The Mulder Files

by DrTaylor

I'm getting the impression that Firestarter was not a big hit in the U.K. - This story is currently being worked (again). In the intervening years, I've gotten married, had a baby, gone to college AGAIN, resulting in a new spate of student loans just in time for new episodes (worth every penny) and I'm hankering to give this another try. Wish me luck.

11. Eve

Sung to the tune of the X-files theme:

The X-Files is a show,

With music by Mark Snow.

I didn't write this show.

I do not own this show.

---

November 22 – 25

Scully is the one who finds the next case that day, while I'm pretending not to limp around. She saw something on the news and had the slides and crime scene reports messengered to us overnight. She even put the slides in the slide projector.

She's getting good at this.

The slides are pretty gruesome, I admit it. That guy is pale.

"Death by hypovolaemia. 75% blood loss. That's over 4 liters of blood," she quotes me while we're looking at the crime scene slides.

Now the thing you have to understand about the FBI is that while the cops can request us they rarely do. We sort of involve ourselves. So when we show up in whatever town this came from, we won't get a warm welcome and my leg hurts, but God is this guy pale.

"I'd say the man was running on empty," I quip, just to see her get annoyed.

Scully keeps lecturing while I get up and pull out my cattle mutilations file. "The man's daughter, 8 years old... was away from his side for no more than 10 minutes. She doesn't remember anything, there was no trace evidence to be found at the crime scene."

Pretty good. "Any evidence would have be washed away by yesterday's rain," I tell her, since it did, indeed, rain.

Scully never does the briefings. This is kind of fun.

"Oh, there were two small puncture wounds in the jugular." She shows me the picture – of the neck. Wow.

"Are you at all familiar with the phenomena of cattle mutilations?" I walk over to the projector and put on the fun slides – my slides. "Since 1967, over 34 states have reported unsolved cases of cattle mutilations. Trace evidence is remarkably similar. Incision marks of surgical precision. The area around the mouth and often the sexual organs have been removed. There's a substantial degree of blood loss but not a trace of blood at the scene." And that is the only thing, as much as it pains me to admit it, that these two cases have in common.

"How could that be?" she asks. Boy will she feel dumb.

I look her right in the eyes. "Exsanguination. If you were to stick a needle into the jugular of any living creature, the heart itself would act as a pump. These animals have had their jugulars punctured the same as the man in Greenwich, CT. Although this is the first time I've ever seen it on a human being." And that's the weird part – this doesn't really fit the pattern. But what the hell, maybe it's a new pattern? Either way, it's weird.

"But there was no sign of a struggle. How could a man just sit through a blood letting?"

"The ME found traces of digitalis, a South American plant that can be used as a paralytic drug," I tell her. She's not the only one who read the file.

She scans the folder I handed her. "Wait a minute. These X-Files indicate UFO related phenomena. Often there are related sightings in the sky near the incidences, along with surface burns..."

She's gonna say we don't have any of this – and she's right. Except for the girl not remembering anything, which coming from and eight-year-old might be a clue in itself. "Witnesses often relate time loss. We've seen this in abduction cases," I remind her, even though that annoying nine minutes is something I try not to bring up. "That might explain why the girl can't remember anything."

"Mulder, why would alien beings travel light years to Earth in order to play doctor on cattle?"

Didn't she go to middle school? Or watch E.T? "For the same reason we cut up frogs and monkeys," I tell her, backing toward the screen to point at the holes in Joel's neck, now being prominently displayed. "Besides, they seem to have stepped up their interest."

XXXXX

Scully is still a nervous flier, and it's never an end of fun to mess with her. This time I limp back from the bathroom and sit down.

"Hey," I whisper.

She looks up from her book. "What?"

"I heard a stewardess talking to another stewardess back there – what does an altimiter do again?" This was too much fun to think of.

Silence, for three seconds. "Why?"

"She said it wasn't working," I tell her, and watch her go pale.

XXXXX

It is late afternoon when we arrive in Greenwich but Teena – the little girl - is in a Social Services facility that used to be a house pending foster placement. We are met by a social worker who lets us in only after checking our ID and expresses her concern that we'll upset Teena exactly once before telling us, "Her mother passed away from ovarian cancer two years ago. There's no other family. We'll keep Teena here until we can place her with a foster family."

Not a happy outlook then. "Has she spoken about it?" I ask.

"No. Not a word."

It's a long shot the first night, but - "Any nightmares?"

"No. At least, not that I know of."

We peek in the window on her door. She's sitting on the bed in a really boring room. They could have at least brought some of her things. "Can we talk to her now?" asks Scully. The social worker nods, so she knocks on the door and we open it. Scully sits down on the bed and I take a chair and hope Scully being a woman will help calm the kid down.

"Teena?" She gets right in the kid's face, which I know is something I always hated when I was a kid. "These are the people we talked about. This is Miss Scully and Mr. Mulder. Do you think you could talk to them?" asks the social worker in a sugary kind of voice.

Teena nods, so the social worker leaves. I wish she'd stick around. Whatever. Scully takes the lead, thank goodness. "Hi. I know you must be feeling really sad right now. And scared. But we want to find out what happened so we can help stop whoever hurt your daddy, Okay?" asks Scully, getting no response to the rest of it. Teena nods. "Okay. Did you ever see any strangers with your daddy at home?"

She shakes her head. I love kids – yes or no. No equivocating, no subterfuge.

"Did you ever see... anyone yell at your daddy or your daddy yell at them?"

"No."

A word! Not even hesitant. Firmly spoken.

"Can you think of anyone who would want to hurt your daddy?"

"No."

How do you win kids over again? Oh, yeah, she's holding a bunny. "Nice bunny, Teena." Yeah, I got nothing else. She gives it a hug. "Can we talk about what happened that day? About what happened in the back yard?"

She nods.

"Yeah?" I try to draw on an FBI agent named Phil Taylor – he was my favorite interrogator. " Do you remember... any strange sounds or lights or anything like that?" Any questions about things in the sky will indulge the Wrath of Scully.

She shakes her head at first, and then she stops shaking her head, and it's like she's thinking of something. And then... "There was Red Lightening."

Scully twitches. She actually twitches. And I didn't lead her at all. Take that! "Can you tell me more about the Red Lightening?"

"I can't remember... it all went dark." For nine minutes, perchance?

Now, more questions to appease the Wrath of Scully, make sure my bases are covered. "Had you ever seen anything like that before?"

She nods. Holy Crap – multiple abductee?

"Yeah? When?"

"The men from the clouds, they were after my dad."

This is almost orgasmic. The men from the clouds, unprompted, from a kid, with Scully sitting right there.

And then Scully's phone rings.

"Scully..." a pause, "Where?"

"Why were these men after your Dad?"

"They wanted to exsanguinate him."

What the crap? Where does an eight-year-old learn that word? "Mulder..." Scully sounds serious, and I stand up and join her. "There's been another one," she whispers, and some dark horrible part of me jumps for joy.

Holy crap. Serial exanguinations by men from the clouds? My life's work is vindicated.

XXXXX

Doug Reardon even has a swing set, just like the Simmons guy. How perfect is that? "It's like looking at a mirror image," I can't help saying, when we finally make it to San Francisco and have a good look at the house and yard. Scully, as always, ignores this while reading the file on the murder.

"The victim, Doug Reardon, was married with one daughter. Cause of death, hypovilemia. Mulder, this is crazy. They also found traces of the poison digitalis."

Again. Wow. And not released to the media. "Puncture wounds?"

"Ah... yes. On the jugular. Time of death was estimated at 2:30 p.m. Same day, only three hours earlier than the Simmons murder."

Actually not. "That's Pacific standard time. That makes it the exact same moment." Huh.

"It appears we have two serial killers working in tandem." Because that, she can deal with.

"No. Serial killers rarely work in pairs. And when they do, they kill together not separately." I can say these things because I am the expert. Sad but true.

"Mulder, nothing beyond your leading questions to Teena Simmons substantiates a UFO mutilation theory."

That wasn't leading! "Was Reardon's daughter here when he was murdered?" I ask her.

"Yes... The police report states that she remembers nothing. Ah... she's with her mother and family in Sacramento."

This is too similar for words. "When will they be back?"

"Um..." she scans the report - "Tomorrow."

And then I'll be proven right. I feel like singing. "Even money... she'll remember Red Lightening." For now, though, I'm gonnna go back to the hotel and watch that show where Will Smith makes a fool of himself.

XXXXXX
The call comes while we're driving back to Doug Reardon's home the next day. Teena has been kidnapped. Last night, I gather, because I'm driving while Scully takes the call. She hangs up just as we pull up to the curb and get out of the car.

"She was kidnaped from the Social Services Home around 11 p.m. last night. Looks like someone was afraid she might remember too much,' Scully is practically dancing with glee, I think.

"Someone or something, Scully." I reply, but I know that's not gonna be enough to really get a good argument going.

She sighs. "Connecticut State Troopers set up road blocks within a half an hour. Nothing."

"Maybe they weren't looking in the right direction." I point up for good measure.

"I told them to contact us in case they find her."

Yeah. That'll happen. People, as a rule, don't get found. I knock on the door and Teena freaking opens it. No kidding.

"Teena?" asks Scully.

"No."

Holy shit. "What's your name?" Scully asks, although this is actually making sick sense without It.

"Cindy Reardon."

Uh huh. "You live here, Cindy?"

"Ever since I was born, 8 years ago." Snarky kid.

"Cindy, who's at the door?" calls a voice. Female. A moment later she appears. "Hello," she says, squinting like she's trying to place us. Cops crawling all over, it's no wonder.

"Hi," says Scully, "I'm agent Scully, this is Agent Mulder with the FBI. Could we ask you a couple of questions?"

Scully, that list just expanded by a couple of dozen.

"Come on in," says Mrs. Reardon. "I'll make some tea."

She parks Cindy on the couch in front of the TV and bustles into the kitchen. When she's gone, Cindy changes the TV from cartoons to a news conference. Weird kid. Her mom comes back a minute later with some mugs.

"Cindy really is a beautiful little girl, Mrs. Reardon," I tell her, wondering how exactly to spill these beans and what, indeed, these beans even are.

"Doug and I wanted to spoil her. We wanted to protect her from everything horrible in the world. She was daddy's little girl." She starts crying.

"Is she an only child?" I ask. Might as well get the obvious out of the way.

Mrs. Reardon nods.

"May I ask... Was Cindy adopted?" asks Scully, very gently.

"No. I gave birth to her at San Rafael General."

I can tell Cindy's listening. Oh well. "So," continues Scully, "I assume you have all the proper documentation. Birth certificate..."

"Of course I do."

Now the less obvious. "Was she the only child delivered at that birth?"

"What the hell kind of question is that? Look, I have told the police everything I know."

If we're breaking out the profanity that 's not good. I pull out the picture of Teena and her father from the Simmons file. "Mrs. Reardon, have you ever seen this man before?"

"This... is this your suspect?" What must it look like to her?

That would make sense, wouldn't it? She thinks Teena in the picture is Cindy. And she's not even batting an eye. Whatever's going on, she's not part of it. It's a picture of the two of them, happy, smiling. "No."

"Did he do something to Cindy?" She's panicking.

And I know this panic and I know that I caused it and now I don't know what to say or how to say it. "No... he... he did... he didn't..." I start stammering like a fool.

"No. Mrs. Reardon," Scully rescuse me, "This is not your daughter. That girl's name is Teena Simmons. She lives 3,000 miles away in Greenwich, Connecticut. That man, her father, was killed in the same manner as your husband."

I notice, during all this, that Cindy is sitting still. Is she listening? Probably.

"Cindy is my daughter. I can show you videos of her birth. We tried for six years to become pregnant."

Ah.

A line from a song pops into my head: I can see clearly now, the rain is gone. "In vitro fertilization?"

Nod.

"At which clinic?" Please follow my reasoning, Scully.

"Luther Stapes Center. Down in San Francisco."

That, ladies and gentlemen, is a lead. "Thanks," I almost whisper.

"Thank you, Mrs. Reardon," says Scully. "We'll be in touch." People must hate us even more when we say that.

XXXXX

Once we get outside though, I know it's gonna get bad. "Do you still believe this is UFO related? Cindy Reardon didn't see Red Lightening."

Well, technically, we didn't ask her, did we?

"I don't know. The only thing similar about these girls does seem to be their appearance."

"Well, there seems to be the random possibility that two people can have an unrelated likeness."

Oh please! This is not, wow, they look alike. They are identical. And also... "Who both just happened to see their fathers exsanguinated. I'd like to get the odds on that in Vegas."

She nods, resigned, I think, to my insanity. We get into the car.

"The girls are the one and only link between identical murders," she says as I start the car.

"One girl was just abducted," I remind her. We should protect Cindy.

"Kidnaped."

Ha. "Potato, potahto."

But it's a good point. I stop the car.

"Where are you going?"

"The murders were committed by the same person or persons. Part of the pattern involves kidnaping the daughter." For crying out loud, she just said it herself.

"And you expect the pattern to continue."

Wow, I totally expected her to jump on that person or persons thing.

"I'm going to keep an eye on the girl. You check out the clinic. See if the Simmons were enrolled in the same fertility program."

I climb out of the car.

"Okay. I'll call the San Francisco bureau and get someone to relieve you."

Awesome. "Okay," I reply, and then I go to scare the crap out of a poor grieving widow.

XXXXX

Once the relief crew gets there, I get a cab back to the hotel and turn on the TV. Scully interrupts Rescue 911 right when some kid is saving his classmate from choking on a Jolly Rancher waving a videotape. "Mulder," she says, "I think I have something."

Since no one's kidnapped Cindy yet, we have nothing else. "Okay," I tell her, "show me." She pops the tape in my VCR.

Apparently it's a video describing the joys of reproduction via little petri dishes, narrated by Sally Kindrick, M.D. Or so says the title.

"Dr. Kindrick was the supervising physician in both the Reardon's and Simmons' IVF program. It seems she was experimenting at the clinic," says Scully, although why she needed a video to tell me that I do not know.

On the other hand, it would help us identify her if we see her. "Maybe now she's trying to erase the results?" I ask Scully.

We turn back to the screen, where Dr. Kindrick is prattling on about how the Luther Stapes Center "can't guarantee everyone's success, but with our scientific advances, a little luck, and a lot of hope... miracles can happen."

"Well, she must have had an accomplice to have done both murders," Scully mutters.

That means some other grudge, right? "So you think this is a vendetta that she and a colleague have against the Stapes Center?"

The phone rings, and Scully grabs it even though this is my room. "Mulder, does this mean you've abandoned your UFO connection?" she asks as she picks up my phone. "Hello? Hello?" She hangs up. "Just a couple of clicks. Must be the wrong number."

The last time my phone clicked there was a van across the street. "I'll tell you what... I'm going to sleep on it and we'll talk about it in the morning." I guide her to the door, hoping she'll take the hint.

"Mulder, you're rushing me out of the room."

She took the hint. "No, I'm not."

"You got a girl coming over?"

This one's easy. She needs to work on her Mulder reading skills. "What's a girl?" I open the door. Actually, all there is America's Most Wanted and then a rerun of NYPD Blue, none of which is crucial to my life, but what can you do? "No, I have... there's a movie I want to watch on TV. Sleep tight. See you in the morning."

She probably thinks I'm watching porn.

The phone rings again.

"Meet me at the pier," he says, and hangs up.

XXXXX

He is waiting at the pier, just as he said. In the bushes. "Are you certain she hasn't followed you?" he whispers.

"Yes." And I am – she always assumes I'll stay in the room. "What are you doing here?"

He comes out of the bushes. "I was hoping we could take in a Warriors game." No thanks. Nicks all the way. "Actually I was just in the neighborhood... Wondered if I had ever told you about the Lichfield Experiments."

He knows he hasn't. "No you haven't." So much he can tell me. Bastard.

"Well, it was the most interesting project. Highest level of classification. All records have since been destroyed. And those who knew of it, denied knowledge of its existence." He breathes a lot, I notice. It existed during the height of the cold war. We got wind the Russians were fooling around with Eugenics. Rather primitively, I might add. Trying to crossbreed top scientists, athletes, you name it... to come up with the superior soldier. Naturally, we jumped on the bandwagon."

Ah. Which they called... "The Lichfield Experiment."

"A group of genetically controlled children. Raised and monitored on a compound in Lichfield. The boys were called Adam and the girls were called Eve. There's a woman you should see and I'll make sure that you can get in."

Into what? They can't still be there. "Where?"

"The Whiting Institute for the Criminally Insane," he says. Conveniently located nearby, outside Sacramento."

XXXXX

Scully grudgingly admits that it might be useful to follow his lead – he's done us good in the past, and I think he might be growing on her – and agrees to go with me. A quick check of the map later and we're on to the Whiting Institute, located under a closed industrial building in the outskirts of Sacramento. It seems crazy, I know, but if people escaped here they wouldn't even be able to tell where the city is from here. There's no clue, no direction. The buildings are so tall you can't see anything.

The front door is open and we are greeted by an armed guard at a desk. "Agents Mulder and Scully. We're here to see Eve 6," I tell him, which is the name on the paper he gave me.

"Deposit your firearms," she says, holding out a box. We do. "Sign for these." He gives us two little remote controls.

"What are those?" I ask him.

"Panic buttons." Terrific. "Can't let you inside without one."

They walk us through cages and corridors made of metal and mesh. This isn't a place where they help people. It's a place to hide them. Finally we stop at a door way down at the bottom and he hands us each a flashlight.

"Why the flashlights?" asks Scully.

"She screams and screams if we turn the over heads on. No one's ever gotten a good look at her."

Yay?

The door opens. "We'll be right outside," says the guard.

Great.

The inside is dark, so we turn the flashlights on. It smells in here – like someone's been living here for a long time and it never got any air. Which is true. The cell is dirty too, there's garbage and padded walls that look like they've seen better days.

At first I don't see her, and then I realize there's someone crouched in the corner in shackles. Her hair is matted and her teeth are yellowed. "Hello?" I ask, but I figure she's probably noticed we're there.

"Well it looks like you got what you're looking for... One of us at least."

What am I looking for? "Sally Kindrick..." mutters Scully. Oh.

"Cut off the chains... then we'll talk."

I think not. "They're probably there for a good reason."

"No. Bad reason. I paid too much attention to a guard. Bit into his eyeball." She giggles and gnashes her teeth. Gross. "I meant it as a sign of affection." She giggles again. "Are you going to give me an IQ test by any chance? I think I can top 265. We're very bright, we Eves. It runs in the family."

What the hell is this? "Where are the others? The other Adams and the Eves?"

"We're prone to suicide. All that's left is me. And Eve 7, she escaped early on. And Eve 8. She escaped 10 years later."

"Are you Sally Kindrick?" asks Scully, but I know she's not – they're too smart to be recaptured once they're out.

"That's not my name. But she is me and I am her and we are all together."

How does she know about Sally, I wonder, as she laughs. Are they psychically linked?

"Did you work for the Luther Stapes Center for Reproductive Medicine in 1985?" What's with the dumb questions Scully?

"1985? I've been tied up like this for two years and for what reason? For no reason, I did nothing. I'm just me. They made me. But did they suffer? No. No. I suffer. I suffer! They keep me alive for the Lichfield Project , they come in... they test me, they poke me... to see what went wrong. Sally knows what went wrong." Sally. That's Eve 7 then, if she was out and established in 1985 as an MD. Eve 6 points at us. "You and you. You have 46 chromosomes. The Adams and the Eves ... we have 56. We have extra chromosomes. Number 4, 5, 12, 16, and 22. This replication of chromosomes also produces additional genes. Heightened strength. Heightened intelligence."

And college comes back to me. Guess what else is in those chromosomes? "Heightened psychosis." I say to no one in particular.

"Saved the best for last." Scully must look doubtful because she tells me, "You don't believe me. I have proof. Look on the wall." She kicks her leg at the wall. "My family album."

I swing the light around, and I'm honestly not sure for a second what I'm seeing and then it hits me. There is a picture of all the Adams and Eves together. The eight Eves are Teena and Cindy.

Oh. My. God.

"My God," whispers Scully, "It's the girls."

"We were close," says Eve 6. "We were very close."

And then, because someone has to, I state what is now obvious. "Dr. Kindrick was using the clinic to carry on the Lichfield Experiment. She was cloning herself."

XXXXX

It's our turn for stakeout duty that night, once we're back, so we end up parked outside trying to keep ourselves entertained by working out theories of the case. "Suppose the killers are working for the Litchfield Experiment," says Scully, and the fathers were in on it. What if one or both of them were planning to talk?"

The fathers weren't in on it. How could they be? "If Eve 6 is right and there are two other Eves out there. That could account for the two identical murders occurring at exactly the same time. Sally Kindrick does have an accomplice," I tell her, and then to be dramatic, I add, "Herself."

"Until I heard that, I was beginning to suspect the girls."

They're too young. And they don't know about each other – how could they possibly collaborate on something like this? No way. "No. No, no, no. It seems the two remaining Eves are doing away with the parents in order to keep Teena and Cindy in the family." Scully pulls out the binoculars.

I can see Cindy at the window, looking out, and I wonder what she's doing up after midnight. "You suppose these girls have any idea of what they are?" asks Scully.

That I don't know, but they're eight. They must be starting to realize they're different now. "I hope not," is all I can say.

Cindy's light turns on. "Mulder, let's go," says Scully and we both get out of the car and run for the house.

Now I don't know about Scully but I'm mostly thinking one thing, which is basically gotta get inside. "I'll take the back," I tell her, because that's closest to the stairs.

Scully takes the front door, and I keep running. It's a bit like calling shotgun – you fight it out later, but for now, you just go. Sadly, I am only able to go as far as the backyard before someone busts out the back door carrying Cindy, which leaves me no choice but to point my gun at them, which is utterly futile, because there's no way I'm gonna shoot while she's got the kid. "FBI. I'm armed." Eve whatever stops and looks at me at least. "Which one are you? Eve 7 or Eve 8?"

She points a gun at Cindy's head. Worse than I thought. "Drop it. You know I'm capable. Slow. Real slow." I know she's capable. I put my gun down and she runs. And then I pick it up to follow but she's already in a car and moving and nowhere near my car, of course, so I can't follow, but not for lack of trying on foot.

Scully is dealing with the police when I get back from chasing the car three blocks, showing her ID and doing what she's good at – making people like her. Mrs. Reardon is there, freaking out and wrapped in a blanket, and I sit down next to her after telling Scully what happened. She is strangely silent during this, quiet and scared. I can hear Scully telling the cops Sally Kendrick's name (good choice) height and weight, the fact that she may have a similar-looking accomplice (nice way to not say identical) and describing the car I described to her – which, since '93 Corollas are about as common as dirt, does me no good.

When she's done, she joins us, and Mrs. Reardon says, "What if she kills her?"

Unlikely. "Mrs. Reardon, the fact that Kindrick and her accomplice murdered the fathers and abducted the girls means they want them alive. I'm sure Cindy's alive and we'll find her."

Mrs. Reardon now starts crying and walks away. This is no good.

"And then what do we do?" asks Scully. She's right. What if whoever is following the Eves puts two and two together? Dammit!

XXXXX

I think the waiting is the worst part, but that's only because I'm impatient. Maybe Scully likes the waiting, who knows? She seems calm enough. Hours pass, and again and again new people come in and out of the house, some going up to Cindy's room and some staying downstairs. Mrs. Reardon has locked herself in her room and who's to blame her?

How much is too much?

Anyway, since it's an FBI case in conjunction with local authorities, if something happens that no one thinks is important, we get the call, which means my phone starts ringing about two hours in with crank callers. This at least passes the time.

Until the third hour.

When the phone rings again, with yet another transfer, I seriously consider pretending to go through a tunnel, but I just can't. Call me an old softie, but I'm still waiting for that call, and just in case... karma, you know?

"Hello," I tell the motel manager, "This is Agent Mulder with the FBI."

Here we go.

"Agent Mueller? Hello Agent Mueller. This is Jack Smith at the Port Reyes Motor Inn. I'm calling about that girl – Candy? Candy Renton?"

"Cindy Reardon?" I ask. Sigh.

"Yeah, her. I think she's in my motel. She pulled up in a car with a dark-haired woman, just like the TV said. I was cleaning the pool. Wouldn't have thought anything of it except she walked up to me and told me I should use chlorine to-" he pauses "-irradiate the dinoflagellates in the pool."

Oh my.

"Thank you, Mr. Smith," I tell him. "That's very helpful." And it is.

"Thank you, Mr. Munster," he replies, and I hear a click before I can correct him.

Scully is giving directions to one of the cops when I hang up. "That was a motel manager in Port Reyes that says he's got a guest that matches Sally Kindrick's description," I tell her.

"We just found the car at the airport."

"She might have ditched it," I point out, which isn't even unlikely. "The manager said this woman checked in with a little girl. That she leaves the hotel in the afternoon by herself, was gone all night and returns the next day with the little girl."

"Someone else could have picked up the little girl without the manager knowing about it. The place is crawling with vacationing families. There would be hundreds of little kids running around."

True. But - "No, he remembers this kid. She told him he should use chlorine to irradiate the dinoflagellates in the swimming pool. Does that sound like someone we know?"

She nods, then, and I know I'm not crazy. "That's it."

XXXXXX

The drive to Port Reyes takes seven hours, and that's speeding with sirens on, bypassing several tolls, and generally being incredibly reckless. But we make it, and the cops are sitting outside like we asked. That seemed like a really good idea – seven hours ago. Just watch.

After all, what good would a cop be against a superhuman?

That used to be a good idea.

What idiot said Port Reyes should be seven hours from San Diego anyway?

"I waited like you told me. No one's gotten out and no one's gotten in," he says, which at least tells me they're probably safe.

And then there's a noise – like a scrape.

"Get the back!" someone yells – maybe me, maybe not, and we all rush for the building.

Inside is a tragedy – and yet not. There is a woman – Sally Kindrick? - on the floor, dead. And then I hear her-

"They left,"

Scully stands from where she's checking for a pulse. "Who's they?"

"Her and another lady."

"We were all supposed to drink but we only pretended to drink it."

"They tried to poison us." They cling to each other.

"What did the other lady look like?" I ask, but I know the answer before they point to the lady on the floor.

"Eve 8. They were working together," I tell Scully. But she knows.

"It's all right. We'll take care of you. You're safe with us," she says, which is what you're supposed to tell kids in these situations.

The girls stay quiet, though, while the M.E. Comes and bags up the body, and while the cops stand around and confer. It's creepy. The Eves dressed them in matching red suits, and their staring is just... creepy.

What the hell is wrong with me? They're just little girls.

"Looks like the Eves mixed about 4 ounces of digitalis in each glass," says Scully, holding out one of the glasses. Charming.

"Their own mini Jonestown," I tell her, even though I know she figured that out. "Eve 6 said they were prone to suicide."

"It has a sweet flavor. It's probably not even perceptible in soda."

Lovely.

One of the police officers who was looking for Eve 8 comes back. "We're still searching the area but still no sign of the other suspect. We'll have an officer take the girls back."

"Ah, maybe it would be better if we took responsibility for the girls," I say, but I don't know why I said it.

"We could take them to get checked out by a doctor," says Scully. She doesn't even blink.

"Okay, whatever," says the cop, and I wonder if he's as unnerved as I am.

Someone has taken them outside, and Scully walks over, doing her maternal instinct thing. "We're going to take you back," she says.

"Back where? What's going to happen to Teena?" says one. That would be Cindy, then. I pretend not to hear – they don't want those answers. We just get them in the car, and they don't protest.

"They've already grown so attached. It's going to be hard when Teena gets placed in foster care," Scully says before we get in after them.

"Yeah." Something's not right.

XXXXX

After the hospital, where both girls are given a clean bill of health, we drive the girls home. It's still a long trip, and we're both tired, when -

"Agent Mulder, I have to go to the bathroom."

Sigh. Kids.

"Me too."

I find myself saying something I never thought I would say.

"Can you hold it?"

"I really need to go."

"I could use some caffeine," adds Scully.

Women. Ganging up on me. Fine. I pull into a truck stop and park. We walk up to the counter – thank God there's no line. "Hi. Where's your bathrooms?" I ask, sounding like a desperate father more than anything else.

"In the back. Let me get you the key." She hands it over and I order us each a soda while Scully takes the girls to the restroom, then hit the men's room myself, because, well, I might as well.

When I get out, one of the girls is at the table with all four drinks. "Those are the diet?" I ask.

"I think these are," she says, pointing to two of them.

I take a sip.

"Are you sure? These are really sweet." They are, too. Surypy.

"I know they are. I saw her pour it."

Oh, who really cares? "Okay."

Scully comes out with the other one. "Let's go."

"Come on," I tell the others, and then I have to go back and pay for the drinks (duh) and even let whichever one is with me pay for them. Scully is complaining about her drink being syrupy too. Must be something wrong with the system. But I don't have the keys.

"You didn't pick up my keys off the counter, did you?" I ask the kids.

They shake their heads.

Fine.

"All right. I'll be right back."

Sigh. I'm tired.

I go inside and grab the keys off the counter – and then I see the table.

The table where the kid had our drinks.

Something green.

Suddenly I'm awake.

I come running outside, and Scully is drinking form her poisoned soda. For crying out loud! They're little girls.

Enhanced psychosis.

"SCULLY!"

"What?" I rush down the stairs.

"I just wanted to open the car door for you," I tell you, and ignore her look as I knock the drink out of her hand.

"Mulder..."

I bend down as I open the door, and whisper, "It's them, they poisoned them, let's just get them into the car."

But they're gone. They knew.

Enhanced intelligence.

"I only had a sip," I say.

"We didn't drink enough to make us sick."

We pull out our guns.

They're little girls. They should be innocent. Dammit.

We wander through the truck stop, trying to find something and eventually I do hear their little feet pattering around, just little girls. And then, there they are. "SCULLY! I GOT THEM!" I yell.

"LEAVE US ALONE!" yells one of them. Dammit. They're little girls. They'll get away if – Just Dammit.

"SCULLY!"

A truck driver overhears, of course. With a shotgun. And a wife. "HEY! What the hell are you doing?"

"Back off. We're federal agents." It's worth a try.

"Yeah, and these are America's Most Wanted?" You have no idea, buddy. "Hands in front."

"LEAVE US ALONE!" Yell the girs. I hope they're enjoying this.

"Get in the truck, girls," says the wife. They squirm away from me and run to her. "Get in. I'm going to call the police."

They won't get in, I tell myself, as Scully says, "We are the police."

"Mulder!" she yells then as they run away through the trucks. They wouldn't get in the truck because they know we can prove our story. And if the police came, there would be no escape.

"They went that way," one driver finally tells me. We return to the truck stop. Nothing. A bus pulls out. They could be anywhere, stowing away on anything. God. The waitress is still inside. "Did you see the twins we were with?" asks Scully.

"No. There's a bunch of school kids just left in that bus."

Great.

Wait.

Too obvious. School buses have radios, roll calls, it's too conspicuous.

They're still here.

Somewhere. I turn to Scully.

"I have an idea." She raises an eyebrow.

I'm totally making that up, of course, but I just let it come spilling out of my mouth. "Scully, what if we were to pretend to drive off? If you drive out after the school bus, they might show themselves."

They'd see just me get in the car, though," she says. Yeah...

"Get in on the passenger side, and I'll get in on the driver side, then I'll crouch low and get back out. If you climb into the driver's seat while I hide, that should keep them from seeing.

She thinks it over. Not my most articulate plan. Whatever.

"Okay." So that's what we do, and then I wait. Sure enough, a tarp over a boat starts twitching. I keep to the shadows, and sneak up behind them as the girls crawl out into the night.

"Forget your sodas?"

"We didn't do anything wrong."

"We're just little girls."

Bull. "That's the last thing you are," I tell them, and then I handcuff the closer one to the boat rail and throw the key into the night.

That should hold them, I think, and I'm right. The other one won't leave her "sister". Instead she sits, glaring at me, as Scully comes back and handcuffs her too, then stands back, out of reach.

"You killed your fathers," I say, meaning it as a question.

"Yes," one of them says.

"We cultivated the plants ourselves," says the other.

How the hell- "How did you know?" I ask.

"We just did."

The police arrive ten minutes later and take the girls away to be evaluated. We can't tell them apart, so Mrs. Reardon is called to get Cindy, but as soon as she finds out that Cindy is in custody for murder she refuses to come down and visit. We drive back to San Diego in silence, and check into our hotel and go to bed.

It's not right.

XXXXX

The next day, the girls are gone, transferred to another facility. Teena's forms are signed by a social worker, but Cindy's are signed by her mother. Which means someone got to her.

We drive back to her house to try to talk some sense into the woman, to try to track the girls – the location of the "facility" where they're being kept is blank. I have a feeling I know where it is, though – and that I won't get in a second time.

I let Scully conduct the actual interview. She's better with people. I let her knock on the door, ask for a minute, and ask about the form.

Mrs. Reardon invites us in.

"I just wanted to know if you could tell us about this facility where Cindy is being kept," she says, as Mrs. Reardon examines a photo of Cindy with her father.

"They said they have an excellent program that can help her," Mrs. Reardon tells us.

I decide to try to talk. "They can't hide behind the bureaucracy, Mrs. Reardon. You have every right to know what happened. You have a right to know about your daughter."

"All I need to know is she was not my daughter. She never was." And that about sums it up. We won't get any help. If we did know where she was, maybe we could try to follow through. But someone came in and took the problem away.

Scully drives us back to the hotel, and we type up our reports and exchange them to read. For once, they're pretty similar. I suppose the facts sometimes just are what they are.