Disclaimer: -----------------------The Drill------------- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ March 7, 2003 Salt Lake, Utah

"Welcome to the Jungle," Mulder sang softly, as he and Scully ducked beneath huge equipment peices, and soon stood before a cliff.

Scully rolled her eyes. She hated when he qquoted his favorite songs at times like these.

"Am I seeing what I'm seeing, Mulder?" They looked below them, onto a massive excavation site, complete with adobe houses and pottery.

"Mulder! Scully!" Federico called from below, running up the hill to meet them.

Scully and Mulder slid down, meeting Federico half-way.

"You must have really had some extra-time on your hands. I thought you were just interviewing the lady, not uncovering her whole life's story."

"Gotta a little carried away's all, Mulder." Federico smiled.

"Somebody fill me in?"

"Did Mulder show you the file I faxed him?"

Scully nodded. It was near sunset, and the temperature was dropping from death-defylingly-unbearable to livable-condition-though-I-may-die- eventually-heat.

"Kosa'peg'gnoci recognized inlets in the lake here, and insisted this was the site of Tekawathapotah Utahlolee, her village," Federico explained. "I called in an excavation team, cause if we really found an Anasazi village, her story would be proven true. With her permission of course....There is one thing, that I haven't told them about. That mountain, its an Anasazi burial site, Etuwahlotah, or Place Of Resting Souls. Its sacred, and no one can know of it." She paused, then continued. "Archeologists of confirmned that this is an Anasazi village, from atleast 800 A.D. Kosa'peg'gnoci had said that they inhabited a village that was built by ancestors years before them. That's her, up ontop of Etuwahlotah...."

"Didn't the archeoogists get suspicous of the mound?"

"Yeah, but upon inspecting its formation, they said it didn't have the markings of an Anasazi ground, that it was indeed a hill."

"Then, Kosa'peg'gnoci...."

"She's not lying, she said that the chracteristics of hills thought to be Anasazi burial mounds are actually characteristics of a rival tribe, the So'pegwhatsi. No one is sure what happened to them either, and their villages were destroyed. She said they dissapeared before the Anasazi...."

There was a brief silence, which Scully took to go ontop of Etuwahlotah. Kosa'peg'gnoci spoke to Scully before she even spoke.

"This is a burial ground of my people." She never moved a muscle. "Centuries old.." She sighed, then snubbed the fire she had been burning in a ceremony of thanksgiving. She got up, and led Scully by the hand to a house in the village.

"This is mine....It looks the same now as when....." Suddenly, she realized Scully couldn't understand her, that unlike Federico or Panus, Scully knew nothing of her language. "Pektah sopa." She waved her arms about, then pointing to herself, in genstures showing that this was her home. Scully smiled acknoledging that she understood.

Federico smiled at Mulder as they watched Scully and Kosa'peg'gnoci talk in their own language, using gestures to explain.

"Think she's got herself a friend." Mulder said.

"We could learn alot from Kosa'peg'gnoci....not just her abduction." She pushed Mulder in their direction. He hesitated, then joined in the awkward conversation, as Federico followed close-behind.

"Ah, Federico. Maybe now we can have a reall conversation?" Scully smiled.

"Kaypah, Pekuwotha. Apotao te wahcohlotah?" ("Ah, My child. Maybe now we can have a reall conversation?")

Federico laughed, and asnwered each woman in turn, using their own respective language.

"I think you were doing pretty darn fine on your own!" "EKay pathoh, nowahasah teoh!"

Mulder turned to Federico.

"But I would like to ask her a few questions.....About her abduction...."

Federico sighed....

"Kosa'peg'gnoci? Echotaylotha pekohtah Mulder tuwahthahlotehayoh."

Kosa, as Federico had begun calling her, nodded her head reluctantly.

"Shoot, Mulder."

"Ask her if they could morph."

"Who? The Anasazi?"

"No, stupid, the bounty hunters."

"She never said anything-"

"-Just ask her the darn question!"

Federico sighed.

"Kalagohtahpah ekrahehpah wahfor chepurahka aloomaka?"

"Tusapay?" ("Bounty hunters?")

"Echtar teloo."

"Osah! Akapohu."

Federico turned back to Mulder.

"She didn't know what a bounty hunter was, I had to explain. In short.....Yes."

Mulder smiled.

"Ask her if any other races were there."

"Ato pahk----uh, man, I wish I remembered more vocabulary----etulosah checugue?"

"Erosmaku."

Federico thought, her mind failing her as to what Erosmaku most nearly meant in Pueblo, and from there into English.

"Yes.....she thinks....but she didn't see them, just heard the Taylotha Pahh talking."

"Taylotha PAhh?"

"Its what they call the aliens."

"Oh."

"What race in particular you looking for?"

"Oh, you know...." He shuffled his feet a little. "Atlantians, Shangrilah....."

"There is no scientific evidence to----"

"----Cut the Scully garbage and ask her!....With all do respect to you, O, Scully of mine...." He added hastily.

"Achopahk.....pahk....uh.....Pahktaylona dequarehzsopah'totah?"

"Artonayquay guemahnteh."

"Shrangilah? Atlantians? She never heard of them. She wants you to stick to the facts."

"I think that last part is just Federico shinning through. Tell her thanks for her time...."

"Ahkay so.......Kosa? Asutaynah, shopue?" ("He says thanks....Kosa? I'll be back in a minute.")

The three agents walked off.

"Scully? Did you ever establish the cause of death for the Roanoke girl?"

Scully nodded. "Massive blood-loss. Massive, there was virtually nothing left for her heart to pump."

"Any idea where it went?"

Scully shook her head. "Lab facility, no doubt."

"In the sky...." Mulder added quietly.

"Why do you ask?" Scully asked Federico, ignoring Mulder.

"Just curious....And uh.....Kosa happened to need a blood transfusion when she was found....."

Mulder turned to Scully.

"TOLD Ya'! TOLD YA'!"

Scully and Federico brushed past Mulder.

"That's right!," he shouted, removing a shell, "You'll see! You'll be lfat left one day, and then you'll see! ONE IS THE LONLIEST NUMBER!" He spat a shell in their path......."Sculls?......Federico?....Come back!!!! GUYS!?"\

Utah Inn 8:40 P.M.

Mulder opened his hotel room door.

"Scully? What are you doing here this late?"

"Autopsy report!"

"I know you wish it were so, but I'm not dead yet."

"Jane Doe, Mulder."

"Oh, is that all." He said, making as though to close the door.

Scully stuck her foot inside.

"Open up, Mulder."

She walked in. Sheesh, Mulder even made his hotel room look as messy as his desk and home. She pushed a pile of shells off his bed, onto the floor, removed the pair of jeans from the bed, and sat down.

"Looky here................Remember John Doe?"

"Who we left lying on the operating table? Yeah."

"I was reviewing his records-"

"-Scully, we left him in the hands of Detective Wright."

"I know, I know, but it turned out for our-your-benefit! Look here. This is a strand of that junk DNA. John Doe had it. Here is Jane Doe. Had it. I took a look at Kosa'peg'gnoci, had it. All these abductees had the junk DNA that we so frequently encounter. If this is a pattern that is kept up, we could have a beginning as to why each group was taken."

"John Doe wasn't abducted."

"Three punture wounds to each cheek, massive blood loss, trauma to the forhead." She shook Jane Doe's papers before his face. "Sound familiar?"

Mulder snatched up the papers.

"Still doesn't make sense."

"I know. Doesn't make sense to me either, but I expected YOU to make a connection."

"Should I take it as an insult?"

Scully Shrugged.

Mulder put down the papers.

"And Croatoan?"

Scully shook her head, leaning back in the only chair in the room, poking her head into a plate of rice Mulder had out.

"Bounty hunters?"

"Naw. Why not pose as one of the colonists?"

"Because they were more ideotic back then?"

"Sometimes you really surprise me!"

Scully sighed. If only they knew where to look, but so far, the only thing they had to go on was Kosa's good word, and a dead woman. She really needed to get back to D.C., to get back to Jane Doe. She wanted to come Roanoke again, though she was surprised at that. She knew Mulder would protest, so she decided to wait until morning, over breakfast. Maybe he'd be half- asleep and would agree without knowing what he's agreeing to?

"Goodnight, Mulder," She said, heading out the door. "I just wanted to bring you that bit of evidence."

"Night, Scully."