Chapter 8
GEORGETOWN
10:45 PM
"All right, there is one disadvantage to the seventies," Mick said. "With no giant computer systems, there's no one file to look for that has all the answers."
"Well, that's the advantage of high technology," Snart countered. "We can photograph everything else and it won't have to take any of it with us."
They'd managed to get into 'Hunt's' home relatively easily and it didn't take them long to find what they were looking for. As was to be expected Hunt had kept everything in the same place – a giant safe that was basically out in the open in the man's study. To be fair, that study was locked and he most likely had the only key but that meant nothing to Snart and Rory. Neither had the combination lock safe which was a primitive version of the one they'd been cracking since they were juvenile delinquents.
What they'd found, however, was a huge amount of manilla folders all thick with papers. There was a benefit that the files were all in English rather than encrypted or jargon but it didn't change the fact that there were hundreds of pages of documents that they were going to have to copy and they were under a time crunch.
And it was hard to know how much of what they were copying was valid. Snart was pretty sure at least one of the files that they had been copying was some kind of literary work – the pages were numbered and it looked more like a narrative then the kind of files that Mulder and Scully had shown them.
"You think this guy Hunt's trying to write the great American spy novel?" Mick asked when he looked at it.
"Not impossible. I can't imagine devoting your life to world dominations pays a proportionate amount to the work involved," Snart said. "Still, maybe there's something of a value."
"I hope it's because it's based on something that happened, cause this guy sure as shit can't write," Mick said.
"When did you become the book critic for the Times, old friend?" Snart teased.
"I'm just saying. You'd figure given the stuff this guy's knows about it he'd be the next Tom Clancy or whoever's writing James Bond these days," Mick said. "I've got better grammar than this guy and he's spelled assassinate three different ways on the same page!"
"You do know there's no spell check now?" Snart pointed out.
"Yeah, but given his day job," Mick countered. "And this dialogue. 'Sit down. You have enough plausible deniability to last the rest of your nine lives'. Who talks like that?" He shook his head. "Mulder might want to read this shit but he won't thank us for making him do it."
"Maybe that's why he's got this safe." Snart held up a piece of paper. "I've run across at least three different rejection letters in this safe so far."
"You wonder if that's why he got into this business?" Mick said, half seriously. "He couldn't achieve his first love so he's punishing the rest of humanity."
"How do you think Scientology got founded?" Snart held up a different piece of paper.
"Don't even talk to me about those nutballs," Mick shuddered. "They make these guys seem normal."
"Wait a minute," Snart said. "I think I've got something that might actually be relevant. You remember Mulder told us about something called the MJ files?"
"Those files that were translated by Navajo in World War II," Mick was taking this seriously. "They found Scully's name in them."
"As they said on Sesame Street, one of these things is not like the other." Snart showed Mick the file. "This is the first thing I've found that isn't in English."
"Where'd you find it?"
"Buried in the pages of whatever story he's telling here." Snart said. "I'd say it breaks up the flow of the plot but there wasn't much flow to begin with. Maybe that was the point."
"He's hiding secret documents in fake manuscripts?" Mick asked.
"In a way, it's genius. Wasn't there some short story where the thief hid a book with secrets in a library?" Snart said. "Where's the best place to hide real secrets? In a work of fiction."
Mick paused. "I have an idea. I know how bad it is when that usually happens…"
"I'm not Boy Scout. I'll hear it before I tell you it stinks."
"What if this safe is a decoy?" Mick asked. "What if he's hiding everything in plain sight?"
"That almost sounds like something I'd say," Snart said slowly. "Which is scary enough in itself. You think he'd hide the secrets of the universe out in the open."
"I think these books are his secret," Mick said. "I mean, let's not kid ourselves, someone like him wrote anything it'd make his colleagues worried, even if it were Hallmark cards."
Snart couldn't deny that. "Okay, say this is a decoy. Where's the real dirt?"
"You remember that job we pulled in Vancouver?"
"The guy was hiding his jewels in his library," Snart said. "Except they weren't in the safe. They were in his collection of French Literature."
"You said it best. They're the kind of books people buy but never read." Mick said. "What if he did the same thing here…"
"…except hide it as actual books," Snart finished. "And as I remember there's one bookcase in this entire place."
"Good thing he hasn't had time to collect more secrets," Mick said.
10:53 PM
FORT MARLENE
"How many historic moments have we already witnessed, Jefferson?" Stein asked. "Our names will never appear in any record of note."
"And here we are again, standing in the shadows, watching it happen," Jefferson said. "Doesn't make me feel that great though."
Based on what they had been told by Mulder and Scully – admittedly from an unreliable source - this was the official moment the conspiracy that they had spent their careers at the Bureau chasing took the form it did. And even from a distance there was something both inauspicious and yet fitting about what they were seeing.
It was dark but not a stormy night. A group of white men, all in their late forties at most, were standing in a barrack. It was pretty clear, even from this distance, that all of them were the same men who had been in the photograph that Mulder had kept in his possession all this time from the Strughold Mining company.
Klemperer wasn't there – Stein joked bitterly that he might well be planning to put the rockets on Voyager as they spoke – but there were quite a few other men in lab coats around. One of them looked vaguely familiar to Stein but he couldn't place the name.
But the other men were all there – the Founding Fathers of the Consortium. They did not yet have names to put to all of the faces but that didn't make them any less familiar from their picture. Some of them might very well regret the decisions they made tonight and would come to Mulder or Scully at one point or another in their lives. Perhaps it was out of guilt. More likely it was because of the friendship they had with the man who had was clearly last to arrive.
Right now, however, their collective faces were as impregnable as statues. Was the fact that Bill Mulder had been the last to arrive with his daughter in hand reminded them of the sacrifice they were about to make? Had that choice caused any of them to have second thoughts about this decision?
The Smoking Man had told Mulder that these were not decisions that were made lightly. Mulder had never believed a word that man had ever said – certainly not about who his father really was - but he had talked to some of his colleagues and given the nature of the men he referred to as Deep Throat and the Well-Manicured Man he believed that they it taken a great effort for them to turn – however slightly – against their brethren to help him the little they had. And considering both men would eventually pay for their choices with their lives – something both seemed to have known in their final encounters with the agents - it must not have been easy to make the choice in the first place.
Whatever they might think later on neither Jefferson nor Stein could see any sign that they were wavering in their decision right now. They stood stock-still with stone faces. Even the Smoking Man seemed overcome by the gravity of what was happening. He looked very much like he wanted to light up but he seemed to understand that the solemnity of this occasion could not be broken, no matter how much he wanted to give into that habit.
"Sir," one of the soldiers said, walking up to him.
The Smoking Man said nothing, merely accepted the bundle in his hands. Then there was a sound overhead.
No one said a word. But there was a sound of a rattling. A bright light - with no origin that neither Stein nor Jefferson could see began to shine. This did not surprise any of them men.
There seemed to be some unspoken agreement about what happened next. The Smoking Man walked forward slowly. Then he knelt and put the Stars and Stripes – the symbol of everything that he and these men had begun their lives in unquestioned service to – on the ground.
Out of the light a figure emerged. It was enormous - six five at least, clearly over two hundred and fifty pounds and built like a boulder. His face was an expressionless as the men before him but there was something in his posture that spoke of a conqueror and endless cruelty. He walked forward, not even baring a glance at the flag at his feet.
The figure spoke forth. "Give us the offering."
The dispassionate way of which this figure - clearly one of the colonists that Mulder and Scull knew was the representative of the aliens – spoke of the loved ones of these men who they were more or less giving up to them along with control of the planet indicated something to Stein and Jefferson immediately. This alien didn't view this with the significance the Syndicate did; indeed he seemed to be going through the motions. This was not the attitude of someone who viewed the Consortium as partners in this project; it was clear that they considered them subordinate. It also looked like there was a certain level of impatience with this; why are we bothered bargaining with these people we could easily destroy.
It was impossible to tell if this creature was the same one that Mulder and Scully would spend their lives trying to fight; considering the role clones played in their society they might very well all look the same. And considering that Mulder had no idea how old these creatures were or if they aged the same way, this creature might be the same one they would know twenty years later or perhaps a descendant of that same group. And it wasn't as if any of the colonists believed in meaningful dialogue.
Perhaps this creature was hundreds or thousands of years old, the way Martian Manhunter was. Perhaps it had seen the extermination and destruction of hundreds of similar planets across the galaxy, the way that so many of the Kryptonians that Kara was descended from. Hell, maybe this was just one stop for this colonist on a similar voyage that was going to take light years and they couldn't believe they had to be in such a backwoods planet.
None of that was relevant. What was relevant was the representative's attitude. And that attitude showed that he found all of the posturing that these men had made to reach this point irrelevant in the schemes of the universe. Which should have been the clearest sign that the deal that they made with this enemy was never going to last beyond the life of the conspirators.
The man who would survive the longest of the Syndicate showed no sign of any contemplation on his part of these thoughts. There were no doubt countless other calculations in play that this man thought were significant and far reaching but had no value to the extraterrestrial he had just sold out the planet too. He certainly gave no thought to the phrasing before he spoke.
"Send it out," he ordered.
The fact that he had just dismissed the loved ones of the men around him - including his own wife – as if they were no longer human should have been a sign to his colleagues. The fact that this man now seemed to be their spoken representative should have been a bigger one. But none of them gave any indication of knowing or caring. And if they did, it was irrelevant.
Their children and wives were coming out now.
GEORGETOWN
11:02 pm
"It's time like this I wish I read more," Mick said gloomily.
"This probably isn't one of those trick cases where the right book reveals a secret room," Snart said.
"House isn't big enough for that kind of thing anyway," Mick agreed. "I'm guessing this guy would hide his secrets in a book that would be precious to him."
"And since I'm pretty sure these guys don't get together for book club…" Snart narrowed his eyes. "I wonder."
He took out a copy of The Manchurian Candidate. It looked like an ordinary book which is what it was. "Would have been a bit on the nose anyway," he said putting it back.
"Okay. He didn't arrange these books alphabetically by title and I'm pretty sure not by author," Snart said. "Fiction is next to non-fiction and we've got a biography of MacArthur next to Power of Positive Thinking. I have no idea what to look for."
"Maybe we're looking for a book that doesn't belong," Mick thought for a moment. "You always read more than I did, anything stick out that way?"
Snart considered that for a moment. The books were a mix of hardcover and paperback, fiction and non-fiction, classic novels and pure pulp. And it didn't help matters that they were trying to base all of this on the reading habits of someone who didn't exist.
And then he spotted something. "Hunt's wife is dead. He has one son who's in college," he said slowly. "So what's he doing with a copy of Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm?"
"That's not classic literature."
"It is. For adolescent girls. No boy growing up in the 1960s would be given a copy unless his grandparents bought the wrong book." Snart took it out.
He opened it delicately. "Jackpot."
Mick stood over him. "I thought that kind of thing was invented for James Bond movies," he said looking at what was clearly a roll of microfilm. "I didn't think covert agencies actually used it."
"There's a reason for it," Snart held it up to the light. "This isn't microfilm. It's microfiche."
"What's that, a precursor to sushi?" Mick asked.
"Back before everything went digital, the only way to read old publications was on things like this," Snart said. "You remember that guy Slater we ran into in Tallahassee back in '09?"
"Yeah. Guy claimed he'd been on some black ops shit in country." Mick was looking at this. "Said some of those Taliban guys still hid their stuff on technology that went out of style with the VCR."
"To be fair, they probably only got the VCR in 2008," Snart said. "My guess half the secrets to the universe at one point were on spools like this once."
"Hell, maybe they still are," Mick said. "Pretty hard to imagine this stuff ending up on an iPhone."
"The thing is, now that we've found it, I'm not sure what the hell to do with it," Snart said. "At some point he is going to notice that it's missing and I don't think we have the technology to read it, much less copy it."
"Yeah, I didn't exactly see a lending library around here," Mick said. "I mean we could bust into the Library of Congress but not on the time issue here."
"No." Snart thought for a moment. "But we do know someone who could figure out a work around."
11:05 PM
It was one thing to know what was about to happen. For Stein and Jefferson it was galling to watch.
Both men were reminded horribly of the clones they had found in Canada when they had gone with the Mulders to see what had been a test site. Samantha had told them that they had been bred for service and had no ability for speech. Over time conscious thought had been removed from their breeding as well until they had essentially become drones in all but name.
With the exception of a woman who was clearly a young Cassandra Spender and two other women, everyone else was a child, all of them clearly within the ages of eight to eleven at most. All of them were clearly human but they were walking into the servitude of their captors with a similar removal that seemed very much like they were slaves already.
They'd seen what had happened to Samantha earlier tonight and it was safe to assume that many of them had undergone similar processes of abduction – they'd likely been drugged in order to subdue them. It didn't explain why none of them were struggling or resisting captivity.
Had the children been lied to? Had they been promised candy or bicycles if they just went with the nice people at the other end of this bunker? Had they been told that if they did this their parents would be proud of them? What deceptions had been put into place in order to get them to go so calmly and quietly into a lifetime of torture and experiments from which they would never escape?
Then they both noticed someone wasn't among the ones walking down to their mates. The irony was it seemed to be the very child who would be the greatest influence for so much of the process.
Where was the eight year old Samantha Mulder?
STAR LABS
PRESENT
"The first time Fox encountered the Bounty Hunter, he also learned about the project known as Gregor," Samantha said.
"That's also the first time he had reason to believe you were alive," Oliver said. "Of course, given who told him that I would have questioned the source."
"You don't think he had any reason to lie?" Cisco asked.
"In my experience it's those who are about to die who are honest," Oliver said grimly. "The ones who are about to kill you, they're less reliable."
Everyone knew Oliver knew of where he spoke so they let the matter drop. "According to him he encountered a room full of clones of, well, you," Caitlin said delicately. "Somehow you seemed to be critical to the process but none of us are sure how exactly."
"We're guessing you weren't anywhere near DC during February of 1995," Cisco said.
Samantha shook her head. "I made attempts to reach out to Fox while he was at the Bureau but always through back channels and never in person. I actually came to DC a few months later. I'd heard that both my father and my brother were dead, and I knew damn well that the Syndicate had them both killed."
"That would have driven me out of hiding too," Oliver admitted.
"I actually went to Fox's apartment building," Samantha said. "But there were police guarding the place and I didn't dare risk it."
"You're lucky you weren't spotted," Barry said. "Your brother's pretty sure the place was being monitored twenty-four seven when he was living there."
"Both Scully and Mulder were on the run from the Syndicate then," Caitlin pointed out. "They no doubt were looking in other directions."
"While I was there, I found out exactly what had happened in my absence," Samantha said grimly. "They'd erased an entire part of the project."
"Gregor. How did they fit in?"
"I don't know all the details but from what I later learned they were among the scientists of the race," Samantha said. "Their job was to gather fetal tissue in order to create the clones that would be part of the process. But I had no idea that I was supposed to be one of their models until years later."
"You were just another of their test subjects," Cisco said. "Why do I feel that I need to personally apologize to every lab specimen I ever experimented on in medical school?"
"It's not like the Gregors were exactly innocent bystanders," Samantha said. "I should know."
Oliver remembered something from the files. "When Mulder encountered the woman claiming to be you, she claimed that Gregor had raised you as his own daughter."
"And I have little doubt she was trained to think that way," Samantha said bitterly.
"Much of what he was told was true," Barry replied.
"That wasn't," Samantha said. "Maybe the Gregors thought they were, the same way that scientists become fond of subjects they've been testing on for years, if not decades. And maybe the clones of myself were trained to believe that part. But there was nothing benevolent about the way they treated us."
"You knew them?"
"That part was accurate," Samantha said. "But the idea of them being fatherly or benevolent compared to the rest of the colonists, well, that was just their own narrative. They were fine with what they were doing. They were active within the Syndicate for years. And I have no doubt anything that they might have told Mulder or Scully at the time was almost certainly out of the fact that they were facing extermination."
"What makes you so sure?"
Samantha smiled grimly. "Because they were there at the start."
NOVEMBER 27TH 1973
None of the men seemed willing to mention the absence of Samantha Mulder. Perhaps they were hoping the Colonist wouldn't notice it.
However just as the rest of them were about to close the distance the Bounty Hunter spoke. "One is missing."
There was a long pause. Bill Mulder's face looked more tortured than ever. His eyes flicked around his colleagues, as if he were hoping for a way out. No relief was given.
Spender looked at the Bounty Hunter. "I will get her."
"Your offering is present. He must bring her here."
"No need," Spender said. "She is coming."
And indeed Samantha Mulder was approaching. But not at the same gait as the others. She looked like an ordinary eight-year old waking up in an unfamiliar setting.
The Bounty Hunter said nothing. Instead he shifted his form until it was that of William Mulder.
It was a cruel twist of the knife and even from this distance Jefferson and Stein could see her real father start to shake, though he was doing everything in his power to remain taciturn. He knew what was going to happen and it did.
Samantha saw her father and walked to him. "Daddy? What's going on?"
'Bill Mulder' knelt down and smiled. "It's all right. I'm taking you somewhere special."
"Where am I?"
"You're going to meet some new friends," 'Bill Mulder said. "They'll take care of you."
"Where's Fox?" Samantha asked innocently. "Can he come?"
'Bill' smiled. "Not right now. But don't worry. You'll see him again someday soon. Just go over there and wait for me. I'll be right there."
Samantha paused for a moment. "All right, Dad."
She wandered in the distance.
"We've fulfilled our part of the bargain," Spender said steadily. "Now honor yours."
The Bounty Hunter gave the smallest of nods. Two figures came out of nowhere.
The first was not recognizable to either of the observers. He was a short man, balding and with dour look. He was carrying a container that was nearly the size of his head.
Spender gave another indistinct nod. Three men in lab coats came out of the distance with a similar container. They were heavily gloved and their faces were covered.
"Is that what I think it is?" Jefferson asked.
"Based on the way those men are dressed, absolutely," Stein agreed.
The alien that would one they be referred to as Gregor handed them the container and opened it from the top. In it was the fetus of an alien, what Mulder and Scully would eventually come to know as 'Purity Control'. From it the Syndicate would be able to extract genetic material with which they intended to use to make an alien-human hybrid.
"That's it," Stein said. "That's the wellspring."
"And we just have to watch as they hand the secrets of the universe over without a second look," Jefferson said. "Gray, there are times I really hate this job."
"If it's any consolation, Jefferson, I think there's someone here who clearly hates it as well."
"Bill Mulder didn't do shit to stop this. I'm not crying any tears for him."
"I'm not talking about Mr. Mulder," Stein said. "Someone on the other side of this clearly isn't happy about it either."
He gestured to the other figure who had come out of the shadows. Jefferson and Stein didn't recognize one of the aliens but they clearly recognized the other. Of all the figures on this momentous night it was the only one who looked on all of this who clearly didn't have a poker face.
It was the alien that would one day be known to Mulder and Scully as Jeremiah Smith.
GEORGETOWN
"This was supposed to be a simple operation," Ray said.
"First of all, Palmer, when is anything we're ever a part of 'simple'?" Snart demanded. "Second of all, consider who we're dealing with."
Ray opened his mouth, then closed it. "Fair point."
Neither Snart nor Mick had been thrilled about breaking radio silence and telling Ray that they needed his help but both of them knew it was necessary. Considering that this was a technological issue – albeit a 1970s one – they both knew he was the best person for the job.
"I have to say even given Gideon's capabilities I'm not sure he could read something like this without destroying it, " Ray said. "And given the delicate nature of so much of what the Syndicate designed over the decades that may actually be the point."
Given what Scully had told them about the implant in her neck – how it had stopped functioning the moment they'd tried to analyze it – no one was inclined to disagree.
"Better than the damn self-destruct button," Mick admitted.
"You think there's something from this era that could read it?" Snart asked.
"My guess is yes but we still wouldn't have the time to find it and replace it intact."
"That's not why we wanted you here," Snart said. "What we need is something that looks like microfiche, feels like microfiche but only when it's examines won't be microfiche."
Ray got it. "That's right. We don't want him to know it's missing until we're decades in the future."
"Or in the past, given our itinerary," Mick said. "The replicator we have on the Wave-Rider, how long would it take to create a reasonable facsimile of this?"
"Two minutes, give or take," Ray said.
"We'll be cutting it pretty close," Mick said. "But what else is new?"
FORT MARLENE
It had never been clear to Mulder and Scully what the pecking order among the aliens was. The Jeremiah Smiths were clearly slightly lower than the Bounty Hunter and his species given what Mulder and Scully had told of them but where did that rank them alongside the Syndicate had never been clear. Based on what they knew they had at best been reluctant collaborators in the process and far more likely part of the resistance, though that was impossible to know.
What was clear was that the Smiths were the only aliens that Mulder and Scully had meant who were something approaching benevolent that they'd met in all their years on The X-Files. And based on the expression on this Jeremiahs face it may have begun on day one.
"Are you certain this is necessary?" he said to the Bounty Hunter.
"It has been agreed upon," the Bounty Hunter replied in that monotone.
"What makes you certain they will live up to their end of the bargain?"
Spender stepped forward. "We've made the ultimate sacrifice. Do you still doubt our commitment to the Project?" he demanded with something close to anger.
"You sacrifice was that of your families. Not yourselves," Smith said tellingly. "That says more about your selfishness than your commitment."
Strangely enough the Bounty Hunter did nothing to admonish Smith. Indeed he looked interested in the proceedings for the first time.
"What would you have us do?" the Bounty Hunter asked.
"I believe they must be monitored from this point forward," Smith said in that calm tone of his.
For the first time the human members of the Syndicate looked uncomfortable. This clearly wasn't part of the arrangement. "We had an agreement!" Spender said slowly.
"The agreement was that we would provide the genome in exchange for the sacrifice," the Bounty Hunter said calmly. "However since you are making this exchange, it is only just that we have a representative of our own to make sure that the timeline remains unimpeded."
"Your presence would be noticeable," Spender said carefully.
"Not unless we choose to make it so," Smith said calmly. "Besides we're not talking a huge presence. Only five or six of us should be necessary. And frankly my colleagues are less obtrusive than those you have dealt with in the past."
The Bounty Hunter considered this. "You will have to remain in the background," he said carefully. "No one can know of your presence until they are ready."
"From what I understand there are places on this planet where we could hide in plain sight until it is necessary for us to reveal ourselves," Smith said calmly. "And while we're here, we can make sure that they are living up to their end of the bargain when it comes to collecting the necessary material."
The Bounty Hunter paused. "Do you accept these terms?" he asked Spender.
"How do we know that he will be loyal to the cause?" Spender demanded.
Smith looked Spender in the eye. "I will be as loyal to the Greater Purpose as you are."
Stein noticed that Smith had never actually promised he would be true to the project; he merely implied it to everyone present. He also noticed that Smith had essentially questioned the Consortium's loyalty to the project – something that they had never intended to go along with, according to their own actions. And it was clear Spender knew it too – and that he resented that Smith had essentially put him in check.
Jefferson got it, too. "Clever girl," he said in a faux Australian accent.
Of course being who he was, he recovered from it. "I think we can find a suitable position for someone of your capabilities," he said with a small smile.
"I guess we know why all of the Smiths were working in the Social Security Administration when they were exposed," Stein said. "What worse place for someone of his capabilities that keeping him in the bureaucracy for the rest of his life?"
"Maybe that was a plan all along," Jefferson said. "You spend enough time at a government job, you wish the world would end so you don't have to keep pushing papers."
GEORGETOWN
11:41 pm
"We're cutting it to the thin edge," Snart said. "We have maybe five minutes before the guard comes back."
"Hey, that's why we're out here and we left the place intact remember?" Mick said. "In case anything goes wrong, we're out of sight and hopefully out of mind."
There had been more than one reason why they had called Ray. The moment he took the device, the two of them had neatened up and gotten out of the building. They'd also locked the door and turned the lights. When the guard came here it would seem that nothing was out of place, and not a creature was stirring. Not even a mouse.
Of course Ray had the ability to get through openings that even mice would find too large.
11:42 PM
Comparatively speaking, the keyhole of Hunt's home was one of the larger openings that the Atom had managed to get in over the last year.
It had taken a little less than three minutes to drop off the microfiche, create a reasonable duplicate of it, put it in his pocket, return to 1973 and then shrink down to a size small enough for him to get through. Now all he had to do was go back to the bookcase, open the book, insert the fake device and leave.
Easy-peasy.
SAME TIME OUTSIDE
"Of course, " Mick groaned. "Why do we have to have the only security guard in the history of mankind with a healthy work ethic?"
"It's DC, it's 1973," Snart sighed. "If I remember my history correctly, about a year ago an ambitious guard found something suspicious at the Watergate hotel and ended up calling the cops. As we speak Congress is preparing to impeach the President as a result of that."
"And given that these guys probably worked with those burglars," Mick said.
"Come on. If they'd done the job, Nixon would have served out his term with no problem," Snart joked. "But it has probably inspired a certain hero influence."
"All things considered this guy would probably be better served keeping what he finds to himself," Mick said.
"All things considered, he'd have a safer job if he worked at Macy's," Snart countered.
"So do we warn Palmer or not?" Mick said.
11:43 PM
INSIDE HUNT'S HOME
Ray was putting the book away when he heard the car drive up. "Of course they didn't tell me," he muttered. He started to walk towards the front door.
And knocked against a table.
OUTSIDE THE HOUSE
Both Snart and Mick were far enough away to be safe but close enough to see the guard's face. And they could tell the moment the guard took a pause that he'd clearly heard something.
"I'm guessing the Saint made a sound," Snart said. "All right, old friend, we have two choices. We can do this the easy way or the fun way."
Mick smiled. "You know what my choice is."
"Don't get carried away," Snart said. "This man may be wearing a uniform but hurting him would raise more suspicions than we need to right now. Besides, he's going to have enough crap to deal with down the road for us to make his life worse now."
"Hey, this guy's not even small potatoes on the bad guy list," Mick agreed. "Still, what kind of fun do you have in mind?"
"Oh, just something that guarantees not even these guys will believe whatever he sees tonight."
FORT MARLENE
For the last bit of their reconnaissance Jefferson agreed to follow the aliens while Stein agreed to stay put and observe the Syndicate.
"Age before beauty, in this case," he told Jefferson.
In truth Stein wanted to try and see – he knew understanding was impossible – how the men dealt with what they just had done.
It looked for a while that nothing was going to be done at all. Then Bill Mulder walked up to Spender.
"I'd say tonight we signed away our humanity," Bill said slowly, "except given what happens its clear I was the only one who had anything left to give away."
"We only agreed to this because of your idea," Spender said.
"That's right," Bill Mulder scoffed. "Do what you've always done. Pass the buck. I think I remember hearing that particular argument when I was at Nuremberg. But then again, I didn't know we'd be using that as a recruitment drive."
Spender's blank expression disappeared. He actually looked angry now. "You want to claim there's no blood on your hands, Bill?"
"Everyone here has been bathing in it for decades," Bill said quietly. "You're just angry that I'm the only one who finally realized it never comes off."
"I realize this is a great sacrifice," Spender started.
"How?" Bill said. "I loved Samantha. Don't pretend you ever felt the same for Cassandra."
For the briefest of moment something very close to guilt flashed through Spender's face.
"That's right. Pretend you don't know what I'm talking about. That's what we do best," Bill Mulder said bitterly. "I just never thought I would be one of the people you decided to ignore!"
"This is hardly the time nor the place," Spender said.
"Actually, it's the perfect time. Seeing as this is going to be the last time we ever speak."
This got a reaction. One of the men – the one that Mulder would one day know as Deep Throat - looked at Bill. "We've gone too far for you to back out now."
"Spare me your flowery denials, Ronald," Bill Mulder said. "This isn't happening, remember? None of us are actually here. And because of that, who's to say who was and who wasn't here going forward?"
Now there was clearly unease. "You've been here since this project began," another man said.
"And it's clearly spiraled out of any one of us being necessary for it," Bill Mulder paused. "Need I remind you what we did to the General?"
There was a long pause. It was clear Bill had just mentioned something that unsettled them all.
"I believe it was made clear that no one in this project could be indispensable. " Bill Mulder pointed out.
"Then you also know that no one leaves the project, Bill," one of the Elders said.
"You really think I'm going to call the Post?" Bill Mulder said sarcastically. "Besides whether I'm in this project or not, my life is over. It's just a matter of who I end up dying with. And I'd rather burn with the rest of humanity then with you fine gentlemen."
"There are protocols, Bill," Spender said. "You were one of the people who created them."
"You don't get it!" Bill Mulder shouted. "You think I want to share this with the world? You think I want my family – my son! – to know what I've been involved with – especially after tonight? I've paid my debt when I handed you Samantha. I will go to my grave never telling another soul what I've done. I hope and I pray that at some point one of you – all of you – come to your sense and realize just how deeply a mistake you've made tonight. I hope that somebody somewhere brings all of this to light. But if you think that I'm going to do it…well, there are plenty of soldier here and I'm pretty sure they'll follow orders."
Stein knew that nothing was going to happen to Bill tonight but he still wondered if anyone was going to do anything at all. Finally Spender spoke up.
"Your access will be revoked. You'll have no say in anything that happens going forward. Whatever happens after this, events will be out of your hands."
"I'm aware of that."
"Bill, think of what you're doing," Spender almost seemed to be pleading now. "We let you walk away from this…"
"I understand the terms."
"After this, no one can protect you!"
Bill Mulder considered this for a moment. Then he walked over to Spender. "You dropped these."
He handed him the pack of Morleys Spender had crumpled.
"You're going to need whatever crutch you can find to get through the years to come." Bill said cruelly. "I know I will."
He began to walk away. "Hell, maybe if you're lucky they'll kill you before you have to face the consequences of your actions."
"Bill!" Deep Throat shouted.
"I'll send your love to Teena."
"Let him go," Spender said quietly. "He'll be back."
"And if he doesn't?" Deep Throat asked.
Spender took out a Morley and lit it up. "He understands what he's done. Besides we have to make sure tonight's sacrifice isn't in vain."
11:57 PM
Jefferson followed the colonist a few hundred feet. He was concerned that it would sense him and maybe it did because it paused momentarily.
Then it lowered its hand over what appeared to be nothing. It took Jefferson just a moment to realize that it was some kind of energy field – he'd seen versions of this long before he'd learned about this project.
And he knew enough from what he'd been told to know what he would see before he actually saw it.
It was the kind of craft that Mulder had found in Oregon, the kind that seemed to be the former of transportation for the aliens. It didn't mesh with the kind of aircraft that the Legends had seen over the last year or anything they'd learned of from Kara and the DEO – maybe it differed from species to species.
What was clear was that there was some kind of bright light that was visible – the closest term Jefferson could draw a parallel to was the kind of beaming pods he'd seen on Star Trek. Except he was pretty sure there was some kind of force field in play because it was hard for him to believe the people within would go on this trip willingly.
There they were, the wives and children of the Syndicate, all standing there with placid expressions on their faces. Jefferson assumed that they'd been tranquilized with something considering that none of them seemed the least bit disturbed about the one-way trip they were about to go on.
Then the light at the center of it began to get brighter and brighter. Jefferson had a good idea what was going to happen before it happened. He looked up and for a moment he could see the craft, triangular with luminescence at the center and larger beyond the proportion of anything made by man – though Jefferson figured that was the point.
Then it began to rise – certainly higher than any aircraft in 1973 could but almost certainly no one would notice it when it reached the stratosphere.
"Jefferson?" Stein said as he approached him.
"What kind of cover story you think they have in play?" Jefferson asked slowly. "Weather balloon? Meteor shower?"
"No other object in the night sky has been more often misidentified than the Planet Venus," Stein said to himself. "Maybe they'll go with that."
"You really think that'll sell?"
"From what I understand, it even fooled Jimmy Carter once," Stein said, almost distracted. "Come on, Jefferson, I think we've learned everything we can tonight."
"How much of this do we actually tell Mulder?" Jefferson asked softly.
"I think he's past the need of being protected," Stein said sadly. "Besides, based on where he wants us to go next, I think he knows what's coming."
GEORGETOWN
When the security guard in the gated community came in at the shift change at midnight, he was fifteen minutes behind schedule. Understandably he'd been distracted.
One of the trees in the neighborhood was on fire. He'd run to his car to get an extinguisher to put it out and when he'd come back not only was the fire out, there seemed to be a touch of frost covering that exact same area.
He'd spent the better part of seven minutes trying to figure out what the hell was going on and as a result he failed to notice two large figures running out past the front door.
Had this been in the era of security footage the guard would have lost his job but by the time the next shift arrived there was no sign anything was out of place. The guard was so distracted he'd completely forgotten about the noises he'd heard inside the household registered to a Mr. Hunt.
He would finally remember at the start of the next shift and waited with bated breath for a full two days to be fired. But Hunt never complained, in fact never mentioned it all.
The guard would eventually leave his post within the next year and never think about what had happened that night. He would have been stunned to know that the man in that home would go to a fiery grave never forgetting what he had seen.
Hunt didn't bother to check the book where he had hidden much of the key secrets of the Syndicate until nearly a decade later and he never bother to look at the microfiche for the rest of his time in the Syndicate.
Had he ever chosen to do he would have found that all of the secrets that he had held had been replaced with a single message, one that would no doubt have baffled him because he chose to go his entire life never reading Douglas Adams.
So long, and thanks for all the fish.
AUTHOR'S NOTES
There are two callbacks to Musings of A Cigarette-Smoking Man. The first is the line in the novel Mick berates in Hunt's safe (and yes that is a direct attack on the often unsayable dialogue Carter wrote for the series). The second, though Stein doesn't know, is what Smoking Man says to Deep Throat when an alien ends up on their doorstep on Christmas Eve 1991.
The scene itself is a flashback from One Son, as recounted by the Smoking Man in that episode. He is hardly the most reliable narrator so this is my version of what happened. In this scenario every known version of the aliens we saw during the show's run is present, though it is unclear if the Bounty Hunter is the same one we saw in the series' original run. Gregor was only seen in Colony back in Season 2 and what we know about it comes from what would later be revealed to be a Samantha Mulder clone, which does make you wonder how reliable that was. I've mentioned Jeremiah Smith in the first story in this series and considering he always seemed to be actively opposed to the Project, I decided to make it clear that he always had those doubts.
I also wanted it very clear from the start that the Bounty Hunter didn't view this deal with the same solemnity the Syndicate did. It was never truly clear how connected the colonists were with the Syndicate or what that relationship was really like. The Bounty Hunter never struck me as having a high regard for diplomacy and I wanted it clear that he considered this going through the motions.
The show only made clear Bill Mulder's involvement in the project after his character was killed and the details differed depending on the season. It was argued in Season 6 that the only reason he went along with it was so that the exchange for the alien genome was so that they could create a vaccine to save everybody. But it's also canon that by the time we meet him he's clearly on the outside given the one meeting Smoking Man has with him in Anasazi – and considering he is executed in that same episode, he hasn't been critical for decades. (None of the other members of the Consortium mention him until their own final episodes.) Based on what we know the Mulder family broke up after what happened to Samantha and by implication Bill Mulder couldn't carry the guilt and more or less became an alcoholic. My argument that his break with the project happened that night would be in keeping with that theory. His outburst makes it clear that everyone is responsible – and would explain why Deep Throat eventually became a source for Mulder in the first place. (I threw in the bit with the Morleys as an added ironic touch; Bill knows his colleague better than he does.)
Oh and that line Stein delivers about Venus is a direct quote that the Man in Black uses in the classic Jose Chung's From Outer Space, including the Jimmy Carter reference. I just couldn't help myself.
The General was never mentioned on The X-Files. But since we're about to go back further I think I'm entitled to some license.
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