Four
Scully smiled at the doorway which led to the basketball court that had been created in Mulder's 'open space'. It was an alteration in the laws of physics she did not understand and had given up trying to. Underneath the room was large but empty, except when Mulder walked in it turned into whatever he wanted, generally some sort of sports arena or field, although she had caught him more than once sitting in what had been their grassy backyard in Virginia. The first time she had gone to sit next to him and cried, only to discover that he had been crying too.
They were still lonely.
Even with the basketball game in full swing in front of her, with six people on each side, Mulder was sitting on the bleachers instead of playing. He was refereeing, probably because he had again been surprised by how many people had come and they had needed somebody to volunteer to sit out, but it still made her feel sad for them to see him sitting on his own smiling at a game he was not participating in. And when he sensed her watching him and then walked towards her, the game did not stop; nobody even noticed.
"Hi stranger," she whispered, watching his smile widen exponentially when he got closer. She slid her hands up his chest and hugged him tightly. She knew he was surprised, but she couldn't help herself. She needed to hold him in those brief moments of loneliness that flitted around their healthy, productive lives. Mulder hugged her just as securely, tucking her head under his chin and stroking her hair that had grown past her waist.
"Got another full house to group therapy," he mumbled, chuckling when she laughed and pulled her head back.
"I can see that," she teased, her blue eyes glistening. "Eddie and I have something to show you, but it can wait if you have serious psychological issues to deal with here." Mulder glanced thoughtfully back at the vibrant basketball game between several of the agricultural scientists, all men, all Asian or European. One of the taller Russians stole the ball and took a three-pointer and his half of the group cheered. Mulder turned quickly back to Scully.
"I don't think they'll miss me," he declared. Scully grinned, ignoring the stab of truth at his words, and clutched at his hand to lead him out. As soon as he left the room the basketball court disappeared.
"He-ey!" Mulder stuck his head back around the corner.
"Sorry guys, important medical business with the little lady. Same time tomorrow!" They laughed and rolled their eyes at him, just as Mulder had hoped with his careful yet coy choice of words. Somebody mentioned getting out a deck of cards, and Mulder was happy. Everyone was socialising a lot better in recent weeks, times, whatever, and that was technically his job there as a psychologist; to help them live with each other. Well he was doing his best, and it seemed to be paying off. He was getting to know them all a lot better, and he was pretty sure all the men who had turned out for basketball that day had been human.
Yep, he thought. Pretty sure.
Scully led Mulder silently up the stairs and he let her, letting go of her hand and resting his palm against her lower back just as he had done so many times when they had worked together at the FBI. He was slightly nervous about the way she had hugged him in the room, and he wished for a moment he could read her mind. Perhaps she had missed him, he reasoned. He had not seen her since she woke him up that 'morning' and told him she had to get an early start at the labs. She had been dressed and out of their quarters before Mulder had even cleared the sleep from his eyes.
"How come you weren't playing today?" she asked as they ascended the steeply curved stairs that ran around the inside hallway of Tower One, one of three cylindrical structures below the ice, connected by sloping ramps. Tower One was mostly administrative, and included all the medical quarters. It was where Mulder and Scully spent most of their days. Tower Two was residential and their private quarters were on the top floor. Tower Three was preservationist, and every floor was stacked with nurseries and plantations and indoor farms for everything from grain to fish.
All the rooms in every Tower were wrapped in a circular shape and the hollow centres provided access to escalators and elevators. If Mulder and Scully were feeling lazy or if they had eaten too much at dinner at the base of Tower Two, it did not take a lot of effort to get to where they were going, but they both enjoyed the stairs and the exercise. And Scully was a doctor; he had learned when not to complain.
"Odd numbers," he answered casually. "I can play in there any time I like but they gotta wait for me to turn up so it's only fair. They were saying they all just got up for their day." Scully nodded. She was aware she and Mulder kept a different timetable to almost everyone else, but it felt right for them, and they were usually casual about the time they kept. If they had a particularly long day at the labs then they would go to bed as though they hadn't, perhaps sleep in, and then get up and start whenever they were ready.
It had taken them both a very long time to get used to the lack of 'time' in Antarctica, but Mulder thought they were doing quite well. Adjusting to other things had been more difficult, like the fact they were the only Americans, and the fact their best friends were a pair of aliens hiding in African American bodies, and the reality that they were searching for two very important things: a cure for an alien plague to save those friends' species, and a remedy to kill the supersoldiers to save their own.
"He's here," Scully announced as they got to the floor to enter the restricted area. Mulder saw Eddie and Michael waiting outside and gaped.
"Did you make them wait out here?" he asked.
"It's 'restricted'," she repeated. "I was told upon arrival that only I can go in and I can only bring others in while they're with me. I kicked them out to come and find you."
"May I point out that I was the one who told you that?" Michael huffed, clearly not impressed. Scully only smirked. Michael looked like a tall, skinny, bald black man in his late twenties. He had a smug sort of smile and he was friendly enough, but Mulder still had not warmed to him after finding him bent over an unconscious Scully with his mouth on her breast. His excuse? Well, he was just a curious little alien who didn't have women in his own world. Yeah, SURE.
It was true, Michael was the equivalent of an adolescent, but Mulder always felt more protective about Scully when Michael was with them. He knew he was being stupid and that Michael had been a good student of Scully's since the two of them had sat down for some serious talks, and he seemed to respect her, but that was what Mulder had thought 'before'. Mulder would never, ever forget that day, and he had told Michael in no uncertain terms that if he ever laid a hand on Scully again Mulder would kill him, alien or not. He knew how.
Eddie, standing calmly beside Michael, was a much better friend. He was nearly as tall as Michael with a thick afro and a happy face. He was physically extremely strong. He was also a scientist in his own world who had been fascinated by earth and its people, and he was desperate to find a cure for the plague which had prevented them reproducing effectively for several of their years. They had already foregone hopes of colonisation and stripped the Northern Hemisphere of its resources searching for a cure that could supposedly be found on the earth, but they had yielded no promising results.
A part of Mulder wasn't sure if he really wanted to find a way to eradicate the supersoldiers. He was worried that if they did that, Eddie's promise not to destroy the south in continued search for their own cure might not mean as much.
But they both seemed genuine and Mulder had to trust them. Or at least try. He trusted Scully, and Scully trusted them, so that was good enough for him.
Scully held her palm against the unseen pad on the door below the directional light and waited as her palm was read, her blood tested, her eyes scanned and her voice analysed. Then the door opened. Mulder blew out a playful sigh of relief and she reached back to swat him, laughing. She was used to the routine, and it did not take 'that' long.
"We have something to show you," she assured him. "I think you'll be very happy."
"Came through on the network an hour ago," Eddie added. "Straight to Michael."
"Michael?" Mulder asked, surprised. Michael nodded. He was, after all, the 'leader' of the Complex, not that anybody would know it considering he masqueraded as a cleaner. His caretaker, the alien man who provided a father role, was important and had put his favourite 'son' in charge of their species' last hope. Mulder knew Michael was not as bright or knowledgeable about earth and its resources and people as Eddie. Mulder wasn't sure that caretaker's decision had been the smartest.
"As soon as they started telling me and I realised I stopped them," Scully explained, leading him to the large, cluttered but ordered workbench they had spent most of their time at, researching using the computer network's available systems and their own less technologically advanced methods like published books and the old fashioned microscope. Mulder smiled as he glanced at it. He loved watching Scully bent over that microscope.
"Wipe the grin, buddy," Eddie teased, catching him in his moment and causing Scully to glance at him suspiciously as his expression became unreadable almost immediately.
"Go on," he urged her. He watched her perch on her stool and tap around on the tall, wide screen in front of her until she found what she was looking for. Mulder peered at the image in front of him. It was a moving picture, he realised. Like on an old, stationery security camera. "What am I looking at?"
"That's the coastline," Scully identified, running her hand along the screen to divide it in two. "And just moving over-" She brushed her hand to the right and the screen jolted, panning across for her. "We've got some sand dunes, and 'here' is what we found." Mulder examined the space her finger had tapped. It looked like a whirlpool had sucked the sand down into a sudden hole in the ground.
"Your lot sent this through?" Mulder asked, glancing at Michael and Eddie. Michael nodded.
"With a message," he added. "As you know, we have someone working on the inside of the supersoldier project who knew about this. It happened a while ago so we think he's been caught up in the panic and didn't get a chance to tell us the coordinates. He was never sure when it was going to be; she never told him she found it until it was done, for security."
"She? And where is this? What 'is' this?" Mulder asked.
"This is the coast of Namibia and Angola in west Africa. That is what is left of a residency of humans working on the supersoldier program in research and development. We estimate up to fifty humans were killed along with the lab and their data, but we can't be sure of the exact numbers as some may have been supersoldiers. 'She' is a woman the supersoldiers know as Eve. The message we got accompanying this is that 'Eve's started'. As soon as I mentioned the name Dana insisted on coming to get you."
"Eve," Mulder repeated slowly, thinking back to conversations with a tall, strong brunette who lugged a car-sized carton of resources across the desert so they didn't go hungry. She had been one of the two first, Adam and Eve. "That wouldn't be Shannon McMahon?"
"I think it is," Scully agreed, grinning. "Eddie, tell him what you told me."
"Eve is a supersoldier, we know that," he explained. "Our 'person' on the inside of the program discovered her and formed an alliance with her at the first signs of her differences with the rest of the supersoldiers. He's kept us informed of her actions, and Eve and our accomplice are the reasons why you have come here. She went to him in Mexico and upon finding out you would be rejected from the other processing centres he arranged for you to come here. He realised you may be of some benefit to us. Your knowledge, that is."
"So when she went there, he knew who we were?" Mulder asked.
"If he didn't at first, once he spoke to me he did," Eddie answered. "Your names were spread around a bit a while ago. Those of us who know of the original plans for colonisation with men your fathers' age know of you and your efforts to bring truth to your people. You knew everything you could have discovered as part of your world, in your positions. But that's off track. Eve is a supersoldier whose differences from the project allow her to retain her pre-existing moral code and to access her free will and feelings. She is working against them."
"That'd be Shannon," Mulder replied with a wide grin. "What'd she do, blow it up?"
"Yes," Michael chuckled. "She took seven earth days to do it too, made it look TOO easy."
"She accessed the supersoldier residency seven nights in a row," Scully elaborated for Mulder. "We think she was periodically placing explosives but she might have done it all on the first night and then just toyed around a bit. But it is Shannon. You know her sense of humour. What you're seeing on the screen here is real time so she's nowhere to be found. Hopefully...considering what we know of her...she rebuilt herself and escaped."
"Would she have had to climb up through the sand?" Mulder asked.
"Well...If her lungs are waterproof they may as well be sand-proof too," Scully reasoned.
"How do you know about how long it took and what she accessed?"
"The full message was 'Eve's started. Achieved positive access over one week, and on the seventh day she rested. Adam is dying." Michael recited from memory. Mulder smirked at the Biblical references and risked a brief glance at the golden crucifix sitting between Scully's collarbones amidst the dark blue of her polo shirt.
"Did you want to try to contact him?" Eddie asked, leaning against the desk beside Mulder.
"There's a phone here we don't know about?" Mulder taunted playfully. "By all means." Eddie rolled his eyes and shook his head with mock shame.
"No man, we'll be takin' a walk for this. But I want to see if he's home. Dana, if you would please step aside?"
"Of course," Scully agreed, sliding off the tall chair and moving to stand beside Mulder, her arms folded seriously. They both watched Eddie rattle the keys or the keyboard on the desk with an unnatural dexterity to his long, brown fingers. His large hands obscured almost all the keys, and Scully again marvelled at his fluency in English and his command of the alphabet. Though their language was so much more primitive than Eddie's, it could not be that hard for them to learn. They could read each other's minds, after all.
However, Scully supposed it was like anything else in life; the ones who really excelled were those who 'wanted' to learn, and Eddie certainly wanted. After spending more time with them, Scully had realised Eddie's grasp of all forms of human communication, verbal and non-verbal, far surpassed Michael's. The passion was not shared by the young commander, but Scully was heartened by the presence of passion for her world in at least one person who did not owe her or any other human his time or concern. Eddie's passion for the human world stirred her, and made her more passionate. It kept her optimistic.
"What are you doing?" Mulder asked, tilting his head to the side as he watched some sort of network window pop up. There was no text on it; it was a black square amidst the much larger screen. Eddie did not reply. He shut his eyes and pressed his finger onto the screen. Mulder saw his lips move and he heard Scully's gasp above the quiet whispers audible in a foreign tongue. With them, Eddie and Michael had spoken nothing but English in either their American accents or something more polished, possessing a subtle British clip from their English 'lessons'. It was the first time Eddie had ever spoken in tongues, and he seemed to be speaking into a little black box.
Mulder would have thought it was a scene from a very bad movie if he was not standing a metre from the man. In fact, he would have enjoyed watching such a movie cuddled up with his partner on his couch in his old apartment. Number 42. How he missed that couch.
Eddie pulled away as suddenly as he had connected and turned to them with a wide smile.
"She's there," he told them, excited. "We've got an appointment. Clear everyone out of your open room Mulder. The four of us are heading there now."
"Any requests?"
"It's taken care of," Eddie promised with a smirk, ushering them out of the research office, but not before a stubborn Scully ran her usual checks on all her equipment and the locks on the doors which led to integral storage facilities and her other offices. Mulder hid his smirk when he saw the indignation on Michael's face. Eddie followed her with his eyes. He looked to be quietly marvelling at the human compulsion to always double check.
"If you think that's bad, you should have seen her 'all' the times she thought she'd left her FBI wallet in random hotels around the country," Mulder mumbled. It was heard by all, and Scully laughed, completing her checks and sealing the final door with her genetic imprint as they huddled in the hallway.
"And where was it 'all' the time, Mulder?" she asked, her voice ultra-sweet and teasing. Eddie led the way back down the stairs, Michael at the rear.
"Oh it was in my pocket," Mulder assured them all proudly. Eddie laughed loudly and freely, and Michael twittered in Mulder's ear. He suppressed a shiver at the sound and was thankful he was between Michael and Scully.
When they entered Mulder's empty room, Scully grinned widely. It was his old apartment. Her heart fluttered with nostalgia as she took her time walking around, running her hand over the top of the television. She laughed at the stack of pornographic videos on the floor beside the VCR and her smile softened as she glanced at the fish tank in the corner, beside the desk and the window she had stared out of many times. She had taped masking tape across it once, desperate, and she had stood where she was standing so many times it was like coming home. It was almost too cruel to realise it was merely an illusion.
Mulder collapsed instantly across the couch and sighed, happy.
"Care to make some room there?" Scully asked, kneeing his hip impatiently.
"Could you have picked a more cramped place?" Michael asked, looking around. "This isn't seriously where you used to live. It's a third of the size of this space's capacity."
"Well it had other rooms," Mulder shot back.
"He only wanted this one," Eddie replied. Mulder narrowed his eyes at him slyly.
"You do this, don't you," he stated. "You can read my mind." Eddie shrugged, expressionless. He had refused to answer that one question that kept coming up. But Mulder knew that he himself was not psychic, and he had no kinetic powers. His most powerful attribute was his photographic memory, and though it was obviously good considering these places he visited in the room were exact replications, he had no ability to transform those memories into reality. Eddie and Michael had masqueraded as the humans who had guided them around the complex upon their arrival; they had introduced him to the room. It had to be them. It had to be Eddie.
"Why?" Mulder asked.
"We knew this room would be safe under your protection," Eddie replied. "It's a window."
"You're not saying we're 'really' here, are you?" Scully asked.
"No, if that were true you could never sit on a baseball field under the stars or in your old backyard. Those places no longer exist. But in another time and place, they do." Scully nodded, feeling tears of confusion sting her eyes, for she still did not understand. It was beyond her physics, beyond the boundaries of her imagination, and for all the comfort the room brought her, it always made her sad. She looked towards the fish tank so nobody saw her trembling lower lip as she fought to control herself.
"So what are we waiting for?" Mulder asked. The atmosphere had almost shivered as Scully's mood took a dive, but he knew touching her or drawing attention to her would force her to shut her emotions down or let them free, and he wasn't sure they had the time for either. "How do they know to come to this room, and not, say, head to the baseball field?"
"We can find each other," Michael answered smartly. Mulder simply nodded, sitting back against his couch and inhaling. It smelt like his couch. The filter of the fish tank bubbled softly. Scully's breathing was steady beside his. In the last few months before his abduction, as they had grown steadily closer and dealt with the newest aspect of their relationship, they had fallen asleep on his couch many times. Scully had sometimes woken him; he had often asked her to stay. Twice Scully falling asleep in his arms on the couch was consent enough, and he had carried her to his bed and tucked her in. Everything had changed so quickly after then. It had never been the same.
"Can we change this?" Mulder asked, staring directly at Eddie as his heart began to beat quickly in his chest, his memories coming too quickly and accurately for him to control.
Scully. William. Leaving. His apartment.
Scully on the floor in the light. His hand over where her heart still was. Sobbing.
Him kneeling in the hallway in the dark. She's dying. Go to her.
Scully waking him as he slept on the couch. 'I just want to hear you beside me. Don't go.'
Scully rocking him as he cried restlessly after his mother's death.
'I won't go, Mulder.'
Scully hushing him to sleep in his bed as he wept for his mom. Scully saying she loved him.
'I love you too Dana.'
'You've seen this movie forty-two times? Doesn't that make you sad, Mulder? It makes me sad.'
'Merry Christmas Mulder.'
"Think of somewhere different then," Eddie urged him as Mulder rested his painfully dazed head in his large hands.
Scully had kept her eyes closed as she battled to control her tears, but when Michael whistled appreciatively she opened her eyes and gasped. She and Mulder were no longer sitting on his couch. They were sitting on the large, cold marble and limestone steps of the Lincoln memorial. It was day time. The sky was a bright blue, there were no clouds, and the water feature that stretched out in front of them rippled in a gentle, cool breeze, reflecting the sun.
Scully stood and turned around, staring past the pillars either side of her and up into the face of the familiar statue. She could swear she felt a chilled draught as the breeze swept in and around the columns.
"In this Temple, as in the hearts of the people, for whom he saved the Union, the memory of Abraham Lincoln is enshrined forever," she whispered, reading what she could make out from such a distance and reciting partly from memory. Mulder opened his eyes and turned around to stare up at her, balancing with a palm against the cool stone. "Very nice, Mulder," she assured him, her voice shaking. "I don't think after this anyone will remember Abraham Lincoln."
"I don't know Scully," Mulder replied, standing up and observing the monument for himself. He could walk forward and touch it if he wanted, but he didn't dare. "The end of the civil war, the end of slavery; that's what this stands for. History repeats itself, does it not?"
"In its own ways," she agreed softly, reaching for his hand and squeezing his fingers firmly. "Are you okay?" she asked. She had heard him request another space. He had never done that before. Mulder nodded silently, and it told her that he most certainly was not okay. "I love you Mulder," she whispered. She was not sure whether Eddie or Michael was close enough to hear her, but they already knew anyway, even if they could never truly understand.
Scully had realised that in all his rooms Mulder kept bringing her home with him. The baseball field where he had taught her to swing, the basketball court she had found him practising in one day, the basketball arena in New York where they had gone to a Knicks game together, their backyard, their bedroom, his apartment; all bringing her home. He was clicking his heels and wishing for their return to Kansas. It was heartbreaking and inspiring, because it told her that for all he had achieved, for all they had learned, they were hopelessly lost, and all Mulder craved was a simple life he could never get back.
"The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear?" she whispered, rubbing her thumb over the top of his hand. "The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? Though a host encamp against me, my heart shall not fear. Though war rise against me, yet I will be confident. For he will hide me in his shelter in the day of trouble; he will conceal me under the cover of his tent; he will set me high upon a rock. I believe that I shall see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage."
Mulder shut his eyes as she hissed portions of the Psalm he had memorised on their bed in the underground safety bunker of their Virginian home. She had left it for him to find if he should ever return there after the invasion, and he had found it. He was not a religious man, he had not been raised Catholic as she had, but he knew her faith and he understood her beliefs, and when necessary he never hesitated to call upon that strength. He had clung to those beliefs then, the confidence in the scripture's words, the truths of which they spoke. When he had seen her again, a vision outside his house upon his return searching for her in DC, he had been speechless, and with those same words she had coaxed his voice from him.
"Getting all mushy, are we?" Shannon taunted from behind them suddenly. Mulder snatched his hand away from Scully in surprise as they both gasped and spun on their heels. She was standing a few steps down from them with her hands on her hips, dressed in jeans and a simple, black t-shirt. She had dirty runners on her feet and her dark hair was pulled back on a low ponytail. Beside her stood a young, skinny man with messy brown hair, brown eyes and glasses. He was also wearing jeans and a loose, flannel shirt. His hands were stuffed awkwardly in his pocket, and Mulder and Scully knew that he was the alien contact.
He did not 'look' like an alien though. Mulder was used to Eddie and Michael, both strong and tall and loud. The man before them looked thin and more timid. Perhaps he was a less confident alien, or perhaps the body he had assumed was the easiest with which he could blend into his environment. Unseen.
"Shannon," Scully gushed, jogging down the few steps quickly and reaching up to embrace a woman she counted as a friend. She was happy when Shannon did not hesitate to hug her back, and Shannon did not flinch when Scully began sobbing into her shoulder. Mulder's heart felt like it shrank as he watched his partner crumble in the arms of a woman who was more than a woman, but less than a robot. One of the tears which had been in his eyes trickled onto his cheek as he watched the way Shannon held Scully, with strength but with tenderness and what appeared to be real affection.
It took a few extra seconds before Mulder realised Shannon was crying too. Scully noticed just a second after he did, and she pulled back with shock as Shannon hurriedly brushed at her tears, attempting to compose herself.
"Oh my God," Scully whispered, reaching up with the curious hands of a doctor to brush her thumbs gently over Shannon's cheeks. "What's this?" she asked, concerned but hopeful as she stared into Shannon's clear, blue eyes. They were wet and bloodshot, and Shannon grinned at her.
"It's a long story," she admitted. "I'm so glad you're both okay." She looked past Scully and up at Mulder then, offering him a casual wave which he returned as he approached. They embraced briefly, Mulder still staring at her with amazement. "Look," Shannon added, holding her arm out for them to peer down at. Scully ran her fingers over the scars on Shannon's forearm that she did not remember ever seeing before. Shannon should not have had any new scars. "I'm still strong," she assured them. "But I don't let myself acknowledge you all most of the time. After I left you on the island I went back to them, and uh, accidentally felt too much on the surface, and a little bit more me got through."
"Oh Shannon," Scully whispered with wide, blue eyes. "It's dangerous for you to keep doing what you're doing."
"I have to," Shannon replied seriously. "I'm fine as long as I shove it all underneath when I need to be strong. I spent ages testing it. It works."
"For now," Mulder mentioned warily. Shannon nodded. Her expression told him she fully comprehended the implications. He could not argue with her.
"How are the others?" Scully pressed without waiting for another second of silence to pass. "What happened to them?"
"I didn't stay long after I went back but I helped them as far as I dared. They were all healthy, just tired and missing you. I know now they've been processed. They all made it through."
"Thank God," Scully sighed with relief. "Where?"
"Central South America," Shannon replied. "Ted's got information of all human survivors processed and where they are. The program knows where the high concentration of magnetite is and they know that's where the human colonies have been set up."
"But who runs these processing centres?" Mulder asked. "If the supersoldiers wanted to destroy humans-"
"It's part of the Convention," Ted explained from just behind Shannon, stepping forward and stretching out a pale, white hand. "You can call me Ted. Nice to meet you." Mulder shook his hand first, then Scully.
"This is Fox Mulder and Dana Scully," Shannon spoke as they exchanged greetings. Ted nodded.
"I heard a lot about you," he assured them with the faintest smile. "The processing centres, at least the 'real' ones, are run by humans but controlled by supersoldiers, and only a small number of people have been allowed to survive. The goal under the Convention is to not destroy the local culture, but you know those provisions have rarely been successful in your world anyway. Words are pretty meaningless, huh? Most humans in the south have died."
"The same virus in the north?" Scully asked.
"No," he replied. "Just killed. Shot, massacred by the supersoldiers, but your friends got through as refugees." Scully must have stared at him with wide, surprised eyes, for his smile widened. "I've studied your world's history and technologies," he explained. "That's why I was picked to be inside on the supersoldier program. Everyone there thinks I'm human."
"Ted fits in real well," Eddie agreed with a wide smile. "He's what you'd call my protégé. Shannon, we've just been observing your work in Africa. Well done girl."
"Thanks," she replied steadily. "Though it took a bit of burrowing to get out. Didn't want to stick my head above the sand to come face to face with the supersoldier who blew up a metre from me at the same time I did. A pretty impressive hole, if I do say so myself. All the senior researchers lived there. It was night. They were all asleep when it happened. You got the extra magnetite?"
"How do you know about that?" Mulder asked.
"I was on land at Cape Verde when I saw them," she replied with a calm shrug. "Prime position."
"I'd mapped where all the deposits were along the east coast," Mulder explained. "When I realised they'd missed some I sent them back. We cleaned up New Mexico and Mexico too, Utah, bits and pieces. As much as we could. It's being processed now."
"Into what?" Shannon asked.
"Some shrapnel," Scully explained. "I've been experimenting with a liquid of some kind. Right now it's a bit like a high school science fair, either really successful or a horrible disaster. We've been trying to split our time between this and the other problem."
"The plague," Shannon stated. Scully nodded, turning to stare out at the water that stretched out beyond the monument. She suddenly had an urge to dive in and go for a swim, but tried to focus on the conversation in front of her. It was more real than the water, anyway. "What's your engineering capacity here?" Shannon asked.
"As I know it, we can do anything you can imagine," Scully answered. "Though I'm still learning the technology and Eddie has been the chief scientist in regards to his world's sciences. He's been a wonderful teacher but I can't compare. Why? What do you need?"
"The supersoldiers are preparing to retaliate," Shannon explained. "They know I was responsible for Africa because I didn't hide it, but at the moment they're confused whether I'm working alone or with others. The supersoldiers have no way to distribute a bio-weapon against any of the colonies, but we're worried about possible nuclear deployment, which could be detonated a safe distance from the magnetite with radiation spreading south with the winds and...I'm about to leave for a bit of a tour to start trying to locate reactors. Luckily there's not so many south of the Equator, and the aliens have taken care of all in the north."
"Is that true?" Scully asked urgently, turning to stare at Eddie. She had not even considered nuclear weapons as a possibility. It would kill even them. Antarctica would no longer be safe.
"It's true. We wanted the resources undamaged and those of us who knew your weapons history insisted upon it. If there is a cure in the south, we cannot risk contamination. I'm assuring you now all weapons have been deactivated. We knew where they were."
"Thank you," Scully whispered seriously, tears stinging her eyes once more as she turned back to Shannon.
"I'm just going to double check the south, blow up a few labs along the way. If we take away the buildings in which they create their science, they'll end up no better off than the humans in the colonies. Speaking of, what I was really getting at before was what your stocks are like of human medicines here?"
"As you suggested before we came here, there's plenty," Scully promised. "Of everything. Things I don't know what to do with."
"Can you make more?" Shannon asked.
"Uh...yes," she answered. "I've only tried it myself a few times to produce basic painkillers for the residents here but uh, yes. Why?"
"As soon as we have the supersoldiers under control, we need to get more medicine to a lot of the colonies. Most are less than a thousand in number and the risk of communicable disease is high. Australia's very isolated and water and shelter are the biggest problems in the north-west, New Zealand is doing okay last I heard, but South Africa and Central America I'm not so sure about. Not much information has come to us about them at all. I assume it's very rough and I'm worried about the others. They were emotionally weak when I left them."
Scully sighed, running her hands through her loose, waist-length hair. Emotionally weak was worse than physical weakness. She understood that as well as anyone. Some days just were not worth getting out of bed for, no matter how fit a person was.
"What do you need?" she asked.
"I don't know," Shannon answered. "That's your department. Malaria, HIV, etcetera. You're the doctor."
"I can have stock ready," she promised. "I don't know how long it will take but I think I can get enough Quinine Sulphate and penicillin and antibiotics together without too much trouble. What about fluid?"
"Fluid?" Shannon asked. Scully nodded.
"Electrolyte replacement for where the patient is at risk of dehydration. What about vaccines?"
"Yes," Shannon decided quickly. "I mean if you can." Scully nodded. She could. "What about sterility?"
"The sharps are limited. They'll have to reuse them. I'm assuming everyone processed has been tested for things like HIV and Hepatitis?"
"Yes just like you were, but in some of these areas locals will have survived. Testing might not have been completed on them."
"I'll get it ready," Scully promised. "Everything I can. And I'll keep working on the magnetite we have here for development. How do you want to do it?"
"We're going to need to be flexible," Shannon explained. "We need to get it to them en mass and individually, and I still think the best way to deliver it will be via craft. Find a way to shoot it out of those alien spaceships I know you have stashed here and you'll be heroes."
"I don't want to be a hero," Scully sighed. "I just want to make sure whatever we do won't hurt my friends."
"Shannon we need to go," Ted announced. He had been silent almost the entire time, but Scully suspected he had been having a telepathic conversation with Eddie and Michael, both of whom had said almost nothing since Ted and Shannon had arrived.
"Okay," Shannon assured him, turning back to Scully and Mulder with serious, blue eyes. "Be careful," she urged them. "And hopefully I'll see you again. I'm sure you're doing incredible work here, and you're in all our thoughts. Are you the only woman here?" Scully nodded, surprised.
"How'd you know?"
"I know about their Plague, what they were trying to find. I suspected as much but I knew you'd be safe, or at least I hoped you would. You are, right?" Scully nodded seriously.
"Couldn't do it without her, Shannon," Eddie promised from behind them. "Or you."
"Thanks," Shannon repeated with a smile, reaching out to embrace Scully before leaving.
"Take care," Scully urged. "And no crying!"
"Yes ma'am," Shannon laughed, pulling away and again briefly hugging Mulder also. "It was good seeing you, and nice venue! I haven't been here in years!" Scully laughed, but her voice died in her throat as soon as Shannon and Ted vanished right in front of them. There was no fading in or out; they were just gone. Scully shivered and wrapped her arms around herself. She may as well have been talking with a ghost. In hindsight Shannon's touch seemed ephemeral, and Scully missed her instantly.
"Did you get everything you needed?" Mulder asked Eddie and Michael. They both nodded.
"It's nearly your bed time," Eddie advised them, more attuned to their habits than even they were. "We'll see you upstairs in the morning okay?"
"But what about-" Michael's protest was cut off by Eddie slapping a hand over Michael's mouth and holding it there.
"Give them some time alone," he seethed through grit teeth, loud enough for Mulder to hear. Mulder knew they did not have to communicate with speech, and Michael probably preferred not to considering how rarely he spoke, but Eddie insisted upon it, even when he was simply talking to his colleague. Mulder and Scully were both grateful for that, and Mulder was even more grateful when Eddie dragged Michael from the room. They disappeared behind one of the pillars, and Mulder and Scully were alone.
"I've never felt so guilty for being here," Scully mumbled, her arms still wrapped protectively around herself as she stared at the water. "HIV Mulder, malaria, nuclear weapons, and we're standing at the Lincoln memorial in a room that exists almost purely for our own selfish benefits."
"We have the ability here to help those colonies and make sure they survive as best they can," Mulder reminded her gently.
"I know," she whispered, sobbing as she sat down on one of the steps. Mulder sat beside her but away from her, giving her the space he knew she often craved. "I'm sorry," she wept. "I just, to see Shannon crying, and the way she was hugging me I, it threw me. I miss them."
"I can't believe I just saw a supersoldier cry," Mulder admitted with a chuckle. "She must have really missed you!"
"We did spend a lot of time together after they found me," she admitted. "Mulder why didn't you want us to meet in your apartment?"
"Too many memories," he mumbled, staring at his hands as they scraped along the rough texture of the steps. It felt so real. "Too many sleepless nights, too many tears. There is too much of us there, Scully. I don't want to let anyone else in there."
"Next time can we come in here and fall asleep on your old couch?" she asked, whispering. Mulder looked at her and saw her cheeks flush with embarrassment. He nodded definitely.
"I would like that," he agreed, his own cheeks and ears burning at the thought. The memory.
"I don't know how to be a doctor from afar," she admitted. "I can get medication together to distribute but how can I know whether it's enough? How do I know...how can I predict...what will happen in those places? They're going to have to reuse all the equipment. You just need one infected person. To have the power to prevent and treat diseases which throughout history has killed millions of people...I don't know if I can do that, Fox. God couldn't."
"Maybe He didn't so that we know now, so that now we are prepared. I know it sounds like a mammoth task and we're already overworked, but Shannon is counting on you Scully, on us, to make it happen. We've got the technology at our fingertips here to really make a difference. It's what we always wanted. I..."
"What?" she asked gently when he drifted off for a long period. He narrowed his eyes at her to guard against his emotions, but his voice shook as he spoke, and she reached for his knee, cupping it firmly in a silent show of support as he spoke.
"We won't have any other legacy in our lives but this, Dana."
She nodded, feeling grief constrict her lungs. He was right, but the truth hurt.
It hurt both of them.