Scully didn't need the clock in the lab to tell her that time was running out. She couldn't even take the luxury of a few seconds to give a cursory glance through the files she now spirited out of the glassed in office and out of the lab. She made her way down the hallway, trying not to move as quickly as her heart beat. She had to travel but a few yards to the stairwell door, but each step seemed to take an eternity. Scully discovered the door was locked when she reached it. She reached into her pocket, took out her fake ID, and passed it through the security device. The light went out for a brief second, but remained red. She tried again, and again the light glowed back at her in bright red defiance. Scully paused for what seemed to be an endless second of an eternal minute, and tried her card again.

The door remained locked. Scully was trapped.

"Dr. Anderson...?"

Scully froze.

"Dr. Anderson, were you looking for me?"

Scully turned around slowly to face the lab technician she'd met earlier. The lab tech asked her the same question again. "Are you ready to start work, Dr. Anderson?" Scully carefully chose her next words. "Actually, I'm not quite ready for you yet. I wanted to go out and get some air; you know, clear my head before we spent all day in the lab.."

"Not with those, you won't" replied the tech. "Excuse me?" Scully asked. "Those files," the lab tech explained. "You'll never make it outside with those. Company property - can't leave the building." The lab tech reached for the files. "Here; I'll take those back to the lab for you." Scully watched herself hand over the files to the lab technician and with it the first concrete piece of evidence she found involving her daughter's disappearance.

"Is there anything else you need, Dr. Anderson?" asked the technician. "Actually, yes," Scully answered. "I was also looking for the ladies' room, but I couldn't seem to find one on this floor." "There's one in the lab..." the technician began. "I was already on my way out and didn't want to go all the way back. There isn't one nearby, is there?" "There's one on the basement floor," the technician replied. "The restrooms are next to the break room and at the opposite end from storage." The technician took her ID badge out of her lab coat and opened the stairwell door. "Thanks," Scully said as she took the door from her. The technician stopped Scully with one last question. "Would you like some lotion?" "Excuse me?" Scully said. "I'm sorry," the technician replied. "I don't mean to be rude, but your hands are peeling. I thought you might like some hand lotion; that's all."

Scully looked down at her hands to discover the polymer that was supposed to shield and disguise her fingerprints was flaking away from her hands.

Scully raced down the stairs much like the heroine of the proverbial fairy tale, trying to outrace a clock that was at the last stroke of midnight. But this wasn't a fairy tale; it washer worst nightmare and was destined to end in disaster.

She reached the basement floor of the building. Relieved that she would not have to use her badge to leave the stairwell, Scully pushed the door open. A few yards ahead of her was the break room, and the few people in it took all of two seconds to stare at her. Scully quickly found the restrooms near the break room, and went inside. She crouched down to look and see if anyone was in the restroom; it was empty. Scully reached behind her for the cel phone that was clipped to her waistband, and called Mulder. It was then she discovered that she could not get an outside signal to connect to her husband's phone. She silently cursed under her breath as she surveyed the room.

She may as well have been in a tomb; there was no way to get out except the way she came in.

Scully slowly exited the washroom so as not to arouse any suspicion. The only way back out was through the stairwell, but it was locked. She didn't want to try her ID again only to have it malfunction again. The break room seemed to have cleared out, and Scully took the opportunity to look around. The room was another windowless tomb. Scully began to despair when she noticed something.

Light. Outside light coming in through a crack in a door.

The door she noticed was a small supply room in the farthest corner of the break room. She said a silent prayer as she made her way over to it, and tried the handle.

The handle turned, and the door opened.

When Scully shut the door behind her , she discovered she was in a small mechanical room that doubled as a supply room for snacks and sodas. As she looked up, she discovered that the light was coming from possibly the only window in the whole building. The architects, when they designed the complex, had wanted to give it the look of colonial Williamsburg, which meant they had to compromise in some cases and adapt in others. One of those compromises and adaptations took shape in the form of a window well at ground level to keep melting snow from flooding the storeroom.

Scully looked around the storeroom, and found three soft drink crates stacked one on top of another. She shoved the cases over to the window, and climbed on top. If she stood on tiptoe, she could just reach the lock on the window. She didn't know how she was going to turn it, but she didn't have to worry.

The window was already unlocked. Scully also discovered when she used the tips of her fingers to open the window that it opened into the room.

Scully climbed down from the boxes, and looked for one more thing that would give her enough height she that she could reach the window. She found an old mop bucket in the corner, and carried over to the soda cases. She turned the bucket upside down and placed it on top of the soda cans.

Just as she climbed up on the bucket, she heard someone outside the door.

Scully held her breath as she waited for the inevitable. Seconds ticked into minutes as sweat trickled down her face. She didn't dare move, not even to blink the sweat out of her eye. After what seemed to be an eternity, the person left.

She didn't wait around for them to come back.

Scully hoisted herself over the windowsill. She stretched her body across the shallow hole and the metal half moon of the window well. She grabbed clumps of frozen sod and dirt, anything in an effort to pull herself out and upright. She stood up and quickly tried to get her bearings. As she made her way to the corner of the building, the spotted her rental car. She quickly cut a diagonal path across the front lawn, unlocked the car, and got in.

Scully tried not to speed as she made her way to the front gate. The only thing that stood between her and freedom was the parking arm. Resisting an impulse to charge the gate, Scully slowed down, rolled down her window, and inserted her parking access card into the machine. She was about to drive through when she noticed the parking arm hadn't moved.

The cybervoice that had greeted her so cheerfully upon her arrival now sounded ominous.

"I'm sorry Dr. Anderson, but there seems to be a problem with your parking access card. Please wait while I address the problem. Thank you for your patience."

If Scully had any doubts about what the cybervoice had said, the second time it repeated itself erased all of them. And Scully did something that was completely out of character for her.

She allowed herself a moment of sheer panic and terror.

There was a room in the basement of Janus Pharmaceuticals. It was at the opposite end of the hall, across from the break room. The room was marked "Storage," but there was a handful of people who knew the room's true usage. Those people, that select few, worked in Security, and knew that behind those doors was the epicenter of all security operations for Janus Pharmaceuticals.

Behind those doors were two people behind the console of a security camera desk. The woman wore a white lab coat and was seated at the desk; on top of that desk near her left hand were two manila file folders from the Cassandra Project. The man stood next to her, and had there been anyone behind him, they would have seen a thin plume of bluish-white smoke. They both watched the monitors; particularly the one focused on the exit gate from the complex. The woman spoke first. "I can run a tracer on the plates, if you'd like." The man made no other motion expect to extinguish his cigarette and light another. "It's not necessary," he replied. "I have all the information I need. Why don't you take a break and get me a cup of coffee?" "Certainly, sir," the woman replied.

The woman got up from her seat, and took off the lab coat she had worn as part of her undercover disguise. She removed the jacket from the back of her chair, and put it on.

Emblazoned on the pocket were the initial of the company for whom she worked.

CSM.

Scully was a heartbeat away from driving through the gate when the cybervoice delivered a different message.

"I'm sorry to keep you waiting, Dr. Anderson. The problem has been resolved. Have a nice day."

The gate arm raised to an upright position. Scully didn't waste any time leaving the office complex.