Chapter 1
"Ollie, I know you always had trust issues," Sara told them. "And I'd really hoped the last two years had finally managed to break down the barriers."
"As each of us has told you at least once in the past hour," Kara said in a slightly annoyed tone. "This wasn't his decision alone. We all agreed on it."
"We know," Ray said softly. "But I think given those of us who worked with him longer than you have, we're having a lot of trouble believing that he trusted you and your friends in the first place."
Kara looked a little insulted until Barry looked at her. "He has a point, and we all know it."
Over the past hour, the three heroes who already knew most of what was in the X-Files had given a fairly detailed summary of what Mulder and Scully had spent the better part of a decade investigating and trying to bring to light. Ray and Stein had been impressed by this more than the others, at least from a purely scientific standard but all of them were more than aware of just how far reaching the consequences of what was in those files were.
On several occasions the three of them – Kara in particular – had questioned the Legends as to whether Rip Hunter had known anything about this invasion either whether it had happened or if they had stopped it. The answer been a slightly slanted no – there had been nothing about it in Gideon's archives, but they had spent too much time in the past year to assume that this was because it hadn't happened. The people who had spent centuries manipulating the continuum could just as easily have made sure the invasion had never made it into the public record. Hell, based on what they knew now, there was just as much a chance they'd been working hand in glove with the Colonists in the first place. Vandal Savage and his ilk might have been several generations removed from this Syndicate.
"If we weren't equipped to believe in huge conspiracies before we all got on the Waverider," Ray had told them, "we sure as hell do now."
Barry, who had more experience with time travel then the rest of them, had asked if at any time during their initial journeys they had encountered anything that could be close to verification of what Mulder and Scully had been investigating. It was clear that none of them had been looking for invaders from another planet at the time, but that didn't mean they weren't there. Sara had offered to take the Waverider back for a look.
That was when the three heroes had gotten to the crux of the meeting. Not only did they not want the Legends to use the Waverider to help them with their problem, they didn't even want them to tell Mulder and Scully about what they'd been doing the past year.
"So you want us to lie to government agents about our activities," Snart had told them. "That's generally myself and Mick's go-to attitude with anybody with a badge. That said it might not be the best way for us to get off to a winning relationship with our new FBI colleagues."
"This was not an easy decision to make," Barry told them. "We spent the last couple of days talking with everyone else. Diggle, Cisco, Caitlin, Felicity, even Kara's sister. All of them think it might be in our best interest not to tell Mulder and Scully about anything involving time travel."
"Gray, make sure I'm hearing this right," Jefferson asked Stein. "In order to stop to huge alien invasion that involves a massive government conspiracy of lies, our friends here are asking us to engage in a slightly smaller conspiracy of lies about one of the only things that might be able to help stop it."
"There was never anything wrong with your hearing, Jefferson," Stein validated. "Because it does seem were trying to convince two people who don't trust easily as a rule by starting out with a massive lie. I can only speak for myself, but if we're going to go along with you on this deception there had better be a very good reason."
"There's a reason," Kara said. "How good it is depends on how much you believe in what we've told you about this new Syndicate and what they're capable of."
"Well, we know some of the players by reputation if nothing else," Ray allowed. "And any club that's willing to have Amanda Waller and Lillian Luthor as members does make you wonder what you have to do to get it."
"I think you all misunderstand the reason we don't want to Mulder and Scully about what you've been doing," Oliver said slowly. "It's not because we don't trust them; we do. It's the people they have to report to where things start getting troublesome."
"We know very little about how deep the real government is involved with the Syndicate," Kara said carefully. "My sister and my colleagues at the DEO had no idea that this was going on, but its pretty obvious ARGUS did. The one thing Mulder and Scully are certain of is that there are people in the Bureau who have links to the Syndicate. Now they may have iconoclasts when they came to the FBI and they still chafe at authority, but in order to do their jobs – which right now involves saving the world – they have to make a report of what's been going on here. The second that someone in the hierarchy learns that time travel is not only possible but that there are people working with Mulder and Scully who have a time machine…"
She let the implications sink in. "It would be every worst case scenario you could imagine," Ray finished.
"And we saw some pretty crappy ones the last year." Even the always snarky Leonard Snart got the logic.
"These people have put their asses on the line for us over and over," Oliver swallowed. "They were willing to sacrifice their own lives to save my son. I don't doubt their integrity. But I didn't trust the government before all this and I do so exponentially less now. Lest we forget, these people have a good idea what I, Barry and our friends have been doing the last few years."
Sara considered this. "That kill list Mulder said he knew about, how many of our names are on it?"
"Just you and Ray," Barry told them. He looked at Snart and Rory. "You're already criminals. Putting you on a kill list would be…excessive."
"Not that they needed a reason to before," Mick was unusually somber for once.
"Neither of the two of you are on the list," Barry told Stein and Jefferson. "Firestorm wasn't around that long; you may not be a blip on their radar yet. That'll probably change if you two get on board."
"Jefferson and I can protect ourselves," Stein said. "Based on what you've told us, it's our families we should be concerned about."
Leonard, who so far had taken all of this with his usual snark, grew thoughtful. Mick, who for all his bluntness had always been able to read his friend, knew what he was thinking about. "Lisa's always been able to take care of herself," he reminded him.
"She can see a threat a mile away," Leonard acknowledged. "But these creatures could disguise themselves as anyone. If they came to the door as you or I, she might not pick up on it until it's too late." He turned to Barry. "These Feds; they keep their word."
Barry knew what he was talking about it right away. "They do."
"And if I were to come to them and ask for immunity from prosecution for my sister, would they be willing to give it?"
Barry paused. "They could authorize it. But you of all people know that's no guarantee of safety."
"You know as well as I do Lisa can handle herself."
"That's not what's worrying Barry," Kara told them. "I don't know into how close a read you gave the files we sent you but Mulder was in scenario like this before. And it really backfired."
She gave a brief assessment of the Gibson Praise case in 1998, starting with Mulder's involvement, focusing on how he'd gotten the Attorney General herself to sign off on it, only to have the suspect killed, Praise abducted and the X-Files first shut down, then torched.
Mick, surprisingly, spoke up first. "You think that would make him think twice?"
Kara shook her head. "Based on what I've heard your sister can take of herself and I have no doubt both you and Leonard would put up a hell of a fight protecting her. That being said, even given the pull he has now, that'll get put on a record somewhere. And considering that one of the people worked for the Syndicate saw this exact play before, she might have a clue what's coming."
"These people have dedication," Sara said, shaking her head. "Only people in the League have this kind of devotion."
"That's actually something I want to talk to you about," Oliver said. "But for now, we're going to set that aside. Snart, your sister, could you persuade to come onboard with the mission?"
Leonard gave this some serious thought for a minute. "She was even less of a team player than I was," he admitted. "But like me, she believes in her own safety. " He turned to Mick. "We're going to need to convince her."
"I'd almost rather take on the aliens first." It was hard to tell how much Mick was kidding. "You don't think the threat of alien annihilation's will be enough on its own."
Snart shook his head. "In that sense, she's too much like our father," he admitted. "She'd wait as long as possible to choose sides and then she'd probably with the one she'd thought would benefit her the most."
"You should know that's not necessarily a disqualification for Mulder and Scully," Kara told them. "They've had to deal with people who only had loyalty to themselves. They don't like it, but they can handle it."
"Throw in the fact that they spent the better part of six years with a death warrant over their heads, I think you'd get along with them swimmingly," Barry said carefully. "You've heard the cliché about cops and criminals more than your fair share, but in Mulder's case in particular I think it's actually true."
Leonard took this in. "I know the feds don't operate like they do on 24, "he said slowly. "Even if they were willing to give a presidential pardon for myself, my sister and my old friend, I know for damn sure there's no happy ending for people like us." He paused. "Happy endings are for fairy tales and I never believed in them. I also know if you and your friends don't succeed, this entire planet gets an unhappy ending. Which at the very least isn't profitable."
"I think that means he's in," Ray said. "However, before the rest of us sign on to this little mission, I think we need some more details. Such as if our group hasn't spent the last year traveling through time, what have we been doing?"
Oliver sighed. "The story we've told so far is that for the last few months, you've been working together as a team of mercenaries trying to clean up the messes around the world that metahumans and other violent elements that have been causing problems."
"Mr. Queen, are you saying that the best story you could come up with was that we're now the A-Team," Stein seemed very dubious.
"Hey, I always loved Mr. T," Mick said with a shrug. "Besides, it's not like it's that much of a stretch from what we've been doing the last few months. Sure as hell is a lot more believable."
"I never thought I'd say this, but Mick is right," Jefferson said in disbelief. "We've been doing this shit for months, and I still don't believe what we saw."
Sara looked at Oliver. "I'll admit that's plausible for now. But how long do you want us to go on with that particular charade?"
"Until you feel comfortable enough to trust them with it," Barry hesitated. "Or if they figure it out themselves."
"I'm sorry." Ray said dubiously. "I know these agents have spent decades investigating things that until recently I would have thought were impossible, but you actually believe they'll just walk up to at some point and say: 'By the way, I understand you have a time machine parked a few blocks away; can we take it for a spin?"
"You don't know these people the way we do," Kara told them. "For the last couple of years Mulder has been profiling people like us. He basically identified me as Supergirl before we'd even met. To use a word he must have gotten sick of, it was spooky. Scully may be a little more determining to let science guide her, but before she got into medical school she wrote a piece in which she theorized the possibility of time travel. Throw in the fact that they investigated a potential time traveler twenty years ago – one of who's colleagues has just come back to haunt us, by the way – and I wouldn't put it past either of them to start dropping hints within a few minutes of meeting you."
Stein was still focused on that last phrase. "What was the name of this person?"
Barry knew given Stein's background there was a chance he might have at least heard of this. "Dr. Lisa Ianelli. Does that name mean anything to you?"
"When exactly was this last case?"
"April of 1997." Barry looked at Stein. "You know her."
Stein's normal calm was rattled. "In the fall of 1996 when I was Harvard, I saw some potential research by Lisa Ianelli. She and her boyfriend Jason Nichols were working in the then revolutionary field of cryobiology."
This was a term that Leonard Snart was familiar with. "The technology for my weapon. Is there any connection to their research?"
Stein shook his head. "I don't remember the details. Even if it was, at that point it was strictly theoretical. The technology to make their work viable was at least fifteen years in the future."
Mick was not good with figures, but even he could add. "In other words, right about now." He looked at Snart. "I don't suppose when you first got the tech for our weapons, you managed to save the original blueprint."
Snart shook his head. "I was concentrating more on the technology rather than the manufacturer. Something I'm now deeply regretting not doing." He turned to Sara. "I don't suppose either of those names is in Gideon somewhere?"
"They may not be, by design," Barry said. "I was hoping to hold this off until later, but you guys need to know this." He then briefly summarized everything involving the case that had first brought Lisa Ianelli to Mulder's and Scully's attention. "Now I've dealt with time travel in the past and I know there are repercussions to everything. I also know that there's no concrete evidence to prove this is possible. But setting all of that aside is there any possibility that there was an alternate future were Ianelli, Nichols and Yonechi succeeded in their work and laid the impetus for where you are right now?"
Sara considered this. "I understand time travel far less that Rip ever did. And I know the man kept more than his share of secrets, including just how time travel came to be in the first place. He was worse than Oliver when it came to sharing his secrets, only when he did people got hurt."
She looked at Barry. "Ianelli's working with you right now."
"'With' would be generous, but yes," Barry said. "And she has been working on this in some form for the last twenty years."
"How much do the overlords know?" Jefferson asked.
"No fucking clue," Oliver admitted. "Which is par for the course in our lives and Mulder and Scully's."
Sara listened to this. "I think this crisis we've been called in to help with just became even more relevant to us than we thought. " She looked at her fellow teammates, starting with Snart. "You're right, Leonard. We have to get involved in this."
Mick looked at Leonard. "Still not wild about working with the Feds, but we rarely could use our employers before."
Stein looked at Jackson. "Our adventures keep getting more complicated. "he told his own metahuman partner.
"Wouldn't have it any other way, Gray," Jefferson said.
Ray was the last to speak. "You say they need Ray Palmer as much as they will the Atom," he asked Oliver.
"They've been very clear at that point," Oliver assured him. "Brains, brawn and superpowers are going to be needed to win this fight."
"Sometimes I wonder how the Batman does it alone," Ray shook his head. "Are we going to be calling on him for assistance too?"
"That's still up for debate," Barry told him. "Right now, we're working on one group of heroes at a time."
"When do we start?" Sara asked.
NEW YORK CITY
4:37 AM
"So they're all on board," Alex Danvers said to her sister about an hour later. "Even with the terms we negotiated?"
"I won't say they're thrilled by them, but they understand the logic," Kara said into the phone. "Hell, I helped arrange them and I'm not wild about them."
"They've been pretty understanding so far," Alex pointed out. "And when we do tell them, I think they'll be able to appreciate why we've been so secretive even if they aren't thrilled."
"They may not even ask right away," Kara admitted. "I've seen some of them in action the last half-hour. Each of them brings aspects to this team that our group is sorely lacking. Getting all seven of them at once – this is a power that I'm pretty sure will keep Mulder and Scully occupied for a couple of days trying to figure out how to best utilize them."
"Felicity told me they have difficulties getting along," Alex told them. "That most of them have real problems with authority."
"In that case they should fit right in," Kara said wryly. "See you back at STAR Labs."
Alex hung up and walked back into the room where the 'grown-ups' had been going through the remainder of the paperwork Cat Grant had brought. "I just got off the phone with my sister. They're on board."
A wistful smile appeared on Quentin's face which disappeared when he turned to Mulder. "Sara can take her of herself," he said quietly. "But I've had to bury her twice in the last seven years. "
Mulder didn't need to hear anything else. "You don't need to tell me about loss, Quentin, and how much it destroys you," he said quietly. "Besides, I've been dead myself a couple of times. It's not fun."
"Then you two should get along just fine," Scully said with a small smile. "How long until we meet them?"
"They've just been on a long trip and had to deal with a briefing that probably doesn't begin the cover the shit they're going to be dealing with." Alex reminded them. "I told them we'd meet them at STAR Labs tomorrow night."
"It can't be easy for so many people with so much baggage to travel from so far away, "Mulder said in the casual tone that had worked wonders on so many unsuspecting witnesses over the years.
Alex Danvers was a trained DEO agent who could've seen this coming through the Holland Tunnel. "Considering the nature of their jobs, they're used to taking red-eyes from places you wouldn't believe," she countered.
"I've seen some of the people who we're meeting. Even before September 11th I have a hard time believing they could manage to find a pilot willing to fly them where they need to go," Scully fired back.
"You also know that three of them can fly under their own power," Alex riposted. "Can we cut the Noel Coward and you can just ask the question you're hinting at?"
Mulder and Scully exchanged one of those looks that would have utterly unnoticeable to anyone except for a person who'd been doing the same with her own sister for the last year. "That would be easier if we knew what question we actually should be asking," Mulder finally said.
It was rare even now to hear unvarnished truth from the agents. So much so that' it caught everyone there by surprise.
"You have to understand this is uncharted territory even for people who spent their entire lives investigating the areas of the map that were labeled 'Here There Be Dragons' with little more than our wits and a flashlight," Mulder said with even more honesty. "And it's not like either of us have actually been in leadership roles even when we were at the Bureau. We were in charge of maybe three, four task forces in our entire careers?"
He looked at Scully. "If we throw in the one where we searching for you, that's about right," Scully said carefully. "And no one took us seriously even when we knew exactly what we were talking about. Now not only do we have people believing in us, but they're people who we spent seven years basically trying to find ways to lock up in labs. It's utterly insane and you're talking to people who started with that as a baseline."
It wasn't exactly encouraging to hear that the two people they were looking towards leading this task force had almost no real clue on how to do exactly that. Refreshing, to be sure, but not heartening.
"Were we good followers at the Bureau? No. But we've had absolutely no experience leading," Mulder reminded them. "Part of me – a bigger part than I want to admit – really wants to hand this over to someone like your sister or Oliver or Barry and just stay in the background. This was scary enough when I was only risking my own life. I never liked risking the lives of others. You've read the files; you know how badly that usually turned out."
"We do," Quentin reminded them. "I don't have to remind you that everybody in this room and who you were thinking of asking to lead has had exactly the same thing happen when they were in charge. The moment you decided to take up a badge and a gun, you knew safety wasn't guaranteed for you or anyone you worked with."
"I really don't know how Skinner put up with us all those years," Mulder told them. "The man was willing to put his ass on the line more times that we could count – certainly more than he thought he did – and I know for goddamn sure he didn't really believe what was in those reports until I was abducted right in front of his eyes."
"He made that pretty clear when I first talked to him," Alex acknowledged.
"Did he mention that, along with any credibility he might have had in the Bureau and at least two attempts on his life, I'm pretty sure it cost him his marriage?" Scully pointed out.
"I hate to say it, but that's nothing new," Quentin admitted.
"The divorce rate among cops is always high even among those who don't work in the paranormal circle," Joe added.
"I honestly figured they'd have put him out to pasture by the time we got our jobs back," Mulder pointed out. "And believe me that was the best case scenario. I don't know how he did it all those years. It's one thing to send agents under your charge into danger – every superior at the Bureau does that – it's another to keep doing when the reports they keep sending you contain items that would make the people at Ripley's go: 'Nope. Sorry. Completely implausible.'
"And now you're basically taking over his job," Cat Grant reasoned. "So what are you worried about more: not knowing what your subordinates will be up to or knowing it?"
"Right now, that's a good question," Mulder admitted. "For all the headaches we gave him over the years, the man basically gave us a free hand and was willing to put himself between us and the bosses. Not just the bureaucracy, but all the conspirators who were walking the halls of the Bureau. Scully and I can do that; the problem is compared to us when it comes to not pissing off people in authority, he was frigging Eleanor Roosevelt."
"Eleanor made a lot of people mad just because of whom she was," Cat reminded him.
"Her husband was leader of the free world for twelve years; that bought a lot of good will," Scully reminded her. "And she had a delicate touch and a way with words, something neither of us do. We break things and don't apologize for it. Which is barely tolerable when you're a field agent in the Bureau, even less so when you're in charge of a task force filled with people who can literally break things with a nod."
"I have an idea how to approach this, at least while we're in the initial stages," Mulder was speaking primarily to Alex. "It'll probably piss off at least some of our friends, but considering that my approach at the Bureau was to piss off everybody I met, that's a partial improvement. But it's going to depend on two things. The first is if Scully and I can manage to delegate power well, and considering I spent at least ninety percent of our time at the Bureau running off to fight monsters and she had to come save my ass, I'm not entirely encouraged by that."
"Mulder, don't be so modest," Scully said soothingly. "It was at least ninety-five percent of the time."
"If you'd stayed in medicine, you'd have been Surgeon General by now," Mulder said in awe.
"I probably wouldn't become an expert in so many different ways to injure yourself," Scully countered.
"You do know there are at least two bedrooms on this floor," Quentin said dryly.
"What's the other part that has you worried?" Alex interjected.
"How well certain members of this group follow orders," Mulder pointed out. "I'm going to grant everybody in this group – which includes the new people – a certain amount of latitude. I'll have to, because doing this by any kind of book will not work. But at the most basic level this will only work – and I can't believe I'm about to say this – if they follow the chain of command." Mulder paused. "Lightning hasn't struck."
"Of course not. We're not in Oklahoma," Scully reassured him.
"Which X-File is that part of?" Joe asked tiredly.
"It involves a teenager, cows being fried and a real high score on Virtual Fighter; you and your friends would call it Tuesday," Mulder said quietly. "There are already issues with some of these people; what am I looking at with the new ones?"
Joe and Quentin, who had the best idea of the group as to what they were getting in to, looked at each other for several seconds before Quentin finally spoke. "Normally, I look forward to seeing Sara kick people's asses," Quentin finally said. "I have a feeling this time I may finally be on the receiving end."
STAR LABS
6:45 PM
Mulder looked at his watch. "You said they'd be here ten minutes ago," he told Barry casually. "Not that I'm throwing stones. As Scully can testify if I showed up the same day I was scheduled to have a meeting with my superiors I was doing well. "
"I know," Barry said resignedly. "But none of them ever stuck to a daily schedule on a good day. And we didn't give them a lot of advance notice."
"We talked about this on the way in."
"You talked. I never agreed to it!"
"Rip left me in charge. I get to go in first."
"Rip didn't so much put you in charge as he left you holding the bag."
Even the people who didn't have super-hearing could make out the bickering and none of them could see any of the new team.
"I'm the one with a supersuit. I should make the grand entrance."
"All due respect Mr. Palmer, Jefferson and I are the metahumans here."
"Fine you want to blow the place up as your grand entrance, be my guest!"
Oliver lowered his voice. "Are they seriously arguing about who gets to come in first?" he asked Barry.
"I knew some of them had egos, but this is ridiculous!" Kara didn't even bother to stage whisper.
"I don't care who goes in first, Snart and I go last."
"Oh, I see. You want to be the final revelation. The grand piece in the puzzle."
"No, we just don't want them to recognize from our wanted posters until it's too late for them to do anything."
Mulder was starting to look concerned. "I know these guys had problems with authority. I didn't think it was that bad."
Scully started walking in the direction of the argument. "Scully, are you sure that's a good idea? This could get ugly."
"If we wait for them to make up their minds, the aliens will have colonized by then," Scully didn't even slow down.
Mulder decided not to waste time either. "Um, guys, I really think you'd be safer waiting for them," Barry said hesitantly.
"It can't be any worse that tracking down the Flukeman," Mulder said just as determinedly.
The three heroes looked more concerned than Mulder and Scully were. They all knew the make up of this team and knew how difficult they could individually each of them could be. But when they'd left them last night they'd seemed in harmony and they'd naively believed they keep they'd be able to keep that mood for at least the next twelve hours. Oliver in particular had believed Sara could do it as she was the cool-headed one before. Boy was he starting to have doubts.
"Kara, Barry, be ready for anything," he said quietly.
"Are you kidding? I'm heading out there now," Kara said. "Anyone else want to try pulling them apart if they have too?"
For a change Oliver didn't argue which actually worried Barry more. "Do you think we're going to need to put these guys in holding before we even get started?"
"I'm amazed they held out this long," Oliver sighed. "And now I owe Felicity ten bucks."
"You bet here that they'd be able to hold together" Barry asked.
"Are you kidding? I bet here they'd be able to hold off fighting each other until after they'd been briefed." Oliver said resignedly. "Right now, Cisco has a pool as to how many brawls they'll get into with each other before this is over with."
"I covered thirteen through sixteen," Now Oliver shot Barry a glare. "Hey I know these guys and I'm a scientist."
By the time the agents got to the source of the voices, they saw something that was scarier than the bickering and scuffling. Kara was down there, flying around like mad, trying desperately to keep order and not doing nearly as good a job as you'd think the Girl of Steel could do.
Finally she did something very un-superhero like. She shouted at the top of her lungs, which for a Kryptonian was pretty close to a sonic boom.
"I don't want to channel my mother, but here goes. You get your goddamn act together, or so help me I will fly each and every one of you to the Fortress of Solitude and leave you there. Are we clear?"
The group muttered their acknowledgments. And now both agents could see the problem. Some of the new recruits were slurring their words and quite a few of them were having trouble remaining upright.
"The bunch of heroes that are supposed to help us got hammered before they met us," Scully said in disbelief.
Mulder took this in before heaving a sigh. "Get them in Star Labs, hose them down with black coffee and let them sleep it off," he said resignedly. "Hopefully, the fact that some of them are superheroes will mean the hangover takes less time to wear off."
Kara didn't argue or even look that upset.
"Our saviors, ladies and gentlemen," Scully's eyebrows seemed like they would leave her forehead.
"Could be worse." When Scully fixed her gaze on Mulder, he shrugged. "How drunk did you get when you learned there was an alien invasion scheduled and you were the best chance of stopping it? I'm kind of shocked we made it through the X-Files sober."
"Would have saved a lot of trouble with Tooms," Scully admitted.
AUTHOR'S NOTES
For those of you who don't know The X-Files, here are some case references in the order they appeared in this chapter (not the series):
The End: Fifth Season Finale: Mulder and Scully are called into investigate an assassination attempt on a chess prodigy named Gibson Praise. It is revealed he can read minds – and so much more. (He may show up again in this series, so I'll hold off on the rest. ) Everything that I revealed was a lead up to Fight the Future (which actually messed up the series but I digress)
Synchrony: Complicated fourth season involved time travel. Details can be found in the previous story in this series: "Like a Bolt of Lightning."
D.P.O. Teenager gets struck by lightning and gains the ability to control it. Episode better known for early appearances of Giovanni Ribisi and future superstar Jack Black.
Squeeze/Tooms: The very first monster of the week involved a liver eating mutant. Hail Morgan and Wong!
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