Date: 21 Aug 1998 14:53:06 GMT From: Arb22 Subject: New: Between Times III:Significant Soil--Part I (PG-13) Title: Between Times III: Significant Soil-Part I Author: ARB Category:SA Spoilers: Through "Christmas Carol" Rating: PG-13. A damn or two. Most of the anguish is personal and private, but I wouldn't let my five year old read it. Summary: Mulder and Scully must find their own way to the Truth. Third in the "Between Times" series. Keywords: Mulderangst, Scullyangst, just angst in general. Shippers and non shippers alike are welcome. Disclaimer: The Mulder and Scully action figures belong to Chris Carter and 1013. I simply want to play with them for a short time. I promise not to mess up their hair or lose their little shoes. (And I only need two more UPC symbols to get the Secret X-Files Decoder Ring!) In light of copyright, however, I'll put them back in the package before the Big Man gets home. All other characters and situations in the story are mine. So there. As I have stated before, I don't own Edna, and I certainly don't own Tom. I wish I did. One thing's for certain, my ends would be meeting a lot more readily. Author's note: I didn't mean to do a serial. I didn't mean to do a serial. I didn't... But I did/am. Why? Because I got such wonderful feedback. And let's face it, we're all suckers for closure. (So *why* do we watch X-Files?) As this is the third in a series, reading the first two would help. I would suggest reading at least the second story "Vain Desires" to get a grip on things. (For those of you who are too lazy to read it, I offer this little bit of info that you need: Scully, withdrawn since the loss of her daughter, abandoned her cross and everything it signifies. Unwilling to see that happen, and unbeknownst to his partner, Mulder now has the cross.) If you can't find the story, email me at ARB22@aol.com. The completed story in all three parts will be up soon on my webpage, (http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Forum/3300/xfiles.html) but until then, I'll be happy to feed your fanfic addiction. Thanks to my OH for so many things, and this is only a small one. Feedback is a must: it's the only fringe benefit. Okay to archive this anywhere so long as you let me know first. And now, back to your regularly scheduled Microsoft Error Messages... Between Times III: Significant Soil ****Part I**** By: ARB ******************* "So is no warmth for me at any fire Today, when the world's fire has burned so low; I kneel, spending my breath in vain desire, At that cold hearth which one time roared so strong: And straighten back in weariness, and long To gather up my little gods and go." --Edna St. Vincent Millay ******************* "And right action is freedom From past and future also. For most of us, this is the aim Never here to be realized; Who are only undefeated Because we have gone on trying; We, content at the last If our temporal reversion nourish (Not to far from the yew-tree) The life of significant soil." --T. S. Eliot ******************* Some of the latest scientific evidence proposes that there is a biological basis for religion: a God-center in the brain. It seems rather preposterous, at first glance: humans wired to create and believe in deities? But some problems are like those 3-D dot stereograms they sell under the title of "Magic Eye": the longer you stare at them, the clearer they become. This is usually not the sort of thing that occupies me, Fox Mulder, on a Saturday evening. Usually my thoughts of the supernatural--if they exist at all--are of E.B.E's, little grey men, and craft that defy physics. Maybe I was dropped on my God-center as a child. But I can't help wondering as I turn over and over the cross Scully gave me in the flickering light of another game the Knicks are destined to lose. I wonder that someone so committed to science to explain everything can also cling to a God strongly enough to hate Him. Because it is still, I think, a form of allegiance. I should know. I've never been content to be an agnostic. Not Fox Mulder. I never do anything half-assed, except maybe when it comes to *not* being a megalomaniac. But if Scully can be so passionate about God that she can bring herself to hate Him for this thing that has happened, I have to believe that she still believes. Or maybe I don't. Maybe I'm just desperately hoping that she still believes. Maybe that's what I'm scared of, what wakes me up at night sweating and shaking then skitters away like an insect from my conscious mind. Maybe...maybe without Scully's faith I fear there is nothing left to save either of us. It sounds silly, overly dramatic, even as I say it to myself. But somehow, amidst the EBEs and little gray men and night chases where all you can feel is the rat-black darkness against your face, somehow in all of this I thought it would not tarnish. I thought, naively, that no matter how far she followed me, she would never overtake me. I can be such a selfish, egomaniacal bastard. I never saw the point where her footprints became my path instead of falling into mine. I wanted so badly to hear her behind me that I let the echo convince me that she was not in front of me. This is my price, her penance for whatever absolution she has bestowed upon me. Doubt is an emotion I am unused to feeling. I know its manifestations well; how many people have doubted me in the course of my convoluted and confused path through life? But until now, I have never doubted myself, or the essential nature of what I sought. I am a Truth-Seeker, I tell myself as I have so often before. Tonight, however, the words ring hollow, like ice cubes in an empty glass. All the substance has been deflated out of my concept of Truth as a universal, unequivocal good. Because this is what my Truth has done to her. And to me. Suddenly the sword has two edges, equally sharp; and if I hold the hilt, she is feeling the point. ******************* It's a beautiful Monday: bright, crisp, so sharp you can taste the air on your tongue. I watched her come in this morning, spent. It's funny the way we are both reversals of every normal paradigm. "Normal" people look forward to the weekends: they give them the energy necessary to complete another week of work. It is not like that for me; nor, I am realizing, is it that way for her. We need the work to make it through the weekends now. At least the meeting with Skinner went well. Neither one of us needed to lose anymore strands of dignity to Rules and Regulations. It's not, I think, that Skinner doesn't care; it's that he doesn't *want* to care. In spite of himself, he can't be that cold-hearted. We've got his number now; one call and he'll come running to bail us out. It's a good thing, too. I need all the butt-saving I can get these days. Balances the butt-kicking. "Scully?" When I glance up from my desk--I realize I have been making a paper clip chain without consciously intending to do so--she is staring near me, but not at me. "Hmmm?" "How was your weekend?" Dangerous territory, but something that will hang over me all day if I don't clear the air now. "Fine." Typically committal Scully. "Oh, and my mom sends her love." She levels that stare at me that seems to know that I didn't sleep at all Saturday night and not much more last night. "She wants you to come up for a weekend soon." "I'd love to." "'K. We'll plan it then. What's on the agenda for this week? Please tell me it's not vampires again." "Nope. VCS sent down a case; they're overloaded and asked us to look into it, since there aren't any pressing invasions of Earth to deal with. But it's out of town." I don't know why it is so monumental to me that this case is not in D. C. It used to be that I would call her up without a thought at any time of the day or night and simply give her a flight number. Used to be. We haven't had a case out of town since Emily, but until now I didn't consider that I'd been consciously avoiding leaving town. The most important cases just seemed to be around here. She gets up from the desk it took me almost five years to requisition for her and takes the manila folder off of my stack of papers. My desk is covered with enough dust to give June Cleaver a heart attack and little motes rise as the papers fan the exodus. After a quick read, she peers at me over the top of the papers. "Well?" Well?... "Oh. What do you think, Scully?" If she is surprised by my question, she does not show it. "I think geography has at least some role in it. All the abductions have occurred along the same Interstate. Other than that...any wild theories for me, Mulder? Aliens? Giant insects?" I quirk a smile, wondering. "You know I can't formulate irrational theories without some bizarre evidence, Scully. And right now we have...nothing." "Isn't that bizarre enough?" "Maybe so. Maybe so." ******************* By the next day we are in the D.C. airport waiting on a plane to Charlotte, N.C. Skinner was eager for us to take this case: apparently there has been a great deal of pressure from the higher-ups. This case is one that doesn't make for good PR and that makes the natives restless. Scully is still impenetrable. Her eyes are dark, not frighteningly so, but as though heavy draperies have been drawn across the backs of her irises. The weekend at her mother's, though she has said little, must have been hard. Both grieving--but for different things. I am better now at reading her than I once was. I can catch now the moments she does not know I see, the quick times before she squares her shoulders and prepares to face the world again, invincible. I do not let her know that I know: she would perceive it as weakness on her part and try harder to hide it. "USAirways flight 287 to Charlotte, North Carolina now boarding gate B-12." The voice over the loudspeaker is grainy. We heft our bags and move into the ticket line; down the boarding ramp; onto the plane. Scully stows her luggage carefully in the overhead compartment and slides past me into the window seat. "No fair," I interject with petulant humor. "I wanted the window seat." "First come, first serve," she parries back with a rusty levity. "Besides, you can hit on the stewardesses easier from the aisle." "Good point. I'm glad I bring you along to think of these things, Scully. Can I have your peanuts?" She laughs. "Mulder, we're not even moving yet. The peanuts won't be here for quite awhile." "I know, but...please? You know how much I love them." I don't know what has come over me. Moods for me are not things I have but things that happen to me. They are draped about me, thick and heavy like comforters. This one is decidedly silly. She smiles and I catch something of life in her eyes that was not there yesterday. "Yes, Mulder. You can have my peanuts if you'll be a good boy." I agree and we settle back as the great engines begin to throb and hum. ******************* One hour and ten minutes later we are on the ground, taxiing towards the gate. Scully has had her eyes closed for the last forty minutes--since she gave me her pretzels (peanuts are no longer served because the nut-dust gets into the air filters and plays havoc with some people's allergies, I was told)--but I don't think she was sleeping. I wasn't. "Welcome to Charlotte-Douglas International Airport. It's 2:20 PM and 37 degrees currently. Enjoy your stay in the Queen City or, if you are continuing on to another destination, we wish you a safe journey. On behalf of the entire crew, this is the captain thanking you for flying with us today." As soon as the whine of the jet engines begins to die, my fellow passengers leap from their seats though they know that no one is going to get off that quickly. First we must stand wedged in the aisle and in a half-crouch under the overhead bins for the requisite ten minutes while the flight attendants laugh behind their hands. "Every damn time," I can imagine one whispering. "You'd think they'd learn." I volunteer to get our bags out of the overhead compartment since I did have the aisle seat and the chance to ogle some fairly nice legs during the flight. As I reach up to pull out our carry-ons, I babble to Scully about the case, about inconsequential details which I have been turning over in my mind for lack of any other evidence to contemplate. Only as I am hefting down the second bag do I pause long enough to realize that she is not listening to a word that I am saying. Or at least not hearing. Her eyes are fixed a few rows back on a young girl who is obviously traveling by herself for the first time. The stewardess--flight attendant, as they now desire to be called--has helped the child get her backpack out from under the seat in front of her and is solicitously helping remove the girl's seatbelt. Behind me, the passengers are beginning to file out of the plane and through the long ramp that leads back to solid ground. Scully is still transfixed, her mouth slightly open, her eyes unblinking. She might as well be staring through the child. The girl offers the flight attendant a brilliant, easy smile and says in a clear voice that carries in the small cabin of the plane, "Thank you for helping me. My grandparents will be waiting for me at the gate." As the child rises, it is time for us, too, to leave. "Scully," I say softly, reaching out to touch her shoulder. She does not jerk at my touch but seems slightly startled that I should still be here. Slowly turning to face me, she offers a slight nod in acknowledgment of my unstated sentiment. "Yes. It's time to go." ******************* Continued in Part II Between Times III: Significant Soil ****Part II**** By: ARB See Part I for disclaimer and notes. See me for everything else. ******************* "Agents Mulder and Scully?" A lanky woman with shoulder-length brown hair strides toward us only moments after we enter the downtown hub of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department. At our affirmative nods, she holds out her hand in greeting. "Kayla Daniels. I'm the senior detective on this case. Welcome to Charlotte. I'm sorry I didn't get here sooner, but as you can see," she waves a hand in a broad sweeping gesture that encompasses the buzzing, bustling room crowded with cops, felons, various civilians, and assorted other specimens of humanity all moving at a furious pace, "we're a little busy." All the while Daniels has been talking, we have been wending through clusters of desks and blue-uniformed officers. Scully has to walk briskly to keep up with the considerably taller woman's long-legged strides. Even I have to hustle to stay in Daniels' wake. The chase ends at a tiny, cluttered office with one glass wall that faces the humming rooms of the police department. Daniels ushers us in, twists the floor-length blinds shut, and offers us a seat and coffee. "Sorry it's kinda strong," she says with a smile, "it doubles as motor oil when the cruisers run low." Scully takes hers with a smile, I saw with relief. I need to see her smile. Daniels seats herself behind the massive desk that is the center of the room and the only relative oasis amidst the storm of paperwork that rages in the rest of the cramped space. "Again, I apologize. This place is a mess but the paperwork never seems to stop coming." I let out what can only be called a guffaw and see Scully cracking as well. In explanation, I say, "We know about the paperwork; believe me." Daniels smiles in return. Already I like this woman, a response which surprises me. Kayla Daniels is attractive in a rather unremarkable way; I would not call her pretty, but there is a subtle beauty to her angular features. Her hair reaches just below her shoulders and is done in a style that even I, with my extremely limited knowledge of the day-to-day life of a woman, can tell is low-maintenance. There is something totally unassuming and trustworthy about her. Only her eyes, an incredible shade between aqua and jade, betray the rather bland front; they flash with a quick intelligence. "Anyway, let's get down to business. I have the files..." Daniels breaks off to search through the stacks of paper around her desk, then finally dives underneath the desk and emerges triumphantly "right here." She passes them to us. "What we have is a series of rapes and murders beginning three months ago. At first, no one connected them. But when the killer got to Charlotte, we found a pattern." What she's not saying, but I'm certain of, is that she is the one who connected the dots. One glance at Scully tells me that she is thinking the same thing. "Geography, right?" Scully asks, the first thing she has said since we arrived. "Following Interstate 85." Daniels smiles. "Exactly. I called in the FBI when we found the connection because we don't have the manpower or the resources to do this right. And I want it done right." The quiet intensity with which she imbues her words makes me glad I am on Kayla Daniels' side of this case. Daniels spread an oversized map of North and South Carolina across her desk, facing us. She traces I-85 with a pink highlighter, and the result is a Northeast-Southwest artery that touches on many of the region's major organs and runs right through Charlotte, the heart. The towns that have been touched by the tainted blood are marked in as well. Henderson. Durham. Burlington. Lexington. Salisbury. Kannapolis. Charlotte. Seven murders with the same MO occurring over a space of two months. "This guy is very good," Scully states, her eyes intent on the map. "He's moving around, but still within a definite pattern. And he knows what not to leave behind." Daniels nods in agreement. "We haven't found any fibers yet that are out of place or can't be accounted for by the scene itself. Seminal fluid traces in every case, but our guy's a non-secretor, of all the luck. Do you think he knows that, knows that he is among the *privileged* few who can rape and not leave fingerprints behind?" Daniels looks directly at me, waiting for an opinion from the FBI profiler she has brought in. I am struck again by her flinty intensity: driving, but somehow also redeeming. The look of someone who is fighting for an ideal, whatever the odds. I weigh the question for a moment. "Yeah. I think he does know. I think he plans these crimes well, knows what he's going to do and just how he's going to do it. We have yet to find a weapon and nothing that could be used as a weapon is missing from the crime scene, so he brings his own. Plus, his timing is impeccable. These women are all home alone, even if there is usually someone else in the house. His entire MO points to a great deal of forethought. I'd say he definitely knows he's a non-secretor." Daniels gives me a last going-over with her eyes before returning to her case notes. I hear her mutter softly under her breath: "Then I hope he also knows I'm going to nail him." ******************* Three hours after our arrival at the Charlotte-Mecklenburg PD and four hours after our touchdown in the Queen City, we are collapsed on the bed in my hotel room, another FBI special. Today with its transit, traffic, and overwhelming amount of information has drained us both. "Ugh," Scully groans. Too tired to move, we are both still wearing our trench coats and suits. "Mmhmm," is the only answer I can muster. Finally I gather the energy to roll onto my side, leaning my head on my hand and propping my elbow on the mattress. She looks so worn out, I think, not for the first time. "Tell you what Scully." "What, Mulder?" "Get out of that suit, into something with jeans, and I'll buy you dinner." "Okay," she answers through a yawn. "It's a deal. Meet you back here in fifteen minutes." ******************* I can't sleep. This should not come as a startling revelation to me: I have always been an insomniac. But it used to be that I would roam my apartment in the wee hours of the morning before quieting down to watch pay-per-view movies that lulled me into a stupor. Now I find myself kept awake by the thoughts that crowd my brain, the images inside my head that will not leave me be. I reach for the nightstand and find the small, worn velvet pouch I have taken to carrying everywhere with me. Even in the dark my fingers know it and they probe inside, extracting the essence of waking dreams. Her cross. It is still with me. In the inky darkness of the still room, the metal catches the small finger of light that reaches in through a crack in the blinds and gleams with a cool sheen. The last time I was given possession of a precious thing, it was this same cross. But then I was only holding it, waiting. I knew, without hesitation or uncertainty, that Scully would return to me and at such time I would give her back her talisman of faith. Now, the future unrolls itself without any definite breaking point; how long is too long? Is there at point at which I will have to renege on belief and put it away, no longer expecting her every breath to carry the words which demand its return? I despise this uncertainty. Hefting the small weight in my hand, I realize that I am afraid, too, of my own position. Scully and I have always played off of each other: equals, opposites, but never wholly dissimilar. She the light of science, I the shadows and whatever came with them. But always, a faith bound us. Mine was the Belief in aliens, in conspiracy, in the machinations of man. Hers was softer--a trust in God, in the underlying order of seemingly turbulent times--but stronger. It was this transcendental orientation that kept our orbits going around each other instead of spinning off into destruction like rogue planets drawn into a star. If time is the fourth dimension, maybe belief is the fifth. And now, without it? Scully is flatter, somehow, as if someone has stripped her of that extra dimension. Watching her today as she lay on the bed after a long day at the station, there was a weariness to her face that was new. Not tiredness; Lord knows, I've seen her tired, with all the mornings I've drug her out of bed at 3 a.m. or the sleepless nights we've spent on stakeouts. But her face was weary, heavy, and I can see the pain etched in whisper-thin lines. God, I wish I could sleep; erase these tortured thoughts with the comfortable numbness of unconsciousness. But I can't. I can't because I have already woken up once tonight to the sound of her tears, soft sobs that eked through the connecting door of our rooms. I can't go to her: anything I would say now would just, in her mind, make the situation worse. And so I find myself alone, facing a stone-wall darkness, and clinging desperately to something that may already be dead. ******************* Another February morning: this one cold and clear, washed in an icy blue. By 7:00 we are in the rental car, on the way downtown to the police department. I glance over at Scully who has been silent all through breakfast. Her breath fogs in the chilled air while we wait for the car to heat up; her face is drawn, and I know she did not sleep last night, even after the sobs subsided. "Beautiful day, isn't it?" I find myself asking inanely. I am bad at small talk, a consequence of too many hours spent alone--in the FBI basement, in my apartment, chasing my demons--instead of with other people. But before, I have never needed small talk with Scully. Our relationship is different now, and since Emily's death I have wondered if I ever really knew Scully. Certainly, I never knew this Scully. "Mmhmm," she murmurs in assent. It really *is* a beautiful day: the winter sun is creeping up a cloudless sky and the air is sharp, clean. "'A dispassionate white sun....saintly thin, and essential.'" She is talking to herself, so softly that I can barely make out any words and I miss the middle of what she's saying. The words are familiar, as though I have heard them before, but I can't remember where. To ease the silence I turn on the radio and find an FM station playing oldies, Motown and Beach Music. Suddenly I wish I knew how to shag. ******************* Daniels meets us at the door, trim and crisp in her blue uniform with the abstracted hornet's nest that is the departmental symbol on her shoulder. Her face is set in serious lines, the green of her eyes dark like a storm over water. "There's been another murder," she says with a heaviness in her voice that I recognize from years on the job as fatigue and repressed anger at the things we see. "Same MO?" This is from Scully. A glance over tells me that she has shaken off whatever fog held her in the car. She is focused, her eyes fixed on Daniels' face. Daniels meets them with equal intensity. "Yeah. Come on, I'll take y'all to the scene. It's not far from here." Once we are in the car, pulling out of the parking deck, the two women are immediately immersed in the case. I stare out the window at the commuter traffic flowing against us, into town and the huge bank buildings, law offices, and cubicled spaces that await; I only catch snippets of the conversation. "...Another one here in town: identical MO. Different location from our other local case, but still in Charlotte." Daniels glances over at Scully. I notice that Kayla Daniels drives like she does everything else: fast, but with a surety that belies any untoward haste. "...Doesn't fit the pattern. This is the first time he's done two in the same place...other towns were smaller and he had a better chance of getting caught. Or maybe this is it: the end phase. Maybe Charlotte is where he's been headed all along," says the non-profiling half of our team. Leave it to Scully to do my job better than I do. I don't need to see her face to know the expression Scully is wearing as she speaks. Her eyes are bright, her focus honed to a point by the case at hand--and by a desire to keep everything else at bay. So smart she can out-think herself, sometimes. By the time I manage to drag myself back to reality, Daniels is stopping the car beside an old but well-kept house. The white paint could use a going-over; the years have dulled its once pristine coloration. But the grass is evenly cut. The flagstone walk is neatly laid out and tended; the shrubs in front of the low porch are trimmed; and the curtains in the windows, though old and faded, are clean and starched. The house of someone with a small income, but a great deal of pride. We duck under the yellow tape that surrounds the house, which seems small and sad in the midst of a swirling sea of uniforms and lights. Waiting for someone who will never come again. Daniels speaks quietly to a blue-uniformed officer by the door and we are ushered inside. The house is dark, the morning light unable to do more than dabble at the shadows through the blinds. Out of habit, I reach for the small of Scully's back, to guide her across the stoop, and she jumps at the unexpected contact. The involuntary twitch of her muscles burns like hot metal on my palm. I drop my hand and follow wordlessly into the darkness. She is--was--in bed. The scene is gruesome, even shrouded in half-light. Daniels moves softly around the bed, taking a quiet inventory of the scene that we have seen in seven other photographs. Scully moves to one side of the bed, her head cocked and her hair falling across her face so that from my position by the door it is a red curtain against the intrusion of my stare. The woman on the bed was beautiful in life, as evidenced by the pictures scattered throughout the other parts of the house. In death, even this has been taken from her. Her feet and hands are purple and swollen; and, the bindings have made deep grooves in her wrists and ankles. She was immobile, couldn't have put up much of a struggle. The black cloth that was used to gag her is still in her mouth, no longer as taut as it must once have been. She could not scream for help. But the final insult is her gown, which lies crumpled at the foot of the bed. He must have undressed her, so she would know what was to come. He liked to watch the fear surge in her face. Damn. Suddenly I am bone-tired. Scully too has been transfixed, but she steps back now, a hard look on her face. Anger. I am angry as well, and sad. In the dark of morning, this is a hard thing to look on, even when you have seen it before. Daniels comes back around the bed. If I have learned to read her at all, I read the weariness in Kayla Daniels' face by the tautness, the unexpected intensity of her green eyes. "Our techs will start on the scene, unless there's anything more here you'd like to see." I shake my head. Scully, too, is finished with the scene. "But I'd like, if you don't mind, to perform the autopsy." Daniels seems not the least bit surprised. "I'd appreciate that." I envy Scully for a moment: her ability to do something while I am relegated to the role of observer. I know, deep down, that I am good at what I do, this feeling-out of minds, thoughts, passions, actions. But profiling can be so nebulous, so wholly uncertain and inexact. I am jealous of Scully's gift and the fact that her findings can be recorded in numbers, analyzed, manipulated and interpreted for consistent, concrete meaning. There are days when I would trade to be able to dirty my hands with the blood of the dead instead of slogging through the serpentine filth in the minds of the living. ******************* I hung around at the scene as the techs dusted for fingerprints, went through evidence, and generally invaded any privacy that death had left behind for the taking. Three hours later I am back at police headquarters no closer to the killer than before. "Come in," Daniels responds to my soft rap on her door. Walking in, I see them together, Scully and Daniels, leaning over the desk to see something. I am struck by the similarities and the differences. They are lost in their task, and so I choose the moment to study them. Scully's face is shadowed by hollows under her cheekbones and eyes. Unbidden, a childhood memory rises like bile and I press it down; "...I walk through the valley of the shadow of death," the pastor's voice rings in my ear. Kayla Daniels has the same intensity as my partner, as I watch she reaches up to tuck her hair behind her ears, in the unconscious way that Scully does. She whispers something across the table and suddenly Scully crumples in laughter. My relief is a palpable thing: it has been, I feel, forever since I heard that laugh. "Ahem." Scully turns as I clear my throat and tries to compose herself. Unsuccessfully. Daniels, also laughing too hard to talk, waves me to a chair. For a moment I am content to watch them watch me and try to control their glee. Finally, with my best face of anguish, I break in. "Scully, I knew you didn't like my ties, but is it that bad?" "No, Mulder," she admits when she finds her voice, "but yesterday's was." Daniels crumples, just shrinks up as though the mirth has pulled all the water from her body and begins to shake with laughter. Scully is content with a broad smile and bright eyes. Before I can control it, a very un-Mulderish snort escapes me. One auburn eyebrow climbs its way up a pale forehead. My laughter subsides slowly, leaving me gasping for air and the object of intense scrutiny from the two women in the room. When I can finally sit up straight, Scully and Daniels run through their findings from the day's work. All told, it sounds like an fairly routine serial case, if an adjective such as "routine" can be applied to something so horrific and ignoble. I notice the effortlessness of communication between Scully and Kayla Daniels: the way they finish each other's thoughts, anticipate the paper that is needed, or the fact for which the other is searching. A little shiver of pain courses through me. Scully and I were like that for so long. We didn't need words; it was instinctive, unconscious, closer than lovers and more connected than friends. I admit to myself that it hasn't been right in a long time, not since Christmas... and Emily. I miss it with a physical ache: I miss *her*. I wonder if she feels it too. "...Earth to Agent Mulder. Come in, Mulder." "Hmm?" Kayla Daniels is leaning across her desk toward me, her hands cupped around her mouth to make her voice louder. I shake myself back to the case at hand, explaining what the police found, but mostly what they didn't find. No fingerprints. No fibers of any significance. In short, nothing to reveal to us the identity of the shadow we are seeking. Just the manifestations of darkness that are left by his passing. Daniels sighs as I reveal the dearth of evidence. Her hair is in her face again, and she brusquely pushes it behind her ear. I can see the smudges of fatigue under her eyes and I know that she, too, feels the burden of this case. "Well, I don't think we're going to figure it out today. Not with the evidence that's here." Daniels spreads her hands, palms up, long fingers splayed, in a gesture of weary discouragement. "It's been a long day. Why don't we all go home and maybe this will be a little clearer in the morning. Or at least it'll be equally muddled and we'll be less tired." Scully and I drag ourselves out of our chairs and make our way toward the door. My head is starting to throb in time to the low clacking of keyboards coming from the great outer room where the uniformed officers are hard at work. I notice that Scully is pinching the bridge of her nose, and I don't think it's because her glasses are too tight. As I open the door, I half-turn to check Scully's progress across the room. I seize up: Kayla Daniels has her hand on Scully's shoulder from behind. There are moments that can manage to make you feel like a stranger in your own skin; moments that alter the fabric of smooth reality, pleating and folding it into strange contours by pulling gently on one string until the entire surface warps and shimmers in an unrecognizable mien. All that is left now is line and shadow: the sweep of Daniels' hair as she leans forward, the shadow on Scully's face as she turns to catch the low words. "Get some rest, Dana." I place my hand in the small of Scully's back as we exit and it no longer seems to fit the way it should. ******************* Continued in Part III Between Times III: Significant Soil ****Part III**** By: ARB See Part I for disclaimer and notes. See me for everything else. ******************* ...Someone is knocking on the door. The door. There is a knock on the door. I am so tired. I only want to sleep, burrow back under these covers where it is warm. Damn. I throw off the covers impatiently, wincing as the cold air hits me, rubbing my eyes against the darkness. There is no one outside the peephole. Fumbling, I unlock the deadbolt, then twist the handle. The light is painful, like ice on dry skin. Still there is no one there. What the hell...? I rub the palm of my hand across my face as some cognizance slowly returns. The knocking continues. Of course: Scully; the connecting door. I stumble across to it, my shins missing the TV and the corner of my bed only as a result of some benevolent Fate. She is standing on the other side, a slightly puzzled look on her face--probably at my inability to seemingly find a door that was all of five feet away from me in a room shaped like a box. I cannot make out her face because the only light comes from her bedside table behind her. Over her shoulder the clock glows 3:30. She skims a hand through her hair which was already wild from sleep. "Mulder, there's been another one." ******************* Fifteen minutes later we are in the car, the headlights cutting swathes of brilliance through the night. There are few cars on the roads at this time of night and the leafless deciduous trees loom like great arms stretching innumerable craggy fingers toward the starless, cloudy night sky. In the greenish glow of the dashboard lights, Scully's profile is sharply contoured, her cheekbones too prominent, and the skin at the corner of her eyes is pulled back tightly. She seems almost to be straining ahead as if by sheer force of will she can increase the speed of the engine. Kayla Daniels is waiting for us at the scene, standing just outside the array of police cars. The blue lights echo off of her frame, revealing her as something alien, come to shatter the calmness of the night. A wave of hopelessness washes over me and is gone, mimicking the revolution of the police lights. Scully and I trail Daniels into the house which is lit up as though inside it is noon while outside the world continues on its previous timeline. Daniels is wearing blue jeans and a faded grey sweatshirt that once said something but has been struck dumb by multiple washings. Scully and I seem somehow out of place in our suits, rumpled though they are from travel and wear. All of us struggle to bring something to this, the most heinous of rituals and ours is clothed in dark, well-cut cloth. "We got here quite quickly," a nameless officer informs us when we reach the bedroom. "A neighbor who gets off work at two was driving home and noticed something strange. He knew her husband was out of town and he got suspicious, so he called the police. The perp had been gone ten, maybe fifteen minutes before our guys showed up. We're taking the neighbor's statement right now and trying to locate her husband. He's in Indianapolis. Or Minneapolis. Anyway, we should have him here in the morning to i.d. the body." Daniels nods as she listens to the eager, scrubbed young officer who is relaying the information. The room is swarming with those who come to collect the pieces that might lead us to make sense of this death. Sense from senselessness. Scully gravitates toward the body on the bed, shifting into full doctor mode, clinical and detached. I can feel the change from my position near the door; it's something about her walk, the knife-blade set of her mouth. ******************* The next few hours are spent doing the mundane. Hair, fibers, fingerprints, statements, impressions: all are collected for use in putting back together the woman who has been torn to pieces in her own home. At some point, an officer arrives with coffee and we pass around styrofoam cups of a bitter liquid that tastes as much like warm oil as anything else. The rest is only a series of impressions. The steady stream of men and women in blue uniforms in and out of the front door. Daniels' lithe form weaving in and out of rooms, people. The light touch of Scully's hand against my arm when she finds me sagging against a wall and senses-- shares--my fatigue. We watch the sun come up through the small kitchen window over the sink. Silent. Not touching. But together. At seven a.m. we have spent over three hours in this woman's house. We know more about her life, and her life with her husband, than either of them ever did. Forgotten letters, photos, wilting lettuce in the refrigerator: all of it is fair game. I run my hand wearily through my hair and think about how far I have come since my idealistic FBI youth. Some days, bad days, what we do almost feels like a desecration of something sacred. On good days, it is a sacrifice; a libation poured out upon the mercy seat to plead for blessing. I put my hand in my pocket to feel the small heft of the talisman there. "Agent Mulder?" Kayla Daniels appears around a corner, her hair a bit disheveled, her eyes tired but sparking. "I just talked to the station and the detective you wanted to talk to, the one who worked the first case, can do a teleconference in," here she glances down at her watch, "twenty minutes. If that suits." I nod. I am tired of feeling impotent on this case, and am eager to talk to the man I believe might hold information valuable to a profile of the killer. At last. A chance to really do something. "Great. We'll have to bust it to get back to the station in time but," a sly look, "I can do it. If you're not afraid of the ride, that is." I grin, grateful for an inane challenge of machismo to take my mind off the current situation. "I'm game. Show me your best stuff, Daniels." A quick explanation to Scully later, we're in Daniels' personal car and tearing toward downtown at an alarming rate of speed, whizzing in and out of morning commuter traffic which is already heavy. This woman should have been in the Indy 500, I think, noticing the smile spread across her face at the exhilaration of the maneuvering. When I glance back, however, her expression is serious, and she takes a slow, deep breath. "You and Agent Scully, you're close." Statement? Question? "I mean, closer than normal partners." She focuses on the road, but glances quickly at me, flicking her eyes across the car to meet mine before reverting her gaze straight ahead. Silence; it must have been an inquiry. "Yeah," I answer the not-question. "We...are." Are we? Now? "In our line of work, you don't have many people you can trust." The truth, absolutely. But misleading, for all its truthfulness. Because it implies a closeness, a connectedness that I no longer feel with Scully. And yet, I will not say that we are not, in some strange way, still deeply rooted in each other. "Hmm." Daniels makes a noncommittal sound and then is silent for so long that I wonder if she is going to drop the matter all together. "Agent Mulder-Fox-whatever. I don't presume to know what you two do, or anything about your private lives. But I do know that Dana needs you. You need each other. I can see it, watching you together. Whatever has hurt her, and I have no idea what it is, she hasn't healed. Just...keep an eye on her, ok? She needs a friend." With a shaky breath, as though this insight has cost her a great deal, Daniels lapses into silence once again. I am left with a newfound respect for this woman who seems to look right through me with her cat-eyes. ******************* "Yes, Detective Perry. Yes, you've been a great deal of help. Thank you so much; I really do appreciate it. Yes, I'll be sure to let Detective Daniels know to contact you when we have any information. Yes, thank you." Letting out a sigh of sheer relief, I close the transmission with the friendly, overzealous detective who worked the first of the gruesome cases. Unaccustomed to such violence in his small town, he was only *too* eager to help. After thirty minutes of his input, I developed a headache like a knife wound. By the time the hour and a half was up, it felt like a steel band was practicing on my temples and eyelids. And now, after two hours, I am drained of any energy I had when I started. Kayla Daniels sticks her head around the door of the tiny, closet-like conference room. "Agent Mulder? Have you heard from Agent Scully?" "No, I haven't." My answer is rote, thoughtless. It is only when I hear my own words that I realize their implication. Fear shimmies up my spine, electric. On the hour. She was supposed to call me on the hour. It is our arrangement: we check in every hour, on the hour. She didn't call. It's been two hours. When Daniels' face comes back into focus I can see the worry darkening in her eyes. She has caught the fear flickering across my face. For a moment we are frozen, and the apprehension is stretched tight between us like a steel wire. Then, simultaneously, we snap back into motion. The chair squelches across the floor with my haste and I am gone, running after Daniels' retreating form toward her car. As Daniels bobs and weaves in and out of traffic, I reach for my cell phone with trembling hands. We are both breathing hard from the dash through the station and my elbow aches where my funny bone glanced off the corner of a counter that I cut a bit too close. My quivering fingers need three attempts to find the quick dial button that calls up my partner's cell phone number. It rings. And rings. And rings. After five rings with no answer, I end the call. In a futile endeavor born of some desperate desire, I dial in the number, hoping against all rational hope that the outcome will be different. It is not. Daniels senses my failure and presses harder on the accelerator, lights flashing and sirens shrieking my fear to the treetops. ******************* I do not know if it relief or another sort of fear that breaks over me in waves as we come to an abrupt halt. The house is dark; the only evidence of the horrors that occurred here in the early hours before dawn is the tattered crime scene tape that flutters on the leafless trees. All the cops have gone: back to work, or to their homes, back to the familiarity of routine. But our rental car is still here, it's blue hulking form parked in the same place as when I left. Is she still here? My mind races, inventing excuses to allay the trepidation. Maybe she had car trouble? Maybe she went with another officer to investigate a lead? Maybe... But consciously, rationally, I cannot even believe my own lies. I know Scully, know her like I know no one else. She would not have done that. Me, yes. I would run off on some wild goose chase and forget to check in at the appointed time. But Scully doesn't work like that, not my Scully. She would call, if she could. Oh, God. The thought sends a new wave of panic crashing through my brain. The door creaks softly on its hinges. "Scully?" Again, louder: "Scully?" Beside me, Daniels trying to keep her voice steady. "Agent Scully, are you in here?" Silence. Nothing moves in the house except the particles of dust which twist and writhe in the watery light that makes its way through half-shut blinds. I reach behind me and pull my gun from the small of my back, wincing at the loud noise the metal seems to make scraping the starched cloth of my shirt. Daniels copies my motion. Arms crooked at the elbows, fingers tense on the triggers, we make our way through the somnolent house. Things take on preternatural shapes, colored by my own deep-rooted demons. The LCD display on the microwave watches me move stealthily through the kitchen, its numbers continuing to mark the passage of time irregardless of the fact that there is no longer anyone here for whom time matters, or exists. Daniels and I continue together, room by room. The sound of our breathing rasps in the still air, rattles like a car refusing to turn over. Like the great whisperings of a tell-tale heartbeat. Living room. Den. Guest Bedroom. Nothing. The master bedroom, where only this morning Death hovered like a new mother over her child. All is quiet, sterile. Bathroom: empty. We return to the den which has a great wall of glass facing out over the small deck that leads down into a well manicured backyard. Daniels sighs, runs a hand through her hair and moves to return her gun to its holster. Halfway through the motion she freezes. 'What?' I ask with a loud look. She cocks her head toward the yard and her eyes wander above my head as she strains to listen. A small sound, soft, like the scream of raindrops shattering. 'There,' her eyes say. 'Did you hear it?' I nod, breaking the spell and we are moving toward the door. A blur of arms; legs; hand on the handle; pushing; the bite of February air; the distant cry of a child. Down the stairs. A visual sweep of the yard: what is wrong here? And then, there, under the deck. A flash of red and a tiny noise. I am moving before my brain consciously process the information, a bundle of nerves flying at him. Her. Scully! He is scrambling up, running. Daniels is behind me. She will find him. I am at Scully's side before she has finished the motion of rolling over. Breathing hard, I kneel by her head. She is in my arms, gagged, but making soft sounds of comfort-whether for me, or for herself, I am not sure. So close. So close. ******************* Later, we sorted it out. His name was Matthew McCaine, a twenty-six year old carpenter from Matthews, a quiet suburb of Charlotte. He was intensely average in appearance: medium height, medium build, brown hair, brown eyes. The only thing that was not normal was his penchant for raping and murdering young professional women. He had not said a word since his apprehension except to acknowledge his Miranda rights. Daniels' eyes flashed with victory and relief as she signed him over to the jail guards. I was flooded with respect and gratitude for this woman I had come to respect so much, but could not reach. She left me alone in her office with Scully to listen to the story, quietly acknowledging our need for privacy. As I watched her disappear, back straight, head high, I allowed myself a brief moment that was sorrow and joy, appreciation, and wonder. She moved like a cat through the crowded room, turned once to smile at us both, and disappeared into the rosy dusk that was gathering itself outside. When Scully had walked into the yard that morning to check for signs of forced entry, he'd grabbed her. She'd lain underneath the deck, bound and gagged, as the officers left the house-they all assumed that she had returned with Daniels and me to the station. As soon as the house was clear, he had begun a slow, sadistic torture. From the little Scully said, it must have consisted in large part of insane ramblings. The pontifications of a mad priest. Her indoctrination into his warped reality. He'd then begun to slow cut her clothes away, a sacrament to mark the loss of her dignity, her humanity. An outward visible sign of the inward spiritual change that he strove to create in his victims. A metamorphosis that we interrupted. He did not rape her. His was a process that took time. But the darkness of her eyes is haunting me, the indigo shroud that fell when she came to this point in the story. She faltered before she could choke out her account of our emergence from the house. "But, if you hadn't gotten there when you did..." Upon seeing us emerge below the deck, he had taken off a dead run. Daniels executed a flying tackle and dropped him halfway across the yard. The handcuffs had made a satisfying sound as they locked into place. She hauled the man to his feet and marched him off towards the squad car, only craning her lithe frame to make sure that Scully was safe. Leaning on each other, Scully and I had emerged from under the deck, disheveled and dirty; she was holding her jacket closed with one hand. ******************* "Mulder?" I take my head out of my hands to look up. Scully is standing in the door that connects our motel rooms. She is wearing a bathrobe and her hair is trailing in damp tendrils down her neck. I trace the shadows that are partly from the low light, and partly from the strain: under her eyes, her cheekbones. She is so small, silhouetted in the solid doorframe. I want nothing more than to take her in my arms and hold on to her for dear life-my life, and hers. "Yeah?" "I just..." the words stumble and she takes a step closer. "I want to thank you. For today. For coming when I," a deep breath as I watch the cords of muscles in her neck contract. "Well... thank you. For being there when I needed you." I nod, unable to speak around the great coil of rapture that has wound itself about my throat. And my heart. She moves across the small space and lowers herself onto the bed beside me. "Scully, I...I have something for you." She gives me a quizzical look, one eyebrow lowered, as I fumble in my pocket. I draw out the worn pouch and press it into her warm palm. Even as I do this, I am not sure if now is the time. But there is no path by which I can return, now. I cannot even retrace my steps. Her eyes never leave my face as her small, deft fingers steal into the impromptu package. Looking at her this way is like drowning in a deep ocean. She draws out the contents and finally, slowly her eyes leave my face. She gasps, a small sharp intake of air, as she realizes what I have given her. Reverently, she turns the cross over in her hand, studying it as though it were an artifact, a glimmering talisman of some forgotten God. As if it were not hers, nor never had been. Finally she looks back up at me, locking eyes. I steel myself for the anger, but realize that I can read nothing from her face. It is completely blank. I don't know how long we sit like that, just looking at each other. But finally I cannot stand it any longer. "Scully, I know you left it behind, but your faith has always meant so much to you and I though, well, I thought that maybe one day you would be ready to have it again, so I kept it for you. And then after all that happened today, I thought that perhaps now was the time to give it back to you. You know, because..." I am grateful when she lays a finger across my lips to stem the torrent of words. She looks quickly back down at the gold necklace before meeting my eyes. "Thank you, Mulder." They are not words spoken, but breathed; yet, I am so close I have no trouble hearing. Her voice shakes as she tries to explain. "I don't know what I believe anymore, exactly," she says, her eyes moving to gaze beyond me at the night sky speckled with old light from dead stars. "I am not sure I believe in God anymore, not the God who condemns little children to horrible deaths and lets murderers live. Not the God who gave me Emily, only to take her away." She closes her eyes briefly, letting the familiar pain swell and recede; and it moves like a shadow over her thin, pale face. "I cannot define Him now as I used to. It is not so simple. I only know now the way I pass to find Him; I do not know where He is. But I refuse to quit searching. I will *not* give up my faith." There is a quiet intensity, a strength like steel in her words which makes my heart soar. My Scully is back. And when she finally meets my eyes, there is a growing flame behind her gaze. For the first time since she told me that Emily was dying, I am convinced that Scully is going to be ok. My heart swells inside my chest until it is painful. "Oh, Scully," I breathe, and pull her to me. As I hold her slender form close, I feel her arms encircle my back, one hand still tightly clutching the golden cross. My tears are silent, slipping down my cheeks and falling onto her wet hair. I can feel her tremble slightly, too. And suddenly, things are again as they should be. The reassurance passes wordlessly between us and I smile through my tears and pull her closer. This is my Home: the dull cinnamon of her hair in the moonlight, the vanilla scent of her shampoo, the softness of her in my arms, the salt of my tears, and the safety of her faith. The stillness where we are for a moment demon-less and at peace. This is my Truth. ******************* Fin ******************* Okay, your turn. I expect well thought out, literate, intelligent, creative feedback. Otherwise I'll become just another bitter old fanfic writer, dry, impotent, and shriveled with carpal tunnel syndrome and nothing to show for it. Email me, let me know what you think: like, hate, or otherwise. Just remember, I take compliments very well. I take constructive criticism well. I load flames into my flame thrower and decimate small villages. Let me know.