Date sent: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 19:57:20 -0400 (EDT) From: LeiaO22@aol.com Subject: Daughter of Three: Conception Finale by CarrieAlyse Daughter of Three: Conception Finale by CarrieAlyse DISCLAIMER: Scully, Mulder, Krycek, etc. all belong to Chris Carter et. al. Hector and Ashley belong to me. CLASS: X, MSR SPOILERS: I think only for Terma, but you all have to have seen that by now! SUMMARY: Scully & Mulder are reunited, and recieve enlightenment under some complicated circumstances. This story will be complete gibberish to anyone who hasn't read Conception I & II, both of which are archived at Gossamer. And please, I took great liberties with the scientific stuff in this one, so just take everything with a grain of salt. Any criticism and feedback is very appreciated, especially since I've been wrangling with writer's block for the past month! Please tell me what you think! Now I'm off to throw the party I said I would throw when I finally finished this thing....enjoy! =) ****************************************************************************** ************** "To live fully, one must be free, but to be free one must give up security. Therefore to live one must be ready to die. How's that for a paradox?" ---Tom Robbins, "Even Cowgirls get the Blues" ************************************************* After Hector had helped Scully wriggle her way out of the cave, he turned back to the strange craft which loomed before him in the beam of his flashlight. He knew that it was the thing that he had seen in the sky about a week ago, when he'd been drunk; he would never be altogether certain of that fact, but somehow, he knew. He crept closer to the thing, stumbling a little on the craggy ground of the cave. He realized the ship was sleek, and black, and triangular, as he struggled to walk around it. The cramped quarters of the cave made it very difficult to move at all; the ship took up nearly every inch of space within it. And once again, Hector thought to himself, <> The only entrance to the cave was nearly too small for a person to fit through. There were no other ways in or out, he'd checked many times when he'd been in here as a kid. The only rational explanation, he thought, would be if someone had brought it through that opening in parts, and assembled it inside the cave. But that might have taken weeks for just one person, and how would a large team of people have managed that feat unnoticed? There was a house not far from here, someone would have surely heard the noise...And how would it have been able to be out flying around merely a week ago, when it had knocked him and Skye out of their boat? Hector went up close to the unidentifiable object, shining his flashlight on the surface. It seemed to be painted and waxed metal, shiny like some high school kid's hot rod. He reached out to touch it, and what he had thought to be metal shrank away from his fingers as if it were alive. Startled, Hector jumped back, hitting his head on the low ceiling of the cave, and dropping his flashlight. "Ow! Shit!" He heard the flashlight hit the floor and unmistakably shatter into pieces, and the cave went pitch black save for the small crack of light provided by the opening. His head throbbing, Hector made his way toward it, and then lost his footing on the uneven floor and fell, twisting his ankle. He cried out in pain, and then burst into a long string of expletives mainly reserved for lobstermen after they had dropped a lobster pot on their foot. Then suddenly, the cave was bathed in a bright light which hurt his dark-accustomed eyes. He turned, shading his eyes from the glare, and saw that it was coming from the belly of the ship. And standing there, as if in the center of an eclipse, was the form of a woman. Adrenaline was pumping so hard in Hector's veins that he was shaking. "Wh--what are you doing here?" he stammered. He could see her face now, framed by long, reddish-brown hair; her eyes were warm and her full lips turned up in a smile as she answered, "Because I have brought you, and everything else you have ever loved, here." ******************************************************** Scully's mind burned with a thousand questions as Mulder rushed toward her. What was he doing here? How had he managed to find her? Had Skinner betrayed her whereabouts? But no, she couldn't see Skinner doing that, despite all he'd done to them...Mulder must have come here of his own accord, it was only some bizarre coincidence of Fate that was now bringing them together. And apparently, Fate had a little help from the hands--or hand, so it seemed--of Alex Krycek. She was really reeling now; the rationale of her world had crumbled to dust in a matter of hours. The numbing, cold pain which had gripped her as a result of believing she'd been raped had been ripped away from her by the Truth, and now she could only feel emptiness and a tempered bitterness at the fact that she'd wasted so much time mourning something that had never really happened. A battle had been fought within herself, between her and the apparition of her sister, and although she had triumphed, her psyche felt ravaged and trampled. And now, without so much as time to take a breath, she had stumbled upon something so unearthly yet so tangible, something which her rational mind was struggling not to accept--it was Mulder's Holy Grail. And a sudden stab of fear shot through her. <> She was truly going crazy, she thought. Her frayed mind was turning against her; she felt faint and weak. But in the face of Mulder, the man she loved deeply and truly as no other man she had ever known, she could not show her weakness. She stood straight and tall and he barrelled toward her, gazing at him levelly. And then, she was too numb to realize that he didn't see that the land dropped off so abruptly, and that his momentum had become too great to stop himself in time. The earth seemed to de-materialize at the edge under his feet, crumbling, sending dirt, pebbles and Mulder plunging toward the ocean far below. ******************************************************** Hector did not understand the answer that the woman had given him. He was struggling to stand on his feet, and began to realize that his ankle was much too sore to stand on. "It's broken," she told him, advancing over the ground towards him. "Let me see it." She came close to him and knelt down, examining the rapidly swelling ankle. "How did you--?" "I'll tell you all this later, F--" she looked at him full in the face for the first time, and suddenly drew back, startled. "You're not my brother!" Hector was throroughly confused. "No, I'm sorry, I--" "Then you must find him for me," she said quickly. "I can't leave here, I'm waiting for--" "I'm here, Aunt," said a small, timid voice behind Hector, and he turned to see Ashley standing demurely at the entrance to the cave. It seemed to him that the girl had grown 5 inches since the last time he'd seen her, but knowing that this was not truly possible, he dismissed the thought from his head. "Ashley! What are you doing here?" "My aunt called me, and I came," Ashley said simply, and then she knelt down next to him and laid her hands on his throbbing ankle. Hector felt a warm, prickly heat begin to seep into the throbbing area; he winced in pain as it seemed a fire was shooting up the side of his leg, and he tried to struggle with her, but it was as if he were paralyzed. He stared at her pleadingly for what seemed an eternity, and then, finally, she took her hands away. "Move it around, twist it like this," she said, making him rotate the joint. He flinched a little; it was still tender, but it didn't hurt at all like it had a few moments ago. Hector stared at her in awe, and then turned to the woman standing next to him. "What the hell is going on around here?" he demanded of her. "Please," she said, not bothering to answer his question. "I need you find Dana Scully for me. I know that she's here, she'll know where my brother is. You *must* bring her to me quickly! If not, they will find us soon, and---" she was blinking back tears. "--I couldn't bear that!" Hector relented. Looking at the woman and Ashley, he could clearly see the family resemblance. And obviously Ashley seemed to trust her. "Okay, okay," he said, wobbily standing on his newly healed foot. "Dana's right outside, I'll go bring her back in here." "Thank you," the woman said sincerely, and watched him as he left the cave through the tiny tunnel opening. ******************************************************** Scully's arm was out in an instant, grabbing Mulder's arm as he teetered on the edge of the cliff. He fell, but she had a hold on him, and he cried out in pain as his body hit the rocky wall of the cliff face. If Scully hadn't caught him, he would have smashed himself to death on the barnacle-covered rocks that waited perhaps 100 yards below. "Why don't you watch where you're going?" she gasped, struggling to keep her hold on him. "What kind of a greeting is that?" he retorted, trying to get a foothold on the rocks. They were smooth, though, and he was still wearing his work shoes which didn't have such good tread on them, and he kept slipping. He could tell that Scully couldn't hold on for much longer. "Well, isn't this interesting," he heard the sarcastic tone of Krycek behind Scully. "Mulder, *what* is he doing here??" she asked him between clenched teeth. "Scully, watch out!" he told her, as he saw Krycek now moving up closer behind her, about to push her. Dammit! He knew he should have never trusted him! "Mulder, I can't---" And then Krycek suddenly disappeared, and Mulder could only see Scully's flushed face as she pulled with all her might to get him up on solid ground. Mulder heard the sounds of a scuffle, and it was agonizing to him that he couldn't see it. Scully glanced behind her very quickly, and there was relief on her face when she turned back to him. "Hector," she sighed. "Thank God, it's Hector." She had gotten him up high enough now so that Mulder could grasp the ground with one hand and help her as she pulled on the other. Finally, he had enough hold to pull himself fully onto the flat earth, and they both fell, side by side, gasping for air in relief. Mulder watched as Hector got the upper hand with Krycek, jumping on top of the smaller man's chest and dealing him a heavy blow to his temple. Krycek's body went limp beneath Hector, and Mulder felt a searing pang of jealousy. If he hadn't taken such an idiotic plunge to his near-death, *he* would have been the one to stop Krycek, not this stranger who looked like he could have been Mulder's long-lost brother. Except Hector looked even more like a poster boy with his bleached-out hair and his broader shoulders. And Mulder felt his stomach turn all the more, when Hector rushed to Scully's side and she embraced him. Well, what could he have expected? There was no reason now for her to love him, when all they'd done was fight for the past few months. She had come here for a vacation, and met this handsome, strong young man, who had proven to her that he could protect her--something that Mulder had failed at, time and time again. <> he thought miserably. <> Scully had drawn away from Hector, and they were speaking to each other in hushed tones that Mulder couldn't hear. He stood, still quivering a little from his near-death experience, and moved towards them, glancing at the unconscious form of Krycek lying on the ground. What had Krycek's motives been? Mulder wondered. Who had he really been working for? And why had he waited until the last moment to make an attempt on their lives? Somehow Mulder knew that he would never find out the answers to these questions, at least now; he had too many other burning questions that he needed answered. Scully felt his presence near, and turned toward him. There was concern in her eyes as she asked him, "Are you all right, Mulder? Do you feel any pain here?" She gently prodded him in the ribs. "It's fine," he told her, even though they were very sore from smacking against the cliff wall. "Where's he going?" He was referring to Hector, who was walking away from them. He hadn't meant for his voice to sound as bitter as it did when he had said that. "He'll be back in a minute," Scully said, and there was tension in her voice. She was looking at him, but he couldn't bring himself to look in her eyes. Finally she said, "Mulder, what are you doing here? Did Skinner tell you I was here?" "No," he said simply. How many times had he planned this meeting in his head? He had so many things to tell her, and now it was as if there was a hand around his throat choking him so that he couldn't get the words out. Finally he said, his voice thin and tight, "I came here with Krycek because he said that he had a lead on a UFO. But obviously he had other plans." He added reluctantly, "I had no idea that you were here, Scully. But, I'm glad that I found you, because there's something I need to tell you." He looked a little ruefully at Hector, who was gathering some twine out of a rowboat not far away, probably to tie Krycek up with. Scully seemed to follow his thoughts. "Hector is an old friend of mine," she told him, picking up on his jealousy. "And I need to talk to you, as well." She slid her hand into his, and he realized that she was trembling. He looked down at her, and she was staring up at him intently. And suddenly he knew that she knew, that somehow she'd figured it out, or that she'd simply remembered what happened between them. And with a great sigh of relief, Mulder wrapped his arms around her and pulled her to him tightly, and she returned his embrace, burying her head in his chest. But he wasn't content just to hold her; he turned her face up to his, and kissed the tears that were forming on her lashes, and then her cheek, her nose, and her neck...he heard her gasp a little, and then he kissed her full on the mouth, pressing her as close to him as he could possibly get her without hurting her, and she was responding to him passionately, running her fingers through his hair and down the back of his neck, and every place that she touched him left him burning with desire. He remembered what Krycek had said earlier, that they had been given drugs to ensure they'd couple; Mulder had felt that he'd wronged her because of that, that perhaps she had not loved him. But now he felt her in his arms, with her lips tenderly devouring him, and he felt the warmth and longing that she felt for him rushing into him, and he felt elated. If Hector had not been so near, Mulder would have thrown her down on the ground right there and made love to her. "Dana!" Damn. To put it bluntly, this guy was just in the way. Scully pulled away reluctantly, taking a moment to catch her breath, and then turned to Hector, who was tying Krycek's one good arm and one fake arm behind his back. "I'm very sorry to interrupt," he said sheepishly, "but is this--Mulder, is it?" Scully nodded, still a little out of breath. "What is it, Hector?" "Well, there's a woman in the cave down there, she came out of the ship--she sent me to find you, so you could find him." A look of pure confusion crossed Scully's face. And then she shook it off, and turned to Mulder. "The thing that Krycek brought you here for--come, I'll show it to you." ********************************************** Agent Mulder's eyes became round as saucers when he first saw the UFO, and Hector didn't blame him. After all, it was a formidable sight, and Hector could tell that this meant much, much more to Mulder than he himself could possible gauge. He turned his eyes to Dana, who was watching Mulder intently; the concern and love she felt for him was sprawled naked across her face, and Hector smiled to himself. They were well matched, these two; both strong, and intelligent, and beautiful in their own ways. They would be good with each other... There seemed to be no sign of the woman he'd seen before, or Ashley, which was puzzling. Had he imagined it all, was it just a hallucination brought on by hitting his head a little too hard? Dana and Mulder seemed hardly perturbed by the woman's absence, and were bantering back and forth excitedly: "What is it?" "Where did it come from?" "How did it get in here?" "But that's impossible!" "This is it, Scully!" Mulder was saying, "This is undeniable proof of the existence of extraterrestrials!" "Mulder, there's no way--there is not one *shred* of any evidence of an extraterrestrial life form here!" "Have you checked inside?" When she didn't answer, Mulder approached the ship from underneath, and went to touch it; and as before with Hector, the material shrank away from his fingertips. He jumped back a bit, but managed to not injure himself, and exclaimed, "Did you *see* that?? How can you say that's not extraterrestrial?" "But it isn't." "How do you--" But Mulder stopped himself when he realized that it wasn't Dana who had spoken. He turned back to the ship, as they all did, to see a kind of flap opening up from the bottom. And much to Hector's relief, the woman who had healed his ankle emerged, once again bathed in light from the inside of the ship. Mulder's jaw had dropped, and Dana quickly stepped up to his side to steady him, as he was swaying on his feet. "Is it you--is it really you?" The woman smiled broadly, and reached out her hand to touch his cheek. "Yes, Fox, it's me, Samantha," she told him, her voice catching in her throat a little. Then she embraced him, and he hugged her back fiercely, with tears streaming down his cheeks. "I can't--I can't believe it's you," he sobbed. "Well, it *is* really me," she said, laughing and crying all at once. "I tried to contact you, once, to warn you that I was looking for you, but I don't know if my message was clear enough for you to understand." Mulder pulled away to look at her. "The psychic?" Samantha nodded, and Mulder and Scully exchanged a look. "The boy in New Paltz was unfortunate," Mulder's sister explained. "I did not mean to harm him--it was an accident. The same goes for you, and your girlfriend," she added to Hector. "But I am no pilot, and I had to figure out this thing in quite a hurry." She glanced back at the ship ruefully. "Where--have you been?" Mulder asked breathlessly. "I have been in a state of suspended animation for over 10 years now, at an underground compound in upstate New York, until a man named Kurt Crawford released me," she answered. "He was the one who helped me steal this from the Consortium. They were using me in a project because of my irregular DNA structure. They did to me what they did to you, Miss Scully. But they were unsuccessful in the end; and after all the tests, and all the hybrid attempts, and all the samples that they took from my body, I became too sick to endure any more. So they put me into hibernation to ensure that my body could heal and they could continue. And sooner or later, they turned to the two of you to complete the project's objective." "Which was what?" Scully asked sharply. "To create an alien-human hybrid," Mulder answered for his sister. "And they succeeded." "But how?" "By taking *me* from your womb before I could be born," Ashley said, emerging from behind Samantha. "And they changed me so that I am now the daughter of three." "Who is this?" Mulder asked, confused. Samantha put her arm around Ashley, and Hector could see that the girl *had* grown markedly, there was no mistaking it. But how was that possible? "This is my neice," Samantha was saying. "Your daughter, Fox. And yours, Dana." The blood drained from Dana's face, and she stared at the child. "That can't be, it's impossible--" she started. "No," Mulder said softly, "No it isn't." He turned to her and put his hands on her shoulders. "The Lone Gunmen explained it to me. There was something in our genetic makeup, that's why they wanted us--to create her. Something about the biological time clock, and it being easily manipulated because of a landmark on my DNA." "She would not even have been born yet!" Dana exclaimed. "This is true," Samantha agreed, "But she is also a hybrid. The Consortium's scientists were successful in melding the genes of your offspring with that of an extraterrestrial. And they also tampered with her biological clock, so she has developed at a phenomenal rate--" "Wait," Mulder interrupted, "You said that she was crossed with--an extraterrestrial?" Samantha nodded. "Ashley has two fathers. Would you like to meet the other?" Mulder nodded only slightly, and poor Dana was too stupefied to even make a gesture. She stared, her mouth agape, as another form emerged from the UFO. Even Hector recognized this; it was so trendy, so engrained in American myth that you couldn't possibly see the real thing without knowing exactly what it was. And what it was was a grey alien. The cave fell into a very long moment of silence. Dana and Mulder were too stunned to speak or move, and Hector was too busy being confused to do anything. Samantha finally broke the silence. "I need to take him home," she said softly. "Would you like to come with me? The ship is fully prepared for space travel." Mulder laughed nervously at the proposition, but Hector could tell by his face that he was seriously considering it. And then his mind changed, his face twisting with a sudden anger. "No, Samantha, I need to stay here, I need to reveal the truth! Those men need to pay for what they've done to you, what they've done to Scully!" "These men are paying for their sins," Samantha reasoned with him. "It is not your responsibility to mete out their justice. You would pass up a chance to see another world just to take revenge on these men? You have found me, and you have found your true love. What more do you need, Fox?" The anger drained from his face, and he turned away from her, pacing the uneven ground. And then Dana approached him, and took his hand. "Mulder, if this is what you want, you should do it," she told him earnestly. "This is what you've been searching for, hasn't it? You can't squander it---" "Come with me," he suddenly said, fiercely. "I won't leave without you." "Mulder! I--I--" "Scully, you and I can handle it! We belong together!" He grabbed her hands and pulled them to his lips. "There is no one, nobody, who I would rather share this with--I need you, to keep me sane through it all." This made her smile, and he pulled her to him tightly. "Please say you'll come with me," he whispered in her ear. "All right," she said softly, somberly, looking at him levelly. There was fear in her eyes. He took her face in his hands and kissed her deeply. "It will be all right." She took a deep breath, and managed to give him a small smile. "I trust you." He smiled back, and looked about to say something cocky in return, but realized that Ashley was standing next them. He put his arm about Scully's shoulders, and touched the girl's face with his other hand. "This is our daughter, Dana." He sounded as if he still couldn't believe it. Ashley beamed up at them both. "I'm glad to have all my parents with me," she told them shyly. "And my friend, Hector." Hector smiled, and strode forward to catch the girl up in a big bear hug. "Skye and I will miss you," he told her. "Thanks for the ankle." "Tell her I said 'bye," Ashley said, and kissed his cheek. Hector put her down, and turned to Dana. "Be careful," he said, and embraced her warmly. "It was good to see you." "Please, tell my mother that I'm okay," Dana told him, fighting back a sob. He nodded, and then turned to Mulder and shook his hand. "We must be going soon," Samantha warned. "We are not that well hidden." "How are we going to get out of here?" Mulder asked. "Don't concern yourself with that," Samantha answered. "Just get on the ship. Hector, I'm afraid that you'll have to leave the cave, and get a safe distance away. The ship gives off dangerous amounts of heat when it shifts." Hector didn't argue with her. He gave them one last goodbye, and then started out the opening. As he was almost out, he heard Mulder say, "Samantha? Can we stop somewhere to get a camera?" "No, Fox." ************************************* Hector would never know, nor was it in his mental capacity to figure out, how exactly the large black spaceship managed to get out of that cave. But it did. >From where he stood at the top of the cliff, he could see the triangular shape of the mysterious craft zoom out of the cave, straight toward a cluster of black helicopters that had gathered on the near horizon. One of the helicopters took aim and fired at the ship, but missed. And then the ship was suddenly not there. But the reflection of the setting sun on the craft as it shot across the sky left a streak so long and obvious that the story of it was in all of the papers the next day. And Hector was so rattled by the whole experience, he didn't even notice that the man with one fake arm--whom he had tied up just a short while ago--was not lying where Hector had left him. ********************************************** Alex Krycek was cutting his way through a brackish swamp on the northern side of the island, keeping low within the reeds to avoid being seen. It was unfortunate that he had lost the protection of the man he had so wanted to kill. But he had lost his chance. So be it. He had not lied to Mulder when he had told him he wished to get revenge on those responsible for him losing his arm. It had just been *Mulder* who was responsible. But there would be another day to make him pay... If he could just find a boat to steal, he would be home free. Where was the shore, dammit? It had to be coming up soon--- Something caught his boot, and he staggered for a few steps, nearly falling flat on his face. He turned to see what he had tripped on, and his eyes opened wide with surprise when he realized that it was a body, covered with a light coat of sand. He picked the thing up by its arm and turned it over, and when he saw who it was, he couldn't help but let out a hearty laugh. It was Cancer Man. And then he was pissed. "Oh, the bastard!" he spat. "I will kill the bastard who killed you, you were *mine*!" He gave the body a good kick in the side to emphasize his point, and then knelt down next to it. "They did a sloppy job, too, you know," he said. "I mean, if you're going to kill someone else's target, you might as well dispose of the body properly!" He reached down into Cancer Man's breast pocket, ignoring the blood that soaked the dead man's shirt, and pulled out the packet of Morleys and a lighter. He muttered to himself under his breath about the presence of blood on them, but managed to find a clean one and lit it up. "Well," he said to the dead body of Cancer Man, "It looks like I'm going to have to bury you where no one will ever find you." He stood up straight, and took a long, slow drag off of his Morely, while he watched the red ball of the sun slip below the horizon. As he exhaled, he began making his plans for tomorrow. ****************** THE END ********************