couldn't you just find the software he was using?"

Mulder shook his head. "I don't remember seeing anything likethat on the hard drive, but even if I found it, it wouldn't do any good,because I have no way of knowing what he was using as a key. AndI just don't have the skills to work it out the hard way." He thoughtabout that for a moment. "But I know some people who do."

He pulled his cell phone from his pocket and punched the third speeddial, glancing at his watch as he did so. It would be almost midnighton the east coast, but they wouldn't have gone to bed yet.

The phone was answered on the third ring. "This is Mulder," hesaid, and waited.

After a brief pause, Frohike said, "I've turned off the tape; hang onwhile I put you on the speaker. Langly and Byers are here, too." Another pause. "Okay, go ahead."

Mulder briefly explained the situation, concluding, "So I guess I'mup the river without a paddle. I need these files decrypted, andI need it done fast. I'm going to email copies to you, okay?"

"Wait a minute, Mulder." It was Langly's voice. "I wouldn'ttry that, if I were you."

"Why not?"

"Captain Scully struck me as a thorough sort of guy when he was in Washingtonlast month. If he's taken the trouble to use passwords AND encryption,there's also a chance that he's set some booby traps that would erase thefiles if anyone tried to copy them. It'd probably be safer if youjust sent us the disk through snailmail."

"Damn. I hadn't thought of that." Mulder drummed his fingerson the desktop. "Snailmail would take too long. Even by FedEx,there's no way it'd get to you before Monday, at this point. Is thereany way you guys could come out here? There may be more than justthe one disk, in any case."

Again there was silence on the other end, and Mulder could almost seethe three men exchanging glances and shrugs. He and Scully weren'tthe only ones who specialized in non-verbal communication. Finally,Byers spoke. "Sure Mulder. Whatever you need, we're there foryou. And for Scully. You know that. We'll catch the firstflight out of Dulles in the morning."

"You need any help with travel priorities?" Mulder asked, and then realizedhe was being an idiot.

Langly again, laughing: "Don't worry about it. I think Ican manage three plane tickets. You want me to charge them to yourAmex, or to Captain Scully's?" He laughed again. "Or maybeI'll charge them to that new A.D. of yours, Kersh."

Mulder chuckled. "That would be fitting. He owes Scullya couple of grand. Just cover your tracks, guys. See you inthe morning." And he hit the disconnect.

# # #

11:43 p.m.

Mulder sat on the sofa, staring at the unlit Christmas tree. Afire was laid in the hearth, but he hadn't bothered to light it.

He'd spent the rest of the evening going through the other floppy disksin the storage container, and for the sake of thoroughness had even checkedthe blanks in the opened box he had found. As he'd expected, therehad been nothing of any interest. Nothing except that one, unmarkeddisk, now resting in his pants pocket. In his mind's eye, hecould still see the filenames, floating in front of him:

981130.

981203.

981204.

And on and on. And finally:

Dana.

Jiggs.

Mulder.

They floated there, tantalizing him, just barely out of his reach. If only he could move a little bit closer, just a little bit --

"Fox?"

Mulder jumped at the sound of Tara's voice, and turned his head to seeher standing at the foot of the stairs. "Tara," he said. "Ithought you'd gone to bed."

"I had." She stood silently for a moment, then walked slowly overto the sofa and stood in front of him. She was dressed for bed, thehem of a sensible flannel nightgown peeking out from beneath a blue quiltedfloor-length robe. "But I couldn't sleep."

He nodded slightly, and waited for her to continue.

"Fox, I wanted to...to apologize." He opened his mouth to speak,but she rushed on, cutting him off. "I've been a perfect bitch today,and I'm sorry. You don't deserve it. I know you're doing thebest you can, and I really appreciate it." She paused for a moment. "May I sit down?"

Mulder smiled. "Sure. But only because it's your sofa."

She smiled back, and for the first time in his memory there was realwarmth in it. She sat on the sofa, a foot or so away from him, thenturned to face him again. "I really am sorry, Fox," she said. "And I really, truly appreciate what you're doing."

"I'm not doing it for you, Tara," he reminded her. "Or at least,not JUST for you."

She nodded. "I know. I really do know. I know it'snot about me, and I know it's not even about Bill. It's about Dana." She reached out and gently touched the place over his heart, then drewher hand back and folded it with the other one in her lap. "I understand."

"Tara, I told you," he said gently. "It's not like that."

Again she nodded. "I know it's not. That's not what I meant. Two people can love each other very much, even if it isn't...physical." She blushed slightly. "I'm sorry, I don't mean to be stupid, or embarrassing. I'm just trying to tell you that I understand."

"What do you understand, Tara?"

"I understand that this is just as hard for you as it is for me. Maybe it's even harder for you, in some ways. At least with me, I'mallowed to be upset and demonstrative, both because I'm a woman, and becausemy relationship with Bill fits into what people expect. But you'rea man, and your relationship with Dana..." She trailed off for aminute, and shrugged. "It's different, that's all. Most peoplejust don't understand it."

He considered her words for a moment. Maybe she really did understand,at least a little. It would be such a relief to find someone whodid. Sometimes he felt very alone, as if no one would ever reallyunderstand the way he felt about Scully, what she meant to him. Hesitantly,he said, "Have you read the Symposium?"

Tara raised her eyebrows slightly. "You mean Plato?" Henodded, and she smiled. "Yes. And I was thinking about it justtonight, while I was lying in bed. It's why I finally came back downstairs." She closed her eyes and quoted. "'For you may say generally thatall desire of good and happiness is only the great and subtle power oflove; but they who are drawn towards him by any other path, whether thepath of money-making or gymnastics or philosophy, are not called lovers-- the name of the whole is appropriated to those whose affection takesone form only -- they alone are said to love, or to be lovers.'"

Mulder smiled again. "I've always liked that passage."

She nodded, a serious expression on her face. "I thought you might." She held his eyes for just a moment, then stood up from the sofa and stretched. "Well, it's been a long day, and I haven't really had much sleep, and tomorrowMatthew comes home from my mother's house. I've got to get some rest." She hesitated just a moment, then bent down and kissed Mulder gently onthe cheek. "Good night, Fox."

Mulder watched as she walked away, turning his head to follow her progresstowards the stairs. As she put her foot on the first riser, he said,"Tara?"

She stopped and looked at him over her shoulder. "Yes, Fox?"

"I've never liked my first name. My friends all call me Mulder. Do you mind?"

The smile he got back this time was radiant. "Of course not. Good night, Mulder." And then she went on upstairs to bed.

# # #

....Fox sits cross-legged on the floor, focusing all of his attentionon the Stratego board. There has to be an answer, and he knows thatif just thinks about it long enough, he will find it. He absolutely,positively isn't going to let her win this one. He just has to concentrate...theanswer is here....

....And then he has it. With a smile of triumph, he reaches outand moves one of his pieces, tapping it against one of hers so that itfalls over, face down....

....And she laughs, and claps her hands together. Fox looks upin astonishment as his opponent rocks back and forth in delight, her redhair swirling around her head and mischief dancing in her bright blue eyes. As she sees the look of puzzlement on his face, her laughter only increases,and she says, "It's a bomb, Mulder! You hit a bomb!" She throwsher arms in the air and shouts, "Boom!"....

....And he looks down at the board in confusion, and feels his stomachsinking. A bomb? It can't be a bomb! He has it all workedout; he knows where her bombs are, and that can't be a bomb. Butif it IS a bomb, if he HAS made a mistake, then he has lost. Again....

....And then she flips her piece over to reveal that it is only a scoutafter all, and she leans across the board and puts her arms around hisneck and she whispers in his ear, "I had you big time!"....

....And then the room is flooded with an intense, white light. Fox is paralyzed; he can't move, he can barely breathe. She seemsunable to move, as well, and as he watches in horror her body lifts offthe floor and floats towards the window. He tries desperately tobreak free of whatever force is holding him. He has to get loose,he has to save her! But even as he struggles, he knows that he willfail, and inside his head he is screaming her name, over and over and over....

....And then all he can hear is her voice on the answering machine: "Mulder! I need your help! Mulder! I need your help! MulderIneedyourhelpMulderIneedyourhelpMulderMulderMulder --"

"Mulder, wake up. Mulder, please wake up -- you're having a nightmare. Mulder?"

Slowly his eyes opened, and he found himself staring up at Tara Scully'sface. He blinked and shook his head; already the details of the dreamwere fading from his consciousness. There had been something aboutSamantha, except that she was also Scully...he couldn't quite grasp it...

It was gone.

"Mulder? Are you awake now?"

He nodded slightly. "I think so." He realized that he waslying on the sofa, had apparently fallen asleep there, and Tara was kneelingin front of him, bent over him, peering down at his face, concern etchedon her features. "What...what happened?"

"You had a nightmare," she said. "You were calling to Dana." She smiled slightly. "Actually, you were calling to 'Scully', butthat means Dana, right?"

He nodded again. Very softly: "Sorry if I woke you."

"That's okay," she replied. "It happens." After the briefestof hesitations, she said, "Do you remember what you were dreamingabout?"

He shook his head. "No. No, it's completely gone." He struggled into a sitting position, and stretched to get the kinks outof his joints. "Sorry," he repeated.

Tara stood up and offered him her hand, pulling him from the sofa. "We should get you tucked into a proper bed; you'll sleep better."

"I'm not sure I can sleep," Mulder admitted. He felt embarrassedat having to admit to weakness in front of her, but he also felt he owedher an explanation for having disturbed her sleep. "I, uh, I getthese nightmares, you see. Most of the time I can't remember whatthey were about, but they always wake me up." Hesitantly, he lookedat her face, and was relieved to see nothing but understanding and compassionthere. "I haven't had one in awhile." Not since Antarctica.

Tara nodded in sympathy. "I'm so sorry, Mulder. Would youlike some herbal tea? Maybe that would help settle you down."

He shook his head. "No. That doesn't work for me; I've triedit." He smiled weakly. "Believe me, I've tried most remediesat one time or another." And there was only one thing that reallyworked for him, only one thing that would allow him to get back to sleep-- but she was missing.

Tara seemed to read his thoughts. "I understand." She tookhis hand again and squeezed it briefly. "We'll find them, Mulder. We'll find them. I promise."

# # #

Miramar Naval Air Station, San Diego, CA
December 27, 12:01 p.m.

"We'll find them, Mulder. We'll find them. I promise."

The words seemed to echo in Mulder's mind as he moved wearily to thenext house. The next front door, identical to all the others on thisblock. The next Navy wife, with 2.3 children, a dog and half a dozentropical fish. The next bland, colorless woman who had no informationthat would be of any use to him. No information at all.

"We'll find them, Mulder. We'll find them. I promise."

He paused for a moment in front of the next house and considered thematter. How could Tara possibly know a thing like that? Howcould she say such a thing? How could she even think it? Scullywould have known better; Scully would never say that to him. Of allthe things Scully had done for him over the years, perhaps the most importantwas that she had never promised him that they would find Samantha. Not once; not even after he'd killed John Roche, when it would have seemedso easy and natural -- almost necessary -- to try to offer him some formof reassurance.

Scully had never lied to him. Not about that.

"We'll find them, Mulder. We'll find them. I promise."

Tara hadn't meant to be lying; in his heart he knew that. Shehad been trying to help, trying to calm him in the only way she knew how. And he had allowed her to think that she had succeeded; he had allowedher to lead him upstairs to the guest room and tuck him into bed, and hehad obediently closed his eyes and lay quietly until she finally slippedout of the room and returned to her own bed. But he had not slept.

"We'll find them, Mulder. We'll find them. I promise."

Mulder shook his head. Words. Only words.

He sighed, and was about to start up the front walk to the house infront of him when he heard a vehicle pulling up behind him. Turning,he saw without surprise that it was the Shore Patrol. He'd been wonderinghow long it would take them to show up.

A moment later he was facing a short, stocky brown-haired woman in herearly 30s, wearing the insignia of a lieutenant commander. Her hairwas either cut short or done up in a bun under her uniform hat; Muldercouldn't tell for sure. In one hand she held a clipboard; the otherhand rested lightly on the baton strapped to her belt, and her body languageradiated confidence and authority.

"May I please see some identification, sir?"

Mulder flipped his badge at her, and replied, "I'm Special Agent FoxMulder, FBI. I'm a guest this weekend of Bill and Tara Scully."

The woman briefly consulted her clipboard and nodded. "All right;I have you on my list." She looked back up at him. "Agent Mulder,as you might guess we've had some phone calls about you this morning. I understand that you've been asking questions about Captain Scully andhis sister. May I ask what your interest is in this matter?"

"Dana Scully is my partner."

The lieutenant commander nodded again, as if she already knew that,and stood looking at him for a moment seeming to study his face. Finally, she sighed. "Agent Mulder, I don't wish to be difficult,and I appreciate the situation you're in. But you don't look likeyou've just fallen off the turnip truck, and I'm sure you know that youcannot conduct an investigation on this base without permission from ouroffice."

Mulder nodded in resignation. "I know. I should have checkedin with you yesterday. I'm sorry." He tried to keep the bitternessout of his voice. "God forbid I should offend the gods of the bureaucracy."

She actually smiled at that. "Hey, we both know how the game isplayed." The smile vanished. "But for the moment I'm afraidI'll have to ask you to cease and desist. Tomorrow morning you cancome in and talk to Captain Talbot; I'm sure he'll find a way to work thingsout for you. But until then...." Her voice trailed off.

Mulder nodded again, and for just a moment he looked back at the househe'd been about to approach. He knew in his heart that there wasnothing there for him. Finally he turned back to face her. "That's okay, Commander. I was done here anyway." And he turnedand walked away, back towards Tara's house.

# # #
.
Residence of Bill and Tara Scully
12:32 p.m.

The Lone Gunmen were waiting for him when he got back.

"Frohike," Mulder said, amused in spite of himself. "You look...charming." The little computer geek was standing in the doorway to the kitchen, wearinga frilly, feminine looking apron with "Navy Mom" embroidered on it in hotpink. "Why haven't I ever seen this side of you before?"

Frohike snorted. "Laugh it up, G-man," he replied, humor glintingin his eyes. "SOMEBODY has to cook lunch, and Mrs. Scully had togo pick up her kid. Come on and keep me company while I finish up."

Mulder hesitated. "Are Langly and Byers..." He let his voicetrail off.

"They're in the study, working," Frohike replied. "There's notmuch I can contribute right now, so I've been relegated to K.P." He stood looking at Mulder for a moment; when the agent didn't move, headded, very softly, "Come on, Mulder. There's nothing you can doright now, either."

A short while later Mulder was leaning against the kitchen counter,watching as Frohike poured a little more beer into the bubbling cheesemixture on the stove.

"Welsh rarebit, Frohike?" Mulder asked. "I had no idea. I thought frozen pizzas and carryout were the extent of your culinary talents."

The little man smirked slightly. "How often do I get access toa real kitchen?" he asked. "Certainly not at YOUR place. ButI'll have you know that I was the pride and joy of Mrs. Johnson's eighthgrade home ec class at Chester Arthur Junior High."

"You took home ec?"

Frohike looked at him briefly and grinned. "Sure. It wasthe only way to get out of taking shop, and Mr. Gonshorowski certainlyhad nothing he could teach ME. Besides, I was the only guy in a classwith 20 girls." He looked back down at the pan. "Be nice tome, Mulder, and sometime I'll make you my famous crepes suzette."

The two men fell silent for a moment. There was an awkwardnessbetween them, an uneasiness which wasn't normally there, and after a minuteMulder realized what was causing it. "It's okay, Frohike," he saidsoftly.

The little man didn't look up, but kept stirring the cheese sauce. After another short silence, he shook his head. "No it's not," hesaid flatly, and finally turned to look Mulder in the eye. "I letyou down. You were counting on me to get you the information youneeded, and I let you down. I let HER down."

Mulder took a step forward, and laid a hand on Frohike's shoulder. "You didn't let her down, Frohike. You got me exactly what I askedfor. It's not your fault if there wasn't anything there to find."

Frohike stared at him for another pair of minutes, and Mulder was shockedto see unshed tears glistening in the little man's eyes. Finally,Frohike said, "You know, don't you, that I love her as much as you do." It wasn't really a question.

Mulder nodded. Very softly: "Yeah. Yeah, I know that. And so does she."

"Are we gonna find her?"

Mulder hesitated, remembering how he himself had reacted to Tara's assurancesafter his nightmare. Finally he just said, "We're going to do thevery best we can."

"I hope to god it's enough," the little man replied.

"So do I, Frohike. So do I."

# # #

12:51 p.m.

"Is that really a Mercedes you guys have parked in the driveway?" Mulderasked as he slid into his seat at the dining room table. The threeGunmen were already seated and working on their portions of the welsh rarebit. "I suppose I knew it was possible to rent a Mercedes, but I never thoughtI'd see it done." He cut off a piece of toast smothered in cheesesauce and popped it into his mouth. Raising his eyebrows in surpriseas he chewed and swallowed, he looked over at Frohike. "You know,this is actually pretty good."

Frohike smirked. "It'd be better if Captain Scully had anythingother than Rolling Rock in his fridge. I assume that's YOUR influence." And he rolled his eyes.

Langly picked up the conversation. "Yeah, it's a Mercedes. I like to travel in style." There was a gleam of malice in his eye. "Besides, Kersh's Amex isn't even close to its credit limit. Yet." And he took another bite of rarebit.

Mulder snickered. "I don't think I even want to know about this." He took another bite and shook his head. "This really is good." He wiggled his eyebrows at Frohike. "Sure you don't want to settledown and raise a passle of kids?" Frohike snorted, and Mulder turnedhis attention back to Langly and Byers. "So have you got anythingyet?"

Byers shook his head. "Not much. And what little we do knowis bad." He glanced at Langly, then back at Mulder. "It lookslike Captain Scully was using DES encryption, which is no big surprise,since he works for the Navy. And while DES is far from being as secureas the NSA claims it is, it's still going to take awhile to crack."

"How long?" Mulder asked.

Byers shrugged. "It's hard to say for sure. With the rightspecialized equipment, we could probably do it in a few hours, but withwhat we were able to bring with us it's probably going to take a coupleof days."

"Two days," Mulder repeated. He put down his fork and stared downat his plate. Somehow he'd been sure that his friends would be ableto wave a magic wand and solve all his problems. Idiot. Thatonly happened in the movies. He took a deep breath and raised hiseyes to look at Byers again. "Well, do the best you can."

Langly cleared his throat. "Uh, Mulder, I know you've probablyalready done all the easy stuff, but --"

"Yeah," Mulder replied. "Tara and I spent a good part of yesterdayevening going through birthdays, nicknames, and all that crap. Cameup empty, except for the filenames."

Langly glanced at Byers and Frohike, then looked back at Mulder. "Actually, it was the filenames I was thinking about. Has it occurredto you to call Colonel Casey and ask him if he knows anything about this? After all, his name is on one of those files."

Mulder stared at the blond man in stunned disbelief. Call JiggsCasey? Why in the hell hadn't that occurred to him sooner? It was so blindingly obvious. Was he really so far gone in rage andself-pity that he could overlook something that elementary?

His thoughts flashed back briefly to the month before. He'd metCasey briefly at the climax of the last investigation he and Bill had workedon together. The colonel was an old friend of Bill Scully's, andan aide to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Casey'spersonal intervention at a crucial moment had helped to break the backof a military conspiracy to overthrow the government, and it made perfectsense that Bill might turn to the tough-minded Marine in a crisis.

Just as he had turned to Dana.

And just as he had apparently considered, at least, turning to Mulder.

"Dammit!" Mulder jumped from his chair and strode rapidly to BillScully's study and started going through desk drawers. He found theaddress book on the third try, and in another moment he was lifting thephone and preparing to dial.

"Wait a minute, Mulder!"

He looked up in surprise to see Langly moving rapidly forward. The blond man took the phone from Mulder's hand and replaced it on thecradle. "The other thing I didn't get a chance to tell you is thatthe phones in this house are tapped. I discovered it during a routinesweep while you were out, earlier."

Mulder nodded, and reached in his pocket for his cell phone. "Atthis point," he said, "nothing can surprise me."

In another moment, he found out he was wrong.

# # #

Shore Patrol HQ, Miramar Naval Air Station
December 28, 9:21 a.m.

Jiggs Casey was dead.

The shock still reverberated through Mulder's system, nearly 24 hourslater. To have had his first real lead dangled in front of him, onlyto be snatched away moments later...it had been unbearable. Mulderhad felt himself slipping into a deep depression, into a darker place thanany he had inhabited since Antarctica, and for the rest of Sunday he hadbeen barely able to function, let alone think coherently.

*God, don't let Scully be dead. Please God, let her be alive. Let me find her.*

But Jiggs Casey was dead, along with his wife. Dead in a housefire, apparently caused by faulty wiring in their Christmas lights. Dead in a house fire that started on the afternoon of December 23rd. Dead in a fire that started almost to the minute as Scully and her brotherhad pulled out of the driveway and vanished. It was a horrible, ghastlycoincidence.

Mulder didn't believe it for a minute.

*God, don't let Scully be dead. Please God, let her be alive. Let me find her.*

That had been his mantra the rest of the day, it had been all he couldthink of. The darkness had settled around him, enveloping him andcuddling him like the old friend that it was. He had sat on Tara'ssofa, staring at nothing at all, not even allowing himself the comfortof curling up into a ball. He had been vaguely aware of the Gunmenmoving about the house, talking quietly to each other, and later he hadnoticed a woman's voice, and Mulder had been forced to rouse himself justenough to confirm that it was not Scully before slipping back into hisfugue.

*God, don't let Scully be dead. Please God, let her be alive. Let me find her.*

Eventually the house had grown quiet, and Mulder had known that he wasalone at last, and finally it was safe to cry. But he had not beenable to.

"Agent Mulder?"

Mulder blinked and emerged from his reverie. That had been dangerous,he realized. He was very fragile emotionally, and it wouldn't takemuch to send him right back into the fugue of the night before. Hehad to concentrate on the outside world; he had to concentrate on doinghis job.

He had to find Scully.

He rose from the bench he'd been sitting on and stepped forward to meetthe tall, grey-haired man in the uniform of a Navy captain who had calledhis name.

"I'm Robert Talbot," the man said. "I understand you wanted tosee me?"

"That's correct, Captain Talbot." He flipped his badge at theman, then reached out and shook his hand.

A moment later the two men were seated in Talbot's office. Talbotsat looking at Mulder for a moment, his fingers steepled under this chin,and Mulder had a sudden premonition that the interview was not going togo well.

Finally: "Agent Mulder, I'll come straight to the point. While I am not happy that you launched into this investigation withoutgetting clearance from my office, I do understand your situation. I'm willing to let that go by; water under the bridge, and so forth." And he stopped and waited. Mulder nodded.

"However," the officer continued, "I'm afraid I'm not going to be ableto permit you to resume your investigation. At least, not at thistime."

"Why not?" Mulder spoke sharply, rapidly. He felt his emotionsboiling up in his chest. He had to make Talbot understand; he hadto get his cooperation. "I have a legitimate interest; this is mypartner and her brother we're talking about. And I've been grantedfull authority by the Bureau to pursue the matter. Naturally, I'll be happyto cooperate with your office in any way that's necessary --"

"Agent Mulder." The other man was holding up his hand, forestallingthe flood of words. He compressed his lips, and his face took onthe expression of a man about to deliver bad news which was not of hisdevising. "I'm afraid your authority to investigate this case hasbeen terminated."

Mulder felt his eyes widen in shock. "Terminated? By who?"

"By your headquarters in Washington. I received a call this morningfrom an Assistant Director Kersh informing me of this decision. Itwas confirmed by fax just before you arrived." Pause. "I'msorry, Agent Mulder."

Mulder sat in stunned silence and tried to comprehend what Talbot hadjust said, but it just refused to sink in. He could not conceivethat anyone would deny him what he needed to find Scully. This wasn'thappening; it couldn't be happening. It was a dream, all a dream. A nightmare.

"Agent Mulder?"

He snapped back to a semblance of attentiveness and found himself risingto his feet. "Thank you for seeing me, Captain. I'm sorry fortaking so much of your time."

"Agent Mulder --"

The door swung shut behind him, shutting off the other man's words.

# # #

Fred's HandiMart, San Diego, CA
December 29, 4:23 p.m.

"I'm sorry," the clerk said, shaking her head. "I haven't seeneither one of them."

"You're sure?" Mulder replied, still holding the two photographs outfor her inspection. "It would have been the evening of the 23rd,around seven or perhaps a little later. They were looking for eggnog."

The clerk continued shaking her head. "No. No I definitelydidn't see them. And I was the only one working that night. Sorry." And she turned to the next customer.

Mulder turned and walked out of the store. In the past 36 hourshe had canvassed every grocery and convenience store in a two mile radiusof the Scully residence, and found nothing. Not that this was surprising;the San Diego Police had already covered the same territory, and also cameup empty. But Mulder had no other leads, nothing to go on, and hecouldn't stand just sitting in Tara's living room waiting for somethingto break. He had to stay active, or the fugue he'd experience onSunday night would return.

Kersh had called three times in the past day and a half, each call moreabusive than the one before. On the last occasion, two hours before,the Assistant Director had threatened to send someone out from the SanDiego field office to claim Mulder's badge and gun. Mulder had turnedhis cell phone off after that call, and then switched it back on thirtysecond later. Scully might call that number; she might call to tellhim she was okay, and on her way home. Or she might call to ask forhis help. She might.

She might.

He wouldn't let himself think about the third possible call he mightreceive about Scully -- the one that some stranger would have to place.

He slid into his rental car and picked up the list of stores he'd leftlaying on the passenger seat. Fred's HandiMart had been the lastplace on the list; now he had nowhere else to go. No one else tointerview. No more leads to follow up on.

Nothing to do but wait.

He sat in the car for several minutes, staring out through the windshieldand off into the distance. She was out there somewhere. Hecould feel it. Somewhere.... somewhere... somewhere in this city. He almost felt he could hear her heartbeat. It was calling to him,beseeching him, asking him to come to her. If only he could listenjust a little more carefully....

He shook his head in exasperation. This wasn't getting him anywhere,anymore than interviewing Bill and Tara's neighbors had, anymore than canvassinggrocery stores had. He had to keep himself focused on the task; hehad to follow the careful, methodical steps he'd been taught to use somany years ago in Quantico. He had to suppress his natural tendencyto go haring off on a hunch, and take the cool, rational scientific approach.

He had to be Scully. Not Mulder; Scully. Mulder alone wasonly half a person. Only Scully was whole; only Scully could findthe truth. Only Scully.

He started the car and threw it into gear, and headed back to Tara'shouse.

# # #

Residence of Bill and Tara Scully
December 29, 5:15 p.m.

Mulder pulled into the driveway next to the Gunmen's Mercedes and switchedoff the engine. He sat for just a moment, his hands still restingon the steering wheel. He hadn't slept much in the past 48 hours,and he was tired; bone tired. The need to cover the grocery storeswas all that had been keeping him going, and now that the interviews wereover, with nothing to show for them, he really starting to feel the exhaustion. He knew he would have to sleep soon, or he would be no good to anyone.

Like he was any good to anyone now.

He pulled the key from the ignition and climbed wearily from the car,and a moment later he was standing in Tara's living room, staring at thesofa. What little sleep he had got had been on that sofa, and nowit seemed to be reaching out to him, calling his name and inviting himto stretch out and let his cares disappear. It was so tempting justto let it all go for a few hours. Just stretch out, let the tiredmuscles relax, and....

"Mulder?"

He looked around and saw Tara standing in the door to the kitchen, holdingMatthew in her arms. He nodded slightly in acknowledgement of theirpresence; he was suddenly too tired for any but the most necessary speech.

"How'd it go? Did you find anything?"

He could tell from her tone of voice that she already knew the answer,but still he shook his head. "No."

She nodded slightly, and just stood looking at him for a minute. Then: "You got a letter this afternoon."

Mulder felt his eyebrows raise slightly. "A letter?"

"Yeah." She nodded towards the sofa. "I put it on the coffeetable." Again she feel silent, and the two stood looking at eachother for a moment. Finally she simply turned and walked back outof the room.

He watched her go, and continued looking at the empty doorway for anothermoment, before finally turning and walking over to the sofa, sitting downheavily. The letter was just where Tara had said it was, lying onthe coffee table next to the copy of the Symposium which he had found inBill and Tara's library the night before.

He reached out and picked up the envelope. His name was typedon the front, and it was addressed in care of Tara Scully, Miramar NavalAir Station, San Diego. It was postmarked the previous day.

For a minute he pondered the significance -- if any -- of the fact thatit was addressed to him in care of Tara rather than in care of Bill, butthe meaning of that eluded him. He was tired; so tired. Hereally needed to sleep before his brain stopped functioning entirely. But first he had to see what was in the envelope. He slit the flapopen with his thumbnail, and gently shook it until the contents slid outonto his lap.

Mulder froze.

It was picture; a Polaroid snapshot, of Scully and her brother. They were sitting on a sofa, side by side, and Scully was holding a copyof yesterday's newspaper, angled so that the headline was visible. Something about Iraq, but that wasn't important; what mattered was thatshe was alive -- or had been 24 hours or so ago.

Or at least, someone wanted him to think that, he reminded himself. It would be no big trick to fake such a picture; hell, he himself mighteven be able to manage it, and it would be no feat at all for the LoneGunmen. So the photo itself proved nothing, and he knew that whoeverhad sent it to him also knew that. They were playing with his uncertainty;they wanted him to have hope, but then to doubt his own hope. Theywanted him to doubt himself.

And it was working.

With a groan of despair, Mulder closed his eyes.

# # #

....Fox bursts from the house, his father's gun in his hand. TheEl Camino is idling in the driveway, and against the glare of the headlightsFox can see the shadowy form of the man struggling to force her into thecar. Fox races forward, brandishing the gun, but even as he crossesthe few remaining feet the car door slams shut and the El Camino is pullingaway....

....And then Fox is running through the woods, gun in one hand and flashlightin the other. The El Camino is somewhere up ahead, he knows it is,and if he can just run fast enough he can catch them, he can still saveher....

....And a shadowy form looms up in the darkness, it is a man, and Foxgrabs his shoulder and spins him around, then falls back in shocked disbelief: It is his father....

....And his father shakes his head sadly, and says, "I'm sorry, Fox;I'm truly sorry. But a choice had to be made, and it's all for thegreater good. Someday, you'll understand." A shot rings out,and Fox's father crumples to the ground without another word, and Fox looksdown in horror at the curl of smoke rising from the barrel of the gun hestill holds tightly in his hand....

....And Fox is running through the woods again, but his flashlight isgone, his gun is gone, and now he isn't trying to catch the El Camino,he's running away. Something is chasing him, something dark and powerfuland dangerous, and his arms and legs are pumping and he's drawing his breathin short, sharp gasps....

....And he trips over a tree root and falls to the ground. Fora moment he lies there, stunned, unable to move, barely able to breathe. The thing which has been chasing him is coming closer, closer; he can hearit moving through the brush. He struggles to a sitting position andleans back against a tree, still trying to catch his breath, and he staresthrough the darkness, trying to make out what it is that is pursuing him....

....And she is crouching before him, her form barely discernible behindthe glare of her flashlight, and she's taking him gently by the shouldersand forcing him to lie down, while speaking quietly to him and tellinghim he needs to rest. "Come on, Mulder; work with me here. You haven't slept in two days." Her voice is soft and lilting, musicto his ears, and he allows her to lie him down on the sofa, and her handsbriefly and gently caress his forehead....

Mulder instinctively reached out and embraced her, drawing her downinto his arms, holding her tightly against him, and for a moment he justheld her there, gently rocking her back and forth, back and forth, backand forth. It was dark in the room, the only light coming from thepartially open door to Bill's study. Mulder wanted to speak to her,he wanted to say something, but if he did so it would break the spell,and so he just continued to hold her and rock her.

Finally he heard her voice, muffled against his shirt. "Mulder? Mulder, I can barely breathe....let me go."

He hastily released her and scooted away from her and into a sittingposition as she straightened up and climbed back to her feet.

"S-sorry, Tara," he mumbled, not able to meet her eye.

He heard her chuckle in the darkness. "It's okay. When you'rea woman in a man's world you get used to being grabbed from time to time." Her voice changed, becoming softer, more serious. "I'm sorry I wokeyou; I was just trying to help you get more comfortable."

He shook his head, still not looking at her. "It's okay. I think I was having another nightmare." But even as he thought aboutit, the fragments of the dream were evaporating, drifting away, and inanother few seconds they were gone.

"I'm sorry." Pause. "I saw that picture you were holding. Of Bill and Dana."

Automatically, he looked down into his lap, but the picture was gone. He turned his eyes to the coffee table, then bent over to look down onthe floor, but it wasn't there, either.

Tara's voice again. "I showed it to your friends. The blondone -- Langly. He seemed to think they might be able to learn somethingfrom it. They're working with it now."

Mulder nodded, and finally he was able to look up at her. "Havethey made any progress with those encrypted files?"

She shrugged. "I don't know. They didn't say anything aboutit, so I suppose not."

At that moment he heard Byers' voice from the direction of the study. "Mulder? I think we've got something for you."

Thirty seconds later Mulder, Tara and the three Lone Gunmen were clusteredaround Bill's PC, looking at a blowup of the photograph Mulder had received. Langly was speaking.

"We scanned the picture into this sorry excuse for a computer," he wassaying, "and went to work on analyzing the image. I ran the usualtests -- checked for odd shadows, looked for reflections, and for pixelsthat didn't belong...all the regular stuff. The short version isthat I am 95 percent certain that this is a natural scene; the photographhas NOT been tampered with."

Mulder let out his breath. "Thank god. Then they're alive. Or they were." He glanced at Tara, standing next to him, but herexpression was giving nothing away.

"That's the way I've got it figured, " Langly said. "Someone mustbe trying to send you a message, and the most obvious message is 'backoff'."

Mulder nodded. He'd already worked that out.

"However," Langly continued, "it turns out that the bad guys aren'tthe only ones sending a message in this picture."

"What do you mean?" Mulder asked.

Frohike picked up the story. "What he means," the little man said,"is that Agent Scully and her brother are two cool cookies. Theycan't have had much warning that this picture was going to be taken, butthey still worked out a way to send you a message."

Mulder shook his head. "What message? I don't see anything." He leaned closer to the computer screen, trying to discern...something. But there just wasn't anything there.

"That's because you were never in the Navy," Frohike said. "Andhard as it may be to believe, I was." His short, stubby little fingerreached out and touched the image on the computer screen. "Look atthe position their arms are in."

Mulder frowned and looked. The positioning did seem a little odd: Bill's chin was balanced on the fingertips of his right hand, the elbowresting casually in his lap, while his left hand hung straight down athis side, fingers reaching towards the floor. Scully, sitting nextto him, had her left hand stretched out along the back of the sofa theywere sitting on, while her right hand, the one holding the newspaper, hungdown at her side, next to Bill's left.

"Okay," Mulder said finally. "Okay, so it does look a little odd." He paused, trying to figure out what he was supposed to be seeing, butit just wasn't coming to him. Finally he shook his head again. "But I just don't get it. What am I missing?"

"It's semaphore," Tara said suddenly. Mulder turned to look ather in surprise, and saw her glancing at Frohike. "Isn't it?"

The little computer geek nodded smugly. "Give the lady a cigar,"he said. Again he pointed at the screen. "No possible doubtonce you know what to look for. It has to be deliberate; no one wouldsit that way by accident." His finger touched the image of Bill Scully. "'D'. Or possibly '4'." His finger moved to Scully. "Andthis one is 'F', or '6'."

# # #

December 29, 11:42 p.m.

Mulder sat on the sofa in Tara's living room once again, trying to think. He hadn't bothered to turn on the lights; his mind worked better in thedark, anyway. He kept his body still and calm, his breathing slowand even, and tried the various permutations in his head, trying to makesense of the message.

DF. D4. D6. F4. F6. 46.

He and Tara and the Gunmen had spent forty minutes kicking it around,brainstorming and trying to make sense of it, but they'd gotten nowhere. Finally Matthew had cried, and Tara had gone to take care of him, and somehowMulder had wound up by himself on the sofa again.

Whatever the message was, Scully and her brother had expected him, orpossibly Tara, to be able to work it out. There was something there;something significant. Something they were trying to tell him. But what? What? They'd tried map coordinates, and they'd triedthe assumption that the figures were in hexadecimal notation and convertedthem to digital and then to binary, but still they'd found nothing familiar. Nothing. Nothing.

He shook his head in frustration. This was getting him nowhere. His mind was running in circles, plowing over the same ground, over andover, and it was making him crazy. He was still pretty tired; he'donly slept for about five hours, and while that had taken the edge offhis exhaustion, he was still way behind in that department. Maybeif he could just stretch out and shut his eyes for a few minutes, and tryto blank his mind, something would come to him.

Mulder was jolted from his thoughts by a knock on the front door. It was soft and hesitant, as if the caller wanted to avoid waking anyonewho might be sleeping. But who the hell could it be at this timeof night? Even as the question ran through Mulder's mind, the knockwas repeated, somewhat more insistently.

He climbed to his feet and crossed over to the door, switching on thelights as he went. He paused for just a moment, unsure of what hemight face when he pulled the door open, then shrugged. How muchworse could things really get? He unfastened the safety chain, thenturned the knob and opened the door, and he felt his eyebrows shoot upin surprise. What was SHE doing here?

After a moment of silence, she said, "Aren't you going to invite mein, Fox?"

Mulder blinked, and stepped back out of the way to allow her to pass. He pushed the door shut and reset the chain before turning to face her. "Diana," he said. "It would be an understatement to say that thisis a surprise."

She nodded. "I know. And I wish it could be a pleasant surprise,but unfortunately it's not."

"Mulder?"

Mulder glanced away from Diana and saw Tara standing at the foot ofthe stairs, a puzzled look on her face. "Tara," he said. "Weseem to have a surprise visitor. This is Special Agent Diana Fowley;she's an old...friend of mine. Diana, this is Tara Scully, Dana'ssister-in-law."

For a moment the two women regarded each other from across the roomin silence, neither making a move towards the other. Finally, Dianatook the initiative. "Mrs. Scully," she said. "I'm so sorryabout...about what's happened. I want you to know that the Bureauis doing everything it can to find your husband. And Agent Scully,of course, as well," she added, turning back to face Mulder again.

Tara nodded, remaining silent, and still she made no move towards theother woman. Mulder could see that she was thinking about something,something complex and not entirely pleasant, but for the life of him hecouldn't figure out what it was. He shrugged and turned back to Diana.

"Okay, Diana," he said. "What are you here for? And makeit march; I've got a case I'm working on, and I don't have a lot of timeto waste on idle chit-chat."

Diana walked over to stand in front of him, her features calm and professional. "Actually, Fox, that's why I'm here. Kersh sent me."

Mulder simply stood there, staring at her. She couldn't possiblymean what she had just implied. He shook his head. "I'm notgetting it, Diana; it's been a long day. Better spell it out forme."

She sighed, and the professional mask melted away, leaving an expressionof sorrow. "I'm sorry, Fox. I really am. But I'm doingyou a favor, and eventually I think you'll understand that. Kershwas going to send the local ASAC, but I persuaded him that it would bebetter coming from a friend." She held out her hand. "I have to have your badge and your gun. I'm sorry, Fox."

For a timeless interval Mulder stood completely still, just lookingat her and trying to comprehend what was going on. He knew Kershhad threatened to do just exactly this, but he hadn't taken it seriously. Truth be told, he hadn't really been paying close attention to anythingKersh had said; the man just didn't enter into the equation, and Mulderhad ignored him. And in retrospect that had clearly been a seriouserror. With a sigh of resignation, he put his hand on the butt ofhis service pistol.

And then Tara said, "D.F."

Mulder froze. D.F. Diana Fowley. And then he drewthe pistol and pointed it directly at Diana's heart.

# # #

"Fox? What they hell are you --"

"Shut up, Diana," Mulder snapped. He looked at her warily, andautomatically took two steps to the left so that Tara would no longer bein the line of fire.

Could it really be Diana? He'd drawn the pistol on instinct, assoon as Tara's words had sunk in, but now he couldn't help but wonder. It seemed so fantastic -- not to mention the convenience of having herturn up at just this moment.

Of course, that very coincidence was also evidence against her. Why in the hell would she have flown all the way across the country justto claim his gun and his badge? Her stated reason didn't really holdwater. It's not like the two of them were that close any longer. Scully might possibly do that for him. But Diana?

"Fox?" Diana's voice drew him back out of his reverie, and fora moment he studied her face. He wasn't sure what he was lookingfor; what he did see was an uneasy mix of confusion and anger. Butno hurt; no sign of any sense of betrayal. And that was another pointagainst her.

"Fox!" This time she spoke more sharply. "Fox, this isn'thelping matters." Her hand was still extended, frozen in place fromthe moment he'd draw his weapon. "Just give me the gun, and we'llforget about it, okay?"

Mulder shook his head. "I don't think so, Diana," he said. He looked at her for just another moment, and then made his decision. He had no evidence; none at all. But his professional instincts hadkicked in, and he was sure that he was right. "Down on your knees,and put your hands on top of your head." She didn't move, and hebarked, "Do it!"

Diana's eyes widened, and then she did as instructed. Withouttaking his eyes off of her, Mulder said, "Tara? Are you going tobe able to help me out, or am I on my own?"

After just the briefest of hesitations, Tara replied, "I can help. What do you want me to do?"

"We need to get her gun away from her," he said. "She carriesit on her right hip. And unless she's changed her habits, she's gota holdout strapped to her left ankle." He addressed his captive again. "And Diana, if you so much as twitch I'll blow your fucking head off."

"Fox, this is insane! You don't know what --"

"Shut up, Diana! Not another word! Last warning." He was aware of motion in his peripheral vision, and realized that theGunmen had been attracted by the activity in the living room. Hiseyes still fixed on Diana, he said, "Frohike? You there?"

"Yeah, Mulder." The little computer geek's voice was tentative,uncertain.

"I need deep background on Diana, and I need it now. I think she'sbeen flipped, and I need to know how and I need to know when. Checkall the usual stuff: Credit card records, Bureau personnel files,whatever you can find. It may be blackmail. I doubt if it'spersonal gain or ideology, but don't leave anything out."

After a short pause: "I'm on it."

Tara had stepped forward and was now kneeling next to Diana and lookingat Mulder questioningly. "Go ahead," he said. "I'm coveringher." Hesitantly, Tara reached under Diana's jacket, and in anothermoment the agent had been disarmed. Tara stood up and backed awaycarefully, holding Diana's service pistol in one hand and her holdout,a short-barreled small caliber weapon, in the other.

"Anything else, Diana? Or do I need to strip search you?" The woman hesitated, then shook her head. "Okay. Stay on yourknees and keep your hands on your head." He stood looking at herspeculatively again. The longer this confrontation went on, the surerhe was becoming that he was doing the right thing. Diana's reactionsdidn't seem quite right; there was not enough outrage, and her reason forbeing here was seeming less plausible with each passing minute.

"What's going on, Diana?" he asked abruptly.

She shook her head. "I don't know what you're talking about." Pause. "Fox? This is crazy!"

"At least we agree on something." He regarded her for anothermoment, and then he noticed her purse lying on the floor a few feet toher left. "Tara," he said. "Get her purse. Dump it outon the sofa."

He waited while she complied, then sidled over to the couch, out ofDiana's line of sight, and glanced down at the small pile of this and that. Wallet; lipstick; comb...all the usual woman stuff. He picked upthe wallet and riffled through it hastily, keeping one eye on Diana ashe did so. Money, credit cards, a prescription for eyeglasses...nothingsignificant as far as he could tell, but maybe Frohike would be able tomake something of it. He glanced down at the remaining items layingon the sofa.

Her cell phone. On an impulse, he picked it up and flipped itopen, scanning the list of speed dials, and he felt his eyebrows raise.

"Well, well, what have we here?" he said, walking back around in frontof her and holding the phone out in front of him where she could see it. "Ten speed dial slots, and only nine of them in use. Why is that,Diana?"

She shrugged. "I guess I only have nine friends," she said, sarcasmdripping from her voice. "Eight, now."

"Yes, but Diana, why is number six the slot you left vacant? Mostpeople would have left the last one vacant." She shrugged again,but didn't say anything. Mulder continued, "Could be an old boyfriend,I suppose...but it doesn't look like it's been whited out." He studiedher face for a moment, but she was giving nothing away. "Why don'tI just push the button and find out?" And before she could respondhe jabbed the button with his thumb, and then raised the phone to his ear.

"It's dialing through," he commented, still watching Diana's face. But still she maintained an expressionless mask. "And now it's ringing. That's one....that's two...."

The phone was answered on the sixth ring, and a sleepy male voice said,"Yes?"

Mulder hesitated briefly, not sure what to do next, then shrugged. In for a penny, in for a pound. "This is Fox Mulder," he said. "I wonder if you might be able to help me locate a couple of friends who'vegone missing."

The was a long minute of silence, and Mulder was just beginning to doubthis strategy when the response came. "Agent Mulder. What anunexpected pleasure." A chill went down Mulder's spine; he couldalmost smell the tobacco smoke. "To what do I owe the honor of thiscall?"

His eyes boring into Diana's, Mulder said, "I was just having a chatwith a mutual friend, and she suggested that I call you, just for old time'ssake."

"Really." The other man fell silent for a moment, and Mulder realizedwith a thrill that for once he actually had the bastard off balance. He decided to press his advantage.

"Yes, really," he said. "You know, you really need to find betterhelp. Diana didn't last five minutes once I started putting the screwson." He saw Diana's eyes widen as the shot went home. "Of course,she doesn't really seem to have anything I didn't already know. Wealready have all of the emails between Captain Scully and Colonel Casey."

Another silence, longer than the one before. "I think you're bluffing,Agent Mulder."

Mulder forced a derisive laugh. "You thought Skinner was bluffing,too," he replied. "Remember Albert Hosteen?" Another inspirationstruck him. "You know, I should give Albert a jingle. As Irecall, you were supposed to keep Agent Scully and me safe, and you seemto have dropped the ball, at least with respect to her."

"Oh, she's safe, Agent Mulder," the other man said. "Perfectlysafe. She'll even remain that way, as long as you don't interferewith things which are none of your business."

Standoff. Mulder considered the matter for a moment. Thiswas the first real lead he'd had, and he had to find some way to exploitit. But the seconds were racing by, and he could feel his advantageslipping away. Finally, the other man laughed softly. "I thinkwe understand each other, Agent Mulder." And the line went dead.

Mulder stood staring at the phone thoughtfully, and for a moment heshut out the rest of the room, trying to put the pieces together. He had to concentrate; he had to work this out. He'd made a definiteconnection between Diana and the Consortium, but that didn't really givehim --

"Mulder!" His head whipped around at Tara's cry, just as Dianacrashed into him, sending him sprawling back into the Christmas tree. For a moment the tree teetered, and then the entire assemblage went topplingover with a crash and a tinkle of broken glass.

Mulder fought against the entangling branches for a moment, strugglingfree just in time to see Diana streaking out the front door, and by thetime he had clambered to his feet and reached the doorway she was in hercar and revving the engine, and in another instant she was gone.

# # #

Residence of Bill and Tara Scully
December 30, 11:29 p.m.

Once again Mulder found himself sitting on the sofa in Tara Scully'sliving room. Another day had passed. Another wasted day. Another 24 hours gone, and he was no closer to finding Scully and her brother.

After the encounter with Diana Fowley, Mulder had had high hopes thatperhaps things were finally starting to break. Frohike's researcheshad revealed the probable reason for Diana's betrayal: Rising creditcard debt coupled with bad investment decisions in her personal financesthrough 1996 and 1997, culminating with several defaults in early 1998. Bankruptcy papers had been drawn up and filed in her home state, the Bureauhad become involved due to regulations prohibiting federal employees fromwelshing on their debts...and then, rather suddenly, she was in the clearfinancially, and even had a respectable nest egg.

The pattern should have set alarms ringing at the OPR, but Mulder hadno doubt of the means by which attention had been diverted. No doubtat all.

None of which was really relevant, except as confirmation of his suspicions. Not that much confirmation had been needed after he found the incriminatingspeed dial, and especially after she fled the scene at the first opportunity. Any lingering doubts he might have had had been laid to rest by the factthat he'd had no further contact from the Bureau in the ensuing 24 hours-- a sure sign that she had not felt it safe to return to her job, or evento check in with Kersh.

He couldn't help but feel sorry for her. He had been in love withher once, and he was pretty sure she had been in love with him. Thepressure brought to bear on her by the Consortium in their efforts to flipher must have been unbearable. He remembered she'd always been veryproud of her independence, especially in dealing with things which womenstereotypically weren't good at, such as personal finances and investments. Yeah, those bastards had known just where to hit her.

Unfortunately, the break Mulder had been hoping for had failed to materialize. In retrospect he didn't know why he'd expected things to change; by allowingDiana to escape he'd been letting his only real lead slip between his fingers. And so another day had passed with nothing to show for it. Even theGunmen had failed to produce anything, beyond Frohike's report on Diana'sfinancial history. The encryption scheme was taking longer to crackthan Langly had hoped or expected.

"Mulder?"

He roused himself from his reverie and turned to see Tara standing atthe foot of the stairs, a book in her hand. He checked his watch,and saw that it was almost midnight. Looking back at Tara, he said,"I thought you'd gone to bed."

"I had," she said, shrugging slightly. "I couldn't sleep. Do you mind if I sit up with you awhile?"

"Not at all," he replied, and waited while she crossed the room andsat down on the sofa next to him. She was wearing the same robe she'dworn the night of the 25th, and the same sensible flannel nightgown peekedout beneath the hem. "Anything special keeping you up?"

She gnawed her lip for a moment, then nodded slowly and showed him thebook she'd been holding. He examined it briefly, and felt his eyebrowsraise slightly as he looked back up at her. "Catullus?"

She nodded again, her face very serious. "Catullus. I'vealways liked him."

Mulder smiled slightly. "Catullus is pretty much the antithesisof what we were talking about the other night, though. He was theking of Roman erotic love poetry."

Her lips quirked. "Which is exactly the point. In any fairdebate, both sides of the argument deserve to be examined."

"What makes you think they haven't been in this case?" he asked, tryingto keep his voice light. He really didn't need to be delving intothis right now. The farther they got into this case, the more confusedand conflicted he was getting over how he felt about Scully. Still,Tara had provided him considerable support, both emotional and otherwise,and he didn't feel he could just shut her out.

"I'm a woman," she replied, still smiling. "Women know these things." Mulder snorted, and she reached out and rested her hand on his. "Truly,Mulder, I'm not trying to make you uncomfortable, and I'm not trying topush you anyplace you don't want to go. Mostly, I just had a feelingthat our discussion the other night was a bit unbalanced, intellectually. Do you mind?"

He shrugged. "Have at it. Which of Catullus' poems is yourfavorite?"

"I've always been partial to number five," she replied, and opened thebook. "But I don't have these committed to memory." And shecommenced to read to him:

"Let's live, my Lesbia, and let's make love
And let us value all the gossip of
Prudent old men as pennies. When the sun
Sets he can rise again; when we have done
For good and all with our one little light
We sleep forever in one dawnless night.
Give me a thousand kisses, then a hundred,
Another thousand, then a second hundred,
Then still another thousand, then a hundred,
Then, when our number's countless, then, my dear,
Scramble the abacus! So we won't fear
The evil eye of hate, for no one bad
must know how many kisses we have had."

She looked back up to him as she delivered the last line, and added,"I've always thought that kissing was undervalued as an art form. Most men -- and a lot of women -- seem to use it only as a means to anend. But I feel kissing is an end in itself."

Despite himself, Mulder felt himself getting caught up in the conversation,and he nodded. "I know what you mean. We all get so absorbedby the expectations of others that it becomes almost impossible, sometimes,to be who we really are." He raised an eyebrow at her. "Ofcourse, Catullus himself was conflicted on the subject. I've alwaysbeen rather partial to number sixty."

She snickered. "I knew you'd bring that one up; I've already gotit marked." She opened the book, and again she read:

"Were you raised by lions
On Libya's hostile cliffs,
Or were you born a bitch
From some dog's filthy cunt
To be so savage and so cruel
That you would scorn my pleading voice
When I need you most?"

She looked up at him again, and mischief danced in her eyes. "Ihope you didn't think you could shock me. I thought we'd settledthat already."

Mulder chuckled. "I guess maybe we did." He sat and lookedat her thoughtfully for a moment. "Are you sure you don't have anagenda here?"

"Of course I have an agenda. But it's not to play matchmaker;I really and truly meant what I said. And I've always hated peoplewho try to push others together." She made a face and shook her head. "I very nearly didn't marry Bill because a couple of well-meaning friendskept trying to hurry things along. I would never do that to you,or to Dana."

"So what's the purpose of this?" he asked, gesturing at the book.

"Just what I said: I wanted to make sure that both sides of theargument had been examined."

"That's it?"

"That's it," she replied, nodding.

He thought about it for a moment. He knew he was overly defensivewhen it came to his relationship with Scully. So many people hadjumped to the wrong conclusion over the years that it had become just alittle too easy to assume the worst of even the most casual comment. And of course his own defensiveness inevitably reinforced the very conclusionshe wanted to dispel.

And at this particular moment, due to the circumstances they were facing,he was especially vulnerable, both to the assumptions of others and tohis own second guessing. The only thing he knew with certainty wasthat he missed Scully terribly; he just didn't function very well withouther, and he knew it -- he had known it for a long time, long before Antarctica. But that wasn't love -- not in the sense Catullus had meant. Wasit?

He shook his head. Everything was all tangled up inside, and thestress of the last several days added to the lack of sleep was just makingit worse. One thing that had become abundantly clear since Scullyhad been taken was that his feelings towards her were not as resolved ashe had believed them to be, and he knew it was going to be a bitch gettinghimself settled again when he finally got her back. He felt a suddenirritation at Tara, but quickly suppressed it. He knew she meantwell, and she really didn't have any way of knowing what a hornets' nextshe was poking at.

"Mulder?" Her voice was soft and gentle, and when he looked uphe saw that she'd set the book aside. "Mulder, I'm sorry. Ididn't mean to upset you."

He looked at her levelly for a moment, then finally nodded. "It'sokay. I was just...thinking about something."

They sat staring at each other for a pair of minutes. Mulder couldn'treally think of anything further to say, and was considering suggestingthat she go on back to bed, when Frohike stepped into the room to announcethat they'd finally cracked the encryption scheme.

# # #

"This is very, very bad," Byers said without preamble as Mulder andTara stepped into the study at Frohike's heels a few minutes later. He waited until everyone was situated around Bill's PC before continuing.

"As you are probably aware," the fussy little man continued, "for thelast six months or so Captain Scully has been assigned to an interservicetask force which has been examining downsizing and outsourcing strategiesat military facilities in the San Diego area." He paused and waitedfor Mulder and Tara to nod. "The brief for this task force is quitebroad: Pretty much everything is on the table. They've lookedat everything from provision of commissary and PX services to operationalreadiness issues to name it."

Again he paused, and this time Tara smiled slightly and said, "I rememberthe commissary study. For awhile I thought Bill was going to throttlethe Donutland sales rep."

Byers nodded, then turned back to the computer. "The first ominoustidbit we came across was a list of the permanent members of the task force." He pointed to the screen, where a list of names and organizations was displayed. "As you might expect, it's top-heavy with DoD personnel, both uniformedand civilian. However, the task force also has several representativesfrom the private sector -- mostly contractors and consultants." Hedropped his hand into his lap, and looked directly at Mulder. "Includingan executive vice president from Roush Industries."

Mulder felt his eyes widen. "Roush? But they're a frontfor --"

"For the Consortium," Byers said flatly.

"THEY have a representative on this task force?"

"Actually," said Langly, "from a quick skim of the meeting synopsesCaptain Scully included, it looks more like the Roush man is running thetask force. From his notes, it's pretty clear that Captain Scullyspotted it, too, although he thought it was a matter of simple graft andinfluence, at least at first."

Mulder's gaze flicked briefly to Tara, trying to gauge her reaction,but she was giving nothing away. He'd spent a couple of hours thenight before, after Diana had left, trying to explain to her about theConsortium and its activities. He wasn't sure how much of it she'dbelieved, but at least she hadn't laughed in his face.

He turned his gaze back to Byers. "Go on," he said.

The dapper little man nodded and stroked his van dyke. "Aboutsix weeks ago, the task force took up the issue of handling and storageof weapons of mass destruction. As it happens, one of the three mainnuclear weapons storage facilities on the west coast is right here at Miramar-- although the Navy, per their longstanding policy, refuses either toconfirm or deny that fact."

Again Byers paused, and Mulder felt a prickle of anticipation on theback of his neck. He didn't like the way this conversation was going. "Get on with it," he said, more harshly than he'd intended.

Byers nodded reluctantly. "One of the first steps taken by thetask force was to order an inventory of the existing nuclear weapon stockpileat Miramar."

"Oh shit," Tara said, her voice flat and emotionless. For justan instant Mulder wondered what had evoked that reaction, and then suddenlyit all fell into place and he knew. He glanced at Byers, and theother man nodded slightly in confirmation.

"Broken arrow," the little man said softly. Broken arrow. Military jargon for a lost or stolen atomic weapon.

For a long moment nobody spoke. At last, Mulder said, "How many?"

"Apparently just one," Frohike replied, his own voice as expressionlessas Tara's had been. "Only one Hiroshima out there looking for a placeto happen."

"Maybe it's a bookkeeping error?" Mulder didn't really believeit, but he had to try.

"No," said Frohike, shaking his head. "They thought of that, andthey checked the inventory thoroughly. It's not a bookkeeping error."

"But why?" This time it was Tara, desperately denying.

Langly shrugged. "Logical progession," he said. "Ruby Ridge. Waco. World Trade Center. Oklahoma City. Dallas. All intended to create an atmosphere of terror, to justify further erosionof the Bill of Rights." He shrugged again. "And this is thenext logical step."

Again there was a moment of silence, as each person in the room seemedto contemplate the consequences of that statement. Then Byers pickedup the story again.

"By sheer good fortune," he said, "Captain Scully was the chairman ofthe subcommittee responsible for the inventory. What this means isthat the matter was immediately reported to competent authority, per theDoD's protocol for such things. Unfortunately, the report seems tohave been suppressed."

"What do you mean?" asked Mulder. "How could it have been suppressed?"

Byers shook his head. "We don't know -- at least, not yet. All we have to go on so far is the material provided by Captain Scully. But it's very clear from reading his notes that while he reported the matterup the chain of command -- as he should have -- those reports were stoppedsomewhere along the way. It's not clear whether the base commanderat Miramar was ever informed, and it's certain that no one in Washingtonknows about it."

"Jesus." Mulder tried to think of something more constructiveto say, but that was all he could come up with. "Jesus." Afteranother moment he looked back at Byers. "So what did Bill do?"

The little man stroked his beard again and nodded slightly. "Atfirst, based on his own notes and as we would have expected, he seems tohave pursued the matter through the chain of command. This reportshould have gone right up the ladder on a priority basis, through the basecommander directly to the Navy Department and the Joint Chiefs, and thento DoD, NSC and several other places. Possibly even to NEST, sincethe missing weapon is within the United States proper."

"NEST?" Tara asked.

"Nuclear Emergency Search Team," Frohike explained. "That's thegovernment agency responsible for finding -- and if necessary disarming-- unauthorized nuclear weapons in the United States. They were establishedin the early 70s in response to the threat of nuclear terrorism."

"When the captain didn't receive an immediate response to his initialreport," Byers went on, "he continued to pursue the matter through channels." He gestured at the computer screen. "That's what those dated filescontain: Copies of his initial investigation and then of the reportshe made to his superiors. Six attempts in all, and each more urgentlyworded than the last. Finally, when it became clear that nothingwas going to be done, he took the next logical step."

"He tried a back channel," Mulder said.

Byers nodded. "That's right. He contacted Colonel Caseyin hopes of breaking the logjam. That's what the 'Jiggs' file is: A formal report of the situation through Casey to the Chairman of the JCS. It was prepared on the 21st and 22nd of this month, and we have to assumethat he emailed it to Casey pretty much right away. And less than24 hours later Agent Scully and her brother disappeared, and Colonel Caseydied in a convenient accident."

Mulder sat quietly for a moment, trying to digest everything he hadjust heard. Finally he said, "So what you're telling me is that theNavy has misplaced an atom bomb." Byers nodded, his lips quirkingslightly at the word "misplaced". "You're further telling me thatBill knew about it, but that when he tried to report the matter he wasignored." Another nod, and Mulder took a deep breath. "Andto put the icing on the cake, Roush Industries, and by logical inferencethe Consortium, is involved in this somehow."

"That about sums it up," Frohike said.

Once again silence fell in the room. This time it was Tara whobroke it. "So what do we do now?"

# # #

Residence of Bill and Tara Scully
December 31, 9:58 p.m.

"So what do we do now?"

The better part of 24 hours later Mulder still didn't have an answerto that question. The five of them had sat up for another hour brainstormingthe situation, but had come up empty. There was no plan of action;there were no further leads to follow up. All they knew was whatBill Scully had known more than a week earlier, and they didn't have eventhe resources or contacts he had possessed with which to follow through.

Going through he Navy hierarchy was out of the question. Billhad tried that route, and failed. If the Navy had not listened toone of their own -- or had allowed him to be short-circuited -- they wereeven less likely to listen to an outsider.

The Bureau was no more promising. The only person Mulder was authorizedto report to was Kersh, and that was clearly fruitless. Kersh wasat best an arrogant, hidebound bureaucrat, and at worst he was a Consortiummole. In either case, he would not be receptive to wild reports ofa stolen nuclear weapon -- reports which the Navy would no doubt deny uncategorically.

Senator Matheson might have been a possibility, had he not retired atthe end of the previous election cycle. Mulder had not had much contactwith the man in the last few years, but there had been some residual goodwillbetween them. Unfortunately, Mulder knew that the Senator's retirement"for reasons of health" had actually been prompted by his diagnosis theprevious year of Alzheimer's, and the disease had now progressed to thepoint where he would not be taken seriously by anyone that mattered --even assuming that he retained the intellect to understand the problemin the first place.

There was always Skinner, and Mulder had seriously considered callinghis former boss. But Skinner was now living under his own cloud asa direct consequence of his previous support of Mulder and Scully and theX-Files. Mulder would not have hesitated to call Skinner if thatwere the only difficulty -- this obviously was a problem of greater momentthan one man's career. But Skinner's stock in the Bureau had fallenso precipitously in the past six months that there seemed to be littlepoint. The man was now held in nearly as low esteem as Mulder himself,and he would not be believed.

Which left them with no discernible options.

So once again Mulder lay on the sofa in Tara's living room and staredat the ceiling. The Lone Gunmen continued to work the Internet, lookingfor some lead as to the whereabouts of the missing atomic weapon, althoughthere was not much hope for that angle of attack, either. But atleast the Gunmen had something tangible to pursue. All that Mulderhad to occupy his time were his own doubts.

"Penny for your thoughts."

He dragged himself out of his reverie to see Tara standing in frontof the sofa, a sleeping Matthew tucked against her hip. "I'm notsure they're worth that," he commented, swinging himself into a sittingposition to make room for her. He nodded at Matthew as she took herseat. "Shouldn't he be in bed?"

Tara smiled slightly. "You sound like my father." She strokedthe boy's hair lightly. "But you're right; he should be in bed. I just wanted to hold him for awhile. He's all I've got right now."

Mulder nodded, and the two of them sat silently on the sofa for a fewmoments as he studied her face. What was it Scully had said abouthim, all those years ago? "Mulder, you just keep unfolding like aflower." She'd been razzing him about Phoebe at the time, but theremark had been appropriate then, and seemed appropriate now. Ifsomeone had told him a week ago that he was about to enter into a warmfriendship with Tara Scully, Mulder would have laughed in his face. Yet here he was.

He let his gaze drop to the child, now curled up asleep on Tara's lap. He hadn't had much contact with children in his life, and now that he finallytook the time to notice he was surprised at how much the boy had grownin the last year. Matthew had seemed like nothing much to write homeabout when he'd been born almost exactly a year ago, but now he was startingto look almost like he might one day grow up into a human being.

Mulder had a sudden flashback to his previous visit to San Diego. Emily Sim. Another bad time for Scully. She'd had so many ofthose in the five years she'd been working with him. For just aninstant Mulder felt a flicker of the old guilt, and he held his breath,waiting for it to come crashing down on him, but then it was gone again.

He glanced up to see Tara looking at him. "Something wrong?" sheasked.

He shook his head and smiled slightly. "Just sittin' and thinkin',"he drawled. Tara nodded at the comment, but her face remained solemn. Scully would have smiled; if he'd hit her in just the right mood, she mighteven have laughed.

God he missed her.

It was not lost on Mulder that the focus of the investigation -- suchas it was -- had changed. No longer were they concentrating on findingScully and Bill; now all their attention was on locating the missing atombomb. Which of course was as it should be, and both his partner andher brother would have expected nothing less. But that didn't makehim feel any less bleak as he reflected on the situation and the possibleconsequences of that change in focus.

At least he'd been getting a little more sleep in the last day or two. He'd actually stretched out for more than six hours last night and thismorning, and if he wasn't exactly rested, at least the crushing exhaustionhe'd been feeling had receded a bit.

But he still wasn't getting anywhere close to a solution. Hell, he hadn't made any real progress since he'd arrived. Everylead they'd got had either come from someone else's industry, or had falleninto his lap unbidden. Even Tara had made more contributions thanhe had; the most productive thing HE had done had been to call the LoneGunmen and dump the computer problems in their lap. And even whenDiana had handed herself to him, virtually on a silver platter, he'd managedto let her slip through his fingers through inattention.

Diana. What a disappointment that had been. She'd been veryimportant to him once, although that had been over for a long time. Still, his relationship with her had largely predated his current stateof paranoia, and it had never occurred to him when she came traipsing backinto his life the previous spring that he might not be able to trust her. It had been a serious shock to his worldview to find that she had betrayedhim, no matter what the motivation. Of course he had not hesitatedto attempt to use her Consortium association to his own advantage, evenknowing that he was putting her life at risk. So perhaps he and Dianawere not that different from each other after all.

"Mulder? Earth to Mulder."

He blinked and shook his head. "Sorry, Tara. Woolgathering." He was trying to frame some flippant comment, to lighten his own mood asmuch as anything, when there was a knock on the door.

He glanced at the clock and then raised his eyebrows at Tara. "Are you expecting someone?" he asked. She shook her head. Mulder rose to his feet, drawing his Sig Sauer as he did so. "Stayhere." And he crossed to the door and pulled it open.

It was Diana.

Mulder took two rapid steps back from the doorway and leveled his gunat her. His gaze flicked rapidly past her to the street beyond, butshe seemed to be alone, and he focused his attention back on her.

For just a moment she stood in the doorway, and he noticed that shewas swaying slightly, as if she were drunk. His eyes narrowed ashe took in her appearance: Black rings under her eyes, and her clotheswere mussed and wrinkled, as if she'd been sleeping in them. Shelooked as run down as Mulder felt.

Finally, she spoke. "I've come to give her back to you."

# # #

Southbound on Route 163, San Diego, CA
10:34 p.m.

"Why, Diana?"

Mulder sat in the cramped back seat of Tara's Saturn, his Sig Sauertrained on Diana's head. She sat in the front passenger seat, whileTara drove. Mulder hadn't been at all surprised when Tara insistedon coming along, and only mildly surprised that Frohike had agreed to takecare of Matthew for her. The arrangement did have its advantages: It allowed him to watch Diana while someone he trusted drove the car.

A brief, bitter interrogation had established to Mulder's satisfactionthat Diana knew nothing of the missing atom bomb. In fact, she gaveevery appearance of shocked disbelief when he told her about it. Part of his mind was screaming at him that he was a fool to trust her,and risk being burned again, but another part was just as firm in its desperateneed to be doing SOMETHING towards resolving the situation.

The silence stretched on, and Mulder began to doubt whether Diana hadheard his question. She sat calmly in her seat, staring at the highwayahead of them, not moving at all, barely breathing. Mulder was justbeginning to wonder if he should repeat the question when she started tospeak.

"I never stopped being in love with you." Her voice was quiet,meditative. "Even after that last, horrible fight; even after allthose years away from you, I never stopped loving you."

She fell silent again for a moment, and continued to stare out at thehighway. Then: "They came to me last winter, right after thefirst of the year. I assume that Frohike found out about my moneyproblems." She turned her head to look at him, seeming to want confirmation. Mulder nodded, and she turned back to face the front again.

"The money was only part of it, though," she went on. "If it hadbeen only the money, I would have turned them down flat. AlthoughI have to admit that having those debts cleared was a powerful incentive. They always use both the carrot AND the stick. I think you know that." Again she turned to look at him; again he nodded. And this time shedid not look away.

She stared at him steadily for a moment; finally she closed her eyesand swallowed. "It was the videos that really did it."

She fell silent again, and this time she did not seem to be inclinedto go on. At last, Mulder said, "Videos?"

She nodded, and a look of pain crossed her features. "Videos. Videos of you...and her."

Mulder felt a shock run through his system. She couldn't possiblymean what it sounded like she meant. "Diana, I --"

"Save it, Fox," she said, bitterness creeping into her voice. "I know I was taken in; I figured it out almost as soon as I saw the twoof you together. But they did such a good job of faking it, and I'mcertain it was your apartment where they did the taping. I'd knowthat sofa anywhere. That part HAD to be real, even if the...the lovemakingwasn't. But I was so shocked, so...so jealous that I couldn't evensee straight. All I could see was you, and her...the things you weredoing together. The things you said. The things about me."

Mulder felt his eyes widen. "Diana, I swear to god...I never saida word about you to Scully. She didn't even know you existed untilthat first briefing. I would never --"

"Just shut up, Fox, okay?" she said sharply, pain and anger strugglingfor ascendancy in her voice. "I already told you I figured that out. And if I'd been able to see past my rage and humiliation, I would haveknown it when they first showed me the tapes. But I couldn't. And so I agreed to work with them, and by the time I realized my mistakeI was in so deep that I couldn't get out."

For a pair of minutes there was silence in the car. Mulder glancedbriefly at Tara, but she was giving nothing away, simply clutching thesteering wheel and staring out to the front, apparently oblivious to theconversation taking place next to her. But Mulder knew that she hadto be hearing every word.

"Fox, I'm so sorry." He shifted his gaze back to Diana, and nowthere were tears leaking out of the corners of her eyes. "I shouldhave known better. I really should have. And it wasn't thesex, it truly wasn't. Oh, that hurt, and I won't deny it, but itwas none of my business, even if it had been real. It was the thingsyou said...the things they made it seem like you said, while you were lyingtogether. Cruel, hateful things. And she laughed when you saidthem."

"I'm sorry, Diana." Mulder knew it was hopelessly inadequate,and not even really appropriate, but it was all that he could think ofto say.

Diana nodded slightly, and managed a tiny little smile. "Actually,it was the laughing -- her laughing -- that finally tipped me off thatI'd been hoaxed." She shook her head. "Do you know that shenever laughs? Never. She barely even smiles. Once I realizedthat, I knew that the tapes had been faked. But by then it was toolate."

Once again silence fell in the car, and more miles fled behind them. And after awhile Diana turned around and faced to the front, and the onlysound was the tires whispering against the pavement.

# # #

Harbor Drive Warehouse District, San Diego, CA
10:49 p.m.

At length the car rolled to a halt across the street from the nondescriptwarehouse which Diana had directed them to. For the past quartermile, signs had proudly announced that this would one day be the site ofthe new San Diego Padres baseball stadium. The streets were darkand silent, and the building itself gave every appearance of being unoccupied.

For several minutes Mulder and the two women sat silently, watchingthe building. Finally, Mulder said, "Are you sure this is it, Diana? It seems awfully quiet."

She shrugged. "This is where they were four days ago. Ofcourse, they could easily have been moved."

Mulder nodded, and they sat in silence for another pair of minutes. Scully and Bill could have been moved, and of course if Diana was now playingstraight with him she would have no way of knowing about that. Onthe other hand, there was the clear possibility that this was all a trapof some sort, designed to lure them to an isolated area where he and Taracould be disposed of quietly.

But it didn't FEEL like a trap; it felt like the truth. And ScullyWAS nearby; he could almost feel her presence. Of course, that didn'tprove anything; even if she was here, it could still be a trap -- and Scullyherself would no doubt snort in derision if he were to try to explain toher the feeling of PRESENCE he was having at the moment.

"Bill's here," Tara said quietly.

Mulder shifted his gaze to her, and saw that she had turned in her seatand was looking back at him with large, luminous eyes. He studiedher face for a moment, looking for doubt or uncertainty and finding none. Finally, he nodded slightly. "Let's do it, then."

The side entrance which Diana led them to was chained and padlocked,but the tire iron from Tara's Saturn made short work of that obstacle. The interior of the warehouse was as silent and deserted as the streethad been. The only light came from Mulder's flashlight; the onlysound was their own footsteps as they proceeded along a narrow corridor,Diana still in the lead. And with each step he took the sense ofScully's presence grew stronger in Mulder's mind.

At last they came to the end of the hallway and passed through anotherdoorway, to find themselves standing along one side of a vast room. A handful of shipping crates were scattered across the floor, seeminglyplaced at random, but otherwise the room appeared to be empty, althoughit was hard to be certain since the far wall was lost in the gloom.

Diana stepped off into the darkness, but Mulder grabbed her elbow. "Just a minute," he said. "Where, exactly, are we going?"

"There's a staircase along the far side," Diana said. "We go upthe stairs and along a catwalk to a small group of offices. WhenI was here on Sunday, Agent Scully and her brother were being kept in oneof the offices."

He looked at her narrowly for a moment. From her body languageand facial expression he was almost sure she was telling the truth, andthere was no denying his own sixth sense that Scully was nearby. At the same time, all of his professional instincts were warning him thatsomething was wrong. The building was too empty, too quiet. If prisoners were being kept here, shouldn't there be SOME sort of guard?

Diana seemed to read his mind, as she sighed and said, "I don't knowwhat's going on any more than you do, Fox. There never were verymany people here, but there should have been someone watching the doorwhere we entered the building. At least, there was on Sunday." Her lips quirked slightly. "It is New Year's Eve. Maybe they'reall off celebrating."

Mulder considered her words for a minute. He was pretty certainshe was still telling the truth, but that didn't make the situation anymore explicable. Without taking his eyes off of Diana, he said, "Tara? What do you think?"

After the briefest of hesitations, Tara said, "I don't know, Mulder. I don't trust her." Another pause. "But Bill is here. Of that I'm certain."

Mulder stood quietly for another moment or two, weighing the situation,but he really didn't have much in the way of alternatives. He couldeither turn back, and give up the one lead he had in this case, or he couldproceed. At last he nodded to Diana. "Lead on."

The staircase she led them to was old and rickety. It appearedto be made of cast iron, and was bolted to the wall almost as if it hadbeen an afterthought. Mulder shone his light up the stairs, but thetop remained hidden in darkness. He felt a prickling on the backof his neck, and shifted the flashlight to his left hand and drew his gunwith his right.

With Diana still in the lead, they proceeded to climb the stairs. The structure shivered with each step, and Mulder had visions of the wholething collapsing under their weight. And he was only three stepsfrom the top when that vision materialized.

It started with a low, creaking groan, and for three vital seconds Mulderfroze as the surface shifted beneath his feet. He was aware of Taraand Diana ahead of him on the stairs scrambling for the safety of the landing,and finally his own reflexes kicked in, but it was too late; the creakinggroan had built to a roar and a clatter of metal and he was falling....

After an unmeasured interval, Mulder gradually became aware of himselfagain. He was lying on the cold concrete floor of the warehouse inalmost total darkness, the faint glow of his miraculously unbroken flashlightjust visible about twenty feet away. For a moment all he could dowas lie there as flashes and sparkles danced before his eyes. Hetook cautious inventory, and decided that nothing was broken, and finallyhe struggled to a sitting position.

Instantly he regretted it. Pain lanced through his head like alightning bolt, and the room seemed to dive and swoop around him. His breathing came in short, sharp gasps, and his heart pounded in hischest. There was a ringing in his ears, and for a moment the darknessseemed to close in on him again....

"Mulder!" Tara's voice. Grimly, Mulder fought to open hiseyes, and even as he did so he felt a hand on his shoulder. "Mulder! Are you okay?"

His eyes flickered open, and he saw Tara kneeling in front of him. Diana stood back a few feet, now holding his flashlight. Idly, hewondered where his gun had gotten to. He thought he'd been holdingit when he fell, but somehow it didn't seem terribly important. Nothingseemed important. He felt strangely detached, and all he really wantedto do was sleep....

"Mulder!"

Again she was shaking his shoulder, and reluctantly he opened his eyesagain. Tara was staring at him, her face only a few inches from hisown. She really had a very lovely face; he wondered why he'd nevernoticed that before. Bill sure knew how to pick 'em....

"Mulder! Dammit, pay attention to me!"

With a supreme effort of will, Mulder focused his attention on Tara,and tried to listen to her words. "S-sorry," he said. "GuessI'm a little groggy."

She continued to peer at him in the gloom. "More than a little,I'd say."

"H-how'd...you get down here?"

"Diana found another stairway -- a little more solid that that one,thank God." Tara held up a finger in front of his face and movedit steadily back and forth. Automatically, Mulder tried to trackthe finger with his eyes, but the effort made him dizzy and nauseous andhe had to stop and swallow carefully. Tara nodded grimly. "Ithink you've got a concussion."

Mulder tried to concentrate on what she'd just said. Concussion. Yeah, that made a lot of sense. He'd had one or two of those before,and he remembered what it felt like: Pretty much the way he was feelingright now. He also remembered that the way to deal with it was toput the feelings away in a box and try to focus on something concrete andimmediate.

"Did you...." His voice trailed off and he had to swallow again. "Did you find them?"

Tara shook her head. "Not yet. We didn't look. Wehad to find you, make sure you were okay." Her lips quirked slightly. "Besides, you had the only flashlight." She hesitated, then said,"Do you think you're going to be able to manage? Or should we getyou to a doctor? A head injury is nothing to fool around with."

Mulder shook his head sharply, and winced as a fresh jolt of pain shotthrough his head. "No," he said. "No doctors. Not untilwe find Scully and Bill." He took a deep breath and started to climbto his feet.

Without Tara's help he would never have made it, and even so it wasa near thing. At last, though, he was standing on his own two feet,albeit Tara was supporting a considerable portion of his weight. The pounding in his head had intensified still further, and the dizzinesshad returned with a vengeance, but at least he was upright. He stoodas still as he could, trying to catch his breath and waiting for the roomto stop spinning.

At last he felt he'd regained his equilibrium, and took a few experimentalsteps away from Tara. On the third or fourth step he staggered andhis knees buckled, and he found himself leaning up against a wall and gaspingfor breath. He heard footsteps approaching, and then Tara was holdinghim up again, while Diana stood a few feet in front of him shining thelight at him.

He winced and ducked his head, squinching his eyes shut. "Jesus,"he gasped. "Get that fucking light out of my eyes!" He feltlike he was going to vomit, and it was only by the barest of margins thathe managed to avoid it, turning away from the light and momentarily leaninghis forehead against the wall.

Tara said, "Mulder, I really think --"

"Just give me a minute," he snapped. He took a deep breath, andthen another, and then slowly and carefully he pushed himself away fromthe wall and opened his eyes again. His vision was blurry, and hewas seeing double, but he could dimly make out the wall a foot or two infront of him. As his eyes slowly came back into focus, he realizedhe was actually standing in front of a door, and that there was a yellowsign of some sort hanging on it. Yellow with a black trefoil shapeon it. It looked vaguely familiar....

"Shit!" He blinked hard, and resisted the urge to shake his head. "Diana! Shine the light over here!" An instant later the areain front of him was lit up, and he swore again, and he heard Tara gasp.

"Mulder?" Her voice sounded fearful and uncertain. "Isn'tthat the radiation hazard symbol?"

"Yes." He paused for another deep breath. "Yes it is. We may just have found...." His voice trailed off; he just couldmake himself say the words. Besides, it couldn't REALLY be the bomb;it couldn't possibly be that easy. It was probably a storeroom forradioactive materials, or something similar. But they had to check;they couldn't just walk away from the opportunity of solving this partof the puzzle, no matter how remote the chance.

Mulder reached out and tried the doorknob, but it was locked. Of course. He considered the matter for just a moment. Therewas a solution; there had to be a solution, if only he could think of it....

Then he had it. "Diana? Did you pick up my gun, too?" Hewanted to turn and look at her, but he couldn't tear his eyes away fromthe radiation warning. It had him mesmerized; it was like a snake,coiled and ready to strike.

"Yes." He heard her footsteps approaching, and he sidled off toone side. "Shoot the lock."

"Fox?"

"Shoot it!"

The gun roared once, twice, three times, and Mulder winced as the soundassaulted his ears and seemed to drive a hot spike directly into his brain. On the fourth shot the lock flew apart, and he fought down another waveof nausea as he moved back in front of the door and pushed it open. He stepped across the threshold and fumbled for the light switch, and inanother instant the room was flooded with light. He blinked backtears and tried to ignore the agony in his head as he peered into the room.

It was the bomb.

It had to be.

An off-white, cylindrical object, perhaps fifteen feet long and fivein diameter, resting on its side in an elaborate laticework cradle. As he stepped closer he saw that it bore U.S. Navy markings, and what appearedto be a serial number was stenciled on the side.

It was the bomb.

He was still digesting the scene in front of him when his cell phoneshrilled. For a moment he ignored it, all of his attention focusedon the cylinder. Then the phone sounded again, and he drew it fromhis pocket and punched the connect button.

"Mulder."

"Mulder, this is Byers." The dapper little man's voice soundedstrained and harsh. "I think we've got a problem."

"No shit," Mulder replied, still staring at the bomb.

Byers continued, "We finally managed to hack into Colonel Casey's Pentagonemail account, and we found he'd uncovered a lot more than we thought. It turns out --"

"That the bomb is right here in San Diego," Mulder finished.

There was a moment of silence on the other end. Then: "Howdid you know?"

"Because I'm standing about five feet in front of it."

Another silence, longer than the last. Finally, Byers breathed,"Jesus." Pause. "Mulder, you've got to get out of there, andI'm not kidding. If the information Casey dug up is correct, thatthing's set to go off at midnight." Byers paused again, as if waitingfor a response, but Mulder didn't say anything. "Mulder? Didyou hear me?"

"I heard you."

"Then get your ass out of there! Frohike's packing up Matthewas we speak; we're about to hit the road." Pause. "Mulder? Are you listening to me? You've only got about 40 minutes; you don'thave any time to waste!"

Mulder stood stock still, eyes still fixed on the bomb, trying to absorbwhat Byers was telling him. Forty minutes. In forty minutesthey could put at least thirty miles between themselves and ground zero. But would even that be enough? Christ, he didn't even know what theweapon's yield was. It might not be too large; he vaguely recalledthat multi-megaton weapons had fallen into disfavor as the accuracy ofthe delivery systems increased. Yeah, not too large -- maybe it wasonly big enough to destroy a SMALL city.

He couldn't just turn and run, could he? Even if he and Tara andDiana managed to get outside the blast radius, that still left more thantwo million people exposed and unprotected, Scully and her brother amongthem. He closed his eyes and tried to think. Byers was babblingin his ear again, and precious seconds were trickling away, but there hadto be a solution; there had to be.

Forty minutes.

Dammit! Why couldn't Diana have come back sooner? Even afew hours sooner, and there would have been time to issue a warning, startan evacuation, get someone down here who knew what they were doing. Someone with the technical know-how to deal with --

My kung fu is the best.>>

"Byers, let me talk to Langly."

"Mulder? We don't have time for --"

"Langly. Get him."

There was a brief silence on the other end, then the blond man cameon the phone. "Yeah, Mulder?"

"Langly, do you know anything about nuclear weapons?"

There was another moment of silence, and Mulder could almost hear thewheels spinning in the other man's head. Finally: "Yes."

"Enough to disarm one?"

No hesitation this time. "Yes."

"Do you think you could walk me through it in the time we have left?"

"Maybe. But Mulder, you'd have to have the right tools. It's not something you can do barehanded, or even with the crap most peoplehave in their basement workshops."

For the first time since stepping through the doorway, Mulder forcedhis eyes away from the bomb and looked around. It was a medium sizedroom, perhaps 20 by 20, with bare concrete walls and a concrete floor. Other than the bomb, resting in its cradle, the only thing in the roomwas a storage cabinet in the far corner, perhaps five feet high. He breathed a prayer. Please, let it be what he hoped it was.

"Just a sec, Langly."

Mulder had actually forgotten how ill he was feeling, but as he movedtowards the cabinet fresh waves of pain and nausea went racing throughhis head and his body. The room started spinning again, and moresparkles of light appeared before his eyes. He gritted his teethand once again fought down the urge to vomit, and somehow he made it overthe cabinet, but then he didn't have the strength to do anything but leanup against it, eyes closed and breathing heavily.

"Mulder?" Tara's voice again. Shit. He'd completelyforgotten about the two women. He forced his eyes open and turnedto look at them.

"Tara," he gasped. "Diana. Get the fuck out of here." He paused again to try to catch his breath.

"Mulder? What the hell?"

He waved helplessly in the general direction of the bomb. "Tara...It'sset to blow. Midnight."

He saw her eyes go big and round, and she took a step back from him. "Matthew --"

Mulder shook his head, then closed his eyes again as more waves of agonyassaulted him. Dammit! "S'okay," he managed to stutter out. "S'okay. The Gunmen...Gunmen're taking Matthew. He'll be okay." God, he hoped he was right. He hoped his friends could drive farenough, fast enough, to salvage something from this miserable situation.

He heard a distant chattering coming from somewhere, and after a momenthe realized it was his cell phone. Langly. Right. Heheld it up to his ear again.

"S-sorry, Langly," he muttered. "You said you need tools." He pushed himself back a step or two from the cabinet and pulled it open,and for once luck seemed to be on his side as he was confronted by rackafter rack of tools, some familiar and others not, and each carefully labeledas it hung on a hook or sat on a shelf. He squinted against the blossomingsparkles that danced before his eyes, and started reading the labels intohis cell phone.

"Okay, Mulder." Langly's voice was calm and professional. "It sounds like you've got what you need. Now the first thing we'regoing to have to do is take the cover plate off. To do that..."

Mulder tried to concentrate on his friend's words, but it just wasn'tworking. The room was spinning again, and the sparkling in his eyeshad gotten so strong he could barely see anything else. Without quiteknowing how it had happened, he found himself on his hands and knees, andhis cell phone was skittering away across the concrete floor, Langly'svoice still chattering from the receiver. He tried to crawl afterit, but suddenly his stomach heaved, and this time he couldn't keep himselffrom vomiting, over and over and over. Then he was lying on the flooron his belly, still puking, and the side of his face was wet and sticky. He couldn't even see the cell phone anymore, it was out of his line ofvision, and anyway it was dark in the room even though he was sure he'dturned the lights on but he just couldn't see he couldn't keep his eyesopen....

And then he heard a woman's voice, very far away, as if it was comingfrom the end of a long, long tunnel. "Langly? This is TaraScully. Tell me what I need to do."

Everything went black.

# # #

UCSD Medical Center
January 1, 1:38 p.m.

Mulder's first sensation was one of pain: A dull throbbing pain,pulsing gently in his head and running down his neck to his upper back. A familiar pain, almost a friendly pain; a pain that evoked strange, chaoticmemories -- memories of falling, of stumbling in the darkness, of desperatelytrying to focus on...something. And then suddenly he remembered.

Scully and her brother, missing. The endless days of worry andtedium. The agony of not knowing. The mounting terror as theConsortium's plan was unearthed. Diana's betrayal and redemption. The desperate journey to the waterfront in the middle of the night. The atom bomb.

Scully.

His eyes fluttered open, and even as the overhead acoustic tiles cameinto focus he realized that he was lying in a hospital bed. He becameaware of more: The soft whisper of a heating duct; the quiet tickingof a clock; the distant murmur of voices. And then suddenly one ofthe voices became louder.

"Good morning sleepyhead."

He shifted his eyes in the direction of the voice, and saw Tara standingat the foot of his bed. Bill was standing next to her, his arm aroundher shoulders, and they both were smiling.

Mulder raised his eyebrows and smiled back at them weakly. "Morning?"

"Well, actually it's early afternoon," she replied.

"But what's a few hours among friends?" Bill added with a light chuckle.

Mulder laughed in return, then winced as the throbbing in his head becameslightly worse. His eyes watered for a moment, and he held still,waiting to see if the nausea of the night before would return, but it didn't. His vision cleared, and he looked back at Bill and Tara. "I takeit the bomb...didn't?"

"No, it didn't," Bill replied, still smiling.

"Eight seconds to spare," Tara added, her own smile spreading into afull-fledged grin. "It was hardly even exciting."

Mulder snorted. "I think you guys have seen THE ANDROMEDA STRAINonce too often."

Tara laughed out loud and her eyes sparkled as she leaned into her husband. "Hey, Mulder, give me a break. I've been waiting my whole life fora chance to deliver a line like that!"

Mulder laughed with her despite the pain, then suddenly sobered. Scully. They hadn't said anything about Scully. Bill was here,and he and Tara were both smiling and happy, so surely she was okay, butstill....

"She's fine, Mulder," Bill said, seeming to read his thoughts. "She just stepped out for a few minutes to give your doctor the third degree,but she'll be right back. And she's going to be pissed as hell thatyou had the nerve to wake up while she was out of the room." He shookhis head in mock disgust. "Sometimes I wonder how she manages toput up with you."

"Well I'm just as glad that she isn't here," Tara said, stepping awayfrom her husband and moving up to the head of the bed. "It givesme the chance to deliver this in private." Mulder noticed for thefirst time that Tara had a small, gayly-wrapped package tucked under herright arm. Now she pulled it out and handed it to Mulder.

Again he raised his eyebrows. "What's this?"

"A get well present," she replied, still smiling.

Mulder hefted the object in his hand for a moment, and gingerly feltits dimensions. It seemed to be a book -- or perhaps two books; hewasn't quite sure. But what books would Tara be giving him? And then suddenly he knew, and he felt an embarrassed smile creep acrosshis face.

"Go ahead, Mulder, open it," she said. "Dana will be back anyminute."

Chuckling and shaking his head, Mulder quickly tore open the package,and was unsurprised to find himself the proud new owner of Tara Scully'scopies of The Symposium and The Collected Poems of Catullus. He stareddown at the volumes for a moment, then raised his eyes to look at Taraagain. Her smile had broadened, and now amusement danced in her eyes.

"Check the inscriptions," she suggested.

Mulder dropped his gaze to the books again, and after a brief hesitationhe flipped open the book by Plato. There on the inside of the frontcover, in Tara's elegant, feminine script, were the words, "To thine ownself be true. Tara Scully, January 1, 1999."

He felt his eyebrows rising again, and looking back up at Tara he sawthat her expression had suddenly turned serious. "I really did meaneverything I said, Mulder," she said softly. "Now look at the otherone."

Once more he looked down at the books, and this time he opened the bookof poetry. Here the inscription had been written in Bill's neat,methodical handwriting: "What she said."

Mulder smiled.

# # #

Residence of Bill and Tara Scully
9:58 p.m. - EPILOGUE

Dana Scully paused in the doorway between the dining room and the livingroom and looked at her partner for a moment. He was stretched outon the sofa in his customary sprawl, arms and legs everywhere. Thetape was already in the VCR, ready to go, and he was playing idly withthe remote control.

For just an instant she indulged herself in the small, affectionatesmile that she never allowed Mulder to see. He had been so solicitousto her since he'd regained consciousness that afternoon. It was funny,really, and rather sweet; you'd almost think that SHE had been the oneto take a knock on the head, and for awhile she'd thought she might haveto draw her gun on him to get him to lie still until his doctor arrivedto clear him for discharge. He was such a pain in the ass when hewas hurt.

She wouldn't have it any other way.

"We gonna watch this movie, or are you just going to stand there staringat me all night?"

Scully chuckled slightly and moved over to the sofa as Mulder rearrangedhimself to make room for her. She handed him the bowl of popcornand one of the bottles of root beer, and then sat down next to him andstretched out her feet to rest them on the coffee table.

Mulder twisted the cap off his soda and took a deep swig, then grimacedslightly. "You know, I still think I could have had a Rolling Rock."

"Not tonight, Mulder," she said. "Alcohol and head injuries don'tmix; you know that. Besides, I thought you LIKED root beer."

"I do," he replied. "But you can get too much of anything." He took another hit from his bottle, then picked up the remote controlagain and pushed PLAY.

For a few minutes the two partners sat together on the sofa and watchedthe opening credits of DINOSAURUS! scroll across the screen. A constructioncompany was using underwater explosives to dredge out the harbor of a tropicalisland, and the project foreman was developing a romantic interest in thelead actress. Of course.

Eyes fixed on the screen, Scully twisted the top off of her own bottleof root beer and took a short sip, then grabbed a handful of popcorn andstuffed it into her mouth. God, it tasted good. She couldn'tbelieve how good it tasted. Everything was perfect; everything waswonderful. She took another handful of popcorn, and followed it upwith some more root beer.

"Scully, do you love me?"

She stopped in mid swig and looked up at her partner in surprise. Where the hell had THAT come from? Not that it mattered; she couldnever lie to him. "Of course I love you, Mulder. Didn't youknow that?"

He was looking down at her, his expression very sober and serious. He nodded slightly, and replied, "I guess I did." He paused, thenasked, "Just exactly what kind of love are we talking about here?"

She hesitated for just an instant, then shrugged and gave the only answerthat she could: "Whatever kind of love we need it to be."

For a moment Mulder seemed to study her face, and she looked back athim curiously, waiting to see what he was going to do. Finally henodded again, and said, "That's a good answer, Scully. That's a verygood answer." Then he turned his attention back to the TV screen,and after another moment Scully did likewise, and for a pair of minutesthey watched the movie together in silence.

"You know," her partner commented after awhile, "we must have seen thismovie at least fourteen times. At LEAST fourteen times." Heglanced down at her again and smiled slightly. "Not that I'm complaining,mind you. Some things just get better with time."

"I guess that's true," she said. And after that they were quiet,and the two friends sat together on the sofa, eating popcorn, drinkingroot beer, and watching television, far into the night.

Fini