Chapter 17: Chemistry.
When Scully was once gain satisfied with her ideas, had jotted them down and had listed the course of action that she was going to take once she returned to work the following day, she once again went searching for Mulder, but he had moved on and she listened as the shower ran. She knew that the sudden termination of their actions was going to leave Mulder unhappy, but she felt justified with the ideas that had just popped into her head. She took herself back to bed, stripped her self of all of her clothing and climbed in to wait for Mulder. She listened as he finished in the showed and began mulling about the apartment until he returned to her bed. Within the darkness Mulder was finally gratified. Finding Scully sprawled out and waiting for him once again was all that he needed to reinitiate his arousal and he was not disappointed with her playfulness of her agility the remainder of the evening.
By morning, however, they were back to their work relationship with new ideas and new experiments to explore. One night of passion had filled both of their head with answers to their questions but no proof to back them up. At least, by morning, Scully had put her anxiety aside and was ready to face the day once again.
The drive back to work was spent in high conversation on what they could or couldn't do to find the proof they needed, and it all came down to the forensic evidence they had found and what they may or may not learn for the other victims in the case. Mulder and Scully parted ways again in the basement of the building, as Scully rushed off to the lab and Mulder began reviewing the other cases that had been lumped together with their current case. The X-file that he held and perused was growing thicker and thicker with every passing day, and it was becoming clear that if their ideas were not correct they would soon be dealing with more dead bodies.
By mid morning Mulder had begun to see the connections that Scully had been making. All the women did deal with metals, but not just any metals, precious minerals that in their raw forms would be found in the same conditions as the gold that they were finding outside of its natural conditions. And the more he thought about the sex, the more he began to realize that Scully was right in assuming that it would cause the perfect conditions for gold production. He began to wonder if, coupled with the sexual encounter and the mixing of body fluids, the contact with metal was the key to his profile. The more the thought about it, the more it started to make sense and he started to list all of the profession in which someone could have contact with the minerals that were involved. Quickly his list became quite long and the idea that almost any woman could possibly be the next victim came to his mind.
Mulder was shaken out of his thoughts as the phone rang and he answered it.
"Mulder it's me, you might want to come up here and take a look at this," Scully said, the hint of excitement on her voice.
"What have you found?" Mulder asked as he stood, pulled his jacket on and gathered the file.
"We got him Mulder, you better get up here." She stated and hung up the phone.
Scully sat patiently staring at the slides under the microscope as Mulder walked into the lab. She pushed the chair away from the desk and looked up at him, a smirk across her face.
"Check it out," she stated motioning toward the microscope. "What do you see?"
"Gold," Mulder gasped as he saw the crystals through the microscope.
"That's right," Scully practically sang.
"How did you do this?" he asked shocked that they had come up with the right idea.
"Well, when I got up here I found this waiting for me." Scully stated, "These are the trace results as well as the DNA matches from the sample that we got from Max. He's a match to the hairs that were found in Emily's apartment as well as the semen that we got off of her body. So I thought if I can run his biological materials with a controlled sample I might be able to get the gold to form, like it did in the victim's blood. So using the swab I took and some blood that I had, I tried that, but nothing happened. So I tried adding some thinking more to the blood and I used the remains of the semen that we took from off of our last victim and voila!" she explained as she pointed to the microscope.
"Whose blood did you us?" Mulder asked still staring into the microscope.
"Mine, it was readily available." She stated.
"And what did you add to it?" He asked.
"Additional iron," she stated.
"Crazy," Mulder stated as he sat down before her. "So we can make more gold just like this? We can be millionaires after all?"
"No Mulder," Scully sighed and stared at him disapprovingly.
"Well I can say one thing," Mulder smirked trying not to laughed knowing that he had annoyed his partner enough with his gold obsession.
"What is that?" She asked rolling her eyes knowing that he was taking great pleasure in mocking and teasing her.
"You've cracked this case!" He smiled. "At my expense, but you cracked it none the less."
"Not bad for a non-believer?" Scully teased, as she winked at him and saucily tossed her hair.
"We have enough to pick him up." Mulder stated standing and practically running out of the lab, "Come on G-woman. We have lives to save!" he winked and walked out of the lab.
Scully shook her head, laughed and followed her partner. Even in the midst of something so terrible they were able to joke and have fun. It was the key to their partnership and ultimately their relationship. He would make her mad, she would drive him to the brinks of insanity and yet it always came down to this same loving and playful relationship that they shared.