My apologies for the delays on new parts. Busy busy busy. I hope at least that the writing quality is up to snuff and if not, there's at least a lot of it.

Speaking of snuff – I do have to apologize for removing the story and putting it back in previously. The system is a little rigid at times and it confounded me so I impulsively chopped the story and put it back. I know a couple people were following it; again, sorry about that. I hope you'll forgive and read and follow it all over again. I think it'll be worth it.

By the by: this tale occurs somewhere among the second season for the young scalliwags, too young to be jaded but too old to know any better; neither is it Mulder and Scully's first rodeo.

Not… that they play 'rodeo'.

I've said too much.

But before you proceed further, gentle reader, I must warn you that this chapter contains several renditions of 1970's trends in interior decoration that might be considered shocking and/or obscene. Young viewers might well have no susceptibility to deliberate representations of kitsch – shag carpets, lava lamps and the like – but the weak and stylistically trendy should probably read no further for reasons of general decency.

The 1970's were an era of terrifying interior design rife with atrocities of pattern and colour. A zealous pursuit of outre ideas and bizarre patterns inflicted what has been termed a state of 'existential shlock' upon an unsuspecting population. Leonard Nimoy's acoustic album springs to mind here (God rest him). Average people suffered terribly under what seemed to be deliberate, malicious miscalculations of style, epitomized by a tribalistic dance performed by primitives under the glare of a glitter-ball spotlight known as disco. I provide you here with a reference guide, which I cannot recommend more highly: institute/interiors/. But be forewarned.

Yet, those who donned bell-bottom pants and purposefully shambled out in Scooby-Doo-style lockstep to the dread tunes of KC and The Sunshine Band are as much victims of those decorative tragedies as we who survived them. We who permitted William Shatner to brazenly do a cover of Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds accompanied by a freaking hand drum are as guilty as the foulest mutton-chop-grower, or anyone who ever wore a Smokey and the Bandit t-shirt. We must move beyond that time, beyond our guilt and pain. Why, should we just lay down and die? Oh no – not I. I will survive.

… At any rate modern man may be thankful that we live in such a fortunate age when the horrors of the paisley era have thankfully mostly gone the way of extinction, like the dinosaur, the great Auk, and the unicorn. But, it is still sometimes whispered by aging dance queens when deep in their cross-hatched green crystal cups that strange holdouts of that dark age lurk unsuspected in eerie valleys and remote byways where time has been forgotten, waiting to spring on the unwary traveler… This, then, is one of those stories. Well, chapters, anyway. This is one of those chapters.

I should mention that no decorators were harmed in the writing of this chapter, or in the 70s.

Still, maybe some should have been. They weren't, but maybe they should have been.

… On a sidenote, have I acquired some kind of questionable interest in home interiors? Sorry about that. I swear, I never even met that couch, man.

Chapter Three – Better Homes and Gardens

By the time they pulled into the Hotel Seven Mulder was in a rare smoldering fury.

The Hotel Seven, blessed venue of the dusty and remote Colorado highways, was an elegant throwback to an older, more mature and more artless time. Built in the early seventies, the charm of the Hotel Seven had persisted for decades without fail – or redecoration – and then forged bravely forward into the modern era under a new word called retro.

It was something of a landmark. Its faded oval sign reared into the shimmering blue sky atop enormous stand-legs painted the blue-green of the rolling, indifferent sea. A dark triangle marked the lower corner of the 'n' where a callous youth had hurled a rock, making the sign seem to read Hotel Sever from certain angles; a coincidental association. Underneath the topmost panel, a newer black-and-white placard proclaimed the availability of 'All-Suite Wi-Fi!' and 'Late Night Selections!', avoiding elaboration on the latter.

Around its spacious ('Free!') parking area, thirty rooms were laid out in two stories of blue panel and dusty glass linked at either end by gleaming metal staircases. In the front of the building, instead of stairs a ramp swept up into a railing that swung round to the main office, proudly yellow-gold and fully fifteen feet off the ground. There was a pool round back; in its day, it had been frequented by the likes of Doris Day, Sally Field and Ed O'Neill – or so the owners claimed – and it was widely believed that Emilio Estevez had once drunkenly shat in it.

Whatever the truth of such flourishes, today it was glimmering and crystal-pure – having had a good solid filter-netting by Emilio the pool servitor – but the wide grass banks around it were withered yellow under the blasting sun.

Despite such attractions and its indisputable monopoly there were few customers: two 4x4 trucks, the endemic work-hog of the American near-outback, were parked there; an honest-to-God station wagon of the forme ancienne, replete with cardboard boxes tied between the roof racks; and a well-kept Saturn short the right front hubcap. A few aging window A/Cs hummed away on the first floor.

'That Sheriff looked a little surprised to see us,' Scully ventured as the Saab crunched up to a gravel space near the office. Mulder made a wordless grunt. 'I still don't understand why Washington's putting another team on this,' Scully mused quietly with a concerned sidelong glance.

'Competition, Scully,' Mulder hissed with force. Sheriff McCarthy had not been convinced of their identities and they had been forced to prove themselves with driver's licenses and badges and phone calls and long minutes of embarrassment, not including the very abbreviated tour of the crime scene through which he'd scarcely been able to concentrate. 'They've decided to try the one thing they've never tried yet: muscling in.' He stared into the impassive blue-green windows of the Hotel Seven, the hotel front shimmeringly reflected there. 'And they beat us here. They've never… they've tried so many things. But they've never stooped to this.' His hands gripped the wheel. 'Well, if they think they can just lift my work out from under me … If they think they can silence me by stealing my own – ' He trailed off, the storm gone as quickly as it had come. 'Goddamnit, Scully,' he said quietly, head against the steering wheel.

Shocked, Scully touched his shoulder. 'It's all right, Mulder. Whatever they find, it's going to be…' – she scanned quickly for the right term – 'conventional. Which means wrong, Mulder.' She shook her head. 'They don't know what you know. They never will. How can they? Look,' she said with a sigh, 'I know that I'm a little more… skeptical than you. But whether or not I believe in everything you do, I believe in you. I believe in you, Mulder.' She smiled at him.

Mulder slowly turned to her, head resting on his fingers on the steering wheel. They shared a slow smile, a little warmth growing around his mouth. 'I knew there was a reason I kept you on all this time,' he said wryly.

Scully's eyes traced his face. The creases around his eyes seemed longer, his brow more furrowed. Was there a touch of grey in his hair? Surprising even herself, she leaned over and ruffled her fingers over his temples. 'You still owe me all that back pay,' she said saucily and they shared a silly grin.

'Thank you,' he said finally, although they still didn't move. 'I'm sorry. These people like to throw things at problems. I should have expected that sooner or later, they'd try the kitchen sink.'

She smiled again. 'I'm just glad I didn't have to slap you.'

'Save it for tonight when I get all maudlin and sloppy,' Mulder suggested with a touch of his old humour.

Scully leaned over. 'If we don't get a move on, the bug-eyed men will get away, Mulder.'

He sighed and unbuckled. 'I'll get the bags, dear.'

They looked the hotel over. Scully lowered her sunglasses. 'You picked it for its charm, I see.'

Mulder looked shocked – or as shocked as he ever really looked. 'This is a genuine piece of forgotten Americana, Scully.'

'It was probably forgotten for a reason, Mulder.'

He closed the trunk and brought the bags around. 'This is the soul of the Midwest; the lure of the backwoods highway, the strange surprises and peculiar doings of the road not travelled. And this way we're also closer to the scene of the crime, ready to spring into action.'

'You mean that Skinner didn't like your last expense reports, so you cheaped out on the accommodation?' She wheeled her travel bags towards the ramp.

'I'm not afraid of Skinner,' Mulder snorted, though he looked over his shoulder as he said so.

Mulder's long legs reached the office first. The heat was roiling outside and the front office's air conditioning hit Mulder like an icy wall of pure relief while the décor, unfortunately, hit him like a stunning wall of absolute kitsch.

An elderly fireplace was set into a layered granite facing; to either side of it an egregiously contrasting floral print turned the eye away from its nauseatingly lurid pattern of oranges and yellow stripes. Chambered brass faux-lanterns hung from the dappled pastel lime ceiling. The floor was a thick decadent not-red not-orange shag layered with broad parallel stripes seemingly woven randomly into the material. On a layered glass coffee table squatted two narrow-necked red vases containing displays of fake orange vined flowers over green leaves. The left wall was set with several aimless paintings of fruit rendered in cheap oils. A central settee was an eye-watering debauche of black stripes and gold armrests with satin-cloth pillows while 70s-style ergonomic chairs around the coffee table formed obscenely anti-Euclidean angles of metal and plastic. 'Whoa,' said Mulder, raising his eyebrows nearly a full quarter inch. 'Funkytown.'

Scully was frozen in place by the overwhelming retrocity. 'My… God, Mulder,' she said quietly.

'What is seen cannot be unseen,' Mulder whispered back behind his hand.

'Hi!' a man in a peaked cap suddenly said from behind the counter. He was looking up from where he'd clearly been polishing the mahogany – was it mahogany? – front desk. He smiled in a nostalgically rigid manner, as if he'd stepped out of an even earlier era. 'Welcome to the Hotel Seven! Hot enough for ya?' he asked jauntily. Then he smiled, also jauntily.

'Er – hello,' Mulder said, clearly off his guard. He looked at Scully, adjusted his tie. 'We have reservations…?' He hadn't meant it to come out like a question.

The man blinked, then snapped his fingers. 'Of course!' He dragged over an enormous reservations ledger and flipped pages. 'Reservations… reservations… hmm.'

Scully and Mulder shared a look. Mulder straightened his tie again and approached the counter carefully, as if unwilling to startle the man. The clerk had longish hair for such an otherwise conventional presentation, dirty blonde and receding a little from his broad forehead, a sharpish nose and brown eyes over a bold, prominent chin. Beside him on the counter there was a small bowl for candy which was strangely filled only with empty wrappers. 'June 17th,' Mulder added helpfully, taking in the rest of the lobby with a peripheral grimace.

'Oh, of course! Here we are!' the man barked, then squinted, pointy nose an inch from the paper. 'Mooolder and… Scull-eye.' He looked up with a conspiratorial open-mouthed grin, as though Mulder had played some kind of a trick. 'Is that you?'

'Er – yes.' Mulder put down the Bureau credit card and glanced backwards for some kind of support but Scully was yards away pretending to examine the postcard rack.

'Ah: plastic. Thank you, sir.' The man snatched up the card and to Mulder's astonishment instead of using an electronic reader he produced an old manual credit card imprinter. Setting the card in the slot with exaggerated care, he swiped the draw handle back and forth once, twice – three times. 'Fantastic machines, don't you think?' he said, meaning the imprinter, then leaned in for a dramatic aside to Mulder. 'A government card, too. Hell, you can spend other people's money that they don't even have yet! Ha ha!'

The concierge returned the card and looked them over appraisingly. 'Two rooms, huh? Here's your keys.' Unusually, they were also the manual, mechanical kind. 'Extra blankets in the closet, and the water will take a while to get hot.' Mulder read the man's nametag. It said Hello! My name is: GABE.

'The office is open until ten, checkout daily at noon. Coffee all day' – the concierge jabbed a finger at an actual Mr Coffee machine in the corner – 'but breakfast only until 7 AM.' He waggled a finger with grim seriousness. 'Company policy. There's a diner down the road. Piggly Wiggly. Best steaks in three counties and their strawberry pie is to die for.' He fixed Mulder with his rigid smile.

'We saw it,' Mulder confirmed.

'Gabe' clapped his hands together. 'Great! You're all set!' He looked them over, lingering a little on Scully, maybe, then leaned forward. 'Listen – ah – we only want to make your stay here enjoyable,' he said quietly and archly. 'So, anything you need, anything at all – cigarettes, a little liquor… rubber products for the missus – you just call me up. Zero on the dial.' That rigid smile again.

Mulder stood stunned. 'Ah – thank you, but I think we're… all set… that way.' He looked back at a startled Scully. 'We're, ah… new here. Maybe you could help us out. What's Sedaia like? Anything, I don't know… unique or special about it?'

The man looked Mulder in the eye. 'Yes!' he pronounced happily, and said nothing more.

Mulder lugged Scully's bags from the car to her room: green shag carpets and striped wallpaper. 'You're welcome,' he gasped.

'I was perfectly capable of carrying my own things, Mulder,' Scully said, noting the quarter-fueled vibrating bed. 'Mulder, what kind of a crime lab did that Sheriff say they had?'

Mulder loosened his tie. 'They didn't. Everything's going to Denver. We should have it back in a couple days.' He hurried to his room, tossed his things in, was briefly repulsed by the décor, slammed the door and rushed back. 'Ready?' Mulder had only agreed to go to the hotel so long as they went to the Dryer location immediately after.

Fifteen minutes later, the Saab pulled up behind a stationary cruiser at 103 Fair Lane, residence of one disappeared Jacob R. Dryer. Mulder smirked with satisfaction: no sign of the Impala. How the hell, he wondered, had the other team gotten permission to use their own vehicle? That was surely not a bureau car. Must have been a local office thing.

But anyway that was a distraction. With luck, he'd have their report done and filed tonight, he mused with satisfaction, and that would be his volley back at the functionaries that had been playing fast and loose with his work. Let them see how their dirty little tactic had worked out.

The Dryer house was, like Hearns' place, cordoned off by police tape, this time screening the entire lot right to the curb. Police searchers were going up and down the grass and there was even a technician in a loose white body-smock examining the front door. Mulder would have said it was a very extreme way to treat a kidnapping – if that shotgun had not been found, and if Mrs. Hearns had not gone missing only a day or two before. Fast foxhounds find foxes. Now if he could only help find their fox.

A cruiser was parked wrong-way on the street directly in front of the house with a trooper or officer sitting in the driver's seat. As Mulder pulled up behind it, a tall and, Mulder noticed, quite pretty Officer with long red hair tied back in a ponytail got out and came towards them, looking them over.

Mulder and Scully got out and walked forward, showing their badges. The redhead stopped. 'Agents… Scully and Mulder, right?' she asked. Her nametag read Barnes. Her appearance read young. 'I'm Officer Cecilia Barnes. Sheriff McCarthy said you might come by; he can't, he's got an important meeting with town council.' Mulder could guess what that was about. 'Agent Scully,' she said as she shook Mulder's hand.

'Actually, I'm Mulder and this is Scully,' Mulder said, indicating Scully.

Barnes smiled disarmingly. 'Really? Sorry – you just kind of looked like a Scully,' she said to him. Mulder and Scully shared a bemused glance. 'Oh, sorry,' Barnes said again. 'I… do that a lot. Bit of a chatterbox, my mom used to say. Anyway, Sheriff says we're all to show you anything you need, answer any questions you might have. He might not always seem it, but he's really happy to have you here.' She glanced at her watch. 'I understand there's another FBI team here – you guys sure are thorough! – but they haven't come by yet.'

Mulder smiled with satisfaction. 'Thankyou,' Scully said. 'I'm sure we'll have some questions for you. Will the Sheriff be available later today?'

'I'm afraid not, ma'am.' Mulder suppressed a grin as the youngish officer called Scully ma'am. 'He has the search to organize after that.'

Mulder's grin evaporated. 'But… we weren't invited to the search.'

Officer Barnes blinked her big green eyes. 'Oh. Oh, well – I mean – I'm sure he'd be happy to have you guys along,' she said mollifyingly. 'Uh, sir. I guess he just assumed that the other FBI guys told you – I mean FBI agents. He's been very busy, the Sheriff. I'm sure it just slipped his mind. Um, can I show you the crime scene?' Quickly, she turned and led them to the driveway door.

Jacob Dryer's house was a mauve partial two-story ranch with a new sun-room off the back, a two-car garage and a freshly paved drive. The front lawn was shady, cool and immaculate. 'The side door has already been checked. Tim Laney – he took a course in fingerprints and forensics – is doing the external doors now.' She let them in by the driveway door to a small landing between the upstairs and downstairs and the relief was a godsend; some enterprising constable had decided that an active A/C was somehow integral to the investigation. A man with a future, Mulder thought. There was a kind of fresh odor to the place, less homey than chemically forced. 'Lead on,' he told Barnes.

The kitchen was spacious; too big for a bachelor with no children, expensive utensils, new coffeemaker and spotless. The area over the counter and the cupboards was festooned with strangely chirpy matrimonial slogans, like Home is where the hearth is and Love is a gift for two. He couldn't have said why, but it struck Mulder as somehow discordant. 'Anything of note in here?'

Barnes shook her head. She seemed a little stiff and tense, and let out a long breath. 'No, sir, nothing here.'

Mulder turned to look at her. 'Officer Barnes?'

She jerked and cuffed at an eye. 'I – I'm fine. It's just that – we don't get too many – this kind of thing doesn't happen around here.' She was pale. 'I'm just not… I don't…'

Mulder stepped close to her, close enough to be friendly but not intimate. 'Officer Barnes.' She looked up at her name. 'Stick to the facts. Just tell me exactly what you know, just like training: facts, details, locations. You're a professional today. Tomorrow, you'll still be one.' He smiled. 'No signs of violence or biological trace in here – right?'

She blinked and took a couple short breaths. 'Nossir. No damage, no indicators of injury at all.' She looked up at Mulder gratefully. 'Thankyou, sir.'

Mulder smiled kindly. 'Not a problem.'

The front room with her was similarly spotless, all in dark-finished cherry and wood paneling with maple stairs. There were photos of Jacob Dryer – short, heavy, moustache – his wife and a boy with him; a desert background, Paris, Florida, a waterfall. Another framed photo showed Jacob Dryer alone, in a different posture: older, sadder, worn. Mulder held up the first photo. 'Mr. Dryer's son?'

'Yes, sir.' She looked a little sad. 'They don't talk much now. I don't know if anyone has even told him yet.'

'Any other children?'

Barnes shook her head, red hair rippling. 'Just the one.'

There were three bedrooms in the place, though the Dryers had only had the one son. The spare rooms were untouched; in the master bedroom the bed was rumpled on the right side nearer the door, sheets tossed back, pillow indented. A gold watch lay on the bed stand of the same side, a glass of water with a wallet and a full billfold beside it. Mulder peered into the wallet: there was money there too. He took his time walking around the bed, eyes searching. 'I'll – I'll just be in the kitchen, sir,' said Barnes. 'Just – take your time.'

Only half hearing her, Mulder circled the bed again. Then he leaned down and pulled back the heavy, ostentatious comforter and sheet. He stared at the mattress for a moment, then replaced the blankets. There was a picture of Dryer and his wife in happier times beside the watch and glass. Mulder considered, then and walked around the periphery of the bedroom. He glanced at the top of the large single dresser, and put on gloves to open each of the drawers and gently rifle the contents, then the end-table drawers. Clothes, some old letters, a few keepsakes.

He went into the bathroom. As everything else, all was in perfect and pristine order, as if it had been scrubbed just that morning. The cup was in its place, razor in a plastic mount over the sink, no loose stubble… even a perfect corner edge on the toilet roll. Mulder checked the mirror shelf. The usual array of things: antibiotic sprays, decongestants, bandaids, ibuprofen, Pepto-bismol, vitamin supplements. There were also bottles of prescription medicine for hypertension, prostate – and something else. Mulder replaced it, closed the mirror and leaned down to examine the toothbrush holder, hands in his pockets, craning his head around several angles until he could see clearly. Well, then. He straightened up and walked out. 'All good, sir?' Barnes asked as he exited.

'No trace in there, Officer? Nothing out of order?' Mulder asked.

Barnes blinked. 'Oh – no, sir. Nothing strange. I checked it myself, and Tim went over it too, already. Nothing anywhere in the house. Sir.'

Mulder nodded slowly. His eyes trailed up the kitchen towards the dining room and the glass door leading to the patio and back yard. 'Let's see the spot,' he said.

Barnes blinked again and followed his eyes towards the dining room beyond the kitchen. 'Yes, sir. That's where…' she cleared her throat. 'That's where it happened.'

The linoleum of the kitchen was immaculate and unmarked right up to the dining area, which directly adjoined the living room. Probably there was minor trace of blood on the kitchen floor somewhere, but it would be little enough and it would have been checked. Mulder could see nothing there.

There was little, too, at the border to the dining room. A plastic sheet had been hung over the door, presumably to keep the flies out, but the strong smells of death and the iron of blood were pungent. Thank God for whoever turned on that A/C, Mulder thought. It could have been a lot worse. He wiped some Vicks under his nose as his sense of smell began to be overwhelmed. Barnes coughed wetly beside him and he offered it to her; she took it gratefully. Another cop was there, a thin man with a receding hairline. He nodded grimly to Barnes, then went back to taking photos and peering into corners and under furniture.

And in front of that sliding door was a large, crimson-black puddle of blood soaked into the carpet, thick enough to mat it with a slab of stinking rot, reeking of iron. Fatal enough. There were broad spatters around it, tiny ones further away, some droplets sprayed on the door, the wall, crimson dots scattered around on the carpet. The main pool was just inside the track of the sliding glass door and trailed outside onto the wood patio beyond the plastic sheet. Mulder heard a nervous choke and he turned to look at Barnes.

She was white as a sheet. Without warning she turned and bolted, retching dryly. He looked at the other cop: his tag read Albright. His eyes followed Cecilia Barnes as she bolted away, then sighed. 'Sorry, Agent. She's… too young for this. I warned her.' He rubbed the back of his head.

'That's all right. Homicide isn't something you guys see a lot of.'

'I worked five years in Pueblo until I could get the family the hell out of there. Thought I was done with all that, and now this.' He took another picture. 'Jim Albright.'

'Fox Mulder. You guys are testing all this?'

Albright nodded. 'Yellow, purple and grey vacu, each site – even the drops – and multiples within the big spot. Saw to it myself.'

'Thorough work, Officer.'

'Jacob was a friend. If there's any chance it's not all his…' Albright caught sight of Mulder's drawn face. 'Yeah, I know. Probably is. Thought I was through with this.' He looked at the door, took another picture.

'I'm sorry, Officer Albright. If you'd like to get someone else – '

'Someone who didn't know him? Hard to find one of them in this town, Agent Mulder. It's fine – I'm fine. I think I'm about through the shock of it. I just want the bastard that did this.'

Mulder studied the room. One glass door was splattered with blood too, and the right-hand lintel of the sliding door, but it was that, the floor of the dining room and perhaps a drop or two in the adjoining kitchen, but not likely. He looked up: the ceiling was clean. 'His sister found him, is that right?'

'Yeah. Poor Helen,' Albright sighed. 'I took the call at the station. She was in a panic, scared out of her mind. I came right down.'

Albright had been listed as the first responder. 'Can I ask you a few more questions?'

Albright looked up fiercely. 'Agent, if it helps catch him, you ask all the questions you want.'

'Can you describe entry and scene?'

Albright seemed to click and started relaying details as if reciting a grocery list. 'Front door unlocked on arrival; no signs of forced entry or unusual appearances. Caller was on the premises in the foyer, highly upset. No noises, no signs of a struggle in front rooms. Appliances off, no signs of removed articles, arson or vandalism. Nothing even broken. Rear sliding door and exterior screen door open, parts dining area saturated with blood residue. No sign of – of possible victim.' He wiped a sweaty brow. Clearly the heat was getting to everyone a little, even in here. Mulder wished he'd left his coat in the car; he doffed it and hung it on the back of a steel-framed chair. Albright went on: 'A search of the rear grounds came up with nothing except a lot of blood trace on the patio. I went back and called it in at that point. No suspects, no one else on the premises.' He stopped abruptly.

'Officer?' Mulder prompted.

Albright shook his head. 'Nothing. At the time I thought I saw something in the woods. Just a flash. Just the wind, or a mule deer – I looked but there was nothing there and the brush is thin back there I'd have seen something if anything was there.' He shrugged. 'This… this has been here for two, maybe three days. It couldn't possibly be what I'm thinking, unless killers come back for a peek.'

'Actually, a percentage of criminal subjects do return to the scene, but that essentially consists of arsonists, who derive a kind of sexual pleasure from their actions.' Mulder was flashing a small UV light under the furniture and the edges of the dining table. 'Almost never in cases of homicide. The Mossberg was found there?' Mulder said, pointing to where a small V-tag was sitting on a stretch of polished hardwood around the fireplace. Another was tacked up with a roofing nail where a fair-sized hole had been blasted in the drywall, big enough to see daylight through. There were four small markers on the carpet where the shells, presumably, had been retrieved.

'That's right,' Albright replied. Scully was coming through the kitchen. 'Downstairs is clear, Mulder: nothing out of the ordinary. It's as neat as a show home basement.' She halted at the edge of the kitchen. 'Anything?'

'A lot of blood, Scully.'

'Your capacity for the obvious always amazes me, Mulder.'

Mulder rested his hands on his knees. 'Jacob Dryer arrives home about 7:00, eats dinner – ' he pointed to the plates in the drying rack – 'turns in for the night, and is disturbed by a sound in the backyard. He picks up the gun and goes to look, opens the door, fires four shots, maybe the last into the wall during a struggle and is stabbed in the torso, fatally, by an unknown and extremely strong assailant or by several subjects, and dies almost immediately. I think that's it. Seems straightforward… sort of.'

'Shots occurred just before midnight,' Albright confirmed. 'Jacob wasn't known for his late nights, probably turned in early.'

'I'm not sure this tells us anything about the killer,' Scully said.

'It tells us that he probably didn't know his killer. If he did, he wouldn't have brought the Mossberg out.'

'Or it could have started friendly and turned sour.'

'Seems to me that he'd at least invite an acquaintance in, Scully,' Mulder said, 'Instead of having a shootout on the patio. Neighbours hear any arguing or shouting?' he asked Albright.

'Nothing reported,' said Albright, nodding thoughtfully.

'And you conclude the subject's strength from the fact that he overcame an ex-Marine? How do you figure torso?'

'The blood spatter pattern is controlled, not wild.' He pointed to the walls, the carpet, the ceiling. 'No spray, no extraneous marking or spatter from a wound to a mobile cranium: heads move around, torsos don't. This means it wasn't a blunt instrument either: two thirds of all bludgeoning wounds in homicide and assault are delivered to the cranium and no somatic blow results in this much blood loss. Instead, all the blood is in one puddle, here, like he was stabbed and it all just ran out – no footprints, no hand marks.' He looked around. 'No struggle. Someone got him and he never took a step, didn't stagger even once with all that blood running down him? Not once? Not even as they fight for possession of a shotgun which the subject either wrenches out of his hands, or knocks flying.' He shook his head. 'The same lack of a body. The complete abduction of persons of the mass of Hearns and Dryer suggests to me an extremely strong subject capable of inflicting a single, fatal blow, and moving them without dragging.' He looked out the plastic sheeting. 'It's the same person for sure here and for Miranda Hearns.'

'Great,' Albright grunted. 'It really is a goddamn serial killer.' He got up and started talking into his radio, heading towards the front door as he did so.

'How did he let an unknown attacker get close enough to stab him?'

'Maybe he was surprised from the side,' Mulder mused. 'Or he fires three shots, moving back, maybe in a panic, misses and is finally stabbed.' But that seemed thin to him, too. The weapon still had four unfired rounds and surely a Marine could put his shots on target. How could he have been stabbed? The doorway was surely a narrow aperture. How had he missed before being struck down?

'Mulder, even average people are capable of picking up another human being; the fireman's carry, for example. Why would even a single assailant need to be extraordinarily strong to – '

Mulder pointed at the base of the glass door. The aluminum alloy of the sliding door track was sharply bent down, nearly flattened. Mulder reached across with his gloved hand to slide the glass door forward. It hit the warped part of the aluminum track with a jarring bang and stopped dead. 'I don't think this is a contractor defect, Scully,' he said sarcastically. There was an odd pattern to the blood-stain there, strange angles in red and beige.

Scully knelt down beside him, the warmth of her thigh suddenly beside his. 'That's… surprising, Mulder. How much weight would it take to bend that metal like that?'

'Maybe five, seven hundred pounds. We could probably find out from the manufacturer.'

'But what did it? Maybe someone brought a… I don't know, a furniture dolly through? Some kind of really heavy machine?'

'What for? There's no sign of theft.' The TV was a new flatscreen and large. There was a computer in the corner and the furniture was tasteful and reasonably expensive. 'No money taken. There's a wall safe in his bedroom and I bet that's intact too. And what kind of furniture dolly makes a mark like that?'

Scully mused. 'Maybe they stole something particular, something heavy that Dryer had. They slip carrying it out and it slams down and dents the metal track – or maybe they were interrupted in the act and dropped it. They flee, Dryer fires, but one of the thieves attacks him and scores a lucky blow. Or else they kill him at the start, but something along those lines. That would still satisfy your supposition about multiple subjects.'

'I'm not too sure about the idea of multiple subjects,' Mulder said. 'He comes out shooting, is startled back into the house, and killed there? The scene suggests a kind of individual strength from a single subject: no struggle. Anywhere.' Mulder looked around. 'Now that I think about it… where are his footprints?' They looked down. There was no real edging to it, nothing that looked like a footprint. And what were those strange angles? Geometric, or something.

'Maybe he fell to his hands and knees. Or maybe he was being held,' Scully insisted.

'Maybe,' Mulder said in a tone that said no. 'Let's take a look on the lawn.'

They went back down to the landing, then outside and around to the back yard, ducking underneath the police tape. 'Now you hold it right there!' a voice barked. A big middle-aged dark-haired man with a wide-shouldered build and a salt-and-pepper moustache was walking quickly towards them. 'I don't know what press outfit you're from,' he grunted, 'but you can go right back there and – ' He stopped short as Mulder and Scully held up their IDs. 'Mulder, Scully,' Mulder said shortly.

'So. The FBI guys,' he drawled, making an off-tone rhyme of the last two words. 'Or some of 'em, anyway.' He regarded them coolly. 'Something big happens and the feds come runnin'. What're you doin' here?'

'We were sent by Assistant Director Skinner's office: S&T Special Branch,' Mulder explained with a tired sidelong glance at Scully. He loosened his collar. It really was a miserably humid heat. Wasn't there some kind of federal employee policy regarding dressing for the weather? He'd have to check that out and see if he could invoke it. 'In the case of Ms. Hearns and Mr. Dryer, we have reason to think that – '

' – the perps crossed state lines, yeah, yeah, I geddit,' Esteban scowled. 'Sheriff told me this mornin', talkin' to them other FBI guys. Any more of you and we'll have more FBI guys than real cops here.' Mulder shifted slightly as he absorbed the insult. 'An' it don't seem to me to be reason enough for you to be here just 'cause Cheyenne happens to be about thirty miles away.' The man was chewing gum and he regarded them thoughtfully.

Perps? 'What exactly did the other team say about the state line issue?'

Esteban frowned. 'They said that it resembled some disappearances in Cheyenne,' he said warily. 'Some people thought to have kidnapped some people. You sayin' that ain't right?' He looked interested, as though there was a chance here to dismiss the federal cops outright.

Mulder looked a little sheepish, then forced it down. 'There's a single possible suspect at this time: a Mr. Tom Hearns, lives up just south of Laramie on the Wyoming side – '

Esteban looked genuinely outraged. 'Ah hell,' he growled, taking a frustrated step away and tossing his hands in the air. 'You gotta be kidding me – Tom Hearns? I've known Tom thirty years and he ain't no killer. He was a friend of Jacob Dryer's! He never laid a hand on Miranda! He – ' He stopped, caught himself. 'If you think Tom Hearns is your perp, then you oughta go back to Washin'ton.' The Colorado accent wasn't strong, Mulder noted, but when pushed the middle consonant drop was there, all right. 'You need to be talkin' to your colleagues and make up your collective minds as to what the hell you're doin' here. Nobody asked you to come – and you stay the hell away from Tom Hearns.' He pointed a blunt finger. 'That man's suffered – you just stay the hell away from him, understand?'

Scully stepped quickly in between them as Mulder was beginning to deliver a retort. 'Deputy Sheriff – Esteban, is it? Deputy, we're only here to help out. We were assigned to assist in this case, and that's what we're going to do. We're not here to step on your toes, or conduct a witch-hunt. We just want to help solve the case. All right?'

Esteban did not look mollified. 'Law says I gotta help you. What do you wanna see?'

'Right now, just the back porch. We want to see if there are any drag marks.'

Esteban snorted. 'There aren't. But come see for yourself.' He took them up the steps – already cleared, Mulder assumed – and to the patio. A trail of blood led from the sliding door, fading out quickly. There was no sign of any dragging. 'Lifted straight out,' Mulder said, shaking his head. More V-markers were set up on the porch: one atop the patio railing where a hole had been knocked in the upper bar. Another was tacked up where a solid slug had punched through the shed wall, twenty yards away. 'Mossberg 500,' Mulder said. The Mossberg was a beast; popular, quick and heavy as a sledgehammer. 'Four shots fired. Four still in the tube,' he recited from the report.

'That's right. Eight shells is legal in Colorado, Agent Mulder,' Esteban said.

'I'm sure.'

Scully quickly tallied the V-markers. 'Only three impact points?'

'Yes, ma'am. One in the house, one in the patio, third one in the shed. Whatever happened to Jacob – excuse me, Mr. Dryer – it looks like he tried to give as good as he got.' Esteban chewed his gum and gave Scully a challenging glare.

'No doubt, deputy,' Mulder said. 'We're just wondering where the other shell landed.'

Esteban chewed more slowly. He looked from the door to the bullet holes in the porch, then out to the shed. 'Went high,' he pronounced. 'Fired up into the air. Fourth shot, probably. Recoil kicks a barrel up. Went high.' He looked around defiantly. 'S'what I figure.'

Mulder nodded almost imperceptibly. 'The subject kills Mr. Dryer there – ' Mulder said, performing an abbreviated walk-through away from the evidence site, 'Brings him out this way, lifts him and just… leaves. Walks away.'

Esteban snorted. 'You think someone carried him off?'

'You said yourself there weren't any drag-marks on the ground, Deputy,' Mulder shot back. 'Unless he brought in a crane, the killer had to have lifted him out and taken him along. It's the simplest explanation.'

Esteban snorted again. 'Jacob Dryer was – is – over two hundred pounds. To lift him outta here, the perp would have to be a linebacker.'

'What's to say he wasn't?' Mulder said. 'Play any football, Deputy?' He left Esteban in open-mouthed shock and examined the carpet in the sliding angle of the late afternoon sunlight.

'Something wrong, Mulder?'

Mulder cocked his head and lifted the plastic, leaning on his knee a little as he did. 'Shapes a little funny. Not shoemarks either.' He dropped the plastic and duckwalked backwards, looking around the patio. There was sweat pooling around his chest and his back. 'Strange. Kind of… actually, I'm not sure.' Solidly built patio; big beams, thick maple. No half measures.

Esteban regarded them sidelong. 'Awright. Since you like footprints so much, come and see this.' He directed them down the railing and they went to the ground. Much of Dryer's back lawn had been replaced by stone: expensive bricks, a small fountain, a rock garden. 'Here.'

Impressed into the smaller stones of the rock garden fifteen feet from the porch stairs were a pair of deep impressions, each several inches wide and a foot long and quite deep. Some stones were scattered in the grass. 'Those look like prints to you? Figure maybe a man, carrying a hell of a lot of weight. Nothing else found from there to here. Bricks and stones. Ol' Jacob always did – does – things thorough. Never scrimps.'

'I think this is our guy, Deputy,' Mulder said. 'But two prints side-by-side? Deep, too.'

Scully frowned and looked back at the wood stairs. From the angle, she could see that there was a long splinter popped out of the area under the top step, like an incredible weight had come from there. 'It's like… he… leapt?' She looked between the steps and the stones. 'From the porch to here?'

Mulder looked at her. 'With a two-hundred pound man on his back?' They both thought about that for a while. Mulder looked at Esteban. 'Any ogres in these parts? Maybe a troll?'

'Huh?' said Esteban.

'Never mind. From the porch to here; fifteen feet. Unless…' There were paving stones making up a small path from the stairs out toward the fountain. Mulder examined one that looked cracked. 'Hop skip and a jump, Scully? Maybe he gave himself a running start.'

Scully came over. 'That still leaves a ten-foot leap carrying two hundred pounds of dead weight. Meaning no offense, Deputy.' Esteban looked disturbed at the FBI agents writing off his friend, but nodded.

'Hell of a jump, Scully.' Mulder stood up. He glanced down at his fingers and frowned; there was some tacky green residue there on his fingertips – paint, he supposed. There was a little spat of it on the stones; the back fence looked a new dark green. He wiped it off with his handkerchief. 'I take it Mr. Dryer did a lot of renovating?' he asked Esteban, jerking his head at the fence.

Deputy Sheriff Esteban snorted. 'You could say that. Always some damn project or other goin' on.' Mulder nodded. They searched the shed, but there was nothing there except the usual: neatly stacked cans of varsol, electrical wires and grease, sealed paint cans, tools – a tidy array of the classical anal-retentive homeowner. And one substantial perforation where a 12-gauge solid slug had punched through the shed wall, and then out the far side.

They went into the edge of the woodlot. It was indeed as sparse as Albright had suggested; trees and wide open spaces between them, no space large enough to hide anything bigger than a badger. 'Broken branches, Scully,' Mulder said, noting small snapped side-limbs and dry trampled vegetation. If anything, the heat and humidity was even worse here. So much for the fresh open mountain air. 'If it wasn't a deer, then I'd say this guy took Jacob Dryer into the woods, just like Miranda Hearns. When is the manhunt scheduled for, Deputy?'

'This evening for the first sweep,' Esteban said. 'Sheriff figured to get on it as soon as we could get enough bodies together. We're doing another one first thing tomorrow.'

'Agent Scully and I will be joining you. Make sure you have enough dogs. And every second man should be armed.'

Esteban's eyes narrowed. 'You want them armed?'

Mulder walked right up to him, unintimidated. 'Whoever took Jacob Dryer disarmed a big ex-Marine with a combat shotgun, in his own home, just tossed it away from him like a toy, unless you think he just got bored of shooting it when he was being killed and threw it away.' Esteban coloured but didn't react. 'Then he carried Dryer off. If we're really hunting someone able to do all that in high brush, I think bringing a few firearms might not be such a bad idea. Just make sure they know what they're doing with them. No accidents and no trigger-happy paramilitary types.'

Esteban nodded defiantly. 'I've got the whole police force coming, and we know how to handle guns around here, Agent Mulder.'

'Glad to hear it.' They walked back. 'I don't think there's anything else to do here. I think we should have a background check of Mrs. Hearns and Mr. Dryer, see if we can generate any mutual hits on financials, education, other connections with any records. We should check at Miranda's workplace, anyplace Jacob Dryer volunteered or habituated.'

'I'll take Dryer,' Scully said. 'He sounds like he was on the grid. I'll check taxes and associations, criminal, military, retirement records.'

'Maybe medical too,' Mulder mused.

'Why?' Mulder pursed his lips. 'Hunch?' said Scully.

'I think so.' He looked around the lot again, the house. There was another spot of paint at the base of the patio stairs. 'Something I can't put my finger on. We'll figure it out.' He blinked. 'Ahh – I forgot my coat inside. I'll meet you at the car.'

Scully nodded, fanning her face. 'I'll call in what we've got to Skinner. Looks like we have enough reason to stay on site… even without your little green men.'

Mulder gave her a mocking sneer and went in the side door. Officer Barnes was in the kitchen, a little red-eyed but composed. 'Agent Mulder,' she said. 'I – how did your search outside go?' she said.

'Just fine, officer,' Mulder said. 'Listen, I know it's a little tough for you, but I'd like to get a little more background if I could and – you seem to know Mr. Dryer pretty well.' He gave a half-hearted shrug.

'Yes, sir,' Barnes said. 'I live just one street over and a house down or so; it's only about fifty yards through the woodlot, but I was on duty that night south of here – the lights in the sky, you know? Did you hear about that?'

'No,' Mulder lied. 'Lights in the sky?'

'There were – oh, lord, I can't believe I'm saying this. There were… strange lights seen over South Field and towards the hill Buttes.' She waved a hand vaguely towards the hills and woods to the west that ran down into the backyards of the town.

'Really?' Mulder said, feigning casual interest, folding his arms to invite her to continue.

'Really,' she said, shaking her head. 'Well, a few people said they saw some strange lights out there over the hills. Ranchers, a couple loggers, a pair of hikers from Dayton. They said they saw some kind of blue lights pass northeast to southwest last Sunday the 10th. One of the ranchers –Roger Ellis, he's a friend of my cousin – said that it looked like a… "ship".' She sighed. 'The hikers say it passed right over their heads, but slow. Probably some low-flying helicopter or Air Force jet. But Roger and his brother Dave swear they saw high white lights the day after in the same area but going east, and then again on Tuesday. Sheriff McCarthy had us out there on the 13th but we didn't see anything like that… UFO wackos. Just wish my cousins weren't some of them.' She huffed out a tense laugh, then took a long calming breath. 'Oh – look, I'm sorry. You don't care about this stuff. I… guess I got off on a tangent there. Sorry.' She ran a hand through her hair. 'Mr. Dryer was my high school softball coach. He was a really, really nice guy. Friend of the family.'

Mulder nodded slowly. 'What can you tell me about him? Did he have any enemies, anyone who had a grudge against him?'

She thought. 'Yes, sir – I mean, no sir. I mean… well, he could be a little… abrasive sometimes. Some people said he was bossy. His son didn't talk to him anymore, guess they just didn't get along. But no one would have hurt him,' she insisted. 'He always took us for ice cream after games, really pushed us to grow, you know? To get better. We almost made State one year. He wasn't quite the same after Amanda – Mrs. Dryer, that is – died. I mean passed on.'

'How so?'

'He seemed older… sadder. It was like he aged ten years that Christmas.'

'When was this?'

'Eight years ago. Well, seven and a half. It was… just cancer. I heard it was in one of her – ' she touched her chest, 'And then it was everywhere.' Barnes stopped talking, cringing a little.

'I'm sorry to hear that,' Mulder said, thinking. 'Did Mr. Dryer have any changes in his personality after that? Did he behave in any strange ways, do anything unusual, meet any new or strange people?'

'Oh, no, sir. Ja - Mr. Dryer was always friendly with everyone, but nothing like that. He played bridge, went out for a drink on Friday nights sometimes, church on Sundays just like everyone, but always the same people. And no one reported any strange or suspicious vehicles or persons here Wednesday or Thursday. Or ever, really.'

'And no recent changes in alcohol use, no drugs, anything like that?'

Barnes laughed. 'No, sir. He only had the occasional drink, sometimes two on his birthday or New Year's. He was a teetotaler, really. He went to the Legion hall, and he called for the bingo, and collected for the VA. He never let it get him down. But…' She hesitated. 'Sometimes you could see it, around Christmas, or around their anniversary. But he was happy. He used to play the stock market a lot and he was doing really well at it. He fixed up the driveway and my cousin Dave just installed a new air conditioning system and everything.'

'Did he start any new businesses in the last few years or have any unusual professional dealings?'

Her eyes narrowed. 'You mean, did he deal with the wrong people? Like the Mafia or something.' She shook her head angrily. 'No, sir. Never that stuff. He wasn't into anything like that.'

'I'm sorry,' Mulder said. 'I didn't want to infer anything illegitimate. It's just something we have to check.' He paced a little, then looked out the window. Barnes saw where he was looking. 'That gray duplex over there? That's Mrs. Schneid's place.' Barnes' nose wrinkled conspiratorially. 'She's kind of a busybody around here, always sits in the front window watching everything that goes on. Convinced something horrible's going to…' Barnes trailed off, looking down, and fiddled with her hat. Mulder moved the curtains; sure enough, a hunched figure was visible in the window, slowly rocking back and forth. 'Anyway, she didn't see anyone.' Barnes stared out the window at her, saying nothing.

The door opened and Scully came in. She saw the two of them talking together and raised an eyebrow. 'Mulder? I wondered what kept you.'

Mulder looked from her to Barnes and back again. 'I was just asking Officer Barnes about Mr. Dryer's habits.'

'I see that,' Scully said. Was that a trace of coolness? 'I called it in. Skinner says stay on site, work the case. I guess the rest of the business can keep for now.' She looked at Barnes. 'Anything on the second floor?'

'What?' said Barnes. 'Oh – no, ma'am. Just two rooms up there storage.'

Scully frowned. 'How do you know it was just for storage?'

Barnes coughed. 'Well, er… it's… just that my cousin David helped him move some things one time, and…'

'And you happen to keep up on everything in a small town like this,' Mulder supplied.

Barnes blushed gratefully. 'Yes, sir.'

Albright came in from the side door. 'Agent Mulder? The search is scheduled for 7 PM tonight. That's the earliest we can manage it; people need to get off work, get dinner, get ready. The second search will go in tomorrow with whoever's available.'

'Good,' said Mulder as they went out. 'Here's my card.' He handed it to Barnes, who was nearer. 'If you think of anything else, call me there, anytime. Oh: and I'll need that list of the, ah, "UFO wackos".'

Barnes frowned. 'Why?'

'The hikers from Ohio. It's a new factor for your area, and it might be worth checking them out.' He nodded at Albright. 'See you tonight.'

'Call me anytime?'

Mulder looked confused, then scandalized. 'Scully… come on. she's old enough to be my daughter.'

'No she's not,' Scully said tartly.

'Anyway, Esteban sounded pretty annoyed when we mentioned Tom Hearns,' Mulder said, changing subjects as sharply as he thought possible. He didn't even complain that Scully was driving.

'When you mentioned him. I think our basis for coming down here is pretty tenuous, Mulder.'

Tom Hearns had been Miranda's husband, and it was true that husbands often killed their wives. But Mulder could hardly deny that Tom Hearns had really merely been a lucky excuse to get involved in two disappearances and the lights. 'Why didn't you say that before?'

'I did say that before.'

'Well, it's a line we'll have to pursue – just not too fast.'

'So we can chase down your little green men, Mulder?' Scully snorted.

'So we can solve the case, Scully. Anything we do beyond that is just a bonus. You notice that the local constabulary thought those lights serious enough to send officers to check it out.' He slid into the car and she slid in beside him. 'What was that about hikers from Ohio?'

'They were in the Buttes southwest from here, I guess, out in the hills. If I can get her list, I can check out the contacts that saw the lights. Two of them had multiple sightings. It's strong, Scully. There's something important here.'

'But no connections. So the murders on our main time and UFOs as a hobby while we're here?'

Mulder shrugged. 'Any ol' justice, Scully. Any ol' justice. I just can't see how they could be a coincidence.'

'Little green men don't seem the kind to carry a two-hundred pounder out the door.'

'Levitation features in all kinds of abduction accounts, Scully,' Mulder said.

'And murder?' Scully shook her head. 'I don't think this is what you're looking for, Mulder.'

'It can't be a coincidence, Scully. It just can't.' He thought as Scully drove, gazing out the window. 'Another question is what lead the other team is working? Did you see any material in the file about multiple cross-border suspects?'

'No,' Scully said, frowning too. 'Maybe they came to the same conclusion we did.'

'Without seeing the Dryer site? I don't know what they're working with but maybe it's time to tele-snoop a bit.'

'How?'

Mulder held up an FBI business card engraved with the names Dean Stanley and Sam Thayer. 'I palmed it off McCarthy this morning.' He held the card between three fingers, then shook it twice and with a flick of his ring and middle fingers the card just disappeared.

Scully blinked, then grabbed Mulder's hand – but it wasn't on the back of his hand either. 'How'd you do that?'

Mulder laughed. 'A good magician never reveals his tricks, Scully.'

'Tell me and we can go see the giant ball of yarn,' she proposed.

Mulder's eyes lit up. 'Really?' Something crossed his mind. 'Jacob Dryer's file says he was a bingo caller. How do you get a hundred cows into a barn?'

'Put up a bingo sign. You told me this one before.'

'No one likes people who steal punchlines, Scully.'

END Chapter 3