Once Mulder was able to sooth Scully as much as possible, he told her about the article and stories he had been investigating about women...former abductees who had surrendered their children as if providing an offering. She looked at him in horror before touching the back of her neck. "You mean...this THING is responsible for making me abandon my child?" she closed her eyes in resignation. She fought back another sob thinking back to the day she gave away her baby boy. "How the hell can I know this isn't what made me give up William?"
Mulder placed his hands on her shoulders, urging her to look at him. "You did it to protect him and keep him safe...that was different." She shook her head. "How do we really know that?" she choked back another sob before running into the living room, ripping open a bag of sterile medical supplies she always kept on hand. When she pulled out what looked like a scalpel, he gasped in horror. "Scully...Dana, what are you doing?!"
When she pulled back her long strawberry blonde locks of hair, he realized what she was about to do and lunged forward. "STOP," he screamed. Just as she knife pierced her delicate skin, she felt the weight of his body easily push her small frame to the ground, knocking the scalpel away in the process. He grabbed her arms harder than he intended when she reached for the weapon. "No, Scully!"
"Mulder, you have to let me do this...this is the reason our baby...babies are gone."
He pinned her wrists down easily as she struggled. "Let me go!"
He forced her to look directly at him. "You think I'm going to let the mother of my children die of cancer. Your illness will come back, Scully and our baby won't have a mother to care and love her."
She shook her head. "Better off without me."
She crumpled to tears.
He used the remaining of his strength to pull her upright. "Hey...Hey."
He pulled her tightly to his chest as she let out several heart wrenching sobs.
"It's okay. It's going to be okay. We'll find her."
Once Mulder was certain Scully was no longer a danger to herself and had sobbed herself to sleep, he gently lifted and placed her on the couch. He pulled a blanket up around her and grabbed the keys before dashing outside to the car, searching it for any trace of evidence of where she may have gone. He unlocked the glove compartment and retrieved the GPS they had recently purchased and began scanning through it's history for any indication of where Scully may have taken Melissa. Nothing. He then retrieved the mileage log Scully kept in the side door and inspected the history. He noted a stop for gas that was made earlier. He inspected the one prior to that and did some slight calculations. He had no idea how much gas was in the car before she left, so he had to take a quick guess...along with the mileage used before she would need to stop and get gas. Scully always refilled around 3/4 of a tank. She was so incoherent that he was sure she couldn't recollect much other than the fact that she had surrendered her baby. Once he figured a mile radius, he placed another call to Skinner asking him to contact every possible adoption agency within that tedious to see if a baby matching Melissa's criteria had been placed. He could always call himself and forge his identity like he did once before, though he was certain Skinner wouldn't like that too much. It had only given him trouble in the past. If anyone could get the answers he needed quickly, it would be Skinner. He needed to do this. He was afraid what would become of Scully especially, as the guilt surrounding William's adoption had never ceased.
To be continued...