By Jake
nejake@tds.net
 

Rating: PG-13 (Language, Adult Situations)
Classification: MSR, X
Spoilers: Quotes from Christmas Carol, The Red and the Black,
One Breath, and The Unnatural; vague references to other
episodes through season 7. If you're looking for a post-
Requiem ep, this ain't the one.
Keywords:
Summary: Ever hear the X-File about the Rabbit-Man of Arizona?
No? Well, get dressed in your comfiest PJs, make a nice cup of
Sleepytime tea, and let me tell you a little bedtime story...

Disclaimer: The characters Fox Mulder, Dana Scully, Walter
Skinner, The Lone Gunmen, Alex Krycek, CGB Spender, Margaret
Scully, Charlie Scully and Bill Scully, Jr. and Sr., are the
property of Chris Carter, FOX and 1013 Productions. No
copyright infringement intended. This is for fun, not profit.

Author's notes at end.

~~~
 

THE CASE OF THE RELUCTANT PATHOLOGIST (1/3)
By Jake

^^"Dana, where is it? Where is that rabbit?"^^

^^"I'm not telling."^^

^^"I'm going to find that rabbit and cook it. I'm going to
turn it into stew."^^

^^"No you're not!"^^

^^"Rabbit stew, here I go."^^

^^"You're not going to find him, Bill!"^^

Dana was just a little girl when her pet rabbit died. To say
that her pet's death caught her by surprise wouldn't tell the
half of it. You see, when Dana tried to hide her rabbit from
her older brother Bill, she trapped it in her lunchbox without
food or water or air where eventually it died -- devoured by a
rather hideous bunch of creepy-crawly maggots. What a shock it
must have been to open her secret hideaway only to learn that
love and death are separated by a mere moment of innocent
neglect.

Did the death of her beloved pet have any long lasting effects
on Dana?

Wellllll...

Twenty-eight years later on a December day in 1997 when Dana
Scully petitioned the state of California to adopt little
Emily Sim, she told Susan Chambliss, the San Diego County
Adoption Agent, "Ever since I was a child, I've never allowed
myself to get too close to people. I've avoided emotional
attachment. Perhaps I've been so afraid of death and dying
that any connection just seemed like a bad thing...something
that wouldn't last. But...I don't feel that anymore."

Oh, really?
 

PROLOGUE

Alice knew it was the Rabbit coming to look for her, and she
trembled till she shook the house, quite forgetting that she
was now about a thousand times as large as the Rabbit, and had
no reason to be afraid of it. -- Alice in Wonderland by Lewis
Carroll

--------------------
Stakeout
2:21 AM

"Mulder, talk to me. Tell me a story."

"Excuse me?"

"We've been sitting in this car for more than six hours and
I'm about to fall asleep. Unless you want to hear me snore,
start talking -- either sing me a song or tell me a story
or...or *some*thing."

Sing a song? Not on your life. Althooooough, Springstein's
'Redheaded Woman'...

Nnnnnnnn...perhaps a story. I could do a story. Several
possible tales run through my head. Most of them based on past
or current cases.

"And make it interesting," she adds.

Well, here's the rub. What Scully considers interesting and
what I consider interesting are two diametrically opposed and
mutually exclusive things. *My* favorite stories contain
triple X ratings or titles like the World's Most Incredible
Something-or-Other. Scully tends toward medical monographs --
anything from the latest research on genetically altered rat
skin to studies about the mating habits of drosophilae
melanogaster. Even so, I feel up to the challenge and am
pretty sure I can come up with something that'll hold both of
our attentions.

"Once upon a time..."

"I said a story, Mulder, not a fairytale."

"This is a *true* story," I insist.

"Then it happened on a specific day at a specific time. I want
details. Don't skim over the facts."

"Alright. Tuesday, September 18, 8:23 AM..."

"That's six hours from now, Mulder."

"Yes, it is."

"Then how is this a true story?"

"It just is. On that day..."

"Mulder..."

"Just go with it, Scully. On that day, at that time, a
dedicated young man was hard at work in his underground
sanctum solving the mysteries of..."

"Hell? This story is about Hell?"

"Huh?"

"You said this dedicated man works in Hell?"

"Some people might define it that way, Scully, but I said
'underground,' not 'underworld.'"

"Oh. Sorry. Go on."

"Anyway, this dedicated young man..."

"How young?" she arches an inquiring eyebrow.

"Young enough. May I continue?"

She lifts a palm indicating I should resume.

"As I was saying, the dedicated man -- whom *many* would
consider young -- was working diligently to unravel the
mystery of the enigmatic Rabbit-Man of Arizona."

"Rabbit-Man?"

"Mm hmm."

"Are you certain this is a *true* story?"

"Absolutely. It all started..."

*          *          *

"Sorry I'm late. Traffic jam over at Dupont Circle." Scully
draped her coat over...

**"I'm in this story?"**

**"Naturally."**

**"I'm not sure I want to be in the story."**

**"It's far too late, Scully."**

Scully draped her coat over the back of her chair and tried to
decipher the blurry image in the slide Mulder was projecting
onto the wall. Although his screen had vanished more than a
year ago -- and he suspected Scully played a pivotal role in
its disappearance -- he found the wall suited his needs just
fine.

**"Mulder, I didn't take your projector screen."**

**"Whatever. Now shhhh."**

"What am I looking at?" she asked, tipping her head first to
one side then the other trying to bring the image into focus.

"The Rabbit-Man of Arizona," he told her, thinking the
creature was so obvious you'd have to be blind -- or perhaps a
bit unwilling -- not to see it.

"The rabbit...?" Looking unconvinced, she hoped her scowl
would discourage any further discussion on the subject. What
she didn't realize, of course, was that her dubious expression
only fueled his fire. He lived for those pursed little lips of
hers.

**"You do?"**

**"Scully, the story isn't about you and me, per se. I'm
applying a liberal dose of artistic license in order to keep
it interesting."**

"The Rabbit-Man," he told her once more, although he was
absolutely certain she'd heard him the first time. "Of
Arizona," he clarified. Wouldn't want her to confuse *this*
rabbit-man with any others.

"It's nothing but a blur, Mulder." She dropped into the
nearest chair while he flipped to the next slide.

Okay, this one was a blur, too, but if a person were to look
reeeeally closely at it...he found himself squinting. Had he
put the slide in upside down? He flipped ahead to the next
slide. Ah ha! *This* one was crystal clear.

"Those are worms, Mulder, not rabbits."

"Right. But the worms and the Rabbit-*Man*," he emphasized the
humanizing suffix, "They're connected. Take a look at this."
He passed her a printout of an email he'd received several
days ago.

-----Original Message-----
From: THalp202@aol.com
Sent: Monday, Sept 17, 2000 6:34 AM
To: cooperativeextension@uaext.ariz.edu
Subject: Question about black worms

Hello -- Please don't think I'm crazy but I need to ask a
question about some worms. First of all, they are black and if
stepped on they sound crunchy and every night they are
crawling on my trailer. Plus they ate my dog. Can you tell me
what they are? Thanks in advance and until I hear from you,
I'm going to keep trying to find out what these things are
and, more importantly, *why* they are here.  --Terry

"*Why* they are here?" she read the last line aloud,
punctuating her query with a delicate snort of laughter.

**"I never 'snort', Mulder."**

**"Yes you do, but that's another story and I'll leave it for
our next stakeout. For now..."**

Skeptical as always, Scully handed the email back to Mulder.
"Terry wasn't recently released from a mental institution, was
he?" she asked.

"No. And there's more."

Despite the fact that her partner is right, like 98.9 percent
of the time, Scully raised a suspicious eyebrow and waited
with thinly veiled impatience for Mulder's explanation.

**"Mulder, I'm not sure I like the way I'm being portrayed in
this story of yours."**

**"I told you, the story isn't about us, per se."**

**"What exactly do you mean by 'per se'?"**

**"I mean the story is based on a true account of something
that hasn't in fact happened -- yet. But it will. In the
meantime, I'm embellishing."**

**"I'd appreciate less embellishment, if you don't mind."**

Fine.

Scully raised an inquiring eyebrow. Ordinarily Mulder would
have responded to her curiosity by explaining how much he
needed her on the case, that together they were the perfect
team and that her scientific approach seamlessly complimented
his own intuitive, albeit less rigorous, style. Not to mention
the fact that her questioning nature kept him on his toes and
without her he was nothing. Less than nothing. Zero minus
infinity. *And* that he thought she was intoxicatingly,
stunningly beautiful at 8:36 in the morning -- so much so that
all he wanted to do was reach over and...but never mind --
we're not embellishing anymore.

**"Very funny, Mulder."**

"That note," he said and nodded at the email, "was sent to the
University of Arizona Cooperative Extension's Pest Management
office. A county Extension agent was dispatched to
investigate. He disappeared the same day."

"Disappeared? No clues?"

"Nothing but a puddle of sticky slime about three feet wide
and an inch or two deep."

"Did anyone analyze the slime?"

"Yes they did. It turned out to be no more than that
disgusting goop that slugs leave behind when they slither from
one place to another."

"That must have been one big slug, Mulder."

"Or a whole bunch of little ones."

"I thought you said the worms crunched when they were stepped
on. Slugs don't normally crunch, do they?"

"I didn't say they crunched; Terry the E-Mailer said that. I
said the only thing the local sheriff found was the puddle of
slime."

"How do they know Mr. Extension Agent was anywhere near the
slime?"

"Because they found his clothes and his camera in the pool of
goo. When they developed the film in the camera, they
discovered this." He passed her his piece de resistance -- a
photograph of Rabbit-Man. Unmistakably in focus.

"Humph," she said.

Although she was trying to remain unconvinced, he could see
that the photo had impressed her. How could it not? It was one
of the most bizarre pictures he'd ever seen and he'd seen a
lot. But this guy...thing...took the cake. At about six-two,
not counting the ears, which were at least 18 or 20 inches
long...high...whatever, the Rabbit-Man was skinny, hairy, and
whiskered. Not whiskered in the sense that he didn't shave
that morning but whiskered like a cat or a mouse or, well, a
rabbit. His upper lip was bifurcated, showing two toothy
incisors in desperate need of orthodontia to correct a
pronounced overbite. And it...he...was staring directly into
the camera lens like a...uh, rabbit caught in the headlights
of a car.

"Impressive, huh?" he asked.

"Mulder, he's wearing a waistcoat and a pocket watch."

"I noticed that. Did you see the little spectacles balanced on
his nose?" He tapped the photo, pointing them out.

"Mmm. Isn't it likely this 'rabbit-man' is simply a man
dressed in a rabbit suit?"

"Why would he do that?"

"Costume party? Kid's birthday? Kinky sex? Any of which is
certainly a more plausible explanation than a Dr. Moreauesque
human/lepus genetic experiment gone awry."

"I was thinking more along the lines of lycanthropes -- humans
that transform into animal forms. You know, like wanshang
dholes or were-rabbits."

"Were-rabbits? You mean like the wolves?"

"Right, only less baying at the moon."

"Oh, brother. Why do I get the feeling we're flying to Arizona
later today, Mulder?"

"Not later. Right now." He yanked two plane tickets from his
breast pocket and slapped them down next to the still humming
projector. His enthusiasm made the slide jump in its slot and
the worms on the screen suddenly appeared to come to life,
jittering eerily across the wall. Scully watched until the
worms ceased their creepy-crawly rumba.

"Let's go," she said, resigning herself to the inevitable.

**"Are you comfortable, Scully? This might be a long story."**

**"How long?"**

**"Epic proportions."**

**"I'm comfortable."**
 

PART I: GETTING THERE

Before her was another long passage, and the White Rabbit was
still in sight, hurrying down it. There was not a moment to be
lost: away went Alice like the wind, and was just in time to
hear it say, as it turned a corner, "Oh my ears and whiskers,
how late it's getting!" -- Alice in Wonderland

--------------------
South Central Arizona
12:48 PM

Their destination was Hideout, Arizona, a small town 120 miles
west south west of Phoenix. That's a left turn at Buckeye, a
right at Gila Bend, and then pretty much a straight shot to
the foothills of the Painted Rock Mountains. More or less.
Word of warning though: if you find yourself in Yuma, you
missed your turn. Lot's of people do. Lots and lots and lots
of people, although we'll name no names since Hideout is
located in a section of the state that isn't even included in
the seven geographic regions of the Official Arizona Guide.
Obviously, the town's not much of a tourist stop -- for
whatever reason, most people would prefer to visit the Grand
Canyon.

"Hideout. Appropriately named, wouldn't you say, Scully?"
Mulder asked. Searching for a decent radio station, not to
mention their final destination, he fiddled with the car's
radio as he drove. They hadn't picked up anything but preacher
shows and static over the empty Arizona airwaves since leaving
the greater Phoenix area.

"There it is," Scully announced, pointing up ahead to Terrance
Halpern's silver trailer, gleaming like a crown jewel in the
necklace of polished hubcaps that surrounded his tiny yard.
Next to the mobile home's front door, a large sign proclaimed
'BEWARE OF DOG' in square red letters, although there was no
dog to be seen. Even through the car's dusty windshield,
Scully could make out the empty dog collar lying on the ground
attached to the trailer by a ten-foot length of vinyl-coated
aircraft cable.

Musta been a big dog.

Pulling into the drive, Mulder parked and stepped from the
car. A gust of breath-robbing heat convinced him to leave his
jacket behind. Instantly his shirt was drenched with sweat and
it flapped against his skin like a flag of surrender in the
searing wind. Sand scoured the desert air in miniature
tornadoes and Mulder's tie waved a frantic goodbye to the cool
interior of the air-conditioned car. When Scully joined him in
the whirling dust, she shielded her eyes from the blowing sand
and the blistering sun by using him as a makeshift windscreen,
following on his heels to the tiny trailer's dented front
door.

"There's no place like home, Scully," he said once he was
poised on the cinderblock that served as a front step. A rap
on the sun-baked tin scorched his knuckles and he shook the
sting from his fingers while he waited for Mr. Halpern to
answer the door.

"Who is it?" a thickly bicepped man with a bald, spit-polished
head said when he swung open the door and released the down-
and-dirty thrum of George Thorogood's Bad to the Bone.

"Skinner?"

"Skinner?"

"Huh?" The man-who-looked-like-Skinner appeared nearly as
confused as the two agents.

"Sorry. It's just...you look a lot like someone we know...uh,
sir. I'm Agent Fox Mulder. This is my partner Dana Scully. Are
you Terry Halpern?" Mulder lifted his badge to the muscular
man's narrowed eyes.

"I am." Halpern adjusted his glasses, pushing the lenses
higher up his nose.

"Mr. Halpern, did you send an email to the University of
Arizona Cooperative Extension requesting some information
about black worms?"

"I did. Took yer time gettin' here, din'cha? Ya' must be real
busy up t'the University."

"Mr. Halpern, we're not from the Extension office. We're from
the FBI." He raised his badge once more, aiming for the
squinty man's line of sight.

"Oh! When you said agents, I thought you meant..." Terry
Halpern's eyes widened behind his lenses and he glanced
nervously from Mulder's badge to the trailer. "Um, I throwed
out all them marijuana plants last spring, jus' like my parole
officer tol' me to."

"We're...uh, we're not here about that, sir. We're here about
the worms. Can you tell us anything about them?"

"Sure. C'mon inside where it's a mite cooler," he urged them
forward with a wave of his hand.

Mulder hooked a thumb at the BEWARE OF DOG sign and raised his
eyebrows.

"Oh, dog's dead," Halpern's voice quavered with watery grief.
"Worms got him." Blinking back an upsurge of tears, he led the
agents inside to where an ancient air conditioner labored to
cool the stifling trailer, lowering the temperature by only a
mere degree or two. "Have a seat." Terry gestured toward a
couple of chairs piled high with Mercenary Men magazines.
"Care fer a Bud?" he offered, apparently recovered from his
sudden but transitory rush of grief.

"No, thank you, Mr. Halpern. We'd just like a little more
information about the worms, if you don't mind."

"Well the worms, they come out ever' night. Millions of 'em,
slitherin' up the sides of my trailer. Creepier'n hell."

"Yes, I can imagine. Mr. Halpern, how long has this been going
on?"

"Weeks. Mebbe a month'r more. What's really p'culiar 'bout 'em
is that by mornin', the worms ain't nothin' but shells. All
holler an' brittle. An' black. Nothin' inside 'em at all. The
wind jes' blows their shells away 'til there ain't nothin'
left. 'Ceptin' the goo, a'course."

"Tell us about the goo."

"That damn slop is ever'where they go. Zigzaggin' all over my
trailer and truck. Puddles in the drive. Sticky as hell. Uh,
Agent Mulder? Whaddaya' s'pose it all means?"

"I don't know, Mr. Halpern. Do you think it means something?"

"Yep, I do. Means trouble with a capital T-R-U-B-U-L." Halpern
opened his refrigerator and grabbed two beers. "Ya' sure I
cain't offer ya' a beer?" He extended a can to Mulder. When
Mulder shook his head, the brawny man opened both cans anyway
and quickly downed one brew after the next. Crumpling the
empties in his fists, he tossed them into the overflowing
trash bin in the corner. "I already tol' everythin' I know to
that other feller. The dead Extension agent. Was he a friend
of yers?"

"No, sir. Like I said, we're from the FBI. Mr. Halpern, the
Extension agent's body was never found. What makes you so sure
he's dead?"

"Well, he must be. He ain't showed up a'gin, has he? I think
the worms ate him. Jus' like they ate my dog."

"The worms ate your dog?"

"Yes sir. Poor Blue was tied outside the first night the worms
come. Next mornin' I found nothin' but his collar and his
favorite chew bone floatin' in a slew of goo. Man, I loved
that dog. Just about broke my heart to lose him. Damn worms. I
gotta believe if them worms can eat a 120-pound Bull Mastiff
then they can pro'bly eat a man, too.  Anyways, ya always see
them jeesly li'l things chawin' on rotted carcasses."

"Are you referring to maggots, Mr. Halpern?" Scully asked.

"Yes, ma'am. Damn jeesly, dog-eatin,' creepy-crawly maggots.
Makes my skin itch jus' thinkin' 'bout 'em." As if to prove
his disgust, Halpern opened the refrigerator door once more
and yanked another can of beer from the shelf. He didn't stop
to offer this one to the agents, but popped the lid and
drained the entire twelve ounces down his throat without
taking a breath. "Ya' gonna find out where they're comin'
from, Mr. Mulder, Ms. Scully? Think ya' can stop 'em 'fore
they take any more lives?" Halpern belched.

"We're going to try, Mr. Halpern. Would you mind showing us
where the Extension agent disappeared?" Mulder asked.

"Me? Um...I dunno." Halpern's fingers twitched in panicky
spasms, causing the veins in his arms to bulge from his wrists
to his muscled shoulders. The beer can snapped and buckled in
his fist. "S'pose I could draw yer a map," he offered and
pulled the nub of a pencil from an old Dunkin Donuts travel
mug that sat beside the phone. Tearing the back cover from the
August edition of Mercenary Men, he sketched a simple diagram.
"There's a cave 'bout four miles from here, Mr. Mulder. Just a
crack in the rocks, s'all it is. The Extension feller was
found jus' outside the hole. Well, least ways they found his
clothes. An' his camera."

"Speaking of which, have you ever seen anything like this
before?" Mulder withdrew the photo of the rabbit-man from his
pocket and showed it to Halpern.

"No, sir. Least ways, not dressed in no glasses nor pocket
watch. Although, I seen a steer wearin' a ten-gallon hat
one'st."

"Where was that?"

"Nam." Halpern handed the map to Mulder.

"Thank you for the directions, Mr. Halpern." Scully tilted her
head toward the door. "Mulder? Shall we...?"

Leaving Halpern in the kitchen popping the top off yet another
can of beer, Scully led Mulder out of the trailer into the
bright noonday sun where the two agents stood for a moment
blinking at the intense light and wide open spaces like twin
Punxsutawney Phils emerging from their holes on February
second.

"Let's go, Mulder."

Scully bee-lined to the rental car, missing the fact that
she'd left Mulder crouching at the trailer's cinderblock step
scraping a gooey sample from the dog's empty collar into an
evidence bag. It wasn't until she discovered the car was
locked and turned for the keys that she saw him squatting on
the ground, sealing the bag. With a roll of her eyes, she
returned to his side to stare down at the crown of his head
while he examined the surrounding yard.

Dry soil. Not a blade of grass, not a green weed of any kind
sprouted from the burnt terrain.

"No blood, Scully. If the worms ate the dog, wouldn't there be
at least a drop or two?"

"It's been weeks since the dog disappeared, Mulder. Maybe the
blowing sand covered any trace of blood."

"Maybe."

"Or maybe Mr. Halpern simply doesn't have his story straight."

"What do you mean?" Mulder rose.

"That he was drunk or on drugs or deranged. Possibly all
three."

"Why do you say that?"

"Mulder, he claims he saw a cow in Viet Nam wearing a cowboy
hat."

"Maybe they have rodeos there."

"Or maybe he was high. As for his killer worms, they're
probably nothing more than mundane maggots."

"I don't think so, Scully. What would make maggots turn black
and since when do they leave a sticky residue like slugs?" He
waved the evidence bag. "And what would draw them out into the
Arizona desert and why only at night?"

"Maybe they come out only at night because they'd burn up in
the daylight." She mopped a meandering trickle of sweat from
her brow.

"Vampire maggots?" he asked with hope, "Or maybe you're
thinking spontaneous combustion?"

"Neither, Mulder. Maggots did not eat Terry Halpern's dog or
the Extension agent. Human and animal myiasis -- the condition
where flies deposit eggs in wounds and the resulting maggots
feed on the surrounding necrotic tissue -- is almost unheard
of in the western hemisphere. Yes, cattle grubs occasionally
attack men and horses, burrowing into the skin. And sheep and
horse head maggots are in the same family as cattle grubs, and
will sometimes take up residence in the nose of the host.
Again, humans are not usually targeted, but infestations of
the nose and eyes have been reported."

"Jesus, Scully, please."

"Well, it's true. And maggots have been known to make their
way into the intestinal tract of humans, surviving long enough
to cause clinical symptoms. Referred to as pseudomyiasis,
infestation is usually from the ingestion of food containing
fly eggs, or from flies laying eggs near the victims anus..."

"Stop!" he begged. "I'm a smidge sensitive about maggots, you
know, Scully."

"Mulder, the tobacco beetles we vacuumed from your lungs never
ate your tissue. You may have been in danger from suffocation,
but not from being digested."

"That's a comforting distinction." He cleared his throat a
couple of times, certain the crawly sensation in his windpipe
was caused by an overlooked larva or two. "I hate maggots,
Scully."

"Well, who likes them, Mulder? I've detested maggots ever
since..." she stopped.

"Ever since...?"

"Never mind. It's not important. Let's check out the cave so
we can prove this rabbit-man of yours doesn't exist and we can
go home."
 

PART II: GOING IN

Either the well was very deep, or she fell very slowly, for
she had plenty of time as she went down to look about her, and
to wonder what was going to happen next. First, she tried to
look down and make out what she was coming to, but it was too
dark to see anything. -- Alice in Wonderland

--------------------

Even from a distance of a quarter mile, Mulder and Scully
could see the rabbit-man pacing back and forth in front of an
outcropping of rock. Shimmering like a mirage in the desert
heat, the amazing lycanthrope glared in their direction as he
marched to and fro, watching their car draw closer and closer
and periodically checking his pocket watch. His long ears
twitched with impatience.

"I don't believe it." Scully stared at the tall rabbit...er,
man...eh, rabbit-man.

"Seeing is believing, Scully. Do you think he can speak?"
Mulder asked and parked the car at a distance of about ten
yards. He rolled down his window and shouted, "Hellooo!"
causing the strange animal to blink twice, flick its ears and
then disappear into a crevice in the rock.

"I think you scared him, Mulder."

"Or maybe 'hello' is an insult in rabbitmanese."

"There is no such language. Are we going to follow him?"

Already out of the car, Mulder jogged to the low outcropping
where only a small patch of rock exposed its worn face to the
battering elements. Like a drowning soul in search of a life-
saving breath of air, the stone's parched lips opened from the
depths of the desert to reveal a tight-mouthed cave that led
down more than in. Mulder paused at the cavern's entrance to
beckon Scully out of the car with an enthusiastic wave of his
hand.

Scully frowned but vacated her seat and followed Mulder's
sandy tracks. By the time she reached his side, he was down on
hands and knees with his head thrust into the mouth of the
tiny cave.

"Can you see him, Mulder?" she asked.

"Candseeuhthin," he mumbled, his small flashlight gripped
between his teeth and aimed into the dark hole. Withdrawing
his head from the cavern, he removed the flashlight to grin at
Scully. "We're going after him," he announced.

"Mulder, we're not prepared...we didn't bring any food or
water or...cave stuff."

"Cave stuff?"

"Ropes, flashlights, compasses."

"I've got a flashlight, Scully." He waggled the little light
at her. "Besides, we have our cell phones in case we get into
any real trouble. Come on."

"Mulder, let's think this through. Neither one of us has any
experience spelunking."

"I'm impressed you know the word. Besides, I visited Carlsbad
Caverns when I was nine. How different can it be?"

"Mulder, Carlsbad is a National Park with thousands of
visitors, park ranger guides, and wheelchair accessible
trails. We're out here all alone. This is foolhardy."

"But free. Costs six bucks apiece to get into Carlsbad. Come
on." He tugged her sleeve.

"I thought you were once a Boy Scout, Mulder. Whatever
happened to the motto 'be prepared'?"

"I was an Indian Guide, not a Boy Scout. Big difference. Our
motto was 'follow the rabbit-man.' Come on." He stuck his head
back into the cave.

"Mulder, I'd prefer to have a well thought out plan before we
wander aimlessly around a pitch dark hole."

"Story of your life, Scully. No time, though." He squeezed his
shoulders through the narrow opening and slithered inside.
"Come on," his voice echoed back to her.

"Mul..." She dropped to her knees. Unable to see him, she
crawled in after him. "Mulder?"

The cave was exactly the pitch-dark hole she had anticipated.
Blind in the gloom, she tentatively probed the air with a
searching hand.

"Mulder, where the hell are you?"

"RAAAHHH!" he roared, flashing his light beneath his chin and
making her scream.

"Jesus Christ, Mulder! That's not funny!"

"Sorry. You shoulda seen your face though," he chuckled.

"Sometimes I think I hate you."

"No, you don't."

"I do."

"You don't." He kissed her nose.

"Don't touch me."

"You don't mean that."

"I do."

"You don't." He kissed her again, this time on the lips. She
lightly kissed him back. "See?" he said.

"Are we going to explore this cave or not?"

"I knew you'd come around. The rabbit-man went this way. I
think." Mulder stuck the light back in his mouth and began
crawling on all fours through the narrow passage.

The path sloped steeply and steadily downward and as they
descended, Mulder's flashlight set the cave's walls ablaze
with a fireworks display of snapping glitter and eye-popping
glitz. The beam flickered and glimmered across a
conglomeration of brassy nodules and metallic crystals and
each glassy surface reflected a miniature mirror image of the
two agents, chasing their phantom rabbit on hands and knees.
Hundreds of Mulders and hundreds of Scullys inched through
hundreds of sequined tunnels hunting hundreds of long-eared
enigmas, ad infinitum, guided by little more than faith and
hope and a thirst for the truth.

Mulder paused to remove the flashlight from his mouth.

"What is it, Mulder? Do you see the rabbit-man?"

"Imagine being a fly on this wall, Scully. How weird would
that be?" He gazed up at the faceted reflection overhead.
Multiple Mulders and multiple Scullys stared back at him as if
he peered through an insect's compound eyes. "Help meeeeee!"
he called out in a high-pitched voice.

"Mulder..."

He popped the flashlight back in his mouth and continued
forward on hands and knees.

That was when the floor dropped out from under them. Or to be
more accurate, they inadvertently crawled off the edge of an
unseen underground cliff. Mulder's flashlight spiraled from
his mouth when he yelped. He grabbed frantically for
something, *any*thing, to hold onto, but the only semisolid
object he managed to take hold of was Scully and so the two of
them hurtled through the air together with his arms wrapped
firmly around her waist.

"Shit! Sorry, Scully," his grunted in her ear as he hugged her
to his chest and they fell and fell and fell.

Scully thought she might throw up. Was this how they were
going to die? Smashed to smithereens at the bottom of a
bottomless well without so much as the satisfaction of solving
the damn rabbit-man mystery? After all they'd been through,
this seemed ridiculously insignificant and cruel.

"Guess we'll be going out with a whimper *and* a bang,
Scully."

"I told you we weren't properly prepared."

"Oh that's just great! We're about to die and you're telling
me I told you so?" Mulder hunched his shoulders protectively
around her as they plummeted down the cave's cooling gullet at
a terrifying, gut-wrenching speed. "That is so you, Scully."

"You have to admit, a rope would have been a wise...ohh!"
Something feather-soft tickled Scully's arms and cheeks.
Something feather-soft and sticky. Something feather-soft and
sticky and getting more substantial by the second until it
felt as though they plunged through a well of cotton candy.
"What is this stuff, Mulder?" She buried her face in his chest
to keep the gauzy substance from her eyes.

"I...I'm not sure, but it seems to be slowing our fall."

It was true. The fibrous materials caught on their clothes and
their hair and checked their break-neck decent, wrapping
itself around them and cushioning them from an inevitable
crash at the bottom of the crevasse. Enveloped in a dense,
spongy cocoon, they rolled to a gentle stop.

"Scully, didn't we see something like this eight years ago in
the Olympic National Forest? Do you think a bunch of insects
are gonna suck our bodies dry now?"

"Not if I can get us out of here first. Good thing I still
carry my Swiss army knife." She tried to unstick her arm from
Mulder's back and search her pocket, but the odd insulation's
gluey threads bound her to him. "Uh, I can't move, Mulder."

He snuggled closer. "I kinda like this," he purred into her
ear.

"Now is not the time. Help me get my knife. It's in my back
pocket. See if you can reach it."

He struggled half-heartedly, more intent on increasing his
body's contact with hers than on setting them free. "Guess
you're stuck with me, Scully."

"Mulder, please try. It's getting hard to breathe."

She was right; it was becoming more than a little stuffy
inside their odd padded cell. It was becoming downright
intolerable. As a matter of fact, the suffocating blanket
wrapped them so tightly, it trapped their expired carbon
dioxide inside with them and the lack of fresh air was
beginning to make them both feel a little lightheaded. In an
effort to find relief, Mulder searched in earnest for her
knife, wriggling one hand past the curve of her waist and
downward to the camber of her backside while the gummy wool of
their enclosure pulled like a Band Aid at the hairs of his
arms. Wedging his fingers into her pants pocket, he dug out
the knife.

"Hurry up, Mulder," she gasped, feeling faint. Her chest ached
for oxygen.

"Got it," he announced with a cough, his heaving lungs rocking
them both.

"Cut us out of here!"

"I'm trying." He fumbled to unfold the knife. "Shit!"

"What's the matter?"

"Corkscrew," he explained. "Why the hell do they put a
corkscrew in these things anyway? Just in case you come across
a bottle of Pouilley Fuisse when you're lost in the woods?" He
stabbed the corkscrew through the confining shroud and to his
astonishment, the point burst their wooly prison like a
balloon. A sudden rush of fresh air popped their eardrums.

"Let's get outta this stuff," Mulder choked. He clawed his way
from the constricting pod and pulled Scully out after him.
Taking a moment to catch their breath, they sat panting and
plucking gooey threads from each other's hair and clothes.

"Mulder...this material...it feels like..."

"What is it, Scully?"

"Human tissue." She tested the gummy texture between her
fingertips. "It almost reminds me of..." she smelled it and
wrinkled her nose, "Lung tissue."

"Lung?" Eyes now adjusting to the low light, he peered into
the dim cavern, cocking his ear to the rolling tide of wind
that rattled past them. "You don't think...?"

"Mulder, we did *not* fall into the lungs of some giant
ground-dwelling creature. There is no scientific evidence to
substantiate the existence of such an animal."

"This is classic Jonah and the Whale, Scully. Other examples
exist in literature, too, you know. Fantastic Voyage, for one.
And in the original Star Wars movie, need I remind you that
Han Solo flew into the maw of an underground asteroid worm."

"Those are just stories, Mulder. Fairytales. Fantasy. Nothing
but fiction. This is real life. We are *not* inside anything
but a hole." Scully's hair suddenly swirled upward, pulled by
a sucking wind that created a churning red halo around her
head. She watched Mulder's hair rise in writhing spikes, too,
only to flatten against his skull when a subsequent downward
draft blasted over them.

"You certain, Scully?" Another updraft tugged painfully at
their flesh. "Ouch!"

"We need to get out of here, Mulder." The cave filled once
more with air and the increased volume threatened to squash
them. "Before we develop nitrogen narcosis or decompression
sickness or both."

"This way." Mulder wobbled to his feet and hauled Scully up
with him.

The air pressure increased and decreased, and as it rose and
fell the agents felt pushed and pulled, crushed and released.
The lack of air was nearly as painful as the overabundance,
causing their skin to swell, their ears to pop and their eyes
to feel as if they were being sucked from their sockets. The
waffling change intensified until it dizzied them. Hand-in-
hand, gripping each other for both support and reassurance,
they lurched along the passage, running when they could, but
more often than not simply struggling to remain upright.

"Mulder, look!" Scully shouted over the now screaming wind.
"There's a light up ahead."

About fifty yards in front of them, a shaft of blue light
illuminated the tunnel, and right smack in the middle of the
fluorescent beam stood the Rabbit-Man of Arizona, checking his
pocket watch.

"There he is, Scully! He's standing beside a door." Together
they sprinted toward the creature.

As they ran, the air continued to howl and pinch, tug and
billow. By the time they reached the door and Mulder was able
to grab it and anchor them to the frame, the Rabbit-Man had
vanished into the adjoining room.

A very different kind of room.

Square and metal, looking solid and safe, the brightly lit
space offered them some much-needed protection from the
dreadful roaring tempest. Mulder yanked Scully across the
stainless steel threshold and slammed the door shut behind
them.

Continued in 2/3
 
 

THE CASE OF THE RELUCTANT PATHOLOGIST (2/3)
 

PART III: UPSIDE DOWN

For, you see, so many out-of-the-way things had happened
lately, that Alice had begun to think that very few things
indeed were really impossible. -- Alice in Wonderland

--------------------

Mulder and Scully found themselves in a large metallic room,
about forty feet square and lit by row-upon-row of fluorescent
tubes suspended from a tall, tiled ceiling. The quiet hum of
overhead lights was a welcome change from the deafening gale
beyond the door. The Rabbit-Man, by the way, was nowhere to be
seen.

"I guess this proves we're not wandering around inside the gut
of an overgrown prairie dog...or any other fictitious monster,
Mulder. Where'd Rabbit-Man go?" Scully ran her palm along a
cool stainless steel wall.

"Humph." Disappointed by both the disappearing lycanthrope and
the realization that they were inside a manmade structure and
not the innards of a previously undiscovered gargantuan
underground creature, Mulder paced to the center of the room.
His footfalls echoed off the steel, crisply disturbing the
tomblike quiet with each disenchanted step. When he reached
the room's midpoint, he spun to inspect their surroundings.

On all sides, dozens of steel refrigeration units lined the
walls. Small boxy compartments -- like you'd find in a morgue
-- were stacked several deep. The rows of polished doors
gleamed, unmarred by either dust or fingerprints.

"What is this place?" Scully examined the nearest compartment.
Hooking her fingers around the door's latch, she opened the
locker and slid out an empty cadaver tray.

"Looks like a mortuary or an autopsy bay," Mulder said,
watching Scully explore the room.

She opened one locker after the next, only to find each one
empty.

"Except that there are no tables or instruments or bodies,"
she said, continuing her investigation.

Despite the peculiar circumstances, the familiar surroundings
soothed Scully's frazzled nerves. She relaxed as she surveyed
the organized compartments. There was a nice logic to this
place, a neatness and a precision that struck a harmonious
chord in her structured mind. She felt at home here where
there were no sticky, suffocating mysteries, no stormy push
and pull, and no surprises around the next dark, unknowable
corner.

Well, perhaps there was one surprise.

"Mulder..." She drew back from a tag that labeled the drawer.

"What is it, Scully?"

She shot him a nervous glance. "Jack. The label says it's Jack
Willis."

"Open it."

She hesitated, not really wanting to expose the decomposing
body of her former paramour locked inside the closed vault.
Mulder crossed the room and reached for the handle.

"No, Mulder," she stopped him, "I'll open it myself." His hand
dropped away.

She decided to do it quickly, like jumping into a cold pool or
yanking off an adhesive bandage.

CLANK. The latch snapped open and the metal door swung easily
outward.

Empty.

"This is weird," Mulder said, his attention already focused on
the neighboring locker. "Daniel Waterston?"

"Daniel's not dead, Mulder."

"Maybe he is to you." He opened the door.

"What's that supposed to mean?" This compartment was vacant,
too.

"Who's Marcus Roberts?"

"Um...my senior prom date."

"I'm sensing a pattern." Another empty locker. "Did you love
him, Scully?"

"No, I didn't love him. We were only eighteen."

"Did you sleep with him?"

"That's none of your business."

"Hooo...I think it might be. You see, *my* name is just a few
doors down. Right after Paul Pritchard, Jason Olivette and
some guy named 'One Night Stand.' Are we missing anyone?"

Scully yanked open Paul and Jason's compartments to
reveal...nothing. "I don't understand, Mulder. What the hell
does this mean?"

"Who says it means anything? Does it mean something to you?"

"Yes, dammit, I...I slept with all these men."

"You did?"

"Mulder, you know I did."

"I knew no such thing. Yes, I knew about you and Jack...and
you and Daniel...and you and me... The others, I had no idea."

"So now you do. What does it mean?"

"Scully, I don't think I'm in a position to say. But something
makes me wish my personal cupboard wasn't quite so..." He
opened his own door and stared into the emptiness. "Bare.
Seems kinda like...I never existed. Anyone hooooome?" he
called into the unoccupied unit and waited for the return of
his trapped echo.

"Mulder, I don't... Did you hear that?"

"What?"

"That knocking. It came from...it's coming from one of the
vaults over there." She pointed to the opposite side of the
room. A faint rat-a-tat sounded from within the closed locker.

Crossing the room, Mulder put his ear to the door.

Knock. Knock.

"Whooooo's there?" he asked.

"Tweedledee, you dumbass," came back the muffled reply.

"Tweedle...?" he unlatched the door and out rolled a short,
rather unkempt man wearing horn-rimmed glasses held together
at the bow with a wad of masking tape. "Frohike?"

"Frohike?" Scully repeated.

"Huh?"

Behind the confused Tweedledee, two more heads appeared from
the shadowy depths of the refrigeration unit. They looked
remarkably like Byers and Langley.

"'Bout time, man," the blonde huffed from the back, "Thought
we were gonna suffocate in there."

"We've been trapped for a very long time," the soft-spoken
bearded gentleman in the middle explained.

Mulder eyeballed all three. "If you're Tweedledee," he pointed
at Frohike's doppelganger, "Then these two must be Tweedledum
and Tweedledumber."

"Very funny, dude. We don't need to take insults from a narc
like you," the blonde's indignant nasal twang reverberated
around the empty metal room. "Our names are..."

"Don't tell 'em who we are, you idiot!" Tweedledee hissed.
"They probably work for the Government."

Tweedledumber's mouth snapped shut.

Mulder crossed his arms. "Fine with me if you want to be
addressed as Dee, Dum and..."

"Don't say it!" Dumber insisted, jumping to the floor. "Narc!"

"Who's the babe?" Dee hopped from the cadaver tray, too, and
eyed Scully, raking her from top to toenails with a lust-
filled stare. "She's *hot*."

"Stop playing games, Frohike. What the hell are you guys doing
here?" She placed her fists on her hips.

"I don't know who this Frohike hombre you keep mentioning is,
but if he's a friend of yours, I'll play along." Dee's
appreciative once-over became a twice-over and then a thrice-
over.

"We've been imprisoned here," the gentle Dum explained,
ignoring Dee's lascivious comment and earning him glares from
his cohorts. "And we've been investigating possible avenues of
escape."

"Who imprisoned you?"

"We don't know. But here we are nonetheless, safely tucked
away. As far as we've been able to ascertain, we're trapped in
a psychological construct."

"A dream?"

"Possibly. Or a fairytale or fable. Or maybe something more
purposeful," Dum suggested.

"Like the physical representation of a psychological state,"
Dumber added, completely serious.

"Our research suggests that this room might be the tangible
interpretation of repressive denial combined with an external
LOC POV, as well as some very specific emotional coping
styles," Dum explained.

"Namely, a personal Berlin Wall," Dumber nodded agreement.

"What the hell are you three talking about?" Scully frowned.
"We're stuck in a damn empty room."

"Our point exactly, cachonda." Dee winked.

"Frankly, our speculation is all for naught, lady and
gentlemen. Whether our theories prove true or false, we are
stuck here in any case," Dum pointed out.

"Have you tried leaving by the front door?" Scully asked.

"Um...what door would that be?"

She turned to look. The door was gone.

"You see? We're completely shut in, closed off," Dum pointed
out. "Although, it's not all bad in here. Clean. Organized.
Uh, clean. Did I say that already?"

"What do we do now, Mulder?" Scully swiveled and searched the
room, hoping a new door would magically materialize as easily
as the old one had disappeared.

"Any ideas, guys?" Mulder asked the Tweedles.

"Nada."

"Nope."

"Sorry, all out." Dumber's apology was punctuated by the
resounding slam of 'Mulder's' closing refrigeration unit.

"Looks like someone's been sleeping in my meat locker," Mulder
crossed the room to inspect his now shut door. "And I doubt
we're going to find out it's Goldilocks. Any guesses who?"
Yanking open the door, he exposed the retreating cottontail of
the Rabbit-Man as the creature scuttled into the shadows at
the rear of the cupboard where he vanished. "Come on, Scully!"
Mulder scrambled into the locker after it.

"You guys coming?" Scully asked, one knee already on the lip
of the cadaver tray.

"I think we'll stay right here," Dum watched her with forlorn
eyes. "Maybe you can come back later and let us out?"

"I'll see what I can do." Scully hauled herself into the
locker.

Just before the door slammed shut behind her, she heard Dee
whistle and say, "Nice ass!"
 

PART IV: SIDE STEPPING

She was looking about for some way of escape, and wondering
whether she could get away without being seen, when she
noticed a curious appearance in the air: it puzzled her very
much at first, but after watching it a minute or two she made
it out to be a grin, and she said to herself "It's the
Cheshire-Cat." -- Alice in Wonderland

--------------------

"Mulder? Mulder, where are you?"

"Just ahead of you, Scully. Hurry."

"I...I can't see you."

A fissure of static electricity momentarily lit the metal
passageway with a finger of crooked sparks. Before the light
fizzled out, Scully caught a glimpse of Mulder about fifty
yards further along the tunnel. A buzz of charged ions
vibrated the heels of her hands, setting her nerves on edge as
she crawled through the dark, scrambling to catch up with
Mulder.

After several knee-numbing minutes and a half-dozen flashes of
lightning, Scully found herself facing a crossroads of sorts
where a second shaft split from the first, leading seemingly
identical paths in two different directions.

"Mulder? Mulder?" she hollered down first one tunnel and then
the next. "Mulder!"

"I'm here, Scully," his faint reply floated back to her.

"Which path did you take?"

No answer.

"Mulder, which path did you take?" she repeated, yelling as
loudly as she could.

"There's only one, Scully." His voice sounded very far away.

"Mulder, wait, please! I...I don't know which way to go."

Silence.

"Damn it, Mulder!" Another explosion of electricity shot
through the air, lighting the shadows for only a second or
two. She decided to try the passage on the left.

The further along she crawled, the more lightning flared
overhead. Eventually the entire ceiling sizzled with
crisscrossing blue-white arcs. An insistent hum accompanied
the sparks and the sound buzzed angrily in her ears. The
stench of ozone filled her sinuses and she clenched her jaws
until her teeth ached.

Zzzzap! CRACK!

"Mulder?"

Her bewildered plea went unheard, drowned out by the fidgety
vibration above her. She wondered if she should turn around,
return to the morgue or at least go back to the divide in the
passage where she might try the other path. Left or right --
her instincts and Mulder's were never in sync. In hindsight,
she realized she probably should have ignored her first choice
and gone with the exact opposite, knowing his selection would,
without a doubt, contradict her own.

Over her head, nerve-wracking streaks of current traveled the
length of the tunnel for as far as the eye could see, lighting
the way with their bright blue shimmer. She hurried through
the passage as fast as she could.

When a puff of smoke clouded the tunnel up ahead, Scully
worried that the shaft had caught fire, ignited by the
constant zigzag of electricity. However, the smell wasn't
quite the plastic odor of an electrical fire, but something
more organic. Like burning autumn leaves or an outdoor
campfire or...or tobacco smoke. That was it exactly -- the
smell of a lit cigarette. Or a hundred lit cigarettes.
Blinking her way through the haze, she finally arrived at the
end of the passage where she lowered herself over the metal
lip into yet another room.

Painted blue from the glowing screens of several dozen hi-tech
surveillance monitors, the room's inky walls closed in on her,
the ceiling hung incommodiously low and the black tiled floor
absorbed all light.

Two men sat on stools and watched the monitors while they
discussed the goings-on in the room they surveilled. They kept
their voices low. Both wore the blackest suits Scully had ever
seen.

"Excuse me..." she cleared her throat, "Uh, sirs?" The men
turned to look at her.

Jesus Christ, it was Old Smokey and his grinning sidekick Rat
Boy. She couldn't believe it. What the hell was going on here?
CGB Spender and Krycek at the bottom of a hole in Arizona?

"Are you lost, young lady?" the Smoker asked, apparently
nonplussed by her arrival.

"Very funny, Spender."

"Spender? You've mistaken me for someone else, I'm afraid."

"I don't think so."

"We've never met," he assured her and drew deeply on his
cigarette. "I'd bet my life on it."

The grinning young man who looked like Krycek laughed out
loud. "You'd bet on anything, Old Man."

"True," the Smoker smiled. "As a matter of fact, I've got a
sizable sum riding on the untimely demise of our friend in the
booth," he nodded at one of the monitors and his Right Hand
Man snickered.

Scully's eyes traveled to the screen.

Oh, God, it was Mulder. He lay unconscious on a bed in a tiny,
whitewashed room. Wires led from his chest, arms and scalp to
a number of monitoring devices. Heart beat, blood pressure,
brain activity -- all his bodily functions blipped and beeped
in various tones on various machines.

"What have you done to him?" Scully demanded.

"We haven't done anything. We're nothing but innocent
bystanders," the Smoker maintained, causing his Right Hand Man
to cackle.

"Then what's wrong with him?" she challenged.

"He's dying."

"Of what?"

"Neglect? Broken heart? Maybe boredom. Who knows? Care for a
jellybean?" The Smoker reached into his pocket and withdrew a
fistful of writhing black and white maggots. He offered them
to Scully. "No? Suit yourself." He thrust the worms under the
nose of his smiling cohort. "Take them," he insisted.

The Right Hand Man's smile faded just a little. Picking
through the worms, he culled out all but the fattest and the
whitest.

"The Old Man doesn't care for the black ones," he explained
before tossing the unwanted maggots into his mouth. His
brilliant smile returned when he swallowed.

A shrill alarm blared, jumping Scully and announcing a decline
in Mulder's condition.

"Do something!" Scully ordered the two men.

"Oooo, problems," the Right Hand Man gleefully shook his head.
"His odds are slipping."

"Looks like I'll win big with this one," predicted the Smoker,
sucking on his dwindling cigarette. "Care to place a bet,
young lady, before it's too late?"

"Where is he? I've got to help him!" Scully's panic increased
as she watched the monitor's readout take a nosedive.

"The chance of a lifetime..."

"Where's the damn door?" Scully paced around them, searching
the black walls for a way out.

"In a lifetime of chance..."

"Shut up and let me see him!"

"It's a high stakes game..."

"God damn it!"

"And high time you joined in." The monitor flat-lined. "Oops,
looks like you're too late, young lady." The Smoker stubbed
out his cigarette.

"Damn you!" Scully returned to the Smoker and grabbed the
unprepared man by the collar. "Tell me how to get into that
room!" she hissed, her fist clenched to strike.

"I think you'll find he's no longer there," the Smoker pointed
a tobacco-stained finger at the monitor. Scully's eyes shot to
the screen and combed the little white room beyond the glass.
The bed was empty. Mulder was gone.

The Right Hand Man let loose a peal of giggles. "Absence makes
the heart grow fonder, hmmm?" His shoulders rattled with
hiccupping hilarity. His teeth were the brightest things in
the room.

"There must be a lesson in here somewhere, wouldn't you say?"
Pleased as punch, the Smoker lit another cigarette and
eyeballed Scully. "What do you suppose it is, young lady?"

"Ten to one she doesn't get it," the Right Hand Man predicted.

"I suspect the odds aren't quite as high as that, but I'll see
your bet. Shall I give her a hint to help her along?"

"No hints or all bets are off."

"Fine. No hints. But if she finds him, in all likelihood
she'll find the truth, too."

"Another wager, old man?"

"Three to one."

"You're on." Instead of laying out cash to cover the bet, the
Smoker withdrew another fistful of squirming maggots and
deposited them next to the now blank surveillance screen.

Scully noticed that not all of the worms were white or black
anymore. A good number were gray. Dark gray, light gray,
silver gray, the colors of smokescreens and hazy nights and
fogged mirrors.

The Smoker popped a particularly fat maggot into his mouth and
bit down on it with relish. "You might try placing a long
distance call," the Smoker suggested to Scully.

"Don't help her, Old Man!" the Right Hand Man huffed, the
corners of his gleaming mouth turning downward.

"Why not? She looks so desperate. Don't you feel sorry for
her?"

Scully ignored them both and pulled her cell phone from her
pocket. She didn't know why she hadn't thought of it sooner.
She punched in Mulder's number.

"He's number one on her speed dial. That tells us something,"
the Smoker pointed out.

The phone rang.

And rang.

And rang.

"No answer?" The Smoker extinguished another nubby cigarette.
"Too bad."

Hearing the faint trill of Mulder's cell from the far side of
the room's back wall, Scully realized she might locate him
simply by following the sound of his ringing phone. She
sidestepped a knotted nest of snaking wires and bypassed the
tower of electronic equipment, listening the whole while for
the distant jangle of Mulder's phone. Like a game of Hot and
Cold, she honed in on the sound. Running her fingertips over
the wall, she searched for a throughway.

"Ooooo. She's rounding the corner."

Beneath her probing hands, she felt a slight depression, not
much more than a paper-thin crack. She rapped her knuckles
along the surface, listening for a change in pitch. No doubt
about it, she'd found a secret door. Now she needed to locate
the hidden latch.

Fingers fluttering along the crack, she searched for a
release. When she found none, she started again from the
beginning, retracing her path.

"Determined, isn't she?" the Smoker remarked to his Right Hand
Man.

"Mmm. More than I would have guessed."

"That's the trouble with you, my friend. You have so little
faith in the resolve of the human spirit."

His comment tickled the Right Hand Man's funny bone. "As if
you'd know a damn thing about the human condition!"

Scully's fingers drifted over a barely perceptible rise in the
surface of the wall. She pressed the tiny button and heard the
concealed release snick open.

"Bingo!" the Smoker applauded. "She's on the homestretch."
 

PART V: TOPSY TURVEY

"I wish I hadn't cried so much!" said Alice, as she swam
about, trying to find her way out. "I shall be punished for it
now, I suppose, by being drowned in my own tears!" -- Alice in
Wonderland

--------------------

Leaving behind the lightning and the smoke and the Right Hand
Man's hateful laugh, Scully pursued the jingling of Mulder's
phone. To her astonishment, she discovered a magnificent room
on the other side of the hidden panel and she scanned the
lavish interior from ceiling to floor, end to apse, with wide
eyes and dropping jaw. All around her, candles flickered,
casting a sumptuous glow on tall, strawberry-colored walls,
and high overhead, she spied a sprinkling of sugary cupid-like
angels adorning a Neapolitan ceiling. A veil of incense
bloated the yawning space with the pleasant aroma of cinnamon
and cloves. The room looked every inch like a gingerbread
cathedral bedecked for a holiday celebration, with a central
aisle dividing endless rows of candy-coated pews, each seat
festooned with a nosegay of spun sugar roses. From somewhere
behind her, a stained glass window cast a kaleidoscope of
colors across the floor.

Smack in the middle of the pretty splash of color lay Mulder's
burring cell phone. Powering off her own phone, Scully
silenced the ringing and retrieved Mulder's cell from the
floor.

"What the...?"

The phone was slathered with goo and the annoying adhesive
clung to her fingers. Forcing the gummy phone into her pocket,
she wiped her soiled palm across her shirt in an attempt to
rid herself of the mess. However, the damn goop wouldn't come
off and her frustrated efforts only made things worse; the
slime bled into the fabric of her blouse where it stained the
silk with a nasty splotch that resembled a Rorschach's ink
blot. She could swear she saw an upside-down rabbit-man in the
crooked outline.

"Damn it."

Glaring at a curiously identical blemish slicking the floor
where she'd found the phone, something about the surrounding
pattern of light caught her eye. She turned to study the
source. No Christ on the Throne or Virgin Mary at the Cross
decorated the enormous rainbowed window high above her head.
Instead, an intricate puzzle of lollipop colors replicated
Mulder's I WANT TO BELIEVE poster. A glazed UFO hovered in a
crackled sky above a compote of green. Mulder's mantra graced
the lower third of the panel causing Scully's stomach to roll
uneasily at the familiar sight.

Where the hell was Mulder?

"Do you believe?" a heavy voice rumbled through the church.

"Excuse me?" Scully spun to find who asked the question.

"Do you believe?" a smiling priest repeated, walking
noiselessly down the aisle.

"Daddy?" Scully gaped at the man who looked like her father
dressed in the robes of a priest.

"Most people refer to me as 'Father.'" The priest's ruddy
cheeks plumped. "Do we know each other?"

"I'm...I'm not sure. You look like..." She hesitated. Everyone
she'd met today resembled someone she knew, but not a single
one of them claimed to know her. Obviously the priest didn't
recognize her either. "What did you ask me, Da...Father?"

"I asked if you believed."

"In UFO's?"

"Or extraterrestrials or life on other planets. Or rabbit-men,
for that matter," the priest chuckled.

"Sir?"

"Perhaps you believe in all things."

"I don't think so."

"Ahhh, you're a scientist. You demand proof before you're
willing to believe. But what about faith and trust? What of
your own God-given instincts?"

"I-I don't understand."

"'Love bears all things, *believes* all things, hopes all
things, endures all things.' First Corinthians."

Scully didn't know what to say. Her reticence spurred the
priest to recite more of the passage.

"'Love never ends; as for prophecies, they will pass away; as
for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass
away. For our knowledge is imperfect and our prophecy is
imperfect; but when the perfect comes, the imperfect will pass
away.'" He took hold of her hand and led her down the aisle
toward the alter. "Do you know the rest of the passage?" he
quizzed.

"Um, I think I, uh... 'When I was a child...?'"

"That's right. Go on."

"'When I was a child, I spoke like a child,...I thought like a
child, I reasoned like a child...' Um..." She stalled.

"'When I became a man,'" the priest supplied, "'I gave up
childish ways.' Perhaps you recall the last line?"

She shook her head. "I'm sorry. It's been a while."

"It's worth remembering. The passage ends: 'So faith, hope,
love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.'
Do you believe this to be the truth?"

With a palm at her back, he guided her to a strange red-and-
white striped cross. Stripped bare of the customary crucifix,
the enormous symbol looked like a bizarre, misshapen candy
cane mimicking, in a Santa's Village sort of way, the tiny
cross that dangled at her collarbone. She stared into the
glossy surface and studied her own candy-colored reflection
while she tried to digest the Biblical quotation and answer
the priest's question.

"I...I want to belie..." Her mouth snapped shut when she
realized she parroted Mulder's poster. "Where's Mulder?" She
turned to face the priest.

"Mulder?" the priest asked, still smiling.

"My partner. Where is he?"

"Did you lose him?"

"I..."

"Why do you suppose you let that happen?"

"What? I didn't..." She fumbled for the words to describe how
she and Mulder had in fact become separated.

"No matter. Where will you look for him now?"

"I don't know. This place..." Her gaze roamed from nave to
choir loft. "I hardly know where to begin."

"Perhaps you need to look inside yourself first, collect your
thoughts in order to get to the heart of the matter. It might
be best if I leave you to yourself." The priest patted her arm
and stepped to a side door. He flashed her a final encouraging
smile before he silently slipped out of sight.

Scully took a seat in the front pew. She wasn't sure what to
do next. This had been such a strange day, and that was saying
a lot considering all the strange days she'd shared with
Mulder pursuing X-Files over the years.

"Mulder, where the hell are you?" she chuffed into the
silence.

"I...I didn't lose you," she insisted, "You lost me. As a
matter of fact, you were so fixated on finding the truth as
usual, you left me in the dust. I don't know why I continue to
follow you on these wild goose chases. Or rabbit-man chases.
Whatever."

Glancing over her shoulder, Scully squinted into the shadowed
nooks and crannies.

Nothing.

"I'm not worried about you," she lied.

Still nothing.

"You better not be hiding out there listening to me talk to
myself, Mulder. I have no intention of saying anything nice
about you," she warned.

Still no response, other than her own irritated sigh. And the
low rumble of her stomach. She was hungry. They'd wolfed down
fast food tacos at the airport while they'd waited for the
rental car but that was hours ago. Now she felt completely
empty and her belly ached for even another limp, stale taco.
Hell, she'd take Mulder's sunflower seeds if he were there to
offer them.

She searched her pockets, hoping to locate a candy bar or a
breath mint. No such luck.

"Damn it. I'd sell my soul..." She paused. "Sorry," she
apologized to the candy cane cross at the alter, "Didn't mean
that."

She decided to pace, maybe follow the priest, discover a way
out. When she stood, however, she stepped ankle deep into a
puddle of syrupy slime. A growing puddle. Sticky and slippery,
the viscous substance already filled her shoes and saturated
her stockings. It inched its way up her calves. And despite
the fact that the awful stuff was clear and odorless,
something about it brought a fire of bile to the back of her
throat and a sting of tears to her eyes.

Arms outstretched for balance, she anchored herself to the
back of a pew while she inched between the rows, following the
priest's path by sliding one cautious foot in front of the
other in an effort to get to the exit without falling. The goo
swirled around her, pushing and pulling her in its sticky
current. Now knee deep, the rising tide threatened to knock
her from her feet. Progress became impossible. She felt like
an insect stuck on a flapping strip of flypaper.

Without any warning, a wave of goop plowed over her. She lost
her hold on the pew and the current sent her spinning, sucking
her away from the exit. She fought to keep her head above the
turbulent surface but the undertow pulled her to the floor.
Pinned beneath the weight of the syrupy sea, she struggled to
hold her breath.

Her instincts told her to swim upward but the frenzied current
disoriented her and she no longer knew which way was up and
which way was down. She twisted in confusing circles. The
agitating slime dizzied her and made her feel as though she'd
fallen into the churning drum of a clothes washer. The motion
sent her whirling out of control. For the second time today,
her lungs ached for a breath of air.

Feeling lightheaded and desperate and soooo unbelievably and
incredibly tired, she finally ceased her struggle. She found
herself thinking instead about Dr. Heitz Werber and the way he
had placed her in a trance so many years ago to help her
regain her lost memories. Recalling his hypnotic voice, she
let her arms, her hands, her fingers go limp, floating free in
the spinning maelstrom.

^^"I'm going to ask you to go back...close your
eyes...relax...your hands, your feet, your jaw...all parts of
your body...go back...take long, deep breaths..."^^

Yes, that would feel good. Letting go. Taking a breath.

She felt herself drift.

Let go.

Breathe.

^^"I feel, Scully...that you believe...you're not ready to go.
And you've always had the strength of your beliefs. I don't
know if my being here will help bring you back. But I'm
here."^^

Mulder.

Mulder's here. Somewhere.

Why is it she can't find him?

Scully pinwheeled in the sticky swirling tide.

Ring Around the Rosie.

Jump rope. Hopscotch. Blind Man's Bluff. Running pell-mell
into the wind, lifting a kite high into the air.

Hide and...

Hide and...

She bumped against something solid but oh, so fragile and it
splintered under the pressure of the overwhelming whirlpool.
Mulder's stained glass poster shattered as the tide washed her
through the gumdrop-colored window. Landing in a heap on the
other side, Scully sucked in a breath of air.

Continued in 3/3
 
 

THE CASE OF THE RELUCTANT PATHOLOGIST (3/3)
 

PART VI: DOWNSIDE UP

"I am so very tired of being all alone here!" -- Alice in
Wonderland

--------------------

Scully gasped, choking goop from her lungs with a seemingly
endless round of chest-rattling spasms. Her pulse pounded in
her ears and her imagination translated the racing thub-dub of
her heartbeat into the words 'too late, too late, too late.'

When her cough subsided, she lifted her head to see that she'd
been deposited in a narrow hallway, painted crimson on all
sides. The broken window was now gone, vanished completely,
and the corridor was doorless as well. An autopsy table
blocked the thin hall at its midpoint and when Scully finally
managed to stand, she saw that the table held a draped body.

The way the day had been going, her first thought was that
Mulder surely lay beneath the starched sheet. But even
Mulder's feet weren't as big as these and his ears certainly
weren't long enough to hang off the end of the gurney. Leaning
on the table for support and still trying to catch her breath,
Scully peeled back a corner of the sheet to reveal the
whiskered face of the rabbit-man.

"Impossible."

She tugged at the hare's hair, expecting the entire head to
slip off, nothing more than a mask. When it didn't come away,
she yanked harder. Then harder still.

"Humph."

This was no man in a bunny suit after all. This was really and
truly, honest to goodness, a rabbit...man, adding another
notch to Mulder's 98.9 percent success rate.

Would she be able to find him to tell him?

Of course she would find him. She had to.

But first things first. A quick examination of the rabbit-man.
Mulder above anyone would forgive her the delay. After all, it
wasn't like she was ignoring him; she was doing this *for*
him.

Snapping the sheet from the body like a magician revealing a
rabbit hidden inside his hat, Scully exposed the lycanthrope's
carcass. To her horror, the rabbit-man's innards gaped and
squirmed with uncountable hungry maggots. The burrowing
gluttons tunneled and digested the poor creature's flesh,
leaving behind nothing but a putrid soup of slime.

Scully backed away from the table. Heart hammering in her
chest, she felt she absolutely must get out of the room. Fast.

Determined to escape, she turned from the table, searching for
a way to flee from the doorless, windowless hall-that-led-to-
nowhere. But four blank, crimson walls stared back at her,
tinting her skin with a flush of panic.

Anger and fear and futility boiled up inside her. She pounded
her palms against the stubborn walls. She called for help. She
thought she might cry and the prospect of losing control sent
a pyre of fury through her. Lunging at the autopsy table, she
shoved the gurney with all her strength. It clattered into the
far wall where it tipped onto its side. The rabbit-man's
corpse tumbled from the fallen table and rolled to the center
of the room where it lay face up, its wound displayed in all
its horrible glory.

That's when something reeeeeeally strange happened.

The maggots lined up like a phalanx of army ants and marched
single file from the corpse. They divided their numbers,
separating into four distinct groups. Each group formed a line
and end-to-end, the maggots crawled in four opposite
directions. Scully watched in astonishment as each little
battalion bee-lined across the floor and up onto the blank
walls. When four squirmy lines extended from corpse to wall to
ceiling marking the room with a big, skinny, maggoty X, the
worms divided once more, every other one going left or going
right, forming four giant Ts, one per wall. The split columns
then headed downward, until several thousand maggots outlined
the shapes of four doors. Finished with their task, the worms
halted and the solid wall within each rectangle of maggots
simply disappeared, exposing four tiny rooms beyond each frame
of worms.

"Holy sh..."

Scully took a shaky step toward the nearest chamber. Poking
her head cautiously inside, she saw what appeared to be her
childhood livingroom. She blinked at the familiar furnishings,
the picture window that overlooked the base housing, the
fireless fireplace, its mantle studded with family photos.

On the sofa, her mother chatted with Bill and Charlie. Her
sisters-in-law sat in the wing chairs swapping photos of the
kids. Beyond the picture window, her nieces and nephews played
in the yard.

It was an odd sensation seeing her family grown older, their
numbers decreased yet greater than ever, sitting and visiting
with one another in the house where she had grown up.

When she entered the room, no one looked at her. Their
conversations continued as if she didn't stand there among
them feeling alone and lost and tired. Laughter peppered the
air making her smile although she hadn't shared their joke.

"Mom? Bill?" She cleared her throat to get their attention.

They didn't hear her. They didn't see her.

Scully stepped closer and placed her hand on her mother's arm.
Margaret Scully didn't flinch, didn't so much as pause in her
conversation with Bill and Charlie.

Behind them, at their backs, Scully was surprised to see two
large holes punctured the livingroom wall as if a wrecking
ball had crashed through the plaster and wood. The gaping
holes made the room appear larger and emptier than she
remembered. Littering the carpet below the ragged tears,
shattered bits and pieces of wallboard reminded her of snow
and she shivered when a chill climbed up her back and prickled
the tiny scar on the nape of her neck. Why would her mother
leave a mess like this? Couldn't her brother Bill see the
enormous holes? Was the destruction unnoticed or simply
ignored? Fix it, clean it up, she wanted to tell them.

But she didn't. She kept her thoughts to herself because she
guessed she must be having a nightmare or had hit her head
during the flood and was suffering from shock. Hallucinating.
That's what she was doing. And since her old livingroom
offered no way out of Mulder's mysterious rabbit-man hole, nor
did it offer any clue as to Mulder's whereabouts, Scully
decided the best thing to do would be to vacate this obvious
figment of her imagination and return to the crimson hall and
the three rooms beyond where she might continue her search for
Mulder. Or an exit. Preferably both.

Crossing the little hall, she chose another of the four rooms
and stepped inside. This room looked every bit like her
apartment back in Georgetown and for a moment she thought
maybe she'd been mistaken about the trip to Arizona and had
simply gone out for groceries or the dry cleaning...except
that wouldn't explain why she stood empty-handed just inside
her doorless apartment.

The air in the place smelled stale, as if the apartment hadn't
been lived in for a while. A long while. A very long while.
And although she was rarely gone for more than a week at a
time, at least a year's worth of dust coated the furniture.
Her potted plants were all dead. Even the cactus. Dry, brittle
and brown. The calendar hanging in her kitchen insisted the
date was September 2000, but the paper was so yellowed with
age, it didn't seem possible the page had been flipped as
recently as two weeks ago. The refrigerator was empty. As were
the cupboards. The entire kitchen appeared to have gone
untouched for months on end, if not years.

She walked through the apartment to the bath. Everything
remained where she had last left it. No items had been moved.
Nothing had been touched. But dust blanketed everything here,
too.

Checking the bedroom, she found her clothes hung in the closet
as always, her Bible rested on the nightstand, and the clock
kept perfect time. But the room felt so...unlived in.

Something on the bed caught her eye. A string of paper dolls,
blank-faced and waiting to be unfurled, rested on her pillow.
Scully lifted the cutouts and unfolded the half a dozen
identical, cookie cutter men. Written across their little
interlocking arms were the words, 'home, sweet home is where
the heart is.' Was it supposed to be a joke? What did it mean?

Scully let the cutouts flutter to the floor when the phone
rang. Although she lifted the receiver on only the second
ring, a dial tone buzzed in her ear. Setting down the phone,
she decided to return to the livingroom to check her answering
machine. Maybe someone had called while she'd been out. Maybe
someone could tell her what the hell was going on.

The machine claimed there were three hundred and sixty five
messages waiting for her.

"Must be broken," she frowned.

She pushed the button to listen to the most recent message.

"Hey, it's me. Up for a trip to Arizona? I hear there's a
Rabbit-Man with our name on it."

Mulder. She rewound the tape and played a previous message.

"Hey, Scully. I've booked us on a flight to New Orleans. Three
decapitations. The heads are still missing."

Mulder again. She tried another message.

"I've got four words for you, Scully: Spontaneous Human
Involuntary Invisibility."

Were all the calls from Mulder? She rewound the tape nearly to
the end before pushing the play button once more.

"Pack your mittens, Scully. We're off to Alaska to hunt
snowworms."

"No, Mulder, we're off to another room to find you," she told
the machine, no longer feeling very at home in her own home-
sweet-home and wishing Mulder's real voice cajoled her with
his latest cockamamie plan.

She left the room and entered the next.

Room number three turned out to be shaped rather like a phone
booth and it contained no furniture whatsoever. Every square
inch of every wall sparkled with the silver slivers of
countless cracked mirrors. Broken bits of glass tiled the
ceiling and floor, too, creating a monochrome chrome mosaic.

"This can't be lucky," Scully said, squinting at her many
fractured reflections. They squinted back, shattered and
sliced like the mutilated cadavers she autopsied. An eye here,
an ear there, linked together in a patchwork quilt,
Frankenstein monster sort of way. "An unfun funhouse," she
observed, not smiling at the irony.

In the middle of the small glittering floor lay an unbroken
hand mirror and Scully bent to pick it up. She held the
looking glass in front of her face and was glad to see that
all her features were connected as they should be. Despite
being all in one piece again, she thought she looked tired and
a bit...well, old, to be quite frank. Hadn't she started out
the day feeling fresh and optimistic? Okay, perhaps not
optimistic. Hopeful might be a more accurate word. Well, maybe
not hopeful either, but certainly not hopeless.

Now she just felt very alone.

"Me, myself and I," she told to her image.

Jesus! In the mirror, she watched with widening eyes as her
skin shifted and jittered. Her lurching reflection suddenly
came to life with crawling maggots! Oh, God! Worms appeared to
cover her entire face, squirming across her lips, down the
length of her nose, in and around her ears. Scrubbing her
cheeks with her free hand, she was unable to feel a single
creepy-crawly worm, yet the maggots continued to swarm over
her in the mirror.

Hoping the terrible sight was in some way due to the hand
mirror itself, she turned away to peer into the mirrored
walls, the ceiling, even the mirrored floor. In every piece of
every mirror, a swathe of vermin enveloped her.

Horrified, she watched while the mirror worms darkened and
turned charcoal black. When a breeze blasted the room, the
dried-up maggots swirled through the looking glass air as if
they'd suddenly sprouted wings. They circled the glass room in
a cyclone of black, empty shells, shushing her as they spun.

Shhhhhh. Shhhhhhhhhh.

Hurling the looking glass at the whirlwind of husks, Scully
hurried from the room.

With no other options, she entered to the fourth and final
room. If this was not the way out...
 
The air was cold in here. Frost covered gray granite walls.
The room was open to the sky and a thick layer of tin-colored
clouds blew past, spitting snow and blocking the sun. A line
of crackling blackbirds burst from their perch along the upper
edge of the open wall when Scully entered the chilly
enclosure.

In the center of the room, an above-ground crypt sat anchored
to the frozen floor. On the tomb a carved figure, clad in a
stony shroud, clasped his hands to his chest. A twisted ropey
vine, leafless in the chill and bristling with thorns, seemed
to bind the statue to his eternal resting place. All around
the tomb, the brittle shells of dried maggots peppered the
floor like the dead leaves in a neglected winter garden.

The black, hollow worms crunched beneath her feet like
hoarfrost as she trudged a circle around the grave.

The name of the deceased was chiseled onto the tomb and
although the letters were shallow from age and the vine
obscured at least two thirds of the granite face, Scully
deciphered enough of the inscription to realize the crypt was
Mulder's. The discovery hardly surprised her at all after the
events of the day. This seemed a predictable and somehow
fitting end. She half expected to throw herself onto the tomb
and be transformed into nothing but icy bones in a matter of
seconds, her flesh falling away like snowflakes. Or perhaps
there was a less tragic end in store for her and Mulder and
she would kiss the stone statue's frozen lips like a fairytale
princess and wake up the sleeping prince.

God, she missed him.

She placed her palms over the hands of the frozen statue, not
caring if the cold crept into her fingers, flowed up the veins
of her arms to flood her heart with its empty chill. She had
nowhere else to look for Mulder. She had really and truly,
once and for all, forever and ever, lost him. And the thought
made her cry.

One, two, three fat tears slid down her reddened nose to fall
somewhere near the statue's shrouded heart, while her own
heart beat doubly fast as if cracked in two.

"Scully, where've you been?"

Slouching against the granite doorframe and spitting sunflower
seeds onto the floor was Mulder.
 

PART VII: COMING OUT

"Wake up, Alice dear!" said her sister. "Why, what a long
sleep you've had!" "Oh, I've had such a curious dream!" said
Alice. -- Alice in Wonderland

--------------------

"Where have *I* been? Where the hell have *you* been, Mulder?"
She wiped the tears from her face.

"Finding us a way out of here." He spit another black shell
onto the floor. "Sunflower seed?" he offered her his open
palm.

She took a seed from the tiny pile and sniffled. "So how do we
get out?"

"Elevator. It's at the end of the hall." He pocketed the
remaining seeds and took hold of her hand.

Oh, she loved the feel of his fingers twining around hers and
the gentle tug of his hand, urging her to follow, yet hanging
on so he wouldn't lose her along the way.

**"Wait a minute, wait a minute!"**

**"What's the matter, Scully?"**

**"'So he wouldn't lose her along the way?' Isn't that a
bit...well, uncharacteristic since you already left me without
so much as a backward glance earlier in your story?"**

**"Scully, I told you before, the story isn't really about
us..."**

**"'Per se.' Yeah, yeah, right. Even so, within the context of
your own story, isn't it likely that 'Mulder' wouldn't care
one way or the other if he ditched 'Scully'?"**

**"I don't really like the word 'ditch,' Scully."**

**"I bet not."**

**"I'll, uh...I'll amend my storyline..."**

She loved the feel of his fingers twining around hers and the
gentle tug of his hand, urging her to follow, yet hanging on
so he wouldn't lose her *again* along the way.

**"Better?"**

**"More accurate."**

When they stepped into the hallway, the fallen autopsy table,
the maggots and the rabbit-man were all gone, vanished without
a trace. The crimson corridor had transformed from a tiny,
cramped space into a huge hall and at its far end, a bank of
brass elevators sat waiting to carry them up to the surface.

"Mulder, where's the rabbit-man?" Scully asked, staring at the
floor.

"You saw the rabbit-man?"

"Yes. He was right here." She pointed to the exact spot. Only
a scattering of Mulder's sunflower shells dotted the floor.
"And...and this hall was tiny!"

"It was?"

"Yes. And the maggots...they..."

"There were maggots?"

"Yes. They crawled up the walls and made the doors appear
and..."

"What doors?"

The doors had vanished, too, of course. The crimson walls
stood clean and unbroken.

"Mul...?" She swiveled, looking for some sign that what had
happened here had indeed been real. She wanted proof.
Something tangible to show Mulder that her words were true.

"Come on, Scully, let's go home," he suggested, not sharing
her need for tangible evidence.

Still gripping her hand, he led her along the length of the
great hall and together they boarded the elevator. He pushed
the up button...well, actually, there was no down button. The
moment the brass doors slid shut behind them, Mulder took
Scully into his arms and kissed her lightly on her worried
brow.

"This was such a weird case, Mulder."

"Mmm." He kissed her nose.

"I mean, I didn't think I was going to find you."

"Mm hm." He kissed her upper lip.

"Mulder, weren't you worried about me?"

"Always." He French kissed her.

**"Mulder!"**

**"What, you object to tongues?"**

**"No, I don't object to tongues. It's just you have this nice
romantic, storybook ending going and suddenly you throw in a
French kiss. It seems kinda...gauche."**

**"Well, we can't have 'gauche,' can we? Let me try again."**

Burning with unbridled passion, he pressed his hungry lips to
her heaving bosoms...

**"Wrong genre, Mulder."**

**"Too Harlequinesque?"**

**"Got anything that isn't either pornography or Bodice
Ripper?"**

**"Yeah, but how boring is that?"**

**"See what you can do."**

"I love you, Scully," he whispered into her ear.

"This entire day has been a nightmare."

"Did you hear me, Scully?"

"Hmm?"

"I said, I love you."

"I...I heard you."

"Is there...is there perhaps something you'd like to say to
me?"

"Uhhhh...thanks?"

"Well, I was thinking more along the lines of..."

**KNOCK! KNOCK! KNOCK!**

**"Agent Mulder? Agent Scully? Excuse me. Agent Dodgson and I
are here to relieve you."**
 

EPILOGUE

Alice replied, rather shyly, "I-I hardly know, Sir, just at
present -- at least I know who I was when I got up this
morning, but I think I must have changed several times since
then." -- Alice in Wonderland

--------------------

Two hours later, Scully and I are basking in the afterglow of
satisfying sex.

Oops, too blunt? Sorry. What can I say? My brain's kinda
steamy and my muscles feel like Jell-O.

So let me back up a bit.

In case you didn't know this already, this wasn't Scully's and
my first time. We've been doin' 'it' for a few months now.
Thank god.

And I am loving the couple thing.

But satisfying as our relationship is, there's still one
teensy-weensy thing missing. I think you all know what I'm
getting at.

As for now, the sheets twist around us tighter than the lung
tissue in my allegorical tale, but our shortness of breath has
less to do with any unstable atmospheric pressure than with
our own recent respiratory workout. Scully's looking
particularly beautiful, sprawled limply on her back, watching
me through half-closed lids from the other side of my unmade
bed. Not quite ready to leave her alone, I trace the outline
of a heart on her naked chest, mere skin and bone away from
her own real beating heart. I add our initials, to see if
she's paying attention. She is and rewards me with a raised
eyebrow and a half-smile. After eight years, I've become
pretty good at reading Scully's body language and these small
signs speak volumes about her affection for me. In a good way.
A really good way.

"Mulder, your story was...um, interesting."

"Thank you."

"And nicely told."

"Thank you again."

"But what did it mean?"

"Did it have to mean anything? It was just a story, Scully."

"Just a story," she repeats. "And all those symbols and
metaphors...they meant nothing in particular?"

"Did they mean something to you?"

Oooo, she gives me a suspicious squint.

"So what was your point, Mulder?"

"My point?"

"The moral of the story."

"The moral," I move closer, tucking myself against her side,
"is that life is more than an adventure, Scully. It's an
adventure of the heart. In the grand scheme of things, nothing
else is really very important. Is it?"

"I don't know, Mulder. What about government conspiracies,
alien takeovers, the end of the planet as we know it?" She
twirls a finger through my hair, creating a miniature replica
of Tornado Alley across my scalp.

"You're sweating the details. What if...what if I died
tomorrow, killed off by one of those government-men-in-black-
hired-by-aliens-bent-on-enslaving-the-planet types? Wouldn't
you miss me?"

"Of course I would miss you."

"Wouldn't there be anything you'd wished you'd said to me?" I
draw an invisible line from her breastbone to her bellybutton,
right through my previously finger-painted valentine.

She knows what I'm hinting at. Turning away, she plucks at the
sheets.

"What are you saying, Mulder? That I should grab life by the
testes?"

I smile, reminded of nonfat tofutti rice dreamsicles and one
of the best days a guy could ask for on a ball field.

"Something like that. Go ahead and say the words, Scully." I
prod her with my finger. "'I love you, Mulder,'" I
demonstrate, "See? It's not so hard."

She looks anywhere but at me.

"It *is* hard...for me," she admits. Her voice is so small she
sounds like a five-year-old.

Her vulnerability brings out the mother in me, so I draw her
close and cradle her in my arms. I pretend not to notice her
wet lashes pressed into my chest. Or her heart racing like a
frightened rabbit's. I give her a moment before I ask, "Why,
Scully?"

"I don't know," she lies, speaking to my collarbone.

"Yes you do. Tell me."

After stubbornly searching her mind for any and all possible
evasive maneuvers, she surprises us both and gives in. "I...I
guess I'm afraid I'm going to lose you. I-I'm afraid you're
going to die," she stutters. She *is* a frightened child.

"You're not going to lose me and I'm not going to die. Not
soon anyway. I hope."

"I've lost you plenty of times already, Mulder. Hell, you've
actually died several times since I've known you." Now she
stares straight into me. A flood of fear threatens to overflow
her lashes and glide down her cheeks. But she manages to hold
her tears at bay.

"And I just keep showing up again, don't I?" I smile. She
doesn't smile. She's not getting it. "Do your feelings for me
change when I'm gone, Scully? Do you care for me any less?"

"No, of course not."

"Then what difference does it make if you say the words or
not?"

"My point exactly, Mulder. You already know how I feel about
you."

"I do." It's true, I do. Even without the words, she shows her
devotion to me every single day and she's been showing me for
years. But still... "Maybe a guy likes to hear the words once
in a while. Or even once." An itsy-bitsy smile nudges the
corner of her mouth. I kiss it. "Grab life by the testes,
Scully," I whisper against her lips.

"I..."

God, I'm straining my ears 'til they hurt. I wonder if dogs or
bats or a SETI Project satellite could pick up a sound this
faint.

"I..."

Jesus Christ. How can this be so hard? What is it about Scully
that makes it so difficult for her to get close, to admit her
feelings -- not just to me, but even to herself? As I wait and
watch her struggle, I try to convince myself that I'm forcing
her through this ordeal for her own good. That's bullshit, of
course. I wanna hear her say the damn words. I do. After
waiting eight years, I wanna hear them in the worst way. To be
honest, I think I've been waiting all my life to hear them.

Then suddenly she's speaking, her words rushing past her lips.
"I love you, Mulder."

Ahhhh! I heard it! She actually, finally, at long last,
forever and ever said it! Holy Words of Devotion, Batman! My
persuasive storytelling must have done the trick. Or maybe it
was my exceptional sexual prowess that convinced her to
finally say the words. Okaaaay, I guess the truth is, she was
probably just ready.

Now that the words are out, however, her eyes lock onto me as
if she expects me to instantly vanish. Ain't gonna happen,
Scully. It's possible I'll spontaneously combust, but that
would be like 'good' crying. You know, like at weddings or
reunions or...or so I've heard.

"Still here," I tell her.

"So I see." She blinks.

"Didn't exactly open the ol' flood gates though, did we?"

"Give me time, Mulder. I'll...I'll say it again. I promise."

Scully doesn't break promises, so I guess there's nothing for
me to worry about.

"Mulder, how did you know about my pet rabbit?"

"You had a pet rabbit?"

"Yes. Wasn't the rabbit-man in your story a parable for my
resistance to emotional attachment brought on by the death of
my rabbit when I was a girl?"

"The rabbit-man is an X-File, Scully. I can show you the
background material."

She looks like she wishes she hadn't mentioned any of the dead
pet rabbit parable stuff.

"Mulder, you said your story was a true one." She calls me on
the carpet now.

"It is."

"So we'll be chasing a rabbit-man later today?"

"Well, no. Not exactly. I may have added a few less-than-
accurate details for effect, but most of the story is true."

"Most?"

"Some."

"Which parts?"

"The end."

Now she looks confused.

"The part when you held my hand in the elevator so you
wouldn't lose me?"

"Nnnnnnnnn...I doubt it."

"The part where you found me standing next to your tomb?"

"Hopefully not."

"Then which part are you referring to, Mulder?"

"The part I haven't told you yet."

"There's more?"

"Mm hm." I kiss her nose, her eyebrows, her cheeks and I end
up at her lips.

"So how does your story end?" she murmurs against my skin. I
lean into her, ready for another round of lovemaking.

"Can't you guess, Scully? Like all good stories, it ends with,
'They both lived happily ever after.'"

And a French kiss.
 

THE END
 

Authors notes: Feedback, good or bad, is welcome on this or
any of my stories. My husband's only comment when he finished
reading The Case of the Reluctant Pathologist was "Were you on
drugs or something when you wrote this?" No, no drugs. Just
experimenting a bit, trying to stretch my writing wings. I
don't even pretend to be a professional writer, so any pearls
of wisdom are very welcome. Send comments to
nejake@tds.net.

By the way, the email about black worms is astonishingly real
(sent to Umaine Cooperative Extension), as is the Rabbit-Man
of Arizona, if you believe what you read on the Internet.

My other fanfic (listed below) can be found at my website,
http://www.crosswinds.net/~bluefroggie/cindyet.html,
generously maintained by the wonderful bluefroggie. I've
created dust jackets for several of these stories, including
The Case of the Reluctant Pathologist. They'll give you an
idea of what I do in RL. Well, I don't get paid to create XF
art (dang!), but...well, you'll get the drift.

"The Boogeyman"
"Madjahando"
"Deep Freeze"
"Split Second"
"Greetings from Maine"
"The Coiled Serpent"
"Devil's Roar"
"Acquitted" (NC-17)
"SHII"
"Encore" (NC-17)
"Impulse"
"Dominion"
"Annelid"
"White Light"
"Mirror, Mirror"
"Snowman" (Airing Nov. 3 on Virtual Season 8 at http://www.i-
made-this.com)
"Re Vivus Facere"
"Afterthoughts"
"Nightmares I & II"
"Nightmares III & IV"
"Nightmares V & VI"
"Sticks and Stones"
"The Case of the Reluctant Pathologist"