Author's Note: This is actually based upon a dream that I had. I decided to embellish it and make it into a fan fiction for the X-FILES, as it seemed very appropriate. Please R&R.

SPOILERS: Brief spoilers for the show through MILLENNIUM (Season 7).

OBLIGATORY: I do not own any of the characters from X-FILES. If I did, the show would have been MUCH different.

CHAPTER 1 (Scully's POV)

With a deep sigh, I pushed the door open with my elbows. I held two coffees. Despite my annoyance with Mulder for calling me into the office at six in the morning, I was not willing to show up with coffee only for myself. As the door opened, Mulder turned from behind the desk. He smiled broadly and stood, quickly stepping over to me. "Good morning, Starshine!" he said, much more perky than he had any right to be. He took one of the coffees from my hands and took a deep gulp.

Stifling a yawn, I responded, "I don't feel very shiny this early." Mulder smiled at that and headed back to his desk. "Have you already had your coffee, Mulder?"

Mulder shook his head, taking another gulp. "Nope – this is a natural high, Scully." He held up a file. I walked over to his desk and sat, sipping my coffee. Mulder began pacing the room, explaining, "We have a new case! And this one…." He chuckled. "This one is fascinating!"

"Define 'fascinating," I said tentatively.

"So three months ago, a young woman in the suburbs of Richmond called 9-1-1." He picked up a tape recorder and hit Play.

9-1-1, What's your emergency?

H-hello? Um… I… I'm on highway 60, a-and… m-my car…

There was a long pause.

Hello? Ma'am? Are you still there?

Y-yes… I'm sorry, it's just… I was driving….

Were you in an accident?

N-no! I mean, my car is a little banged up… b-but I'm calling b-because... There are bodies on the road!

Mulder gave a triumphant smirk.

Did you just say there are bodies on route 60?

Y-yes! There… God, there are… There're piles of bodies…

With that, Mulder hit Stop. "This phone call was made at four o'clock in the afternoon in a fairly busy area. No one else reported these bodies. When the police came to investigate, they found nothing and the young woman who called had disappeared." He handed me a file. "Six hours later, she was found. Dead."

I opened the file and glanced through the notes. "She suffocated?"

"Yes, but get this: there were no marks on her neck." Mulder pointed to the picture that showed no damage to her neck area. "She was found in a wedding dress that was so tight it had crushed her upper torso, causing suffocation. " He turned back to his desk and picked up two more files. "Then, two months ago the same thing happened – a young woman called 9-1-1 to report bodies but showed up suffocated with identical wounds six hours later. Then it happened again last month. Different highways, but always the same thing."

"Okay… we definitely have a serial killer. But other than the victims' hallucinations of bodies on the highways, what makes this an X-File?"

"I was waiting for you to ask me that," Mulder replied. He reached back and pulled six more files. "These are files on murders just like these three… only these were back in the 1920s. I did some research, and before that around the time of the Civil War there were reports of deaths similar to these. Unfortunately we don't have the reports for those."

"So… we're going to Charlottesville?" I asked.

Grinning widely, Mulder nodded.