FEEDBACK FOR LAURA MAY BE EMAILED TO witsec@altavista.com and it will be forwarded to her. ANYTHING OTHER THAN FEEDBACK WILL BE IGNORED. VERLASSEN by TexxasRose (a.k.a. Laura Castellano) January 1999 Revised, March 2001 Classification: S, A, MSR, MT Disclaimer: If I owned Fox Mulder I'd keep him much too busy to solve cases. If I owned Dana Scully she'd be my shopping buddy. If I owned Kersh I'd use him for target practice. They all belong to Chris Carter, and 1013, and Fox Broadcasting, and all those other lucky entities. Spoilers: for Fight the Future Timeline: This is set directly after 'Fight the Future' and the first few episodes of Season 6. Ignore the dates . The time diverges from the show after that. Rating: R for language and one mild sex scene Archive: No archive to Ephemeral or Gossamer, I'll submit. All others, sure, especially if you have the older version archived. Summary: The knowledge Mulder receives from an informant is more dangerous than ever before. How much will he sacrifice to guarantee Scully's safety? ********** Part 1 ********** AUGUST 29 Ringing. The sound invaded his deathlike sleep and Mulder ground his face further into the back of his couch, ignoring it. He'd been awake until after 3:00 a.m., and his eyes felt heavy, determinedly seeking the rest he still needed. Incessant ringing. With an unintelligible curse, Mulder rolled over and fumbled for the phone on the coffee table beside the couch, protesting eyes still firmly shut. After knocking over his empty water glass and scattering a pile of magazines that had been neatly stacked, his groping fingers found the telephone. "This better be good," he mumbled into it, still unable to pry his eyelids up more than a fraction of an inch. "Agent Mulder, someone has left a gift on your doorstep." The voice was deep, male, and completely unfamiliar. His reluctant lids shot wide open at the odd statement, registering the time on his desk clock. 3:45. He winced. Damn. Forty-five minutes of decent slumber shot to hell by a crank phone call. "What?" he asked, still confused from being jerked awake so suddenly. "Open your front door, Agent Mulder." The click on the line told Mulder that his strange caller had disconnected, and he held the phone away from his head stupidly for a moment. He didn't recognize the voice, and if it had been one of his usual informants--they had ways of identifying themselves. This man was a mystery. Mulder shifted his gaze to the door curiously, wondering if this was some kind of trap. He didn't think he had pissed off any of the bad guys lately, but you never knew. Nothing had come of his trip to Antarctica to rescue Scully except losing the X-files, and he had expected much worse. He'd walked around on tenterhooks for weeks, waiting for the other foot to fall before finally deciding they weren't going to kick him out of the Bureau or have him killed for his rebellion. As for himself, he really didn't care--at least most days--but Scully had refused to leave him when he'd urged her. She'd insisted her place was at his side, fighting them, fighting for the truth, and the warm feeling that had swelled in him when she took his hand as they walked away was not quickly forgotten. Once he awakened enough to realize he'd just been given a warning, of sorts, Mulder grabbed his weapon and crept carefully across the room, keeping watch for anything that looked or sounded suspicious. His first thought was of a bomb planted outside his apartment, but then, he was leery of bombs these days. Besides, the only way to discover if that was the case was to open the door, so if he was blown to kingdom come...Reaching the door, he hesitated a moment, listened and heard no sound, then quickly flung the door open. He jumped aside at the same moment in order to be out of the way should someone decide to attack or shoot at him. The hall was empty, and deathly quiet, as any proper apartment building should be this early on a Saturday morning. He looked both ways and satisfied himself that there was nobody nearby. It was impossible to miss the large brown envelope on the floor that he'd obviously been meant to find, and he cautiously nudged it with his foot. Finally he bent down and picked it up, glancing around again and retreating back inside, locking the door behind him. Taking the envelope back to his couch, Mulder wondered again if it was some type of bomb. Turning it over, he saw that there were no markings on the outside at all. He carefully fingered the package, and was surprised to note the shape and feel that could only be a spiral-bound notebook. Not the sort of thing he'd expect to find left outside his door so surreptitiously, but it clearly was a notebook; he could make out the metal of the binding through the envelope. At last, hoping it wasn't rigged in any way, Mulder grasped a corner of the sealed flap and pulled it quickly open. If he was about to die, he might as well get it over with. No explosion rocked his living room, and he released a long breath. Turning the envelope upside down, he reached inside and extracted the book. It was accompanied by a smaller piece of paper that fluttered out almost as an afterthought. Going quite still, Mulder stared at the words written in a bold, black scrawl on the paper that had landed face-up on his coffee table. 'Research Journal - Dr. Jon Steinmetz'. Steinmetz' name was vaguely familiar to Mulder, and straining into the depths of his memory, down into the reaches where he kept the unimportant trivia that he never thought he'd access but hadn't quite forgotten, Mulder came up with details: Dr. Jon Steinmetz, noted virologist, killed recently in an automobile accident. And now somebody was giving Mulder his research journal? The obvious questions of "who" and "why" aside, Steinmetz' "accident" suddenly seemed a little questionable. He opened the journal and was confronted with pages and pages of writing--and to his dismay it appeared to be in German. Mulder sighed. It wasn't the first time something like this had happened to him. He wished for the fiftieth time that he was fluent in another language besides English, but the small bit of French he had taken in high school and college hadn't really stuck with him. Besides, so far he'd yet to discover a secret journal written in French. Navajo and (chinese?) seemed to be the thing, and now German. Privately Mulder thought the entire world ought to speak English anyway. It seemed to work okay on 'Star Trek.' Wide awake now, Mulder went to his bookshelf, searching until he finally extracted a small German/English dictionary--he didn't even remember where he'd come by such a thing, but who was he to question providence this early in the morning? Grabbing up a pen and a pad of paper from his desk, he settled back on his couch and began to do his best to translate. Three hours later he put down the pen, yawned hugely, and stared in amazement at what he had written. Translating German to English was difficult when the only assistance you had was a dictionary, but he was beginning to get the gist of what was written in this research journal, and if it was what he thought it was-- Scully. He gave a quick glance at the clock again. Almost seven. Maybe she was awake by now. She'd studied German in college, she would probably be able to confirm his clumsy attempts at translation. Also, he'd need her medical expertise on this one, because if this was what it appeared to be, it was another Holy Grail. He wondered uncomfortably what type of trouble would follow in its wake. After the events of the summer, Mulder didn't feel up to another boxcar adventure. ***** "Mulder, where did you get this?" Worried eyes stared piercingly up at him, and Mulder could tell from her expression that the journal was, indeed, exactly what he had suspected--research notes covering the development of the vaccine against the alien virus. A vaccine that was not supposed to exist, against a virus which would be patently denied by everyone involved. A vaccine he had held in his hand and administered to Scully not so long ago. Again, Mulder had to wonder who had left him this gift--the man who'd given him the means to save Scully from the alien ship had died in a fiery explosion, but it seemed there wase always another person waiting in line to help him, when the last one had been eliminated. "Someone left it outside my door early this morning. Someone who wanted me to have it." Even as he answered her, his mind was racing through the possibilities as he decided the best way to use this information. Hard evidence. Finally, hard evidence that he could present, evidence that wouldn't disappear in the next few hours. It was in his hands and it was staying there. When he confronted them with this--they would no longer be able to deny. Nervously he wondered how much time he had before someone discovered the notebook was in his possession. As soon as that happened, they would be in grave danger, and he didn't want to put Scully there. For a moment, he almost regretted showing it to her, but then decided philosophically that she would have been in danger anyway; anyone coming after him would naturally assume he had shared the information with his partner. "What are you planning to do with it?" Her practical question brought him back to reality, and he bowed to her superior knowledge. "Do you think it's authentic, Scully?" He knew in his gut that it was, but he needed her confirmation. Of course it was authentic. Why else would someone go to so much trouble to make sure that it fell anonymously into his hands? "Well, my German is rusty and I'm not a virologist, but yes, I think there's a good chance it's genuine." He could see the fear in her face as she examined the journal--fear for him, fear for his safety. She wasn't thinking of herself at all; she didn't realize that if there was danger she could share in it equally. "Scully, this is it!" he replied in a voice quiet with awe. "The proof we've been looking for, the proof that keeps getting yanked away from us, this is it!" "Mulder, this doesn't prove anything," she protested, and he grabbed her shoulders, angry, forcing her to meet his eyes at last. "How can you say that?" he demanded. "This *is* proof, Scully! This is the vaccine that I gave you in Antarctica, the vaccine that saved your life. We know it exists, and we know it works. This will confirm the testimony we gave that they wanted to ignore. They can't just continue to disregard it when we show them this. They'll finally have to acknowledge it." "What makes you think they'll accept this as authentic, even if it is?" she questioned bluntly. "What's to keep them from denying it--dismissing it as the science fiction that it will appear to be to the general public?" He shook his head impatiently. "Dr. Steinmetz was was well respected in his field, I'm sure his peers--" "Mulder, Dr. Steinmetz is dead. He can't confirm his own work. He died two months ago." "Yeah, I know," he agreed. "Killed in a "tragic automobile accident." Where have we seen that before? Doesn't that seem a little suspicious to you?" She sighed. "They killed him, Scully," he hissed at her, seeing her face begin to register the familiar denial. "You know they're capable." Scully put her hands on her hips, and Mulder realized he might have pushed her too far. She wasn't ready to acknowledge what had happened in Antarctica--he could respect that, but her constant questioning of his own memories stung. "But why, Mulder? Why would they kill one of their own, one so obviously valuable?" Her firm voice demanded an answer--no compromise. He thought for a moment. "Maybe Steinmetz decided to talk. Maybe the idea of a Nobel prize was too enticing to resist and they suspected he was going to reveal their secret." "Mulder--" "Scully, this is real," he told her impatiently. "You can't ignore it, and you can't deny it, and you can't explain it away. Sooner or later you're going to have to admit what you saw, and admit what happened to you." "I didn't see anything," she reminded him, her eyes flashing anger, "and as for what happened to me--I don't remember a thing after being stung by that bee until I woke up on the ice with you passing out in my arms." He stared, amazed at her capacity for denial--she eventually dropped her gaze but refused to back down. There was a slight flush on her face, and it struck him, suddenly, that neither of them had dared discuss what had almost happened *before* the bee stung her. He wondered if that was the cause of her embarrassment. Before Mulder could make up his mind whether or not to pursue the topic, she brought the conversation back to the journal. "What will you do, assuming this is what you think it is?" she asked again. He paced around his living room restlessly, realizing he had no answer to her question. "I'm not quite sure," he admitted. "I'll think about it for a day or so. So far nobody knows I have this except you. We'll have to keep quiet about it until we can safely bring it out into the open." "And how can you be certain your apartment isn't bugged again?" she asked in a whisper, glancing around uneasily. "I can't be positive, of course, but I did have the guys check it recently. It was clean." "You don't know who this person was who left it for you? What if it was a trap, some kind of setup? You could be in danger just from having this thing in your possession," she pointed out. He nodded soberly. "That's why we have to be quiet about it. You should go on home, spend your weekend the way you always do, and I'll meet up with you at work on Monday. Hopefully by then I'll have formulated some kind of plan." She didn't want to leave him alone, he could tell, but all at once it seemed vital that Scully be removed from the situation. "Go on," he urged. "Visit your mom or something." "Well, I was planning..." she demurred. "Do it. We should try to appear normal." "So what will you do?" she countered. Mulder grinned. "Hibernate here in my apartment, of course. For me, that's normal." ***** Mulder was running on adrenalin for the rest of the morning and early afternoon, working hard at his translations, and although he didn't understand everything he wrote on the legal pad, he was fairly certain that someone with a medical background would be able to make sense of it easily. For a brief moment, he considered calling Scully and asking her to go over some of it with him, but quickly decided against that. He'd been right to send her away, he thought. This was his problem, and he didn't want to endanger her any more than was necessary. When he finally stopped working late in the afternoon, Mulder was overwhelmed. From what he was able to make out, not only did the journal document the development of the vaccine serum, it also gave case-by-case synopses of the effects of the experimental vaccine on human subjects...unwilling human subjects. He felt nauseous, thinking of the failures, when he remembered the shape Scully had been in before it was administered to her. Was that vaccine a different formulation from the one described in the journal, or had they simply been incredibly lucky? He might never know. Yawning hugely, Mulder lay back on his couch and stretched his sore muscles. He closed his eyes, intending only to take a short catnap, and within minutes was in a deep sleep. ----- So soundly was he sleeping, Mulder never heard a sound as the intruder entered his apartment. The man's footsteps as they crossed to where the agent lay on the couch were muted, but firm, and had Mulder not been so tired he might have heard them; he was not normally a heavy sleeper. As it was, his first clue that something was amiss was the stinging sensation in his upper arm. He struggled reflexively, but a huge hand came down on his mouth, serving the dual purpose of stifling his cry and holding his head immobile. Mulder watched from eyes that were already beginning to glaze over as the man holding him withdrew the syringe from his arm, tossed it aside, and grabbed for his captive's flailing hands. He felt both of his wrists squeezed together in one of the attacker's hands, while the man leaned over his chest, pinning him to the couch so thoroughly he could barely breathe. Or was that the effects of the unknown drug with which he'd been injected? Eventually Mulder's efforts to wriggle free from the giant grew weaker, as his limbs stopped obeying, and as his vision began to blur he found himself wondering whether their plan was murder or kidnapping. His last thought before slipping into unconsciousness was to hope it was the former; he didn't want to find out what they might do to him otherwise. ***** AUGUST 31 Scully arrived at work on Monday morning to find Mulder hadn't made it in yet, which annoyed her to no end. Granted, he didn't have the same dedication to this assignment that he'd had to the X-files, but all the same she expected him to be on time. She hadn't heard from him since early Saturday, and she was anxious to hear what he had decided about the journal. Phone calls to him had been ignored, and she'd pictured him hunched over the notebook, working feverishly to translate, barely even registering the ringing of the phone or even the passage of time. On Sunday afternoon she'd intended to drop in and check on him, but her mother hadn't wanted her to leave after church, and Scully found herself whiling the rest of the day away over a lazy lunch and a movie. When she'd finally made it home, it was almost ten o'clock, and after trying Mulder once more and receiving no answer, she had swallowed her exasperation and gone to bed. Now, rolling her eyes in irritation with her wayward partner, Scully put her purse down on her desk and reached for her coffee mug with one hand and the ringing phone with the other. This had better be Mulder with a good explanation, was her first thought. Whatever her second might have been was lost in a stab of anger when she caught sight of the white envelope tucked beneath her mug. It had to be from him. She held the envelope for a moment, fighting down her growing feelings of rage. She didn't need to read his note to know what this meant. Mulder had run off to pursue his investigation into the mysterious journal without her, no doubt leaving her behind in order to 'protect' her--and to cover his ass with Kersh, whose secretary was at this moment yammering in her ear that the Assistant Director wanted to see her in his office. Immediately. Scully refrained from slamming the phone down after assuring Kersh's assistant that she would be there pronto. She cursed beneath her breath, then felt a smite of guilt. She had hoped Mulder would overcome his need to try and keep her from the thick of the danger as their partnership progressed, but it had only grown stronger. She supposed it was her own fault, in a way, for agreeing to leave him on his own this weekend. She sighed. Now all she had to do was locate him before trouble found him first. Ignoring the summons to Kersh's office for a moment, Scully gave vent to her frustration with Mulder by ripping at the flap of the envelope and quickly extracting the paper inside. Spreading it on her desk, she began to read, her mouth dropping open as she digested each word. When she had finished, she dropped weakly into her chair and read it again. It was cryptic and to the point, just like Mulder. "Scully," it read, "Please don't do anything foolish when you get this note. I have quit my job and am leaving town. I'll be in touch with you sometime in the future, although I'm not sure when. The package I got this weekend was much bigger than I expected. I am following up on it the best way I know how, but for now you should just go about your life. I know this is sudden, but please don't try to find me. I need you to trust me. Mulder." Her brow furrowed in concentration, Scully stuffed the letter into her pocket and started for her command performance with Kersh. There was no way this could be authentic, but before she could begin her search for her wayward partner, she'd have to get her boss off her back. When she was admitted to her supervisor's office she was met with the stern frown that he seemed to reserve exclusively for her or Mulder. She stood before his desk, unyielding, and waited silently for him to speak. He minced no words. "Agent Scully, would you be so good as to explain to me the meaning of this?" he questioned harshly, shoving a paper across his desk at her. She swallowed, meeting his eyes, and then reached for the paper. Kersh's letter from Mulder was even briefer and more to the point than hers had been. It was a simple letter of resignation, effective immediately, signed by her partner. According to these documents, he had apparently quit his job with no notice and taken off. Except she didn't believe it for a minute. Scully carefully examined the signature. It looked genuine, but she was beginning to grow suspicious. If their enemies had discovered that Mulder had Dr. Steinmetz' research journal, surely they would want to take any means necessary to cover it up. The idea that Mulder would quit without notice, with no immediate prospects of further employment, was much less plausible than the idea that he had met with some misfortune. The man had bills to pay just like everyone else. He needed a steady paycheck. Mulder might be impulsive and foolish at times, but he certainly wasn't stupid. "I take it this is a surprise to you as well," Kersh commented, studying her face as she read the letter. "Sir," she began carefully, wondering how far she could trust Kersh--she didn't like the guy, and it was obvious he had it in for Mulder, but surely he wasn't totally dishonest. "If you don't mind, I would like to have this letter analyzed. I have reason to suspect it might be a forgery." Kersh's expression clearly indicated what he thought of that idea. "A forgery, Agent Scully?" Scully inwardly winced at the derision in his voice, realizing she had probably just received the answer to her question as to how far he could be trusted. She deliberately neglected to mention to Kersh that she had received her own letter from Mulder, and waited for him to go on. "What reason would you have to believe it's a fake?" "I--can't explain yet, Sir," she began, but he didn't let her finish. "That's the trouble with you and Agent Mulder," Kersh informed her in a highly disgusted tone. "You want to run off and do your own thing, but you never feel the need to explain. No, Agent Scully, this letter is no forgery. I can't imagine why you would even think so. Agent Mulder has been disobedient and irresponsible ever since he was assigned to me, and the meaning of this letter is very clear. There's no need to have it analyzed." She tried again. "Sir, if you would just let me--" "That will be all, Agent Scully," Kersh snapped, clearly dismissing her. Scully stared at him for a moment, her face taking on that pinched look it got whenever she was being chewed out by one of her superiors--an event that seemed to occur more and more often the longer she stuck with Mulder. Finally she turned on her heel and left his office, taking great care not to slam the door behind her. It required enormous self-control. She stopped briefly by Mulder's desk, then headed for the elevator. She wanted to talk to Sharon Henderson in handwriting analysis, and then she wanted to talk to the Gunmen. ***** Mulder's first sensation upon regaining consciousness was of a pounding in his head which, thankfully, began to subside rather quickly once he'd opened his eyes. Squinting carefully at first, then opening them fully, he began to take in his surroundings. If he'd been kidnapped, it was the oddest kidnapping he'd ever heard of. He was lying on a huge, soft bed in a luxurious bedroom, worthy of any five-star hotel. It was sparsely furnished, but the furniture was obviously expensive and quite opulent, and the room was enormous. Carefully, Mulder raised himself to a sitting position, mindful of his headache, and pushed himself back against the massive wooden headboard. He slowly allowed his gaze to drift around the room, his eyes automatically drawn to the large windows. Warm sunlight poured in through the steel bars that covered them. He felt a sick feeling begin in his core at the sight. In one corner a door stood ajar, and Mulder rose cautiously from the bed, feeling his bare feet sink into the thick carpet as he made his way on wobbling legs over to peer through it. He was certain it wasn't an escape route, since he was barred in at the windows, but he had to investigate nonetheless. Passing through the doorway, Mulder found himself in a sitting room, smaller than the bedroom but no less impressive. A sofa, coffee table and two chairs flanked the room, with an entertainment center along one wall equipped with a large television set. These were the room's only furnishings. Another doorway led to a bathroom which contained a shower stall as well as a bathtub big enough to accommodate at least three people. He was fairly sure the faucets were plated with real gold. Rather than being carpeted like the other two rooms, the floor here was a rich blue marble, covered in strategic places with thick rugs of a lighter blue. The bars on all the windows didn't seem all that out of place when paired with the heavy steel door in the sitting room which apparently led to the outside world, and Mulder stared at that door for several moments before trying it. Naturally, it was locked. He wondered, somewhere in the back of his mind, how much it had cost to outfit this luxurious prison, and who the hell considered him worth the expense. Crossing to one of the two windows in the room, he stared outside. He was high up--about third floor height, he guessed--and not far away was a beautiful beach. He gazed at the waves lapping against the shore for a moment before resuming his exploration of his prison. Wandering back into the bedroom, he noticed for the first time a bookshelf and crossed to look at the books stacked there. With a jolt he realized that most of them belonged to him, apparently taken from his apartment. Mulder wrinkled his brow--this abduction was growing more odd by the moment. It was clear that whomever had taken him wanted him to be comfortable. He glanced down at himself, realizing for the first time that he was wearing nothing but boxers and a pair of gray sweat pants--not what he'd been wearing when the giant of a man had slipped him the Mickey. A horrible suspicion struck him, and he rushing quickly to the bedroom closet, Mulder yanked the door open. The breath left his body when he saw his clothes hung there, neatly lined up along the rod. Mulder felt his blood go cold. With an effort he drew in a lungful of air and closed his eyes for a moment. It was obvious that his abductor planned on keeping him for awhile. That could bode good or ill. He supposed he should be grateful that they hadn't just perfunctorily killed him, but then he still didn't know who had kidnapped him, although the "why" was obvious; it didn't take a genius to realize it had something to do with Dr. Steinmetz' journal. All things considered, he might be better off dead. Shaking off that thought, Mulder began exploring the rooms thoroughly, checking out every nook and cranny and ascertaining without a doubt that there was no means of escape immediately available to him. Finally he settled down, pulling a chair over to one of the windows, and waited. Sooner or later, someone was sure to show up. He doubted they'd stashed him here to starve. ***** Sharon Henderson rose with a smile when Scully entered her office. "Dana!" she exclaimed happily. "What brings you up here? I haven't seen you around in a long time." Scully smiled tiredly. "Hi, Sharon. Actually, I'm here to ask a personal favor." She handed over the suspicious letter, as well as the page of handwritten notes she'd grabbed from Mulder's desk on her way up. "Do you think you could compare these two samples for me?" Sharon took the pages and raised an eyebrow at the letter. "Mulder's left the Bureau?" she asked, astonished. "Yes, well--don't believe everything you read, Sharon," Scully said grimly. "You think this letter is a fake," Sharon stated softly, and Scully nodded. "But why? And who?" "I have no idea. I showed up this morning to find that letter waiting for me, and no sign of Mulder. Assistant Director Kersh showed me a letter of resignation, also supposedly written by Mulder. I just think it's a little...suspicious. Sharon snorted. "Yeah, I'll say!" "I'd like to keep this as quiet as possible, if you don't mind. I don't want to draw any unnecessary attention to the situation just yet." Sharon took another look at both samples and slid them into a desk drawer. "I've got a pretty heavy workload today, but I can get to these late this afternoon. I'll have a lot more privacy then." Scully smiled at her. "Thanks. I really appreciate it." "Not a problem, Dana. You know I've always had a thing for Mulder. If he's disappeared, I want to make sure he gets found." The words were said jokingly, but Scully knew that Sharon really did have a soft touch for her partner. She was always ready to drop everything to help him whenever he asked. Sharon could be depended upon to be discreet. Scully nodded and left the office, fighting back her fear. It wasn't time for that just yet. ***** He had been awake for about two hours, according to the clock on the wall--a genuine Black Forest cuckoo clock, if he wasn't mistaken--when he heard footsteps approaching and the sound of a key inserted in the lock. Mulder rose quickly, positioning himself just inside the door, prepared to attack as soon as it opened. Nervously, he wondered what he was about to be confronted with--if it was the man who had grabbed him in his apartment, he probably had no chance at all, but he had to try. Giving up was simply not in his nature. He blinked in astonishment when the door opened to reveal a small, beautiful blond woman, then felt his hope fade when he saw the two men behind her. They were both easily as big as the man who had kidnapped him, if not bigger, and Mulder wondered for a moment if all these men were brothers...or clones. The men stood back, allowing the woman to enter the room alone, but both kept a watchful eye on Mulder, ready to pounce on him should he threaten their mistress in any way. "I'm glad to see you're awake," she greeted in a musical voice, but her sunny smile seemed out of place here. "Shall we dispense with the niceties?" he suggested coldly. "How about just telling me what you want with me? Why am I here?" She regarded him thoughtfully, then pulled the other chair over in front of the window to face his. "Sit down, Fox, and I'll tell you everything," she invited pleasantly. He waited a moment, as if to argue, but when she gestured again at his vacated chair, sank back to his seat. He couldn't help casting a suspicious glance at the men who had entered the room and now flanked the door. "Don't worry about George and Albert. They're only here to ensure that you don't hurt me. As long as you behave, they have no intention of causing you harm." Mulder relaxed marginally, wondering why he believed her, and she continued. "I'm Amelia. Amelia Steinmetz." He tried to keep his expression bland, but she'd clearly seen the recognition cross his face. "Jon Steinmetz was my uncle," she told him. "I'm sure you're familiar with the name." "Not really. I try not to keep up with current events if I can help it." Her eyes bored into his. "Please, Fox. Let's not toy with one another. You were briefly in possession of his research journal, I believe." Mulder smiled grimly. "And where do you suppose it is now?" he questioned. Her smile was dazzling. "It's been completely destroyed." He shrugged. "Then why bring me here? Without it, how could I be a threat to anyone?" Amelia crossed one leg over the other and answered smoothly--it was clear she'd anticipated his question. "You could do quite a lot of damage if you chose to," she informed him. "The proof might be out of your hands, but the information contained in that journal, in the hands of the wrong people...you might have wreaked unimaginable havoc." "How?" He leaned forward in his chair, through playing games now, willing her to listen to him, to listen to reason. "Who would have believed me?" "Those who weren't in agreement with the development of the vaccine in the first place," she retorted. "You see Fox, Uncle Jon's vaccine wasn't one hundred percent effective. You probably gathered that from your reading." He said nothing, and in a moment she went on. "It appeared to have only about a sixty percent success rate. Those of us..." she stopped for a moment, swallowed hard, and with a look of determination on her lovely face, forged ahead. "Those of us who want to save this planet are working to perfect the serum, but if we were to be stopped...well, you understand why we couldn't take the chance." A thought occurred to Mulder then, a frightening one. "What about Agent Scully?" he demanded, trying not to sound breathless, hoping his calm exterior belied the wicked pouding of his heart. She smiled at him reassuringly. "Agent Scully is, at present, quite safe." He tried not to make his relief obvious. "For how long?" he asked sarcastically. "What's stopping you from grabbing her too? For that matter, how can I believe you?" "Fox, Agent Scully is more reasonable than you. Less impulsive. She's not as likely to go off half-cocked. We feel that with the proper incentive, she can be persuaded to keep things quiet. You were the one we were worried about." "And what would be the proper incentive?" he asked, afraid he already knew the answer, but determined to hear it from her. She arched a delicate eyebrow. "Why, you, of course," she told him, sounding surprised that he needed to ask. "Surely she'll cooperate in order to assure your continued safety." He snorted at that. "Safety?" "We're not planning to hurt you, Fox," she told him gently. "Not unless we have to." "Then what are you planning to do with me?" She shrugged. "Keep you here. Keep you safe. Keep the world safe, if we can." "Keep me here? For how long?" Mulder was beginning to find breathing difficult, and he didn't want her to see that. Surely they didn't intend to keep him prisoner in these three rooms indefinitely. "For as long as necessary," she replied firmly. "As long as we feel you are a threat." Mulder felt himself blanche, but maintained his stony expression. "I'll always be a threat to the lies you people spread. I'm sure you know that." She didn't answer. Swiping a hand over his face to remove the sweat that was beginning to break out, he asked shakily, "Why keep me alive at all, then?" He swallowed hard and forced his voice to steadiness. "Why not just kill me and be done with it?" She shook her head regretfully, and he felt a chill at the callousness of her next words. "It would have been the wisest thing to do, I agree, and perhaps in the long run the kindest. The order came to me from my superiors. Someone wants you alive, Fox, whatever his reasons, and it's my job to keep you that way. When I found out they needed a place to hide you I volunteered. This is probably the best place on earth to stash someone. It's completely private, and so small that few people even know of its existence. Nobody will ever think to look for you here, I'm afraid, so don't torment yourself by dreaming of rescue." "Where is 'here'?" he asked curiously, ignoring her admonition, because of course Scully would find him. Didn't she always? "Verlassen," she replied. "It's a tiny private island that was willed to me by my uncle. I was his only living relative, and I inherited everything. He was quite wealthy, as you might suspect." "Verlassen..." he said softly. "Loosely translated, it means 'deserted,' or 'abandoned.' And it is, other than you, me and my employees." She jerked her head toward the two men at the door. "There are ten of them, all quite loyal to me. They aren't a threat to you unless you become one to me." Mulder glanced at the men again and then back at Amelia. "I don't suppose promising to keep your secret would get me released?" he asked, only half-joking. Hey, he reasoned, it was worth a try, even if it did guarantee to be futile. Amelia shook her head in amusement. "Oh, Fox, you know you couldn't do it," she said, almost giggling, and somehow her amusement seemed vile, given the situation. Mulder wondered if she was really as cold-blooded as she seemed. "You can promise your silence, and you might even intend to keep your promise, but we both know in the end your passion for your work would get the better of you...and that would be disastrous. For everyone." Amelia rose from her chair and extended her hand to him. He ignored it. After a moment, she shrugged again and withdrew it, a small smile playing about her lips. She'd expected defiance. The smoking man had told her the type of behavior she could look for in Agent Mulder, and she had to admit to herself that she found the prospect of getting to know him better...intriguing. "I'm afraid you'll just have to resign yourself to being our guest here for a few weeks." She turned to go. "I'll have some lunch sent up to you." He raised one shoulder indifferently, turning his gaze to stare out the window. "Don't bother." "I have to bother. I have to keep you healthy." Mulder made a noncommittal sound and continued his staring until she left, then dropped his head to his hands in despair. Weeks! Weeks of being locked away. He'd either die of boredom or end up killing himself out of sheer depression and despair. He couldn't even stand to be in his apartment with the door shut for too many hours at a time. It was one of the reasons he enjoyed running--the freedom, the outdoors, the fresh air. Sighing heavily, he stood and began to make his way around the perimeter of the apartment again, carefully examining everything in it. There had to be a way out. Nothing was inescapable. Was it? One thing was certain, despair would gain him nothing. It was a waste of time. ***** "Agent Scully?" The voice came from the shadows of the parking garage, and Scully swung around, her hand already reaching for her weapon. "Don't be afraid," the well-dressed, elderly man told her. "I have information for you about your partner." "Where is he?" Scully demanded, her right hand still hovering near her gun. "I can assure you he is unharmed." The man reached out his hand to her. "Take a walk with me and I'll explain everything." She hesitated, glancing around the empty garage. "Please." At last, she cautiously nodded to the man, and followed him out of the garage. When they had reached a nearby park, Scully stopped and turned to him, unwilling to walk any further from her car. "Tell me what you know about Agent Mulder. Now." The elderly man turned to her. "As I said, he is unharmed. He is in a place where he will be kept...safe." "Safe? Safe from whom?" she questioned angrily. "The only ones who ever put Mulder in danger are your people!" "Not true, Agent Scully, I assure you that is not true. Agent Mulder manages to place himself squarely in the face of danger, quite without our assistance, at times." She shrugged. "Where is Mulder?" "The research journal that Agent Mulder received this weekend put his life in great jeopardy. He was abducted by our people, true, and would have been killed were it not for the intervention of one man. A mutual friend who has an affinity for cigarette smoke." Scully felt her stomach churn at his words. The smoking man was responsible for preventing Mulder's murder? Why? "He's no friend of mine, or of Mulder's," she replied coldly, but he ignored her comment and pressed on. "The development of the vaccine that saved your life a few months ago was chronicled in the journal Mulder obtained. Unfortunately, the vaccine has not yet been perfected, and there are those among us who would destroy our chances to do so if they could. Those with...different goals than our own." "What goals?" Scully inquired hotly. "I don't give a damn about your goals. I want my partner back." "The goal of saving the people of this planet," the man replied firmly. "Nothing more, nothing less. Our methods in the past may have seemed heartless, even evil, but I assure you, Agent Scully, our objective is a noble one. Unfortunately, some of the people involved are not as noble as the project in which they are engaged. People have been hurt. You have been hurt. Mistakes have been made. But we cannot afford to take the risk that Agent Mulder might jeopardize the entire future of Earth in his passionate search for what he terms the 'truth.' Therefore, we have simply--removed him from circulation, so to speak." Scully digested this speech, then opened her mouth to protest. He held up his hand and, inexplicably, she found herself waiting. "He will be unharmed as long as you cooperate with us, and I promise you, Agent Scully, that sometime in the future he will be returned to you. If you cooperate. If you do not, I can also promise you that Agent Mulder will suffer the consequences." "Cooperate how?" she asked carefully. "What is it you want of me?" "To do and say nothing," he replied promptly. "Drop your investigation into the research journal. Stop searching for Mulder. Go about your work and your life as though Mulder's resignation from the Bureau was real. *No one*," he emphasized, "can know the things you saw in that journal." "How do you know I haven't already made them known?" He smiled. "Agent Scully, let us not toy with one another. Had you done so, our people would most certainly have been made aware. You should be thankful we were able to retrieve the journal, and Agent Mulder, before any real damage was done. Your partner might not have fared so well in other circumstances." She shook her head a little, curious and confused. "If what we know is such a danger to your project, why let us live? Why not just kill us both?" Her companion sighed, an indulgent smile on his face. "Our mutual friend argued against it. And because of the nature of the compromise he made with us, we were willing to go along with his request. Besides, killing you both would attract undue attention. We do not condone the unnecessary taking of life, Agent Scully, not even when the person is as much trouble to us as Agent Mulder has been and will, no doubt, continue to be. It's almost a game between us, although I'm certain your partner would disagree. However this, young lady," he said firmly, turning to place his hands gently on her shoulders, "is not a game. The very future of our world is at stake." "So, I'm supposed to just keep my mouth shut, stop searching for Mulder, and trust you to return him to me at some time in the future--whenever you see fit." Scully's anger was beginning to flare again. Did this man truly think she was an idiot? "That is the situation in a nutshell," he agreed. Scully shook her head. "Sorry. No deal. And this conversation is over." She turned on her heel and strode away into the darkness. "Agent Scully," he called after her. "Bear in mind that Mulder is currently at our mercy. He has not been hurt--but he can be." Scully ignored him and continued her trek back to her car. She was fuming inside. Did they honestly think they could buy her silence with threats? That she really believed Mulder was unharmed? She shivered. If the smoking man was involved, Scully knew there was a good chance Mulder was dead already. ***** Scully entered her apartment wearily, kicking off her shoes and tossing her jacket to the couch. After changing into comfortable sweats, she walked back through the living room and noticed the blinking red light that summoned her to check her phone messages. Desperately hoping for word from Mulder, she pushed the button eagerly to retrieve her messages. The first two were unimportant nothings and the last was from Agent Henderson. "Dana, this is Sharon Henderson." The voice sounded hushed and hurried. "I found some things...I think you'd better come to my office in the morning. You were right about the letter you received being a forgery, but when I checked it for prints..." She paused for a moment, and her voice grew even more quiet. "Dana, the only fingerprints I found belonged to Assistant Director Kersh." Scully's eyebrows raised in surprise. "I'll be here early, come on up when you get here," Sharon concluded, then there was only a click, and silence. Scully's eyes narrowed and she felt her knees weaken. Kersh! If Kersh's prints were on the letter left on her desk, it would mean he had known about it all along--had possibly even been the one to deliver it. And yet, he hadn't mentioned it at all. Was it possible that he was the forger? If that were the case, he must know where Mulder was, or at least have some information about his sudden disappearance, but he'd spoken to her this morning as if her partner's "resignation" was a total surprise to him. Why was Kersh covering up Mulder's disappearance, and how deeply was he involved? ***** SEPTEMBER 1 Scully got to work late the next morning, thanks to a monster traffic tie-up, and as soon as she'd dropped her purse at her desk she headed for the elevator, waiting impatiently, anxious to talk with Sharon about her findings. As soon as she reached the seventh floor she pushed her way hurriedly out of the elevator and turned toward Sharon's office. The sight that greeted her stopped her short. People were milling about, and the entire floor too closely resembled a crime scene for Scully's liking. "Excuse me," she called, flagging down a security guard. "Could you tell me what's happening here?" The security guard checked Scully's badge to make sure she was on the up-and-up, and then jerked his head toward Sharon's office. "An agent was found dead in her office this morning. Heart attack." He went back to his task, dismissing the minor interruption. Scully began to get a cold feeling in her stomach as she approached Sharon's office. The activity grew more hurried the nearer she drew, until she was forced to stand back against the wall to make way for the gurney being wheeled out. "Wait," Scully commanded one of the paramedics, and he glanced up, stopping instinctively at her tone. Scully lifted the sheet covering the face of the body, and let out a sigh when Sharon's lifeless eyes stared back at her. She dropped the sheet and nodded to the paramedic, who continued on his way. Scully made her way back to her desk and picked up the phone, dialing the offices of the Lone Gunmen. She didn't know where else to turn. "Lone Gunmen." "Frohike, I need a favor." "Ah, the lovely Agent Scully. I am at your service, ma'am. Will that be whipped cream or--" "I don't have time, Frohike," Scully interrupted, grimacing at the little man's attempt at humor. "I need you to do something." "What's up?" he asked, taking on a tone of seriousness quickly enough that she forgave him his indiscretion. Leaning into the phone, covering the mouthpiece with her hand to gain as much privacy as possible, she quickly explained the situation to him, adding, "I need you guys to try and track down any trace of Mulder you can find in the last forty-eight hours. I'll be here all day if you uncover anything." "Will do. And Dana? Don't worry about Mulder. I'm sure he's fine." She hung up, unconvinced, and steeled herself to face A.D. Kersh. ***** "Agent Scully?" Kersh inquired, nodding toward a chair before his desk. "My assistant said you requested to see me." Scully remained standing. "Yes, Sir. I wanted to ask you something." He waited, his features fixed in their usual stern expression. "I wondered," she continued, her eyes locking with his and never wavering, "what you may have had to do with this." She lay the letter on his desk. Kersh glanced briefly down at the paper, then back up at her. "I have no idea what you're talking about." "Agent Henderson, before she was killed last night, phoned to tell me she'd discovered your prints on this paper. Not Mulder's, Sir. Yours." "It was my understanding that Agent Henderson had died of a heart attack." "A heart attack can be faked easily, with the right drug." "Agent Scully, are you accusing me of something?" His voice was cold, and she realized it would be better to back off a bit. "No, Sir, of course not. I was simply curious as to why a letter, which purported to be from Mulder, held your prints and not his." "I have no explanation for that, other than to speculate that Agent Henderson probably made a mistake. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a lot of work to get done, what with one of my agents resigning unexpectedly." "Sir--" "That will be all, Agent Scully." Neglecting to acknowledge his curt dismissal, she turned on her heel and left. She had more questions than answers now, but she also felt a certainty that Kersh was involved in Mulder's kidnapping. That belief made her want to strangle him. ***** "What do you want?" Scully demanded harshly, gasping for breath after being startled out of ten years life. The man who had visited her the night before was again waiting in the shadows of the parking garage, stepping out suddenly into the dim light like one of Mulder's apparitions. He shook his head sympathetically. "You should have listened to me, Agent Scully," he said sadly. "She didn't need to die." Scully's eyes widened. "You killed her!" "No." "Then you had one of your people do it!" Scully insisted angrily. "I thought you told me you didn't condone needless killing." "Her death was, regrettably, deemed necessary." "Why? And how is Assistant Director Kersh involved?" she demanded. The elderly man smiled. "Kersh is nothing but a messenger." His hand made a dismissive motion. "He is, perhaps, a bit of a weasel, but he isn't a threat to you, or to Agent Mulder. The only threat to Mulder's well-being now is you." He leaned closer to her, lowering his voice intently. "Drop your investigation, Agent Scully. Now. Before Mulder has to suffer for your stubbornness." Moments later he disappeared back into the shadows and was gone. ***** SEPTEMBER 3 Mulder jerked around in surprise and warily surveyed the two guards who had just burst into his rooms. He had turned one of the chairs by the window around so that it was facing outward, and spent a good part of each day there, gazing out at the freedom that he craved. He'd only been imprisoned here a few days, and even though he still watched for any opportunity to escape, he could already feel himself losing control. Mulder knew he wouldn't stay sane locked up here for the indefinite period of time that Amelia had mentioned. The guards--one Mulder knew was called 'Jacob' and the other he privately thought of as 'Olaf' because of his size and Scandanavian appearance--approached him quickly and wordlessly and before he even realized he needed to run, had grabbed him by the arms and hauled him up out of the chair. "Hey!" he protested, but the men ignored him. 'Olaf' grabbed Mulder around his chest from behind and held him firmly in an iron grasp while Jacob caught Mulder's kicking legs and tucked them easily under one arm. With his free hand he removed Mulder's shoes and socks. Mulder was taken aback by this action but didn't grow terribly alarmed until Jacob put his bare feet on the floor and reached for the wasteband of his sweats. "What the fuck are you doing?" he yelled, again trying unsuccessfully to kick at Jacob, while visions of sexual assault ran through his mind in a terrifying stream. The large man lifted his legs again, stripping the pants off him in one fluid motion, leaving him clad in only his boxers and t-shirt. "Sorry guys, I don't even kiss on the first date," Mulder quipped, fighting his rising panic as he continued to struggle against them. Still ignoring him, Jacob grabbed his bare legs and held them firmly while his other attacker pulled Mulder's shirt over his head, and within seconds the agent was practically naked. He expected to be thrown to the floor and raped, but instead he was placed firmly back on his feet and each guard took an arm, guiding him, protesting loudly, out the door. They dragged him down the hall and into a room very similar to the one he had just left, with one important exception. This room came equipped with a video camera, set up to capture the action revolving around the single, straight-backed chair in the center of the room. ***** SEPTEMBER 4 Scully parked in front of her building and sat in her car for a few minutes before going inside. She'd had an exhausting week. So far there had been no trace of Mulder, and Kersh had kept her so busy with what she considered insignificant, yet highly detailed assignments that she'd had little opportunity to investigate further on her own. She'd relied on Frohike and the gang to dig up information, and so far they had been unsuccessful. She had found the time to phone Mulder's apartment manager and question him; he had no information whatsoever. Mulder hadn't broken his lease, hadn't moved his things out, hadn't turned in his key, and had already paid his rent for the month of September. As far as the manager was concerned, Mulder was still one of his tenants until the rent became past due or he was notified otherwise. She'd gone over there once to check things out and feed the fish, but her search hadn't turned up anything useful. As far as Scully could tell, Mulder had simply vanished. She trudged into her apartment, stopping to grab her mail on the way, and carefully examined the small, padded brown envelope that she had received. She wasn't expecting a package, and she didn't recognize the handwriting on the front. Naturally, there was no return address. From the size and shape of it she guessed it was a videotape, and she turned it over to take another look at the handwriting. That's when she noticed that there was no postmark. The package had been hand-delivered. Curiously, and with a mounting sense of dread, Scully opened the envelope. A grey box fell onto her lap and she picked it up, shaking the videotape out into her hand. Examining the tape and the packaging again, she discovered no other indication of where it might have originated. After what had happened to Sharon, Scully was afraid to take it to the fingerprint lab, and besides, she'd handled it enough already to effectively destroy any prints they might have lifted. For that matter, what if they did find prints, and what if they belonged to Kersh? What could she do about it? Scully didn't want the death of another agent on her hands. She'd been told to drop her investigation, and... "Oh God," she breathed aloud. "Mulder." Her mysterious informant had told her Mulder would pay the price if she didn't stop searching for him. Had they followed through on their threat? Was this...? Scully closed her eyes and swallowed hard, afraid to see what was contained on the tape and yet knowing she had to watch it. Finally, after taking several deep breaths to bolster her courage, she rose and determinedly popped the tape into her VCR. Steeling herself for whatever she was about to see, Scully sat down on the couch, remote in hand, and leaned forward in concentration. The tape started off with static, as homemade videos are wont to do, but soon the picture cleared and Scully could see a straight-backed, wooden chair sitting alone in the middle of a room. She heard the sound of scuffling off camera, then Mulder, naked except for a pair of dark-colored boxers, appeared. He was dragged toward the chair by two men who must have been professional wrestlers at some point in their careers, if size and strength were any indication. They dwarfed her partner, both in height and weight, and he looked as helpless as a child struggling and protesting against them. They slammed him roughly down into the chair and Scully winced when she saw that one of the men had produced several lengths of rope. "Will you just tell me why you're doing this?" Mulder demanded from the tape, and Scully clenched her fist around the remote control. He was trying hard to maintain a brave front, but she, who knew him so well, could hear the note of fear creeping into his voice. "Just tell me what you want!" Not bothering to answer, one of the men grabbed Mulder's arms and pulled them behind him, tying his wrists together, while the other bound each of his ankles to a chair leg. A piece of rope was then tied around his waist, fastening him firmly to the chair, and as a final restraint, another rope was looped around his neck and secured to the rope that held his hands. In this position he was barely able to move. Too much struggling would cause him to choke. The wrestlers then moved out of camera range, and seconds later, a woman approached Mulder. Scully could clearly see the look of confusion on Mulder's face at her appearance, but didn't detect any real fear of the woman. She was convinced that her contact had been truthful when he said Mulder hadn't been hurt. If Mulder had been tortured by these people on previous occasions, it would have shown in his demeanor. "Do you know what this is, Fox?" The woman's clear voice came through the videotape. She produced a curling wand, the type found in most of the bathrooms or bedrooms in America, and held it up for him to view. Mulder gazed at the device and gave a smile that was half sneer. "Gee, and I didn't even make an appointment," he remarked sarcastically. Scully bit her lip at Mulder's characteristic humor under pressure. It was obvious what was about to happen and, while she didn't want to see Mulder being hurt, she found herself unable to tear her gaze away from the images on the screen. Mulder apparently had realized it as well, because he grew serious, asking, "Why are you doing this, Amelia?" The woman he called Amelia shook her head sadly. "I don't want to, Fox. It's your partner. She was warned to drop her investigation into your whereabouts and she has refused to do so. We're hoping this little performance will give her an incentive to obey us." Scully paled, closing her eyes against a rush of guilt and horror, but quickly opened them again when she heard Mulder's voice take on the faintest tinge of desperation. "Wait," he insisted. "Wait a minute! You don't have to do this. If you just tell her you're going to hurt me, she'll back off." Again Amelia shook her head. "We did tell her. We warned her that you would suffer for her inquisitiveness, but apparently she chose not to believe us. Now we're going to prove to her that we do not bluff." She approached him without further comment, and Mulder winced, biting his lip firmly to keep back a cry of pain, clenching his eyes shut and turning his face away as the hot metal rod found the tender skin of his thigh. Amelia held it there for five of the longest seconds of Scully's life, then pulled back. Scully found herself panting with anger and horror as she watched Mulder's torment. Next Amelia pressed the curling wand to Mulder's bare chest, and this time he was unable to suppress a groan of pain. He tried to jerk away from her but couldn't escape the searing metal. She held it to his flesh a little longer than before, and Scully was able to see the tears making their way down her partner's face, matching the ones staining her own cheeks. "Stop. Amelia, stop!" he panted as she approached his unprotected belly with the rod, but she ignored him and held the hot metal to his skin longer than ever. Mulder squirmed wildly, again to no avail. He was trying to hold back screams of pain, but Scully could see the sweat pouring from his brow mixing with the tears he could not control. The agonized whimpers he was unable to suppress tore through her, and she was afraid he would bite clean through his bottom lip. Scully squeezed her eyes tightly shut to block out the sight, but she was unable to escape the sound of Mulder's pleading voice. She could almost feel the agony he was enduring. She'd burned herself a few times with her own hot curling wand, and she knew how painful it was when it touched her skin for a fraction of a second. Mulder was receiving much longer exposure, and Scully found herself growing nauseous as the torture continued. "No..." he begged as Amelia slowly brought the rod toward him again. "Don't..." She touched it to his cheek for a few seconds, and then withdrew, leaving a welt on Mulder's face that Scully could clearly see, even on the low-quality videotape. Scully's tears were flowing freely now, and she felt her fury mounting. As Amelia brought the metal instrument again toward Mulder's body she jumped to her feet and threw the remote control at the television with all the force of her rage. She wanted to be able to reach into the television set and throttle the life out of the woman who was torturing Mulder. The remote shattered, sending small pieces of black plastic flying. "Stop it!" she screamed to the woman on the videotape. "Stop hurting him!" As if hearing Scully's screams from thousands of miles away, Amelia drew back and set the tool of Mulder's torment down off camera. She gestured to someone off to her right and one of the men who had bound Mulder to the chair approached with a cup of water which he held to their prisoner's lips. Mulder drank weakly from the cup as Amelia turned toward the camera. "Agent Scully," she said softly. "I don't like having to hurt Fox, and I don't want to do it again, but I assure you that if it's considered necessary I will. Only you can guarantee that he doesn't suffer more pain. You will drop your investigation immediately, or I promise you, your partner will receive much worse than this." Scully could see the man behind Amelia beginning to untie Mulder, who now sat weak and limp in the chair, just before the video ended. She swiped her hands across her face, angrily wiping away her tears, and jumped to her feet, beginning to pace back and forth through the room. She simply had to come up with a way to rescue Mulder. ***** SEPTEMBER 3 Mulder made no fuss as Jacob and his companion pulled him to his feet. He tried to walk, but the two of them ended up practically dragging him back to his room with Amelia following. Mulder's skin throbbed everywhere that the hot metal had touched him, and he found himself amazed that such a short session with such a simple object could cause him so much pain, and drain him of so much energy. Jacob and Company hauled Mulder into his bedroom and lay him easily on the bed, but he hissed in pain when the blanket they draped over him touched his burned skin. "Wait," Amelia commanded, pulling back the blanket, and then she was rubbing something cool and soothing onto him and miraculously the pain was beginning to fade. Mulder tried to stifle his sigh of relief. He simply lay there, feeling much like a worn-out dishrag, as she tended him. "It'll be all right, Fox," she told him gently as she smoothed his hair away from his sweating brow. "I doubt we'll have to do this again." Mulder stared at her in what could have been hurt silence for a moment, then closed his eyes wearily. There didn't seem to be anything to say. ***** SEPTEMBER 23 Sometimes Mulder thought he would die of sheer boredom. He had read every book provided at least once, and had discovered to his disgust that even when you had 128 channels to choose from, there was rarely anything decent on television. He couldn't endure what passed for comedy, and daytime TV, as a rule, was mind-numbingly stupid. Most of his days were spent sitting at the window, staring out across the water and daydreaming. Sometimes he would fall asleep in the chair and when he did, his dreams were usually of Scully--her soft voice, her gentle touch on his arm, her passionate debates with him--all the things he had grown to love about her. He missed her more than he had ever thought possible, and soon began to crave her companionship even more than his own freedom. Mulder knew what was happening to him; he recognized the signs of serious depression, but didn't have the energy to try and pull himself out of it. It was so much easier to sit and dream. He had all but forgotten what it was like to be able to come and go as he pleased, or to have work to occupy his time, but he had not forgotten what it was like to talk with Scully, laugh with her, or feel her soft hands on him. Other than the one videotaped torture session, he had been well-treated, and he supposed Scully had gotten their message and backed off. He didn't know whether to be relieved that he wasn't being hurt, or upset that she was apparently no longer searching for him. It saddened him to think she might be growing used to life without him, even though in his moments of higher thought, he knew she would never abandon him. His was, he thought despondently, probably the most luxurious prison in the world. The food was excellent, when he could bring himself to eat it, but Mulder had always lost his appetite in times of stress, and nothing was more stressful to him than imprisonment. Most of the gourmet cuisine went untouched on his tray, but they were still served to him faithfully, three times daily. Amelia visited him for a few minutes every day. At first he had rebuffed her attempts at conversation, but before long his loneliness and boredom had led him to respond. He had questioned her endlessly about why he was being kept here and when, if ever, he would be released, but her answers had been vague and wholly unsatisfactory. Mulder was beginning to get a very sick feeling that the "few weeks" Amelia had originally spoken of would be extended indefinitely. Eventually he had given up on his attempts to get information from her, and their conversations had degenerated into discussions about the weather and other, equally trite topics. At times he found himself almost overwhelmed with the impulse to throw himself to his knees in front of her and beg for his freedom, but the knowledge that he would simply be humiliating himself to no avail kept the last vestiges of his pride intact. He remained standing, or sitting, as the case may be, but never, he vowed to himself, would he kneel. His biggest concerns were for Scully, and in his worst moments be hecame convinced she had been killed, and that he had been lied to about her safety. He was constantly plagued by nightmares of her demise. Other overnight terrors had him, trapped in this prison, while all those on the outside succumbed to disease, or attack, or any number of other ravages. He saw himself slowly starving to death, unable to escape, forgotten by all. The loose translation of the island's name became more realistic and appropriate for him every day. Amelia had finally confessed to him that it was the smoker who wanted him kept alive, and Mulder could only guess that the man felt this slow descent into death by boredom was the most exquisite torture that could be inflicted on him. He felt impotent rage, and his fingers would actually curl with the desire to wrap themselves around the man's neck and choke the life out of him. Thoughts like these nearly drove him mad, while thoughts of Scully kept him sane. The two were at constant war in his mind, a war he realized, with more than a little fear, he was slowly losing. ***** SEPTEMBER 29 "I don't know if there's anything you can do," Scully finished, "but if you could somehow manage it..." Skinner regarded the woman carefully; since Mulder's disappearance, she had been under constant scrutiny from everyone. Most expected her to crack, but other than a slight deepening of the lines around her eyes and mouth, barely noticeable yet, there was no outward sign of her distress. Not to the casual observer, anyway. Skinner had been through enough with her and Mulder to recognize the excessive stiffening of her posture, the lack of peace in the aura that enveloped her. "I can ask them to transfer you to my command, Agent Scully, but I feel certain the request will be denied." "Sir, they put us under Kersh in order to keep us off the X-Files. I'm not asking to be transferred back there." She grimaced. "I wouldn't want to work with the current team, anyway. All I'm asking is that I report to you, rather than Assistant Director Kersh." She'd told him, quietly, off the record, of her suspicions regarding Kersh, but Skinner's own subtle investigations had yielded no results. They had truly covered their tracks this time. "If not to your command, perhaps a temporary transfer to Quantico could be arranged," she continued. "All I know is that I can't continue working for Kersh." Skinner shook his head slowly, but didn't want to deny her request outright. "I'll see what I can do." It was all he could offer her. ***** OCTOBER 1 "I have a surprise for you, Fox." Amerlia's voice trickled into his consciousness and invaded the daydream in which he was immersed at the moment. He was sitting in his usual chair, the untouched lunch tray beside him, when she entered the room. He barely registered her presence until she pulled up the other chair and sat next to him; he had learned the hard way what would happen if he attempted to rush the door. Mulder glanced over at her, disinterested, then resumed his wide-eyed gaze out his window. He was leaning forward today, his hands clasping the steel bars as if he hoped for the strength to separate them. Somewhere out there, he kept reminding himself, was life. She touched his shoulder with a gentle hand that went unnoticed. "Fox?" He turned his head slightly toward her, an impatient look on his face, willing her to disappear so he could get back to his thoughts, but she refused to cooperate. "Would you like to go outside for a bit?" At first he didn't seem to understand, gazing incomprehensibly at her, then shifting his eyes again toward the outdoors. He glanced quickly back at her face, as if trying to determine whether or not she was cruelly teasing him, and finally decided that perhaps she wasn't. "Outside?" he asked hesitantly, his voice cracking from lack of exercise. He still absolutely refused to begin talking to himself, and he hadn't said a word to her in days. She nodded, smiling. "Under guard, of course, but I thought perhaps you might like a swim in the ocean." Outside. An opportunity for...what? Escape? Perhaps not, but just to feel the wind on his face and smell the fresh air... The smile that broke out on his face almost made Amelia want to cry. She'd been afraid to let him leave his rooms for weeks, terrified he'd do something that would cause her more trouble than she could handle, but he was so subdued now that she felt confident it was safe to let him have a little outside time. Maybe it would help restore his spirits. Certainly it appeared as though he would be here much longer than they had originally intended, and she was concerned about the depression into which he had so effortlessly slipped. There was a noise at the door, and they both looked up as George, Martin and Kenneth entered the room. Mulder seemed a little frightened at their sudden appearance as a group--the last time more than one of them had come to him he'd been stripped, dragged away and tortured--but Amelia reassured him calmly. "I can't let you go out alone, Fox. They'll be with you, just to keep an eye on you." Finally he nodded, accepting her restriction as inevitable, knowing he would receive no taste of freedom without it, and she left him with the men. "Let's go," the one that Mulder knew as Kenneth said in a low, rumbly voice, and rising quickly, Mulder followed Kenneth, George and Martin bringing up the rear. He looked around curiously as he was led down a long, wide hallway toward a staircase. He had never seen any part of the house outside his apartment other than the room they had taken him to for his film debut. The mansion appeared enormous. "Don't get any ideas," George warned from behind him, and Mulder shook his head silently. He wasn't stupid enough to try and make a break for it with these three guarding him. Any one of them looked as though he could snap Mulder's neck with minimal effort. Besides, he reminded himself, they were on an island. Even if he did manage to elude them, where could he go? They would be bound to find him eventually, and then Mulder was sure there would be hell to pay. Instead, he walked quietly down the stairs, meekly following their directions, and a few minutes later found himself standing on soft, warm sand and staring out over the endless ocean. Mulder took deep, greedy breaths of the fresh air and tilted his face upward to feel the sun full on it. It was all he could do to hold back the tears of joy he felt at finally just being out. He had truly begun to believe that he would never leave those three rooms again as long as he lived. His natural impulse was to make a break for freedom, and he curbed it with effort. Maybe, if he behaved the way they wanted, they would eventually relax their guard. Maybe there was a way off this island, but he'd never find it by trying to run right now. Quickly, Mulder glanced around, hoping for some glimpse of a boat, but nothing was visible but empty beach. "You can swim if you want," Martin encouraged him. Martin seemed to be the friendliest of all the men who tended him, and Mulder glanced hesitantly over at him when he spoke. Seeing Martin pulling his shirt over his head, Mulder slowly removed his own shoes, t-shirt and sweatpants. When he was stripped down to only his black boxers, he took a small step toward the water, then another and another, and soon he found himself running, barely able to keep his balance in the sand, until the waves splashed up his legs wetting him from the waist down. He stopped, standing in the surf, and looked around for the guards. George and Kenneth had remained on shore, but Martin was right behind him. "C'mon, Fox," the big man urged, making his way toward deeper water. "You're not going to get any exercise just standing there. Enjoy it while you can." Mulder watched Martin as he lowered himself into the water and began to swim, and then eagerly followed. Soon the two men were diving and splashing, and Martin was surprised at how easily Mulder took to his newfound freedom. He had half-expected their captive to be too beaten down emotionally from his imprisonment to participate, but was happy to see that wasn't the case. However, it wasn't long before Mulder's lack of food and exercise caught up with him and Martin could tell that the other man's strength was giving out. "Let's go, Fox. Back inside with you now," he commanded, grabbing Mulder's shoulder to steady him when he almost lost his balance and fell under the water. The prisoner's face was pale and his bones were more prominent than was healthy. He was breathing heavily, his exhaustion easily apparent. Nonetheless, Mulder protested. "Not yet. Not just yet," he murmured weakly, turning back to the open water. He began slowly swimming out toward the horizon again, and Martin sighed impatiently. "Fox, you're tired. We need to get you back to your room so you can rest." Mulder ignored him and continued swimming. He knew it was futile, stupid, but all at once he was powerless to stop himself in what had to be a pointless attempt at escaping them. He swam as quickly as he was able, in order to put as much distance between himself and his guards as possible. The attention of the two men onshore had been drawn by Martin's unsuccessful efforts to rein Mulder in, and Martin was quickly becoming irritated at his charge's refusal to obey. "Mulder, come here. Now." Mulder heard the commanding voice from behind him and, as if from outside himself, knew what he was about to do. He'd dreamed of it, had wondered what it would be like, but had never truly considered it until this very moment. The choice was clear: captivity or death. It was now or never. Not even stopping to question himself, afraid to delve too deeply into his motives, Mulder threw himself into the water face-first and deliberately inhaled. He felt as if he must be dreaming; how many days had he spent staring at this blue water and imagining losing himself in it, sinking downward, downward, until the breath and the life and the pain left his body and he was finally at peace? At last, he'd summoned up the balls to do something about it. Martin, guessing Mulder's intention roughly one second before it became action, lunged for the smaller man, grabbed him by his hair and hauled him up out of the water just as he began to draw it into his body. Angrily he threw Mulder over his shoulder like a rag doll and strode back toward shore. Mulder coughed and sputtered, only now realizing the enormity of what he'd done. Hell to pay. "No," he whispered, his throat stinging from the salt water. "Don't. Just let me go..." Martin's only response was to grip Mulder more tightly until they reached the shore, then to slide him easily to the sand. Mulder was still coughing, clearing the last of the water from his throat and nose. He raised himself to his hands and knees, retching saltwater from his stomach onto the sand. When he finally had himself under control, and after his breathing had returned to normal, Martin and Kenneth reached down simultaneously and hauled Mulder up by his arms. Standing trapped between them, he was confronted by George. Mulder felt perfect fear shoot through him at the look on George's face. He was in big trouble. Hell to pay. "What the fuck were you thinking?" George demanded. "Did you really believe we'd let you drown?" He leaned closer, his face less than two inches from Mulder's. "We can't afford to let you die." When Mulder didn't answer he received a severe shake from the men holding him. "Answer!" George roared. "What were you thinking?" "I--d-don't know--" Mulder stammered, beginning to feel terror rising up from his toes and engulfing his entire body. He was trembling, unsure if it was from fright, shock or cold. "You don't know why you tried to drown yourself?" Martin retorted angrily. Mulder shook his head slowly. "I wasn't thinking at all," he ground out. "That should be pretty obvious." "Amelia's going to give us hell," grumbled Kenneth, and Mulder's head whipped around quickly. "She doesn't need to know," he said desperately. Please--please don't tell Amelia." He despised himself for the begging tone he had taken on but was unable to control it creeping into his voice. "Look, it was just a stupid mistake on my part. It won't happen again." "Your damned right it won't," George declared. Shaking his head angrily, Martin began half-dragging Mulder back toward the house, with Kenneth still supporting his other side. George picked up Mulder's clothing from the beach and followed. Soon Mulder was deposited back in his room, dropped unceremoniously on the bed, and left alone. He had begun shaking in earnest now, and finally decided it was from cold as much as terror. He rose and, grabbing a clean pair of boxers from the dresser, headed for the bathtub for a warm soak to restore his body heat. He tried not to dwell on the punishment that was sure to come. ***** OCTOBER 2 Scully stood in line at the grocery store and regarded her meager purchases sadly. Since deciding to maintain Mulder's apartment in the firm belief that he would return to it one day, her financial resources had been stretched to the limit. She simply wasn't equipped to pay double rent each month, and even though she had only made one payment, she was feeling the strain. On the other hand, she was determined not to give up on Mulder. She had also paid his utility and VISA bills, and was now discouraged at her checking account balance. If Mulder didn't return soon, she would have to dip into her savings account in order to survive. With a set to her jaw, Scully decided she would do that, if necessary. She would do whatever she had to do. This was one small way that she could continue to feel Mulder's presence in her life, one thing she could do that felt like *something* in the face of her helplessness. She'd gotten nowhere in her investigations, and after seeing how Mulder had suffered for it, she had stopped searching. She couldn't risk having him hurt again. So, in a pathetic attempt to convince herself she was taking some sort of action, she had taken over his finances. Besides, she couldn't bear the thought of someone else living in his apartment. She'd been dropping by his place several times a week to check up on things and feed his fish, and part of her always half expected to find him there, sleeping on his couch. She always felt a tiny rush of disappointment every time it didn't happen, even though she tried to prepare herself for the inevitable. It was simply one more dagger in her heart. Scully frequently cried herself to sleep under the safe cover of darkness, remembering the videotape of Mulder's torment, for which she still blamed herself. She had recurring nightmares of him caught in a constant cycle of pain and torture. Once or twice she'd even indulged herself in a few tears on his couch, inhaling the scent of him that clung to the leather even now, and remembering times they had spent together. Sometimes she thought she could almost hear his voice, and she was made uneasy by his continued impression on the apartment--it was as if he was still there, yet unreachable. She couldn't count the number of times she had called his answering machine for the sole purpose of listening to his familiar voice, and she remembered Mulder telling her once that when she had been missing, he would do the same. It frightened her to realize how much she needed him. She received periodic reports from the man who had first approached her to insist she drop her investigation, and he continued to assure her that Mulder was safe and in good health, but Scully knew Mulder. She was familiar with his ability to lose his appetite and forego sleep in times of stress, and she knew captivity had to be taking its toll on him. Mulder couldn't live in a prison, of that she was certain. Just today, she had decided to bring his fish home with her. They must be lonely, she reasoned with a fair amount of amusement. As far as she knew there hadn't been a break-in or any unauthorized surveillance equipment installed since Mulder's disappearance. Besides, she craved this part of him, this testament to his life, and wanted it near her. Gathering up her purchases, she started off toward Mulder's apartment and her soon-to-be foster pets. ***** To Mulder's immense relief, Amelia was inclined to forgive his act of rebellion, although he was sternly lectured about repeating such an idiotic stunt. At first he had been terrified that she would never let him out of his rooms again, but after her severe scolding, Amelia had patted his cheek gently and said, "I understand why you did it, Fox, but you mustn't despair. You won't be here forever." The look on his features conveyed his disbelief. "I know how depressed you've been, and I'll forgive you this once. You won't want to try anything like that again, though," she had warned him, and he had suppressed a shiver at her tone, nodding acquiescence. When she left, he pounded the chair's arm in frustration. Why had he done such a stupid thing? He couldn't even begin to answer that question. All he knew was that he had acted without thought, without a plan, and it had been a severe setback--both in their trust of him, and in any possible future escape attempts. Amelia was treating him like a child, and the men were furious with him for causing them trouble. It would undoubtedly be a long while before another chance presented itself. He wondered how much longer before Scully arrived to get him out of this hellhole. It was close to a week before Mulder was taken out again, and when Martin offered to let him swim, he and George had stuck so closely by their prisoner's side that Mulder wouldn't have been able to get his face in the water had he tried. After that, since he was a model of good behavior on his trips outdoors, he was allowed them once a day, after lunch, on the condition that he eat at least a portion of his meal. Mulder swallowed his objections to the condescending treatment and gave them what they wanted, if only to be able to escape from the room for a short time. Those moments in the sun had come to mean everything to him. Eventually the guards backed off a little and decided that Mulder could once again be trusted, at least to a point. He hadn't shown any inclination toward suicide since his first ill-fated attempt, and they finally concluded that his fear of losing the small amount of freedom he'd been granted was threat enough to make him toe the line. ***** OCTOBER 26 Mulder had taken to walking the island after his swim, trying to build up some of the strength that he had lost during his weeks of captivity. He knew exercise was an important part of maintaining emotional health, even though in his situation, it might be a bandaid on a punctured artery. It wouldn't hurt him, and it gave him time to think. So far his thinking had availed him nothing. The terrain of the island was unsuitable for jogging, so he exerted himself by walking and climbing rocks and trees. He had spotted the boathouse easily, once he'd made his way around the curve of the island, but with his two keepers nearby, there was never a chance to make a break. His hope was that in time, they'd trust him enough to let him out alone on the island, or perhaps with only one guard. He thought he could take one of them, given the opportunity and his desperation. It would be worth a try, at least. And even though he had no idea where this island was located, map-wise, Mulder knew he would rather die at sea in a break for freedom than to continue to waste away here. Once they had made up their minds he wasn't going to try to hurt himself again, his guards kept a discreet distance of about twenty yards; they knew they could easily outrun Mulder if necessary, should he be stupid enough to try and make a break for it. Most of them found it amusing to watch him climb the large trees on the island like a young boy, and thus were being singularly inattentive the day he deliberately hurled himself fourteen feet to the ground in the hope of breaking his neck. He knew it was a bad idea from the beginning, but like a moth drawn unwaveringly to a flame, Mulder was unable to deter himself from his course. He had been taken over by what he jokingly thought of as his "other" personality--the one that had no fight left...the one that was ready to die in order to escape. He managed to keep that personality under control most of the time, but just as when he'd attempted to drown himself, this time it took over and he was helpless. Mulder had climbed the tree, knowing he would jump, hearing the tiny voice inside himself that ordered him to hang tough be overpowered by the louder, more determined one that insisted this must end. He made a conscious effort to turn his mind off completely, climging to the highest branch that would bear his weight. Mulder shifted position a time or two, making certain no lower branches would be able to break his fall. He stood up, carefully balanced himself, then let go with his hands and pitched forward. The two guards were watching Mulder indifferently, paying much more attention to their conversation than to their prisoner's actions, when the sight of the man falling fast toward the ground shook them out of their apathy. Racing to the still form that lay crumpled on the dirt beneath the tree, they turned him over fearfully, noting with dismay the blood oozing from a large gash on his forehead. "Is he dead?" George asked, afraid of what the answer might be. "Not yet," Kenneth told him. "But I don't know what condition he'll be in after Amelia gets finished with him. This may be the last straw for her. It's a lucky break the ground's soft here." Disregarding the possibility that Mulder may have a spinal injury and should not be moved, they grabbed him by his shoulders and ankles and hauled him back to the house. "Now what?" demanded Amelia as they carried the unconscious Fox through the front door. "He threw himself out of a tree," explained Kenneth as they hoisted Mulder up the stairs. "We never even saw it coming." Amelia sighed. "I'll be up in a minute," she told them, and made a detour toward the telephone. She was going to have to call for a doctor this time, it could no longer be avoided. She prayed that she would be able to get him to and from Verlassen without the smoking man finding out, and that Fox would make a full recovery. She swallowed hard at the prospect of having to report her failure to keep her charge safe from himself and his desperate impulses. The smoking man would listen to no excuses if Fox should die. That had been made very clear to her. ***** When Dr. Tenger finally arrived, Amelia led him upstairs and relieved George, who had been assigned to keep watch over their troublesome captive. "He hasn't moved except to change position a time or two," George reported as he left the room, and Amelia nodded. "Amelia--" he began, turning back when he reached the bedroom door, but Amelia dismissed him with a wave of her hand. "Don't worry, George, I don't blame you or Kenneth for this. We all know how--impulsive Fox can be." He gave a quick nod and disappeared. "This young man is severely undernourished," Doctor Tenger said sternly to Amelia and she sighed. "I know. Getting him to eat is almost impossible, I'm afraid," she told him regretfully. "He shouldn't have been allowed to sleep like this. If he'd sustained a severe head trauma, he could have slipped into a coma and died." Amelia shuddered inwardly at his words and resolved to hire someone with medical training as soon as possible. With all the mistakes they had made, they were lucky they hadn't killed Fox themselves. Dr. Tenger began a detailed physical examination of Mulder's body, probing, prodding and trying his best to determine, without benefit of x-rays, whether or not Mulder had broken any bones. Dark bruises had appeared in several places on his body, and when the doctor reached Mulder's left wrist and saw how swollen it was he shook his head. Grimly grasping the hand and twisting it every which way, he finally decided that it was broken--not a bad break, but one that would require immobilization to heal. Mulder responded to the pain of having his injured wrist manipulated by moaning and trying to jerk away from the hands that were torturing him. "Wake up, son," the doctor said in a kind voice, gently patting Mulder's face until he opened pain-filled eyes, blinking against the bright light. "You are a very lucky young man." Mulder tried to raise his head and winced at the flash of agony, immediately settling back on the pillows. He squinted his eyes open a little, saw Amelia's forbidding expression and gave another slight moan. "Oh yeah...Lucky's...my middle name..." he whispered. "You could have died, either from your fall or from the handling you received afterwards. It's amazing you're alive at all." Mulder ignored this observation, concentrating on mentally checking out the rest of his body. The pain in his wrist was bad, but his chest hurt the worst, surprisingly enough, since the doctor seemed more worried about his head. In Mulder's opinion, all of his injuries paled in comparison to Amelia's probable reaction to his latest effort toward declining her further hospitality. It was very likely he'd completely managed to destroy any future opportunity for escape. "Well," Dr. Tenger announced at last, "he has a couple of ribs that are probably cracked, the wrist is broken, and he doesn't appear to have a concussion, although I want him watched closely throughout the night. Keep him awake as much as you can for the next few hours." He bound Mulder's chest to support the ribs, and elevated his sore wrist, ordering ice packs to bring the swelling down, then wrapped it tightly with elastic bandages and fashioned a sling for his arm. "I'm leaving some pain medication for him, but don't start him on it until tomorrow," he told Amelia. Seeing Mulder's involuntary wince, he told his patiently in a sober voice, "I'm sorry, Son, but I can't take the chance of sedating you just yet. You can take some aspirin for the pain, but nothing stronger." Amelia thanked the doctor as he left, then turned back to Mulder, settling herself in the chair she had claimed. "You had to try, didn't you?" she asked wearily, and he shrugged his good shoulder in answer. "And now you're wondering what the consequences will be, aren't you?" "I doubt you'll believe me, Amelia," Mulder replied in a voice roughened with pain and emotion, "but I didn't plan to do it. I just...wasn't myself at the time." She sighed. "I do believe you, Fox, but it doesn't change a thing. I'll have to give the situation some careful thought before I make a decision." He could tell she was angry with him, too angry to put him out of his misery by telling him what actions she was considering. He wasn't surprised when she ignored his pitiful, inquisitive look and left the room without another word. Closing his eyes, Mulder tried to ignore the throbbing in his wrist, his chest, his head--Amelia returned a few minutes later with a glass of water and four aspirin, which she fed to him one at a time, allowing him to swallow them down. "I hope this helps," she told him with more sympathy than she'd displayed moments earlier. "I'm sorry you did such a stupid thing, and I'm sorry you're now having to suffer for it." He nodded, closing his eyes again, and she almost didn't hear his whispered, "Me, too." ***** NOVEMBER 3 "You told me he'd be returned," Scully accused, leaning over the bridge and gazing at the rushing water below. "It's been months. I know Mulder, and I know he can't live like this. You've got to bring him home, or he'll die." "I told you he would be returned when he was no longer a threat to the project," her contact insisted. "Unfortunately, progress has been slower than we expected." The elderly man's voice was kind, but firm in its determination to protect this project with his life, or Mulder's if need be. Scully rubbed her aching head with her hands and turned to her informant, the fight suddenly gone from her. "How's he doing?" she asked softly. "I mean really, how's he holding up?" He made a noncommittal gesture. "He's holding his own. He actually tried to kill himself a couple of times, but was completely unsuccessful. He's watched much more closely now," he added at her sharp look. Scully shuddered at the thought of Mulder being desperate enough to take his own life. She might expect him to waste away and die from sheer depression, but if he was actively attempting to kill himself, things were much worse than she'd feared. "I want him back," she told the man. "There simply has to be another way to protect your project." The man put his hand on her shoulder, and she unwillingly took comfort from his touch; he was a tie to Mulder, her only connection these days. "Hold on, Agent Scully. Just keep quiet, as you have been doing, and Mulder will be fine." ***** DECEMBER 3 "Fox." He ignored her, continuing to stare out the window at the freedom that he had once known. His thoughts barely registered the fact that she was there, so immersed was he in a daydream of himself and Scully walking along the sunlit beach below. Scully was turning her beautiful face to him, reaching up to whisper something in his ear, when the unwelcome interruption insisted he to return to dull, grim reality. Forcing it away, he reached again for the illusion. His "other" personality had almost completely taken him over now, and while he understood that, and recognized the danger, he found it was far too much trouble to care. He simply didn't have the energy. Amelia came around to stand between him and the window, and only then did he acknowledge her presence. He gave her a look of mild irritation, craning his neck to see around her, wishing she would leave him to his dreams. "George tells me you haven't eaten today." Mulder shrugged, abandoning the ocean view and switching his attention to the blue sky he could see framing Amelia's head. "Or yesterday." "Not hungry." "Fox, you must eat. You'll lose all your strength." She leaned down toward him, concerned, and again blocked his view. This got a reaction. He looked directly at her for the first time since she had entered the room. "Why do I need strength?" he demanded. "I don't exactly have a strenuous lifestyle here." She sighed. "You know that you would have more freedom if you would stop trying to injure yourself," she pointed out. "I don't want to keep you locked up in here, but if you were successful in one of your suicide attempts, I would have to answer for it--to him. Surely you can see my desire to avoid that situation. When they allowed me to bring you here, it was with the understanding that you would be kept safe. If I don't keep my end of the bargain..." He made a noise of derision and dropped his eyes to his lap. "Why?" he asked in a voice that was more of a moan. Disgusted with himself, he fought to bring his emotions under control, and when he spoke again it was in a much steadier, colder tone. "Why do I have to be kept alive like this? Why can't you just let me do it? Who would even care?" Amelia caressed his face tenderly, and Mulder leaned back, trying to evade her touch. "I've told you why," she reminded him. "And I have no wish to endanger myself." In spite of his determination, his "other" self broke through once again, and the pleading need for freedom shone in his eyes. "I just want to go home," he told her softly, dropping his gaze from hers and plucking weakly at his pant leg. "I want Scully. I want Chinese take-out. I want to work. I want to have a life again. Or to die now..." he added in a voice that was almost inaudible. She pulled him to her for a hug, and he allowed it because he craved any kind of human comfort now, even if it came from his captor. When she released him she wiped a stray tear from his cheek--the only one he had allowed to escape. "I'll see what I can do to make it more bearable," she promised, and rose to leave him. "Amelia?" She paused and turned questioningly back to him. "I used to have a...a picture of Scully in my wallet," he said hesitantly. "When they took me it was in my pocket. Do you think...maybe...if I could just look at it for a few minutes..." He stopped, hating the raw pleading in his voice but knowing that he would do anything, anything at all just to get a brief glimpse of Scully. "Just a look? What could it hurt?" "I don't know if we still have it," she told him. "Your identification was destroyed. I'm not sure what became of the rest of the things you had on you." She was saddened to see the way his face fell. She had known it wouldn't be easy for a man like Fox to adapt to captivity, but had hoped it wouldn't be quite this hard on him. He was like a caged animal and she feared now that he would never learn to adjust to his new environment. The changes she'd see in him--one minute defiant and sarcastic and the next pleading and desperate--worried her. Part of her thought briefly that killing him might be the more merciful solution, but the consequences of that would be horrible to face. She had no intention of sacrificing herself, not even for Fox. ***** After determining that Mulder's wallet and all its contents had indeed been destroyed as soon as he'd arrived, Amelia picked up the phone again and dialed the man she feared most in the world. Surely he would be able to provide her with a photograph of Agent Scully. ***** When he heard her request, the smoking man sighed inwardly. He had hoped to avoid a face-to-face confrontation with Mulder, but it seemed as though it would be necessary now to keep the young agent from simply willing himself to die. After Amelia had repeated Mulder's hopeless words to him, he took a long drag on his cigarette and blew the smoke thoughtfully out his nose. "I'll be there in the morning," he told her. "And I'll bring some things to lift his spirits a little." ***** Scully almost didn't open the door when she saw who was outside, but he'd had ample opportunity to do her harm in the last few months and hadn't taken it, she reasoned, so surely he wouldn't hurt her now. Still, only the possibility that he had information about Mulder made her let him into her apartment. She kept her weapon handy. "Agent Scully," he said in greeting, and she stepped back, waiting silently for him to go on. "I have a proposition for you." "Will it get Mulder released?" "I'm afraid not." "No deal," she informed him coldly. He gave her a grim smile. "Don't you want to hear me out?" he asked idly, as if her answer made no difference to him either way. She stood silently and waited, unable to imagine that he had anything to say she would want to hear. "I'm offering you a chance to see for yourself that Agent Mulder is alive and unharmed." "Yeah, I saw how unharmed he was when your people were torturing him!" she snapped. "That was a direct result of your actions, Agent Scully, one that you were warned about in advance," he told her mildly. "He hasn't been hurt since that incident." Scully considered his words. So far every promise they had made to her concerning Mulder's treatment had been kept--as far as she knew. If he was truly willing to take her to Mulder, she could see for herself. She hesitated for a moment, uncertainly wondering if this was just another trick, or a trap she would be walking into. "You'll be taken to him, allowed to see him briefly to assure yourself that he's alive and well, and then returned here safely. You have my word on that, Agent Scully." "How much is your word worth?" she asked sarcastically. He reached into his pocket and extracted a package of cigarettes, expertly shaking one into his hand. "How much is your peace of mind worth?" he returned. "Or Mulder's? Are you aware that he's managed to convince himself that you're probably dead? That he thinks he's been lied to about your safety? I'm offering you a chance to let him know the truth." "Why?" she demanded. "What does Mulder's peace of mind matter to you?" When he made no answer, she gave voice to her suspicions. "He's dying, isn't he?" "Agent Scully, Mulder will be kept alive, in spite of his best efforts. He isn't happy, but he is far from dying. I do believe a visit from you would lift his spirits, however. Give him a reason to continue, so to speak." Scully closed her eyes, trying to mask her defeat at his mention of Mulder's torment. If she was walking into a trap, so be it--she had to trust this man, just this once, at least in this. "All right," she told him. "When do we go?" "Immediately." She followed him to a car parked in front of her building, and after a moment's hesitation climbed in as he held the door for her. They rode in silence for half an hour, finally arriving at what appeared to be a large pasture, empty but for the helicopter sitting in the middle of the open expanse of grass. Their driver left the road and bumped over the terrain until he pulled up to within about thirty feet of the helicopter. The pilot was already aboard, firing up his machine. Ignoring the smoking man's offer of assistance, Scully clambered into the helicopter and took a seat. After he had settled himself beside her, he reached into his coat pocket and withdrew a black strip of cloth. "I do regret this, Agent Scully, but you cannot be allowed to see where we're going." Scully looked at the blindfold for a moment, then nodded her head resignedly and turned to allow him to fasten it on her. In for a penny, in for a pound, she told herself wryly. Once he had the fabric firmly tied around her head, she settled back in her seat. Moments later she felt the sharp prick of a needle in her arm. "Hey!" she protested angrily. "It's a long ride. It will be better for you if you sleep through it. When you wake up, you'll be allowed to see Agent Mulder." Scully leaned back against the seat again, uncertain now. She had about fifteen minutes to worry whether or not she was making a terrible mistake before the drug claimed her and she slipped into unconsciousness. ***** DECEMBER 4 "Have you come to kill me, or to let me go?" Mulder asked as the smoking man approached his chair. His voice held only mild curiosity, as if either outcome was equally acceptable to him. "Neither, actually. To tell the truth, Agent Mulder, I have good news and bad news for you." Mulder laughed shortly. "And when have you ever told the truth?" The older man smiled, a chilling expression on his hardened face. "I'm telling it now. The good news is that Agent Scully is downstairs." Mulder's grip tightened on the arms of the chair and his face drained of color. "Why have you brought her here?" he hissed. "What have you done to her? You have me--leave her alone!" "Relax, Agent Mulder. She's unharmed. I brought her here so you could see that for yourself, and to prove to her the same about you. She'll be allowed up for a visit in a little while, but first--the bad news." Mulder settled back into the chair cautiously, uncertain whether to believe the reassurance that Scully was safe. He found himself tensing as he prepared himself for whatever bomb this man was about to drop in his lap. Somehow, he sensed the smoking man's idea of "bad news" would be almost unbearable. The elderly man glanced around casually, then seated himself in the chair that Amelia used when she visited. "I suppose Miss Steinmetz has told you why you're here?" Mulder nodded, unwilling to have any sort of conversation with this man--not now, while his defenses were so unreliable. "Has she given you any expectation of how long you'll be her guest?" "She said you'll let me out of here when I'm no longer a threat," Mulder replied shortly. "Which doesn't give me much hope, since you and I both know I will *always* be a threat to you and your conspiracies." His visitor looked slightly taken aback for the shortest of moments, then crossed one leg over the other with...could it really be forced nonchalance? He smiled again, a cold smile that chilled Mulder's blood. "You always were an intelligent young man," he commented lightly. "It's one of the things I've admired about you. That, and your willingness to do whatever it takes, accept any risk, to get what you want." Mulder crossed his arms and waited, giving no response. "Unfortunately," the smoker continued, "progress on perfecting the vaccine has been slower than we had hoped." He paused a moment to let that sink in. "How much slower?" Mulder ventured at last. A shrug. "We had planned on success within a couple of months. Now we find it could take years." Years. Mulder felt his chest compress at the word, and suddenly breathing became a terrible chore. Closing his eyes tightly, he concentrated on his respirations until he felt he had them under control, then looked over at his nemesis. "You're planning to keep me here forever," he stated quietly, hoping his "other" would not choose this moment to emerge; begging this man for his freedom would be more demeaning than he could endure. "Oh, I don't know, Mr. Mulder. Forever is a very long time. On the other hand, I don't think you should make any long-term plans just yet." He lit another of his infernal cigarettes, avoiding Mulder's eyes while he fumbled with the package and the match. After dropping the used matchstick on the windowsill, he finally turned back to the agent. "Why?" Mulder rasped, hands clenched tightly in his lap. "Why bother? Why not just kill me?" Smoke into the atmosphere. "I can't." "Then let me do it!" No answer. "Why?" This time a whisper, barely discernable. "I have my reasons," the older man replied, standing, his air casual. "Personal ones." "It isn't enough that you killed my father, that you had them abduct my sister, that my mother has suffered so much because of you. You won't be happy until my entire family is destroyed, will you? What is this sick need you have to tear us apart?" Mulder's voice had grown stronger with each word, until he almost felt like himself, but the effort cost him; he was breathing heavily by the time he finished. Ignoring the agent's outburst, the smoker dropped his cigarette into Mulder's half-empty water glass. As as long as you're safely tucked away here, I can be certain you won't endanger the project. And it would be a shame for Agent Scully to meet with some misfortune, should you decide to become less...cooperative." Mulder was out of his chair in a flash, his arm against the other man's throat, shoving his enemy against the wall. "You leave her alone, you bastard!" he raged, feeling the surge of adrenalin overcome his weakness. "This is between you and me. It doesn't concern her." The man shook Mulder off, seeming unfazed by the attack, but Mulder could see faint beads of sweat on his wrinkled forehead. "It can continue not to concern her, Agent Mulder. All you have to do is behave yourself." Mulder tried desperately to hide the faint trace of hope the words gave him. "Can you promise me that?" he demanded harshly. "If I agree to be a model prisoner, can you promise me that she'll be safe?" The smoker made a noise of amusement. "Oh, I wouldn't expect you to be a model prisoner, Mr. Mulder. I doubt you're capable." "But she'll be safe?" Eyes met eyes. "Of course." "And I'll be left alone? No using me as one of your lab rats?" A slight nod of assent. Mulder's eyes held his for a long moment, and then the younger man nodded slightly and turned away. He didn't know whether he could trust the promise he'd been given, but he really had no choice. If his incarceration would guarantee Scully's safety he would willingly stay here forever, even though it would be the worst kind of damnation. "I'll send Agent Scully up," the visitor remarked mildly, and left the room, locking the door securely behind him. ***** Scully opened her eyes to the bright light of morning. She was lying on a bed in a room she did not recognize. She sat up quickly, swinging her legs to the floor and carefully standing. After a minute of allowing her body to adjust to the lack of motion and the residue of the drug in her system, she was able to walk somewhat confidently across the room. Scully half expected the door to be locked, but when she turned the knob it opened easily. Cautiously, she poked her head out into the hall and looked both ways. It appeared deserted, so she stepped outside the bedroom and made her way down the corridor until she came to a staircase leading both down and up. Quiet sounds of conversation drifted up to her, and with a careful glance in that direction, Scully chose up. It was the most likely place for them to have Mulder stashed. She'd gotten no more than three steps toward the third floor when she was confronted by a woman, about her own size, flanked by two of the biggest men Scully had ever seen. "Ah, Agent Scully, good morning," the woman said brightly, gesturing toward the downstairs flight, apparently willing to ignore the fact that Scully had been snooping. Scully's eyes narrowed as she recognized the woman who had tortured Mulder on the videotape. "Who are you?" she asked, firmly standing her ground. "My name is Amelia Steinmetz. Welcome to Verlassen." Amelia's smile seemed genuine, and Scully felt a moment of confusion. Why was this woman being so hospitable? "Where's Mulder?" Amelia nodded knowingly. "Of course. You want to see your partner, and you will, very soon. Someone else is with him right now, and as soon as he's finished you'll be taken upstairs to see Fox. Will you join us for breakfast?" She continued downward, and when Scully hesitated, one of the men gently grasped her arm above the elbow and attempted to escort her. She shook his hand off angrily, but, not knowing what else to do, followed Amelia. They approached a long table, laden with food, and Scully reluctantly took the seat she was offered. She wanted to hurl the heavy dishes at Amelia's head, wrap her fingers around the blond woman's throat and choke the life from her, but instead she remained politely silent. Her defiance now would not help her partner. A plate of food appeared in front of her, placed there by one of the men, none of whom had yet spoken, and she welcomed the delicious aroma in spite of herself. She had not eaten since early the day before, and should an opportunity to rescue Mulder present itself, she needed her strenth. With that in mind, she muttered a resentful "thank you," and began to pick at the fruit on the plate, her eyes wandering the room. Amelia attempted to draw Scully into casual conversation, possibly thinking to put her at ease, but Scully was not distracted. Finally, she put down her fork. "Look, Miss Steinmetz--" she began firmly. "Amelia." "--Amelia, I appreciate your hospitality, but this really isn't a social call. I was brought here to see Mulder. I want to see him now. Where is he?" "Anxiously awaiting your visit, Agent Scully," said a voice from behind her, and she turned to find the smoking man standing in the doorway. "He's ready for her now," he continued, directing his last words to Amelia Steinmenz. Without a word, Amelia rose and, gesturing for Scully to follow, led her up the stairs. ***** "Mulder!" She managed to contain herself until the others left and they were alone, then ran to him, eagerly throwing herself into his waiting embrace. Mulder gripped her tightly, running his hands through her hair, over her face, up and down her back and arms, as if to assure himself that she was real, flesh-and-blood real, and not just another of his dreams. Scully drank him in with her eyes, unable to get enough of him but saddened by the changes she detected. He was pale, a weak shadow of himself, and she could tell that his captivity had been harder on him than she'd dared imagine. "Oh Scully, I never thought I'd see you again," he murmured, burying his face in her neck as he tried to wrap himself completely around her. "Mulder, are you all right? Have they hurt you?" she asked, drawing back enough to get a good look at him. He shook his head briefly. "No, they haven't hurt me. Not really." "Except for that one time," she pointed out. He made a small, disparaging gesture. "Mulder, I'm so sorry. That happened because of me. I just wanted to find you and bring you home, I didn't really think they would--" "Don't, Scully," he interrupted. "Don't blame yourself. I'm glad you were looking for me." He let a tiny smile creep over his lips. "In fact, I counted on it. But now you see that I'm safe, you can give up the search." She went silent and still for a moment, surprised at his unexpected words, and did not fail to notice that Mulder turned away from her. He would only have done that if he had something to hide, something he didn't want her to read in his eyes. "Mulder, I'm going to find a way to get you out of here," she insisted, but he cut her off. "No, Scully. You can't." Her face registered her confusion, and she waited for him to explain. "I have to stay here," he told her, fighting down the "other" that wanted to take her in his arms and beg her to help him, fighting down the tinge of desperation that tried to color his voice. She shook her head impatiently. "Mulder--" "No, Scully, listen to me. I have to stay." ***** Mulder shrugged, hoping his attempt at nonchalance was less transparent than the smoking man's had been. Scully wasn't ready to accept his words. "This isn't like you," she insisted. "The Mulder I know would fight them, fight to the death. He'd--*you* would never give in." "Scully, I haven't given in," he answered, his voice almost harsh. "It's just--it's better if you don't try to rescue me. It's better if I just...wait until they're ready to release me." Her eyes were shocked, angry, and although his own implored her to accept his words at face value, he knew she could not. "What did they do to you?" she demanded tightly. "What did they say? What did they threaten you with?" Even he could barely hear his muttered response. "You." "What?" Mulder turned fully toward the window now, his hands gripping the steel bars as he leaned on them, head bowed, eyes closed. It was so hard to keep control of himself now, was growing more difficult by the second, and he was afraid of losing himself in front of Scully. That would be the ultimate humiliation, to appear weak before her. With a supreme effort, he straightened his shoulders and answered. "They promised me you would be protected." "And you believed them?" He was silent for several long seconds. "I have to believe them." She watched him for a timee, her heart aching for him, seeing the position in which he had been placed and knowing that Mulder--the man that Mulder was--had been left with no choice but to agree with their demands. Finally she shook her head sadly. "Oh, Mulder...don't do this." He refused to look at her. He stood at the window, his skin almost translucent in the beautiful morning sunlight, staring out at the ocean--out past the bars that had become his life. Finally, when long, uncomfortable minutes had passed, he broke his silence. "I don't know what you want me to say, Scully," he said, and his voice was fragile; he felt the fragility, but the effort to be normal was simply too much. "I'm here. They're not going to let me go. You can't get me out, and I haven't found a way to escape. It's better than death." She saw a tight little smile grace his lips. "At first I didn't think so, but it is." "Mulder..." Her voice trailed off, and he was glad, afraid that too many words from her might finally cause him to break. "Go, Scully," he said in a low voice, turning partially toward her but not quite meeting her eyes. "Go back home and live your life. Do your work. Make a family. Forget about me." He heard her small gasp of shock. "Forget you, Mulder?" she asked, her lips trembling with emotion. "How can I?" It was too much. His face drained of its last bit of color, and a second later she was swept up fiercely into his arms, his tears warm on the top of her head. "Maybe not to forget," he choked. "No, on second thought, don't...don't forget me, Scully. I couldn't bear it if I thought you had." Scully returned his embrace, wrapping her arms so tightly around him that it seemed she would pull him completely inside herself simply by the force of sheer will. "I couldn't, Mulder. You know I couldn't." He tilted her face gently upwards with his long, slender fingers, stroking away the streaks of moisture that marred the perfection of her cheekbones. He tried not to beg. "Please, Scully, if you ever cared for me...just do as they say. Walk away from it." He met her shimmering eyes and fell into their depths, drowning as he had so many times before, but this time he knew there would be no rescue. "Don't try to help me. Let me at least live out the rest of my life knowing..." He took a deep, shuddering breath and stared out the window again, fighting for composure. "...knowing you're safe." He could tell she wanted to argue, to cry, to rail against him for giving up, but to his relief, she instead nodded in reluctant agreement. His mouth opened again, and to his shock, he found words pouring from the core of his soul, words he never thought he'd speak--words he knew she needed to hear now, when she was losing him. "You do know that I've loved you all these years, don't you, Scully?" He smiled through the tears that threatened to fall again, fighting them back with a will, then rubbed his thumb lightly over her chin and gently traced her bottom lip. "Almost from the beginning," she whispered, and he understood, he knew she wasn't responding to his question, she was affirming her own emotion. He only wished it had all happened years before, without this catalyst to separate them. Scully reached her hand to his own face, touching it softly, and he leaned into her hand, resting his cheek against her warmth. It was nearly his undoing, so after indulging himself in the feel of her for a few seconds, he drew back slightly. "I've given up everything in my search for the truth," he told her seriously. "I won't sacrifice you as well. Not again." She opened her mouth as if to protest, and he silenced her with his fingertips. "I know you'll want to keep searching for a way to free me, but if you continue, they'll kill you. Or me." He could tell that his words gave her pause. She'd be perfectly willing to risk her own life in her quest for Mulder's return, but the idea that he might suffer because of her actions would keep her in check. At least, he hoped that was the case. "Don't offer up yourself needlessly, Scully. Promise me. It won't get me back." His eyes bored deeply into her, compelling her, willing her to accept his decision and move on. "Maybe we could deal with them," she ventured hesitantly. At that, Mulder gave a tired smile. "And offer them what? Our silence? I already tried that. The risk is too great for them. If we didn't keep our end of the bargain, killing us in retribution would only be a minor satisfaction to them. The damage would have been done." "I just feel so helpless. Mulder, what about Skinner? He could help--" He shook his head firmly. "If you do that, they'll kill you. And probably me as well." He touched her forehead, the place where her cancer had been, first with his fingers and then gently pressing his lips there. "For now, we have to play their game," he whispered sadly. "I've turned it over in my mind a million times, Scully." Again that tiny grin, that flash of his old self. "Believe me, I have plenty of time to think in here." She sniffed lightly, delicately, and he was fiercely proud of her for refusing to allow her tears to fall. This was the brave, proud woman he'd fallen in love with, and before Mulder even guessed his own intentions, his lips pressed to hers, then tried to draw back just that quickly. Her hands behind his neck stopped him and of her own accord, Scully deepened the kiss until their mouths were open and their tongues were exploring, battling, fighting the knowledge that although this was their first kiss, it could very well be their last. Giving in, Mulder allowed her to take him to a small part of heaven, if only for a moment. Then reality intruded. The kiss was broken, but not the embrace, when they heard the sound of a key in the lock. His arms tightened spasmodically around her for a moment, then released her in quiet acceptance of the fate that awaited him. "It's time to go," Amelia announced from the doorway. ***** Scully glanced at her quickly, and then back at Mulder. His face had taken on an impassive look, and she knew he was forcing himself to maintain control in front of his captor. He placed his hands on her shoulders, kissed her forehead again, then with a whispered, "I'll miss you," dropped his arms and stepped away. Their eyes locked for a long moment, and he gave a slight nod as she reluctantly turned away. Scully couldn't look back as she walked out the door, leaving Mulder behind. She knew if she did she would break down. She left the room without another word. ***** Mulder saw Amelia's expression, a mixture of sympathy and determination, before she closed the door, locking him securely away from the only person in his life that had ever loved him unconditionally. He felt Scully's absence as surely as he would feel the loss of breath should his respirations cease. Mulder stood there for a few more minutes, amazed that he could actually feel his heart breaking. Finally he wrapped his arms around himself in a fruitless attempt to ward off the pain, and slowly sank to the floor, surrendering to the "other" Mulder, giving in to the harsh, wracking sobs that tore through his body. He was alone. Abandoned. *Verlassen.* ********** DECEMBER 25 He glanced at her dully as she entered the room, then turned back to the window. Amelia didn't spend as much time here as she had in the past, mostly because Mulder stared blankly at the ocean whenever she tried to talk to him. She wasn't sure if it was simple depression or if he held her solely to blame for his incarceration, but whatever the reason, conversation with him had ceased to exist. It was something she regretted; he was an interesting man. However, this was a special day, and she had a special item for him, one that she'd been saving since the day of Scully's visit. He had looked so...broken as Scully left him that day, and Amelia was certain that was the exact moment the will to live had completely left Fox. She didn't know about his "other" self, didn't realize he'd been constantly at war with that part of his personality for months until at last the "other" had won out, but there was one thing of which she was very certain--Fox had given up. Ignoring his disinterest, she pulled up her customary chair and placed a gaily colored package in his lap. "Merry Christmas, Fox," she said quietly, and waited to see what he would do. For a moment there was no reaction at all, as if it took his brain several seconds to process her words, and then, so quickly she almost missed it, a look of intense pain crossed his features and was gone. He glanced down at the box in his lap with a complete lack of curiosity, then wordlessly went back to studying the horizon. After a few minutes of silence, Amelia reached for the package. "Here, let me help you," she told him, and slid the ribbon off so the lid could be lifted. When Mulder showed no inclination to open his present, she pulled the top off the box herself and dropped it to the floor. "Look at it, Fox," she commanded softly, and finally he lowered his gaze to the gift in his lap. A beautifully framed color photograph of Scully stared up at him, and Mulder's breath caught as he looked into her eyes. Amelia watched him carefully as he slowly reached out a finger, just one finger, and touched the glass almost reverently. As if uncertain that this treasure was really for him, Mulder looked up at Amelia searchingly. Her heart ached at the pain and hopelessness in his eyes. "It's yours," she told him, nodding reassuringly. A quick smile touched his lips, and although it didn't stay, its ghost remained, and suddenly his eyes weren't quite as lifelessly grey as they had been before. Amelia shifted uncomfortably. Moments like this should not be shared. "I'll put it here on the table for you," she said briskly, and reached to take the photograph from him. Mulder didn't speak as Amelia placed the frame on the table, but a small distressed noise resonated from his throat and when she turned back to him, she was stunned to see tears forming. "Scully," he whispered slowly, reaching his hand toward the frame. She immediately returned his gift to him and, he took it with both hands, pulling the picture close to himself in a protective hug. Mulder closed his eyes, bowing his head over the frame, and Amelia saw sadly that tears began to color the fabric of his sweatpants as they fell. She again felt as though she were intruding upon an incredibly private moment of grief, but was at a loss as to how to comfort Mulder, or if he even could be comforted. Silently she picked up the box and the ribbon and stole from the room, wondering if the photograph had been a stroke of genius, or a very bad mistake. Mulder sat for hours with the picture clutched firmly to his breast. ***** JANUARY 5 Mulder lay in his bed, carefully considering his next move. It had to be quick. It had to be sure. There would only be one chance, if that. It had taken him weeks after his last suicide attempt to reach this point, but the days and days of loneliness had driven him once again to the brink of despair. He was ready to try again. This time was going to be a lot more painful, he knew, since anything that could reasonably be used as a weapon had been removed from his rooms. All but the furniture, he thought with a grim smile of determination as he scooted himself to a sitting position against the headboard. It stood five feet above the bed and was made of solid cherrywood. Mulder had actually laughed at himself for not realizing its potential in the first place, only discovering it when he had flung his arm against the headboard during a nightmare and raised a nasty bruise. Since then he had been thinking, planning, weighing the odds of success against the consequences of failure. He could do it successfully, he finally decided, if the timing was just right. Should they discover his act too soon, they would simply nurse him back to health--and then, no doubt, lock him in a padded room for his own "safety." He couldn't endure one more day of "safety." ----- His uneaten breakfast had just been collected, and he knew George thought he was taking a nap. He should be able to count on not being disturbed for several hours, and Mulder hoped fervently that it was long enough. The unfortunate drawback to his plan was that he was almost certain not to die immediately. He felt behind his head to make sure he hadn't dragged any pillows or blankets along when he had moved into position. He wanted nothing there to pad his head as it impacted with the solid wood. It was time. Without further hesitation, Mulder leaned forward, took a deep breath, counted to three, and deliberately whammed his head back against the wood as hard as he could. The pain was incredible, something he could never have prepared for. Survival is instinctive, and even though he had tried to psych himself up for this, he still found himself involuntarily drawing back a little just before the impact, thereby lessening its effect. Nonetheless, Mulder was determined, so taking another breath and ignoring the nausea caused by the first blow, he slammed himself against the headboard again. This time things went black for a moment and with a desperate sob he fought to maintain consciousness long enough to finish the job. He had never felt anything as agonizing as this, not even when he'd been six years old and had broken his femur falling off the jungle gym. Nothing, *nothing* could ever hurt this badly. And yet he had to do it again, because he was still conscious, still breathing, still all-too-aware. One more really good blow might be enough, he thought, willing himself to inflict another. His breaths short and panting now, no longer deep and measured, he leaned forward farther than ever preparing to deliver the final attack on his battered head. His eyes were closed and so deep was his concentration that he never heard the door to his rooms being flung open or George's cry of dismay when he entered the bedroom. Mulder had just gotten up his nerve, after battling a moment of almost debilitating nausea, when he felt strong hands grabbing his shoulders, holding him down...stopping him. Keeping him here. "I need help in here!" George bellowed, and Mulder moaned in fear, frustration and agony. George's voice cut through his head like a machete. He cursed his luck at being discovered once again, and tears of despair coursed their way down his face when George forced him to lay gently back against the pillows. "Don't stop me," he entreated through the pain, "please...don't stop me..." A moment later George cursed and hauled him back to a sitting position, shoving a section of the sheet to his face. For one happy second Mulder thought George was going to smother him, and he tried to help by burying his nose in the fabric, but instead George just dabbed at the blood that had begun to pour from his nose. By the time the nosebleed was under control, Amelia and several of the others had arrived, including Dr. Tenger, whom Amelia had invited to stay at the island for the next few months on retainer. She'd commented mildly that she was certain Fox would require his services sooner or later. Now it seemed she was proven correct. "Turn him over," Dr. Tenger instructed, and George picked Mulder up as if he were no more than a tiny kitten and deposited him face down on the bed as Amelia looked on, tight-lipped with worry and anger. "Carefully!" the doctor ordered, but George had already dropped Mulder. After checking Mulder over thoroughly, and making sure his nose hadn't begun bleeding again when George had flipped him, Dr. Tenger gently bandaged the bleeding gash that Mulder had managed to create. "Don't let him sleep," he ordered as he left the room. "He does need to rest, however. Watch him. I'll check back shortly." "Don't worry, Doctor, I won't let him fall asleep," Amelia replied grimly as the men left the room. Mulder had kept his eyes tightly closed during the entire examination, afraid to face her wrath, and wracked with disappointment that his latest attempt at checking out of Hotel Verlassen had failed. Now that they were alone, he risked opening them just a tiny slit. She was sitting in a chair beside his bed, studying him thoughtfully, and when she saw him peeking at her she frowned. "You might as well wake up and face the music, Fox," she informed him. "You aren't fooling me." He gave a small sigh and opened his eyes fully, thankful that the light in the room was dim. The pain in the back of his head was agonizing by now, and he was fairly certain, from past experience, that they wouldn't be giving him any pain medication this soon--not the good stuff anyway. "What else did you expect me to do?" he asked in a raspy whisper. She reached over and brushed a lock of his hair away from his eyes so she could look at him fully. Her face was still grim. "What did I expect? The unexpected, to be certain, but not this. Never this. Not from you...from the man I'd been led to believe you were. This was nothing but a cowardly little stunt, Fox." He almost laughed--*Little stunt?* He'd just tried to off himself again, in the most creative way to date, and she called it a *little stunt?*--then clenched his eyelids shut as the pain slammed into him in a huge wave. The doctor had given him an injection of anti-nausea medication, but it clearly wasn't working; Mulder was feeling more and more ill every second. With great effort, he raised himself up on his elbows, ignoring the lightning bolt through his head, just in time to avoid retching all over himself. Then promptly fell face-first into the bilious mess. As soon as Amelia realized what was happening she yelled for them to get Dr. Tenger again. She held Mulder up as he vomited all over the sheets, wiping at his face with one corner of the fabric. When he finally finished, she pulled his trembling body close to hers and ran her hand over his back, murmuring soothing words to him as Dr. Tenger administered yet another dose of medication. The doctor checked Mulder's pupillary responses and seemed pleased. Apparently he hadn't managed to do any further damage to himself by vomiting. George and Martin carefully plucked Mulder from the bed and placed him gently in the chair, changed the sheets and returned him to the bed, all in the space of a few minutes. By the time Mulder was settled back under the covers he was freezing, and fighting hard not to fall asleep. He had been ordered by Amelia to stay awake, and feared dropping off now might just try the last of her patience with him. He didn't know what she would do but he did realize that he was completely at her mercy, and that she was not above hurting him if she felt it necessary. She'd already proven that. "Keep him awake for another couple of hours," the doctor told them. "Then it's all right to let him drift off to sleep, but wake him up every half hour or so until about mid-afternoon, just to make sure he still knows who and where he is. If he shows any disorientation, or you're unable to rouse him, call me immediately. Surely by now we all know the drill," he sighed. "George, Martin, why don't you take shifts," Amelia suggested. "He seems to feel most comfortable with you two." George settled in to watch Mulder, and Mulder covered his face with his hands and tried to lose himself in his own mind. He had tried. He didn't know what else to do. ***** JANUARY 21 Mulder lay in the middle of the huge bed, pretending to sleep while Jacob watched over him. Since his attempt two weeks ago to bash his brains out on the headboard, Amelia had decreed that he was to be watched round-the-clock, thereby removing any and all privacy Mulder may have enjoyed before. He didn't realize he missed it until he tried to go to the bathroom and was followed inside by his enormous keeper of the day. Since then he'd gotten somewhat used to having someone else around him all the time, but several of the men still made him feel uneasy, although he was unable to pinpoint exactly why. None of them had ever treated him badly, but a couple of them made his skin crawl. He had learned to limit his bathroom time after that. One of those who gave him the creepy-crawlies was sitting watch over him now, which was why Mulder was pretending to still be deep in slumber. Jacob had a look in his eye at times that made Mulder distinctly nervous, and Mulder wasn't sure if the look meant Jacob wanted to thrash him within an inch of his life or throw him down and fuck him silly. Maybe both, he thought with a shudder. The door opened, and Mulder risked squinting a peek to see who was entering. Mentally, he rolled his eyes. Great, he thought. Just great. Another day with Ian. Ian was the guard Mulder had originally though of as 'Olaf', the largest of the men who watched him and another who made Mulder uneasy. Unfortunately he wasn't given a choice in who his handler for the day was; they rotated--sooner or later it was bound to work around to these two. "He sure is a pretty boy, ain't he?" Ian smirked as he took in Mulder's still form curled under the bedclothes. "Yeah, real pretty," Jacob agreed. "I've been sitting here for the last hour thinking how much fun I could have with him." Ian gave a furtive glance behind him to make certain he had closed the door. "I won't tell if you won't tell," he winked, and Mulder felt his bowels turn to water. He fought to maintain his even, steady breathing so as not to give himself away. "You mean now? While he's sleeping?" Jacob gaped stupidly. Ian leered again. "He won't be sleeping once I get my cock up his ass," he vowed, leaning over the man in the bed and reaching to draw back the sheet. Like lightning, Mulder threw the covers aside and tried to scramble off the bed, but Jacob grabbed him around the waist and yanked him back. He wrenched Mulder's arms behind his back and pulled his victim up against his chest. Ian caught Mulder's legs and, with one swift pull, stripped him of the sweat pants he'd been wearing for warmth. "HELP!" Mulder yelled with as much voice as he could muster, and was silenced a moment later by Ian's hard slap across his face. "Shut up, bitch!" he growled as Jacob clamped his big, beefy hand down over Mulder's mouth. Ian reached for Mulder's boxers, and Mulder began to fight like a wildcat, managing to sink his teeth into the hand covering his mouth. This only earned him another slap which sent his ears ringing. The hand was replaced over his mouth, much more firmly this time, and Mulder found himself getting lightheaded from lack of oxygen. Frantically he sucked in air through his nose as he continued to kick and try to avoid Ian. Ian grabbed both of Mulder's ankles with his hands and forced his legs to the bed, then climbed on Mulder's thighs, pinning him helplessly to the mattress. Unable to move, Mulder watched as Ian triumphantly produced a large pocketknife and flipped it open with a sinister smile. He shut his eyes briefly, then forced them open again and fixed his gaze on the knife, following it down until he could only see the top of Ian's head bending over him. Seconds later a cool rush of air caressed his genitals as Ian sliced his boxers away from his body. Mulder's struggles were becoming weaker as exhaustion threatened to overtake him, and there was one horrifying moment when he knew with absolute certainty that he was about to be brutally raped. Ian stood up and began unzipping his jeans, and Mulder closed his eyes, hoping that they would at least do him the courtesy of killing him when they were finished. "Ian! Jacob! What the HELL do you think you're doing?" Amelia's voice cracked through the room and all three men jumped in surprise. Mulder felt the hand over his mouth relax as Jacob stuttered, trying to come up with a good explanation for why the two of them were holding a completely naked Mulder down on the bed. Finally he stopped trying to speak, released his grip on Mulder's mouth and wrists, and eased himself out from under the smaller man. Mulder grabbed for the sheet and drew it over his entire body, burying himself in the safety of the covers and leaving only his eyes peeking out. Once safely hidden, he waited to see what Amelia would do. She was red-faced and trembling with fury. "Have you forgotten what will happen to all of us if we hurt Fox?" she spat at them. "Fuck each other if you must, but you will not touch him, do you understand me? I have no intention of suffering the consequences of your actions. Now go. I'll deal with you later." Mulder watched from his hiding place as the two men slunk from the room, completely cowed by their much smaller, much fiercer mistress. The idea of the men who, just a few minutes earlier, had been manhandling him as if he were nothing more threatening than a plush toy animal being ordered away by the diminutive blond struck him as suddenly hilarious. "I'm so sorry, Fox," Amelia began, turning to him after Jacob and Ian had left the room. She stopped in surprise at the shaking bed and the noise it was emitting. Walking over and gently tugging the covers away from around Mulder's head, Amelia found tears streaming down his face and his body hitching with sobbing laughter. "Oh...Fox," she said in a half laugh, sitting on the bed and pulling him to her. "They didn't hurt you, did they?" He burrowed into her embrace and shook his head quickly, his desperate laughter quickly turning to real sobs as shock set in. His "other" had completely taken over now, he realized from somewhere outside his body. As a spectator, he watched while she rocked him back and forth, rubbing his back and smoothing his hair for a long time until finally he began to calm down. Still she held him, and eventually his breathing slowed and he dropped into an exhausted sleep, merging back with his "other" just before losing consciousness. His dreams were of his body, split neatly in two, neither side alive, both halves bleeding, bleeding, until he simply melted into the sand of Verlassen's beautiful beach. ----- Amelia watched as Fox slipped into sleep, then eased him out of her lap and down to the bed, quietly covering him. She left the rooms, locking the door securely behind her, and went to make another phone call. ***** JANUARY 22 Mulder moaned softly in his sleep and rolled over, pulling the sheet with him. Martin put down the tray of food he'd brought and pulled the sheet away from Mulder. Mulder's eyes flew open and he scrambled quickly to the other side of the bed, a look of abject terror on his face. "Relax, Fox. I'm an avowed heterosexual, and I like my women willing." Martin smiled easily and went about straightening the bedroom, careful to keep his distance from Mulder. "Sit up. Eat your breakfast. Nobody's going to hurt you, I promise." Mulder regarded him warily, letting his eyes drift to the tray of food. For the first time in days, he actually felt as if he might be able to eat something, but he had no intention of getting any closer to Martin than necessary. He refused to take his eyes off the other man. Martin, noticing his uneasiness, took the chair beside the bed and dragged it over against the wall on the other side of the room, then sat down and made himself comfortable. "Go ahead and eat, Fox. I'll sit over here." Cautiously, Mulder moved across the bed to the tray and picked up a slice of toast. He raised it to his mouth, keeping his eyes on Martin the entire time. Martin saw how nervous Mulder was, so he picked a book at random off the shelf beside his chair and settled himself to read, glancing over the pages occasionally to check on the progress his charge was making. Mulder eventually cleaned the entire plate, finishing his first complete meal in weeks. When he was done he sat back against the pillows, uncertain of what came next. "You need to have a shower," Martin commented, putting the book he'd been pretending to read back in its place. Mulder stiffened at the comment, but knew it was Amelia's order, and that Martin would see that it was carried out. When Mulder hesitated, the big man se sighed and stood up. "You can do it yourself, or I can drag you in there and do it for you, but it's going to happen. It's your call, Fox." Mulder considered for a moment. Once he'd awakened, alone, after the rape attempt, he had donned a clean pair of boxers and sweatpants as well as a long-sleeved sweatshirt. He wore it still, since he hadn't felt comfortable removing even one item of clothing the night before when he climbed into bed. He wanted to get cleaned up, but at the same time loathed and feared the idea of being naked and vulnerable. When Martin didn't back down, Mulder slid off the bed and stood uncertainly for a moment, then went to the dresser and pulled out clean boxers and sweats. He started for the bathroom, hesitating when he had to walk in front of Martin. "I'm not going to lay a finger on you unless you force me to," Martin assured him, and with a hopeless sigh, Mulder decided his suspicion could gain him nothing. If Martin wanted him, Martin could certainly take him easily. He walked quickly into the bathroom and his guard allowed him to close the door behind him, for which Mulder was profoundly grateful. He hurried quickly through his shower and threw on his clothes, terrified that at any moment the door would be thrown open and he would be dragged out and violated. When he emerged from the bathroom fifteen minutes later, he discovered Amelia had returned. "How are you, Fox?" she asked solicitously, and Mulder shrugged casually. "Okay," he told her. "Come, sit down. Let's talk." She walked to the window and gestured to his chair, and after a moment's hesitation, with another long look at Martin, he crossed the room and sat beside her. Nervously Mulder twisted his fingers together in his lap, refusing to look at Amelia. He didn't know what she was going to do to him now, but somehow he was sure it was going to involve another loss of his freedom or privacy. There was so little remaining now that he had almost nothing left to take away, but he was certain Amelia wouldn't let him go unpunished. In the terror and confusion of losing himself to the "other," Mulder was convinced he must have been somehow at fault for yesterday's debacle. The fact that the idea made no sense didn't penetrate his consciousness, not now, after all these months of captivity. He was a mere shadow of himself now, and sometimes, in private moments, he wondered if Scully would still want this weak, frail, damaged Mulder, should he ever taste freedom again. "What are we going to do with you?" Amelia asked, a slightly indulgent smile on her face. "Let me go home?" he responded in a sarcastically hopeful tone, irritated at the way she spoke to him, as if she were his mother and he no more than an unruly toddler. She ignored his comment. "I have to keep you under watch, or you'll no doubt try to strangle yourself with the bedsheets or something." Mulder raised an eyebrow thoughtfully, as if considering the option, and she sighed. "This leaves me with a bit of a problem," she continued, obviously not in the mood for his sense of humor. "I can't run the risk of you attracting any more of my help--I can't spare the rest of them." He glanced up at her, suddenly sober. Surely she didn't mean--? "Ian and Jacob are...gone. They've been dealt with. Don't worry, Fox, they'll never be able to bother you again." Gone. Mulder supposed that meant she'd had them killed, and a quick look over at Martin confirmed his suspicion. Mulder slumped back into the chair, hating the fact that all he felt at the deaths of two men was relief. All the same, it was surprising that he, a lowly prisoner, rated that type of vengeance. "I think what I'll have to do is stick with Martin--you seem to do all right around him--and one other. George?" George. George was gruff and stern, but he had never been unkind, and Mulder had never felt his skin crawl when George looked at him. George had never run his eyes up and down Mulder's body the way Ian had done on occasion. He looked down at his lap again, feeling the awful defeat overtake him, and nodded once. George would be all right. "Now, as for you." She shook her head again and sighed heavily. "I know if you get another chance to hurt yourself you'll take it, and I don't know what else to do to prevent it except immobilize you completely." Mulder's head shot up and he was already wondering how best to form his plea for mercy when she said, "I'm not planning to do that, so don't panic." He sat back heavily, eyes closed, exhaling a long breath of relief. His desire to joke around was completely gone, chased away by her threat. Amelia leaned very close to him, so close their knees were almost touching, and dropped her voice half an octave. He looked up into her serious face and waited. Her words caressed over his cheek, a warning he dared not ignore. "However, rest assured, I'll do what I must. The next time you get the urge to do yourself harm, Fox, take a moment to picture yourself tied to your bed twenty-four hours a day." He kept his gaze level, but paled slightly at her words--he knew they were spoken without a hint of insincerity. If she thought she had to keep him completely restrained, she would do so. End of discussion. He fought his "other," fought valiantly, and thought he'd won until he opened his mouth and heard the "other" speak. "I--" He stopped and swallowed convulsively, willing the words not to come to his lips, losing the battle completely. "Don't. Please. I'll--I'll behave." Amelia waited a few seconds to answer, and Mulder felt sweat bead up on his brow. Finally she spoke a single word, "Good," and left the room. Mulder watched her go, and his eyes had become empty again. He hated himself. ***** FEBRUARY 13 "C'mon, Mulder, you have to eat something or I'll be in trouble," Martin said, his voice strangely gentle for such a large man. He urged a bite of perfectly scrambled eggs toward Mulder's mouth. Mulder stared blankly out the window, unseeing. He was gone. The "other" had taken over. He made no response as Martin pressed the food to his lips, except to open his mouth a fraction of an inch. Martin was able to tuck the eggs inside, but the recipient of the chef's efforts didn't make a move to chew or swallow. He just sat quietly, his vacant, sad expression unchanging. ------ Martin sighed and rubbed his forehead with his free hand. It was going to be another long day with Mulder, he could tell. Only a couple of weeks ago the man had seemed almost normal, but now... Martin found himself wondering how much longer Mulder would last. Things had been pretty good after he and George had been assigned to guard Mulder exclusively, and he'd even had some interesting conversations with his charge at first, the most enlightening being when he'd asked if Martin would call him by his last name. "Please," he'd said, and Martin could tell Mulder hated the way that word spilled so easily from him these days. Martin was willing to bet the only time the word 'please' had crossed Mulder's lips before Verlassen was as a courtesy; Mulder didn't seem the type of man to beg. Now it prefaced nearly every sentence he uttered. "Everybody here calls me Fox. I hate that name. Back home--" He'd broken off for a second, turning to face the window so Martin couldn't see his desolate expression. "I'd prefer it if you would just call me Mulder," he'd finished, having gotten his breathing under control. "Just Mulder." "Mulder. Sure, I can do that," Martin had agreed easily, and a new bond had been forged between them, albeit a very small one--a certain type of trust had been created. Now, sitting here in front of the eternal, blasted window, Martin was getting fed up. Mulder had become less and less responsive over the past few days, and Martin knew if he didn't manage to get some food into the younger man soon, Mulder was going to waste away into nothingness. Trying desperately to get some show of emotion from Mulder, he remarked snidely, "Maybe I could get Ian up here to hold you while I forced it into your mouth." He immediately regretted his words when Mulder's blank expression turned to one of loathing and he shifted his eyes from the ocean to Martin's face. Mulder swallowed quickly, and asked in a low voice, "They're dead, aren't they? They were killed because of me." "No, Mulder," Martin replied, sneaking another bite of egg into the prisoner's reluctant mouth. "They were killed because they tried to rape you. It's not quite the same thing. They put us all in danger with their actions." ----- Mulder smiled a tiny, sad smile. "Even locked away I can still get people killed," he commented. "You know," Martin replied casually, spearing some fruit on the tines and offering it to Mulder, putting the fork down when it was ignored, "it's great how you take the weight of the world on yourself. I mean--who needs Jesus when you're so willing to atone for everyone else's sins?" "You don't understand." Martin shrugged. "Try me." Mulder glanced over at him, as if sizing up Martin's ability to comprehend his level of responsibility. "I got Scully's sister killed. I almost got Scully killed...so many times. She's safe now, though." His eyes drifted over to the photograph of Scully that was never out of his sight, being carried faithfully from room to room as he moved about the apartment. It was as if Mulder knew, deep within his own mind, that if he didn't have Scully with him, he would lose sight of why he was enduring this imprisonment, and if he lost sight of that he would surrender completely in the madness that threatened to engulf him. His suspicions, those that had been growing steadily more certain for months now, were suddenly overwhelming, and he wanted--no, he *needed*--reassurance. "Do you think she really is safe, Martin? Do you think he lied to me? What if she needs me to take care of her, or protect her, and I'm not there?" As quickly as he'd changed before, he changed again; the "other" covered his face with his hands and tried to block out the image of Scully lying in her hospital bed wracked with the disease that had so nearly taken her life. "What if her cancer's come back and I'm not there for her?" Martin reached out, taking one of Mulder's hands and pulling it away from his face in order to see a bloodshot hazel eye peeking out. "Mulder, she's safe." Mulder glanced sidewise at him, the one visible eye focusing on Martin's face. "She's safe and she's well." Mulder dropped his other hand and gazed at Martin eagerly. "You know about Scully?" he asked excitedly. "What she's doing? How she's been? Can you tell me about her? Martin, please, tell me-- what do you know?" Martin rolled his eyes a little and put the fork he was holding down on the plate. It was more animation than Mulder had shown in weeks. "I know some things," he confirmed, "but you're not getting them out of me that easily." Mulder stared back in shocked surprise. It hadn't occurred to him to ask for information about Scully from Martin, and now the big man was teasing him with it, wanting something in return--wanting what? Jesus, not that! No!...no...not that. Not that at all. This was something much more benign. Martin was holding the fork out to Mulder, a chunk of sausage speared on the tines. He wanted Mulder to eat. Mulder almost laughed with relief. He breathed a small sigh of relief and took the utensil reluctantly. He'd been ill--he experienced almost constant nausea. There was no way he'd keep the food down, but if it would get Martin to talk about Scully, Mulder would gladly eat his breakfast and vomit up his guts afterwards. Small price to pay. He stuck the sausage into his mouth, waiting expectantly for Martin to speak. When he had chewed and swallowed, Martin said, "She's completely healthy." Mulder's eyes lit up and he ate a bite of scrambled egg. "She has a new partner." At that, the hazel eyes clouded over, and Martin had to gesture toward the plate before Mulder reluctantly took another bite of breakfast. "She's been paying the rent on your apartment." Mulder froze for a second, unbelieving, and then a look of incredible softness appeared on his face. He took the next bite slowly, almost dreamily, and waited for his next tidbit of information. "She's adopted your fish." The tears came without warning, and Mulder was powerless to stop them, cursing himself inwardly even as he turned away, burying his head in the crook of his arm. The fork clattered to the floor, and he tried desperately to muffle his cries against the chair. Mulder felt the churning in his stomach increase with his outburst of emotion, and soon, as expected, he deposited his breakfast on the floor next to the chair. He was a little surprised that it had happened so quickly, but he had known that it was inevitable. ----- "Shit, Mulder, if I'd thought it would have this effect on you I'd have kept my mouth shut!" Martin grumbled as he set Mulder's plate aside and stood up, pulling the other man to his feet. "Come on, let's get you back to bed." He threw Mulder's arm over his own shoulders and guided him toward the bedroom, carefully avoiding the mess on the floor. Mulder slumped against him, drained of all his energy, and Martin practically had to drag him the first few steps before Mulder was able to help out. Just as they reached the bedroom, Mulder released his grip on Martin's body and leaned over to retch again. Martin barely caught him in time to prevent him going face first to the floor. "You done?" he asked when Mulder seemed to have vomited up every last bit of food in his stomach, and the only thing coming out was yellow bile. Mulder nodded weakly, a look of pure misery on his face, and Martin, in exasperation, picked him up and carried him the last ten feet to the bed. He lay Mulder down carefully and covered him with the blankets, taking note of the way the thin body on the bed was beginning to tremble. "Martin?" the weak voice stopped him as he backed away. "Yeah, Mulder?" A pause. "How long have I been here?" Martin sighed. He shook his head sadly. "Don't do this to yourself, Mulder," he said firmly, and turned away, trying to block out the soft sound of heartbroken tears. After cleaning up the mess that had been created by his ill-fated attempts to get Mulder to eat, Martin checked on him again. Mulder had fallen asleep, and studying him now, Martin could clearly see the toll captivity had taken on him. His skin was stretched tautly over the bones of his face and had an unhealthy pallor. His entire body was painfully thin, and when he'd picked Mulder up, the man had felt light as a feather in his arms. Martin lay his hand on Mulder's forehead, and frowned when he felt the heat there. It might be nothing yet, but he was pretty sure Mulder was developing a fever. He'd been coughing and sniffling the last two days, but neither he nor George had seen any sign of real illness. Now he wondered how long Mulder had been hiding the nausea. With another sigh, he pulled the covers tighter around the shivering figure and left the room. He had discovered, much to his surprise, that he actually liked the man in the bed, and it disturbed him to think of Mulder wasting away here, mind and body, pining for Dana Scully, life draining away from him day after day after day. It disturbed him more than he cared to admit. Surely there was an easier way of guaranteeing Mulder's silence. Quietly stepping outside Mulder's rooms, Martin flagged down George, who happened to be starting down the stairs. "Can you sit with him for a few minutes? He's asleep, and I need to talk with Amelia." "Sure," George shrugged. "No problem." After making sure George was safely watching over Mulder, Martin went in search of his employer. He found her in her office, talking on the telephone with the man that Mulder always referred to as 'Cancerman,' or 'Black-Lunged Bastard.' a name which Martin privately found quite amusing. It appeared that Amelia was getting an update on Scully, something she tried to keep up with so she would have bits and pieces of information to feed to Mulder when he was particularly down--little tidbits to entice a bit more life from him. Martin berated himself for not thinking sooner of the quid pro quo game he'd played with the food. "And her checkup was normal? No sign of the cancer returning?" she asked as she turned to Martin and held up one finger to him. "That's good to hear, I'll pass it on to him soon. He's been pretty depressed lately, this should cheer him up a little....No....No, there haven't been any more incidents like that, and there won't be. The two men guarding Fox now are completely trustworthy....Yes, Sir, I'll keep you informed." She hung up the telephone and turned to Martin. "Well, Scully had her regular checkup yesterday and she's still cancer-free. That should make Fox feel better," she told him with a bright smile. "What can I do for you, Martin?" "He's not going to last much longer," Martin told her bluntly, ignoring her chipper mood. "And he's getting sick. He puked up his breakfast. Better get Dr. Tenger back over here." Amelia sighed. "I knew I shouldn't have let him go," she muttered to herself. "But Fox has been so...sedate lately. What happened?" she frowned, and as Martin filled her in on Mulder's frighteningly deep depression, her worried look deepened. "Do you think he'll snap out of it? He always has before," she asked hopefully. Martin seemed to be something of an expert at gauging the many moods of Fox Mulder. "Amelia, he's dying," Martin explained patiently, wondering why nobody else could see this. "He might live another six months, but he's slowly dying. And this is cruel, keeping him locked up here like this. Why do we have to torture him?" He stood quietly for a moment, thinking, and then ventured, "What if he had an accident--one that couldn't be pinned on us?" Amelia looked suddenly wary, and Martin reached behind himself, gently pushing the office door closed. He leaned in to her and said in a voice that was practically a whisper, "I could smother him with his pillow. It would be over in a matter of minutes. He'd be out of his misery." Amelia drew back, a thoughtful expression on her beautiful face, and let the idea run through her mind for fully ten seconds before beginning to slowly shake her head. "No, it's too dangerous," she told him. "If there was an autopsy performed, they'd figure it out, and we'd all be dead. Besides, it's our job to prevent accidents happening to Fox. Somehow, I doubt *he*," she added, jerking her head toward the phone, "would accept that excuse. We'll just have to let things run their course, and do what we can to help him." "Why would there be an autopsy?" Martin demanded incredulously. "He couldn't exactly call a coroner and tell him the FBI agent we've held captive for the past few months died suddenly." Amelia's face darkened. "You never know with him," she answered. "He's a constant surprise." Martin crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back against the door, irritated at the turn of events, irritated at Mulder, irritated at himself for caring what happened to the man upstairs. "Then if I were you, I'd get back on the phone and tell your boss he needs to come up with a better solution than lifelong incarceration if he wants to keep Mulder alive. Although why the hell he cares is beyond me." Amelia played idly with a pen on her desk for a moment, lost in thought. Finally she looked up at Martin, seeing the weariness etched in his face. She realized with sudden revelation that he honestly cared what happened to Fox. "I'll see what I can do," she promised him, "Although I can't imagine what else he could suggest." "Scully is the key, I think," Martin commented after a minute. "He'll do anything for her. That picture of her is the only thing that's kept him sane this long, if you ask me. The reason he encouraged her to stop trying to rescue him was because he was promised her safety. Maybe she could be used as leverage to assure his silence. Although I doubt he remembers enough of what was in that journal to do much harm at this point." Amelia sighed. "It was never a matter of him remembering what was in the journal at all. It was simply the fact that he knew the vaccine wasn't one hundred percent effective that was the threat. Nobody outside our circle was supposed to know that. If Fox had gone public with that journal, the project would have been jeopardized. If we release him now and he talks...well, the threat is still very real." "That's what I mean. He'll keep quiet if Scully's threatened." She regarded him doubtfully. "Do you really think so? Fox is so passionate about his truth." "Believe me, Amelia, he's much more passionate about that woman." Martin stood up straight and reached for the doorknob, then turned back. "Think about it, would you? Because I guarantee, Mulder isn't going to live much longer. They should have just killed him in the first place." Amelia sighed. "That's what we all told him, but he wouldn't hear of it." "Well, it's too late to change that decision now, but if he still wants Mulder alive he's going to have to think of a way to free him without endangering the project." "Maybe we could find a way to give him a little more freedom ourselves?" she asked questioningly, turning to Martin for the answers. "No. He'll just go back to trying to do himself in as soon as he's strong enough. Walks on the beach and swims in the surf aren't going to solve the problem, Amelia. That man is dying." He stalked out of the office and down the hall, leaving Amelia to wonder how you could coax life out of somebody who had lost the will to live. ***** "I want to offer you a deal." The smoking man frowned at Scully, standing in the depths of shadow. He didn't like to be summoned--he was normally the person doing the summoning--but when the man assigned as Scully's contact had told him she insisted on a meeting with him, he'd thought it expedient to agree. He reached into the pocket of his suit, fumbling for his cigarettes, and withdrew an empty package. Angrily, he crumpled it and tossed it to the ground. "And what makes you think you are in a position to offer me anything, Agent Scully?" Scully stepped closer, staring up at him with eyes that were steely and unafraid. He felt an unfamiliar sensation, and realized it was discomfort. He, who had seen many men die, felt uncomfortable in the sights of this small, insignificant woman. "Because I have nothing left to lose." He raised an eyebrow and waited. "I know what you promised Mulder, in exchange for his cooperation. I'm here to offer you a similar arrangement in exchange for his freedom." He smiled, his yellowed teeth gleaming in the moonlight. "You'll promise not to give me cancer?" he asked sarcastically. She was unmoved by his sense of humor. "Mulder offered to sacrifice himself. I'm giving you the same." His gaze grew more interested, and Scully nearly retched at the implication. "Not that, you bastard," she told him coldly. "Frankly, I doubt you're capable." Inwardly, Scully winced at the crudeness of her talk, but pressed onward forcefully. "You wanted me before for experimentation purposes. Wouldn't you like to finish the job?" His eyes roved over her. "What makes you think we weren't finished with you?" Scully's eyes narrowed. "Because you and your Nazi doctors left me alive," she spat. "Alive and barren. There must be years worth of research you could use my body for." "Ah, so you *are* offering me your body. I want to be clear on this." Scully took yet another step forward, and felt a surge of triumph when he moved almost imperceptibly backwards. "You told Mulder I'd be safe if he cooperated. Now I'm telling you--if you let him go, and he doesn't keep your secret...I'll go with you willingly. You and your people can do whatever type of--" She stopped, unable to voice the horrible offer. "You trust him that much?" His voice was mild, but she knew better than to take it at face value. If he wasn't considering her offer, he'd be on his way by now. She said nothing more--just waited. The ball was in his court now. He regarded her coolly for a few moments, then said, "How interesting." And disappeared into the night. ***** There was a knock at the door, and Martin opened it, leaving Mulder in his usual spot at the window. It was Raymond with their lunch. Martin inhaled deeply when he saw the tender steak on the plates. He knew getting it into Mulder would be a chore, but he was certainly going to enjoy his own. The cuisine was one of the best things about this job. "Could you watch him for a second while I visit the john?" he asked Raymond, and Raymond grunted assent while he placed the tray on the table at Mulder's elbow. Martin disappeared into the bathroom, and Mulder glanced disinterestedly at the tray beside him. Steak. God, the food here was incredible. Too bad he never felt like eating it. He was sure it would compare with any famous restaurant back home. Home. Mulder closed his eyes tightly, fighting back a wave of emotion. He knew now would never see home again. One of the violent coughing fits he'd been having gripped him suddenly, and it took his mind off his memories for the moment. When he'd gotten himself under control, Mulder took a deep breath and glanced around the room. After making sure Mulder was all right, Raymond strolled over to the other window, turning his back on Mulder temporarily, and Mulder's gaze played over the tray. His breath caught when he realized that some fool had left two sharp steak knives on the tray. There should have only been one, Martin's, because obviously Mulder couldn't be trusted with a knife. Someone had made a serious mistake. Shooting a quick glance over at Raymond, Mulder snaked his hand out slowly toward the tray and held his breath while his fingers closed carefully over one of the knives. Quickly, silently, he brought the knife close to his body. Where to hide it? He heard the toilet flush and knew he had only seconds to make a decision. In the chair? If they discovered it was missing, that would be the first place they'd search. Water ran in the sink and Mulder hastily shoved the knife into the waistband of his sweats, careful to point the blade away from his bare skin as much as possible. He adjusted his shirt over the knife a split second before Martin returned, and when his guard lowered himself to his chair, Mulder was sitting still, as quiet and detached as ever. Inwardly, he prayed Martin wouldn't hear the pounding of his heart. Martin nodded to Raymond and reached for the tray, taking his own plate--and the solitary knife--and moving it out of Mulder's reach. Mulder glanced at the food disinterestedly and went back to staring out the window while Martin ate his own lunch. He knew Martin would begin coercing him to eat as soon as he finished. ***** George placed the lunch tray on Amelia's desk and turned to go, not wanting to bother her while she was working. He was almost at the door when she spoke. "George? Could you please bring me a knife?" she asked absently, her eyes on the paperwork before her. George swung around in confusion. "But I put it there mysel--sonofabitch!" He raced for the stairs, Amelia close on his heels. "What is it?" she demanded as they approached Mulder's room. "What's happened?" "I put a steak knife on your tray, Amelia," he explained grimly as he unlocked the door and flung it open. "Someone obviously mixed them up." Martin and Mulder looked around, startled when the door flew open and Amelia and George burst into the room. "Where is it?" George demanded, instantly confronting Mulder. Mulder gave him a look of incomprehension and glanced nervously at Martin, stifling the cough that tried to overtake him. "What are you talking about, George?" Martin questioned, putting one hand on Mulder's arm to calm him. "The knife," Amelia told him impatiently. "There was a mixup in the kitchen and Fox was given my tray by mistake. Where's the knife?" Martin shook his head while Mulder cowered back into his chair, breathing heavily, frightened by the intensity of their reactions. "There was only one knife delivered to this room, and it's right here," he assured them, holding up his own steak knife, which he had been very careful not to let go of for even a second. "Mulder hasn't touched it." George gave Mulder a suspicious glare. "Are you sure?" he asked Martin. "Of course I'm sure, it's the first thing I looked for," he said testily. "I know my job." Amelia shook her head, positioning herself directly in front of Mulder's window. "Stand up, Fox," she ordered. He did, skittering quickly out of her way, and she stuck her hands carefully down all around the cushion of his chair. Finally satisfied that he hadn't stashed the knife there, she turned to George. "Search him," she commanded. George reached for Mulder and Mulder backed away, holding his hands out protectively. "I don't have it," he insisted, licking his lips nervously as George advanced on him. "I'm not *allowed* to touch a knife. I'm not even *allowed* to take a piss by myself!" George grabbed him by the biceps and Mulder reacted violently, the memory of his near-rape still too fresh in his mind. "Leave me alone, you bastard!" he yelled, struggling as George shoved him up against the wall to hold him in place. "Fox, he's not going to hurt you," Amelia interrupted sharply. "Just let him search you, or hand over the knife." "I don't have your stupid fucking knife!" Mulder screamed, completely out of control now. "I don't have anything at all!" His voice cracked with emotion. "I just want to be left alone. "I've lost every bit of freedom I ever had because you people couldn't keep track of your fucking journal! I never asked to have the damned thing delivered to me, and the next thing I know I'm a fucking non-person. Keep your hands off me!" He kicked out frantically at George and George looked over to Amelia for direction. She nodded reluctantly, concerned at the violent reaction George had drawn from Fox, and George released Mulder after a long, direct look into the smaller man's eyes. Mulder slumped down to the floor, coughing severely again and gasping for breath, and with an aside to Martin to watch Mulder closely, the two left his rooms. Martin, who had observed the whole scene with some amusement, merely commented, "I don't suppose I'll be able to persuade you to eat at all now, will I?" Mulder didn't give him the satisfaction of an answer. ***** Downstairs, Amelia asked George, "Do you think he has it?" "Oh yes," George nodded certainly. "He has it." Amelia stood still, thinking for a moment, then said, "Watch him carefully tonight." ***** FEBRUARY 14 12:30 a.m. Mulder surveyed George between the slits of his eyelids as he pretended to sleep. His guard had been nodding off occasionally in the chair, and Mulder was hoping George would fall fully asleep so he could retrieve his knife from the sofa where he had managed to hide it when Martin's back was turned that afternoon. He studied George patiently, waiting until his head slumped against the arm of the chair and his breathing deepened, and then began to slide slowly and carefully out of bed. Mulder placed his feet on the carpeted floor gently and stood, grateful that the floorboards in his bedroom didn't creak. He made his way one cautious step at a time to the sitting room, and was leaning over the sofa feeling between the cushions for his prize when suddenly he was grabbed from behind. One of George's massive arms snaked around his waist and a huge hand covered his mouth. "You don't want to do that, little one," George hissed in his ear, and after a moment of shocked struggling, Mulder went limp with defeat. George had caught him in the act, and he was doomed. He didn't even dare argue over the degrading term with which George had addressed him. George reached down between the cushions where Mulder had been groping and retrieved the knife, holding it up in front of Mulder's face so the moonlight gleamed off the shiny silver blade. "Nice try," he commented dryly, giving Mulder a little shake. Mulder kept his silence. "Go into the bedroom and wait for me." Mulder nodded weakly and George released him, striding purposefully toward the bathroom. Mulder obeyed, turning on the bedside lamp so George could find his way back to the bedroom easily, then sat on the bed to wait, the very model of good behavior. Couldn't hurt to try and earn brownie points at this stage of the game. He shivered, feeling suddenly like a small child, waiting for his daddy to come to his room and punish him. He heard footsteps, accompanied by an odd ripping sound, and wondered what George was up to. His answer came when George entered the bedroom carrying the remains of Mulder's oversized bath towel. It was now in four long strips over George's arm, and Mulder swallowed hard, wondering what George was planning to do to him. He knew this act would not be forgiven easily. "Are you going to rat me out?" he asked in a low voice, keeping his eyes fixed firmly on the floor as George approached him. "Nope. Not yet, anyway," George answered, and Mulder looked up at him hopefully. As badly as he'd hoped to hide his crime from George, the thought of Amelia discovering his treachery was tenfold more terrifying. His hope faded with George's next words. "Lie down, Fox." Hesitantly, Mulder did as he was told, and sighed in resignation as George began looping one of the long towel strips around his wrist. The guard tied the towel firmly around Mulder, then affixed it to the nearest leg of the large bed, knotting it securely. He then repeated the action on Mulder's other wrist and both ankles. When he was finished, Mulder was spread out on the bed, tightly secured, unable to move more than a few inches. "I believe Amelia threatened you with this if you were so foolish as to try and hurt yourself again," George commented mildly. "But I wasn't--" George held up his hand. "Please, Mulder, credit me with *some* sense, would you?" After a few seconds consideration, Mulder gave up, completely conquered. George would never buy his lie. Hell, a five-year-old wouldn't buy it, it was that lame. "I think I'll let you spend the rest of the night this way to give you a little taste of what it would be like, and then we'll try again." He reached over and patted Mulder's cheek condescendingly with his big hand. "This'll be our little secret, okay, Fox?" George went back to his chair and sat, picking up his book and opening it to the page he'd been reading earlier that evening. "Good thing for you that I'm not like Ian and Jacob, isn't it?" he commented with a chuckle, and smiled at the grimace on the face of his prisoner. Mulder would learn. George would make certain of it. ***** Mulder lay awake the rest of the night, squirming occasionally to try and ease the uncomfortable cramping in his muscles. At one point he glanced over at George, hoping to elicit pity from his keeper, but George had stared back impassively and turned another page in his book, wordlessly returning to his reading. Mulder sighed quietly and concentrated on relaxing his aching shoulders. He wished he'd asked to use the bathroom before George had tied him up, but he wasn't about to risk life and limb by requesting permission now. Hours later, as dawn began stealthily creeping over the horizon, George rose, stretched, and reached for his pocketknife. He cut the towel strips off Mulder's wrists and ankles, and helped him rise to a sitting position. Mulder suppressed a groan and allowed George to haul him upright, then stood carefully, with the other man's assistance, and stretched his sore muscles. When he had loosened some of the kinks in his back and shoulders, and gotten the feeling back in his legs, Mulder turned to George, his eyes downcast. "So. You gonna do that every night, or was this a one-time deal?" George laughed. "I won't tie you up again, Fox. Not without Amelia's order. But if you do anything else stupid on my watch, I *will* tell her about this." He leaned close to Mulder to add emphasis to his words, his laughter completely gone. "You know what she promised to do." Mulder swallowed and gave a slight nod. "But if I don't--give you any trouble...you won't tell her?" He looked up hopefully at George. "I don't think she'd be inclined to cut me any slack at this point." George laughed. "You're right about that, Fox, but your secret is safe with me. As long as you behave." Mulder shrugged his agreement and started for the bathroom. He only got two or three steps across the room when a wave of dizziness hit him and he started to fall. George managed to catch him just before he hit the floor, and pulled him back to his feet. Taking a good look at Mulder for the first time, George noticed the flush on the smaller man's face. Mulder clung to George as another bout of coughing shook his frame, and when it finally passed he gasped for breath. George lifted him back to the bed and pushed him down on the pillows, piling them up behind Mulder's back so as to elevate his head and chest. Mulder's breathing was labored, and when George put his hand to Mulder's forehead he drew it away quickly. "You're burning up," he stated with dangerous calm. "Why didn't you tell anyone you were sick again, Fox?" ***** Mulder lay quietly in the bed, eyes closed most of the time against the pounding in his head, suffering the pokes and prods being inflicted on his body yet again as Dr. Tenger examined him. He could hear voices flowing around him, but it was too much trouble to try and make out the words over the noise of the jackhammer in his brain, and he simply lay there and let them do with him as they would. He'd thought his "other" had completely taken him over before, but he had been wrong. Now, the "other" was the only Mulder who existed. The real Mulder, the strong one, had been locked in a closet somewhere in the recesses of his mind. He should have wondered if his real self would ever emerge again, but the "other" didn't care. As always, whenever something uncomfortable was being done to him nowadays, Mulder hoped fervently that the person inflicting the discomfort would kill him when they were done, but as always, he knew that they would patch him up and leave him alive to suffer. Mulder had been steadily praying for death to a God he wasn't sure he believed in, and the lack of response wasn't helping convince him of the existence of such a deity. Surely, he reasoned, if there was a God, He would have mercy on Fox Mulder at some point; on the other hand, if Mulder was to be consigned to Hell for eternity, why had God taken him there early? He concentrated on that burning question, a philosophical puzzle to occupy his mind, when Dr. Tenger raised him to a sitting position and forced him to cough. Coughing hurt his head and it hurt his chest, but Mulder was unable to escape the tickling in the back of his throat. It would become more and more annoying as time passed and he repressed the cough, until eventually it restricted his breathing and his traitorous body expelled the cough forcefully, causing him great pain in the process. Dr. Tenger said if he held a pillow firmly to his chest when he had to cough, it would lessen the pain. Dr. Tenger lied. Now Mulder pondered the existence of God and His reasons for torturing one poor pathetic soul while Dr. Tenger collected his sputum sample from Mulder and helped him lie back. He felt someone take his arm and wrap a rubber tourniquet around it to draw blood, but Mulder didn't bother protesting. It wasn't as if he had any rights any longer anyway. He was just somebody's piece of property, hidden away and forgotten. Abandoned. *Verlassen.* The tourniquet was removed and he heard Dr. Tenger's voice rumbling unidentified words, and Amelia's higher, softer tones responding. A moment later someone patted his face, and Mulder wanted to slap the offending hand away but didn't have the strength to lift his arm. "You in there, Mulder?" Martin asked, leaning close to his patient's face. Mulder responded to the voice he recognized as belonging to the closest thing to a friend he had in this forsaken place. "Why does God hate me, Martin?" he asked in a puzzled voice, as if the answer to that question held the answer to all of life for him. "What did I ever do to make God hate me?" ***** Mulder's voice had the confused inquisitiveness of a very young child, and Martin feared he had finally slipped over the edge of sanity. "God doesn't hate you, Mulder," he said as he helped Mulder get settled back under the covers and piled another blanket on him. "Nobody hates you." "Nobody loves me, either," Mulder mumbled pathetically, snuggling his shivering body into the warmth of the blankets. "Scully does," Martin pointed out, turning her picture on the nightstand so Mulder had a clear view. Mulder's eyes opened a slit and fell on the picture. "Scully..." he said softly. "You have your faith. Your faith saved you when you were dying, not me. It was never me. Can your faith save me now, Scully?" he pleaded in a whisper, his eyes drooping closed again. Soon his breathing evened, although it was still too shallow for Martin's liking, and he dropped off to sleep. Martin studied him worriedly for a few moments, then left the bedroom to find out the doctor's verdict from Amelia. "Probably pneumonia," she told him when he asked. "He's taken the samples of blood and...stuff...to make sure, but he's fairly certain." "What will he do about it?" "Intravenous antibiotics to start with, I suppose," she said. "I really don't know. He looks to me as if he needs to be in a hospital." "He needs to be released. Or killed," Martin told her flatly. "We can't keep pulling him back from the edge of death forever. He hates us for it, you know. Hates us for keeping him alive all this time. Sooner or later, with a man like Mulder, hatred becomes dangerous." She made a gesture of helplessness. "I don't know what to do about it, Martin. If I'd realized what we were getting into, I never would have volunteered to let him bring Fox here. How was I to know it would turn out like this? I had hoped, after a time, that he would adapt." "Mulder isn't the kind of man who will ever adapt to being kept in a cage like an animal," Martin told her. "He's got to be released, or one way or another he's going to die." Amelia studied Martin intently, as if trying to read his thoughts, and he smiled because hers were so transparent. "Don't worry," he assured her complacently. "I won't do him in until you give me the order." "See that you don't," she commanded. "Your attachment to him worries me." "Nothing to worry about, Amelia," he said as he left to return to his duties. "I just happen to like the man, and I think it's a shame to put him through this. My loyalties are still with you. They always have been." ***** FEBRUARY 18 "Fox?" Mulder turned his eyes, no longer a bright green-brown hazel but faded to a dull grey, toward the voice. It was the woman. A woman. Scully? No, Scully was gone, he couldn't see Scully anymore. What was this one's name? She took care of him, he remembered, and although thinking made his head ache, he reached deep into his memory for her name. Amy. Was that it? No. Am--something... A cool hand brushed the hair back from his forehead tenderly. "Fox," she said again in a voice that was almost a whisper. "You have a visitor." She moved aside and Mulder saw movement behind her. A man this time. He closed his eyes in dejection. He didn't want have to try remembering another name. He still hadn't dredged up the woman's. One impossible task at a time, please. The man settled himself into a chair at Mulder's bedside, and Mulder gazed at him blankly, thinking that he looked familiar but too tired to try and pin an identity on him. He waited for the man to speak, hoping it would give him some clue as to who this person was and what he wanted. Why couldn't they just let him die in peace? He had overheard voices, one of them insisting he was going to die soon, and Mulder wholeheartedly concurred. He had every intention of giving up on life just as soon as these people quit pulling him back from that sweet, dark abyss he had tried to slip into on several occasions. God was watching Mulder very closely, and every time it looked as though Mulder might escape from Hell, God had one of His angels drag Mulder back. God was cruel, and Mulder meant to tell Scully so the next time he saw her. Oh...Scully...he'd forgotten...he couldn't see her anymore. Someone else would have to tell her how cruel God could be. "Hello, Agent Mulder," the man said in a wispy tenor voice, and Mulder recognized it instinctively, if not intellectually. His face took on a pleading expression, even while he knew, from somewhere deep within, that pleading with this man was pointless, and humiliating. "Home," he whispered through the soreness in his throat caused by days of coughing up sputum and blood and anything else that his body chose to eject through his lungs. He closed his eyes, exhausted with the effort of speaking, but his lips mouthed the word again. Home. "You want to go home, Agent Mulder?" Dull grey eyes probed the visitor from the bed, conveying everything and nothing in a flat stare. "I might be able to arrange it." Something in Mulder heard these words but refused to believe them--God was simply playing cruel tricks on him again. If he went home, he could see Scully...but he couldn't see Scully anymore...if he went home the world would end but if he stayed here only *he* would end, and one man's life was a small sacrifice when the fate of the world was at stake, so why were they keeping him alive just to torture him, why couldn't they just let him go let it end let him die let him die let him die? "I'd like to offer you a deal, one that would allow you to resume your old life. It would also allow you to be with Agent Scully." Now he had to speak, to tell the voice to go away, tell God's angel to go back to Heaven and leave him alone in his own private luxurious Hell and not to ever, ever again take Scully's name in vain. He opened his mouth to tell the angel this but all that came out was, "Scully?" "She's anxious to have you back. I'm sure we can work something out, but before we do, you have to get well enough for us to have a real discussion." The man leaned closer to Mulder, and Mulder could smell the acrid scent of cigarette smoke clinging to him. "Do you understand? You have to fight the illness--you've always been a fighter, haven't you? Fight your way back, Agent Mulder, and we can make a deal." "Deal," Mulder whispered inaudibly. "Yes, a deal. But we can't make a deal if you die, Mulder. You have to fight. You have to win. Then you can go home and be with Agent Scully again." Mulder's lifeless eyes tracked the man as he rose from his chair and walked toward the door. He turned at the doorway and faced Mulder again. "Remember, Fox, if you want to deal with me you must win this battle." They stared at each other for a moment and then Mulder gave a small nod and closed his eyes, wondering what this fight was that he was going to have to win, and if this would be the last fight, and if winning meant he finally got to die. ***** MARCH 8 It had been a long and arduous battle, but Mulder was finally back in his chair at the window, although he had to be half-carried there by Martin. He leaned limply back against the upholstery and let the morning sun bathe his face. It felt so good to finally be warm again, after his weeks of shivering fever, and to breathe easily again after weeks of coughing and fighting for oxygen. Although his strength was almost nonexistent and he was at his lowest weight ever in his adult life, Mulder could actually say that for the first time in a long time he actually felt...good. Which just went to show that everything was a matter of perspective. Enjoying the feel of the heat on his bare skin, Mulder again tried reaching into his subconscious to remember the dream he'd had during his illness. He vaguely recalled someone leaning over him smelling of smoke and speaking to him of home, but it had to have been a fever dream. He would never be allowed to go home. He knew that now. Occasionally he even told himself he was resigned to it, but deep down he knew that was a lie. He would never resign himself to living in a cage. The door opened behind him suddenly, and Mulder perked his ears up, unmoving. He heard Martin rise from the chair beside him and opened his eyes to see who was taking his guard's place. He raised one eyebrow at the face that presented itself. "I knew there was a reason to live," Mulder commented dryly in a voice that barely worked. "Well, I'm glad to see you haven't lost your sense of humor," the visitor responded, blowing smoke into Mulder's face. Mulder held his breath for a moment until the smoke cleared, refusing to give the man the satisfaction of a cough. "Why are you here?" Mulder asked impatiently, anxious to get back to his basking. "Did you come to satisfy yourself that they were keeping me alive? Don't worry. I'm watched more intently than a circus freak." "No, Agent Mulder. I came to discuss our deal." Mulder's heart skipped a beat. Deal? "You have my attention," he said finally. "You don't remember." "Remember what?" Mulder asked curiously. Surely it had been a dream. Hadn't it? "I told you there might be a way for you to return to your former life." A sunbeam caught the smoke and made it shimmer for a moment. Mulder coughed once, unable to suppress it any longer, and it earned him a sharp look from Martin, who settled back on the sofa when he decided Mulder wasn't in any danger. "What do you mean?" Mulder asked carefully when his respirations were again under his control. "Well it isn't complicated, Agent Mulder. You give me something important to me, and I give you your life back. A deal, plain and simple." The elderly man's look was inscrutable, and Mulder searched his face for a clue as to what kind of trap he might be about to fall into. "What do you want from me?" "I want your promise that you'll keep quiet about the journal, the vaccine...everything." "And for that you'll let me go home?" His voice almost broke on the word 'home'. Almost. He controlled it just in time. The smoking man nodded silently. "Why? Why now, after all this time?" he asked incredulously. Ashes flicked. "You're dying." "And that doesn't make you happy?" "No." Mulder digested this information for a few minutes. "What's the catch?" "No catch, Agent Mulder. You keep your end of the bargain and I keep mine." Mulder shook his head, a grim smile touching his lips. "I'd have made this deal long ago, you know that. Why are you willing to risk it now? What happens if I talk? You'll send me back here? You must realize I'll die before I'll let you do that." The visitor nodded his head sagely. "I suspected as much. No, I'm afraid the threat of imprisoning you again wouldn't be very effective. I had something else in mind. Something a little...closer to your heart." Mulder was certain for a moment that particular heart had stopped. Gripping the arms of the chair tightly, he willed it to begin beating its rhythm again. "Scully," he said flatly. "Yes." "Don't hurt her. You already have me, don't hurt her." Mulder tried hard not to beg, but he knew if they took Scully they could have anything they wanted from him. This man obviously knew it as well. "We have no intention of hurting her, Agent Mulder. Agent Scully has been cancer-free for quite some time now," he commented mildly. "I can make certain she stays that way--lives a long and healthy life." "Or?" "Or I can make certain she doesn't." He dropped his spent cigarette into a glass of water on the table and reached into his pocket to withdraw his pack. "And as long as I keep my mouth shut, Scully's safe?" Mulder pressed, wanting to be clear about exactly what was expected of him. "Of course," the smoker said around the Morley between his thin lips. "You see how simple it can be?" Mulder stared out the window at the ocean. It had been his only view for so many months that he had forgotten what else life had to offer. The idea of leaving this prison was at once exhilarating and frightening. To be a man again, independent, with a life, a job-- "What about my job?" The smoker took a long drag on his cigarette, leaving a glowing orange tip for Mulder to stare at while he waited for the answer. "You'll be reinstated," he said at last, "as soon as you're fit. You and Agent Scully will be partners again. I wouldn't be surprised to find that soon you even get your X-files back." Mulder's eyes lit up at the prospect. If it had been anyone else offering him this deal he would have accepted it without thinking, but this man had proven too many times in the past that he could not be trusted. He sat silently for a few minutes, thinking through all the possibilities, and finally decided that he had only one choice. "I accept," he told the smoker, and the older man smiled gently, managing to convey the message that he'd never had a doubt about Mulder's compliance. "There's just one thing you should know," Mulder continued. "If you don't keep your end of the deal--if Scully suffers even a little because of you--I'll rip you apart with my bare hands." That earned him a real smile. His visitor stood, then, flicking his ashes into the water glass. "Good. I expected no less of you, Mulder. Consider it a bargain, then." He started for the door and was stopped by Mulder's voice. "When do I get out of here?" he asked quickly, trying to keep the pleading out of his voice. The man turned back. "As soon as you're strong enough, Son," he said, and before his words could register with Mulder, he was gone. Mulder sat back in the chair, a sensation of incredible relief washing over him, but it wasn't because of the deal. It was because he had conquered the "other." ***** Mulder was a changed man, Martin thought as he brought the dinner tray into the room. As soon as the smoker had left Mulder had insisted Martin help him into the shower, and then he had put on clean clothes and even tried getting some exercise by pacing purposefully through the small apartment. Finally he had exhausted himself and Martin had forced him back to bed for a nap. Mulder had insisted fretfully that he didn't need one, but he was asleep almost before Martin had him safely on the bed. He slid Mulder's shoes off and pulled the covers over the sleeping form with a little smile. Apparently Mulder was going to attack living with the same energetic determination he had exhibited in his attempts at death. The change would be refreshing. As it often did, however, Mulder's enthusiasm soon got the best of him. His determination to regain his health in a matter of mere minutes caused his fever to return, and he had to be confined to his bed for several days in order to let his body begin catching up with his mind in the recovery process. Keeping him in bed at night was never a problem for George, because one look at that stern face and Mulder remembered the night he had spent immobile at the hands of this particular guard. He had no wish for a repeat. Martin, on the other hand, at first had quite a chore keeping Mulder down during the first day. Eventually George noticed his trouble and whispered a hint into his ear, and on the second day of Mulder's forced bedrest, when Martin arrived for his shift carrying strips of toweling over his arm, Mulder shrank back into the bed and watched him carefully, making no move to rise. He was no fool. Martin lay the strips across the back of the chair that he would occupy for the day and settled himself comfortably. Finally Mulder could stand it no longer and had to speak. "You've been talking to George," he stated flatly. "George and I do exchange notes frequently," Martin confirmed, working hard to keep the smile from his lips. He heard a small sigh from the bed and Mulder turned on his side, curling into a ball. "All right, you win," he muttered. "I won't make any trouble." Martin reached for his book, still fighting to suppress his amusement. "It's easier that way," he agreed, opening it to his page and beginning to read. At least he knew he wouldn't have to coax Mulder into eating. ***** APRIL 1 "Mulder, sit down," Martin ordered, and Mulder obeyed, flinging himself to the sofa for the space of about sixty seconds. Then he was up again, restlessly prowling the apartment. He'd been at it for over an hour and Martin was ready to knock him over the head and tie him to the chair. Today was the day Mulder was to be taken home, and George reported that he'd been awake at four a.m., unable to sleep any longer, pacing. At this rate they wouldn't need to drug Mulder to keep him asleep during the transfer, Martin thought, he'd simply wear himself out. Mulder had put on a little weight during the last few weeks--not enough, but it was a start. The most difficult thing had been getting him to rest long enough for his body to begin recovering from the pneumonia that had almost killed him. Mulder simply couldn't accept the fact that he was weakened, and constantly pushed himself too hard if allowed. Martin had finally gotten down into Mulder's face and growled at him that he was to take a nap in the morning and another in the afternoon, without argument, or he was going to tell Amelia about the knife incident. Although Martin doubted Amelia would follow through with her promise to tie Mulder to the bed now that suicide wasn't his immediate goal, the threat had the desired subduing effect. Mulder took his naps obediently, although with much grumbling. "When are they going to get here?" Mulder demanded for the fiftieth time, much like a small child. He peered anxiously out the window, searching the skies for any sign of the helicopter, but there was nothing. Every minute that passed, Mulder was becoming more and more convinced that this promise of freedom had all been nothing but a cruel hoax on Cancerman's part, and that soon someone would arrive to laugh tauntingly in his face and tell him so. He had even asked Martin if that was the case, reminding him that it was, after all, April Fool's day, but Martin had laughed and assured him that he was indeed going home. Home. Mulder shivered when he thought of it. Scully. How would he find her? Would she have bonded with this new partner of hers to the point that she wouldn't want Mulder back? Would she refuse to return to the X-files division if he was reassigned there? She had as much as told him she loved him right here in this very room, but she'd never actually spoken the words, had she? Never come right out and said them, not the way he had. And it had been so many months ago. Even if she'd felt it then, who was to say her feelings hadn't changed? He unzipped his bag and took out the photograph of her that lay atop his clothing. Her soft blue eyes shone up at him and Mulder felt his heart melt. She was smiling her incredible smile in the picture, the one that he'd rarely seen in the past couple of years. Life had become so difficult and complicated for her because of him. What if she'd relished her return to relative normalcy while he was away? "You think too much, Mulder." Martin's words interrupted his thoughts and he looked up, startled. Martin shook his head with a fond grin. Mulder had no idea how many of his thoughts played out across his face sometimes. With a sudden rush of surprise, Martin realized he was going to miss Mulder's company. Their conversation came to a halt when the sound of chopper blades filled the room. Laying the picture carefully in his bag, Mulder rushed to the window. His face was that of a kid after a visit from Santa when he saw the chopper set down on the helipad outside. After a moment, a figure emerged, and Mulder saw that it was the smoking man. He had a horrible moment of pure fear that the man had come to shoot his dreams down until he felt Martin's hand on his shoulder. "It's okay, Mulder. You really are going home. It's not a trick." Mulder turned to face the man who had become, in a strange way, his friend. He put his hand over the one resting on his shoulder for a moment. "Martin, I--thanks," he managed awkwardly. Martin smiled. "It's been interesting, Mulder," he said pleasantly. "I've never had a job keep me hopping the way you have." The door opened and Amelia entered, smiling happily. "Ready to go?" she asked Mulder, and without a word he grabbed his bag from the sofa, zipped it, and followed her out the door. Mulder took two steps into the hallway and froze. He hadn't been outside these rooms in months, and he was suddenly gripped with an overwhelming feeling of agoraphobia. A moment later he felt Martin's reassuring hand at his back. "You all right?" Mulder took a deep breath and nodded. "Yeah. I'm just beginning to realized how fucked up I am by all this." Martin laughed. "You'll make it, Mulder. You're a survivor." They walked him outside where they were met by the man who held Mulder's entire future in his hands. The smoking man and Amelia exchanged pleasantries while Martin stored Mulder's bag in the helicopter and Mulder drank in the sights, sounds and smells of the outdoors. Finally, Mulder was urged into the passenger seat by the older man. He hesitated briefly before climbing in, realizing suddenly that he was about to be drugged and helpless in the hands of his enemy. Who knew where he might wake up, or even if he would wake up? Finally shrugging, Mulder decided that anywhere was better than here. At least it would be a change of scenery. He settled himself in the seat and put on his seatbelt. The expected syringe was produced and Mulder frowned, but made no comment as his body was injected with the drug that he was promised would make him sleep through the journey. The location of Verlassen would remain a secret. As the helicopter lifted into the air Mulder took his last look at the island that had been his prison for so many months. The sun glinted off the steel bars that covered the rooms where he had been locked away for so many months and he shivered. He turned his gaze from Verlassen and toward the blue sky. He was going home. Minutes later he drifted off to sleep. ***** APRIL 2 "Mulder?" A soft hand was in his hair, smoothing it gently. It must be Amelia. That would mean he had managed to hurt himself again. With a small groan, Mulder opened his eyes and glanced around himself. Distantly familiar sights greeted him, sights he hadn't seen in far too long. He raised his eyes and met Scully's blue ones, filled with both concern and happiness. She continued to stroke his hair, and Mulder smiled, shutting his eyes again, still woozy from the drug. "Scully?" he asked, swallowing to lubricate his dry throat. "Yes, Mulder?" He was silent for a moment. "Are you real?" She laughed through her tears. "I'm afraid so, Partner." He reached up to embrace her gently and found himself pulling her down fiercely close to him, to lie atop his body and enter into his soul. He inhaled the scent of her deeply and ran his hands over her as if to reassure himself that she was not an apparition. Scully nuzzled into his neck, placing soft kisses there and he felt the wetness of her tears on his skin. "It's real. I'm really home," he said dazedly, as if unconvinced still. "Yes you are," she told him happily, raining more gentle kisses on his face and holding him as tightly as he held her. "And Mulder? I hope you won't be offended if I tell you I'm never letting you out of my sight again." A thought struck him suddenly, and he knew if he was without her for even a moment he would die. "Scully?" "Hmm?" she asked burying her face in the warm chest beneath her. "Will you marry me?" She froze for a second, taken aback by the question, and raised her head to look in his eyes. The desperation she read in them matched her own. He was traumatized and damaged, but was there anything wrong with Mulder that couldn't be repaired? She doubted it, and she certainly wouldn't trust anyone else to oversee his recovery. "Let's discuss that later," she told him simply, leaning in to kiss him again. The kiss deepened and without warning they were on fire, pulling and ripping at each other's clothing, tearing away the barriers in the effort to get closer to one another, get inside one another, merge together in such a way that they could never be separated again. Scully tore the shirt over Mulder's head and kissed her way down his chest, licking at the still-too-prominent ribs and eliciting a groan from him when her tongue lapped at his stomach. Sadly she caressed the faint scars he still bore from the time Amelia Steinmetz had tortured him. Scully forced herself to hake off that thought. He was back. Now it was time to welcome him home. She could feel his hardness beneath her and eagerly reached for the buttons of his jeans, too loose on his slender body. Mulder reached up and removed her shirt, sliding it off her shoulders and tossing it to the floor. He placed his hands over the cups of her bra, cradling her warm breasts and relishing their softness. Pulling her back down to his chest, he reached behind her to unfasten the clasp, and soon the bra joined her shirt. Scully felt his mouth find her nipple and gave a feline growl, grinding her pelvis into his with ferocious intent. This first time was not going to be slow for either of them, she thought as she felt the tension building in her body. It didn't matter. Fast and furious suited her just fine right now. She pulled away from him long enough rid him of the remainder of his clothing, and Mulder and drew her back down atop his nude body. He feasted on her neck, chest and breasts while his hands roamed over her back, cupping the soft swelling of her ass and slipping inside her pants. Scully devoured any bit of him she could reach--ears, neck, chest, nipples--and thought that nothing had ever tasted so sweet to her as Mulder's tender, pale flesh. She felt him tug at her zipper, and rose to help him remove her slacks and panties. When they were both completely naked he flipped them over so that he lay above her, conquering, claiming, marking her as his own. His mouth was everywhere on her body, and Scully thought later, when rational thought returned, that she had never been so thoroughly worshipped. Mulder merely offered up thanks that his "other" had at last been vanquished. Their joining was frenzied and intense, ending with a jolt that made them both cry out and cling to each other with fierce determination when it was over. Finally, after long, long minutes of lying melded together, they rose and went to shower. They never took their hands off one another. Washing her body under the warm spray, Mulder took her into his embrace and kissed her tenderly, feeling the heat building within his body again, and this time they made love with a softness that soothed their aching souls and made them both believe that they could be together, and that everything would be all right. Later, lying tangled together with her on his bed, Mulder looked around his apartment with comfortable familiarity. "Did they tell you they were bringing me home?" She raised up on one elbow to look at him. "I received a message this morning that there was a package waiting here for me," she smiled. "Imagine my surprise when it turned out to be my very own man." He caressed her face. "You kept everything just the same," he commented lazily. Scully snuggled closer to him. "I knew you'd be coming back someday," she told him. "I wanted you to have your own home to come back to." "But how did you pay for it?" he asked curiously. She'd obviously been covering the rent on his place all these months out of her own pocket, not to mention some of his other expenses. Scully shrugged. "I managed," she murmured softly. "I'll make it up to you," he said, gently running his fingers over her soft skin and relishing the feel of her flesh and blood body in his arms after so long holding onto nothing but dreams. "You can make it up to me by never leaving my sight again." Mulder smiled and pulled her closer. "I can do that," he agreed before drifting off to sleep again. Three days later they were married, quietly and without fanfare, and as they left the courthouse Mulder's arm tightened around Scully almost painfully. He thought about the truths he had been searching out for so long, and the lies that had almost destroyed them on occasion. Somehow none of it mattered any longer. He looked down at his wife and kissed her softly on the lips right there in the middle of the sidewalk, relishing the freedom and the feel of her and the knowledge that she was finally his. Truth be damned, Mulder thought as he tasted her lips. This was truth. THE END