Lacrimae Mundi

by Brandon D. Ray
publius@avalon.net


BEGUN:  February 10, 2000
FINISHED:  April 19, 2000

==========

DISTRIBUTION:  Anywhere is fine, as long as these headers
remain intact.  But please let me know where, so I can
visit.  If you want a nice clean copy all in one piece,
email me and I'll send it to you.  You are more than welcome
to link to the copy at my site -- although, again, please
let me know that you're doing it.

FEEDBACK:  I live for it.  But you already knew that,
right??

==========

SUMMARY:  After losing his mother and finally learning
Samantha's fate, Mulder has been set adrift, and is unsure
of how to proceed with his life.  Will investigating a
series of brutal murders help him find a new focus?  And
will Scully's caring and concern be enough to hold him
together while he tries?

CATEGORIES: X-File (MOTW), Romance, Angst

KEYWORDS:  MSR.   MulderAngst.  ScullyAngst.  Mulder/other
(past)

SPOILER STATEMENT:  Anything through "Closure" is fair game,
but NONE of the subsequent episodes have occurred.  There
are also some non-specific but important spoilers for "all
things" -- although, again, the events in that episode have
not yet occurred.

TIMELINE:  This story takes place in the second half of
Season 7, two or three weeks after SUZ/Closure.

RATING:  NC-17

CONTENT STATEMENT:  Contains both explicit sex and explicit
violence, sometimes occurring simultaneously.  Sexual
content includes both hetsex and m/m slash.  Some people
might consider some of the sexual content to be
non-consensual.

==========

THANKS AND CREDITS:  To Brynna, Narida, Paulette, Sharon,
Shawne and Trixie, for brainstorming and beta and all that
good stuff.  Thanks to McKab and Thomas Hong, for research
on New York City morgue facilities, and to Blackwood, for
helping me find my way around the seamier parts of NYC.

And of course ... any shortcomings in this story are my own
responsibility, and not those of the wonderful folks who
devoted so much time and effort to helping me put it
together.

==========

DISCLAIMER:  If I owned them, I would no longer be making
monthly mortgage payments.  It's as simple as that.

==========

AUTHOR'S NOTE:  Don't you hate shooting at a moving target?
I started this story right after SUZ aired in the United
States, and subsequently incorporated the events in
"Closure", as well.  I knew there was more to come, and I
even had an inkling as to some of it, since I'm a spoiler
whore.  And so I took a guess at how Mulder's reaction to
the events of Closure might play out, and I turned out to be
wrong.  Oh, well.

So as I said in the SPOILER section, this story is set post-Closure,
AND BEFORE ANY OF THE SUBSEQUENT EPISODES HAVE
OCCURRED.  Developments on the show have in some ways passed
me by, but I still like this story, and I hope that you enjoy the ride.

==========END HEADERS AND NOTES==========


"It is a lonely life, the way of the necromancer... oh, yes.
Lacrimae Mundi - the tears of the world." -- Merlin,
"Excaliber"


===========
Prologue
===========

The music isn't loud enough, but for tonight it will have to
do.  The volume is already cranked as high as it will go.

He resists the temptation to stop what he's doing and study
the canvas.  To study it would be to overintellectualize it;
it would mean sucking the life from his work.  The urge to
do so is almost overwhelming, but he fights it down.  That's
just what *they* want him to do, and he refuses to succumb.

This will be *his* work.  His art.  It will belong to no one
else.

He must not study the work; he must not think about it.  He
must *feel* it.  He must immerse himself in it, and make
himself manifest; he present *himself* on the canvas -- and
thus, to the world.

As always, when the work is going well, his body is bathed
in sweat.  It drips from his face and runs in rivulets down
his neck and lower body.  He wears no clothes tonight; he
never wears clothes when he works.  Clothes are an obstacle;
an artificiality.  They only get in the way of true art.

He continues to move about the studio, dancing now, swaying
in time to the pounding and throbbing of the music.  In his
mind, he begins to see it, as it slowly appears out of the
darkness, red and glowing and angry.  It has no form and no
substance, but he knows that it will have.  Soon, very soon,
it will live.

He's whirling and spinning, attacking the canvas with paint,
red and yellow and blue, an assault done in oil.  The music
pours across him and through him, driving his rage before
it, pushing him, forcing him to move faster and harder and
deeper into the darkness.  He can see the thing more clearly
now, he can see it begin to take on shape and form.  He can
see it begin to look human -- harsh and ugly and human.

He can see it.

And now there are tears on his face, mingling with the sweat
that still pours from his brow.  A part of him wants to
stop, wants desperately to pull back and away from the chasm
that's rapidly opening up before him.  But he knows he will
not; he knows he cannot.  His anger has only one outlet, and
this is it.  If he does not allow himself this release, if
he attempts to bottle it all up inside, it will destroy
*him*, rather than *them*.

And they so richly deserve this fate.  They deserve nothing
but pain and horror and contempt, and as he remembers this,
as he remembers all the suffering and humiliation they've
earned, his doubts quickly fall away, leaving nothing behind
but the rage.

The rage.

The rage.

The thing in his mind is now fully formed, huge and hard and
solid, glowing with a dull, red heat.  He moves closer to
the canvas, holding the creature in his mind as tightly as
he holds the brush in his hand.  He can see it all, now; he
can see it as if it were happening before his eyes.  His
brush flies frantically across the canvas, trying to capture
the moment, his heart swelling with emotion, growing larger
with each stroke, and he sees it all, he feels himself
sinking down, down, down, until he becomes --

The man in the tavern, abruptly consumed by lust.  His gaze
moves restlessly around the smoky room, searching,
searching, sliding past one patron after another, until
finally it falls upon the woman.  Until this moment, until
this instant, he did not know why he was here.  He did not
realize that he was sent to find this woman, and unite with
her, but now he knows.  He can feel it ....

She knows, too, and he can also feel that.  He feels it as a
stirring deep in his groin, a needy, demanding surge that
will not be denied.  And even as he's rising from the
barstool, he sees her also coming to her feet, a feral smile
appearing on her face as she walks slowly towards him ....

Without quite knowing how it has happened, they're in the
alley behind the bar.  The woman is backed up against the
wall, her skirt around her waist, her panties lying torn and
discarded on the ground.  He's thrusting into her, driving
into her, harder, harder, harder.  Her legs are wrapped
around his waist; her arms tight about his shoulders.  Her
breath against the side of his neck is hot and moist and
harsh ....

A small, distant part of him, deep down inside, is screaming
for him to stop.  He doesn't understand why he's doing this;
he doesn't want to be doing this.  That small, distant part
of him already knows how this will end, and its cries of
protest are awash with fear and horror.  But those cries can
barely be heard; they're so lost and far away.  And his hips
keep driving into the woman, moving in time to the beat of
some unheard melody, driving, driving, driving, seeking the
ultimate release ....

And then suddenly its there; the climax is upon them,
pounding from his body to hers and back again, seeming
almost like a living thing.  Her hands are clutching
convulsively at him, clawing at him, frantically digging
into his back and shoulders, and she's crying out, her voice
raw and hoarse, and then the knife appears as if from
nowhere, filling his hand, and in another instant her
screams turn from pleasure to pain ....

The artist returns to himself, at last.  He is alone again,
in the studio, standing before the easel.  It was so simple,
so necessary, so right, but as before, it has left him
drained and empty.  Strangely unfulfilled.  And he weeps,
his tears falling from his cheeks, spattering across the
canvas, mixing with the still-wet paint ....

The music continues to play.

==========END PROLOGUE==========

===========
Chapter One
===========

Washington, D.C.
Tuesday, March 7, 2000
8:05 a.m.

Scully was going to be late for work, and she had no one but
herself to blame.

That was not entirely true, she thought grimly, as she
steered her car through the morning rush hour traffic.  But
it was true enough.  Her alarm had not gone off, and in the
end she was responsible for that, because she'd apparently
forgotten to set it the night before.

Again.

She'd been having difficulty with her alarm clock for nearly
two months now; ever since she killed Donnie Pfaster.  She
knew perfectly well, on an intellectual level, that Pfaster
was the source of her problem.  The memory of her clock
reading "666" the morning he escaped from prison had burned
itself into her memory, and that was making it hard for her
to deal with the damned thing.

It wasn't that she had to force herself to set it, though.
That would be too easy; she could have worked her way past
that.  No, what was happening was that she was having
trouble remembering to take care of it at all.  Not every
night, but about one night a week, she found herself
drifting off to sleep, and then suddenly remembering that
she hadn't switched on her alarm.  And very occasionally --
like last night, apparently -- she forgot about it entirely.

Scully swore as a battered station wagon abruptly changed
lanes, cutting her off.  Morning rush hour traffic in
Washington could be infuriating; sometimes she almost wished
she were an ordinary cop, so she could pull people like that
over and write them up.  But for an FBI agent, of course,
that would be serious overkill ....

A few seconds of sharp maneuvering brought Scully into the
clear once again, and she pressed down on the accelerator a
little harder, trying to make up for lost time.  And,
inevitably, her thoughts returned to the alarm clock.

There was another element to the problem, of course:
Mulder.  Or rather, his absence.  She didn't have this
difficulty on the nights they slept together, and not only
because he understood about her problem, and took care of
the alarm himself on those occasions.  No, the whole thing
was just easier to deal with when he was there.  Scully
would never admit it to anyone, least of all to Mulder, but
she felt more secure and content when he slept next to her.
Safer.

Unfortunately, those times had been few and far between
since Mulder's mother had died, and after they finally found
out about Samantha's fate.

At first he'd seemed very calm and accepting; he even told
her that he felt as if he'd finally been set free, and
Scully had thought he just needed a little space, a chance
to regain his center.  She'd wanted to help him, of course;
she'd wanted to offer him the comfort of her love.  But
their personal relationship had only begun on New Year's
Eve, and everything was so new and uncertain that she'd been
afraid of making things worse.  And in the end that fear,
reinforced by her own resistance to emotional intimacy, had
won out.

Lately she'd come to realize that she'd made a mistake.
Mulder was very dependent on the people around him for
emotional support; she'd known that for a long time.  His
tendency to withdraw into himself was the result of a
quarter of a century of mistreatment by those he loved and
trusted.  His mother's suicide had simply added fuel to the
fire, and Scully was now berating herself for allowing him
to push her away.

Samantha was also an issue, of course.  Although Mulder had
seemed genuinely relieved at having the matter of his
sister's disappearance finally settled, Scully had not been
surprised when a secondary reaction of depression set in.
Her partner had focused his entire adult life on finding
Samantha; it was completely predictable that when that focus
was suddenly and finally taken away, he would feel lost and
without purpose.

She was going to have to change that, and it wasn't going to
be easy.  It had been nearly a decade since she'd been
seriously involved with a man, and even then, she hadn't
been very good at taking the lead or showing her feelings.
But she was just going to have to do it, she told herself
firmly.  Mulder needed her, and that was the only thing that
mattered.

At last she found herself pulling into the Hoover Building's
underground garage.  Not too bad, she thought, glancing at
her watch as she grabbed her briefcase and laptop and headed
for the elevator.  It was only 8:20.  It could have been
much, much worse.

Scully decided to swing through the cafeteria before going
to the basement.  Mulder had almost certainly not had
anything for breakfast; he was probably already on his third
cup of coffee, but that would was most likely *all* he'd
had.  He hadn't been eating well the past few weeks, and she
decided that trying to do something about that would be the
first step in her campaign to show him that she cared.
Little things could mean a lot, after all.

And so it was that she walked into the X-Files office a few
minutes later, bearing a tray laden with bagels and orange
juice.  As she'd expected, Mulder was already there.  As
she'd also expected, he was staring at his computer screen,
his finger clicking the mouse button every few seconds.
Random surfing, she thought.  He'd been spending a lot of
time on the web since they got back from California, not
doing anything in particular as far as she could tell.
Another sign of his withdrawal.

Another thing that she was determined to change.

"Hey, Partner," she said softly, after it became evident
that he wasn't going to acknowledge her presence.  "Sorry
I'm late.  But I did bring you breakfast."

For a moment she thought he was going to continue to ignore
her, and she glanced at the computer screen to see what was
holding his interest.  He was to be looking the web page for
something called the New York Sanctuary for Contemporary Art
-- an art museum, apparently.  He was currently scrolling
past a series of thumbnail images, but they were too small
and the screen was moving too quickly for her to get a
really good look at them.  Just as she was about to speak
again, he stopped, bookmarked and closed the page, and
turned in his chair to face her.

"Scully," he said faintly, as if he were mildly surprised to
see her standing there.  His features were drawn and sad, as
they had been since that horrible night.  As long as she'd
known him, there'd been shadows hovering around Fox Mulder,
but now it seemed as if they had finally settled down to
stay, and were gradually soaking into his skin.

And that was unacceptable.

Scully put the tray down on Mulder's desk, pushing aside a
file to make room.  She then stepped across the small room
and grabbed a chair, pulled it over next to him and sat
down, deliberately positioning herself so that her knee
brushed against his.  Mulder flinched slightly at the touch,
but Scully did her best not to appear to notice.  Contact,
Partner, she thought.  You and I are going to have some of
that this morning.

"Food, huh?"

Mulder's voice pulled Scully back out of her own thoughts,
and now she studied his face, briefly but thoroughly.  To
anyone else, she knew that he would appear unchanged from
when she'd entered the office.  But she was so familiar with
him, so accustomed to looking at him and interpreting his
expession, that she had no difficulty detecting the slight
wariness that now crept across his features.

"That's right," she said calmly, looking him steadily in the
eye.  "Food.  As in breakfast."  She picked up one of the
bottles of orange juice, shook it slightly, and twisted off
the cap and handed the bottle to him.  "I was just reading a
monograph about it the other day.  It's the latest thing in
preventive medicine."

Mulder actually smiled slightly at her weak attempt at
humor, and Scully felt her heart lighten a little.  He was
still there, and she could still reach him.  Everything
could still work out okay.  "I hear all the cool kids are
doing it," he replied levelly, and then he took a sip of
juice.  Scully rewarded him with a smile.

"There," she said.  "That wasn't so bad, was it?"

Mulder hesitated, then shrugged.  "No, I guess not."  He
took another sip, a little larger than the last.  "I'm ...."
 His voice trailed off and he shook his head helplessly.
"I'm sorry, Scully."  He waved at the bagels sitting on his
desk.  "You shouldn't have to do this."

"I don't have to do this, Mulder," she responded, refusing
to allow him to break eye contact.  "I *want* to do it.
Because I care about you."  She held his gaze for one more
moment, then leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek,
before finally turning towards the desk, picking up one of
the bagels and smearing cream cheese on it.

"What'd you get?"

Scully thought she detected reluctant interest in her
partner's voice, and she smiled once more.  "You're the
profiler, Mulder," she said, finally turning to face him
again and handing him the bagel.  "What do *you* think I got
for you?"

This time his smile seemed a little less cautious and
insecure, and he said, "My favorite?"  He held it up to his
noise and sniffed at it.  "But Scully, you hate garlic."

"That's right," she agreed, once again catching and holding
his gaze with her own as she carefully maintained the serene
deadpan expression that she knew he loved.  "And that alone
should tell you how serious I am about this.  That I freely
and without coercion brought you a garlic bagel."

"That is pretty remarkable," he said solemnly.  "Worthy of a
lengthy entry in my diary, I'm sure."

"Mulder, I don't even want to think about what might be in
your diary," Scully replied, continuing to maintain her
cool, professional demeanor.  "Now why don't you start on
that bagel, and while you're eating you can tell me about
the new case we just got."  The last was a shot in the dark,
based on the file folder on his desk and the unusual
interest he'd been showing in the art museum's web page.
But when he raised his eyebrows at her statement, she knew
she was right.

"And you say *I'm* the profiler," he murmured.  He paused
and took a small bite of the bagel, then as he chewed he
pulled the folder over in front of him and opened it,
briefly skimming the cover page before beginning his
presentation.

"Kimberly brought this to me a few minutes after I got here
this morning," he explained.  "Apparently Skinner's in
budget meetings over at Justice all morning, and he felt the
file was self-explanatory."

"What does it concern?" she asked, pulling her chair a
little closer to the desk as she automatically dropped into
her full professional persona.

"A series of murders in the Manhattan area," her partner
replied, pausing for another sip of juice.  His voice was
halting and uncertain at first, but as he continued his
explanation, he gradually seemed to pick up strength and
energy.

"There have been three so far," Mulder went on.  "All of
them were extremely brutal."  He turned over several pages
in the folder, revealing photographs of the victims:  a man
lying in a shower stall, his head beaten to an almost
unrecognizable pulp; another man, sprawled on a king-sized,
four-poster bed, looking as if he'd been partially eaten by
some sort of animal; a woman, her eye sockets nothing but
bloody wounds and her upper body one massive bruise, lying
sprawled across the counter in what appeared to be a fast
food restaurant.

All of the victims were nude.

Scully shook her head, but forced herself not to look away.
She'd seen worse, of course, but she'd never gotten used to
it.  God willing, she never would.  Nevertheless, she
studied each picture with slow deliberation, trying to
absorb all the details she could, before going on to the
next.  Finally she looked back up at her partner.

"Serial killer?" she asked.

He shook his head, and in the distant place where she had
pushed the part of her that was Fox Mulder's lover, Scully
felt a small surge of joy as she realized that her *partner*
was gradually reemerging, at least a little.  They'd been
needing an assignment, she realized.  They hadn't been out
in the field since the conclusion of the LaPierre case.
This would be good for both of them.

"It doesn't look like it," Mulder was saying, picking up the
pace of conversation even further.  "For one thing, as you
can see, the method used varied from one incident to the
next.  Also, there's no apparent pattern in the selection of
victims.  Both of these factors are uncharacteristic of the
serial killer."  His lips quirked slightly, and he added,
"And then, of course, there's the biggest objection.  In
each instance, the alleged killer was immediately taken into
custody.  All three of them have already confessed."

Scully felt her eyebrows shooting up in surprise.  "I don't
get it," she commented.  "If the locals have already made
arrests, and there's no apparent connection between these
murders, why are we being asked to investigate?"

"That's an excellent question, Agent Scully," her partner
replied with a small smile.  "And the answer is that someone
on the NYPD is learning to think outside the box."  He
flipped through the folder and extracted what appeared to be
the cover sheet.  "A Detective Burks has requested that the
Bureau take a look.  As I'm sure you can imagine, the New
York field office was less than enthralled by the prospect,
and bucked it on down to Headquarters.  Eventually, it wound
up on Skinner's desk."

"I still don't see the point," Scully objected.  "What is
there to investigate?"

"I wasn't sure of that, myself," Mulder responded.  "Until I
read Burks' report, that is.  He noticed that there *does*
seem to be a link connecting these cases.  Not between the
victims, though; between the killers.  Each of them is a
respected member of the New York art community.  One is a
museum curator; the second is on the faculty at NYU; the
third seems to be something of a dilettante, but apparently
has enough money to have bought himself a seat at the table,
so to speak."

"Do they know each other?"

"Yes, but that doesn't prove much," her partner said.  "The
art world in New York City is very tightly knit and insular,
almost like a small town.  These people all know each other,
and the three suspects have all served on various boards and
foundations together at one time or another -- although not
all three of them at the same time, so far as anyone's been
able to find out.  And, of course, none of them were
acquainted with their respective victims prior to killing
them."

Scully shook her head.  "So what you're saying is ... what?
That these three men conspired to commit brutal murders
against a series of randomly selected strangers?"

"No," Mulder replied, shaking his own head.  "In the first
place, one of the suspects is a woman."  He held up the
photograph of the man whose body had been chewed.  "Victim
number two, Marvin Draper, was murdered by one Sylvia
Denson, that NYU faculty member I mentioned.  Married, and
by all accounts -- including her own -- happily so.  Three
children.  Butter wouldn't melt in her mouth.

"But also by her own account," he went on, "she picked
Draper up on a subway platform, went with him back to his
hotel room, engaged in sexual intercourse, and then
deliberately bit through his carotid artery at the moment of
climax."  He dropped the picture back on the pile.  "The
rest of the bite marks were apparently inflicted while she
was waiting for the police."

Scully felt her eyes widening.  "You mean she just sat
around afterwards until the authorities came?"

"Better than that," Mulder said laconically.  "She was the
one who called 911."

"You're kidding."

"Nope."  Her partner paused for another bite of his bagel.
"And that brings me to the other thing that ties these cases
together.  The confessions  are eerily similar.  Each
suspect can describe the event in vivid detail, and has made
no attempt to deny his or her guilt.  Each of them also
remained at the crime scene until the cops came -- in two of
the three cases, the killer actually called the police.
Finally, each of them characterized the incident as
something that seemed to be happening to someone else; they
said it was almost as if they were standing outside their
own bodies, watching it all go down.  'My body did it.'
That phrase occurs repeatedly in all three confessions."

"So is that the X-File?" Scully asked, consciously
suppressing the urge to be openly incredulous.  They needed
this case, she reminded herself.  They needed to get out in
the field again.  Even if this turned out to be a dead end,
as she suspected it would, it would still be good for them.
But she couldn't resist tweaking Mulder, just a little.  
"You suspect some sort of out-of-body experience, or
something?"

"Perhaps," he replied.  From the glint of amusement and
appreciation in his eyes it was apparent that he knew
exactly what she was doing.  "Or possibly possession."  A
slow smile spread across his face.  "Or it could even be a
coincidence, Agent Scully.  But we won't know unless we go
and look, now will we?"

==========END CHAPTER ONE==========

===========
Chapter Two
===========

U.S. Airways Flight 6362
Somewhere over New Jersey
Tuesday, March 7, 2000
1:48 p.m.

Scully stared out the window at the sunlight glinting off
the Atlantic Ocean, and thought about how much of her life
these past seven years had been spent on airplanes.

It was really quite a remarkable total.  Early in her
partnership with Mulder she'd kept a log, and assuming that
their travel had continued at the rate she recorded those
first few months, she must now have well over five hundred
hours in the air, just since starting to work on the
X-Files.  And that didn't even count time spent driving to
and from airports, waiting for delayed or connecting
flights, waiting at baggage claim ....

She looked away from the window and snuck a glance at
Mulder, snoozing in the seat next to her.  How typical that
one of them should fall asleep on the plane, even on such a
short flight.  But how atypical that it should be him.
Usually she was the one who fell asleep, as a defense
mechanism against the fear of flying she had never managed
to completely shake.  She'd long since lost track of how
many times she'd awakened during the final approach to some
airport, her head resting comfortably on her partner's
shoulder.

And yet, today it was Mulder who dozed, and she, Scully, who
was having no difficulty staying awake.  Another defense
mechanism, she supposed, on both their parts.  Sleep was
Mulder's way of avoiding the tedium that would inevitably
lead him to thinking about his mother and his sister, while
this unusual wakefulness was Scully's way of maintaining a
vigil, and keeping him safe.

She had done the same thing the night his mother died, and
again the night they finally proved beyond any doubt that
Samantha was dead.

In the first instance, Mulder had broken down completely,
and the tears hadn't stopped until he finally fell into an
exhausted sleep.  In the second, he'd remained dry-eyed, but
very, very still, so still that Scully was never quite sure
when he finally drifted off.  But in each instance, she
cuddled with him in bed, holding him through the night,
staying awake in fulfillment of an unspoken commitment to
guard him while he slept.  Offering as much comfort as she
could.

Offering as much comfort as he would accept.

Even now, though, even as he slept, he didn't seem as if he
was really resting.  His body was still -- there was none of
the tossing and turning that characterized some of his
nightmares.  But even so, he was not calm; his brow was
furrowed, as if he were deep in thought, and his lips
twitched intermittently.

Hesitantly, remembering her resolve to reach out and try to
help, Scully gently stroked her partner's forehead.  She
didn't want to wake him; the flight crew's announcement of
their final approach to LaGuardia would do that, soon
enough.  But she did want to soothe him, and perhaps remind
his sleeping self that he was not, after all, alone.

And to her immense gratification, it worked.  Under her
gentle touch, she saw the wrinkles disappear and the frown
lines ease.  Mulder's eyelids flickered slightly, and he
mumbled something that she couldn't quite make out.  Then he
spoke again, a little louder, and this time she *could* hear
him.

He was speaking her name.

For an instant, Scully's hand froze in place, and she felt
tears filling her eyes.  He recognized her; he recognized
her touch, and it was calming him and helping him relax.
She didn't understand why she was so surprised and moved by
the discovery, but she was.  It was just the reaction she'd
hoped for, of course -- but she had not, deep down in her
heart, expected Mulder's response to be so immediate, or so
quietly dramatic.

She gave his forehead one more soft caress, and then
withdrew her hand and settled back in her seat.  For another
moment she sat quietly, watching him, wanting to make sure
the change would be a lasting one.  Finally, she turned her
attention back to the casefile sitting on her lap.

#          #          #

Manhattan Detention Complex
Manhattan, NY
4:01 p.m.

"Agent Mulder?  I'm Paul Burks, NYPD.  We spoke on the
phone."

Mulder nodded as he took the detective's hand.  The man's
grip was brisk but firm, and Mulder found himself taking an
instant liking to him.  He was tall and bulky, with dark,
almost olive-colored skin, and light blond hair done in a
buzzcut.  He appeared to be in his late 30s, and wore an
open, friendly expression on his moon-shaped face.  His
clothes were conservative, and looked expensive.

"And this must be Agent Scully," Burks said, offering his
hand to Mulder's partner with the same economy of movement
he'd used in shaking Mulder's hand.  As he continued
speaking, the hint of a southern drawl that Mulder had heard
on the phone became apparent.

"I'm very pleased to meet you both," the detective went on,
allowing his hand to drop back to his side.  "And I must say
I'm impressed by the response to my report.  I thought
perhaps your New York office might send someone over to ask
a few questions.  I never imagined that two agents would be
sent all the way from Washington."

"We're from a special unit," Mulder replied, giving his
standard explanation for the existence of the X-Files.  "We
focus on investigating unexplained and paranormal phenomena.
 The way your report was written it got routed to our A.D.,
and he passed it on to us."

"Paranormal phenomena?" Burks repeated, his eyebrows rapidly
climbing towards his hairline.  "You mean U.F.O.s and ghosts
and stuff like that?  And my tax dollars are paying for
this?"  Mulder felt his hackles starting to rise at what he
assumed was the derision behind the man's words, but before
he could respond, the detective went on, "That's great!  As
I'm sure you know, cops see a lot of strange things that
tend to get swept under the rug.  It's good to know that
*somebody's* paying attention."

Mulder blinked in surprise, but before he could think of a
reply the detective had turned away and was leading them
through the crowded reception area of the detention center.

As they made their way further into the building, Mulder
speculated on the source of Burks' comment.  It was
certainly true enough that police sometimes saw things that
they didn't report, because they wouldn't be believed.  That
was how the X-Files got started after all, half a century
earlier -- as a dumping ground for those unexplained
incidents that *did* get reported.

But was that really all Burks had on his mind?  Despite the
stories that circulated in locker rooms and squad cars, most
cops were pretty hard-nosed, and didn't take such things
very seriously.  So why was this one so much more open to
the idea?  Just the luck of the draw?

For that matter, Mulder wasn't entirely sure how *he* felt
about the paranormal anymore.  Originally, the X-Files had
just been an entree, a way of diverting official Bureau
resources to help him in his search for Samantha.  Over the
years, they had grown to be much more than that, but now
that his quest was finally at an end, and he had his answer,
he wasn't sure if there was enough there to hold his
interest.

More than anything else, this was why he'd become so
withdrawn from Scully the past few weeks.  He knew he'd been
doing it; he'd seen it happening.  But he'd been so
self-absorbed he couldn't seem to stop himself, even though
it was clearly worrying her -- and perhaps hurting her, as
well.

The problem was that he didn't know how to raise the issue.
He couldn't just walk up to her and say it, could he?  He
couldn't just say, "Well, Scully, now that we've found out
what happened to my sister, what say we close up shop and go
back to the real world?"

Could he?

Because that was exactly what he wanted to do, some days.

"Agent Mulder?"

Mulder realized that they'd come to a halt in front of a
door guarded by two uniformed correction officers, and that
Burks was now looking at him inquiringly.  The detective had
apparently said something, but Mulder didn't have a clue as
to what it might have been.  Dammit, he had to pay better
attention than that --

"Yes, Detective Burks, we've both read the file," Scully was
saying.  Glancing down at his partner, Mulder saw that her
expression was as smooth and professional as her voice.
"Has there been any change since your report was faxed to
Washington?"

Burks shook his head.  "No.  McSparran is standing by his
confession, and he's still refusing legal counsel.  He's
made no effort to hire a lawyer, although he could probably
afford one.  The public defenders have been over here a
couple of times, too, but he wouldn't talk to them, either."

"Will he talk to us?" Scully asked.

"I think so," the detective responded, now focusing all of
his attention on Scully.

That was okay, Mulder thought, feeling a slight sense of
relief.  Scully could handle this; he'd let her take the
lead.  She *had* seemed to be interested in this case, after
all; that was the main reason he hadn't offered any
resistance to it.  When she arrived at work that morning,
Mulder had been seriously considering waiting until Skinner
got back from his meetings, and then trying to persuade the
A.D. that there was nothing here of interest.  But Scully
really seemed to want this case, for some reason, and so
he'd acquiesced.

"He hasn't had any problem with talking to the cops or the
D.A.," Burks went on, still speaking to Scully.  "At least,
not so far.  He even cooperated with the shrinks -- and
we've been told informally that their report will state that
he's able to stand trial, by the way.  Anyway, I told him
you were coming, and he seemed fine with it."

Scully nodded.  She seemed to be giving all of her attention
to the detective, but Mulder knew better.  There was nothing
specific he could point to, nothing in her body language or
facial expression or tone of voice.  But it was clear that
she was very aware of his own presence, and was in some way
responding to whatever it was that she perceived coming from
him.

Unfortunately, he didn't have a clue as to what she thought
she was responding to, which made it impossible for him to
understand what she was trying to say or do.

"Is there anything else we should know before we go in?"
Scully asked.

Burks hesitated, and gnawed his lip.  His gaze flicked
briefly to Mulder, and then back to Scully, before he
replied, in a low tone of voice, "This guy's weird."  The
detective shook his head in exasperation, and went on, "I
don't mean he's a flake; he's as sane as you and me.  But
... he's weird.  All three of them are.  You'll understand
when you've talked to them, but I wanted you to be aware
that there's something funny going on.  That's why I asked
the Bureau for help."

Mulder continued to watch as his partner nodded slowly.  She
glanced up at him briefly, seeming to peer down inside of
him with those inquisitive blue eyes of hers.  Finally, she
turned back to Burks and nodded once more, and the detective
led the way into the room.

==========END CHAPTER TWO==========

===========
Chapter Three
===========

Manhattan Detention Complex
Manhattan, NY
Tuesday, March 7, 2000
4:28 p.m.

Scully stood for a moment just inside the doorway to the
interrogation room and looked at the man in the orange
jumpsuit.

His name, she remembered, was Devon McSparran, and he looked
completely ordinary.  About six feet tall, still in
surprisingly good shape for a man of 52 -- but of course,
his habit of jogging each morning helped explain that.  His
hair was sparse, but what there was of it was iron gray, and
still carefully styled, even after three weeks in custody.
In short, he looked like what he was:  a respectable,
middle-aged man in a prison jumpsuit.

"Devon, these are the people I told you about," Burks said,
moving further into the room.  "The FBI agents."

McSparran nodded, but remained silent, and for a moment no
one in the room spoke.  Finally, Scully shrugged slightly,
and stepped forward and took a seat at the table across from
the suspect.  A few seconds later, Mulder joined her, while
Burks continued to stand behind them.

"Mr. McSparran," she said, opening her badge and displaying
it to him, "I'm Special Agent Scully, and this is Special
Agent Mulder.  We'd like to talk to you about George
Ventner."  McSparran nodded, and she continued, "First, I
want to make sure that you understand that this conversation
is being recorded, and that by talking to us you are waiving
your Constitutional right to remain silent.  Anything you
say here today can and will be used against you in a court
of law."

"Yes," McSparran said, speaking for the first time.  "I
understand."  His voice sounded dry and scratchy, and was
without inflection.  He added, "I have nothing to hide.  Not
anymore."

Scully cocked her head slightly and looked at the man for a
moment.  He hadn't even spoken a dozen words, and already
she was starting to understand why Burks had said he was a
little weird.  There was an odd lifelessness to his tone and
delivery; a sense of listless finality.

Scully shook her head, and pushed the thought away.  There
would be time to consider that later.  She continued,
"Second, do I understand correctly that you have also waived
your right to be represented by counsel during this
interview?"

The prisoner shrugged.  "A lawyer's not going to do me any
good."

Scully hesitated again, then repeated, "Do you waive your
right to be represented by counsel?"

For the first time, the man met her gaze, and there was a
brief spark of annoyance in his eyes, gone so quickly that
Scully wasn't even sure she'd really seen it.  Small as it
was, it was the first sign of true emotion that he'd
exhibited so far.  Finally, he gave another shrug, and said,
"Yes."

Scully nodded, and glanced briefly at Mulder, but he was
still sitting next to her, quietly and impassively.
Apparently he was content to have her carry the ball, at
least for now.  She looked back at the prisoner.

"Mr. McSparran," she said, "why don't you tell us what
happened on the morning of February 14."

The man shrugged yet again.  "You know what happened," he
responded.  "I killed a man.  Or, to be more precise, my
body killed a man."

"George Ventner," she said after a moment, when it became
apparent that he didn't intend to speak any further.

"That's what his name was," McSparran acknowledged.  "At
least, that's what the police say it was, and I have no
reason to doubt them."

"You didn't know Mr. Ventner?" Scully asked.

"No," the prisoner replied, shaking his head.  His voice
continued in the same dull, inflectionless monotone, and
Scully found that she had to strain to make out his words.
"Until that morning, I'd never met him; I'd never even laid
eyes on him."

"So why did you do it?" she asked.  In her mind, she
continued, Why did you have sex with a total stranger, and
then batter his head against the wall of the shower until he
was dead?  And then why did you *keep* battering his head
against the wall, over and over and over ....

"I don't know," the man said calmly.  "I have absolutely no
idea.  I just ... did.  My body did," he amended, his choice
of words reminding Scully that this was one of the major
points of similarity in the three crimes they were
investigating.

"Why don't you tell us how it happened," Scully suggested.
She wasn't sure what they were going to learn from this
exercise; she and Mulder had both read the man's statement.
But at least it was a place to start.

"I went running," McSparran said, his voice still flat and
emotionless.  "I go running every morning, 5:30 sharp, rain
or shine."  He leaned forward slightly, and went on, "You
have to make yourself do it, you see.  You have to
discipline yourself.  I'm sure you understand how hard it is
to find time for such things; you just have to *make* the
time.  So I run.  Every morning."

"Okay," Scully said.  "So you went running.  Then what
happened?"

"I went running," the prisoner repeated.  "It was still
dark, and I didn't see very many people.  But after a few
minutes, I noticed another man also running, a short
distance ahead of me."

"Ventner?"  Scully realized that she'd almost snapped the
victim's name, and she forced herself calm down.  The man's
tone and affect were definitely bothering her; he was so
calm and serene, even as he was discussing the horrible
things he'd done.

"That's right."  McSparran nodded.  "As I said, I'd never
seen him before.  They tell me that he'd just moved into our
neighborhood a few days earlier.  Anyway, I saw him running
a little ways in front of me, and so I naturally picked it
up a bit until I was running alongside him."

"Competing?" Scully asked.

The man shook his head.  "No, not at all."  He looked at her
speculatively for a moment.  "You don't run, do you?  Or you
wouldn't ask that question."  He glanced briefly at Mulder.
"But he does.  He runs.  I can tell.  He understands."

Scully felt her eyebrows rising slightly, and she had to
force herself not to look at Mulder to check his reaction.
She was about to respond, and attempt to steer McSparran
back to the real subject, when her partner suddenly spoke.

"Runners don't compete," he said.  Scully glanced at Mulder
in surprise, to see that he was looking intently at the
prisoner.  "So you weren't competing; you weren't trying to
beat him.  Why did you kill him?"

For an instant anger flared in the other man's eyes, but it
was quickly extinguished.  After a moment's hesitation, he
said, quietly, "I told you -- I don't know.  My body did
it."

"Okay," Mulder replied smoothly, "Tell us how your body did
it.  You saw Ventner running ahead of you, and you caught up
with him.  Then what?"

McSparran frowned, and for a few seconds he chewed on his
upper lip.  His hands were clasped tightly together on the
table in front of him, and he stared down at them, as if he
expected them to somehow unlock some great mystery for him.
Finally, he looked back up at Mulder.

"That's when I started to feel ... outside," he said.

"Outside?" Scully asked.

The prisoner looked at her and nodded.  "Yes.  Outside.  I
felt as if I were outside of my own body; as if I were a
spectator, watching someone else.  At the same time, I was
still fully aware of being myself; I could hear my thoughts,
and I could feel everything that was going on."

Scully nodded.  "Go on."

The man shrugged.  "There isn't a lot more to tell," he
replied.  "We ran together for a while.  Fifteen, twenty
minutes.  We didn't say anything, and I sort of assumed that
at some point he would break off and take a different route,
and that would be the last I'd see of him."

"But he didn't."  That was Mulder again, and Scully saw that
her partner still wore that expression of intense curiosity
on his face.

"No.  He didn't."

"Did you still feel as if you were 'outside'?" Mulder asked.

"Yes."  The prisoner hesitated, then went on, "It was the
strangest feeling I've ever had in my life.  I almost felt
as if I was in two places at once."  He touched his
forehead, and said, "I was up here."  Waving his hand
vaguely to encompass the room.  "But I was also *out there*
somewhere."

The conversation was abruptly interrupted by the shrilling
of a cell phone.  Automatically, Scully reached for her
jacket pocket, and was aware of Mulder doing the same.

"It's me."

Scully had almost forgotten about the presence of Paul
Burks; now she turned in her seat in time to see the
detective punch the CONNECT button on his phone.  She
watched for a moment as he spoke to whoever was on the other
end; then she turned back to face McSparran once again.

"So what happened after you stopped running?" Mulder asked.

McSparran shrugged again.  "We stood for a few minutes in
front of his building, cooling down and doing some
stretches.  Then he invited me upstairs."

"To have sex?"

No hesitation.  "Yes.  He didn't say so in as many words,
but it was understood."

"And you went with him."

"Yes."  A brief pause.  Then:  "I don't quite understand
why, though.  I'm not ... interested in men.  I'd never had
sex with a man before.  I'm also happily married, and even
when I was single I was never into one night stands."  A
shadow crossed his face.  "At least, I *was* happily
married."

"But you did go with him?" Scully persisted.  The state of
McSparran's marriage was something they were going to have
to look into, but not yet.  First they needed to establish
the facts of the case.

"Yes, I did," the prisoner answered.  "And it was ...
different."  Scully realized that the man was now staring at
Mulder, and she was suddenly aware of an odd tension
radiating from her partner.

"You might understand," McSparran continued, speaking
directly to Mulder.  "You might understand how amazing it
was.  We took a shower together, and after we'd soaped and
rinsed each other he went down on me.  And it just felt so
*incredible*, you know?  I mean, the worst blowjob I ever
had was still pretty good, but this was ... fantastic.  I
think it was because he was a guy, so he knew instinctively
what would feel good."  He paused, still staring at Mulder.
"You *do* understand, don't you?"

Almost against her will, Scully found herself looking at her
partner, but he was giving nothing away.  His face was bland
and expressionless; his body language unreadable.  There was
something going on behind his eyes, but she didn't have a
clue what it might be.  Finally, she forced herself to look
back at McSparran.

"So the victim performed oral sex on you," she stated,
drawing the prisoner's attention away from Mulder and back
to herself.

"Yes," the man responded, nodding.  "He did, and as soon as
he'd finished, I killed him."

"Why?"

The prisoner sighed.  "I keep telling you -- I don't know.
I wish I did.  But he sucked me off, and before I'd even
finished coming, I was overcome with rage."  McSparran's
voice was calm and matter-of-fact, as if he were giving a
weather report.  "It was completely overpowering, and it
just seemed to come from nowhere.  I was holding onto his
head and he was still sucking, and before I had time to
realize what I was going to do I was slamming his head
against the wall, over and over and over.  After a while, I
knew he was dead, but my body just kept doing it.  I
couldn't seem to stop."

"But you did stop," Scully noted.

"Yes, I did," the man acknowledged.  "Eventually."

"And then you called the police."

"That's right."

"Were you still 'outside' when you made the call?" Mulder
asked.

McSparran looked at him and shook his head.  "No," he
replied.  "No, that was me."  He frowned.  "I'm not entirely
sure when the outsideness stopped; it just sort of faded
away once he was dead.  It was definitely gone by the time I
called the police."

"This rage you felt," Mulder said.  "Was it because you were
uncomfortable with having participated in a homosexual act?"
 It seemed to Scully that there was a tinge of ... something
... in her partner's voice, but as with his expression a few
moments before, she couldn't put her finger on what it might
be.

The prisoner shook his head again, firmly.  "No," he said.
"That wasn't it.  As I said, I'd never had sex with a man
before, but it seemed completely right and natural."  He
drew himself up slightly.  "I'm not a homophobe, Mr.
Mulder."

"What about your wife?" Mulder persisted.  "Is it possible
that you were angry with yourself for committing adultery,
and displaced that anger onto the other man?"

"I don't think so," McSparran replied.  "I've thought about
it, of course -- and the police psychiatrist suggested that,
as well.  But I don't think that was what was going on.  I
was just ... angry.  Suddenly, uncontrollably enraged.  I
don't know where it came from, or why."  He seemed to be
struggling to find the words.  "I almost felt as if ... as
if that man, George Ventner, had insulted me in some way."

Scully felt her eyebrows rising.  "Insulted you?" she asked.
 "You mean, by suggesting that the two of you have sex?"

"No," the prisoner responded, shaking his head again.  "It
wasn't about the sex.  I don't know what it was about.  I
just felt as if he had ... humiliated me.  As if he had
abused and belittled me."

"But you'd never met him before that morning?" Scully asked.

"No.  I'm sure of that."

"Then your interaction that morning was the only opportunity
he had to humiliate you."

"That's right," McSparran agreed.  "And he didn't.  We ran
together, he propositioned me, I took him up on it, and I
killed him.  And I have no explanation for any of it."

For a moment or two silence descended on the room.  Scully
knew there would be more questions to be asked, but they
would have to talk to McSparran's wife, among other things,
before they could pursue the matter further.  At last, she
turned to Burks and asked him to summon the guards, and a
few moments later, she, Mulder and the detective were alone
in the room.

"So that was the first one," Mulder commented.  "And number
two was the woman, Sylvia Denson, right?"

"Yeah," Burks replied.  "But you'll have to go out to Rikers
to see her, and it's already getting late.  I've arranged
for you to interview her tomorrow morning, if that's okay."

"That's fine," Scully said with a nod.  "What about the
other male suspect?"  She searched her memory, and added,
"Bradley Hamilton."

Burks hesitated, then shook his head.  "I'm afraid that
won't be possible.  That phone call I had a few minutes ago
-- they were calling to tell me that Hamilton just committed
suicide.  He hanged himself in his cell."

==========END CHAPTER THREE==========

===========
Chapter Four
===========

Residence of Devon McSparran and Kendra Prentice
Manhattan, NY
Tuesday, March 7, 2000
6:55 p.m.

"They sent a man this time.  Thank God."  Mulder felt his
eyebrows rising at the greeting, but before he had a chance
to respond, the woman standing in the doorway continued,
"You *are* the FBI agent, right?"  He nodded, and she
concluded, "Thought so.  You've got the G-man look.  Come on
in."

Upon hearing of Bradley Hamilton's suicide, Mulder and
Scully had decided to split up for the evening.  Scully had
gone with Detective Burks, in hopes of being allowed to
participate in the autopsy, while Mulder got them checked in
at their hotel, and now was keeping the appointment Burks
had made for them to interview Devon McSparran's wife.

So here he was, standing in the doorway of the couple's
condominium on the Upper West Side, trying to figure out
what he could ask this woman that the NYPD hadn't already
covered.

Ms. Prentice, Mulder reminded himself.  She was married to
Devon McSparran, but she hadn't taken his name, and
according to Burks she could be a little belligerent about
it.  She was Kendra Prentice, not Kendra McSparran.

"I really am glad they sent a man this time," the woman was
repeating, as she led him down a short entryway to the
living room.  She appeared to be in her late 40s or early
50s, with short blonde hair and a good figure.  Her clothes
were casual, but looked very expensive.  She held a
cigarette in her right hand, and a trail of sweet-smelling
smoke followed her as she walked.

"I mean, that woman they've been sending to talk to me," Ms.
Prentice continued.  "Detective Ross.  She means well, I'm
sure, and she's very correct and professional.  But she's
also so cloyingly sympathetic that it makes me want to throw
up."  She had walked over to peer out the window at the
street below; now she turned to face Mulder.  "I have a
feeling you're not like that."  And she took a long drag on
her cigarette.

Mulder took a couple of steps further into the room, towards
Ms. Prentice.  "You don't want sympathy?" he asked.

The woman rolled her eyes.  "Of course I want sympathy," she
snapped.  "*Meaningful* sympathy, from people who know me
and Dev, and actually understand.  But I don't need a bunch
of strangers offering a few empty words, out of the hope
that it will make it easier for them to do their jobs."

"Do you think that's all people mean when they express
sympathy?"

"Isn't it?"  Ms. Prentice lips quirked, and she took another
puff on her cigarette.  "Would *you* be here, right now, if
someone wasn't paying you?"

Mulder blinked in surprise, then shook his head.  "Probably
not," he admitted.  "But that doesn't mean I'm not
interested, or that I don't care about what's happening to
you and your husband."  The words were true, but even as he
spoke them, Mulder felt a niggling in the back of his mind;
the woman's question as to why he was here seemed to be
finding fertile soil.  Not now, he admonished himself.  Not
here.  We can think about all that later; right now, we need
to stay on task.

"Well, at least you're honest," Ms. Prentice said flatly.
"That's something."  She gestured at the sofa with the hand
holding the cigarette.  "Why don't you have a seat, and I'll
get you something to drink.  Cops like beer, right?"

"Not when we're on duty," Mulder replied.  He was starting
to get an edgy feeling about this woman, and he just wanted
to get the interview over with so he could get out of there.
 "And it's really not necessary --"

"That's fine," she said, interrupting him with a wave of the
hand that held the cigarette, as she moved briskly across
the room.  "My mother would have another coronary if I
didn't offer you something.  I'll be right back."  And she
was gone.

Mulder sighed and stuck his hands in his pockets, as he
waited impatiently for Ms. Prentice to return.  He briefly
considered taking the seat she'd offered him, but he didn't
expect to be here that long.

For that matter, he didn't expect to be in New York for very
long.  Bradley Hamilton's suicide was no doubt going to slow
things down a bit, but so far, Mulder had not seen or heard
anything that really interested him.  The only real link
between these cases was the similarity in language found in
the suspects' confessions, and that could very well just be
a coincidence.

God.  He was starting to sound like Scully.

He shook his head, and paced across the room and back.
Nothing seemed to be working for him; nothing seemed to be
right.  Things hadn't been on track since the end of the
LaPierre case, and Mulder couldn't find a reason for that --
at least, he couldn't find a reason that he *liked*.

Because the fact of the matter was that he was bored.  Bored
and detached.  The work that he had found so compelling and
important only a few weeks ago now seemed to be more
irrelevant with each passing day.  He just couldn't keep his
mind on it.

Mulder found himself standing in front of the sofa, looking
up at a painting hanging on the wall.  At first glance, he
thought it was just an abstract, but now as he looked at it
more closely, he realized there was some sort of pattern
there ... something he felt he should recognize, but
couldn't.  There was a strange tingling sensation in the
back of his head --

"I found some root beer."

Mulder started at the sound of Ms. Prentice's voice, then
turned around, to see her steadily approaching, two highball
glasses in her hands.

"Root beer?" he asked, eyeing the dark brown liquid and ice
in the glass she handed him.

"Yeah," she replied, and her right eyelid flickered in
something very close to a wink.  "It's Dev's; it's his
secret vice.  I can't stand the stuff, myself."  Her own
glass, Mulder noted, was half full of what appeared to be
whiskey, straight up.

"So what does the FBI want to know?" the woman asked.  She
gestured again at the sofa, this time with the hand holding
her glass, and the liquid and ice sloshed slightly.  "No,
wait," she went on as Mulder reluctantly sat down.  She
paced over and sat primly on the hassock positioned directly
in front of him.  "You want to know if my husband is gay or
bisexual, and you want to know if he's cheated on me in the
past, right?"

Mulder nodded.  "That'll do for a start," he replied.  He
was definitely becoming irritated with Ms. Prentice, but he
couldn't seem to find a handle with which to take control of
the interview.

"Well, the answer to the first question is no," she said,
taking another drag on her cigarette, followed quickly by a
healthy hit from her glass.  "I've been married to Dev for
twenty-two years, and we lived together for two years before
that, and if he had any interest in other men, I'd know
about it."  She smiled slightly.  "Not that I would have
minded.  I've always thought it might be fun to watch a
couple of guys going at it."

"Okay," Mulder answered, fighting down his own sense of
discomfort at addressing this issue so directly.  That was
in the past, he reminded himself; it was a long time ago.
He forced himself to focus on the interview.  "And as for
the other question?"

The woman shrugged.  "Has Dev cheated on me?  Of course he
has, although he thinks I don't know about it.  But it was
never serious; just a quick screw at a party sort of thing."
 She took another drink.  "And we've swapped a few times
over the years; who hasn't?  But that doesn't count as
cheating, does it?"

Mulder couldn't keep himself from blinking, and responded,
"That wouldn't be for me to judge, Ms. Prentice."

"Well, it doesn't," she asserted.  She stuck her cigarette
in her mouth and left it there for a moment.

Mulder nodded, and tried to turn the conversation in a more
useful direction.  "Are you or your husband acquainted with
Bradley Hamilton or Sylvia Denson?"

Ms. Prentice frowned.  "Yeah, we know Brad and Sylvia.  Not
well, but we know them.  Dev works with them from time to
time, and of course we bump into them at parties and the
like."  She swirled the ice in her glass, and seemed to have
a sudden fascination for watching the ice cubes go round and
round.

"Was there any bad blood between you or your husband and
either of them?"

She looked up at him curiously.  "No.  Not especially.  I
think Sylvia was one of Dev's conquests, but that was years
ago, and it's not a big deal.  Of course, the art crowd can
be pretty cutthroat, but there wasn't any serious trouble
with either of them."  Her frown deepened.  "Are you trying
to suggest there's some sort of connection between what Dev
did and what Sylvia and Brad did?"

Mulder hesitated, then shook his head.  "I really can't go
into the details of what I'm investigating, Ms. Prentice."
He maintained eye contact until she nodded, and then he went
on, "What about George Ventner?  Did you or your husband
know him --"

"No."  She shook her head firmly.  "Never met the man.  I
did call his wife, the week after -- after he died.  But she
didn't want to talk to me."  Her lips quirked slightly.  "I
can't say that I blame her."

"What about the other two victims?  Marvin Draper and Louisa
Antonelli?"

Ms. Prentice shook her head again.  "Strangers," she said.
"I couldn't even have told you their names."  She leaned
over to the coffee table to stub out her cigarette, then
straightened up and cupped her nearly-empty glass in both
hands.

Mulder nodded again.  "Ms. Prentice," he said, "I know this
is a difficult question for you, but based on your knowledge
of your husband, can you think of any reason for him to have
murdered George Ventner?  A total stranger?"

For a long minute the woman didn't say anything, and as
Mulder studied her face he saw the facade of self-possession
finally start to crumble.  At last, she seemed to force
herself to meet his gaze, and Mulder saw that there were
unshed tears in her eyes.  "No," she said quietly.  "I
can't.  It's almost as if he must have been possessed or
something."  She gave a bitter smile.  "But the cops aren't
going to believe anything like that, are they?"

Mulder wanted to reassure the woman; he wanted to tell her
that he, at least, might be willing to believe her.  But
once again he found that he lacked the energy; his heart
just wasn't in this case, and he seemed to be powerless to
change that.  So he didn't comment, but simply moved on with
a few more perfunctory questions to wrap up the interview.
Fifteen minutes later, he was on his way back to the hotel.

#          #          #

Bellevue Hospital Center
Manhattan, NY
10:12 p.m.

"Agent Scully?"

Scully turned, to see Paul Burks approaching from across the
hallway outside Bellevue's Department of Pathology.  She'd
just finished assisting with Bradley Hamilton's autopsy.
She was tired and irritable, and wanted nothing more than to
get back to the hotel, check and see how Mulder was doing
and, hopefully, get some sleep.  But here was Burks bearing
down on her, a friendly smile on his face.  Apparently she
was going to have to play nice for a few more minutes.

"Detective Burks," she said.  "I didn't expect to see you
again this evening."

"I know this is going to sound like a line," he replied, the
friendly smile still in evidence.  "But I was just in the
neighborhood, and thought I'd drop in."  Scully raised an
eyebrow, and he went on, more seriously, "Actually, that's
even true.  I've been over at the office trying to get
caught up on some paperwork, and it occurred to me that
you'd probably be finishing up about now.  So I thought I'd
stop by and see what you'd found.  If anything."

Scully shook her head.  "Nothing out of the ordinary," she
told him.  "Ligature marks consistent with strangulation,
and everything else matches up, as well.  We'll have to wait
until tomorrow for the tox screen and the other blood work,
but I'd say it's just what it looks like:  a man overcome
with remorse who couldn't live with what he'd done."

Burks nodded soberly.  "I can't say that I'm surprised."  A
lopsided grin.  "But I am a little disappointed.  I'd been
hoping there'd be something there that would provide the
missing link."

Scully allowed herself a small smile.  "Sorry."  She started
walking down the hall, in the direction of the elevators.
Burks followed.  "What's your interest in all this, anyway?"
she asked.  She didn't really want to get involved in a
long, drawn-out discussion, but she'd found it was generally
good politics to be friendly to the locals -- and since
Mulder got along with people only when it suited him, she
usually had do the lion's share of their liaison work.

"It's my job," the detective said simply.  He got to the
elevators a step ahead of her and punched the up button,
then turned to face her.  "I have a sort of roving
assignment.  Technically, I'm attached to Internal Affairs,
but what I actually do is look for connections."

"Connections?" Scully asked.

"Yeah," Burks replied.  "Oddball stuff.  Things that don't
quite match up, or make sense.  Sort of like what you and
Agent Mulder do, I think."

"Really?"  Scully felt her eyebrows rising in spite of
herself.  Still, if the FBI had an X-Files unit, why
couldn't the NYPD have something similar?  Although she
would have thought they would have heard about it by now --

"It's low profile," the detective said seriously, almost as
if he'd read her mind.  "*Very* low profile.  And a lot of
it isn't really paranormal -- that's not even a formal part
of my brief.  I spend a lot of time on political work."  The
elevator arrived, and they got on board.

"What do you mean 'political'?" she inquired.

The man shrugged.  "You know.  Cases that are spread over
several precincts, and for one reason or another nobody can
see the connection.  In some cases, nobody *wants* to see
the connection.  Like this one."

"Why are you so convinced there's a link in this instance?"
They stepped off onto the main floor and Scully allowed
Burks to lead her towards the main entrance.

The detective hesitated, then shrugged.  "There's not a lot
I can point to," he admitted.  "Just the items you already
know about -- the similarities in the confessions, and so
forth.  I guess after a while it just gets to be an
instinct."

"I see."  The conversation was starting to sound eerily
familiar to Scully -- and she realized with a stab of
heartache that this was one of the things she'd been missing
these past few weeks.  Mulder's tenacity, and his
willingness to jump to outrageous conclusions, often on
little or no evidence, had sometimes infuriated her, but
those were also two of the qualities she found most
endearing about her partner.

God, she missed him.

"Agent Scully?"  Burks again, of course.  "There's a cop
hangout a few blocks from here.  I was thinking we could
stop by and have a beer, and talk things over.  I'd like to
get your views on this -- and I'd also like to hear more
about the work you and Agent Mulder do.  It sounds
fascinating."

Scully stood for a moment, looking at the man and trying to
gauge his intentions.  What he'd just said sounded
suspiciously like a pick-up line, and she just wasn't
interested.  She was also tired, and her feet hurt, which
meant she wasn't in the mood to deal with him as gently as
she otherwise might have.

She shook her head, and replied, "I'm sorry, but I'm already
seeing someone."  Her gaze flicked briefly to the heavy gold
band on the ring finger of Burks' left hand, and then back
up to his face.  "And even if I weren't, I wouldn't go out
with a married man."  She suppressed a shudder at the
thought.  Not again, she thought.  Once was more than
enough.

For a moment the detective simply stared at her, a look of
confusion on his face.  Then his eyes widened, and he burst
out laughing.

"I'm sorry, Agent Scully," he said, in his soft, southern
drawl.  "I really am.  I guess that did sound like a bit of
a come on."  He raised his left hand so as to display his
wedding ring more clearly.  "I didn't mean it that way at
all.  Not that you aren't a lovely lady, but I *am* married
-- happily married.  And I really am interested in talking
about the case and your work -- but *only* about the case
and your work.  So how about it?"  Still grinning broadly,
he added, "I'll even let you buy."

Scully felt herself blushing furiously.  She should know
better by now than to make snap judgments about people when
she was this tired.  Thank God the detective hadn't taken
offense.  But now she was going to *have* to go with him, at
least for a little while, which meant it would be that much
longer before she would have a chance to check in with
Mulder, and then get some sleep.  She forced a smile, and
replied, "Okay.  But just one drink, okay?  I need to get
some rest tonight."  And she allowed Burks to lead her on
out of the hospital to his car.

==========END CHAPTER FOUR==========

===========
Chapter Five
===========

The Best Western President Hotel
Manhattan, NY
Wednesday, March 8, 2000
12:29 a.m.

Mulder lay in bed staring at the ceiling of the darkened
hotel room.  He'd been lying there for over an hour, but
sleep just wouldn't come.

He'd tried his usual remedy:  the television.  He had, in
fact, spent nearly forty-five minutes flipping through the
channels, looking for something to watch, but nothing had
attracted his interest -- not even on the adult channels on
pay-per-view.  He'd finally turned the TV off in disgust,
its annoying babble not providing the distraction it had
given him in the past.

This was yet another of the things that had changed for him
in the past few weeks.  For so very many years, he had
suffered from insomnia, but he'd developed a set of coping
mechanisms to compensate.  He would study the current file,
or he would surf the net, or he would watch television, or
he would run, and eventually some combination of these
elements would lull him, if not to sleep, then at least into
a state of restfulness.

But now everything was different.  Mulder still had problems
sleeping, but it wasn't because of nightmares, or chronic
anxiety over his sister.  No, these days it was about
himself.  It was about his life, and the lack of meaning or
direction in it.

It was because of this wakefulness that he'd started pushing
Scully away -- or at least, he'd *tried* to push her away,
he amended in his mind.  The trouble was, she was
steadfastly refusing to be pushed -- and to be perfectly
honest, at least with himself, his heart wasn't in it.

He didn't *want* her to go; he wanted her to stay.  He
wanted her right next to him, as close as possible.  He was
almost certain that having her around would in the long run
help to solve his problems; the catch was that he was
unwilling to reach out to her, because he feared what that
solution might cost her.

Whatever the hell *that* meant.

God, he was a mess.

Mulder grumbled softly and turned over in bed, so that he
was lying on his stomach.  That was the real difficulty, of
course.  He didn't clearly understand what he wanted, and he
wasn't sure what the stakes were, for him or for Scully, if
he tried to find out.  It seemed that dispite having at last
found release from the uncertainty over Samantha's fate, he
had somehow acquired a new state of not-knowing.

Or perhaps it was simply that now he finally had enough
spare emotional energy that he was actually capable of
caring about his own life and future.

Shit.

He was drawn from his introspection by a light rapping on
the connecting door to Scully's room.  For a moment he
considered feigning sleep; part of him didn't want her to
know he was having trouble sleeping, because he wasn't
completely ready to try to explain himself.

But he knew that even if he did pretend to be asleep, she
would probably come in anyway -- and if she didn't, it would
just be one more instance where he had pushed her away.  If
he did that enough times, eventually she really *would*
leave him, and if he was honest enough to admit to himself
that he didn't want that, then he should try to be strong
enough to modify his own behavior, so that he would no
longer be shoving her in that direction.

"It's open," he said, very softly.  "Come on in."

Almost immediately, the door swung open and then shut again,
briefly admitting a narrow shaft of light from the other
room before darkness descended once again.  He was
momentarily blinded by the brief flash of illumination, but
he could still hear her.  He could almost *sense* her
presence, as she moved carefully across the room.

He knew when she stood by the bedside, looking down at him,
perhaps wondering if she should sit on the bed, or even lie
down next to him.  And just as his eyes finally adjusted,
and he was about to invite her to join him, he made out her
shadowy form as she turned away and found the chair next to
the small round table next to the door, and sat down.

"You were out late," he said, trying to cover his
disappointment, all the while wondering why he didn't just
speak up and ask for what he wanted.  "Was it a complicated
case?"

"Not that complicated."  It was still dark in the room, of
course, but now he could see well enough to make out the
shadow of her head, shaking back and forth.  "We found
nothing out of the ordinary.  It's going to be reported as a
simple, straightforward suicide."

"He just hanged himself, huh?"

"Were you expecting something different?"  Her words could
have sounded combative, but somehow they did not.

"No, not really," he replied, after a short pause.

"Hoping?"

Mulder sighed, and shook his head.  "No, not that either."
There was a brief silence.  Then:  "So what do you think?
Should we pack it in and go back to D.C.?"

"Well, I don't think there's an X-File here," she said,
seeming to choose her words carefully.  Mulder waited in
silence for her to continue.  After a moment, she went on,
"But I don't think we should go home.  Not just yet.  We
accepted this assignment, and I think we owe it to ourselves
to do a thorough job."

"To ourselves?"

"Yes."  He could see her shadowy form nodding, and she
leaned forward a little in her chair.  "Mulder, we haven't
been out in the field since the LaPierre case.  We've been
sitting in Washington, spinning our wheels, not doing
anything much of importance, and it's been making us both a
little crazy.  I think we need to put some direction back
into our professional lives, and I think this case can help
us do that."

"But what are we doing *here* that's of importance?" he
objected.  "All that I can see going on is a small group of
unconnected murders, and the police already have them all
solved.  So what's the point?"

This time the silence was long and heavy, and when Scully
finally spoke, she sounded as if she was having trouble
keeping her throat from constricting.  "Mulder," she said,
"I don't like to hear you talk like that."  She rose from
the chair and stepped forward, then dropped to her knees
next to the bed and reached out and felt along the covers
until she found one of his hands.

"I want to be out in the field with you," she went on -- and
now he could see her eyes, blue and luminous, seeming to cut
through the darkness.  "I like going places and seeing
things.  I like the problem solving.  I even like the
arguments.  It's part of who we are."

"I thought you were the one who wanted to stop the car."
Mulder felt a sense of helplessness closing in on him.  This
was exactly the reaction he'd been afraid of, and he didn't
know how to deal with it.

"I never said that," she replied, shaking her head.  "I'll
admit that I thought about it some, back when we were under
Kersh.  And I'll also admit that I raised the subject.  But
it was never what I really wanted.  I was just ...
frustrated with the way things were going that fall, and I
was playing with ideas.  The fact of the matter is that I
want to stay in the car.  But only if you're there, too."

"Why?"  The word was out of his mouth before he realized he
was going to say it.

There was another pause; then Scully replied, "Why do I want
to stay in the car?  Or why do I want to be with you?"

"Either.  Both."  Mulder realized he was clenching his free
hand into a fist, and he made a conscious effort to relax
it.  And he wondered just how he had so completely lost
control of this conversation.

She seemed to consider his question for a moment, her head
cocked thoughtfully to one side.  Finally, as if she were
dictating an autopsy report, she said, "I want to be with
you because I love you.  I realize that begs the question,
but it's really the only answer that I have."

"You love me," Mulder repeated.  It wasn't the first time
she'd said those words, but he still had trouble accepting
them, and he couldn't keep himself from saying them aloud,
as if they were some sort of magic incantation.  "You love
me."

Scully shrugged in the darkness.  "I never planned for it to
happen, and if someone had suggested it to me, way back when
we were first working together, I would have laughed.
Nevertheless, it happened.  And before you ask, I wouldn't
have it any other way, even if I could."

"What about the car?" he asked softly.

His partner shrugged again.  "How far do you want me to
carry that metaphor?  I like it in the car.  The car is
moving; it's going places.  Looking back at my life before
the X-Files, it seems very static and uninteresting."  She
hesitated, then added, "Mulder?  What's wrong?"

And there it was, Mulder thought.  She'd finally come out
and asked him directly, and he wasn't going to be able to
evade the issue any longer.  Even so, he couldn't keep
himself from trying to hedge a little.

"I'm ... not quite sure what's wrong," he said, his voice
very low.

"Do you want to stop the car?" she asked.

"I don't know," Mulder replied.  "Sometimes ... sometimes I
think maybe I do.  God, that seems so selfish."

There was another moment of silence, as Scully apparently
waited for him to go on.  Finally, she said, "It's okay to
tell me how you feel, Mulder.  Even if it's not entirely
positive, I want to know.  I *need* to know.  Why do you
feel it's selfish that you've been thinking about stopping
the car?"

God.  She wasn't going to cut him any slack; she was going
to make him face this.  He wanted to run away and hide, but
he couldn't.  This was Scully, he reminded himself.  She was
his partner, and she deserved the truth.

"I'm not sure I really do," he replied.  "But sometimes I
think I do.  And as for why ...."  His voice trailed off and
he shook his head angrily.  Try again.  "I've given up so
much to this fucking quest, Scully.  I've lost so many
things that I'll never be able to get back, and all the time
I was searching she was already dead ...."

"And you want to try to reclaim some of those things?"  Her
voice was soft and understanding, and her hand was warm and
comforting in his.

"I think ... sometimes I think I would, yes."  The admission
came with surprising ease, and Mulder was encouraged to
continue.  "But I don't see how I can.  It's too late for
most of it."

"Why is it too late?  What do you want that you think you
can't have?"

"I want ... I want you."  The words sounded foolish, even to
Mulder, and he tensed as he waited for her reply.

"You've already got me," Scully said quietly.  Hesitantly,
she leaned forward and brushed her lips against his.  "And
you'll never, ever lose me."

"I know.  But that's not what I meant."  God, this was going
to sound stupid -- but he was too far in to back out now.
And so he continued, "I want to be twenty, and meet you for
the first time.  I want to bump into you on the Quad, and
... and be taken with you.  Immediately.  I want to go on
dates with you and have the experience of falling in love
with you without having to worry about government
conspiracies and alien invasions.  I want my biggest worry
to be whether you'll agree to go with me to see The Police
in concert."

"I didn't like The Police when I was twenty," she commented
-- but there was no mistaking the amusement in her voice.

"Then I want to convert you," he insisted, feeling a little
more confident at hearing the tone of her response.  "I want
to invite you over to my apartment and feed you spaghetti,
because that's what bachelors know how to cook, and then I
want to make you sit on the sofa and listen to my albums."

"We'd just listen to records?" she asked.  "Nothing else?"

"Well, this *is* our first date I'm talking about here,
Scully."

"I dunno, Mulder," she replied.  "I have a feeling you were
a pretty sharp operator when you were twenty."

Suddenly things were serious again, although he didn't think
she'd intended that.  "I would never do that to you,
Scully," he said quietly.  "I did do some things when I was
younger.  Stupid things.  Things I'm not proud of."  He felt
a shudder race through his body, as the memories that were
stirred up by his interview with Kendra Prentice threatened
to surface once again, but he hurriedly thrust them away.
"But I would never do anything like that to you."

"I know that, Mulder."

Scully fell silent again, and Mulder tried to think of
something else to say; anything to move the conversation
along.  Things were going pretty well, so far -- much better
than he'd expected.  But now he wasn't sure how to proceed.
There was so much more he wanted to say --

Abruptly his partner was rising to her feet and letting go
of his hand.  For a moment Mulder was confused, and didn't
know what he could have done to upset her -- but then she
began unbuttoning her blouse, with quick, efficient motions.
 A minute or two later she was lifting the covers and
sliding into bed next to him, her naked body warm and
comforting against his own.

Automatically, he slipped his arms around her waist, drawing
her closer, even as she was bringing her hands to rest on
his shoulders and pressing her forehead against his.  But
before he had a chance to say or do anything further, Scully
spoke.

"Hi," she said, with surprising shyness.  "Do you mind
sharing your table?  All the other seats appear to be
taken."  Mulder blinked in confusion, but before he could
think of something to say in response, Scully went on, "My
name's Dana, by the way.  Dana Scully.  I've just arrived
from America; I'm a transfer student from the University of
Maryland."

"Oh."  Mulder blinked again, but now he felt a smile tugging
at the corners of his mouth.  "Sure.  Have a seat.  I'd
enjoy the company."  He hesitated, then added, "My name is
Fox."

"Fox."  She seemed to think about the name for a moment.
Then:  "That's a lovely name.  Very unusual."  She tilted
her head slightly.  "But I have the sense you don't like it
very much?"

"No, I don't," he admitted.  Immediately he regretted the
words, as he saw a flicker of disappointment in her eyes.
"But I like the way it sounds when you say it.  Say it
again."

"Fox."  Her breath puffed against his lips, warm and moist.
"Fox.  It really is a lovely name; it's so unique."  She
pressed her lips against his again, gently and briefly.

"Dana's a nice name, too," he replied, once his mouth was
free.  "But doesn't a pretty girl like you already have a
boyfriend?"

Scully shook her head, smiling, and somehow she managed to
look much younger than she was.  "No," she said.  "No,
there's no one.  No one but you.  And there never will be."
Then she kissed him again.

This time the kiss went on for quite a while.  Mulder moaned
slightly as he felt Scully's tongue trace the outline of his
lips -- and then he willingly opened his mouth, allowing her
inside.

God, this was good; this was so good.  Suddenly, Mulder
couldn't remember why he'd been keeping this woman at arm's
length recently.  She was, quite simply, the best thing that
had ever happened to him, and he was an idiot not to accept
everything she wanted to give him.

Scully pushed on his chest, very gently, and Mulder allowed
her to roll him onto his back and crawl on top of him.  They
were still kissing, alternately exploring each other's
mouths, and now Scully's fingers were tangled in his hair,
clutching and very gently scratching at his scalp.  Nor were
his own hands idle; they were stroking and caressing her
back, and tracing the length of her spine.

Mulder was so absorbed in tasting her and feeling her and
just basking in the warmth of her body that he barely
noticed as she lifted her pelvis, and reached down to push
his boxers down off his hips.  His erection sprang free, and
in another instant she'd grasped him with one hand, gently
touching and caressing him for a moment, before she finally
lowered herself again and guided him to her entrance.

"Ahhhh!"

The cry of pleasure had come from Scully; Mulder was almost
sure of it.  She was poised above him, now, her expression
taut with ecstasy as she slowly moved her hips downward
until she had sheathed him completely.  Mulder felt his own
body quivering in response, and as his hands came to rest on
her hips, it was all he could do not to slam himself up into
her.  Not yet, he told himself firmly.  Not yet.

For a moment or two they both held perfectly still, trying
to adjust to the sensation.  This was not new, Mulder
reminded himself; this was something they had done before.
Yet, somehow, it *did* seem very much like the first time.
And not just the first time with each other, but the first
time with anyone, ever.  It was almost as if they *were*
both twenty, and everything was new and fresh and exciting.

Scully's hips began to move, then, banishing coherent
thought.  Mulder had to struggle to keep his eyes open, but
he didn't want to miss this; he wanted to watch her face as
she made love to him.  He wanted to lose himself in her, and
drown in her expression of joy.

Jesus, she was beautiful.  Her face was flushed, eyes
closed, head thrown back, mouth slightly open.  The tip of
her tongue protruded slightly between her teeth, and she
wore a look of intense concentration on her face.  She's
still thinking, he thought, feeling a sense of wonder
spreading through him.  She's *always* thinking, always
aware of who she is and what she's doing.  Even now, when
she's obviously in the throes of intense physical pleasure
....

Almost as if she had read his thoughts, her eyes came
partway open, and she looked down at him and gave him a
smile that took his breath away.

"Scully," he whispered -- but that was the only word he had
time to utter before her mouth descended on his again.

This time, as they kissed, it was electrifying.  Mulder felt
a tremendous surge of energy coursing through him, seeming
to pass directly through his mouth and groin to Scully, and
then come streaming back at him, added to and multiplied by
her own unique flavor of passion ....

They were both moaning, now, writhing in each other's arms,
their bodies slick with their mingled sweat.  The scent of
their mutual arousal filled his nostrils, and seemed to
pervade his very being, sending him higher and drawing him
closer to Scully with each breath he took ....

They moved in perfect unison, hips pumping desperately, arms
clutching fiercely.  Mulder found himself no longer able to
concentrate on her face; he was no longer able to do
anything but feel the desperate need that now pulsed
frantically in his groin.  He might have felt selfish about
his drive to satisfy that need, were it not for the fact
that he could feel Scully's desire, as well, simmering just
below the boiling point ....

And then, suddenly, he was there -- *they* were there.  The
bright, white pinpoint of his arousal abruptly blossomed in
a silent explosion of emotional release.  He was still
thrusting up into her, just as she was slamming down onto
him, and he was spending himself, emptying himself into her,
giving her everything that he had, even as he felt her
entire body quaking and convulsing in orgasm ....

And she was lying on top of him, her body apparently as limp
with exhaustion as his was.  Somehow, Mulder managed to find
the energy to reach for the covers, and draw them up to
cover both of their cooling bodies.  Scully sighed, and
snuggled down on top of him, and he could feel her gentle
breathing tickling slightly against the side of his neck.
And after a while, he slept.

#          #          #

He is unable to sleep.

He came home hours ago, after a long, tedious day of dealing
with the world.  A day of putting up with the stupid and the
scoffers and the detractors.  Those who make the destruction
of others into a sport.

Those who have made a mockery of his life.

This would not be enough, in and of itself, to keep him
awake.  Not yet, at any rate.  It has not been long enough
since the last time, and the pressure has not yet pushed him
to the breaking point, forcing him to descend once more into
the darkness.

Still, he cannot sleep.

He stands before a blank canvas, now.  As always, he is
nude.  The music pounds in the background, blasting from the
speakers, assaulting his mind and soul.  But unlike the
other times -- unlike the four previous occasions when he
was overtaken by his rage and hate -- he stands perfectly
still.

Motionless.

Unmoving.

He has been standing here for more than an hour, now.  It's
been that long since he gave up tossing and turning in his
bed, and entered the studio.  It has been that long since he
finally admitted that what he felt, earlier this evening,
was real.

It *was* real, he thinks.  It was no more than a twinge, a
faint echo of the pressure he usually experiences, but it
was no less authentic for that.  There was a familiarity to
the feeling, but he can't quite put his finger on why.  It
was almost as if someone was walking on his grave.

He even had a brief flash of an image.  It was a vision of a
man, tall and dark-haired, with infinite sadness in his
eyes.  A sorrow that said, somehow, that this man, whoever
he may be, is also familiar with the darkness, and may even
be a resident of that awful place.  There was a kinship
there; a sense of fellowship.  And it is this feeling that
the artist is now seeking to capture in oil.

Without success.

At last he flings his brush aside in disgust and storms from
the studio, leaving the blank canvas behind.

Waiting.

==========END CHAPTER FIVE==========

===========
Chapter Six
===========

Northbound on Interstate 278
Approaching Rikers Island, NY
Wednesday, March 8, 2000
9:18 a.m.

"So how long have you and Agent Mulder worked together?"

Scully glanced at Paul Burks, sitting in the driver's seat
of the car.  Once again, she and Mulder had chosen to split
up, at least for the morning.  Mulder had taken their rental
car and gone to interview Bradley Hamilton's widow, while
she and Burks planned to visit the prison facilities on
Rikers Island, and talk to the other surviving suspect,
Sylvia Denson.

"Seven years," Scully replied.  She and the detective had
chatted a bit the night before over a couple of beers, after
the autopsy, but neither of them had said much of substance;
it had been a get-acquainted session, for the most part.
Now, Burks apparently wanted to continue the process.

Liaison, she reminded herself firmly.  Liaison.

"Seven years," the man repeated.  "That's quite a stretch.
I thought the Bureau moved people around more often than
that."

"It does," Scully replied reluctantly.  "But the X-Files is
a special assignment, outside the Bureau mainstream, so not
all of the regular rules apply.  Also, we've got an
assistant director who believes in continuity."

"The X-Files?" Burks asked.  "Is that the unit the two of
you work for?"

Scully smiled slightly.  "Actually, we *are* the X-Files
Division," she admitted.  "Mulder's technically the senior
agent, but as a practical matter we work as equals."  She
glanced at Burks again, and saw that he appeared to be
genuinely interested.  "We each bring our own strengths to
the partnership," she added.  "We complement each other."

And it was true, she thought, as Burks broke off the
conversation for a moment in order to negotiate through some
particularly heavy traffic.  It hadn't always been so,
especially in the early years, but now it was.  The events
of the past few months had finally forced Scully to
acknowledge something that she'd only paid lip service to in
the beginning:  that Mulder's wild leaps of logic and his
almost childlike willingness to believe were just as
necessary to their success as partners as was her own
devotion to science and reason.

It had been a bitter pill for Scully to swallow, and it
hadn't been until well after her return from Africa that she
had finally reconciled herself to it.  For all that she
trusted and respected Mulder, there had always lurked in her
soul a series of quiet reservations about his worldview.
That, more than any other single factor, had been the reason
she had resisted his hesitant overtures concerning a
personal relationship.

But last fall, all of that had changed.  Last fall, on the
west coast of Africa, she had been confronted by an artifact
and associated phenomena that she could explain in no other
way but by resorting to Mulder's theories.  Nor could she
turn away from them, as she sometimes had in the past, and
pretend they didn't exist, or hadn't happened.  Not with her
partner's life hanging in the balance.

When she returned to Washington, Scully found that the walls
that she had hastily and thoroughly torn down in her moment
of desperate need could not be casually and easily rebuilt
-- nor did she really want them to be.  And, for the first
time in her long, odd friendship with Fox Mulder, she found
herself reaching out to him at precisely the same moment
that he was reaching out to her.

And the rest, she thought sardonically, was history.

"That's a nice situation to be in."

For a moment, Scully was confused by Burks' remark; her
thoughts had drifted so far from their conversation that
she'd lost track of the thread.  But then she replayed her
own previous comments in her head, and realized what he was
talking about:  her partnership with Mulder.

"It is," she agreed with a nod, after a slight pause.
Something about the detective was encouraging her to speak,
and she added, "It's the most meaningful relationship I've
ever had in my life."  The words were out of her mouth
before she could stop them, and Scully tensed slightly as
she waited for the man's reply.

Burks hesitated, and glanced briefly at her before looking
back at the road.  "Agent Scully," he said, seeming to pick
his words very carefully, "again, I'm so sorry about last
night.  I never intended for my invitation to sound as if
--"

"It's okay, Detective," Scully said, more sharply than she'd
intended.  She deliberately softened her tone, and added,
"If anything, I should be apologizing to you.  For jumping
to conclusions, I mean."

Burks shook his head.  "No," he said.  "No, you were fine.
Believe me, I've been around, and I know how hard it is for
a woman to make it in law enforcement."

Scully considered the man's words for a moment.  There was
certainly some truth in what he said; it *was* difficult.
But Scully had never been one to rely on excuses, even when
they were valid, and it went against her grain to
acknowledge such a handicap.  It almost felt like a weakness
--

"I'm sorry too, Dmitri," the detective murmured.

Scully felt her eyebrows shoot up in surprise, and then her
lips twitched slightly as she recognized the words Burks had
just spoken.  Dr. Strangelove.  The detective's eyes were
glued to the road, but Scully could see a smile tugging at
the corners of his mouth.

And suddenly it did all seem terribly funny.  Burks was a
perfectly ordinary man; very pleasant, good-humored and
unassuming.  They'd had a brief misunderstanding the day
before, but that was all it was.  And so, struggling to keep
a straight face, she replied, "Don't say that you're more
sorry than I am, because I'm capable of being just as sorry
as you are.  So we're both sorry, all right?"

The gate guard at Rikers Island would be telling people for
weeks about the FBI agent and the cop who passed through his
checkpoint with tears of laughter streaming down their
faces.

#          #          #

Rose M. Singer Center
Rikers Island, NY
9:59 a.m.

"My attorney says I don't have to talk to you."

Scully nodded, glanced briefly at Detective Burks, and then
looked back at the prisoner sitting on the other side of the
table.

Sylvia Denson was an attractive woman in her early 40s; even
the prison jumpsuit couldn't conceal that.  She had short,
dark hair, framing an elfin face, and her eyes were even
darker than her hair.  She was short, almost as short as
Scully, and had the sort of tight, compact figure that spoke
of regular exercise and religious adherence to a diet.

There was a callus on the third finger of her left hand,
presumably where her wedding band had been.  Scully knew it
would have been confiscated when Denson was processed in by
the police; she wondered, though, if the prisoner would be
wearing it now, even if she could.

Because this woman, of course, had seduced a man other than
her husband -- committed adultery with him -- and then
brutally murdered him and mutilated his body.  With her
teeth.

"That's very true, Ms. Denson," Burks was saying, in cool,
professional tones.  "But it's our understanding that you've
signed a waiver of your Miranda rights.  Is that correct?"

She sighed, and nodded.  "Yes."

"Have you changed your mind?" Burks pressed.  Scully nodded
to herself.  Best to nail it down; they didn't want any
doubts about the status of this interview.  "Do you wish to
invoke your right to remain silent?"  His eyes flicked to
the empty chair next to the prisoner.  "Your attorney does
not appear to be present," he added.

"No, he's not," Denson agreed.  "I don't need him.  And no,
I haven't changed my mind.  I just ... I'm not used to this.
 That's all."

"Not used to what?" Scully asked.

The other woman glanced at Scully, and shrugged.  "Not being
in control," she replied.  "Having other people decide where
you sleep, when and what you eat, when you take your
exercise ...."  Her voice trailed off and she waved a hand.
"Everything."

Scully nodded, carefully keeping her features professional
as she suppressed the slight feeling of discomfort Denson's
words had evoked.  She could certainly relate to what the
woman was saying -- but this interview wasn't about her.  It
was about the prisoner.  And her victim.

"Ms. Denson," Scully said, beginning as she had with Devon
McSparran, the day before, "why don't you tell us about
Marvin Draper."

Denson shrugged again.  "There's not a lot to tell," she
answered.  "I was on my way home.  It was a Monday, and my
day to fix dinner.  While I was waiting on the subway
platform, I noticed this man looking at me."  She looked
Scully in the eye.  "You know how it is, I'm sure."

Scully did know, and she couldn't keep herself from nodding.
 "Go on."

The prisoner took a breath, and continued, "So I saw this
man looking at me.  And at first, I did what I usually do in
that situation.  I ignored him.  But I found I couldn't make
it stick."

"What do you mean?"  That was Burks chiming in, and Scully
glanced at him and nodded approval of the question.

"I mean," Denson said carefully, "that I couldn't just
ignore him."  She went on quickly, "He wasn't bothering me;
he wasn't getting in my face or anything like that.  But I
couldn't keep myself from looking back at him."

"Why do you think that is?" Burks asked.

"I don't know."  She paused for a moment, then added, "He
was attractive, of course.  I'm sure you've seen pictures of
how he looked ... before."  Scully and Burks both nodded.
"But that wasn't it.  You see attractive men on the street
all the time.  But this was ... different, somehow."

There was a moment of silence; after it became clear Denson
wasn't going to go on, Scully asked, "How was it different?"

"I'm not sure if I can explain it," the woman said.  "I felt
... I felt as if I wasn't in control of my own body."  She
shuddered.  "As if someone else had taken over, and I was
just along for the ride."

"So what happened?" Burks prodded, after another moment of
silence.

"I don't quite know," Denson replied.  "Not the early part
of it.  I kept looking at him, he kept looking at me.  The
train came, people got on, and the train left.  And he and I
were standing on the platform together.  Alone."

"You didn't get on the train?" Scully asked.

"No, I didn't."  The woman frowned.  "Look, could just one
of you ask the questions?  I'm starting to feel whipsawed
here."

Scully glanced at Burks; he nodded for her to go on, and she
looked back at the prisoner.  "So the two of you were on the
platform," she said.  "Then what?"

"Then ... then I don't remember very clearly.  The next
thing I remember is riding up in the elevator to his hotel
room," Denson said, her face reddening.  "He was from out of
town -- at least, that's what they tell me.  We never really
talked."

The prisoner shook her head, as if she couldn't quite
believe the things she was saying.  "So we got to his room,
and ... and we had sex.  He didn't offer me a drink and we
didn't make small talk.  We just took off our clothes and
did it."  Still shaking her head:  "God, I can't remember
when I've been that ... that aroused.  And the things he did
to me felt so damned good ...."  Her voice trailed off.

"And then you killed him," Scully finished.

"Yes," the woman agreed flatly.  "Then I killed him."  She
closed her eyes for a moment, then reopened them.  "And no,
I don't know why.  He was on top, and he was ... fucking me.
 I was really into it, we both were, and ... and I felt my
orgasm starting.  And then, suddenly, I felt this terrible,
horrible rage.  I was so angry and hurt and frustrated and
humiliated that I couldn't think.  And his neck was right
there, and there were a few marks on it -- we'd been a
little rough, earlier.  So I bit him.  Hard."

"You severed his carotid artery," Scully commented.

"I know.  That's what I intended."  The prisoner's voice was
flat and expressionless.

"You meant to kill him."

"Yes," Denson said.  "I meant to kill him."

"Why?"

The woman shook her head.  "I already told you.  I don't
know.  It wasn't me doing it."  She waved her hands
helplessly.  "I mean, it *was* me.  I remember everything,
after we got to his room, and obviously, it was me.  But at
the same time, it wasn't.  It was as if my body did it."

//As if my body did it.//  Scully shook her head.  The same
words the other two suspects had used.  The same dead end.
She sighed, and looked back at Denson again.  Well, there
was still one more line of questions to pursue.  "Ms.
Denson, are you familiar with Devon McSparran or Bradley
Hamilton?"

Her eyes clouded, and she nodded.  "Yeah," she said.  "Yeah,
I know Dev and Brad.  I've known them for years.  I also
know that Brad killed himself yesterday."  Scully felt her
eyebrows shooting up in surprise, and the other woman added,
"That sort of news travels fast when you're inside, Agent
Scully."

Scully nodded in acceptance of the point, and asked, "How
would you describe your relationships with Mr. Hamilton and
Mr. McSparran?"

"I know them," the prisoner repeated.  "I've worked with
each of them on projects from time to time.  We get along,
but we aren't great friends."

"Kendra Prentice -- Mr. McSparran's wife -- she thinks you
slept with him," Scully commented.

"Yeah, I know," Denson replied.  "I know she thinks that;
she confronted me about it once.  But she's wrong --
although I think I may be the only woman in the past twenty
years who turned Dev down.  But I've been faithful to my
husband, Agent Scully."  Her eyes dropped, and she seemed to
be studying her bare ring finger.  "Until now."

Scully couldn't think of anything to say to that, so she
didn't try.

==========END CHAPTER SIX==========

===========
Chapter Seven
===========

Residence of Bradley and Helen Hamilton
Saddlebrook, NJ
Wednesday, March 8, 2000
11:09 a.m.

For the second time in as many days, Mulder found himself in
an upscale home, waiting for the owner to appear.

Actually, in this case "upscale" was a major understatement.
 Mulder had driven for the better part of an hour to reach
this place, and found it to be more of  a mansion than a
house.  A long, pebbled drive wound through leafy greenery,
finally terminating in a loop in front of a three story
brick house -- a house that had obviously been there,
virtually unchanged, for a century or two.

He'd been greeted at the door not by Mrs. Hamilton, but by a
butler -- an honest to god butler, complete with the dark
suit and the high, starched collar.  The man led Mulder into
the house and down a long, wood-paneled hallway, finally
leaving him in a moderate-sized room lined with bookshelves
-- self-evidently the library.

And now here he stood, looking idly at the books on one of
those shelves, for lack of anything better to do.  It held
an odd jumble of titles, that seemed to be arranged in no
particular order.  He noted books by Poe, Hawthorne,
Dickinson ... a couple by Melville, although not //Moby
Dick//.  He smiled slightly and made a mental note to
mention that to Scully.  Many of the books were older
editions, and most of them looked as if they hadn't been
taken off the shelf in years.

"Sir?  Mrs. Hamilton will see you now."

Mulder turned and followed the butler out into the hallway
again, and further back into the house.  A moment later he
was stepping into a large, formal-looking room, and being
introduced to his hostess and the young man -- Bradley
Hamilton III, apparently -- he found waiting for him there.

The woman looked much like her house:  elegant and refined.
Her clothes were flawless and conservative, and her hair was
perfectly coifed.  Her bearing was proper, almost regal, as
she stood waiting for Mulder to approach her.  The agent
knew she was nearly 60, but if not for the streaks of gray
in her hair, she could easily have passed for 40.

"Agent Mulder," Mrs. Hamilton said -- and Mulder started
slightly at the Brooklyn accent issuing from her mouth.
"I'm so sorry to have kept you waiting, but things are
difficult this morning.  I hope you understand."

"Of course," he replied, briefly taking her hand and then
releasing it.  "I'm terribly sorry to have to intrude like
this.  I'll try not to take too much of your time."

"What exactly is the FBI's interest in this case, Agent
Mulder?"  That was the son speaking, Bradley III.  Mulder
turned to face him.

He looked very much like a younger, male version of his
mother.  He seemed to be in his early 30s, and was
immaculately dressed in a three-piece suit that Mulder
suspected had been hand-tailored.  His face was lean and
tan, and his manner practically radiated "Wall Street".

Mulder extended his hand, and after a moment's hesitation,
the younger man took it.  "I regret intruding on your
grief," the agent said.  "As Detective Burks explained on
the phone, there are some unresolved issues surrounding your
father's case, and I'd like to ask your mother a few
questions."  Something told him he was going to have to go
through young Hamilton to get to the dead man's widow.

"What sort of issues?" Hamilton asked sharply, coldly.  "My
father's death should have closed the matter."

Mulder nodded.  "I agree," he replied.  "And for the most
part, it has.  However, there are some ... oddities that I'd
like to resolve before --"

"'Oddities'?" the young man repeated, even more sharply than
before.  "Agent Mulder, I don't pretend to understand why my
father did what he did, but I don't propose to have the
incident turned into a ... a circus for the idly curious.  I
ask again:  what is the FBI's interest in this matter?  To
the best of my knowledge, there is no federal jurisdiction
involved.  Am I mistaken in that?"

Mulder shook his head.  "No, you're not mistaken," he said.
"However, the local police have asked us to take a look at
the case, as well as two others, and try to determine if
there was some linkage between the three."

"He's talking about Dev and Sylvia," Mrs. Hamilton said
suddenly.  Mulder turned to look at her, and she nodded
bleakly.  "I've wondered about that, myself.  The
similarities were rather striking."

"Mother," the young man said crisply.  "As I've already
pointed out, you are under no obligation to speak to this
man.  There is no legal case anymore, and --"

"Yes," Mrs. Hamilton interrupted.  "Yes, you mentioned that.
 Repeatedly.  And I told you that I intend to answer his
questions."  She glanced briefly at Mulder, then back to her
son.  "Within reason, of course."

"Mother, none of this is reasonable!  My father is dead, and
--"

"That's enough!"  The woman paused and took a breath, then
continued in a shaky voice.  "Bradley, I thought we'd
settled this.  Your father was a good man, and no one is
going to miss him more than I am."  Another deep breath.
Then:  "But he also killed a woman, and the authorities and
*her* family and friends have a legitimate interest in
having the matter settled."

"It *is* settled," her son insisted -- and now Mulder
thought he detected a tremor in the young man's voice, as
well.  "It's over."

For a moment, Mrs. Hamilton stood quietly, looking at her
son.  Finally, she sighed, and said, "Bradley, why don't we
step out in the hall for a minute."  To Mulder, she added,
"Mr. Mulder?  Will you excuse us?"

"Of course."

Mulder waited in silence as mother and son left the room.
He'd had reservations about conducting this interview at
all, let alone so soon after the elder Hamilton's death.
He'd known that the family would be in an emotional turmoil
over the events of the past few weeks.  But Burks had
assured him that Mrs. Hamilton seemed very calm and
reasonable over the phone, and he *did* want to close this
case and get back to D.C., so he'd agreed to do it, and now
here he was.

He'd been a little surprised when Burks offered to take
Scully out to Rikers Island.  The partners had already
agreed, before the detective arrived, to split up for the
morning.  It would speed things along, and there was no real
risk involved, so there was no reason not to do it that way.
 But Mulder had assumed that Burks would come with him.  It
hadn't worked out that way.

In retrospect, it made sense that the detective, with his
familiarity with the city's correctional and detention
facilities, should choose to accompany Scully.  Still,
Mulder couldn't help but wonder if there wasn't some other
reason for the man's offer.  A personal reason.

He shook his head angrily, and began to pace around the
room.  That was absolutely ridiculous.  Burks was just
trying to be helpful on a professional level.  The man had
invited the two agents up here, after all, and he no doubt
wanted to facilitate their investigation.  That was *all*
that was going on.

And even if the detective *did* have something else in mind,
Scully was quite able to handle the situation, Mulder
reminded himself.  He'd certainly seen her do so plenty of
times in the past.  He smiled slightly as he remembered how
she'd shut down John Kresge, when they bumped into him
during their most recent trip to California.  The look on
the man's face as she turned and walked coolly away had been
priceless.

Mulder's smile faded as he found himself standing in front
of a pair of paintings at one end of the room.  He didn't
recognize either of them; they appeared to be abstracts, and
not in a style he cared for.  Nevertheless, there was
something about the one on the right that was catching his
eye.

He looked at the painting thoughtfully for a minute.  There
was something familiar about it, he decided.  He didn't
think he'd actually seen it before, but there was something
about the way the bright, primary colors swirled and
interacted, not *quite* coalescing into something concrete
and real.  He felt an unpleasant tingling in the back of his
mind, and that seemed familiar, too --

Abruptly, the room he was standing in seemed to disappear.
The tingling feeling swelled quickly from a minor annoyance
until it dominated his entire consciousness.  Mulder felt
lost and disoriented; there was no up or down, no sense of
direction at all.

He felt as if he were being lifted up, thrown down, pulled
apart and crushed all at the same time.  He was hot and
cold, sleepy and wakeful, exhausted and energized.  In the
space of a few seconds, he felt sorrow and anger, remorse
and terror, panic and horror.  And mixed with it all was a
strange, terrible arousal that he couldn't seem to resist.

That he didn't *want* to resist.

The anger was dominant, now, burning inside him and mixing
with sexual desire.  All he knew was his hunger and his need
for release.  He needed to assert himself, he needed to
stake his claim and shout his fury and defiance to the
world, to the universe.  His entire body throbbing, now,
swelling and growing until he thought he would explode --

"Mr. Mulder?"

He was standing in front of the painting again, in Helen
Hamilton's home.  He blinked several times as the strange,
frightening feelings slowly faded from his mind.  At last,
he turned to face Mrs. Hamilton.

"I'm sorry," he murmured, still trying to shake off the
effects of the rapidly fading vision, or whatever it had
been.  "I guess I was ... preoccupied."

"That's okay," the woman replied.  She stepped forward to
stand next to him, and for a moment she looked at the
painting he'd been staring at.  Mulder couldn't bring
himself to follow her gaze; instead, he focused his
attention on her face as she studied the piece of art.

"I must admit I don't know what Brad saw in this one," she
continued after a few seconds.  "He usually had much better
taste than that."

"Your husband purchased this painting?" Mulder inquired, his
gaze still on the woman standing next to him, rather than
the artwork.  He didn't know why his question was important,
but something inside him was insisting that it was.

"Oh yes," Mrs. Hamilton answered, looking briefly at Mulder
and then back at the painting.  "Brad purchased *all* of the
works of art in this house.  He didn't have much confidence
in my judgment when it came to aesthetics."

"I see."  Again, what she'd just said seemed to Mulder to be
significant, but he didn't have the faintest idea why.

She glanced at him again, and smiled briefly.  "I grew up in
Brooklyn, Mr. Mulder, as I'm sure you've already deduced.  I
went to Princeton on a scholarship, and that's where I met
Brad.  His family has never quite forgiven me for my
birthplace, and even Brad never quite shook *all* of his
prejudices."

Mulder couldn't think of anything else to say, so he simply
repeated, "I see."

Mrs. Hamilton shook her head slightly, and said, "I'm sorry.
 That's not what you're here to talk about it, is it?  Why
don't we sit down, and you can ask your questions."