Title - Kismet
Author - Jaimee Kidder
Email - invisibleshining@ivillage.com
Rating - PG-13 (for violence)
Classification - XRA
Spoilers - Herrenvolk/Talitha Cumi, Fight the Future,
Triangle, Two Fathers/One Son, Three of a Kind
Keywords - Mulder/Scully romance
Summary - Mulder and Scully investigate a seemingly
meaningless murder in a small farming town in Alabama and suddenly find
themselves caught in the middle of events that could lead to the end.
::whirrrrr:: "I made this!"
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters in this
story. I wish I was Scully and owned
Mulder, but such is not the case. If I
did, this would be an episode -- or two, or five -- of the show, not some story
that Chris Carter will prob'ly never read. :) The secondary characters are mine (so there!). But Mulder, Scully, and the rest are all CC's (hail to the man!),
1013's, and Fox's. Too bad for me. ;-)
Oh yeah...and I borrowed Celine
Dion's "Because You Loved Me"...so thank you, Celine, for singing
such a lovely (and shippery) song!
.kismet.
.epiphany.
Jacksonville Hospital
5:57 p.m.
"I need some information on a person who was brought in here a few hours ago," Scully announced to the desk nurse, flashing her ID.
"Name?" she asked
crisply, flipping through the few file folders on the desk.
"Mulder -- Fox Mulder."
"Multiple gunshot?"
Scully's breath caught. Quickly forcing herself back to a
professional demeanor, she acknowledged, "Yes. I need to know what room he's in."
The nurse consulted her file,
then glanced up. "112."
"Thanks."
Scully turned and strode quickly
down the hall. Coming to Mulder's room,
she paused a second, collecting herself, and then turned the handle and eased
the door open.
Relieved to see Mulder still in
his bed -- you're as paranoid as he is, Dana -- Scully pulled the hard
plastic chair up to the side of his bed and picked up a Reader's Digest that
was lying on the side table as she waited for him to come to.
She had just finished reading
"All in a Day's Work" and was smiling wryly at the name when her
cellular rang.
"Scully."
"Scully, it's Langly."
"Did you find
anything?" she asked eagerly and quietly, standing up.
"Nothing so far on either
Phillip Kahn or Robert Harris, but I think we've got something on that company
you gave us. Nature's Best. It allegedly produces corn products -- oil,
that sort of thing, right?"
"That's right."
"We haven't been able to
find much of anything about them through public channels -- nothing on them on
the Internet, promotionals or ads for their products, or national distributors
of foodstuffs. The only thing we found that
was available to the general public was a few scattered employment offers. In newspapers, mostly. I think a commercial even ran on TV in some
places during a late timeslot. But you
won't believe what we found...unofficially."
"What?"
"Various government charters
transacting business with a certain government-owned company. Guess who the company was. Nature's Best had signed to transport
something referred to as 'the product' to and from various locations worldwide. And get this -- this international company,
that should've taken years to establish itself even nationally, was only
founded in 1996."
"What?" Scully asked
incredulously.
"That's all we were able to
find," Langly continued, pleased at such a favorable reaction. "But like I said, we haven't even
looked into those two guys you gave us."
"No, no...this is
fantastic...thanks, Langly."
"Don't mention it...and
Scully?"
"Yeah?"
"Tell Mulder 'hey' from all
of us...and we hope he's O.K."
"All right. Thanks."
Scully flipped her phone off and
slapped it down on the table, her mind working furiously over what Langly had
said. She settled back in the chair and
tried to get comfortable, prepared to wait for her partner.
Monday, August 16
8:31 a.m.
Dana Scully had not slept a
wink. Totally preoccupied in watching
over Mulder and trying to understand the strange events of the previous day,
she hadn't yet missed the sleep. Not to
mention that anxiety for her partner made it difficult to keep her eyes closed
for longer than two minutes together.
Mulder stirred.
"Mulder?" Scully scooted the chair over to the bed and
looked at him closely. "Mulder? Are you
awake?"
He lay motionless for a few
seconds as Scully began stroking the side of his face with her hand. Then his eyes eased open, staring blankly
before focusing on her face.
She smiled gently. "Hey."
"Oh Scully...you have no
idea how much better it is to wake up to your face than theirs..." Mulder
slurred. She blinked, then remembered
the summer and smiled. He tried to sit
up, then moaned and collapsed back on the bed. "Don't try to sit up, Mulder," she cautioned. "Do you remember what happened?"
Frowning, Mulder thought
back. "Last thing I remember is a
man in a white suit aiming a gun at me."
"I guess you decided it was
better to get away from them...even if it meant getting shot."
Mulder smiled. "Or maybe I just didn't want to lose
you again."
Unsure of what to say, Scully
smoothed his hair away from his forehead and plunged into the business at
hand. "Mulder, I talked to
Langly. It seems that Nature's Best
doesn't even exist as a food company; apparently it's government-owned and was
only founded in 1996. And they dug up
government documents referring to transactions with Nature's Best, who had
agreed to internationally transport something they called 'the product'."
Mulder propped himself up on his
elbows. "That's it, Scully. 'The product' -- it's the virus. That's why the company was created. To transport it."
She nodded. "I think so too, Mulder." Then she was quiet, lost in troubling
thoughts. "Mulder...you realize
what this means, don't you?"
His brow furrowed. Scully took a deep breath.
"It means you were right,
Mulder. About everything. The aliens, the abductions, the bees, the
black oil.... The time is near. They've gotten to the point where they need
this thing to be transported worldwide. They're preparing. For a global
invasion."
Mulder's eyes widened in
comprehension. Then he nodded slowly,
the truth of her words sinking in. "So...now what?"
"Well...we should get over
to the Nature's Best office with a search warrant. And I'd like to find out the name of the friend that Rob Harris
was going to see so we can question him."
He sat up and started to swing
his legs out of bed. "No,
Mulder. You need to lie back and take
it easy."
"I'll be okay," he
assured her, wincing slightly as he tried to stand. He walked over to the other side of the bed where his clothes
were folded up and picked up his slacks.
"Mulder, get back in
bed."
"Look at me, Scully. I'm fine; I've had worse," he
maintained, pulling on his pants.
"You can't even put weight
on your right side without flinching. You need to be in bed," Scully insisted, knowing it was pointless
to argue.
Mulder looked at her
closely. "You've been here all
night, haven't you? Did you get any
sleep?"
She looked him directly in the
eye. "I didn't want anything to
happen to you."
"You're the one who needs to
be in bed, not me." Mulder slid
the hospital gown off over his head and wriggled into his bloody shirt,
cringing as it brushed against the white bandages.
"Mulder...."
Suddenly Mulder laughed. "Listen to us, Scully. We both should be resting right now but
neither of us wants to admit it...or lose time on this case."
She looked indignant for a
second, then smiled. "Let's just
go."
He nodded and slung his jacket
over his back, sticking his service weapon into the holster. The two stood to leave the room, his arm
encircling her shoulder. Then Scully's
cell phone rang. She dug into her
pocket and pulled out the phone, stepping slightly away from Mulder as she
answered.
"Scully."
There was silence, and then
"Sir?" Scully asked, confused, as Mulder stiffened beside her.
"What??" Mulder turned
apprehensively to face her. She glanced
up at him as he mouthed 'what?'. She
looked about to reply when something on the other end of the phone caught her
full attention. "What evidence?"
Scully demanded incredulously, distrust obvious in her tone. Silence, and then, "Classified? This was our case--"
She stared rebelliously into
space for a minute as the person on the other line spoke. "Yes."
She flipped the cellular off and
stood, taken aback at the news. Mulder
waited, knowing she would explain when she could collect her thoughts. After a minute, and still staring at some
imaginary point on the wall, Scully spoke. Her voice sounded distant as she related what had been said.
"That was A.D. Kersh. He said that they've found new
evidence," she began, still stunned. "Evidence proving that Robert Harris died of natural causes. He wouldn't tell me what it was. Said it was...classified." She laughed
quietly, contempt and anger sliding through her voice. "Anyway, they've closed the case; we
are no longer here in official capacity and he wants to see us back in D.C.
immediately," she finished, her quiet, measured tones belying the turmoil
that showed on her face.
Dismayed, Mulder stood,
motionless for a moment. Then he leaned
close to Scully, whispering, "They must have bugged the room, Scully. They've been watching us -- monitoring our
progress. We've gotten too close to
something, and I am not about to let them take us off of it. And then when they heard you telling me what
he said, they had Kersh call us to close the case. They've been keeping tabs on us the whole time."
"But...why give us the case
in the first place?"
"I don't know. Maybe someone slipped up somewhere, or maybe
someone somewhere is trying to help us...I don't know. But they know now that we've seen too much,
and they'll do anything they can to make sure that we're taken off the
assignment -- one way or another...that this case does not go on
record."
Surprised at how much this made
sense to her, Scully asked quietly, "So where do we go, Mulder? What happens now? If this is true, we're not safe anywhere...except off the
case. Not to mention that they'll never
let us have a search warrant for a case that's supposed to be
closed." She trailed off and sat
back down in the chair by the bed, staring at the door absent-mindedly as she
searched her mind for a solution.
Mentally going over everything
they had found out, Mulder suddenly remembered something. "Officer Kelley." Scully glanced up from her contemplative
daze, questioningly interested. "Down at the police station. We can call him...see what's going on down there." He fished his phone out from his jacket pocket
and dialed the operator, and then from there called the police station.
"Hello, this is Agent Fox
Mulder, from the F.B.I. I'd like to
speak with Officer Kelley, please. Agent Mulder." He
waited for a moment, and then, "Officer Kelley? Yeah, this is Agent Mulder; we spoke briefly Saturday
evening...yeah that's right. Listen, I
need to know what you turned up that showed that Rob Harris died from natural
causes." There was a long pause,
then Mulder nodded. "Thanks."
"What'd he say?" Scully
asked as Mulder hung up.
"He said they had declared
that he died from cardiac arrest," Mulder informed her, skepticism showing
on his face.
"What?" Scully
cried. "That's virtually
impossible, Mulder. Harris's medical
file showed that the ECG had come back negative."
Mulder took a breath. "That wasn't all he said, Scully. He said...not to call again. He said that a man had come in and told the police
department not to give us any more information...that we were here
illegally. No one believed him at
first, until he took the chief of police aside into an office and spoke with
him for a few minutes. When the chief
came out he gave everyone strict instructions not to help us, and to notify him
if we called." He shoved his phone
into his pocket and went to pick up his jacket. "Then he hung up. I
think he was trying to warn me but just didn't know how."
Scully looked at him in silence,
waiting for him to continue. He sighed,
and looked her straight in the eyes. "Scully, we have to give up the case." As he spoke, he silently motioned her over
to the thin notepad lying on the table beside his bed. Hurriedly, he scrawled a short message on
the piece of paper, then held it up before her eyes. 'They may be listening.' Her eyebrows went up minutely, then she nodded and took the paper and
pen. 'We can't stay here anymore' she
scribbled as she said "I think you're right, Mulder. As soon as possible."
Mulder took the paper and jotted
down three letters, then handed it to Scully. Her eyes widened, then she nodded, and without a word, walked into the
bathroom. A ripping sound was faintly
audible, and then the toilet flushed and Scully emerged, hands empty.
"Let's go."
Somewhere in New York
10:10 a.m.
Tendrils of pale grey smoke
curled like long skeletal fingers in the darkness of the room. Light came in tentatively through small
windows but was filtered through nearly shut blinds. No one turned on a lamp. The darkness was preferable to those present.
A man, face veiled in shadows,
stood in the middle of the room. Several others stood around him, silent and motionless. His eyes met those of a tall man with white
hair. The tall man spoke.
"There is a problem."
The first man drew nearer. "Yes?"
The tall man strode to the small
television that had been placed on an end table and pressed a button. The screen flicked on. It was footage from a security camera. The first man came closer.
"Our operatives recorded this from a camera inside the hospital," the tall man stated. "We were able to pull this from it." He handed the first man a printed image, a clarified and sharpened still from the footage. It showed a man and a woman standing near a table, with a piece of paper between them on the table. The writing on the paper had been circled. The first man squinted at the three letters on the paper.
"L. G. M." He took a long drag on his cigarette and blew the smoke out slowly. "They're going to Washington."