Chapter 8

In retrospect, Mulder realized that trusting any of his informants had been a devil's bargain. Deep Throat had seemed avuncular, but that was probably because he had known Mulder's father – and by extension, the Smoking Man. He openly lied to Mulder, and even after he'd been assassinated, Mulder had never really been sure of his loyalties.

X had been a different story. Every time Mulder had encountered him, he could see the rage. He seemed even more reluctant to give information, and he was more than willing to kill to protect his secrets. Even being held at gunpoint never fazed him.

But he'd thought he could trust Covarrubias. After she'd been exposed to the alien virus, there'd seemed to be a genuine sincerity and desperation to her actions. The Syndicate had basically used her as a guinea pig and had thrown her away when she'd served her purpose. And then, she and Krycek had come to the Bureau and betrayed him to be tortured and discarded as a corpse.

"I let you walk away from the trial without having to burn yourself," he said slowly. "I gave you your life back. And now, it seems you've used it to sell your entire species down the river. So no, I'm not happy to see you."

"They let you live, Agent Mulder," Marita said calmly. "After they killed him –"

"Which time?" Mulder asked sarcastically.

"Your value to the conspiracy was gone. You and Scully could have been taken out half a dozen times before you ever stopped running," Marita went on.

"Are we supposed to be grateful?" Mulder asked.

"I'm trying to get you to look at the bigger picture," Marita asked. "You always had trouble seeing that."

"Really? Because what I'm looking at now is a woman who sold out her side whenever it was convenient," Mulder told her. "Krycek, the Syndicate, me, all of it to keep yourself alive. And now you're hear with a bunch of soldiers trying to convince me you're on the side of the angels. You're a worthless piece of shit, Marita, and right now, I really wish I'd let Walter let you testify in my behalf."

Covarrubias didn't even flinch at this. Hell, her own lover had probably called her worse. "This property contains material necessary for global security," she said instead. "You know that as much as I do."

"Yeah. Which is why I have no intention of letting you and your band of thugs take it," Mulder said just as icily.

"You've always been something of an egotistical son of a bitch, but I seriously doubt you can overcome this many soldiers," Marita said slowly.

"Lucky for me I brought a friend."

And on cue, Supergirl emerged. "It's always to meet another member of the enemy," she said quietly. "Most of the time, they just wear masks."

If Covarrubias was unsettled by this, she gave no sign.

"You've done your homework, Marita; you always have," Mulder said calmly. "So you know that twice as many soldiers against my friend would end up just as badly beat up. So let's make this easy on both of us. The FBI and the DEO are claiming jurisdiction on this territory. Should you or any of your friends hurt so much as a hair on mine or anybody on this reservation's head, I will make it my life's mission to make sure to bury you in paperwork."

Marita looked a little bemused, and even Supergirl wondered about him. "That's your power play?" she asked. "Bureaucracy?"

"Well, I can't threaten you with exposure, because I've already gone public with all of your sins, and I can't threaten to beat everyone of your minions up, because we know my friends can do that, so I figure why not have you deal with the same paper shuffling that gave me so many nightmares all those years during my first stint at the Bureau," Mulder said calmly. "God knows it annoyed the shit out of Scully and I those seven years, trying to go through all that crap just so I get to a scintilla of the truth. So I figure what's good for the gander is definitely good for the geese. I'll have you deal with the worst possible people that thousands of years of civilization have contrived to producer. Accountants and lawyers. Granted, you won't get more than a paper cut, but it'll keep you and your friends very busy. And you can't afford to lose a lot of time these days."

This had to be the most ridiculous threat that Kara had ever heard of yet. Which is why she was stunned to see that Covarrubias actually seemed to be thinking it over.

"I know the UN must have a ton of it. Otherwise, they'd have cracked that whole world peace thing by the fifties." Mulder added.

Now the soldiers were looking a little concerned. Marita took a long look at this, and heaved a sigh. "I'm not going to bother with the whole 'this isn't over' bit, because we both know it's not," Marita said quietly.

"I'll bring the white-out," Mulder said.

And then, much to Kara's amazement, Marita got back on the helicopter followed by the entire military presence.

As soon as the helicopter had taken off, Kara turned to Mulder. "Okay, what just happened?"

"Kara, did you really think that Marita was going to have UN security forces attack Supergirl?" Mulder said quietly. "Unless they've been handing kryptonite laced bullets to peacekeeping forces, there was no way in hell they could take you. And considering that the DEO and the White House both support you, creating an international incident is the last thing the Syndicate wants to do. Until they can come at you directly."

That actually made a lot more sense. "So all of that talk about paperwork was just blowing smoke up her ass?" Kara asked.

"They must really have some loose constructs at the DEO," Mulder said gently. "When I was working at the Bureau, I had to fill out a form every time I discharged my weapon accidentally. Everything in the government is under paperwork. Once I put a stake through a vampire's heart, and I was sued by the family of the victim for 446 million dollars. The only reason I never had to pay out was because the family was vampires too."

That sounded so ludicrous Kara knew she wanted to hear the story behind it, but now was not the time. "I've secured the magnetite, and there's some more stuff down there that we need to get back to the DEO," she said instead.

"I'm going to need a few hours to recharge from all this," Mulder told her. "Plus there's something I want to check on while I'm down here. You get the stuff back to the DEO ASAP."

Kara nodded, and then blinked. "The Syndicate can't possibly have paperwork like that, can they?" she asked.

"It's the only legitimate reason why I considered working for them," Mulder said dryly.

ARROW HEADQUARTERS

6:12 PM

Felicity was never freaked out by a lot of things, but what she was seeing on these rubbings was shaking her up even more than the idea of aliens invading in the first place. She knew that Oliver had seen some next level shit when he'd dealt with Ras Al'Ghul and his ilk and whatever he knew about the sources of Damien Dahrk's power, so she decided to see if there was any intersection between that world and the one she currently inhabited.

"I'm being completely honest," Oliver told them.

"For a change?" John was still royally pissed that Oliver had yet to come clean as to just what he'd been doing those last three years before he'd returned to Star City.

"Yes, I knew about the paranormal before I came back, I fully acknowledge it," Oliver admitted. "But as far as I knew, that just meant that there was a lot of supernatural stuff on this planet. Frankly some of the ideas that you're telling me about – that somehow everything paranormal we've dealt with might have some alien origin" he paused, "it scares the living hell out of me. "

"Good," Thea said. "It means you have some human qualities. Some of us were beginning to doubt it."

Felicity thought for a moment. "That guy Constantine, you think he would know anything about this?"

"I think there's a legitimate possibility he might have known drank a couple of Guinness and forgot about it," Oliver said wryly. "But I'm not sure we want to put him on the radar of the Bureau just yet. We'll probably have to at some point – there's just too much overlap between his work and the X-Files for us not to."

"What about Sara and Ray and the rest of them?" John reminded him. "Think the people they work for know something about this?"

"If they did, whoever they're working for really dropped the ball," Felicity said. "They're in charge of controlling the timeline. I think the colonization of Earth in the not too distant future would cramp their style."

"Wasn't their something in the X-Files about it happening in 2012?" Curtis pointed out. "Maybe it happened and they stopped it and we just didn't notice."

"That I don't buy at all," Diggle said. "I think something happened to push it back and none of us know what yet. Which is why we should reach out to them."

"We're going to need their help anyway," Oliver agreed. "If Agent Mulder is serious about this task force, we're going to need as many allies as we can. Still, I think we have to do it carefully. I'm very reluctant to give any government agency knowledge of a time machine, much less access."

"I agree with you about that, and I'm pretty sure Mulder and Scully would too," Felicity replied. "However, none of this deals with what they found in that cave."

"I know," Oliver agreed. "That being said, given everything else we're dealing with right now, I think we have to put it on the back burner, at least for now. We're dealing with enough threats from every angle; we can deal with this problem later."

Just then, there was another beeping sound. "Supergirl's back," Felicity told them. "I'll let you know what else we've found."

She shut off the computer, and walked over to Winn and Scully. "I take it you're carrying precious cargo," she said as Kara came over to them.

"More than I thought I'd be coming back with. " She unzipped the special DEO storage bags. "According to the testing, this is pure magnetite."

Scully looked a little weird. "You all right?" Winn asked

Scully shook her head. "It's just been a very long time since I've seen this, and even then, it wasn't in its unaltered form. Can you get to this into the lab? We're going to need to run some tests to figure out how to best use it."

"Maybe, but there's something else we need to check on first," She took out the skeleton she had found in the cave. "We need to run this structure through our databases. See if we can identify the race."

"Well, I can tell you right now, it has nothing to do with the aliens Mulder and I have been chasing."

"How can you tell?" Winn asked.

"The colonists didn't have any real skeletal structure. Once they were killed, they dissolved into acid." Scully reminded them. "And the supersoldiers bone structure was almost entire metallic. I don't see any evidence of that."

"We have no idea how old the bones are," Kara reminded her. "But I'm inclined to agree with you on that front."

Felicity looked at the bones. "Friend of yours?"

"No, but right now I can't rule out the possibility that we're related." Kara admitted.

"You mind if I go in with them?" Scully asked. "Believe or not, all the years I spent on the X-Files, I never got to perform an alien autopsy. Not a real one."

"It would be an honor," Winn told her.

Just then, Jonn came into the room, looking pissed. "I didn't think they'd try this way," he was saying.

"Who? The Syndicate?" Scully asked.

"I just got a call from General Lane," he told them. "Apparently, they've called Mulder's bluff. Three different NATO members have demanded to know what we found in New Mexico. They've spoken with the President and are demanding access."

Scully was stunned. In all the years she'd been dealing with the shadow government, they had almost never tried to go against them by using the 'real' one. When they did, the results were never good.

"Doesn't our charter supersede theirs?" Kara demanded.

"For all we know, the conspiracy's supersedes yours," Scully reminded them.

"The President has been operating from a position of weakness in this regard for the last few months," Jonn admitted. "She's been a supporter but the combination of the recent attacks and the conspiracy's exposure have hurt her politically."

"So the shadow government is trying to use her policy of transparency to get to us," Lance said. "Kafka would have a field day with this."

"What are they doing?" Winn asked.

"A UN inspection team is en route and will be here within the hour," Jonn told them. "You need to take everything and get out of here now."

"There's nothing you can do to hold them off?" Felicity said doubtfully. "You're seriously telling me the UN's power trumps Supergirl?"

"They've been around longer, and they know more tricks than we do," Scully said tiredly. "Mulder wasn't lying when he said they can make the bureaucracy work for them."

"And you know very well that there is a certain percentage of the population that views any alien as a hostile. " Supergirl said. She turned to Felicity. "Download anything you think is relevant and meet me in the heliport in five minutes. Take the magnetite with us."

"And Church?" Winn asked.

Everybody looked at Jonn. "That's what they've come here to take possession of. Of course, there are a lot of places in these offices to hide it from them."

"Stall them as long as you can." Kara said. "By the time we're done, we'll have found a way to put him out of operation once and for all."

GEORGIA O'KEEFE MOTOR COURT

7:28 P.M.

Mulder had been getting used to having a much greater expense account, but a part of him still missed the cheap motels that he and Scully had spent seven years staying in on the Bureau's dime (and four years on the run – albeit with slightly better sleeping arrangements). Of course, back then he really hadn't cared where he slept – he'd spent so much of his life sleeping on his couch that he really didn't care about clean sheets.

He hadn't been lying about the need to crash – he'd been up for nearly forty straight hours by the time they got to Farmington, and his internal body clock still wasn't used to Bureau hours. But there had been something else he'd needed to check – something that despite all of the people who now genuinely believed in him, he wasn't quite ready to share with the real world.

He hadn't been to New Mexico since their initial time on the run – when Scully and he had found themselves in Roswell, swearing they'd find a way to stop the invasion. But he still had some connections here, and nearly seventy years after the initial contact in 1947, there were still some people he'd known who'd been willing to talk about what they'd seen. Most of them were dead now – refreshingly for him, of natural causes – but there were still two or three around, and they were still willing to talk.

After catching five hours of sleep, he'd make a call on one of the secure phones the DEO had provided him with. Now, he was on his way to see him.

The man who had only referred to himself, perhaps in jest, as 'Dr. Smith' had been one of the medical experts called in to examine the bodies that they had pulled from the craft that had crashed on August 16th. The basic description – grey, simian-like, big ears, big eyes – had fueled conspiracy theorist and sci-fi writers alike ever since. The problem was, what he'd seen didn't match any aliens that Mulder had ever encountered, and more concernedly, none of the species on file at the DEO.

Now he knew that everyone there had no idea the conspiracy had even existed until Cat Grant had revealed it, and he was more than inclined to believe them. Which meant that either Smith was lying, or more disturbingly, they were a player that had never made an appearance on the scene. Like all of Mulder's informants, he'd thought Smith had always known more than he'd let on. And he was tired of being late to the party.

"I thought I told you not to contact me again," Smith told him when he arrived at the motel.

"We're in a brave new world, Doctor," Mulder reminded him. "I actually have some power behind me."

"You'd think after all this time you'd know better than to think you can outsmart these people," Smith snapped.

"They're all dead. I'm alive."

"But the Conspiracy lives on. The players may change but the game hasn't."

Mulder couldn't exactly argue with that. Then again… "I'm actually trying to save the world. You've had knowledge that could have helped stop these people, but you've been in hiding for more than seventy years. Now, I could make an offer to keep you alive, but I think we both know that wouldn't matter to you much longer."

"So what do you want?"

"The old men guarded the conspiracy with their lives. After the majority of them went up in flames in '99, a new group has been taking over, and I think they may now have finished their coup." Mulder told him. "Now I actually have allies who may be able to fight them, but before they enlist, I need to know what we're up against."

Smith looked at him differently. "They've always asked the wrong questions."

"Excuse me?"

"Everybody wanted to know about the aliens, what they looked like, what was their body structure like. The aliens were always the least interesting thing. The ships, that's what they should be concerned about."

Mulder knew that they were important. He'd spent his entire career, in effect, chasing flying saucers. He kept seeing vague shapes of them, had hunted for pieces of ancient ones, and had ultimately been abducted and left for dead by one. But had he ever even considered this part of them?

"What was different?"

"The technology was beyond anything the human mind could conceive of, especially after the war." Smith told them. "Asimov, Heinlein, they were close but they never had the imagination for what our people had in mind for them. I never saw anything like them before. Now we see them everywhere."

Mulder looked at him. "Are you telling me that our military's aircraft, all the advances we've made during the Cold War, are because of that alien spacecraft?"

"We'd demonstrated our capacity for manufacturing before the war. All we needed was the wellspring. No one ever questioned why we needed military spending afterwards."

This was impossible to believe, and yet it made perfect sense. Kritschgau had tried to convince him that aliens were a hoax by our government to cover up the military industrial complex. Now it looked like it was the other way around.

"But if all the military is based on alien technology, how does that lead to colonization?" he asked Smith.

"You're still asking the wrong questions, Agent Mulder," Smith said. "You know the aliens have never left, and you know the military's based its weaponry on aliens. So the question is, why haven't they taken it already?"

"Something's holding them in check," Mulder said.

"Something that still thinks they can win."

DEO HEADQUARTERS

"Director Hinshaw." The woman who walked up to Alex and Jonn was tall, dark-haired, and bore a striking resemblance to Xena. "Unit Leader McMahon."

This was a little puzzling to both of them. It was public knowledge within government circles who was really running the DEO, even if many people disagreed with the choice. Alex had figured the conspiracy had to know it too. Had they just not related it to the rank and file, like they did with so many others? Or was there something more deliberate about this choice of names?

Jonn decided to play into it for now. "You have to know this is a completely unwarranted intrusion," he said briskly. "You and your people have no right to be here."

"Hey, we just go where our bosses tell us too," McMahon said an easy going tone. "There's no need to make this harder than it has to be."

"I think it does," Alex said just as deliberately. "Not to bitch and moan, but our charter is far larger than yours. And this is a bureaucratic mugging.""

McMahon shrugged. "That's as maybe, but our team has been given jurisdiction to take possession of a prisoner, and that's what we're here to do."

"Just out of curiosity, how does a genetically enhanced drug dealer fall under the echelon of global security?" Jonn demanded.

Something changed about McMahon. It was subtle, but Alex was trained to pick up on the subtleties. "I was hoping that we could do this without any rancor."

"I think you should know that's a non-"

She never finished the sentence. A split second later, McMahon's left hand was around her neck and crushing her windpipe.

Everybody around Alex began to react. "Anyone tries to shoot at me, I will remove Danvers' head from her body," McMahon said as calmly as if she were discussing her order from Big Belly.

"You're one of them," Jonn hated himself for stating the obvious.

"My associates will be taking position of Mr. Church. You have exactly two minutes to bring him to me or I will tear Danvers in half. And don't take the opportunity to get help from your flying friends."

Whoever this woman was, she was clearly plugged into every aspect of the DEOs game plan. What they didn't know was that Winn had been moving Church's to one of the facilities subbasements, and that he had been monitoring everything that had happened.

They had also forgotten how quick he was at improvising, and he did have a trick up his sleeve.

"You have twenty seconds remaining," McMahon told them.

"Hey, hey." Winn said quietly. "How about a little trust? We know how you and your colleagues operate? What's to stop you from killing Alex even if we give you exactly what you want?"

"You're ten seconds away from finding out." McMahon said calmly.

"That's about five seconds longer than you have." Winn said. Please let me be right, he thought to himself as he pressed a button the 'magic lantern' he'd spent the last half-hour devising for Church.

The reaction was stunning. McMahon dropped Alex, and put her hands to her head. She started to shake.

"Alex, you might want to run," Winn said, as he did just that.

McMahon started to vibrate. Silvery grey veins began to appear in her arms and then in her face. She held her head in her arms. And then, without warning, she flew right towards the lantern and there was a huge puff of smoke.

When it finally cleared, there was no sign that McMahon had ever been there. Four of the DEO guards drew their weapons and surrounded the remainder of the UN team – which Winn was willing to bet a year's salary had no connections at all with the UN.

Winn and Jonn ran over to Alex, who was staggering around, but otherwise looked fine.

"Are you all right?" Jonn asked.

"As long as I skip karaoke night this week," Alex managed to gasp out.

Jonn looked at Winn. "I'm guessing Kara didn't leave here with all of the magnetite she came with."

"I thought it was likely we were going to need some kind of weapon to dispose of Church in case he really was a supersoldier," Winn pointed out. "Based on what there was about magnetite in the X-Files, I wanted to try and develop some kind of weapon that might be more concentrated than the deposits that worked on them before. I had a basic construct in my lab; all I needed was the magnetite." He paused. "Of course, I had no idea if it would actually work outside my lab."

"Clearly you have less faith in yourself than we have," Alex told them a little less hoarsely. "So the conspiracy had a supersoldier on staff."

"Which is an interesting trick," Jonn said quietly. "Because I'm pretty sure this particular soldier already died in the line of duty."

"We talking conspiracy dead, or all the way dead?" Winn asked.

"Depends on who you ask," Jonn said. "There's a file in here written by Doggett and Reyes a couple of days after they took over the X-Files. They were trying to find a link to these supersoldiers and this man Knowle Rohr who Doggett knew from the military."

"I think I remember this," Alex said. "You're telling me the woman who nearly ripped my head off was Shannon McMahon?"

"In the flesh, or whatever the hell these things are made of," Jonn agreed. "Which is weird, because according to this report, McMahon was decapitated and had her body thrown in the river."

"And it's still not the weirdest thing we've had to deal with involving this conspiracy today," Winn muttered. "We better get word to Supergirl; tell her this was almost certainly a setup."

STAR CITY AIRFIELD

12:37 AM

"We keep making trips this often I'm going to ask for frequent flier miles as part of my health plan," Felicity told Scully.

"Wait? You have a health plan?" Kara said wryly.

"You know, with everything that's going on right now, is it wrong that I'm still jazzed that I'm riding shotgun with two of the greatest icons in the world?" Felicity pointed out.

"Yeah. If you can get past the whole world come to an end part," Quentin remarked dryly. "Which considering our lives the last few years is pretty easy to deal with."

"That's the weird thing," Scully said cautiously. "For all of the shit Mulder and I spent a decade dealing with, I don't think even until the very end I realized just how genuine the threat was. I was always viewing at a more personal level than Mulder was."

"Well," Kara started gently "given everything that happened to the two of you, I can understand why."

Scully shook her head. "Just before Mulder went off to Oregon, he told me that there had to be an end. That the personal costs were too high. Of course, after he got taken, the costs became exponentially higher. Even after all of that, I'm not sure I could do what you and your friends do."

Everyone was a little shocked to hear that. "Scully," Quentin started, "you're an FBI agent."

"And even without everything that chain-smoking bastard and his ilk put us through, I can't tell you how many time Mulder and I ended up in the hospital," Scully told them. "Of course, I was more worried about Mulder. I'm immortal, after all."

They all considered this for a moment. "You serious?" Felicity asked, a little afraid to hear the answer.

"Just a joke an insurance salesman in Minneapolis told me before he passed away," Scully told them.

"An insurance salesman," Quentin was just as skeptical.

Scully looked at them. "Well, he was a psychic insurance salesman."

The thing was, that would've hardly been the weirdest thing any of them had ever heard of, and they still couldn't believe it. "Which of the files is this one under?" Kara said resignedly.

"I'll tell you when this is over," Scully said as the mayor's limo pulled up.

"I've heard that one before," Felicity mumbled.

Oliver and John got out.

"Please tell me nothing serious has happened while we were out of town," Felicity asked.

"Since when are our lives ever that simple?" Oliver reminded them.

"What happened now?" Quentin asked just as resignedly.

"Well, it doesn't have anything to do with us directly," John said slowly. "But given everything else that's happening, it's the last thing we need."

"Now what?" Scully demanded.

"I got a call from Lyla two hours ago," John told them. "The other shoe finally dropped. Congress just subpoenaed her to testify before the Intelligence Committee day after tomorrow."

There might have been worse times for this to happen – during the middle of a raid on the city came to mind – but it was hard to think of any right now. "About what?" Kara demanded.

"The steaming pile that Amanda Waller left for her," John said angrily. "Her building a squad to protect the country made up trained killers, dealings with vigilantes over the past two years in here and in Central City, general corruption and military subcontracting of ARGUS. All the bodies that Waller knew were buried, and she's leaving my wife holding the shovel."

"You're sure that's what they're really after?" Scully asked.

"Raking my wife over the coals isn't enough?" John demanded

"You misunderstand. Almost twenty years ago, Mulder and I were chasing a lead on a diplomatic pouch which contained a rock that had the alien virus in it," Scully told them. "Mulder went halfway around the world to try and figure out its earthly origins. He was thrown in a gulag and nearly had his arm cut off before he managed to escape."

"I don't follow," John said.

"I think I do," Kara said surprisingly. "While this was going on, Scully was called before Congress and was nearly held in contempt because she refused to reveal where Mulder was. Something I'm pretty sure they knew about at the time, and there were things going on that should have been of far greater concern."

"So you think this is a move out of the conspiracy's playbook?" Oliver asked.

"One of the people involved at the time was Marita Covarrubias," Scully told them. "These people do seem stuck using the same moves over and over again."

"Lyla's not going to be happy to know that her public flogging is some kind of distraction," John was a little calmer now.

"Maybe there's still time to provide her with cover." Felicity said thoughtfully. "When does Lyla have to testify?"

"Ten a.m. Thursday."

"Which gives us a little less than thirty six hours to figure out what the conspiracy wants and to try and outflank them," Kara said thoughtfully.

"That's easy enough to say. But you and Mulder have been trying to figure out what they were up to for nearly twenty-five years," Oliver reminded them. "We've done some impressive things on short notice, but this is going to be tough even with us pooling our resources."

"No one's expecting to shut the whole thing down. All we have to do is find a way to keep them in check." Scully reminded them. "We have to figure out what they're after right now, make sure it's out of their hands, and then figure out a way to outmaneuver their current position."

By now John was thinking calmly. "Well, they only made this move when you got possession of Church, the magnetite, and that artifact in roughly that order."

"Well, we know they've got access to more magnetite than we could give them, so it's probably not that," Felicity said thoughtfully.

"And we didn't know about the artifact until a few hours ago," Scully pointed out. "Which leaves us with Tobias Church and his links to Lillian Luthor."

Kara shook her head. "The federal government's always had a very complicated relationship with the Luthor family," she reminded them. "Do you think they'd go to this length to protect one of them?"

"The government wouldn't. Amanda Waller would." Oliver pointed out. "And considering that they subpoenaed Lyla makes me relatively certain the pressure's coming from her."

"Much as I'd like to publicly see Waller get a flogging herself, if she's stayed hidden this long, it's going to take a miracle to smoke her out." Quentin reminded them. "Which means it might be in our interest to find Lillian Luthor."

"And by a stroke of luck, we happen to have someone in federal custody who could lead us right to her." Oliver said.

Almost on cue, everybody's cell phone started beeping that very moment.

Kara, who didn't need one, turned on her earpiece. She listened for ten seconds and got the news. "Well, the good news is everybody at the DEO is safe," she said. "The bad news is, the Syndicate was apparently so desperate to get Church back, they sent a supersoldier into the enemy camp."

Scully reacted first. "It's a good thing you have a better metabolism than we do," she said. "Because I'm pretty sure you're going to need to fly back ASAP."

Kara nodded, and was in the air within moments.

"You think they're going to try another play that quickly?" Oliver asked.

"I'd be shocked if they hadn't had some contingency plan in effect right now," Scully told them.

DEO HEADQUARTERS

Scully was right. Just before one of the 'inspectors' had put their hands in the air, they had pressed a button on a device given to them by Covarrubias.

No one in the party knew what it did. But the moment he touched it, two things happened simultaneously.

The cameras covering the room Church was being held in became snowy.

And Church began to pull himself back together.