By Deirdre
deirdre@x-philes.com
 

Original posting date: December 17, 1996.
Rating: PG
Category: SA
Summary:  After the Christmas-time investigation of a small-town
kidnapping case turns into a murder investigation, Scully tries to
find a way to calm her troubled soul.
Archive: Archive freely; this story is released into the public domain.

Disclaimer:  This story contains characters created by Chris Carter
and 1013 Productions.  No copyright infringement is intended.

Author's notes:  I pulled this story up today to take a look at something
and found myself revising it.  I guess my writing style has changed
slightly over the past two years, and some components of my former style
completely irritated me. :)  Be warned - the characterization and
background of Mulder and Scully dates back to the third season.  I was
tempted to update it, but that would make it an entirely different story.

******

Dana sat in the back pew of the church, the words of the
young priest's homily rolling past her ears too quickly to be
grasped.  Around her, the few elderly men and women who
had scattered themselves throughout the oversized building
on this dark evening shifted restlessly, as his quick nervous
words evaded their understanding as well.

She felt distinctly out of place, a young woman dressed for
the business world seated amongst the elderly of this small
town. A stranger disturbing an evening tradition.  Each and
every person here probably knew everyone else, knew where
they sat, and why they came.  *She* was the outsider, and
although she'd been welcomed by gentle smiles as she entered
the church just minutes before the service began, she still felt
awkward.

Why had she intruded upon this evening service?  Right now,
shifting uncomfortably upon the cushioned seat, she didn't
know.

About an hour before, after returning from the scene of
another brutal crime, it had seemed like a good idea.  After
seeing the young girl's cold body, the days-old blood crusting
her skin, and realizing that she'd need to autopsy this body
tomorrow, her professional distance had abruptly fled and
she'd automatically turned away from the sight to reassert
her control.  But that turn had brought her face-to-face with
Mulder and the clear horror upon his features.

She didn't even need to ask what he was thinking about -
logic made that perfectly clear.   This child had just
turned nine, was part of a loving family with two very worried
older brothers, and had vanished while shopping for Christmas
presents on the quiet main street of the town.  Kidnapped
without a witness, without a trace.  Until a hunter had
stumbled across the mutilated body deep in the surrounding
forest preserve.

For an instant, her mind flashed to the dog-eared picture she
had frequently seen, the smiling brown-headed girl, a moment
in time captured forever - and her betraying mind had
superimposed the image over the dead child's features.
Gasping for air, she'd turned back to the body, to remind her
mind that the girl bore no resemblance to the old picture of
Samantha, and for an instant had seen a young Melissa
instead, lying dead before her.

With the greatest effort she'd ever mustered, she'd pulled her
straying thoughts under control and had turned to the
paramedics waiting to remove the body to the morgue.
Quietly, she's informed someone to schedule the autopsy for
tomorrow morning then, taking Mulder by the arm, had
somehow gotten both of them back to the car and to the motel.

Finally safe in her room, she'd laid back on the bed, trying to
desperately push the scene out of her mind ... the sight of the
lovely young girl, eyes closed forever, lying against a back-
drop of bloodied and trampled snow.  A life cut too short, a
child who would never have the chance to grow up, to see the
world ....

After reaching that point in her thoughts and realizing that
if she did nothing the images would plague her for the
rest of the night, following her into her nightmares, she'd
left the room, searching for some way to distract herself.
Turning to Mulder was out of the question.  Tonight he was
struggling with his own personal demons, and didn't need the
burden of hers as well.  His lay too heavily upon him already.

Anyway, neither of them would dare lose control in front of
the other.  It was stupid, since they understood each other and
each other's burdens so well.  But it was the simple truth.
Losing control, allowing the other to see the fears of their
deepest selves ... it just wasn't safe!

Trudging though the lightly falling snow, she had heard the
soft bells of St. Michael's calling people to the evening
service - probably a advent tradition in this tiny town.  And
she, although the last time she'd been to mass had been
Melissa's funeral, had followed the soft bells as well.

But now, after sitting through the beginning of the traditional
Catholic ritual, the formalized boredom that had been the first
part of her disillusion with the religion, she felt extremely
uncomfortable.  Perhaps this worked for others but it did
nothing to lighten the leaden burden upon her soul.  In fact,
as it brought up her unresolved questions, the left-over
childhood guilt associated with her decision not to practice
Catholism, the service only increased her feelings of confusion and
guilt.

Quietly she slipped past the older man seated at the end of the
pew, mumbling an apology, determined to leave and find
some other way to occupy her thoughts.  Maybe a movie ...

But as she exited the main part of the church into the small
annex that housed a brightly decorated Christmas tree and a
community bulletin board, a hand gently touched her
shoulder.  Turning, she found herself face-to-face with the
man she had passed on her way out.

"Leaving so soon?" he asked kindly, warm eyes studying her
face.

Blushing,  Dana lowered her eyes and nodded.  "Yes sir,
pardon me for disturbing you.   I just wasn't in the right type
of mood tonight."

"Are you sure that Fr. Gray's homily didn't play a part in that
decision?  Don't worry, you didn't disturb me.  I'd heard
what I came for."

She glanced up in confusion and the man laughed and
extended his hand.  "Fr. Martin.  I'm the pastor and had
heard several complaints from our older members about his
speaking style.  I just intended to listen to the homily, and
even those few minutes convinced me that the complaints
were valid."  He sighed.  "That young man has several things
to learn.  But when I saw you leaving I decided that perhaps
I was more needed here?"  The question in his voice was
obvious.

She looked at the kindly older man and shifted foot-to-foot.
Yeah, she needed to talk - but to a stranger - to a *priest*?
Somehow, she felt like she'd been tossed back into third
grade, a little girl in pigtails and a dirty uniform jumper,
confronted by the parish pastor who'd found her up in the oak
tree behind the school.  Her face still blazed when she
remembered his lecture on 'feminine behavior.'  Probably
what she would get tonight would be no better.  Talking to a
man who spent his life's work supporting beliefs she'd almost
completely ignored throughout her adult life?  Once he heard
her story, he would no doubt at least try to 'instruct' her back
to the faith.  She'd had enough of *that* throughout her life.

"No thank you, Father." she said, quietly.   "I'm fine."

"Yeah, right."  he shot back, a wry smile on his face.  "But
it's your choice.  But if you ever decide that you do need
someone to listen, you can reach me at St. Michael's rectory.
Although advent is a rather busy season - I'm always available
to listen."

After surprising her with his bluntness, he touched her gently
upon the shoulder once again, and nodded before turning to
reenter the church.  And a need to just *talk* exploded in her
heart.  "Father Martin..."

He turned back, a grin on his face.  "Always works.  Here,
come with me."

Taking her arm lightly, he lead her though a wooden side
door into a small chapel.  As she looked around her, Dana's eyes
widened in surprise.  The cold, ritual,
too-large atmosphere of the huge marble-decorated church,
bright with the harsh white glow of electric lights, was gone.
Instead the tiny room, flanked only by two rows of wooden
pews, flickered in the soft light of half-melted candles, their
tiny flames reflecting from the windows of stained glass,
windows that must turn the rounded room into the interior of
a rainbow on sunny days.  And as Fr. Martin reached through
the shadows, obviously after a light switch, she whispered
"Don't."

His hand stilled.  "Beautiful, isn't it."

She nodded.

His voice carefully soft, he continued "We call it the
children's chapel.  Those windows"  gesturing towards the
stained glass "have scenes from Noah's ark, from the
Nativity, from the tale of Joseph and his multi-coloured coat:
simple, colourful scenes of hope and love that children
recognize.  The candles are still lit from an prayer
service Mrs. Grandish's class held about a half hour ago
to pray for the safe return of Laura Melsh."

Laura Melsh - the child whose body they had discovered just
before dark in the woods.  The bloodied, broken body she'd
have to face in the morning.  Suddenly as she looked around
the chapel, with its flickering candles and its air of hope, the
memory tore her heart apart.  Sinking into the pew, Dana put
her head into her hands and drew deep breaths, forcing back
her tears.

He sat beside her and she looked into worried eyes, realizing
that he still didn't know, that the town's rumour mill was a
couple hours behind her.  And realized that *she* had to be the
one that told him.

"I'm Special Agent Dana Scully - one of the FBI agents called
in to investigate her disappearance.   And Father, " she
paused for breath, "I'm sorry that I have to be the one that
tells you ... but Laura's gone."  Her voice cracked. "Murdered."

He closed his eyes and leaned back.  A tear glinted at the
corner of his eye. "I had so hoped ... the death of a child, so
near Christmas ..."

They both sat in silence for a moment.  Then he continued,
in a slightly bitter tone, "Surely this is not all that upsets you?
In your line of work, does not this become almost commonplace?
The crimes, the death?"

She resisted the urge to laugh bitterly.  "Never commonplace.
Becoming numb is the greatest fear and the greatest hope of
every agent.  We try to learn not to care, try not to let a little
piece of us die with every case, but when the numbness sets
in - that's when the job means nothing anymore."

She looked at her folded hands.  "It's just the lastest, but not
all.  Sometimes there comes a time, a case, when the memories
crash the barriers that you build around them."

"And you seek comfort - but it is nowhere to be found?  Is
there a reason that your faith does not comfort you?"

"Father, after all I have seen, sometimes the idea of a God;
of a loving, caring God, seems so foreign.  After the death,
the lies, the destruction ..."

Missy's blood staining her floorboards ... a grieving Mulder
still intent on finding a sister torn from him in childhood ...
a cigarette-smoking bastard whose self-righteous front hid
secrets too terrible to behold ...

"How can I still believe in a God after all the
misery and darkness I've seen - much less a God that
*manifests* in that ritualized ceremony?"

"A God that seems to have no relation to the real world?"

She nodded, looking away from him and towards the image beside
her.  Daniel in the lion's den.  Lightly, she let her fingers
trace the leaded glass, running along the outline of the
sleeping lion's mane.

"Yet you still wear the cross."

Her fingers flew to the tiny golden cross.  She'd forgotten
about it.

"I could offer you platitudes - tell you how God works in
ways mysterious to us, but I sincerely doubt that would settle such a
troubled soul as yours."

She still refused to look at him.

Hesitantly, he continued "Maybe if you told me of what
causes you to reject the faith, of what causes you despair,
of the darkness you speak about?"

He faded into silence and Dana wondered for a moment,
realizing how fantastic her life over the past few years would
seem to an ordinary person and how little she could tell
anyone.  How insane, her worries, her concerns, her
knowledge might seem.  How much was classified, and just
plain dangerous.  But in this warm little room, the flickering
colours dancing upon the walls, she realized how tightly
everything pressed against her defenses tonight and how
desperately she needed someone to listen.

"Father, some of what I know is so unbelievable ..."

"I'll listen." he whispered.

And the flood was released.  Words poured forth and she
talked.  About the tangled webs of government conspiracies that
made their lives living hell, of the horrors she'd seen and
suspected - horrors created and supported by factions within
the American government - of the tests performed on
innocents.  Of death, Missy's, the clones (seeing first the
astonishment, then the belief that coloured his watching eyes);
of the human terrors she'd confronted, Tooms, Duane Berry,
Pfaser; of murders she'd investigated; of the paranormal she'd
seen but been unable to accept ... of the child, Kevin ... and
finally, in a voice tight with tears, of the fears surrounding
her own abduction, fears she'd been unable to share even with
Mulder, fears that haunted her nights and every visit to the
doctor.  And though it all, through the hour and a half of her
struggling with words, trying to explain the strangeness of her
life, of her work, he just listened, an occasional comforting
hand touching her shoulder or her folded hands as she
struggled to force some of the words out, not condemning,
just listening.

But what was more surprising was his expression at the end,
as she struggled to repress her sobs, although somehow
relieved and lightened through spilling forth her secrets.  Not
shock, not astonishment, but realization, exhaustion, and acceptance.

"You're not surprised."

"Miss Scully, we priests aren't as naive as many think.  In the
confessionals we hear not only the petty confessions of
children who fight with their siblings, of adults that cheat in
the business world, but sometimes the darkest secrets and
blackest crimes - and we, as human beings must live with
what we hear.  We're all flawed humans - just as anyone -
and forgiveness is a hard thing, although something always to
strive for.

"I was a missionary, Miss Scully, before I settled here.  I
have seen horrors equal to yours: children dead in the streets
from starvation, sick people I could do nothing more than
pray for ... but I tried.

"Your horrors - your tales of destruction that these men
wrought, doesn't surprise me. In fact it clarifies some
things I've heard.  You might be surprised to know that I've
seen one of your computer chips, although I dismissed the
story as the ravings of a delusional teenager.  The girl was
involved in drugs and it was logical that it was an imagined
story dreamed up while high on crack ... but ..."  he sighed,
aimlessly waving his hand through the air.

"I don't know how to comfort you.  But I can tell you this.
You and your partner pursue the truth, putting your lives on
the line to save the innocents these men's experiments harm
and to save people who have no one else to turn to.
Something like today might make it seem like your efforts are
doomed to failure ... but every time you catch a person like
the one that murdered Laura, you're saving someone else.

"And by helping the way you do, you're doing God's work."

"But every time I face another death, my heart breaks a little
further ..."

"Hearts will never be practical until they can be made
unbreakable, yet they continue to be made.  Love, pain - it all
has a place in life even as we wish it didn't.  Pain - it seems
as though both you and your partner have suffered more than
enough, yet you continue.  Somehow, what should break you
gives you both strength."

"I didn't ..."

"You didn't tell me about him in so many words - but it's
obvious, from the fact that although you completely trust him,
yet won't trust him tonight, that he suffers as greatly as you."

She turned away from him slightly embarrassed that she'd
been so transparent, staring at the lumps of wax that once
upon a time had been candles.  She hadn't realized how long
they'd been talking - how much she had told him.

"Father, some of what I told you ... possessing some of the
knowledge might put you in extreme danger.  I wasn't trying
to edit what I told you, perhaps I should have, I don't
know how I can protect you if the fact you know this leaks
out."

"Don't worry about that. I have much experience in
keeping my mouth shut.  Anyway, I've had a long life ... I
place it in the hands of God.  And if those men are so
cowardly that the knowledge of an old man could hurt them -
let them come after me."

"If they ever find out, they will."

"Well, young lady, you keep your mouth shut, and I'll keep
mine shut." he grinned at her.  "And, though I'd like to keep
talking to you longer, I suspect we both should get going.
Before they lock us up in the building for the night."

After a glance at her watch, she
nodded, and rose to leave.  "Fr. Martin, thank you."  It
seemed so inadequate, but it was all she could say.

"You needed it."  he smiled.  "So I offered my help.  It was
the least I could do - especially for one trying to help us."
He turned toward the front of the chapel, slowly dousing the
shortened candles, letting her quietly slip out in the growing dimness.

Making her way across the parking lot, now almost six inches
deep in the soggy snow, she was surprised by just how
relieved she felt.  Sure, the problems, the memories, that
burdened her were still there, but somehow the didn't weigh
as heavily.  Somehow, through talking, a slight distance had
found its way there.  Not enough to numb her to the
emotions that the memories inflicted, but enough to let her
handle them.  And she had a *priest* to thank for it.  Of all
the wonders ...

Tomorrow she'd still have to face the autopsy.  And her
stomach still did flip-flops at the thought of it.  But tonight,
she didn't have to face it but someone else still was.  And
although the help she needed had dropped (almost literally)
from the heavens, help needed to hit him over the head to get
his attention.  Or she needed to hit him over the head to get
his attention.  And now that she'd settled herself, well, she
could be there for him.

God's work, she mused, his words still echoing in her
mind.

Well, she really didn't believe it, but she liked it.

*****

Staring at the television screen, Mulder allowed himself to be
hypnotized by the flickering images dancing in front of him.
What time was it?  Didn't know ... too exhausted to look at
the clock.  Had he eaten?  Couldn't remember ... didn't care ...

Guiltily, he thought of Scully for a moment, his wandering
mind actually gathering the energy to focus for just that
period of time.  She'd seemed as upset as he, although she hid
it better ... probably should try and go to her ... help her ...
be there ... but the thought drifted away.

Some other time.

Then the pounding began.

Huh?

Dragging his mind back from the memories, the general grief
in which it wallowed, he turned his eyes toward the door.
Someone was pounding at the door.

"Mulder, open the damn door before I use my badge to get a
key."

Scully? He'd thought she'd gone to isolate herself in her
room as well.  Dragging himself back to the present, he made
his way to the door and glanced through the peephole.

Scully, definitely Scully.  But Scully balancing a huge bag
of Chinese take-out.  Where had she found *Chinese* take-out
in this two-street town?

He pulled himself back together, since he'd *never* allow
anyone to see him in such a disjointed mood - he was a psych,
knew that too much of it could get his badge, and opened the
door.  "Scully?  Isn't it rather late?"

"Only just after ten.  Have you eaten?"

"No, I was too tired.  And if you'll excuse me, I really want
to sleep."  Usually that would get his polite partner off his
back ... thank god she never pushed.

"Yeah, right.  I'm not eating all this myself."  And she
pushed herself past him into the room, quickly taking over the
tiny nightstand with her load of food.

As he continued to stare, his mind still slow from where it'd
spent the last couple of hours, she started pulling out mass
amounts of food and all his favourites.  Why in hell was she
here?  Didn't she understand he wanted to be *alone*?

"Scully ..."

"No nonsense.  Eat."

"But I just want to be alone ..." he was almost whining, not
a mood he ever wanted her to see.

"To think about Samantha?"  with those words, he felt like
she'd hit him.  Although she knew that Sam was always in the
background of his thoughts, a traceable influence upon his
actions, she'd never come out and directly accused him of obsessing.

"None of your business."

"Mulder, don't.  Of course it's Samantha, hell even I
thought of her when we found that body.  But don't isolate
yourself."

"Look who's talking."  Little Miss 'I'm Fine.' Where did
she get off telling him not to isolate himself?!?

For an instant, Scully looked down at the floor, not meeting
his eyes, and he regretted his hasty words.  But then she
glanced back up a sad smile on her face and said "Guess I
deserved that, I went off wandering rather than talk to you.
But we both do it.  We both suffer, then refuse to talk about
it.  A perfect match, huh?"

Huh?

"You don't have to talk about anything Mulder, but I'm not
leaving until you've at least eaten something.  And we can
watch something.  We've got cable here, at least.   A movie,
perhaps?"

A movie - probably a chick flick.  But if she wasn't leaving
that Chinese smelled awfully good.  Flopping down
on the rock-hard mattress, he almost grinned at her for an
instant.  And although one part of his mind demanded that she
leave, another just felt relief.  Tossing her the remote he'd
stuck under the pillow earlier he said "Okay, your choice.  I
know what you think of mine."

A wry smile gracing her face, she flopped down next to him
and began fooling around with the remote, flipping her way
through the fifty-odd channels to find something, and he
grabbed a steaming container.

Good, she'd remembered plastic silverware ...

The pillow hit him directly across the side of the head.
WHAT?

Insulted, he turned to face a pouting Scully, who said "That's
MINE."

And when he graciously gave up the container, her laughter
echoed throughout the room.  He'd love to know what put her
in this mood after their almost desperate flight from the
scene, 'specially with this case hanging over their heads ...
but he was glad.  'Though he'd never tell her that.  Forget
about the case for a while, watch a movie with an actual
*plot* ... nicer few hours then what he'd planned.

And glancing over at the woman relaxing beside him, having
shed her boots somewhere near the door, he realized that
somehow, she'd realized that.  And planned her blunt
entrance to snap him out of it.  Thank god for Scully,
sometimes.  Even as he wanted to pout, being denied his
hours of regret that he'd planned, he found himself relaxing,
forgetting about tomorrow.  Just for the instant.  He could believe
in her ...

End.