Visitor in the Desert: Chapter Eight
Author: Gillian Leigh
Summary: Mulder seeks vengeance.
Disclaimer: C'mon now, we know who owns Mulder and Scully, and it's certainly not a seventeen year-old who has $22 to her name…
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"Well, Agent Scully, it would appear that you are mistaken. I am here, and I am very much alive." Scully looked around to see if Skinner was witnessing this, but he was halfway across the platform, occupied with luggage and Agents Doggett and Reyes. She turned back to the man who stood before her, and he pulled up his sleeve to check his watch. "We must hurry. Tell your companions that you have business to attend to, and that you will meet them back at your hotel for dinner."
"Why should I trust you?" she asked, crossing her arms. "You've always been a part of the group of men who have tried many times to bring Mulder and myself to our ends."
"I helped Agent Mulder to help you once, and now it is your turn to help him, before he gets himself killed." Her eyes locked with those of the Well-Manicured Man, and she queried,
"How do you know that I'm here for Mulder?" He laughed.
"Please, Agent Scully, as if you would travel to Seattle with AD Skinner and those two other agents on the premise of anything else." She felt the anger rising up in her chest.
"Why offer your help? What do you gain?" His eyes locked with hers again.
"I am no longer associated with those men, if that is what you are wondering. And I gain nothing, but I'm tired of seeing so many suffer at the hands of men who are losing their battle with Colonization," the Well-Manicured Man replied. Scully's eyebrow was creeping up her forehead again. "Go tell them that you have business to attend to, or I can disappear just as mysteriously as I came, and leave you with nothing."
"What do I tell Skinner?" she asked, touching her cross out of habit.
"Tell him that you have things to attend to," he replied, gesturing to her cross. She understood what he meant, and said,
"I'll be right back." She turned and walked over to Skinner. "Sir?"
"Yes, Scully?"
"I'll meet you, Monica and John at the hotel. I have some things I'd like to attend to before we start looking for Mulder," she said, doing her best to meet his eyes as she spoke to him.
"Things?" he queried, setting her bag down. She reached up and touched her cross.
"Yes, things. I haven't been to church in a long time, and I'd like to--" Skinner cut her off.
"Go ahead. Would you like someone to go with you?" She adamantly shook her head.
"No, Sir. I'll be fine on my own. I have your cell phone number if I need anything." With that, Skinner joined Doggett and Reyes again, and Scully watched as he explained to them what was going on, and they left.
Sighing with relief, Scully turned and walked back across the platform to where the Well-Manicured Man was standing. Her instinct was normally to follow Mulder's advice of "trust no one", but something inside told her to place her trust in this man. Her mind was working overtime to try to process the goings-on, and the fact that this man was seemingly back from the dead was not helping matters. Although, she thought with slight amusement, it wasn't the first time she'd had to deal with that.
"Shall we?" Her eyes trained on the elderly man beside her, who gestured to a black sedan parked at the curb just on the other side of the platform. His driver opened the door and Well-Manicured Man aided Scully as she climbed into the back seat of the car.
"Thank you," she said, still not totally sure what to make of this man.
"I understand your hesitation to trust me. Agent Mulder showed the same hesitation four years ago, but he trusted me, and he saved your life, did he not?"
"Yes, he did save my life," she replied simply, instinctively running her hand over her abdomen in a futile attempt to calm Rhiannon's kicking.
"I've come to you now so that you can do the same for him. If you do not intervene, Mulder will surely get himself killed. If you're willing, I'll help you to save him." He sipped the glass of wine that had been resting in the cup holder just beside him.
"Of course I want to save him. I want him to come home safe."
"Would you like to have something to drink, Scully?" he asked. She shook her head.
"No thank you. I'm fine." She reached up and held the cross she wore around her neck, wishing for the uneasy feeling to go away.
In a stereotypically dingy motel room, just outside the hustle and bustle of Seattle, Mulder sat before his laptop, formulating his plan. Ever since his first heart-to-heart with Samantha, he had been devising ways to kill the men who had hurt his family. With assistance from the hacking skills of the Gunmen, who had thoroughly protested his acting in retaliation, Mulder found clues which led him to believe that the remaining members of the Syndicate were operating out of Seattle, Washington, in the area surrounding the Space Needle. His own research led him to an abandoned warehouse two blocks from the popular tourist site, where he believed the men were congregating. Busily studying blueprints of the warehouse in question, didn't notice the girl standing beside him until she spoke.
"Why are you doing this?" He jumped to a standing position and plucked his gun from beside him and spun to face her, pointing it in her face. When he realized who had spoken to him, he lowered his weapon and said,
"Don't do that, Rhiannon." His tone was gruff and low, and there was a danger in his eyes that his daughter had never seen before, and it frightened her.
"Why are you doing this?" she asked, her voice shaky.
"You wouldn't understand," Mulder replied, turning back to his computer.
"You're going to get yourself killed," Rhiannon said and paused, fearing his reaction.
"How do you know that?! How are you so totally sure of that, Rhiannon?!" he practically yelled, keeping his face just inches from hers.
"Because it's happened this way before," she said, quietly. His eyebrows went up, and his expression softened.
"What do you mean, 'it's happened this way before'?" he asked. "What do you know that you're not saying?" Looking down at the floor, Rhiannon was nervous about her reply.
"This outreach attempt was not my first. I came once before this to try to save the future, before Mom was pregnant with me. Just after you returned. You did what you're doing now. After you met up with Samantha again, you set out for revenge. You were captured, and so was Mom. They used the three of you to aid the Apocalypse."
"Why don't I remember this? If you came once before, shouldn't I remember it?" Mulder asked. Rhiannon shook her head.
"It's difficult to explain. The world as we know it came to an end. I once again met the fate that I came to you in the desert trying to avoid. You don't remember it because it was a different world. I had hoped you would choose a different path if I came later, but you haven't. You're damning the world again, but this time, more is at stake." Mulder looked at her in alarm.
"How am I damning the world by killing the men who remain in the Syndicate?"
"When you left the Underground to seek revenge, Mom got the same information from Uncle Melvin, Uncle Ringo and Uncle John that you used to find these men… except she's using it to find you. But if you don't stop looking for these men, you're going to get caught, and Mom's going to get caught too. And then it will lead to the destruction of everything that you're trying to save by working in the Underground."
"So you're telling me that Scully came looking for me even though I told her not to?" Rhiannon nodded.
"And she brought Grandpa Walter, Uncle John and Aunt Monica with her. You have to find her, Dad. Find them and get them back to the Underground. Please, you have to trust me. You've trusted me before, Dad, and I really need you to believe in me now."
"What do I do?"
"Stay here. Mom will come to you," she replied. Mulder nodded. "Dad, there's one more thing. I don't know if I'll be able to come see you guys again, so I want you to have this." She handed Mulder a photograph, and said,
"It's always been my favorite." Mulder studied the picture in his hand. It was obviously a Christmas picture, and he was sitting on the floor beside Scully, who had a three-year-old Will and an eighteen month-old Rhiannon in her lap, and they were all laughing over something. He had only ever seen Scully laugh like that once, when he had successfully (or so he believed) diapered their two day-old son, and lifted the baby up to show Scully, only to find that the diaper was on backwards. "That was the Christmas before the twins were born; the last semi-normal one we ever had. Grandma Maggie took the picture. By that time you and Mom had gotten Will back, but the Syndicate had his DNA, and they were working on the final stages of the Project. Life went to Hell that summer."
Mulder wrapped his arms around his daughter, and said,
"Take care of yourself and thank you."
"Bye, Dad. I love you."
"I love you too, Rhiannon."
And with that, she walked out the door and was gone.
~X~
"Excuse me," Scully said, approaching the reception desk in the motel. The tall young man behind the desk turned his attention from the television before him to the distraught-looking redhead.
"Yes, Ma'am?"
"I'm looking for a man. He would've checked into his room late last night or early this morning." She reached into her wallet and pulled out a picture of Mulder. The young man, his name tag read 'Joe', shook his head.
"If he's here, he came in before my shift started. If you have a name, I could see if he registered." Scully thought for a moment, and then said,
"Rob Petri." Joe flipped through the registration book, and stopped.
"Aha," he said, showing the book to Scully, and pointing to the pseudonym written in Mulder's characteristic unruly scrawl. "Room 16."
"Thank you," Scully said, and looked behind her to where WMM stood. He nodded to her, as if to assure her that he would be fine. She walked out of the office and down to Room 16. She waited a moment before knocking firmly on the door.
Mulder's attention was drawn from his packing to his door, which was being insistently knocked on. He rose to his feet, and pocketed the picture Rhiannon had given him before opening the door. Scully's trench-coated figure practically fell into his arms.
"Mulder!" she exclaimed, wrapping her arms around him. He pulled her inside and closed the door. "How could you leave like that?!" she said, glaring at him. "Do you know how much it scared me to wake up to an empty bed?"
"I never should've left," he said. "But I was angry, and I wanted to make those men pay for all the wrongs they have done onto us."
"Mulder, I know that those men have hurt us in the past, but we're okay now. My cancer is gone, your sister is back, and I've clearly had my ability to conceive returned to me. I know you're angry because you missed 2/3 of my first pregnancy, and that you couldn't protect me from my abduction, or save your sister, but we're all back. We're together again. We have one another, a healthy family, and we're saving the world. Come home, Mulder. Come home, please."
"I'm doing just that Scully, as soon as you tell me how you knew which motel I was in…"
"You're not going to believe this, Mulder, but the Well-Manicured Man came to me. He told me which motel you were staying in." Mulder regarded her with alarm.
"Scully, Well-Manicured Man is dead. I watched his car explode before I came to save you in Antarctica."
"No, really, as crazy as it sounds, he's alive somehow. He helped me to find you. He said he did it because he helped you save me once, and he wanted to allow me to return the favor. He's waiting in the lobby. Come with me; I'll show you," Scully said, taking him by the hand. The two speed-walked back to the office/lobby, but there was no sign of WMM. Scully looked around frantically and stepped up to the desk.
"Excuse me?" Joe looked up.
"Yes?"
"Did you see where the man went? The one who came in with me?" Joe raised his eyebrows.
"Ma'am, not to be rude, but no one came in with you…"
"There was an older gentleman, wearing a suit. Gray hair, about five eight…" Joe shook his head.
"No ma'am. I never saw that man." Scully quietly thanked him, and left the office.
"I don't understand it, Mulder. He was here. He met me at the train station, and helped me. God, Mulder, I swear to God he was real…"
"I believe you, Scully. The Well-Manicured Man is as real to us as Rhiannon is. He exists… we just can't explain it," Mulder replied.
"So you think that just like Rhiannon came to us from the future, Well-Manicured Man came to us from the past?" Scully queried. He nodded, and then said,
"I'm almost done packing, and then we'll go get Skinner, Doggett and Reyes and get the hell out of here. Rhiannon warned me to leave, and I intend to."
"Sounds like a plan," Scully replied, stepping into the motel room behind Mulder and closing the door. "I want to go home."
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Author's Notes: Wahoo! Another chapter done! So for all of you who wanted to know, it was indeed Well-Manicured Man…As Caitlin (JinxdnCursed) told me, I like to throw in twists every so often… I guess it's just to keep you on your toes! Well, I really have no idea where this story is going, but the next chapter's going to be lighthearted, I can promise you. Oh, and don't forget to send a review my way! :o)
