By Julie Fortune
juliefortune@comcast.net
 

http://home.comcast.net/~juliefortune/

Mulder lurched out of sleep and fumbled for the telephone, one hand brushing sleep from his face. He
didn't remember picking up the receiver but then it was next to his ear, ice-cold, and he heard
himself croak out something that might have been a hello or a damn-you-to-hell. He couldn't honestly
be sure which it was.

"Mulder? Fox, buddy, you there?"

The voice was a man's, thick with some kind of a Southern drawl. Mulder opened his eyes and stared at
the dark, anonymous ceiling overhead, tried to remember where he was. Another antiseptic hotel room,
sheets like gauze, pillow too soft and bed too hard.

Georgia. He was somewhere in Georgia.

"Who's this?" His voice sounded as musty as it tasted. He cleared his throat and sat up against the
cold wood of the headboard.

"Man, I knew you had a short memory but hell if I thought it was this short. Harlan Gathright,
remember me?"

"Harlan? How the hell are you?" Mulder squinted at the digital clock. "Aren't you still in Texas?"

"Still warden at Huntsville, home of the knife and gun club, as we say down here. Listen, I know it's
damn early -- "

"It's the middle of the night."

"Not in the country, we get up with the chickens out here." Harlan Gathright was no kind of a hick,
but he had the image down pat. It had won him a lot of poker games during the one year he'd been at
the FBI Academy before washing out -- or, as Mulder had always suspected, deliberately flunking.

"Cut the crap, Harlan, not even chickens get up at four in the morning -- what is it, three there?"

"Kind of an emergency, friend, that's why I had to call before you hit the road again. You're a tough
guy to catch, you know that? I had to get past about seven different guard dogs before I could get a
clearance to call you on the road."

Mulder closed his eyes, counted to five and said, "What's the problem?"

"Yeah, you're a busy guy, I understand that. Let me just say two words to you, see if they click.
Gregory Piper.”

Mulder's eyes snapped open. Shadows waved across the ceiling.

"Remember him?" Harlan prodded.

"I remember." He rubbed at an ache that had started in the pit of his stomach. "What about him?"

"Wants to talk to you."

"And I'm guessing you already know that's not going to happen."

"Well, old son, I understand that, all right, 'cause I just got through talking to the son of a bitch
for close to four hours and I damn sure don't ever want to talk to him again, either. But I had to
call you." All trace of the hick dropped out of Harlan's voice. “You know he’s been doing all that
painting. Therapeutic, his shrinks say."

“I heard.” There was a thriving, sickening market in serial killer art, and Gregory Piper’s name
loomed large in it. He did landscapes, mostly. Some portraits. So Mulder had heard, anyway; he'd
avoided looking for himself.

“We tried to put a stop to it but the courts say we got to let him, so long as he don't profit
directly, so he’s been painting away. I ain’t been paying much attention to it last couple of years,
‘cause everything seemed pretty straightforward. But I happened to be going through there last night.”

In the long pause he heard the squeak of Harlan's chair adjusting position.

"And?” Mulder prompted. God, he was tired. His head ached, his eyelids felt like sandpaper. Two hours’ sleep last night, a maximum of four hours per night for weeks on end.

He didn’t need Scully's medical background to tell him he was pushing his physical -- and emotional --
limits. She'd tell him to take a vacation, but vacation was something other people did, people who
didn't get chased by man-eating bugs and alien serial killers. Vacation, and sleep.

“Nobody else would have recognized it,” Harlan said by way of apology. "But I did, and so might some other folks.”

“Harlan, no offense, but could we come in spitting distance of the subject before I fall back to
sleep?”

“He did a painting of you.” Silence. Mulder listened to the hoarse sound of Harlan’s breathing, and
felt stifled and distantly panicked. “Mulder? You listening to me?”

He grated out a “Yes.”

“I confiscated the damn thing last night, and damn if his goddamn lawyer didn’t call at ten p.m. and
tell me that Piper donated the thing to a charity auction. It’s going out the door at four o’clock
tomorrow, and I can’t do a damn thing about it. I already tried to impound it, got Judge Baskin out of
bed at midnight to do it, but no go. And now I’ve put a little too much light on the thing to make it
disappear, if you get my meaning. Can't exactly arrange a tragic accident for it.”

"What does he want?"

"I told you. He wants to talk to you." Harlan's voice dropped all trace of accent and went smooth as
glass. "Buddy, I wish like hell I didn't have to say it, but I know you don't want this thing out in
public. I really do."

Mulder switched on his bedside lamp and swung his legs out of bed into the chill of air conditioning.
"I'll be there as soon as I can."

"I’m sorry," Harlan said.

Mulder hung up and stared at the shadowed wall for a few minutes, deliberately pushing away all his
memories of Piper. Too many memories, and they still had too much power, even after all the time, all
the counseling.

He knew, deep in his soul, that he could never look Piper in the eye again. Not for any price.

So why go?

Maybe because Harlan Gathright knew the story, or as much as anybody besides Mulder and Piper did. And Harlan wouldn’t have bothered him with anything small.

He dug a rumpled pair of pajama bottoms from his suitcase and stepped into them before opening the
connecting door that separated his room from Dana Scully's. Her door, blank and knobless, vibrated
under his knock.

After a few minutes it opened, and she squinted against the light at him. She'd taken the time to pull
on a thick fleece robe, but underneath he caught a glimpse of a white satin gown. Her face was
tattooed with sheet wrinkles, and she batted disorderly hair back from her eyes.

"This had better be good," she said, and leaned her cheek against the door frame. "If it's insomnia,
I'm going to have to break something. Probably you."

"I have to go leave. I have to go to Texas."

"I heard the phone," she said. "What's happening?"

"Just something I need to take care of."

She studied him without a smile. "You're a lousy liar, even when I'm half-asleep. What is it?"

Six years together, night and day, knee-deep in cases that could have shattered their trust instead of
forged it solid. There were good things about that -- great things -- but the major drawback was that
she knew him much too well.

She stepped aside and gestured him in. "Sit, Mulder. Talk."

"Your bedside manner is amazing. What do you do with your dates, Scully, hit them over the head and
drag them back to your cave?" He sat in an uncomfortable hotel armchair and stared as she turned on
the light. Her robe fell back, revealing a glimpse of her bare thigh. She tugged it back into place
without comment, and he continued on, "Ever hear of a man named Gregory Piper?"

She shook her head and propped herself up on the bed with two pillows at her back.

"He was part of a two-man killing team that traveled through the South about eight years ago. His
partner was Jesus Morales Perez. They were good." That was shorthand for a lot that Mulder didn't want
to discuss; she accepted it with a nod of her head. "Perez died in prison about two years ago. Piper's
in Huntsville. He’s awaiting execution."

"And you’re going to see him?"

“Not if I can help it.” Mulder looked down at his clasped hands. “The warden down there’s a friend of
mine, and he says there’s a painting of Piper’s that I’ve got to see.”

“Painting?” she repeated.

“Of me.”

She made an interested noise. "Is he any good?"

Mulder lifted his head and met her eyes squarely. “Scully, I can’t joke about him."

That made set her back, as he’d known it would. From anyone else there would have been sympathy,
questions, platitudes. Scully just looked at him with those warm, dispassionate eyes that refused to
cut him any slack or grant him any pity. "Okay," she said. "We'll leave that for later. Why would he
do a painting of you?”

Scully was asking him to place everything in a logical context. He sat up, took a deep breath, and
said, "Because I’m the one that got away. I know he thinks about me a lot. Like all serial killers he
lived mostly in fantasy, and his only motivating force was to make the fantasies real. He completely
sublimated all his sexual impulses into murder. Now, I guess, into his painting."

"Was he an organized killer? Disorganized?"

"Mixed. He seemed organized in the way he stalked and the way he disposed of the evidence, but he's
completely disorganized in the level of savagery he displays at a crime. His last victim, they had
trouble counting the bite marks." God, he was tired, and the last thing he wanted to do was go back to
sleep with Piper on his mind. "I've been waiting for something like this. He just loves his head
games."

Scully sat quietly until she was sure he had stopped, then asked, "Just how good is he?"

"If it were an Olympic event, he'd be sweeping the medal category. Even the Ukranian judge."

"Mulder, if he painted a portrait of you, he did it with the sure knowledge that you'd see it. He
wants you to see it."

"I know," he interrupted, heard the edge in his voice and tried to smooth it out. "I know, but I have
to go. Harlan said -- " She asked the question silently, with raised brows. "Old friend. Warden.
Harlan wouldn't have tracked me down about this if he didn't think it was ..." Important didn't sound
right. "... invasive."

"I imagine it is," she said. "He means it to be."

Mulder stood up, too restless to sit still any longer.

Scully looked up at him with that maddeningly calm expression and said, "I'll make the reservations."

###

"Tell me we're there," Scully said without opening her eyes. Mulder squinted into the punishing Texas
sun and wiped sweat from his forehead. "And next time the air conditioning doesn't work, we take the
car back. Agreed?"

"Absolutely." A fortress of blinding white concrete loomed out of the green Texas hill country. "We're
there."

"You're just saying that so I won't shoot you." She didn't open her eyes until he stepped on the
brakes to slow for the forbidding entrance. "Mulder?"

"Yeah?" He watched a crisply uniformed guard walk around to inspect the car. His identical twin
circled Scully's side.

"You owe me so big."

He glanced over at her but she was facing away, watching the guards.

"FBI, Special Agents Mulder and Scully to see Warden Gathright." Mulder handed over their badges. The guard stared earnestly at the pictures and their faces, nodded and handed them back.

"Yes sir, ma'am, you're on the appointment book. Go right inside, stop at the next gate. He'll check
your IDs again and give you visitor passes. You'll need to leave your car with him and they'll park it
for you." The guard stepped back and gave them a professionally grim smile. "Watch your step."

Scully looked back at the gates closing behind them as they rolled down the narrow, stone-fenced drive
toward the inner gate.

"Something wrong?" he asked. She shook her head.

"Prisons." At his questioning look, she shrugged. "Never mind. It's nothing."

At the next gate they left the car and walked down a narrow brick oven of walkway, preceded by a guard
armed with a shotgun and mirrored sunglasses. On the other side of the fence, prisoners stopped their
exercise period to watch them pass -- no, to watch Scully pass. The hair prickled on the back of
Mulder's neck as the whistles and catcalls started, blending to an animal-like howl. He wanted to get
between her and the fence, block the abuse, but he knew that was useless. Worse, it was condescending.

Inside it was cool and clean but perfumed with sweat and desperation, so thick it left a rough taste
like garlic on the back of his tongue. The guard, stiff-backed, walked them down another hallway to a
frosted glass door that said WARDEN H. GATHRIGHT in gold fancy letters, just like the Old West. The guard knocked and pushed the door open for them before turning to march down the hall.

Harlan was already on his feet, one hand outstretched, a smile on his wide, fleshy face. He'd gotten
balder, which meant that all the hair he had left was a thin fringe clinging to the back of his head,
and he'd gotten wider. He wore a white cotton shirt and a plain blue tie and blue suit pants. The coat
was draped over the chair behind his desk.

"Dana Scully," he grinned, and shook hands with her before gesturing her gallantly to one of the two
chairs. "Ma'am, a pleasure to meet you. Hope you're keeping this one on a short leash."

"He's not my dog," she said, deadpan, and sat. Harlan watched her with a gleam of outright admiration
as she adjusted slightly and assumed her habitually neutral posture, knees together, body straight,
hands folded. Mulder rapped on the corner of the desk to attract his attention.

"Nice to see you, Harlan." He offered his hand, and Harlan took it with a wide, apologetic grin.

"Likewise. Say, you getting taller?"

"Just tireder." He sank into the hard wooden chair and stretched his legs out with a breath of relief
-- the mid-sized car had, as usual, been a medieval torture device. "Anything new?"

Harlan sat back with a protesting creak of wood and springs and laced his fingers over his padded
belly. "Nothing except I got every civil liberties lawyer in twelve states calling the switchboard and
sending me goddamn e-mail about how I’m smothering a talented artist. Hell, Mulder, you know there
ain’t any lack of artists in prison. People got talent here, just like anyplace else. Don’t make them
nice people.”

“What about the painting?”

“Piper’s lawyer’s babysitting it. She’s got it in her head I might trip and accidentally rip the thing
to shreds.”

Harlan’s teeth showed, square and mulish. “She won’t let anybody close to it, says it’s worth about
two million dollars.”

“Is it?” Scully asked mildly.

“Probably. Wouldn’t stop me from throwing it in a shredder if I had half a chance, though -- but they
ain’t giving us half a chance. So, Mulder, you ready to take a look?”

"I suppose I’d better be." Mulder stood up, knees creaking protest. Scully stood, too. Harlan
Gathright paused in the act of reaching for his jacket.

"Miss Scully, you'll want to wait here, I expect,” he said.

"No, I don't think so." She met Harlan's gaze steadily. He studied her a minute, then shifted his gaze
to Mulder, frowning.

"Talk to you a minute in private?" he asked -- not subtle, not diplomatic, but Harlan had never been
known for his tact. Mulder glanced over at Scully and saw her brows quirk, either in irritation or
amusement. She stood up and let herself out without comment; as soon as the door was shut and her
shadow gone from the frosted glass, Harlan said, "I don't feel so good bringing her into this. They're
wound up in here, it's pretty ugly. We had a nurse gang-raped in the infirmary two weeks ago. Plus --
I got to tell the truth here, buddy, you don’t want her to see this thing."

Mulder nodded. "Okay, give me a couple of minutes with her. I'll let you know."

Harlan left and, after a few seconds, Scully looked in the open doorway. Her face was set in that
bland, challenging expression he knew all too well.

"Let me guess," she said, and leaned against the doorframe. "I'd be detrimental to discipline."

"He doesn't think it's safe."

She waited, staring at him.

"Scully, you know I'm not about to tell you what to do, but it's an unnecessary risk."

She stepped in and shut the door behind her. "I don't want you to go in alone."

"I won't be alone. I'll have Harlan and the guards with me."

"You said it yourself, this man's a manipulator. If he created this painting of you, he wanted you to
see it, and that means he's aiming for a reaction from you. If I'm there, it gives you an anchor."

"Or it gives him two targets instead of one."

"Since when did I become a vulnerability?"

That stopped him cold. He cleared his throat and said, "It's up to you, Scully, but I'd rather you
stayed."

She sat back in the chair and looked away at the wire-reinforced window beyond Harlan's desk, at the
white concrete guard towers looming in the distance.

She finally said, "I'll look over the files on Piper and see if I can find anything useful."

He felt a tightness ease in his stomach and realized that he'd been worried. Not like him.

Not like Scully to give in, either. He acknowledged her gesture with a nod, nothing else, and got up
to give Harlan the good news.

###

The painting was titled Four and a Half Hours and Mulder, after the first glance at it, found his eyes
clenched shut, his body tensed. He took two blind steps backwards before he turned his back on it.

He found himself staring, just for a second, at Harlan Gathright’s sober, knowing eyes.

Gregory Piper’s lawyer, a chubby-cheeked young woman with the icy stamp of ambition on her face, said, “You’re the model, aren’t you?”

“Leave him alone, Tracy,” Harlan said.

“It’s a remarkable likeness,” she continued. “Look, Agent Mulder, I’m sure I understand how you feel,
and if Mr. Piper failed to obtain a standard model’s release from you I’m sure you could seek damages
or possibly even ownership of the painting. But you can't stop us from disposing of the painting as we
see fit at this point in time.”

Damages. Mulder’s world reeled sharply left, and he tried not to let it show, tried not to let the
memories flood back.

Instead, he found himself looking at the painting again.

Piper had painted him naked, bloody, his body draped over the lap of a woman leaning over him. Pietá.
Fox Mulder as Christ.

Only there was a subtle distortion to the pose -- a kind of rapacious hunger to the woman, and Mulder
was pretty sure Christ had never been depicted with a raging hard-on. And the face, the face of the
woman ...

Four and a half hours. Piper’s private little joke, just for him. He would give anything, anything,
for the chance to destroy that painting, that moment, that memory. But he was still in control of
himself enough to know that it wasn’t possible.

He took a deep breath, and said, “What does he want?”

Tracy the lawyer gave him a thin-lipped smile and deliberately turned to look at the painting. “He
doesn’t want anything, Agent Mulder. This painting has been donated to the American Civil Liberties
Union. It’s being auctioned tomorrow, and I believe there’s a half million dollar floor on bidding.
Aren't you flattered?”

“Stick a cork in it, Tracy, and I mean it,” Harlan snapped. He stepped in between them before Mulder
was even aware he’d gotten angry. He let it go. Let it all go.

“Too rich for my blood,” he said as mildly as he could. “Nice meeting you.”

As he headed for the door to the small, airless interview room, Tracy the lawyer said, “Oh, Agent
Mulder, my client did say that he might consider giving you the painting. As a present. If you’d talk
with him.”

As if it were yesterday, Mulder heard Piper’s smooth, even voice say, Do you like games, Agent Mulder?

“No,” he said. His voice sounded hoarse as he reached for the doorknob, and escape. “I won’t.”

Outside, in the cooler air of the corridor, his head began to pound violently enough to make him sick.
His blood pressure was hitting the ceiling. Harlan Gathright walked with him, slowly, not saying a
word as they passed empty barred holding cells and more interview rooms, some in use.

“The woman,” Harlan said. “Looked like Jenny Grant to me. At least, looked like the pictures of her
from before, you know.”

Before Piper. A bottomless pit opened in Mulder’s stomach and when he blinked he saw Jenny’s face,
pale and terrified, the way she’d looked as --

“It’s Jenny,” he answered. His voice seemed to bleed away into the shadows. “The wounds -- on my body in the painting -- they’re hers. He’s reminding me that I could have saved her.”

Looks like she's been savaged by a wild beast, Mulder remembered the dispassionate coroner saying.
Flesh severely bitten, partially masticated. Stab wounds --

“Bullshit, buddy, don’t you dare start playing that game with him. You couldn’t have saved that girl
no matter what, and you damned well know it. Piper was going to get her. He just wanted to make you an accomplice, but you never were, hear? You never were.”

They’d come to a halt in the middle of the hallway, Harlan holding him by the arm to keep him still.
It would have been easy to break free, but Mulder let it go. He took a deep breath and nodded. After a
few seconds, Harlan let go of him and stepped back.
 

“If you gentlemen are finished?” Tracy the lawyer asked coolly. She was standing at the end of the
hall, jiggling one spike-heeled foot impatiently. “I have other clients waiting.”

“Don’t you worry, honey, Charlie Manson ain’t going anywhere,” Harlan snapped. “Mulder?”

Mulder nodded. They started walking again. Echoes from the quiet walls chased behind them.

“You ever tell her?” Harlan finally asked. “Your partner, I mean. About Piper?”

“No.”

“You ought to. She looks like a listener to me.”

Tracy opened her mouth to say something sarcastic, but she was cut off as the general alarms went off
with a deafening shriek.

###

“Ma’am?” Scully looked up to find a prison trustee standing in the doorway, swaying uncomfortably from one foot to the other. Prison blue didn’t flatter his pallor or the blunt, blocky haircut. He kept his
eyes away from her, restlessly surveying the corners of Warden Gathright’s office.

“Yes?” She closed the folder, a little grateful for the distraction. Piper was an ugly way to spend a
morning. She glanced at her watch and wondered how much longer she’d have to stall.

“Uh, ma’am, Warden wanted me to get you. It’s your -- uh -- your friend. He’s sick.”

“Sick?” Scully stood up without meaning to, smoothed her skirt. “What’s wrong?”

“I -- think -- uh -- “

He stepped aside to let her out, but she shooed him ahead, careful as always of men at her back. He
padded softly down the concrete hallway, past the glassed-in reception area, and took a sharp left
toward cell doors.

“Wait,” Scully said. He looked back over his shoulder, face a startled moon-slice. “I thought he went
to the interview rooms.”

“He did, ma’am, but --uh -- they went to go see Piper. Y’all know who Piper is?”

It sounded like something Mulder would do. She nodded and waved him on ahead, glancing back to look for a guard.

None in sight. That seemed odd.

As she turned back, the prison trustee’s hands fastened around her throat, crushing, and he lifted her
off the floor. She tried to kick, gagging against the pressure of his thumbs on her windpipe, and one
of her pumps fell off to slap against the far wall. She clawed at his hands until her vision grayed
out.

He dropped her to the floor.

She came back to consciousness in time to feel him roll her over on her back, jerk her limp hands
together, and snap handcuffs in place. He lifted her by the chain, instant agony burning through her
upper arms and shoulder blades, and she stumbled to get up and relieve the pressure, gasping for
breath through her bruised throat.

"No noise," he said. She couldn’t have screamed if she’d tried, knew she’d come within a fraction of
having her hyoid bone snapped, an ugly, lingering death. She knew from the flat look in his eyes that
she still wasn’t far from it.

At the guard station, the gate was open. The inner gate, the one opening to the wards, was still
closed. She looked up and saw the closed circuit cameras, couldn't tell if they were functioning or
not.

The guard was dead, strangled. She looked away from his hemorrhaged eyes, his gaping mouth, and
concentrated on what she had to do.

The man behind her pressed a button next to the dead guard's hand. A buzzer sounded. The gate clicked
open.

"Move it."

As they passed through the gate, into enemy territory, the klaxons went off, loud whooping sounds that
slapped at her ears like physical blows. If he shouted at her, she couldn't hear; he dragged her
forward at a stumbling run, holding her elbow in a grip hard enough to make her bones creak. In the
cells they passed, shadows moved.

Scully thought once, only once, please, God, help me. Then she thought about what to do next.

###

They couldn’t make it back to the secured hallways of Administration. Harlan led them through a maze
of dark corridors at a jog, and Mulder kept hold of Tracy the lawyer’s arm as she stumbled along, pale
and terrified. He had no time for her.

Piper. This had to be Piper's doing. Piper's plan.

Piper's game.

Up ahead, in a large open area between the cell blocks, stood a raised circular platform. Harlan tried
to shout over the klaxons but it was useless; he shoved Mulder toward the platform and turned to give
orders to the two guards who’d remained with them.

The shotgun blast made surprisingly little noise over the sirens. One of the guards’ faces disappeared
in a spray of blood and flesh, and Mulder was too late in turning away, the taste of death coppery in
his mouth. He dove for the floor, saw Harlan doing the same. The remaining guard spun around, gun
ready, and took one in the chest. Mulder wrestled the weapon from his limp hand as he fell.

Harlan slid for the other fallen gun, sighted down the length of his body, and fired at the figures
moving in the shadows. Tracy, left standing, ran toward the shadows of another hallway, no time to
worry about her, no place to go except to the platform in the center of the room.

The riot bubble.

The theory of the bubble was simple -- a bulletproof shield of Plexiglas that dropped out of the
ceiling and enclosed anyone standing on the platform. How it worked in practice, Mulder didn’t know;
he’d never had to duck inside one, didn’t relish the prospect now but there seemed to be no
alternative. He grabbed Harlan’s arm and dragged him toward the platform.

A bullet caught him low in the leg, stitching heat along the inside of his calf. He fell forward,
thumping painfully down on the smooth cool steel of the platform, and reached back to grab Harlan.

Harlan shook loose, gun held firmly in both hands, and Mulder saw where he was aiming.

A prison trustee standing at the end of the hallway. He held Dana Scully’s elbow and had a knife at
her throat.

Don’t, Mulder almost shouted, but Harlan had always been a better shot, none better.

And he dropped the man holding Scully, neatly as if he were a pop target on the range. Scully
staggered, stockinged feet sliding on bloody floor, and ran for them.

The riot bubble engaged, triggered by Mulder’s weight. He looked up to see it sliding down out of the
ceiling, screamed a futile no and Harlan threw himself out of the way, the wrong way, out of the
bubble, and Scully was still three feet away and Mulder’s outstretched hand slammed against the
plastic at the same time she did, their eyes locking in an instant of rage and fear, and then,
suddenly, the wail of the klaxons stopped.

Harlan and Scully were on the wrong side of the bubble.

The silence rang with echoes. Gunshots. Shouts. The futile beat of Mulder’s pulse in his ears as he
watched Harlan reached out to grab Scully’s arm. Get out. Get out of here.

Scully mouthed something to him. It took him a second to realize what it was, and by that time they
were running, dodging toward the far corner of the room.

We’ll be okay, she’d said.

But she didn’t understand.

This was Piper's game now.

###

The first thing Harlan Gathright did was take off her handcuffs, which was a relief, but a brief one;
he had a bullet wound in his side, and she didn’t like the wet sucking sound of his breathing. They
were jammed into a small maintenance closet just off the hallway where Mulder was trapped in the riot
bubble like a goldfish in a bowl. They crouched low and pulled down stacks of towels and sheets, mops
and boxes of toilet paper. It wasn’t much of a hiding place, but it was the best to be had.

“Sit down,” she whispered. Harlan kept his eyes fixed on the door. He was sweating in the stifling
heat, but his face looked doughy and pale. “Sit before you fall down. Let me get a look at the wound.”

“Don’t make no difference right now,” he said reasonably. “Either I die or I don’t, you ain’t gonna be
able to fix this with industrial cleaners and a bobby pin. Take the gun.”

“What?”

“Take the gun,” he repeated. She grabbed for it as his knees gave way and he slumped against the wall.
She felt for a pulse in his neck, found it fluttering and weak. “Damn. Starting to hurt.”

Now that he was down, she pulled his coat aside and saw the entrance wound, an ugly large-caliber hole
that leaked a steady stream of blood. Not arterial, at least. But not good. She grabbed towels and
applied pressure to the wound, ignoring his hiss of pain.

“You got the gun?” he asked. His eyes were tightly closed.

“I’ve got it. Save your strength.”

“Only two shots left, you save ‘em until they’re right in your face. Make a mess if you can, that’ll
keep ‘em careful. Don’t let ‘em rush you.”

“Warden -- “

“Never should have got the two of you in here. My fault, playin’ into his hands. Son of a bitch wanted
this the whole time, wanted to get Mulder back in here, play his stupid goddamn games -- “

He sucked in breath and closed his eyes against the pain. When he spoke again, it was in a much softer
voice. "You know anything about Piper and Mulder?”

“Not much,” she said. “Stay still.”

“Mulder was one of four agents sent in to track Piper down, him and Jenny Grant. Two died right off.
Mulder tried to keep Jenny Grant alive. Managed it for a good three, four hours before he lost one of
Piper's goddamn fucking games. Penalty for that one was watching Jenny Grant die slow and ugly.”
Harlan heaved a bubbling sigh. “Son of a bitchin’ sheriffs showed up about then and took Piper down.
He’d already started on Mulder, the way he did all of ‘em. Took Mulder a long time to heal up.”

She really didn't like the way his breathing hitched, or the pallor growing in his face. Internal
bleeding. Nothing she could do for him, hiding here in a broom closet. Fear made her angry, made her
want to snap into cool professional mode and save his life, save hers, save Mulder's.

But that wasn't possible.

"Miz Scully?" Gathright wheezed. She took his hand and didn't look away from his eyes. She knew what was happening to him, knew how terribly painful it was. Knew it was something she couldn't take away
from him, no matter how much she wanted to. "Just wanted to ... say ... "

"Shhh."

"No ... glad he ... found you ... needs somebody like ..."

She watched him die. It took too long, but somehow she managed to keep her cool professional demeanor. She wanted to scream, but if he wouldn't, she couldn't.

When he was still, when she'd closed his staring eyes and checked his pulse one last time, she folded
his hands over the bloody shirt and bowed her head to pray. Tears shortened her breath, threatened to
gush, and she forced them back. Daughter of a military man. Doctor. FBI Agent. None of them should be weak enough to cry.

One tear fell and splashed on her bloody fingers, and then another, and then a betraying third.

She was still crying, still fighting not to, when the door opened and a man said, "Well, I guess I win
the prize."

She came to her feet in one galvanic rush, slammed into him and knocked him aside. Fought to raise the
gun but there were others, hands all over her pulling and groping her.

Mulder in the bubble, staring, hands pressed against the bulletproof glass.

Pain exploding somewhere in the back of her head.

###

The world came back in uneven bursts -- pain first, a deep ache all along her side, a sharp throb on
the right just under her breast, a headache that thundered like a storm and made the world lurch
uneasily around her. Then smell -- disinfectant, scared sweat, blood. She could have done without
hearing, as soon as it started making sense.

" . . . damn feebie, man, don't care what we do with her but we got to kill her ass, we got to, show
'em we ain't afraid -- "

"Hell with that, Bo, why waste it? You seen an ass like that in five years?"

"Shut the hell up, the both of you! I don't give a damn about her badge!"

She kept her eyes closed, waiting, wishing she could think of something to do. Hostage training came
back to her. Be compliant. Be prompt. Do anything and everything your captor wants you to do, but show no emotion, no fear, no anger, no disgust. Don't give them anything to feed on.

She'd been a hostage before, and she'd been scared, but not like this, never like this.

A shoe slammed into her injured side; she jackknifed into a fetal position, gasping, and felt an
agonizing drag as someone yanked her head back by the hair.

"Open your eyes," a voice grated; it puffed on her cheek and smelled of old meat and garlic. She
obeyed.

Four men facing her, one behind her holding her head back. Identical expressions she didn't allow
herself to analyze.

"Goddamn feebie," the youngest one said, and made a production of spitting at her. She kept her
reaction quiet and interior. Think of something else, she told herself.

Her scalp felt like it was being ripped away. The painting. Done from memory? If not, did Piper have
photographs of Mulder? Where did he get them?

"None of that," said the man who'd told her to open her eyes; he was older, buzz-cut hair gone gray at
the temples. He had knife scars on his throat that rippled like worms when he swallowed, and his face
was quiet and his eyes cold. "We have a rare commodity, gentlemen. Very rare. There's nothing like a
female federal agent to get the media whipped into a frenzy. Mr. Keyes, you can let go of her now, I
don't think she'll give us any trouble."

The pressure on the back of her head released. She kept watching the older man's face, the cold eyes.

"You know who I am?" he asked.

"Yes," she said.

His lips stretched in a rubbery false smile. "I think the pleasure's all mine, Ms. Dana Scully."
Gregory Piper tipped her face a little to the right and stared at her profile. "Did anyone ever tell
you that you have very good bones?"

###

The riot bubble came equipped with an intercom, a control panel, and a weapons locker he didn't have
keys to open.

Mulder stalked from one side to the other, watching the knot of prisoners at the far end of the room,
watching Piper with Scully.

Useless. Useless to speculate what he was doing, what he was saying.

Useless to think about Jenny, but he couldn't help it, could help remembering her eyes, the way they'd
pleaded with him to save her life.

He'd been helpless then, too. Helpless and stupid and slow.

The intercom gave a raw shriek of noise behind him; he backed toward it without looking away from
Piper and Scully, and keyed the receiver. "Mulder, FBI."

"Give me the number on your visitor badge, sir," said a deep, rumbling voice on the other end. He read
it off the laminated plastic. "Thank you, sir. Okay, now, you're in the bubble, can you see anyone
else?"

"Agent Scully," he said. "My partner. She's outside with a group of prisoners."

Long silence from the other end.

"I see," the man said. "My name is Ed Hawes, I'm a Texas Ranger, Agent Mulder. You see anybody else?"

"Warden Gathright went into a janitor's closet about ten feet from where Scully is, but they haven't
dragged him out."

Mulder swallowed convulsively, wished for water. "He might have been shot."

"I show you were with a lawyer -- "

"I don't know where she is. Look, Ranger Hawes, this is going to get ugly. You need to get some men in
here."

"I'd like to do that, but it's already very ugly, sir. I've got six guards dead that I know of, and
right now we don't even have closed circuit. In fact, all we have right now is you."

Then you don't have shit, Mulder thought. He was sweating badly, couldn't breathe -- psychological,
probably, they'd hardly build a riot shelter without an air supply. His pulse beat in his head like a
clenched fist. Nothing I can do. Nothing.

"Agent Mulder? You still with me?"

"I'm not going anywhere." He sucked in a deep breath; it tasted of stale sweat.

"I need you to give me an accurate count. How many prisoners do you see in front of you right now?"

"Five."

"Okay, now, this is real important -- anybody you saw earlier who's not there now?"

Mulder had a sudden enlightenment. "Where are you, Ranger?"

"Don't think you should be worrying about that, Agent Mulder, let's just concentrate on the intel.
Anybody missing?"

"Yeah, there were two others, they went down the hall on the right." Where, Mulder suddenly
remembered, Lawyer Tracy had gone. "No, wait, three others. One's down."

"Dead?"

"Yes."

"Agent Mulder, here's what I want you to do. I want you to watch these bastards and tell me when Agent
Scully makes her move."

"You expect her to try."

"Hell yes, I expect her to try, she's a federal agent, not some cleaning lady got caught in the
crossfire. I need to know, instantly, are we clear?"

"Clear," Mulder said. "But you're wrong. Scully knows better than to pull anything. She'll wait for
you."

"Well, son, we're about twenty minutes from setting you free, so you just hang in there."

And then he saw Piper turn and look right at him, and it was like dropping a thousand feet straight
into hell.

###

Scully, on her knees, refused to look down at the floor. It wasn't in the hostage rulebook, but she
couldn't stop herself from staring defiantly back at him. Piper.

"I think Mr. Keyes likes you," Piper said conversationally. Keyes must have been the one who kept
nudging her with his foot. "What do you think about that?"

"What should I think?" she asked.

"Young federal agent lady, if I were you, I'd be very careful what you say to me just now. You're
filet mignon in a room full of starving men."

He didn't want a reply. She didn't give one. Somewhere past him, somewhere in a blurred distance she
didn't allow herself to focus on, Mulder was trapped in the riot bubble, watching. At least she had a
chance out here, a line to play. He was helpless. A helpless witness.

Just the way Piper would want him.

"Did you see my new work of art?" he asked, leaning close.

His eyes were a very light blue, almost gray. The irises looked uneven, as if imperfectly formed. "Did
you?"

"No."

"Did Agent Mulder see it?"

Scully kept watching him, but was aware of the others, too -- Keyes, the biggest one, staring fixedly
at her, edging closer all the time. The other three, whose names she didn't know, sweated and fidgeted
and looked at her alternately with lust or rage.

"I don't know," she said. Piper sank down to a crouch, eye level with her, and as much as she'd
despised the sight of him towering over her she hated being close to him worse.

There was a sense of decay around him that was almost palpable.

"Say your name." He watched her shake her head. "Come now, you really don't want to get on my bad
side, do you? Very Special Agent?"

"Scully," she said.

"First name."

"Dana."

"Do you know why I asked you to say your name, even when I already knew it?" He didn't pause for the
answer, which she wasn't intending to give anyway. "Because names have power, Agent Scully. May I call you Dana?"

She hated the sound of it on his lips, but she kept her face still and quiet.

He smiled. "I'm a very good painter," he said. "You know what that means to me? Nothing. I took up
painting for one reason only, to force a moment like this. I've been waiting for it all my life."

He turned and looked over his shoulder. At Mulder. Scully could see the impact of it even across the
long distance, and ached for him. Being helpless was Mulder's special horror.

"Let the games begin," Piper said. In one quick move he grabbed her by the hair and dragged her to her
feet. She had no choice but to follow him, panting at the pain, and some blind distance later he let
go and something smacked hard in the bend of her knees and she collapsed down on the floor.

While she was helpless, she felt Piper's hands on her, not lewd, just practical, searching her for
weapons. He had her pinned flat. She tried to slow her breathing, remember her training, and almost
lost control when she felt cold metal snap over her wrists.

More handcuffs.

She turned her head to the side and tried to see through a veil of her disordered hair. His shadow was
there, looming. "Piper, you know that if you kill me they'll get you. No matter what it takes, they'll
get you." She tried to keep her voice even and quiet. "If you let me go you won't be harmed. I can
promise that."

"Oh, Agent Scully, I would have thought they'd tell you that they can't harm me." His fingertips
stroked the long twisted scar on his neck. "I'm not interesting in bargaining with you, I've made
enough bargains already. You can get up now, Agent Scully. To your knees only."

She did, shaking with rage and fear, feeling sweat drip down her face and inside the collar of her
shirt. The handcuffs hurt. She tried to relax her shoulders, and raised her eyes to look at Mulder.

He was standing motionless on the other side of the bulletproof glass. Pale as wax, but composed. She
couldn't read anything in his eyes, and that was good; if she couldn't, it was likely Piper wouldn't
be able to, either.

"We're going to play a game," Piper said again. "Every question Agent Mulder gets correct, you get to
live on without pain. Every question he gets wrong costs you. Do you understand?"

"Yes," she whispered. Her mouth was dry. Sweating a river, and her mouth was dry. She tried to
swallow.

"Good." Piper touched her, just a little, moving limp hair back from her face. The better, she
thought, so Mulder could see her. "Let's begin."

###

Mulder watched Piper rifle through Scully's jacket pockets without any comprehension of what the man
might be looking for, until Piper came up with Scully's mobile phone. Some brief, silent-movie
conversation on the other side of the glass between Scully and Piper, and then Piper pressed buttons
on the phone.

The intercom was still talking. "Agent Mulder? You there?"

"Here," he said. "Piper wants to talk."

"Play for time. We're moving your direction."

Mulder's pocket cheeped for attention. He retrieved his own phone and answered the call.

"Agent Mulder, it's so good to see you again." He'd never forgotten Piper's voice, that toxic mixture
of sugar and cyanide, rage and selfish pleasure. "You know what I want."

"I know." His voice was shaking, and he couldn't control it. Even separated by a bulletproof barrier,
Piper had the power to push all his buttons. "Not going to happen. No games."

"If there are no games, then I'm not interested," Piper said. He took hold of Scully's hair again and
dragged it back, pulling her head with it at what had to be an excruciatingly painful angle. "The
penalty was quitting is just as severe as it is for losing ..."

He knew the penalty. He'd watched it happen, heard the screams, seen things that he knew he could
never forget. It had been his last experience working out of Behavioral Science. Almost his last
experience in the FBI.

"If you don't want to play, you have to pay."

And there it was, bright steel in Piper's hand.

A knife. His weapon of choice. His paintbrush, to use on his canvases of flesh.

"Don't turn away, Agent Mulder, I really do want to see your face when she starts to scream."

"Fuck you. I'm not listening."

And he hung up.

He'd succeeded in surprising Piper. It was a gamble, a desperate one; Piper was fully capable of
slashing Scully's throat in a fit of pique, but he liked to take his time, and with her dead the game
would be over.

Mulder held the stare, focused on those pale, misshapen eyes, on the horrors that crowded behind them.
And then he raised the phone and speed-dialed Scully's phone.

Piper raised it to his ear.

"Let her go."

"Well, I have something you want, but I doubt you have anything I want, Agent Mulder."

"Sure I do. You want me."

Piper was silent, thinking. He kept the knife poised, barely touching Scully's throat.

"Are you making an offer?" Piper finally asked. "Interesting. How exactly would I take advantage of it?"

"I win, you let her go. You win ..."

"Agent Scully dies."

Mulder forced a smile onto his lips. "Come on, Piper, that's not very original."

"It's all I have at the moment."

Mulder held up the handgun that he'd taken off of the dead guard. "You win, I put this to my head and
pull the trigger." He held the stare, saw the spark of interest flare bright in Piper's face.

"And how would I ever be sure you'd keep that promise?"

"Because I'll do it before you let her go."

Those cold, dead eyes actually had a spark of morbid interest. "You do know that if you lie to me, if
you deceive me, what happened before will be nothing. I will be very disappointed, Agent Mulder." One
slow, reptilian eye-blink. "Show me the clip. I want to know that it's loaded."

Mulder ejected it, showed Piper the bullets. Piper nodded. Mulder slapped the clip home and picked up
the phone again. They're on their way. Just play for time.

"All right," Piper said. "Let's play."

With those two words, Mulder was back in the nightmare again.

###

"You know the rules," Piper said. He sat down cross-legged across from Mulder, comfortable and at
ease. His men patrolled the room like wild tigers, sweating and scared. Of Piper? Probably. Mulder
couldn't imagine what it might do to a man to be locked up in close quarters with Piper for twenty to
life. "Answer the question correctly, Agent Scully gets to draw another painless breath."

"How many questions?"

He'd annoyed Piper. That wasn't necessarily a good thing, but Mulder had to stall for time, had to.
Once the game started in earnest, Piper wouldn't accept hesitation.

"I need to know the rules before we get started, right?" His hand was sweating, slippery on the slick
plastic phone. "How many questions?"

"Ten," Piper said. "Ten questions, hardly even a children's game. You should be right at home."

From inside a pocket of his orange jumpsuit, Piper pulled out an egg timer in the shape of a ladybug -
- red, cheerful, homey. It was, if not the same one, then one just like what he'd used in that barn
with Jenny, and the sight of it made acid churn in the back of Mulder's throat.

Piper carefully set it for one minute, held it, held Mulder's gaze.

He let the timer go and said into the phone, "My mother's maiden name."

A detail, one of those goddamn details that weren't germane to the investigation, that were right on
the page but slipped by. Piper knew he'd seen it, and knew he couldn't remember.

Mulder felt despair claw him inside like a wild animal and tried to concentrate. At least he couldn't
hear the damn ticking over the phone, that had haunted his dreams for so long, that innocent ticking
egg timer --

He closed his eyes and the answer floated up, effortlessly, from some hidden storage cabinet he didn't
know he had. "Geller," he said. "Carol Yvonne Geller."

When he opened his eyes Piper was still staring at him. Dead eyes, a corpse's eyes, they always looked
somehow diseased, unfinished, wrong. Nothing about Piper was right. Unlike other serial killers he'd
never blended in, never tried to ... he'd been exactly what he was. A murdering, sadistic, inhuman
creature rotting from the inside out.

"How's the cancer, Greg?" Mulder asked. It was a wild guess out of nowhere, a leap of logic culled
from the unhealthy prison pallor, Piper's loss of weight, his thinning fine hair. Radiation
treatments, chemo -- something.

"In remission," Piper said, and smiled. His teeth still looked strong. "Cancer won't kill me. Nothing
can. Good answer, Agent Mulder. Very good. You want that one to count, or can we call it a warmup?"

"Count," Mulder said. "What kind of cancer?"

"Lymphatic." Piper reset the timer with a cheerful ding of the bell and ratcheted it to forty seconds.
"Second question. What was your sister's favorite stuffed toy called?"

Mulder's mouth went dry. This wasn't a question to try to win, this was one to frighten. How much
could Piper know about Samantha? "Myrtle," he said. "It was a stuffed turtle."

Piper's pallid, wormy face tilted, and Mulder felt a prickle of terror flash across his skin. No. How
could he have forgotten ...

"Actually, its name was Myrtle Purtle my little Turtle," Piper said. "But you were partially right."

He reached down and broke one of Scully's fingers. No drama about it, no warning. Her scream came over the phone like a physical shock, and Mulder yelled too, but it was too late.

Scully subsided, panting. He could barely see her face beneath her disarranged hair.

"I'm all right," he heard her say, distinctly.

"Of course you are," Piper said. "A broken finger is nothing to what Agent Mulder and I are playing
for, is it, Agent Mulder? Third question. What hospital did they take Jenny Grant to when they tried
to save her life? You have thirty seconds."

Seconds ticked. The red ladybug shimmied its shell, counting down; Mulder tried desperately to
remember. He could remember everything, every cursed second of that day, except that. Sisters of --
no, Perpetual -- no --

"Five seconds," Piper reminded him.

"St. Anselm's," Mulder blurted. "It was St. Anselm's."

Oh, God, it was the only thing that had come to his mind, and he had no idea if it was right.
Something shifted like breaking dirty ice in Piper's eyes, and Piper looked down at Scully.

No no no no no ...

"Correct," Piper said softly, and brushed auburn hair back from Scully's pale cheek. His fingers
traced down her skin. "She's very pretty, your partner."

Mulder didn't answer. Scully was steadfastly staring at the floor, and her shoulders were trembling
with a fine, desperate vibration.

Just like Jenny Grant.

"Don't you think she's pretty, Agent Mulder?"

He'd made this mistake before, with Jenny. He'd said No, and then Piper had given him that curiously
empty smile and said, Wrong answer ... Because the game didn't stop. It only mutated.

"Agent Mulder?" Piper raised his head. "I asked you a question. Tick, tick, tick."

"No," Mulder said. "I don't think she's pretty."

He half-expected Scully to look up at him, but she didn't. Piper, however, blinked and started to call
him a liar ...

"She's beautiful," Mulder interrupted him. "She's very, very beautiful."

"Ahhhhhhhhh." It was drawn out in a long, satisfied exhalation, and Piper stroked Scully's hair like a
favored pet's. "We're telling the truth now, are we? Really, Fox. It's improper for you to notice such
things about a partner, isn't it?"

"Yes."

"And yet you do notice, don't you? ... lie to me, and I'll take that beauty away, one bleeding slice
at a time."

"Yes." It was all coming back again. Piper had him now, had him like a frog in the dissecting tray,
and he'd cut until Mulder's heart was completely exposed. The cell phone felt hot in Mulder's hand,
the batteries burning furiously. "It's improper."

"Well, you're only human." Piper lifted his hand in a parody of the sign of the cross. "Go and sin no
more, my son. ... Have you fucked her?"

It came across the phone as a hushed, avid whisper, and Mulder swallowed bile. "No."

"Do you want to?"

"Not right now."

"Ah, unfair, but I'll give you the point. You get half credit."

"No!" Mulder couldn't stop the word, no more than he could stop Piper, who put the cell phone down on
the ground, put the knife to Scully's back, and cut her. One long, agonizing slice from shoulder to
waist.

Scully's choked scream vibrated into noise on the tinny speaker. She bent forward, trying to crawl
away, and Mulder saw the wet red shine of blood spreading over the back of her shirt. It wicked
through the fabric and dripped out in patters down her side and he couldn't stop it.

"Piper!" He screamed it into the phone, banged on the plastic wall. Piper's face was rapt and alight,
and the bloody knife kept moving. "Stop!"

It felt like an eternity, but he did. Piper's breath was coming fast, his cheeks flushed with an
unhealthy glow, and when he picked up the phone again his hand was unsteady. His breath pistoned
through the speaker, and Mulder saw sweat sparkling on his forehead.

"Very nice," Piper said, and sucked in a deep breath. "She's delicious, Agent Mulder, really, what are
you thinking, holding back? Improper or not, I'd fuck her. And maybe if you ask me nicely, I might do
that instead of looking at the color of her liver."

Scully looked up and her face was stark white, fixed, furious. Her pupils were blind pinpoints and he
read in her expression one, utterly clear message. Don't you dare.

He wouldn't. He'd played that game before, and lost. There was no bargaining with Piper, not really;
it was a script, and if you followed it, someone died. It was just a matter of how much screaming
there'd be.

"Where are we?" Mulder heard himself ask.

"Pardon?"

"What question are we on?"

Piper blinked, and some of the fevered glow left his eyes. He was disappointed, but the game was
something that pulled him irresistibly, like gravity. "Ah. Yes. Well, I suppose that little digression
must count. Let's say ... question five."

"Question eight."

"Hardly."

"You asked a lot of questions, Greg."

"Fine. Question seven."

"I'm ready."

"We're having so much fine with your lovely friend, I suppose we should continue ... what about her do
you find unattractive? And be honest. No point in sparing her feelings." Piper reset his cheerful
ladybug timer, and it began its manic shimmy.

Mulder felt sweat leave a greasy trail down his back. His muscles were so tense he could barely move.
"She's argumentative, stubborn, and too cautious."

"Anything else?"

"She's short."

Piper laughed, a genuine, full-throated roaring laugh of delight. "Short! Yes! Congratulations, that's
marvelous. He says you're short, my dear. Does that come as a shock to you?"

Scully's voice came faint as a ghost through the phone. Mulder watched her pale lips move to match.
"Does that count as question nine?" she asked. Don't, Scully, don't draw his attention, he hates women
...

"No." Piper was still smiling when he kicked her in the ribs, brutally hard. She fell and rolled,
blood smearing the floor, and for a few seconds her eyes went totally blank and empty before she
blinked and slowly focused on Mulder again.

"Ask me," Mulder whispered. "Ask me another question. Me. Come on, Piper, time's wasting. What do you want to know?"

"This one doesn't count. Did you ever tell her?" Piper reset the timer, watched it dance in silence
for a few seconds, and then prodded Scully with his toe. "Tell her about our time together?"

"No." It tasted like blood, that word. Like failure.

"Do you want me to fill her in? I'm sure it would make all this much easier for her to understand."

"No." He had trouble keeping his voice level. "Tick, tock. Ask your question."

"Is she special? Do you love her, your pretty short stubborn partner?"

Mulder's mouth went dry. Desert-dry. He tried to swallow again and felt as if his tongue had turned to
dust.

Scully's eyes were open and fixed on him, but now, slowly, she let them drift shut.

I'm sorry, he howled it silently. I'm so, so, sorry ...

"Yes," he said with eerily, glasslike calm. "I've loved her ever since I met her."

Piper's eyes went bright and cold, and he reached out to grab a thick handful of Scully's red hair. He
jerked her head back at a painful angle, the white column of her throat straining and working.

"I don't think I believe you, Agent Mulder," he said softly. "I think that sounds like the whisper of
a coward, telling me what you think I want to hear."

He rolled Scully over.

No no no no ... memory threatened to white out his vision; Mulder blinked, gasped, leaned against the
plastic for support. This is how Jenny started to die, like this, I lost control and she ...

Piper had his hands on Scully. He wasn't going to stop.

"Yes!" He battered the plastic, punched it as he shouted into the phone. "Yes, I love her! I'm telling
the truth! Come on, listen! Believe me!"

Piper paused, knife pressed against the pale skin of Scully's collarbone, lifted the phone to his ear,
and listened.

Just ... listened. Savoring the sound of Mulder's fast, panicked breathing.

"Don't hurt her," Mulder said. His voice sounded shockingly rough. Scraped raw with emotion. "Please."

"Ah, you know I can't do that. She's the meat on the table, Agent Mulder. I need this."

"What do you want?"

"Death."

"Take mine."

Piper's eyes met his, and Mulder slowly raised the gun to his own head, folded up the cell phone, and
put it down on the floor in front of him. Deliberate, ritual movements, like a Samurai preparing for
death.

The intercom speaker rattled and blared. "Agent Mulder! Do not do this! Put the gun down! We are
coming in, do you hear me, we are coming in! Dammit, put the gun down!"

Piper was laughing, those extraordinarily evil eyes gone shiny as silver.

"I was telling the truth, you son of a bitch," Mulder said. His finger tightened on the trigger ...

... just as a black-armored SWAT officer eased around the far corner and focused a red dot in the
center of Piper's forehead.

For a dizzying second Mulder wasn't sure if the sound of the shot came from his service weapon or the
rifle, and then Piper swayed, comically amazed, and slowly toppled over backward with a red/black hole
in his skull. Blood sprayed out in a graceful trail behind him, rich as brocade.

Scully, panting, twisted around on her stomach and met Mulder's eyes. Kept staring at him as the SWAT
team cleared the room, then gave the all-clear. Willing him to lower the gun and put it on the floor,
which he did, with nightmarish slowness.

The riot bubble gave a grating lurch and lifted back up into the ceiling. Before it had cleared two
feet on the floor, Mulder was under it, sliding to a stop at her side. He started to touch her, then
stopped his trembling fingers an inch from her face and went instead for his handcuff keys.

She was bleeding badly from the slash on her back. He wadded up his suitcoat and applied pressure.

Neither of them said a word as the paramedics swarmed in, full of purpose and painkillers.

###

It was very, very late, and the hotel felt empty.

Scully stood by the picture window, staring down at the gemlike glow of the pool as it floated in the
dark. Swimming didn't sound appealing, considering the massive number of stitches holding her back
together; painkillers had rounded off the edges of things and made the world safer, but not that safe.

And she couldn't sleep without dreaming about Piper's eyes.

She went back to the bed, stretched her legs out and leaned cautiously against the pillows; the pain
was instantaneous but manageable. Her ribs were worse, like broken glass stabbing when she took
anything but the shallowest of breaths.

This is going to take time, she thought, and flipped on the television. Someone was trying earnestly
to sell cheap Chinese vases at a very inflated price. She pulled the folder closer from the bedside
table, fumbled it into her lap, and turned the page. There. One broken finger doesn't disable me from
reading, at least.

The Bureau's account of what had happened to Mulder for four and a half hours in that barn was dry,
sparse and not very enlightening, but she supposed it was as much -- more -- than she should ever
know. She'd seen it firsthand, anyway; she'd seen the horror in his eyes, and the cool desperation
with which he'd been prepared to end his life rather than go through it again.

The only way to win is not to play.

Except he had played, and it had kept her alive long enough to survive. At great personal cost.

Two very soft knocks on the connecting room door. She debated for a long moment, then managed to get up and open it.

Mulder came in, set a fresh batch of ice on the table next to her, handed over a cold Diet Coke, and
said, "You should eat something."

"I had soup."

"Yesterday."

"Oh." She blinked, considering; it hadn't felt like a day had passed. Hadn't felt like anything,
really. The miracles of modern medication. "I'm not hungry. When's our flight?"

"Three hours. So, you thinking of going Feng Shui?" He nodded at the TV. She took her time getting
settled again, pillows at her back, legs stretched out, blanket over her lap.

They hadn't really spoken at all. Light, casual conversation. He hadn't even asked if she was all
right.

She picked at lint on the blanket and wondered why that mattered so much. Wrapped up in her chemical
cocoon, nothing should hurt inside, but there it was, a constant tense ache.

"What about the painting?" she asked. Mulder, who'd been staring at the energetic silent salespeople,
looked momentarily sickened.

"It was impounded," he said. "Evidence."

"Will they let you have it?"

He shrugged. "I don't want it. I just don't want anybody else to have it."

She nodded slowly and leaned her head back against the soft mound of feathers. Silence. They were both tiptoeing around the huge gray elephant in the middle of the room, the topic neither one of them
wanted to touch.

She closed her eyes against the slow, steady drag of medication and said, "You're a hell of a liar,
Mulder."

Just for a second, she felt the soft warmth of his fingers brushing her hair back from her cheek, and
she knew that if she looked, if she'd seen the expression on his face, they wouldn't have been able to
deny any of this. She could feel the nearness of it in the trembling of his hand.

She kept her eyes closed. When his fingers left her, they took the warmth of the world with them.

"Yeah," he agreed. "I'm the best damn liar in the world."

She heard him close the door gently on his way out.

-end-